Chapter 3: Lessons From A Summon
{Don't you think that you might have acted a bit excessively?]
"Perhaps, but... I look really cool now."
[...]
Robert admired himself in his new gear: a staff of the archmage with robes of concealment and an unassuming storage ring. "Remind me how these work again?" Robert asked.
[Huhhh, fine. Try to channel your power into the staff and imagine the effect you want to produce.]
Robert imagined a stream of power flowing from him into the staff and was pleased when the first of the sixteen crystals embedded in the staff began to glow brightly. "Okay, now what sort of power should I use?" Robert pondered. After thinking about it for a while the second crystal began to glow and Robert realized that he was still feeding the staff power, he noticed that he seemed to have grown noticeably weaker. "System, what's going on?" he asked
[First, I have a name, I am called Apophis and-]
"Apophis? Seems a bit long, hmmm, I know! From now on I will call you System App or App for short!" Robert interrupted.
Robert heard a sound that was so strange and foreign to him that the only thing he could link it too was the fact that it sounded like things grinding against each other, "Woah, what was that?" Robert asked.
[Hmmm? Oh that, that was the sound of me grinding my teeth]
Robert made a mental note to avoid annoying App.
[Anyway, you are channeling mana into that staff and each of those crystals represents a level of power, so currently it is charged to the middle step of common rank. Congrats, you could kill a farmer with that, assuming that he doesn't try to dodge it or anything like that.]
"Okay then, so does tha-" Robert began.
[You are incredibly weak, you're death is utterly inevitable because you are incompetent and completely incapable of surviving in a world that doesn't pander to your every whim.]
"What? Why would you-" Robert began in a confused tone before he was shocked into silence as a surge of necromantic energy burst outwards from the tip of his staff as the crystals dimmed.
[Good, your lack of decisiveness was beginning to bother me and bring you dangerously close to running out of mana.]
"So... what you're saying is that you were just trying to help me, right App?" Robert said in an inquisitive and hopeful tone.
[No, I just find your indecisiveness an extremely annoying trait and I'm mourning the fact that I was somehow bound to you. Actually... how did you manage to do that? There is a long list of things that should have made that impossible, first and foremost how did you know my name?]
"Your name? Well it was in a book that I read once back on earth."
[Ha, I guess that the ones that tried to erase my existence didn't bother trying to erase my presence from separate universes. But that doesn't make any sense, they have always been extremely thorough, there is no way that they would have forgotten something so important, unless... something was preventing them from accessing your specific universe.]
Robert began to think about how the gods of this universe really seemed to enjoy spouting exposition but his thoughts were interrupted when he noticed that the surge of necromantic energy created by his negative emotions hadn't dissipated but had instead condensed into a ball of black fog that began to send tendrils into the ground as if searching for something, the ball of fog looked to have found something as after a few seconds of searching it seemed to shudder with delight. The fog continued surging into the ground until it had dissipated completely and a few seconds afterwards a skeletal hand pushed it's way out of the ground. The hands owner then used his new grip to pull himself out of the ground and rise to his full height of seven feet.
[Congratulations! You learned a new skill {Control Undead(Level 1)}. This undead is at the late step of the common rank by the way,]
"Wait, I can learn skills without buying them?" Robert asked in a confused tone.
[Yup, most skills are race specific so it should be pretty easy to learn them with some effort, Although the neutral skills and elemental skills will be much harder to learn by yourself. Oh by the way by learning a skill you completed a common quest and got one point... yay.]
"Okay then." Robert said before turning to the skeletal figure "So who are you big guy?"
"My name... you may call me Zain." said the skeletal figure "My power seems to have been greatly reduced... summoner help me rise once again to my full might and I will teach you all I know of the necromantic arts. Step one: I require a staff,"
"Alright then, App spend 50 points and give me a second staff of the archmage."
[Very well then]
A second staff appeared in Robert's hand and he said to Zain "My name is Robert and I'm the villain, welcome to the team Zain."
Zain took the staff and stared at it for a moment before testing its weight. He then poured mana into the staff until three of the crystals lit up on it. "My power seems to have been reduced to the late common rank, as for you... I never encountered a villain in my time but I have heard that you are all anomalies, this would explain how you were able to summon me- however I also heard that you could not be human and I can feel necromantic energy seeping from you, so what manner of creature are you?"
"Me? I'm a lich, what are you?" Robert asked
"Interesting, I am a high ranked subrace of lich normally called an Undead Overlord," Zain replied, then continued "Now let's begin your training, to start let's head to the nearby town's graveyard so that we have plenty of materials."
2 months later...
Zain had taught Robert how to use all of his basic skills apart from phylactery creation, all of the advanced (Second level of proficiencies) proficiencies and even the basic soul capture ability. Zain then told Robert that he couldn't teach Robert anything else without Robert increasing his mana, Zain said that he had some items at his old base that could help Robert. After that Zain set off, saying that he would be back in a few months if nothing went wrong, leaving Robert to figure out what to do in that time.
