From the tender young age of ten, when he first felt the warm burning embrace of Uvu's gift in his mana core, Seth knew he was special. Most children heard from the Fire god, Ignitus, the Earth god, Magmus, the wind god, Finea, or the water goddess, Aquina, but he heard from Uvu, himself. The closest being to Giai, the mother of gods.
After the birth of his sister, Seth's father, Pascal Ryall lost all hope that he could have a son who had a strong connection to Uvu. After all, he was already blessed by a daughter beloved by the sun God. When Seth was born, he was prepared to settle for a simple connection to Ignitus or Finea, or any of the other elemental deities, if he was unlucky, but he was blessed by Uvu twice.
Seth's awakening was met with much fanfare, and he was trained by the brightest knights of Brightmont until he was thirteen. He was bound for service at the Borderlands when the war started. The burning embers of war sparked the dawn of a new age for Mormon and brought the fall of the house of Ryall.
Seth's lungs whistled, as hot streams of tears flowed down his cheeks. He wanted to give up. Never had he felt so much pain, so much weakness. At the borderlands, he was the top student. He fought with a devilish fervor and he cut down mountains of beasts and men and yet before a construct his power and strength betrayed him.
Why was Uvu abandoning him? Was this all his talent amounted to? He slapped his cheeks with one hand and favored his exposed, raw chest with the other. He grits his teeth. In his heart, he understood how outclassed and insignificant he was before a great mage, but he wasn't quite ready to give up yet.
He summoned his father's favorite blade, the jet black estoc. His father's last gift before we set out for the front. He knew very little about the blade and its magical properties, but with it, he knew he still stood a chance. He was determined to put up a fight - one last bloody dance with death herself.
He'd rather die than be used as a bargaining chip by heretical mages. He still had his pride, or what was left of it. Hopefully, he could hold out and keep them engaged long enough for reinforcement to arrive.
He sat up and looked at his father's blade. The handle, guard, and blade blending together to form a thin sullen thrust blade. With the support of his blade and the marble wall, he got up on his feet. He laughed nervously, "Alright you little shit, let's do this again!"
"I wouldn't do that if I were you." A cold, steely voice echoed from the shadow of the blood wolf. A swirl of red and black emerged from the darkened marble at the beast's feet and formed a bloody humanoid with a hole in his chest. Reddish-black blood poured from his mouth, chest, and several cuts on his arm and face. He was missing an arm, he wore a sickening grin.
"Your sister is surprisingly resourceful. When the light distracted me, she went all out. If I was a lesser mage, I would have died on the spot," he smiled.
Dark tendrils danced chaotically around him, his eyes glowed, and mountainous aura exploded from his frame. The air was thick with the sickening smell of blood and death. The smell of iron wafted through the air, and a thin reddish mist flooded the hallway, diminishing the star-white of the wall crystals. Seth's knees quivered, he dropped his sword and looked away from the bloody-shadowy frame. Sheer terror flooded his mind. The taste of iron forced his tongued to curl, his stomach tightened, he started to convulse, and his vision blurred.
He wanted to abandon honor, forsake his sister, take another step back, run away, and escape somehow; but his back was against the marble wall, there was nowhere to run to. A black tendril shot forward and wrapped around limbs and torso, immobilizing him.
"I didn't want to do this, but I suspected that this would happen. I wanted your sister, but if we couldn't get her, you were always another choice. You achieved a full-body energy construct despite just being a just a recruit, you certainly have talent. Dare, I say more than your sister. Your body will serve me well. Thanks to your sister, I was forced to use light magic to heal some of my wounds, and that poisoned destroyed this body beyond repair, it's impossible to absorb your sister now, not without a proper host. That is where you come in" Ranok spoke as he stepped forward from the distorted shadow of the wolf. With one hand, he stripped Seth of his chainmail and damaged armor, revealing his battered torso.
"I will certainly have to make some changes to this body, this simply will not do" Ranok frowned as he inspected Seth's battered frame. He took a step back and sent all the remaining black tendrils swirling around him into Seth's chest.
