NOVEL NEXT Fenrir 1: Overlooked
If the beast was being perfectly honest, he didn’t really need the silly spellbook his sire was crafting for him. He would use it, of course, if just to please his lord, but…
Fenrir punched forward at the lunging Nailwolf and a bolt of black lightning erupted from his inscription. Said inscription seared itself into his flesh slightly, but he reinforced the area with Mentum to prevent it from doing what a standard talisman would– that is, devouring him to empower the cast.
With a controlled flow of Forbodum, he could feed the rune exactly the amount he intended to. With his Mentum, he could cut off its pull from his body before it started trying to kill him.
It was technically a risky, more focus-intensive way of using a simple enchantment, but it was much more powerful, and well… the results spoke for themselves.
The world froze wherever the lightning passed, and the wolf was simply stuck in the air as part of its body had been pinned there.
Using a carefully-crafted intent and the more space-related aspects of Forbodum, Fenrir had managed to create a semi-offensive Ordinance, one that demanded that its affected objects freeze in place. On the wolf, it was simply a debuff of sorts, but against a living being? A properly-aimed blast could stop a mortal’s heart.
The Nailwolf flailed in the air, but the effect dropped off after a few seconds, allowing it to flop to the ground. It once more went on the offensive, but another, more powerful blast of stasis convinced it to concede.
Some howls of acknowledgement reached into the heavens– or rather, the corners of the Seam in reality.
His pack followed him as he moved on to the next group of Nailwolves.
It took but a few short hours for him to conquer his floors. A handful of wolves attempted to slice him to bits with their magic, but it mattered not, for his flesh was simply too energetic for their matching energies to seriously harm, and he outranged them.
Exploring his new body in this way was rather effective, as he was able to explore his limits quickly and had the time to gather his thoughts and fully realize the concept of existence.
His wolven instincts– held by the body he inhabited, rather than his own Wisp mind– and ramshod Stasis enchantment did most of the combat on his behalf, which just allowed him to think even more.
First of all, he realized that his creator had some things he needed to be doing.
A mental tug was all Fenrir needed to call over his master's attention.
“Do you need something?” The voice reverberated through the lycan’s mind, and the Nailwolves in his surroundings were immediately cowed by the commanding feeling of their master's magic.
“Yes, sire,” he voiced aloud, “I believe that you have yet to examine the memories you gained from absorbing the Ordinance rune in depth?”
A chilly feeling swept over the area. “No, I have not. I'll rectify that now.”
“Ah, no! Master, I can explain the situation.” The lich-lord’s attention remained in the area, so Fenrir continued, “Ordinance inscriptions have two primary effects.
“The first, as I'm sure you're aware, is to add temporary rules to an area when you give it mana, such as making air toxic, stopping water from freezing or fire from burning, halting the wind, or allowing grass to grow through stone.
“The other is the same, but ever so slightly different. You see, the way that the Ordinance rune works is as part of an If/Then statement. When given an input, it creates an effect. It's coding, master.”