Near the end of the next week, it was once more time for me to teach my fourth-years necromancy, like every week. The first-years from the class before filed out of my classroom and I went about prepping for the upcoming class.

  For the past weeks, class had been focused on theory, history and runes, but now it was time for something more practical. Within one of the cabinets on the other end of the classroom, I’d stored an assortment of rodents. Their corpses were kept fresh with a ‘simple’ cooling enchantment, lest they stink up my classroom and scare the delicate sensibilities of the first-years.

  Whilst I was busy floating the rodents and trays over to the desk without leaving my seat at my desk in front of the classroom, Fluminix was busying herself with… I looked around in search of the increasingly mischievous dragon, only to find her toying with one of the small skulls that decorated the cabinets. I stared at her for a brief moment in amused frustration, before I shrugged. Easy enough to replace.

  Slowly my students trickled in. Some eyed the rodents on the desk with curiosity, while others eyed them with apprehension. The ‘holier than thou’ duo looked at them with clear disapproval. A couple of them spared Fluminix a look, but by now they’ve grown both used to the dragon’s presence and her antics, so mostly they just chuckled.

  Once the last of them had taken their seat, I closed the door and stood up from my seat. “Welcome back to yet another lesson in the time-honoured art of necromancy, everyone.”

  They spared me a scattering of muttered responses.

  “Now, I’m sure you’ve either wondered or guessed what the mice are for. Or maybe both. Well, today, I’ll be instructing you on the various ways a necromancer can prepare the remains of deceased animals, including humanoids, for reanimation. Now, I know some of you have reservations about this, but – unfortunately for those with said reservations – this is a mandatory part of the class.”

  I pointedly ignored the grumbling and frowns from in the class that had hoped to skip this part, Roland and Lisya, the ‘holier than thou’ duo, in particular. “There are, in general, three different ways to prepare the remains, all three tying into the underlying principle of reanimation: flesh bad, bones good. Anybody remember the four different types of undead and their characteristics?”

  I nodded to Kumbe when they raised their hand, and they spoke up with some reverence in their voice. “The classic is the skeleton, a construct of true mastery. Created by binding a spirit to the thoroughly cleaned bones of the dead, requiring the most prep time but least mana out of the unintelligent undead.”

  I nodded my approval and pointed at the student who raised their hand next.

  “Jiangshi,” Aoi answered. “Ah, sorry, you call them zombies. I forget sometimes. Anyway, zombies are any unintelligent undead that still has any flesh left on their bones.” Her brows furrowed in a thoughtful frown. “Though, you still haven’t told us why.”

  I shrugged. “Nobody knows. It’s something specific to spirits and, unfortunately, they can’t communicate with us. No matter what anyone says to the contrary. Anyway, the astral is as big of a mystery to me as it is to you.”

  She seemed to accept it with a slow nod, before continuing. “Zombies don’t require preparation, but the mana cost for raising them increases with the amount of flesh left. Again, why is a mystery…”

  I nodded and gave the next student a chance to answer.

  “Revenants,” Roland almost growled out with clear disgust. “Undead knight. Intelligent. No magic.”

  I nodded again. Short, but informative, I supposed.

  “Liches.” Lisya continued before I could give her leave. Her voice was venomous but tempered with her begrudging respect for me. Once more, I was becoming the exception to the rule. “Intelligent undead mages, like yourself. Some look like skeletons, but most are like you and appear humanoid. Both liches and revenants require the same ritual.”

  I didn’t frown. Well, I did, but not outwardly. I hadn’t mentioned that revenants and liches were formed from the same ritual. It would seem that she had been reading ahead. I was both concerned and pleased. Always an odd combination, and frustratingly common. Still, I nodded to let her, and the other students know it was correct.

  “Good. Now, this brings us to this,” I gestured at the three mice that laid in front of me, each on their own tray, before I frowned. “Just one moment.” I floated very basic knives out of a cabinet over to the students’ desks and my own, before I floated a flask out of an out-of-reach cabinet. Once I had a knife and the flask in front of me, I continued as if nothing had been amiss, whilst ignoring the concerned mutters of my students. “Defleshing methods.”

  As expected, Kumbe and a few others looked even more excited, and were already placing their hands on their knife. While others looked more resigned or unwilling.

  “As I said at the start of class, there are three methods commonly used by necromancer to prepare remains for reanimation, if they have the time to,” I continued. “The first, is with magic. The second, is with acid, or other flesh dissolving substances. And lastly, good old knifework.”

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  I pointed at the left most mouse and a spell formation formed in the tray underneath it. I made sure to use a spell that was slow enough for them to observe. Bit by bit, the dead flesh of the mouse turned into nothingness. The soft clacking of the bones in the tray signalled the end of the spell. That, and the light of the spell formation disappeared.

  “In the hands of a capable mage, this first method can easily clean the flesh off of the bones without damaging the bones,” I explained. “How fast this is done depends on both the mage’s skills and how much mana they are willing to pour into it. Understandably, this is the most mana intensive method, and therefore the least used.”

  As there were no questions, I continued with the next method. I picked up the flask, which content bore a striking resemblance to bile, and poured it over the mouse in the middle. The flesh immediately started to sizzle, and steam rose from the remains. The nearest students did their best to create distance between themselves and the foul stink that rose with the steam. It wasn’t long before only the bones of this mouse remained, as well.

