Magic. Was. Frustrating. It took far too much time and energy to learn, and you never got to the point where you could smite your enemies. Of course, he didn't actually have any enemies, but that was completely beside the point. No, magic, while being a powerful force of change, was also one that was weak enough to mimic random chance. Arren knew this as well as anyone, but knowing how something works and accepting it are two different things. He had tried to let go of his childish desires for years, but in the end, Arren really longed for the magic of fantasy. It was something most practitioners of magic scoffed at, but he couldn’t quite let go of the idea of casting fireballs and flying.
Not that Arren would ever admit to such things; if he did, people would think less of him. As it was the magical community viewed him as a prodigy, a position he had worked hard for. Ever since he was a child he had sought magic, always yearning to fill the hunger within him. He worked hard and as a result, he had progressed abnormally fast compared to his peers. Not that there were many of his age involved with witchcraft, most never bothered to consider magic, fewer still kept with it, but even among those who earnestly sought it out, it was a long and arduous journey. What made him special was his hunger for it, not the power in or of itself, but magic, raw, undiluted magic. He only felt whole when casting spells and working rituals, as if he could finally be more than a husk, be himself, be alive.
This fervor had shaped him, guided his actions; it was what had caused him to strive for knowledge, and what had seen him initiated as a high priest at twenty-one. That was what had really caught the eyes of the pagan community. Many of them remarked on his ability in rituals and the power he displayed in spell work, a few were jealous. The elders saw him as a young man with a powerful future, the power hungry and weak saw a child with too much power. In his own eyes, Arren saw only continued failure. Even if his standards were unfair.
On a logical level he knew that his dreams were unrealistic, magic was far too weak on earth, and pursuing magic and mysticism in a world so devoid of power was useless, still he pressed on. He would spend hours with his nose buried in dusty old tomes, if there was a book about witchcraft he would read it. Well, there were some exceptions; when someone tried to tell him about the virtues of amethysts to relieve stress and quarts for a clear my mind he would tell them to fuck of. New age idiocy wasn’t something he indulged in. He would rather read the tales of the old gods or work his way through Solomonic summoning circles and spells than listen to women extoling the virtues of fairies.
He found power while searching, but not the power he had wanted. Many of his friends and family tried to tell him that witchcraft was meaningless, that it didn’t work. He disagreed, but he couldn't disprove them either, the problem with the magic, as he saw it, wasn’t that it didn’t work, it was that it was slow. He could reach out with his power to affect the weather, though the effects could take hours, even days to manifest. He appreciated it for what it was, but wanted more, magic powerful enough that no man could deny its existence.
It was in pursuit of such power that he found himself sitting on the hard, wooden floor of his apartment, three white circles painted around him. Within the inner circle was a square, within it a six-pointed star, finally the star was intersected with an equidistant cross reaching out to the circle with elemental symbols painted in the center.
The circle was of his own design, he called it the world circle, for combined with the ritual he had prepared it would reform the world. His would draw on the power of the endless planes of existence, to bring magic to earth. If he succeeded his name would go down in history, though as a hero or a villain he couldn’t be sure
Arren sat inside the circle; he breathed in the soft scent of the candles and started centering himself; of all the rituals he had ever performed, this one would require the most of him. He breathed deeply, and for a while, he simply sat there feeding mana throughout his veins, letting it ripple throughout his body. When the mana began flowing in a steady stream he channeled it into his voice and started chanting.
At first it was a slow, deep and quiet bass. As he went on the volume and speed built up, the heavy notes echoed of the walls of his apartment. He lost himself in the ecstasy of ritual, he didn't notice or care about the volume, damn what his neighbors heard, he couldn’t care less. His bass rose higher, losing and transcending the note as he built both speed and tone. The words themselves were meaningless, but in his frenzied mind, he found meaning to them. In truth, it was less a language and more of a verbalization of emotion and desire; it was one of the most primal forms of magic, but he needed that chaotic power. It wasn't pretty or civilized, but what it lacked in sophistication, it made up for in raw power. Most magicians craved control, control that the primal chaos banished. It was dangerous, as Arren was no longer in control of the ritual, but he knew the power needed was an uncontrollable one, so for once, he surrendered himself to the chaos at let it guide, build and break him.
