Mage academy 4 a litrpg.., p.18
Mage Academy 4: A LitRPG Magic Academy Light Novel, page 18
"Good." Abraham walked past Danny and clapped him on the shoulder. "Then please, accept a small gift. A token of my appreciation for all that you've done, and hopefully a token of a long and fruitful friendship between the Silver and the Youngblood families."
Danny turned as Abraham clapped his hands, and the door swung open. Boniface swept inside and placed a small box on the bed. He flipped it open, revealing the same suit that Danny had worn on the day of the crowning ceremony.
"I'm afraid it was damaged severely in your battle. We've fully repaired it, and we've added in a few enchantments that should provide some protection, both from physical and magical attacks." Abraham smiled. "You'll be able to wipe out entire armies, and you'll look spectacular doing it."
Danny laughed and smiled but paused as Boniface brought out a second item. He carefully laid a sword in its scabbard down just next to the suit then stepped back. Danny slowly reached out and took hold of the weapon then grasped the hilt and drew out the blade. His jaw dropped as he looked at the weapon.
[You have discovered the Frostbite Sword!]
[Rank: S]
[Deal ice damage to a target]
"The power of the ice attack increases as your own skills increase," Abraham explained. "And I should note that it's based off all your skills, not just your ice skill, which I know that few people actually possess."
"Thank you, sir." Danny could hardly tear his eyes from the blade.
The sword was crafted from a silver-white metal, with a hilt encrusted with more gemstones than he had ever seen before. The weapon felt perfectly balanced in his hand. As he stepped back and twirled it a few times, he realized it had no equal among the swords he had wielded. Granted, he didn't use swords often, but this one was exceptional.
"I'll treasure it," Danny said.
"That is nothing. A mere token, something I likely would have given you even if you had done nothing." Abraham nodded to Boniface who backed out the room.
A moment later, he returned, holding a small cage.
"This is what I truly give to you," Abraham continued. "Something only you will be able to appreciate, and something that few others have ever seen."
Danny leaned forward, peering into the cage. Inside was a small bird. It darted this way and that then locked eyes with Danny who instantly felt a connection.
"What's this?" Danny murmured.
"This is a Nightingale of the Snow," Abraham answered. "There are very few of them left in the world. We have a small population that we keep here, but unless we can find more of them in the wild to expand the gene pool, we expect that the last of them will die out within a hundred years due to inbreeding. I am told that you can extract the attributes of a creature just by looking at it. Please, help yourself. There is no song more beautiful than that of the Nightingale of the Snow, and it has several other traits that I believe you will find unique."
Danny nodded then held out his hand. After a brief flash of light, a notification appeared.
[Creature Absorbed: Nightingale of the Snow]
[Traits: Nightingale Torso (Lv. 1), Nightingale Wings, Nightingale Feathers, Nightingale Head, Nightingale Feet, Ice Attribute, Song Attribute, Sleep Attribute]
[Mana to Quicksummon: 5]
Danny frowned. "Sleep Attribute?"
"All nightingales possess the ability to sing a target to sleep," Abraham explained. "They were highly prized in years past for this ability, which is why so few of them exist in the wild. They can be resisted, of course, but to hear one sing is to become drowsy, even if your Constitution and Magical Resistance stats are quite high. Royals often used them to sleep at night, and they were often employed as traps, of sorts. Assassins would become weary and fall from palace walls, or even just curl up on the floor of the bedrooms of the kings they were sent to kill. They're quite useful, in many ways. I imagine that you'll be able to find much use of it."
"Thank you," Danny said with a smile. "Thank you very much."
Abraham nodded to Boniface who withdrew. "I'll leave you alone, now. Until we speak again."
With that, Abraham left. Danny watched him go, a smile spreading across his face. The gifts were amazing, but more importantly, everything Abraham had said was true. He would have helped Radiance simply because she was his friend, and he would do so again in a heartbeat.
