"Godloss or the Bloom is a terrible disease killing all who are infected with it. The patient develops large pus and blood filled blisters which cover the entire body of the patient. The blisters are agonisingly painful if touched causing the inflicted to be bedridden wailing in agony. At the terminal stages of the illness which can arrive as long as a season after contracting the disease, the blisters begin to swell up gaining a distinct blueish hue, before bursting violently causing the patient to slowly bleed out. The disease is transmitted by touching an object previously touched by inflicted or coming to direct contact with the fluids leaking profusely from the dying and dead.
The disease gets one of its names because of its total immunity to any spells aimed at healing the patient which as if mocking the healer who is treating the unfortunate soul will ultimately worsen the progress of the disease. The healing spells cause inflammation of the entire body and eventual eruption of the patient bowels out of his body. The agonising screams are said to be heard for hours after the death. Its other name "Bloom" refers to the red flowers which quickly appear on the piles of corpses after they are quickly dumped somewhere far away from the few remaining survivors.
Mysteriously the cursed disease was proven to be able to appear suddenly and without any reason in any settlement of any intelligent beings. This horrifying revelation leads many to question the inherent benevolence of the System or the Aspects..."
-First page in "Godloss the Daemon Plaything"
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"Teach-!" The human child yelled excitedly. "-er." The child's tone suddenly changed as she laid her eyes on the tall elf standing in the doorframe with a puzzled expression painted on her pale face.
"What are you up to?" Lamia stepped in front of Iris as she eyed the little human child. "Didn't I tell you to sleep as much as possiable? We are going to gather ingredients for your practice lessons later." She placed her arms on her hip as she spoke to the child.
"But Teacher, I wanted to see my siblings and when I entered their room. Brother was there and then others came back when I pushed the pretty girl and I tried to talk but her face turn pink and others tried to stop me but-" The girl started to talk at an incredible speed which slowly increased before the alchemist interrupted her.
"Sally." Lamia let out a tired sigh, her expression showed Iris that the middle-aged woman had many similar conversations with the girl. "I told you to not enter that room. Go upstairs and quickly dress yourself up." She patted the girl on the back.
"But they were back!" Sally lamented.
"No buts."
The human child walked out of the room with a glum expression. Lamia sat down on the bed and let out a long tired sigh. "Sorry for that."
"No need for that, we are only guests." Iris tapped Kia on the shoulder, giving her a newly cleaned cloak to hide her ghostly white body.
"I am worried about her, she doesn't have any friends of her age and people generally avoid her more than they do me. She tells people she can still see the other children I used to take care of after the undead attack."
Iris didn't know how to respond or was she particularly comfortable with inquiring Lamia further ending up patiently waiting for the woman to continue. Kia sat on the opposite side of the bed staring at the alchemist with curiosity from the moment she mentioned undead, seeing the girl the elf rolled her eyes as she unwantingly said.
"Ehh, what you mean by undead attack?"
"There was another village not that far away from here," Lamia said." It was a mining village to be exact, I used to travel between here and that village getting to know the locals but five years ago something happened in the mine and... and these horrible looking undead attacked the village, killing almost everyone."
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"And you took in the children which survived?"
"Yes, about twelve of them from age five to twelve but they all died except Sally due to the Bloom. Locals said they died because they were cursed. Ludicrous!"
Iris shuddered at the mention of the deadly disease images of towns filled with corpses having to be cleansed by fire flashed through her mind. She glanced at Kia, somehow feeling that the petite necromancer's desire to know where was this mining village.
"Is there a contract for cleansing the mine from the undead?" The elf asked.
"No, even if there was, the reward would be pathetic if not worse." The human said, staring at her guest trying to figure out the reason behind the elf's questions.
"Could you give us directions to the village?"
"You don't have to do this because of me. I don't want to have you on my conscience." Lamia expressed her worry. "You can follow an overgrown route heading north through the forest." Seeing her guest staring at her with a stone cold face, she buckled.
"Thank you." Kia suddenly cried out as she ran toward the open front door, leaving the two women stunned.
"Was that a voice of a divine?" The human asked, her voice trembled with emotions, uncertain if she should be scared or delighted.
