Time in the cafe

The café's bone-carved walls loomed like the ribs of some ancient beast, their surfaces polished to a sickly sheen. Jaundiced light dripped from chandeliers of fused vertebrae, casting skeletal shadows over tables where undead scholars hunched over crumbling tomes, fingers stained with ink that never dried. The air clung thick with the cloying stench of rot and clove. His gaze swept the room until it landed on Zael, slouched in their usual corner.

Zael was a zombie warlock who shrugged.

His right hand: stripped to bone, draconic runes smoldering in the joints. Left still flesh, but corpse-pale, veins like ink. Cracks webbed his jaw, glowing faint as banked fire.

The dragon did the work—one eye molten gold, scaled cheek a blade's edge. The other eye, milk-dead. Hair hung in ash-clumped tangles; his cloak, dragonhide, hissed when he moved.

But that grin. A draconic fang, sharpened. The rot took what he didn't need.

---

The warlock's boots were propped on the table, a smoldering grimoire open in his lap. His mismatched eyes—one human, restless and bloodshot; the other a draconic slit, faintly gold—flicked up as Norris approached.

A wraith with formal spectre clothes materialized beside Norris, its voice a rasping void. "Order?"

"Eternal Twilight", Norris said with a hint of anticipation. Norris had gotten used and learned to love the brew. No wonder undeads love it. It helps activates the soul allowing them to feel alive.

The wraith dissolved. Norris slid into the seat across from Zael, who snapped his grimoire shut with a puff of ash. "Six months in the crypts," Zael drawled. "Find the secret to death yet?"

"Almost," Norris replied.

Zael snorted. "'Almost.' Mage-talk for 'I've memorized six ways to resurrect a rat but won't admit it.' "

"You're still clinging to that necromancy drivel?" Zael's draconic eye pulsed as he leaned in, his voice dropping to a fervent hiss. "I told you—death's just another cage. Break it. Burn it. When my patron's flames first seared my bones, I screamed for days. Know what I learned? Pain's the only prayer chaos answers." He grinned, teeth sharp and charred at the edges. "You'll never master the secrets of magic if you keep knocking politely."

The wraith reappeared, depositing Norris's tea—a shimmering violet brew that reeked of iron and wilted roses. Zael's drink, a bubbling black sludge, hissed as it hit the bone-carved table.

Norris sipped the Eternal Twilight, its bitterness numbing his tongue.

Zael leaned forward, his draconic eye flaring. "You know your problem? Mages. All of you. You treat magic like a damned recipe. Measure the mana, chant the syllables, bow to the Lady's Arcane Realm—" He spat the name like a curse. "Magic isn't a servant—it's a lover. You don't command it. You let it unravel you. Let it rip through your veins like a goddamn symphony!".

A spark of dragonfire leapt from Zael's fingertip, twisting into a searing rose before crumbling to ash. "You think this is control?" He hissed, flames reflecting in his slit pupil. "This is surrender. I let the fire sing through me, let it scorch my bones black. You want power? Stop thinking. Let it burn. Let it scream. Let it turn your blood to lightning!"

Norris stared at the ash drifting onto the table. "That's how warlocks die, Zael. Unraveled."

"No!" Zael slammed his palm down, flames licking between his fingers without scorching the bone. "That's how they live. You've never felt it, have you? That moment when magic cracks you open and pours the stars back in?" His voice dropped, trembling with fervor. "I'd let it devour me a thousand times over just to taste that heat again. Your rules? Your balance? They're chains. And I'd rather rot in a pyre than wear them."

He leaned back, flames dancing across his knuckles in wild, ecstatic arcs. "You call me chaotic? Good. Magic isn't a library—it's a wildfire. And I'd rather burn bright enough to blind the gods than flicker politely in a lantern."

Norris sipped his tea, the numbness spreading to his fingertips. "Your passion for magic… it's admirable, Zael. But you're dancing too close to chaos. One misstep, and it won't just burn you—it'll turn you into a new you. Erase everything Zael is ever known for instead leaving a shell advocating chaos"

Zael's draconic eye dimmed, the fire along his knuckles stuttering. For a breath, his grin faltered, the human eye darting to the unmarked table where his flames had once left scars. Then he scoffed, flexing his hand until the fire steadied. "Erase me?"** He leaned back, voice deliberately lighter, but his boots thudded to the floor, no longer propped carelessly on the table. "Chaos isn't my dance partner, Mage. I'm the conductor. You think I'd let it snuff out my symphony?"

He snapped his fingers, and a flame burst into existence—not the wild, devouring spiral from weeks prior, but a tightly coiled helix that hummed like a struck chord. "You remember that spell that vaporized the training yard?" His tone was smug, but his fingers twitched, subtly shaping the fire. "Took me three days to rebuild it. But this time? Not a single ember out of place. Not one." The helix dissolved into smoke, leaving the air crisp but unharmed.

