About two minutes later:
-... mother! Did you decide to make me die of shame?
- With all my insanity and the edge of my mind, I was able to note that Rung had never repeated himself... but I had forgotten the spell again...
- I don't understand the reasons for your indignation - I did the spell right - despite the fact that at the moment I didn't give a damn about the "strong" opinion of some elderly orcs there, I was able to pronounce the phrase almost exactly.
Yes, I need this spell-like corn from the heel of a goblin-pig-pass! What stinking nupperibo are you wobbling around like an elf who took a salvo of yard moonshine charcoal?!
- I don't know, - I cover my eyes, massaging the right temple.
- It feels like...
- My thoughts were stirred up by guesswork.
- My body resists the erasure of memory, - having thought a little and remembered the feelings that accompanied me in the application of magic "from the sheet", continue the thought, - or rather, when I finish the spell and it comes out of the aura, I feel as if I'm pulled out of a piece of meat.
- So, the shaman nervously scraped his nails on his chin, let's take it one by one. What memory?
- About the formula of the spell used...
- Hmm...
-Ork thoughtfully chewed my lip, measured me with his evaluating look and, having crushed my chin, stepped aside, thinking something hard.
The silence lasted for a couple of minutes, during which the shaman was nursing the room, nervously tapping with his fingers a simple motive on the stick. If it wasn't for the sight that didn't fix any fluctuations in the magic background, I'd be sure that he was cooking some wickedness, but no, the seconds would stretch, and the old man seemed to be really thinking about the problem.
- Okay, he finally stopped flickering and turned to me.
- I'll think about it. In the meantime, I think you should do something about it, the orck pulled his chin toward the roughly chopped table in the corner, where there was a bowl and a few bags on it, and dust it off. And don't forget to clean the bowl every time you rub a new ingredient! The spell, heh heh, you know...
Sometime later, the next corridor.
Rung came out of the cave where his new student was studying. Phobos... as he called himself. A vampire...
The old shaman still couldn't believe he had agreed to teach him. Twenty-three years ago, he dared to have students after his last student tried to stab his teacher to death, wanting to become the tribe's supreme shaman. That time the orc saved only the fact that he did business not only with the inhabitants of the Lower Plans but also had several personal spirits from the Air Plans and even one small spirit from the Plan of Life.
Once upon a time, it took Rung a lot of effort and a few years to secure the friendship of these, though very weak, but extremely useful in some things creatures. That's when the seemingly worthless spirits in battle saved his life. A faithful disciple, to whom the old orc passed almost all his knowledge and who was perceived as his own son, managed to block all the souls captured by the shaman and to buy off the dark spirits that served Rungu. All those whom he painstakingly caught for many years from Abisa.
Negliggers, weaker than the skinniest demon, could not even take on a material form. Little thing, generated by the emanations of Chaos, which is attributed to the demons is godlessly flattering, but, alas, like demons, very fond of other people's blood, pain, and suffering.
Before that time, the spiritual leader Ravshayev did not perceive this feature of his servants as a problem; on the contrary, he was even glad - in the society of orcs there is no shortage of possible victims, and more than two dozen such creatures made Runga almost invulnerable. Little magic from the lower circles could have hurt an untidy spirit, let alone a conventional weapon, and therefore it was very difficult for those who were protected by these spirits to do harm, and someone powerful enough, to possess spells that are dangerous to the spirits or armed with powerful artifacts in Teriamara has not appeared for a very long time - the city was still on the back burner and did not present any value or any serious threat to distract strong fighters to its destruction. However, the disciple was smart enough to make a triple sacrifice, and the connection could not be broken completely, but for a few hours his teacher was almost defenseless, and if it was not for the spirits of air and the spirit of life that woke him up in time, the Ravshay tribe would now have another supreme shaman.
Or wasn't... Just as there wouldn't be a tribe. His traitor student would have been able to protect an old shaman ten years ago, but he had doubts about it. Most likely, this rat bastard would have died as talentlessly as other shamans...