Everyone stood before the rusty hexagonal gate of cobblestone margins, the torches in their hands isolating them from the engulfing darkness. With a key in his pockets, Zho spread the blockage, giving them access to the cemetery.
"You have the keys? Doesn't this place have a gravekeeper?" asked William.
"We have a deal with him. And no. He's not here today, only the four of us. And the souls and the creatures inside, of course," Zho handed his torch to him.
Raising his hand, the lich mentor spread his gloved fingers once, and a floating ball of yellow light spawned near his shoulder, following him as he walked through the door.
William was still impressed by his magic. Back on Sunia, the only magic he had seen was priests litting candles and tall chandeliers, similar to what Zho just did, except that on a smaller scale.
Inside, the darkness around was too dense to discern how ample or deep Inanna's old cemetery was, as their torches only illuminated the black soil at their feet at a radius of five meters around.
The wind made the trees' branches whistle, the dead bushes crunching as if snakes slid on them. William couldn't get more of an eerie feeling. Were they all unarmed? He could feel as if something stalked at them in the dark.
"This place holds an important history," said Zho, going ahead. "It was built centuries ago, and many interesting figures rest here. Nowadays not many bodies are buried here."
William looked around; some of the tombs were unusual from what he was used to. Some of them were thick, hexagonal blocks raising from the ground. Others were simple tombstones covered by a layer of simple cobblestone.
Very few broke the formula besides some of them being small vaulted mausoleums, their entrances, as expected, hexagonal. Zho stopped before a simple tomb made of nothing but cobblestone and a simple wooden sign.
"Eh, I don't think we should use that one, Master Ming," hesitated Miris.
"Using? What are you talking about?" Willaim frowned.
Artur read the sign, everyone ignoring his question. "Unidentified body. Should anyone report who she is, he or she should report her identity to Inanna's authorities. Her soul shall not cross the sea to the Far Beyond until Bloodsucker is brought to justice."
"Bloodsucker," said William. "Is not it that serial killer that's terrorizing the town?"
"Yeah," replied Artur. "I came here to Inanna four hours ago for supplies to fix the Hall of Progress. Rumors say Bloodsucker has taken another two victims. This must be one of them. Should we unbury the corpse and take a look at it?"
"Artur, funerary rituals and burying places are sacred to us. You can't do that," Miris raised her voice.
"Yeah, yeah. Whatever, mom," he sighed. "we should come here to investigate one of these days, Will. This thing's got me curious."
"A killer that drains his victim from all blood, leaving only a dry carcass behind. Interesting," Zho grabbed his own chin like a detective. "C'mon. This tomb is not safe. We should use another one."
He turned around and continued among the rows of abandoned tombstones and the dead of night. Miris and Artur followed him behind, William being the first to ask questions.
"Zho, Mr. Ming," he didn't know how to address him. "Do you know something about this… killer?"
"It matches with some description I am aware of, but we have no proofs. C'mon. Let's focus on our task."
"Yeah, as I suspected…" William sighed. "Now, what do you mean by 'using' a tombstone? I'm not liking where this is going…"
Zho stopped again, this time next to a regular tombstone with a hexagonal head before its paved bed, where disorganized, dry flowers that looked like roses rested. Everyone gathered around, and he answered William's question.
"A phylactery is the most important part of any lich, William. It contains our very souls. It's the oath ring between life and death that lets you remain in this world as a fully conscious creature while being dead. Now, like the human body needs air, fish need water, or Aeschylus' locomotive needs water and coal, our phylacteries need fuel, their own source of energy."
"And what's that? Why are we here?"
"The fuel our phylactery needs is souls. Uncorrupted souls of deceased living beings. What better place to get them than a cemetery?"
"Give me your hand, William," Miris extended hers open as if she wanted him to put his above it.
He hesitated, gulping his own saliva. They were indeed going to desecrate corpses.
"Please, give it to me," she insisted again. "This is not going to hurt you. We're actually only taking a minimal fraction of a soul; a soul fragment. That's what we call them."
"You need them, William," said Zho. "Without soul fragments, you'll degenerate into various possible kinds of beasts. Your body will rot and your mind will be gone if you don't consume them."
It was all too wicked for William. "Fragments? What are we going to do? This is desecration. Why are you not taking the whole souls, by the way?"
"Because doing so would be an offense to Sekera. It would create an unbalance in the cycles of life and death, something we liches promised to honor."
