The circle pulsed and the light grew to be blinding, causing the blond to cover his eyes and squint against the light. His gaze tracked back up to the prostitute, his heart sinking with every second. He stared at the circle, his head pulsing from the lightshow even as he forced his eyes down to his hands, where a glowing tattoo stood out against the back of his hand the visage of a crying Virgin Mary in red. Or rather, staring at a glowing circle on a hotel room floor, replete with arcane symbols and what was clearly a glassy-eyed prostitute off to one side. Trent Blackmore, as he had often found himself in life, had once again found himself holding the bag for someone else. Johan clutched his head, his breathing growing shallow and his heart thudding in his chest. A crimson circle surrounded a spadelike shape that hinted at a mask, though one divided down the middle, with one half calling a tragedy mask to mind, and the other corresponding to comedy. Oh, and the unnaturally bright sigil etched into the back of his right hand was also a glaring sign of unfamiliar things. They were several shades too pale, the fingernails were entirely too well kempt and there wasn’t a single hair on either of these hands. Or rather, that his hands were not his hands. The third thing he noticed was his hands. The second thing he noticed was the throbbing pain in the side of his head. Indeed, he didn’t recognize where he was at all. The first thing Johan noticed upon waking up was that he was no longer in his room. His boot-clad feet shot from beneath him, his head collided with the corner of a table, and he knew no more. As he stepped forward to begin the ritual, his foot touched down on a small drop of ectoplasm that had splashed out of the circle. With this, his victory in the Grand Holy Grail War would be assured! The poem that would summon the Servant he sought, in precisely the class he desired. This page was a new addition, and one he’d taken great pains to acquire. The ectoplasm then settled into a liquid form, sinking into the cracks of the summoning circle as Yohanan looked on in satisfaction.Īfter taking a moment to cackle maniacally (mentally, of course he had standards, after all), he turned the pages of his grimoire to a particular spot near the center. With another gesture, razor-thin blades of ectoplasm carved a magic circle just so into the stone floor. With a flourish, the pale Magus snapped the book open and strode to one corner of the room, notably barren. Quick as a whip, the Ectothrall presented Yohanan with his magnum opus: a massive grimoire whose very pages were linked to his own Magic Crest. With a sound like flan being torn apart by a particularly vindictive badger, Yohanan’s Mystic Code, the Sefer Dim'dumiym, fell into the familiar’s outstretched fingers. Its thin, clawlike fingers groped around until they found purchase on seemingly thin air, but this impression was quickly disproven. Waxy, translucent limbs sprouted from a torso no wider than a human spine, while a visage not unlike a half-melted skull scanned the room with an eyeless gaze. Yohanan turned on his heel and beckoned with one hand, whorls of light briefly flickering along his arm as his Magic Circuits called to one of his familiars.Īnd the being obeyed its master’s instruction, taking haunting form from the ectoplasm that followed in his wake no matter where he went. Serpent though the man may have been, the Yggdmillennia patriarch’s machinations had opened the way for a most fortuitous opportunity. Yohanan ran a hand through his white hair. The pale man glanced at the crimson sigil etched into the back of his right hand, the Command Seal that signified his right to participate in the Grand Holy Grail War instigated by that pompous snake, Darnic. Wait any longer and the slot I desire might be snatched up!’ Though night has yet to fall, this will do. He leaned back in his chair then pushed off it, brushing motes of dust from his brown suit-jacket as he rose and crossed the dark room with long, gliding steps. A tempestuous eve would’ve set the mood more nicely than the balmy afternoon that it actually was. Well, it wasn’t actually, but Yohanan Maveth Byzantium pretended otherwise.
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