I didn't wait.
I launched myself forward, arcana spiraling around me like a second skin. My fingers danced through the air in flowing patterns as I neared the man in the center. I whispered a word.
The wind obeyed.
Crash! A pulse of focused air struck him squarely in the chest, launching him several meters back across the courtyard.
The others steadied themselves quickly, faster than I expected.
"Fools," I growled, drawing a rune in the air. Light-blue sigils shimmered to life, encircling my body like an orbit of stars. "You really think you're the first zealots to throw yourselves at me?"
OK, they are but still those words sounded cool
They attacked in sync, one with flame, one with shards of earth, the third conjured chains of dark mist. My hands spun in fluid arcs, unraveling the threads of their spells mid-flight.
One spell turned to petals. Another to sparks. The chains shattered against a prism of light I conjured with a flick of the wrist.
Then I struck back.
From one hand, a spiraling lance of molten crystal shot forward, forcing the flame-caster into a desperate barrier. From the other, I pulled the petals around me and forced them down, transmuting the into stone with a crushing thud.
A gesture behind me created five mirrors of light that absorbed and fired back a stream of arcane blasts. They screamed as their own magic lashed at them.
This wasn't a fight but a demonstration. I was beyond them and now they knew that. Sadly I didn't intend on letting them leave here.
I saw them grab vials. My eyes narrowed at this as a purple liquid glowed faintly. I felt divine essence in it, barely perceptible, restrained but, there was something else mixed in it. They drank without hesitation.
A flash of white overtook their eyes. Their bodies surged with energy, veins glowing like molten lines beneath their skin.
"Of course," I spat. "You'd cheat death like cowards."
Then came the real barrage.
Spells rained like a hurricane, bolts of violet flame, crescents of ice, rending winds that could tear a man in half. I spun and weaved through the chaos, my clothes slashed and singed, fingers weaved spells faster than my thoughts.
A wall of mirrored water absorbed the violet fire and redirected it into ice. My breath summoned a barrier of gold-threaded arcana that pulsed with every strike.
But they kept coming.
One of them appeared behind me with a silent blink-step and drove a jagged spear of black mana through my shoulder.
I screamed then spun. My left hand rose instinctively but it was too slow. A blade of red-hot force severed it at the wrist. Agony ripped through me, I didn't fall, I couldn't afford to and pure rage kept me upright.
I turned with a cry of fury and cast with my soul, not my body. Warmth trailed down my eyes and spitle even flew out of my mouth. A vortex of sapphire runes formed above them, one for each element. Earth, water, fire and wind. They cascaded down like judgment, like the heavens themselves had condemned their heresy. The earth shook violently as I channeled more of my fury, my voice even distorted.
When the dust cleared… they were broken. One crawled and one moaned. The last simply lay still, it was indeed professor Stennwald just like I thought. The others were men I didn't recognize.
Black mist steamed in the cratered ground. I clutched my stump, smoke rising from it. My right hand trembled as I raised it, forming the last sigil in the air: a glyph of containment. A golden seal slammed down onto their bodies, pinning them in place.
Breathing heavily, I stood above them, light from the cinders lighting across my face.
"You're not priests," I muttered coldly. "You're pests. Deluded puppets drinking poison and calling it wine."
I looked at the stump of my left hand. Blood dripped freely, but I refused to fall.
"You thought this would stop me?" I whispered. "This is the beginning."
The moment the last cultist died before me, my left hand nothing but a smoldering stump, I fell to my knees, chest heaving, lungs clawing for air, blood drumming in my ears. The stink of burnt stone, iron, and divine essence clung to my skin. My body was wracked with pain but it was my heart that roared.
I could still feel it, that gaze, that weight that pressed on the whole place around the occult building's grounds. Someone or something had been watching. I grit my teeth, and my lips curled into a snarl.
No. I can't fall here, no doubt something sinister will happen if I fall unconscious here. I raised my charred wrist before me. With a thought and a breath, the ruined flesh mended. Blue light stitched it together, muscle and skin weaving anew until my fingers flexed once more with strength.
A ripple pulsed from my core, pushing the lingering ash and divine residue away like a tide retreating from the shore.
I stood, albeit with great difficulty. My knees were about to give out as I walked away from the occult club's building.
"That wasn't fun at all, right, Adam?"
The voice was too smooth, like velvet soaked in poison. Calm, composed… and dripping with mockery.
I forced my eyes open. At the far end of the occult club building open area , I saw them. Ten figures, maybe more. Their dark cloaks fluttered unnaturally, though there was no wind. One stood ahead of the others, wrapped in immaculate white robes, his golden papal tiara catching the faint glow of broken divinity still floating in the air like ash.
