The answer to his internal question was as painfully obvious as it had been the last time. Nothing, and he meant nothing, beats lightning, except MOAH LIGHTNING.

Despite the sense of a weak resonance, he mentally tried to force the explosive circuit to combine with the Arcane Spark spell. The two concepts in his mental library slid past each other, rebuffing one another with each attempt. Briefly he considered changing what he was trying to do. Maybe he really should just hold onto the shard? Maybe there would be a better combination or the opportunity to incorporate multiple circuits together? What were the chances though that there would be another or many others of Them which were empowered by broken bits of magical Artifacts? That sort of thing would only happen as some convenient plot device in poorly written web novels where the readers could choose the main character’s fate.

He looked around for a moment, feeling as if there was some foreign presence. Whatever it was, the feeling left as quickly as it had arrived. Was there someone or rather, something watching him? Was that how he’d gotten here in the first place? Had they, it, taken away his memories, stripped him of his individual substance?

Were they sending Them to attack him?

He once again mulled over the shard. He’d need to make the combination soon. Within a minute the nearest of Them would come close enough for a Spark. If he could make the combination quickly, he could test out the changes. The shifting colors of the broken piece of magical hardware taunted him as the spell and circuit once again refused to combine. And again. And again. They were resisting a little less each time though. The combination with the Shadow circuit kept trying to grab hold instead. Mana Bolt screamed to be the choice over Arcane Spark.

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He refused. He would make these spells HIS. They would listen to HIM. THEY. WOULD. COMBINE.

As Arcane Spark ripped apart and recombined, the circuit etched into its structure like a cancerous growth, the shard crumbled into Chaos. The released energies were pulled easily into his center, swirling around and purifying to Mana, joining the nearly full core. The first of Them was well within range of a Bolt, but he smiled, hypothetically since he didn’t feel his face move at all with the attempt, and begin building the warped structure of the modified Arcane Spark spell instead.

It fought his mental control. The spell was wrong, perverted, imbalanced. Yet form it did. Compared to exerting his will to make the combination, building the spell was easy. As the first of Them stepped within range of the original Spark, he poured Mana into it. The structure of the modified spell practically screamed. His Shadow rippled much as it had when the insectoid had managed to shriek despite the lack of air. Mana built and built in a resonant loop within the spell. His excitement began to turn to cold dread as he felt the resonance reach a critical point within him.

The first of Them was about to be within reach. Charging the spell was taking too long. Worse, it seemed like it intended to simply detonate rather than provide any useful effect. Had he crippled himself? Lost his ability to utilize the spell? Would he… would he even survive the backlash if it failed? Perhaps he could stop it! Yes, yes, perhaps he could rip out the modification even and regain the use of the spell again! He just needed to survive the still spawning waves of Them long enough to get a moment to focus on it.

Mana Bolt started forming as he glided backwards from those of Them nearest him. They were coming from all directions though and he’d spent far too much time trying to play around with his newly broken spell. A Bolt went wide, the building and screaming resonance within him shaking his Shadow so violently now his aim was being thrown off.

If only he’d chosen differently…