The Forsaken Hero

The eighth-level mage stumbled back, his eyes widening in alarm as Luke’s jet of raw curse mana smashed into his hastily erected wards. I flinched, half-expecting an earth-shattering explosion or a shockwave to ripple through the valley, but the blast of darkness simply flowed around his magical shield like water.

The mage’s wards held briefly before they thinned and collapsed under their own weight, allowing the insidious curse to seep through. A scream tore from his throat as the shadows dripped onto his exposed skin, searing his flesh black wherever they touched. The darkness didn’t stop there, but crept into his body like a living thing, coursing through his veins and turning them black beneath his now translucent skin.

The curse ravaged the mage, body and soul. Dark tendrils tore into him, rending apart his mana even as he desperately tried to weave another spell. The half-formed runes dissipated as he lost control and crumpled to his knees, his screams echoing through the valley.

The entire exchange, from the mage’s furious bombardment to Luke’s devastating Soul Break, had happened in the blink of an eye, almost too quickly for me to follow. But by the time the mage’s wards had failed, Luke was already casting another spell, this one an eighth-circle incantation.

The demonkin’s staff glowed with an inverted brightness, sucking in the surrounding sunlight instead of glowing on its own. The result was a faint, violet hue that pulsed with a cold, ominous aura, sending chills down my spine.

”He’s insane,” R’lissea muttered, shaking her head.

To begin an eighth-circle spell mid-fight was absolute madness. They took time and focus to cast, and even the slightest distraction could lead to disaster. Backlash from a failed spell at that level could cripple or even outright kill a mage, and no opponent would sit idly by and allow it to happen.

But Luke began the incantation before the effects of his Soul Break were even clear. He had gambled completely on my word alone that Adaptive Resistance would protect him. Now, with the mage incapacitated dealing with his curse, he had bought the time he needed for such a spell.

Would I have been willing to do the same? Could I trust my life to someone I barely even knew?

I shuddered, glancing at R’lissea. If she told me she used a spell that protected me from the slave crest, would I allow someone to place one on me? Maybe, if it was her, but Luke? Could I really trust him as much as he trusted me?

As the minutes crawled by, Luke’s spell continued to gain power. The mana grew so dense it was visible to the naked eye as a dark shimmer in the air. I could practically feel the enemy mage’s frustration, but he was helpless to intervene. It took the whole energy of his soul just to fight the curse gnawing at his soul and purge his body of the darkness.

At the same time, the demons clashed with the remaining soldiers of the fortress in a brutal, chaotic melee. The humans were few in number, but their souls burned with a fiery intensity, none weaker than the sixth level. They slaughtered demons with every spell and technique but had little to show for it. The demon horde cared little for their losses and continued attacking, determined to bury them under a mountain of corpses if that’s what it took.

”Dark Seal!” Luke roared, his voice cutting through the din of battle.

A massive magic circle materialized underfoot, dwarfing the one I’d summoned for Mana Storm. It hovered an inch above the earth on a horizontal plane, most passing intangibly through the mountains on either side of the valley.

Black energy surged from the circle, a suffocating wave of power that pressed against me even from this distance. My chest constricted, and my tail quivered, pressing flat against the ground. The humans’ auras winked out, their bodies seizing as the Dark Seal took hold. They stumbled, looking as if they carried the weight of mountains, each step cracking the ground beneath them. The demons swarmed in, seizing the opportunity to drag their helpless victims into the horde. The sun grew dim as the black power rose into the sky, sending a chilly breeze washing over the valley. At the same time, the shadows around the curse demons flared with newfound power. Their attacks became a whirlwind of darkness while the defenders’ sun magic flickered and waned, struggling to pierce the gloom. ”It’s like Celestial Grace,” R’lissea breathed. Her face was pale, a flicker of fear in her eyes. ”But limited,” I said, trying to reassure myself as much as her. ”Only curse magic, and only within the circle’s reach.” ”Still...so strong...” Elise’s voice was barely audible, her body trembling. Her knuckles were white, and her hands clenched so tightly I thought her nails might draw blood. If she was this affected, how were the humans actually within the spell’s range coping? The thought sent a shiver down my spine.

Just as the Dark Seal cemented into the earth, the eighth-level mage finally purged the lingering remnants of Luke’s curse from his soul. The shadows clinging to his form evaporated as he released his aura once more, but against the overwhelming power of Luke’s spell, it barely pushed the encroaching darkness back a few meager feet.

Luke was already moving. He dismissed his staff, drawing his sword in a single fluid motion. The blade gleamed with a predatory light as he charged, a whirlwind of curses swirling around him. They were darker than ever before, enhanced by the power of his Dark Seal.

The mage began chanting, throwing spell after spell at the charging apostle. It was a barrage equal to his first but mixed with a few seventh-circle spells. He was holding nothing back, burning through his mana at a rate that should have broken his soul.

Luke’s aura flared up whenever a spell got close, siphoning its power and weakening it to the point where it shattered harmlessly against Adaptive Resistance. It was a tactic I’d never witnessed before, a completely new application of curses that hadn’t even crossed my mind. To me, curses were about afflicting pain and controlling others. Could they really be used to do something like this? Was there more to curses than just hurting me?

The mage grew increasingly frantic as Luke emerged from the ensuing explosions completely unscathed, gaining ground with every passing second. When the demonkin closed to within a hundred feet, the mage took a desperate gamble and began casting a seventh-circle spell. It resolved with stunning speed, and a chillingly familiar magic circle materialized in the air above Luke. A shiver raced down my spine as I recognized the attack: Solar Flare.

If it were any other spell, casting something so close to himself would have been an act of suicide. But sun magic possessed a devastating power against demons that it lacked against other mortal races, meaning the ensuing blast would likely fail to even scratch the mage’s own wards, let alone harm him directly.

For Luke, however, it was an entirely different matter. As strong as he was, even he would suffer greatly if struck by a seventh-level sun spell at point-blank range. If he survived the initial damage, he would undoubtedly be inflicted with sun purge, likely far worse than what I had initially suffered when Soltair hurt me with the same spell years ago.

”Luke!” I cried out, my terror-stricken voice a mere whisper in the vastness of the valley. If I were closer, I might have been able to counter or dispel the deadly spell, but from this distance, all I could do was trust in his strength and the protection I’d given him. And I was quickly learning just how fragile that trust truly was.

Luke’s gaze snapped upwards, his face paling as the Solar Flare descended upon him like a vengeful god. The mage had cast it with a speed that defied expectations, catching even Luke completely off guard. He barely had time to gasp, his tail stiffening in shock, before the searing magic engulfed him.

I cried out again, my hands clasped tightly together in a gesture of helpless fear as he vanished within the blinding explosion of sun magic. The shockwave swept outwards, momentarily illuminating the oppressive darkness of the Dark Seal with a terrifying brilliance. But the eighth-circle spell quickly reasserted its dominance, consuming the light and allowing the blast to escape its confines.

I shivered as the residual power washed over me, my horns itching and my skin burning. Adaptive Resistance prevented any actual harm, but my heightened sensitivity to sun magic made itself known with a vengeance, leaving me feeling so intensely uncomfortable that I nearly wept. Yet, it wasn’t the sun magic itself that finally brought tears to my eyes. It was the sight that greeted me when the blinding light of the Solar Flare finally faded.