"We've finally reached the day of enrollment."
Gazing at the sign of Loran Magic Academy, the young Medivh took a deep breath.
His life had been full of twists and turns. In his previous life, he had been an archaeologist on Earth, and he had risen to fame thanks to a great discovery.
Just as he was basking in both fame and fortune, a car accident brought his previous life to an end.
After he died, his soul traveled to another world, where he was reborn as the son of the third son of Earl Hobarton.
His father, known as the Spear of Hobarton, was a remarkably gifted knight and a strong contender for the title of Earl Hobarton.
When Medivh was five, his aptitude for magic was discovered.
With a powerful father and a talent for magic, Medivh's standing in the family soared.
He had been a winner from birth.
But his good fortune didn't last. When he was ten, his father died in battle in another world.
Not long after, his mother fell ill from grief and followed him in death.
The people who had gravitated toward Medivh because of his father distanced themselves the moment his father died.
Medivh's standing in the family plummeted. If he hadn't possessed a talent for magic, the rivals his father had suppressed would have found a chance to kill him long ago.
After losing both his parents, Medivh grew even more withdrawn. He avoided socializing and stayed in his family's courtyard all day, as though the Hobarton Family had forgotten he existed.
No one knew how he had spent those eight years. If the Magic Academy hadn't sent him an invitation to enroll, the people of the Hobarton Family would have almost forgotten they had another family member.
After completing the enrollment procedures, Medivh went to a building where magical affinity was tested and queued for his turn.
"Necromantic affinity."
The mage administering the test glanced at the glow of the magic orb, then looked at Medivh with pity.
"Next."
After handing Medivh the form, the mage went back to his regular duties. What did other people's fates have to do with him?
"I was just about ready to quit and go home to farm, but they assigned me another job. What a pain."
"And you—you're really unlucky. You've got super-high necromantic affinity."
Following the map, Medivh found the place where he would study.
The person there to receive him was an old man with a scraggly beard. There wasn't a trace of a mage's usual nobility about him.
After learning why Medivh had come, the old man took a couple of gulps of wine, grumbled a little, then picked up his test form.
When he saw Medivh's affinity results, the old man couldn't help spitting out the wine he had just swallowed.
Medivh's necromantic affinity towered over all the rest, leaving his elemental affinity nowhere to be seen.
If the word before "affinity" hadn't been "necromantic," Medivh would have been a genius mage.
But the trouble lay in those two words: necromantic affinity. Mages were respected, but Necromancers were the exception. It was a cursed profession.
The curse on Necromancers stemmed from the Necrotic Scourge that had swept across the planes a thousand years ago.
The Necrotic Scourge had been quelled by the forces of the Alliance, led by the God of Light.
The God of Light had fallen in the final battle, leaving behind the Hospice Blessing before his death.
Within the blessing's range, the souls of all the dead would be at peace, and their bodies would rest undisturbed.
The Hospice Blessing had reduced necromantic magic to its weakest state.
After the God of Light fell, his daughter inherited his divinity and became the new God of Light.
The Goddess of Light carried on her father's work, striving to expand the reach of the Hospice Blessing.
Though the Alliance had disbanded after the Necrotic Scourge, the powerful figures who had lived through it didn't want the disaster to happen again.
On this matter, they all supported the Goddess of Light and worked to spread the Hospice Blessing.
Nowadays, every plane with a Temple of Light was covered by a vast, web-like Hospice Blessing.
Whenever a living being on one of those planes died, the Hospice Blessing would take effect automatically and purify their corpse.
For ordinary Necromancers, casting necromantic magic on a fresh corpse was not only difficult to accomplish but also invited backlash from the light.
The Hospice Blessing had reduced Necromancers to a bottom-tier profession, leaving them on the verge of being expelled from the Mage Association.
Medivh was incredibly unlucky. If his necromantic affinity had been even a little weaker and he'd had an affinity for another element, he might have had the chance to switch to another branch of magic.
"Go practice for now. Once you've mastered the Meditation Method, come find me again."
After confirming again and again that Medivh intended to stubbornly pursue the dead-end path of a Necromancer, the old man didn't try to dissuade him. He showed him how to learn the Mental Meditation Technique.
"Mentor, I've mastered the Mental Meditation Technique."
A few days later, Medivh returned to see the old man and move on to the next stage of his studies.
The old man had never told Medivh his name. Clearly, he didn't think the boy would amount to much.
"Then we'll begin your spell lessons."
The old man fetched two pure corpses, the materials needed for teaching spellcasting, with a pained expression.
For a Necromancer Apprentice to cast necromantic magic on a corpse bearing the Hospice Blessing was no different from committing suicide.
The corpses used for teaching had to be pure ones untouched by the Hospice Blessing.
Those kinds of corpses were hard to come by these days, and each one cost a fortune.
"Like this."
After explaining the essentials of spellcasting several times, the old man slowed down and demonstrated how to construct the Magic Runes for Medivh.
Once Medivh had memorized the essentials, the old man cast Bone Resurrection on one of the pure corpses.
White bones burst out through the flesh, and soon a skeletal undead rose from the rotting, bloody muck.
After finishing the demonstration, the old man pointed at the other pure corpse and looked at Medivh, signaling him to try it himself.
Medivh reviewed the essentials of spellcasting, then followed them to construct the Magic Circuit.
A wisp of black light gathered at his fingertip, and he entered a strange casting perspective.
All he had to do was release that wisp of black light, and he would complete the casting of Bone Resurrection.
As Medivh aimed at the corpse, a strange spiritual vision suddenly appeared in his field of view.
He could see when the corpse had died, and he instinctively grasped a unique form of Bone Resurrection.
Medivh was level-headed. He didn't cast that unique form of Bone Resurrection in front of the old man, instead continuing with the standard spell as the old man had taught him.
When the black light at his fingertip fell, the corpse suddenly glowed with a faint white light, blocking his spell.
Fortunately, the white light wasn't very strong. In the end, the black light broke through the barrier and landed on the corpse.
After a bloody transformation, a short skeletal undead with what looked like osteoporosis rose to its feet.
"Excellent! You really are a Necromancer genius!"
The old man was delighted that Medivh had succeeded in casting the spell.
His delight was entirely because he wouldn't have to spend any more money on teaching materials.
It would save him a considerable sum.
For once, teaching a Necromancer Apprentice was profitable. He had never experienced that before.
Medivh didn't ask about the earlier anomaly. He planned to test it on his own.
"Medivh, you've graduated."
Before Medivh could ask what he would learn next, the old man handed him a signed scroll.
"Mentor?"
Medivh stared at him, baffled. Wasn't this a little too hasty?
"That's how it is. The Necromancer Apprentice curriculum consists of mastering the Mental Meditation Technique and Bone Resurrection."
The old man took out the Academy's teaching guidelines and handed them to Medivh.
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