Abigail didn’t have any clue how long she spent in the ruins of the once great library. It was long enough that she had reached the pinnacle of purity she could in her own Aether, and while she was growing her core, it was extremely slow going.
She had also advanced her Aether-based perception. Not only could she make out incredible detail in a five meter radius, and decent detail in about a twenty meter radius, she could also send out a small pulse of Aether and analyse the results, giving her a view of things in a several dozen meter range.
One day, something finally happened. Someone came into view. Abigail watched as the man carefully used his magic to excavate the part of the library she was in, all that remained of the once grand building.
He finally wigged his way in and began methodically checking each shelf. When he found a more intact book, he would use a knife to extract its spine, which he then placed into a pouch.
When he reached Abigail, his eyebrows rose in surprise at how good she looked. He was even more surprised when his knife failed to cut through her, only leaving a thin line through the black charring on her surface. Where the knife had effortlessly removed the pages of other books, it only left a shallow scoring on her pages, a wound that healed up in only a minute.
“Well now. That certainly qualifies as an enduring book.” He remarked quietly.
The man proceeded to dump all the harvested spines from his pouch, then placed Abigail within it.
‘Fuck yeah, let’s go for a ride!’ Abigail thought, ecstatic that she would finally get to leave the ruins of the place of her rebirth.
The man quickly walked to a small camp where he had his horse. It took him but a few moments to gather his few belongings and mount his horse. Then he set off at a canter, leaving nothing but hoofprints and droppings behind.
They traveled well into the night, stopping occasionally to let the horse drink, eat, and rest.
Abigail knew it was night because of the drop in temperature and change in sounds. The mage also began using some kind of magic on the eyes on both himself and his horse. Night vision, if Abigail had to guess.
But finally the man had to stop to allow his horse to sleep. And although he tried to keep awake, he too drifted off to sleep.
This left Abigail with a potential quandary. If someone was to threaten the man, could she even alert him? If so, should she? And most importantly, would she?
She decided that, yes, she would try to alert the man should someone come into her perception radius. She figured a jolt of her ultra-pure mana point blank would wake the man up. And if it didn’t, then she would have at least tried.
The night passed uneventfully and the man and his horse woke with the rising sun. The man cursed softly, then gave food and water to his horse before setting off once more. The remaining breaks were short, no more than fifteen minutes at a time, except for lunch, for which the man took an hour.
Nightfall was approaching as they reached their destination, a small number of squat buildings built partially underground. Of particular note was that one of the buildings was warded such that Abigail’s Aether sense couldn’t see inside.
After the man settled his horse into the stable, he entered the warded building. Interestingly, the runes were one-way, and Abigail’s passive Aether sense could see out, though her active version was uselessly absorbed by the runes.
“Renault. Back so soon?” A pudgy man asked.
“Hello Greg. Yes, I am back earlier than anticipated.” Abigail’s companion of the past day-and-a-half replied, somewhat disdainfully.
“So I take it you found what you were looking for then? Mind if I take a look?” Greg asked with a slimy grin.
“So long as I draw no attention to myself or the group as a whole, my expeditions are none of your concern. I will be in my workspace if B needs me. I do not wish to be disturbed.”
Greg let out a malcontent grumble, but made no move to stop Renault, nor did he try to engage the man in further conversation.
When he reached his door, Renault did something with his mana that made the door unlock and pop open. He swiftly entered and relocked the door behind himself.
“Filthy prick. Doesn’t he understand how infernally awful he smells? I know I’m no summer rose, but I haven’t had access to a shower for a week.” Renault made his displeasure known only to himself, barely above a mumble. Abigail heard of course, her Aether sense uncaring about the distance from his lips to her cover.
He removed her from the pouch and placed her gently on a clear space on his workbench. He then quickly moved over to a small partitioned off space. He stripped out of his filthy traveling gear and dropped it in a bin. He stepped into a magical shower cubicle, sighing in delight as the hot water flowed over him.
Abigail was fascinated by the shower. A series of runes pulled water from a reservoir up along the inside of the front wall, then sprayed it out onto the user. The waste water was then funneled through another set of runes that separated it into clean water and waste. The waste went into a collection chamber tucked behind the shower, while the clean water returned to the reservoir.
‘I think I’ll like it here.’
Truthfully, anywhere would have been better than the ruins, but she was truly excited to learn about new things, and magic at that. Her enthusiasm was probably also due to Renault’s book collection. He had not one, not two, but four huge bookcases nearly full of books.
After his shower, dressed in a fluffy robe and ate a proper meal. When finished he grabbed a book and moved to his bed.
The book turned out to be pornography of some kind, as he began pleasing himselfr. He even managed to turn the pages with his off hand!
