Fantasia Concordat Ch. 01

Jack mused to himself while sitting alone at his desk, passively flipping through the book. Each time he came to a new page, he admired the intricate designs on each page, though he could not discern their meaning. Nor could he read the strange language the book seemed to be printed in. He knew enough of foreign language to recognize that this book wasn't written in any of the major languages, so he contented himself with looking at the pictures and designs the book contained instead.

The book itself seemed to be very old, perhaps explaining the unidentifiable language contained within. Jack had decided to buy the book from the local thrift-shop based on its age alone; he enjoyed old books. He loved the way their leather covers looked, he loved the way their hand-bound spines felt, he loved the slightly yellowed flash of color to their pages, but he loved the smell of an old book most of all. Jack found it a little difficult to admit, but he'd chosen most of the books in his collection based on smell and age alone. One of his favorite past-times was leafing through books in his personal library here in his room, just feeling the crinkled pages and weather-worn covers.

This particular book was an oddity, to be sure. It bore no external monikers on any of its covers, front, back, or inside. There wasn't even a title page printed in the strange language. Jack had just opened to the first page and was greeted with a very intricate, unknown design. Jack grinned to himself as he allowed his mind to ponder the purpose of such markings. His first impression was that the book was some sort of Satanic or demonic cult's instruction manual, but he had quickly ruled out that possibility. Jack knew a few common symbols the demon worshippers liked to use, and this book went beyond that. Many of the symbols looked similar to what might be considered "alchemical" designs, but Jack wondered why, if this book was an alchemist's journal, the book was not written in a common language.

Jack sighed as he reached the end of the book. He admired the symbol on the final page before preparing to go through the book once again, paying closer attention. He planned on grabbing a mirror and checking if the language was encoded a la Da Vinci. As he turned back to the first page, his eyes widened. Jack stared in disbelief as he saw a page in the book that wasn't there before. He was sure this page hadn't been here before because this particular page was printed in English.

Awakening Instructions:

1. Place bloody palm on summoning glyph.
2. Speak the required mantra.
3. Incubate with chosen guardian to complete binding.

Jack read the page, reread it, and then read it once more. Once he was certain that he could still read correctly, he held the page up to the light of his desk lamp to look for a hidden back or pocket within the book cover. He wondered if a stuck page that had transferred when he closed the book, or if some kind of vanishing ink had been activated by the warmth of his lamp. He tried to think of anything that could explain what this page was doing here.

Resigning himself from solving that particular mystery, he instead chose to focus his efforts on deciphering what the page meant. He was grateful and stunned by the fact that it was printed in perfectly legible English, but what the words actually said confused him greatly. "Awakening instructions"? What was being awakened? What the hell was a summoning glyph? And where was this "guardian" he was supposed to "incubate with"?

Jack furiously began flipping through the book once more, looking for any other "surprise" pages. To his shock, he found two. Near the center of the book, there was a double printed page containing a large, highly intricate design that featured a roughly palm-sized circular gap in the center of the book. Narrowing his eyes, Jack caught sight of more text at the top of the pages: "Summoning Glyph".

He balked at the simplicity of it.

"And the mantra...?"

Just as he whispered the words to himself, his eyes caught sight of a string of words constructed of the strange language near the bottom of the two pages. His eyes glanced lower, and say more words, presumable a pronunciation guide spelled out phonetically with English characters.

"This is ridiculous", Jack grumbled. "It's like I've suddenly opened 'Devil Summoning for Idiots'."

Despite his utter disbelief, Jack still found himself drawn to the pocket knife within his desk drawer. He felt the incredible hunger of curiosity compel him as he flipped open the pocket-sized folder. He glared at the fine, steel-edged blade as he contemplated the pain of what he was about to do. He thought ahead all the paper cuts he'd ever received and tried multiplying those by one hundred in order to gauge the amount of pain cutting his palm open would cause.

"Fuck it," Jack said suddenly. And with quick jarring motion, he drew the small blade across his palm, wincing almost immediately. A fire blossomed across his skin as his palm began to fill with a dark, crimson ichor. At the very least, he'd have an interesting book to add to his collection.

