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“Is it safe for us to be here?” his mom asked.

“Y-yes; there’s nothing showing any active spells or rituals in this shed. You’re fine. But what’s been done in the past…This is not the work of a low-Level Blood Mage. I’m beginning to question if it was a Blood Mage at all. Good gods, never in my life…”

The glow ended.

“Little girl,” the woman said, “you saw what happened last night clearly, yes?”

“Y-yeah,” Sophie responded.

“And you are absolutely certain you saw pink lightning?”

Silence. Zeth assumed she nodded.

“Once the pink lightning ended, what happened?”

“The monster caught on fire.”

“Was there any sort of projectile? Did it look like someone threw fire at the monster?”

“No. It just caught on fire, all at once.”

“Everywhere on the monster’s body? Or just one part?”

“Everywhere.”

There was a pause, before eventually, the woman spoke again. “It was definitely a Blood Mage. She’s describing a Fire Ritual perfectly. Ma’am, you said your son works in this shed regularly?”

“Are you accusing my son?”

“I’m asking you a question, which I expect you to answer.”

“There’s no way Zeth is this Blood Mage you’re talking about. He would never take an outlawed Class to do…gods know what with.”

“Ma’am. Does he work in this shed?”

“...Yes, he does.”

“Does anyone else work in this shed? Has anyone ever been in here to your knowledge within the past few days?”

“...Not that I know of. But I don’t keep an eye on it at all times. Someone might have snuck in.”

“I’m aware of the possibility. Just gathering evidence for who may or may not be our outlaw.”

“You don’t seriously think my son is this Blood Mage, do you?”

“All evidence points to him so far, ma’am.”

“But-but how do you even know that this mana test thing was showing Blood Mage spells? What if it was totally innocent magic?”

“Ma’am, there are two explanations for the result we’ve just seen. One, your son is the most powerful magic-user residing in this town, and has for some reason hid this fact from you and everyone else he knows, or two, someone has been routinely breaking into your shed and using it as a hiding place while they use the space to cast extraordinarily powerful spells. Do you expect me to believe that, in either of those scenarios, there is nothing illegal going on regarding the nature of this magic? There is clearly blood covering the floor from whatever sacrifice was used to fuel the most recent ritual. If your son did not butcher an animal here in the past thirty minutes, then it was spilled in the process of casting whatever magic was used here. It is clearly the work of a Blood Mage, and currently, the most likely suspect is the person who is in this shed most often.”

“But Zeth couldn’t do it!” Sophie shouted. “He’s hurt right now. You said someone was here only a little bit ago, but he’s been far away at Turin’s house this whole time!”

“And how do I know you’re not lying on his behalf? Or he didn’t lie to you?”

“Actually, ma’am,” the lead guard spoke up. “I was there when he got hurt. He had some bad injuries from the fire in town last night, and tripped while we were waiting for you to arrive. I saw him; he was in extremely bad shape. He left the house immediately to get medical attention.”

Once again, there was a moment of silence before the woman replied. “Are you certain those wounds were genuine?”

“As certain as I can be. Looked close to death, frankly. I doubt he could have done much in that state.”

An even longer period of silence. Zeth almost wanted to just take the opportunity and run off now, but he had to know if people were about to go try and arrest him and he’d need to flee town.

Finally, the woman spoke once more. “Ma’am, rest assured, your son is no longer a suspect.”

“R-really?” Zeth’s mom sighed in relief. “That’s amazing!”

“You are mistaken. That is bad news—not good. That means the person sneaking onto your property to conduct extremely powerful, extremely dangerous magic is someone with no ties to you. If it were your son, you wouldn’t be in much danger, and we would be able to arrest him on the spot. But this mystery person is someone we have no leads on, and they may be planning to harm you or your family.”

“I-I see,” she said. “But still, how can you be so sure?”

“Because, if Lieutenant Smill is to be believed, your son is not nearly strong enough to be a high-Level Blood Mage. The Class increases your Endurance by two with each Level-Up. And in order to use magic of the caliber we just saw, he would have to be extraordinarily high-Level with the Class to do so. Additionally, some Blood Mages continue to purchase more points of Endurance with their Skill Points on top of the natural growth, because of the…harmful nature of their magic. That is to say, if your son was injured to such a degree by a simple fall, there is no chance he had such high Stats, and therefore, there is no chance he is high enough in Level to use such powerful magic.”

Zeth decided that was all he needed to hear. He wasn’t suspected, which meant he needed to go to Turin’s immediately so his story would line up.

He took off through the grass and down the road, desperate to finally lie down.

Once the farmhouse was out of sight and Zeth was no longer at major risk of someone spotting him, he felt his heart finally slow its rapid pace. He also felt the full brunt of the pain and exhaustion wracking his body. He thought he’d been able to feel it this whole time, but he was wrong. Now that there was no longer any distraction, every square inch of his burnt flesh stung, his muscles ached, and his eyes felt like they may shut on their own and he’d pass out in the middle of the town streets. But in the moment of calm, he organized his thoughts and began planning.

