Mwahaha! It is I! the great one capable of posting two 2k+ Word chapters in a single day! Fear me and hear me snore! -Collapses-
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It's been a week since I was removed from the family before I even had a chance to really join, grandfather has found me a two story three bed two bathroom house with a sizable basement. He wasn’t able to spare too much money at the nagging of his brother but he was able to help convert the basement into a Arcane Lab and one of the upstairs bedrooms to a study with a modest library on various magics which I finished reading in the first few days.
I also received several sets of t-shirts, jeans and a light gray hoodie that I always wore since it was thin enough for hot weather and pretty soft.
It all felt a little too big for one person but that might have just been my nervousness about living alone. Over the past week my abilities have advanced far more than before, with special vitamins and pills provided by grandfather it began to grow in leaps and bounds. I also grandfather ask for an Elvae tutor on Telepathy to come later today. I still had a week and a half before school started so I made sure to use the most of my time.
I made a quick bowl of cereal and descended into the basement, There was a lot of odd tools lying about but from what I could tell there was an alchemy or chemistry station, having plenty of flasks, heaters, and plenty of other bits and pieces. In another area there was a Array creation area, with basic elemental chalk, various crystals, and a protection array to prevent any mishaps from spreading away from the circle. Up against the wall there was a computer connected to a projector aimed at the wall so that I could copy any instructions without having to walk over to check the screen.
To get started I hopped down in front of the computer, quickly starting it up and researching into mana cores. There wasn't too much, mainly a large amount of baseless theories but I had a few things I had prepared to try.
Hopping out of my chair I walk over to the Array station, I will a piece of Darkness chalk into the air, Focusing and willing it to draw a circle with various symbols for break, deconstruct, and mist. I then take a black sphere from a crate of similar orbs and casually toss it into the center of the circle, where is suspends and begins to fade apart. Turning into a black mist that fills the protection barrier. Once it all turns to mist I make a minor alteration in the deconstruction array, adding runes for self. Causing the array to fade into the mist as well.
I then strip off my clothes to reveal my body covered in runes, the ones on my body made with holy ink, as to counter act with the dark attribute and a single rune for 'Merge' written on my forehead in Dark ink.
Silently I step into the protection array, Immediately being covered in the darkness. This will be my fifth attempt at increasing my affinity, and at the rate of times I almost exploded I’m not sure if I should continue.
The mist is thick and feels almost as if wading through water. I activate Focus to my current Maximum ability, which is 6x. And split my attention between the mana core in my mind, the mist, and the 'merge' rune on my forehead. It’s minorly difficult to split my attention onto three different things but I can manage it as long as there is no distractions.
I then spread my consciousness out, using telepathy to create a barrier around the darkness that slowly closes in, pushing the darkness to become thicker and flow into the merge symbol like a whirlpool.
Groaning in pain I continue to force the barrier closer, my nose begins to bleed either from the from effort or from the darkness. As I continue to absorb the energy the blood begins to grow darker in color until it’s entirely black. But soon enough all of the energy has flowed inside of my head. I quickly cancel my focus and sit on the ground, panting heavily. Wiping my hand across my nose I stare in concern at the black blood.
Perhaps it’s just an odd side effect... I stand up and walk over to the alchemy station. Taking a tube and a surgical knife from the table, making a cut across my hand and squeezing it into the tube which I quickly put the top on it. Wrapping up my hand before walking over to the testing tablet by the computer grandfather had given me. I place my uninjured hand on it and wait for the results.
The darkness affinity has gone up to 5.1%, I smile. Wonder how much farther I can increase it like this.. And then there's the other elements.. And could it be used on others? There's really only one way to find out. Testing and more testing.
I begin to make preparations for another 'darkness imbuement' when I pause. This all feels.. off. I don't remember this being how I usually act.. Could it be the effect of the dark attribute? Likely, then if I were to increase light it would probably cancel itself out.. However this personality isn’t too bad. I could get used to it. I grin and continue with the preparations, repeating the same process over leaves me with bloodshot eyes and another bloody nose, however this time the blood is perfectly black.
