Mark was the first of the three students to make a move.
He traced a line in the air with his sword tip. The blade of his sword shimmered as stone raced up his legs and to the sword, wrapping around the hilt and covering the entire weapon.
He dropped into a crouch, holding the blade with one hand, and placing his other on the ground. Without an instant of hesitation, he dashed forward. Mark closed the distance between him and Delph within a second.
Delph twisted, allowing the blade to pass mere inches away from his chest, and drove his knee into Mark's nose.
Mark let out a cry and staggered backward. The rock covering his weapon crumbled but regained its integrity as the boy refocused. A trail of blood trickled out of his nose and down his face.
"You have magic that requires concentration to keep active," Delph observed, making no move to continue pressing the boy. "If your defenses aren't better, your magic will fail you at a critical juncture."
Mark bared his teeth in a feral snarl and dashed toward Delph again. He swung his sword for the man's chest again. Mark pulled the blade back moments before it got close to the professor, converting his momentum into a new strike aimed at the professor's lower body.
Delph leapt into the air, jumping clean over Mark's strike. His leg snapped out in a brutal kick that picked Mark off the ground and sent him tumbling across the arena. He didn't get back up.
"Next," Delph said, turning to look at Sylph and the bald student.
Sylph watched him silently, not moving. The bald student, realizing Sylph had no plans of fighting yet, took a step at Delph. He lowered into a fighting stance and curled his fingers into claws.
Delph remained in position as the boy let out a heavy breath. A puff of thick white steam escaped his mouth and curled around him.
The bald boy blurred, moving so quickly he made Mark look like a slug. He appeared beside Delph and thrust his hand toward the professor's stomach.
Delph's hand shot out, and he grabbed the boy by his wrist. Then his eyes widened, and he released him, hopping back a step.
"That almost hurt," Delph said, frowning. A small trail of smoke rose from the professor's hand. "Just how hot is your body?"
"Very hot, professor," the bald student replied. His clothes smoked as well. "I've never gotten a chance to measure it, but I have runed clothes to resist the heat."
"We'll have to find out at a later date," Delph said. The air between him and the bald student seemed to crumple, and then Delph stood before the student. It wasn't that he'd moved quickly, it didn't look like he'd moved at all.
"Teleportation," Henry said. "I believe mortals consider it somewhat difficult, although all mages tend to learn at least a variation of it at some point."
The bald boy doubled over as something slammed into his stomach. He flew several feet into the air, then slammed into the ground as if an invisible hand tossed him around.
"I yield!" the boy yelled. He collapsed to the ground with a groan as Delph turned to Sylph.
She was gone. The professor frowned and tilted his head. His eyebrows rose imperceptibly upward, and he flickered to the side.
A dark line appeared in the air where he'd been standing. The ground around Delph erupted, filling the air around him with sand. Sylph's form was outlined as the sand covered her.
Delph teleported out of the way as another black line nearly dissected him. The sand covering Sylph collapsed to the ground.
"Sylph can also teleport?" Damien asked in disbelief.
"No. That's not teleporting. You'd know if you had any access to magic, but her form isn't disappearing and reappearing. It's kind of just…shifting," Henry said begrudgingly. "It's more like an advanced camouflage, and she's just very fast. For someone of your age, at least."
Delph shifted his stance. He disappeared, and Sylph's magic sliced harmlessly through the air once more.
"Very impressive," Delph said. "However, I can't tell if you're hiding your power very well, or if your magical strength is just pitifully low."
The professor tilted his head. Then he spun, thrusting his hand into what looked to be an empty spot in the air beside him. His hand tightened around an invisible arm, and he yanked backward.
A bubble of darkness formed in the air as Delph dragged Sylph back into vision, his hand wrapped around her wrist.
Instead of resisting, Sylph used the momentum to throw herself toward the professor.
As her body fully left the bubble, Damien realized she had a thin blade made of inky energy grasped in her other hand. Delph realized it at the same time, but it was too late.
The weapon was already a millimeter from his neck, and it showed no signs of stopping.
The air around Delph inverted in color. Time seemed to slow to a halt for an instant. Damien's ears popped, and a trickle of blood ran from his nose. Sylph's magic shattered like glass and evaporated into the air. She crumpled to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.
Damien's mouth nearly dropped open.
"What was that?" he asked, shocked. "What did you do?"
"Magic," Delph replied dryly. "Magic I didn't think I'd be using against a student. Your friend likes to go for killing blows during training exercises."
"Is she okay?" Damien asked worriedly. Mark could move again, and the bald student was struggling to his feet.
However, Sylph was as still as the sand beneath her.
"She will be," Delph said, rolling his shoulder. "I can honestly say I didn't expect to break a sweat today. She didn't cut me, but I think the dean would have my throat if I didn't apologize somehow. I suppose I owe her something."
