After separating from Helena, I went to the merchant. Once there, I sold the crown and bought it back, allowing me to have infinite crowns (Horcrux) in stock. I did this in case my method of restoring the crown failed.
What made me curious was what would happen if I bought another corrupted crown? Would there be another horcrux of Voldemort, or would it be an unrelated soul fragment? I shook my head in disappointment that I couldn't check it out, I haven't money to buy a second crown.
'I currently have many expenses'
Even on my limited budget, I took it upon myself to procure a necessary item for my date with Lady Ravenclaw, a bottle made of clay mixed with bone dust, filled with naturally grown fruit wine. On top of that, I bought some of the smaller, cheaper creatures.
With the bottle in my hands, I went back to the room of all requisites and prepared an altar in the shape of a cube, similar to a low stone table. I placed the bottle exactly in the center of the table and, moving two of my fingers very predictively, caused a line of blood to begin to form a large circle around the bottle.
This bloody line took a while to complete the circumference, as it was intended to be slightly carved into the stone. To say that it was completely blood would also be incorrect, since it was loaded with a lot of my magic as a wizard as well, making it not so liquid and more of a kind of bright red light or plasma.
Once it was completely turned around, I moved my hands once more so that four different symbols were drawn in four different directions, equidistant from the bottle. This was faster, and the table was recorded in a flashing red color.
I prepared the creatures that I bought in the surroundings, none closer to the table than another, and with simple spells I put them to sleep. They were not magical beings, for the most part, they were common animals more than anything. Cats, rats, squirrels, and other things that I once sold to the merchant to increase the variety
With the animals already asleep, I used my blood magic to slowly stop their hearts, killing them all. With the dead creatures, I sucked all the blood out of their bodies to replenish my reserves, since for this I only need them to die peacefully, I don't need to keep them in good condition.
I saw the mummified animals around the altar and nodded, turning to leave. I would go back to the centaur camp to see how everything was going.
...
My way to the centaur camp was not difficult at all, but after the last mishap, I was more tense than usual. On this occasion, instead of going directly, I decided to be more cautious and considerate, stopping in range of the patrols to warn them of my arrival.
When the sentinels met me, the atmosphere became awkward, I could tell how nervous they were when they saw me. I asked if they could inform Marril and they, hoping that I would leave as quickly as possible, sent one of their own to the center of the camp to look for her.
I waited for a while lying on a tree, 'guarded' by the centaurs, until I saw how the old healer slowly approached. Seeing her I was glad, at least now I did not receive a shower of arrows.
"Hello Marril, how's everything going?" (Red)
"For the centaurs, everything is as it usually is, beyond the evil that haunts your castle... but I think that's not what you mean" (Marril)
"That's right, since I left have things improved?"(Red)
"She has calmed down... from her anger, the other emotions are not in order" (Marril)
"Could you cure her? She was very bad"(Red)
"Yes, we treated her, but it is as you would expect, her condition is not even close to what it was originally" (Marril)
"Do you think I can see her?" (Red)
"I don't know how she will react, but you could try it at your own risk" (Marril)
"I'd better not risk it. Send her my best wishes, and here I have some of the incense she likes for you to place when she can't sleep" (Red)
"I can't do that" (Marril)
"Huh...?"(Red)
"I can't give it to her"(Marril)
"Why?"(Red)
"She is no longer in the camp, she left not long ago" (Marril)
"Gone?!"(Red)
"Yes, she didn't want to be here anymore and he left" (Marril)
"But you said it wasn't right!"(Red)
"She is not, she has no strength and her body is very fragile right now"
"AND WHY DID YOU LET HER GO?!" I yelled furiously, unable to control my aura. My appearance in my real body changed to that corresponding to the alignment, but since the one in the forest was a clone, it was not noticeable.
"It was not our decision to hold her, she was destined to die that day and you saved her. We will not interfere with destiny, but neither with you. We healed her as you wanted but we did not stop her against her wishes" She responded calmly to my outburst.
"BUT SHE IS GOING TO DIE! Where did she go? With the other unicorns?" I asked something anxious and angry, I didn't expect this from centaurs.
"It shouldn't be, she went in... exactly that direction" she pointed towards the forest.
"Ahhgg…" I grunted as started to run, leaving the centauride behind.
I was worried, knew well what condition she was in before and that it would be difficult to restore it in a short time, even with the help of the centaurs. This forest is getting more and more dangerous the further you go, and the direction she went was not towards the outlying areas.
I activated [Wrath], [Hunter Essence] and [Sense of Life] at full power while running in search of her. It was not difficult for me to increase my speed in that state, I was very upset that they let my patient go just like that, she was mine... and they put her in danger...
This place was dangerous, so I dispelled several clones along the way. With my blood magic reserves increased along with the restoration of the other stats that are lowered by the skill, I felt much more confident moving forward.
The wind hit my body but it did not stop me, the speed at which it arrived exceeded what was expected of the wizards and humans. I was happy that I had practiced parkour around the castle at the time, because now I was using it in this forest.
...
Deep in the forest, the place was gloomy, the large trees covered the little sunlight that remained at this time of day. It was dusk and the night was falling, bringing with it the terrifying sounds of the creatures that lived here.
In this particular area, white but sinister cobwebs could be seen covering entire trees. It was not the safest area of the forest, this was the territory of the acromantulas that had invaded decades ago.
In one of the nets arranged between two nearby trees was, in a way, hanging, an injured unicorn with its fur almost dull. Stretching out, she could touch the ground with her hooves, but moving only caused the cobwebs to take hold.
