Chapter 37: Chapter 31- The Last Three (Arc 2 Start)

One must be careful when using a spell that is, as called by the scholars of Mount Averus, extreme. Due to the intensely variable nature of magic and mana, many effects can be caused by magic, and they only become more unique and interesting as one delves deeper into metamancy. However, a responsible mage always makes their spell only affect a single subject. Always. If they do not, then it is possible that the spell that only meant to curse a single bloodline or only cause one person to gain power from the moon may turn into a land blight that requires national effort or a forest of moons. Magic can easily go wrong, weird, or over the railing, and most aspiring mages only become real mages when they have made a big enough mistake that they truly respect the consequences of screwing up a spell.

-Excerpt from ‘Might of Magic,’ By Noctian Verluc

 

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[You have successfully guarded your mistress’ property for a day. Experience has been awarded.]

The zombie looked at the new system message that appeared in front of her and sighed. The zombie next to her, a lizardman zombie, gave her a look, “You alright?” the second zombie asked with a hiss, “You’ve been sighing for the last hour, you know?”

Another zombie, an orc zombie, nodded along with the second, “She is right. You have been sighing for the last hour or so. What are you thinking about?” she asked.

The first, a human zombie, looked between her two recent companions. One was a lizardman zombie, blood red scales adorning her body, while the other was a tall, strong orcish woman with a perpetual scowl and a tendency to speak slowly, “Well, I have a reason, you know,” she said, “I have enough to gripe about, anyway.”

The lizardman zombie pouted, “I won’t do it!” she stubbornly said.

“But why!? The mistress won’t do anything bad! Besides, what do we have to fear? It’s not like she doesn’t know; once she gets around to it, she’ll find us, and we’ll have a lot of explaining to do,” the first zombie said, annoyed.

“While I do think we should tell the mistress,” the third said, “We need a plan. It has been half a day since we have gotten our higher intellect; the mistress will likely not be happy with us for keeping ourselves a secret.”

The second scoffed, “Seriously? And just hand ourselves to whoever our mistress is on a silver platter? Not a chance! What if we are needed some day?”

“You do understand,” the third reminded, “That willingly not serving the mistress is both a terrible idea and one of the only ways for us to die naturally? Saying that is akin to saying that you would not care about a sword falling from the sky and onto your head.”

“Well I-” 

The first coughed lightly, “Calm down, you two. We shouldn’t fight about this. We want two things, I believe: to serve the mistress properly and to not be killed. Correct?” the other two nodded, “Good. While we may be the weakest among every undead here, we are also more intelligent than our brethren over there,” she said as she pointed to the other side of their empty, dark room where the zombies were kept.

The third shook her head, “No, we are not actually the weakest. We are simply at the lowest level.”

“Isn’t that the same thing?” the second asked.

“It is not,” the third replied, “Until the mistress decides on their Traits, we are identical. Apart from, of course, the obvious,” she explained, pointing to her temple. 

The first groaned, “Either way, that just means that we are not able to pick Traits. I mean, each of us are… I don’t know, stronger than the living, I think. Actually, what are the living like? I’ve only killed a few of them and got shot by a couple.”

“Well…” the third said, “I have only seen a few of the living; one is the mistress’ friend or partner, one was a merchant, and the other two are passengers. They were, at the very least, far more intelligent than we were before our ascension. They were also more animated.”

“Animated?” the other two asked in unison.

“Animated. They swayed with their breathing, subtly moved from side to side with the breathing of their hearts, looked around with either terror or curiosity. It was interesting. No- they are interesting,” she recalled. 

The second glared, “Well, are we stronger than the living?” she asked, “I think we are, but it just might be the whole ‘doesn’t care when you stab us’ thing.”

The first lightly smacked the second on the back of her head, “Don’t be like that. Knowing how they are is just as important. What if we ever have to go and do something for the mistress that entails working with the living? What if we can’t just kill our way out of a bad situation?” she asked, pulling the revolver her living self held with her out, “This is not always the answer to our problems, so we need to understand more about the world. You know what the first is? Going to speak with our mistress.”

“Hey! That’s unfair!” the second growled angrily, “I don’t have anything to say against that!”

The first slapped herself in the face, something she failed to understand the meaning of but something she had the overwhelming urge to do whenever her lizardman sister said something stupid, “That’s why I’m right. Because you don’t have anything to say against that, I am right. But-” the door to their room slowly opened just as she was about to speak, inching its way into the room with audible creaking. 

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From within the hallway beyond, a head poked in and served the room. The mistress’ friend or mate, the one her orc sister once called Fara, took one look at them and sighed, “Dammit… since when did she make more? Alright, stop acting like normal zombies, you three,” she said to the three sisters who, for lack of a better option in the first’s opinion, began trying to blend in, “I heard you from the hallway.”

