In some ancient ruins, such as those of what most assume to be necromancer orders, artefacts are often found. There are, unfortunately, few safe ways of appraising the effect of such an item. The only sure-fire way of understanding something of that nature is to simply use it and hope for the best. Fortunately, the Hunter’s Guild provides free medical and curse removal services to anyone who finds an artefact, as was established by Sibvid the healer’s influence.
-Excerpt from ‘Artefacts for Hunters,’ author unknown
*=====*
Mori moved her head left and right, watching as the red-pupiled, blue eye followed her. There seemed to be no intellect in the eye, being nothing but instinct, but there was also a purpose in the movements; the eye focused on her skull, staring at her empty eye sockets. She slowly, carefully, picked the glass container up off of the pedestal and placed her hand on the necklace. Almost instantly, the reliquary began shaking. Dust was dislodged from the ceiling and fell down on them. Mori made a split-second decision, grabbing each artifact and rushing out of the room, dragging Jel as she stood stunned.
Jel snapped back to reality before long, running along with them once they reached the spiral staircase. They ran and ran, dashing past the orrery room, each of the other doors still left unopened. Running through the long corridor of psychic illusions, the walls showing cracks,, Mori noticed a distinct lack of said illusions. Putting the thought out of her head, she led her death knights past the large front door of the reliquary just as the building began to collapse. The stones of the ceiling began to fall, burying the corridor and blocking it. They all stood from the outside, watching as the structure collapsed.
Once the final stone fell, Fury sighed, “Well, that was interesting, at least. And we got some experience for that too,” he said contentedly, Ally agreeing with him as he spoke.
Jel sighed, “At least no-one got h-hurt.”
“I was wondering,” Idle piped up, “What was in the rest of those rooms? I mean, sure, it was just some basic stuff, but it was basic stuff for a god. Isn’t it, you know, a pretty big deal?”
They all paused, thinking over her reasoning, before collectively sighing, “Dammit…” Mori groaned, “Is there a way to, I don’t know, get the stuff out from there?”
Pride tapped her on the shoulder, pointing to a few earthshaker wyrms that had popped up to see what had happened, “Can the wyrms use their mana on the rubble?”
Mori, looking at them, nodded slightly, “Worth a shot,” she muttered, “Wyrms! See if you can get in there!” she shouted. They followed her orders, squirming headlong into the rubble. With a resounding crack, the first slammed into the rubble, coiling up and breaking itself as the momentum of its charge pushed it into itself. The other wyrms quickly stopped themselves before slamming into the rubble like the first did. With a pitiful cry, the wyrm that slammed into the rubble fell limp. Mori stared in disbelief for a moment, checking her Minion Page to see that she had one less earthshaker wyrm as she should have, “Are you serious…” she muttered while a few of the death knights sighed, “Let’s see if I can wake it up…” She walked over to the newly-dead corpse and sent a flash of her mana into it. It writhed and wriggled for a moment before its broken body reared up sloppily. She checked her Minion Page once more, only to be met by another surprise.
[Broken Wyrm Zombie: A zombie created by the body of a Wyrm with the majority of its skeleton broken. An inferior version of a Wyrm Zombie. Like all undead, it requires occasional mana to fuel its soul.]
“It looks… wiggly,” Mae helpfully stated.
“I agree,” Pride said, “I believe it broke its skeleton during its… impact, with the rubble.”
“Will i-it work?” Jel asked, staring at the shattered zombie.
“I doubt it,” Mae responded.
Pride sighed, “The skeleton is an important aspect of the creature, providing proper support for its bodily functions. Without a skeleton…”
“Wouldn’t it just be the slime?” Mae asked.
“I do t-think it would work like U-Unio, but he w-was made from a bunch of b-bodies. Not just o-one,” Jel answered.
With a sigh, Mori whispered her final command in its ear, watching it writhe and fall to the ground. Looking at the body, she began to poke at it with her stone staff, noticing the utter lack of anything in it that was not broken. Grumbling, she sent a bit of earth mana to the ground, shuffling the corpse over to the side, “Alright,” she said, “Wyrms, try to clear the rubble while we wait here. Also gather anything that looks valuable,” she said, walking back to her death knights. As the wyrms began to gorge themselves on loose rock, spitting it up off to the side, Mori walked over to the death knights, “We’ll be here for a while. Do you have something to pass the time?” she asked.
They gave her blank looks, confusing her, before Tisi pointed to the handful of artifacts valued by a god, “Mistress, perhaps it would be pertinent to focus on the greatest treasures you have gathered during the expedition,” she passive-aggressively suggested.
Understanding the oddity of the zombie’s emotive statement, Mori turned her attention to the treasures she had taken. The first, the silver armband, did not seem very special. She was able to sense some odd mana at play, somewhat similar to the mana she had felt from a few skiffs in the harbor, but it was nonetheless foregin. She also noticed that the armband was meant for someone with a bit more anything on their bones than her. Shrugging at both the odd mana and the size problem, she molded the metal on her gauntlet with [Mechanical Skeletal Manipulation] and slid nestled the armband into a divot made into her gauntlet.
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
The second item, the bronze circlet with the ruby, was somewhat more interesting. She had never felt anything like it, but she also knew that it spoke to something she did not have. Whatever that meant. Nonetheless, she reluctantly put it on her head; she doubted it would do anything if it was trying to affect something she did not have. She did indeed feel a pulse of mana reach the jewelry, but its effects simply washed through her bones, doing nothing. After another two pulses, it stopped.
