Chapter IV.L (4.50) - Dolls

  “Evie!” Kizu called out. He hoped the Kemon girl had simply slipped away back upstairs silently. She was incredibly quiet after all. It seemed plausible.

  No response.

  Mort fidgeted on Kizu’s shoulder. The monkey hadn’t noticed Evie departing either.

  Kizu wheeled around and set his stance. Potion and dagger in hand. Snuffing out his light, he let his golden eyes adjust to the low lighting. He scanned the darkness, seeking out his enemy.

  Unlike the floor above, nobody had bothered covering the basement’s furniture in sheets. There were craft tables everywhere with all manner of tools lining the walls, from scalpels to pickaxes. And everything pinged his spellsense. When everything was enchanted, it blinded him to abnormalities, making the sense next to useless.

  He kept the wall to his back as he maneuvered over to the side, the basement opening up further to him. Knives jutted out of lumps on the tables. Wooden scraps lay scattered across the floor. A hammer stuck out of one wall, having smashed through it.

  “I’ve killed before,” Kizu warned the empty room. “Come out now or forfeit your safety.”

  A mangled giggle sounded right beside him.

  Kizu swiveled and stuck out in the direction with his dagger. Sojan sliced through empty air. Then connected with something unseen with a thump. Kizu yanked back and heard the scamper of footsteps away from him.

  An invisible opponent.

  That sadly did not lower his suspects by as much as he might hope. But the fact Sojan had struck it so solidly meant it likely wasn’t incorporeal. Sojan struggled to pierce those sorts of foes.

  He glanced down at the blade. The eye embedded into the pommel met his gaze. Sojan had awoken. After a moment of hesitation, Kizu drew the blade across his palm, feeding Sojan his blood.

  “Hello, Kizu!” a chipper voice said in his mind. “I didn’t know if we’d meet again. Sad to see you’ve got an irritating soul guardian blocking me from any measure of control. Do you not trust me? What did I do to deserve such suspicion?”

  “Yes. Happy to have you back,” Kizu said quickly. He scanned the darkness. “Can you give me any sort of analysis about what you cut through earlier? What sort of blood? Human?”

  “Nah. Not human. But plenty of nice, juicy liquids inside so I do still highly recommend stabbing. You’ve surely improved your stabbing technique, right? Pointy end though the flesh. Nice and simple.”

  A table toppled over, chunks of rocks, hardened clay, and wood were sent skidding across the stone floor. Something knocked against Kizu’s leg. He glanced down and a pair of glowing orange eyes gazed up from face with the nose and mouth sealed closed with smooth stone.

  Kizu instinctually kicked the head and it smashed into a far wall, crumbling to pieces and leaving behind a clump of stone stuck to the wall. More moaning shook the basement.

  “If not human, then what was it?” Kizu asked while he set up spatial barriers around himself.

  “So sleepy.”

  Kizu sliced his palm again with the dagger. In a matter of a single second, the eye went from lethargy to snapping open with keen vigor.

  If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

  “Information! Sojan!”

  “Oh, I don’t know what sort of species. Never encountered anything like it before. Like I said though, it was quite tasty.”

  Kizu took that statement as confirmation that the dagger could, in fact, seize control of whatever it was.

  Something slammed into the barrier on his left. Kizu dropped the barrier and lunged forward. This time, Sojan sunk into the invisible creature and Kizu released his grip.

  The dagger hovered there for a few seconds, black blood oozing out of nothing and being absorbed by the ever-hungry blade.

  “Well, this is an interesting body.” The voice sounded like two gears spitting out noises that resembled speech. “Atypical. And weird blood. More like ichor. Not very self sufficient either, unfortunately. But no soul competition for control. Should last a couple days before I drain it dry.”

  “Can you become visible?” Kizu asked, still on edge. He didn’t know where Evie went.

