Disaster

Power.

Elation.

I feel like a god.

I opened my eyes and saw the world collapsing in on itself, no not itself. The world was collapsing in on me, and me only. The trees of the forest surrounding me were the first to go, the circle of devastation around me increased in size until the city of Xinia was clear in my vision. I saw the city gate, still manned by Mr Wawr, get destroyed next. Something was wrong, yet there was nothing I could do, or even wanted to do. I felt power unlike anything I had ever felt before rushing through my very soul and it was increasing the more that the circle of destruction widened.

I closed my eyes and laughed, this truly was the greatest experience I had ever felt. The euphoria flowed through me and I relished the experience, keeping my eyes shut.

No one would win against me anymore.

Not Adrian Wykes, not any other adventurer on this continent, the power I felt put me on a completely different plane than them. I could fight an adventurer before I awakened, so what could I fight now? The possibilities were endless and would only grow more vast as I purified my core. Ah, I should check that, this truly doesn't feel like power that would be achieved at solely the black core stage. Maybe I skipped a few because it took so much effort to form my core. That would truly be a great reward for the effort I had put in.

My eyes were already shut so I simply focused on entering a meditative state and then it appeared.

A dark black ball.

Ah, I see. This is just the power of a black core, and my mind has simply never experienced such power.

I'm likely overreacting.

I felt myself get grounded and the euphoria subsided, I still felt the steady thrum of power in my solar plexus, but it was much more steady. It no longer rapidly grew, I had completed my awakening. With that thought, I opened my eyes.

It was a wasteland.

As far as I could see was a land of barren dirt, a crater of monumental proportions. It was as though I was in the epicenter of a nuclear explosion.

What?

I hadn't even had an explosion, it was an implosion by all regards.

I was a conjurer.

Why is there such destruction?

My mind flashed with activity before I finally put it together. I had been delirious earlier, so I had forgotten, but hadn't my implosion reached the city?

Mr Wawr!

I felt the smoked meat that I had eaten earlier rise from my stomach and I threw up. I threw up until there was nothing left and continued dry heaving.

I had killed them all.

Me.

I had killed the guard whom I promised to repay for his kindness.

I had killed the child who had asked if I wanted to play.

I had killed the housewife who had smiled lovingly at her child.

"I'm sorry…"

I felt tears from my eyes.

I had killed my teacher.

…

I stared into the barren wasteland that surrounded me.

"They can't be dead…"

I walked through the empty dirt, yet in my eyes I saw the entrance to the city.

I smiled and waved towards Mr Wawr and he reminded me to be safe.

I walked through a scenic route of the city and saw the child that had offered me to play in the morning.

I smiled and waved.

I walked back to my teacher's home, the cabin he had spent years building and renovating.

I saw my teacher looking at me with a proud look.

He must have realized I awakened.

His face morphed into a pained expression and he glared me down with the fierceness that must have once stared down an Elven Lance.

"You killed me."

Mr Wawr appeared at his side, as did the child and the housewife.

Then the healer who had not allowed Lance Varay to pay for healing me.

People appeared one by one, side by side until there were enough to fill an arena.

"You killed us."

I looked at them with a hollow look and stared down at my hands.

They were covered in blood.

I had killed them all.

"I'm sorry…"

"I'm sorry!"

I felt pain sprout in my head and a cut appeared across my chest. My vision cleared and I once again saw the vast expanse of dirt in my surroundings. Only this time I was no longer alone, there was a large green dragon, no wyvern, with an old lady in witches robes on its back.

"Who are you? What have you done?"

"I killed them. I killed them all, it was me! They all died from what I've done!"

Her gaze hardened as she raised her arm and began chanting. I saw winds, visible to the eyes, appear in front of the old witch. She seemed familiar, yet I couldn't bring myself to care. I saw the gusts of sharp wind steadily move closer to myself and decided, I would die to bring justice to those who I had killed…

I saw my teacher appear in the corner of my eye and shake his head at me. Next was Mr Wawr, he wouldn't have wanted me to die, but it had to be done. Then the healer appeared next to him, she looked at me angrily, not because I had killed her, but because I had yet again been injured.

I wouldn't die.

I would live.

For them, not for me.

I wanted to die to give them justice, and I would in due time.

Yet, for now, I needed to live.

I would kill Agrona, and I would kill Kezzess and I would save the lives of so many that these deaths would seem like a drop in the bucket, and I would die to do it. That's how I would die, I couldn't die here on this empty desolate plain.

So, I raised my arm and chanted the chant that had once almost stolen my life. I knew on instinct that it would work, and it was my only chance of survival. I couldn't die here, so it simply had to work.

"Flames of old and embers bright,

Craft for me a fiery might.

Gather heat and swirling spark,

Form a fireball, through shadows, embark.

Ignite the skies with your glowing hue,

Ablaze with power, fierce and true.

From flickering ember to sphere of fire,

Grant me strength, my desires inspire.

Fireball."

A fireball did not appear in my hand, instead, a column of fire manifested in front of my arm and stretched across the desolate plain. The wyvern flew above the column, but not without damage, its feet were singed. I felt blood fall from my nose and tasted iron in my mouth.

Not enough.

I pushed more of my mana into the spell, now that I had casted it, I had gained a slight understanding of how to manipulate my mana. The column of fire widened and I moved my arm to point it at the wyvern. The wyvern dodged and dodged until I felt a sharp pain throughout my whole body and coughed up blood. My spell fell apart once I no longer focused on it, and I fell to the ground.

I watched the witch approach my body, which was lying prone on the floor and struggled to my feet. She looked at me with curiosity, and walked closer yet again.

"Is that a new spellform? Agrona seems to have improved a lot to be able to send a child of this level as a mere suicide bomber."

I summoned the last vestiges of my strength, not mana, and ran towards her while moving through some familiar motions. With speed that should've been impossible to muster without mana, I reached the witch.

I punched, kicked, headbutted, elbowed, kneed, and used every part of my body in perfect tandem with no limit as I attempted to hit her. It was a perfect recreation of the Dance of Vulcan that my teacher had taught me.

I missed every single attack, she reacted far too quickly.

I heard a sonic boom and felt my eardrums rupture before I fell to the ground and everything went black.

[End of Volume 1: Glum in the Slums]