Abad looked at the book and smiled. "The Goddess may have changed one of her laws."
"Which was?" The red dots in its skeletal face narrowed.
"Death comes for all things, whether by time or tragedy. Mortals reincarnate. Immortals return to the void."
"Yes, that is the Goddess's law. The cycle of reincarnation fuels Elysium and keeps chaos at bay, or so her writings claim."
He nodded. "And now, there's an addendum." He took a deep breath. "When he dies, Abad-Shai returns to his vault."
"The possibilities are... endless." The ancient tome whispered. It began furiously writing in its pages.
Abad sat staring up at the vaulted ceiling for some time, listening as the quill in the book's skeletal hand scraped against the pages of its tome. Angra's heartbeat thudded against his chest. Her eyes were on his.
"So you'll never be free?" She whispered.
"No." He spoke the word with finality. "Not until I succeed. And there's no guarantee of success. I don't even know if it's possible. She didn't think it was."
Her face looked hopeful. "So we'll just keep trying until it works?"
"I will. You're not leaving the vault again. I won't lose you a second time. Now that I know this vault doesn't go back in time, I don't know that I'd be able to bring you back again." If she stayed here, he could keep her safe. She was the only thing that he couldn't bring back since she wasn't part of Reial anymore. "You're not coming with me this time."
"Master..." Her lower lip trembled, and her yellow eyes glistened. She gripped him tighter. He felt something wet against his skin. "That's not fair... What will happen when you die? Who's going to look after you? What happens if someone kills you and takes your corpse or cuts your soul apart? I won't be there to protect you." He saw tears running down her cheeks.
"Angra..."
She was quiet for a moment. "What if you die and go to a new world without me?"
The book kept furiously scribbling. Abad pulled his familiar into a tight embrace, holding her close. "If you stay here, you'll be safe. No one can take you from me if you stay here. No one. You'll be protected in this sanctum. I won't have to worry about losing you."
"But that's not fair..." she cried softly into his chest.
Abad sighed. She was right, but he'd made his decision. "I've decided."
"And I've decided as well." The book's voice boomed through the chamber, loud enough to make Abad jump.
"What do you mean?"
The grimoire's covers snapped closed, and its skeletal body slid the book back between the skeleton's ribs. It leaned forward and placed its hand on Abad's head, its other on Angra's.
[Shared Fate]
"While normally a curse, I believe you will find this spell a blessing. The little one will, at the very least. Your fates are intertwined. If one dies, both die. Your fate and your companion's fate are now one." The Grimoire sat down on the floor next to them. It pulled its book back out and began scribbling once again.
Abad shook his head and stared at it dumbfounded. How much knowledge did the object hold? He didn't know any magic of that kind.
Angra's face lit up. "See? The stinky old book knows better than you. I'll be fine." The book gave them both a sly look, or whatever counted as one for a pair of red floating lights in a skeleton's face."Plus, you said it yourself. I saved you. You need me. Even the Goddess said so. I'm kind of a big deal. And I've seen your fighting. It sucks. You really do need me."
Abad laughed, but doubt filled his heart. "Are you sure this will work, book?"
The skeleton didn't look up. "Of course. [Shared Fate] was your master's favorite means of guaranteeing compliance. It's one of the many things she never taught you."
"I see. Then... Thank you."
"Please. We both know it is for the best. As the little one said, your fighting 'sucks.' You need to improve. Shall we start your lessons? You moved too quickly in your last life. You ought to stay a while and listen."
Abad shook his head. "Unfortunately, there is little time."
The book laughed. Dust shot out from its skeletal mouth as its cackling filled the renovated halls of Abad's vault. "You have nothing but time, little immortal. Astral sanctums are outside time and space."
"Reial was saved because I anchored my soul to the exact point in history when my life first ended. And I made the vault my sanctum. It's a part of me now. As long as I remain in the coffin, the vault stays in the astral sea. The second I leave it—"
"You will rejoin the world, and your vault along with it," the grimoire finished. He could feel a small pulse of mana. The book was reaching out and scanning the world around it. Its red eyes dimmed. "Time continues. The Depths have returned to surround this place." It shook its head. "Could you not have created better terms?"
Abad laughed. "Not exactly. The world was ending, and Elesara and I tried several options. None of them worked but this one."
"Elesara?" Angra asked.
"The Goddess."
"You know her name?" Her eyes narrowed.
