The Necromancer's apprentice

He casually pulled out a covered jar from the bag and met my gaze. “Yes?”

I swallowed, trying to piece together the right words to say. “How do you … justify your residence here and the death-inducing blight?”

Master Dagg simply smiled his set of sharp fangs at me, which made him appear more frightening than comforting. “Is that what he told you? That I am some evil creature who is responsible for this blight? Is that what your feeble little mind has been manipulated to believe?”

My eyes gazed suspiciously at him. “It's what I know about you.”

“You know nothing about me except what little you've seen and have been told,” he scoffed.

I fell silent. Perhaps he might have been lying to me all this time, but I had my doubts. I could sense that deep feeling of passion in his eyes whenever he was drawn into his work. His love for the Necromantic Arts was without question.

“Tell me this, then,” I finally said. “Are you really a Dragon?”

The smile remained plastered on his face and his eyes regarded me with mild amusement. “Do you think I am?”

“Banin spoke of a black Dragon that resides in the swamps. I don't want to ‘think’ you are that Dragon or not. I want to know the facts.”

“Do you, now? Interesting, you certainly did not feel this way moments ago when you were so quick to believe what you wanted and take it as fact.”

I sighed in exasperation of his sharp mind — and an even sharper tongue — and finally threw my hands up in frustration. “All right, I'm sorry for misconstruing you, Master Dagg. I wish to know the truth about you. I wish to know why Banin is hunting a Dragon. I wish to know the source of this blight.”

“More questions,” he laughed and simply turned to place the covered jar on a shelf with several others. “Banin is a vile man bent on ignorance. His hatred for me spurs from mere assumptions and misunderstandings. He's become more of a thorn in my side than anything else. Like most slayers, he believes the Dragons are the bane of existence and the cause of the world's sufferings. He would love nothing more than to be rid of our kind once and for all. While I'm not a religious man, even I know that it is against the Goddess Celestra's will to harm our race in any manner. I practice the … ‘Forbidden Arts’ — as ignorant humans tend to more elegantly associate ‘Necromancy’ — for my own knowledge and understanding. I have no intentions or desires to abuse what I consider a ‘hauntingly beautiful’ art.”

My brow furrowed in confusion. “So … You are really the Dragon he is hunting?”

“Indeed, I am,” he replied simply. Once he had finished rearranging his supplies, he began traversing the laboratory, gathering stray books.

I frowned, watching him. “Yet, you appear to be human …” When he passed by, I handed him the notebook I was ‘reading’ earlier.

He snatched it from me and smiled shrewdly. “Our kind possesses the ability to shape-shift into other forms at will.” After gathering the rest of the books, he went to the bookshelf and began arranging them one by one. “You ask many questions that you already know the answers to,” he continued, his back turned to me while he worked, “yet, you fail to ask the most obvious one.”

My eyes widened slightly in surprise. The questions I did ask were merely based on assumptions and doubts, but I sought to justify their credibility. Master Dagg's comment only further reminded me of just how closely-linked he and I had become over the past few months of my apprenticeship.

“What do you hope to understand from working with the dead?” I finally asked again after taking a few moments to think on his words.

His smile widened slightly, as though my latter question had been the very one he was waiting for me to ask. “Despite my physical appearance, I am very old beyond my years, Jasmine. When a Dragon dies, they pass through what is called the Twilight stage — the stage in which their body returns to the goddess Celestra, their creator. There is still so much in this world I have yet to experience and I wish to preserve my life just a little longer. Life Preservation is something believed that only the gods themselves are capable of, but my studies of the dead and undead have opened up new discoveries of this notion. I feel as though I am so close to perfecting this. Now that you have come, it is all but a matter of time.”

I nodded slowly, trying to make some sense of his reasoning. “Are you trying to become a god, yourself?” I asked, dumbfounded.

Master Dagg chuckled darkly. “No, My Dear, though, it would be nice, wouldn't it?”

“Then, are you simply trying to live longer than most Dragons?” I tilted my head to the side.

He approached me and leaned against the edge of the table, looking thoughtful. “I care not about what the other Dragons do,” he said. “My issues are my own. That is my prerogative.”

The notion of having such god-like abilities nearly frightened me. What would become of the world should someone as sinister as Master Dagg acquire such malefic power? I thought.

“Now that you know my secret, I guess I will have to kill you, hmm?” he said jokingly, though I could hear the slight seriousness in his tone of voice which was more of a warning gesture towards me.

I swallowed nervously. “N … No, you don't need to do that. I will not tell anyone of this, I swear.”

“Good,” he paused and his gaze hardened as though struck with a new thought. “Banin did not see you come in here, did he?”

“No! Of course, not!” I answered promptly. “I remained elsewhere around the swamps until he left, but I think he knows you reside somewhere in the area.”

Another annoyed hiss escaped his lips. He picked up a stray beaker containing dark blue fluid and examined it. “There is one thing I truly hate about slayers,” he began, “and that is the fact that they are persistent. If he wants to deal with a necromancer, then I will send forth an army of zombified harpies for his pleasure.”

I blinked at his words, thinking that he was merely jesting at first, but the stern look in his eyes told me otherwise.

He carefully covered the beaker, walked over to one of the bookshelves and placed it in a secure spot on the top shelf. As he prepared to leave, he glanced back at me.

“I need you to separate three milliliters of vampiric blood into those small vials there,” he instructed as he gestured to the far end of the table where four, small, empty vials and two larger ones filled with a dark crimson liquid were sitting. “Afterwards, they need to be heated to 270 degrees until the curdles form. Separate the curdles and place them into one of the glass jars on the shelf.” He then added in a warning tone, “Do be certain to finish this before I return.”

I looked at the vials for a moment, then back to him. While the task didn't sound too complex, I had recalled watching him do the very same before. It was a process which required extra precision and care due to the nature of certain vampiric blood being acidic when heated to extreme temperatures and could literally eat away at whatever it came in contact with. I nodded slowly to Master Dagg in confirmation and turned to begin working when another thought crossed my mind.

“Master Dagg, may I ask you one last thing?” I looked at him.

Another annoyed sigh was heard and he turned back around. “Yes? What is it …?”

“What is the true cause of the blight upon our lands?”

He took a moment to think on the question before finally crossing his arms. “The cause of the ‘blight’ is of the gods' choosing. There is no Dragon; no evil monster; and no wicked, wild magic causing this. It is the natural lifecycle of the world. The very same has happened since the dawn of civilization and it will happen again in the future. The world suffers, only to recover once more. That is how the balance between life and death is maintained. The minds of lesser creatures are so feeble that they will believe just about anything due to fear. They fear what they do not understand. That is why Banin and all the other wretched Dragon-slayers in the world are foolish in their ways, believing in such ridiculous notions and superstitions. Soon, however, they will see the errs in their ways.”

I felt skeptical about the matter. Master Dagg made it all sound so simple, but I couldn't bring myself to believe that the continuous ceasing of life in our country was solely a natural occurrence.

“Is it … natural to be amongst the only forms of life out here in the swamps?” I asked. “Is it natural to not encounter anyone or anything else from the outside world for so long?”