He changed into the dress clothes, wanting to show his gratitude, and strapped the sword to his side. Then he made his way to the front gates of the palace, where the Diamond Carriage awaited. The doorman opened the door, and Danny climbed in, now accustomed to the ritual of having his feet wiped. Soon, he was seated and ready, leaning back to wait.
Radiance and Isa arrived shortly after, and as soon as they settled in, a small spread of food was brought out to them. They began to eat as the carriage set off across the countryside, and Danny sighed contentedly.
"And now, back to the real world," Danny muttered. "I'm going to miss this place."
"Enjoy being waited on hand and foot?" Radiance shook her head at him. "Honestly, I kind of enjoy not being followed around at the Academy."
"Don't get me wrong, I think I would go crazy if I had to do it for my whole life," Danny said. "For a short vacation, though, I'd say that it was quite a good time." He paused, then nodded to her. "How do you feel?"
"I'm alright," Radiance answered after a brief pause. "Better than I might have thought, all things considered."
"Ready to go back and take your place in the Silver Family line?" Danny joked.
"No, but I'm okay with remaining in the line," Radiance said. "I understand a bit more about why it was done. I'd only ever met my uncle's side of the family a few times, and…" She shook her head. "The only way he should come into power is if most of the family wealth is given away. If he gets it, the Empire will regret it."
Danny grinned. "I'll take your word for it."
"Good." Radiance paused then leaned forward and balled her hands into fists. "Now, who tried to have me killed?"
Danny gulped at the fierce gaze plastered on her face. He glanced over at Isa who was doing her best to fade back into the upholstery of the carriage.
"Kill you?" Danny held up his hands. "Who tried to kill you?''
"I'm not stupid." Radiance rolled her eyes. "There was a reason my father made me avoid part of the palace the last few days. The day of my crowning, you were missing for most of the ceremony. Plus, you know… I do have ears. I could hear the servants screaming, and since then, I've heard them talking about it."
Danny grimaced then bit his lip. "Ahh… It's a little complicated."
"Come on, Danny." Radiance shook her head. "Haven't we been through enough together? Surely, you can tell me who was trying to kill me."
Danny sighed then nodded. "Her name was Barbara. She was the magically conjoined sister of Captain Anne."
"Was?" Radiance asked.
"I… sorta helped separate the two of them." Danny shrugged. "Like I said, it's complicated."
"And you have no idea why she was trying to kill me?" Radiance asked.
"I wish I did," Danny said. "I truly do."
Radiance nodded then leaned back in her seat. The carriage rumbled onward, across the snow and down toward the Academy in the south. Danny gazed out the window, wondering what they would come across next. He recognized the sights that they passed, seeing them now in reverse, but… something told him that things were only just heating up.
The creature, Deepcorp, all of it was somehow connected. He didn't yet have all the pieces, but that didn't mean he was going to stop looking. He just had to stay the course.
And he had to do everything in his power to make sure Barbara's prediction was wrong and the blood of countless people wouldn't lie on his hands.
Auto save - [Savefile: Information]
Health: 100%
Mana: 100%
Quest: Return to the Academy.
Location: Silver Road
Inventory: Essential Supplies, Basic Armor, Iron Sword, Sword of the Wasp, Aquamarine Sword, Frostbite Sword
Skills: Monster Summoner (Lv. 35), Flame Combat (Lv. 2), Wind Combat (Lv. 5)
Relationships: Friendly with Isa, Friendly with Radiance, Speaking Terms with Abraham Silver, Ascended Ice Mage
Time of Day: 9:31 a.m.
See You Around
The trip back to the Academy passed without incident. Danny, Radiance, and Isa remained quiet and pensive, reflecting on everything that had happened. Radiance seemed to be embracing her role as the ruler of the estate, despite her claims of wanting to be elsewhere. She wore her new responsibilities well, and when she did speak, it was about the various trials and challenges occurring on and around the Estate.
Isa often winked at Danny when Radiance spoke, making light of her seriousness. Radiance didn't notice, which was probably for the best.