Quickly I hop upstairs and into the shower, cleaning off all of the black ink. I then throw on my clothes, head back downstairs and sit down at the desk.
"Could I take other people's attributes? Its probably denser for those who are born with it so I'd probably gain more. I'd have to kill them though, which might be problematic to hide.." I talk to myself as I write down notes.
While I’m busy there’s a loud knock on the front door. Sighing I stand up, and head upstairs, I find Aavin standing there, alongside a girl about my age with similar features, namely the blonde hair, blue eyes and ears. She had an hourglass figure and wore what seemed like a school uniform.
"What can I help you both with?" I give the girl a quick glance which causes her to tremble before turning my attention to Aavin.
"Boy... What happened to your eyes?" He questioned me concerned.
"My eyes...? I glance at my reflection in the door to find my originally blue eyes had turned black and dark veins seemed to spread out from them. "Oh, that would be a minor side effect to an otherwise successful experiment. But what did you need. Are you here for the tutoring? Either way come on in." I glance them over carefully, The old man probably has lots of affinity, I don't believe he knows about the telekinesis so if I just distract him I could drive a kitchen knife through his neck... No, there’s likely others who know that he came here. Not to mention the girl.
Suddenly Aavin grabs my face, after a moment of confusion I find out what is going on. "Shit! Telepathy!" I will several kitchen knives into the air and send them hurling towards his back.
He swiftly moves out of the way of the knives but I turn them towards him, embedding one into his shoulder and the other into his lower back.
Before I have the chance to push the blade deeper in he slams my head into the kitchen counter, cleanly knocking me out.
.......
I groan in pain as my eyes flutter open, Remembering what happened I quickly sit up, I’m in my basement inside of the protection array, with a piece of white chalk, a white sphere, a bowl of dark and light ink. Over at the desk I see Aavin and the girl sitting and watching me. "What the hell are you doing?"
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
I step forward, hitting my head off of the barrier. Glancing down at the runic symbols I curse in my head. They altered the pattern to contain all, not just magic.
Attempting to use telekinesis I find myself totally unable to reach anything outside of the barrier.
"Hm, I’m not angry. If anything I am impressed, I read your notes here. Never would I have imagined that you could improve your affinity, let alone in a week." Aavin speaks.
I snort. "I’m a fast learner, what can I say. Now let me out." Growling under my breath I stare at him.
"Not going to happen, at least not until you fixed what you’ve done to yourself. From what this says everything you need is inside of the circle. So once you perform your ritual twice with light magic you will hopefully be back to normal."
"Fuck you old man! Like hell I'm going to be bossed around any more!" I concentrate, forming a spike out of telekinetic energy, spinning it as fast as I can and drilling it into the wall. It manages to hold for a few moments but a small fracture begins to appear, slowly spreading out.
"Shit kid! Get a hold of yourself!" He makes several incantations, causing the barrier to repair itself and grow thicker. "I thought that would have been enough to hold you but it seems I underestimated you. However I have much more experience in magic and I can strengthen this barrier all day."
The spike fades away as I calm down, it seems that my only way out is to use the array.. I don’t even have the materials to make something to break me out. 'Fine, Ill do it." I take the chalk and recreate the array from earlier, with separate runic symbols to replace the dark ones.
I then strip of my clothes, smirking at the girl who blushes furiously and look away as I do so. "Uwahh, I can’t believe an old man is making me strip, how scary." I mock him as I will the white ink up into the air, painting itself onto me as I enter Focus for precision as I form the runes.
It doesn’t take long and I deconstruct the sphere, and then the chalk. Repeating the process from before as I condense it into my skull, pitch black blood drips from my nose, slowly turning lighter as it fades.
I sit down on the floor to take a quick break, not bothering to put on clothes and look at them. "So who's the girl?" I look her over. "Y'know it’s not polite to leave me as the only one naked here, I mean really. Proper guest manners."
