Shadow Author

As the Mana chaotically surged around the room until coming under Willow's control my heart rate dangerously increased.

Although I saw what happened when I glimpsed into the future, facing it in real life couldn't compare.

The pure power within the attack was not something I could deal with. A single brushing against the aura would at best kill me, and at worst… there would be nothing left.

Shuddering at the realization I was way over my head I sent my thoughts into overdrive as I tried to come up with a solution.

Unfortunately, my luck ran out as this moment marked the end of the time I could see into the future.

Of the hour I got half of it was spent on waiting for teams to get picked and such rather than the actual battle.

Which is why I cursed my stupidity for using the ability too early and leaving me stranded in this terrible situation.

Luckily I knew enough up until this point to be able to survive but now I was trenching through unknown waters.

While I had been going through my thoughts Willow finalized her preparations and released her attack.

As Willow's aura enveloped her rapier once it got to its peak state she made a diagonal cut in the air.

A moment later the mana and aura burst out and a visible slash materialized coming straight at me.

The blue energy grew more powerful and deadly as it charged at me with the intent to remove me from existence.

Staring at this wave of power two options crossed my mind: I could use 3rd Person POV one more time to see how I get out of the situation and deal with the consequences later or spend some of the CP I had stored up on a defensive gift.

The former was too much of a risk as using the same ability on the same day, only an hour later at that could potentially do irreversible damage. Plus there was no guarantee that the ability would save my life as what I see in the future might just be my death.

Leaving only the ladder I knew I had to come up with a defensive gift that would allow me to survive the attack while also being in my price range, and hopefully not making me go broke.

Yet I didn't have the option to optimize how I wanted the gift to be created as the blue wave was now practically on top of me.

This meant I had exactly one chance to get it right. If the gift I made was too weak all my effort would be for naught and I would end up dead. However, if the price was even a single CP higher than I had stored the gift wouldn't be created and I'd face the same fate.

Therefore I had to get it perfect and pray for the best as even if the gift were to bankrupt me I would at least still be alive to recuperate my losses.

But even in that situation, my greed was too much as instead of coming up with a feasible gift I left it to chance.

'Create a defensive gift that will allow me to stop the aura attack and make it now, no matter the price!'

A split second later I felt a vibration on my wrist — that or I was shaking so badly due to the incoming attack.

The next thing I knew the attack arrived in front of me.

Staring at imminent death right before my face, I wasn't afraid. I knew death all too well and when the time came I would embrace it. Yet that time wasn't now.

Having the gift finalized something clicked in my mind; I knew how to survive.

Whispering in an almost inaudible voice I called forth the aspect of my new power.

"Break."

Then as if I had been blind my whole life my eyes opened and I understood.

The wave of aura that was a hair's length away from evaporating me shattered into millions of pieces. Imitating a cracked mirror the mana that held together the attack broke apart and returned to its normal state. All the power and force behind it vanished leaving nothing but a gush of wind to blow past me.

Unable to take even a second to realize my accomplishment, my thoughts turned chaotic.

The world around me transformed from color into black and white. Where empty space all around me was white and minuscule black specs filled it.

These tiny dots swayed peacefully within this new world where there was a perfect sense of harmony.

It was so simple and beautiful that it was hypnotizing.

Then suddenly within this perfect moment, a splash of color fell from the sky.

It sped up until crashing into the ground and spreading out to fill in the space.

Wanting to investigate, I made my way over to the puddle of the rainbow. As the color sat on the floor taking away from the white I realized that the black spots refused to go anywhere near the color as if it was cancer.

Then all at once thousands of droplets of color came crashing down from the sky. They wiped away the white and filled the blank world which caused the black spots to flee in search of safety.

While the storm of color continued it quickly began forming abstract forms and shapes until before I knew it I had returned back to reality.

The color that was making something turned out to be the very scene I was looking at through my eyes.

In front of me was Willow who had a shocked look on her face, to my left were my teammates who were frozen staring right at me a few feet from Willow, and to my right were a bunch of teachers who were looking right at me wide-eyed.

Then I looked down at myself; I looked at my hands as I slowly moved them about, my clothes as they stuck to my sweaty body, and my sword which lay on the ground shattered.

Unable to make any sense of what just happened I whispered:

"What, was that?"

Then as if everyone else had the same question — although for a different reason — Willow shouted:

"What the fuck! How did you stop my attack?"

Pushing the questions I had to the back of my mind I looked up at Willow and answered.

"I didn't."

She looked even more confused.

"Then how di-"

"You must not have mastered your attack yet because it failed at the last second. It wasn't that I stopped it, just that you couldn't complete it."

"There's no way, I had full control-"

"Don't be too disappointed in yourself, using aura in your first year at your age is quite the accomplishment. But being about to attack with it is a whole other deal, don't worry you will get better."

"But-"

Thankfully it seemed that my reasoning was solid because Miss Smith cut Willow off.

"Lucas is right Willow, being able to use aura at your level is already a grand achievement but using it to attack… that's just unprecedented, especially while being a first year."

"That doesn't make any sense! I had full control until the last second and then it just stopped! It's impossible! He did something!"

Willow was getting angrier and angrier by the second as she pointed her finger at me accusingly.

But Miss Smith still didn't believe her.

"Look Miss Willow I know you want to save face after your attack failed and since he… used some derogatory language but this needs to end here. What's impossible is for someone of Lucas's standard to not only stop an aura-infused attack but also render it completely void."

After Miss Smith's degrading understanding of my capabilities Willow begrudgingly accepted the result.

Miss Smith concluded our battle by counting it as our team's win due to Willow's failed attack and we still had all three members active.

In the end, I managed to remain under the radar due to my masterful skills in gaslighting.