NOVEL NEXT Chapter 68: The Necromancer
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Gordon: I guess I just don't really get the appeal of AC mode.
Karen: Well, Gordon, when a hippogriff loves an adventurer very much…
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Saturday, November 16th, 2090, about 3:35 pm MST, Montana City
Karen didn't really like the dark. Being out under the stars was one thing. Being out on a moonless night with rain clouds and wind that hid even most street signs and street lights was one thing. Those were okay. But underground is really dark. Capital-R, Really True Darkness. Things that have never known light live there, or lie there and wait. Maybe. In a game like this, you never knew.
And did she have a torch? No. Why would she have a torch? She was a two-handed specialist. Did she have a lantern? Yes, in her saddlebags, because no one expects their friends to try to burn them to death twice in such short succession.
Karen also played with the pain turned all the way on most of the time. For verisimilitude, it just made her more aware, more alert. But also, she would have felt bad streaming next to Gordon, who also played with his pain turned all the way on. She really needed a new group of friends. Hers were all masochists. Except for the weenie, the rest were masochists. And lava had not been a fun time. She wasn't sure how Gordon had taken it so lightly; she'd been quite peeved. Not to mention, she wanted to fight the Minotaur so badly. One of these days, they were going to have a rematch. Grudge match. Mano a… mano a mino, because Gordon would probably also want that grudge match.
It was dark, and she was feeling around with her hands, trying not to think about the fact that it was dark. And then it wasn't quite dark. It was almost a dark gray-purple, then paler. A light source was moving around toward her. Now what made gray light? she thought to herself. Excellent. He's got a specter. I'm going to get possessed.
It was almost inevitable. Specters were useful for their ability to jump bodies. If one was possessed by a necromancer, the necromancer could jump into your body. She'd often thought that many of Ghostlands' game mechanics made a lot of sense for a pen-and-paper game, but seemed deeply inappropriate and borderline traumatizing for a VR game with sensation. She imagined feeling her limbs moving under someone else's direction and shivered. If this player did that to her, she would go find him in real life and kick him in the 'nads.
Apparently, it wasn't for her, because the shade slipped smoothly past her, up through the same channel she'd entered by, and out of sight.
The game had three arenas for combat: physical combat, magic being the second, and social being the third. Shades could only be harmed through social combat. They were not exactly a role-playing group. She suspected that, when it came down to it, the only person she personally knew who would be able to kill a shade might be Marie.
That was the moment Karen realized what the Spectre was for. It wasn't just some ambient horror—it was meant to possess Harry. To make him kill Claire.
Not on my watch.
She dropped into a low crouch and sprinted off in the direction it had vanished, deeper into the necromancer's lair. The light thinned. The walls grew slicker. Air like damp stone.
"I found the cave," she panted into team chat. "Claire—I'm gonna need lava. Lots of lava."
"You're inside," Claire said, alarm threading through her voice.
"Whatever," Karen said. "Don't pretend you haven't wanted to charbroil me a little."
"Right now?" Claire admitted. "Maybe."
"Go nuts. Free shot."
The spell bloomed.
And lava poured in.
Karen crept forward, bootfalls silent on damp stone, fingers tensed near the hilt of her blade. A growing orange light followed her careful steps, accompanied with the popping of hot stone and charring wood.
"What in ze he—"
A flicker.
"Hallo!"
What.
Light bloomed at the center of the chamber. It should have been a cavern—raw and unworked—but what it looked like now was… suspiciously even. Tiled, almost. With a kind of gleam. In the center of the space stood an open casket made of some polished gray stone.
In the casket lay a slender, elongated figure—comically blinking up at her, speckled, and unmistakably European.
Her hated foe.
"Voss ist loss?" he said brightly. "Hallo! Very good!"
His English was still awful. His enthusiasm, tragically, was unchanged.
She hadn't seen him in ages.
Karen groaned. "No. No, no, no. You were supposed to stay dead."
He wasn't. Players respawned. But it seemed appropriate.
She didn't lower her sword, exactly. But she did sigh.
"Hallo!" he beamed. "Cuts_by_Karen!" (He pronounced it Charon, like the mythological ferryman.)
"My nemesis!"
He waggled his fingers in a friendly hello.
Karen closed her eyes. Just for a moment.
"I'm gonna lava this whole chamber," she muttered.
He didn't notice. Or maybe he just didn't care. He sat up with an audible creak, one leg swinging over the side of the casket like he was lounging poolside. "It has been ages! Would you like to dance again?"
