Book of The Dead

Well away from the walls of the city, Tyron’s undead swarmed over the land. He was connected to all of it, each and every one of his minions bound to him through the conduits he had created when they were raised. Constructs, blocks of infantry, wights, revenants, demi-liches and liches, all were accessible to his mind, and his consciousness rolled through the horde like the tide.

Land was being flattened and prepared for ritual circles while outriders and scouts were being sent to monitor the flanks and watch for the approaching army behind them. A thousand different activities were taking place across the vast force of undead, numbering well over a hundred thousand individuals at this point. Too much information for a normal mind to encompass, but Tyron had ascended far beyond what might be considered ‘normal’ at this point. Reinforced by the Unseen, his body and mind were beyond superhuman, capable of enduring unbelievable forces and processing absurd amounts of information.

When he was satisfied that General Crow had things well in hand, he opened his eyes and recentered himself in his own body.

With the powerful influx of information streaming into him at any given moment, it was getting easier and easier to detach himself from his own physical existence and experience the world as a bizarre, gestalt entity. Seeing the world through thousands upon thousands of undead eyes at the same time was a heady experience and one he could see a person becoming lost in if they weren’t careful.

“When was the last time you slept?” Filetta asked him pointedly when she noticed him stirring.

As usual, Tyron was seated upon his floating construct, but it hovered only an inch or two above the ground to keep him out of line of sight. He looked up at her, frowning.

“A few days, I think.”

“And the last time you ate?”

“You fed me yesterday.”

“I haven’t ‘fed you’ for two days, and that was one meal.”“We’re going to be a bit busy here, Filetta,” he said, waving a hand towards the city. “There isn’t going to be time to eat and sleep.”

“All the more reason you should do it now while you can,” she huffed. “I’m having something brought over. Make sure you stuff it in your stupid face.”

Although he wanted to protest, Tyron decided against it. It was unlikely he’d get time to rest, but a decent meal was something he could manage. At least they’d managed to pilfer some supplies from abandoned wagons and towns they’d passed through on the way to Mirasmas. A bit of bread, cheese and dried meat washed down with a little wine or ale was a lot more palatable than wild vegetables and mostly raw meat. Filetta’s sense for cooking certainly wasn’t improving with practice. She was hardly to blame for that, she didn’t have tastebuds anymore.

“I will, I will,” he relented.

So long as he ate, maybe she wouldn’t hassle him about sleeping too much, he really didn’t have time. There were a handful of full liches now, besides Master Willhem, able to draw on far more of their abilities than they could before, but he still viewed most of them as second- or third-rate Mages. They were horrendously unworthy of the precious little Soul Magick he was able to accumulate, but he needed them to help run the rituals necessary for his siege.

If he could launch the Screaming Skulls without having to manage the rituals himself, that would free him up to try several new magicks he’d been working to cobble together. Having to worry about getting his head blasted off during the march had made it a little harder to concentrate, but he’d made progress nevertheless.

Worrying about having his head blown off had also caused him to put off another important task. The assassins waiting in the wings would like nothing more than to catch him mid-ritual. Nor had he wanted to halt the march in order to properly protect himself during the process. Now that they had arrived at Mirasmas, he finally had an opportunity, before the spells started flying, to update his status and take hold of all the power he could.

He was going to need it once the battle was underway.

Before doing anything, he undertook a quick scan to make sure he was safe and out of sight, with all of his defensive measures in place. Shrouded in darkness, surrounded by powerful minions and layered in defensive magick, he was as secure as he was likely to get.

Taking a breath, he reached into his pack, took out a volume and ripped loose a blank page. Drawing blood was, as always, something of a challenge for him now. He’d had Master Willhem whip up a small knife forged of the highest-grade bone he could find, layered with multiple enchantments of piercing and sharpening.

Pressing his thumb against the point of the blade, he managed to puncture his skin and get the blood flowing. He pressed his thumb to the page and spoke the words of the ritual.

Words appeared on the page, and he leaned forward to see what the Unseen had to offer him.

New Spells Created:

Wind of Death

Umbral Claws

New Skills Created:

Soul Reformation

DeathSoul Threading

Tyron blinked… he hadn’t finished working on the second spell, nor had he considered what to call it. Did the Unseen have some sort of naming sense built in? The Mage who’d constructed it seemed to have implanted his own personality, possibly his soul, into the spell, so perhaps it came from there? As for the Skills, they most likely related to the creation of the Liches he had added to his horde, starting with Master Willhem.

His attributes continued to increase with every level he gained, rising to truly terrifying heights as more and more power was poured into him. As an Ascended Skeletal Artifex, his current Class focused heavily on crafting undead, and the stat distribution reflected that.

Intelligence and willpower rose by a staggering ten per level, along with eight in dexterity and constitution. Strength rose by only two, just as it had at gold rank, along with charisma. These two attributes were not a focus of his, after all, as he had no need to charm or strike anyone. Wisdom and poise rose by six per level, while manipulation rose by four.

