Sitting on the sandy ground, Stanis dug his finger into the soil and began throwing the dirt out. In his head, he had the image of a perfectly circular hole, although reality turned out to be much more ragged and messy once he had finished. The hole was finger-length deep and as wide as a tightly-clenched fist. Nodding after inspecting it, he began to create similar holes all around him. A few minutes later, he sat around 8 evenly-spaced holes.

Unable to hold in his excitement, he beamed a wide-grin as he got up and began searching for rocks. They had to be circular and had to fit the top of the holes but not fall in. A while later, he was sitting down again. He spotted the rocks around him and then closed his eyes.

He released his mana and began feeling his surroundings. He could sense the rocks strongly due to their close proximity, but he cast Scout and sense anyway, inwardly worried about what was to come. He made links with all 8 of the rocks and streamed mana into them. And then, he created lightning on the surface of his finger.

He was delighted that he wore armour now as he didn't know how volatile the reaction would be. He was now proficient at controlling lightning and at making links with objects and people, but what about both at the same time? Biting down on his teeth, he released the bolt from his finger.

It struck the rock and burst into it. Stanis felt current flow through his link with the rock and then felt an electric shock. It didn't even cause a scratch on his body, instead just a soft tingle, and yet Stanis was displeased by this very fact. What was the point of a light shock? He wasn't here to tingle himself; he was here to hurt himself.

He built up another bolt on his finger. It grew much larger and was also more saturated with mana. It constantly juddered into morphed versions of itself, clearly far past the volatile meter. He aimed the menacing bolt at the innocent rock and fired, before feeling a wave of guilt wash over him. Wait, no, not guilt but disappointment.

The defenceless rock was gone: in its place hundreds of shattered, jagged shards. In fact, a few of the shards were even embedded in Stanis's skin, although not deep enough to draw blood. He shook his body and all the shards fell off.

Dispirited, he looked at the 7 remaining rocks. He had been hopeful about his idea of tempering his body with lightning. Using his Lightning seed, he could create lightning on his skin and shoot it out, but not in. So, he had thought of using his class to link himself up to the rocks, effectively creating externally-controlled dummies. This way, he could shoot the lightning back into his body, causing extreme heat and tempering himself. But now it seemed to be a lot more work than he had initially thought; not only did he have to find the sweet spot of the material he was using so that it wouldn't explode, he would also now need to find a stronger material as that bolt of lightning wouldn't do much to his body.

Sighing, he was about to get up and leave when he saw a sporadic line form in the sandy-ground. It seemed as if a kid was drawing with a stick from the imprecision and from the activity itself, but there was a lack of stick or kid in Stanis's vision. He waved his hands over the carving and felt nothing, no kid nor stick. Lost for thought, he sat back the next second, waiting for the carving to stop before he made a move.

"Yils…" Stanis read out the first word. Straight-away, he knew who it was. In fact, he had already guessed after thinking the handwriting childish; it had to be Zelgard. "… won't yet. Wait, no. won't let me wun. Shit. Won't let me turn off the illusion," He wasn't able to read the last word but he guessed it from the strokes anyway.

"Why not?" Stanis asked aloud.

"I dun no," the reply read.

The stroke was left unfinished so Stanis waited for another minute. He then realised it was entirely possible that Yils had already caught Zelgard in the act. And so, he released a sigh as he saw the stroke continue, still messy and headache-inducing.

"But what I do know is that you are doing it wrong," it read.

"You're telling me," Stanis replied, "I figured after getting stabbed," Although Stanis couldn't hear anything or see anything being written down, he knew Zelgard was laughing his arse off right now. He also knew that Yils had clearly already noticed Zelgard's rebellious behaviour, most likely sighed, and then decided to just ignore it.

"What do I do then?" Stanis asked, his lips wide and curved.

"Try creating a mental barrier against the stone, and pool the lightning against it," the ground read.

Instead of going wide-eyed with realisation, Stanis went wide-eyed with shock as he realised Zelgard had clearly been looking inside his body all this time. And he hadn't even noticed… Clearly, both Zelgard and Yils were far stronger than he had given credit to.

Realising how far superior they were, Stanis immediately tried Zelgard's suggestion. He first created a strong barrier against one of the rocks, before shooting a small bolt into it. He promptly felt an attack against his mental barrier, one that didn't shake up any foundations but did still declare its existence.

Excitement reignited, Stanis began shooting stronger and deadlier bolts, but none as deadly as his second bolt. Quickly understanding the sweet spot for the rock, he began shooting bolts just a degree lower in intensity. Eventually, his barrier began to speak of its destruction, threatening to topple over and allow in all the hound-like bolts. In response to this signal, Stanis decided this was enough for a first try and reversed the barrier…

A second later, spitting a mouthful of blood, he immediately collapsed. He didn't lose consciousness but he did lose all control over his body. An intense heat bit away at his body, stabbing daggers into every inch of his flesh. It was even worse on his face where it was like a battlefield, the freezing air around him for some reason trying to invade his volcanic body. Unfortunately, he had already lost rein of all his senses but one, and that remaining one made itself very well-known to him. Out of the blue, another lightning strike struck his body, about half as weak as the first one he had shot at himself. However, due to his broken body, it meant that it hurt even more…

At this, he let go of whatever remaining grasp he had of his life and fainted. Minutes, or maybe hours, or perhaps days, later, Stanis awoke…