A Day of Witchery

by **Edwin** Mon Aug 16, 2021 12:27 am

" The weather is quite splendid today. " Edwin said to himself as he sat down outside the local Inn, he was staying at. He was sipping on tea and eating biscuits for breakfast as he flip through the towns paper. He was quite engross on the town's paper that he was able to tune out the morning hustle and bustle of street chatter and wagon's rolling over the cobblestone ground. Nothing was important outside of this world of paper that was until he eyes read over a haunting revelations." Newdale is confirmed to be the first region of the Outer Realm where a Church of Fleuve'ir is set to be built." He said to himself as he quietly reread that line before quickly continuing reading the rest of the article.

Edwin couldn't believe his eyes. As he thought of this as nothing more but as humans making a missionary approach into the eldritch region. He found it funny as he had feelings against this as he was no longer human. He would silently take his right hand from the paper and place it against his heart. It was still beating and he found it hilarious to think he would still have a heart after the process he went through. He found the feelings he held towards this piece of news, hilarious in fact due to his face still remaining unmoved and keeping the cheery expression that most will quickly get accustomed too.

" Someone has to put a stop to this mockery. " He thought to himself as he continued on with the news article. The piece of about otherworld invaders, it was a boring article till he read that they all seem to come from a portal in Hoptus Forest. As it detailed a powerful pool of energy was ripping people out of their times and bringing them here with otherworldly knowledge. " This is quite interesting. People coming from another world with their own laws of the world. This is an excellent case of study to see if they too are bound by the same laws that govern me. I need two specimen. One for study and another for experimentation." He thought to himself as he continue to read the article.

The last article on this talk about Wyverns being spotted in the same forest where the "other worlders" are coming from. Edwin quickly concluded that this was probably due to the massive amount of energy coming off that portal. As he continued on, it was reported that fifty eight people this year died to Wyverns while a whopping two hundred thirty two died to slimes. Which Edwin found to be the most hilarious thing in the world. " That's hilarious. People dying to slimes? Must be rookie adventures. Defenseless townspeople and children lost in the woods. " He concluded to himself as he gave a slight chuckle before closing the paper and setting back down on the table as he quickly notice he was out of biscuits and tea.

Stacking the tea plate and cup on the plate. Edwin would get up from his seat and take his leave as he has already paid for his breakfast. Edwin appearance and strange one, at least he would like to think it is. He was a tanned-skinned youth, white hair like silver, and dark ageless golden eyes. Which he found some of the ladies were quiet fond of, which annoyed him as they would ask to come look at the holy man's eyes.

The reason why he was called a holy man was because of what he wore most of the time. He wears the vestments of a priest and a golden cross around his neck. His vestment is a type of a red holy shroud and he wears this over his two cassock. The look is tied together with high boots, a sword in a bright red scabbard, a medium size black satchel filled with collecting material and his two notebooks. He claims the sword is for self defense against animals as he would never raise a hand against unless they are evil with all their heart.

That however was and still is a lie as he has went out of his way before to hunt down a deer or two during his travel. The reason he wears this clothing is simply because he wishes not to be bother. The only people who bother him is the occasional child, old people asking for a prayer, or some girl trying to woo his heart. This was fine, what wasn't fine was the drunkards or the assholes bothering him saying they need their beers bless and what not. Annoying is what it is, after encounters like these he would usually be quickly leaving the area after quickly handling people like that through the means of magic. May their gods forgive them because he won't. He would often say something like that along those lines after dealing with fools like that.

As he walked, he found that he had exited the city walls and was now making his way through the rural area of the city. " I'll reach the forest soon at this place. I need to take a break and make a list. " The list he was talking about was none other than a list of alchemy ingredients for a ritual. Most people would this a witches ritual but Edwin personally hated that. While if people knew he wasn't a human, he would be a label a witch and he hated that term. If you ask him, Witch described the females of that group and warlock described the males. He hope that someday that the term witches was changed to something to benefit the group like Coven or something but for now he had bigger things to do.

Taking a seat on a fallen log, Edwin would flip through the thick book given to him by his angelic friend. The book was made with a deep black leather and was bind together with fine elven string. Flipping through the pages, Edwin quickly found the ritual he was looking for. Reading through the materials real quick, Edwin quickly pulled out a small notebook with brown leather as he began to write. four eyes of frog, three tail of newt, a bottle of blood, bat's wing, boar tusk, Hawk feathers, and slime extract. Putting away the black book, Edwin sat up with his smaller notebook in hand as he made his way into the forest.

As Edwin walk through the woods, he was keeping an eye out for very specific things. Deer trails, soft ground, feathers, berries, lush undergrowth, a sound of weird plopping. These important features would be extremely important for his gathering as deer trails meant that animals commonly walk that path, soft ground typically meant their was a stream nearby that water level rises when it rains, feathers and berries are usually indication that birds and other small prey are near or have been here. The lush undergrowth are the common hiding spot of reptiles and bugs and finally the soft plopping noise means it's a slime.

