Chapter 5

The enemy is closer than one could expect

After he served tea to his teacher, Felix sat quietly next to him. Before he knew it, Mana began to sneak a glance at him. He couldn’t figure out exactly why, but the young man had a familiar presence. His green eyes gave him a strange sense of déjà vu and when their eyes met for a split second, Mana was left breathless. The small smile on Felix’s face made him freeze for a few seconds. It was only when he realised his odd behaviour that Mana lowered his gaze and remained like that for quite a few minutes.

As he sipped his tea, the man pulled out an old box from nowhere and slammed it on the table and made everyone flinch. Mana’s face turned white as he peeked inside. It had a lot of needles of different sizes carefully placed in it, at which Seneca looked almost with fondness.

His long fingers moved slowly over each one of them, occasionally drinking from the tea that had gone cold. The man beckoned to his disciple that returned with another cup of hot tea. But he doesn’t forget to take another look at Mana. As if he sensed anxiety, perhaps even impatience of the boy, Seneca put down his teacup and asked in an almost playful tone, “What’s with the face? Relax. This isn’t for you.”

“If it isn’t, why are you looking at me?”

“Do you think everything is about you?”

He suddenly pulled out a needle the size of a finger, only to put it back in again. Mana, for the tenth time that day, felt his blood pressure spike. All he wanted was to get it over with as quickly as possible and the fact that Seneca seemed to drag his feet didn’t help.

The man pulled out another needle, this time much smaller and as thin as a thread of hair, and when he turned his gaze back to him, Mana flinched, prepared to bolt at any moment. Seneca raised the needle and showed to Mana with a smile that promised trouble.

The child would have run if he could long ago, but his body had been pinned to where he stood by a faint energy he could barely see. For the first time, Seneca revealed a bit of his god-like nature, something he had almost forgotten. The light around his body has become brighter, but it takes on a steam-like consistency, far too hard to describe and even harder to understand. One thing was certain, unlike the other gods he met, his aura was far weaker, as if his body restricted his energy or perhaps he used less of his strength to avoid injuring him.

Anki’s aura expanded, wrapping itself around his body like a snake. In this situation, Mana could only stand and wait helplessly for what was to come.

But to his confusion, nothing happened, at least not to him.

Instead, Felix fell unconscious on the table. As if nothing had happened, his master picked him up and laid him face down on the floor. A small needle was stuck in a lump at the back of his neck. The end of it had a black stone from which energy seemed to flow.

Within seconds, a red mark appeared on Felix’s face just above his left eye that grew so large it reached his neck. The symbols on his body looked familiar and gave Mana a shiver just looking at them. But at the same time, at the sight of him in that state, something snapped inside him.

“Uncle...”

“Don’t worry, he’s safe.” Seneca placed Felix face down on the floor and invited the two to watch. “Look at the spot where I stuck the needle. That bump on the back of his neck is his most sensitive spot that puts him to sleep almost instantly. It’s very important because there will be times when you have to do this. For his well-being and yours, Mana.”

“I don’t understand,” said Mana.

“That lump on the back of the neck is actually a parasite implanted by Acheros, the most powerful disciple of Miazanoapte. Through that parasite, Acheros can find out the location of his host at almost any time. But that works the same way for Felix. If he tries to get close to Mana, he’ll be the first to know. That way, it will be extremely difficult for him to make a move, and if he’s crazy enough to do it, I’ll be here.”

“Does that mean there’s a good chance they know Mana’s awake?” asked Bianca

“I’m sure he already knows, but he won’t make a move, not yet. That’s why we have to focus on the competition right now. You have to, somehow, make it to the top to be accepted as an apprentice of the Midnight Valley, but they don’t accept over six children each year. Those are the best and they fight for the best teachers. But you don’t have a choice. You either get a spot on the top six or you die.”

The Midnight Valley was a place similar to an academy where the most talented sorcerer entered to learn the mysteries of sorcery. Very little was known about that place except that it was hidden in Astral and no one could find or enter that place without being invited in by someone from inside. Bianca had heard of the place from her teacher, who had been a disciple there since she was five, stayed until the age of seven. After two years, she was taken by a priestess from a temple of death, where she has remained to this day.

She was and still is one of the best black magic sorcerers alive, and one of the few sorcerers who can control the grey energy, also called death energy. But the chances of Mana, a child who had never practiced sorcery before, to get in there were very low, especially since his weakness for light, especially fire magic, would be a tremendous disadvantage.

Seneca pulled the needle out of his throat gently, allowing him to wake up. But it took Felix a few minutes to wake up and even then, the boy was so dizzy he couldn’t even stand up. “While he is asleep, Acheros will lose control over him at the same time their bond will be interrupted. Remember, you can’t use this technique too often. If he stays in this state too long, the parasite can kill him.”

Felix lay on his back in bed as his body shivered wildly. His hands paler than ever tilted his bedclothes and his almost white lips trembled and clenched his teeth in an attempt not to cry out in pain. Mana could even hear soft groans of pain that he tried to suppress, which was useless because his hearing was much more sensitive compared to humans.

