Hera analyzed the same spells countless times, but eventually, she managed to reach a conclusion that made sense. That didn't mean it was easy or even that it was a logical assumption, but it was the only possible option. The wrapping that was setting up the spell was no wrapping at all. Instead, it was like a blueprint. Something that would explain to the incoming mana how to act and what to do. In essence, it was a spell that made a spell. It was kind of funny how that ended up being the guide for the spell, but when thinking about it, it made a lot of sense. No one was entirely sure, but people assumed that magic was something created by the system and that the system was lazy. Because of that, having a guide for each spell, so it wouldn't have to worry about controlling the strength of the more powerful magic, sounded like something the system would do.

That being said, replicating the effect was very complicated. Hera never made 'smart magic,' and the concept itself felt odd. Magic was something very contradictory by default. To make a spell, you had to give orders and instructions, forcing the mana to act in a way that wasn't supposed to, but the result was something more natural, yet artificial at the same time. However, the instructions had to be given first to allow the rest of the spell to work normally. In fact, many mages argued that the instruction part of the spells did not include mana on itself, but they were a language that would help translate what people wanted mana to do. The concept Hera was trying to follow right now still was, in its essence, the same thing. But instead of just telling what the mana would do, she would have to teach the mana to tell others what to do.

Scratching her head, she started by making a spell very small, small enough so it could be part of a single particle of mana. Unfortunately, that seemed impossible. Even if she made the tiny spell circle, the mana wouldn't go through it. She couldn't force the mana to do anything it didn't want to. After some attempts at ordering the mana around, she realized this wasn't going to get her anywhere. The path to replicate a fraction of the power those spells had wasn't this, but she didn't know what it would be.

"Do you want my help?" the curse asked, almost as if taunting Hera.

She stopped working for a moment and turned towards where she heard the voice. The silhouette was standing there. Still a hole in the fabric of reality, but she didn't say anything else. After waiting a few moments trying to get a read on the body without actually looking directly at it, she turned back to her work once again and started pushing more mana into the spell.

"That won't work," the curse chuckled.

"Oh, and you know what will?" Hera huffed.

"As a matter of fact. Yes"

"How? Is it all from experience? Are you trying to get better at magic too?"

"My purpose is to grow. In any way possible," the curse went back to being cryptic, and Hera couldn't tell why.

"Did you already know how to do this?"

"No."

"When did you learn?"

"A few moments ago."

"What?" Hera glanced back again, but this time there was no response, "Did you learn how to do this through me?"

There was a long pause, "Yes."

"So I already found the answer?"

"Not exactly."

"What do you mean?"

"Are you asking for help?"

"Just answer my damn question!" Hera barked.

"You have reached a conclusion but took an approach that was a bit too literal. The answer is much more simple than you are imagining," the curse replied, its voice becoming clearer in Hera's mind.

Even without hearing the actual words, the Empress understood what it meant. Her attempts were about making each particle of mana be able to teach the entire spell. But that wasn't a good way to go about it. She was too focused on the idea that the effect happened like a cake, where a single person had to make it, or in this case, a single particle had to make the entire spell. What if she considered this as a bakery? There was the cook, the cashier, the HR, the janitor, the marketing, and the owner. What if, instead of teaching all the spells to each particle of mana, she would, instead, teach it just a little? Breaking it all down into small pieces could teach or guide the rest of the mana in the right direction. Expanding from her new theory, maybe the mana that was being pulled out was like the produce that the bakery needed. There could be a part of the spell dedicated to pull the ambient mana inside. This would require two more 'jobs' for the mana. One checked if all the parts of the spell had the same amount of mana, and another told the ambient mana where to go.

Feeling energized, Hera started working again. This time, she stopped trying to make a version of the spell Dao or Core were using, instead, she used the spell she knew best. Poison Needle. She started slowly, focusing first on breaking down her spell into its most basic pieces. First, the poison itself, then the movement. Those pieces worked by themselves, but if she tried to cast the spell, it would just plop to the ground. There was more that she needed to realize about the magic so it could work. Hera kept going, inching closer to the result she wanted, but it was always out of reach. After another dozen attempts, the Empress found something weird. By all accounts, she had all the pieces of the puzzle, but they didn't fit together. She had pieces of mana taking care of the size, the pierce effect, the speed, the direction of the movement, the wrapping of the needle, everything, but when she placed it all together, the spell just crashed as if it was a balloon that just pooped. During this last, she managed to prepare everything very quickly, being almost fast enough to be used in the middle of a fight, and instead of feeling the spell breaking apart from inside, she felt like some outside force was responsible for it.

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The Empress stopped and looked back to the 'shape' where the curse existed, "Are you doing something?"

"What do you mean?" the curse replied without missing a beat as if it knew she was going to ask a question.

"Are you messing with the spell, so I have to ask you for help?"

"Is there a reason to do that?"

"Of course there is!" Hera scoffed, "You just want to grow, and I don't trust for a moment that you can't lie. Now answer me, are you messing with this spell?"

"Unfortunately, you don't have enough time to hear the answer," the curse replied with a happy voice.

"What do you-" Hera was suddenly tossed to the side as if gravity had shifted and, instead of pulling her down, was pulling her horizontally. She felt a burning sensation on her cheek, and just as she was about to be impaled on a nearby branch, she opened her eyes- "What the hell?"

