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Shadow World Chapter 14 - Fear, Part 3
Viktor had entered the cemetery near the east wing. The mortuary chapel stood a good fifty yards away, amid the grim yew trees and grandiose mausoleums of noble families. Like many cemeteries in the Empire, it had been there a long time. It was probable that in that place there had been a burial ground since long before the founding of the city, when the first settlements had arisen at this point of the river, since there were areas of the cemetery that had fallen into oblivion and neglect.But between him and the funeral chapel, Viktor discovered two men who were in the cemetery, although the tombstones did not allow him to see clearly what they were doing.So focused were they on work that they didn't seem to have heard the confrontation that had occurred on the road, and they certainly didn't notice Viktor's presence inside the cemetery.One was tall and robustly built, with broad shoulders and heavily muscled arms. His partner was short and stocky, but something about the efficien
Shadow World Chapter 15 - Knowledge, Part 1
They say that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing; Nothing so true has ever been said.Some would say that it is the search for knowledge that defines us as superior to other races.Some will say that it is what has led humanity to become the dominant species of our world.He could talk about steam contraptions, different alchemical formulas, or the discovery of gunpowder and the terrible war machines that use it. All marvelous accomplishments, though none were accomplished without first taking a toll in human lives.But it could also be argued that the insatiable search for knowledge, the inquisitive and inherent curiosity of the human being, is what could bring us to the brink of destruction.It has been the study of the arcane arts that has led the human nations to shine, one example is Gregori, the current supreme magician who is in the Empire Magic Academy, it is irrelevant that he is a semi-elf, the important thing is his existence.<
Shadow World Chapter 16 - Knowledge, part 2
Erich was home for the first time in three days, was what Viktor knew. He was sitting at the attic table with the usual half-empty bottle uncorked, and he was swirling the wine in the container. His grungy ginger cat sat smugly on his lap, stroking his ears.Emboldened by the swig of wine Erich had poured him, Viktor began to speak. And once he started, the words just came out like a torrent and he found himself telling his friend everything… everything except the fact that the chase had caused a wave of emotion in him.When he was done, Erich simply sat in the chair, motionless, his mouth open and his expression stunned."My, my, you are a black sheep, right Viktor?" Erich said at last. “The black sheep of the family, huh? Well, I don't mind telling you, peasant boy, that I didn't think you were capable of something like that. You are full of surprises, right? "In the course of a few minutes, Viktor had completely changed Erich's opinion of
Shadow World Chapter 17 – Knowledge, part 3
The house was as run down as it looked from the outside. The room they were in was completely devoid of furniture. The floorboards were bare and bristling with splinters; the walls covered with damp peeling stock.Erich, regaining some of his earlier bravery, led the way and left the room.On the other side of the door they found themselves on an equally bare stair landing ... To go up to the upper floor there was a staircase with some steps missing and others half broken.The air was thick with the smell of mold ... It seemed that no one had inhabited the house in a long time, and yet he had seen some kind of servant open the door to the two body snatchers just a month before.Erich surveyed the flight of stairs that led up into the darkness of the upper floor. Convinced that there was no danger that could come from there, he cautiously peered over the railing. Viktor followed suit.The light from the street lamps that entered the building through
Shadow World Chapter 18 - Knowledge, part 4
The simple black-skinned book was a scholar's chronicle of his search for lost knowledge at the time of the coming of the Dark Gods, and while it was an interesting read, it didn't really teach Viktor anything very useful.The book titled only Anatomy, on the other hand, fascinated him and he had to acknowledge that the concepts and detailed information it contained were easy for him to assimilate and integrate into his own knowledge. In fact, he seemed to have a strange affinity for the ideas presented in the book. He attributed this to the long relationship he had had with death by growing up as the son of a priest of the death god.After a week without any sudden and unexpected visit from the guard or worse, Viktor dared to go out into the street again. He even dared to return to the School to continue his work there. When Professor Ulbert Hinsteil asked him where he had been, Viktor replied that he had suffered a bad summer cold. Lying was another thing he was not
Shadow World Chapter 19 - Post Mortem, part 1