“Bianca, you will stay here with them. I still don’t trust you alone with the rest of the kids. Tomorrow, you will attend lessons with others under the guidance and supervision of a teacher until your instructor arrives. Mana, you will keep an eye on Bianca, and she will do the same for you. If something unusual happens to one of you, let a teacher know as soon as possible before things get complicated.” Seneca got up to leave but was stopped by Mana, who grabbed his sleeve. The man lowered his gaze to the boy, who looked at him with big red eyes. “What?”

“Do something with him! How can you leave your disciple in this state?”

“I can’t do anything. At most, you can give him some painkillers. But don’t worry, he’ll be fine by tomorrow morning.”

The pain in his legs he almost forgot about it suddenly returned after a long time. It wasn’t long before the boy felt his blood rushed to his head and by the time he realized what had happened, his vision had gone blurry until he could see nothing but darkness. Even his hearing faded to a point where he could no longer distinguish very well what he was hearing.

“Go to sleep. Tomorrow’s going to be a busy day.”

Once the man’s voice fell silent, Mana could only hear the sound of footsteps as he walked away from him. Stubborn and far too confident he wouldn’t hurt him, Mana decided he didn’t want to end the conversation there. He crawled as far as he could move and grabbed his feet. Seneca shook his leg a few times in an attempt to get away from him, but the boy wouldn’t let go.

“You will not let me breathe for a second, are you?”

“You’re not gonna leave it like that? Aren’t you supposed to be a doctor?”

“Whether you believe me, it’s up to you.” But even then he didn’t let go, thus it made him slowly lose his patience. “His disease cannot be treated by conventional medicine because the source of the problem is a parasite attached to his soul that not even death can get rid of. If you want to help him, kill the one who implanted the parasite.”

An awkward silence soon followed between the two, especially after Mana realised he had been clinging to his leg the whole time. Embarrassed, he let go of the man, expecting him to leave, but was surprised when he did not. He was even more puzzled when he realised that the man had pulled out a needle out of nowhere and held it with an almost eerie smile.

“Are you going to sleep by yourself or do I have to put you in a coma until tomorrow?”

Although the question seemed to be addressed to both of them, Mana felt as if the question was strictly for him. They both got into bed without a word and Seneca was about to get out when a small voice stopped him.

“When I can get my memory back?”

“You can forget about that. There is no cure for litha water.”

The man left without another word, making it clear that the conversation was over. In the few minutes of silence, Bianca fell asleep almost instantly, but Mana was still awake even after an hour. He was tired and exhausted, but still couldn’t fall asleep. By then, the silence around, accompanied by the chirping of crickets, became downright sinister and an odd, sweet smell filled the place, a smell that caused him to become hungry.

Then his gaze fell on Felix’s blurred silhouette. Although his eyesight had recovered, the boy still had problems with blurred vision, yet at the same time, his sense of smell seemed to improve.

Mana got out of bed and sat next to Felix, who was half unconscious. He could tell he’d realized he was there when he saw his green eyes that opened just enough to see him.

“What happened?” asked Felix, half-mouthed. Part of his face was still paralyzed, so he had trouble talking.

“I don’t know...”

His breathing was shallow and his red eyes dilated so much they became almost black. His hair moved chaotically, as if he wanted to grab something. Felix didn’t even get to say anything as he felt his hair curl around his body.

“You must be hungry-”

Felix froze as he felt a pain in his neck accompanied by the sensation of warm liquid running down his throat. Hundreds of hairs enter his skin trying to pull the parasite away from his body. The marks on his face become visible again as Felix struggles to remain conscious. Then he felt a sharp pain that shot through his entire body and caused him to be paralyzed again. His gaze fell on Bianca, who was dead asleep, completely undisturbed by the noises as well as what was happening around her.

He wanted to shout, to wake her up, but found that once he opened his mouth, he could not utter words but only intelligible sounds. The young man used all his strength as he tried to stop him, but was powerless and before he knew it, he had completely lost consciousness.

“Stop it!” Mana wanted to pull away but found that he had no control over his hair. “Bianc-”

A numbness spread through his entire body and made him lose his balance. A short time passed before every muscle in his body seemed to be paralyzed in just a few seconds and with it, his vision grew blurrier and blurrier until he lost consciousness.

The first thing he saw once he opened his eyes was a dark but stretched out meadow-like place. The atmosphere around was strange, and the air seemed to be unbreathable to the average person as the place was engulfed in heavy, thick, coal-black smoke. Yet he was not affected; He felt good, as if he had always been there.

“Did you summon me, my lord?”

Mana could feel a chilly breath in his ear, with thick smoke that enveloped the shoulders and arms. It was a strange sensation, but it didn’t make him feel endangered.

“No.I don’t even know who you are.”

“Then perhaps I should introduce myself.” The smoke that enveloped his body moved in front of him, taking the form of a tall man with no eyes. His body was not physical, being made up of nothing but that thick smoke.

“Your loyal disciple, Acheros, is glad to see you, my lord,” he said with a bow.