The Conclave Feralium was the magic system of the novel and the recurring source of power in this world. It was quite simple, really.

  Summon a magical beast. Bond with it. Gain its power.

  Easy, no?

  Wrong. You fool.

  The problem was that the magic system in the novel had never been finished. The fucker dropped it halfway through, leaving only hints of deeper layers of power that were never fully explained.

  Which meant I only knew the same basics everyone else did… while also knowing there was more but not knowing what exactly, not a good thing under stress, really.

  What, when, who, and how?

  Your guess was as good as mine. Which… in a way, made me a fool as well, I guess. But fuck it, blind we go.

  Now, back to the problem at hand.

  Having convinced Elowen that I had genuinely forgotten, I sent her off to her room and began roaming the mansion, searching, praying that Valen, in all his excessive glory, had already purchased and stored the materials required for the summons.

  The process was brutal in its simplicity.

  One or two days of travel to a specific place. One day to perform the summoning. Another day to form the bond. Two more days to return.

  Six days in total.

  I... had seven.

  Seven days before having to deal with the promise this bastard had made right as I inherited his body. Any hope of a few quiet days to settle in evaporated instantly.

  But this mattered more than comfort. A good impression on Elowen and getting a good summon for myself meant more than comfort. It meant survival.

  So for once in his miserable life, I was hoping Valen Ashmoor had planned ahead and bought the damned materials.

  But no matter how long I searched, moving from room to room, all I found was more luxury. More excess. More utterly pointless shit.

  Entire rooms filled with costumes. Gloves. Capes. For what purpose, exactly? Other than making an impression and metaphorically pissing on everyone else with the next most expensive thing, they served no function whatsoever. Most of it wasn’t even armor or anything remotely practical. Just extravagant, narcissistic bullshit.

  And, of course, no summoning materials. Not a single damn thing.

  It didn’t help that I was stalking through the mansion like a madman, my thoughts spiraling, panic clawing its way up my spine. Every maid, butler, and guard I passed reacted as if death itself had entered the corridor. They flattened themselves against the walls, eyes down, bodies rigid, not daring to move until I was gone.

  Some of the maids didn’t even breathe properly.

  I slowed to a stop, dread pooling in my stomach.

  What in the Gods’ names had this psychopath done to these people to instill this level of fear?

  Not that it mattered now… it just made me feel bad. Still, I pressed on.

  An hour later, desperation had me moving outside the mansion, ignoring anything that would normally stop me in my tracks. I navigated the paths instinctively, hunting every storage room I could find.

  Fuck all.

  Next stop: the nearby barracks. At least I could tackle one of the pending problems.

  “M-My Lord,” a man in his thirties jumped to his feet, nearly choking on the water he’d been sipping, “What can I do for you this late at night?”

  “Reginald,” I said coldly.

  I knew the man’s name by heart, speaking it as if he were some distant cousin, but he was just one of Valen’s retainers, inherited from his father.

  “First,” I asked, hoping someone would actually know something, “Do you have any idea where the materials for the Conclave Feralium are?”

  “No, sir,” he shook his head, sweat droplets forming across his forehead. “You mentioned them once in passing, but that is all.”

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  “I see…” I sighed, disappointment crawling up my spine. “Either way, have a thousand men ready a week from now. We travel for business.”

  “My Count,” he bowed deeply, hand across his chest, as I turned on my heel and left, ignoring the stares, bows, and panicked postures of the soldiers as they rushed to line the hall I was walking on.

  But by now, I was biting my lip in frustration, worried that the bastard had really screwed me over. The only saving grace? He at least mentioned the materials once, so maybe I’d simply looked in the wrong places.

  But the list of possible locations was shrinking fast. And to my absolute disgust, once I was back in the mansion, none of them held a trace, not even the study.

  I could only give up and hope that Elowen would forgive a slight delay… or at least not hire an assassin to end me tonight. Though knowing who helped the main character kill Valen, she probably already had. She and every single one of my now-fiancées. But a man can hope, right?

  Guess what?

  The materials were in one of the two places I hadn’t checked yet.

  The first was Elowen’s room. And of course I hadn’t looked there, doing so would have ended the survival of my second life either tonight or the following morning, when the Arch-bishop inevitably declared a holy Crusade on my ass. He was already tempted. No need to hand him even more justification to do it.

