I assure you, in this chapter Dezen will stop creating spells.
Dezen was planning to create defensive spells now, but sudden inspiration made him change his mind.
The spell he created, makes explosions, which doesn't hurt him nor his undead, but it can hurt Alex. Dezen can't throw it or place somewhere yet, he has to touch something, or someone to attack with it. Dezen called it Spark Explosion, since explosion creates only sparks and smoke, but no fire.
Just in time, when he ended testing a new spell, a priest from church of Alen came.
Assuming that he wants to recruit him, Dezen started refusing.
- No, Tyrone, I'm not joining your church. Nor will I teach anyone Necromancy.
The priest sighed heavily, then, as if he was bored, said.
- I know, I know. But please, hear me out. You don't want to permanently join any army, or force, I understand that. However, you can join the church of Alen for some period of time, which you will choose. And if you don't want to do even this, you can decide to closely work with us. No obligations.
Tyrone paused, wanting to see if Dezen want to tell something. After seeing that he doesn't, priest continued.
-Church can pay you with resources, knowledge, or help, with your development, if you start working for him. Furthermore, don't be ridiculous. As for now, you cannot keep that magic for yourself only. There are organizations and people who can force you to give them necromancy, and you won't be able to protect yourself from them. Not yet.
He paused again, this time to let him think a little, and absorb informations.
He continued, after around 20 seconds.
- However, we, the church which I represent now, if you prove your worth we will protect you. And we will not force you to anything. In fact, it would harm us. So please, think about it. And think what you want, but I don't want to hear about your death one day. Instead, I hope you will hear about mine, from old age.
- Well, I did not know, that possibilities like these exist. I will think about. But I would rather not rely on any force. I can promise, that I will grow in strength, as fast as I can, so said forces and people won't be able to take what's mine. And even if I am not powerful enough to kill them, or even protect myself, I won't make it easy for them.
- I just hope that you will have time to obtain that strength.
Now, going back to the plan he will create defensive spells.
The first spell he created, makes skin more durable, comparable to stone, so he called it Stone Skin. It doesn't change its color, but after using it, a wave of green mana will flow over the skin.
Dezen can use it not only on himself, but also his brother and his undead animals. Plants aren't affected by it, so he had to create a second, modified version.
It lasts for 1 day, and after 3,5 hours it will start becoming weaker.
The second spell creates a green, spherical barrier around him. Its diameter is 2,5 meters long, but it will become bigger if he adds more mana.
He can even make it big enough to surround his house.
He named it Green Barrier.
Although he didn't plan it, Dezen can use these spell to protect Alex, while he is travelling. However, before he will do it, Dezen has to create a storage, or source of mana to keep them activated. Currently, he doesn't have resources needed for it, nor knowledge, but he can try to make undead with such capabilities.
While creating these spells, he was also thinking about words of Tyrone, and so Dezen started planning, how to avoid such a future, where he will be forced to teach someone necromancy, or even worse, where he will become someone's slave.
Now, as he planned, he will make movement spells.
First spell Dezen called Pseudo-Skating, it lets him move on any surface, that is solid, like he was skating. It creates under his feet a mass of green mana, to show full potential, legs need to be engaged, but it alone can also, slowly move him.
The next spell lets him stick to solid surfaces, like walls and roofs. Dezen named it Sticking.
The third spell creates something similar to an invisible barrier over his body. It doesn't grant big protection, but it reduces air resistance. However, Dezen doesn't entirely understand it, so he called it Weaker Air.
Next were hiding spells and searching spells.
To hide he created 3 spells, first makes around him barrier stopping sound, he called No Sound.
Next was spell changes temperature that his body is emitting. For instance, if something can literally fell his warmth from a long distance, using this spell will deceive that being. Dezen called it False Warmth.
The third spell prevents anything he touches from shaking. There are not many beings who can sense shaking of ground, from long distances, but it is better to have methods against them. Its name is No Shaking.
To search, he made aspell making his hearing better, which he called Improved Hearing and spell letting him sense warmth from long distances, he called In Search Of Warmth.
After creating these spells, he stopped and focused on training. Also, he spent more time doing researches, trying to make undead able to storage, or produce mana.