It seemed more like Delph spoke to himself than the students. His gaze refocused on Damien, and he jerked his chin toward Sylph's prone form.
"Is she your roommate?"
"She is. How did you know?" Damien asked. There were half a dozen other questions he also wanted to ask, but after watching Delph manhandle the other students, he decided it would be best to keep them to himself.
"You said you followed her gaze. You're more likely to be paying attention to people you know, so it was a safe guess," Delph replied with a dismissive shrug. "Take her back to your rooms. I'll be taking the other students to a healer, but they can't help with my magic. She'll wake up in an hour or two. I removed all the magic from the area around me, so she'll probably feel weak for a bit."
Delph didn't wait for him to respond. He shimmered through the air, tossing Mark over one shoulder and the bald boy over the other. Then the professor tapped his wristband and vanished without a second glance in Damien's direction.
"What in the seven planes was that?" Damien asked, staring at the space where Delph had been standing.
Henry didn't respond.
"Henry?" Damien asked, his brow furrowing. There was a long pause. Then he felt Henry let out bewildered sigh.
"I have no idea what he did," Henry said, a faint note of awe and excitement in his voice. "I've never seen that magic before."
"That's…cool, I suppose," Damien said.
"You don't understand," Henry snapped. "I've seen every form of magic that humans have. I've been watching the earth for millennia millennium! How could something be this foreign to me?"
Damien walked over to Sylph and knelt on the ground beside her. He nudged the girl's shoulder. She didn't respond.
"We can worry about that later," Damien said. "It's not like Professor Delph is going anywhere. If you don't know what happened, I suppose I just need to get Sylph back to our dorm."
"Did you not hear me?" Henry asked, exasperated. "New magic! To me! How are you not comprehending how important this is?"
Damien rolled his eyes. He hadn't heard Henry this panicked since they'd made the contract four years ago.
With a sigh, he put his back against her chest and grabbed her arms, pulling them in front of him.
Sylph was heavier than he'd expected. Damien gritted his teeth and rose to his feet with the girl slung over his back like a sack of potatoes.
"You need to start getting more exercise," Henry said, taking a quick break from his ranting about magic to prod Damien. "You're lucky this girl is barely more than half your size, or you'd be dragging her back to your room."
"I think I preferred it when you were terrified of Delph's magic," Damien grumbled, trudging toward the exit at the end of the arena.
"Not terrified," Henry said. "Shocked. You couldn't even begin to comprehend how unbelievable it is to learn something this new after a thousand years of stagnation.
And yet, the more I think about it, the more familiar his magic feels. How strange."
Damien would have shrugged if that didn't involve having to lift Sylph's body more.
Students gave Damien strange glances as he staggered through the streets with Sylph over his back, but none of them paid him more than a few moments of attention.
Evidently, this wasn't the strangest thing they'd seen on campus.
The only thing that kept Damien going was the sight of the huge library in the distance. Each step he took felt impossibly small, and Sylph seemed to grow heavier with every passing moment. After he'd walked for around thirty minutes, he was practically trembling with effort.
"Not to be an asshole, but this is pathetic," Henry said.
"Shut up," Damien snapped, speaking aloud by accident.
A passing student shot a dirty look in his direction, but he was too tired to care.
He was nearly upon the library, but there was still a long walk after he made it there. Damien set his jaw and continued to trudge onwards.
"You know, you could have just taken the portal in the arena," Henry observed. "Although, this is good exercise.
Maybe you should do it all the time."
"It would have taken me to the courtyard," Damien rasped. "I don't remember which portal went to the mountain."
"I do," Henry said, cackling as Damien ground to a halt.
"You're nearly there, though. You've gone more than half of the way, so it'll be faster to finish walking than to turn back."
"You suck."
Henry's laughter faded as Damien mentally shoved him into the depths of his mind. He resumed his trek, ignoring his body's desperate pleas to stop. If he did, Damien was pretty sure he'd end up dragging Sylph along the ground behind him for the rest of the trip.
When Damien finally reached the base of the mountain, he'd completely lost track of time. His legs burned with pain he knew for a fact would be coming back with a vengeance tomorrow.
With a weary sigh, Damien staggered up the mountain paths. The sun set behind the clouds, casting the sky in brilliant pink and orange hues. The view from the side of the mountain was magnificent, and Damien likely would have appreciated it if he'd had the energy to look away from the dirt in front of him.
Damien had never seen a dark cave opening look so inviting. He drew on the last of his energy, stumbling across the plateau and into their room. He tossed Sylph onto her bed and groaned in relief.
He slipped his travel bag under his bed and pulled the covers down, climbing into it while removing his coat and scarf with aching arms. Damien removed his shirt and pants as well. He tossed them to the foot of the bed and slipped under the sheets with a relieved sigh.
