TESWKM 27

chapter 27

At Theor’s words, a small laugh slipped out of me without realizing it.

Even I—who had learned black magic since I was very young—had always been dissatisfied with the fact that every spell formula required my blood infused with dark magic.

After all, if my blood had to be used every time I drew a spell, that meant I had to painfully bleed like this every single time.

Still, fortunately, there was a black magic healing technique, so no scars were left behind. At first, making my finger bleed hurt terribly and stung a lot, but after drawing spells for so long, the pain had dulled, almost like the way skin forms calluses.

“I’m used to it now, so it’s fine. Actually, in the beginning I couldn’t even imagine biting my finger to draw blood. I carried a small dagger with me and cut my hand each time to make a wound before drawing the spell.”

I added that while drawing a spell in the air didn’t hurt, the sting from the cut itself remained, so I still didn’t particularly like the feeling of being sliced by a blade.

Theor stared at me quietly for a moment, then let out a short sigh.

“It seems your awareness of pain is somewhat different from other people’s.”

“My awareness of pain?”

“It means you seem completely unaware of how much something hurts—how painful it really is.”

His tone sounded strangely irritated, which caught me off guard.

Unaware of pain? I knew pain better than anyone.

By nature, I was actually quite the crybaby.

On top of that, the body I’d possessed seemed just as sensitive to pain as my original body.

I’d only been slapped once, yet my face had swollen badly and the inside of my mouth had split open. Even moving my lips a little hurt, which meant this body was quite fragile too.

“I know very well.”

So I answered with complete sincerity.

Then I began walking toward the corpse of the monster flower.

Theor followed me, continuing to ask questions about black magic.

“So once you draw blood, can you keep using spells until the bleeding stops? Your finger is still dripping blood even now.”

Looking down at the finger I had bitten, he spoke a little faster.

“Are you leaving the wound untreated so you don’t have to draw blood again later? Is it because drawing blood itself is painful, so you leave it as it is? Or does the bleeding simply not stop while using black magic?”

My eyes blinked rapidly at his constant stream of questions.

He seemed genuinely curious about my black magic.

Since I was also curious about the dark attribute, I understood his interest.

I stopped in front of the monster flower. Picking up the monster stone it had left behind, I placed it into the pouch we had been given before entering the hunting grounds.

The pouch was something we received when the hunting festival began. When monster stones were placed inside, it automatically contacted the organizers at the entrance so they could determine first and second place.

Since I couldn’t hunt together with Sister Pere anymore, I had resolved to collect more monster stones than anyone else, win first place, and give the prize to her.

“If we’re in a situation where I have to use black magic anyway, I’ll end up using it repeatedly, so I don’t heal the wound. And biting my finger is simpler than pulling out a dagger and cutting to the right depth—but it hurts more than a dagger cut. So if I healed it and then had to draw blood again right away, that would be a bit troublesome.”

At my explanation, Theor’s eyebrow twitched slightly.

I walked past him deeper into the forest and continued.

“My black magic actually has quite a few attack patterns. The basic one is what you saw earlier—channeling dark power through a spell formula to create a sharp blade and attack with it. Another method I use just as often is binding the target with black smoke.”

“That sounds similar to my black shadow ability.”

“Black shadow?”

As soon as I asked, Theor stretched out his hand toward a stone monster that had suddenly appeared in front of us.

Without using any spell or blood, a black shadow naturally flowed from his hand. It shot forward, splitting into several branches.

Those strands of shadow wrapped around the monster’s neck, arms, waist, and legs.

With a crushing motion, the stone monster shattered into pieces.

Since it was a low-level monster, it was dealt with very quickly.

“That’s the same attack pattern as my black smoke. The only difference is shadow instead of smoke.”

At my words, Theor nodded once.

With a calm expression, he quickly dealt with the monsters that were suddenly appearing in greater numbers.

Watching his fighting style, I couldn’t help thinking that the black magic I had learned must have been derived from the dark attribute.

After all, his abilities looked like a superior version of my own techniques.

He used black shadows to wrap around the web shot by a spider monster and grind it into powder.

He enveloped a dragonfly-like monster in shadow, then clenched his fist to crush it until it burst.

He even created countless blade-shaped shadows and launched them at a pack of wolf monsters rushing toward us.

Seeing that, I wondered if the reason I had been reincarnated into this world was somehow connected to the black magic I possessed and the dark attribute Theor wielded.

“This is how it works. Now, would you show me your other abilities?”

After speaking, Theor let the darkness surrounding his hands fade and looked at me.

I nodded.

Then I raised the finger that was still dripping blood and drew a spell in the air while looking at the pack of wolf monsters wandering ahead.

Black smoke flowed out through the spell and wrapped around the entire group of wolves, turning them into powder.

There were two methods—blowing them apart or grinding them into powder.

I usually chose the powder method.

Even though that spell was more complex and required more strokes than the explosion one, it was my small effort to avoid unnecessary bloodshed.

Anyway, Theor and I continued deeper into the forest, using dark magic and the dark attribute side by side.

After quite a number of monster stones had piled up in my pouch—

Suddenly, Theor, who had been walking calmly, looked sharply up at the sky.

Then he grabbed my arm, pulled me behind him, and formed a long black shadow sword in his hand.

At that moment, something descended from the sky and attacked us.

It was a golden monster with enormous flapping wings.

With the head of a crocodile, a body resembling a turtle, and the tail of a snake—

I instantly recognized it as an ancient monster.

It was the same monster that attacked Lloyd during the hunting festival in the original story.

The Empress had constantly tried to kill the grown Crown Prince so her own son could become emperor. That ancient monster had been part of the first plot she carried out with a dark sorcerer.

Wait.

Something’s wrong.

Why is it appearing already?

And why is it targeting Theor instead of Lloyd?

The situation resembled the original story, yet was unfolding in a completely different direction, leaving my expression stiff.

The ancient monster had been strong enough to injure even the adult Lloyd.

There was no way the still-underage Theor could handle it alone.

So I quickly drew a spell and deployed a defensive barrier in front of him.

When the monster’s attack began getting sucked into the barrier dome, I drew blood from another finger and began tracing a summoning circle with both hands.

An ancient monster could never be killed with ordinary black magic.

Using a summoned creature seemed like the better option.

In truth, since possessing this body, I had never summoned anything even once.

And although dark power flowed through this body, it wasn’t my original body. I wasn’t sure if the summoning would even work properly.

But if I did nothing, both Theor and I could be injured—or killed.

I could already see Theor starting to lose ground in the fight.

Drawing the summoning circle quickly in the air, I poured even more dark power into it just in case.

Since this wasn’t my original body, I worried the dark power contained in this body’s blood might not be enough for a proper summoning.

“…!”

Fortunately, the summoning worked.

From the brilliantly glowing circle emerged Pandeum, the summon I had contracted with in my original life.

Pandeum was the only creature that could be summoned through black magic—the king of the summoning realm Pandemonium.

The reason I alone could summon him was simple.

Because when I had been a black mage, I had been a genius.

“Where is this, Master?”

Pandeum flapped his massive black wings as he asked.

There was no time to explain the situation.

So I immediately gave him an order.

“Kill that golden crocodile-turtle!”