Van went on a killing spree, blasting any zombies that got too close and forcibly banishing any ghosts as well.
The ghosts were not like the ones he knew in the community homes, they were more like the apparition that he met before. Eyes wholly black or red, limbs missing or too transparent, hands like claws and worse.
He didn't care to save any of his energy at the moment, he was surrounded and preferred not to be. That was all that mattered to him right now.
In the back of his head, he wondered if he should bring out his familiars or perhaps Anna. But even now, he refused to give in to those thoughts. He rather use the amulet and teleport out than have to rely on them for everything. This was him trying to prove to himself that he could take care of himself, that he could be a proud spirit caller and necromancer. And a necromancer, or a summoner for that matter, was never outnumbered.
Thanking his past self, he summoned four wolves made of shadow. They were slightly stronger than the one that was used to hold down the death wolf of the past. He even went so far as to use parts of that death wolf to augment the shadow wolves he summoned, making them far stronger.
With a will, he sent them to attack the ghosts and zombies that were slowly trying to surround and overwhelm him. They shredded into the rotting flesh of his enemies, and even the ghosts were surprised to find that their semi-incorporeal forms were no defense against the pure shadow energy of his wolves.
Taking his time, van slowly dealt with the undead, ringing his lantern every so often to stun them and give his wolves an easier time, and blasting any that got too close to him. After what felt like forever but was probably like ten minutes, he finished the last of them off.
“Alright, no more mister nice guy. This stupid place wants war, I’ll give it war!” not that he had any choice at this moment. Ringing the lantern so many times probably woke up the mansion nice and proper, and it probably would now be more determined than ever to get rid of the intruder that messed with its sleep. Which meant Van had to pull out all the stops if he was going to get anywhere.
Taking some time to gather all the essence that was made from killing all those undead, he paused in the center of the room to decide what his next course of action would be.
“I already checked most of the first floor… Perhaps I should check the second floor and see if it has a study, maybe it will have some info about where I can find the core…” with that in mind Van dispelled any fear he might have, putting himself in the proper mindset, and set his wolves to guard him in square formation. Two in the front, two in the back, with him taking the center and summoning a ball of white light so that he could see better.
Taking a mana potion, he left for the second floor.
The mansion seemed content to wait for him, he could almost feel it biding its time as he walked up the creaking stairs and looked down the long dark corridors of the second floor. It also gave up most if any pretext of pretending not to know that he was there. The eyes of paintings and statues were watching him, and they did not care anymore to hide it.
With a grunt, Van sent some of his shadow magic to temporarily blind up the eyes of the paintings and statues. Cruel? Maybe… but he had this thing about being stared at, especially by a creepy house that wanted to kill him.
The upstairs was also much different than the downstairs. Lounge rooms, guest rooms, and more, he slowly walked down the dark corridors. The sudden silence and inactivity from what he faced downstairs, unnerving him.
Opening a few doors, he found that everything was in its place, nothing out of the ordinary. This actually went to confuse and worry Van, as it made him feel like the house was preparing something that he probably wouldn’t enjoy.
Going deeper he finally found what appeared to be the master bedroom. Lavish and more importantly, excessive and gaudy designs made up the room. He lingered a little, despite the danger, the room carried a sense of presence, a lingering feeling of the past and of whoever lived here. It was a cruel feeling, an obsessive one, and staying in the room was slowly making his spine shiver. Worse, it seemed the house particularly didn’t like him barging into the place.
Sensing that the core he was searching for was not there, he left to look elsewhere.
Finally finding what he was looking for, he entered the study, the smell of old books and mold making up the air. But no matter how much he looked around at the books, he couldn’t find any title that popped out to him. Even when he used his mana sense, he felt nothing important showing up.
It was then that he realized that the master bedroom and the study were very close to each other and that there was a lot of space in between. “Perhaps there is a secret personal study?”
Forcing his senses to the utmost, he checked the walls and bookcases for anything out of place. After half an hour and almost giving up, he sensed a hollowness from one of the walls. Using his mana, he seeped it in through the cracks of the wall and into the opening mechanism, forcing it to work.
With a loud thunk, the wall very slowly and with difficulty gave way. Allowing Van to access what lied beyond.
This new study was far different than the one that was clearly meant for show. It was darker, and the titles displayed on the new rows of books were stomach-churning, to say the least.
