Death After Death

Mentally and Morally, Simon was deeply opposed to blood magic, but after he’d seen what the Murani had done with some of their spells, he understood the appeal. Whether he was willing to do something like that to an actual human was out of the question, but a goblin was something he was more open to, even if he hadn’t decided one way or the other.

Thanks to the coma he’d drifted in and out of for who knew how long, what should have been a desperate need to devour their life force was just the slightest tickle at the back of his skull. That wasn’t the driver. It was that he’d allowed secrecy to stymy his creativity in his final years in Ionar. Until that final battle, he’d worked hard to keep his secrets under wraps for reasons that were both personal and political.

If he’d had the chance to run back to his rooms, he could have retrieved some of the rune-carved arrowheads he’d crafted to try. They weren’t quite grenades or shoulder-fired missiles or anything, but it would have been fun to see them in action just the same. Simon had other ideas, too. Honestly, he probably had too many. He still wasn’t sure how far he wanted to go down the road of magical warfare, but he did kind of want to test some of his ideas out on the little green vermin while they were around.

They could help him lose weight. He definitely needed that. Being back at the beginning of things felt like he’d been shoved into someone else’s body. He no longer recognized, or even identified with, who he’d been when he’d come here.

It is nice to feel young again, though, Simon thought as he walked outside and into the sunlight.

He’d felt old for so long that he’d kind of forgotten what it was like. He’d just stayed fiftyish for a decade. Even with his excess weight now, he could feel the difference in his joints and in his lungs, and for a while, he just stood there, feeling the breeze and the heat of the sun play upon his skin.

It was only when he felt revitalized that he walked to the stream. This time, it wasn’t to fish or get some cool, clean water. He just wanted that soft, clean sand to draw in as he tried to come up with the right tool for the job.

He had a sword and a dagger, and though neither one was of particular quality, they were both acceptable enough to be imprinted with magic. The question was what spell to fix them with. Having grown old more than once now, Simon was becoming stingy with his years, and he wasn’t so happy to fritter them away as he had in the past.

“Age catches up to you quick, even on runs where my not-wife doesn’t make me wait a for A FUCKING DECADE to see my son,” he grumbled to himself.

This was another trick he hadn’t discovered until far enough into the pit that it was embarrassing, but he used it often now, even it a stream, wasn’t ideal because it made the letters blurred and distorted. Calling the mirror did not require a physical mirror, after all, it only required a reflective surface.

He studied his notes for a moment and drew a few lines on the bank nearby. Then he brought up Vosden, Hyakk, and Celdura and made a few more notes. Up until now, he’d always used drain to drain literal life energy for himself, but that had been from convenience as much as habit. In his last life, all he’d really needed was to stay a little younger, a little longer.

He’d done experiments that had transferred other things, though, like heat and hardness. He’d been able to make a steel chest piece as fragile as glass and a cotton frock as hard as leather in that way. So, he knew he was only nibbling around larger ideas.

So, if he wanted to go pay the dragon a visit, he was going to try siphoning physical health, strength, and fitness from the little green bastards. “Maybe that won’t be quite so addictive,” he told himself.

The fact was that even as good as Simon was at drawing human anatomy at this point, he still didn’t trust himself to alter his own fat and muscle cells without mutilating or crippling himself. That was something that the body needed to sort out. He just needed to give it the resources to do it.

So, he spent the afternoon sketching in the soil with a stick, and when he had a good idea of what the final rune needed to look like, he returned to his cottage to work out the final formulation. He did this by mixing a little water with wood ash to create something closer to paint than ink and then drawing the final design carefully on his mirror. That took an hour, and since it was so complicated, he opted to make the designs on the opposite faces of the blade different to spread out the impact.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

In the end, when he finally sat back to appreciate it, he was satisfied by what he’d made. It was certainly one of the most complicated works of artifice he’d made so far, and if he’d had to construct the thing with acid and clay, he probably would have had to try a dozen times to make it. With magic that wouldn’t be a problem.

The front side held Aufvarum Zyvon Hyakk Vosden, but the back side was marked with Aufvarum Aufvarum Zyvon. While he expected the main rune set of lesser transfer of health and strength to do the lion's share of the work, he also included the crippled alternate rune of lesser lesser transfer as well.