Danny, for his part, kept his thoughts focused on Deepcorp, the Crawler, and the myriad mysteries surrounding them. He desperately wanted to uncover the truth before everything came crashing down, but he didn't even know where to begin. The threat from Deepcorp loomed large in his mind. If they had tried to kill Radiance once, they were likely to try again. Barbara had left without harming Radiance, but Barbara wasn't the entirety of Deepcorp, and many others would be far less forgiving.
Upon their arrival at the Academy, there was little fanfare. It was late in the day when Danny and Radiance climbed up to Professor Goldstone's classroom. They knocked on the door, and the elderly professor opened it with some surprise. After handing over their work, she thanked them both, and they went on their way.
Back at their dorm rooms, Radiance sighed and nodded to Danny, the weight of their experiences still heavy on their shoulders. She paused at the door of the bedroom and grasped the handle.
"Thank you again, Danny."
"You're not going to sleep in the lobby again?" Danny asked.
"No." Radiance shook her head and straightened her posture, radiating a new confidence as she turned to face him. "I'm not. Whatever they think, I'm not guilty. I have nothing to prove. If they're going to try to slander me again, I'll just fight it."
"And I'll be at your side," Danny confirmed.
Radiance smiled then vanished into her room. Danny entered his own, and dropped into his own bed for the first time in weeks. It felt a great deal lumpier than he remembered it, and his blankets and pillows seemed coarser and more uncomfortable, but not everyone could be a royal.
The next morning, a Saturday, he rose and walked out, finding himself in the Grand Hall, more or less just wandering. A flash of armor caught his eye, and he waved to Janna as she swept up and into the Academy. She waved back and walked over to him.
"Hey, Danny." She stopped and crossed her arms. "I hadn't heard you were back in town!"
"I just got in last night," Danny said then yawned. "What are you doing here? There hasn't been another attack, has there?"
"No, things were all quiet while you were out of town," Janna said. "Actually, I'm just heading over to check out the mageball tournament. It's been ages since I've seen a game, and… I don't know. I get the bug to watch it every now and again, and Tess is watching the Precinct for me."
"I hope you enjoy it," Danny said as he waved.
"You coming?" She gestured over her shoulder. "I can save a seat for you."
"Nah." Danny shook his head. "I need to get some things done, now that I'm back. Master Thornwood needs an essay I was supposed to write, which means that I need to actually write it, and I have some work for Dungeon Analysis that I didn't exactly get done while I was gone." He rubbed the back of his neck. "Lots of projects to get done."
"I feel you there! I ran into the same problem a few times when I was in the Academy." Janna laughed as she started to walk off. "I do not miss it, that's for sure!"
Danny waved then walked over to a table and sat down. Part of him wanted to go up to the Library to hang out with Master Barrydew, but the other part of him just wanted to sit in the Grand Hall and enjoy the ebb and flow of people moving through the area. He took a seat and pulled out his paper then took out a pen and dipped it in his inkwell.
"Alright," he mumbled. "Professor Thornwood wants an essay on what you might do if you encounter a set of identical twins. You know that one of them committed a murder, and will likely commit more. What do you do? How do you find which one is innocent?"
He sighed and drummed his fingers on the desk. It was an extrapolation of his "lesson" on magically conjoined twins, and the professor had come to many of the same conclusions. Danny, of course, didn't see the same outcome in pretty much any case, but… He did have to get a good grade. Or, at least, a passing one. He started to write, but found his mind wandering.
"Twins… Barbara… Monsters…" A thought suddenly struck his mind, and he tapped his pen against the page. "No. I have to write. I have to get… I…"
He sighed then folded up his supplies, shoved them all into his inventory, and marched off. A few minutes later, he rapped sharply on the door of Isa and Marcella's laboratory. Marcella pulled the door open and raised an eyebrow.
"Danny! Come in." She stepped back. "I'm glad you caught me here. I was about to leave. I don't normally come in on Saturdays."
"I was hoping either you or Isa would be here," Danny said. "I know Isa has some homework to get done before Monday, so…"
"Well, if she's going to come by, I haven't heard about it." Marcella smiled. "What's up? Maybe I can help."