Content with a simple new piece of jewelry, Mori turned her attention to the last item she took from the reliquary: the necklace. Looking at it, she realized that, while the thing looked like a necklace, it had to be something else. Instead of string or chain holding it, there was a thick band of golden silk that seemed able to unravel to a ridiculous degree. She could have fit the thing around her skull if she really wanted to. For some reason, throughout the whole process, she noticed the thing continually staring into the eye sockets of her skull. Its gaze never shifted, never waivered.
On a whim she brought it closer to her eye, just to satisfy the thing’s odd need, and felt it gather the ambient mana around her. Pulling it away immediately, she could swear she saw it look at her with faint disappointment. Laughing to herself at the ridiculous idea, she studied it once more, shrugging and placing it on her eye socket. Immediately, the golden silk wrapped around her skull and flipped the eye around, aiming its gaze outward. Then it began to gather mana once more, something she allowed. After a moment, something connected with her sight and the world seemed to open up in indescribable colors.
It was not a Connection, in the sense of what her psychic powers were capable of, but it was a simple link that let her see what the eye ‘saw.’ If it could be called sight. She saw the world through a special type of vision, like heat vision, except she had no idea what was being emphasized. Heat vision colored the hottest parts and left the coolest parts blue. Rivers of oppressive grey flowed through the air, settling into the walls. After a moment, she looked at her death knights with her new vision. She must have obviously looked like either idiotic or unnerving, as they shied away from her gaze.
Most of the death knights had a different color with different intensities. Idle was a cool baby blue. Pride was a deep gold. Fury was a bright scarlet. Jel was a rich purple. Mae was a calm white. Ally was a bright scarlet, just like Fury. Tisi was a fierce black. It was like looking at their personalities in color form. As she looked closer, she saw streaks of black in Pride, for example. Yellow through Jel, Fury, and Tisi. It was very difficult to understand what they meant, but she could guess. Turning her attention back to the environment, she noticed a thin strand of purple that wove through the air and past her. Looking behind her, she saw it weave its way into the ruins of the reliquary. It was quickly fading, though, losing a sort of luster and becoming duller and duller.
She sighed and took the eye patch off, ‘I have no idea what the hell this is… Probably something to help the Great God of Sleeping Leaves or whatever his name was with… whatever.’ She tucked the item away, hanging it from a rib bone. She finally turned her attention back to the group of death knights and began listening to her conversation.
“-these hoity-toity types-”
“Fury, who the hell says ‘hoity-toity?’ You sound like you’re a thousand years old.”
“Shut up, Idle. This is my story. So, anyway, these… stuck up guys walk up the plank of the Kharon and I can see their little mask break almost instantly.”
“I was on the street below. They were scared before, but seeing a group of modified lizardman zombies must have broken their spirits; they came back seemingly in need of a stiff drink.”
“Really? Mae, did you see?”
“I did, but I didn’t really pay attention. I was ordered to watch the idiots and barely paid them a glance back then.”
“So, anyway, I was watching these guys gather their courage, just building it up like they were about to meet death herself-”
“They w-weren’t too far off.”
“Agreed, but shush. Anyway, they’re walking up to her and they look at her all formal-like. ‘Good evenin’...’ They go on and on about getting called over for a gunfight.”
“That is a guard’s job, Fury.”
“Tch. I get it, Pride, but they were minutes late to a damn gunfight. A knife fight, I get it. There aren’t literal explosions going off in a knife fight, but a gunfight is different. You can see it in the dark and you can hear it just as well.”
“There were lances of pure light going off too. Don’t forget that.”
“That too! I bet they were just waiting for us to finish up and then they come in to clean up.”
“Fury-”
“Pride, don’t ‘Fury’ me. You know that’s what happened.” There was a moment of silence before Pride smacked Fury on the head, “Ow! The hell’s that for!?”
“For being rude. Now, I was going to say that they have much less to lose if they do it the way you described. That is what I was going to say.”
Another moment of tense silence passed, with the two staring at each other, before Ally stepped behind them, “Now kiss…” They both glared at her, “Come on, you two give each other such passionate eyes-”
“Ally.”
“Mae.”
“Shut up.”
“No.”
“Why are you like this?”
“‘Cause it’s fun.”
“S-She has a point.”
“Not you too, sweet innocent Jel.”
They laughed at that, Jel standing next to them, uncomfortable, “I’m not that innocent.”
At that point Mori cut in with a grin, “You are, Jel. You’re like a little kid compared to the others, sometimes.”
“Oh, she took off the weird eyepatch,” Fury muttered.
“So it was weird…” Mori wondered aloud.
Idle snorted, “Mistress, we’re used to seeing you with two flames. Seeing a creepy reptile eye is way weirder.”
They all murmured in agreement. Mori rolled her eye-flames, grinning, “Alright, fine, it’s creepy. So, Fury, you were saying?”
“Oh! Yeah! That-”
“Wait,” Pride cut in, stepping towards Mori, “Mistress, please do not put random enchanted items on. What happens if it curses the wearer to die a horrible death?”
Mori shrugged, “If it’s in a god’s reliquary, in a place he keeps all of his good stuff, then why would it? If it’s a cursed enchantment or whatever, he would just put it up top to kill greedy plunderers.”
“She’s right, Pride,” Fury agreed, “Anyway, after that-” They listened to Fury’s stories, mostly about things they had already done together, until the reliquary was opened up once more.