Koyuki, the Necromancing Foxkin

The next day we continued our experiments for the spellblade project. We once again met in the lab to try out ideas.

"I brought my book on earth magic." Skadi said. "Let's see if Hatsumi can use anything, and what it does for vampires."

"Harder skin could be useful." I mused.

"Yes and no. Bleeding is not necessarily bad for a blood mage. If you get your blood on the enemy you can do fun things with it." Skadi said. "Well, assuming you know the right spells. I am still working on that."

"Blood mages, like vampires, tend to focus more on regeneration than straight durability." Hatsumi added.

"Not every enemy has blood though. That means you can't always rely on healing yourself that way." Helena pointed out.

"Hm, actually, what about the bones? Can you use earth magic to enhance your bones? That would help with the undead strength enhancements so you don't damage yourself with a punch." I mused.

"We will have to see how much earth magic I can use in the first place. While I do have earth and water, blood magic in general comes a lot easier to me." Hatsumi replied.

"It's just for testing, you don't have to use the spell in combat." Cassie reminded her.

"I do have something else to try as well. Gronir has given me a book with an undead regeneration spell." I said.

"But you already know an undead heal, how is that different?" Helena asked.

"It's slower but lasts longer. The heal makes me channel mana into the undead and then they repair themselves. The regeneration places a spell on them that lasts for like an hour and they heal fast during that time." I explained.

"Is it a spell you have to channel?" Skadi asked.

"No. I use a set amount of mana when casting and the spell slowly uses it up." I replied.

"What is the point? Would it not be better if the spell used all the mana the moment healing became necessary? What happens if the undead is destroyed while the spell is going?" Cassie asked.

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"Well, there is a reason why I have never learned that spell. It was designed by someone who experimented on undead and needed a slow but constant heal to keep them from being destroyed. It is not very useful in combat. The idea is that you don't have to concentrate on the spell, you just cast it and then work on your undead. Like covering bones in metal, which would damage the skeleton. However, it could be something that works with spellblade runes." I explained.

"I wonder, does the spell actually do any regenerating?" Kaito asked.

I frowned. "What do you mean?"

"We heal through mana. All the tier three you have created can absorb mana in some way, by devouring things. That mana can be used to heal our wounds. Our bodies feed off mana, it keeps the spell that allows us to exist alive. I think that healing us just means feeding the right part of the spell that we are."

"But you are more than a spell. You can't just leave your body." Cassie pointed out.

"Perhaps an enchantment would be a better comparison. Our spell is most certainly attached to the body." Kaito mused.

"Is that different from us? Aren't we just souls attached to a body?" Helena asked.

I pondered that. "I think I know what he means. A living body has the information about how the body works stored in itself, while an undead has the information stored in the spell that animates them. We have to feed our bodies food to keep them going, they feed their spell mana to keep their body going."

"That means an undead is actually different from a magical monster. They are just animals with a core, right?" Skadi asked.

"True. I have never thought about it like that. Magical monsters still eat food. Undead only absorb mana. They need to be bound and have a link, or eat things containing mana, or live in an area saturated with necrotic mana." I said.

"Nyx eats bones. Even bones that should not have a lot of mana." Helena pointed out.

I scratched my head. "I suppose they can use some materials to improve their bodies? Maybe? I am not sure how Nyx can devour entire bodies and such. She does not have a stomach. She must have a way to convert everything to something usable."

All of us stared at Nyx. Nyx stared back. I retrieved a small chicken bone from my pocket and offered it to her. She happily chewed it. The resulting dust just disappeared in her bony mouth.

"I have seen her eat so many times and it is still fascinating." I mused.

"Meow!" Yoru complained, while scratching Helena's leg.

Ivy and Kasai immediately appeared as well, while Nyx looked smug. Soon all cats nibbled on some treats.

"Ok, we don't know how devouring works." I concluded.

"So, how are we using that revelation about undead bodies and spells? Some body enhancements seem to work on them." Skadi wondered.

"It is still a body, made of undead flesh, or bones, or other materials." Kaito pointed out. "Improving the body improves us. Our mana strengthens the cells, regenerates them, empowers them and so on. The difference is where the information about how the body works is stored. And how the body is being powered, or fed."

"Oh!" I said. "I think I understand. If a spell just hardens the skin it works. If a spell just offers mana to the body to improve its skin it would not work for an undead. You have to send the instructions to the spell that powers them instead. That's why undead use different heals and enhancements. You need to send the instructions to a different place."

"I do wonder if vampires are a sort of hybrid creature." Hatsumi mused. "I believe some spells for the living work on me because I heavily use blood. Even though my blood is a bit different."

It was an interesting point. "We should probably talk to Gronir about this. It might be a bit more complicated than that. But I think Kaito's theory has some merit. We need to make sure the runes do not just enhance the body, they need to properly integrate with the spell keeping an undead alive. Well, not alive I suppose, keeping the undead undead."