It took about a hour of walking till he came upon a small clearing in the forest. Before he broke the clearing he heard soft plopping ahead of him. Edwin swore it was the sound of a slime and started to reach for his sword but stopped himself. Slimes aren't really effected with slashing attacks so he prepared the next best thing. A spell, holding one finger up on his right hand like he was pointing at something. Edwin quietly gather light to the tip of his finger forming a small ball before stepping out into the clearing. 5 meters in front of him was a small slime about the size of a small child as it sound and wiggled at him. Pointing his finger at the slime, Edwin waited as the slime pulled back. The moment was tense as the slime launch itself forward as Edwin unleash the control on his spell as he mumbled, " Light Ray. " The spell made quick work of the slime as it landed 2 meters away writhing as it swirled upon itself trying to regain the mass it lost from Edwin spell. "

"Study note. concentrated rays of light will annihilate slime flesh quickly reducing it's mass. The slime in regards to sudden mass loss will collapse on it's self trying to quickly up the lost of mass." Edwin would say with his signature smile pasted on his face as his voice sounded cheerful as if making a new discovery but behind the mask was a man who morbid curiosity of the unknown push him to pursue all matters of knowledge and he found this information euphoric. He quickly blasted the slime two more times watching as it pitifully tried to recover the lost man only to end up struggling melting down to a small sticky liquid puddle. Edwin would pulled a small vial and scope up the slimly material before placing the vial back in his satchel carefully wrapping it to make sure it doesn't break from simple movement.

Now having a better look of the clearing, Edwin could that this was or is a slime nest ground as bones lay scattered across the ground. Thankfully, due to the scattering of bones. Edwin was able to identify a boar skeleton quickly picking up the beast discarded skull and making his way out the clearing before more slimes show up. Quickly making movement between the clearing and himself, Edwin ran back the way he came with the boar skull in tow. Only to stop sprinting just to continue walking and after thirty minutes decided to rest up against a tree and was now using a hunting knife to crave the boar tusk out of it's skull. This task took about two hours as his hands would get tired and he would go else where in the forest to find material he needed.

Only managing to get his hands on the bat wings and the vial of blood as he found a bat sleeping in a tree during one of his breaks from craving the boar tusk. A well place hit in the head with a rock knock the bat out of it's slumbering state into the ground breaking one of it's wings on impact. Slitting the poor beast throat, Edwin made sure every drop of bat blood went into the vial before corking it and wrapping the vial in the beast's wing having severed it from it's body. Edwin also took it's eyes and fangs. Placing the eyes in a clear flash of water before corking it. He would once again wander the forest for another two hours finally acquiring everything he needed but the hawk's talon.

Finding the forest stream wasn't hard as the sound of rushing water helped him find it eventually, the part was trying to catch the frogs. Edwin would soon give up trying to catch the frog with his hunting knife resorting to killing three frogs with three separate cast of light ray. The first frog he used the spell against lost a major portion of it's under belly as he used the hunting knife to remove the eyes of the frog placing it in the same vial with the bat eyes. The second frog had it's head seared off leaving it's useless to him as the final frog he hit lost both of it's back legs, leaving it helpless to a predator such as himself as he took the frogs eyes for his own use. He found a family of newts living under a rock by the same stream he killed the frogs. Using his hunting knife as a skewer, he impale the family of newts in quick succession before cutting off their tails, draining their blood into an additional vial and wrapping it in a bundle tree's leave before placing all the material into his bag.

Edwin would start his trek back to the inn as within three hours it would be nightfall and it would take a hour to reach the town, thinking of where he could acquire a hawk's feather. As he walked back to town he saw kids of a nearby farm taking pot shots at their barn walls with a bow and arrow and that's when the idea hit him. He could ask the town's fletcher for spare hawk feathers. In high hopes of a potential successful day of ingredient hunting, Edwin would quickly return to town heading straight to the fletcher. In return for a bundle of hawk feathers, Edwin had to trade the spare boar tusk. He happily agreed with the trade as he made his way back to the inn with his mask of quiet happiness plastered on his face, but in actually he was looking forward to tonight. It wasn't often he made a ritual for cursing someone or something so he would be looking forward to the results to add to his note of study. " What a wonderful day today was."

WC(Word Count): 2187 TWC(Total Word Count): 2187 Tags: N/A
Edwin Dialogue color

HUMANS	██████████████ 28
ELDRITCH	███████████████ 30
GAIYANS	█████████ 17
ANTHROS	███████ 14
HYBRID	███ 7
OTHER	████ 8
TOTAL	79