Academic gathering with a lich

Lyle found himself to have a group of exceptionally capable companions, whose reliable temperament kept showing through ceaselessly, even at the moments they became skeletons, along with some of their traits that didn’t need to exist. Lyle sat at the desk of the Necromancer Figure Club, reading through the classroom notes left by the manipulation over these past days. To call them notes was a bit of a stretch; they more closely resembled random diary entries, especially since those other things mixed in the pages were more striking than the occasional mentions of Spirit Summoning Studies knowledge.

These diaries were recorded using the time Lyle was away, but not because the brothers missed him too much. Instead, it was the Liches’ shallow concept of time that made them utterly forget the date.

"The second day after the Boss left, it was Mister Dragon’s Bone Summoning Study.

Plague Doctor Boss’s leave of absence surely had a certain impact on Mister Dragon, please tell me that is indeed the case, and that Mister Dragon’s course schedule was only due to his abnormal yearning for his disciple. My bones, we underwent an afternoon of beatings training, literally, in the Colosseum piled high at the Sea of Skeletons, Mister Dragon slaughtered us students mercilessly.

Not a single Lich left the class intact, my ribs broke, all of my ribs. Although Mister Dragon had warned us in advance that we could fight back, we never imagined that when he picked up that Bone Rod, he would whirl up a bone storm in the tight space like a meat grinder. The bones of all students flew through the air, unity was bullshit, shoving the classmate next to you into the Dragon meat grinder gave you more space to dodge.

This method allowed us to stand unbeaten for a while, until Mister Dragon took notice of our actions.

’As companions of the Plague Doctor, how could you be so sneaky and tricky!’

My sternum, Shiny’s leg bone, the flexible upper body, shattered in an instant. As my skull became part of the bone storm, I suddenly realized what a wise decision it was for Plague Doctor Boss to install the gyroscope inner loop in the Spine Wheel. The first time around, my skull was lucky to survive.

During the rest period, Mister Dragon’s skeletal avatar applied a white ointment to my fractures, my bones sprouted and grew like trees; within moments, I was whole again, even feeling a little harder than before. But this was not good news, wholeness was in preparation for the next shattering.

When I had become accustomed to being part of Mister Dragon’s bone storm, I felt sad about my numbness, truly a little sad. During the last mistreatment, Mister Dragon left our shattered remains in place, saying it was to train us in the subjective ability to repair ourselves. I don’t have a clue what that is, and I’m afraid no student does. Because they all remained in their shattered state on the ground, perhaps for the entire night.

We, slightly smarter, the three geniuses from the Necromancer Figure Club, ingeniously thought to reconstruct ourselves, turning into a skeletal fusion monster, and limped back to the clubroom. At this very moment, it is I who manipulate Shiny’s finger bones to write these notes.

It is said that such training will continue for several days.

The first day without Plague Doctor Boss, miss him.]

Lyle gently touched the shiny white powder left on the pages and, with sympathy, gathered it into his handbag.

"Lich Dust, collection complete."

On this page were many scratches, perhaps due to the three consciousnesses’ lack of coordination over the single body. This might explain why, when they first came back, the three were far apart from each other, probably because of the no-distance contact, a you-in-me and me-in-you for a while.

The notebook was thin, and as Lyle attempted to turn the next page, his gloved hand felt an abnormality in the crevice of the book. On closer inspection, from the corner of the gap in the next page, a crimson adhesive substance oozed out, no wonder this page felt much thicker, with shadows remaining in places. It seemed as though the next page was filled with honey, but everyone knew what was on Lyle’s gloves was definitely far worse than honey.

"Damn it, could those guys not take care of a book? Or did they have a big bleed-out due to a mishap with the Spine Wheel?"

Lyle forcefully turned the next page, the two pages sticky with blood pulling apart like strands. The scene was like scooping dung.

’How am I supposed to read the words, clean the filth from this?’

The smeared flesh started to morph, as if a slug crushed to death had activated a death replay. The flesh converged at the center of the pages, forming a lump the size of a human head with a strong scent of blood. A large mouth opened beneath the flesh. It aimed at Lyle as if it were about to say something.

"Hungry..."

With a pop, Nia’s tentacles shot out like a frog’s tongue, snatching the meat lump into the shadows behind Lyle and incidentally licking the book clean.

Before Lyle could react, Nia had already digested the lump of meat.

"What was that? Nia?"

Nia’s upper body leaned over Lyle’s back, her mouth with shark tooth marks and a cracked opening made a sound.

"Nearly starved flesh, tastes awful."

"That was clearly not meant to be eaten..."

Nia ignored Lyle’s complaint and retreated into his collar. "Already eaten, Nia can’t spit it out now!"

"I didn’t say I wanted it back. If they hid it in a book, it’s probably nothing important," Lyle shifted his gaze onto his notes.

[Surprise! Did I scare you, Plague Doctor boss!

Ever since taking over the task of writing class notes, I, Shiny, must do something out of the ordinary!

Today’s lesson was Crimson Sir’s Flesh Summoning Study. Other than dealing with that old pervert Crimson, everything was delightful; I finally didn’t have to get beaten up! Today we learned simple Flesh Crafting, embedding magical neurons in flesh tissues for basic control of flesh. Well, I guess, Plague Doctor boss, you probably don’t need to learn anything from this class, since you can already manipulate flesh. It’s probably the most basic course you can get knowledge from, the Flesh Great Tree really is biased in its creation.

In simple terms, we were all kneading blood mud today. It’s much harder to give free rein to a piece of flesh than to create a Spine Wheel with a fixed template. The guy next to me must have connected the wrong magical nerve because his flesh exploded, and he was stripped of all his belongings and thrown out by Nola, the conscience of the Flesh Great Tree. But the remaining gruesome scene left a deep impression on me, so I prepared a surprise.

The Terrifying Meat Lump, I don’t know if you’re aware of the Terrifying Box, Plague Doctor boss, but my inspiration came from it. I stuffed the meat lump in these notes, so when you flip to this page, the flesh will react and transform into one piece, lunging at your face! Hahaha, it must’ve been quite funny when that lump of meat lunged at your beak!

I was really looking forward to that moment!]

Lyle understood the surprise Shiny had prepared, but reality was likely not as he had imagined. The meat lump didn’t spring as he had thought, but instead, it was Nia’s tentacles that did.

"Maybe Shiny forgot to feed the flesh, after all, this thing isn’t a Lich, it gets hungry."

Lyle stroked the tentacle Nia extended, "Shiny also forgot, that Nia is by my side."

Nia made a cute purring sound, her tentacles twining and tumbling around Lyle’s fingers.

"Nia will avenge you, Nia will strip Shiny of all his scales!"

"There’s no need, Nia, Shiny failed." 𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺

Lyle looked at the remnants of the flesh imprint on the page.

"Tonight, there’s also a class taught by Arnold, the head professor of the Flesh Fraction..."