Interlude: Vali IV. - Getting Mortal Servants

Will Binding Runes were a rare piece of knowledge and could be considered very advanced for a world where Magic was already on the last dying breath and would kick a bucket any time sooner.

Despite all of this, Vali began to ponder if this was just a lucky coincidence or if this world actually had advanced knowledge of Runes.

This wouldn't be the first time since the Chthonian Empire started sending probes to the Endless Void in search of some more isolated Dimensions and Worlds in the Endless Void.

They found a whole bunch of them, and there were some of them which have extremely weak Magic in them.

This typically resulted in their Magic Systems becoming more and more refined because they needed to focus on finesse and control instead of brute power.

Something which was also once a problem with the Baator, because of the abundant Magic that was in the Baator, many people were neglecting the aspects of finesse and control over their skills and so.

Still, after a few incorporations from different worlds and also, new Imperial Edicts about education in the Schools, Academies and Universities, it was swiftly resolved.

"And what do we have here?"

Vali then turned his sight at the mortal human man who summoned him before he started examining the man while occasionally frowning in annoyance. It was clear that Lord Voldemort or Tom Riddle, as was his name, didn't like this, but there was nothing he could do about it because he couldn't move a muscle.

"Foolish human, what have you thought dividing your soul into six pieces through this crude imitation of Lichdom?"

At first glance, Vali was able to recognize that the magician that summoned him had divided his soul into six phylacteries.

Or rather, it would be more prudent to call them fake phylacteries because it was done through some extremely simple ritual that was unsuccessfully imitating Lichdom.

While Vali was by no means pursuer of the Arcane or master in the fields of Magic, but he was still highly educated on the topic and was a Master in several types of Magic, including huge theoretical knowledge about Ritualistic Magic and various obscure types of the Arcane.

He was personally taught by his father, so his knowledge rivaled even those old coots that did nothing all days and years aside from studying Grimoires and Magic Tome. And one of the first lessons he had with the Father of All Devils was never to harm your soul.

Especially thing like dividing souls was not only an extremely foolish thing to do but dangerous as well.

While anchoring a piece of one's soul to a material object would provide some kind of pseudo-immortality because one couldn't be really killed through normal means.

Still, it also led to the partial destruction of one's talent, cutting the path before him, not to mention people who did so tended to go mad for various reasons.

"What to do with you now..."

Vali muttered because he didn't really know what to do with the human who summoned him here... as he pondered over it and took into account that he already came here through the Contract Flyer.

"It would be proper to start by introducing ourselves. Vali Lucifer, Imperial Elder of the Imperial House of Lucifer of the Chthonian Empire of the Baator, son of the Ancestor of the Baator, Lord of the Chthonian Empire, and Lord Marshall Militant of the Imperialis Militarum."

Vali introduced himself in a way where Venelana Lucifer would be proud that her etiquette lessons were not forgotten somewhere on the way. While the human wouldn't know the weight behind those titles, each one of them sounded pretty important, signifying that Vali was someone socially very, very high.

"Tom Marvolo Riddle, a Wizard and descendant of Salazar Slytherin."

Introduced himself as the self-proclaimed Dark Lord, wisely choosing the leave out the part of being a Dark Lord because he had some hunch that it would just irritate the devil that someone as weak as him was calling himself a Dark Lord.

At the same time, his mind was spinning as he heard the words of the devil, who said that the only thing he achieved by splitting his soul into several parts was just cutting his path before him.

Of course, someone as weak as him wouldn't understand the true purpose of those words, but even he could see that it was something related to power.

The soul was the source of everything and without it, nothing could be done. He created the Horcruxes to achieve immortality, but as it seems, it came with a much higher price than one would initially anticipate.

"Now, why have you summoned me here, human?"

Vali asked after some time when he saw that the human magician or wizard, as he called himself, was in deep thought, probably about that part when he told him that splitting his very own soul was an extremely foolish thing to do and came with severe consequences.

In the Chthonian Empire, there were only very, very, very few people who would do something like this and all who did it were either dying or in some special and precarious situation where Lichdom or something like that was the only alternative to find a way out.

"I want to obtain the power to win the war that I would be fighting against the muggles and other filth that are polluting the world that belongs to us, Wizards."

He summoned a Devil Contract and started writing there some things before passing it to the mortal.

"Sign it, and you will get whatever you want... of course, the price will be appropriate."

Vali then said as he let Tom Riddle read the contract. Of course, with his meager "strength" there was nothing that the barely Tier 1 magician could do, and everything that was happening right now was just because Vali thought it would be entertaining, not to mention he needed to be careful in this world.