"I'm going to take a look around the world," Henry said.
"Check out what we're dealing with. I'll be back before you wake up."
"Oka— Wait. What?" Damien asked, jerking upright and blinking groggily.
"I need to scope the area out," Henry replied. "Relax. I won't do anything. I'm just going sightseeing. Nobody will even know I'm there."
I'm not so sure about that. How do I know you won't try to do something?
"That's the funny thing, boy. There's nothing you can do about it. This is in both of our best interests, so the contract isn't stopping me. I'm just letting you know. Enjoy your rest," Henry said.
A cold wind blew through the room. Damien's shadow stretched and pulled away from him, vanishing into the sky and leaving him staring at it helplessly. A wave of intense exhaustion washed over him, turning his thoughts even more sluggish and fuzzy than they already were. His mind suddenly felt profoundly empty, like a large part of him had vanished. Considering Henry had half his soul, Damien supposed it had.
He sighed and tapped his wristband, pulling up the information that Blackmist had on him.
Damien Vale Blackmist College Year One Major: Undecided Minor: Undecided Companion: [Null] Magical Strength: 3.4 Magical Control: .5 Magical Energy: 8 Physical Strength: .2 Endurance: .35 At least his trek back through the campus with Sylph over his shoulder had been good for something. He didn't have the energy to worry further about the consequences of a deadly eldritch creature roaming the world. The call of sleep was a siren, and Damien was no more than a hapless sailor. He fell back onto his bed. His head hit the pillow, and conscious thought blinked out as he fell into a deep sleep.
Damien blinked. He sat on a grassy hill completely naked, which was rather strange considering he was quite confident he'd gone to sleep in his bed wearing underwear.
Surrounding the hill, there was…nothing. Blank, empty darkness enveloped the world, starting at the base of the grass and stretching beyond the horizon. Damien started to stand up, then glanced at himself and thought better of it.
Strangely, he felt no fear or panic. Instead, the emotion circling his mind was more of a detached bemusement.
"Hello?" Damien asked. His voice echoed out, repeating itself to him several times before fading away into the darkness. "Is anybody here? Where am I?"
A cold breeze brushed against Damien's back. He shuddered and hugged himself as goosebumps raced up and down his spine.
"Within your mind. A very small part of it, anyway," Henry's voice came from behind Damien.
Damien turned around. Henry sat before him, dark smoke rising from his shadowy form. In his chest, a miniscule pinprick of white light shimmered faintly. Thin lines of energy stretched from the dot of light and into his chest.
Henry noticed Damien's stare and grunted. The darkness surrounding him flared up, smothering the light.
"It's rude to stare," Henry said.
Damien shrugged in response. Henry sighed. He waved his hand in Damien's direction. A tiny dot of darkness floated through the air and passed through Damien's forehead. He blinked lazily, then drew in a ragged gasp.
"What in the hells?"
"Much better," Henry said. "Your subconscious was trying to sleep, but we have important matters to discuss."
"And that involves you bringing me to a hill in the Void without any clothes?" Damien protested.
"It's all in your mind," Henry replied. "This is where I reside while you go about your happy little mortal life.
Don't complain too much. And, again, your mind. It's not my fault you've shown up naked."
Damien frowned. His normal clothes popped into existence around him as if they'd always been there.
"Huh. That's cool," Damien said.
"You're literally just imagining things. It couldn't be more uninteresting," Henry grumbled. "On topic, please.
This is serious."
"Right, sure," Damien said, massaging his forehead as he dug through his memories. His brow furrowed. "Wait, you ran off last night! What did you do?"
"I told you. I was scouting out the area. Nobody saw me, and I didn't bother any mortals. You have nothing to fear."
"Right," Damien said, crossing his arms. "That's why you say we have a serious topic to discuss."
"Okay, there might be a little bit to fear," Henry admitted. "But it isn't my fault."
"Just tell me already!"
"If you insist. I'm not the only creature from the Void in the mortal plane."
Damien blinked. Of all the things he'd been expecting, most of which had to do with getting caught by Dean Whisp, that wasn't one of them. As he processed Henry's words, he realized he would have preferred the dean to have found his secret.
"Just for the sake of clarity, could you expand on that?"
Damien asked slowly. "This might be a time when numbers matter."
"I detected five of my brethren in the world," Henry said, floating to his feet and pacing back and forth. "They are all Void denizens like me. Luckily for you, all of them were bound in some manner or another. I did not get close enough for them to identify who I am."
"That's…really bad," Damien agreed, well aware his words were an understatement. One world ending creature was bad enough. "You don't sound particularly happy about this. I would have thought you'd want more eldritch creatures on the Mortal Plane."
"Of course, I don't!" Henry snapped, spinning toward Damien. "I've just found out there's new magic I don't know. I want to experience that before the world for at least a bit before it all goes boom."
