Benny slammed straight into a wall.

How many times was he going to go through getting thrown across the paddock like a ragged doll? Momentarily dazed and feeling as though every part of his body was bruised (again), Benny looked up to see everything had gone all foggy. He soon realized he had lost his glasses in the explosion! His lost his new hat as well.

But that was the least of his concerns.

Screams and shouts can be heard from the background. Despite his foggy vision he could see the reason why. There was an enormous black shape hulking like some gigantic ape. Benny could make out two red dots as some kind of sinister, glowing eyes. It was also covered in that black haze that made Benny sick earlier.

Whatever it was, it was definitely something dangerous!

“Flame Dragon Style: Blitz Fang Blade!” yelled Tenryu’s voice.

He could make out that Tenryu had shot red flames from his sword.

“What the blitz?!” says Tenryu, his voice sounded as though he were in disbelief.

“Knuckle Plant!” yelled Nia’s voice as Benny could see some kind of movement whacking the creature, “W-What? It passed through it?!”

“Megaton Hammer!” yelled Eldon as a loud smashing sound could be heard.

“Double-Cross Blade!” shouted Bronson.

A loud roar came from the shadowy creature.

“Are you kidding me?!”

“Blast it! Our attacks aren’t working!” Tenryu sounded annoyed. “What the blitz is this thing?”

Benny could not see entirely what was going on. But from what he could hear, he could tell that whatever this thing was, their attacks were ineffective! The creature roared again and made some swinging movements. A loud smacking sound could be heard.

“Aaargh!” someone shouted.

Bronson yelled, “ELDON!!!”

“I’m alright!” Eldon yelled back, “Just keep that thing under control!”

“Flame Dragon Style: Triple Claw Slash!” Tenryu made another flaming strike but it seemed ineffective again.

Benny struggled to find his way. With his glasses gone, he could only see as far as his nose. He had no hope of finding them in this situation. And what’s more those were his spares in the first place!

Wait a minute! He thought. I do have something!

Benny felt around the pocket of his pants. Thankfully, the bottle of Vision-Corrector drops was still inside.

“If I remember correctly, all I have to do is put a few drops until my vision clears.” Benny uncapped the bottle. He lifted the bottle towards his face and gulped slightly. “I hope it works…”

The first drop stung like hell!

Benny felt his eye was on fire!

It was nothing like any eye drops he had before! He thought that Nia might have given him acid! As soon as the stinging part faded, Benny tried to open his eye, expecting that he had become blind. But to his surprise, his vision in the right eye started to become less foggy compared to his left. Although he did not like the sting, Benny added a few more drops and endured the sting!

By the third drop, his vision was as clear as though he wore his best glasses or contact lenses! Maybe even better! Benny did the same for his left eye (and endured the pain.) Now he suddenly had 20-20 vision!

He had never seen his surroundings so clear…even though it looked like apocalypse movie.

What was causing the commotion and Benny’s nausea earlier became apparent!

Before him was a gigantic black monster! It looked like it was made of black gas! It was hulking and huge! Its jagged teeth looked like sharp broken glass. Its red, menacing like eyes reminded him of Aunt Leah’s creepy, hairless cat. Only this one was a lot bigger, meaner, and in Benny’s opinion…a lot uglier.

It was also completely covered with those same black hazes.

But that wasn’t the worse of it! This thing was thrashing around and smashing everything in its way. It didn’t look intelligent but as it kept on smashing and punching everything on sight, it was just destructive! Some of the clerks were trying to subdue it. As it turns out they each had Magic Tools of their own. But every attack they shot against it just phased through it like it were a ghost. It was dangerous combination of being intangible and destructive!

And whatever this thing was it was clear that it was instinctively evil!

***

Tenryu and Nia had joined in the fray along with Bronson and Eldon. Eldon, Benny had noticed, was wincing as though he was injured on the side. They were trying to fight it but all their attacks seemed to just pass through it! ­

“Blast it! None of our attacks are working!” Tenryu gritted his teeth in annoyance as his flaming sword attack just missed the creature again.

“All of you!” Eldon yelled to the clerks, “Assist in getting everyone to the escape routes! We’ll handle this thing!”

It would seem the clerks were very effectively trained in crowd control as they immediately led all the customers out of the way an into the escape routes. This has was done in less than a minute.

While that was happening, Eldon turned to the other two Adventurers beside him. “You two should get out of here as well!”

“Hey!” Tenryu looked rather offended, “Don’t think you can have all this fun for yourself!”

“This isn’t fun and games boy, this is serious!”

