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Archers lay as a mismatched pile of bones at Jay’s feet.

Jay had plenty of mana left and he wasn’t even feeling drained from re-summoning it numerous times. It only needed five mana to summon, and Jay still had over 90 to work with.

Satisfied with how much he had learned, he gave himself a break and used [Mass Summoning], dumping the rest of his mana into the pile of bones.

The energy coalesced into a dense orb that crackled with necrotic power. The bones, like lifeless twigs, began to stir and rattle, awakened again by the power that surrounded them. This was the most Jay had dumped into the mass summoning spell, and slowly, they lifted into the air, their pale surfaces aglow with the eerie green light that flickered and danced through them.

The floating bones orbiting the nest felt familiar, a pleasant reminder of his necrotic ring. Of course, as a gauntlet with thousands of bones inside it was too risky to shift it into its orbital form; it would probably cause another storm.

The bones floating around the nest of mana began to merge.

“Hang in there, Archers.” Jay muttered, feeling a wobble. His mana reserves had depleted rapidly, the strain of the spell weighing heavily on his mind and body.

Jay stepped onto the ramp of his single-room house, sitting in the doorway and watching the spell work its wonders.

I wonder if Archers gets a different class after all this abuse? Jay thought.

Archers appeared before him, its bones clattering and clicking as it rose into the air. He wondered if the poor skeleton was feeling the effects of the constant un-summoning and summoning, but with a single thought, Jay mercilessly willed it to un-summon again, its form dissolving back into the bone pile.

To automate the process, Jay made a second bone pile nearby, filled with another assortment of obscure bones from different creatures. Every so often Jay motioned for Red to toss a few more bones into the mana well, trying to keep the ratio’s of odd bones equal.

Jay was determined to learn more about his craft, the pursuit of necromancy, so even while he was light-headed he continued to watch intently as the bones shuddered and shifted, waiting for the next cycle of summoning and un-summoning to begin.

The day marched on and Jay leaned back, watching the spell like it were a crackling fireplace—rather than the dark, abominable offense of raising the undead that it actually was.

After a lunch of unidentifiable meat, Jay planned to spy on whatever Hegatha was doing in her basement. After Archers’ body rose and fell like the lapping waters, Jay gained 18% more chimera research, bringing it to 77%.

When Archers rose the few final times, the different bones assembling its body had become distinctly distributed, each of them finding the perfect place in its body like it were a pattern coming together each time, and it made the skeleton appear as if its own body had a mirror image of itself going down the center. The chimera skill was developing, so Jay’s mana gradually mastered the perfect bone placement and distribution.

Jay gained enough mana to use [Host], but before using it, he glanced at the shack, hearing something.

Deep creaks sounded. Jay sensed Dark’s presence above ground; there was movement inside.

Jay stood in his own doorway, watching while he idly chatted to Red.

“Seems like she’s finished melting the breaking shards into that black altar-thing?” Jay said.

Red glanced up to Jay, clacked its jaw once and turn to look back at the shack.

Jay look at Red and raised a brow, guessing that Red said “Yep”—In its own way.

“I better check on them.” Jay said, turning to his bed. Red nodded and stood guard at the door while its master lay down.

Jay wouldn’t enter Hegatha’s shack voluntarily. Dark and Sweeper were still assigned to guard Asra, so he wasn’t worried about her safety either. He simply wanted to [Host] to avoid Hegatha and her nauseating abode.

***

Asra’s eyes were gently clasped shut, dreaming of sweet sunlit meadows or cold stone castles plunged in shadows, but even asleep a vampires awareness was sharp enough to sense a husk drawing near. Especially such a large one.

Before Hegatha’s sausage-like, dirt-covered fingers could stroke her hair again she snapped her eyes open abruptly sat up, staring at Hegatha.

“Here to— Huh?” Asra said, her mouth slowly opening in shock. Hegatha had changed.

Her skin was clear of moles, with fewer freckles. Some of the bumps and lumps across her neck had either disappeared or deflated. Her blackened toothy mouth was not so blackened and not so toothless anymore.

Hegatha slyly smiled as she walked past Asra, who couldn’t help but ask questions.

“What happened to you? You’re… cleaner?” Asra asked.

Hegatha replied with her lips curled in a proud smile as she walked past.

“None of your business.” She said, as if it were a matter of fact.

Even Hegatha’s voice had changed—it wasn’t so raspy and biting. There was a subtle, gentle sweetness in it. Asra thought it was similar to the alluring voice she heard from the previous night. The one that sent a shiver up her spine; the voice Hegatha used to lure someone—or something.

Hegatha crushed another writhing piece of meat and chewed it down, so she wasn’t too different. With the piece of slimy meat dangling from her lips she lumbered over and sat by Asra’s side, still chewing.

Asra squirmed out of the blanket and pulled herself away on the table.

“I feel much better. You don’t have to—”

“Nonsense. Give me your leg. I have a deal with Jay.” Hegatha said, pulling on her clothes.

Some leaves fluttered down from the ceiling into her palm, which she quickly crushed and swallowed with the remainder of the slimy morsel of meat.

Sweeper tilted its head to the side, and stepped around Hegatha to see better.

Asra looked up at the skeleton, sighed with a frown and gave in to Hegatha’s demand, not wanting to ruin Jay’s plans.

Besides, the wound was still a scarred mess which pained her whenever she bumped it. She needed more of these special healings.

With a frown Asra looked up into Sweeper’s ghostly eyes, hoping it could at least tell Jay of her suffering here—but she also didn’t want him to see her sorry state.

I’ll just need to trust him. Asra thought, looking at Sweeper tilt its head and look around more than it usually did.

Him and his weird skeletons.