Going over the same spell that pulled him into the fantasy world, Steve realized that he and Sum'gial are the same person right now. The ball of yarn that was Steve and the ball of yarn that was Sum'gial had become one. The lich of death wasn't one of sentimentality, or regrets, he was made of obsessions of Steve and knowledge of Sum'gial.
The enchantment school of magic on soul was one, Sum'gial studied to overcome the weakness on the phylactery that was hastily made thanks to Jacob. Now he was studying it to change a devil's true name. Sum'gial for the first since his coming to Orbisar, felt like a kid on a sugar rush. The same enthusiasm, not out of necessity, but out of want, just like a first bite of a burger.
The same desire in the memories of original Sum'gial for the magic, one reliable pillar in the chaotic life of drow. The magic never betrayed. Sum'gial realized that Steve's obsession and Sum'gial's obsession were fused together, the faint existence of the magic network just out of his perception, the hum, the groan, he was obsessed with the orderly magic.
Just like building dominoes, one after another, then pushing one tile to reach the satisfaction. Sum'gial realized the chaos in the other floors of the tower didn't bother him while he worked on magic. Till now, he worked on and on for the sake of his OCD, yet now he worked for the magic. He wanted to perfect the magic in front of him. He wouldn't even put one variable wrong.
He needed experimental materials to test whether he put any variable wrong. What should he call this magic? Soul reorganizer? Sum'gial's Soul Organizer, yes that sounded better. The orchid cult was a good source of inspiration for this magic. He wanted to see the face of the goddess of the orchid cult, when he saw this magic.
Ahr'zel was correct about one thing about him, he was truly mad.
"Kakakakakakakakaka" , the bone chilling laughter he let out made his mood better than ever.
—
Selithrae POV
"Trust me, it will work." Vyrgil said.
"Oh, dear goblin, I am definitely not going to step on a random teleporter." Selithrae replied, and said "I have a different idea, why don't you randomly send a dart to my wall map? And we will go where the dart lands.".
Two legendary undead, a Wight and a Vampire go on an adventure, sounds like a joke yet, it was happening, Selithrae was enjoying herself, the innocence of the vampire goblin made him pleasant company.
"What is a dart?" Vyrgil asked.
"An old throwing weapon, dear Vyrgil, it is easy enough, just throw it randomly on the map." said Selithrae fondly like she was teaching an elven child.
The thrown dart landed right on the slime forest by the ocean of merman.
"That's where the ball of liquid is, what have you gotten me into Vyrgil." thought Selithrae clutching the worry beads tightly.
Muck of the slime forest POV
Magic is the energy naturally existing in the universe, the first spell was created by the Metallic dragons. In the age of dragons, when the magic network didn't exist, the first spell was created by using natural elements. The first spell was obviously dragon breath. The wise dragons gathered together studied this phenomena and to ensure this knowledge would not be lost they carved into bloodlines.
Elves seeing the magic of dragons, came up with the idea of carving the magic into their homes. The largest known magic sphere was carved by the elves to protect their homes. The wise men and women of elves carved the magic sphere into spacetime itself. This magic was so powerful that Ther'vassi didn't dare to touch the forests of elves. However, their powerful magic itself prevented the large-scale domination of the elves.
The glory of Ther'vassi rose, along with it the resistance of other races. One notable resistance leader among those was the orc leader Urzag Stonebite. The charismatic berserker of orcs, for the first time brought the orcs to heel, and ruled them all. Had the humans not betrayed the orc leader, he might have succeeded to carve a part of the continent for the free races.
The captured orc leader was handed to a secret institute, where I don't know.
"Magic and Leaders" by the first councilor Curm of NosGoblin, as Muk of the slime forest read about the days when he had a humanoid body, it felt no regret. Not for trusting humans, not a shred of hatred for the goblins that turned it into a ball of liquid. It did its best and somehow it survived till now.
The orcs understood the best what the survival of the fittest was, it also understood. When the curses of the gods came down, it escaped its prison and let loose all the slimes into the forest. It studied magic and found ways to kill its time. It was no undead in a normal sense, a slime life's core was a magic stone. Its magic stone happened to be a necromantic one.
It used to be an iron slime, but as it ate more and more metal somehow it became a mythril slime. An undead blob of liquid didn't need to eat metal, it needed to eat the magic. So, it formed a natural cycle of slimes eating the corpse, it eating the slimes under its domains. It didn't need to eat living slimes either, only their magic core was somewhat useful to it.
The liquid of the slimes after their death could be used as a fertilizer for the plants or the trees in the forest. It didn't enlarge the forest either, it understood the cycle of life should come naturally. That's why gods left it alone, it didn't struggle for anything. Lucky if I get it, not my problem if things go sideways.
It needed eyes though, the magical perception was great and all, but it couldn't read. Its perception was limited by what it could see. It missed the ability to see.
Ther'vassi communication book vibrated, as it opened the book to the only place it could see and understand, it felt a joy-like feeling. It never met the other owners of the communication book, the closest owner of the communication book to it was the righteous ship.
A private message from a Wight? It became curious.
Dear ball of Liquid,
The elegant goblin and I would like to visit you, and form a non aggression and a defensive alliance. Please let us know if you are interested in such an alliance.