“In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a full-fledged Adventurer!”

“What about you?” says Nia in concern, her eyes darted towards his side, “You’re obviously hurt!”

“I’m fine! You kids just go!”

“Not a chance!” Tenryu twirled his sword.

“I’m not a kid…” says Nia, looking around her.

“Does it matter? You two and your friend from earlier…wait, where is he?”

“Now that I noticed…Where’s Benjamin?”

“I thought he was with you?” shouts Tenryu.

“Perhaps your friend already evacuated? Hmm, a smart kid in my book…”

“Eldon, head’s up!” shouted Bronson, “It’s about to do something!”

The creature inhaled as though it were sucking all the air from the surroundings!

“What the blitz is it doing now?”

“Never mind that!” says Eldon, “Move it, kid!”

Everyone dodged as the creature roared! Releasing a thick laser blast of dark energy that was destroying everything in sight!

Luckily everyone else had evacuated…apart from Benny.

Benny managed to hide behind some debris.

He wasn’t sure why, especially with his instinct saying he should make a break for it like they thought…but he wanted to help. He had to find a way for to help them! He wasn’t going to lose them again!

“Blast it! What am I supposed to do?” says Benny in frustration.

There was another loud smashing sound.

Benny looked up to see Tenryu had managed to dodge getting smashed by that creature’s fist! The creature was about wing another arm when Tenryu pointed his sword and blasted it with flames! This time it managed to hit the Beast and it screamed in pain!

“Alright!” says Tenryu.

“Don’t get cocky kid!” Bronson steadied himself, “It’s still not down for a count!”

The Beast roared in what looked like anger. It seemed hard to tell as it already looked angry.

“Double Cross Blade!” shouts Bronson as he swung his axes.

His attacks formed an X-shaped blast but once again it just passed through as though the thing were made of air!

“Missed again?” Bronson growled in anger.

That Beast roared as it sucked air again.

“INCOMING!!!” Bronson yelled.

The Beast released another powerful blast which everyone jumps out of the way to avoid!

But Tenryu saw where the beam was heading.

“BENNY, LOOK OUT!!!” yelled Tenryu.

Benny, who was struggling on what to do, had looked up and saw what was coming at him.

“Oh, dang it!” cursed Benny as he leapt to the side. The attack nearly missed him by an inch. Benny tumbled to the floor again as the beam missed him and smashed the fountain!

“Benjamin! Are you alright?!” Nia calls out to him.

“Yeah, I’m fine!” groaned Benny.

“But you’re hurt!”

When she said that, Benny felt a stinging pain in his cheek followed by something warm dripping. The color of red told Benny he had deep gash in his cheek.

“Hang on! I’m coming to-”

“That thing is about to attack!”

Benny yells pointing at that Beast.

Tenryu turned his attention to the Beast, his eyes seeing red with rage, “Why you?! You’re gonna pay for that!”

He sent a flurry of flaming attacks. However, each one passing through it! Nia tried attacking it by causing the plants in the area to strike it. However, just like before Tenryu’s fire attacks it just passed through the Beast like it was nothing!

“Blast it! Just what is this thing?!” says Tenryu.

The Beast raised its arms and roared loudly. But as it did so…it suddenly stopped.

***

Everything else stopped! Everyone was frozen in mid-movement.

Everything and everyone…except for Benny.

“This again?” gasped Benny.

“…Haven’t seen one of those in a long time…Its creator was no doubt a fool…”

Benny felt a jolt.

It was that voice again! But this time it was different. Instead of sounding like it was in his head, it sounded like it was right behind him!

He turned and there standing right behind him was a person.

Judging from his height and build he seemed to be the same age as Benny.

He was wearing a set of hooded white robes. On his right hand was a long golden staff that was curled a bit on the top. He had the hood of his robes over his head showing only half of his face but Benny could see he was frowning.

Benny immediately recognized him as the one he saw out of his bedroom window from that time!

“It’s you! You’re the one I saw out of my bedroom window!”

The person nodded, “Indeed…that was me…”

“And you’re the guy who was talking in my head this whole time!”

“That is true also…I have been speaking to you…”

“And you’re real?!” Benny added.

“I’m not sure how to respond to that…but since I’m talking to you that mean I am, aren’t I?”

That actually makes sense.

“Hello, Benjamin… It’s so good to finally meet you face-to-face… Though this isn’t exactly what I had in mind…”

He pointed at the creature with his staff.

“Just what is that thing?!”

“A Demon…”

“D-Demon?!”