He spent like that 3 weeks, until he decided it's time to travel. His researches didn't bring any successes, so he just used Stone Skin on Alex and ordered most of his undead to protect him.
Dezen took with him only insects, wanting them to protect him from other bugs. To gain more battle strength, he decided to revive (during travel) one of the dead trees he found during his walks with Alex. He could do this with only one, because more would destroy balance between his production and use of mana.
As a necromancer his production of mana was stunning, due to the constant need to keep undead "activated", but it also used the most of it.
His main goal during this travel is to find and kill/catch magical beings, or find magical materials like metals. However, it has too little chance of success, and Dezen doesn't want to come back home with nothing, so, he set himself an additional goal, which is finding and killing a pack of wolves, to change them into his undead.
During the first 2 days nothing special happened.
He wasn't constantly using Pseudo-Skating, so his speed was less than 2 times better, than that of a normal person.
Third day something finally happened, but it wasn't an encounter with a magical being or finding something precious, at least it wasn't first.
He revived the tree during the first day, but at night Alex ordered it to patrol the surroundings. Second night, he ordered it to bury in the ground, and he slept on its branches. He did because it was much more comfortable, safer and if some predator tries to attack him, it won't know about his servant.
When he woke up, he felt that his mana production was higher than it should be.
At first, he thought some of his undead were destroyed, so reached into his soul and felt connection with them.
Connection with these who were close to him was strong, those he left with Alex had a faint, but perceptible bond with him. None of them was missing. However, he felt that the tree he was sleeping on past night, uses less mana than normally. Dezen was puzzled, so he tried to examine it.
At first he was afraid, he was petrified, because he couldn't find anything wrong with tree, at least not with his sight.
Then he tried to reach into his soul and closely "observe" it. Unluckily, when it comes to his soul he is still too weak, so Dezen couldn't find out anything.
After 2 failures, he stayed still for a while and started to think about other possibilities.
Quickly, in his head, a new idea appeared.
Dezen ordered the undead tree to move, and started examining the ground in which it buried itself. He didn't find anything, and soil seemed to be normally too.
Thinking, Dezen was looking around in hopes of finding some hint.
" What could it be? This area, can natural mana be here so thick that it helps me keep my undead? No, if it was this, this place would many magical beings, and it should also help me keep my bugs. But can I feel it? Mana I spend on them is minimal, but on the other hand, creating so many spells improved my mana control greatly. Could it be that tree was eating, and it made the cost of keeping it lesser. No, I checked it on insects... But I was weak then, I might not have felt it. It's possible..."
Dezen took food from his bag and ordered insects who were with him to eat it.
He then reached into his soul once again and focused on his connection with them.
At first nothing happened, so waited. Few minutes, ten, twenty... Dezen was patient because after ordering the tree to bury itself yesterday, he stayed awake for more than half of an hour, and during this time, he felt nothing.
After waiting over 30 minute, Dezen could finally feel that his mana consumption lowered a little.
He then focused on his connection with bugs and found out they use less mana.
Happy, he gave them more food and started planning, how to use that in the best way.
He can feed them, and reduce costs of keeping undead. Thanks to it, he can expand number of his undead, but then he would have to rely on food, not only on himself in this aspect.
For Dezen it is acceptable, so he decided that he will gain more undead and keep them in that way. However,if he does find any magical creatures, who will probably consume giant amounts of mana, he will instead use that "method" to keep them.
Dezen continued his travel, which brought him more benefits that day.
After 3 hours he witnessed something unusual, even unthinkable, some might say.
He saw 3 different species of ants working together, not only this, they attacked other bugs and protected each other.
Dezen was looking at it puzzled, until he realized why it is happening.
- Royal ants...
Dezen quickly recalled his memories about that creatures. Their queen can enslave other species of ants and use her childrens to oversee them.
Every Royal Ant can be treated as magical animals with enslavement properties. Using them, he can perform many new tests and even try to create enslavement magic by himself.
While becoming an enslavement mage itself doesn't interest Dezen, using it to turn their queen into a source of Royal ants sound tempting. He can either change into them undead, test on them, use in researches, or sell.