Norris raised an eyebrow. "And if it slips?"

Zael hesitated, his gaze lingering on the smoke. Then he smirked, but the draconic pupil stayed narrowed, watchful. "It won't. I've carved rules into the inferno itself. My patron's disciples and children still piss themselves trying to replicate my 'art.'" He flicked his wrist, conjuring a small, contained sun that cast no heat. "Passion without precision is noise. But precision without passion?" The sun imploded silently. "That's just arithmetic. Magic is Music" .

Norris said nothing, watching Zael's restless fingers—the way they trembled slightly before steadying, the ash-stained grimoire still shut tight on the table. Progress, he thought. Not restraint, Calculation.

Zael leaned forward, the fervor creeping back into his voice. "You want to resurrect the dead? Fine. But don't beg death for secrets. *Rip them out*. Burn the veil between realms until it screams your name. That's how you master magic. That's how you—" He cut himself off abruptly, the human eye flicking to Norris's untouched tea. When he spoke again, it was quieter, almost grudging. "That's how you survive."

The admission hung between them, sharp and startling.

Norris set down his cup. "And if the fire rips out your name instead?"

Zael stared at him. Then he laughed, bright and brittle, the sun-relic flaring again—controlled, contained, perfect. "Then I'll burn bright enough to make the gods jealous on my way down."

---

The café's bone-carved door shuddered open. Alaric Mortevault stood silhouetted against the gloom, skeletal hands gripping a staff crowned by a pulsating soul gem. Cerulean soul fire writhed in his eye sockets, casting jagged light over robes embroidered with a serpent coiled around a sealed abomination. Behind him lurked two undead scholars, their hollow gazes dimmer echoes of his flame.

"You," Alaric hissed, soul fire flaring violet as he marched toward Zael. "I saw you outside, defiling the air with reckless flames. Heresy. As always."

Zael didn't look up. "Still policing the world for your family's approval, relic?"

Alaric's flames streaked crimson. "My family shackled the Duskbound Leviathan—a demigod of the abyss. Twelve generations have refined its whispers into spells that rewrite death itself. The Eclipse Glyphs… the Veilrend Choirs… all born from its hunger. What have you ever shaped but ashes?"

Zael's draconic eye narrowed. "Spare me the drivel. You say this every time like you're afraid we wouldn't know. Hunger you've leashed. How many generations have you gnawed scraps from its cage?"

Alaric's soul fire darkened to indigo—a flicker of shame?—before hardening. "We command it. Our rituals evolve. Soon, we'll fuse its essence with mortal will—a demigod reborn, perfected."

"Reborn?" Zael laughed, flames twisting into a mocking serpent. "You're stitching rags onto a rotting banner. Your demigod reeks of fear."

Norris set down his teacup, frost creeping across the table. "The Leviathan is a thread, Alaric. Not the web. Your family's meditation on its essence… it limits you. You see death through its eyes, not your own."

Alaric's soul fire dimmed, then blazed brighter, sharpening the serpentine sigils on his robes. "Threads weave tapestries. Our legacy is stitched into the Lady's web itself."

Zael snorted. "Scribbling the same poem on every tapestry."

Alaric ignored him, flames roaring white-hot. "We write the laws. The Eclipse Glyphs bend death. The Veilrend Choirs fracture time. What has your 'web' wrought but theories?"

"Theories don't burn cities," Zael smirked.

"No," Alaric snapped. "They build them."

The mummified philosopher Hesiod wheezed in the corner, "Arrogance… is doubt's echo…"

Alaric's scholars hummed in harmonic defiance. "We've earned this arrogance. Every scar, every scream torn from the Leviathan's jaws—" He slammed his staff, bone walls trembling. "—has been a stitch in a tapestry grander than your web."

Norris tilted his head. "Then why hesitate when I mentioned the web?"

Alaric paused, soul fire steady but his voice a half-breath too slow. "Metaphors don't forge demigods."

Norris leaned forward, frost crystallizing in the air. "Your family's rituals are elegant, Alaric. For relics."

Alaric's soul fire flared crimson. "Elegant? Masterworks. The Leviathan's essence hasn't slipped its shackles in twelve generations."

"Shackles rust," Norris said, numbness sharpening to a blade's edge. "Genius grows complacent."

Zael snorted. "Complacent? His family's been reciting the same spellbook since the Leviathan's farts fossilized."

Alaric's staff cracked the floor. "You think we haven't evolved? The *Veilrend Choirs* alone took centuries—"

"—and still rely on a single thread," Norris interrupted, frost weaving a fragile web. "The Leviathan's power is a river. Redirect it. Consume it. What if your demigod is just the Leviathan wearing mortal skin?"