My blood ran cold.
Eric.
But what truly made my stomach twist was the man standing beside him. Dressed in somber grey priest robes, his face was hard, detached familiar. Professor Malcom.
He gave a shallow bow. "This is the vessel, Pontiff."
Eric's smile stretched, becoming something almost grotesque. "Marvellous," he sang. His eyes sparkled like a child's on their birthday. "His Majesty can finally descend upon this world and save it from itself."
Descend?
Who the hell is descending?
"You should feel honored, Adam," Eric said as he stepped toward me with open arms, as if welcoming a lost son. "To serve as the vessel for the great god. It makes me jealous, really. I always believed I was the chosen one."
He laughed softly, his gaze flicking over my trembling form. "But you, you have the perfect constitution. A soul and body capable of absorbing divine essence without breaking apart."
He tilted his head, eyes narrowing slightly. "That explains your unnatural progression, doesn't it? All this time, you were breathing in divinity, drinking it like water."
I felt something coil inside me.
"You talk too much," I growled, curling my fingers into a fist.
Then I struck.
A roaring glyph exploded from my hand, a raw pulse of kinetic force wrapped in blinding light. It cracked through the air toward Eric like a hammer of judgment. But it never reached him.
CRASH.
Three cloaked figures blurred into motion faster than I could blink. Their robes snapped behind them like flags in a storm as shields shimmered into place. Silver. Crimson. Violet. Their hands weaved symbols with brutal speed.
My spell hit an unseen barrier and detonated in a flash of white fire.
Sixth Circle Arcanists.
I jumped back as the shockwave rattled the area, but they were already closing in. Two of them dashed forward, brandishing blades of condensed light. I ducked under one, spun away from the other, and pulled deep from the power within. A blue sigil pulsed beneath me as I launched into the air, flipped, then hurled twin bolts of lightning downward.
One screamed as it struck his shoulder. The other batted it away with a glowing rune-circle, swallowing the bolt like it was nothing.
"I don't suppose you'll tell me who this god is you're so eager to die for?" I snarled as I landed in a crouch.
The woman with emerald tattoos laughed like a lunatic. "You won't live long enough to understand."
"Besides," Malcom muttered, his fingers dancing along the floor as sigils bloomed, "what fun is there in explaining things to a corpse?"
The ground burst open beneath me.
I cast Aether Shield just in time. Lava and stone slammed into my barrier and shattered, but the force slid me back. Three bolts came from behind, I rolled aside, sliced upward with a blade of wind, and felt blood spill as I tore through one cultist's chest. He fell screaming.
But for every one I killed, two more rushed in.
Eric raised his hand lazily and a pillar of fire erupted toward me. Blinding white-hot. I roared and slammed my hands together, pulling everything I had left from my core. A golden dome erupted around me just as the inferno hit.
The world vanished in heat and flame. It felt like the sun itself was trying to consume me. Pain tore through every nerve, my skin cracked, my vision blurred but I held.
"Impressive," Eric whispered. "You really are perfect."
I dropped the shield and charged. Wind blade in hand, I fought like a storm. Sigils burned behind every strike. Light and shadow danced around me. I burned, I froze, I shattered bones and broke bodies.
A rib cracked. Blood soaked my side. My breath came in rasps, but I didn't stop.
Malcom launched spiraling rings of black toward me, I incinerated them in scarlet fire. Someone tried to bind me with glowing chains, I shattered them with a roar.
But they weren't tiring while I was.
I leapt back, panting, watching the others circle me like predators. Why was Eric holding back? The sheer power he radiated, it wasn't Fourth Circle. Not even close.
My heart was racing, the glyphs inside me still spinning wildly. I was alive I still had some arcana left. So I opened my mouth and unleashed it.
Magma burst from my lungs, flooding the broken tiles beneath the cultists. They screamed and stumbled.
And then, something twisted.
A sharp pain ripped through my chest, down to my stomach. The circles around my heart trembled violently. My body burned, not from arcana, but from something deeper.
Footsteps approached.
Eric appeared again, standing over me with a delighted grin. He crouched and gently lifted my head.
"Got you," he whispered.
Then he pressed his palm to my forehead.
Power surged into my skull. I screamed, agony ripping through my brain as if knives were flaying it. My vision turned red, pulsing and spinning.
I tried to leave, tried to force my soul free, to escape the body like before. But something held me in place. It felt like lifting your leg from thick, wet mud, only for it to cling tighter the harder you pulled. I strained, I fought but nothing, I was trapped, then, everything went dark.