The moment I wake up I can tell that I’m no longer in my cell, the space is illuminated with torches and I can see a lot of light coming from mana stones arranged in different places, I try to stand up but I realize I can’t do it, for some reason I feel too weak to do it, the only thing I can do is turn my head to the side with a lot of effort.

  Those guards take their jobs really seriously, my body hurts even when I’m immobile, trying to focus on what’s happening in the surroundings, out of the corner of my eye I notice people silhouettes covered with black cloaks stained with blood. I start to wonder just what in the world the royal family is making them do to put them in that kind of state.

  “O domine da nobis potentiam tuam.” I can hear the chorus of the people trying to connect their magic in some kind of way and I notice how all their mana is directed at me.

  I can feel how the mana is condensing all around me and connecting to my body.

  “Coercere et accipere.” After I catch their words I know the reason why I’m feeling this way, I become aware there’s no more handcuffs restraining me, so I try channeling my mana just to notice that I can’t, their spell is restricting my body movement and my dominance over mana.

  We are in the middle of a ritual and they are doing everything they can in order to complete it before I can figure out something to disrupt their plans.

  I know the worst thing that I can do is to start panicking so I try to calm myself and analyze my circumstances.

  I’m in the middle of an anagram filled with some complicated runes glowing that are been charged with a lot of high mana stones, I’m able to count twenty cloak figures, they aren’t covering their faces so I can distinguish how some of them are classmates that I used to have during my school days, I can see the faces of all my brothers and sisters, the last person that I see is my teacher.

  She taught me the basics of magic and was someone who I always respect, even if in a certain point she wasn’t capable to teach me something because I surpass her.

  It hit me hard when I perceive how she can disregard me so she can become another dog of my family, the same way my fiancé turn on me and make me drink poison, silly me thinking he would never betray me.

  I certainly know that there’s nothing I can say for them to show mercy, I try it for the first month that I spend in prison and the only thing that I obtain in return was the guards laughing at me after a session with their fists.

  From the moment I open my eyes in that cell a part of me always knew that I would never be free again, all the time they tried to break me and wanted me to promise that I be loyal to them, but I refused every single time, I would prefer they torture me that to lose myself in their hands.

  With a million ideas crossing through my mind and trying not to lose my reason, I take deep breathes and I manage to think straight again, if there’s a remote possibility to get out of this situation I need to take it.

  And for that I start to feel the way my mana is circulating in my body, now that I’m not longer with the restricting handcuffs, I should be able to manipulate mana again.

  The twenty years of my life I’ve always been gifted with magic, but this feeling is something entirely different, it’s like trying to swim against the current, all my mana circuit is in shambles after the treatment for the past year and they are forcing their own mana in it for the ritual.

  Another thing that I notice it’s how my mana core is completely empty and I’m trying to get a little mana inside but they don’t allow it.

  I try direct some of the ambient mana inside my core but that too is in their control, even the mana I can feel coming from the earth is behaving abnormal when it comes in contact with their runes engraved on the floor.

  With every attempt I make with the mana and directed it the way I want, some runes illuminate in the surroundings and I start to figure it out how they are making everything work.

  With their chant they take control over my body and the mana, this effect it’s amplified by the anagram who in turn is getting fuel by the mana stones.

  Everything seems to indicate that in this ritual I’m the sacrifice, there’s no other reason for them to release me from prison after a year in confinement.

  I try directing my senses towards a rune only to get rejected by an invisible wall, apparently they aren’t leaving anything to the unknown in regards to me, they know about my talent and how a single error or omission on their part can lead to my advantage and their doom.

  I start hearing a person approaching only to observe how this person doesn’t reveal their face having it covered by a demonic mask, but I have the capacity to tell that he’s my father for the way the body moves and how everybody looks at the figure, the king of Valden, Maxfield Valden.

  Since the death of my mother by the hands of some assassins he changed and started treating me different, with the way his eyes looked at me I always knew that he blamed me for my mother’s death, like I was some kind of jinx and for a long time I used to believe it.

  That was until I found happiness again with magic and the love of my life, Richard Lodwight, the man who I used to think would always stay by my side.

  “Finally all the necessary steps are complete, we can commence, remember that after we take what should be ours since the beginning all of us will beneficiate.” He said it to everybody to hear and I know that they truly assume that something was taken from them, being in the position that I’m at I can only infer that they think that I do it.

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  “Talentum eius accipe et da mihi, accipe mana eius et da mihi, ut accipias animam suam et da mihi.” Resembling a chorus they change their spell and start a new one together and judging by their proficiency they have done this multiple times, only the gods know how long it took them to be this good in their spells as a group.

