Low-Fantasy Occultist Isekai

Rhea hesitated, struggling to understand why he had his dagger drawn, until she caught his smirk and growled, "Must you phrase things that way?"

Nick snickered, shaking his head. "Where's the fun in that?"

Considering how tense she had been, seeing her roll her eyes and huff was a good sign that she wasn't in a funk anymore.

"Alright, enough of that." He chuckled, pointing his dagger down, "I actually have a way to shield the dagger, but it might be a bit weird. We need to find a decently powerful monster because I need blood and bone as a catalyst, and I doubt any of us wants to volunteer theirs."

Elia tilted her head, curious about where he was going, but Rhea simply nodded. Ever since their conversation by the fire, she had become very accepting of all his oddities, and while this would likely push their perception of his magic further away from what a typical Mage should be capable of, he was already straining that illusion.

It's better if we hide from the Ultimers than for me to maintain the illusion of normalcy. The girls have already seen too much anyway.

"Want me to go hunt for one?" Elia asked, and he nodded. He could do it himself, but he wanted to get this done as quickly as possible, which would require some preparation, particularly because it wasn't a formal ritual.

"That sounds good, anything mammalian would work, but please keep the size small, and be sure to keep it alive and as uninjured as possible. Rhea, you should try to clean up the hilt as well as you can in the meantime. Use alchemical solutions if you need to; just make sure no foreign mana remains on it." He ordered, sitting down and plunging his dagger into the ground.

He wouldn't need an actual circle for this, but having a counterpoint to anchor the magic would be useful, and his dagger would serve that purpose well.

After the girls began following his instructions, Nick leaned down to whisper, "I promise I'll get you a nice meal after this. Just make sure that the mana stays stable."

A faint pulse answered him, as the remnant inside the dagger acknowledged his request. Given how greedily it had feasted on the troll, it had been surprisingly well-behaved. It's probably been digesting all this time. Despite its strength, it had been starved for who knows how long.

With that done, he began preparing the anti-divination magic.

African divination is such a vast field that it can hardly be described as a singular practice, but that is precisely why it's so useful. There is always something that fits.

Unfortunately, Nick didn't know every little detail. His memory was practically eidetic at that point, but that didn't mean the books he had read on the subject were that comprehensive.

Still, this particular case shouldn't be too difficult. Chepsageinik were master diviners and locators of the Nandi people of Kenya, and they could just as easily find something as they could obscure it.

There was a reason Nick chose this specific tradition over others he was more familiar with. While Norse and Hermetic divination spells existed, and he was confident he could cobble something together from them, why bother when he already had exactly what he needed?

To find something, the Nandi shamans typically used Barbarek, small round stones that they tossed and interpreted. However, when it came to sympathetic magics, they developed a unique method of using living animals that was unmatched.

Only the skin-walkers of the Navajo could claim equal mastery, and their own practice demanded interaction with the animal spirit in a manner that felt far too intimate for this particular situation.

No, the Nandi way would do.

First, Nick summoned a glob of water to clean himself.

Even though he did his best to keep dust, dirt, and blood from reaching him, that wasn't always possible, especially in the middle of a fight when his attention was focused more on his enemies' actions.

The ball of water moved around his body, collecting tiny particles he would have otherwise dismissed but knew could weaken the spell he was about to cast.

When he was finally completely clean, he sighed in appreciation. It's surprising how quickly one can adapt to being dirty all the time without modern amenities, but this is so much better.

Soon enough, he felt Elia return with her prey held in her hands. Surprisingly, she didn't seem to have needed to use foxfire, as the grassland cat hung limply in her grip, its eyes glazed over.

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Illusions? She must have really gained a boost in power if she can use them on a predator with such keen senses.

At the same time, Rhea joined him, holding the broken dagger wrapped in a clean cloth. The metal shimmered, almost as if it had just been polished, but no smell of oil wafted from it. It was simply high-quality materials crafted by masters.

"Thank you, both of you. Please, put the hilt next to my dagger and hand me the cat," he ordered, reaching up to grab the dazed predator.

It wasn't much larger than Talbot, though it had very sharp teeth and a leaner, more angular face. A quick glance at its claws told Nick that it could likely shear through muscle and bone with ease, reminding him that he wasn't the only one who could surprise his enemies with his appearance.

The cat might have passed as a house pet to an inexperienced observer, but his senses indicated that it was at least a level thirty creature, strong enough to take down most soldiers.

"Alright. Elia, stand back a bit. Rhea, sit down opposite me and don't move away. This might be a bit shocking, but it's the best way I know."

Rhea sat down, curiously eyeing the cat. "Can you tell me what to expect?"

Nick gently set the monster down next to the hilt and wrapped his hand around its neck. "What I'm doing is called sympathetic magic. It is possibly the oldest kind there is, and is a way to transfer qualities from one thing to another. It can be used to summon a reaction from otherwise inanimate things, or to remove certain undesired traces from an object and transfer them to something else."

Distantly, Nick heard Elia make a sound of realization, as she likely had just remembered the first piece of magic he'd ever shown her. [An Eye for an Eye] was a pretty basic spell and something he wouldn't use again unless there was a very specific need, but the principles behind it were similar.

The method, however, was much different. This text is hosted at NoveI★Fire.net

Nick started squeezing the monster's throat while pulling air away from it. It quickly began to struggle as the illusion holding it still weakened in the face of instinctive terror. "I am going to suffocate this monster and use its skin as a way to create a link with the hilt, which will not only cleanse it of previous events that could lead a diviner to find us, but also redirect their attention away from us."

He added more strength, making sure not to break the skin accidentally, and funneled more air away from it. It was an inefficient way to kill something in a world where most enemies had high enough CON to survive without air for several minutes at a time, if not longer, but the cat hadn't been given any time to prepare, and the pressure he was exerting on its throat finally became too much.

With a crunch, the monster died.