My feet hurt.
There's something lodged in it. It hurt even more with it pulling me around. Why am I being pulled? What's pulling me?
With these thoughts I peel open my eyes. The sky is dark. I remember it from when I fell. Dark and empty. There are no stars twinkling in the night sky, the moon is nowhere to be seen either.
"Anselm." I groan and suddenly I stop being pulled. I hear a growling, deep and rumbling. An animal.
I look and find a large chunk of my leg in the maw of a giant white wolf. Rows of its teeth sunk in my leg. Had I been hunted?
I remain deathly calm. In pain but calm nonetheless. It must be dragging me back to its pack. But wolves hunt in packs, there shouldn't be a need to drag me, I should have been eaten right there and then.
Was it a lone wolf? If there ever was such a thing. A wolf, hungry with no pack. Had it dragged me off to finish me on its own?
Its eyes shone a great gleam of red. Murder, hunger in its eyes. It eyed me, wondering if to forgo the journey back to wherever and just have its meal now.
I smile. I remember.
With a jerk I sprang up and sat on my ass, my hand flying straight at the large wolf, it is slow to make a decision I catch its hesitation and slap my palm on it, letting my necrotic mana seep into it.
"Soul Drain!"
I haven't used this skill since the cave. Since the goblins. I remember there's always the chance for the skill to fail, I'm not sure what sort of variables went into deciding whether or not it works but I'm glad I have yet to experience a failure when I desperately needed it.
Yet, I am not sure if I can call this a success or a failure.
Like usual, I am invigorated by the rush of power flowing into me from the wolf. But, unexpectantly, it doesn't budge. Not only does in fail to recoil in pain, it also fails to wither away as its very soul is transformed into lifeforce for my use.
Its fur doesn't fly and fall away, its skin doesn't peel back and its flesh doesn't melt at my touch. There is no immediate necrosis. No decay. No death.
I stop. I have to. It'd been a minute, my wound kept trying to close around the wolfs teeth, push it out perhaps, but to no avail. It didn't even seem fazed by the attempts to close the wound. It stares, only stares at me as my mana wasted away in a skill that was working but failing woefully yet.
I am left at its mercy. If Soul Drain failed, I doubt anything else would work.
As if sensing my despair, it pulled its teeth out of my leg ever so slowly, eyes trained on me. It hurt even more but I bit down on a scream lest I scare it into eating me whole sooner.
It stood tall. Without its head bent down to drag me, it stood likely over seven feet tall. Dangerously large. Ethereally, the night clouds part, giving way to the sheen of the moonlight to bathe the white wolf.
Again, it growled. Except this time, it sounds like a cough, a hacking cough, trying to get rid of something stuck in its throat perhaps. And then, it spoke.
"Did you really believe that you held the capability to harm me?"
"You can talk" I blurt out.
"Did you presume speech common only to your kind?"
"You're a wolf."
It looks at itself, even licking its lips, all the way over its nose. "Right now. I suppose I am."
I gulp. Talking animals are a lot lessfriendly looking that they are on TV. "Are you going to eat me?"
"Eat you? No. Why would you think that?"
"Because-"
"Right, because I am a wolf and I bit your leg. Silly me."
I stare at it for a moment as it seems to smile and chide itself. Surreal.
"So? You're awake now. Let's go."
I blink. It turns around an begins to thunder off through the weeds and tall grass. I turn, look behind me. I can't find the path anymore. Where am I?
"Go where? Where were you taking me?" I jog after it, the wound on my leg long healed from the excess HP I absorbed. With four long legs the wolf covered ground at speed.
"You summoned me, for a contract and in doing so you used up all your mana at once and slept off. I had to drag you off in to my shrine."
Summoned? I don't remember that. All I did washit yes.
"Shrine? Who are you? What are you?"
It looks down at me, disappointed. I could tell by its eyes. "A warlock, even at such a paltry level as yours should be knowledgeable of those such as I."
"Uh, I'm self-taught."
The disappointment softens into something else. "And you managed to summon me, albeit, woefully to your detriment. You have a lot of mana for one self-taught."
Right. I wouldn't have so much if I hadn't lucked in at death. But I wouldn't say that. No, I don't understand what this being is, but if it is to be the one to make me stronger, then I'd follow it.
"I'm talented but ignorant." I surmise, making an excuse for anything I don't know I am meant to know. "My name is Asher. Asher Taserman. What's yours?"
It stops. Its head swerves to mine, his eyes glowing bright as he studied me.
"Talented indeed. There are only so few shrines to myself in this Kingdom, and yet, away from all of them you managed to tap into my power and pull my attention to you. You shall serve me well."
"Serve you?"
It grins.
"I am Lotar. You wish to for a pact with I in exchange for my power do you not?" It circles around me, watching me, stalking me like the wolf it appears to be. "You wish to serve my purpose so that I may serve yours as well, you wish me your Patron God, don't you? You do. I can smell the ambition leaking off of you, you seek power, even now you tremble, not with fear but with anticipation."
"You're right. I want power." More than anything I sought it out. Power. Power more than I had now, power to create the nation I have envisioned, a nation to keep me safe, a nation to conquer all, a nation to give me what I deserve.
"Are you willing to do anything for it? For your ambitions?"
"Yes. I am."
"Then come," It somehow picks me up, setting me on its back. "I will give you power."
The world begins to shake, the grass no longer billowed freely in the wind, now it and everything around drew to us, the stone, the air, the dead carcasses of animals, everything bent around us. And with a flash, we were gone.
In a blink I flutter my eyes open. I look around. There is no grass, there is no path, there is only stone and air. This is a rock, a large one a mountain perhaps save for the absence of plant of any kind.
Except, there is one plant. A tree, a large tree, growing from the centre of the rock. At the tree's feet are eye-catching brilliant shining white petal flowers, I'm not sure they're roses but I'm sure they're beautiful.
I am set onto the ground by Lotar, it struts on over to the tree, beneath it is a shrine. I walk behind him and the closer I get, I notice on the shrine sculpture of a wolf, on its back is a bowl, much larger than it.
I stand before the bowl; it is stained with blood and white petals from the flowers growing at the trees root.
"Pick a flower." Lotar says at last.
Looking up at him I notice the sky twinkles with stars abundant. We must have travelled a distance.
I don't bother questioning Lotar; we were past that now. I walk past the shrine and pick up a flower at the base of the tree. Once done, I look to the wolf for further instructions.
I watch it pierce its paw, blood pools and falls like a tear into the bowl. I understand and walk to the bowl, tossing the cut flower in.
"I cannot give you a specific power. But I can assure you that whatever your class of magic, it will be powerful. I will grant you power you would not have dreamt possible to have at your lowly state, this I promise."
"And what must I do for you?"
Again, it grins. "Nothing too difficult, I'm sure you'll agree. I only need you destroy a certain Cult. The Cult of Phien."
Oh jeez. Not those guys again.