His voice rose and fell with the beating of his heart. He cast his mind out into the chaos and drew all the power he could find. The air became colder, yet he didn't notice, too lost in the ritual he was carried on his own voice and power as he soared into ecstasy. His eyes closed in concentration, the chant spilling from his lips guiding a torrent of power into his body. It was unlike anything he had ever felt, as if his body was rapidly ripped apart, then repaired again, the power both poison and medicine. The moment drew into infinity as he cycled through bliss and agony in turn. He didn't control the chant anymore, he didn’t have to, or want to. His voice kept rising and falling slowly building to rapturous shout. As he screamed out the last word of his spell he opened his eyes to lines of energy enveloping him before a flash of light threw him into darkness.
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Arren woke up slowly, his body spread out on the cold ground beneath him. He felt light-headed and fatigued. His fingers scratched the dirt he was laying on, strange he thought, there shouldn’t be dirt in his apartment. He opened his eyes to look around, but there was only darkness. Confusion overcame his mind, what the hell happened?
Turning over he stretched his arms out but he could only find more cool ground, no wooden floor, no half-melted candles, nothing but dirt. He sat up slowly, carefully, in case he was in a confined space, he felt around above him for a roof, but his hands met only air. He wanted to stand and look around, but his body still felt wrecked and his mind was sluggish. Perhaps the last was a good thing, or panic might have overtaken him.
A flash of light in front of him, caused him to fall backwards in shock. The space around him was still entirely dark; yet hovering in front of him was a translucent box.
Down the rabbit hole
Magic is not for the weak, wane, or the stupid. Trying to tear a hole in the fabric of reality is an act that normally results in death, yet somehow, probably through dumb luck, you seem to be alive. Have Fun.
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
What the actual fuck?! Message boxes belonged in games, certainly not in reality, hovering in the air before him. Clearly the incense he had used was a bit too potent and was fucking with him. This was a vivid dream, or a really fucked up trip, obviously. He promptly lay down, closed his eyes and pinched himself, desperately trying to wake up. He had wanted magic, not a psychedelic dream telling him he was a lucky moron. Who needs sarcastic message boxes? The pinching was painful, but did not wake him, still he kept on trying until a slight pop made him open his eyes again. In front of him was another translucent box:
Trait gained: Denial Play an ostrich all you want, hiding your head in the sand doesn't change anything.
Well that was just great, wasn't it? The damn thing was mocking him, he thought as he burrowed his head further into the cold dirt beneath him. When he looked up the message box was still there, glowing eerily.
He sat up again, brushing the dirt from his hair. Clearly, he wasn't waking up anytime soon, so he would just have to bear with it. Psychedelic hallucination or not, this place seemed really, really realistic, discounting the boxes of course. “Well fuck it!” He should at least try to enjoy himself as long as it lasted. If nothing else the dream might let him indulge in his fantasy of how the ritual was supposed to bring magic to earth. He reached out to his surroundings to gather mana and immediately froze. There was mana, well that was understatement, there was more mana than he had ever felt and as he tentatively reached out to touch it that mana started streaming into his body. It was like a river flowing into him, gathering at his core where it started swirling and condensing, filling him in a way he had never imagined possible.
Arren lay there in silence watching as what had been a dry pond turned into an ocean, all of it swirling like a vortex with a golden core condensing in the center. The craving he had always felt, the hunger? It was all fading as the sea inside him filled, like this was what he had been missing all his life. Suddenly he was praying, hoping, begging that this wasn’t a dream or a hallucination, this feeling, he was so content, he wasn’t empty.
With a slight flexing of his will Arren drew a silver of mana from his now full mana pool as he raised his right hand into the darkness, he concentrated on the image of light gathering above it. At first nothing happened, then a single spark of light; in his excitement he lost focus and the spark disappeared. Still it had shown that it was possible, so he renewed his focus and concentrated. It took a while but in the end a bright globe of light hovered slightly above his palm.
Looking around he found the reason for all the dirt, he wasn’t at home, not at all, in fact he seemed to have ended up in a cave. There was only him and the dirt and rocks that littered the cave, that is until another box appeared out of nowhere.
Trait gained: Awakened You have taken the first step towards magic and awakened your mana pool, allowing you to store and regenerate mana.
Trait lost: Denial See? Believing isn’t so terrible, is it?