They tried to keep up the act for a while, but the woman simply sighed and walked over to them, leaning against the wall. Finally, the first zombie turned to face Fara, “Are we in trouble?” she asked. 

The second zombie clicked her tongue while the third sighed at the first’s words, “Probably not?” Fara replied, “I don’t think Mori would be angry with you if you’re afraid of her; apparently a couple of the others were afraid of her before they really had a chance to meet her. So, what are you three going to do?”

The three looked at each other for a moment, “We’ll come with you,” the second said.

“Going with her will be better for us,” the third stated, “Besides, we can help her in whatever she may need.”

Fara gave the sisters a big grin, “If you don’t mind helping me, then I’ll gladly take up your offer!” she happily said, “Right now, I’m trying to get a sense of what kind of skiff this is; we’re doing an upgrade, so plans need to be drawn up.” 

“What do you want us to do?” the first asked, “We aren’t particularly skilled at much.”

“We are!” the second refuted, “We can kill things really well!”

“Killing is not the only thing of importance,” the third sighed, “Besides, you were never even a part of the battle. You were stuck in here and did not level up for whatever reason.”

“Even though the other lizard-zombies did, yeah, I get it. I’m a fuck-up and I need to be better. Whatever,” the second grumbled.

Fara sighed at their debate, “Never a dull moment here, huh? Either way, I just need some help with measuring the distance. Can you three help me with that?” They stopped, nodding. “Good! Now then, let me just get my tools…” They followed her out of the room, into the hallway, and into the woman’s own bedroom. The three idly looked around the room they found themselves in, wondering what everything they saw was. Before long, the woman came out from behind her bed with a few odd-looking items, “These are ‘tape measures.’ They’re the staple of any macro-mechanic’s toolbox. Come on, I’ll show you how to use it.”

For the next hour, they meticulously measured everything about the skiff. From the length of the boat to its draft and clearance but together, they eventually understood it all. At some point Aerolat appeared to question her about the new death knights, of which Fara asked the orc-shaped blood mass to keep a secret. The blood mist promised to not say anything outright, but would not keep a secret from his mistress if explicitly asked. After they were finished, they ended up back in Fara’s bedroom, “That was… a lot of work,” the first zombie said, “I think we should go speak to the mistress now…”

“You have been saying that ever since we began,” the third replied.

“It’s kinda getting annoying,” the second agreed.

Fara, sifting through her bag, sighed, “She is right, though; you can’t just stay a secret forever. She’ll find you eventually and, knowing her, you’re in for some sort of lecture at worst. Still, better to build up trust with her. Come on, I have to sketch out my design before anything else and I need a table to do that,” she said, making haste to the dining room. The last three unnamed death knights followed behind her. 

Walking into the room, they were met by a chaotic scene. Seven large, deformed lizardman zombies stood around a table, talking, while two humans, an orc, and their mistress were sitting at another. They nervously followed behind Fara as she walked up to the lich, “Ohhh… So those were the last ones… I kind of forgot about them…” she said, scratching the back of her skull.

The woman sighed and flicked the lich in the skull, “Give some more thought to them, won’t you. They were worried that you would get mad at them for being weak, so they kept themselves in the hold of the skiff,” Fara explained.

The three zombies nodded, slightly fearful of what the lich would say, “We, uh… were kind of nervous, mistress,” the first said.

The second simply nodded along, “I agree,” the third echoed, “We did not know how you would react to having such low level death knights…”

Mori giggled a bit as they spoke, catching the zombies, who thought that the lich would be a more stoic person, off guard, “That’s good, actually,” she said, “It just means that you have some time to understand what path in life you want to take. I mean, it’s not like I know each of you best —only you know that— so it’s in my best interest that you all do your own thing,” she explained, “However, I think I want to try my hand at giving you three names, but that only depends on if you don’t mind it.”

“You didn’t give us specialized names,” one of the lizardman death knights called out.

“Maybe not, but you guys sure chose some interesting names!” the lich called back in good humor. A short bout of laughter rose and fell as they spoke, “Anyway, I do have a few names that are rattling around in my skull, so if you want them, just ask.”

“I want one!” the first yelled out, a smile on her face.

“I want one too!” the second one repeated.

“I as well,” the third agreed.

The mistress giggled, “That’s good then, that makes this much easier then. In that case, you,” she said pointing to the first, “Will be Megaera. You,” she said pointing to the second, “Will be Allecto. And you,” she said pointing to the third, “Will be Tisiphone. I hope you like your names,” she said, her skull warping into a smile. They eagerly took their names, finally feeling as if they were ready to take on the world.

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