Hera groaned. She was currently on the floor by her bed, and she could feel her heartbeat on her cheek, not to mention a sharp pain on the side of her face. Looking up, she saw Blue with a mix of worry and anger and the rest of her party behind her.

"Are you back?" Blue asked.

"Back? Yeah, I guess."

"Did you lose a tooth?"

"What?" Hera used her tongue to check if everything was ok, "No. They are all here."

"Good," Blue reached out to help her friend get up, but as the Empress did so, she was slammed against the back wall, "Now, what the fuck were you thinking, Hera!"

"Fuck! What is the matter with you?" Hera yelled back.

"We got here, and you were in some sort of trance. We could see the curse spreading! We tried waking you up, I even slapped the shit out of you but nothing. When the veins started forming that weird pattern on your forehead, I just punched you in the face, hoping you would pass out or wake up," Blue continued yelling. This time, her face was almost touching Hera's.

"I was just using the curse for a thing," Hera tried to push Blue back, but she wasn't strong enough, not without any buffs.

"And that explains it?" Bonnie gasped, "Hera, we all agreed that we wouldn't do this alone and that if anyone needed to call the curse, they would let the others know."

"I told Nimbus, Lurize, and Daskka. They could have let you guys know," Hera glanced at her three court members who were by the side.

"We couldn't…" Lurize was staring at the floor.

"Why?"

"Because you told them never to interact or do anything that could make the curse worse. That includes talking about the curse with others," Daskka explained.

"What? That doesn't make any sense. You guys talked about the curse before," Hera looked at Nimbus with a confused expression.

"I don't have an answer for that. Only that when you were meditating, we couldn't talk about the curse," the Sentinel Explained.

"And what was so important that you had to talk with the curse?" Helena asked.

"I was trying to replicate that effect from when I got a billion stats," Hera replied.

"Did it actually reach a billion?" Bonnie stepped forward, crowding the already crowded room.

"I don't know. I don't think so. But magic acted in a different way, and I was trying to make it work like that."

"Different, how?" Bonnie asked.

"Is this really important right now? She is just as bad as Alex," Blue turned around, "Where is Alex, by the way?"

"She's not with you?" Hera asked.

"No, she wasn't here when we arrived," Adriel replied.

"Where is she then? Sammy!" Hera called, remembering why she wanted everyone together.

"She's in the woods. I can take you guys there, but we have bigger problems right now," Sammy had a worried expression as soon as he appeared.

Before anyone could ask what was going on, they heard shouting and a loud rattling sound from outside. This was the signal that the village was under attack, and they needed all hands on deck. The group got their weapons, but before heading out, Adriel turned to Sammy.

"Where is Alex?"

"She is outside the village. In the forest, but she is not listening when I call her. It's very similar to what happened with Hera. I think the curse is blocking me from talking to her," Sammy replied.

"And where is she? We need to get her to safety," Adriel pressed.

"You don't. Whatever is attacking the village is ignoring her. For some reason. I don't want to sound the alarms, but I feel like this is related to the curse, and that's why she's safe."

"Then what are we supposed to do? Just leave her there?" Bonnie asked.

"Yes. That's what I'm asking you to do. At least for now," Sammy replied.

"I knew we should all be together," Hera grumbled as she left the house and noticed the dark sky, "How long was I out for?"

"About 7 hours. Everyone was really worried," Blue walked out and looked around. She saw Berylla running toward the entrance gate, "Where do you need us?"

"Take the north wall. Those bugs are everywhere!" the beastwoman replied.

"Let's go!" Blue glanced back and started moving, but Shane grabbed her wrist, stopping her.

"Hang on. Sammy, are you positive Alex is safe? You said it yourself, the timeline will fix itself, so these people are dead one way or another. Shouldn't we go after Alex?"

Sammy nodded. He knew she was safe because an effect was surrounding her that turned her into what was essentially a ghost inside a memory. It was a very similar effect to what Sammy himself did when traveling through someone's past, but he didn't know how Alex managed to do that. Worst of all, he feared that if he or anyone else interacted with her directly now, it would spill the beans to the curse, showing that they were not in the past but inside a memory. That's why he was trying to believe that all of this was related to the curse. If it wasn't, then all of their efforts might have gone to waste.

"I'm sure. She is fine, no monster will try to attack her. It is like they see her as one of them. Leaving the village might look like a good idea, but it's not. Even if we assume the monsters are part of the curse because of what is happening with Alex, we don't know for sure. Until we have more information, we should act like the people here are still suspects."

"But if they are suspects, wouldn't it be better to just let them die? That way, we don't even have to destroy the curse ourselves," Blue suggested.

"That is only the case if we know for sure that the curse was not born yet. If someone is already cursed and a monster kills them, then we might have to chase after that monster through the woods, making sure it wouldn't spread to other monsters by either being killed and eaten or just procreating. In the end, dealing with cursed people would be much easier than cursed monsters," Sammy replied.

"But what if-" before Bonnie could say anything, a loud noise rang in the wall behind their house.

Hera sent Armory up to see what was going on, and the tiara gave some intel as soon as she could, 'In the end, Alex wasn't completely wrong,' the tiara replied when she got high enough to peek beyond the walls.

"Why is that?"

'We are dealing with an army of ants.'