Chapter 93: Wind Magic
The moon hung on one side of the sky where its pale light spread across the land, illuminating everything in a dim silver glow. Far from the mansion there was a quiet place covered with trees, and in that little forest lay a small clearing where nothing grew, as if the ground itself had been left bare on purpose.
As the night wind drifted through the trees, the branches swayed gently and petals scattered in its path, carrying with them the faint sound of cloth brushing against the current. High above, seated on one of the thicker branches of an old tree, Kael shivered as the cold air pressed against his body.
"This is actually nothing..." he whispered in thought before he let himself drop from the height.
It was not a graceful jump but rather a fall, his coat billowing upward in the rush of air until his legs touched the earth with a solid thud, as if it had cost him no effort at all. The hem of his coat swayed and settled slowly as he straightened.
He had come here for a reason, not by accident. This was the place he had chosen to test the element he had discovered within himself, the element of wind, something he had once known yet forgotten. Tonight he was determined to find out how far he could push it, how many things he could attempt, although the answer to that would come later.
For now, he had already chosen the very first spell he wished to try.
A crooked smile appeared beneath the mask that concealed his face as the thought crossed his mind, "First of all... I need to see if I can fly using wind magic. I desperately need this spell more than anything else."
Indeed, it was not an exaggeration. He needed the ability to fly. That was why he had put on his assassin form tonight. In that form he had always relied on his legs, running and leaping across distances that left his body aching. If flight became possible, then all those painful exertions could be replaced by ease, and he would be able to cover distance in ways he never could before. Yet the troubling question remained, could he actually fly at all?
From what he remembered, very few ever managed to fly even if they possessed wind as their element. The reason was simple, their mana capacity could not handle it, but that was not always the only cause. There was also the matter of imagination.
To cast a spell one had to imagine it clearly within their head, and imagination was not always kind. If Kael simply pictured himself soaring in the sky without ever understanding how he was held aloft, then the spell would fail at once. That was the problem with imagination, it was never enough to picture the result, one had to know the process that led to that result.
In simpler words, if he imagined pushing a gust of wind beneath him then surely it would lift him into the air for a moment, but it would vanish just as quickly, and he would need to repeat the process again and again, wasting more mana than he could afford. He knew well enough he did not have that much.
He tilted his head slightly as his hand slipped into his pocket, "So then, how exactly can I fly? A single gust is not enough. If I rely on that alone, I will only rise for a moment before falling again, and the cycle would drain me empty. Unfortunately my mana cannot support that. So... what should I do?"
He lowered himself to sit on the cold earth, the coat folding around him. It struck him only now that when he had first thought of testing this spell, he had not thought about the actual method of how it would work.
Flight was far more complicated than any simple attack or defense spell, yet his desire for it remained the same.
Ideas came rushing through his head, too many and all of them more complicated than the last. The first was to surround his entire body with wind and lift himself that way, but such a method would devour a tremendous amount of mana, far more than he could spare. For Seraphina, perhaps, it would have been nothing but a small expense, yet for him it would cost more than half of what he possessed. Such waste he could not accept.
"I need something lighter, something that consumes less mana but still allows me to fly... but just what can I do?"
As his thoughts churned, his gaze caught the sight of a bird gliding across the sky. He watched its every movement carefully, his eyes lingering on the way its wings opened and closed.
He knew birds flew by thrusting their wings downward and backward, and their light weight gave them a natural advantage in the air. Their tails gave them control and balance. Yet Kael noticed something else, something far more important.
At times the bird ceased moving its wings altogether, holding them still, and yet it continued to glide for some distance as though the air itself carried it forward.
A slow smirk curved at Kael's lips beneath the mask. "In other words, birds are not relying on their muscles alone, they are using the air around them, turning it into an advantage. Their curved wings catch the air and hold it. That is how they manage such effortless flight."
Now he understood. The world itself was filled with air, and if he did not have the mana to create flight from nothing, then why not use the air already around him?
The answer had been right in front of him. If birds could do it with only their wings, then perhaps he could do it with magic guiding the air into his own control.
"That is the path forward," he thought. "But what a pity... this will be a pain to master. To do it, I need to understand the nature of wind itself, not just the magic."
He realized then that true flight was beyond his reach for now. He would need to study not only the wind born from mana but the natural wind that filled the world, because the two were not the same.
Mana created wind through magic, but that wind was not the same as nature's. Magic was born from mana, and mana itself came from nature, yet the two were not interchangeable. Wind always existed freely, but wind magic was something forced into being by human will.
To put it simply, If someone were trapped in a place with no air, then even if they had the wind element and used magic to summon it, they could not breathe. The air made by mana is not nature's air, it would never fill the lungs.
But if a fire mage were trapped in that same place, he could summon fire, and it would burn and glow, because that fire too would be a creation of mana. That is why, when it comes to cooking, most people still prefer to use real flames, the ones born of wood and oil, because the taste of food cooked on mana's flame is never quite the same.
In other words, if nature is a mother, then its elements and the element of mana are her twin son and daughter, alike in appearance yet different in essence.