Jack placed his palm flat against the assigned area in the "summoning glyph" within the book, careful not to drip blood on his clothes or onto any of the words within. He moved his arm slightly out of the way so as to make it easier to read the pronunciation guide below.

"Z-zha....Kal...Ah...Das...Eek..Koo-Bal....Ah-sod...Day...Dem-Plarr-e..."

Jack finished his incantation, and waited. After a few moments of silence, Jack let out a long sigh. This was stupid, after all...

"Awakening sequence confirmed." Jack nearly fell out of his chair. He looked around his room for the source of the noise, looking to see if the T.V was on, or perhaps a game system he'd neglected to shut off.

"Your instructions, sir?" The voice sounded again. Jack eyed the book suspiciously, still pressing his bleeding palm against its pages. It certainly sounded like the voice had come from the book itself. He'd just about lost his patience and decided to plunge face first into insanity.

He decided to answer back.

"Hello? Who or what are you?" Jack flavored his question with a stern tone, hoping to hide his total lack of control or grip on reality.

"I am now your Grimoire. There is no need to be afraid or unsure, sir; I will answer all your questions." The voice had a dull, monotonous tone to it that seemed almost genderless. The voice's quality baffled Jack, as it didn't sound like someone who was bored or angry. Rather, it sounded like machine speaking English, without emotion and without noticeable inflection or intonation.

"You're this book?" Jack offered, unsure.

"It would be more correct to say that I am the guardian that resides within this book; just like you are not simply a pile of flesh, blood and bones, but the consciousness that controls the entire conglomeration."

Jack was silent a moment. "What are you called?"

"I am known as Dahlia, sir."

"Dahlia..." Jack repeated, "Are you female?"

"Yes, my awakened form resembles that of a human female."

"Awakened form..? What..." Jack stopped himself before he asked another question. This conversation, as absolutely strange as it was, was not going in the direction he wanted.

"What is a Grimoire supposed to do? What is your purpose? And what does this have to do with me?" Jack gasped, having expended most of his air in a single conglomeration of confusion and frustration. His mind was racing with thousands of thoughts a second right now, and he'd accidently allowed his mouth to reflect this state.

The Grimoire answered almost immediately, "A Grimoire is a companion assigned to any individual that possesses magical affinity. They operate as entities needed to advise and guide, as well as teaching young mages the basics of magic. The guardian spirit residing in each Grimoire is tasked with translating and interpreting thousands of years of magical research to each pupil so as to avoid tragic mishap. I am a specific Grimoire that is designed for use by human mages."

Jack's mind had boiled over to the point that he'd come full circle. His thoughts were oddly calm and reasonable at the moment. "Magic, you say? Tell me more, please."

"You seem to have gotten over the whole 'talking book thing' rather quickly," the Grimoire noted.

"Honestly, I figure I'm probably just having an awesome dream right now, so I'd rather not waste my time on the 'disbelief' stage. I've always hated when they did that in the movies," Jack said plainly.

"I see." The Grimoire plainly continued, "To put it in general terms for you, sir, Magic is the process of transferring arcane energy present in one's surroundings into 'spells' which have the ability to change reality in a number of ways. I am sure that you are familiar with the basics, though, as Magic is not an uncommon topic in human literature."

Jack exhaled once and grinned. "So, when do I start?"

"You must first complete the Awakening, sir."

Jack suddenly remembered the third and final step from the set of instructions he'd read on the first page. "Oh, right. 'Incubate with the Guardian', was it? I guess you would be the Guardian, now how do I 'incubate' with you?"

"Like this."

A flash of light filled the room and a strong whirlwind picked up, flinging various papers and light objects from Jack's desk. Jack removed his hand from the book to shield his eyes from the piercing rays of light. When he lowered his hands a few minutes later, the sight that greeted him was more shocking that his schizophrenia-esque conversation from before; Sitting atop his desk with the Grimoire at her side was a beautiful, naked woman, staring at him blankly and dangling her legs off the desk.

The first thing he noticed about this woman, despite her obvious lack of clothing, was her strange skin. Her pale flesh would have been absolutely without flaw if it weren't for the strange designs inscribed over her entire body. Jack's first impression was that the girl was covered in tattoos similar to the words and designs in the book, but as he stared for longer he noticed the words and designs would shift across her skin, as if alive. Jack blinked a few times and watched the skin of the naked girl crawl with intricate symbols and lines of strange language, like she was some kind of humanoid projector screen.