"Yes. As I said, our relationship wasn't always antagonistic." Hazy memories floated into his mind, but he pushed them away. They didn't matter now.
"Well, then, we'd better prepare, shouldn't we?" The skeleton asked. "How much time until the world ends?"
"If I don't interfere and Helia finishes her ritual, Reial has three months. If things happen like they did last time, the world has a little over two months."
"You have two months to change the world. How exactly do you intend to do this?" The grimoire continued scrawling on its page.
"If I make the right choices, I might get more time."
"You said that earlier. I didn't understand it then, nor do I know."
"I have to ensure Helia can't complete her ritual. If I don't, the world will end. If I do, I might have a few years more to prepare."
"Do you believe that this is sufficient time to stop the end?" The book asked.
"I have no idea. But I don't intend to waste it." Abad stood. A great weight settled on his shoulders, but he welcomed it. Angra ran from his side and jumped into the air, her wings spreading behind her as she circled him. He noticed they had changed. She'd always had bat wings in the past. Now, they were adorned with black feathers.
"I have an idea, dark one. Give me three days to complete my work."
"I don't have time for—"
"Do not argue. You will find much use in what I provide." He stood, put his book back into his ribs, and marched to the back halls.
Abad watched as it walked away, but a thought came to him. "Book."
Its skeletal body turned. "Yes?"
"Would you be willing to write me a scroll?"
"Of course. That task would be trivial."
"Please create for me a [Teleportation Circle] scroll."
The skeleton nodded, then disappeared through the archway that led to the back halls of Abad's vault.
"Hey Angra?"
"Yes?" She landed on the ground, her feathered wings flapping several times to stablize herself.
"Let's go clean up. It'll be a long time before we have access to a nice bath. We should take advantage of it."
She grinned. "A girl likes it when she's treated well, Master. You're learning!"
***
After their bath, one of the skeletons handed Abad a scroll. When he took it, the skeleton bowed deeply, then returned to its tasks. He unfurled it and understood its principles. He spent all of his time learning its contents.
In three days, he was ready.
Abad sat on the edge of his sarcophagus. Angra sat in his lap.
This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
Curious about his current power, he pulled up his scroll. He needed to know where he was at. Abad watched as words etched themselves onto the ethereal page.
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Abad-Shai
Shadowspawn Sun Elf Warlock of the Mask
Level XVI
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Sun Elf
✭✭✭☆☆
1. [Fey Senses II] (Passive/Active, Reserve ◈): Elves possess heightened perception, blending their superior physical senses with an innate connection to magic. You can see in the dark, hear acutely, and use mana to detect magic around you if you dedicate mana to this ability. At rank II, your physical and magical senses are more honed and precise.
2. [Elven Grace]: Elven heritage gifts you with heightened reflexes, allowing you to react faster than most mortals. This talent provides a boost to speed, agility, and reaction time, particularly in combat and hazardous situations, you are sure-footed in all manner of environments, and your footsteps are nearly silent.
3. [Scion of Lost Light]: The remnants of a forgotten brilliance burn within you, a beacon of hope and defiance against the encroaching darkness. You and all allies within your aura gain increased resistance to shadow and necrotic damage, and your fire and light spells are infused with the Lost Light of Reial.
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The Mask
✭✭✭☆☆
1. [Illusion Magic] (Passive): You have the ability to weave subtle deceptions, clouding perception and bending reality to your will. You can learn spells that create illusions, deceive the senses, and manipulate perceptions of the world around you.
1. [Mask of Many Faces] (2nd Circle, Active, Reserve ◈◈): Due to being born under the sign of the Mask, you can dedicate a portion of your mana to change subtle elements of your appearance.
2. [Minor Illusion] (1st Circle, Active, Reserve ◈): Harness the power of deception to conjure a fleeting illusion that manipulates sight or sound. This spell allows you to create a convincing sensory trick.
3. [Armor of Shadows] (2nd Circle, Active, Reserve ◈◈): While active, you develop a second skin of shadow that absorbs a portion of incoming physical and magical damage and obscures your form, making you harder to detect or target.
2. [Quasireality] (Passive): Your mastery of deception allows you to blur the line between illusion and reality. All illusions you create are imbued with a fragment of reality, enabling them to partially interact with the physical world. These quasi-real illusions can deal minor damage, exert force, or create subtle environmental effects, confounding your enemies and enhancing your trickery.