His learning had also given him nine more points from App. However Robert had decided to save his points until he needed them for an urgent situation. "I am going to go into town and see if there is anything I can do there." Robert decided, before asking the system "This armour will hide me from anyone looking or me right?"
[Yes, the armour uses a variety of simple spells working in tandem to make you seem like a human, or to say it in the way those of your world would: "It's a simple spell but quite unbreakable".]
"Okay then," Robert said "Exchange ten points for ninety gold and a hundred silver."
[Done, by the way you do realize that that amount of money makes you rich by the standards of a commoner and very poor by the standards of even the most minor noble.]
"I know, but i am not trying to draw large amounts of attention to myself." Robert replied,
[Interesting, then what is your plan?]
"I am going to become an apprentice!" Robert exclaimed
[To who?]
"I have no idea!" Robert said in an overly enthusiastic tone that made App-"No, Apophis!"Apophis caught himself.- wonder how long his host would survive.
Robert began to walk towards the town and arrived at the gate where two guards were standing guard within the day. "Hello there, could you open the city gate for me?" Robert asked the guards.
"There is a fee for entering the town, two silver pieces." said the guard, who Robert noticed was drinking from an ale flask on duty.
"Very well," said Robert, handing over the money "and what is the name of this fine town?"
The guards raised there brows and shared a look but eventually shrugged and replied "This is a trading town called Desert Winds."
"Got it. Thanks for your help." Robert said as he walked through the gate into a town filled with a variety of elves, dwarfs, humans and other strange creatures like satyrs and a strange serpentine race of humanoids.
"Interesting," Robert said , noticing that he could read the street signs "well, I guess that I should go see if I can find the trading market."
Robert followed the signs for a few minutes before eventually finding the trading market and being awed by everything that was going on there. There were street performers everywhere (According to App these people had put some effort into increasing there power and they were all between the middle and peak steps of the common stage), there was about a dozen of these performers scattered around the area. Each of the performers seemed to have there own shtick, with some using small bursts of elements in the shapes of a myriad of creatures, most of which Robert didn't recognise, while others created dazzling light shows and one, who was at the peak of the the common stage, created elemental puppets and magically enhanced ventriloquism to create scenes of war and duels while he narrated the events.
Robert could see that the performers made between one and five gold for each show, a tidy sum that would let them live a modest life for about a month -or so App told him- and a luxurious one for a few days.
Robert continued on until he found a building with a large sign atop it reading, in large silver letters: Craftsman's Guild. "Perhaps these people will be able to help me get an apprenticeship in the town."
Robert entered the spacious guild hall that, while not bustling, had people filling many of the tables and seats. Robert walked over to the reception desk and asked the woman sitting there if he could apply for an apprenticeship, she looked at him strangely, probably wondering why someone with such fine gear would want an apprenticeship, but eventually handed him a form and told him to fill in his name, proficiencies and their level. He began to do so and noticing that there were only three slots for proficiencies he shrugged and wrote 'Runecraft-Advanced' under the other three slots and handed it back to the receptionist- only now realising that he had subconsciously written in the same language he had been seeing on the signs since he came into the town.
The receptionist took the form and began reading through it, when she suddenly looked extremely shocked "Err, sir, you have Runecraft down here. Is that correct?" she asked politely.
"Yes that's correct, I have an advanced knowledge of Runecraft. Is that a problem?" Robert replied, before noticing that everyone within earshot was now staring at him and it was spreading via murmurs "Hmm, it seems that my plan to avoid attention is failing." Robert thought to himself.
"No sir, but I think that we should continue this conversation in one of the guild's private rooms to avoid attracting unwanted attention." the receptionist said, looking nervously at the watching guild hall.
"Very well then." Robert said, following her into a nearby room marked "private", while he asked himself what he had gotten himself into and whether his plan to "Lay low" could be salvaged.
[I believe that you have exhausted that path]
"I think you need to stop being so negative App, just watch, I will straighten everything out and then we can continue completely unnoticed." Robert said mentally.
[You realize that I have access to your memories...]
"Yes." Robert replied in a confused tone.
[And therefore your conversations...]
"Yes..." Robert thought, still not following.
[And therefore the fact that your persuasion attempts are so terrible that you have made people stop something that they were already planning on doing, just by trying to convince them to continue?]
"I hate you," Robert thought "almost as much as I hate light bulbs."
"Err sir? Are you feeling alright?" the receptionist asked Robert, noticing that he had been staring into space for the past minute.
"Oh right, yeah I'm fi-" Robert began, before noticing that the room he was currently in was bigger than the building he had entered.
CREATORS' THOUGHTS 
Nathair_Insint
Nathair_Insint Hey there, if you find any spelling or grammatical mistakes then please inform me- also please keep in mind that most words will use the European spelling.
Thanks
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