The Forsaken Hero

”I came to help,” I said.

The pressure of the two raging eighth-level souls was overwhelming, but I forced a small smile. Luke’s eyes brightened, then quickly narrowed, and his focus returned to the inquisitor. He shifted closer to me, grip tightening on his sword.

”I wish you hadn’t,” he muttered, tail starting to twitch. ”This man is dangerous.”

”Hmph,” Lord Evlon shook his head, a frown deepening his wrinkles. ”So, the city has fallen? It’s truly a pity, but it allows me to end things now. You should have run when you had the chance, little filthbloods.”

Luke stepped forward, raising his sword. ”I won’t let you touch her.”

The inquisitor raised an eyebrow, casting a ponderous gaze between us. ”Curious. It was my understanding that the Apostle of the Descent was a cold-blooded killer.”

”I don’t care what you heard. You die today.”

Lord Evlon raised his staff, and a dozen magic circles whirled around him. Judging by the absurd amounts of mana within, he’d been gathering it for some time. ”I’ve killed a dozen fiends more powerful than you. Even if that damned mutt took more effort than I was anticipating, I’m more than capable of putting down someone like you.”

His aura intensified, and my hands gripped Fable tighter. Luke scoffed and strode forward, his curses reaching out to drain the gathering mana.

”Your light will never pierce my shadows.” Darkness gathered on the edge of his blade, black as midnight against the brilliance of the inquisitor’s gathering magic.

A small smile flitted across Lord Evlon’s face. ”You are tenacious, but victory is rarely decided by the sharpest sword. For instance, what of one who can’t even wield one?”

I frowned slightly, a tingle racing through my soul. Lord Evlon’s eyes flickered from Luke, locking on to me. A shiver crawled down my spine.

”No!” Luke shouted, diving forward.

Lord Evlon’s frown turned to a grin. ”Glorious Purge!”

The intensity of the inquisitor’s aura magnified tenfold. A crushing weight settled on my chest, constricting my throat and making every heartbeat pound in my ears. Fable shivered under the pressure, but even as he tensed, preparing to move, the magic circles activated.

A beam of molten light erupted from the inquisitor’s hand, searing a line across my vision. It moved so quickly that I hadn’t realized the spell was cast before it was too late, and the beam slammed into us.

At least, it should have. A shadow materialized between us and the incoming eighth-circle spell. There was a flash of darkness in the torrent of light, and everything blurred out in a flurry of black dots. Terrible shudders shook my body as the sunlight bled through my wards.

I screamed, covering my eyes with my hands, and Fable finally reacted, accelerating so quickly that he almost tore out beneath me. Another scream rose, sending chills down my spine. Tears leaked from my eyes as I clung to Fable, soul casting a healing spell. Even a sixth-circle Regenerate did little to ease the discomfort, though my vision cleared up.

The explosion was small and concentrated, containing the entire focused power of the eighth circle spell in a radius of only thirty feet. Shockwaves radiated from the epicenter, buffeting my wards with enough force to crack them. Any buildings within several city blocks were blasted apart, and combustible material incinerated in a wave of ash.

It happened in the blink of an eye. A wave of darkness swept out of the light, merging with the explosion and slamming into us. My wards shattered like glass, and the power descended upon me. The sun magic seared my body like molten lava, while Luke’s curse tore into my soul with a fury reminiscent of the Soul Binder’s punishment. At the same time, the lingering power of the regenerate fought against the damage, but my bloodline’s vulnerability, weak body, and sun magic sensitivity left me writhing in agony.

I drew on my soul, relying on its power to remain conscious through the pain. To my horror, the curse magic attacked my remaining spells, siphoning them into nothingness. Even Celestial Grace wasn’t immune, and as it faded, my pain increased to unbearable levels. I threw back my head and screamed, contorting in an effort to shield myself from the entwined eighth-level magic.

In a last, desperate struggle, I flared Adaptive Resistance. It had taken me hours to shape the ability to resist the crystal enchantment, but I didn’t have such a luxury now. I used it like a blanket, wrapping it around the last of Celestial Grace and holding on for everything I was worth.