"Tessa! Help me" Seth cried and tears rolled down his face as his body shivered. His mind hollowed out, despair and fear overtook him, and he knew that he was going to die.
***
Tessa swung her blade so fast, it was formless. Flickers of white light mixed with red, and sonic booms echoed with each collision, Tessa felt herself slipping. With each light bolt and flash step, she slowly felt her power draining, the heart of Malum was reaching its limits. She knew that without the academy's protective magic dampening the opponent's attacks, and his natural weakness towards light magic, one of his numerous sonic bursts would have immobilized her already. She had to end the fight.
"Blood mesh." Countless streams of blood shot out from her opponent's frame and intertwined with each other, covering the width of the hallway, slicing marble and wall crystals as they swept towards her.
"Flash step" Tessa materialized above the bloody mesh that slithered towards her and she chanted, "Holy Roar." Her mouth shone, her armor of light collapsed and got sucked into the glowing ball forming in her mouth.
Holy roar consumed a lot of mana. It was a half a meter wide ray of light that eviscerated everything it was aimed at. It was pure compressed, undiluted holy magic. It placed enormous trains on her holy conduit. During training sessions, and missions, she only used it if the heart of Malum was fully charged. One attack completely drained the heart. With most of the mana of the heart already drained, she would have to use her mana to fuel the attack. It was going to completely drain her, perhaps even kill her, but her opponent would share her fate so she steeled her resolve.
Her attack wasn't all that impressive in itself, not against a great mage. But, between blood mages natural weakness for holy spells, and the speed of the blast, she was sure he wouldn't be able to create another sonic blast to counter her attack in time.
She closed her mouth and forced the energy down her lungs. She opened her mouth again, preparing to finish her enemy, then she heard a desperate cry.
"Tessa! Help me"
It was her brother's voice. Ranok stood in front of him, he had numerous black tendrils stabbing into his chest. Her chest tightened, and she realized what she had to do. She contracted her trachea and pursed her lips as she readied her attack.
She planned to shift the target of the blast and narrow the range of the holy roar, increasing its destructive power and speed. This will reduce the blast radius and, hopefully, kill her brother's captor and leave him unscathed. Her heart thumped mid-air. What she planned to do was experimental. She would no doubt lose her jaw, and maybe her life, but she was had to save him, he was the only family she had left.
She set aside all her fears and fired. A thin, arrow-wide ray of light shot out from her mouth. It burnt her throat and shattered her jaw, and traveled down the hall, at near-light speed. The beam drilled through the side of Ranok's head killing him instantly, and it blew through the magic-reinforced marble floor of the hallway, scattering dust and marble everywhere. Ranok body went limp, and the dark tendrils faded as he crashed to the ground. Tessa lost consciousness and fell into the mesh of blood swirling underneath her.
Tolkien's eyes widened, his blood mesh failed? It was the fastest wide-area blood attack he had in his arsenal, yet she dodged it and had enough time to prepare her most powerful attack. If she didn't miss he would've died.
He stopped his attack when he saw her unconscious body falling, 'she must have run out of mana,' he thought. He caught her and he stared at her charred, bloody jaw. 'That attack decimated her. Why would use an attack that would kill her on me, and still miss? It's like she had no intention of winning.' He laid her lifeless frame on the ground and turned around, "Ranok, he called out. Ranok?"
He looked back in the direction of his spawned blood wolf and tried to sense Ranok's presence, he couldn't sense his life, only his blood.
"Shit, he exclaimed. Void Step," he reappeared in front of Ranok's body. Ranok's sickly eyes were unshifting, black blood oozed from his head and stained grey matter stained the marble floor. Black blood poured from the wood in his chest and his missing arm, and mouth. He looked surprised in the moment of his death.
"Ranok? Ranok!" he screamed, tears down his face, and he let out a loud cry. "Aaaahhh" He gripped the bloodied corpse of his deceased mentor, and stroked his disheveled blood-soaked hair.
