Blood pact

After a day of rest, Zora moved out of the house again to check on the mysterious book. Before arriving home he decided to hide it at the edge of the forest by digging a small hole in the ground and encase it in solid rock, then covered it with dirt.

He didn't want his family to know what he found. He was honest about the dungeon, but didn't talk about the book. If it was legit, the Necronomicon could mean either bad news, or good news with bad prejudice following behind.

He didn't like either of the options.

The parents actually heard about dungeons before. The village elder talked about them as mythical trials left behind by the Old Gods. It is rumored, that if one manages to fight their way all to the end, then treasures of unimaginable quality and quantity would await them. They had a fleeting conversation about this in that evening.

"So it really was just a tall tale, huh..." grumbled Ezakiel with his hands on his hips, looking disappointed. "Or maybe you've just missed it, haha." he joked.

"Well if I can't tell of something that its a treasure, then what use do we have of it?" asked Zora.

"You are just a naive kid, aren't you? You should've brought home everything, we could've shown the loot to the traveling merchants, maybe some of them would've been willing to buy..." Ezakiel replied with a condescending tone, but was interrupted.

Lilly hit his husband on the head and reprimanded him. "Don't say that! He's barely seven years old, be glad he returned in one piece! What were you doing when you were seven? I'm pretty sure you were just playing around with wooden sword and horses with your friends." she said with an annoyed tone. She was aware of her husbands faults, and was never afraid to correct him.

"Yeah... you're right. Sorry Zora, I didn't mean it. I really am glad you are okay. Don't make us worried like this again though!" he said, while he apologetically scratched the back of his head. He was kinda afraid of Lilly, so he rather backed down against the fierce woman. Zora obviously knew that.

"Heh, sure, dad. I'll be careful." he replied, finishing the conversation.

In the morning he rushed out to grab the book and study it. He reached the patch of dirt where he hid the loot, unearthed it, then flew into the forest to have some privacy. It was highly unlikely for him to run into anyone there.

After a few minutes of flying he found a nice clearing with a hill in the middle of it, which had a single great tree on top of it. It was a scenic place, Zora landed right away to claim the spot.

The book was flying behind him all that time, which he then pulled in front of him and opened right away. He checked it before with mana tendrils, but the book was so packed with magic that he had no way to discern its functions, apart from reading it.

He opened it and checked out the first page. To his dismay, it was written in an unknown language. He waited out a bit to see if anything would activate. After a minute of waiting he decided to flip the pages. Then again, then once more. In a few minutes he flipped through the pages, but nothing happened. There were nice drawings in it, but all of them were too complex for him to understand. What now?

"God damn it! This is useless!" he said and threw the book away. He was quite weak, so it didn't fly far, but just because of its potential value he still decided to grab it mid-air instead of letting it fall.

"What the heck am I supposed to do with this? I can't make anyone translate it, its the Necronomicon! Its supposed to be some unholy stuff for the common people, and bad news for the rest! What do I-." he suddenly stopped the ranting. He realized something. He was able to read the front cover! He knew the name of the book. That means somehow he must be able to magically translate the rest too!

He pulled the book closer again and viewed the front cover. The skull looked hungry somehow. The circles were connected by small tendrils running from the middle all the way to the edges of the cover.

"Once I've read a book where magical artifacts tended to work by giving them the user's blood. Well, its worth a try..." he said thinking out loud.

Next the used an air orb to slightly cut his palm, then moved his palm above the book resting in the air, kept in place by Zora's magic. The blood splashed on the cover. Zora expected some sort of light show, indicating the book activating or bonding with him or whatever. Instead a booming voice sounded in his head.

"Stop! What the f*ck are you doing, are you insane!?" The voice was deep and strong, it somehow carried authority in it.

"Who is that!? How do you talk in my head?" Zora asked, visibly confused and scared. He was preparing his best attack, a few lightning orbs as fast as he could.

"You stupid brat you stained me with your filthy blood, fuck off! How do you think am I supposed to get rid of this? Why the heck did you do this, is reading not enough?!" With that Zora understood whats going on. Still, he felt like asking the obvious.

"Are you the book? Are you the one speaking in my head?"

"Of course its the book that is speaking to you in your head, or do you see anyone else around you? How can you get even more stupid, or are you actually mentally retarded?!" the booming voice kept ranting in his head.

"Jesus, your voice is making my brain all fuzzy, could you settle down a bit? What do I have to do to make you shut up?"

"To make me shut up? You f*cking brat, you sully me with your shitty blood and now you feel offended? You have some guts to talk to me like that. First you better fix me or you will dearly pay! When you are done with that, we might even try a civilized conversation, if you are capable of such, you little monkey..." the book said, not hiding his annoyance and outrage in the slightest.

Zora summoned a water orb to try and separate his blood from the book. It worked to an extent, but the book kept shouting angry curses at him, calling him an amateour, among other things. He just sighed and endured. This book must be something marvelous, but it sure had some attitude too.