Chapter 25

A streak of blinding light pierced through the skies, stabbing straight through the neck of the monster. The monster crumbled into thin air, leaving a single magic stone on the ground.

“Woah…”

“What was that, Fortis?”

“Did you really do that?” The three girls gathered around me. We stood in a dungeon, investigating yet another demon-tempered monster. I had just utilized quad-casting, casting four different spells at the same time.

I wasn’t the only one that was able to do that, though. Nayala had shown something similar yesterday, although in her case she utilized four spells from the same element. For my spell, I merged Bind, Cliff, Engulf, and Steel Spear. I had been trying to do that a couple of times before, especially with how closer we were getting to the demon king’s return. It took many tries, and this was the first time it worked.

“Is that not any more powerful compared to White Void?” Emori asked.

“Purely counting strength, no.”

But my combination did come with several effects. Unlike White Void, which was more of a beam, my combination could stick around as long as I kept the spell active, much like a physical spear. That said, the sheer difficulty of the casting wouldn’t allow me to keep it active for long. It would serve more as a distraction rather than for attack.

This monster in particular was already harmed, so it died quickly.

“Could you make stronger combinations, though?” Solicea asked.

I reacted with a shrug. “Maybe yes, maybe no.”

So far, the spells I used were high-damage spells that I used often back in the game. Different spells result in different combinations. A weak spell combined with another weak spell may result in a strong spell. That was why, while this combination wasn’t weak, it wasn’t the most powerful. Whether I could make a stronger one or not depends on whether I have the time to train.

For now, I want to focus on mastering this one.

“Let’s proceed.”

As we went deeper, I constantly tried to use quad-casting against any other monster. The others watched me carefully. I managed to do it three more times, despite failing much more often in between. Whenever I failed, the others were quick to cover me. We made pretty good teamwork, breaking through the waves of monsters within seconds.

“We’re here…” We finally arrived at the deepest floor of the dungeon, evident from the flower symbol on the floor. There were no boss monsters or any monster at all for that matter.

We took a few checks to make sure, looking into corners where something might hide. After failing to find anything significant, we stepped closer to the symbol.

“This connects to the demon king’s castle?” Maya asked, tapping on the floor. The symbol and its surrounding was made out of solid rock, with no visible seam in sight. It certainly didn’t have anything that would hint to it being a regular door. That said, Teleport as a spell exists. There was nothing that said that this floor couldn’t be a magic door. It had been irrelevant so far that I hadn’t paid attention to it.

I tried to sense if there was any flow of mana, but came up empty. I knocked on the floor, even stepped on it, but nothing happened.

Steel Spear! Fire Ball!

I tried stabbing it and burning it, but nothing happened.

… If the demon king is him, and this symbol is connected to him…

I turned to Emori and motioned her to come closer. “Can you try firing White Void into this symbol?”

“You sure?”

I nodded. We all backed away, giving Emori enough space. Emori turned to the flower symbol at the center of the floor, then fired White Void in its full strength. The floor shook, beams of white appearing from many points of the solid stone surface, all piercing up straight to the ceiling.

“What's going on?” Solicea asked as she tried to keep on standing. It was like an earthquake. The scattered lights began moving, heading to the center of the flower. It joined in to form one powerful beam, then disappeared. The floor began moving. The petals separate from each other, opening one by one and disappearing into the sides, revealing one small tunnel underneath the surface.

We all fell silent, peering into the dark abyss.

Light All!

Nothing came to light. There was no torch, no visible ladder, nor a visible end. I could sense intense overflowing mana coming from within the tunnel, not sure where it came from. The sensation reminded me of the anti-magic barriers, albeit less powerful and less chaotic.

“Can we even enter through this thing?” Emori asked.

“Size wise, it’s large enough, I think.” The hole fits a single person. I took my wallet and took out a coin and tossed it into the hole.

“That isn’t important, is it?” Maya asked.

“Just a regular coin, the smallest one.”

No sound came from the hole.

“So it's pretty deep…” Solicea murmured.

I took out my fire and steel wand, using Steel Spear and Engulf, preparing the symbol for Zoom on the side. I shot my combination into the hole. The burning spear flew deep underground. I kneeled by the edge and used Zoom. The streak of fire flew deeper and deeper, before disappearing all of a sudden.

“That’s weird...” Something was off down there. The way the fire simply disappeared all of a sudden was unnatural.

“I’ll contact Miss Nayala.”

“Alright.”

As Emori did that, I thought about more ways to explore this hole safely.

… How about this? Bind!

