Fallen Mage Regressor

One of the cultists growled and stepped forward. “You again. Who the hell do you think you are?!”

Mal took a few lazy steps forward. His eyes categorized each cultist’s behavior and the way they were reacting to the unexpected situation.

There was no way they were the real deal. Mal should have had his brains blown out by now. Or at the very least, someone should have been charging up a spell.

”I’m the King of Chama, and I’m putting you all under arrest.”

One of the cultists squinted their eyes. ”You don’t look like the King.”

”Have you ever seen the King?”

The cultist raised a hand in objection, then slowly lowered it.

”Well I have, and he clearly isn’t,” another said. ”Don’t be stupid. For goodness sake, you’ve all met this guy. He’s a student at—”

”At the Academy. Right, Hypode?”

At that, the room went deathly still.

Hypode’s teeth grinded together so hard that Mal could hear it from the other side of the room. ”I truly do detest you, Malfrasius Patoal,” Hypode said.

”Join the club.” Mal strolled closer to the pentacle. ”So what is this? You’re obviously not cultists. Our last encounter should have given me enough of a hint about that, but then you do something like this and it pretty much confirms it. Either that, or the cult’s done some layoffs and really needed to lower their standard of quality.”

Hypode stomped up to Malfrasius. ”Your dead wrong, we’re the Bird Eaters, and if you don’t leave, we’re going to kill you—!”

Mal pulled his Nettleleaf dagger from his belt in a smooth motion. The tip pressed against Hypode’s neck and a thin line of blood dripped down from where metal met flesh.

Hypode went perfectly still.

”H—hey, there’s no need to go that far!”

”Put the knife away, there’s no need for this!”

The older student—Norin—he wasn’t here. If he had been, Mal wouldn’t have been able to get away with this.

Hypode glared at Mal hatefully.

”W—wait, we’re not cultists, you can put away the knife!”

One of the ”cult” members stepped forward. Hypode turned his gaze at the one who’d spoken.

”Be quiet, Emerald, let me handle this!”

”I—I’m sorry brother, but this has gone too far!”

Hypode opened his mouth and Mal pressed the dagger a little closer. Hypode’s mouth snapped shut.

Emerald pulled his hood off, his face sweaty and hair matted.

Mal tilted his head. ”Well?”

”Have—have you ever heard of secret societies?”

”Yes, I hear about them in the newspaper every day.”

”No, not those kinds of secret societies. Not like the actual Bird Eater cult. What it is is that our parents all know each other, and they were in this group before us. So, it’s a sort of... family tradition, if that makes sense?”

Mal raised an eyebrow. He gestured at the bird mask on the ground.

”Interesting theme.”

Emerald laughed and rubbed the back of his head. ”We just thought it was a really cool theme. I mean, obviously the cult is actually dangerous in real life, but they haven’t been spotted in ages, so it was all just sort of... roleplay?”

Malfrasius looked at the shoddy pentacle on the floor and shoved Hypode to the ground.

”Honestly, you people have no sense of taste,” Mal said.

Hypode looked off to the side. ”I can’t say that I disagree.”

The students shifted on their feet like school children who’d been caught outside after curfew. Mal supposed that in a way they kind of were.

Malfrasius looked up at the ceiling. ”What was up with the flowers on top of the bell tower?” Mal asked.

”Oh, that was me too!” Emerald said. ”I got some airlilies to beautify the place a little bit. I was planning to redo the church yard as well. See, this is actually Hypode’s dad’s property, so we’re free to do whatever we want with it.”

Mal sighed. He twirled his dagger between his fingers, then slid it inside of his makeshift sheath. ”And I really thought we were onto something, too.”

”So, uh, can we go?” Emerald asked.

”Get out of here.”

Emerald nodded and walked over to the entrance. One by one, each of the students streamed out.

Hypode was the last to go. He glared at Mal one more time before he left.

A minute later, Rolam walked into the room, a stiff expression on his face.

”So, looks like it was a bust,” Rolam said.

”Yeah. Looks like it.”

”I guess all of our theories about the cult being active was just nonsense, then?”

Mal shook his head. ”That I’m not so sure about. But what I do know is that we have pretty much no other leads, so I guess we should probably just drop it for now.”

Rolam opened his mouth to say something when he stopped and focused on the pentacle on the ground.

”You said this wasn’t the real deal, right?” Rolam asked.

”Yeah, I did. This is the most awful summoning circle I think I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Come to think of it, that’s probably by design—they just wanted the aesthetics of a demon summoning, not an actual demon summoning.”

”Oh! Good, that means the glow probably doesn’t mean anything.”

Mal stiffened. “The glow?”

