“Well, you see, there’s a rumor going around, and I wanted to make sure you were ahead of it.”
I had a bad feeling as soon as he said that. “What’s the rumor?”
“Well… I’ve heard a few people claiming that they’ve encountered the ‘Mage of Rosenheim’. I understand why you wanted to keep it quiet, man. I heard what happened to that Frozenflame guy.”
I cursed under my breath. “How did they find out?”
“So it’s true? Damn… Some members of a PvP group said that they encountered a powerful caster from overseas. Given the information available, they figured out that it had to be that mage.”
PvP, or Player versus Player, was a pretty common occurrence in games, but I knew right away who he meant. “The Eternal Brigade, huh?” It was the only PvP group I had fought against so far, so there was no doubt that it was them.
“Yeah, that’s them. Listen, you should probably lay low for a while. Some people think that you destroyed the area around the capital.”
I shook my head, sighing. “No, I didn’t. I saw the guy that did, but it wasn’t one of the foreigners.”
Kev laughed quietly on the other end. From the sound of his voice, I could tell he was calling from the real world, rather than in the game. “That figures. You know, as soon as that forest area got wiped out, a bunch of powerful monsters started showing up? And since all of the Brigade died, they respawned in the city. Since they couldn’t leave easily, most of them were taken arrested.”
“I expected something like that to happen. Still, better than the guy sticking around to personally keep them there.” I shuddered involuntarily, thinking about the power that Kor had used.
“Still, man, you made it all the way to being a mage? And the first one as well, among the ‘foreigners’ at least. Someone even started a rumor to give you a nickname.”
Oh boy.. I had a feeling I knew what was coming. “What is it..?”
“Wordsmith, according to the rumors. Gotta say, how you’ve been keeping this all a secret seems to make it fit.”
I let out a long sigh, remembering that I had only told that title to one foreigner. “Yeah, that rumor was started by the other mage, I’d bet. Still, I was hoping to maintain my cover for a little while longer.”
“Well, it’s not as major now. There have been a couple more people to become a mage since then. I don’t have any information about them, but I’ll listen for it.”
“Thanks.” I nodded to myself, realizing that I absolutely had to keep some of this a secret still. “Sorry for not telling you sooner. You aren’t exactly the best at keeping secrets, you know?”
“That hurts, man. Even if it’s true, it still hurts.”
“Yeah, yeah. Hey, what’s the highest level foreigner you’ve heard about so far?” I was curious where I stood in the rankings, since I knew that I wasn’t at the top.
“Hmm… the highest? There’s this one elf I heard about, he was in the low four hundreds. It’s not exactly easy to gather information without the internet, now.”
“Well, thanks anyways.” Four hundred? That’s pretty high. I wonder what kind of character he is..
“No problem. Anyways, I’ve got to go. Picking my sister up here in a few.”
With that, the two of us ended the call. I couldn’t help but shake my head as I thought about what had been told to me. It was a rather sudden revelation, and I didn’t have any time to prepare. So, the secret’s out? Well… I guess that means I can stop holding back. I just need to hold off on the infernal magic for now.
Now that I no longer had to worry about hiding my magic, I was even more eager to learn as much magic as I could. And, as I had just decided before, my first step would be to create a homunculus familiar. After quickly returning the book I had been reading, I opened up the Hellgate, making my way to Hell.
Levy, mind coming to meet me? Need to speak with you for a bit. I mentally called out to Levy as I emerged somewhere in the District of Pride. I knew that as soon as I entered Hell, she would be able to hear my thoughts. Sure enough, I received a reply a moment later.
Alright, I’ll be there in just a minute. You go over my book yet?
Yeah, that’s one of the things I wanted to talk to you about. I smiled slightly, moving to find an empty area. The District of Pride was Hell’s training area, and given their lax schedule for demons there was plenty of free space.
After a few minutes of waiting, I saw Levy running towards me in the distance. As soon as I noticed her, she suddenly appeared in front of me, causing me to jump in surprise. “Alright, what do you want?” Levy asked with a smile, and I saw a small purple dragon-like creature resting on her shoulder.
“I’m wanting to make a homunculus.” I figured that was what the creature resting against her was, since actual dragons are magnitudes larger than that thing.
Chapter 24
Levy stood there, blinking for a few seconds, “You want to make a.. ohh, you aren’t hiding anymore.” Getting the reason from my mind, she formed a wide grin on her face. “That was faster than I expected, though I guess it can’t be helped. I take it you already got the spell from my book in the library?”
“Yeah, but I would prefer having you help me with this. I don’t want to mess up and get something I won’t be able to use.”
The demoness nodded to me, “And you wanted to use it for a… you called it a familiar?” When I nodded, she continued after getting the relevant information from my mind. “There’s not a system like that in place here, but you can give your homunculus a mana pool and magic abilities. This little guy,” She pointed to her tiny dragon, “is able to breathe fire, for instance.”