Immediately, the pain lessened, allowing me a few precious seconds of conscious thought. I reached out and called the Oracle of Eternity. The world froze.

Crackling arcs of sunlight and violet curses wove a beautiful, terrifying picture around me. They arced across my body like static electricity, leaving thin, black scorch marks in their wake. The curses stabbed into my soul like needles, draining my mana at an appreciable rate.

I didn’t have long. My soul was rapidly depleting of mana. In just a few seconds, I would be plunged back into the world, and the pain, and...

But it wasn’t? It took me almost five seconds to regain my senses once the pain had stopped, and yet, my soul hadn’t lost more than a fraction of its mana. I could feel it rushing out of me in an ocean, yet the well never ran dry. It was simply inconceivable, but I didn’t have time to investigate it. First, I had to focus on surviving.

Adaptive Resistance had been pushed back into the depths of my soul. Luke’s eighth-level curse invaded in every direction, siphoning its power before it could be brought to bear. Despite the pain it inflicted and the danger I was in, I couldn’t help but take a moment to admire its beauty. Pure, simple, and terrible beauty.

The curses didn’t just sap my mana but actively steal it. The deeper it burrowed, the stronger it grew, even as I grew weaker. It wasn’t like Adaptive Resistance at all, which only made the magic disappear. But...why? Why did I have that assumption? Until my time in the darkness of the abandoned city, I hadn’t even the courage to look at Adaptive Resistance. So...who said the mana just disappeared.

My attention flickered to the familiar weave of Adaptive Resistance. Just where did all the mana and energy go? It was something I’d wondered in the darkness of the abandoned city, but hadn’t been able to figure it out. Now, with the curtain drawn back by the Oracle of Eternity, things became clear.

Adaptive Resistance’s weave was intricate and complex, built of millions of individual threads of fate. They cycled constantly, analyzing all forms of mana as it interacted with me. Upon finding it harmful, or as I directed, it absorbed and discharged the energy into fate itself. Unlike runes, fate had an early infinite capacity for mana and perfect conductivity, so I’d never run into a wall with how much it could absorb.

”All this because I finally looked,” I whispered, pressing a hand to my chest.

After years of suffering in willful ignorance, it was unbearably simple. Adaptive Resistance absorbed hostile energy, broke it down into pure, unattributed mana, and diffused it into the weave of fate. It was exactly like curse magic, only...Luke’s magic assimilated it instead of getting rid of it.

My soul groaned as the burden of maintaining the timeless state grew, but I was too distracted to notice. All my attention was focused on Luke’s curses and comparing them to my ability. I’d considered myself an expert on curses, but this was completely foreign to the slave crests and soul magic I’d dealt with. It was true curse magic, pure, even, to the point I wondered how Luke had accomplished it. He had mentioned his aura preyed on curse magic, using it to strengthen him, but this weave wasn’t technically associated with his aura. It was a technique he’d used to protect me and had taken only a split second to cast. There was no way he had time to form it this way consciously.

So...was this phenomenon not a trait of all curse magic? Could it just be an effect of his unique ability?

Time lost meaning as I let my worries go and focused on the magic. All that mattered was the intricate weave of curse magic penetrating my soul.

Slowly, carefully, I began to flex Adaptive Resistance, molding its threads into a crude replica of the curse. The threads of my ability were so delicate that inverting them into my soul was far from easy. The real challenge came, however, when it was time to tie them into the fabric of my soul. Allowing unfettered mana to flow into my soul without respecting the cycle and harmony of my natural mana would have devastating consequences and would likely cripple or kill me outright.

As my mana began to wane, I came out of my work with a start. My body trembled, and my tail dangled limply across Fable’s back. My soul ached from the strain of modifying my ability and sustaining the Oracle of Eternity. A bead of blood trickled from my nose, heralding a pounding headache.

”Alright.” I took a deep breath, glancing nervously at the currents of sun and curse mana frozen around me. ”Please, Fate, let this work.”