The arc left the staff, and this time I was ready for it, my Concentration wrapping around the cast the moment it departed, and I felt the directional control I had glimpsed at rank thirty now extended into something longer and more precise.

I could not help the small grin I knew was on my face. Despite the fact that I may be dying painfully in the near future, to feel such power running through my body and staff was an experience that I wished everybody would have.

Remember that every spell cast was a part of my soul, and so I could almost feel the blue lightning traveling in the air.

Under my control, it was not traveling as fast as normal lightning, but it was still moving extremely quickly, more than the eye could follow, but with the marvelous power of the soul, I was able to track and follow the spell with my soul.

In this manner, even though the spell was traveling extremely quickly, I could still follow it with my soul.

My staff, with its new transformation, also aided me in this a lot, and if I did not have it, then control of a spell as powerful as Arc Lightning would have cost me a lot to fully control.

Just because I could gain this spell at the Acolyte level did not mean it was easy to control, but as streams flowed into rivers and rivers flowed into the sea, my spell discipline was slowly taking shape.

The little munchkin, my sister Mel, had always asked me to describe what it feels like to have magic flowing through your channels, and the closest I could tell her was to imagine that instead of blood in your veins, you had wind flowing through them.

A wind that you could feel, and that could grow hot or cold depending on what you were casting, and this wind could change the world around you.

I knew that I did not paint a great picture, but you would have to forgive me, after all, I had not been an Acolyte for long, and everything I was experiencing was still changing very fast, and I still did not have a solid idea of what I was doing.

The arc traveled six meters, and I turned my attention to a supply crate off to the right, and then curved and struck the crate cleanly, leaving a blackened line across the wood that smoked faintly in the morning air.

I cast a third time, and using new instincts, curved it harder. Allowing the arc to travel its full range and then pulling it sharply back along a new path before it could dissipate.

It followed my control like an eager puppy... a puppy that could kill in the blink of an eye, crush mountains, and dry seas. There was a reason why mages were feared and worshipped as gods in some parts of the world.

The branching capability was a result of my Attunement Skill, Staff Resonance, and it had instantly taken this spell from something simple to a potent power.

My hands were shaking slightly, as I knew that I had just been handed something I had wanted without knowing how much I wanted it.

What began as pushing my Spark to the next level had transformed into something that could potentially change my life.

Mel... mum... dad... I will survive and come home by the year’s end. I will not die here. And the charms on my staff rang, causing me to smile even as I cleaned my eyes with the back of my sleeves.

I don’t like to cry, dammit.

The small silver charms had rung softly at the threshold crossing of the Spark Spell. I had not noticed it in the moment, but I noticed it now.

It was like a faint lingering vibration in the metal, and I held the staff with both hands and breathed and let the feeling of what I had just done settle into my body.

A lot had happened in a short amount of time, and I needed to rapidly process it and make it a part of me.

[Meditation 18 — 21 (Initiate)]

This action gave me a boost in my meditation, and I was not too surprised, knowing that the moment I pushed any of my abilities forward, due to its increased potency, it would begin pushing the rest of my abilities to grow as well, since they were being essentially forced to adapt.

If I kept channeling powerful spells, my Anima Depth would increase, forcing my body and channels to grow to accommodate my increasing soul strength.

I had three Acolyte-tier Disciplines now, Threadwork, Surge, and Arc Lightning, which had been Spark two minutes ago. 𝕗𝚛𝚎𝚎𝐰𝗲𝗯𝗻𝚘𝚟𝚎𝗹.𝕔𝐨𝕞

These were going to be the foundation on which I built my whole magus system.

Perhaps if I had more time to study in the academy, then I would have collected a more robust foundation for me to build upon, but as an Acolyte, it was not the best thing to spread yourself too widely, else you would not be able to go far.

For me, this rule was even more important because I needed to survive past this hour, and only then would I have the capability of thinking about my future... Now, I only needed the power to kill.

As if this declaration in my mind was one of war, the sound that reminded me of a foghorn sounded.

The long, deep tone bypassed my ears and arrived directly in my chest the way it always did.

I think I should stop calling this a sound; it was more like a frequency that spoke to my Anima rather than my hearing, and I don’t know if it was perhaps the growth in Demonology, but this sound almost began to make sense, as if there were words being spoken, but were in a frequency I could not quite grasp.

The pyramid pulsed red in its black face, the deep breathing pulse I had watched from the cook fire in my loops, and above it, the sky began to darken and gather the way storm clouds gather when a front is approaching.

I had practiced more deeply in this loop; still, the eruption was arriving at its scheduled time regardless.