  “Oh, yeah. Maybe. One sec.” A moment later, a humanoid figure appeared in front of Kizu, with Sojan’s black hilt jutting out of its chest. The naked body was made from clay and wood with large glass eyes that took up nearly half its face. The mouth was permanently ajar, the lips cosmetically carved into its structure. Hair drooped over the top of its eyes, sprouting from its scalp.

  “This is horrifying,” Kizu stated. From on his shoulder, Kizu could feel Mort’s emotions mix with his own. Fascination, fear, distrust.

  “I rather like it,” Sojan said. He raised a hand and flexed fist. “I’ve got to give you some credit. You stabbed a nice target this time around. Responsive. Convenient. Much better than the jellyfish. Though I do have a slight preference for organic, the artificial stuff in this is the best I’ve ever tasted. You think you can brew me up some extra? That’s your whole thing, right? Cooking up weird random stuff.”

  “I’ll take a look at it. But for the moment, we need to find Evie.”

  “Who?”

  “Porcipine girl. She came here with me.”

  Sojan’s body made a grinding noise that Kizu decided to decipher as laughter. “You fleshy mortals like collecting. How many girls do you have now?”

  “She’s a friend. And she’s in danger.”

  Sojan waved a hand. Kizu eyed it warily. Instead of fingers, the artificial creature had long, metal claws. They glistened with some sort of venom.

  “You’re absolutely certain you have control over that body?” Kizu asked.

  “Yep! Complete control.” To prove his point, Sojan attempted a backflip. He slammed into the ground face-first. Unfortunately for him, the body didn’t seem to have been designed with tumbling in mind. “I do feel a bit of a pull towards specific instructions,” Sojan said from the floor. “It seems this golem was instructed to protect this place and deter any intruders.”

  “Golem? Is that what this is? Do you know what it would do with intruders?” That might give him a hint as to where Evie had disappeared to.

  “Eh. I don’t know. I just control the body. I don’t read minds. That would be violating. Crosses a line, you know?”

  Kizu focused his spellsense and tried to feel the room more thoroughly. Every tool, table, wall, and piece of material had some form of enchantment on it. The owner of this home had been serious about his enchantments before his death.

  Kizu opened up a large wooden crate and a dozen puppets turned their heads to look up at him from within. Their jaws fell open in unison.

  “Maaaamaaaa—”

  “Nope.” Kizu slammed the lid of the crate back down.

  He scoured the workshop, pushing aside chunks of clay and moulds. He even looked over the work desk in the corner. He found the schematics the first year had practically begged him for. He pushed them aside. They were far beyond his comprehension of enchantment configurations. And even if he needed the money, which he currently didn’t, there was no way he was helping out that bratty librarian kid.

  Sojan’s movements were jerky as he strolled around the workshop and there were times when parts of his body randomly went transparent. But the fact he had control over the golem at all was remarkable. Sojan said he’d never been able to take control of a golem before this. Whatever experiments this enchanter was working on, it was clear the headmaster must have suspected they would be compatible with Sojan’s unique blood consumption.

  “Maybe she actually did leave,” Kizu muttered to himself. He supposed it was possible. Or she just went upstairs for some reason. After one final sweep of the workshop, Kizu and Sojan started back up the stairs.

  Halfway up the steps, Kizu tripped. He created a spatial barrier to keep himself from face planting on the steps. There was a burning pain in his calf. He reached down to touch the bloody pant leg and winced as his hand brushed up against something protruding from his leg. Gripping it between two fingers, he yanked it from his leg. His eyes watered at the sting. After blinking away the moisture, his vision cleared and he saw the pain’s perpetrator. A long, brown quill. And a glance down at his leg revealed it to be far from the only one embedded in him.

  He looked over to where he’d tripped on the stairs. “Evie?” he called out. Then he looked down at Sojan who still stood at the bottom of the steps. “Sojan. What exactly do you have coating your claws?”

  Fifteen Blood Curse Academia chapters (7 weeks) ahead of Royal Road on Patreon!

  Book 4 COMPLETE on Patreon!