  “Acid is the tool favoured by alchemist necromancers,” I continued my explanation. “Relatively quick, but not for those with weak stomachs. Also, requires one to either make the acid themselves, or buy it from someone else. The former is time consuming and the latter expensive. There’s also a high chance of damaging the bones and therefore weakening the undead, if reanimated.”

  I ventilated the air with a quick spell, much to the nearest students’ relief, before I continued on to the last method. I picked up the knife and sat down, before I pulled the last mouse closer.

  “And lastly we arrive at the method you’ll all be practicing in this class,” I began as I started to cut into the mouse with the knife. “Scraping the bones clean with a knife or some other bladed object. This is, obviously, by far the most common method. The reason is simple, of course. It’s cheap and doesn’t require extensive knowledge on biology and chemistry.”

  With practiced ease, I cut out a rib and carefully started to remove any flesh I could see attached to it. The ‘holier than thou’ duo grimaced at the casual ease with which I worked. It made me want to roll my eyes. The hypocrisy. As if they never killed animals or have them slaughtered.

  “Still, it requires a delicate touch,” I continued. “It is all too easy to nick the bone and create a weak spot. Skill, concentration and practice combined will make it possible to perfectly deflesh the remains. Obviously, it’s incredibly time consuming and one of the reasons why we don’t see necromancers or liches wielding massive undead armies without some form of support.”

  “Why aren’t we practicing on something a bit… bigger?” Omri, another student from the knight department like Roland, asked, after I nodded at him.

  I chuckled softly as I finished up the last rib from one of the mouse’s sides. “Because the delicate nature of small bones is what will help teach you to be careful. Also, I can’t very well bring a bunch of cows in here, now, can I?”

  The truth was that rodents were pests and therefore not complained about when used for teaching necromancy. Also, they were easily replaceable.

  I continued to calmly, methodically defleshing the mouse whilst the class laughed and chuckled in a way students do at a teacher’s joke, a mix of amusement, awkwardness and cringe.

  “Couldn’t damaged bones be repaired before being animated?” Tereza asked. She was… an odd presence in my necromancy classes, as she was hoping to become a necroherder. She wanted to have undead sheep. I wasn’t judging. “Or even after they’ve been reanimated? I know there’s a heal undead spell.”

  I shook my head as I kept on working on the mouse’s remains. “Unfortunately, no. The remains of the deceased can’t be healed, as healing works on the presence of a soul. Once the soul has departed, it becomes inert. Well, aside from the natural decay that is.

  “As for healing after reanimation and the spell you mentioned, that works on the presence of a spirit. So, any damage the remains have sustained prior to reanimation, can’t be healed because there was neither a soul nor spirit present.”

  She looked rather dejected, but for some reason determined to prove me wrong. I wished her luck.

  I finished defleshing the mouse’s remains, leaving cleaned bones on one side of the tray and the soft bits on the other, whilst fielding some more questions. Mainly points of clarification on the theory, like if one could bind two spirits to one set of remains. Which… hard no. One body, one soul. And therefore, one body, one spirit. Though, some were more practical.

  “I’ve been wondering, but,” Aoi asked as I placed the knife down, “how does the spell know which bone belongs to which body? Or is it something the spirits govern? If not, wouldn’t that mean that it’s possible to combine different bones and body parts into one’s undead?”

  I always loved the scholarly types. They asked the most interesting and inquisitive questions.

  “Yes,” I answered with a sly smile. And didn’t explain any further. I could justify that it is advanced necromancy knowledge, but that will neither satisfy her nor drive her to dive deeper.

  Aoi, predictably, frowned at my answer and even the other students looked confused, as they were used to me explaining just about anything. Keywords, just about. A slightly tense silence fell over the classroom, which was promptly broken by the sound of a crack.

  Collectively, everyone in the room turned to the source of the sound. There, in the corner to my left, was Fluminix, proudly looking up at me with a crushed skull in her maw.

  I snorted out a chuckle and the class let out various noises of tension relieving laughter, and the class moved on. With my demonstration over, I let the students have a go at their own mice, whilst I strolled through the classroom to give advice and guidance to those that needed it.

  Which led me to the ‘holier-than-thou’ duo. Alright, I might have been judging them too harshly today, as they aren’t that bad. Just… I was cranky.

  “I thought I’d told you to try it yourselves?” I asked, whilst eyeing the completely untouched mice in front of them.

  Lisya looked up at me with an impressively challenging frown. “Why?”

  “Well, the direct answer is that I told you to,” I said, after a shrug. “However, there is also something to be learned from this assignment, even if you can’t see it at present.”

  She didn’t seem all that convinced and Roland was about to jump in with his own challenge, so I continued. “It is mandatory. If you want a grade for this class, you’ll have to at least try. And with that, I don’t mean just a token effort, but to actually try to master defleshing. It’s not as if I’m asking you to reanimate the remains.”

  With some grumbling, they actually started to try. It was a token effort, but at least I’d gotten the ball rolling. That was more important to me.

  villa1ny's . It is, along with The Calamitous Bob, a source of inspiration for Morgana's appearance.