When Morris finally re-emerged from the concealing shadows where he'd been hiding with a relieved sigh, the Forbidden Forest had returned to its usual state of tranquility.
The clearing was empty of unicorns. The sounds of their angry neighing and thundering hooves had faded completely away into the distance.
Morris looked carefully around in all directions, scanning for any remaining threats or observers, and breathed a slight but heartfelt sigh of relief when he confirmed he was genuinely alone.
Those damned unicorns had forced him to remain hidden in the uncomfortable shadows for nearly half an hour without moving.
Morris had almost suffocated from holding so long.
He rolled his shoulders, working out the stiffness, and reflected bitterly on what he'd just experienced.
Who on earth wrote that supposedly authoritative book Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, claiming that unicorns were gentle, passive creatures with absolutely no aggression?
The book had specifically stated that unicorns never attacked wizards proactively under any circumstances, and would only flee in retreat when encountering danger or threats!
What utter nonsense!
What happened to that entire tale of peaceful flight from conflict? Where was the gentle temperament? The non-violent nature?
Morris would bet every Galleon he owned, that the author, whoever they were, had never personally experienced being chased by five or six thoroughly enraged unicorns at full charging speed with their horns lowered apparently for kill.
The theory clearly didn't match reality.
Morris couldn't even claim he'd done anything genuinely wrong to provoke such extreme hostility. He hadn't attacked them, hadn't even approached too closely before they'd charged.
Well, perhaps he had harbored one slightly unsavory and ethically questionable thought about their deceased companion.
When Morris had first seen that unicorn corpse lying in the center of the mourning herd, for just one brief moment, he'd seriously considered the possibility of transforming it into an undead creature.
But it had only been a passing thought, quickly dismissed as impractical.
After all, one of the vital requirements for successfully performing an undead creature transformation ritual was that the subject must possess at least some lingering desire to survive or continue existing, and must not actively resist the process of becoming undead.
For a creature as inherently pure and sacred as a unicorn, successful transformation while the body was still fresh and the soul potentially present would have a ghost's chance at best.
Unless Morris was transforming a long-dead unicorn whose flesh had completely rotted away, or simply an old unicorn skeleton that had been buried for years or decades, there might be realistic hope for success.
By that point, after sufficient time had passed, the unicorn's original soul would have completely dissipated and moved on to whatever afterlife awaited such beings. The spiritual resistance would be gone.
Even if such ancient remains became undead through his ritual, the resulting creature would essentially be just an empty shell powered by magic but containing no remnant of the original unicorn's intelligence or personality ans capable of understanding and executing only the simplest, most basic commands from its master.
Just like those first-stage skeleton dogs Morris had created.
Of course, this entire theory about unicorn transformation was merely his own conjecture. The specifics would definitely require further dedicated research and experimentation if he ever managed to obtain suitable unicorn remains to work with.
But anyway, there was no point in dwelling on impossible hypotheticals now when the fresh corpse was gone and the living unicorns would kill him if he came near again.
Morris stretched his somewhat stiff shoulders and neck with several rotations, working out the painful kinks from his long period of immobility, then turned around and carefully walked back toward the clearing in the forest where the confrontation had occurred earlier.
Perhaps the unicorns had left something behind.
When Morris arrived at the site, stepping cautiously into the moss-covered clearing, he found with disappointment that the entire herd of unicorns had completely vanished without a trace.
And, as he'd feared, the corpse had disappeared along with them carried away to some secret location where they buried or otherwise disposed of their dead.
Only messy, overlapping hoofprints pressed deep into the soft earth and a few scattered strands of silvery-white hair clinging to nearby bushes remained.
They really hadn't left Morris even the slightest opportunity or chance to obtain materials.
Morris sighed with resignation.
Though this outcome was well within his realistic expectations, it was still disappointing.
He pulled out his Death Compass again from his pocket and checked its reading. The enchanted needle still pointed steadily and firmly in one specific direction, most likely still locked onto and indicating the location of that unicorn corpse wherever the herd had taken it.
However, provoking that herd of unicorns again by following the compass straight to their hidden location would be clearly unwise and suicidal.
Fortunately, Morris had wisely built a target reset function into the Death Compass's enchantment structure during its creation, anticipating this kind of situation.
He only needed to manually turn the needle counterclockwise one full rotation to skip the current locked target and force the compass to search for and point toward the next qualifying location within detection range.