"You're not being metaphorical, right?" she asked. "You're bad at them."
"This was very never personal," he assured her.
"You have never taken anything personally in your whole life," she accused him.
He nodded happily.
"Well I guess this won't hurt too bad."
She sprinted at him.
She's met him back at level 40, when he'd only been level 200. And survived, but could t touch him. She's resented that he wouldn't make it easy to resent him for it
He wasn't there.
A hand on her back reminded her that he'd also had time to level up. She froze involuntarily.
"Ah nooo, lava coming mmm. Sorry!"
She lunged.
And froze.
Not voluntarily. Not psychologically. Literally.
Every muscle locked mid-stride, breath stuck in her throat, blade halfway raised. Her body wouldn't listen. She couldn't twitch a finger.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
Paralysis.
Her eyes still worked—just barely. She saw him stroll back into view, hands folded behind his back, posture casual and maddeningly upright.
"Oh, Karen," he said, with that fake-disappointed lilt. "You always charge. It is very brave. Very noble."
He circled her slowly, like a man inspecting a sculpture. "But also very… predictable. Ta!"
He vanished.
Just popped out of existence. No puff of smoke, no dramatic exit animation. Just gone.
Karen couldn't even scream.
Then the lava rolled in.
It came in slow, steady, and utterly indifferent. Glowing red, hissing against the cool stone, licking toward her boots with the casual certainty of gravity. The paralysis hadn't worn off.
Unbelievable.
Somewhere in the back of her mind, Claire was probably watching this through the stream, horrified. Or laughing. Maybe both.
Lava hurt just as much to die in the second time.
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He was here.
Claire spun, dodging frantically. Fire burst from her hands in short, sharp pulses, each one missing by inches. The freaking vampire wannabe wouldn't stay still. Stupid teleporters. Stupid spells. She wanted one. She deserved one.
Fwoosh.
Fwooosh.
FOOOMMM!!
She hit nothing but air.
He wasn't there anymore.
"You almost hit me," Harry noted, voice calm, somewhere off to her left.
"I'm sorry, my love," she said automatically.
> CowardlyTaterhead: Awwwwwwwwwwwww
"Enough!" Claire snapped. "You creeps are getting on all of my nerves!"
> Randoon_the_Wizard: She doesn't mean us. She'd have banned me for sure.
> Xtraprofit: She looks like she's considering it.
Harry didn't need to look up to make himself heard: "Don't ban him, honey."
His sword whistled, slicing through ghouls. "He means well."
Claire launched another firebolt into a ghoul's mouth and grumbled, "You're all the worst."
The Spectre emerged from the packed dirt beneath Harry's feet—no warning, no shimmer, just a ripple and a slide. It rose like smoke, then flowed into him.
He froze mid-swing.
Claire's heart seized.
The necromancer was there.
Of course he was. Just standing on a nearby ridge, arms folded, posture elegant, absolutely unbothered. He looked—
—like a stick insect.
Terrible thing to think, Claire told herself. Terrible. I'm going straight to wherever honest people go.
"I made a hobby of counterspells," he said, voice light, as if he'd overheard none of it. "Now it is just we two."
He tilted his head slightly, like he was asking a riddle.
"I wonder—would you indulge me?"
Claire didn't answer his question.
She just moved.
Fast. Flame and motion, darting between stone outcrops, spells flying—missiles of pressure and fire. She winged him twice, once along the side and once just under the ribs, but the necromancer barely flinched. He was too smooth. Too trained.
And annoyingly good at counters.
Every time she tried to summon something bigger, he flicked a tiny ice sigil—no grand gestures, just cool precision—and a storm of ice-BBs blasted her spell from the air before it finished forming. Like a kid with a BB gun at a birthday party. She hated him.
Soon, she had nothing left.
Empty sigil slots. Dry channels. She stood panting, raw-palmed and shaking, knees flexed, daring him to get close.
What had she done.
He did.
They were all going to die.
Calmly. Curious.
It was all her fault.
He circled her once, then stepped in, as if to check if she really had nothing left. He raised a hand—not to strike, but to mime an attack. Just a little theatrical flick of his fingers.
She should have known better, but she'd had the idea and fallen in love with the elegance of it.
She was in her own head, now, wrapped up in guilt, nothing left to do but die stupidly.
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The necromancer flicked her in the nose.