Checking his level, Tyron was pleased to see that his invasion of the south and the endless fighting of his minions at the rifts had netted him another three levels. It was an absurd rate of progression, given that he was platinum rank. A rate of progression only possible for an advanced Necromancer, capable of fighting in so many places at once. What must have taken his parents a decade to achieve, he had done in a matter of months.

Now that he had reached level eighty-eight, his attributes had risen to almost laughable proportions.

Strength:

278

Dexterity:

503

Constitution:

605

Intelligence:

964

Wisdom:

834

Willpower:

602

Charisma:

389

Manipulation:

331

Poise:

430

Every time an attribute passed a multiple of a hundred, he crossed another threshold, compounding the power of that attribute even further. With interest he eyes Wisdom and Intelligence. In just another few levels, they would both cross a threshold. Just how powerful was his mind going to become?

More than the attributes, however, he was interested in his ability selection. No longer granted every second level, but every fourth, the selections were both rarer and more meaningful.

As before, he now had the ability to add a spell or skill to his active Crest, upon which it would undergo an evolution and he would be granted knowledge of an advanced form. For his current Class, the active crest related entirely to creating new minions.

Skeletal Artisan

Raise Greater Undead

Bone Artistry

True Death Magick

Aphotic Bone Shaping

Dimensional Conduit Magick

Soul Marrow

The individual abilities no longer had levels indicating his mastery over them. Instead, as his mastery grew, that power was shared across every ability in the crest. The Unseen no longer felt the need to quantify that strength with numbers, but Tyron could feel it. To him, the loss of numbers represented the loss of limits, as any ability within a crest was no longer subject to a maximum level. He could improve an individual Skill as much as he was capable and the Unseen would reward him all the way.

But what to add to the crest? Last time, he had added Arcane Marrow, which had become Soul Marrow, giving him an important clue on how to uplift his demi-liches. It was unlikely any selection he added would empower him for the siege to come—he couldn’t exactly start tearing apart his minions in the middle of a battle to remake them—but afterwards? If he was victorious, then what might he be able to create in the ruins of the Southern Province?

Hopefully enough power to march on the Imperial Capital.

There were many tempting possibilities. Even his new skills, DeathSoul Weave and Soul Reconstitution, were highly tempting. More and more he needed to delve into the secrets of the soul and the power contained within to advance his capacities. Frustratingly, it meant his hunger to gain more Soul Magick only continued to grow, but that was a problem he could resolve another time.

Tyron considered all of the abilities he had at his disposal. There were many he could apply, but ultimately he needed to consider which minions he was most likely to be able to empower in the shorter term. None of his liches were anywhere close to their level caps; they all still had plenty of room to grow. His wights, on the other hand….

Spirit Flesh Formation, the key ability behind the creation of the wights. It enabled him to create a mesh of soul and magick bound to the skeleton. An ethereal green material that seemed to glow from within, it made his minions look far more like they had in life, even granting them facial features and expressions. More importantly, it granted them the capacity to interact with the Unseen and grow, giving a new Class and the ability to accrue levels.

His other option was Summon the Ossuary. Although it didn’t empower his minions directly, he was completely dependent on it to raise undead in the volumes required to fight against the Empire. Indeed, without it, he’d have been forced to try and create something to serve the same function, which may have taken months, if not years. As the demands of the horde only continued to grow, even the Ossuary as it currently stood may prove to be insufficient.

Although he had a few ideas on how he might improve Spirit Flesh Formation, Tyron was clueless as to how he might do the same for the Ossuary, which, in a way, made the decision for him.

In blood, he wrote the name of the Skill on the page, then ended the ritual.

A rush of power flooded into him and Tyron threw his head back as knowledge poured into his brain, his eyes closed as he accepted what was granted.

When it was done, he breathed out slowly and rolled his shoulders. It would take time for him to unpack what the Unseen had given him, but he was confident it would be transformative, the first clue on how to uplift his wights to an even higher plane of existence.

Looking around, he found Filetta next to him, a plate of food in her hand.

“A new ability?” she asked him, pushing the plate towards him.

Sausage, cheese, some bread that wasn’t mouldy. This was heaven compared to what he’d been eating not that long ago.

“Any wine?” he asked hopefully.

“Wine?” she scowled at him. “Right before you attack a damned city? Don’t be an idiot. Here’s some water.”

She slung a waterskin at him, which Tyron snagged out of the air with his free hand. Placing the plate in his lap, he uncorked the skin and took a long pull, the cool water refreshing him immediately.

“Thanks,” he said, giving her a nod. “I appreciate it.”

“You should,” she muttered, sitting down beside him.

Tyron used his knife, after wiping off the blood on the grass, to slice the cheese and sausage before laying them over the bread. When he was done, he grabbed it up and started munching.

In the distance, screaming skulls of dark magick began to rise into the air, arcing high above before descending onto the city below.