"I would say it was her own voice." Iris retorted before leaving Lamia alone in the room.
Iris put her hand to her eyes as the sun blinded her, her eyes quickly adjusted to the bright environment and she scanned her surroundings in search of the reckless girl eventually finding her standing beside her.
"Kia?" The elf asked the confused looking undead.
"Yes?" The confused undead fidgeted nervously under the elf's questioning gaze.
"You know what you did?"
"No." The girl answered with the most innocent and charming tone Iris could imagine. She was willing to forgive Kia's reckless behaviour before snapping herself out of the charm. Many horrible images of her and others' enslavement flashed in front of her eyes, she was Kia's and she could not let her endanger herself in such a way.
"Kia," Iris struggled to mold her worries into a coherent sentence. "I don't want you to suffer terrible things so please control your voice when you are around humans." She finished, feeling unsatisfied with how she phrased her warning.
"I know," The hooded girl answered in an apologetical voice. "Iris?"
"Yes?"
"Where is north?" Kia said, her face gaining a pinkish hue.
"First you have to tell me why are we even going north?" The taller undead crossed her arms in front of her chest.
"Gain expiration for you?" The girl tilted her head as if the answer should have been obvious before her large colourful eyes seemed to beg the elf her previous question.
The tall undead quickly glanced at the sky where the sun was, using its position to orient herself and answering the helpless mage. "There." She confidently said, pointing her finger to the north.
The two headed north to finding a forgotten path running through the forest. The path was clearly not maintained as the stone forming the pavement was scattered around, leaving enough space for one person to walk on the overgrown path. The elf could imagine the massive wagons hauling goods from one village to another on the once broad stone road.
"Kia, I want to ask you something." Iris suddenly said. "When Lamia spoke about the undead I felt that you wanted to know more. Is that because of the ritual?"
Kia looked concentrated on elf's question, almost tripping on a tree root jutting out between the pavement. "Interesting, do you feel anything now?" Her usual adorable tone changed to a tone of a curious mage finding a new specimen to experiment on.
The tall undead closed her eyes, trying to focus on a similar feeling that she experienced. "No."
The girl walking beside the elf thought about the response, her face slowly flushing with red. "Ehh... Did you feel anything before y-you entered the house?"
"No, why you asked?" Iris answered honestly, not understanding Kia's sudden embarrassment.
"No reason!" The mage squealed. *Cough* "M-my soul is coiled around yours and it seems that you can sense some of my emotions probably depending on their intensity."
"I actually was wondering. How can you use your inventory but you can't equip your clothes, it does not make sense to me?" Iris asked.
"That's a simple question to answer. Souls are actually pretty simple to understand," The ancient necromancer said not showing a sign of sarcasm on her spotless face. "They have a core which consists of basic information like your Essence, keystones of personality, system identification and so on.The soul creates petal-like layers which hold less important information the further it is from the core. So let us say I would strip your most outer layer. Your soul would lose the information housed in the removed layer which would mean you would lose a level or two. The ritual caused the system to basically view me as your familiar which overrides the system's response toward me being outside my domain but under the requirements of my soul being stripped to match your soul size and encasing both of our souls in your body. My ability to use inventory simply is very close to my core while the spell required to instantly equip myself was pretty far away." Kia lectured the elf, unfazed by the remarks she said.
"You are in me?" The elf raised her brow as she touched her chest.
"My soul is. Thanks to me technically being your familiar I can control my body like I uselessly do without any issues." Kia responded.
"And you lost all your levels when you did that?" Iris said, feeling shame for stripping the powerful undead to the girl in front of her.
"Nnooo," The undead mage replied seemingly finding her creation's question bizzare. "If you turned me into actual familair the answer would be yes, but my soul acts more like a parasite taking a bit of your mana to maintain the spell. The Anchor encased your my soul in a protective ward which retained all of the layers inside as I had them stripped. As you level up I will only have to pick up the fallen petals around my soul and reattach them."
Iris watched the girl beside her walking with her hands behind her back she gave her a quick peck. "I never thought I would be happy having a cute little parasite sucking on my soul~."
"Hey!" Kia pouted at the playful elf. "I'm only technically a parasite."
"Technically is the best kind of correct."