A Mage's Prank

Klein savored the incredulity evident on the faces of the couple before he made to sit up from his lying position; it was then that he noticed a slight discomfort on his chest.

'When did I get attacked?' Klein thought as he swiftly swiveled his head to look around him, before sighing in relief at no signs of obvious danger, then touched his chest in confusion.

Amelia, who had yet to fully shake off her stupor, saw this, and spoke

"Ah, you seemed about to die, so we tried helping..." Amelia spoke, unsure if the soldier-turned-wizard understood her, or whether he understood the concept of chest compressions.

Klein turned to focus at the woman before tilting his head.

He only understood the word 'die' in that whole sentence. Luckily, he was clearly perfectly fine, so it couldn't be about him.

He smiled again at them reassuringly, before attempting more English...

Before then giving up. He really couldn't keep this up without...

He sighed, then chuckled.

[Soul-Link].

He cast the cursed Soulspell with great trepidation. He didn't want to be stuck in a strange soul realm that slowly sucked away at his being and existence, his reason, and his very reason for being.

But...

If it was going to try, Klein Stanfield would let it know what a menace he could be.

And he really wanted to speak with these people.

After casting the dreaded thing, he spoke as fast as he could,

"Gotta make this quick, I can't speak English, just using a strange deadly spell to connect our souls to make it happen. I kinda sorta don't wanna use this spell anymore after almost dying to it, so... uhh... do you mind teaching me?" He cut off the cast and gave them a sheepish grin.

He then looked away from them and up at the stars in wonderment, as if that would somehow alleviate the couple of their inhibitions.

Klein was certain they were considering his request with great deliberation.

Amelia and Harold looked at each other for a brief moment, recognizing the tiredness in each other's eyes, then nodded at the soldier-wizard before returning to their car.

They wanted to just sleep this whole ridiculous day off.

Klein watched them in giddiness.

'They agreed! Haha, they definitely fell for my charms' He hummed to himself as he made to stand.

He stumbled, before placing a hand on his APC for support.

He then climbed over it in one swift motion before stitting on its roof.

He examined his foot. It seemed... better at least. The purple wasn't so purple anymore.

He then focused his breathing to accelerate his mana recovery.

He drew the ever-present pieces of energy in the air towards himself with each of his breaths, forming a resonance between him and the mana surrounding him.

An unknown amount of time had passed, but when he felt he had enough mana again, he didn't hesitate to cast 'Detoxify'. He even tried 'Minor Heal' to see if it was effective.

He repeated the process many times, exhausting himself completely.

He examined his foot again, and then attempted to move it around. It was certainly a lot better, albeit with a remaining lingering ache.

Phew.

'Nystagmus...' Klein thought back to the abomination with a fond smile.

He had never seen anything like it before. And Klein had seen a lot and knew a lot.

'Is that some sort of alien creature?' He decided he would ask the couple about it later.

To Klein, new things were always exciting.

He thought again about the future.

He had found people to teach him English.

And then, once he learnt to read, he could look for a library.

'There might even be more interesting things than Precise Engineering' Klein thought, then immediately dismissed the notion. That would be absurd.

He gazed up at the stars again.

'Yup. It doesn't make any sense' Klein confidently thought with a happy smile and laugh.

The whole thing didn't make a whit of sense.

But when did something like that ever stop him?

He paused, thinking back to [Petra's Soulspells], and cautiously accessed the tome, closing his eyes.

It naturally wasn't a normal thing - why would it be? Thinking back on it, Klein did think it was odd that the text burrowed into his mind the moment he had touched the book. And then thinking about it more, wasn't there a weird glow about the place he found it after he had acquired the thing?

And speaking of the place, wasn't it an underground tomb?

Recalling those events again, Klein did find it a little strange now that the moment the text imprinted itself on his mind, the underground tomb began to collapse.

If he wasn't such an outstanding combat mage with an impeccable calculative ability and his unmatched usage of 'Blink', he probably would have been buried there.

He had dismissed that entire event because it just seemed like some accomplished mage's prank. In fact, Klein was sure he would have set up something similar to freak out any ambitious acolyte hoping to get a powerful inheritance. 

'Ah... good times' Klein reminisced. He had been pretty desperate during that period of his life, and was pretty fortunate to find something like [Petra's Soulspells], even though he had limited use for it at the time.

Klein closed his eyes, searching for the text. So far, he had only been able to access the Acolyte spells, which weren't much. There was [Soul-Link], which he had already spent ages researching, and had managed to repurpose. And there was [Soul-Search], which he didn't want to touch with a ten-foot staff. It sounded weird, and he could barely understand any of its contents, nodes, or circulations.

'Creepy...'

When he opened the text this time, though, it seemed to reveal a new text he had not read through before.

It had always been a strange experience accessing [Petra's Soulspells]. Like he wasn't really where he was - that he was somewhere else, and that he was something else.

It was an empty space, except for a large golden tablet half-hidden in a ghostly mist.

The mist receded slightly, revealing three new spells to him.

'... This thing also has second-circle spells? Has Petra, bless his soul, whoever he is, decided that I can graduate from being an Acolyte?'