“To be precise it is an Artificial Demon. This thing was created by a fool who obviously did not know the consequences of meddling with such dangerous Magic…”

“Okay, so this thing is a product of Magic. How do we stop it exactly?”

The boy turned to him, “You have to help your friends fight it, of course!”

Benny quickly shook his head, “No way! That’s impossible! I can’t fight that thing!”

“Isn’t the reason why you stayed here instead of escaping was because you wanted to help your friends?”

Benny gulped. “It was on impulse. Now that I think about…” he looks at his friends who were frozen in time and struggling against it, “There’s nothing I can do at the moment…”

“Ho? Nothing you can do? You have all the means to do that, no?”

Benny looked at him completely confused.

“I don’t-”

“Last night…you’ve discovered you can cast Magic without a need of a Magic Tool. So technically you can fight as you are right now.”

“Eh? You know about that?”

“You also happened to have a book of incredibly powerful Spells…”

“Oh yeah… I do have that…”

“And you’ve just proven to be quite adept in Magic, using a highly advanced Spell and doing it magnificently after reading about it only once...”

“Ah, that was just luck…”

“Not to mention you invented Flight Magic which is supposed to be an Impossible 13 Concept. This shows you have a natural aptitude to create and develop Magic. A rare skill nowadays…”

“That is…”

“Benjamin…you have proven to be someone who is very capable…So why are you saying you can’t do anything in this situation?”

“I…I’m not sure I can…”

“It has been defeated before and it can be done again… I’m not saying it would be easy though…”

“Would you stop it?” yells Benny, “There’s no way I can fight that thing when they can’t either!”

There was a pause before the mysterious person continued.

“Even when you have shown great potential and skill…yet you’re still saying that? ...you’re not really living up to what you are capable of doing…”

“Don’t expect me to do things because of a few circumstances! There’s no way I can do that! There’s no way…I can live up to other people’s expectations…”

Benny thought back to his previous life in his home world. No matter what he did he couldn’t match up to what was expected of him. By his teachers…By his peers…By his family…he couldn’t meet their expectations

“Then don’t.”

“Huh?”

Benny was a little off footed.

“Don’t live up to other’s expectations.”

“Eh? But didn’t you just say…I wasn’t meeting up to…”

“You shouldn’t do that in the first place. You should live up to your own expectations… Haven’t you noticed that the amazing things you did was not because it was expected of you to do them…but because you wanted to...”

Benny was speechless at that.

“Tell me… Did anyone expect you to be able use Magic without the need of Magic Tool?”

“No! Nobody knows about that!”

“Did anyone expect you to use that powerful Magic earlier…Grand Cross if I’m not mistaken… even if you were not sure yourself?”

“No…at that time…I just wanted to try that spell…”

“Was it expected of you when you created a Magic that is supposed to be an Impossible 13 Concept?”

“No, that was something out of whim…didn’t expect it would work though…”

“Benjamin…You achieved those amazing things because those weren’t expected of you but because you have a genuine interest in them... and that doesn’t apply to achieving things…”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“I will ask some more…Was it expected of you to help Mr. Azalea and his family…and all those people during that crisis in Marblewood?”

“Huh? How’s that…”

“Was it expected of you to go help your friends when they were in serious trouble with Cactus Hun? Did anyone expect you to use Magic to help them out?”

“Um…No, I just wanted to…”

“Was it expected of you when you shielded that poor boy from that detestable nobleman earlier?”

“Huh? You saw that?!”

The mysterious person nodded with a smile.

“Indeed…you are quite a brave and compassionate person. This is what everyone got impression out of you.”

“But I…” Benny looked down on his feet.

“What I do think is that you mistook impressions for expectations… You can’t say it was expectations because no one thought that you were capable of any of that…”

Benny fell completely silent.

“But I can understand why you felt this way…You’ve lived under the shadow of everyone that you don’t have the confidence in yourself and continuously felt pressured.”

Benny shook at where he stood. What the guy said was actually on the mark. He was already fighting back tears but a few were leaking from the corner of his eyes.

“But there isn’t any of that here… don’t be chained down to what you assume everyone expects you to be…but rather be someone you want to be…”

Benny looks at him, dumbfounded.

“Listen Benjamin…there were many people if not all great people who achieved what they did because it wasn’t expected of them…but because they wanted to… Even Merlin himself was like that…To be honest you two are quite the same…”

“Eh? Merlin..? You mean that Legendary Adventurer Merlin?”

“Er…I don’t think he’d be very appreciative that over-the-top title.”