However, soon enough, Kael pushed aside the unnecessary thoughts that were clouding his mind and returned his focus entirely to the matter of attack magic and defensive magic.
Magic, after all, had no real boundary, and if one truly desired it, they could shape almost any kind of spell they wished, as long as it made sense within the laws of magic themselves. Since spells were born from the creativity and will of the mage who wielded them, new techniques and strange discoveries had always appeared throughout history, crafted by those daring enough to push their imagination forward.
But there were always many people who did not bother to create new spells, and instead learned from others, since it was much easier than making something new.
With that thought lingering faintly in his mind, Kael raised his hand and shot it forward, closing his eyes in the same moment to better sense the mana flowing into his veins. He felt it coursing within him, heavy and warm as always, steady yet unyielding, like molten metal traveling through a body not meant to hold it.
When his eyes opened again, the mask on his face caught the glow of two crimson eyes burning within its emptiness.
The air around him seemed to tighten, faintly trembling with pressure as though the world itself were waiting for something to be released. Then, with a sudden surge, a gust of wind burst forth from his hand.
At first, it was nothing more than a small push, light and almost harmless, but soon it extended outward, stretching forward like a force given shape, and collided with the trees before him.
Branches bent back at the impact, the leaves were stripped from their homes and fluttered down like falling fragments of emerald, and the forest itself stirred in reluctant response to the spell he had unleashed.
Kael's eyes widened, his expression caught somewhere between disbelief and wonder as he stared at the mark his magic had left on the trees.
"Damn…" his voice slipped out in a half-breath of amazement, "wasn't expecting something like this at all."
He lowered his gaze toward his palm, turning it slowly as though it had become something unfamiliar, before a crooked smile broke across his lips.
"Didn't think I would be proud of my magic one day. It almost feels like I just hit a jackpot or something equally absurd."
The realization struck him deeply in that moment: his magic was not as worthless as he had once thought. The gust had not only proven itself useful, but it carried a pressure that far exceeded what should have been possible for his rank.
A C-rank mana core should never have been capable of pushing out that kind of force. Perhaps, it was simply the nature of his wind, that strange individuality the world sometimes gifted to certain people, granting them an element slightly different, something sharper or heavier than what most could wield.
He shrugged inwardly, for he did not truly care about the reason. What mattered now was that he had something, and he would keep experimenting until he could grasp every possibility.
Time slipped by in his excitement. At last, Kael found himself crouched with one hand pressed against his knee, his breaths coming hard and heavy, the faint burn of exhaustion rolling through his chest. He lifted his gaze once more toward the trees before him, and what had once been a calm little patch of woodland now stood battered and altered.
Several trunks were cracked and broken, a few trees had been stripped of their branches entirely, leaving them naked and pitiful, while others bore deep scars along their bark. The ground itself was littered with torn leaves, scattered like a green carpet.
"I think I've gone too far, I guess."
A sense of exhilaration filled Kael despite the fatigue dragging at his body. He had tried countless variations, each strike of wind sharper, heavier, or stranger than the last, and though he was exhausted, he was deeply satisfied.
Because the pressure within his magic truly made up for the lack of mana that had always been his weakness, though it did not mean he was capable of tearing down an entire forest just yet.
Exhaling once more behind the mask, Kael tilted his head upward. His crimson eyes narrowed slightly when he saw that the same bird from earlier was still circling in the sky.
Something about the way it drifted above him gave him the feeling it was mocking him, as if its very flight existed to remind him that he remained bound to the earth.
He clenched his fist, his lips curling behind the mask, and without any hesitation he raised his arm toward the sky. Using his finger as a crude target, he aimed directly at the bird, his gaze sharpening with intensity. His voice, low and bitter, spilled out like a curse.
"Die… you bastard. I swear you're actually pissing me off."
The bird continued its flight without care, but in the next heartbeat, one of its wings was suddenly ripped apart, torn from its body by the unseen force of his magic. With a broken cry it plummeted toward the earth, crashing down helplessly as feathers scattered in the wind.
Kael let his hand fall back into his pocket, his posture turning casual as though the act had been nothing more than brushing aside a nuisance. A cruel smirk curved across his lips beneath the mask, his voice soft yet mocking as he walked forward.
"Ah… poor soul. You really shouldn't have tried to make fun of me here. Still, I suppose I should thank you, for at least you taught me how you fly."
He stretched his arms above his head with a weary groan, his body heavy with exhaustion.
"Ugh… I've used almost all of my mana already. I'm so damn tired I could just collapse right here."
With his strength nearly spent, Kael finally turned away. He made his way back toward the mansion, dragging his body more than walking, until at last he found his way into the bath. After washing away the sweat and changing back into his normal clothes, he carefully folded and stored away the garments of the assassin once more.
Then, at last, as his body surrendered to the weight of fatigue, Kael collapsed into the comfort of sleep beside Seraphina.