Abigail was curious as to what the man was reading, but her Aether sense was unable to discern the written word.
The Flow as my witness, I will find a way to read again!’ She declared to herself.
Abigail wasn’t horny: she was bored. Watching a man jacking off to porn was about the least sexy thing she could imagine, at least while still being lewd.
Renault finished. Then he kept reading for another two page turns.
‘I guess that book is porn-with-plot then. Either that or he’s a trooper.’
Renault closed the book and placed it on his nightstand. He waved his hand, releasing a small amount of Aether as he did so. Abigail wasn’t sure what he’d done, but based on the response from the runework in the room, she figured it was most likely turning out the lights.
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Renault woke to a sharp rapping on his door. He pulled his fluffy robe on and tied it closed. He checked the door, then gestured for the person on the other side to enter.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
“Good morning B.” He greeted the stern looking woman, her hooded and enchanted robe obscuring her features from even Abigail’s sight.
“Good morning Renault. Welcome back. I assume that your early return is good news?”
“It is.” He smirked, “Do you remember when I thought that the spine of an enduring book would be the easiest component to get?”
“I do. You found one?” Though it couldn’t be heard, B’s smile colored her voice.
“I did. The whole book even.”
The woman nodded.
“Do you want my help?”
“No thank you. I will be just fine on my own.”
B nodded. “Don’t die. Blood magic can be quite touchy; I should know.”
With that she saw herself out.
Renault quickly dressed and wolfed down a breakfast of meat, cheese, and bread.
He then wasted no time in diving into his work. First he unfurled a scroll, placing weights on it to keep it from closing back up.
“To make a Grimoire: For the cover, a mat woven from the bones of a powerful being and covered with the hide of a mimic.” He intoned from the scroll, then took the previously fabricated cover from a drawer.
It was...disturbing, but brimmed with potential and strength.
“For the heart, the spine of an enduring book.” He looked at Abigail. “I’ll finish that bit after I start the page slurry.”
“For the pages, an alchemical mixture of slime core jelly, a perfect drake scale, the eye of a wyvern, and the residue of an arcane elemental; all dissolved and bound within the purified life essence of a powerful mage.”
“To bind the book, two rituals; one to construct, and one to link the grimoire to its master.”
He took a deep breath and sighed.
“I suppose there’s no putting this off then.” He bemoaned as he rolled up his left sleeve.
He set up a flask and retrieved a needle from its ornate box. After muttering a quick charm to sterilize everything, he swiftly slipped the needle into his arm, and his blood flowed out the end and into the flask.
The needle itself was enchanted with dozens of tiny runes. Abigail wasn’t entirely sure what it did, but she guessed that it was an alternative to an enchanted sacrificial dagger.
Once the flask was filled to a predetermined point, Renault removed the needle and pressed a bit of sterile cotton to his arm, holding it until the bleeding stopped.
He inspected the flask.
“The blood of a powerful mage, willingly given.” He nodded. “Now to purify it.”
He opened a jar of crystals and weighed out some. He kept switching individual crystals out until his exacting measurements were satisfied. He then carefully added them to the flask of blood; stoppered it; and began to gently swirl it.
Ten minutes later, the blood had turned murky, with chunks occasionally visible as they slid along the bottom of the flask. He quickly poured the contents through a filter, revealing that the crystals he had added had become vibrant to Abigail’s mana sense, almost oozing power. He then rinsed the crystals with a chemical that caused the chunky bits to shriek and smoke as they were annihilated. After the haze cleared he was left with nothing but clean, potent crystals.
He placed the crystals into a fresh flask and secured it over a burner. A quick spark from his fingers and soon there was a small flame to heat the glassware.
Fear and anxiety rushed through Abigail at the sight of even such a small flame. She wanted to be as far from it as possible. Even the other side of the spacious room wouldn’t be far enough as far as she was concerned. Maybe in a hardened bunker, with all sorts of automatons and traps to stop anyone who might conjure fire from ever-
‘Oh. I’ve got PTSD, haven’t I? Ok, deep breaths Abi, deep breaths.’
While Abigail couldn’t really breath, what she actually did was to push and pull her Aether in and out of her core. It was her way of meditating and was quite soothing.
Meanwhile, as Abigail was getting her panic attack under control, the crystals had begun to crack and fracture, letting out droplets of a vibrant gold fluid as they did so. Soon the crystals were reduced to sand swimming in the golden liquid. The remaining crystals started to evaporate, although the level of the fluid rose as they did, rather than fall as expected of mortal chemistry. It was alchemy, after all.
