Saintess Summons Skeletons

The night turned black like ink as Sofia stepped into the blurry void beyond the orphanage’s gate. She could feel her mana return, not that it had ever left, but more so that she had become unaware of it. There was a single light in the black void, the flickering flame of a short candle, almost fully consumed. A shadowy figure stepped up to the candle, barely perceptible in the darkness. It blew out the candle.

Instead of darkness came light. Sofia stood in the center of a familiar library, illuminated by hundreds of candles that hardly left any darkness anywhere.

In truth, she had almost forgotten that this was what she initially came for.

Despite the events that had happened here the previous time, there were no traces left of the fire. The shelves were all cleanly stacked with thousands of ancient, but intact books.

Sofia silently observed the tall bookshelves for a moment, still reeling from the emotions of the ‘test’.

“This is… Going to take a long time to read,” she muttered, her fingers caressing the polished dark wood of the bookshelves with a smile on her face. “Should I grab a few to take home?” she wondered by herself, her feet unconsciously carrying her to the spellcrafting section.

“You– You can take them all, you know?!” Velania’s voice came out of nowhere, “It’s all yours now!”

“Wha– Really?” Sofia asked, looking around but not finding where the voice came from.

“Absolutely! They are all real books so you can take them out. I– I wrote a lot of them so… I don’t mind, if you take care of them.”

“What would you prefer I do?” Sofia asked.

“Well… It might be asking a lot… But if you could take them all, then, it would make me happy. I could use the space under my house for something else...”

“... It’s good that I made my home’s library really big. I’ll do that, then. Any you want to keep?”

“No no!” Velania answered, sounding a bit flustered, “I– I read everything multiple times already…”

Sofia nodded, “Alright. I’m taking it all, then. I’ll bring you some new books next time I visit.”

“Ah– You really don’t have to!”

Shaking her head, Sofia walked through the tall bookshelves. She did a first pass, picking up a handful of books that she placed in a corner of her storage.

That should be everything that Cinthia wanted to pick up last time…

And now…

Hah. I need to do some cleaning.

Sofia sat in the middle of the library where there was some open space, and proceeded to reorganize her storage. It was already rather tidy, since she had cleaned it some by leaving stuff at her house and handing stuff to sell to Pareth, but she had to move things around if she wanted the free space to store all the books in an orderly manner. Since the shelves were already organized by theme, there was no way she would undo Velania’s hard work by tossing everything all willy-nilly in her storage ring.

Having freed sufficient space, she walked to the lowest shelf in a corner of the library, and let her mana glide along the surface of the books, storing them one by one into a clean pile. Then she walked back, storing the row above that one, and again and again until the library was empty, and her storage ring had become a true maze full of walls of books.

Now on the other side of the library, Sofia stored the last book.

“Counting the ones I put aside and the one I already had… That’s… Fifty one thousand, four hundred and twelve. Quite the harvest. Did you really read them all?” Sofia asked, still not seeing Velania anywhere but assuming she could still hear her.

“Almost!” Velania answered, “There are a handful in the archeology section that are languages I don’t know and couldn’t translate. I left notes in them so you will know, one of them has really pretty light magic you can use to make colored lamps!”

“Sounds good, I’ll check it out. Ah right, how long was I… You know? Did you see…”

“Oh it wasn’t too long,” Velania answered, “about half an hour? Nightmare magic can really mess with the perception of time. We could see you and your facial expressions but not look inside of your head. Aunty handled almost everything.”

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Sofia nodded along, “Alright, I have everything, how do I get back?”

She had looked around but presently the library seemed to have no exit.

“Awa– I– Umm… Give me a moment!”

It was the second time Sofia really saw Velania’s reality-bending powers in full force.

The wooden shelves seemed to melt and collapse into the floor, the stone brick walls warped and shifted, the ceiling spun around, its rectangular shape stretching into a round dome. In mere moments, the library was definitively erased, replaced by what looked like a wide ballroom, quite a bit larger, with a spiraling white marble staircase in its center, going straight up through the ceiling.