Silver-colored blood could also be seen on her body oozing from the wounds, apparently from bites. The unicorn only put up a weak resistance, she was already weak, but what stopped her the most was the loss of her will to live.
Not far away, if not close, was an acromantula that she fought and the reason she ended up on this web. The spider was slowly approaching with its multiple legs, it didn't risk going directly. It knew the power of unicorns and would wait for wounds to further weaken its prey rather than endanger itself. In itself, its own avoided beings like this, but its violent nature did not allow it to miss this opportunity.
The unicorn had teary eyes, she didn't expect it to end like this. Among hers, she is one of the youngest, shortly after being an adult a monster killed her mother, and now... she would also die.
The acromantula was approaching and seeing how her prey seemed to give up or weaken, didn't really care, prepared itself and jumped on her to deliver the coup de grâce.
«Avada Kedavra...»
A green light suddenly appeared from a certain direction and collided with the giant spider while it was still in the air, pushing it away as it writhed and fell to the ground with contracted legs.
...
Seeing how my target shot out, I made a surprised face. I used my blood magic to power up the killing curse, since I didn't know if it would be strong enough to finish it off. It was the first time I did it and it felt weird.
I didn't want to waste any more time, the truth is I had already come across more spiders on the way but I avoided them with my invisibility. My sudden attack would only help us for a few seconds before more came.
«Diffindo»
I cast the spell at the web, severing it and causing the unicorn to fall to the ground.
"Here I am! Come on, we have to go!" I said with emphasis, but without causing too much noise.
"No... you... no..."
"Stop acting like a capricious little girl. Get up, we have to go" I scolded her as I tried to get her to her feet.
"Let me... let me die... I don't want to anymore..."
*Slap* "Shut up! We're going to get out of here, whether you like it or not" I slapped her face when I heard her and tried harder to get her up.
I finally got it but she swayed from side to side as if she was going to topple over with the slightest breeze. With my hands on her body I started to use my healing to see if she could wake up, she was so weak it was hard for her to stay awake.
She kept telling me to leave her, that she wanted to die and no longer suffer, which I didn't like at all. Even with the evil alignment, I could feel so bad for her and her pain. I would have liked to be able to respond with comforting words but I heard the spiders approaching... and they were not few, I saw them in the distance, approaching very quickly.
"LET'S GO NOW!" *SLAP* I yelled at her as I spanked her in the butt, charged with [Fury].
This seemed to make her react and, without any regard for her feelings and opinions, I jumped on her back to sit astride her. She could feel I was mounting her, but before giving her a chance to say the slightest word, I spanked her again, yelling "RUN!"
Maybe out of inertia, maybe out of fear of being eaten alive just like me, maybe just out of anger... but she galloped in at the right moment, avoiding the spiders that jumped from the trees towards us from catching us.
The sudden momentum pushed me back and I had to grab hold of her mane to keep from falling. I knew that she couldn't continue alone and I didn't sit idly by, with my hands on her, I made sure to use my blood healing at full power to prevent her from ending up suddenly falling unconscious.
I wish I could say this helped us escape, but things weren't that easy. Looking back and to the sides, I could see a tide of huge spiders that made my anus clench in fear. I perfectly understand my brother's fear at this point. How the hell are there so many spiders in this forest?
I drew my wand and cast spell after spell at anything that got too close to us, buying some time... I think. There wasn't much I could do.
The centaur camp was in an address full of spiders and I didn't want to bring this trouble to them either. I didn't know anyone who could currently help me in this situation, so using my real body to call for backup was useless. Nor did I think about undoing my clone and leaving the unicorn to its fate, I had to try to fight and get it.
My [map] hadn't explored the forest so I was going blind and the spiders had covered a lot of the places we could come back from, they knew this place better than we did. I tried to use bombs or similar to open the way but it was very difficult for me. I had to constantly heal my mount while defending myself, which was only possible because having a lot of clones helped me develop good parallel thinking.
Going into desperation I started to sweat even in my real body, this is a situation where I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel and I don't like it at all. I don't feel like I can fix it and I'm scared, not of what might happen to me for being a clone... but of failing.
I looked through my list of skills and inventory as much as I could to see if I could find a way around this, not noticing that I had some new prompts. I was able to form an idea but I was running out of time, the wear and tear of the race could not be compensated with my healing if we continued like this for a long time.
I used [Help] to see if my idea was plausible and save both the unicorn and my clone. A screen with intermittent ellipses had appeared while my query was being analyzed and the first I received the 'OK', without further digging into the details received, I made my decision.
I pushed my body as best I could, and with me the unicorn, in the direction of a small and not very deep cave that I saw in the distance. She was very tense and no longer opposed to anything I did, also scared to death, so she followed my intention.
As we got closer I opened the campaign menu and quickly selected, almost at random, the first thing I could. After some notification windows where it asked to confirm the selection, the point in the timeline where to start and accept certain terms, including not creating a new character and/or taking the current mount with me, I was able to press the 'start button campaign'.
I saw how a loading screen appeared with a bar at the bottom that was filling up quickly, in the rest of the screen you could see an ancient scroll where there were four animals running.
When fully charged, 'puff', everything seemed to go dark for a millisecond before we were back to see where we were, with slight differences and without the tide of spiders. But we didn't focus so much on that, since that interval of darkness made us lose what little stability we had and we fell rolling inside the cave.