While Renault did check on the mixture periodically, he was more concerned with preparing some slime cores for the next step. Each was roughly the size of a kiwi and composed of a tough membrane filled with thick goo. Renault took many measurements of each and wrote them down. He measured their weight, their size, their deformation under a calibrated weight, and also how high they bounced after being dropped from a calibrated height. All of this went into a spreadsheet of prepared equations.
After the last of the crystals had evaporated, the golden fluid was moved to a graduated cylinder and measured. He quickly sorted through his slime cores and selected eight that added up to the needed quantity of core jelly. He used a pipette to remove a small amount of the golden fluid from the graduated cylinder, and double checked the volume. He dumped the graduated cylinder into a large beaker, then added a slime core.
The core began to deflate, and once empty, he fished out the membrane. The process was repeated seven more times, and each time the fluid grew in volume and started to shift to a blue-green hue.
Next he pulled out the palm sized eye of a wyvern, complete with a substantial amount of optic nerve. It too went into the beaker, where it promptly dissolved into a series of orange streaks.
Finally Renault went to his heavily warded safe and opened it. He removed a small cloth bundle and brought it to the workbench. He donned a pair of silk gloves and painstakingly unwrapped the bundle.
“A perfect drake scale.” He intoned in awe as he held the jet black scale reverently.
With a somewhat conflicted expression, he gently placed it into the mixture. It floated on the top and didn’t seem to do anything. After a minute and half, though, it suddenly dissolved, vanishing into the fluid in an instant. Rather than make the mixture darker, however, the fluid shifted to a milk white.
Renault let out the breath he’d been holding in. The drake scale was rare, but even worse it had been horrendously expensive to obtain, as even the slightest imperfection or damage would have rendered the mixture worthless.
He finally turned his attention to Abigale. He picked her up and held her gently.
“Ok little book. I don’t know if you can hear or understand me, but I want to work with you. Grimoires are the stuff of legends, said to contain vast amounts of knowledge, to grant their users access to the secrets of the universe, and allow arcane might to rival even the strongest of archmages. I can make you into one. In return, I ask that you assist me in my pursuit of knowledge, to assist in my spellcasting, to hold my knowledge, and to protect my secrets. All I need is for you to allow me to extract your spine, so that I may bind it to your new form.”
His words were very attractive to Abigail. It helped that he was bearing his inner aura to her, which meant that she knew that every word was his truth, and that he had no deceptions or twisted intent behind his words.
She decided to take his deal. She focused and began pulling all her mana into her core. She felt distress as her cover began turning to charcoal, and as her pages curled and yellowed. She gritted her soul and pushed through. The words on her pages had already disappeared, pulled into her core.
Renault was shocked. He hadn’t expected such a profound result. He recovered quickly, however, as he was used to such strange phenomena occurring in rare magics. The book more or less fell apart in his hands. It only took a light tug to remove the pages and the cover crumbled into ash at his touch.
‘Amazing, to think that a book possesses the mana and will to survive otherwise total destruction. An enduring existence indeed.’ Renault marveled once again at how the arcane never ceased to surprise and amaze him.
He was quickly left with only the bare spine of the book, which he held tenderly. He carefully moved over to the prepared ritual set into his workbench. He set the spine down on the cloth that had previously held the drake scale. He moved the cover into the center of the formation, taking great care to ensure that it was aligned properly.
Renault took a tool, with an end like a razor blade bent back on itself. He carefully carved out a slot in the cover, the tool effortlessly slicing through the tough bone at the center. He carefully slipped Abigail into the groove, where she fit perfectly.
Then he started chanting, in a language that Abigail couldn’t recognize. Abigail herself was busy holding all her Aether in her core and couldn’t spare any attention to try and see what was going on. When the ritual began tugging at her Aether, she allowed small strands to flow forth. About a third of them snaked into the cover, while the rest started forming into a mind bogglingly complex formation.
Once the roots had extended to the right stage, Renault began to pour the alchemical mixture onto Abigail. Her roots sucked it up greedily, growing through the material as fast as their owner allowed. Something in Abigail’s mind told her that keeping the process slow would be better and she followed her instincts.
The white fluid spread out across the inner surface of the cover, then solidified into a perfect plane of glossy white. The ritual to assemble was complete, and that only left the binding of the tome and master together.
The second ritual reached out to both Renault and Abigail, and offered them a partnership. Abigail was pleasantly surprised at being given a choice, rather than simply being enslaved or coerced to follow Renault’s bidding. She accepted without hesitation, as it wouldn’t do for a newly minted grimoire to renege on a deal.
She could feel when Renault also accepted. She could now tell where he was in relation to herself, both direction and distance. She felt something else too:
Hunger. Burning, ravenous hunger.