So there’s no familiar system? That explains why the mages in the college never had one. Still, having it would be convenient. “I see, and you can enchant them with any abilities you want? How do you give them a mana pool of their own?”
“Well, obviously you can only give them abilities that you can figure out how to enchant, similar to items. As for giving them a mana pool, there are two ways that I found. The first one was to steadily feed it my own mana over the course of several hours. The second is typically less useful, except to people proficient in Origin magic like us. You’re able to feed Mana Stones to the homunculus, and it will gain both the spell in the stone, as well as the mana in it.”
I nodded, thinking for a moment. “So the most convenient way to let it grow would be to make mana stones of what I want to give it, and then feed them to it. Alright, and the body of the homunculus is formed during the spell. Is there anything else I need to keep in mind?”
After a few seconds, she shook her head. “No, that’s pretty much it. I didn’t have your spells yet to compare it with, so there isn’t an adjustment period at the end. Whatever image you have at the start of the spell is what you will end up with.”
“That’s fine.” I began thinking about what I want my homunculus to look like. There were literally countless possibilities, but I needed something personal. Once the idea formed in my mind, I grinned to myself. However, Levy groaned upon seeing what I had pictured. “Of course… well, can’t say I’m surprised. Something like that might fit you perfectly.”
“Thanks…” In order to get the best result, I didn’t want to have to be focusing on the spell diagram in my mind. As such, I used my Sculpt Earth and Stone spell to carve the diagram into the ground in front of me, slowly lowering myself to my knees. “I never really thought that earth shaping spell would be so useful.”
Levy giggled slightly, nodding her head. “I know. Just remember, a homunculus has no intelligence or will of its own. After you create it, it will be mentally linked with you, and only act as you direct it. This was my first Origin spell, so I hadn’t figured out how to create a mind yet.”
Nodding my head to her, I closed my eyes, placing my hands on the edge of the spell diagram before beginning. “Body lost in deepest shadow, formed beneath the sea of souls. Cast aside without a thought, yet returned now to your
master’s embrace.” As I spoke, I felt my mana pouring out of me, gathering in the circle before me and taking shape.
It wasn’t a hard task to focus on the shape I wanted my homunculus to take, though I doubted if anyone would be able to recognize it for what it was at a glance. Upon opening my eyes, I saw what I had created. Roughly a foot tall and half as wide, bound in leather, there was a book laying on the ground in front of me. And the book was… breathing. It made no sense, but it was breathing.
You have created a homunculus!
Origin Magic has increased to 26
I let out a sigh, looking at the book. Immediately, I erased the spell diagram that had created it, thinking about what to do next. “Well… I should probably give it a flight power. Mind helping me out with that one?” I smiled to Levy, since I never got around to making that spell.
She shook her head, smiling back to me before closing her eyes. This was the first time I was seeing the process from the outside, but I watched as waves of mana rolled down her arm and coalesced in her hand to form a green gem. After a few moments, a spell diagram formed within the gem, before she opened her eyes. “You want to study it or keep trying to fly your way?”
Of course she knows about my Aura training.. “I want to try it my way for a while longer.”
She nodded, and looked down to the breathing book. “So, uh… how exactly do I feed a book?”
I paused for a moment, and then started laughing. “That is a good question! Try putting it in the cover?”
Levy hesitated, but nodded after a few moments. I mentally instructed the book to open, and it did so right away. Once the gem was placed inside, I told it to eat it, unsure of what would happen. Fueled by our curiosity, Levy and I watched as the covers of the book grew teeth, slamming closed around that gem. The sudden change made both of us jump back slightly, and then we shared in a laugh as the book really did eat it.
Once the book opened its cover again, I saw that the spell diagram had been moved to the first page of the book, as well as the details of the spell. The only thing missing from it was the chant. “Well.. that’s convenient.”
“Very. So, you can keep feeding this thing Mana Stones, and each one will fill another page?” Without picking the book up, Levy stared at its pages for several moments. “Looks like there are maybe a hundred pages. That should last for quite a while.”
I instructed the book to fly up, and indeed it floated above the ground, moving to my backpack where I had it rest. “Thanks. I’m going to have to work on powering this guy up for a while.”
“Yeah, if you feed them mana directly, it takes a while to show results. But, then again, that was with my mana capacity. You should be able to get it a bit faster. I’d say in a couple days, if you channel your mana constantly, it should have about half as much as you do.”
“And they regain their mana naturally?” I wanted to make sure I understood everything before I sent my book into battle.
“Very slowly. In an emergency, you can fuel their abilities with your mana directly, but increasing their reserves takes longer. Also, your homunculus probably has a weakness of being blind, so it won’t be able to act outside your field of vision unless you give it a vision spell.”
