The Undying Magician - Book 3 - Chapter 16 - New Developments (Patreon)

                         Somewhere in the Outer Ring of the Kingdom of the Fallen
                                               Year 2850 | Month 4 | Day 22

“Let me get this straight, you were unable to construct any sort of a binding deal with the magician and yet you still dare to come back here without something to show for it?” Baron Henry Cavendish states rather slowly as silver chains slowly snake across Antonio’s body. “Give me one reason why I shouldn’t just demote you right here and now.”

Antonio grimaces, purposefully not reaching for the chains that are starting to choke him since it would only anger the baron further as he exclaims, “Because I have intel on some of their capabilities!”

The chains stop in place after tightening a tiny bit more, not relaxing or tightening further afterwards.

“Speak,” Henry states from his place seated on his throne.

“The Undying Magician has a way to remove miasma from the air!” Antonio croaks out, the chains squeezing his throat ever so slightly and making it difficult for him to speak. “He’s also wary of us from what I’ve seen!”

Henry scoffs at that and says, “Of course he’s wary of us. He’d have to be stupid not to be.” He frowns. “But being able to remove miasma from the air… have you seen it yourself?”

Antonio hurriedly nods his head and croaks, “Yes! I have!”

“Then we might have an issue on our hands…” Henry mutters while rubbing his chin slightly, relaxing the chains a little in the process. “And what other news did you bring?”

“I sent out a telepathic pulse after the negotiations and determined the number of magicians they have!” Antonio continues, no longer having to croak out his words.

“And?” Henry prods.

Antonio immediately continues, “I also tried a subtle mind attack on the Undying Magician himself but the man wasn’t affected by it in the slightest. He didn’t even seem to notice it happened.”

Henry finally grimaces at that news.

Immune to mind attacks? Guess he really is like an undead in some ways.

The baron quickly scratches off several of the possible directions for Tier VIII spells he and the other barons were planning on making to handle the Undying Magician. Since if they aren’t going to work then there’s no reason to waste years trying to develop one.

At the same time, if even mind attacks don’t work on the magician, then that severely limits their possibilities.

Their original plan was to develop a Tier VIII mind spell meant to turn a magician into a drone who follows the orders of their master absolutely. A spell only possible because of Baroness Elara Nightshade’s special affinity in soul magic to bind the magician’s soul, his own affinity in metal magic to bind his blood, and Baron Cedric Whitmore’s affinity in suppression magic to suppress the magician’s mind and magic.

Now the necromancer’s plan will be useless in this and we’ll have to find a different way to capture the Undying Magician.

He would normally consider still developing the spell just to mind control all of the Undying Magician’s subordinates, but that would be years of time wasted just to mind control some subordinates once and never be able to use the spell again without the help of the necromancer. A major deficiency common in multi-affinity spells.

They require more than one magician to cast regardless of how powerful the magician may be.

And that’s not even considering the chance that the Undying Magician might not even care about those subordinates. A rather high chance considering the outlook of most magicians.

Especially since the man seems almost dead inside from what Henry has seen.

Which means they’re limited to physical and magical restraints with nothing to affect the Undying Magician’s mind and stop him from revolting. So the man very well might outlive them all if their experiments don’t bear fruit and could take his revenge in the future.

Damnit, this is going to be harder than I expected.

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                                                      Nathan
                                Year 2850 | Month 4 | Day 22

Well that’s interesting…

I frown as I study the result of my experiment. One meant to combine fire and death mana in a spell.

The spell that I had in mind when designing it was meant to be a bolt of mana that I send flying at the target with a layer of fire mana on the outside and death mana on the inside. Fire mana to deal with armor, weapons, and other non-biological things, and death mana to directly deal with the biological matter. A good combination.

But when I actually tried it out in practice…

I stare at the strange black flame floating in the air above my hand.

This was not what I was expecting.

Instead of the fire and death mana remaining separate as I had expected, they merged into one. Something that shouldn’t have been possible from theory on magic that I’ve learned.

Is it because both of the mana affinities come from me? Something about that making them able to merge into one?

Out of curiosity, I reach out to touch the black flame with my left hand. And immediately lose my left finger.

Interesting.

My finger grows back and I reach out to touch it again, watching the process more carefully.

Then I realize that the black flame burned my glove over my finger too. Not just my finger.

And it was honestly more of a simple devouring than a burn. There was no smoke, no reaction in the air, and no ash from my bones. Just plain vanished within the black flame.

Like the flame devoured it.

Interesting. Reminds me a little bit of that uncontrollable void element but far weaker.

On that note, I try to alter the spell in order to give me a bit more control over the flame through a constant feed of input that lets me change its trajectory midflight. But when I try to do that, I find it… rather difficult.

Looks like whatever this flame is, it really doesn’t want to be controlled.

Guess I have another thing to add to my list of topics to research.

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