Resurrection magic.
A tingle ran down Ted’s spine. If he had the power to bring the dead back to life… well, he wouldn’t be the barely accepted outsider anymore.
Not unless it was banned—then they’d probably try to kill him.
Cara stared at him, her mouth hanging open. Was she thinking about the fellow hunters the village had lost? If there was a chance to bring them back, he knew she’d take it, banned or not.
Jeremy, meanwhile, was as calm as if he’d been read a weather report. This wasn’t news to him. “The Empire declared it profane necromancy. Almost all mention of it was wiped from existence. Even discussing its existence is forbidden under penalty of death.”
No wonder they’d kept their attempts to explore the ruins a secret. Was bringing him here a sign of his trust, or of desperation? “Alright, so, let’s never tell anyone about this, got it. How do I open it?”
“Apply your blood to the seal.”
Quivers in his chest fluttered and snuck into Ted’s voice. “That’ll work?”
Jeremy half shrugged. “Shoot the bow and listen.”
Coming from Jeremy, that was somewhere between worrying and downright scary. “Dagger, please, Cara. The smaller one.”
She passed it to him with a gleam in her eyes. “Here you go!”
Ted’s nose wrinkled. Here he was about to spill his blood onto ancient magic with no idea what would happen, and she was watching like it was prime time. Not that he should have expected otherwise. “Alright then, let’s do this.”
He stood before the door, his rib cage crushing in around him. Discern Magic once again made it crystal clear the seal was bad news. Did he really want to do this? Blood magic didn’t exactly have the best reputation, and it seemed many of Earth’s folktales drew inspiration from this world.
His breathing raced ahead, and he reined it back in. If Jeremy thought it was worth the risk, he had to trust him over legends from another world.
Steady breathing, steady hand, a clean cut.
He held the blade above the palm of his hand. Why was it always the palm? His hands were important. Wouldn’t his fingertip, or the bottom of his ear, make more sense?
What the hell, he’d be healing it, anyway.
The knife sliced through the skin easily. Pain cried out, a fire that spread and consumed everything it touched while demanding relief. Relief it couldn’t have, not yet.
He applied his hand to the door. The blood seeped out and disappeared into the wood. No, Discern Magic revealed, not into the door, but into the magical seal. The densely interwoven threads and aspects of the seal lit up in a pattern far too complex to track.
“Is it working?” Cara asked, bouncing on her tiptoes, watching yet seeing none of the magical action.
Something was happening, but this was beyond him. Could Jeremy discern more?
Jeremy shook his head. “No. Only part of the puzzle.”
Could it be the same here as on Earth? Ted chuckled to himself and muttered, “Something you have, something you are, something you know.”
Jeremy’s eyebrow shot up. “I didn’t know you were familiar with magical security.”
“I’m not.” Ted smiled. Maybe his computing knowledge wasn’t so useless here after all. “The fundamentals of security don’t change, no matter the type of lock.”
He handed the dagger back to Cara with a grateful bow and held up his hand, considering what the best way to proceed was. The pain, and the blood, would make casting the Heal spell trickier.
Before he could act, Jeremy grabbed his wrist in a steely grip and beat him to the punch. “No explosions in here,” Jeremy said, pressing green swirling magic against the cut.
A warm tingling filled Ted’s hand, soothing the pain away. “Thanks,” he said, watching as the cut sealed itself up, leaving not even a trace behind.
The non-instantaneous nature of healing magic gave Ted an idea. If he crafted a long-duration self-heal, he could precast it and it would heal him once injured. That’d be easier than casting with injured hands, or worse.
Ted made a mental note to experiment with it next time they rested, and returned to the problem at hand. “That should be ‘something you are’ checked off, though, right?”
“Correct,” Jeremy said, with a certainty that made Ted pause for a moment. What secrets was the Prowler still holding? “Around a third of the seal is disabled.”
“Alright, that leaves something to have, and something to know.”
Jeremy nodded. “If anywhere, they’ll be in the Divine Empire.”
That was a little too convenient. But if it was planned, then by who? Then again, maybe it was just coincidence. It seemed like the Divine Empire was the focal point for a lot of the world, the grand prize that the Heroes had fought over. “Sounds like a quest.”
Jeremy stiffened up. “Do you both swear to silence? To share the quest with no one? To keep it a secret until the end of time?”
Given the penalty of death for even discussing the existence of the magic here, secrecy sounded like a damned good idea. “I do.”
That left Cara, lost in her own world studying the not-carvings on the wall. A silence fell and dragged out for a few moments until she turned to face Jeremy. Her brow furled and she fiddled with her fingers, her gaze darting around. “I’ll… do my best?”
Another silence fell, more awkward than before. After what felt like an eternity, Jeremy swallowed hard and closed his eyes for a moment. “Remember what’s at stake, Cara. I have faith in you.”
