I AM A MAGE BUT WITH MILF SYSTEM

And judging by the density of the boundary surrounding his consciousness, he stood only a single step away from Grand Mage.

Julian opened his eyes briefly, glancing down at the man seated before him.

Kraven’s expression remained blank.

The realization drew a faint smile from Julian.

So the nobleman had been cultivating seriously all this time.

Quietly.

Hiding the truth of his strength behind wealth, desire, and reputation.

Interesting.

Julian closed his eyes again and allowed his awareness to sink deeper. The inner landscape of Kraven’s sea of consciousness gradually took shape through the fog.

Julian had expected something vast.

Cultivators at the level of Archmage typically possessed massive inner worlds, vast landscapes forged through decades of disciplined cultivation.

What he found instead was… smaller than anticipated.

But what it lacked in size, it more than compensated for in intensity.

The entire realm was surrounded by fire.

An ocean of burning mana encircled the land like a living wall.

A fire mage, Julian thought.

He pressed deeper.

The fire itself was not truly dangerous. But the constant pressure surrounding him was undeniably irritating. It pressed against his awareness from every direction, like being deep under water.

He kept his mana wrapped tight around himself and moved forward, following the thread deeper into the sea of consciousness. As he followed, circular shapes began to drift past him.

Memories. Julian realized as he got close to one of them.

They appeared like translucent bubbles suspended in the dark waters of Kraven’s mind. Some were small and faint, others large enough to fill Julian’s entire field of vision.

Inside them, fragments of Kraven’s life flickered.

A young boy standing in a grand courtyard while tutors lectured endlessly about duty and power.

A banquet hall filled with nobles.

Julian drifted past them slowly, observing without touching.

One cluster of memories glowed brighter than others. Julian approached it and saw memories tied to Kraven’s mother. His obsession. His love. His rejection.

Another group revolved around his sister, the Queen.

Admiration. Resentment.

Something far more complicated than either.

But one memory cluster in particular caught Julian’s attention.

Hatred.

Cold.

Every fragment within it burned with the rage and was directed toward two figures: Kraven’s father… and the current king.

Julian noted the observation away without lingering on it.

He continued deeper.

Without warning, a wave of fire suddenly flared. The flames rose suddenly, transforming into a wall that resisted Julian’s advance.

He reacted instantly.

His own mana flared outward, forming a tight shied around his fragile awareness as the wave crashed against him. For a brief moment the entire world became nothing but blinding light and pressure.

Then he pushed through it.

The heat was strong. Far greater than he would have expected from an automatic defensive response.

Interesting.

He continued forward. He had barely taken three more steps when it appeared.

A black flame.

It manifested without warning. There was no gathering of energy, no visible source and not even build up like the other defenses.

Julian had approximately half a second to recognize what he was looking at.

Then it swallowed him whole.

There was no fighting it. No redirecting it, no protecting against it with the mana he had available at Grand Mage suppression. It hit his consciousness like a wall hits water and in an instant ejected him with a force that snapped him back into his own body so violently that he was pushed backwards.

Infront of him, Kraven remained exactly as he had been.

One second passed.

Then another.

Then a third.

Then his legs gave out entirely.

He collapsed onto the bed beside Kraven, landing heavily on his back. He stared at the ceiling, his breathing labored and uneven. Inside his head, his consciousness felt hollow—like something had reached in, scooped out everything of value, and left the empty shell behind to bake beneath a merciless sun.

The lingering agony from earlier, the relentless drain of mana, and the violent ejection from Kraven’s mind had combined into something far worse. It felt as though pressure was building inside his skull, as if the bones themselves were straining to contain it.

For a long time, he did not move.

The room remained quiet.

Kraven still sat upright at the edge of the bed, blank-eyed and unmoving, an obedient puppet awaiting further instruction.

Julian barely noticed him.

His gaze remained fixed on the ceiling.

“It can’t be,” he said quietly.

The words fell into the silence of the room.

But even as he spoke them, Julian knew the truth.

It was.

He had known it from the very moment the black flame had appeared.

Some knowledge did not require proof.

Some things were understood instantly. The same way the prey knows that its being hunted.

The moment he saw that flame, something inside him reacted.

Because he had seen that power before.

The memory surfaced slowly at first, like something rising through deep water.

The visit to Apollo Kingdom.

Marquis of Ravenswood.

The moment Death’s servant had appeared and how the temperature of everything had dropped.

And surrounding that figure…

The same black energy.

Julian closed his eyes.

He remembered it all.

Julian lay still for another moment, then pushed the pain sideways through sheer will, and sat up.

He had found a lead. He wasn’t going to sleep on it.

He stood, took a deep breath, and reached out, placing his palm against Kraven’s forehead again.

He closed his eyes and went back in.

This time he moved differently. No pushing, no forcing towards the deeper part of the sea of consciousness where the black flame waited. He stopped early, finding the layer where the bubbles of memories floated.

He wasn’t here to breach anything further. He was here to watch.

The memories began to surface around him.

A large castle with the banners of House Astran flying from its towers. The halls blooming with luxury and noise as they celebrated the birth of heir. Julian could feel the joy from the memory—the Duke’s proud face, the Duchess pale and beautiful in her bed with a newborn in her arms, the gathered household expressing congratulations to the duke and duchess.