Blasphemy

Chapter 1 – Apple

By Year 682 of the Holy Calendar, Rogge Horta Reeves had already attended the Rhine Magic School for four years. He was considered quite intelligent among his peers. In another two years, he would be able to leave the school as an official mage. In this age of turmoil, magicians were very popular because of their destructive power. At the same time, due to the common weaknesses of magicians, such as their lack of stamina and long casting times, the protection of magicians became the highest priority in war. Despite this, even the most experienced generals could not completely avoid casualties.

Mastering magic required talent, and becoming a qualified magician required a fairly long time. Thus, the number of magicians on the continent was quite sparse, while their status was inversely quite high. Furthermore, most high-rank magicians were considered wealthy due to the high prices of magical materials such as gems, mithril, and darksteel. High-rank magic items made it possible for juniors to beat their seniors. Someone once said that the power of a magician was proportional to his wealth.

Rogge’s father, Lord Reeves, could only be considered a lower-class noble of the Rhine City-State Alliance. His fiefdom only consisted of a small town and several villages where the population was a meager several thousand. Yet no matter how low of a noble he was, Rogge was still entitled to the “Horta” in his name, which signified that he was the heir to a lower-class noble within the Rhine Alliance.

The names for this continent were numerous, because almost every country called it by a different name. With the rise and expansion of the Holy Church over the past few years, the myriad countries gradually accepted the name of Gloria, meaning the Hymns of the Gods, as the name of the continent. The Rhine Alliance was located in the southeast of the continent and consisted of ten duchies. Compared to the three great powers — Derow, Austria-Hungary and Aethrophics — it could only be considered a second-tier country. Yet although the Rhine Alliance may have been worse off than some, it was still better off than many. The Alliance’s King Louis XIV frequently showed off his military force to the remaining thirty small countries, especially the neighboring Ron Duchy and Kidou City-state. But thanks to this king’s interests in the arts, beauties, and immortality, rather than in the expansion of territory, the Alliance has remained peaceful towards its neighbours for a long time.

In accordance with the status of the Alliance, the Rhine Magic School was a second-tier magic school on the continent. Located to the north of the capital Rhine City, the school only provided an ordinary education, which directly led to its failure to nurture any world-shaking characters in its three hundred year-old history. And as a result of the heavy demand for magicians, magic schools were the most equal place within the continent’s rigid hierarchy. At the very least, it was rare to see a commoner magician beaten to death by a noble one. In addition, a commoner magician who had successfully graduated would have a high chance of becoming a noble after gaining a bit of experience.

Rogge’s family was on the decline with only four servants at hand, which was quite embarrassing for a manor-owning noble family. Old Reeves, aside from his explosive temper, had no abilities in financial management and had no way to stop the family’s income from decreasing year after year. However, this did not hinder Rogge from learning the vices of a noble: arrogance, lust, violence, and even qualities that common nobles lacked, such as wickedness and cunning. At the age of 14, Rogge had his first sexual experience with his servant girl. Since then, the small manor became a place of pandemonium. Old Reeves had no choice but to send him to the Rhine Magic School a year later, at the expense of the remaining few heirlooms.

Rogge had never expected any further support from Old Reeves. But in order to satisfy his daily pleasures, he needed money. Thus, relying on his sweet-talking, he curried favor with a mid-ranked magician named Faith and helped him manage the magic laboratory, doing Faith’s dirty work. At the moment, Rogge was busy studying a bead that had inexplicably appeared in front of him. It was a dull, pale bead with a few cracks on it that gave the impression of being worthless. It had only one characteristic that was a little unusual: two beams of light, one white and one black, flickered within it. Rogge opened his eyes wide, carefully evaluating the value of this bead. But he would never have thought that the bead was also studying him. Suddenly, the bead split open and the dark beam drilled into Rogge’s head, entering his mind. Rogge’s entire body began to squirm around as if it were a mollusk. From time to time, a part would swell up here, another part would sink there, and black blood would spurt out from his skin.

