Chapter 76: Graduation Day (1/2)
“This is an excellent idea for an artifact,” Isabelle Maure said. “But without Hell’s Prime Contract to which all souls are bound, it will never work. You will need to summon and convince all demons of the Ars Goetia.”
“Can you teach me?” Victor asked, waiting for the foul price she would certainly ask.
“Yes,” she sensually crossed her legs. “But not for free.”
“I have nothing to offer,” Victor began his well-oiled speech. “But my body and soul!”
“Then strip.”
“... and that is how you animate a flesh golem,” Camilla told Victor, as the necromancer sewed dozens of corpses into a single giant. “As you can see, while the process is similar to animating zombies, the crossing of necrotic streams makes it much more difficult…”
“You call that a deathtrap?” Deathjester complained, after examining the poisoned bloody spikes. “You aren’t supposed to give the captive an escape route! Again!”
What? That was thirty of them so far! How many trapped hallways would Victor have to design before he gained a level in [Architect]?
Congratulations! For judiciously training your soul-fu, you earned a level in [Reaper]!
“Maure shall not be sent overplane!” the specter of Brandon Maure shouted, having stolen enough life energy from Isabelle to regain some amount of corporeal substance.
“How could you do that to your own mother?” Victor said, disgusted. Cock-blocking him was one thing, but that part was beyond irredeemable!
“She is my mother, my property! I do what I want with it!”
“This will be a true test of your necromancy skills,” Camilla told him, putting her hands on his shoulders. “Remember what I taught you… use your soul… channel your spirit...”
“Dalton! For sheathing your sword where you shouldn’t have, you shall perish by Maure’s own!”
“Like Happyland I will!” Victor replied, spellcasting with his scythe. “I will send you back where you belong, Braniño… to your mother’s basement!”
“You saved my life back then,” Goblina told him, after catching him in a hallway. “You could have let Jack Frost freeze me to death, but you didn’t. Why? I don’t understand!”
“It’s just…” Victor shook his head. “After years of intense academic rivalry, I guess… I guess I consider you a friend.”
“Even after I tried to poison you? After I burned your homework?”
“Forget it, Goblina,” Victor replied. “It’s Scholomance. It’s weird.”
The goblin struggled to grasp the concept, for a while. “I guess… I guess we could form an overlord alliance?” she said, using terms she understood. “We take out all the competition for valedictorian, and then we fight for the post in the last year! What do you say?”
She offered her tiny hand.
Victor shook it. “Deal.”
Congratulations! For exorcising Brandon Maure’s spirit from his mother’s bedroom and forever grounding him, you earned a level in [Reaper]! You earned the [Vicious Ankou] Class Perk!
+10 SP, +1 VIT, +1 SKI, +1 AGI, +1 INT, +1 CHA
[Vicious Ankou]: You steal the future of those you kill. Whenever [Helheim] traps a soul in your Scythe, you gain immunity to [Aging] for one year (multiple victims stack). The corpses of your victims age to dust after extraction of the soul; this is a [Time] effect.
“Guys, I’m immortal!”
“Shush!” Goblina told him, as she finished reading the Book of the Wicked, while the tentacled librarian glared at them both. “I have an [Eldritch Philosophy] exam tomorrow.”
“Sorry, I can’t hear you over the sound of my ill-gotten eternal youth!”
The library’s books wailed in response to his bragging, much to Goblina’s annoyance.
Chocolatine de Gevaudan cannot answer your summon right now.
Again? Did the time anomaly interfere with his Perk, or had something gone wrong in Murmurin? He had tried to contact people for months, to no avail. If only he could leave the school grounds...
Well, in that case, he had no choice but to use this newly crafted [Diabolist] Tier IV spell he designed. He couldn’t believe nobody else thought of it before him. Or maybe they simply never lived long enough to distribute that spell...
“[Succubus Booty Call]!” Victor cast in his bedroom, a pentagram of crimson light manifesting on the ground as a winged, curvaceous shape appeared within it...
Congratulations! For inventing new soul-based spells to fulfill your darkest desires, you earned a level in [Reaper]!
+30 HP, +10 SP, +1 SKI, +1 AGI, +1 INT, +1 CHA
“Goblina, I don’t want to fight you!” Victor panted as his blood dripped on his scythe.
“Neither do I,” the goblin he had once called a friend replied, her sword too, red with Victor’s blood. “But I won’t let you get in my way!”
