Vizet lowered his wand, its tip casting a soft glow in the dark.
"Lumos."
The light flickered to life, but instead of shining steadily, it began to shrink — compressing inward into a tight sphere. Within moments, it vanished with a soft pop, snuffed out like a candle under a glass.
Vizet raised his eyebrows slightly. The effect of the Blackout Spell was even stronger than expected.
Relieved that the darkness was no hindrance, he snapped his fingers lightly.
Immediately, his fingers turned into vines slithered outwards — his Devil's Snare state, unfurling across the floor like living tendrils.
Thanks to its connection to his senses, Vizet could now "see" without seeing, mapping his surroundings through the subtle pulses of the Devil's Snare fingers. The Blackout Spell further enhanced this sensory awareness, sharpening every instinct.
He lifted his wand again and pointed it toward the residual shimmer of silver-blue light.
Raising his arm high above his head. The shimmering light responded, plunging into the ground and etching a glowing circular symbol into the stone.
From that radiant seal, something began to rise.
Stone ground against stone as a knight statue emerged, slow and deliberate, forged of dark stone with gleaming silver etchings. But it wasn't alone. From the base — wriggling, slithering — snakes began pouring out in droves, cascading over one another in a nightmarish tide.
A sharp, fishy stench hit Vizet's nose as the creatures surged toward him.
His fingers immediately reacted. Through it, Vizet could feel the press of hundreds — thousands — of serpents around him.
Even without that connection, the relentless hissing was enough to set every nerve on edge.
Without hesitation, Vizet undid the Self-Shaping spell and pulled a few seeds from the pouch inside his robe. He tossed them onto the ground, pointed his wand and cast:
"Botanomorphis!"
The seeds erupted into tangles of Devil's Snares.
Some vines lashed forward, impaling snakes mid-strike with a wet puff. Others coiled rapidly, tightening like springs and crushing the serpents with sickening cracks.
The symphony of horror filled the dark chamber — snakes hissing and snapping, vines piercing and crushing, flesh parting, scales splitting. The soundscape was macabre, like a grotesque orchestra playing in a minor key.
But the tide was endless.
More snakes kept emerging — layer upon layer, slithering over the dead, heedless and unrelenting.
The Devil's Snare had its limits. It was most effective against large creatures; its strikes against smaller, faster targets like these required far greater concentration and precision.
Vizet narrowed his eyes. I can't keep this up forever. He needed to conserve strength.
His gaze snapped to the knight statue.
That was the source. If he couldn't destroy it, the snakes would just keep coming.
Without hesitation, he twisted one of the Devil's Snares into the shape of a long, spiraling awl. Then, with a thought, he sent it lancing through the swarm — aimed directly at the statue's core.
But before it could reach its target, the snakes leapt upward as one, fusing into a writhing, muscular shield of flesh and scale. They coiled tightly, absorbing the impact of the blow.
The statue responded.
It was no mere object. It sensed Vizet's intent.
The ground vibrated faintly as more snakes poured out from its base, faster and in greater numbers than before.
Within seconds, the radius around Vizet had shrunk to less than a meter. The swarm was closing in.
He clenched his jaw, frustration gnawing at him. At this rate, I'll be buried alive.
With a sharp gesture, he coiled the Devil's Snare tightly around his own body, weaving it into a protective shell — vine armor, thick and dense, wrapping him from shoulders to boots.
Then, breathing evenly, he stilled himself — mind racing.
He needed a new strategy.
A way to break through.
Long-range attacks wouldn't work. The flesh-shield of snakes blocked everything thrown from a distance.
Then I need to get close.
Vizet narrowed his eyes, gauging the thick tide of serpents between himself and the knight statue. A direct assault might be the only way — but not without the right spell.
Diffindo.
The cutting spell. Traditionally a utilitarian charm, but lethal when adapted for combat. More importantly, it had the potential to hit multiple enemies at once if directed properly. A perfect candidate for enhancement.
He still had a reservoir of primordial magic that he already stored within A Wizard's Practical Guide. Without hesitation, he cast the Augmentation magic upon Diffindo.
The guide's pages flipped with urgency, then stilled.
On a fresh sheet, new text wrote itself in glowing ink:
Primordial Magic: Severance (Elementary)
Guides ancient magic to cast cutting spells... enhances magical force... slices through the target and continues toward nearby enemies...
Vizet gave a rare, satisfied smirk.
He swept his wand sideways, carving a horizontal arc through the air, then thrust it forward with a sharp jab.
From the tip, a brilliant arc of razor-sharp light burst forth — cutting cleanly through several snakes in an instant. But that wasn't all. The arc shattered, its fragments spinning outward like blades, carving through the serpents nearby in a lethal fan.
The denser the enemy, the more deadly the spell becomes…
With his Devil's Snare shielding him, Vizet surged forward — slicing through the writhing mass of serpents with spell after spell. The silver-blue arcs of Severance lit up the darkness in flashes as he hacked a path through the horde.
Before long, he stood directly in front of the knight statue.
He summoned several strands of Devil's Snare from around him, weaving them into the shape of a massive hammer in mid-air. Then he slammed it downward.
Boom.
The statue shattered, bursting apart in a brilliant explosion of silver-blue light. But the radiance didn't linger.
The large black bubble surrounding them — a remnant of his Blackout Spell — drank the light greedily, absorbing it into its void-like depths.
That light had been enchanted, no doubt. Some kind of ancient spell...
As it faded, remnants of that silver-blue power scattered across the ground.
Where the magic touched the fallen snakes, they lifted into the air as if possessed. Dozens of bodies fused together, writhing and bulging grotesquely, forming a single massive shape.
A new creature emerged — long, sinuous, and unmistakably serpentine.
It was a Runespoor.
Three heads, fused from flesh and blood, stared him down. It was younger than the one he'd once encountered — but faster, more agile.
Before Vizet could react, it lunged.
He threw up a vine shield just in time — the Devil's Snare curling into a solid wall that absorbed the impact of the strike.
The Runespoor recoiled, then began circling him in wide arcs, moving like a shark around wounded prey. Its three heads hissed in unison, seeking an opening.
Vizet didn't panic.
He closed his eyes and activated the Guardian Meditation Technique. Instantly, his awareness and reaction speed increased a lot.
The moment the Runespoor flicked its tail — there!
Vizet cast the Primordial Magic: Ascend, a spell he had acquired long ago but never had the chance to unleash in real battle.
The Runespoor's body froze — then lifted violently into the air, writhing midair, unable to anchor itself.
"Accio Runespoor!"
The Summoning Charm wasn't a true Primordial Spell, but he'd augmented it to summon living creatures. The floating Runespoor hurtled toward him like a bolt loosed from a crossbow.
At the exact moment it reached him, his Devil's Snare struck — shooting out and binding the Runespoor midair, locking its twisting body in place.
Now helpless, the Runespoor thrashed violently — but it was too late.
"Morbus Letalis Crucio!"
A needle-thin bolt of dark gray light shot from his wand — fast, precise, and merciless. It pierced one of the serpent's eyes with a sharp snap of impact.
The Runespoor shrieked — three voices screaming in overlapping agony — as it writhed in torment, still trapped, still bound.
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