"Also, by absorbing someone's soul, you're absorbing their essential energy," said Artur. "You're absorbing their fears, their anger, their madness… You don't want to mix that with yours, right? That's why we should only take fragments from a soul. In this way, we get our necessary energy, and we respect those dead. Think about it as only eating the berries of a wild bush without harming or eating the plant too. It's an even trade."
William took a moment to think. They were mentioning 'degeneration' and 'rotting again' too much, Miris especially making too much emphasis on it. Sigh. Maybe they were right. Again, why would they go through that much trouble only to harm him afterward?
Even their leader, Oraesh Khugazid, stopped his fight against that armored skeleton when he could have let him die crushed by its hammer.
He extended his pale hand to Miris' tan-colored. She gently grabbed him by the wrist and began to put on it a brass watch full of tiny levers and mini-gears around its hexagonal shape.
"What's this?" he asked.
"It's the gift Aeschylus had for you. All of us have one like yours," said Artur, unraveling his sleeve and showing his, which had its screen mint-colored.
William noticed that Miris also had one around her finer hand, but its screen was faint-orange. Zho also had one around his thick wrist, its glass lilac.
"It's a soul absorber," said Zho. "it lets you absorb soul fragments with ease, and store a few of them for later usage. Try to keep some of them always in reserve."
Miris finished, letting his hand go. William could not decide whether it looked like the expensive jewelry of a wealthy monarch or a precise tool used by a jeweler or a watchmaker.
Its grey screen suddenly turned aquamarine —like the phylactery in his chest. Tiny clock hands were at its upper corner indicating the hour, while most of it was covered by a 'u' shaped bar, which appeared to be empty.
"It looks good, I guess. But now, how do we 'absorb souls' I don't know what you're talking about."
"We are here to teach you," said Zho. "you don't need your soul absorber in order to absorb soul fragments, but it's great because it helps you measure how much you've taken and makes it easier for you. Watch and learn. To absorb a soul fragment, simply point your hand against the source of the soul; a deceased living being. In this case, this tomb, where someone rests."
He did as he described, Miris and Artur raising their sleeves and joining him. William witnessed something otherworldly; from the tombstone, faint blue energy raised like a spiraling beam and connected with each's hands, slowly dancing around them like the smoke of a cigarette.
A pair of seconds after, they put their hands away, Miris' and Arturs' brass watches beeping as they indicated they had absorbed enough.
Then, each pointed their hands against their chests, and more steamy energy connected from their shiny chests to their soul absorbers, as if both were trading energy.
"Now that was refreshing," Artur took a relieving breath. He raised his shirt and coat for a moment, showing the mint-colored gem in his chest glowing strongly before stabilizing.
Miris unbuttoned her coat too, exposing her pastel-orange phylactery and her humble breasts with the same relief, only to button it again with rolling eyes as Artur launched her a stare.
Zho was immuted by the soul fragments he absorbed, remaining calm as ever.
William extended his arm against the tomb too. A tickling sensation engulfed his skin and muscles as a beam of energy surrounded him with a refreshing, pain-killing effect. It was like nothing he had felt before.
His soul absorber vibrated with a beep, and he put his arm away. One-third of its u-shaped bar was filled. Directing it against his chest, a refreshing sensation took all over his body as the watch and his phylactery traded fuming faint light.
The effect finished shortly after, no more energy coming from his soul absorber as its measuring bar had been emptied.
"That felt… good. Was that all?"
"Yes. It's something simple you should do regularly to keep yourself healthy," said Zho. "that soul-fragment should last you three days before you need more. Two for you, William, as you're still recovering and need extra energy. In my case, it will last me four months. You'll need less and less as you level up in lich power."
"Almost as good as Onissa's moth milk sauce, right?" said Artur. "Only we get to experience this, Will. Tell me it ain't amazing."
"Now, now," continued Zho. "Let's continue filling your soul-absorbers, young liches. You never know when you'll need extra soul-fragments. We have already taken enough from this soul. Remember what you know about only taking tiny fragments and not the whole soul, and you'll be alright."
They continued from tombstone to tombstone doing the same wicked necromantic process, William delighted yet feeling creeped out each time they did it.
Zho also explained something that didn't make sense to him: Miris mentioned a soul crossing to the Far Beyond —which was some kind of Oksidi afterlife— yet they were taking soul fragments as if souls were something that remained static in a place forever.
According to Zho, the combination of a resting place, a corpse, and the liches' unique affinity with the undead, they were able to create a link between worlds, a connection acting like a portal that helped them absorb a soul.
What kind of power was that? and lich power levels? What did Zho mean? What would happen if he stopped taking soul fragments? He still had to pay attention to see what else came on…