“We were supposed to unite against the Headmaster and expose his treachery!” Victor protested. “You weren’t supposed to join him!”
“I must avenge my clan… and kill that paladin! Only Sablar can give me the power needed. The power of time itself.”
“I thought we were friends!”
“We’re not friends!” Goblina snarled. “There can only be one Valedictorian!”
“So that’s it,” Victor glared back at her. “From now on… we’re enemies!”
Congratulations! For fighting an up and rising goblin overlord into a bitter tie, you earned a level in Reaper! You earned the [Soulmaster V] Class Perk!
+1 VIT, +1 SKI, +1 AGI, +1 INT, +1 CHA, +1 LCK
[Soulmaster V]: You can now learn and use [Necromancy], [Rituals], and [Diabolism] spells up to Tier V. Reaper levels now count as Caster levels for the purpose of class restrictions, and if a class grants you a spellcasting tier in your specialized schools of magic, they will stack with Soulmaster V. This replaces [Soulmaster IV].
“From the Outer Gate, we call upon the guidance of Yog-Sothoth,” Victor chanted alongside five other students, all of them surrounding a sacrificial goat. “Line our brains with eyes, so that we may glimpse the cosmic truth! [Ritual of Eldritch Insight]!”
But something was wrong… the energies… the streams of energies didn’t align! The stars weren’t right!
They weren’t summoning Yog-Sothoth! They were summoning… something ancient… something inhuman...
Something racist.
Congratulations! For accidentally summoning and befriending Cthulhu through an ancient, foul ritual, you earned a level in [Reaper]!
+30 HP, +10 SP, +1 VIT, +1 SKI, +1 AGI, +1 INT, +1 CHA, +1 LCK
“Brains?” the ancient, mummified ghoul asked, as the eldritch spirit settled in its rotten flesh. “Babies?”
Victor glanced at Camilla, who was raising a thumbs-up in pride.
“Babies’ brains?” the ghoul asked again, with a hopeful look on its face.
Congratulations! For reviving the ancient Order of the Ghouls to oppose the Headmaster’s machinations, you earned a level in [Reaper]! You earned the [Reanimator] Class Perk!
+10 SP, +1 SKI, +1 AGI, +1 INT, +1 CHA, +1 LCK
[Reanimator]: By sacrificing money or items, you can revive a living being as an intelligent undead; alternatively, you can place back one of the souls trapped in your scythe inside a corpse, the resulting undead retaining the original soul’s class levels. The funds needed to revive someone depends on the soul’s value, whom you intuitively understand. This replaces [Animate Dead].
“You…” The dark, demonic figure of the Headmaster glared at the two students. The teachers of the school laid frozen in time, while the wormlike abomination powering the time distortion strained against its bindings. “Goblina, how dare you betray me?!”
“I was never on your side,” the goblin replied.
“We planned this since the beginning,” Victor added. “Your plan to free the Timeworm of Sablar failed before it even started!”
“The beginning? No…” the wicked fiend showed his fangs. “It can’t be…”
“That’s right,” Goblina said. “We staged a fake rivalry for three years straight!”
The Headmaster let out a roar of pure rage and frustration, as both students prepared themselves for the final battle.
Congratulations! For saving the Nightlands from the Timeworm of Sablar, and finally defeating the Headmaster, you earned two levels in Reaper! You earned the [Soulmaster VI] Class Perk!
+60 HP, +10 SP, +1 VIT, +2 SKI, +2 AGI, +2 INT, +2 CHA, +1 LCK
[Soulmaster VI]: You can now learn and use [Necromancy], [Rituals], and [Diabolism] spells up to Tier VI. Reaper levels now count as Caster levels for the purpose of class restrictions, and if a class grants you a spellcasting tier in your specialized schools of magic, they will stack with Soulmaster VI. This replaces [Soulmaster V].
As he stood on the amphitheater stage, watched by students, teachers, and three deities, Victor held his breath. Goblina remained at his side, just as tense.
Seven years had passed, although he hadn’t physically aged much since acquiring the [Vicious Ankou] Perk; life was just that dangerous at Scholomance. Seven years practicing dark magic until he could cast spells all the way to Tier VI. Seven years working on a dark artifact, foiling the Headmaster’s dark intrigues, and offering his body to all kinds of extraplanar outsiders.
“Seven years,” Victor muttered.
“So many adventurers, you could fill a whole book,” Goblina whispered back, before chuckling. “If we censor the Shoggoth in the basement.”