Quest received: Restore ancient wood elven magic.
Quest giver: Keeper Laotan Erinbar So’aroaska
Quest description: Powerful magic lost to the Wood Elves is sealed within the ancient ruin east of Tolabar. Breaking the seals requires three parts: being, having, and knowing. Acquire them and unlock the Tree of the Druids to recover its secrets. Multi-part quest.
Quest reward (completion): 50,000 XP, gain access to magical effects Mend, Commune, Grow, Shapechange, and Rebirth
Part 1 description: Discover what one must be to unlock the seals.
Part 1 reward: 5,000 XP
Part 2 description: Discover what one must possess to unlock the seals.
Part 2 reward: 5,000 XP
Part 3 description: Discover what one must know to unlock the seals.
Part 3 reward: 5,000 XP
Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.
Part 4 description: Unlock all five seals in the Tree of the Druids.
Part 4 reward: Quest completion
Restore the ancient wood elven magic (part 1) completed.
5,000 XP received!
Level increased 5 → 6!
Sweet, a level up, and all Ted had needed to do was spill his own blood. Since spellcasting capability was the order of the day, and not the kind with illusions and telepathy, he spent the stat point on Intelligence, bringing it up to 19, before rereading the quest.
Like the last one, it had the decency to include actual information. Most of it was unsurprising, but one section Ted struggled to believe, even reading it over and over. “Laotan put you up to this? He seemed curious in the meeting, but… well, I guess politics is another thing that’s the same everywhere.”
Jeremy nodded solemnly. “Sometimes, secrecy is necessary. It is often unclear how to best help our people.”
Help our people. Maybe politics wasn’t the same here after all. “Politics is their problem. Ours is getting past these doors. Guessing you can’t teleport through them?”
“No. This is an extra-dimensional pocket. Teleportation is impossible here. Same reason we cannot cut through the walls.”
“They aren’t really walls, right?” That was plan B caput, not that it had ever really stood a chance.
What did they know? What could they use? Ted leaned against the bark wall and stroked his chin. “Toward the end of the Age of Heroes, they shut this place down suddenly. I assume you had Grow for a long time before that, right?”
“Correct. All of those magics had long histories, except for Rebirth.”
“The Great Tree still responds to the tree-song,” Cara interjected, without looking up from her study of the walls. “It’s slow, though.”
It sounded a lot like an MMORPG event. Introduce a powerful new magic that lets you bypass Death’s bargains, then lock it away and require three things to open it. If races were factions which fought over the Divine Empire, it’d fit for the race required to unlock it to be that of the current holder. Make the different factions fight over it. “I think these seals are supposed to be openable only by the Divine Emperor.”
“Perhaps.” Jeremy paused and his speech slowed. “We suspected as such. Given there was no Divine Emperor for millennia after the Age of Heroes, that would explain ten thousand years of failure.”
If part one of the quest involved conquering an Empire, how hard would parts two and three be? Since the seals were unbroken, presumably the Heroes had disappeared before they could assemble all three pieces.
Resurrection magic, though… That would be one hell of a boon.
He stared at the seal, his mind whirring. If this was a simulated world, and it had been some kind of scripted event, it wouldn’t have had to follow all the rules to the letter, but maybe it held to some. He stared closer at the magic of the seal, tracing the interlocking threads that held it together.
It was far more complex and powerful than any other magic he’d encountered, but it wasn’t unfamiliar in the way the Ring of Return or the library books were. “The seal’s a spell. The duration is… long. Really, really, long.”
Given infinite power and a short deadline to seal a door, slapping together a cheated spell and casting it on the door might well have been the simplest solution. Or maybe it was simply easier that way, rather than stacking more enchants upon the already enchanted door.
Ted smiled. Maybe this wouldn’t be a complete bust after all. The more aspects he could identify in the seal, the easier discerning new aspects would be. “Do you know a spell that can repair things?”
“I do!” Cara shouted. “I’ve gotten really good at fixing things.” She smiled sheepishly. “I’ve had a lot of practice.”
“How about a spell for holding something in place?”
Jeremy nodded. “An orc sold me one as a combat spell. Ineffective, unless you’re fighting a snail.”
“All I need is the aspect.” If this worked, they might come away with some magic after all.
They headed outside, just in case, and a few minutes later, Ted had two new spells in his spell list and picked out the new aspects.
Lesser Repair (Transmutation/Touch/Repair)
Weak Hold (Force/Projectile/Hold)
“You going to fill us in?” Jeremy asked, as they re-entered the extra-dimensional space.
“Only if it works,” Ted said, smiling as confidently as he could and taking up position close to the Rebirth door. “Now, throw some offensive magic at this one.”
“You’re trying to isolate an aspect from the door.” Jeremy shook his head. “It can’t be done.”
“Why not?”