“Well, that, that was weird”, he thought, but then this entire situation was strange. First things first, he needed to figure out where he was, then how to get home. Looking at his light globe he smiled, aside from the unexpected teleportation, and the weird boxes, I guess my spell really did work, this is awesome.
The boxes, conveniently disappeared when he was done reading them, but Arren still wondered what the trait things were all about, feeling a bit silly, but figuring a world with messages boxes might have stats and such as well he tried to imagine a status screen, with no result. He did try a few more time with command prompts like “status” “menu” Character screen” etc. which were met with similar results. That result was expected, relieving, and yet oddly disappointing.
Gaming was a pastime of his and it would have been interesting if the world suddenly had game elements, but then what game didn’t have monsters? So in a way it was relieving, although who knew what so much mana would do to plants and animals in the world? It would be interesting to see, but come to think of it, he might not want to let on that his spell had changed the world, at least not until he had seen the effects of the change.
Well, that was a matter for later anyway, after all the change might not affect anyone other than magic users. The most immediate problem was figuring out where his spell had landed him, that and getting new clothing. All he was wearing was his plain black ritual robe, it wasn’t exactly warm and people do tend to think you’re a bit odd if you walk around wearing a robe in the streets. Also, it clearly wasn’t the best gear for cave delving, especially since he was barefoot.
Standing around thinking wasn’t going to do much so he figured it was about time to move out; the sooner he got back the sooner he would have access to proper clothing. The room he was in was quite small, about the size of a basement, and it had only one tunnel leading out of it, making his first choice of direction an easy one.
The tunnel was quite rough and uneven, but at least it was big enough to walk upright, he continued following it for quite some time, there were a few offshoots, but seeing as they were much more cramped he elected to follow the main tunnel. His first real choice was when he came to a fork with two passages leading in different directions, but seeing as the left-hand path slanted slightly upwards he figured it was his best bet. Walking forwards his bare foot caught on a rock leaving him sprawled out on the ground with a small cut on his toes. It wasn’t anything major, but it still stung, especially since the dirt crept into the wound. After that he started walking slower, he wasn’t really in a hurry anyway, he had the weekend of work so unless he was in a different country he should be able to get back, somehow. He kept walking for another ten maybe twenty minutes, it was hard to say, but he eventually came out onto a ledge overlooking a giant cavern.
Looking down he was stunned, there were spiders everywhere, but they weren’t normal spiders like one would brush away at home, or even the massive ones you might see on TV, no these were humongous. He was roughly a hundred feet above them, and he could see their features clearly, they had to be two meters across and there were hundreds of them. He was terrified, he didn't mind spiders, at least not the ones at home, but then, they were tiny and hardly venomous, there hadn't been any truly dangerous ones where he lived, but these monsters? Just the size meant they could probably have him for lunch, not to mention the venom they were likely to possess.
“Okay Arren, you can deal with this, they are down there, you are up here, just walk along the ledge and get the hell out” he spoke quietly to himself in an effort to relieve his fear. Unfortunately the spiders didn’t seem to agree, they seemed restless, and then, to his utter horror, they started turning towards him, or more specifically the light globe he still kept above his hand. “Not good, not good at all” The spiders were moving towards him just as he started sprinting along the ledge. The cliff face was an almost vertical drop, hopefully giving him an advantage, but these were spiders, they probably wouldn't care much for little trivialities such as gravity, awful monsters that they were.
He heard the screeching of enraged spiders as he ran, the ledge was narrow, but fear pushed him on, even if such speeds were reckless. At the end of the ledge there were two passages, one leading up, and one continuing straight ahead. A breath of air came from the first one so he sprinted, hopefully the air would mean an exit from the wretched cave. His legs were aching, his breath came in short bursts, and he was nearing exhaustion, but fear and adrenalin pushed him to keep running. Finally, after what seemed like forever he saw light, and with a last burst of effort he ran faster finally emerging into the light of the sun. He turned back towards the mouth of the cave and collapsed unto his knees. Hearing the wretched creatures approaching he did the only thing he could think of, gathering as many strands of mana he could, he wove them into a large hand and pushed it into cave and had it bash at the wall. Just as he could see the first spider the cave collapsed, hopefully burying the abdominal creatures.
Arren allowed himself to fall backwards onto his back, looking up at the sky, the sun was setting making the clouds look as if they were on fire. He lay there silently watching as the sun finished setting and the moon started to rise. Eventually falling into an exhausted slumber