MAGUS INFINITE

I was the obstacle standing between them and the rebirth of their god. Every demon in that sky knew it, and all of them came for me at once, a tide of flesh that could bury a continent.

It was in moments like this that I understood what the loop had made me into. Something that could look at an army of demons and step forward.

Then an idea struck me, and I did not stop to wonder whether it was madness. I decided to go all in.

Leading the horde were the Thulls. I had fought two before, in a different loop, on the apex of a falling Caelith, and their deaths were what had opened my fifth Earth Gate.

I knew what they were. Heralds of the end. Things that fed on worlds the way mortals feed on bread. Now there were dozens of them, and more coming, heading towards me with nothing but murder in their cold hearts.

Ninety percent of my Anima regeneration was chained to the remnants of the Jade Oracle’s prison, holding the Pale Matron at the edge of waking, and ten percent of my regeneration was still ten percent of mine.

My Anima Depth was not like other mages’, not after all the modifications I had made to my body. An Arcanist at full capacity could cast spells for days. I could cast for months. An Arcanist at full capacity could level a city, and even in my diminished state, I could level a continent.

Ten percent of that was still more than any mage of my rank could bring to bear.

The first Thull reached me in three seconds, tearing through my threads. I did not move. Heaven’s Verdict answered before I consciously called it.

With the power of my Lightning Arcanist Title, which laid the laws of lightning open in front of me, I reached into the spell and pushed it towards a new state. This battle was not just to gain essence. It was to polish and unlock my Laws in the middle of a war.

Heaven’s Verdict screamed as it left my soul. It was no longer a single spear of golden lightning. I had merged it into my Domain, and it became a field that covered a mile in every direction, and within that field every enemy was marked, tracked, and had its weakness laid bare.

One of my Lightning Law Shards vibrated, and I knew I had just made a connection with it through the spell.

The Thull entered my Verdict, and the sky opened.

A hundred spears of golden lightning fell from the clouds above, each one aimed with a precision that would have been impossible for any other mage. They struck the Thull at the same instant, hitting every joint, every seam in its Abyssal shield, every point where its flesh was weakest.

The creature did not even have time to scream. It came apart in a burst of golden light, and its body was ash before it hit the ground.

These things had bodies that could match a Sovereign’s. The last time I fought one I was at my fourth Earth Gate. I had not refined my soul twice, or gained multiple Laws, or reached the Sovereign Tier in my body and my Lightning Resonance. I was holding back their god with most of my strength, and I was not the same damned mage who had nearly died fighting one of them.

[ Stored Essence: 954,775 → 977,618 ]

Twenty-two thousand eight hundred and forty-three points from a single Thull.

I opened my arms wide, the wind picking up my long white hair where it glowed blue with thunder, and I called on the fury of the heavens.

∞

My consciousness moved through the spells I knew, recalling every evolution from Spark to Arc Lightning to Lightning Cascade to Dominion, and on to reality-altering spells like Lightning Edict that transcended the boundaries of normal magic.

I felt it touch another of my Lightning Law Shards, and I smiled.

Lightning Edict was paired with my Inscription. I wrote and spoke laws into being. Every word I wrote in the air became real. Every command I gave was obeyed by the world itself.

I wrote Rise on the air, and the ground beneath the demons erupted. Pillars of stone and ash shot upward, impaling hundreds of three-horned Narghul Sorcerers and lifting them into the air where my threads were waiting. The lesser demons died in their thousands.

Fall, I whispered, and the sky above them darkened. A sheet of blue-white fire poured from the heavens and covered miles of the plain. The demons caught in it died in waves, their bodies vaporised before they could register the pain.

My pen was already moving, writing Burn, and the ash on the ground ignited. Fire that was not fire, lightning given the properties of flame, spread across the plain and consumed everything it touched. The demons screamed as they burned, and the sound was music to me.

[ Stored Essence: 977,618 → 1,010,000 ]

The Thulls came through the fire. They were tougher than the lesser demons, and their Abyssal shields protected them from the worst of it, and they were not immune.

I wrote Break on the air, and the Script flew at the nearest Thull like a blade. It struck the shield and shattered it, and the flames rushed in, and the creature burned from the inside out until its body collapsed into ash.

[ Stored Essence: 1,010,000 → 1,032,000 ]

Another Thull died. Another. Another.

I was not moving, since most of my focus was spent holding the seals intact. My spells required only my will.

This was the power I had been denied in the past, and my soul sang as it unleashed carnage.

I wanted to howl, but Aurora was not here with me, so I was silent.

∞

Even as I fought, my consciousness kept picking through my soul, bringing my Law Shards against my spells, waking them one at a time. Before long the Loom of Lightning touched the shard that paired with it, and when I released the spell again it had become something far greater, an extension of my soul. Every thread was a part of me, and every thread carried my will.

I spread my hands, and the Loom answered. Millions of threads burst from my fingertips, each thinner than a hair, every one carrying a different Script, spreading across the battlefield and covering miles in seconds.

The demons that touched the threads died. The ones that avoided them died anyway, because the threads were not only physical. They were spatial. They existed in the gaps between moments, in the spaces between thoughts.

There was nowhere to run.

The Thulls tried to tear through the web. They were strong enough to break individual threads, and for every thread they broke, a hundred more took its place. The web was not a static thing anymore. It was alive, and it adapted.

I watched one struggle against the threads for three seconds before it was cut into pieces. I watched another try to fly above the web and find that the threads went up into the sky as well. I watched a third try to retreat and find that the web had closed behind it.

[ Stored Essence: 1,032,000 → 1,091,000 → 1,115,000 → 1,340,000 ]

The Thulls died. The three-horned Sorcerers died. Everything that came through the fissures died.