The OP Lich is a Returnee, Chapter 3 (Patreon)

Chapter 3 – Identity

Kaori sighed. Even if she didn’t need to breathe, being a soul mystically bound to their body by way of a phylactery, the motions of a sigh were still the same, and she could force herself to make the sounds, if she wanted to. But that was neither here nor there.

Honestly, she didn’t know what she had expected to happen. Part of her honestly wished that the return ritual would somehow put her, and her classmates, back in the world they came from, at the moment they left, all very much alive. But that was a fool’s hope, she had known that even at the time.

Magic had its limits, even when practiced by an Archlich who had trained to the level of Archmage. Going from one world to another was one thing. Choosing a particular world to go to, out of all the possible ones, was on a whole new level of difficulty. Adding in time travel and resurrection to that? Well, that was, in all likelihood, completely impossible without a lotmore power than she had access to.

Time magic was simple enough on the surface, but far more complicated in practice. Locally slowing or speeding up time was the basis of the ‘Slow’ and ‘Haste’ spells, after all. Taken to extremes, that could see someone age to death in a matter of seconds, or have someone’s time frozen until later, effectively sending them forward in time. But moving willfully through time (especially BACK in time) was on another level altogether.

Simply put, the forces of magic did not like time travel. Time was meant to go in only one direction. Magic could be used to view the past, even experience an echo of it, but actually going back, and possibly changing it? Magic itself resisted something like that. And bad things happened when Magic started resisting you.

Resurrection magic, on the other hand, was wholly impossible, given what she’d learned in that other world. Oh, there was a window between the moment of death and when the soul left the body where, if a healer was present, they could revive a ‘dead’ person, but that was the equivalent of using CPR or a defibrillator on a clinically dead person and resuscitating them. While it was technically true that they were dead, and then they weren’t, it was not truly a resurrection.

The stories of someone dying, and then rising on the third day after they’d been entombed were either the result of an undead, a deception, or myths of divine entities playing about in the mortal world. Unless there was a true god getting involved, those who died were dead, and could not be returned to the living. There were workarounds, of course, mostly involving various forms of undeath or soul constructs, but that did not change the fact that returning someone to life was impossible.

So, she shouldn’t have been surprised that, when she returned to her home world under the power of her own rituals, that such fanciful things didn’t happen. Instead of seeing her classmates in the flesh again, she was faced with a tasteful memorial, with their names and hers carved upon a henge. At least in this world they would be remembered, even if no one else in the other world would be left who knew their names.

She had spent the last forty years planning how to take down the Demon King, and make sure that what happened to her, and her class, would never happen again. That world would either burn, or it wouldn’t. The years she had spent with her Legion forming the bulwark against the Demon King had given the Free Kingdoms time to rebuild, so they had a fighting chance. They just wouldn’t be doing it with kidnapped schoolchildren to throw into the fire.

She had planned all that, but she hadn’t planned what to do once she finally made it home. Now, she was here, and, for the first time in forty years, she was at a loss as to what to do. Everything had changed.

Currently, she was sitting in an interview room at the local police department. Like she had been for the last four hours. It was now four in the morning, according to the clock on the wall, and she had spent most of that time talking.

Confirming her identity had been troublesome. She didn’t have fingerprints, retinas, or blood to do any of the normal identifiers. As a Necromancer, she could rearrange and shape bones, so even dental records weren’t reliable. And her memory of her life forty years ago was somewhat limited, just like anyone in their late fifties or early sixties might be when trying to remember details about their childhood, and the stuff she could remember was all publicly available.

Fortunately, the police department had a mage with some divination ability, and so they were able to at least confirm that she believed what she was saying was true. With was good, since the other magical tests weren’t available, what with her not having any magical records on file. But at least having them acknowledge that she believed her words and wasn’t trying to lie was a step in the right direction.

The door opened, and a tired-looking mage walked in. “Ms. Akagawa?” She nodded, and the mage continued as he sat down across from her. “I’m sorry. Normally, I’d ask you if you wanted any refreshments right now, but I’m honestly not sure if we have anything that you could drink.”

She chuckled at that. “You are not the first to run into that issue of protocol with me, mister…?” She trailed off, obviously seeking his name.

The mage smiled, and said, “Sorry, manners. I am Captain Marcus Fairchild, commander of the Magic Containment Unit. Basically, the MCU is the magical equivalent to the SWAT units of your time.”

“I see. And I take it that my entrance caused some concern about my being a threat?”

“Heh. You could say that. You have to understand that, despite magic being around for forty years, it is still a pretty young science. There’s a lot we don’t know. There have been some outbreaks of undead before.”

“Ah, let me guess. Young necromancers, raising more than they could control, or using improper methods that allowed the undead to spread like a virus? Probably skeletons and zombies for the most part?”

The mage nodded. Leaning forward, he asked, “Yes. I take it this ‘other world’ you were summoned to has had similar events?”

