After a couple of days walking through the forest back to Moraz town, Lumian decided to test his ability to see the shadows of life. Picking up his knife, he noticed a suitable target to test this ability on, a bird was perched upon a branch minding its own business. The bird had dark brown feathers with a golden yellow beak biting at its feathers trying to grab a hold of something.
As this was happening, Lumian held his breath whilst staying deathly still to avoid attracting attention before he threw the knife stabbing the bird in its chest.
SQAWK
The bird screeched in pain before falling into the grass besides the tree. Lumian walked up to the fallen bird seeing that the signs of life faded from the poor creature. It appears to be some sort of eagle. Lumian thought to himself before looking back at the eagle as his purple eyes glowed slightly revealing wispy shadows floating from the bird’s corpse gently blowing up around in the wind. Could this be the shadow of life? great I can see it, now I just need to figure out how to connect with it. Hmm, "Arise?" No? "How about Transcend!"
Thinking to himself, Lumian tried different ways to connect with the shadow of life before coming to the conclusion of TRANSCEND as transcend can be seen as 'Transcend death'.
As he said Transcend out loud, a change happened to the wisps of shadow by the corpse. They began to churn from being mere wisps into more a veil of shadows growing into the familiar shape of the eagle only veins of purple fire lurked where its eyes would be as tips of its feathers also became a similar shade as to the purple fire as well.
Lumian instantly felt a sense of mental connection with the eagle where its mind was still like an untouched lake. Ok, it seems it worked now I need to test if killing it will cause any irreparable damage. Thinking like this, he grabbed onto the head of the eagle and crushed its skull in his hands. The eagle dissipated into shadows, but Lumian still felt a connection in his own shadow so looking back into it he sees purple eyes looking back at him from his own shadow. I see, when they die, they merely 'return' to me to be used again.
After memorising this, Lumian also felt a miniscule amount of being drained of energy. It also seems to take up some stamina to bring them back as well I must remember this just in case. After coming to these conclusions, Lumian decided to think of a name to call his first shadow of life after all, it will be a sort of familiar for him.
"I will call you, Aethon." Lumian says out loud despite not receiving a response. Return. After the command, Aethon blended into Lumians shadow as he used the corpse of the eagle as a meal in between rests. As Lumian arrived at Moraz town, it was already becoming night therefore he found a suitable place to rest for the night in one of the abandoned buildings.
Some time passed as dawn came, and the glimmering sunlight brushed upon Lumians face waking him up from what can be considered his most restful and peaceful night he has had in a long while. Sitting up he thinks to himself as to how he should plan his shadows as to what they should be, at least the first thirty of them.
In the apprentice stage I can only have ten and one of them is Aethon. I feel that the first ten of them should be scouts, existences that others would not care if they existed so that when I become a beginner necromancer, they can gain the ability to see and hear through them in which they can be useful. Hmm, they should also be good to use in case I need a distraction against some opponents to spread their focus so that I can get a clean kill.
As for the other twenty that I will get at the beginner necromancer stage, it will have to depend on how big and strong the creature that I can connect with. While thinking, Lumian hears the scurrying sounds of something scratching against the dusty floorboards so peeking up from looking down, he sees several rats sniffing around.
Rats could be a good option, wait! This can also be good timing for another test, what would happen if it was one of my shadows that killed them instead of me directly? Thinking along these lines Lumian grabbed a dagger getting ready to throw it at one of them while commanding Aethon to kill another. Ready...Go!
SQEAK!!
Squeak squeak
The dagger thrown and pierced one of them while the beak of Aethon stabbed through another as the rest of the rats squeaked and ran away from the devastation of their family members death. Lumian quickly activated his ability to see shadows of life and noticed two wisps coming from both of their bodies. Ecstatic by this discovery, Lumian commanded them to Transcend adding the two rats to his roster of scouts.
Similar to Aethon, they were black shadows with some level of substance with purple flame-like eyes. "Return." Lumian using his voice commanded them back into his shadow before getting up and heading to the North of Moraz town where the capital city is said to be beyond the rest of the forest.
There are many other tests that I will need to do so that I have greater understanding of my own abilities so that I don't get ahead of myself and misjudge my capabilities when it comes down to a life and death fight.
Thinking this, Lumian walked into the dense forests edge as he thinks of the other seven possible scouts that can be very useful in other situations for example, rats can be good for slums and dirty areas whereas Aethon is good for the daytime overhead scouting but not useful at night. Meanwhile, bats could be useful at night but not during the day and all of them are rather noticeable animals therefore, smaller insect-like creatures can be useful when he doesn't want to be absolutely noticed, perhaps spiders can be an option?