The Demon Fire Worms continued streaming into the pit which was now filling up fast. At the side, there were a bunch of fat worms who actually knew how to climb up to shore to avoid the traffic, through what had to be either a stroke of brilliance on their part or who knows what…
Having just been driven off, it was highly unlikely that the Flame Devouring Fishes would return anytime soon.
Furthermore, this battle wasn’t a complete waste either. In truth, it was the perfect opportunity to verify whether the golems could overwhelm the fishes under such circumstances.
By the time the pit was about full, Nola, who had gone chasing after the fleeing fishes, had just returned along with several dozen lower starred Demonic Fire Salamander.
“I’m back.”
Salamanders in tow, she swam up to shore, dragging a wave of lava up with her at the same time. In the meantime, her gigantic limbs plopped down with thunderous rumble, as if she had no inkling about how huge her body actually was.
“Dead?”
“Mhm.” Nola nodded her head before sweeping an eye over her salamander kin. Tone relaxed, she said: “These are some of the temporary guards I managed to find. They will aid in guarding the entry and exit points, they can also communicate with the Demon Fire Worms. If there is anything you wish them to do, just tell them.”
With regards to the unplanned decision by her to bring more salamanders to help, I wasn’t that surprised. As a fellow carnivore, she was probably worried that we would force the Demon Fire Worms to split or even kill them off before they did.
Regardless of what reason she had, this was within my expectations. Rather, what concerned me was whether or not they could speak the tongue of the Devil.
“Can they speak Devil?”
“No.” She shook her head before explaining:” For us salamanders, learning Devil isn’t an easy feat. Normally, only Five-stars and above Salamanders would know how to speak in the tongue of the Devil. Even so, they can understand it at least.”
“As long as they understand, it’s fine.” It wasn’t like I could make too much demands of them anyway. With that in mind, I turned around to face No.6 who was respectfully waiting by my side. “No.6, go familiarize yourself with them for a while, you guys would probably be working together in the future for a long time.”
“Understood, Master.”
No.6 was a clever fellow. He knew how to read the moment and he was eloquent as well. Amongst the Devils, he was truly a rare talent. If he really managed to construct a recruitment point to my satisfaction, I wouldn’t mind employing him heavily once more. It wasn’t like there was any chance of him betraying me anyway, what with our master and servant pact. More importantly, in a world of meat brain Devils, trying to find someone smart wasn’t easy.
While No.6 started communicating with the Salamanders, I turned my head to face my little sweetie who was currently running circles around the new pit with Cinderel.
“Mona, come to Papa for a second.”
Hearing that, she happily flew over with Cinderel while calling out in her melodious voice that sounded almost like a chime: “Mona’s coming, Mama.”
As always, she dove into me and started slobbering all over me. A while of having fun passed before I reached out with my hand to try and stop her. However, she deftly shifted herself to the back of my neck while her legs locked themselves securely on my shoulders in what had to be her favorite position thus far, the pony riding stance.
I left her to her own adorable devices for a while longer. Finally, when she had calmed down somewhat, I asked what had been on my mind for a while now: “Sweetie, Papa wants to know, exactly what was that black magical fog you used a while back against that Demon Fire Sprite?”
“That was Mo Na’s personally modified magic, it’s really fun.”
‘Modified magic…so what you’re saying is my little girl is a 100%, absolutely no take backs, bonafide genius?! For her to modify and improve upon spells…unthinkable! Can her talent be anymore unreal, she’s not even one years old yet!’
“You used the Vengeful Soul spell as a base?” That fog was vaguely familiar to me, it was out of the blue that I remembered her showing off this particular spell to me in the past. Back then, the form of the spell was roughly similar, only the color of the fog was different.
“Mhm, that was an improved Vengeful Soul.” Mo Na answered confidently. “Mo Na increased the mana capacity of the spell and added a Shadow Darkness element to it to give the spell a corrosive effect. Plus, plus, it’s now more flexible than the original one, it can even avoid some physical attacks because it is smoke…”
When it came to her modified magic, Mo Na held nothing back as she told me animatedly about her magical expertise. I had to admit, based on what I observed then, this improved Vengeful Soul was definitely a lot more powerful than before. Not only did it perform its role as a observation spell, its destructiveness had doubled, truly a useful composite magic.
“Sweetie, can Papa learn this spell?”
“Mama wants to learn it too?”
“Mhm, Papa is fascinated by this convenient spell.”
