It was Lunday, the first day of my second week. Today would be my very first advanced death magic class! I was really excited. When my affinity was discovered I was uncertain at first. By now I wanted to fully embrace it. Maybe Helena was rubbing off on me but I liked the idea of having an undead army.

That was a long way off though. At least the physical training in the morning helped me to calm down. Archibald still sneered at us at every opportunity. Nothing had changed there. But he was whispering to his followers a lot while watching us.

Finally the afternoon arrived and I was on my way to the death magic lecture. A course that only people with my affinity would take. No one from my regular class was here. Only three students were in the small lecture hall. That included myself. The others were both human males. And they looked the same. The twins had orange hair, a friendly face and waved at me as I entered.

“Hi. We are Tim and Tom.” They said,

“Hi. I am Koyuki. Do you think someone else will show up?”

“It’s a rare affinity.” Tim said, shrugging.

Just then another person entered. He saw me and approached with a smile. His face was slightly rugged yet handsome. He had black hair and dark brown eyes that almost seemed black. His body was well trained.

“Hello, I am Leo. A pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Leo? Was that the guy Helena warned me about?

“Hello, I am Koyuki.”

“I have heard about you. Helena’s friend, right? And very gifted when it comes to magic.”

I was unsure how to reply. Thankfully the teacher arrived, which put an end to the conversation. But Leo chose the seat next to me.

For the first time we had an instructor who was clearly not human. A dwarf with grey skin and a long white beard entered. He was bald and looked relatively old. But I had to admit, I was not good at judging the age of a dwarf.

Stolen novel; please report.

“Ah, we have four students this year! Splendid! Sit down, sit down.” He sounded rather excited.

“Death magic is such an interesting field! Many fear it, for good reason. It is very efficient at killing. But you can do so much more! I have a skeleton to clean my room, for example. The undead make for very efficient servants.” He smiled, then remembered something.

“Oh, where are my manners! I have not even introduced myself! I am Gronir. I have been teaching this class for many years now. Since this is your first year you won’t be raising any armies, yet. But you will be required to animate something in this class. Of course, I will teach you direct attack spells as well.”

The door opened and a skeleton emerged, it was carrying books. Unlike the other teachers, who floated them to us with magic, Gronir used an undead to hand out the reading material. It was the first time I saw an animated skeleton up close. It looked surprisingly clean. I tried sniffing it and was surprised, it smelled faintly of flowers.

Gronir chuckled. “Undead do not have to be dirty. Make no mistake, on the battlefield they will be. But when you have time you can prepare your skeletons appropriately. There is a large variety of alchemical treatments. Some will make the resulting undead stronger, others will simply make them smell nice. Of course, that is mostly for skeletons. Dealing with the stench of a zombie is a bit more complicated. Most just learn a spell to help with the smell.”

He waited until we all had a book in front of us. “Raising an undead can be done quickly on the battlefield. But it is a lot easier, and more efficient, to do it slowly. You can prepare the corpse properly. As I have already said, I expect you to create an undead in this class. It is up to you to choose what kind. My recommendation is to use a small skeleton as a base. It can be a rat, for example. The book does offer further suggestions, so give it a read. And you can always ask me for help. You have one week to decide.”

One of the twins raised his hand.

“Tom.”

“Once we choose something, where do we get the skeleton from?”

“The school can provide you with some. A rat would be free. Some others can be purchased cheaply. You can always go into town and buy the bones you need. If you have an exciting idea I might be convinced to help you obtain the materials.”

I raised my hand.

“Koyuki.”

“Would something bigger be harder to control?”

“No. Control is only an issue if you have an intelligent undead. There are three tiers. One is a mindless undead that follows simple orders. They will offer no mental resistance. A tier two would retain some of their instincts. A cat skeleton might still go and hunt rats, if not commanded otherwise. They are easy to control for anyone with experience. They can follow more complex commands. A tier three would be really intelligent. Unless you know what you are doing they might break free and kill you.”

“Would a tier three undead remember their life?” I wondered.

“That depends on how it is created. It can be the actual soul of someone bound to an undead body. That is hard and very illegal. They would remember everything. But more often a new being is created. They would inherit some aspects based on the shell you are using. But they would have our level of intelligence. Raising a tier three is beyond most necromancers. Most undead are tier two. Tier ones are only useful for very simple things.”

“So it makes no difference what sort of skeleton we use?” Tom asked. He did not even put up his hand but Gronir did not seem to mind.

“A bigger skeleton requires more mana. But it can also accomplish more. A tier one undead horse might not be the best battle mount but it is great for carrying supplies.”