I sent my vines deep underground, trying to use it to sense if there was anything down there. Magic relied more on eyesight then senses, but some spells does give you some kind of feedback when they touched something, Bind being one of them.

The sensation cut off as roughly the same mark as the flames, but I could sense something beyond that. The part of my spell that extended beyond was heading horizontally to a different direction. I took my compass and checked the direction. The tunnel was heading southwest, toward the South Sea where the demon king’s castle was located.

The path traveled continuously, far beyond the reach of my spell.

“I think what Nayala said is true. This path does leads to the demon king’s castle.”

“Wait, doesn’t that mean the demon king could reach all of Syla and Nanawak?” Solicea panicked.

“Unfortunately, yeah.” The demon king could use the dungeons as a way to sent monsters through, bypassing any defenses put up on the southern borders of either country.

“What should we do, then? Aren’t we all in big trouble?”

“Calm down, Solicea.” Maya patted her head. “Fortis will find a way.”

“Way to dump the responsibility on me.” I turned to Emori. She continued speaking for a bit more before the symbol disappeared from her right eye.

“I told her the news. She’ll come quickly.”

“Okay.”

•••

“So this is the hole?” Nayala peeked through the tunnel. It didn’t take long for her to come after Emori called. Less than ten minutes. While we waited, I tried optimizing my combinations, making spell after spell.

“Your Highness, please be careful,” the mage that accompanied her warned.

Hearing that, Nayala waved her hand and took a step back. “Don’t worry.”

“What should we do about this?” She asked me. I could only shrug. It seemed like a dangerous place to travel through. It wasn’t a place a bunch of school kids like us should venture out to.

“... I’ll deploy some guards here while we think of something. You should all go back for today.”

“Okay.”

I called the others over and used Teleport to retreat back to our manor. Once there, we decided to relax a bit, wandering about the big manor. The girls decided to do a little trip to town, while I teleported to the Eastern Wolves’ base.

“Hey, Kid, here alone?” Amira noticed me coming out of the office and greeted me. Regus stood next to her, carrying a stack of papers.

“You here for something?”

“I’m here to practice, if you don’t mind.”

“Sure. There are some empty spots.” Regus headed into the office to drop off the papers, then motioned me to follow him. The three of us went down to the first floor, to the center field.

“The others are out on a mission, so you’re free to use this field.”

“Thank you. How about you two? You’re not on a mission?”

Amira shook her head. “We just returned from one. Currently awaiting orders.”

“How about we accompany you on your training? If you don’t mind, that is.”

“I don’t mind, but I’m here to solo train.”

I couldn’t use quad-casting consistently yet. I wouldn’t be able to win against anyone with it.

“Sure. Need a training dummy?”

“If you have one.”

This was the first time Regus offered me something like that though, probably because I usually spar with other wolves when I came here. Regus went to a nearby warehouse and pulled out a training dummy. He then put up a Duel Shield over us. I concentrated. I took a deep breath, then started by making sure I had all four wands held in my hand.

I made four different circles in front of the dummy. Silver, brown, dark green, and red. I then merged them, silver on the top left, brown on top right, dark green on bottom left, and finally red on bottom right. I then painted the symbol for Steel Spear, Cliff, Bind, and last Engulf, painting them all half full. Once I was ready to strike, I completed the symbols at the same time, fusing the spells into one.

What resulted was a burning, rocky spear that stabbed straight at the dummy. The dummy was thrown into the wall of the Duel Shield. It was undamaged thanks to the Duel Shield, but the effects of the spell were clear from how harsh it was thrown.

“You’re growing more impressive by the day. I couldn’t believe you’ve learnt to do quad-casting.”

“I’m still learning. I could only work with this combination.”

In the past, I had used multiple combinations from many different spells. Learning them in game took a lot of effort, I couldn't even imagine the amount it would take for me to learn it here.

With our recent discoveries, even with a chance to take the fight directly to the demon king, it would limit the time I have for learning. I don't really have the luxury to learn a lot of spells, especially not the harder, damage oriented ones, although I most likely wouldn't need them.

Asytelar didn't know about Emori’s White Void when she brought me here. It would be better for me to take a more support-oriented role, leaving the damage dealing to Emori.

I repeated the spell again and again. I still failed a couple of times, but I grew more accustomed to it with each attack. The two Wolves continued observing me.

“Should I try moving the dummy?” Regus asked.

“You can’t do that from outside a Duel Shield?” The Duel Shield locked out all influence from the outside, regardless of the origin. It ensured a fair fight between the two inside the shield.

“Oh, right. How about Amira fighting you?”

“Dumping it on me now? Well, I guess some light training wouldn’t be too bad.”