Walking a little further, he entered a large dark room, using his magic, set to light the candles and shined his light over the place. Revealing a desk with notes strewn about and a few bones on the opposite side with what appeared to be runes engraved onto them. Walking over to the notes, he started to read.
It was mostly about whoever this person was, trying to figure out the best way to make skeletons stronger, by engraving runes onto the bones. Not something bad in general, if anything, an interesting idea. It went on how this person went and stole the idea of putting runes on corpses from another who they deemed weak and lesser and took that person's ideas further. The way this person went about it was to engrave them while the person was still alive as opposed to being dead because they felt like the pain and agony will help trap the soul energy of the person into the bones better, making them more powerful.
Again, Van was reminded that the people of the Nilfan empire practiced dark necromancy. While he did read up about the runes, whenever he saw a note that just went into the torture of the people this affected, he burned it.
Which might have been a bad idea, for the second that he did, the bones slowly started to form together into a horrific monstrosity. A golem made of bones with hands for claws and several heads looking every which way, towering over him. The growls and barks of his wolves were all the warning he got as it swiped at one of his wolves, destroying it in one move with surprising ease and quickness. The runes on its body glowing a menacing light.
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Van was temporarily in shock with how easily the bone golem destroyed one of his wolves, already deducing that the runes must be giving its attacks some sort of magical property that would allow it to so easily destroy a being mostly made of shadow.
It roared with a dozen voices, sending a chill down Van’s spine as he prepared to fight this monstrosity. “How the hell am I going to beat that!?” he thought to himself.
But unlike before when he fled the wraith, he was going to try and defeat this foe. First things first, he tried to slow it down so he could buy some time to figure out how to defeat it. Using his shadow magic, he wove tendrils of darkness around its legs and sent more to his wolves to make them stronger.
He then willed his wolves to stay on the defensive, dodging when they could and only attacking when an opening presented itself. Sadly, it was not very effective. The wolves had a hard time dealing any damage to something that was made with hard bone and magical protection's. All they could do was keep it occupied and distracted as he kept having to reinforce the shadow bindings on its legs.
The bone golem roared angrily as it tried to attack the many wolves that were running around. Through sheer force of will, and probably thanks to some of its natural magic, it tore at its bindings and stamped down with its leg with great force. Flinging two of the wolves away, damaging them, but thankfully not destroying them.
Realizing that he was running out of options and time, Van contemplated if he should use the lantern again. Instinct was telling him not to, warning him that it might just make it angrier and more focused on him. But at the moment, what other choice did he have?
Banging his lantern, the chime seemed to madden the golem, and it glared angrily at Van, just as he feared.
But Van still wasn’t going to run away. Instead, he pulled out his saber and prepared to go toe to toe with the golem and see if his sword could do more damage than his wolves. Using his focusing orb, he sent a large and fast fireball that blasted a small portion of the golem. Willing his wolves to surround and attack so as to provide himself with openings. He ran towards the golem, prepared to fight for his life.
Not wanting to waste any more of his mana, he amped up his aura. Time seemed to slow as he sped up. But just because he was faster, didn’t mean that it still wasn’t dangerous, if he was hit by its claws, it would do enough damage to see him out of commission for the next few days. Which meant that he would be automatically teleported out, thanks to the amulet.
Dodging said swipe of the claws, Van jumped and stabbed his sword as deep as it could go in order to gauge how thick the golem’s defenses were. Just as he feared, while it was easy to get in between the gaps, or to damage or cut some of the small bones that made up the bone golem. It would be impossible to do anymore without magic.
Jumping back now, he sent another blast of fire to send it reeling so he could buy some time and space to think. He didn’t want to spend any more of his mana, but at the moment he might not have another choice.
Taking a potion, he prepared to brute force his way through this fight, that was until an idea came to him. Realizing that there were many gaps in the golem and that most of the golem was just composed of many separate reanimated skeletons working as one, he began to think of how he could use that to his advantage.
Unfortunately for him, he didn’t have as much time as he thought, as the golem charged at him faster than he was expecting it to recover. Its runes flaring and its speed and power increasing at an alarming rate.
It took everything Van had just to not get hit. It ignored the wolves now and was solely set on trying to kill him. Using what Van had learned from his classes, he prepared a few spells that would interfere with the magic that reanimates corpses.