It was very inefficient. What he needed was a way to use greater drain in a single thrust and then harvest that energy for later use, either as to give him a day of life every day or else to fuel the spells he cast. He just didn’t know how to do that yet. He’d figure it out, though. Every experiment like this was one step closer in the grand scheme of things.

When the runes were ready, he stilled his mind and meditated on his sword for several minutes. It was only when he could see the glowing designs on the surface of the chipped blade that he finally said the words, “Celdura Vosden.”

Part of him feared the pain of casting magic again, but with a new throat and a new life, there was no sting, and the magic rippled out from him harmlessly, changing nothing except for the composition of metals in his blade in a very precise pattern.

Simon studied both sides, noticing the way that the silver and steel glinted slightly differently in the light. Then, once he’d done that, he pronounced himself satisfied and started to don his armor. He hated the way the tight leather made him feel like it was a sausage casing around his body, but there was nothing for it. Maybe after I kill a couple of goblins, things will start to loosen up a bit, he thought.

When all was in preparation, he started a fire and cooked one of his sausages. This wasn’t for eating, though; it was for bait. Once it was half cooked and sizzling, he tied it to some twine and then went out into the dark woods to find a likely tree branch to secure it to.

As he went, Simon observed that things got darker and darker until he could hardly see at all unless he was looking up toward the sky. When the foliage got thick enough that even that didn’t work, he finally whispered, “Aufvarum Barom Oonbetit.” And watched the world spring back into focus.

The spell was essentially the opposite of the limited invisibility spell he'd invented a couple years ago. Rather than making his body repulse light, though, his eyes attracted the limited light of his current surroundings, making everything that much brighter. He imagined that they probably reflected creepily right now, like a cat's eyes, but he wasn't particularly interested in hiding right now. He wanted the bastards to find him.

The magic made things a touch hazy at first, but after only a few seconds, he could see almost as well as he might in daylight. On some level, it felt like the waste of a week, but he hated being bitten by goblins, and it cost him less to cast lesser light focusing on his retinas than it would to cure and heal wounds after the fact.

“Of course, I won’t be able to go back to the cabin for a few hours or my hearth will blind me,” he thought to himself, but then, he didn’t plan to. He planned to spend hours murdering goblins and seeing what that did for his lackluster physique. While he didn’t want to look like a body builder or anything, he would settle for not looking like the Doughboy.

Simon didn’t have to wait long for the first goblin to show interest in the smell of cooked meat. That’s probably how they eventually find my cabin, he thought to himself as he watched the vermin approach.

Unfortunately, it never got its meal. Instead, Simon waited for it to reach the tree and start climbing before he pinned it to the bark with his blade. He didn’t even try to kill it with that first stroke. He just let it scream and rage helplessly while he focused on the sensations coursing up his sword arm. He felt the trickle of pure life essence, as he expected, but he felt another stranger sensation, too. It was too little to say for sure that it was working as expected, but it was definitely the first sign that it might be.

If it turns me into the incredible goblin hulk, I can always reset the hard way and start over, he told himself. He didn’t want that. He didn’t even think it was likely, but when one started working with fuzzy concepts, it certainly wasn’t impossible. Simon supposed that siphoning intelligence, skills, or even more intangible things like Karma or Memories off of other humans might be possible with a similar spell, but he had no intention of trying. At least, he had no intention of trying yet. He could replace his body, even if it became a zombie, but his mind? If he screwed that up, it was screwed up forever.

I’m still dealing with problems because of Helades stupid language potion, he thought dispassionately as he watched the goblin weaken visibly.

After half a minute of struggling, the goblin’s body ceased its struggles, and Simon released it, letting its corpse flop lifelessly to the ground. It hadn’t contributed much, but it had been an excellent test subject, and it had done its job. It had rung the dinner bell, and even now, he could hear other members of the goblin tribe racing through the forest, howling for blood.

The goblin life was kill or be killed. Sometimes, he didn’t even think they cared which side they were on, so long as it happened and it was bloody.