Lifting a small rock with my hand I tossed it towards the small circle I carved into the stone that signaled the area the ritual was in. The rock sailed through the air until it was a few inches above the circle when a vine of earth shot out from the ground and reached for the rock and gripped it tight. The vine then sunk into the ground and held the rock against the ground with all the might as it could.
I chuckled at the sight of the functionality while thinking back to all the work that I put into getting just this one spell to work properly in ritual form. First I had to connect the mana within the mana stone to the mana I used for the instructions, then I needed to give very specific instructions on when and what to do.
The first spell I tried doing was the Tri Earth Bolts spell, but I unfortunately found out that everything about the spell, even the direction of the projectiles in this case, needs to be accounted for as the ritual is being casted. If you don’t then it just picks a direction to shoot at random, or in that case three directions at random from the mana stone itself. Such limitations would only make rituals useful when in certain situations, the best example I could think of as setting magical traps.
I also found with another day of experimentation that the best spell to use that I was intimately familiar with was the Earth Vine spell. Though I needed to give it certain instructions such as to only attack certain things to keep myself from being harmed it was very effective and would help keep me safe when I attract the attention of the Red Eye cult.
‘Now I just need to work out a few of the kinks before I can actually do something to that damn cult. I think killing and capturing a few cult members before turning them over to the city guard would get me enough attention for that vampiric assassin. With that I can get the Paladins of the circle of fire involved and deal with the vampire lord himself.’
I felt proud of myself with the little plan I cooked up, I had everything set up like some sort of lord or king. All the pieces were falling into place, and I was taking as little risk as I could when dealing with such a powerful threat.
*********
Back at my room within the Free Parrot Bar I was setting up the mana stone against the wall below the one window in the room. I was hoping that the vampire would strike at night like he did the last time, this way he would be restrained by the earth vine that would be conjured as something other than myself moved through the window and into the room.
The one problem that I thought would be large was the mana stones and the light they emit, but as it turned out mana stones don’t emit any light at all. Though they look like they are glowing that is just an illusion created by the fact that they are literal mana taken physical form. The magical glow they emit is how the strength of stone is determined. As such I didn’t need to worry anyone seeing the mana stone from the outside when I was ready.
‘Now I just need to find one of the cult members out there doing something illegal and catch them. This place doesn’t have a view of the land surrounding the manor, so I will need to stay around the place and watch for any activity.’ I gritted my teeth at the thought. The idea of wasting all that time that would be better off studying or practicing my magic.
********
Two nights of watching on the ground level I had wasted before I found anything. At first I thought it had been just a trick of my mind from all the stress and time I wasted outside, but then I heard the noise once and then twice more. I looked up and in the field of grass was someone dressed in a red cloak dragging something. I nearly smiled at the sight, though I quickly corrected my thoughts when I noticed they were dragging something.
‘If my memory serves me correctly, which it always has, then that is likely another corpse that a cultist is dragging off to be buried in one of their secret graveyards. I wonder just how often they need to do that considering this will be the second time that I will be catching them burying corpses drained of blood.’
I started following the cultist with the mana stone within my left hand ready to activate the ritual casted upon it. One of the wonderful things about mana stones was that the rituals they are used for can be centered around them and follow them around, which was why I had an air barrier ritual ready and waiting to be activated.
I followed this cultist for quite some time until we eventually reached a small clearing that was completely empty aside from a single shovel laying on the ground. The cultist dropped the corpse which had been wrapped in a large piece of fabric like a blanket at a spot in the far corner of the clearing before picking up the shovel and starting to dig a hole right next to the corpse. I waited there just out of view with the ritual active for the cultist to finish so I had some good evidence for the city guard.
The cultist took quite a while to dig the hole which likely showed that this cultist wasn’t very strong or experienced with digging graves to hide corpses, even though I had no experience I could easily see that he was only digging up a little dirt with only some of the shovel blade instead the whole thing. In truth it was a little sad to watch.
When the cultist was happy with the hole they dug I stepped out from my hiding place and quickly conjured up three earth bolts and stepped towards them. I kept my open palm pointed towards the cultist’s head for when he would turn around. Just as he started to try and drag the corpse into the rather shallow grave I gave a fake cough to get his attention.
In both surprise and shock he turned with a start towards me and was about to say something when I willed my three bolts to shoot towards him. They quickly sailed across the air between us and found their mark in the eye, the throat, and the left shoulder of the cultist. He quickly fell to the ground clutching his injuries and ironically falling into the grave he dug.
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I rushed over to him and watched as he tried pulling out the bolts that had sunken well into his flesh and bone, he struggled and struggled but I knew he wouldn't survive without proper medical attention. That was something I was both unwilling and unable to give him. Instead I conjured up three more bolts and put the cultist out of his misery. I had to watch the blood pool from his injuries for a few seconds before I received a notification of his death.