3. [Locked]
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Shadowspawn
✭✭✭✭✭
1. [Dark One's Shadow] (Passive): As an inheritor of the Dark One’s essence, you are immortal and do not age past your prime. You also require less food, water, and air to survive, but you bear the marks of corruption upon your body.
2. [Devour the Weak] (Passive): Damage you inflict heals a small amount of your life force. Your magic is particularly potent against beings that share your dark heritage.
3. [Embrace of the Abyss II] (Passive): Darkness and shadows strengthen you. When in darkness or shadow, you gain an increase to your physical abilities equal to two ranks, and existing enhancements grow two ranks stronger. You also gain the become difficult to detect with both physical and magical senses as long as you’re in darkness, stacking with ranks of the [Stealth] enhancement. All shadow-based attacks and spells gain a boost in power.
4. [Nightmare Aspect] (Passive): By channeling your inner rage, you can transform into a shadow beast, gaining unnatural strength, agility, resilience, and an aura of terror. Your appearance alone can break the spirits of weak enemies, and all damage you inflict drains your foes and restores you.
5. [Dominion]: By infusing your words with your essence, you gain the ability to alter reality itself. Creatures, environments, and objects must adhere to your whims, provided your mana and essence reserves can sustain the change. The strength of your influence scales with your intent, the scope of the alteration, and the resistance of the target. The world bends, reshaped not by steel or spell, but by the simple utterance of your will. Dominion is yours to claim.
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Warlock
✭✭✭✭☆
1. [Summoning]: (Passive): You can call forth entities from other realms, who lend you their strength and skills. You can learn spells that summon, bind, and empower creatures and objects to serve and protect you.
1. [Teleportation Circle] (5th Circle, Active, Cost ◈◈◈◈◈): This spell enables the caster to establish permanent teleportation circles or teleport to existing circles that the caster has tied to.
1. Portal Ties
1. Temple of Yslene
2. Farnfoss
3. Wysten
2. [Blood Magic II] (Passive): Your life force fuels your magic, allowing you to cast additional spells at the cost of health. You can learn spells that draw on blood and life energy to strengthen your casting. At Rank II, your mastery over blood magic deepens, allowing you to draw on your life force with greater efficiency, casting blood-fueled spells at a reduced health cost. This level of skill also enables you to learn more advanced Blood Magic spells, expanding your arsenal in exchange for careful management of your own vitality.
1. [Essence Transfer] (1st Circle, Active, Cost ◈+◈/♥): The user can transfer a small amount of health or mana to or from a willing target.
2. [Sanguine Gift] (2nd Circle, Active, Cost ◈+♥): Sacrifice a portion of your life force to briefly grant yourself or an ally enhanced reflexes, strength, and stamina, amplifying their physical abilities in a burst of vitality.
3. [Devour Essence] (2nd Circle, Active, Cost ◈◈): Target an enemy or recently deceased creature within range. Drain a portion of their essence, dealing moderate damage to a living target or consuming a fragment of their energy. The drained essence replenishes a portion of your health and mana.
3. [Fire Magic] (Passive): You wield the essence of flame, strengthening your power over physical and spiritual fires and increasing your resistance to them. You can learn spells that summon, control, and unleash fire in its many forms.
1. [Burn the Weak] (1st Circle, Active, Cost ◈): You conjure a small, searing flame that can be thrown at creatures within sight, igniting and inflicting fire damage. This spell is especially effective against vulnerable or injured enemies, dealing additional damage to those already weakened.
2. [Candlelight] (1st Circle, Active, Cost ◈): You conjure a small flame that can be used to ignite inanimate objects and inflict small amounts of fire damage on a target.
3. [Eclipse] (5th Circle, Active, Cost ◈◈◈◈◈◇◇◇◇◇): When cast, a massive explosion erupts around the caster, engulfing the area in a swirling inferno light-infused flame.
4. [Black Magic] (Passive): You possess an affinity for dark, potent forces that lie beyond the mortal realm. Shadows and negative energies respond to your call, enabling subtle manipulation of fear, weakness, and despair in others. You may now learn Black Magic spells, tapping into powers that corrupt the living, obscure perception, and invoke primal dread.
1. [Corruption] (1st Circle, Active, Cost ◈): Draw on the shadows to infuse a target with negative energy, weakening their defenses and dulling their senses. This spell saps the target’s physical and mental resilience, leaving them vulnerable to further attacks and susceptible to effects that prey on fear and confusion.