Finally, Rogge slowly opened his eyes, his eyes a sheet of white, and gave out a gloomy laugh: “The spirit strength of this soul isn’t bad.” Rogge looked at the fragments of the bead. Just at this moment, that white light also struggled free and flew out, but it was unable to fly too far away from the bead fragments. Rogge’s eyes flashed. The white beam and the bead fragments were also sucked into his head. A bleak cry echoed in the lab and Rogge’s body became like boiling water, then quieted down after a long while. When he opened his eyes again, he had regained his ordinary appearance.

The black light was precisely the soul of Rodriguez, who had successfully escaped from the Judgment Light and avoided the pursuit of the Heaven with the help of a divine artifact: the Soul Bead. However, the power of Judgment Light was unsurpassable. The strength of a real god was naturally incomparable to that of a so-called divine artifact, to say nothing of the Judgement Light that was usually unleashed by Heaven’s main gods to annihilate the powerful evil in the world. After the battle at Odi Shrine, the soul bead had already used up all of its power. The necromancer did not actually eliminate Rogge’s soul; rather, he chose to fuse with it, keeping all of Rogge’s temperament. Due to the finite capabilities of the soul bead, most of which had been used to seal Vena’s soul, Rodriguez abandoned his vast concrete knowledge of magic and only took along with his soul the understanding of the essence of magic. At this moment, only a bit of power from the core of Vena’s soul remained. Now called God’s Essence, its entire consciousness had already disappeared long ago. This small amount of God’s Essence was also brought into the soul.

The necromancer did not destroy Rogge’s soul and instead fused with his soul consciousness. “I have already been branded by too many imprints in this world and all I am capable of is destruction. Perhaps to this world, creation is the most important. When an apple jumps onto the chessboard and begins to smash around violently, it affects the entire board more than a chess piece.”

Rogge’s innate talent was only average. After four years of half-hearted practice, he was merely a Rank 2 magician and could only use junior rank and Rank 1 spells. According to the regulations of the Rhine Magic School, when one was able to easily release two different Rank 2 spells, then he would become a Rank 4 magician and could graduate. But the fusion with the necromancer’s soul brought along matchless spiritual power, which could be used to attain an extremely high level of magic control. After all, a magician’s strength did not only depend on magic power; the understanding and control of magic were perhaps more important. However, according to Rogge’s understanding, a magician’s strength still depended on cunning and wealth. “A Rank 1 magician with reinforcement rings on all of his fingers would absolutely overpower a Rank 2 one without any items.” The necromancer actually agreed on this point. After all, the difference between a Rank 1 magician and a Rank 2 one was like that between a fool and an idiot. And given Rogge’s strength, making him understand Rank 4 and higher magicians was still somewhat challenging.

A strict magic system was developed over the course of many years (mostly for the purposes of war). In general, every one higher rank magic the magician could use, the magician would obtain two ranks. In other words, a Rank 10 magician should be able to use a Rank 5 spell whereas a Rank 11 magician should be able to use two Rank 5 spells. And of course, there were some freaks that existed outside of the system such as the necromancer Rodriguez.

God’s Essence was the purest form of soul energy, through which Rogge, who had been completely transformed in body soul, would create his magic pet. In general, magic pets and their summoning were monopolized by high-ranked magicians. On the other hand, “Creation was God’s domain,” the necromancer thought. However, the necromancer had never respected the gods and was once again occupied with fusing the soul and remodeling the body. After completely fusing the Soul Bead into the body, Rogge’s physical body had already been altered beyond recognition. But due to all kinds of considerations, Rogge’s outer appearance remained the same. He was still short and stout, fat and chunky, with an ordinary face and a pair of sinister eyes. Yet the Soul Bead had granted another mysterious skill: space.

Rogge did not really have any objections, even if he did, he would not dare to express them. Though after understanding the origin of God’s Essence, he expressed incomparable envy towards Buren, the Cardinal of the Holy Church. “He definitely won’t be the last one.” Rogge thought venomously.

After three days and three nights of a dream-like life and being reprimanded by Faith countless times, the necromancer finally finished his work.

Rogge woke up. From now on, Rogge was still Rogge, but Rodriguez was Rogge as well. The necromancer had escaped successfully from Heaven and placed an apple on the chessboard.