Magic Mistake

Jace (Morph - Philia)

I finally found of those reservoirs. It was very difficult to find without the help of a guide, but I must figure out how to cleanse the reservoirs with magic before I go to the adventurer's guild once more. All I have to do is focus and try to cleanse it with magic. How hard could it possibly be?

How the hell does one cleanse a reservoir.

If I was a verbal caster, I would be able to just shout some funny words and have the whole body of water crystal clear and completely clean in no time at all, but nooOoOOoOoo, I'm a visual spellcaster, so I have to picture the process and the end product in a relatively accurate manner for my spells to succeed. What, am I supposed to picture the water separating from every single particle of grime and... what is this? Why is there a curse in the water? The witches were said to have all died off in the Salami Trials decades ago, so why is a curse from the old ages right infront of me? Well, before I do anything else, I need to neutralize the curse--although I don't know what it does, I guarantee that whatever it's meant to do isn't a good thing.

Both the grime and the curse are heavily interwoven with the water. What if I picture it as using my magical energy as a sort of strainer? Yeah, that might work. I'll give it a try even if it seems a little outlandish. Okay, so my magical energy should form into a sort of film at the top of the water and then, once it fully covers the water, slowly descend through the water into the deepest depths of the reservoir, stretching and molding itself to fit the shape of the stone below. Once it reaches the bottom of the reservoir, it should push anything resting within it above it and solidify into a sort of strainer that will only allow pure water to pass through--I know this will get rid of all of the minerals in the water if the spell works as intended, but I don't want to risk leaving anything harmful in the reservoir. After the raw magical energy solidifies into a sort of strainer, it will begin to rise through the reservoir leaving nothing but water in its wake. Once the strainer reaches the surface, it will have formed a somewhat spherical container around the polluting waste, dark magic, and other minerals. Then, the sphere will move away from the reservoir and slowly shrink until all of the waste and dark magic has completely condensed into a small orb. I hope this works.

I'll call this one... how about... no, purify is already taken, as is cleanse... oh, I know! How about Sphere Clear? I'm sure James would make fun of the name, but damn it I like it so I'm sticking with it. What's he going to do anyways, scold me from the afterlife?

As I run through and refine the sequence of the spell in my mind a few more times, I decide that the spell should be ingrained into my brain enough for use. Saying the name I've paired with my new spell, the ingrained sequence runs through my mind as if I'm watching a video in my head. The spell has worked as intended thus far. Now, all that's left is to move away and condense the garbage and curses into one small spherical mass... OH WAIT NO NO NO WAIT THAT'S A TERRIBLE IDEA!!!

Dang it, not again... I've literally made this mistake before, but I believe I was attempting to condense and dispose of James's residual holy magic and the corpses of some goblins when James shouted, "Wait WAIT WAIT WAAAAAIT! You IIIIIIIDIOT, you've just created a monster core!" In front of my eyes I see a dark mass of magic begin to swirl around the core I've just created. Drawing my short sword, I prepare to face whatever terrible foe I might've created. Against my expectations, however, what forms infront of me is a completely naked girl with purple hair--purple hair, purple eyes, where they come, curses lie! ...at least I think that's how the old nursery rhyme went. Witch or not, I don't want to kill an actual human being, but I also don't want to be around a witch in the slightest because witches are an alien species to me, so I'm just going to pretend I saw nothing and walk away before--

Witch: "Ughhhh, I'm finally awake! Who might you be?"

Jace (Morph - Philia): "...I'm just going to swiftly walk away and not turn around. If I just pretend she isn't there..."

"Uh, rude? You do know that you're talking out loud, right?"

"No, I'm clearly not, and you must be hearing things since there's no one behind me who is talking."

"There's no way that the common tongue has changed so much since I was slain that whatever the jibberish that just came out of your mouth was could actually mean something coherent, right?"

Jace begins to power walk out of the hidden, ancient dungeon he mistook for a typical reservoir.

