2 Seeking Magical Enlightenment (Part 2)

"SKREEE"

"Pipe down you vermin!"

Blood, entrails, and rotten apples scattered over the oak table as twenty black haired masses thrashed against their bindings. Golden light suddenly weaved between two of them, illuminating the steel blade looming over their severed legs and abdomens. The light pulsed, permeating into these new crevices while a crimson hand sprinkled rancid mashed apples over them.

"SKREEEE"

"Oh for pete's sake! I already gave you weed!"

The steel blade pushed the forgotten legs back into their sockets expecting the golden light to fuse what once was, but it was rejected! A grimy gruff face suddenly broke from the darkness to inspect the golden aura. The light pulsed once, twice, and thrice but still refused to bind the scrawny legs.

"Hmm, adequate nutrition was provided by the apples, but magic that relies on the premise of relying on a soul, no matter how petty, to decide what should make up it's body limits my capability to bind a foreign rat leg to a new body."

THACK

The steel blade was stabbed into the wood a millimeter from the nearest rat head, setting off another wave of agonizing shrill wails. A spark from a match went off, lighting another candle and allowing me to jot down my current insights into my old journal. I remembered that one of the elven books I had purchased about "Tier 1 light magic" said that you must consult a body's resident soul to heal the body, but what if that soul just rejects your aid all together? Sure, the weed I gave my rats coerced them to accept any sort of remedy for their misery, but their darn soul is rejecting any foreign rat legs from binding to their original bodies.

Maybe it's because I still can't properly read elven. I had managed to translate as much as I could to English by bribing the rare elves at the tavern from time to time, but I still think some of them blew me off with their translations.

Another annoying wail broke my train of thought. Scowling, I cursed at the rat, "You're freaking mind is so primitive!"

"SKREEE"

"Pfff!" White light began to glow within my eyes. "Why can't I just overwhelm you?!" I exasperated while pointing at it with a blood soaked finger. Instantly, I felt a blinding pain near my abdomen, almost falling face first into rat guts as a white cord of light jumped from my finger to the rat.

"AAAAGH!"

A crimson blade, nefarious face, and eternal darkness shrouded my vision. My soul shaked within my bones to let me out, let me free! The blinding fire tormenting my - my leg - my missing body! I'm missing my legs?! That's impossible!

My body convulsed as I realized that I was - no I knew that I am human. I know that I am standing. I know that I butchered the rat's darn legs. I know that I am me.

Aldric.

That is my name.

But why do I feel like I have a dumb mind?

Slowly opening my eyes, a cord of white light greeted me, connecting my finger straight to the writhing darn rat.

I bonded to this thing?!

The connection fizzled, as if sensing my disgust, forcing me to quickly suppress my feelings. Wretched or not, I need to remain bonded because maybe… maybe I can overwhelm its soul. Taking in a deep breath of bloody air, I tried again to perceive the dimwitted mind I just sensed a minute ago.

There.

The white cord pulsed as I felt it, the tormented existence.

But it had no legs, yet it did sense the foreign legs I placed near it.

Threading my mind into a thin needle, I poked the rat's soul near the legs, coaxing it, telling it that its misery could end if it just let me bind these new legs to its body.

Nails racked against the table and eyes bulged out of their sockets as the rat's soul screamed heresy, screamed mutiny against such an abominable proposal. But that was only the beginning of the storm.

With a mighty burst of willpower, I evolved my harmless needle into a hammer of resolve, swinging it right down.

THWACK

It ended.

No more high shrils emanated from the rat's limp body which only took feeble breaths now. Only a sliver of its mind remained even though it was the unscratched soul that had taken the beating.

"Interesting."

Maybe a soul can't be harmed by this level of power I exerted on it. Well, at least now it should be tamed enough, if barely alive, to listen to my commands.

"Heal."

Golden light escaped my un-occupied hand, encompassing the mashed rotten apples and the broken rat while I prodded the rat's soul again with a mental needle to accept the foreign leg.

It gave.

Rancid apples were consumed, nerves were connected, bones were created. Everything fell into place for rat number 506 as it was finally freed from its misery. But its mind was practically destroyed.

Sighing, I grasped my quill and jotted down the latest results. Well, at least it was a success, I guess. But if I have to mentally cripple every rat in the process, I don't know if it is even worth it to help people like old man Mitchell. First off, that's a powerful human soul and second, well… I don't want him to leave us just yet.

The old oak door creaked open behind me, filling the room with a slight firelight and a baby's wails. "Goodness, can you quiet down in there? You're scaring the newborn!"

"Sorry Elisa, but you should really - really check this out!" I motioned at rat number 506.

"I managed to do it!"

Elisa's grey eyes opened wide. "Wait, for reals? How did you -"

"WAAAAA!"

Elisa exasperated, "ugh, show me after we close the hospital for the day will you? I have more patients to tend to."

