Chapter Five

"Harmony, do you know what time it is?!"

Jerked awake at Ambrosia calling her name, Harmony rolled out of bed and started her morning routine. Physical skills aligned her back and muscles. [Renew Spirit] with a rush from a slight bit of [Cold Touch] forced her fully awake, while [Analyze], [Recall], and [Keen Investigative Awareness] knocked lingering sleep and dreams from her thoughts. [Beautician] and [Manipulate Dead] refreshed her looks. [Claim the Remains of Power] left a hungry pit as [Goblin Breath] withered over the night. She'd injected the latest mix of [Renew Spirit] and [Mend] and [Cold Touch] to try to keep it preserved. More of it was there, but it was too broken to fill up again. With a flick, she removed the nasty skill from her system. It had taken multiple rinsing to get the taste from using it out of her mouth.

"You stayed up too late reading books again, didn't you?" Ambrosia asked.

Tess stood beside her with a tray of breakfast. The smaller spider sat in the eggs, generating heat with its body, keeping the hot food warm.

"I didn't know The Under had a library. There was a book by Alden, Superior Supportive, about carrying burdens that I got wrapped up in. I thought maybe it was about authority, but had some luggage packing tips. Why the wake up?"

"We ordered you a fresh body. With it being summer, it is defrosting quicker than we'd like. There are also new hires and one other issue that showed up for you to deal with. Gone are the days where you can sleep all day."

There were never any days where she could sleep all day. Maybe Ambrosia was a little ticked she'd left all the work to Bates and her yesterday. One less day together before the Ascendant Games, and she'd run off to a club without her. Harmony threw on a simple blue dress and then took some bites of her breakfast. "Show me what you got."

The corpse waited in a box outside of the manor entrance. The woman was old, Harmony used [Cold Touch] and [Renew Spirit] to cool down the body and preserve what she could of the meta-physical aspects from the summer heat. She might look like a frail corpse but the professional skills she had were labor dependent. It was that her class had been stuck at level eleven, and she'd only had two skill stones used that were of the dirty dozen.

"Passed away in her sleep this morning, didn't have funds for cremation for those who don't want to get dumped into old bones, not that it didn't take the ashes anyway. Hopefully, she won't mind that we claimed this for you."

That kind of thing weighed on those who would never leave Hazeldown. It used to weigh on her. "We all join death. She lasted longer than some."

[Claim the Remains of Power] Picked through the options. The barely developed class skills were [Aim], [Power Shot], and [Track]. The labor skills had a few social, organizational, and physical, she settled on an external strengthening skill, [Reinforce Construction] a well-developed skill. That should satisfy her hunger for today. "What do we do with the body now?"

"That depends on our new hires," Ambrosia answered. Off went one of her birds to fetch them.

Four new servants walked out. Harmony could smell the decomposition coming from one of them, but another had an earthy necromantic feel. [Recall] found a young man she'd seen in the crowd at The Grave Society, he had the earthy feel and had the bearing of a houseboy. Young to both his class and profession, younger than the competitors she met in The Under. The woman who smelled of [Rot], differentiated and had the sturdiness of someone several levels past evolution. The last time Harmony had seen her was in front of a chalkboard writing Thibodeaux. "Threnody?"

The former Grave Society teacher curtsied. "Lady White, your speech inspired more than only me and Gustov. We're honored to be the first to take service with you."

Bates wouldn't let a Grave Society spy into her service, would he? Even if all is acceptable, depending on how many more she snagged Peartree might go from annoyed to antagonistic. "A pleasure to have you in service. You two are here just in time to help with a problem. But first, why don't you all introduce yourselves and the strengths you'll add to my house?"

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The two non-necromancers, Matterly and Gisle, were experts on logistics, one with people, and the other with materials. They would be taking over many of the organizational roles Ambrosia had stretched herself to cover and would take more time as they added more people. Gustov was as new as you got, having made his choice a few weeks ago to be a necromancer and a houseboy. Bates will probably run him everywhere until a clear image of where his strengths were defined. Threnody weaved a tale of being outside the top climbers and feeling stagnant in her role of teaching, a curriculum developer, yet they stuck with the basics like Thibodeaux.

