Reborn with a Necromancer System - Chapter 213

Chapter 213: Subservience

Kai pressed his palm against the barrier once more. The resistance was like pushing through thick stone coated in ice, but he could feel it weakening. Threads of life essence peeled away, unraveling the arcane weave that had held this prison together for countless warped years.

[192,457 / 250,000]

He gritted his teeth. The drain was slower now—like the barrier was aware of its demise and clinging to its final strength. The runes pulsed in irregular patterns, once neatly symmetrical, now fracturing like a dying heartbeat.

Across from him, Orlin sat cross-legged on the worn stone floor, skeletal hands resting atop his rotted robes, what remained of his flesh clinging to the bone like desiccated parchment. His once-proud crown had fused with his brow, and his eyes glowed faintly, like distant stars seen through a mist.

The lich’s voice was brittle but thick with memory. “He was taller than me. That always bothered me, you know? Ebonbrand. He was never loud. Never cruel. Just… constant. Like gravity. You didn’t realize how much you depended on him until he was gone.”

Kai said nothing. He merely siphoned more life essence into the barrier. The numbers crawled forward.

[208,732 / 250,000]

Orlin laughed quietly. “He used to hum. Did you know that? Little things. Stupid little songs from when he was mortal. I can’t remember the tunes anymore, only that he hummed them when he worked.”

Kai’s chest tightened. That same hum had echoed through Mirth when he entered the manor alone, weeks ago. It hadn’t come from a voice, but from the stones themselves, an echo of memory buried in the architecture.

Orlin’s voice dropped into a near-whisper. “I tried to carry on after he died. But his death broke us. I broke us.”

[237,409 / 250,000]

Kai swayed slightly, sweat dripping from his chin. His pool of life essence was vast, but this… this was monstrous. His heart pounded in his ears. What if he didn’t have enough?

He clenched his fists. He was too close to turn back now.

[249,120 / 250,000]

Still not enough.

He bit his lip, hard enough to draw blood. He could feel the last fragments of the barrier trembling, clinging to its final threads of essence. Any moment now…

Then the world shifted.

A soundless shatter rang through the chamber. The glowing runes flickered once, then vanished like embers snuffed out by wind.

The barrier was gone.

For a second, Kai felt triumphant. He had done it.

But then his hopeful thoughts were disrupted.

“You,” Orlin snarled, his head snapping up, eyes burning with green fire. “You are NOT my master!”

Without pause, Orlin raised both hands and a storm of spells erupted from his fingertips, jagged bolts of necrotic lightning, spectral spears, clouds of soul-burning fire.

Kai’s instincts kicked in. He hurled himself back, casting barriers and retaliatory magic, while calling forth from his shadow space.

The room exploded in motion. Undead poured from the darkness, skeleton knights, horned wights, dozens of ghostly archers. They slammed into Orlin like a tidal wave, but the ancient lich moved like a whirlwind of spellcraft, burning through them with raw force. Limbs flew. Bones shattered. But they bought Kai time.

He gathered his focus.

“Undead Enslavement,” Kai declared, voice sharp with command.

Darkness coiled from his hand and struck Orlin like a spear through the heart.

And then Kai’s consciousness reeled.

It was as though he had plunged through a veil of smoke. He was no longer in the chamber. No longer himself.

He was inside.

Orlin’s soul.

And it was not empty.

Memories poured around him, not like a dream but like a storm. A memory rose to the surface:

A snowy encampment under a grey sky. Tents in perfect formation. Armored undead marched in formation. At the center of the camp was a man—Orlin, younger, vibrant, draped in deep green robes stitched with silver sigils. He was leaving the camp, stepping through a portal conjured with subtle magic.

Where it brought him made Kai freeze.

It was a field lit by golden sunlight, and there in the center sat a human woman, though her presence boiled with divine power. She was cloaked in sun and sky, her gaze impossibly ancient.

Demeris.

Kai knew it before her name was spoken.

Orlin bowed deeply.

“I’ve done what you asked,” he said. “The camp’s location. The wards. Their numbers. It’s all yours. Just… keep your promise.”

The avatar of Demeris tilted her head. “Peace?”

Orlin’s hands trembled. “I’ve carried their bones long enough. I want silence. Not more power. Just… peace.”

She smiled. It was a soft smile. Almost kind.

“I will keep my promise.”

The memory blurred, shifting, and Kai saw flashes—fire raining from the skies, necromancers burned where they stood, wards unraveling under divine light.