Sending said necromantic blasts at the golem, they were designed to effectively cut off the power and magic of the undead, something most necromancers could do. Slowly, some of the skeletons that the golem was composed of lost power and fell away. But it still wasn’t enough, that only made it redouble its efforts and Van was slowly losing space to dodge and steam to continue with him slowly being backed into a corner.
It was then that he tried to use all of his senses, trying to figure out what other weakness the golem could have, desperately looking for any insight. “I didn’t want to have to do this!” Van sent a massive fireball that took half of his mana. It blew a small hole in it’s chest and many more chunks of its bone flew off.
Taking the opportunity of his staggered opponent, he fled around the golem to open space and ordered his wolves to attack it from behind. “It’s times like these I’m glad I have so much more mana than most, otherwise that would have depleted me. I only have one more blast like that left in me. I could try again and hope that would end it and just take the time to recover afterward. But there's no telling if that would be enough or that I will have that kind of time in a place this dangerous.” That was until a thought came to his mind.
The bone golem turned around, or more, reformed its bones in such a way that its damage was fixed and that it was now facing his way. Slightly smaller than before, but not by much, it charged at him with a fury. Ignoring his wolves it went straight for him, which was exactly what Van was hoping for.
As the bone golem ate up the distance between it and him, its foot suddenly fell into the ground, stopping it in its tracks and falling face forward. Half its leg was now stuck in a portal made of pure shadow.
Normally, even the best shadowmancers could not force a living thing in their shadow, as all living things have an aura that protects them from such magics. But the golem wasn't alive, and he already checked for an aura and found none. Which meant that the golem was less necromantic in nature, and more pure golemancy.
But even this was straining Van, having the energy of the golem in his shadow felt like too much water being pushed into a very small balloon. But he just needed to keep it still for a few moments more.
Sending one of his shadow wolves to attack, he sacrificed it mid-flight and turned it into a shadowy webbing that adhered to the golem, keeping it down. Now feeling the strain of keeping a part of the golem in the shadow and another shadow keeping it down, Van moved to quickly cast the spell he was hoping would finish the golem off once and for all.
From what he could deduce from his mana and spirit sight. The golem was using the souls sacrificed to it as a power source, the runes acting like a conduit for its movement and power. With a clap of his hands, and with the focusing orb to help, he created a banishing/exorcism formation hovering right above the golem. Using the last of his mana, he completed the spell and activated it.
Van did not hear it, but he felt it, the screams of both agony and joy of the souls that were released from the many skeletons that formed the golem. A silent thanks as it ended and the golem stopped moving.
He stood there for a while, slightly unbelieving at how he got away with his life. Wanting to collapse, but having too much pride, looked around until he found a chair he could walk to and sit down with a crash on.
Sitting there, he just let himself enjoy the moment of victory as he tried to recover from that horrible ordeal.
Feeling a little better half an hour later, he decided to take the opportunity to look over some of the notes that were now strewn about thanks to the scuffle.
Hours went by as he read what he could on what the madmen who made the golem was doing in this secret study. Hours more to fully recover. But after all that, he came out of it with a morbid respect for the madman. It still didn't stop him from burning such evil notes after reading them though.
Throughout his reading, he did learn a few more things about necromancy that he was planning to use later, not to mention giving him some ideas on how he could improve as a necromancer as well. He also learned that most of the notes he read were stolen from another, who was studying something similar, though not in such a gruesome way. The person whose idea was to use living people also had several side projects as well and seemed to hate a person called Rudrick, from who most of the notes were stolen from.
But what was really important was finding out that there was a secret underground near the training ground in the basement. Somewhat similar to what was in his own home, a vault where most of one's treasury was put.
It was there where the madmen did most of his, or her, experiments, and where most of the victims would be as well. Which meant that it probably was crawling with undead. But at least he now knew where the core was, and where to go next.
With that in mind, he prepared what little he could, even going so far to summon four more shadow wolves. Unfortunately, they were not only not the strongest, as they were test and experimental summons, but also the last of his summons.
A little disappointing, but reminded him that he should always be better prepared. Speaking of which, when he gets back, he should thank Lorenzo, the mana-focusing orb was far more useful than he first thought it would be.
With those thoughts out of the way, he did one more check to make sure he was prepared and set out. Determined to get as far as he can, and prove to himself, how much he has matured.