“Fancy. What is this room for?” Sofia asked, looking around as she took her first steps on the stairs.

“Music,” Velania explained, “I want to try that next after cooking.”

As Sofia climbed up, she watched different instruments appear on stands and tables around the room. They took much longer to appear, each designed with meticulous care. A piano, a harp, many flutes, and much more, it seemed Velania was going to be trying everything.

When she almost reached the ceiling, the piano began to play by itself. The melody was slow and clumsy, but it was pleasant to the ear nonetheless. Sofia let herself be carried by the amateurish music as she made her way up in no hurry, eventually emerging from the stairs in the same exact spot she had gone down through before in the living room.

Cinthia waved at her from the couch, Velania lying passed out next to her, “Welcome back, and congratulations. How are you holding up?”

“I feel… I’m not sure… a bit… empty? I– I’ll be all right; I… just need some time, I think. Thank you for asking.”

Cinthia looked at Sofia with a bright smile “It’s the least I could do. If you need to talk, I’m here anytime! Well, not here here, but-”

“I know, same for you. What about her? She was talking to me just moments ago.”

“Ahah, the illusion spell she used on you was pretty taxing. She was almost… Flickering in and out of existence, at times, like a candle in the wind. I would have been really worried if not for Cryb– I mean Sorrow assuring me multiple times that you were both completely safe… She held out a bit longer after you got out but… Yeah, she’s asleep now.”

“... If I had known I would have been faster. I need to properly thank her too… Oh, speaking of which.” Walking up to the coffee table, Sofia placed a dozen books on it. “For you. It’s everything you picked last time, plus a few extra I thought you might like.”

“Woah, thanks, Sof! You didn’t need to.”

“It’s my pleasure, Cin.”

Far, far away, in orbit, a tall foggy figure rose above an ocean of flame, glimmering white dust swirling like a storm, suppressing the magic around. Six sky-blue eyes opened, gazing down at the sea of fire that still burned, uncontrollable, inextinguishable.

The vague shape of a rising hand extended from the foggy deity.

Crash.

An invisible figure fell from the flames. Like a meteor, it crashed into the moon, creating a gigantic crater. Its perfect invisibility barely flickered. Just enough to show a hint of blue.

In an instant, the creature was already gone. Vanished once again into the sea of flames.

It attacked. The god’s divine form was shredded to bits, scattered into the black void of space beyond this fiery domain.

It was not a victory. The hazy figure pulled itself back together as though time flowed in reverse.

Erode.

The invisible attacker roared. Bits and pieces of its flaming body fell and burned. But in the flames, it was a true immortal.

The divinity’s voice was steady and cold, like an emotionless judge announcing an irrevocable sentence.

Crumble.

Shatter.

Pulverize.

The moon rumbled from the beast’s cries as its body continuously fell apart. But the flames raged on, barely any weaker, soon it would be whole again.

As the beast desperately tried to pull itself together, the god briefly paused. Her next word was different, it carried a hint of disdainful mockery.

Collapse.

The beast’s body was rebuilt in an instant. Too fast. It could not stop the pull inward. The flames that had surrounded the moon for so long all collapsed into its flickering form, gathering together into an amorphous mass of pure energy. It tried to pull itself apart, but it was too late, so much energy was called back, its momentum would not be easily reversed.

Slowly, a small figure in badly damaged black armor rose from the charred surface of the moon.

It laughed, as its body started to bloat, growing explosively into gigantic black dragon that took contented steps on the hot lunar soil. Its immense jaws opened, slowly engulfing the growing bundle of wild energy.

Her voice came out from thin air, the mouth not needing to move.

“Let’s hunt together again, soon.”

Just as the beast’s energy was finally all gathered into a single point, the jaws closed shut, sealing the invader’s fate.

Moon’s shifting form slowly dispersed, moon sand scattering into a formless cloud, finally bringing this Phageid attack to a close.