"Why did you have to take over the stupid brother?" he whispered, as grief wrenched his beating heart from his cold undead chest. He recalled the short conversation they when he was battling Tessa. He wanted to transfer his blood core to the kid's body and take over it. Tessa interrupted the spell and it probably killed them both. The spell he was using was an advanced ability transference spell he created. It was much faster than regular ability transference, all blood mages were able to perform, and it came with obvious risks.
With a wave of his hands, he recalled his blood construct. He looked to the lifeless youth who sat, neck tilted, back slack against the wall.
Seth's body was ash-white, he was not breathing. 'If only this bloody meat sack didn't shout and drew his sister's fire,' he cursed. 'I would gladly trade my life for yours'. He sighed, his eyes heavy with grief, all he had left was hope. He looked at Seth's closed eyes with a desperate singular longing. He hadn't felt this powerless and pathetic since the day he died his first death.
He could only hope the process was somehow completed. He let go of his master's corpse and walked over to Seth's body and starred at it longingly and whispered, "I really wished you were still here."
Seth's eyes shot open, his pupils shone red. The blood that stained the floors and walls began to swirl around him and his body began slowly rose to his feet. He opened his mouth, and the swirling blood flowed in. Mana burst from his frame and his wound slowly began to heal. His bent neck angled up, he smiled and turned to Tolkien with worry etched on his face.
"Yes! I knew you wouldn't die on me Ranok." He said bursting with joy. "I didn't think you would succeed with so little time to prepare!"
"I did not. Some parts of my soul are fractured, missing." He placed his palm on his bare pale chest. "I feel him inside me, he has more control over this body than I do" Ranok inspected his new body. He opened and closed his hands a few times, he looked up at his friend.
His voice was terse, almost business-like. "Look after my old body, and keep the junior knight alive. If she dies preserve her mana core. The interruption damaged both our cores and fractured our minds. I feel some part of my past missing. Bits and pieces of the knowledge I once possessed, gone. About one hundred years, I gather." His eyes fell down
"We were both damaged by the sudden interruption, and our cores merged, I think. We both lost a tremendous amount of power- he more than I." He glanced down the brightly lit hall.
I sense their reinforcement coming, it won't be long before they arrive; you must go Tolkien. Wait for me at my castle in Gresha, they won't think to look for you there."
Tolkien knew that blood mages were not allowed to show weakness or fear, but he was glad to see his friend and mentor again. He was so glad to see him that he wanted to hug him- something so human and demeaning the very thought disgusted him. Instead of holding him like a frightened meat sack he simply smiled, nodded, and chose to say nothing, holding the bursting joy, and relief that surged inside him. He was glad that his partner was alive, even if he shared a body with this runt.
"What should we do about the mission? We cannot return to the Vraphen without you absorbing her core? Why don't you come with me?"
He closed his glowing eyes, and they returned to their normal brown color. "We both have lost most of our connections to the elements. As of now, the body of this child just encountered magic. The road is long, and you will have pursuers, I will only slow you down."
"Besides he will awake soon, and it will take many years before I will be able to take control of his body or master holy magic enough to fully consume the knight.
Tolkien starred at him, and blinked, "Being reborn has changed you. It's just as the legends say, you are now different. You aren't less optimistic than I remember."
His eyes shone with fury, "Of course I am not optimistic, I am bound to this flesh corpse!" he raged. His voice was fractured and ethereal. He took several breaths, calmed himself and spoke, "They are almost here, now go"
Tolkien nodded, vanished, and Ranok sat on the marble floor and fell into thought as he felt Seth's consciousness stir awake.
'I need to control him somehow. I must ensure that he gets stronger, and he must not die. The simple solution would be to fight his mind for dominance or merge with his consciousness, but even I don't know what will happen if I attempt to fully integrate. I suspect that our minds won't survive.
'The only logical way to ensure his growth and my safety, for now, would be will create a mental construct to guide him. When I grow strong enough and my strength overshadows his many times over, I will simply destroy his mind and take what is mine.