It is a common misconception to believe that necromancers hate life because of their dealings with death. There could be nothing further from the truth!Those who practice the art of necromancy may well spend years looting the graves of the dead, abandoned cemeteries, fetid ossuaries and ancient burial mounds, avoiding the light of day to take advantage of the protective shadow of the night and the relationship with the living in favor. From the company of moldy corpses. But what motivates this behavior is the desire to hang on to life for longer.Some actually reach necromancy by mistake. They want knowledge for its own sake, or they are trying to save their own life or that of a loved one. Perhaps it is also true that many of those who come to practice the dark art are prone to madness and dark desires because what else could lead them to study the lowest and vilest form of the art of magic? Yet there is something in their forbidden quest that inevitably leads them o
Shadow World Chapter 20 - Post Mortem, part 2
Viktor continued to descend, the voices that seemed to be casting a spell clearer with each step. He still didn't understand the words they were singing; they seemed to belong to a language he did not know. But as he listened to them he felt his scalp tighten and his hair stand on end. Sound leaked like icy liquid from every pore.Suddenly Viktor realized his teeth were chattering, so he clenched his jaws. Was it really from the cold under the house, or was it due to something else?The stone steps ended and he began another corridor, this one made of crumbling bricks, glittering with algae and water. The ceiling was covered with cobwebs where the skeletal corpses of their owners could be seen. The light flickered at the other end of the hall. By going down that path, Viktor risked coming face to face with whoever was casting the spell, probably Doctor Tepes, but now he couldn't help himself.Before he knew it, he was peering around the archway at the other end
Shadow World Chapter 21 - Post Mortem, part 3
The doctor had finished sewing the opening of the corpse and was now making strange gestures with his hands on the body; as the spell increased in intensity. This curious procedure made Viktor's stomach turn. Every gesture the doctor made was burned into his memory. The incomprehensible words of the spell reverberated in his mind as if they were familiar.As the mantra continued, the atmosphere in the laboratory cellar changed perceptibly. Viktor felt static electricity build up inside his own body as if he were trapped in the middle of an incipient electrical storm. He felt the shadows thicken around him. The air itself had taken on a suffocating quality. He looked greasy and tainted.Seen out of the corner of his eye, as he watched the doctor and the ritual taking place below, the impenetrable darkness that refused to disappear from the corners of the vault seemed to run like oil across the ceiling and ruined walls and gradually envelop the room, as if the shadows we
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- Shadow World
Chapter 39 - Among the Dead, part 6
Father Wilkud leaned back in his chair while he rubbed his temples with callused hands, as if that might somehow help clear the fog of uncertainty and malevolent skepticism from his mind.Only then did he realize that he had become so caught up in the story of Brother Mateo that he had leaned forward to listen more closely.Wilkud felt a sudden chill run through him, spasming his frozen muscles and causing his entire body to cower in fear. His feet were numb with cold and the skin on his face felt as if it were taut and clinging to his bones. He had been so engrossed in confession for so long that he hadn't even realized that the fire in the fireplace had gone out.What time was it? Wilkud wondered absently. How long had the tale of the dying priest lasted? The brother must have been talking for many hours. In addition to being chilled to the bone, Wilkud had a raging hunger. Or was it the all-consuming doubt that he now
- Shadow World
Chapter 38 - Among the Dead, part 5
Viktor didn't need notebooks or hours of preparation to cast spells in the mausoleum. Theodria drew the power of death from this place, and Viktor could do the same. But there was no question as to what the strongest will was there.Viktor could still feel the evil presence of the Tomb Raider that lingered on the periphery of being aware of him. There was no time to lose. Viktor had to act fast while Theodria was still stunned from the impact of his initial assault.Viktor, the dark magician, cast a spell using as fuel the negative energy that he had absorbed along with his own inner mana, combining both energies to use black magic, to use Necromancy."[Reanimate the dead]"Hot, sticky blood gushed out of Viktor's nose as the dark power gathering behind his eyes shot out with a second spell. The bitter taste of black bile filled her mouth and she doubled over at the waist in excruciating searing pain
- Shadow World
Chapter 37 - Among the Dead, part 4
Viktor could imagine the rest for himself: Erich taking him back to the house, observing his progress after the change that Theodria had imposed on him, encouraging him to develop his necromantic abilities and strengthen his mind; VIktor's friend betraying him unbeknownst to the impressionable peasant boy, acting as Theodria's spy, determining when Viktor had honed his talent enough to become a suitable vessel to which Theodria could transfer her malevolent soul.It wasn't Viktor who had driven Erich crazy. It had been his union with the Tomb Raider that had caused him to gradually lose touch with reality. This bitter revelation brought Viktor back to the present moment with tremendous shock.He knew that he was going to die. For a brief moment he wondered if he should allow Theodria or whatever her name is to finish him off instead of letting the black magic she had turned her back on use him once more for his foul purposes.