Thewightduchess, The Elegant Goblin
–Hopefully your future allies.
It wasn't dear to anyone for a long time. The muck of slimewood forest hadn't even bothered to name itself other than its previous epithets, eventually the ball of liquid and the muck of the slimewood forest became its name. It agreed to their visit, curious about their purpose.
—
Jacob POV
Jacob was orchestrating the downfall of a house which had lost protection of the Queen of Mushrooms, as a mercenary and an ambassador. This was a rare opportunity for him to show the undead of Sum'gial. The slave army was first to fall, the drow master of arms defended well, but he was only an elite level warrior. He fell easily with the drow army. Then, the drow army fell.
The odd thing was that every fallen member just got up as undead, Jacob was puzzled at first. Then realized that every undead under his control had a cursed weapon, whether swords, spears, arrows shot from crossbows, whenever took a life, brought back an undead.
He wouldn't kill any females here, they would join different houses. They will hold a grudge against him for sure. He needed the space where the house was located, and he wasn't a member of the nobility here at E'nathyr. No one could fault his actions. The Mushroom Queen would delight at the chaos he created. The matrons wouldn't bother him for a low ranked house like this one.
He turned his head to the closest mushroom and mouthed silently "Your turn Veyn'dor". For he knew the archmage would be watching.
Veyn'dor POV
Veyn'dor knew that Matron Baey'Ra drew the wrath of Mushroom Queen, normally another house would take advantage of their weakness and take over their assets,the drow population except for the noble house members would be revived and added to the winners. This time though, the surface dweller attacked and took over the assets.
As he entered the former residence of Baey'Ra house, he started to think of the consequences.
This action itself was legal, the Baey'Ra house didn't exist except for the priestesses, they would be taken over by the upper level houses.
The problem was the political influence of this action would shake the underdeep. For the first time, a surface dweller took action in the underdeep, and there was no repercussion on the perpetrator. Perhaps this was what the Mushroom Queen was after, she didn't want an orderly E'nathyr. She wanted chaos.
Despite his inexperience Jacob did well, in his opinion. He saw two death knights standing guard where the previous Matron and her daughters were being held.
A light nod, and death knights let him pass, these two were ordered to not let people out, even if Veyn'dor brought in an army, they would let him in.
Jacob was sitting there drinking mycelbrew with the matron and her daughters. There was no conversation, no fighting, except matron Xaliathra who looked like she wanted to eat him raw. His opinion of Jacob rose further.
With a bow of equals, he sat at the table, used a few cantrip spells to pour himself some mycelbrew, and said "well, there is no house of Baey'Ra, priestess Xalianthra is to join House Haet'Ra, apprentice priestess Oryndra and Vess'ri is to join E'nathyr academy for further studies. I think what I am saying is crystal clear for the present parties?".
Jacob rose, with a bow of equals, said softly and firmly "I hope you will leave my quarters, in an hour, after that I will kill every living being in my new headquarters!".
As Jacob left the room, with no hurry Veyn'dor drank his Mycelbrew, said "Our host is quite impatient" and, rose from his seat, asked "Shall we?".
Sum'gial POV
Sum'gial summoned one chaotic imp after another, tested his magic over and over again in front of Ahr'zel whose patience was running low.
Ahr'zel said with a bite in his tone "I am not your lab assistant you know! The magic was perfected thirty experiments ago in the twentieth version! We don't have anymore imps to summon, the ones we summoned from first hell thanks to your magic all ended up in the ninth hell. Especially the last experiment, I never thought the day I would see an imp with cleanliness obsession!".
"I am sure it will be fine, the ninth hell needs cleaner after all." Sum'gial replied lightly.
"Yeah, if that imp saw the archduke of hell, he would give the archduke a good wash up!" said Ahr'zel with deep sarcasm dripping from his tone.
"You were quite happy to help with my experiments before we started off, why the sudden dislike?" Sum'gial asked.
"I wasn't expecting this! What kind of experiment causes imps to fear diseases, have cleaning urges, or even have existence crises? Lets not forget about not trying to step on lines, swearing, paying attention to their breathing!" Ahr'zel exclaimed.
"These imps already had those phenomena, what we are doing right now makes those desires more prominent, and identifying those traits in the yarn ball. In theory, true names are bestowed by hell, due to your prominent traits. Once those prominent traits change, hell senses the changes and gives new names." Explained Sum'gial.
"So, why don't you make those imps more chaotic? Why do all of them end up in weird situations? Cleaner imp swore to hell, he won't stop cleaning the hell till his death!" Ahr'zel had a manic look in his eight eyes.
"Oh, that imp was a castle butler while it was a mortal, so I had to improvise somewhat to make the changes prominent, especially the imps we summoned. Almost all of them don't even have prominent traits at all. Most of the imps had their true names like imp 01, imp 02…" Sum'gial said.
"Will I end up like those imps?" Ahr'zel asked.
"We have another option for this kind of experiment, instead of making things prominent, we could reduce. I am pretty sure those side effects would be much more prominent though." Sum'gial said.
"No, no, no. I really don't want to lose my sense of cleanliness!" exclaimed Ahr'zel.
"That's for later, let's not worry about it for now. I need to go over the data we gathered, and come with a couple of options for you to choose from. For now, we are done with the experiments" Sum'gial said.