Mirabel forced me to change into armor, white plates covering my chest, shoulders, arms, and legs.
She also, quite annoyingly, handed me her sword and took mine, then left just as quickly as she'd arrived.
Her actions were telling. She didn't trust me, and, admittedly, that might've been warranted.
I leaned back against a dying tree and let out a sigh as the sky began to darken.
Magic is the act of giving form to mana, shaped through means far beyond my own.
To use mana, I first need to align myself with the spell I wish to cast. Dark Alter isn't a spell, yet it still requires mana.
The problem is that if I were to draw on any other source, physical, spiritual, or mental, I would die instantly.
Mana is the accumulation of all three, refined and filtered into raw energy.
That energy becomes reality, allowing those attuned to it to bend the world as they wish.
Monsters, however, pull mana from the environment.
That's how they cast spells like Blood Tear without suffering its cost. People like me draw it from within, which creates a burden.
[Nicholas's illness turned the act of casting magic into a punishment. Even existing came with a cost.]
My condition made movement a strain, dulled my nerves, and numbed my pain. But it granted one unexpected benefit.
The mana within me was so potent and overwhelming that it granted immunity.
That's why those blood attacks failed to poison me; blood magic is meant to infect, but in my case, external effects were simply erased.
If I had continued my cultivation while younger, my illness likely wouldn't even be as burdensome in the first place.
Smiling faintly, I stood and picked up my sword. Before me lay the corpses of over three hundred monsters, all of them sent to kill me.
Only now did I truly need to use magic.
I walked forward, ignoring the cries of the sky, and hummed a quiet tune.
My destination was the river, then I would turn back. It had to be done before the next dawn. After a bit of rest, I would return again.
To create a constant burden is to create growth. My illness, in its own twisted way, worked like a muscle.
I would strain it until it tore, then build from what remained.
Eventually, it would become a strength, but even in the future, that wasn't fully achieved.
[The future was a matter of fate, or even causality. For Nicholas, it was irrelevant.]
It began to snow. The wet turned to white dust, and soft flakes clung to my skin as I stepped forward.
Within the snowfall, a haze thickened, one that blinded me from all truths and lies.
As my blade rose, I heard it. A rhythm. A song stitched in despair.
I had been waiting for this.
A Black Death.
A creature entirely consumed by the Darkness.
They earn their name for being closest to a full evolution. When that happens, they begin to laugh. Because then, they stop being monsters.
They become humans.
Now it laughed. Its rhythm circled me like a slow curse. My blade trembled in my hand.
Then came the sound of footsteps, screams, and the cry of a child that wasn't there. That was how it lured you in.
And then I saw it.
Eyes white as chalk. Skin black as pitch. A humanoid shape, too smooth, too wrong. Its grin stretched wider than its face should allow.
A song followed, one laced with death. It danced in circles around me, singing as it skipped, laughing like it had just won a game.
This monster was happy.
It had found its first prey of the hour.
[Faced with death made flesh, Nicholas reached for something far beyond instinct. He called it safety.]
I chuckled, wrapping mana around my blade. "Come on. Stop tempting me with such a good time."
It heard my voice, and its grin twisted into something darker. Its hand was at my face before I even had time to think.
Light flared from its eyes. I bent back, dodging the strike, and shoved it away with my palm.
Flipping backward, I evaded another beam as it flashed past my left.
Then I ducked low and swung upward, my blade slicing through its shadowed flesh.
It only laughed.
A kick lifted me into the air. A punch sent me crashing back into the snow-packed earth, blood rising from my chest.
That's when I saw it.
A white orb pulsed in its palm, swirling like a miniature sun, filled with loathing.
It launched the sphere toward me. The moment blurred, too fast to track, too real to ignore. I barely raised my sword in time.
My arm jerked from the impact as its hand wrapped around my neck and slammed me into the ground.
Then it opened its mouth.
What came forth was not white light, but black.
A beam so impossibly bright it defied logic.
For a heartbeat, I thought of everything that had led me here. Then I laughed.
One last time, I used it, Dark Alter, and stumbled backward just as the black light tore into the earth where I had been.
It looked up with a wicked grin, wagging its finger like I'd misbehaved.
Blood dripped from my eyes. I saw its hand rising toward my neck again, but I moved faster, slipping behind it and forming a bubble of water.
With a roar, I slammed the sphere into its back, sending it flying across the field.
Water. The building block of life.
That was the gift from my ritual; water itself had become subject to my will.
I dropped to my knees, panting.
It returned in a blur, now furious beyond reason.
I formed another bubble of water within my mouth as it charged me.
Leaning back, I opened wide and unleashed a beam of water straight into its path.
The blast hurled it backward, but it recovered quickly. Still, I had bought enough time to stand and parry its next strike.
I kicked it back, drove a spear of water into its chest, and slammed it to the ground.
But stumbling again, my vision blurred just as a white light flashed, and my chest collapsed inward.
My armor shattered, but somehow, I remained standing.
[Salvation. Nicholas recalled a memory of a shadow parting from its body.]
Tears welled in my eyes as I leapt back, barely dodging another strike. I raised my blade and severed its hand in one clean motion.
Anticipating its next move, I slashed off the other before spinning around and carving into its neck.
But the wounds healed effortlessly. It grabbed my wrist and hurled me skyward.
Tears now fell like cannon fire, drenching me as I came crashing back down. My mind felt like it was burning from the inside out.
[Nicholas saw a figure falling to their knees, darkness rising around them like fire.]
It caught me again, slammed me into the ground, and dragged my body along the dirt until I was buried deep within the soil.
Then, stepping backward, it opened its mouth to charge another beam of black light.
That was its mistake.
With a flick of my wrist, a surge of mana erupted at its side, knocking it slightly off balance.
I dropped to the ground, stood tall, and raised my hand like I was reaching for the stars. Then I clenched it.
Around its heart, a thin stream of water coiled like a serpent, tightening, crushing.
But the creature only laughed. Even as its heart was bound, it released the beam of darkness anyway.
It struck me fully, hurling my body through the air until I crashed beside the river.
In the haze, I began to laugh, right before its foot slammed down onto my neck.
It tilted its head in curiosity.
Then it noticed the river, once clear, had turned pitch black.