Jeremy frowned. His forehead wrinkled, and for a moment he seemed to come around. Then, in an instant, the uncertainty was gone, replaced by an unwavering smile. “It can’t be done.”
Had something tugged him back into line? Magic? The System Death had mentioned?
That a powerful force didn’t want it attempted suggested it would work. Would that power, whoever or whatever it was, not mind Heroes doing it, or was Ted just harder to influence? If so, this might make him a dangerous enemy.
Was he harder to influence?
Icy tendrils took root in Ted’s gut. How would he even know? An uncomfortable thought, but not one he could do anything about. “Actually, maybe you two should step outside, in case there are traps.”
Jeremy nodded. “Make it quick. We should leave shortly.”
If any door would be trapped, it would be Rebirth. Better to start small. Ted squared up to the door leading to Growth and took a deep breath. Hopefully he wouldn’t regret this.
He drew on his mana and weaved it into Firestarter. “Enkir.”
The spark collided with the door. Nothing happened, not even under his Discern Magic. Had he misjudged it? Or did it have to be powerful enough to cause damage?
Technically, this wasn’t the Forest. Besides, it wouldn’t catch fire, anyway.
He held the Firestarter spell in his mind and amped up the power to the Ignite aspect, crafting a more potent version of the spell. He checked and rechecked it, determined not to visit Death again quite so soon.
If it went wrong, he wouldn’t hold on. He’d release it right away, tank the blast, and hope Jeremy never found out.
Ted chuckled to himself. Apparently, that was what passed as a solid plan these days.
He reached inside and mana eagerly answered his call. Pulling on it, he bound it into the spell and aimed it at the door. “Enkirtara!”
The firebolt slammed into the seal and a complex, interweaving cascade of white, teal, gold and other colors flared up, dissipating the spell without even a hint of damage.
Cautious excitement fluttered in Ted’s stomach. A Protection aspect that guarded against hostile magic would make the detour more than worth it. He repeated the experiment several times, building an ever more complete image in his mind of what happened when the firebolt hit the seal.
Every time the firebolt struck, a white aspect flashed—Hold, neutralizing what little momentum the firebolt had—and the fire magic rippled through the lines of the seal, diverted and funneled to a teal aspect that swallowed it whole. With the magic spent, a faint gold sheened across the door, repairing any damage that might have been done.
Fire magic skill increased 1 → 2!
As the model built up in Ted’s mind, he carefully removed the aspects that he recognized. The unidentified Protection aspect was the bulk of what was left behind, but that wasn’t quite everything. Small amounts of magic slipped deeper into the seal, beyond his ability to discern and analyze it.
A redundant second layer, perhaps? Begrudgingly, he focused on what he could see—no point speculating on a problem he couldn’t solve. Not yet, anyway.
The model of the Protection aspect was nearly formed in his mind, so close he could taste it. It really wasn’t so far off reading code. Really intricate, interconnected code without any comments, but at least it wasn’t full of goto statements.
A few more casts later, and the Absorb aspect solidified in his mind.
For discerning a rare spell aspect from an active spell, you are awarded the trait Insights to Aspects. One additional aspect is ignored when determining cohesion penalty while crafting spells.
Perception skill increased 3 → 4!
Nice. Ted mentally probed his new trait, confirming that it would stack with Cohesion. When it came to crafting more complex spells, that would be very useful.
With the new Perception perk point, he leveled Discern Magic again and the wood elven magic lining the walls jumped into even greater detail. Marvelous, incredible detail. “I’ll be back,” he said, hoping that it would be true.
The magic tingled across his skin as he passed back through the threshold to the Great Forest. Did it warp space, disintegrating and reassembling him? No, that would kill him as he passed through. However it worked didn’t really make sense—it was magic, it didn’t have to be logical.
Outside, Jeremy stood watch while Cara sat cross-legged, carving wood and humming a merry tune, oblivious to the world.
“All ready?” Jeremy said.
Phrased as a question or not, Ted knew the expected answer. “Yeah. We can go now.”
Cara looked up from her carving, which now looked very much like Nibbles. “Get anything good?”
A tug pulled at Ted’s heart. It was a shame that the darling little creature couldn’t come along, but it was for the best. “Yup—the Absorb aspect, which protects against hostile spells. Thinking it might help make Spellcrafting safer, and give us the edge on any casters we have to fight.”
That earned a warm smile from even Jeremy. Well, a smile, at least. “Teach me before you go. We’re fast-tracking casters. Anything that can help? We need it. Anyone asks, you learned it from a dungeon spawn mage.”
“Understood.” Ted shivered, remembering being blown to pieces by his own spell. If he could stop even one Ranger killing themselves training, it would be worth it. “I’ll level Protection as much as I can before we have to part ways.”
“Thank you.” Jeremy bowed his head before gesturing north. “Let’s move.”