/- - - - - -\
+ 50 Exp
\- - - - - -/
With that I took a quick look around the area to be certain that I wasn't followed or watched by anyone before leaving to find the city guard.
*******
Half an hour later I was standing near the clearing that had been closed off to the general public while an investigation was undergoing. Three guards were keeping an eye with their spears on hand while the detectives were looking over the crime scene I brought to their attention. After around twenty minutes of investigating and collecting evidence the lead detective walked towards me and nodded to the three guards who gave us some distance.
“Good evening sir, if you would be willing I would like to ask you a few questions about this place you discovered for us.” The detective was a middle aged human man dressed in middle class quality clothing and wearing a leather overcoat. His voice was a little rough and he looked as if he was tired and called while he was sleeping, yet he remained respectful.
“Of course detective, ask away.” The detective eyed me suspiciously at the statement of his profession but quickly looked to the small piece of parchment that contained his questions.
“You said you discovered this small and illegal graveyard while following someone in a red robe. Would you tell me why you decided to do that?”
“Pretty simple really. I saw someone else wearing a red robe just like the one here today and they entered this property and disappeared into the grass. Today while walking around I saw another wearing the same color of robe and dragging something behind themselves that was rather large and heavy. I got closer out of curiosity and discovered that they were in fact dragging a corpse wrapped in a large piece of fabric.”
The detective eyed me with a touch of suspicion in his eyes but didn’t ask anything about why I was in the area. “And I assume you were the one to kill the perpetrator after they dug the shallow grave for the corpse.”
“Yes, that is correct. I wanted to be certain that they wouldn’t get away while I was gone.”
The detective wrote something down on the paper before continuing. “How exactly did you kill this robed young man? I see you have a sword on your hip, but the wounds on him don’t match with a sword. They resemble more of an arrow or crossbow bolt.”
“With my magic of course.” I said before quickly and easily conjuring up three earth bolts with a small wave of my hand for him to see. The detective seemed to wince at the sight of such effortless magic casting and continued with more stress and worry evident in his stance as he quickly wrote more on his paper.
“And you felt that you needed to kill this criminal rather than simply capture him?”
“I don’t know any spells that work as long lasting prisons or cages. I could have made something like that with just geomancy manipulation, but that would have disturbed the crime scene and possibly the evidence.” I could tell the detective wanted to say something to me, to say I was wrong in my actions, but he was scared of something. Most likely it was the guild itself he was afraid of given how much influence and power they have within the kingdom and how I was able to easily cast tier one spells with just a small motion.
The questions continued for another few minutes before the detective was done asking. He directed two guards standing on watch to take me back to the public street and then to return. But before we left he had one last thing to say to me. “Sir mage, do try and keep out of trouble from now on. This group you have discovered might become more active against you if you continue to antagonize them.” I smiled and nodded towards the detective that just looked happy to see me gone.
The guards escorted me like they were directed to the nearest street and then left me on my own. Instead of walking right back to the Free Parrot Bar where I was staying I just stood in the street and looked up to the sky. All those little stars in the sky were just little glowing dots in the distance, in truth I wondered what they were. I know some of the priests I have passed by have stated they were other suns like our own orbiting other worlds. ‘I guess when I have some time I can look into astronomy. The library should have a few books on the subject in the public section. I wonder just how people are able to look at those stars with such accuracy and precision, they must have some sort of device to do that, likely a dwarven made machine. I don’t know of any others who have the skills to create something as complex as that.’
********
When I arrived back in my rented room I quickly attached the mana stone to the wall just below the window and quickly prepared the ritual. When it was done I conjured up a small clump of earth and tossed it over the area where the ritual would operate, as the clump was sailing through the air above the ritual area the vine of earth shot out from the floor and snapped at the clump like a snake jumping out at a rat.
I had set certain requirements for the ritual to activate, specifically I had set two. The first was of course for anything that was not me which it checked based on mana, the second was for conjured earth created by myself. It did cost a little extra mana for the ritual to check that each time but it was a good way to check and be certain that the ritual was working.
‘Now I just need the cult to track me back here and send their vampire assassin to deal with me. Given that I am far more powerful than I was the last time he should try a more stealthy approach instead of just smashing through the window like last time. I wish I had enough money to do the same thing with the front door as well, unfortunately I will just need to rely upon the lock to keep him from trying it.’
For the last few hours of the night before I went to sleep I decided to continue practicing my magic, specifically my geomancy and the only tier three geomancy spell I knew. I conjured up several weapons but mostly stayed with longswords as those were the weapons I knew the best. Something interesting I found was that I was able to put more power behind the conjured longswords as I was able to mostly negate the effects the weight had on handling as I could control them with just my thoughts and my connection through mana.