Ryan stepped into the muddy sphere of magic. It felt suffocating in here. This wasn't the sort of pressure that you could feel when just dipping into a pool, he could feel the water pushing down onto him from all sides. Luckily, the earrings that he was given by Goria were able to counteract a lot of the more serious issues from water-related pressure changes.

  But even without that worry clouding his mind, it was already hard enough to get through here as a physical feat in and of itself. It was like the water was trying to push him back out, as though rejecting him. And with every 'breath' that Ryan took in here, he could feel his lungs fill with violent magic. It felt comparable to breathing in straight smoke from a chemical fire.

  But he had to continue pushing through. After all, in the centre of the sphere, Ryan could see Michael, suffocating himself as well. Usually, it was close to impossible to hurt yourself with magic. It was a sort of mental block that people imposed on themselves subconsciously. Just like the sensation of feeling physically restrained when trying to jump off something too tall, or if you were to try and stab yourself with a knife. One's body did everything it could do to protect itself. And the same thing was the case with magic. But in cases like this, when someone's mind was almost fully overtaken by rampaging magic, it was even possible for someone's own magic to kill them.

  There was a famous case with a necromancer in the long past, who lost control over his magic and turned himself into a simple skeletal soldier. And though it was used as a punchline in a lot of jokes nowadays, that didn't change its historical validity.

  Ryan stared forward, but at some point, he wasn't able to continue on anymore. As he stretched out his hand, the raging currents of the inner section of the sphere cut open Ryan's skin. The dirty water that got into his wound burnt like hell and back.

  He pulled back his hand, startled. It seemed like this damaging current was just a small layer, and wasn't touching Michael himself. Luckily, otherwise it might be hard to get him out of there completely unscathed.

  But even so, it didn't seem like Ryan could just force his way through that without getting really, really fucking hurt. It might get down to his bones, and do permant damage to his hands. And he wasn't sure if he could afford that. Not only because it wasn't clear if it was enough to just get Michael out of the water to stop his rampage, and most importantly... because without his hands, Ryan couldn't keep helping the spirits. So... Ryan pulled back.

  He stepped back out of the water, his clothes drenched in the mud. It was too crazy in there for him to get any moment to think about what to do. But luckily, he wasn't alone right now. He had companions that he could count on at any time. Silvia and Modak were both standing there, outside of the shed.

  Silvia, sobered up but clearly still affected by the spell, was cutting into some of the clothes that she had made for Ryan. Modak was standing next to her, the heavier bits of armour and fabric, holding everything so that she could work, even if in a rush. Somehow, though Modak was still swaying a bit... he seemed weirdly fine.

  "Dude, what's-"

  "I'll explain it later," Modak interrupted him, and Silvia slowly nodded her head. Her cheeks were flushed, and it was like she was trying to shake off the thoughts coursing through her mind. By then, Fae came running over, carrying a small necklace in her hand.

  "Is this the one?" she asked, holding it forward. It was shaped like the other necklaces Silvia had made for Ryan, each one acting as the centre- and last-piece of each outfit she had made for him, representing the spirits' cores. But this one didn't have a single colour, it was two. A deep red and a golden yellow. Maximus and Morgana's cores.

  The two colours were bleeding into each other a little, showing the texture of the mana a bit more as they did. Maximus' red was dissolving into small wisps, while Morgana's yellow broke away into rays of light.

  "Yes! That's the one, thank you," Silvia smiled broadly, looking over at Fae. Her hands, that had been moving this whole time as she manually stitched a few pieces of fabric together, were now frozen in place as the elf looked at her partner, "Wow, you are so beautiful, do you know that?"

  "Get your mind out of the gutter and keep at it. You said you think this will work, right?" Modak asked, and Silvia looked away from Fae, nodding her head.

  "Right, sorry. Yes, this should totally work."

  "What the hell are you guys even talking about?" Ryan asked, staring at his friends confused. They both looked at him, and Modak quickly started explaining.

  "Spells created through rampaging mana are extremely unstable. As long as you interrupt the flow of magic throughout it, the whole thing will crumble down and will even give a small mental shock to the caster, potentially waking them up from the trance-like state they're in."

  Ryan listened to Modak's words, narrowing his eyes, "Weren't you, like, super fucking high like ten minutes ago?"

  "Yeah... I made a pretty big breakthrough. Honestly I think I should get high more often. Anyway, I'm still really baked, but I can think a bit clearer. I looked outside, figured out roughly what was going on, and went to get Silvia. She and I had been working on something to try and... well, surprise you."

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  Staring at the outfit that Silvia had made, Ryan put two and two together pretty fast, "You want to boost two concurrent links? But just because I'm linking to both of them doesn't mean that things are any different all of a sudden."

  "Except... you've been training under both of them for a while now. We've seen the sorts of things you can do now, and we know that you can do one very specific thing," Modak said, pointing at the sphere of water, "You're going to cut into that sphere of water with the swordsmanship you learned from Maximus, and inject mana the way Morgana tells you to."

  Ryan turned around, letting out a long sigh, "If you say so, I can give it a shot. And is there a reason why Maximus can't do it? Won't aura be fine to interrupt the flow of mana in there?"

  The orc immediately shook his head, "No, aura and mana don't interact unless you use special methods. They'll just interrupt each other. What is needed is mana, and mana that is compatible enough to take over a small section of of the spell and destabilise it completely. And your mana..."