Crap.

He dropped to his knees and took a closer look at the ritual.

Not only was there a dark red glow, there were mana particles getting sucked out of the air and into the circle. It was happening at such a low and slow rate that Mal had missed it.

”I can’t believe it,” Mal muttered. ”They somehow managed to screw it up so bad that it flipped back around to actually becoming a working summoning circle.”

Rolam stiffened and backed away. ”That thing’s active?”

”It is. It’s pathetically, comically inefficient. It’s been sucking in mana at about the same speed as a drugged slug, but it’s still technically active.”

”Can you deactivate it?”

Mal shook his head. ”It’s been active for a while. There’s a ton of mana stored up inside of this thing. If I try to destroy the circle, it’ll explode mana in every direction. We’ll be hit physically and magically.”

”So what do we do?!”

”I would say that we should go to the city guard, but unfortunately, I think we’re just about out of time.”

Rolam paled. ”Doesn’t that mean it’s going to summon a—”

”—demon, yes. In approximately three, two, one—”

The circle increased in luminosity and flashed like the surface of the sun. Mal shielded his eyes and the light died away.

Rolam scurried backwards, hands outstretched for combat, a wide-eyed look on his face.

Mal turned his head around in a circle, then shook his head.

He looked back at the circle, then clicked his tongue.

”Where is it?” Rolam twisted his spine around in every direction. ”I don’t see it!”

Mal shook his head. ”This is a charm based summoning circle.”

”What does that mean?”

”It means that the location of the summoned creature is bound to a charm. I’m willing to bet good money that that charm is currently in the pocket of one of those idiots.”

A scream ripped through the air.

Mal broke off in a dead sprint out of the church doors.

Blood stained the road. A limp, barely breathing body lay on the ground. A cluster of students had formed around the barely alive figure, acting like their mere presence would somehow be enough to heal them.

Mal stepped forward. ”Out of the way.”

The students jumped, but complied. Rolam trailed behind Mal, his own breaths coming in a little bit faster.

Mal kneeled down and took a closer look at the wound. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the face of the figure. Hypode. What were the odds?

At a glance, the wound didn’t seem to have punctured particularly deep. The problem was that the long claw mark was so wide and so long that Hypode was losing blood at a ridiculous rate.

Mal clicked his tongue. He brought out his Nettleleaf dagger and sliced off the shirt.

”Hey, what are you doing—!” one of the students shouted.

”Trying to save his life, you idiot. Stay out of the way.”

Mal took away the shirt and clenched his jaw. In the future, he needed to carry bandages around. But for now, he would have to make do with what he had.

He shut his eyes and tried to focus. He could try using his bramblevine to thread the wounds back together—but he doubted he had enough control for that. If he had access to better materials, he could make a healing potion.

He thought back to his herbalism lessons.

I won’t be able to get all the ingredients for a proper brew—but I remember what the ingredients did.

In particular, there was a plant that quickly coagulated the blood if applied to a wound.

Mal’s eyes shot over to the vines growing up the side of the church wall. ”One of you, go get me those vines.”

The group stared at him in confusion.

”Now!” he raised his voice.

Rolam dashed off ahead of the others. In a second, he was back with the vines.

Mal pulled out his mortar and pestle and ground the leaves together. With no water available, he spit into the mixture to turn it into a paste.

Rolam made a disgusted face.

Mal rolled his eyes. ”It’s going to save his life, you dumbass.”

Mal ignored Rolam in favor of applying the paste to the seeping wounds. He hadn’t realized it, but the paste was sticky enough to where it would actually help to plug up the hole.

Mal stood to his feet.

”Rolam, get him to a clinic as fast as you can. Even a church if it’s closer—they usually have medical staff on standby.”

Rolam gave a shaking nod. ”Oh—okay. But what are you going to do?”

Mal took a deep breath. He could still smell the scent of infernal mana on the air. Ash and sulfur, with a tinge of iron.

”Nothing important,” Mal said.

Mal sped along the city streets, Nettleleaf dagger hidden away in his pocket. He paused and took another deep sniff. He made a hard turn into an alley, then turned right and back onto the main street.

The faint glimmer of infernal mana particles was hard to see in the sea of white unaligned mana particles that surrounded Mal. Even so, their color was so distinctive that Mal was able to lock onto them. He ran forward and dodged around a horse-drawn carriage in the middle of the road. He went through an alley and appeared on a side street. A woman had a bucket above her head—she was using it like a shield and ducking underneath it.

”Where did it go?” Mal said.

She startled, then saw who it was.

”A student?” She shook her head. ”It went that way.”