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Enhancements
* [Evasion I] (Perk XII): Your reflexes improve to match those of a wild predator, such as a lynx or cheetah. You gain an increase in reaction speed and agility, allowing you to better dodge attacks and move fluidly.
* [Focus I] (Perk XIV): Your mental clarity improves, enhancing your ability to concentrate and reducing the likelihood of spell disruptions. This heightened focus increases your casting precision and slightly boosts your resistance to mental effects.
* [Life I] (Perk X): Fortifies your life force slightly, making you sturdier and harder to wear down in combat.
* [Life II] (Perk XVI): Fortifies your life force further, making you stouter than all but the strongest mortals.
* [Mana I] (Perk II): Increase your mana reserves by a small amount, allowing you to cast more spells.
* [Mana II] (Perk VIII): Increases your mana reserves by a sizeable amount, allowing for greater spell-casting endurance and more complex incantations.
* [Pack Bond] (Oath to Zethari): Grants an increase to your ability to work seamlessly with allies, enhancing cooperative efforts and tactics. Additionally, you gain a boost to perception when near companions.
* [Potence I] (Perk IV): Increase the potency of your spells, increasing their range, power, and duration by a small amount.
* [Potence II] (Perk VI): Further amplifies the strength of your spells, making each cast more impactful and destructive. This enhancement also slightly reduces resistance to your spells, increasing the chance of bypassing defenses.
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Titles
* [Master of the Vault]: Bestowed upon you by the mighty Grimoire, the last creation of the Archmage Aughra, this title marks you as a true keeper of lost knowledge and forgotten relics. You will always know in what direction your vault lies and the best path to get there, and you have a second sense for finding valuable items and equipment.
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Quests
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Equipment
* [Vaultkeeper's Pack]: This unassuming leather pack is bound to the Vault of Abad-Shai. Placing items into the pack will transfer them to his arcane sanctum, and by reaching within and giving a mental command, items can be retrieved.
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Achievements
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He'd retained much of his strength. Losing a small portion of himself wasn't bad at all compared to the last time he'd died. His level had remained intact, though his power decreased somewhat. It was nothing. Somehow, by anchoring his spirit to his vault, he'd been able to retain his growth.
"Dark one." He turned his attention to the book as it entered the main hall.
"My preparations are complete. Here." It tossed a pack to him.
"You made me a pack? Was that something worth wasting three days doing?" He opened the pack and looked inside. He felt a strange pull on his body. "It's enchanted?"
"Yes." The skeleton looks smug, and the face on the book's face grinned. "Try it. Reach your arm in."
Abad frowned but did what he was told. As he inserted his arm into the pack, it vanished. "So you made it larger on the inside than the outside? That's basic conjuration. Any hedge mage could do that."
"Not precisely."
"Oh?"
It walked to one of the chests filled with coins. Grabbing a handful, it marched up to him and thrust the coins into his hand. "Drop the coins into the pack."
He turned his hand over and dropped the handful of coins into the bag. When he did, he heard jingling in the distance. Clicking told him several of the skeletons were rushing to the sound. A moment later, two of them bent over, picked something up and approached. They were holding the coins he'd dropped in the bag
"It bends space," Abad said.
"Yes." The skeleton reached out and deposited several more coins into the open bag. The skeletons rushed toward the sound once again. "Anything you deposit will be sent to your vault. Now, you will truly live up to your title."
"That's... brilliant. I never thought to make something like this."
"You couldn't. There is much that remains for you to learn, young one."
He shook his head. His teacher was still so far beyond him. "Book, will you come with me?"
The skeleton shook its head. "You may only share your fate with one other." It turned its skull to him. "Plus, I have grown... attached to this place. You must go on alone. Or rather, with that imp." It chuckled. "Be off. You are running out of time." He gestured toward the repaired teleportation circle. "If any comes here, I will protect my home with my existence."
"Thank you, book." He smiled. "Truly. Without you, I wouldn't have made it this far."
"Of course not. I am my maker's creation. I was meant to be used."
Abad laughed. "We'll meet again."
"We will."
Abad focused his mind and drew upon his spirit. He fixed his mind on Yslene's statue. He was behind, but he might catch up to his former allies if he hurried. He knew the path this time.
He stepped into the circle and set his jaw. Angra stepped beside him and grabbed his hand.
"Are you ready, little one?"
"To save you again? I've never been more ready."
He smiled. He could do it. Whatever the path was that lay ahead, he'd find it.
[Teleportation Circle]