Aavin frowns as he stares with a slight trace of killing intent. "That girl is my granddaughter, Madri."
"Woah gramps, Calm the hostility. I get it, I was wrong to openly speak of my intentions for your little girl." I continue to smirk as I stand up and begin the second ritual. This time when my nose bleeds it is gray.
Once it is finished I really want to cry. "I-I-I'm sorry! I really didn’t mean it! I didn’t think there would be such horrible side effects, thank you for helping me return to normal!" I bow up and down.
He sighs "It’s fine, I know you were influenced by the darkness, Now let me get you out of there." He quickly reverts the Array to normal, where it will only block magic and I walk out.
"I swear, from now on I’ll increase the elements balanced with their opposites. So I don’t end up so different." I can still feel the darkness inside of me but now there is also the light. They're creating a balance.
"Err.. How is your back?" I question him, thinking back to the knives I tried to drive through him.
"Hah, That was easy to fix up, you almost had me with that chantless telekinesis. It's rather impressive. How did you manage to learn runes and arrays so well though? There's countless runes that need to be memorized, not to mention what they do when connected to other runes."
I smile lightly. "Oh that’s pretty simple, It's just memorizing. And I have a really good memory." I glance over at his granddaughter who stands silently. "Ahhh.. Sorry for stripping in front of you.." I bow with my face bright red.
"Its.. Its fine..." She mutters as she looks at her feet.
"Hah, memory, you have no clue how many arrayist's you would make cry. At this rate you'll have your potential up to standards in no time at all."
"If only it was that easy, I feel like ten percent is the highest I can manage with these resources, I need stuff with more dense and powerful mana." I look at them pondering something. "Say.. what's your granddaughters Affinities?"
"Well, She has 60% in nature and 40% in water. Why do you ask? Do you think you could raise it?" He questions excitedly.
"What do you mean nature affinity? That wasn’t on the test from before."
"Ah, it's a unique magic to the elvae only, it’s why our appearance is more beautiful, but back to raising affinity of others...?"
"Right, I could likely raise anyone's, as long as I had the right materials... What I’m getting at here is a partnership, you supply me with resources to raise my own, and I can raise you and your Families as long as you keep it secret that I raised it for now, I don’t currently have the protection of the Stratyn family and I don’t want to get kidnapped.. And by supplies I also mean the types that I can use to give myself Nature affinity as well."
"You think you could gain nature affinity? Really?"
"You ask a lot of questions.. But yes I should be able too, it’s a type of magic just like any other. It’s just unlikely for people to be born with it. Do we have a deal? Though I won't be able to raise an affinity past a certain point so I suggest raising one that you don’t have an affinity for, but not darkness. Possibly light if you want to be a better person, otherwise just go with something elemental. Basic ones should like fire, earth, wind, water, or lightning shouldn’t affect your personality."
He nods his head. "I agree to your terms. Ill bring you all of the supplies you need and you can decide how many people you want to enhance."
"That seems rather one sided in my favor..." All the supplies I need, That seems too good.
"You don't seem to understand the worth of increasing your affinity, it means you are more capable of using that style of magic and it will be more effective and controllable. It's different from just increasing mana capacity, there are many ways to do that."
"Alright then. I’m glad we both benefit so much." Grinning slightly I shake his hand. "Oh I totally forgot, Why are you here?"
"Ah, I originally came to train you and my daughter in telepathy but it seems I’ve been here for too long as is, I’ll have to come over next saturday if that’s alright with you. However I can drop by tomorrow and give you some supplies for increasing your affinity. I’m intrigued to see how high you can go in this week before school." He says as he gets up and leads his daughter towards the door, she waves lightly but says nothing, likely still freaked out by the whole naked thing. I don't really blame her.
I show them to the door before sitting down on the living room back, sighing deeply and turning on the television. "It’s been a damn long day yet I didn't even go outside."
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Thank you for reading~ Please comment what you think follow if you like and all the good stuff! I have a lot of stuff I want to do! Eventually some different world action~ :3