Alaric's soul fire condensed into a searing helix, fractal light dancing in his palms. "Consume it? You speak like a warlock."

"I speak like someone who's studied webs," Norris said. "Threads snap. Webs hold. Your family's genius could forge a new path—not repeat the past."

Alaric stared at the helix, flames churning gold. "A demigod's birth… reshaped by *my* will. Not just my ancestors'." His voice trembled with hunger.

"Exactly," Norris said. "A legacy even the Leviathan would envy."

Alaric extinguished the helix, soul fire flecked with triumph. **"A storm, then. We'll drown the Leviathan in *our* tide."

He strode out, scholars trailing like embers. Zael whistled. "Stroke a lich's ego, and suddenly he's a revolutionary."

Norris stared at the door, frost melting from his cup. "Pride is sometimes a sharper weapon than logic."

The numbness in his soul didn't return.

---

Norris back in his spell lab took out a magic artifact. It's one of Norris most prized possession, the infinitPad. It's like having a personal database that can store large amount of information which Norris can retrieve through search like a search engine. It was his graduation project from the Empires academy. Norris took advantage of the fact that resources which were hard to see in normal times were provided and spent most of his wealth to make this. Mystical resources sometimes can not be bought by wealth.

In his infinitePad, Norris is seen writing his ultimate understanding of Mage's spellcasting. "Mages gain power by learning, creating their own beliefs, and shaping their own understanding of the world. If a mage strongly believes in their idea and uses their inner energy, it can become real for them, even if it's not objectively true."

This idea resonated deeply with Norris, who had always been drawn to the more unconventional and unorthodox approaches to magic. He believed that the key to true power lay not in blindly following established dogma, but in forging one's own path, even if that meant challenging the status quo.

From Alaric Mortevault he learned something important which he decides to record. 'Magic is infinitely broad. Most mage families who have lived years just like the Mortevault have actively shackled themselves. He doesn't think he's the smartest person in the world. So of course only the people involved know why they did it. He feels there must be a reason so he decided to actively limit himself right now instead of allowing himself to go further. His rationality and instincts were telling him to. This is how Norris has lived and gotten to this point with only a broken soul as the price and not a madman who only knows chaos or a more rational madman who feels that order is essential for the continuity of the universe. Using Logic and common sense hidden in plain sight to Navigate the world.'

Alaric going out to pave a new path was a suggestion Norris gave after careful consideration. Families that relied on advanced meditation techniques based on artifacts, sealed divine evil, Eldritch entities, etc had both advantages and disadvantages. On the one hand, they had access to unique resources and guidance from their family's established traditions, giving them a head start in their magical pursuits.

By openly accepting and meditating on higher-dimensional essence under their control, without hesitation or fear one could easily become tainted by the concepts held by the higher dimension. This taint would result in a limited understanding and affinity for the concepts, manifesting itself in innate spells, special bloodlines, or other predetermined paths. However, the downside was that their understanding of magic was inherently limited by the collective knowledge and experiences of their family.

In essence, these families created a self-localized network of magical knowledge, where each member's contributions added to the collective understanding, but also reinforced its limitations. To truly break through these limitations required a genius-level mage, someone who could transcend the boundaries of their family's magical tradition and forge new paths.

The Mortevault family has sealed a demigod Eldritch entity. Norris doesn't dare think about the name too much. Divine creatures are very unreasonable. Who knows what could happen. From what he has observed their family is proficient in reanimomancy(Raising of corpse). With a little mind network between each of the reanimated corpse with a Mortevault member as a core. There might be more to it but it's not something Norris can know.

In contrast, Norris's decision to meditate on the Death Realm had its own set of pros and cons. On the one hand, the Death Realm was too broad, too vast, and too amorphous to provide any concrete benefits. It simply nourished his soul, bringing him closer to the concept of death, which was, in itself, a very broad concept.

However, this broadness also gave Norris the freedom to create his own unique magical theories and spells, unencumbered by the limitations of a traditional family magical network. His spells might seem nonsensical to other mages, but to Norris, they made perfect sense within his own cognitive framework.

In this way, meditating on the Death Realm allowed Norris to tap into his own creative potential, fueled by the unique blend of knowledge and experiences he brought with him from his previous life. The vast amount of information and fiction that could be accessed in his previous life was enough for him in this new realm.

Spells were tangible expressions of concepts, accessed through the Arcane Realm or generated from personal energies. They were manifestations of the complex interplay between collective knowledge, individual perspectives, and the inherent structure of reality.

In simpler terms Spells are concentrated expressions of magical energy, shaped by concepts, intention, and will, to achieve a specific effect or outcome. Norris had purchased a collection of spells, and through his study of them for months, he began to analyze the concept of necromancy ready to make a choice in specialization. And the results were particularly Amusing.