"That would suck," Damien said in a dry tone. "I'm sure you'd lose a lot of sleep over it. Not like life itself would be snuffed out for all eternity or anything. Just some spilled milk."
"Destroying this feeble, worthless plane is the reason for my existence. Besides, it wouldn't be all that bad," Henry said. "Imagine being in a race for someone to learn magic, and only the winner would be able to do it."
"I am not going to empathize with something that wants to end the world," Damien said, glaring at Henry.
"However, if you're serious about there being other eldritch creatures on the Mortal Plane—" "Why would I lie?" Henry asked, throwing his hands into the air. "Listen, boy. We need to work together on this. The other eldritch creatures cannot escape. We must find them and kill their hosts before they do."
"What? Isn't there another way we can get rid of them?"
Damien asked, frowning. "I can't even cast magic yet! And I'm sorry, but I don't trust you enough to kill random people with nothing but your word to go on."
Henry grabbed Damien by the shoulders and shook him like a ragdoll.
"Do you not understand the magnitude of the situation?"
Henry screamed. "They can end the world! Before I learn all the new magic!"
Damien knocked his companion's hands aside. He looked into where Henry's eyes should have been on his face.
"You've lied to me one too many times, Henry. I agree that this is a serious issue, although I think our reasons for that are a little different. Still, I won't be killing people just because you said to. If you want my trust, you need to earn it. You can start by giving me any information you know about these competitors of yours."
Henry let out a frustrated huff. "I know little beyond that they exist. Their powers were weak, as is mine."
"So they aren't breaking out anytime soon," Damien said. "And by soon, I mean within a few years."
"It's hard to say," Henry replied, shrugging. "Probably not, but if whatever is holding them is damaged, they could escape tomorrow."
"In that case, the world is over and there's nothing we can do about it," Damien said. "So let's not worry about that. How far away were these creatures?"
"One was quite close," Henry replied after thinking for a few moments. "No more than a hundred miles. The rest were farther, and I didn't get a good feel for where they were."
"And they didn't sense you?"
Henry paused. He thought for a few moments before shaking his head.
"Doubtful. I was looking, and they were not. However, if we were to come face to face with their host, it is likely we would recognize each other."
"Will I be able to recognize them?" Damien asked, drumming his fingers on his chin.
"When they burn you alive or stick a dagger into your back, yes," Henry said.
"Okay. Then we've got the beginnings of a plan," Damien said. "I can't go seeking these guys out yet, since they'll just kill me. If they're contained, all I can do is get strong as fast as I can. Then we can seek them out. If they are what you claim they are…" Damien grimaced. How could he know if the other people were any different from him? It's not like he'd asked to be saddled with Henry.
"…we'll figure something out," Damien finished. "And we can't exactly tell someone at a mage college. If they even believe me, they'll wonder how I knew about your Void friends."
"They are not my friends."
"Sorry. But my point still stands. Unless you have a better suggestion?"
"I do not," Henry said, sighing. "Not one you would accept. You must grow in strength quickly. If I was able to sense them, they will eventually be able to sense us.
Believe me, it is much better to be the hunter than the prey."
With that sobering thought, the world rippled like it was the surface of a lake that had a stone tossed into it. The hill faded, and darkness enveloped Damien.
The following morning, Damien awoke to something warm bearing down on his face. He groaned and rolled over, burying his face in the pillow.
"Wake up, boy," Henry said. "I want to look around the campus."
"Then do it your—" Damien stopped mid-sentence. Then he let out a groan and rolled over, opening his eyes, and staring at the ceiling. The memories of what had happened overnight came rushing back to him. "Don't do that, actually. Last night was more than enough."
"I recommend we avoid speaking of last night unless needed," Henry said. "Your mind is not the sanctum you believe it to be, and who knows how many eyes are watching us. Go about your training but remember what lies at stake. Also, you're talking aloud again."
He forced himself away from the pillow and into a seated position. His sore limbs voiced their protest. Damien grimaced.
Not one more word about that, Henry I'm working on it.
"I didn't say anything," Henry said with false innocence.
Good.
Damien glanced at Sylph's bed. She was gone. He frowned and shimmied down the bed, grabbing his clothing, and pulling it under the covers to get dressed.
Where's Sylph?
"The girl woke up a few hours ago," Henry replied. "You could take a few pages out of her book. You waste half the day sleeping."
Damien grunted and shuffled over to their small bathroom. The runes he'd drawn on the wall still emitted a faint light, but it had grown weaker since yesterday.
"Wrong way," Henry said. "The exit is behind us."
I'm not going anywhere until I've taken a shower and brushed my teeth.
Henry settled for a grumble. Damien's thoughts told the companion he wouldn't be making any headway in that particular argument.