Next Bonus at 100 stone
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The Altar (Few hours Later)
Rasputin stood before the blood-stained stone, his arms raised in supplication.
"I have spent a lifetime searching for them," the monk whispered, his voice trembling with dark ecstasy.
"The Ogdru Jahad. The Seven Gods of Chaos. They sleep in the crystal prison of the abyss, waiting for a key."
He gestured to the mound of bones beneath the altar.
"My brothers... the other dark wizards of the Thule Society... they gave themselves willingly. Their souls are the mortar for this temple. Their sacrifice fuels the beacon."
Ernst adjusted his glasses, looking at the skeletal remains.
'Voluntary?' Ernst scoffed internally. Hardly.
His enhanced vision picked up the fractures in the cervical vertebrae and the shatter patterns on the backs of the skulls.
These men hadn't laid down to die; they had been executed.
Probably by Kroenen's blades while their backs were turned.
Rasputin is a butcher masquerading as a prophet, Ernst analyzed.
He's using their residual mana and resentment as a battery because he can't generate enough power on his own.
"Inspiring devotion," Ernst lied smoothly.
"But devotion doesn't turn the gears, Gregory. Physics does."
He walked over to the massive ring-machine.
"This device is an energy transducer. You're trying to convert necrotic spiritual energy into a spatial rift. The problem is translation. Your magic is analog; this machine is digital. The signal is getting lost in the noise."
Rasputin frowned, his ego bristling.
"And you can fix this?"
"I can," Ernst nodded.
"But I am a scientist, not a sorcerer. I need to understand the source code. I need you to teach me the basics of your magic. Just enough so I can calibrate the lenses to the right frequency."
Rasputin hesitated.
Teaching a non-believer the dark arts was blasphemy.
But the war was losing, and the portal remained closed.
"We do not have time for an apprenticeship," Rasputin growled.
"Magic takes a lifetime to master."
"I am a quick study," Ernst countered.
"Give me your books. Your notes. Let me see the theory. If I understand the variable, I can solve the equation."
Rasputin studied him for a moment, then nodded slowly.
"Very well. But know this, Doctor: The abyss gazes back. Do not lose your mind in the dark."
He raised a hand. A glowing, purple rune materialized in the air, writhing like a snake.
With a flick of his wrist, Rasputin sent it shooting toward Ernst.
Schwing.
Azazel was there instantly, his dual blades drawn, stepping between Ernst and the spell.
"Peace, demon," Rasputin sneered.
"It is a key, not a weapon."
The rune bypassed Azazel and imprinted itself on the back of Ernst's hand.
It burned cold for a second, then faded into the skin.
"The Library is warded," Rasputin explained.
"That mark grants you passage. Without it, the books would boil your eyes."
Ernst looked at his hand. He could feel the magic, a low-level psychic construct.
With his mental power, he could scrub it off easily, but he nodded in thanks.
"Ilsa," Rasputin commanded.
"Take him to the archives."
The Archives
Ilsa Haupstein led them down a damp, spiral staircase into the bowels of the abbey.
She unlocked a heavy iron door and gestured inside.
"You have until dawn, Doctor," she said coldly, then left, locking the door behind her.
The room was vast, filled with shelves of rotting tomes, scrolls made of human skin, and tablets carved in dead languages.
"Guard the door, Azazel," Ernst ordered.
"You really going to read all this?" Azazel asked, looking at the thousands of books.
"It will take years."
Ernst smiled, taking off his glasses.
"Not for me."
He walked to the center of the room and closed his eyes.
Brain Capacity: 27.6%. Initiate High-Speed Data Ingestion.
He opened his eyes.
They glowed with a terrifying, electric blue light.
He didn't pick up a book.
He extended his hand, and his telekinesis surged.
Whoosh.
Dozens of books flew off the shelves, hovering in the air around him.
They opened simultaneously.
The pages began to flip rapidly, sounding like the beating of a thousand insect wings.
Ernst didn't read words; he absorbed information.
His eyes darted back and forth, scanning faster than a high-speed camera.
Sumerian summoning rites. Analyzed.
Lemurian blood magic. Cataloged.
Dimensional geometry. Integrated.
He tore through the library like a wildfire.
He stripped the mysticism away, looking for the underlying mechanics.
To a primitive mind, this was magic.
To Ernst, it was just another form of energy manipulation. It was code.
Spellcasting is just executable programming, Ernst realized, watching the pages blur.
The incantation is the command line.
The mana is the electricity. The ritual is the circuit board.
Four hours passed.
The last book snapped shut and floated back to its shelf.
Ernst blinked, the blue glow fading from his eyes.
He rubbed his temples.
He had just absorbed five centuries of occult knowledge in an afternoon.
He wasn't a Sorcerer Supreme, he lacked the practice, but his theoretical knowledge now rivaled Rasputin's.
"It's all just energy," Ernst muttered to Azazel, who was staring at him in awe.
"Rasputin thinks he is praying to gods. In reality, he's just dialling a phone number."
Ernst looked at his hand. He visualized a flame.
He didn't use a spell; he used his understanding of the energy matrix he had just learned.
Snap.
A small, perfect sphere of emerald fire ignited above his palm.
"Whatever Rasputin is trying to do," Ernst said, crushing the fire.
, , -
Authors Note:
There is something incredibly disrespectful about a guy walking into a sacred library, floating all the books at once, and learning in an afternoon what took Rasputin a lifetime.
That isn't studying; that is a hostile data breach. Rasputin is going to be so jealous when he finds out Ernst didn't even read the footnotes.
Rasputin: "Did the abyss gaze back?"
Ernst: "Yeah, it blinked first."
Rasputin: "Impossible!"
Ernst: [Summons Fire] "Look, no hands! It's just thermal dynamics, Gregory."
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