It seemed like the sheer power wielded by the Blood Magus Class had saved him. Evidently, even at a low Level, it threw so much mana around when doing rituals that it imitated an insanely high-Level Blood Mage when being looked at through the lens of whatever Skill that woman was using. He hadn’t even known that there was a way to detect mana having been used somewhere days beforehand; he was lucky it hadn’t ended up getting him caught outright. But now that he knew, he’d have to be far more careful about where he used his magic. And that house would probably be crawling with guards and investigators from now on anyway, meaning he definitely needed to find a new place to work.

But that was later. Right now, Zeth could identify one main threat to his continued presumed innocence: even if he got to Turin’s place right now, if someone spoke with him and he said Zeth had arrived over an hour later than he should’ve arrived, it would rouse suspicion. He needed to find some way to prevent that from looking suspicious. He didn’t have much time to figure out a plan, so he took the first course of action that came to mind.

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On his journey to Turin’s house, Zeth took a turn down a side street and stopped by the library. He’d forgotten he was still absolutely covered in blood, though, and the employees refused to let him enter.

“Please, can I just run in and grab one book?” Zeth asked the woman at the front desk. “I promise, I’ll be in and out in a matter of seconds.”

“Sir, you are dripping blood where you stand; you absolutely cannot come in. If you touch a book, you’ll stain it red.”

He sighed, rubbing his eyes with his fingers, inadvertently staining his face red as well. “Uh, okay. Can you just go get one for me? I’ll pay extra.”

“Okay, fine. What book?”

“Anything is fine. Just, uh…get a book about magic. Like, some sort of a guide. Something you could learn from.”

“You don’t care which one?”

“First one you see. I’m in a hurry.”

“Alright,” she said with a shrug, then turned and walked off into the halls of bookshelves.

Within a minute, she returned.

“Okay,” she said, looking at the cover, “this is ‘A Traveler’s Guide to Magic and—’”

“That’s perfect,” Zeth said, not bothering to let her finish. He fished into his purse for the last coins he had, shoved them into her hand, grabbed the book, and ran off to Turin’s.

With the book in his possession, he had everything he needed. All he had to do was show it to Turin and tell him he’d made a stop by the library to get a surprise book for Sophie, and that if anyone came by, he should say that Zeth had arrived an hour before he actually had, that way the surprise wouldn’t be ruined for his sister.

Now that the matter of his alibi was sorted, Zeth just needed to head to Turin’s house, get patched up, and hopefully it would be relatively smooth sailing from here. He certainly looked forward to finally getting rest. Hopefully his wounds would fully heal before he got hurt another time. Now that he’d unlocked Self-Destruction, he wondered if it would be a good idea to go ahead and purchase it to accelerate his healing.

Oh, shit! Speaking of Skills…

He’d almost forgotten the whole source of this trouble. He’d Leveled Up! And in the process, he’d gotten two more Skills. And with the crisis averted, he finally had time to look at what they were.

Gazing inward, he read through their effects as he walked.

[Resonant Whispers

Cost: 9 Skill Points

The strands of blood magic within your soul communicate more clearly with your mind, allowing the dark art to whisper in your ear.

Provides you with an inherent instinct for how effective any nearby blood will be at fueling your rituals.]

This first one he’d unlocked seemed interesting. Certainly nice to not be forced to do guesswork in the future. Plus, it only cost nine Skill Points, meaning once he got it to the max Rank of 10, it would have profited him one Skill Point.

But the moment he started reading through the other Skill he’d unlocked with his Level-up, all thoughts of the first left his mind.

[Demonic Covenant

Cost: 15 Skill Points

Uses a ritual circle to attempt to summon a demon from the Thirteenth Realm. The demon will be bound to the caster’s word, and can be dismissed at will.

Strength of sacrifice required: Moderate

Required ritual circle diameter: 8.81 feet (originally 10 feet)

Time required to draw: 4.41 hours (originally 5 hours)

Upkeep time required each day: 3.52 hours (originally 4 hours)]

Zeth’s eyes were stuck wide open. Holy fucking shit. Thirteenth Realm? Summon a demon?!

He’d heard a few mentions of Blood Mages being able to summon demons lately, but he’d assumed an ability that powerful would come at something like Level fifty—certainly not five. Though, maybe a Blood Mage got it way later, and the Blood Magus just broke all System balance and got it sooner than would ever be considered reasonable.

Demons. From Hell. The Thirteenth Realm. Yeah, just summon one of those fucking things under your command. Holy shit.

Currently, Zeth had eleven Skill Points, and was at a bit of a crossroads in terms of what he should purchase next. He went ahead and looked over his list of Skills.

[PURCHASED CLASS-EXCLUSIVE SKILLS

Vile Focus - Rank 5

Hellfire Ritual - Rank 2

Empowerment Ritual - Rank 4

Ritual Circle Mastery - Rank 6

UNLOCKED CLASS-EXCLUSIVE SKILLS

Resonant Whispers - Cost: 9

Demonic Covenant - Cost: 15

Secure Rites - Cost: 12

Speedy Rites - Cost: 12

Compact Rites - Cost: 12

Forbidden Knowledge - Cost: 25

Unholy Strength - Cost: 18]

On top of his list of Exclusive Skills, there were also two Universal Skills he was considering—Heat Resistance, which cost fourteen, and now Self-Destruction, which cost three.