Regus disabled the spell and Amira stepped forward into the field. Using the same spell, Regus once again engulfed us inside the Duel Shield.

“This might hurt, you know?” I asked to make sure. I didn’t want to send her to a clinic much like what Emori did to Akareseki. Amira isn’t my enemy.

“I’ll endure it, somehow.” She looked confident, at least.

“I’m here to train unleashing the spell, so please go easy on me.” I had yet to achieve full control of the spell, so fighting someone with it was unpreferable.

“Alright, I’ll let you do the opening move.”

I was a bit worried, as a mistake might cost her life. Despite nullifying all the damage received from an attack, it wasn’t made for fights to the death. Most of the time, this spell is used for wooden sword duels. Not that it couldn’t handle anything more, but the circumstances were different from when Emori fought Akareseki. Neither of us have something we must fight for.

“...”

I decided to consciously hold myself back. If I could handle Amira without going all out, then I would have a better chance at fighting the demon king, even if only by a small bit.

I began painting a magic circle, and at that exact moment, Amira rushed me.

“He- Hey!”

She brought down her dagger with full strength. Despite being an info-dealer, she wasn’t lacking in the physical department. The blade moves fast, barely a millimeter away from my face.

“What happened to holding back?” I yelled. Amira returned my shout with a smirk.

“I said you can do the opening move, not that I will hold back.”

“I hadn’t even fired a spell yet!”

“I let you form a circle.”

That doesn’t count!

Besides, the circle hadn’t even taken on its complete form yet. Amira looked like she had enough talking and began striking, chasing after me like a wild cheetah. I fired off Bind, trying to buy time for myself. The spells missed their target, and once again the dagger flew close to the tip of my nose.

I managed to jump back in time, then used Fire Ball to try to push her back. She leaped away, dodging the flames. I followed it up with a Steel Spear, then Flower Field to put distance between us.

“You can’t always run, Kid!”

“Yeah, but give me some time! I just learnt this recently!”

Just because I was a bit higher than them in levels, didn’t mean I could do everything instantly. I still needed some practice.

I concentrated, once again forming a circle with the four colors. Silver, brown, dark green, red. I merged them and formed four different symbols in my vision, not completing them. I looked for Amira, keeping my concentration on the symbols.

I disabled Flower Field, noticing a shadow leaping straight at me from my right. I adjusted the circle and completed all four symbols at the same time. A streak of light sliced through the sky. Amira attempted to jump, but was a second too slow. The light slammed straight into her and sent her flying to the Duel Shield’s wall.

She flopped down to the floor like an inflated balloon.

I quickly ran up to her. “Are you alright?” I asked, extending my hand. She held her stomach, where the spell hit, then gazed up at me.

“It… surprisingly… it’s… hurt…”

“Are you alright?”

She held onto my hand and lifted herself up, the Duel Shield still active above us.

“The pain… wait…”

I supported her for a few seconds, before finally being able to stand on her own. Once she was back to normal, the Duel Shield went off.

“So, how was it?” Regus asked. “How does being on the receiving end feel?”

“The Kid’s impressive, really. Quad-casting, a powerful one at that.”

That’s still not the most powerful combination in the game, though.

Interesting enough, the most powerful one in the game came from a seemingly random combination of spells. The most powerful combination I knew, at least. It wasn’t listed in any website, a combination I found after messing around in some spells out of boredom. I used it in PvP duels often, resulting in cheating accusations.

I haven’t tried it here because I rarely use the spells that form it, making it harder to create.

“Do you still feel any pain?” I asked just to make sure. Amira’s breathing was still heavy, but she had calmed down a bit. She stretched her limbs and shook her head.

“All gone. The amount I felt when it hit was crazy. Not even a stab from a sword could rival that.”

A Duel Shield didn’t simulate stab wounds the same way a regular attack did, though. That’s because Duel Shield nullifies all damage, and some pain came from the damage itself, hence why even though it’s fairly realistic, the amount of pain couldn’t be compared to actually getting hurt.

Although, in such extreme cases, you’ll be dead anyway.

“Makes me want to try it myself.”

What are you two talking about?

I sighed. “Who’ll be creating the Duel Shield?”

Regus turned to Amira, who took a step back. “No thanks. I don’t want to be blamed for your death.”

“Hey. The point of one is so the participants don’t die.”

“I’m not confident in my abilities, so no thank you.”

“Fine, I’ll try it sometime. Want to eat something, Fortisbel? My treat.”

“Uh, sure.”

I went with the two to the cafeteria and enjoyed some food together.