With an idea of how to motivate the people here, I now had to turn that idea into a workable plan, before turning that plan into reality. Given that my idea was fairly simple, the plan was similarly simple, I only needed to make sure the tools I had at hand could do what I needed.

The first step was to make sure that I could control Shattered, or at least direct them to my will. The least palatable option would be to use Blood Magic to create some sort of bait, maybe something akin to a scent trail that ultimately led to the apartment building, but given the uncontrollable variables of that idea, I wasn’t a real fan of it.

No, learning how to control Shattered before turning one of them into my sockpuppet was the best option, at least in my mind. Turning a single enemy into a symbol for the locals would allow the one to ultimately slay that single enemy to easily take control over these people, a role I intended for one of my students. With them at the helm, I was fairly confident that things would change around here, maybe not for the better, but their recklessness in approaching me gave me the impression that they wouldn’t be satisfied with the status quo. At the same time, I was also confident that they wouldn’t turn against Arcane Magic, or Hecate for that matter. I was still a bit of a worry for me, I had no desire to live in a world where religious doctrine controlled society, something akin to Europe during the Middle Ages, where clergy could make and break society on a fundamental level.

My personal preference was more in the line of a world like Mundus, where religion had its place but was ultimately secondary. However, that perception might stem from my continuous travels and the fact that I spent the majority of my time travelling Aretia. If I had started on Arbortoma, my view of Mundian religions would likely be different. But ultimately, it didn’t really matter, I would fight against what I considered religious nutjobs, but that was just personal preference, taste and opinion. Realistically, I highly doubted my students held the same views in that regard but by having Arcane Magic as the core of their power, persecuting those travelling on the Arcane Path became detrimental to their own growth and thus a lot less likely in the long run.

But before that came into play, I needed to learn how to control Shattered. For this, I had decided to travel alone, partially because I was the stealthiest of us all, and partially because I wanted to avoid letting the others know about my plans. Not that I feared they’d turn against me, but because I wasn’t confident Lia had the acting ability to pull off a convincingly surprised reaction and because I didn’t want to taint Luna’s innocence with my schemes. She was my cute munchkin and didn’t need to get dragged into plans that would hurt, maybe even kill, a few of the locals.

Another advantage of moving alone was that I could have fun with my new trick, using Wind Magic to improve my movement. I couldn’t do it while sneaking, but for now, I wasn’t interested in stealth, merely in travelling across the city as quickly as possible.

Though, if I wanted that, Wind Magic wasn’t the answer, at least not in my current state. Using Blood Magic to empower my muscles gave me a greater boost than using Wind Magic, likely due to my greater ability and affinity with Blood Magic. Now, combining the two was truly interesting, even if it drained a lot of Astral Power. The combination allowed me to move at significant speeds, to the point that I was fairly confident I could have outrun a car within the city, without needing heavy traffic to slow the car down. Similarly, my ability to jump, especially with Draconic Leap, was just unreal, allowing me to leap across tall buildings without issues. Amusingly, testing the two ways to empower my body gave me yet another point in Wind Magic, making me wonder if this was a more suitable application of the skill, and two points in Blood Magic, bringing the skill to forty-one.

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Once I was on the other side of the city, far from anything I had investigated previously, I stopped running and disappeared into the shadows of the building I had ended up on. There were Shattered and Undead in the streets below, but nothing that gave me the impression of suitable power. In a way, these generic Shattered were perfect to test things out, just like I had in mind.

Stepping from one shadow to the next, I dropped down from the roof, remaining hidden behind a large dumpster. By now, whatever had been in the thing had decomposed to the point that it barely stunk any longer, or maybe it had been empty when the change hit, I wasn’t sure. Either way, it provided me a good spot to study one of the Shattered, the creature a paltry level thirty according to a concealed Observe. One of the weakest of its kind, to the point that even the Undead around it had a similar or even higher level, despite their levels normally lagging behind the levels of the Shattered by quite a bit. An underachiever but, as the saying goes, no body was truly useless, they could always serve as a bad example. Or test subject, as was the case here.

My first attempt was to gently reach out with Mind Magic, not even trying to incorporate Death Magic into the mix, in an attempt to achieve some kind of connection. Maybe it would allow me to interpret the things emotions, if it had any, or assert some base influence, as I could with animals. Subtly and stealth were the names of the game, trying to achieve something without the Shattered noticing my influence or presence.

Pushing and prodding a little, I failed to garner any real results and I had a feeling that the only way I’d achieve anything would be to overcharge my Mind Magic to the point that it would knock the thing out. It was the simplest of brute force approaches, one that I wasn’t really interested in as it wasn’t the right direction. No, I needed to accomplish something more in line with the way I had pulled people into the Astral River while teaching, only that I didn’t want to pull them into the Astral River but push myself into their mind or something along those lines.

Thinking back to the way I had pulled people into the Astral, I reached out to the Shattereed, only to feel my attempts glide off, for lack of a better word. There was obviously something missing, something that Lenore had been able to do and make it look easy. The obvious answer was that at least a bit of Death Magic was needed, or maybe even pure Death Magic, though I hoped not.

Closing my eyes, I thought back, trying to remember the sensations, especially those during our Avatar State as we destroyed that bandit village, using a cursed mist to turn them all into Undead. Back then, we had instilled some sort of instinct into the Undead, but it had been almost entirely Lenore’s work, making me a bystander at best, a bystander who now tried to repeat something similar.

Shaking my head and opening my eyes, I tried to weave a thread of Death Magic into the Mind Magic I was using, conjuring it in a fashion similar to the way Lenore had used her magic. It wasn’t easy and I could already feel a headache form, but I had a feeling i was onto something, that there was a merging going on between the two distinct types of magic.

Again, I reached out with the combination, trying to push a simple command into the Shattered, a desire to take down a nearby Undead. It was a simple test, maybe the simplest I could come up with, giving the Shattered an order to do something it might have done eventually anyway. Sure, Shattered and Undead generally got along, but I had seen Shattered destroy Undead before, and Withered-controlled Undead destroy Shattered. Normal Undead attacking Shattered were something I hadn’t seen, though that might be because Undead lacked the power.

Not that it truly mattered, as I pushed the command into the Shattered, I felt a moment of resistance before something happened. I wasn’t quite sure what, but I felt a surge of Astral Power leave my body, the Death Magic sapping my vitality and then, something happened.

Something interesting…

For a moment, the pale, blue flames in the Shattered’s eyes flared green, a distinct shade of green I knew quite well, before returning to their original flame. And then, the Shattered suddenly lunged at the Undead I had intended as its target, tearing into the creature with surprising strength and fury.

Maybe I was onto something here.