She pointed off behind her. Mal ran past her. As he did, the smell of sulfur increased tenfold. It was like he was drowning in a sea of rotten eggs.

And there were faint red flecks of light floating around her.

His breath hitched and for a moment he considered turning around, before he continued running.

I see what’s going on, Mal thought.

He grinned.

These idiots have no idea what they’ve done, do they?

He followed the trail and made a left turn. He ran forward, then made a right, then a left, then another left. With each turn, he went deeper and deeper into the alleyways of the city. The occasional stain appeared on the wall. Random pieces of wood and stone dotted the walkways.

Eventually, he came to a dead end. A puddle had formed from the drip, drip, drip of a leak from one of the buildings. Out of this puddle, vines had grown around the walls, roots dipped into the water for sustenance.

The sound of wings fluttering came from behind Mal.

He turned around.

Four winged demons blocked off the other side of the alley.

Each of them was that sickly red that Mal associated with inferno type mana. Two horns sprouted from each of their heads, and their legs ended in hooves instead of human feet. A woman passed through from behind them.

”I can’t believe you fell for that,” the woman said.

It was the same woman who’d redirected Mal on where to go.

She brushed her dress off and tilted her head. ”Honestly, I really did expect better from you. For one with the mark of fate, you seem remarkably dim-witted.”

”Mark of fate? They’re making one of those now? I thought that there were only marks given to heralds and endbringers.”

”It was a metaphor. You know what I—” She pinched the bridge of her nose. ”I can’t believe I almost got into an argument about this.”

Her skin warped and wriggled like there were worms crawling up the inside of her muscles. The color changed into a dark red and fur sprouted from her legs. The dress folded into her body and disappeared.

The demon grinned widely, its long, dagger-like nails glittering in the sun.

”Remember me?” It lifted its nails into the air. ”And remember these? You should. They’re what gave you that nasty wound on your chest.”

Mal’s eyebrows lifted slightly. ”I almost forgot. Your kind doesn’t die—not really. You just get sent back into hell for a little bit of recuperation.”

”Yes! I did take a loss to my power—I can’t quite use the spells that I used to. Hence why I brought plenty of insurance to make sure that your death finally sticks.”

”That’s why the summoning circle worked. You’ve been trying to break through and find a way up to the surface ever since you came back, weren’t you?”

”Exactly. Horrendous as that pentacle was, it was still usable. We needed to do some work on our end, but it all turned out for the best.”

”All that work for little old me? You’re a very sore loser, aren’t you?”

”I didn’t lose!”

The demons behind the head demon glanced at each other uneasily.

The head demon took a long breath.

”Be honored,” the head demon said. ”For your final moments, I will grant you the privilege of knowing my name. Savor it, for it is the last thought you shall have before your death.” It grinned. ”I am Vraxis. Prepare yourself, mortal.”

Mal tilted his head.

He didn’t immediately respond. Vraxis narrowed its eyes.

“Are you deaf? Speak, mortal.”

“Just to double check, you’re all lesser demons, right?”

Vraxis snorted and puffs of flame and smoke came out from his nose. “Though I detest that term, yes, we would be what you humans would classify as lesser demons.”

“That’s good. I would have been a little bit worried if one of you was a greater demon.”

“What are you talking about—?”

Mal took a leisurely step forward. “See, Vraxis, I think there’s a fundamental misunderstanding of what’s happening here.”

Vraxis stepped back, then froze.

He looked down at his legs like they’d betrayed him, then glared at Mal. “I think you’re the one who doesn’t understand the situation, mortal. One lesser demon nearly killed you, and now you’re surrounded by a host of them. You have no backup, and no one’s coming to save you this time.”

“Is that so?”

His bracelet shifted. The vines on the walls wriggled from side to side in an unnatural fashion.

A few of the demons behind Vraxis glanced uneasily at each other. Vraxis stamped his hoof onto the ground and curved its spine forward. Mal took another step. “Let me ask you, Vraxis, do demons pray?” Mal asked.

Vraxis’s pupils had shrunk to pinpricks.

“I ask, because I’m fairly certain that the only thing that can save you right now is divine intervention.”

At that, Mal shot forward and unsheathed his Nettleleaf dagger. One of the demons rushed forward to meet Mal. Mal dived underneath the swipe, and scored a thin cut across the leg. The demon let out an infernal screech and froze up from the pain. Mal flipped the dagger into reverse grip and drove it into the demon’s throat. It disintegrated into a show of fire and light, a single horn and an orb of infernal essence falling to the ground. Mal stared at the faces of each of the demons.

Shock—anger—fear.

His mind went to work categorizing each one’s likelihood to flee or to fight.

“So,” Mal said. “Who’s next?”