  The second place?

  Valen’s own bedroom.

  Why? Because who in their right mind would store something so precious, so fragile, volatile, and rare, next to their head while they slept? It was like keeping a gold-plated grenade on your pillow. Either it exploded, or someone stole it. In both cases, I was the one losing.

  But that was the flaw in my reasoning.

  I wasn’t dealing with a man in his right mind. I was dealing with a narcissistic, manipulative lunatic.

  Of course, he believed the safest place in the entire estate was beside him. Where else would he trust something so valuable? To servants? To guards? To the vaults?

  Please.

  The only thing Valen Ashmoor trusted was himself.

  Maybe the Gods and Goddesses, too, but they clearly had better things to do than care for his items.

  Now that I knew the items were secured, I finally allowed myself to breathe.

  It had been a long day. The day I died, and the day I reincarnated as the worst thing imaginable. Still, I’d ended it on a rare high note. So, in equal parts celebration and preparation, I collapsed onto the far-too-comfortable bed and, without much resistance, slipped into sleep.

  Goodbye, Earth.

  Good morning, fuckery.

  New day, new me. Literally.

  I slept like a log, right up until dawn, when the realization hit me like a brick to the face.

  This wasn’t a highway-induced fever dream. I really was Valen Ashmoor.

  If that wasn’t depressing, I didn’t know what was.

  Still… I felt rested. Genuinely rested. A sensation I hadn’t experienced since high school, a relic of the past I missed more than I cared to admit. So I chose not to ruin such a rare gift with a full-blown existential crisis.

  So I got up, washed the handsome bastard I’d become, stared at... well, my rather impressive upgrade in the manhood department, and got dressed.

  Chest in hand, filled to the brim with absurdly expensive materials for the Conclave Feralium, I made my way toward the dining hall, prepared for breakfast.

  “Go-Good morning, My Lord,” a maid stuttered, eyes to the ground the moment I entered the dining hall.

  “Morning,” I replied, “Send someone for Elowen, and another to prepare the carriage.”

  For a moment, the woman went pale for the same reason my head started aching for an instant. I greeted a commoner. A maid. And it seemed Valen’s body hated it with every fiber of his being.

  But the maid, perhaps fearing the end times were approaching now that I greeted her, nodded to my commands and rushed out of the dining hall, sacrificing the second maid present to serve me breakfast.

  She was quick to bring the food from the kitchen, knowing Valen hated to wait for others, before trying to escape the fate the other did. But I didn’t let her.

  “Wait.”

  A quiet gasp left the woman’s lips when I talked to her.

  “...Sir?” she asked sheepishly, “What c-can I do for you?”

  “Could you also bring Elowen’s share? She is soon to join me, so it would be a pity to have her wait,” I replied, my voice calm, commanding, but low enough that it sounded caring, “We have a long day of travel ahead of us.”

  “Y-Yes,” she stuttered in a panic, her voice louder than before, perhaps taken aback by my nice demeanor.

  A demeanor that was costing me a headache and a half as the bastard’s body was fighting back against any decent human act.

  But that all ceased when a voice behind me drew my attention.

  “How considerate of you, Count Valen,” Elowen replied flatly, walking past me toward her chair, “Impressive act. If I weren’t at the door to see it all, I would’ve thought you were genuine just now.”

  To be fair, I had no bloody clue she was there. After all, I just sent a maid to wake her a minute or two ago. It was really just a coincidence that she was here, while I was slowly trying to improve my image with the people working for me.

  Otherwise, when an assassin came, who do you think would open the door or ‘mistakenly’ forget it open, while I slept? It was all a matter of survival here.

  But I sighed, ignoring the remark of the pretty lady who hated my guts.

  “Ah, yes,” I said, fork pointing toward the chest near my feet, “Found the materials. We will start traveling immediately after breakfast.”

  She frowned at my words, “...Is that so?”

  “Are there any issues with that?” I asked, narrowing my eyes involuntarily.

  “None at all,” she shook her head, turning her sight toward the food the maid was now bringing in, “Just an oddity.”

  Get used to oddities, dear fiancée. I would ensure that I live this second life to the full, no matter what I have to do.

  And the next step toward that goal was reaching the Conclave Feralium.

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  -Wulibear