After Tikka had left, her daughter hopped up and flew over the table and tackled Viktor to the ground with a squeal.

The ferret peeked over from its mistress’s previous hiding spot and watched as Sisa hugged the fallen necromancer. “Paley, Viktor! Viktor, Paley!” she shouted while she nuzzled her head to Viktor’s chest. Just as normal, she had gotten what she had wanted and more, learning even his actual name.

Viktor patted Sisa’s back and laughed, both in relief and at the antics of his new apprentice. “Come now, get off me!” He said in between bouts of laughter as he latched off the leech from him and sitting up. The leech then took hold of his lap and rested her back against his chest as she looked up.

“What now?” Sisa asked with uncontained anticipation, “Teach me?”

“I’ll do my best.” He responded while separating part of his attention towards his grimoire to seek answers. His own teachers assenting this to be possible and giving him guidance on how to approach teaching someone.

“Hmm..” Viktor hummed as he finished talking to Percy and Higgins before continuing, “I believe you don’t need more lessons on respect.”

Sisa nodded eagerly to it, yet Viktor hesitated for a moment before testing her.

“What was your take on what I mad-. Told your mother of?”

She bit her lip and chewed it for a moment to ponder it before responding, “Tribe dead not to use as servants..” She hesitated a bit but continued, “Not tribe, not care?”

Viktor scratched his neck and thought it over as well. He had made it sound to be more that what Sisa just said, but she said it exactly how he viewed it. Well, not using the tribe was, in his opinion, a rather hard stance to take as long as they were willing, as well as their loved ones he felt they could be put to use while respecting their remains.

“Yes, correct my little apprentice.” He nodded after reaffirming his own views and found her answer not wanting in Tikka’s or his own views.

“Apprentice!” she cooed in delight and swung her dainty legs in his lap with elation. She picked up the undead ferret and raised it up. “Conjurer Sisa!” she squealed as she swung the ferret around. “Waker of the dead!”

Viktor watched as she swung the ferret around, his eyes spotting how lifelike it had become. It had come over to Sisa with no prompt from her or him and was now showing general signs of being conscious. He decided not to mull over it much ´, perhaps a fragment of his soul had acclimatised to its form after these weeks and this was the result.

He let Sisa goof around for a bit before raising his hand and conjuring balefire and catching her attention.

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“We should check if you can learn what I do.” Viktor said with a sigh as he felt a slight vertigo from his lack of energies. He felt his body growing more rigid from it but soldiered on. “Place your hand in the fire and close your eyes.” He urged her as Sisa watched the flickering flame of life.

“Try to sense how this flame feels.” Viktor instructed after Sisa let the ferret go and did as instructed. “Feel its vigour and seek it out in your body..”

Sisa scrunched up her face in concentration and did as told, but after a while she said “I can’t find it” dejectedly, but kept her eyes closed and continued on.

“Can you feel the flame?” Viktor asked.

“Hmm.. Yes? I dunno..” she answered hesitantly, “What should Sisa feel from flame?”

Viktor pondered how to explain the power he had and came up with: “A warm breeze in the meadow filled with sunlight, warm and filled with life.”

Sisa’s eyes jumped open as she turned towards Viktor in glee. “Sisa feels it now!”

She closed her eyes again in agitation, trying to find a similar feeling in her body. Viktor decided to help and put his other hand on her back and slowly sent some of his power in her without injecting with the energy with any intent.

Sisa shifted in his lap before a gasp left her mouth. “Find, find!” She was about to shift around again and interact with him, but Viktor stopped her. “Try to move the energy. Make it move faster in your body.”

Sisa grumbled in affirmation as she sat still in his lap.

They sat like that for an hour as she willed the small motes of energy to bend to her will. Her body was covered in sweat in the end and the greenish grey dress made of fibre she wore stuck to her skin before Viktor stopped her from continuing.

With a weary sigh, Sisa stopped and looked back at Viktor again, showing him a glimpse of a tiny receding glow of green in the veins of her golden eyes.

“Good job.” He said with a smile as he caressed her cheek with the back of his index finger as he looked at her tired face.

“Lets get you home to Tikka, shall we?” Viktor said as he stood up and carried her.

“Nnn—” She nodded and rubbed her heavy eyes. “Did good?” She asked while motioning the ferret to climb up and join her.

“Very good, but don’t continue practicing without me.” Viktor responded as they exited the hovel and entered in to the chilly night. He looked at the resting goblin child in his arms clutching a ferret like a doll. “Just in case, okay?”

“Okay.”

Viktor walked the shadowy first platform towards Sisa’s home and listening her as she continued to fall to asleep.

After giving Sisa to Tikka who merely nodded with a thankful smile and told Viktor not to worry about Krugh or others, he headed for the staircase and waited.

Soon, a figure emerged from the dark carrying a bag. It was his new servant, who he had commanded to pack up and meet him.

He needed to do something if he was to teach Sisa further.

His crippled state was hampering both his and his new apprentices’ progress if he would not find something to recharge his storage. Preferably, he’d want more minions as well, but his energy reserves were crucial.

He sent some flying insects to scout ahead as they made their way up the staircase. He faced the dark and gloomy night forest with determination and forced himself to ignore to fatigue hitting him in waves.

Unlike him, Sisa would not be able to take the life essence of others for a long while based on what the wise duo had told him. And he would not let her apprentice, whom he viewed as a little sister, cripple herself because of this. She would need a source of life and he would give it to her.

His dark vision left the forest colourless and eerie as he stood at the top of the stairs to catch his breath, his left hand clutching at air to look for the staff he had forgotten to bring, only for it to appear in his hand.

He looked up and saw a veiled figure who was smiling underneath it and move ahead of them before stopping a few steps ahead and turning around.

Fafi waited calmly for the suspicious Viktor to walk to her with his minion before asking, “Go to forest?”

“Yes. To find something.” Viktor said, while scanning Fafi carefully as to divine her purpose.

“Then Fafi come with, help Paley find the something.” She said and began to gently drag Viktor into the forest. “Fafi will be great help to Paley in search of something. Fafi is shaman after all.”