“You know him? But he lived over a thousand years ago!”

“In case you haven’t noticed, I’m not a living human being anymore so I don’t have the average lifespan of one…at least not anymore…”

“Anymore? …Then that would mean that you’re a…ghost…?”

“That’s neither here or there… But going back to Merlin, what I can say is that nobody expected much of him but when he revived the Era of Magic it’s because he wanted to and not because everyone expected him to.”

Benny was a little amazed to hear that.

“I should also point out that this applies to both good and bad. There were many people who had fallen down the wrong path to achieve what they wanted. Just like that idiot who created that Beast over there and got what he sowed in the end. So I’d advice you that while you can achieve great things you must not lose your heart and way in the process.”

The mysterious person approached him.

“But for now, tell me…what is it do you want to do in this situation. Don’t think of what people expect you to do. Think about what you really want to do. And please be honest…”

Benny wiped his eyes with his sleeve and took a deep breath.

“I want to help my friends.”

The person smiled once again.

“Exactly what an Adventurer would say…”

“B-but…I’m not an Adventurer!”

“I guess the choice for that is up to you….But what’s important right now is that you need to help your friends.”

“Ah… yeah, you’re right. So how do we defeat that thing?”

“First…Even if you have achieved the Conjurer Ability…I would agree it is quite risky. So I think you’re going to need this…”

The mysterious boy presented to him the staff.

“You’re staff?”

“Actually, I’m only just holding on to this...But as of now…It belongs to you...”

As though in a trance, Benny takes the staff into his hands. All of a sudden Benny felt a strange sense of warmth coming from the staff. The same kind of warmth he felt before from the Spellbook. Then the staff glowed brightly! Strange enough it was also the same experience he felt with Spellbook!

“Ah! It has accepted you…”

There in his hands was a long, golden staff. The top end was hooked and curled around like the staff a bishop carries during services. That curved part was also stylized like some kind of bird with its wing outstretched and its tail curled inward over a large, white crystal orb. There was a strip of cloth that was wrapped around the top part and was tied on both ends. The rest of the staff was a long golden rod that made the thing a head taller than Benny.

Suddenly from within his bag there was another light!

“Eh? What’s this?”

The flap cover of his satchel flips open and out flies the Spellbook glowing with light!

“T-The Spellbook?!”

“Oh, the Spellbook has reacted to call of its purpose…”

“Purpose?”

“What else? It is to provide its owner with the knowledge of Magic…now you have the tools you need. In fact…”

The mysterious person gazes at him for a bit and a smile can be seen once again underneath the hood.

“This overall appearance suits you quite well though I think something’s missing… I believe it’s this…”

Out of nowhere…he pulled out Benny’s hat.

“Hey! That’s my hat!”

“Be careful not to lose it again…”

Benny takes the hat and puts it back on his head.

“Now…you look like an Adventurer…I think a Magician to be precise.”

“Magician?”

“You know the term already. But in this world it’s one of the Specialty Classes like Swordsmage…hmm…it seems you haven’t read that part of your books yet…Ah!”

The person turned around.

“It seems the Time Spell has ended….”

At the moment he said that everything began moving again!

***

The creature roared loudly and sent another blast of dark energy causing another explosion! Nia and Tenryu dodged it but Bronson wasn’t so lucky. He got caught in it and the huge Bear-clan Animalian was sent flying and smashed into several shelves!

Eldon watched as his comrade was blasted away, “BRONSON!”

“Mr. Bronson!” yelled Nia.

“Alright…” says Tenryu as he powered up his sword, “You’re asking for it!”

Tenryu slashed his sword and caused an explosion of flames!

***

Watching from afar, Benny and the mysterious boy looked at the sea of flames.

Benny and the boy’s cloaks flapped around them.

“That boy is powerful as ever. I’ll leave it to you then…Good luck…” The mysterious boy started to fade away.

“W-Wait?! You know what this thing is so how do we stop this thing? Their attacks aren’t working and that monster can hit them! So far only Tenryu was able to land a single blow!”

“So you have observed that moment! Well, done…”

The boy became more and more transparent but his voice still remained.

“Here’s another advice I can give you: think why that happened…”

Again Benny looked confused.

“There’s always an answer Benny… you just have to find it… We will see each other soon…”

“There’s still one thing. Can you at least tell me what your name is?”

The boy smiled once more underneath the hood before completely fading away.

“If you must know…My name is…Emrys…”

The mysterious boy whose name is Emrys…

Emrys…

For some reason, Benny felt he had heard of that name before…