“Yes. Mages of all kinds have similar issues, but necromancy has a little more chance to get out of control if improperly used. That’s part of why the kingdoms focused on finding and training those with magical ability as young as possible, at least giving them enough discipline to not be a danger to themselves and others. People made sure to get their children tested, because depending on their strength, it could be a ticket out of poverty for them.”

“Then that makes it a bit easier. So far, we’ve only come across two types of undead that could reasonably be called sentient. Ghouls and Vampires. Some argue that ghosts should be included, but most believe that they are merely psychic echoes of people, not thinking creatures. Any skeletal undead we’ve found have been, well, mindless. Even the ones that were capable of using magic were only running on animal instinct, at best.”

“Ah, well, I am what is known as a Lich.”

Fairchild nodded. “Like the old D&D monster? Powerful spellcaster, binding their soul into a phylactery and all of that?” He smiled at the looks she gave him. “The Awakening caused a lot of people to revisit ‘existing source material’.”

“Ah, Thangvald’s First Rule of Magic.” Now it was her turn to smile. “As you said, Magic is new here. But in the other world, it was much older. As much art as science, but there were certain rules that people knew. Thangvald was a scholar who put them into common circulation.”

“What were they?”

“Rule One: Magic is Mana shaped by the Mind. The Mind is Knowledge, Perceptions, and Intent. Therefore, each facet of the Mind influences the shape of the Magic.

“Rule Two: The sum of Mana, Energy, and Mass cannot be created or destroyed, it merely changes form.

“Rule Three: For every Magic, there is an equal and opposite Magic.”

Fairchild nodded slowly. “I see. So, our knowledge and preconceptions about magic from games and stories helped shape it when the Awakening happened?”

“Yes, that is what I would theorize. However, I’ve only been back in this world for a few hours, so I would hardly be qualified to make an actual declaration.”

“Well, that leads me to the first thing I was going to talk about. I want to state that, officially, you are not in any trouble, nor are you going to be held or detained. Also, barring any evidence to the contrary, we are accepting your stated identity of Akagawa Kaori as fact. We’ll have a lawyer in here in the morning to go over the legalities with you.”

He paused for a moment, obviously a bit uncomfortable. “However, there are some… concerns from those we’ve been able to wake up. One of the Lost Sleepers returning, and as a new kind of undead? There is no way that the story isn’t going to get out, and we really aren’t certain what will happen when it does. There are some people who would like to take you into protective custody.”

“Ah, please inform them that I do not need protective custody. I can handle my own protection quite well, I assure you.”

“That is part of what they were afraid of, honestly. Laying all the cards on the table, they wanted you in protective custody as much to protect you from the public as to protect the public from you. At least until things are sorted out.”

“Hmph! Even in the other world, the number of individuals who weren’t full-fledged gods that could be a threat to me could be counted on both hands, if I’m being generous. And most of those were ancient dragons and other such monsters. By the time I was done, the Demon King went and died in a single hit. Really, it was quite anticlimactic.”

“Ah, yeah, you mentioned something about that before. Part of why there are people who are a bit scared of you, and what you might do if someone attacks you out of fear or ignorance. Your appearance doesn’t help any, either.”

She chuckled. “Ah, yes. Well, that, at least, I can do something about.” With that thought in mind, she reached out to the side, as a black tear in reality tore itself open. Her hand disappeared into the rift for a moment, before she came out with two pieces of jewelry. A silver ring, and a stylized golden ankh with a blood-red stone set in the middle, hanging from a golden chain.

When she put on the ring, the oppressive aura of power and danger that she unconsciously gave off cut off. Fairchild straightened, feeling as though a heavy weight had just been lifted from his shoulders. He hadn’t even realized that her aura was so oppressive, and he was a trained combat mage!

The lich responded to his relief with a smirk on her skeletal face, as she slipped the amulet around her neck. Before Fairchild’s eyes, the lich’s form changed, muscles growing upon her bones, and then skin covering them. The blue orbs of fire that were her eyes became a human’s eyes, brown in color. Black hair sprouted from her hair, growing down to her waist. Instead of a skeletal undead, all his senses said that there was a human girl of Asian ancestry sitting in front of him. If he weren’t watching it happen, he would have said it was impossible.

Almost lovingly, she stroked the gem on the ankh. As she did so, the regal clothes and armor she wore changed. First, they became a gown, fit for a ball out of a fairy tale, then the white kosode and red hakama of a Shinto shrine maiden’s traditional attire, before finally settling upon the school uniform she had been wearing when she was taken, forty years ago. When she looked back at Fairchild, he had to pinch himself to make sure he wasn’t seeing a vision straight out of one of the photographs that were housed in the Awakening Memorial’s museum, showcasing the Lost Sleepers.

With a more human voice, she asked, “Is this better, Captain?”