"Actually, you probably can," Danny said. "Have you heard the rumors of the Shadow Crawler? I assume you have by now, I think pretty much everyone at the Academy has heard at least a bit of it."
Marcella nodded. "Yeah, I've heard a few things. What about it?"
"I was wondering if you'd heard of something similar." Danny crossed his arms. "The Waking Death. Any chance it sounds familiar?"
"Very." Marcella folded her hands. "Where did you hear it?"
"Call it a bit of a meeting," Danny said. "Perhaps not an entirely mutual one, though I'll admit that I did sorta instigate it. I can't really reveal who it was with, just that it happened, and I'd appreciate it if you had any information."
Marcella frowned then walked over and sat down at one of the tables. Danny followed, taking a seat across from her after shoving a few piles of books aside to make room between them.
"The Waking Death was a ritual that I knew of back when I was still in the jungle," Marcella said. "It was a really creepy one. The only people who would touch it were the really scary witches. I'm talking about the witches who looked like walking skeletons, the ones that you knew you didn't want to mess with. They'd curse you if you looked at them wrong, and if one of them came into town, you gave them whatever they wanted, and hoped and prayed that they would leave it again right quick."
Danny winced. "I was afraid you'd say something like that. What can you tell me about it?"
"It was a type of curse," Marcella answered. "They would cast it on their enemies. Basically, they would get a bit of the blood of the target, and then there was some sort of ritual. I don't honestly know what sort of ritual, I stayed well away from it. Anyway, when the ritual was complete, the target would start to grow weak. They'd be angry, irritable, all the marks of a curse. Most of the time, they'd know that they were cursed, and they'd be angry, which wouldn't help anything. Well, at that point, they had two options. The first one was to go to the witch to beg for mercy. Most of the time, at that point, the witch would just kill them and complete the transformation, though every now and again, he or she would leverage it for whatever they wanted, and then cure the person and send them on their way. The second option was to try and fight it, but that didn't work out all that often. Most of the time, when that happened, folks would just get sicker and sicker, until they died and transformed."
"Transformed into what, exactly?" Danny pressed.
"You remember the husks from a couple years ago, right?" Marcella asked. "Well, think of something like that, except the inversion. In the case of the Waking Death, the body is destroyed, but the mind remains. Except, of course, by the time that the death takes place, the mind has been so warped by the curse that it's angry, upset. It becomes a monster that roams around, until it winds up either binding to another body, or dissipating into the other world."
"Hold up." Danny held up a hand. "Binding to another body?"
Marcella nodded. "Once it started to roam, it would usually latch onto someone. It could be anyone, really. Usually whoever it happened to come across first. Once it had chosen someone, it would stalk them until it judged that their defenses were low, then it would attack, and, hopefully, take over their body."
"Just like that?" Danny frowned. "That's possible?"
"It's a soul without a body," Marcella said. "All it wants, at that point, is to get a body again. Anyway, when it attacks and binds to the body, there becomes a fight for the body, soul against soul. If the owner of said body wins, they're usually quite depleted for life, and usually don't have a long life span. If the Waking Death wins, they'll gain control of the body, come back to their senses, and usually kill themselves in remorse. Sometimes they just try to make amends, but since the body and soul weren't originally together, they usually don't last long." She shrugged. "Why?"
"Because I think that the Shadow Crawler might just be a Waking Death," Danny answered.
Marcella nodded slowly. Suddenly, all the blood drained from her face. "So… That means…"
"That means Margot's father was likely tortured and zapped into this Waking Death thing and then bound himself to Radiance." Danny sighed. "You're sure he's not in control of his actions?"
"I've heard of a few people who were able to successfully control themselves after being cursed, but that's the exception, not the rule," Marcella answered. "As soon as they realized what was happening, they usually just ran off in the opposite direction, and are presumed to have died after the curse wore down, and their soul departed. At the end of the day, though, no one knows."
"Hmm." Danny crossed his arms. "That's interesting." He paused then decided to come clean. "I saw the thing, up north. It followed us. I thought it was after me, but then it went to attack Radiance at the crowning ceremony."