  For the words they use I grasp the meaning behind it, it’s to robe and take talent, something that should be impossible, I’ve never heard about something relate it to this dark magic, even if it exists I have no idea how they managed to gain this information, it should be treated as forbidden magic.

  Suddenly I start feeling the mana rushing towards me like a beast shattering my mana network, the same that took me years to form and improve, I can feel how evil this ritual truly is, I feel like some demon is licking my skin.

  Before they lock me in prison I used to love the way mana feel inside my body, now I can only describe it like liquid fire is transporting in my insides until they reach my core, little by little they start corrupting it and a pain that I have never felt before assault me.

  “Aaaaahhhhh!” So I scream even when I promised myself to not let them see me like something pathetic, not even the past year prepare me for this, I start losing my mind in the pain, just to snap out of it when I feel my core start breaking, a part of me rush to every person who’s performing the ritual.

  I can see some kind of blue gas being absorbed by every person here.

  “Yes, it’s working.” My father, the king, says with excitement in his voice. “Continue, we cannot repeat the same mistakes we do with the other subjects.”

  I can feel how I’m losing something important, I just don’t know what it is, my life is on the line with every second that passes, but no, it cannot end this way, even if this is my end I refuse to become just a stepping stone to make them stronger.

  I try every way I remember to channel my mana but it doesn’t work, the moment I feel some kind of response they neutralize my magic with the runes they have planted in the platform that I’m currently at.

  “Exponentia impedimento.” I open my mouth and try to say a spell that would interrupt the flow of mana but it doesn’t work, I can feel the tears streaming down my face for the impotence that I’m feeling.

  ‘Please Goddess Hecate, help me.’ I pray the gods for help but nothing happens.

  My body starts expanding abnormally and if this continues at a certain point I wouldn’t be able to take it and I’ll explode, maybe that’s why there’s blood everywhere, other victims explode when their bodies couldn’t handle it anymore.

  “Noooooo!” One of my eyeballs fly apart and the only thing that it’s left for me is regret for trusting who I shouldn’t, I know that it’s not my responsibility what others people think or do but god I wish I could do a lot of things different.

  More cracks appear in my core and I know that my time is limit, I need a solution and I need it now.

  With pure willpower I manage to take control of some mana and directed it to myself, I feel something besides my core, something pure like nothing I’ve seen before, it looks like a star, the energy that radiates it’s in another level that I have never felt before.

  I don’t doubt it and grab it, my memories came from there like a hurricane, I see all my life past before me in milliseconds, when it happens I know that this is my soul, I don’t know why I’m able to sense it.

  I know that if I ever do something wrong to my soul that means my end, and not only in this life, I’ve read about it and soul magic is a taboo for a reason, my soul it’s the bridge with the afterlife, if it gets destroyed I would severe my connection to it, but I can’t let them have me, if it means my end so be it, I would do whatever it takes to stop them.

  [New skill acquired]

  [Sense soul Lv1]

  “Careful I’m feeling how we are losing some mana.” I hear my teacher Evangeline Torne give a warning to everybody else, but for once I’m grateful for my family and how they never consider the opinion of someone who isn’t a royal.

  They ignore her, and I know this is my last chance, so I squeeze my soul and fuse it with what remains from my core, in an instant I feel how they lose my connection.

  ‘I made it, I took it from them, and the only thing that is left is to burst apart.’

  “Erupit veritas.” A suicidal spell, something often used during wars when someone captures a magus or the magus offers to do it like a last resort.

  But I’m not done yet, I mold my core to perform space magic.

  “Eget rerum.” I use a spell that I’ve only read in manuscripts that intends to distortion reality itself but nobody has manage to do it, if by some miracle I manage to inflict some damage to them I can be happy. My soul gives energy to my core and use it to perform magic in another level.

  [New skill acquired]

  [Soul manipulation Lv1]

  [New skill acquired]

  [Soul energy Lv1]

  [New magic attribute acquired]

  [Ethereal magic]

  First my body inflates like a balloon and my extremities explode staining them with rest of body fluids, then my core with my soul do it’s part and create waves in the reality until it reaches every person in the area, and that’s how it should be the end of all, what remains from my body should be next but I can feel my very being or at least what little is left of my soul is getting drag to a hole in existence form from my soul magic.

  In there I only see a pair of eyes looking at me, that’s the last thing that I can think before everything becomes dark.

  [New achievement]

  [Affix to a supreme being]

  [New blessing acquired]

  [Error]

  [Error]

  [Error]

  [Error]

  [Error]

  [&%!???!?”&&$]

  [Clean slate]