Witch: "Hey, wait up! I don't want to be alone down here, and I don't know how to get out."

Jace (Morph - Philia): "Everything is fine, I didn't revive a witch, I'm not scared, Everything is fine, I didn't revive a witch, I'm not scared..."

"I'm not some sort of demon, you know?"

"EEK!"

Jace shrieks and then breaks into a full on sprint when the witch stands next to him and speaks.

Witch: "WOULD YOU PLEASE STOP RUNNING AWAY FROM ME?! I haven't even got your name yet!"

Jace (Morph - Philia): "IF I LOOK AT YOU YOU'LL CURSE ME FOR GOING TO SLEEP AFTER MIDNIGHT!"

"WHAT ARE YOU, A CHILD!?"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

After running deep into the forest by the towns and Jace's campsite in a random direction until he couldn't run anymore, Jace passes out for an hour on the spot from stress and overexertion.

Jace (Morph - Quartz): "GAAAA!! Huh... huh... huuuuh... phew, it was just a bad dream. Where am I?"

Witch (from directly behind Jace): "Sooooo my name's Twilight Hectate, what's yours?"

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHH--hhEehhh *thump!*"

"She passed out again, didn't she? Wait, is this a mask?"

An hour later:

Jace: "So you're not goint to curse me?"

Twilight: "Of course not! I don't even understand why you thought I'd curse you in the first place."

"Where'd you get those black robes and that pointy hat?"

"Dark magic."

"Is it... cursed?"

"Why would I curse my own clothes?"

"But doesn't dark magic just make curses?"

"That's like saying holy magic can only make enhancements!"

"Oh, okay, so it's just a historically biased misrepresentation of dark magic."

"Why are you taking notes in such an incredibly complex magical tome?"

"I guess it has kind of become a habit at this point--I hardly even noticed I was writing until you pointed it out."

"Why did you revive me?"

"Uhhhhhh... well, actually..."

Jace proceeds to recount and explain the towns' situation, the reservoir purification practice, the reasoning behind him hiding his identity with the mask ("Quartz" took the quest, so Jace didn't want to be seen looking into the reservoirs' purifications), his accidental revival of twilight, and the intricacies of his new spell sphere clear over the next thirty minutes.

Jace: "So yeah, I actually mistook whatever that pool was meant to be as a reservoir."

Twilight: "Wait, you realized there was a curse on it, but didn't realize it was a place related to witches?"

"My mind's not in the best place right now."

"Oh? You could've fooled me."

"Well, since you're all alive and fine and stuff, I'm just going to leave you here and go cleanse those reservoirs before those villagers die. Don't do evil stuff and have a nice day!"

"Why do you keep trying to run off?!"

Before Jace can start running away, Twilight grabs his left arm.

Twilight: "I'm not just going to stand still as you run off again. You woke me from my slumber, so you have to take responsibility and tell me everything that's changed in the past few centuries."

Jace: "HOW THE HELL AM I SUPPOSED TO TELL YOU EVERYTHING THAT'S CHANGED IN THE PAST FEW CENTURIES?!"

"Well, if you won't tell me now, I'm just going to follow you around until you do."

"You can't go into town with those eyes and that hair."

"The other races still have a grudge against witches?"

"I can't speak for the iclost, the elves, the dwarves, or any of the other literate races, but the humans still fear witches."

"Fine, I'll change my hair, but the eyes stay."

"Ah, I never thought illusion magic could be used on yourself; your spell is so convincing that even I can't tell that your hair isn't naturally red."

"You were so scared earlier; I'm surprised someone so powerful and self-confident could be such a coward."

"I-I wasn't scared! I'm always brave and confident!"

"Sure, sure. Didn't you have somewhere you had to go?"

"Ah, right, the reservoirs! Shoot, I better hurry up! And I'll be taking my mask back, thank you very much!"

With that, Jace sets off towards the towns by following his own tracks. Snickering at what can only be seen as an interesting toy, Twilight follows after Jace.