After the two Unspoken priests left, Sarah warned Crow about his actions and showed him the symbol of the Brotherhood of the Unspoken.
“If you see that on their stole, be mindful of what you say. Especially since you’ve antagonized them, we’ll send a report through the Clergy under Emma’s name.”
“Do it under Buer’s name. That self-righteous bastard would likely report it, anyway. Let him take the blame,” Crow laughed.
Sarah nodded and felt Buer was a better choice; he was arrogant and too dumb to think for himself. Maybe the fallout would be enough to wake him up.
The following two days were uneventful, and Crow spent his spare time in the library provided. It didn’t have much information, but surprisingly, it had several books on curses and methods of resisting them.
Even with a Shield, a curse wasn’t instantly dispelled. Depending on the amount of mana and a cultivator’s power, it could last anywhere from a few minutes to a few days. Reinforcing a curse was a method of stacking them on an individual, allowing the caster to extend the duration.
Crow didn’t have time to process all the data, so he memorized it and only focused on finding information about the Dark Blessing used on them. Eventually, he found a plain-sounding curse that matched the changes he’d noticed. It was called the Curse of the Dead and was an aura-based curse. Everyone that came in contact with him felt like they were in the presence of the undead.
It was called a Dark Blessing because it allowed a living cultivator to perform specific Dark Arts used by the dead. Advanced zombies could use spells like Pestilence, and if Crow knew those spells, in theory, he could cast them now.
All that aside, he found this information a little more disturbing than he liked. It implied that the under realms had their own cultivation and abilities. The Unspoken’s plan felt like they were herding sacrificial sheep into a wolves’ den.
This thought spurred him to adapt and try out some of his abilities under his new passive aura. It wasn’t like his Astral Aura because it felt inherent to his existence, which meant it would interfere with his current abilities.
Crow could still use some of his abilities because most were related to spirits and the dead—specifically, the Ghost-type techniques. Even though he’d transformed them into spells that used his Astral Aura, this was a good thing and benefited him greatly in this current situation.
A Druid Circle, for example, used the natural mana in an area to transform the templated techniques. All he had to do was experiment a little to determine how his abilities would change. Blood Thorn—now called Spectral Vines—was his primary ability, but he wondered if she should find another power that was less taxing on his mana.
He liked the plant-based spells and felt a high affinity toward woody plants, like vines. That was likely because of Soul Carving, but the reason didn’t matter. Spectral Vines had a lot of applications which could be snares, entanglement, whips, and thorn-type attacks. It was versatile, but he had an idea that with his Astral Aura, Druid Arts might provide him with some unique adaptations.
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Druid Arts were simple charms that compelled the natural spirits of the world to act. Crow rarely used them because he had other means, but after thinking about it, the basics were often the foundation for understanding and growth. He thought the charms were useless because they provided minor utility and distractions but no combat ability. He could invoke a wolf howl within fifty meters of himself, which wouldn’t scare most cultivators. Start a fire by conjuring a flame, make a plant grow faster, or cause a random, natural, very minor weather event.
The most helpful charm was Path Finding, which allowed Crow to request nature to part and let him pass. It was an ability he used long ago when escaping after Gideon took his mother. It was why his path through the forest was relatively unhindered. He didn’t know it then, but Druid Arts were almost natural-born abilities for his people.
Vines was a nature or plant-related ability that aligned with Druid Arts. As the Druid Arts advanced, there were spells they could master, which could become the foundation for more powerful techniques later. Crow felt it was highly likely that Blood Thorn grew from Druid Arts. Some of the low-level spells related were things like snares and thorns.
The ability to control flames was also part of the family. Initially, it starts as a little flare ability used to start fires, but it develops in various ways, including fire control. It was likely that his control over the heavenly flames was probably related to this control.
Crow was suddenly interested in these arts because of several plant-related charms. The charm that interested him the most was being able to communicate with plants and plant growth. However, there was another charm, possibly a spell, called Plantsportation. Crow cringed at the name, but that’s what they wrote in the Druid Arts. It was like the Astrologer’s teleportation ability but with a few significant restrictions. First, it was strictly realm based, meaning he couldn’t even jump floors or into sub-worlds. Second, it required physical contact with a plant in that realm. In other words, he could only teleport between two plants he touched. Last, the plant had to be large enough to support the cast, or it’d end up destroyed, sending Crow out of the space tunnel created between the two.
Those limitations weren’t all that bad but required some preparation on his part. The ability was best used between trees, which had more natural energy to assist the transfer. The one problem was Crow didn’t have the specifics of the spell on him. The next keystone he found, he’d request a copy from the Druid Council. Actually, Crow was going to ask for the entire compendium on Druid Arts. They wouldn’t hesitate to send him a copy if he contributed to its growth.
Now that he had a plan, he began using his time to take apart the charms he knew. Plant growth was pretty simple. Stripped of the botanical element, it was eerily similar to the mending ability. He paid attention to where the original spell appeared within his Astral Aura, and when he used the spectral version of it on his head, he felt his hair growing at an alarming rate.
Crow attempted to modify the Plant Parley ability, but outside the normal placement within his Astral Aura, he couldn’t find any other use. Primarily, it was because he didn’t have other language techniques to use as a comparison, so he felt he should find one and see if he could figure out how to create a universal type of communication.
Druid Arts had three circles of development that he knew about based on the charms he knew: Plants, Earth, and Flame. It was likely that water and wind were also circles since these were elements found in the natural world. There were also poison skills, and he initially felt those belonged in the Plant circle, but knowing that many venoms came from animals, maybe it deserved a circle of its own. He was trying to classify these arts but kept circling the same thoughts—techniques were not so easily categorized.
“All paladins come to the atrium—it’s time.” A voice boomed through the entire building, alerting everyone that their destiny with the under realm was at hand. Crow shuddered slightly but quickly reorganized his thoughts. The three of them left the room in silence—all lost in their thoughts.