I nodded again, making a mental note of that. “Thanks. I need to go pay a visit to your mom now.”
Levy giggled, before taking a step back and nodding with her hands behind her back. “Alright. I’m sure she’s already expecting you.”
Thinking the same thing, I turned and made my way to the palace. As soon as the book had flown into my backpack, I began channeling my mana into it. I wasn’t sure exactly how much I was feeding it, but I kept it just high enough that it did not outpace my recovery speed.
As I walked the streets of Hell, I passed by many different demons. A few I was even able to identify, in terms of species. Imps were fairly obvious, being the most numerous of demons. I had no doubt that many of these imps could be centuries old, but since they spent so much time at peace they didn’t have the urge to grow. There were also a few Reborn, the most human of the demons. In many aspects, they looked like incubi and succubi.
Other demons, I wasn’t as familiar with. The variety in Hell is simply too vast, and I was unable to track all the different evolutions. I passed by a few hellhounds, and frowned inwardly as I remembered what Lilith had said about them. Only the imps that lose their minds will become demon beasts..
Of course, that wasn’t necessarily true, if Levy and I were to specifically make a demon beast. But I imagine all of these were formed naturally, meaning they must have lived a very difficult life up to this point. I couldn’t help but feel sorry for them, thinking about what they must have gone through.
While I was lost in thought, my feet had already carried me the rest of the distance to the Infernal Palace. Upon seeing me, the guards simply smiled and allowed me through, so I walked directly to the throne room to meet Lilith. When I arrived, I found her dressed in her usual armor, which covered hardly anything it should have. I knew from experience that this was an item that could change its shape, so this was her own personal preference.
“Ah, Jin, I was wondering how long it would take you to show up.” She smiled brightly at me as I entered.
“Thanks. We figured you would be expecting us.”
“Naturally. I read a few more of your world’s Lilith stories, and they are generally quite amusing. I’d like to thank you again for the name.” She tilted her head back, laughing. Her generous chest shook with the motion.
“You’re welcome. I suppose you know why I’m here this time?”
“What kind of demon queen would I be if I didn’t? You’re wanting infernal essence, correct?”
“..I… Believe that is what you’d call it. The same type of material that is used for the hellfire forges.”
Lilith bowed her head in acknowledgement. “That’s it. Really, you should be able to make it yourself if you knew the process. Infernal essences are a bit different than the elemental cores, because they are simply condensed infernal magic. They aren’t used as the core for a creature or anything like that.”
I raised an eyebrow, having not known of this. “I see.. Would you mind providing some for me, since I don’t know how to make it myself?” I considered trying to make it via my Origin magic, but if I didn’t know the process of making it normally, it may fail.
“Sure, sure. How many do you want?”
I considered for a moment before answering. “I’m wanting to enchant a robe with some of it, and also to possibly make my own forge.”
She nodded again, closing her eyes and focusing. “Okay, seven should be enough then.” The corners of her mouth rose up in a smile, and black flames began pouring out of her body. Slowly, she rose to her feet, raising a single arm in front of her. As if drawn by an unseen force, the flames gathered above her hand, forming seven floating orbs of energy. The moments passed by slowly as I watched those orbs condense further, seemingly solid spheres forming at their centers.
Once the seven spheres had been completed, she gathered them in both hands. They still gave off that black flame, but not to such a degree as before. Walking over, she carefully handed me the newly created items. “These will burn anyone who touches them, unless they are resistant to hellfire. Of course, anyone who masters Infernal magic naturally possesses such resistance. But your companions likely do not share in this, so I would suggest they not hold them.”
Taking the offered essences, I nodded my head. They did indeed feel warm to the touch, but not enough to burn. “Thank you. So all I have to do is condense hellfire on a single point to form the essence?”
Lilith smirked, lifting her head proudly. “Of course, but it’s not as simple as it seems. Normal demons would take hours to produce a single essence. So, what is this you said about making your own forge?”
“Something I’ve been considering… I know that I can create pocket dimensions, thanks to the library. No, don’t give me
that look, I’m not going to try to make a new Hell. Just a small home that I can expand on gradually, tucked away so that it can only be accessed with a special item.”
Lilith thought it over for a few moments, and started snickering. “You know, some of these things you make, if normal people found them they would be considered stuff of legend. A library that contains all written knowledge, a home that you can carry with you, even those rings you made for Denise and Cynthia are quite extraordinary.”
Tilting my head, I considered her words. “Maybe. I don’t tend to think about it like that.”
“Of course you don’t.” Lilith shook her head with a grin. “You’re almost as good at coming up with this stuff as Dremor is. He’s always seemed to be able to make a spell or enchantment for anything.”
“I suppose that is his talent.” I smiled to her, placing the seven essences inside the Artifact World. “I’ll be around for a few more days, and then we’ll head towards the dwarven mountains.”
The Dive: Birth of a Hero Page 35