He could, if he wanted to, go ahead and buy Resonant Whispers right now, which was certainly tempting. Considering it was a profit Skill, he basically knew he’d take it eventually, and the sooner he got it, the sooner he’d be able to start Ranking it up and earning back those Skill Points. And with a cost of nine, it’d leave him only one Skill Point away from being able to purchase Self-Destruction right after and begin benefiting from the accelerated healing factor of that Skill.

On the other hand, he could also wait a little bit to Rank up one more Skill to push up to twelve Points so he could afford one of the Rites Skills. Reducing the time to conduct a ritual or the diameter of his circles could prove extremely useful, especially now that he’d Leveled up once more and the time required to draw his next Empowerment Ritual had gone up once again. If he wanted to keep Leveling at the rate he currently was, Speedy Rites would be an absolute necessity.

But then, he’d need to continue finding sacrifices to conduct the Empowerment Ritual, as well. Especially now. When he looked at its requirements…

[Strength of sacrifice required: Moderately Low

Required ritual circle diameter: 3.96 feet (originally 4.5 feet)

Time required to draw: 10.6 hours (originally 12 hours)

Upkeep time required each day: 1.25 hours (originally 1.42 hours)]

The sacrifice requirement had finally gone up, from “Low” to “Moderately Low.” Even though he knew the requirement went up every time, it wasn’t always enough to change the term used. The fact that the requirement had moved up an entire category now had to mean it’d be far harder than before. There was no way a single farm animal would cut it at this point. He’d need to find a better source.

And with his only means of attack being the extraordinarily dangerous Hellfire Ritual, it didn’t seem particularly reliable to just go out and hunt monsters out in the forest. His burns stung just thinking about something like that. So, when it came to the decision of what to spend his Skill Points on, there was also the option of waiting a little longer until he got the fourteen Skill Points necessary to afford Heat Resistance.

Though, if he was in the market for more sacrifices, there was one Skill that was clearly better than the rest.

Demonic Covenant would give him access to an insanely powerful warrior from an insanely deep realm, and it seemed like it’d be forced to follow his commands. He’d only heard of demons in passing before, but he knew those things were far, far beyond the capabilities of any normal human.

Though, he’d also heard plenty of different stories in history about ‘a deal with a demon gone wrong,’ where some mage would summon a demon and make some sort of bargain with it that ended up with the destruction of this or that village. So he also knew they were not to be trifled with. He’d be surprised if the Skill he’d just unlocked really functioned as cleanly as it stated. However, anything that gave him access to such tremendous power needed to at least be considered—especially at the cost it was being offered at.

Now, even if it was relatively cheap, that didn’t mean it was free. Zeth would still need to come up with enough Skill Points to make that cost, and he wasn’t sure if he’d be capable of Leveling Up anytime soon. Which meant Ranking up four of his Skills to earn the difference in Points. Hellfire Ritual was the lowest-Rank Skill he currently had, meaning it would be the easiest to Rank up, but he didn’t exactly have anything to use it on right now.

Though, with law enforcement so close on my tail, it might be smart to keep an already-drawn circle on me somehow just in case, Zeth thought.

He didn’t have the luxury of infinite time and freedom anymore. He’d have to be careful about what he did and where he did it, with those investigators able to detect any place he performed his rituals for days after he did them. He’d need to move quickly but carefully. And that meant not getting distracted by lesser Skills. Speedy Rites would be convenient, and Self-Destruction would certainly offer a lot of comfort, but Demonic Covenant would be the most obvious increase in his power. It had to be that one.

And with law enforcement crawling around now, they might even spook the Blood Mage into fleeing town, which would mean Zeth would have no chance of tracking them down and getting his revenge. And that was not an option.

He arrived on Turin’s doorstep. Okay. Just go in, explain everything, get fixed up and get some rest, and maybe find some time to practice your Skills at the same time to build up Skill Points. Should be smooth sailing from here.

Raising a still blood-covered hand—it’d fully dried onto him now—he rapped his knuckles against the door. Instantly, stinging pain ran up his entire arm.

Ugh, I forgot how messed up I am right now.

He knocked again, much more lightly this time to spare his arm. But there wasn’t any response.

Probably can’t hear me. Whatever; I used to just walk right in when we’d hang out as kids. Shouldn’t be a problem now.

So he reached down and opened the door, stepping in and raising his hand to wave.

“Hey, I’m—”

Instantly, something flashed across his vision and searing pain stabbed through his hand.

“Agh!” he shouted, stumbling back. He looked down. Sticking all the way through his palm and coming out the other side was a crossbow bolt. A whole new fountain of blood poured out of his wound as Zeth struggled not to collapse to the ground in agony.

A voice shouted from inside the house. “Don’t you dare move, or the next is going straight through your skull!”