And then silence. Death.

When the vision ended, Kai felt himself torn from the memory and plunged into darkness.

A cold, black void.

No ceiling. No floor. No sound.

Just a faint presence nearby, like a dying flame in an ocean of ash.

Kai stepped forward through the nothing, his form dim and flickering. Each movement echoed like thought rather than sound, like he wasn’t really walking, but being drawn by intent.

In the corner, hunched over and weeping, sat a man.

His shoulders trembled with each ragged breath, and his once-proud robes of a grand necromancer hung in tatters, frayed by time, memory, and guilt. Long white hair, unkempt and clumped, covered most of his face, but Kai recognized him instantly.

Orlin.

The true Orlin. Not the corpse trapped behind the barrier. Not the screaming, spell-slinging wraith. This was the mind beneath the ruin. The soul broken beneath the burden of betrayal.

Kai didn’t speak at first. He just watched.

Orlin sobbed without shame, clutching his own shoulders, whispering over and over.

“I wanted peace. I wanted peace. I wanted peace…”

Kai took another step forward. “Orlin.”

The man flinched. For a long time, he didn’t look up. Then, slowly, he did.

His eyes were sunken. Haunted. Red and raw. But behind the agony was something else.

Recognition.

“You…” he croaked. “You’re not him.”

“No,” Kai said softly. “I’m not Ebonbrand. But I carry what he left behind. And I’m here because I need your strength.”

Orlin stared at him for a long time, then lowered his gaze.

“I killed them,” he whispered. “I killed all of them. I betrayed the only people who understood me. The only ones who accepted me as I was.”

Kai walked closer, the void curling around his ankles like ink. “You wanted peace,” he said. “That’s not a crime. You trusted a god to give it to you.”

Orlin let out a laugh—dry and cracked. “And they gave me this. A prison of time and silence. A world where the only thing I could hear was my own voice telling me how wrong I was.”

Kai knelt in front of him. “That might be something you can never atone for, Orlin. You might carry that guilt for the rest of your existence.”

Orlin closed his eyes.

“But,” Kai said, firmer now, “don’t stop trying. Not until your bones turn to dust and your soul drifts into the void. You wanted peace? Then earn it. Protect the people still alive. Fight for something more than silence.”

Orlin’s breath hitched.

“I can’t,” he murmured. “I don’t deserve to… I’m not…”

“You’re not alone anymore,” Kai said, extending a hand. “Let me take control of your power. Lend it to me. Let me carry your strength into the world.

Not as a weapon of betrayal, but as a shield against those gods and goddesses who would use mortals like pawns.”

The void trembled.

Orlin looked at the outstretched hand for a long, long time. Then he finally reached for it, his fingers brushing Kai’s.

The darkness around them began to ripple, and Orlin’s form began to fade into silver threads of light, drifting toward Kai’s soul.

As the last of him started to vanish, Orlin spoke again.

“Tell me something, Kai Tensen.”

“What?”

“…Do you think I’ll ever be forgiven?”

Kai looked him in the eyes. “I think forgiveness is a journey. Not a destination.”

Orlin closed his eyes. “Then I’ll walk it.”

And with that, he was gone.

The void collapsed inward. Light flooded Kai’s senses. And the next thing he knew, he was back in his body—on his knees in the basement of the Mirth manor, hands gripping the stone floor, his breath ragged and heavy.

He gasped, his eyes wide.

The fight was over. Orlin lay still, barely animate, his soul cracked and leaking. The last of Kai’s undead had pinned him to the stone floor, his arms torn, his robes in tatters. But it didn’t matter.

Kai stared at him, chest heaving.

“Kai…” Orlin said, completely of sound mind.

“You betrayed them,” he whispered. “You betrayed Ebonbrand.”

Orlin didn’t deny it.

“You already knew that. I was tired,” he rasped. “And I was promised peace. But gods lie.”

Kai slowly approached him. He felt sick. Hollow.

“There were children, Orlin!” Kai composesd himself. “She used you. She used me when I was Luke… I was meant to clean up what you both destroyed.”

Orlin looked up at him with hollow eyes. “Then maybe… there’s still something left to save.”

Kai lifted his hand again, ready to finish the transfer of control.

But now, it wasn’t about power.

It was about truth.

About understanding what had been lost, and what could still be redeemed.

And so, with grim determination, Kai reached out once more.

“Undead Enslavement!”