  "Is compatible in that way with basically everything, I get it," Ryan looked back at the sphere of water behind him, "Then hurry it up at least, I don't know how long Michael is going to hold-"

  "Done!" Silvia said, pushing the outfit right at Ryan. Without hesitation or even looking at it, he stripped out of the clothes he was wearing until now and put on the newly created outfit.

  It was kind of weird, the way it was a mish-mash of three different things. You could already think of the regular 'Urban Spirit' series of a fusion between Ryan and each of the spirits, but this one was a fusion of Ryan and two of the spirits.

  What was the most surprising to Ryan was the porcelain armour. Basically, he had greaves and boots made out of reinforced porcelain. Neither did he know how the hell they got this, nor did he have any idea of this was actually reliable as a piece of armour, but he just had to trust his friends for now.

  Each piece of armour was engraved with patterns like those on Morgana's dress. He didn't have a hoodie anymore, but instead a black, sleeveless, high-necked shirt, and pants that were so wide they might look like a skirt at first glance, ending just a bit below where the porcelain boots started.

  But most importantly... instead of the knight helmet, Ryan was wearing a cloth blindfold that completely blocked his sight. Usually this would be a problem, but if he was linking with Morgana and Maximus anyway, then he would at least have their sight. Maybe it would actually help Ryan do what they were suggesting.

  Ryan took a deep breath, placing the necklace around his neck, as a connecting thread formed between him and the two spirits in question. His world that was just complete darkness until a moment ago, expanded in two ways. But... something was different. With his own sight completely blocked, and because of the deeper connection that he had two the two of them, he wasn't just receiving the raw information of the world around him. No, he was actually seeing through the eyes of both Maximus and Morgana.

  Maximus' eyes saw the mundane and physical world, whereas Morgana's eyes saw the magical world. The combination of both almost stunned Ryan. He clutched the horn of shapeless water in his hand. Tiar's tendrils flowed into the horn and began to shaped Granfell, Maximus' greatsword. It was heavy, of course, but Ryan had specifically practiced with Maximus how to properly use this despite the weight handicap.

  The tip of the sword was laying on the ground, and he was about to start focusing on his attack, but Morgana stopped him. She wanted him to construct something else. Ryan slowly split off a chunk of ice from the surface of the sword, which quickly regenerated a moment later.

  From that chunk of ice, Tiar formed a small book made completely of ice. Morgana's Grimoire of Frost. Once the 'Spirit Armament' skill reached level 10, Ryan and Tiar were able to reconstruct two pieces of equipment at once, rather than just the one. Plus, they were apparently more 'accurate' to the real thing, though Ryan had no idea what that really meant. At least, until now.

  Ryan felt a calmness flow through his mind as the grimoire floated above him, flipping through translucent pages. He could feel himself become influenced by the two spirits. Maximus' stoic nature, and Morgana's ever-distant demeanour somehow helped him completely focus his mind on the task at hand.

  He tightened his grasp on the horn, which acted as the sword's handle. An icy breath flowed out from his mouth, as Ryan dragged the imitation Granfell's tip over the dirt. His magic was almost forced out his hands and into the horn. Somehow, Ryan activated the elemental effects of Granfell, just through magic and not aura.

  As the blade touched the sphere of water, it immediately began to freeze over. But the parts that froze also cracked due to the pressure exerted by the blade. The sphere of muddy water immediately turned into a cloud of dusted ice, which fell down onto the ground around Michael like snow.

  Standing in the centre of that pile was Michael, who fell to the ground almost immediately. His mana was no longer leaking out, so Ryan ran toward him and quickly dragged him out. He couldn't stay in contact with that magic anymore.

  When he stepped back outside, carrying Michael, he turned toward his friends with a light smile on his face, "Looks like you were right."

  But both Silvia and Modak, as well as Fae who didn't even have a reference-point for Ryan's abilities in the first place, just stood there, staring at him in confusion.

  "I, uh... I thought you would just cut through the water, and the bubble would slowly fall apart, but I..." Modak stuttered, and Silvia immediately nodded her head.

  "I guess we really still don't understand these synergies. We should keep testing them out. Do you have any more ideas for potential combinations?" Ryan asked, looking at Silvia with a curious expression. She stepped back, a little surprised by Ryan's attitude. Usually, he would be shocked and confused as well, but he was so... calm.

  Ryan carefully put Michael down onto the grass, and then looked around. Morgana and Maximus immediately turned into the direction he looked to as well, practically shadowing him, so that he could actually see what he wanted to.

  "Looks like Rose is finally here, too. Modak, do you think you're sober enough to figure out a way to distribute the potion to everyone at the party? They won't be just readily accepting it."

  "Huh? Wait, how am I supposed to..?"

  "Your speakers are all over the party, aren't they?"

  "They are, so what? Should I- Wait, actually, now that you mention it... if I can target the specific potion, I should be able to use a spell to turn it into a fine mist that people can just breathe in... would it still work the same?"

  "Ask Rose and Kim. They would know what the best method is. Either way, we need to hurry it up," Ryan said, staring over at Michael. The mana flowing through his body, which was once so clean and pure... was now murky and dark, "I'm worried that some of this could cause permanent issues."

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