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He cast both his spells and stepped out of reach of the man’s dagger. The blade passed through his clone without any resistance. The man didn’t understand what was going on, but his adrenaline wouldn’t let him stop to ponder, and he began swinging wildly at the clone. Nothing he did, no matter how he tried, inflicted any damage, as the real Noah was standing several feet away, waiting for this thief to tire. The foolish fish had taken the bait, but not until its fins went slack would he reel it in. With every attempt, the thief became more agitated, unable to understand what was happening and why his blade wasn’t harming Noah. It was when he finally stopped to catch his breath that Noah stepped forward and lopped off his head.
Noah deactivated both spells and then reactivated his invisibility. He crouched down, placed his hand on the now cooling body, and summoned his clone. He felt it once again, foreign mana from the man latching onto him and shrouding his body like a nasty odor. Or perhaps that was just the smell of the corpse. This guy and his ratty clothes stank to high heaven. Noah’s clone appeared, giving him the appearance of the slain man.
"Now we’re talking."
It was confirmed: he could now take on the appearance of other people. The mana use was heavy, taking three times as much as his usual clone, and killing people each time could get him in trouble, but it was worth it to know that his magic still had room to grow. Whether he had more tricks waiting to be discovered or his magic would evolve on its own, that potential was priceless. Now to experiment.
Just like the previous night, he could not separate from his clone, nor could he dispel it simply by covering his eye. He tried to remove the illusionary shirt he was wearing, but the spell refused to be altered. Normally, removing clothes or drawing weapons was within his clone’s capabilities, so either that would change in time as he’d train and experiment, or this wasn’t a clone at all, but a third type of illusion he could create, one with its own rules. He looked at his hands, now hands that he did not recognize, and brought them to his face, covering both eyes at once. Whenever he tried it before, all it did was activate or terminate both of his spells simultaneously. Maybe… no. He lowered his hands to find that the illusion was still active, even though his spells had ended.
‘Damn. Will I really have to wait for my mana to hit zero for this spell to release? After last night, that’s not really something I want to be stuck with. Maybe if I just repeat the process, that’ll undo it.’
He covered his left eye with his hand, and to his surprise, he returned to his original appearance. So casting his invisibility spell undid the illusion? A welcome mystery. While still invisible, he put his foot on the dead body and conjured the illusion once more, no issues. He released his invisibility and recast it, and the illusion was dispelled.
"That’s one issue out of the way." Like the spell, his bitter mood from dealing with Cyrilo came to an end. There it was, that spark of excitement, pushing the shadows from his mind. He savored it as much as he could, like the meager sunlight in winter.
Now that he had a sense of how to use the illusion, it was time to put it to good use. But first, this body had to be dealt with. Noah pulled out his bottle of high-proof liquor and poured it on the severed head, then lit it with his flint and steel. The flames wouldn’t remove the evidence, just disfigure the face so that it wouldn’t be recognized.
Disguised, he left the alleys and made his way through town, soon arriving at an apothecary shop he had passed on his way to the docks. Cyrilo told him that the potion would immediately draw the attention of the authorities, but this time, Noah could make a proper escape. He had been in these shops several times since arriving in this world, and they were all the same. The walls were lined with shelves of merchandise, mostly jars of ground up herbs and potions, while various plants hung from the ceiling to dry. Behind the counter, an old man was working a mortar and pestle the size of a punch bowl, with biceps that shamed most of the blacksmiths Noah had encountered so far.
"Can I help you?" he asked. He looked uncertain as he sized Noah up, but his disheveled appearance would naturally bring such mistrust.
Noah laid out all of his ceramic bottles on the counter, including the one he had received in the warehouse, six in total. Each had a different label written in an unknown language, except for the warehouse potion. "I pulled these off a body earlier this morning and want to know what they are."
The man got up from his seat with a grunt and came over to examine the bottles. "Well, judging by the ceramics, I’d say western Ezeria." Noah vaguely recalled the name. It was a nation to the southeast, across the sea.
The apothecary uncorked one of them and gave it a whiff. "I’m detecting filo berries, fermented lizard blood, some keel mushrooms, and a hint of… rose cactus. This is a slow-acting health potion." He studied a second. "Hmm, smoky, with hints of melted fat. I’d say honey root, dried over a cooking fire, with malin sage and water. A second healing potion, faster acting." The third: "Scorpion venom, mixed with velmon fruit juice, a bit of… harken, and some… camel urine. This is a paralyzing agent." The fourth, he described as musty with the scent of desert flowers, cactus juice, wildebeest eyes, and ash, all ingredients for a deadly potion, and the fifth bottle was the antidote, but when he came to Cyrilo’s potion, the old man grimaced. "I’ve never smelled something like this before. It would take time and money to research."
Noah smelled the mysterious potion and he too was thrown for a loop. It was a smell that came out at first as subtle, then, once it filled his nose, there was a sharpness that made him twitch. Organic, metallic, chemical, it seemed like a combination of all three and yet different from all of them.
"I’ll pass. Anything else you can tell me?"
"Well all these potions here are used almost exclusively by the Harajin. The bottle shape is their handiwork and they’re labeled with some code they use in the field."
"What are the Harajin?"
The man began examining the bottles once more. "Long ago, a plague swept through Ezeria, one that rotted the body inside and out. People began wearing masks to protect themselves from the disease, hide their deformed faces, or even commit crimes. Eventually, the citizens banished the infected, casting them out into the desert to die. Those that did not succumb to the disease or the desert heat learned to survive amongst the dunes. They formed clans of cutthroats and thieves, living off those who entered their domain. Legends were born of masked marauders, appearing like a sandstorm and then vanishing before their victims even knew what happened, leaving bodies utterly drained of blood. Their skills and reputation have only grown with the passage of time."
"Would you be interested in buying these five?"
The man spat on the floor. "Nothing good comes from being associated with the Harajin. Throw them in the gutter, preferably far away from me."
Noah bought some herbs and potions and left the shop, then ducked into a nearby alley. Not all of his questions were answered, but the scales had been tipped.
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