Time of the Dead

After a somewhat tiring first day at work in Fiore, Kuro was finally able to slowly head back to her new home, where her sister was waiting. However, there was one more place she had to visit along the way. Not one too out of the way, thankfully. A seemingly abandoned cemetery in what was known as the Cursed Lands. Though for a necromancer like Kuro herself, such place was almost hallow, blessed with boundless potential. This was why she was heading there in the first place. She had heard that the dead were restless for a while now, cause of this unknown.

Regardless of why it was a perfect opportunity to study the walking dead. Despite her magnanimous end goal, she was but a beginner in the dark arts still. There was a need for practice! And although the feline felt the need to hurry back home to Shiro, she would never be able to improve if she would not invest extra time into things like this. And so she swallowed the urges tugging on her heartstrings, taking the small detour. Even from distance, the dark energies swirling over the resting place of many could be felt by those spiritually attuned.

The good thing about this was the simple fact that anyone who would be capable of standing in the girl’s way would stay as far away from this place as they possibly could, especially as it was far into the evening now. She was quite sure that she was the only actual living individual. Not needing to hide her form away anymore, as a result, she shed the black coat, leaving it on one of the gravestones. But to her dismay, her soon-to-be test subjects were all… well… quite old. It only made sense, looking at how ancient this place must be.

Still, skeletons were not exactly ideal pawns for the freshly trained necromancer. With a sigh, she seated herself at another marble stone, finally attracting the attention of the undead. Clearly, they were not pleased with her showing absolutely no respect toward their final resting place. Though, of course, Kuro had no intention of letting them reprimand her in any way. The moment they approached, she released her stored energy and tried to command them. “Bend to my will!” Her words echoed with magical power, but the skeletons only slowed down, some stopping completely.

Observing them for a while, it became clear that something already reanimated would be a much more difficult target for her than a corpse without any semblance of life to it. But an important observation was that it was not impossible. She would just need to tweak her magic, make it more powerful. Still, these things were quite relentless. Was it anger which powered them up? One of the skeletons even made it all the way to the girl, ready for a swing of its sword. Naturally, there was no chance it could ever harm her, no when slowed down by her necromancy.

No, Kuro would merely plant her feet on the ground again and hop to the side before releasing her power momentarily. Returning to its full speed and strength, the skeletal being could not stop itself from smashing the tombstone into pieces with the force of its blow, sending it into a maddening fit of unbridled rage. Though the girl had already adjusted her spells and tried again. “Bow down and obey!” Her magical energy gathered as a green mist that shot outward, covering most of the immediate area around her.

And this time, no matter how mad the dead one was at the girl, it had to fall to its knee and lower its skull in front of her. Suffice to say, it allowed a sly smile to creep up her lush lips. While at the expense of her magical energy, she could even overwhelm remains that still had souls attached to them, as long as the body had perished before and opened up to the attacks of necromancy. This result was most pleasing, though it was also painfully apparent that the girl could not steal away the will of much more than these fleshless corpses just yet.

Increasing the limits of her magical reserve presented itself as an adequate goal for the time being then. Of course, almost any mage out there had such a goal. It forced a sigh out of the small girl. Despite her appearance and goals, she was not so special. She certainly had her talents, no one could deny that. But in the end, only those subjected to hard work would be rewarded with real power, be it to melt one’s opponent or to reanimate the corpse of a powerful individual. She was not exempt from this.

It would be a lie if she ever said that she was not jealous of those special beings who were already born powerful. Born rich. Born without any real need to worry about anything. If she were one of them, she would be able to bring her sister back already! But instead, she had to jump through loops, study the forbidden arts of necromancy and possibly even work herself down to the bone. But she was willing to do so… for Shiro, she would do anything, even if it would cost her everything. That was her drive, the one thing she truly had working in her favor.

Concluding this little experiment a success, she gathered her power once more and unleashed it. Exploding the necrotic energy withing the skeletons, she effectively disposed of them all in an instant. After all, she did not have the energy to subjugate their souls indefinitely. And she certainly was not interested in them trying to exact their vengeance upon her. With the bones shattered and scattered across the stones and dirt, she had picked her coat back up, heading back toward the Phoenix mountain once more. Surely she would be back to this place soon enough. In the end, cemeteries were the best source of corpses for necromancers. And she would need to eventually build an entire army to test the limits of her powers.