---
As the sun rose from the horizon and spread its golden light across the quiet town, a short girl with dark hair stood before a bench, her expression unreadable while her eyes lingered on the brightness that bathed everything in beauty.
For a brief moment she stood still, but soon Eska brushed aside whatever thought touched her heart and quietly walked away, her steps carrying her toward the tavern.
Upon reaching it she received the usual greetings from her sister, and without delay she began her day just as she had always done, moving with the quiet diligence of habit as she arranged the chairs and tables, prepared the vegetables, set aside the bread, and saw to a few other tasks.
Yet before long her hands froze in place because she suddenly felt two arms circle tightly around her stomach, and a familiar voice breathed softly against her ear.
"Hey, Eska. It's really good to see you again. I see you're doing quite alright."
Eska quickly pried Effie's hands away from her body and turned her head with a frown, speaking in a quiet but sharp tone. "Where the hell did you come from? What took you so long, huh? If sister were here she would be very much furious with you." Her eyes lingered on Effie's face, and in that instant she noticed the dark circles shadowing her friend's already dark eyes. "W-what the? Did you stay awake the whole night?"
Effie's hands immediately found her stomach again, as though she could not restrain herself from that touch, and her voice carried a soft laugh that masked her exhaustion. "Yeah, I was awake all night. I couldn't rest at all because I was worried about you, you know? You suddenly disappeared yesterday and I searched everywhere thinking something had happened, but in the end I couldn't find you anywhere. Where did you go?"
Once more Eska pulled the girl's hands away with an annoyed gesture. "Could you please stop doing that?"
Finally Effie gave her a little space, but instead of leaving she hopped onto the counter where some ingredients were waiting to be cut, ignoring them entirely as she let her legs swing back and forth. "Alright, I'll stop now," she said with an almost playful tone that carried a heavier undertone. "Then tell me what happened to you yesterday?"
Eska hesitated for a long breath, but in the end she decided not to hide anything. She told Effie everything she needed to know, and since Effie already knew about the cruel violation that had marked her, there was nothing left to conceal. When she finished, she had expected her friend to react with shock or pity, yet Effie's expression remained strangely calm, her dark eyes merely watching while her bare legs moved idly and revealed a few faint cuts that she paid no attention to.
When Eska's voice faded into silence, Effie's face darkened ever so slightly as she drew in a deep sigh. "Oh, I see. I suppose it was to be expected," she murmured, pausing for a long moment before continuing. "I warned you before, didn't I? From the very first day you spent time with him I told you to stay away, because I never trusted him then and I do not trust him now. You knew very well that he was a thief, Eska, so tell me honestly... what else could you have expected from a man like that? Nothing."
Eska's lips parted as though to argue, yet no words left her. She remained quiet, staring at her friend's cold expression. Somewhere deep inside she wanted to reject Effie's words, because she still believed her husband was not a thief. Even so, she could not deny that Effie had warned her many times before.
Effie's voice flowed on, firm yet strangely gentle. "I think he has been using you from the very beginning. He saw your innocence, and he wrapped himself around it just to make you marry him, because that was all he ever wanted. Do you really believe he had no cruel intentions when he began? Think about it, Eska. A man who pretends to love you should never be able to humiliate you in front of everyone, yet he did so without hesitation. And you know as well as I do that this is not the only thing. If you are still clinging to some faint hope of fixing everything then please, Eska, let it go. Throw it away completely, because it will only destroy you."
Without waiting for her reply, Effie suddenly slipped down from the counter and wrapped her arms around Eska in a firm embrace. Her voice trembled ever so slightly as she whispered, "I do not want you to suffer any further. You never deserved any of this, my dear friend. You have a new life growing inside you, so if you want my advice then I will tell you... forget him completely, burn every memory you ever had of him no matter how much it hurts. I can still see in your eyes that you are holding on to a little hope of having him back, but you should not, Eska. Do it for your child. And please remember that I am with you, always at your side from now on. Forgive me for not being able to protect you before, forgive me for failing you, but if you want your child to have a happy life then this is my best advice."
Eska could no longer hold back the heaviness in her chest. She stayed silent for a long while, her thoughts circling endlessly around her friend's words. Deep down she knew Effie was right, even if her heart still refused to fully let go. A small part of her continued to long for her husband, to see him and speak to him again, but at least for now she had to place her child above her own desire. If she tried to fix the relationship it might endanger the life that was slowly forming within her.
Tears slid down her cheeks as she clung to Effie even tighter. "I will listen to you this time, Effie. I should have done so from the start. I know I have done many wrong things, but I will try my best not to ruin my child's life."
"I know you will," Effie answered quietly, her voice steady.
Then, just as the two held each other in silence, their sister's loud voice broke into the room. "If you two are done with your drama then get your asses up and start working. Soon the customers will fill this place."
The embrace loosened, and Eska quickly wiped her tears away. A small but genuine smile crept onto her face as she glanced at Effie. In a soft whisper that carried her renewed strength she said, "You bet, we will."
Their eyes met, and for a brief moment they shared a quiet smile together.
---
(Chapter Ended)
To be continued...