Well then, back to work.
At midday, as the morning progressed toward afternoon, the sun finally climbed to its overhead position and, for a rare blessed moment, actually showed its face through the continuously overcast winter sky.
A few rays of warm sunlight spilled down through gaps in the forest canopy, creating moving patches of light on the forest floor.
Morris had been wandering through various sections of the Forbidden Forest all morning, following his compass from location to location, investigating potential material sources.
Though he'd encountered two separate pairs of patrolling centaurs during that exploration, Morris had successfully avoided detection both times with Sparkles's help.
Sparkles circling above had spotted the centaurs from a distance and warned Morris in time to hide or detour around their patrol routes.
His material haul from the morning's work wasn't particularly impressive in terms of quantity, but it was something at least.
Just a single canine or wolf-like skeleton he'd found lying beside a small stream as the creature had apparently died of injury or disease and been left to decompose naturally. The bones were relatively clean, scattered but complete.
Plus, Morris had also discovered several dead Acromantulas in various locations.
But he hadn't taken those spider corpses with him despite their potential value, because the Acromantulas, even dead, were larger than grown adult humans.
More problematically, they were simply too hideous in appearance and reeked with an intensely unpleasant sour, rotten stench that made Morris's stomach turn.
Even shrunk down with magic and stuffed carefully in his backpack, Morris knew he'd find their presence disgusting and probably wouldn't be able to use them without gagging.
Juvenile Acromantula spiders would be far better if he needed spider-based undead creatures. They were smaller, more manageable, and honestly rather cute in their own way before they grew to horse-sized.
It was precisely then, as Morris was contemplating his limited haul and considering whether to continue searching, that he suddenly realized something very important: He hadn't brought any food with him on this expedition.
Though Morris was a wizard with access to magic that could solve many problems, he was still fundamentally human and still needed to eat regular meals to survive.
His stomach was already growling with complaints, informing him that breakfast had been many hours ago.
If possible, Morris thought regretfully, he'd definitely prefer some desserts rather than emergency rations. Maybe some of that chocolate cake. Or literally anything sweet.
So, he decided pragmatically to search just one final location indicated by his compass, then return promptly to the castle for a proper lunch.
Following the Death Compass's steady guidance through dense forest, Morris eventually came upon an exceptionally massive ancient tree that immediately got his attention.
This tree was absolutely enormous in its scale and age. The trunk was astonishingly thick, so wide around that Morris estimated even ten people standing together with arms outstretched might not be able to fully encircle it.
After careful examination of the compass reading and the surrounding area, Morris discovered something interesting: the enchanted needle wasn't actually pointing at the magnificent tree itself, but rather at something located beneath the ground nearby.
Buried underground... could it be an actual grave?
Morris's interest and excitement were immediately piqued, his pulse was quickening with anticipation.
Grave digging was something Morris had never personally experienced in either of his lifetimes, neither as his original self nor in this reincarnated existence.
This would be genuinely a first.
"Pardon the intrusion," Morris murmured politely to whatever might be listening; the forest spirits, the deceased creature, his own conscience. "I mean no disrespect. This is purely for research purposes."
Then he raised his wand and used the Bone-Summoning Charm to conjure a sturdy shovel made entirely of bone.
The object appeared in mid-air and dropped into his waiting hand.
Morris examined the shovel briefly, then flicked his wand at it in a specific pattern while speaking an incantation.
"Effodio!"
The shovel immediately began moving on its own with impressive efficiency, rising into the air under magical control and then plunging down to scoop up earth and toss it aside in a growing pile.
Again and again, working tirelessly without need for rest.
Such impressive efficiency made Morris nod with deep satisfaction.
This automatic excavation charm, this convenient self-digging spell was something Morris had learned from a rather specialized book he'd found buried in the Restricted Section during one of his unauthorized browsing sessions.
The spell had been invented by a professional tomb raider who'd apparently made quite a good living from magical grave-robbing for years.
As an interesting aside, Morris recalled, that the inventor was currently enjoying a vacation in Azkaban.
Azkaban-certified magical technique, so the reliability and effectiveness were definitely trustworthy!
Whatever lay beneath the soil wasn't buried very deep at all. This old tree's roots must have prevented deeper burial.
In a relatively short time, the bone shovel touched something solid that wasn't earth or stone and began carefully unearthing it.
A thick hind leg bone emerged first from the dirt which was long and clearly from a large animal.