- Shadow World
Chapter 36 - Among the Dead, part 3
"Professor Theodria. Impossible"Hearing Viktor's words, Professor Theodria put on a creepy smile full of evil"for the moments…. That would be my current name, although it is only one of the many names I have used ”Professor Theodria removed the ring and immediately returned to its repulsive and decomposing appearance.If Professor Theoadria was the Tomb Raider, who was Dr. Shandri Drake Tepes?At that moment, Viktor realized that it was not Theoadria who was holding the lantern as if he wanted to inspect the body of his prisoner. The necromancer's servant stood beside him, silent, his ghastly face white as marble polished in the flickering glow of light in one hand."W ... what do you want from me?" Viktor stammered, overwhelmed by the horror of the situation he now found himself in. He had to know why they had brought him there. He had to know why he was going to
- Shadow World
Chapter 35 - Among the Dead, part 2
Erich led Viktor off the street and led him for a hundred yards, then into the maze of back streets around the carpenters and woodworkers guild. As they moved quickly, they were talking."Erich, where are we going?""I can't ... I can tell you.""Why not? Are we going to the docks? "Erich took a moment to reply.“Y… yes. T… that's it. ""But I thought you couldn't tell me."Logic seemed to have abandoned Erich along with good sense.“I… I can't! Because you ho… you would be horrified. "Viktor's blood ran cold. What could it be that Erich was so desperate to show him and yet he was unable to mention?Suddenly, all of Viktor's suppressed doubts and worries returned in a moment of panic that made his heart race. Erich was walking away, se
- Shadow World
Chapter 34 - Among the Dead, Part 1
I have done all kinds of evil in my unnaturally long life as a necromancer, but the irony is that it was the wrong actions of others that made me a necromancer.When Inquisitor Felix Crissinger accused me, in our first meeting, of being that hideous specter, the Tomb Raider, I was, thus far, innocent of any crime. If that accursed Inquisitor had subjected me to the ordeal of the rack and inevitably found me unjustly guilty, he would have been burned on the pyre of heretics and killed innocent in place of that wretched Sederit Hischer.But the real outrageous irony is that if the irrational inquisitor had ended my life, he would not have been able to turn me into the very thing that the temples and the inquisition made so many puritanical efforts to eradicate. He would not have turned me into the very thing that Felix had accused me of.So I ask you, who prompted me to commit so many unspeakable acts of depraved evil?Who made me mean?And what is i
- Shadow World
Chapter 33 - Broken, part 3
Under a sky the color of wet slate, Viktor paused under the shade of a tree and looked across the fallow fields, toward his hometown. After a frustrating five days of travel due to low carriage traffic, he had returned home once more.Wayward thunderstorms chased swift tides of clouds across the sky, like wolves hunting sheep.Chipped still looked the same as ever. The forests that gave the austere town its name were dotted with gold and reddish bronze, and the blackened branches stood out against the sky.Frayed-winged birds circled over the cliff to which they had given their name, their squawks barely audible in the breeze.As he moved out of the way again to cross the bare fields, Viktor heard a painful sound that chilled the blood in his veins.The lonely tolling of the chapel bell reached him across the desolate landscape. It could only mean one thing, because the bell rang when: someone had died and passed from the mortal world to the twilig
- Shadow World
Chapter 32 - Broken, part 2
Some even put forward the ridiculous and stupid idea that it had been spread by rat fleas. Those people should be locked up in a madhouse.Certain preachers of catastrophes declared that it was a condemnation that had fallen on the city.The general consensus was that smallpox was dying out as the end of the year approached, as the disease that had spread in the fetid heat of summer was unable to survive the cold of the coming winter.Of course, others, of a more religious slant, said that the wrongdoers had been punished and that the gods showed their mercy. There was even talk that some of the city's inhabitants would return before the end of the year.By the time he finished his drink, Viktor decided that he had heard enough already and returned to his house not daring to stay there any longer.Viktor returned home to him, but he was changed beyond recognition.Under the lacerated sky that bled wisps of smoke stained red by the setting su
- Shadow World
Chapter 31 - Broken, part 1
What is death? What does it mean to die? Where does that immortal part of us go when we die? Or is this fragile world the only thing there is?As the son of a priest of the god of death, I need not tell you that Mortis is the most austere, demanding, and ruthless deity. He offers very little in terms of blessings and favors to the common man who does his thing, and yet we all beg for his mercy.All the souls of the dead belong to him and he greedily treasures them ... he is a cruel and ruthless god who knows no mercy.Do you think that what I say is heresy?Maybe yes, but I also know it's the truth.I have looked out into the other world, into the icy abyss of what some stupid people call the afterlife.I will tell you what death is.Death is the ultimate thief. It is stronger than love and more durable than time.You may wonder if it is possible that someone like me can talk about love. However, believe it or not, I have loved