The next thing Jack noticed was the shape of her body. His close inspection of the girl's skin revealed that her breasts were rather small in size, giving her upper body a very lithe appeal. As his gaze flowed downwards, he noticed that her hips flared out proudly into a pair of well-shaped legs. Overall her appearance was rather bottom-heavy, and Jack felt his arousal jump at the thought of the (no doubt) plump behind he couldn't yet see. The hip-tastic goddess before him wore a strange, emotionless face as her eyes regarded him in the same manner as he her. A short-cropped pixie cut tinged a particularly light shade of blonde framed her youthful face. Jack was surprised to notice that although her face did have more of the strange markings found elsewhere on her body, the ones of her face did not seem to move.

"You are..." Jack's voice suddenly broke the silence between the pair.

"Dahlia, sir, ready to serve." Her face did not change from its emotion-less state as she spoke, but somehow Jack could sense an odd amount of emotion from behind her piercing gaze.

"You mean to say, you're...my Grimoire...?"

At this, the girl turned her head suddenly down, and mumbled something under her breath, "he said my..."

"What?"

"Nothing." Jack could have sworn he saw her blank face blush.

"Well," Jack said, suddenly clearing his throat, "Let's get on with the incubation then...I guess..."

Dahlia suddenly straightened up in her spot and her eyes widened "R-right away, sir!"

This was the only warning Jack received before she pounced on him, literally, while he was still seated in her chair. Jack made to utter his disbelief and concern, but his efforts were crushed against the Grimoire's resolve to replace his mouth with hers. She feverishly parted his lips with hers and assaulted his mouth with her tongue. Jack closed his eyes and relented to the onslaught as she arched her back and tried to place her body even closer to his.

Jack found his hands being placed on her firm yet bountiful buttocks. Feeling a little adventurous, he decided to smack her ass with his wounded palm, leaving a bloody handprint on her cheek. As soon as he spanked her, he saw the markings on her body all suddenly jump into violent sine waves. Dahlia moaned into his mouth.

He spanked her a few more times, now using his good hand, and delighted his eyes in the way the revolving markings would react each time. The markings began to shift and change and crawl through her skin at an increased pace now. Dahlia broke their kiss and both fumbled to remove Jack's pants and free his straining erection.

Clothing discarded, Dahlia and Jack shared a glance. He was taken aback by the expression on his little book-worm's face. Gone was the blank matter-of-fact expression she had previously worn. Her face was now a mask of over-indulgent pleasure and adrenaline. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes were wide. Jack was a bit startled by this sudden contrast of emotion.

Jack watched in awe as Dahlia sat up with her shapely legs and began hastily positioning Jack's member to ensure it would be "on target" with her heated core. He took another glance at her crazed eyes and began to utter some words of retreat or pause before being cut off by her sharp and sudden descent down his entire length. Her ass and thighs wobbled enticingly as she slammed Jack's whole cock into her in one smooth motion.

Jack groaned.

The symbols moving across Dahlia's skin were going crazy now, the very lines that composed each diagram becoming nothing more than hasty scribbles. They zoomed across her flesh at a dizzying rate, seeming to gravitate towards her nether regions, and an upper portion of her chest. Her expression was now a completely gone "fucked silly" expression. Her tongue hung from her agape mouth and Jack could feel the heat from her gasping breaths hitting his face and neck. Groaning softly he gently sucked her tongue into her mouth and pulled her face closer to his. Dahlia started moving. And so Jack began to lose his virginity to a book he'd purchased from a thrift-store.

Jack wrapped his arms around Dahlia and forced their bodies to meet at deeper points. Dahlia's arms cradled Jack's head as she attempted to lick the inside of his mouth. Jack allowed their tongues to dance as they may, he didn't mind her sloppy kisses. Jack allowed his hands to roam across her smooth back, finally coming to rest once again on her ample ass. He grabbed two generous handfuls of supple flesh and yanked her body downwards onto his length, holding them both still for a moment. His mind reeled at the impossible heat and wetness of her pussy. Jack's mind was torn between staying still and enjoying the fervent throbbing of her core or beginning to move once again in order to find release. He wasn't sure he wanted this encounter to be over so quickly though.