The door creaked shut, leaving me in the dimly lit room. I glanced down at my crimson spotted apron, the rat carcasses floating in the jars on the wall, and the rat gut strewn laboratory table. I really should clean this place up… just not today.

With another wave of my hand, I focused on recreating the soul bond from before and proceeded to refine the way I walloped- I mean communicated with these ungrateful rat souls.

After a lengthy two hours, I plopped down on the hardwood chair sweating pearls. Man, for a couple of vermin, they do put up a hell of a fight.

Looking up, I spotted the 10 out of 20 rats that remained alive throughout the process. Five had bled out quickly after I crudely cut them open while another 5 had their souls completely escape their bodies. Only 10 of them had managed to survive my brutal curiosity, but they all came out as perverted as the first one. All they knew now was how to breathe.

Shaking my head, I wiped my face and hands with a rag, took off my apron, and headed out through the oak door. A small fireplace greeted me as I stepped into one of the two hospital rooms we had. Four hard beds, a couple of chairs, and one long table were situated inside of it. Agave, nettle, cannabis, and other herbs were stacked on top of the table alongside some jugs labeled "potion of calming", "potion against diarrhea", and other lesser potions. It was all we could achieve for now, especially since mother and I were having difficulty haggling elves to translate the withering elven light magic books we had bought.

We would have had a higher income if not for the fact that my sister Elisa and I had to hide the fact that we had learned how to conjure light magic. That is impossible, the elders would say. It is unfair, the no-mages would say.

Like who had ever heard of someone of the same family having magic? It was unheard of and it would be egregious if they found out how we achieved it. My sister and I begged our father to teach us, to convert us, to imbue us with his magic, but he himself passed sleepless nights trying to place his knowledge into words.

Annoyed, my mother asked, "why don't you just recreate the events that 'enlightened' you?"

And so he did.

Feeling my belly, I shuddered. I'll never be mad at being fat again.

"Aldric!"

I snapped back to reality as I heard my mother calling me from far away. She was probably in the kitchen on the second floor. Finding my way towards the staircase, I began to hear my mother, father, and Elisa chattering along with the clutter of knives.

As I walked in, I caught sight of my mother's red hair as she stood up from the oak table to her full height of 5' 8". "Where were you? Your sister started cooking without you. You know you're both supposed to cook on Tuesdays right?"

"Yea, yea, sorry, I got carried away," I waved my hand for her to chill out as I poured some water from the jug by the door to wash my hands and face of the leftover guts and gore.

"Ughh, nope that won't do. Here."

Crystal clear water rose from the jug and readily got under my nails, my brown shirt, and all over my face. It even got into my ears as mother flicked her thin tanned hand up and about until all the water rapidly left me, jumping into a murky jug by the side.

"Pff- agh - blah! My ears! Agh, a little warning next time."

"Woahh, mom, it's been less than a year and you've gotten that good?" Elisa asked surprised while setting down an onion.

"Heh, practicing on a daily basis with all those rudimentary potions I make has given me some finesse, but that wasn't even the hard part. I mean like - ugh," she pressed her forehead with her thin fingers. "Like I explained before, I finally am able to channel water magic after getting 'enlightened' as you put it through putting my life on the line 14 times. 14 darn times! And it was all because I was hunting sea urchins to support our family! Do you think it's fair when your paralysized by those stupid poisonous urchins just because you want to sell them to those urchin hungry gnomes?" She held up a hand, "no, ugh, don't even get me started."

"Yeaaa," I grimaced, "don't remind me. If you want stupid stunts like that how about you try hunting down a couple of wolves with Elisa, father and I while your at it?"

"Oooff." Her face contorted slightly in pain as she turned towards my father. "Andrew, honey, I swear I love you, but you're an idiot. That's not what I meant when I said 'recreate the events that enlightened you' when trying to teach our children some hocus pocus called light magic." She motioned to Elisa, "at least Aldric and Elisa managed to come out of it alive. Aldric, you might as well look how far both of you have come. You and your sister learned light magic and are standing here strong and healthy before me no?"

"Hmmm," I paused, trying to find the right words. It's not like she's wrong, it's just that having a frenzied wolf embed its fangs into your abdomen is not the most thrilling memory to have.

But then again, I knew the risks. And why should I sit here instead, twiddling my thumbs because I'm too scared to actually strive for anything?

"Hmm... I guess we are all stupidly ambitious then," I smirked as I grabbed a spare brown apron off a nail.

"True," Andrew, my brown eyed father, replied. "Just because I'm only 5' 3", that did not stop me from asking your mom, Priscilla, for her hand in marriage. Pah, of course she thought I was a little squirt, so I made a bet with her that I could hunt down an Orc."

"Ha! As if," she shook her red curls. "Andrew, you were a sorry little kid back then, like honestly, how would I think you would actually go through with that?"

A spark lit in my father's eyes, "Come on, for someone so tall, where's your spirit Priscilla?"