Harry broke free.
The Spectre shattered off him in a shriek of torn magic. His anti-magic mind trait—as designed—marked him as an invalid target for possession, when active.
And his sword was already mid-swing.
From twenty feet away, it hit as if he was directly beside the necromancer. The edge caught the necromancer across the midsection, blood misting out into the cold air and running in rivulets.
"Ach!"
The necromancer stumbled—
—and cast Heat Metal.
Harry hadn't seen it coming. Heat metal was a spell wizards tried all the time, but it only affected volume by level, and was all or nothing. And a fully equipped knight, with greatsword, was a lot of metal.
This guy was max level, though.
Everything flared to sullen light.
Sword. Armor. Greaves. Pauldrons. Codpiece.
"GAAAAHHHHH—"
He screamed, collapsed, rolled—
There was no safe part of him. Every buckle, every plate, every scrap of metal became an oven-hot branding iron. He attempted a followup strike with his sword—too late. It sizzled the grass where it landed, his hands unable to hold it.
Claire had been standing there shocked, but turned her head towards him at his involuntary sounds. Her face, already hard and stark with self-judgement, went mad.
Through smoke-blurred eyes, Harry watched her tackle the necromancer mid-incantation.
She teleported with him in a flare of cerulean glyphs.
They landed nearby.
It didn't matter, because she wasn't casting anymore.
She bit.
Teeth into throat. Hands scratching and clawing. Bronze headdress slick with blood. Topless, barefoot, blood-painted, she was no longer a player, in a game, or even a woman.
She was an archetype.
Wrath and retribution in human form.
A Morrígan, writ in molten bronze.
His volcano priestess.
Tribal-marked and fearsome.
Primal.
She tore.
She swallowed.
She screamed.
Blood flowed, breath ceased, bone snapped, and with eyes still wild with the echo of fire still singing in her limbs, she came to her senses.
Claire looked down at her blood-slick hands, chest heaving, each breath an audible effort.
"I—Harry, I—"
He was still on the ground, burned and half-broken, but he made the effort to smile at her. She needed to know what he'd seen.
"You were beautiful. No one will ever call you Ice Queen again."
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Claire could have cried. It was all over her face and she didn't care.
His pelt was scorched from the overloaded haptic suit. A four-inch branching fractal branded into his skin. She would never forgive herself.
"It's not that bad. I knew this seam was frayed; it's my fault anyway. You didn't do anything wrong." he told her.
"I owe you," Claire said quietly, brushing a hand over the freshly bandaged burn along his ribs. The gold thread had shorted. "I'm not going to sugar coat it. I—I'm sorry."
He took her by the forearm, her following his lead willingly, and sat her on his lap. He hugged her.
"I could make it up to you if you want me to," she said, tentatively. His brows furrowed. He didn't like it.
"No," he said into her shoulder, soft but firm. "You're my wife-to-be. And sexy as hell. Now-—I'm sure we can come up with something—if you can enthusiastically consent."
Claire stared at him. Her expression was all over the place—relief, amusement, affection. She felt embarrassment at how unguarded she'd become. Then a spark of something else.
She was short, but still managed to knock him off his feet.
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She was already asleep, breathing steady against his chest. Her hair still smelled like sweat and smoke. One hand rested, curled, near the burn on his ribs.
Harry stared at the ceiling. He hadn't moved in twenty minutes. Not because he couldn't—though his muscles were sore in places he didn't know had names—but because if he moved, he might lose the thread of this feeling. This weight in his chest.
She'd said it so casually. Like her submission was expected if she admitted wrongdoing.
Hiram was a bastard.
Eventually he realized he couldn't sleep if he thought she thought he wanted.
He needed to set the record straight.
He swallowed. His hand drifted up and touched her hair.
"Hey," Harry said softly, nudging her in her underarm—she slept with her arm over her eyes. "Listen. Slave Leia? I never liked her."
Claire lowered her arm with visible confusion, blinked at him, still half-asleep. "Uh."
He kissed her gently. "You're worth too much to debase yourself for anyone. Even me."
She sat up a little. Clearly reran that. Processed it. Considered being vulnerable. Wondered what Karen would do.
She snorted. "Heh. You said debase. What a nerd."
He kissed her again, smiling into it.
"Shhh," he murmured. "Sleepy Claire sounds like a Karen. Wouldn't want that."
"Mmmm," she muttered, already drifting again. "Meanie."
Good enough.