Harmony dismissed them all except for the necromancers who she introduced to the body. "Thoughts?"

"I have the [Burial] skill if you just want it buried." Gustov tried to offer helpfully.

Harmony had only asked for him to remain along as a class courtesy, and to get him used to being told what to do or that there was a problem to fix. She'd considered synergizing [Disintegrate] and [Manipulate Dead] to see how quickly she could turn it to dust. That seemed a waste of the resource.

"I have [Animate Dead] but most people frown on undead people shuffling around. I could only get it to do simple tasks. I sense something off, something missing that might interfere. I have perfected my [Rot] to make more of a compost that feeds plants than the toxic mess some leave behind." Threnody offered.

"I want you to animate it so I can observe and then I'll dispose of the body if you don't mind me interrupting the skill. Ambrosia fetch my…" The maid already had a journal ready to hand over for Harmony to take notes in. "Very well."

Harmony watched her soul sight as crisp as she could make it using beats of Stamina and a boost or mana rotation. [Analyze], [Keen Investigative Awareness], and [Recall] were all actively in play.

Threnody's [Animate Dead] hit and it was not as she'd theorized in The Deadwoods. There was no refilling of spiritual energy in the container. Threads Harmony could only assume came from the other necromancer shot into the corpse, looping into the frame, and the body somewhat. Odd springy marionette strings that leaked some spiritual sense. They shied away from the void where she'd plucked the skill. There was a spiritual increase from energy radiating off the strings but it was very faint. A dash of [Renew Spirit] would bolster the creation, but as it was the puppet creature created wasn't anything similar to what she'd seen in the deadwoods with constructed bodies and containers, or even the body borrowing one they'd met on their initial journey.

It jerked upright in the coffin it had been delivered in. and stepped out. Pulses of necromantic energy vibrated off the threads to control movement. It clearly took some skill, like plucking the strings of a harp to make music. A dash of [Renew Spirit] and the corpse moved more fluidly, the signals now pushing a pseudo-will operating in the shell temporarily from the skill. A synergized [Renew Spirit] with [Disintegrate] and [Manipulate Dead] to cut a string had Threnody grunt and an arm drop down lifeless.

It was only when Harmony caught a stare from one of her mother's support staff, along with a look of disgust on their face that Harmony decided to end this. Next time a private room or lab might be better. [Disintegrate] and [Manipulate Dead] combined in a nasty destructive force grinding the poor animated old woman down in ten seconds, only facing some resistance from Threnody's magic controlling the body.

"That was insightful. Thank you for your assistance." Harmony started to write up notes while Ambrosia ushered the new staff off to place them under Tess's guidance.

Harmony already had a loose outline to fill out when Ambrosia returned. "Some of Kelly's people were watching. Do you think that will cause trouble?" She asked.

"They'll all be trouble. You should have had me toss your mom out and send birds after her until she'd run herself all the way out of the kingdom." Ambrosia let loose a long sigh. "I get why you made that deal. It'll take time for us to build up a staff to counter her influence. We'll be staffing and setting up your house and income while you're in the Games. We can keep Kell and her people busy controlling narratives but under supervision. I'm mostly annoyed that you'll be leaving me for months!"

Harmony gave Ambrosia a hug. "It could only be days."

"Like you won't make it to the end. Ashes, we'd both be surprised and disappointed if you didn't. Discordant notes, that reminds me of our other surprise for you. Follow me."

Harmony rushed off after Ambrosia, following her back into the manor to one of the unrepaired sections. They'd explored the place thoroughly when they'd purchased it. There she was led to a door in the back.

"A closet?" Harmony asked.

"She says she knows you." Ambrosia opened the door.

A woman of manufactured beauty waited. Pale, unearthly, a little run down from traveling. The undead energy here was completely different than the [Animate Dead] she'd seen earlier as this was a contained, self-sustaining system. Maybe a few leaks as the repairs had been slightly rushed. The scar in the repaired skill was more visible like a flaw in a gem. How had she gotten out of the Deadwoods?

"Bea, what are you doing here?"

The body-bound spirit knelt and bowed her head. "I've come to serve you, my lady."

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