“Okay, okay!” As she sat atop my shoulders, Mo Na happily clapped her little hands in joy: “Let’s start right now then, Mama”
…
Vengeful Soul was an Undead spell that required certain conditions to be met in order to be cast, being of the Summoning branch and all. To cast it, one had to first trap a soul…Necromancers had a variety of methods to do so, Mo Na was naturally no exception either. This spell had a broad range of uses, of which included observation and killing. Unfortunately, it had one downside in that it was a one-time use spell. On the bright side, as long as it was only used to observe an enemy, this spell could be reused multiple times.
When used for combat purposes however, it had only one way of fighting, and that was to approach an enemy and blow itself up. Its explosive power was derived from the mana it had stored; kind of like an alternative world version of a human bomb.
For ordinary Necromancers, the casting conditions for this spell wasn’t easy. First of all, a soul was needed. Things were different for me however. Because my mana had a degree of intelligence, me casting Vengeful Soul would cause my mana to automatically coalesce into a being of low intelligence. In other words, all those requirements didn’t apply to me.
“Can it be enhanced with flames?” Having seen what Mo Na did to the spell, an interesting thought occurred to me which I voiced out. “Those of the Lust evolutionary branch have always found themselves most talented in Flames and Shadow Darkness. Since the Vengeful Soul can be enhanced with Shadow Darkness, shouldn’t Flames be…ah…ahem…I almost forgot, Flames are the antithesis of the Undead…”
“Mo Na tried that before as well, but the Flames always ended up countering the Undead aspect of the spell. Every try so far has ended in failure.” Having said that, her eyes turned a little gloomy.
‘Seems like my little baby has been trying out a lot of things while I wasn’t looking.’
Having paused for a second in thought, Mo Na continued, albeit in a slightly unsure tone: “Mama, perhaps you can try it out with your Nether Flames…those flames are special after all…”
‘Nether Flames? That’s right, each time I used them to burn an enemy, their bodies would burn up but their souls would be intact, didn’t that mean that the Nether Flames aren’t harmful to Souls? Or perhaps I can control it such that it won’t cause harm to souls?’
‘Wait…that might be true for others, but not me. If I were to cast the spell, I wouldn’t have to trap a soul beforehand since my mana acts as a complete subsitute. And since those Nether Flames are born from my mana…doesn’t that mean that I can just use the Vengeful Souls to summon Nether Flames, then…what should I call this new spell? Nether Flames Vengeful Soul? Or perhaps, Burning Vengeance?’
‘Hold on a second, isn’t ‘Burning Vengeance’ that Brand guy’s…bah, forget it, let’s just try it out for now.’
In order prepare myself well, I first lowered Mo Na back onto the ground before following the steps she taught me.
It was a complicated process, not to mention that I was trying to modify it right off the bat. Thanks to that bit of greediness, I had to attempt several times before it finally succeeded.
*Whoosh*
A fiery black skull, composed entirely of Nether Flames, coalesced into a floating object on my right palm. This was my version of the Vengeful Soul. Even though it differed a lot in terms of appearance from Mo Na’s one, the important thing was that it was more destructive than her modified version, by not just a few times too! After all, these flames were destruction incarnate.
“Whaa~~Mama’s amazing!” Seeing me succeed, she immediately threw me a fervent look full of worship. The little scamp seemed even more excited than when she had learnt something new herself. With a clap and a jump, she continued cheering: “Mama’s so amazing, Mo Na’s spell was improved upon just like that!”
Naturally, I was more than happy to accept her worship.
With regards to how smoothly this all went…how should I put it…the spell itself was extremely suited to me and my unique strengths. Thanks to that, I hardly encountered any difficulties in picking up this spell. Had it been any other spell, I probably would have gotten a headache.
“That’s an interesting spell you got there…” In the midst of her break, Nola’s interest was immediately aroused by my summoning of the modified Vengeful Soul. “That must be the flames you used to kill that Demonic Fire Sprite and the Flame Devouring Fishes…truly fascinating…”
“How about you try it out then?”
Seeing her so intrigued by the flames, I couldn’t help but poke fun at her, directing the fiery black mass towards her in the process.
“Hey, don’t point that thing at me…”
As the modified Vengeful floated towards her, Nola practically leapt out of her skin as her four limbs frantically retreated backwards in an unexpected show of feebleness while trying to distance herself from that black mass.