Dahlia broke their kiss again, a line of saliva connecting their mouths as she pulled away. Jack took this opportunity to indulge his mouth in her pert little breasts while he relaxed his arms and allowed Dahlia to gently rock on his erection once more. Jack, in his inexperience, realized he had no clue what he was doing, but decided to try to compensate with his eagerness. He used his tongue to spear the attack against her nipple, taking a few seconds to suck it into his mouth. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed scribbles and lines of text radiating from the breast under his ministrations. Curious, he used a free hand to tweak the other nipple, and noticed a similar occurrence of lines and scribbles reward him for his efforts.

As Dahlia began to slam into his lap with increased vigor, Jack made it a game to run his hands across her smooth skin and watch the scribbles dance under his touch. They seemed to follow the pleasure he gave her body, and expressed certain truthfulness about her body that words surely could not. He grabbed handfuls of delicious, jiggling flesh on her hips and thighs and watched the symbols and scribbles bend to accommodate his will. He nearly broke out laughing when the thought came to his mind that he really was making love to a book.

Eventually, Jack could stave off his release no longer. "I'm gonna cum..." He breathed, barely about to speak between gasps. Dahlia removed her arms from behind his head and placed her soft hands on either side of Jack's face. She held his head steady as she locked her gaze with his own. Jack stared hard into the depth of her iridescent eyes as he began his release. Jack mashed his mouth against Dahlia's and slammed her hips against his own forcefully with his arms. As before, he held his member as deep within her as possible as his member began to throb. Dahlia broke their kiss to moan loudly as she felt Jack spurt within her. Crazy runes of unintelligible dialogue began emanating from her lower regions. For a split second, Jack could have sword he saw a curly heart form right under her navel.

As soon as Jack spurted his last, Dahlia let out a huge sigh and collapsed forward onto his chest. The room was soon filled with both of labored and pleasures gasps and sighs.

"Awakening...complete..."

"So explain this to me, one more time?" Jack asked, scratching his head a little.

"Of course, master," Dahlia said, having since return to reside within the original Grimoire. The book opened up to a blank page and Jack watched as lines began to shift and coalesce to accompany Dahlia's words.

"Arcane energy, or spiritual power, exists within a realm that overlaps this physical dimension, normally inaccessible. Magic is the art of learning to tap into this energy, and channel it in order to alter reality within the desired dimension. Only individuals with an affinity to tap into this arcane power and allow it to run through their bodies can perform magic. Since arcane energy does not have a 'real' form within this dimension, it is much easier for a mage to exchange this energy with an element already existing within this dimension."

"Whoa." Jack could only express wonder at his Grimoire's explanation. It challenged everything about his world he took for granted.

Dahlia continued, "This is why your culture's common image of an individual performing magic includes elemental spells utilizing lightning, fire, water, et cetera, because of this property of arcane energy. Although, this is not to say arcane energy is not usable in its pure form, it simply requires much more work to utilize."

"Uh-huh." Jack grunted, "So why did we need to fuck again?"

Dahlia spluttered. "T-that was a sacred r-ritual! I-it was merely the f-f-formal sealing of the c-contract! Don't p-pervert it with your f-foul intentions. Idiot."

"What was that last bit?" Jack said with a grin. He knew exactly what he was doing, but he found he enjoyed teasing the guardian spirit. Her normally monotone demeanor made startling embarrassment all the more enjoyable.

"R-right," Dahlia said, calming down, "Now the reason we, uh, sealed the contract was to make sure to link your soul with mine, so that I might be able to perform my duties as Grimoire and instruct you, my Master. Normally, even those with magical affinity find it hard to channel arcane energy. A Grimoire is designed not only to be a wealth of knowledge, but also a tutor to guide the mage into connecting with arcane energy. And that's where these come in."

The book flipped pages suddenly to one of the strange symbols Jack had seen before. "These are what you would probably call 'spell runes', but you can just think of them like 'recipes' for magic. Once you've already gathered enough arcane energy, actually doing something with it is another obstacle. It takes a great deal of concentration to transform gathered arcane energy into something tangible. These symbols are a bit of a short-cut. They..."