It definitely didn't look human, which was honestly a relief. Morris had no particular desire to disturb human graves.
As more earth was carefully cleared away by the tireless shovel, revealing more and more of what lay buried, additional contents became visible.
Ribs curving like ivory arches. A long spine with intact vertebrae. Another leg bone, then a third and fourth. A skull beginning to emerge.
Eventually, as Morris watched with rising excitement, the shovel had roughly pieced together and exposed the complete skeleton of an adult equine creature.
Large, graceful, unmistakably horse-like in general structure but more refined, more delicate in the bone structure.
And most distinctively, there was a long spiral horn still attached to the forehead of the skull.
A unicorn!
It really was an actual unicorn skeleton!
And not just any partial remains, but a complete unicorn skeleton with almost every bone present and the precious horn still perfectly intact!
Morris felt his heart racing with excitement.
This was an incredible find. An absolutely priceless material that he never could have afforded to purchase even if such things were legally available.
He quickly checked the surrounding environment with paranoid care, scanning in all directions and listening intently, making absolutely certain no other creatures, especially no living unicorns were lurking nearby watching him.
The area was clear.
Then Morris carefully used the Shrinking Charm on the entire exposed unicorn skeleton, reducing it to be small enough to fit in his backpack.
The backpack immediately became noticeably and substantially heavier.
But he didn't care about the discomfort. This was absolutely worth it.
Afterward, before departing the scene, Morris didn't forget to demonstrate at least some basic respect and caution by restoring the earthen pit to its original state.
He used magic to push all the excavated dirt back into the hole, patted it down, scattered leaves and forest debris over the disturbed area to disguise it, even encouraged some moss to grow over the fresh earth.
Within minutes, the burial site looked almost untouched. Unless someone examined it very carefully or knew exactly where to look, they'd never notice it had been disturbed.
Afterward, Morris used the Point-Me Spell to find the correct direction and left the scene.
His fortunate, wonderful, incredibly productive Forbidden Forest expedition had concluded perfectly with an actual complete unicorn skeleton as the crown jewel of his collection!
Morris practically skipped back toward the castle.
After successfully returning to Hogwarts without incident, Morris finally reached his dormitory.
He immediately took out the shrunken unicorn skeleton from his backpack with care and laid it gently on the floor in the center of the room.
Next, Morris retrieved from his desk drawer a reference book called Detailed Explanation of One Hundred Magical Creature Skeletons that he'd obtained from Frick.
Morris turned carefully to the "Unicorn" chapter, which included detailed diagrams showing proper bone arrangement, and began adjusting the skeleton's details according to the illustrations.
He worked for perhaps an hour, making tiny adjustments.
The skeleton, despite having some considerable age to it had almost no damage at all to any of its components. Even tiny cracks were extremely rare.
'As expected of a unicorn,' Morris thought admiringly. One could only marvel at the inherent quality and durability.
Finally, after careful work, all the bones had been properly aligned.
And Morris confirmed with satisfaction: not a single piece was missing from the complete skeleton.
This also definitively meant that this unicorn's body had been intentionally buried by someone, perhaps by its own kind performing funeral rites, perhaps by humans.
But regardless of who had buried it or why, Morris didn't care in the slightest about the circumstances.
What mattered was the present opportunity.
He immediately began setting up an undead creature transformation magic circle in the center of his room, working around the skeleton.
"The world of the living has not yet forgotten you; death's slumber is not your final chapter!"
As the final words of the incantation fell from Morris's lips, the magic circle activated smoothly.
Crimson lines of magical energy began to flow and pulse around the circle's perimeter, glowing brighter and brighter, then drilling entirely into the unicorn skeleton like liquid light being absorbed.
The bones began to tremble.
The unicorn skeleton, which had been lying motionless and dead for so long, slowly began to rise to its feet amid the grinding, clicking sounds of bones moving and connecting.
Simultaneously, deep within the unicorn's hollow eye sockets where only shadow had existed, two ghostly blue flames suddenly blazed to life.
Even more visually striking and remarkable was that the spiral horn on its forehead had transformed completely into a deep, rich black like obsidian.
And on that black horn's surface, a wisp of blue flame likewise coiled and danced, wrapping around the spiral.
"Neigh~~"
A whinny sounded directly in Morris's mind rather than his ears, carrying a trace of warmth and affection.
The undead unicorn had been successfully born!