The Formulae Magic that protected Lune was the creation of a certain individual.

Steps splashing on the now muddy ground, Ray ran through the twisty alleyways. He had spotted Elaine’s descent and had a general idea on where she was; but getting to her was proving to be more difficult than he thought due to the maze-like pathways.

If he was right, Elaine and the leader should be fighting against one another now.

In his worst assumption, as she was a mage; not a fighter, Elaine would already be dead.

The assumption worried him, for he’d rather not her cause of death be due to his incompetence.

Anything but that…

***

‘Cost and restrictions,’ said the girl.

Seated on soft grass, the boy heard her answer on what made magic fun.

There they were, in an open grass field, commonly reserved for high-tier mages for their magic experiment. The air was soft, the greens were lush, and the atmosphere was tranquil. Child Elaine had reserved that very same field for her personal use: to teach child Ray about magic. She was able to reserve the field because her master had great influence and because everyone admitted her talent.

‘… Isn’t that what makes magic the opposite of fun? All those costs and restrictions, they complicate things!’ he protested.

‘They’re not complicated!’ she replied, then thought a while. ‘Okay, maybe they are. But cost and restrictions make magic fun! I’ll show you!’

Elaine grabbed her pointy hat; from it she took out a wand. No, her hat wasn’t a magic storage artifact or the sort; she simply kept her wand inside her ordinary hat. The advantage of a wand compared to a staff was that the former was more portable—and smuggle-able, allowing her to practice magic everywhere, at times without permission.

She weaved her wand and chanted formulas. The vapor in the air condensed into droplets, gathered slowly into a blob, and refined into a floating perfect sphere of water.

‘That, just now, was the most effective way to create a sphere of water. It took some time, especially with the wand weaving and the chant, but the mana I used was very little.

‘Now, watch.’

She levitated the sphere of water at the tip of her wand, not to pull attention to it but to get it out of the way. She raised her left arm, turned her left freehand palm up.

Elaine did not weave her wand or chant, but the vapor in the air condensed into droplets, gathered chaotically into a blob, and remained a blob.

‘This is an ineffective way to create a sphere of water. I used a lot of mana, and the result isn’t great.’

‘You’re saying that costs and restrictions—’ Ray compared the blob and sphere of water— ‘can help make better result?’

‘Yes.’ She nodded with a smile.

‘I still fail to see how this makes magic fun.’

‘This makes magic fun because this means that with the right costs and restrictions anything is possible!’ she said cheerfully. She weaved her wand, joined the blob and sphere of water together, then chanted formulas. The water solidified into spherical ice, then immediately sublimed into vapor. ‘Just think of the fun things you want to do, because anything is possible, and figure it out from there!’

***

Inside the alleyway’s open space, two figures clashed: one was a leader with years of fighting experience, another was a mage with hardly any fighting experience. Judged based on fighting experience alone, the fight was akin to an adult facing against a child. As the mage’s attack kept missing and as the leader closed their distance, it was clear on who the battle was tipping for.

Snap!

A small sphere of electricity formed. He kept closing the distance, eyes fixated on where the tip of her thumb was pointing. He altered the course of his run by a bit—Zap!—evading the attack with a slight dodge. He continued closing the distance.

Apparent by his dodge, the leader of monster worshipper had figured the process of her magic and had devised countermeasures. Meanwhile, Elaine kept on repeating the same attacking patterns without any changes.

Snap!

Fire sphere was formed.

Bwoosh!

The leader dodged with minimal movement.

Now that the distance was within his range of attacks, the leader of monster worshipper took out a hidden knife from under his coat, and immediately thrusted the blade toward Elaine.

Surprised by the swiftness of his attack, she twitched and moved. Of course, she had not planned her dodge, and her frantic head movement was simply a frantic head movement instilled with panic.

Still, it seemed that even a frantic movement was better than staying still.

Swish!

The knife’s blade nicked her left ear and her blood added to the rain.

It hurt. The cold, stinging pain was followed with a hot, searing sensation. Tears welled in her eyes. As much as she would like to wail out the pain, she was given no chance to.

After the thrust, the leader of monster worshipper winded his arm, swinging his knife horizontally from her right. Seeing the knife travelling toward her, Elaine knew that she had no way of defending against that. She couldn’t create a barrier magic to protect herself like she usually would do, couldn’t block or parry like Ray or Dunnford would do, and couldn’t… like she…

Elaine had witnessed Dunnford and Freya’s fight in the past. Has seen how Freya had…

Elaine tilted her upper body sideways and dodged the knife. Her inflexibility caused pain on her sides from executing such maneuver, and she did not have the balance to support herself back up. Splash! She fell to the watery, muddy ground. Reduced to a vulnerable state, an opportunity which her opponent pounced upon.

‘Checkmate,’ the leader declared. This time, there would be no dodging the attack. He raised his knife, started the motion of swinging the blade down, and—Elaine showed him her left, ungloved palm.

It was a gesture that was commonly associated with begging for mercy, but this wasn’t that. No.

This was…

Fire suddenly coursed through her palm, emitting a red-orange glow that warmed the cold blue of the weather, giving off heat that evaporated the surrounding rain almost instantaneously.

‘Roaring Blaze.’

A large-scaled blazing flame erupted, its erratic movement created a roaring sound and clawed everything in its path. The rain couldn’t extinguish it, and the wind only breathed more life into the flames.

***

I did it! Elaine thought as her attack had hit.

The roaring flame was losing its initial heat and was slowly extinguished by the rain.

Having learnt from her previous battles, where her magic attack kept on being interrupted and never coming to fruition, this was the solution that she had devised: to not chant aloud, to use more mana, to take more time creating the magic, and to relinquish finer aspects of the magic.

Chanting inside her mind created stealth and surprise, using more mana—more cost—allowed for creation, taking more time—more restriction—allowed her to pause and continue her chant, and not having perfect control over her magic was fine; offensive magic was meant to create chaotic havoc.

The glove, the magic tool she had created, was there to—well, to win fights when possible, but when not it primarily served to buy her time to create the kind of offensive magic she had just used.

I could’ve executed that magic faster if I had my staff, Elaine thought, slightly unsatisfied by the crude result. Not having perfect control over a magic just didn’t feel right to her. Regardless, I did it. I won.

Elaine breathed relief.

She deserved a moment to keep herself together, and the negation magic she needed to cancel surely could wait just a moment.

‘I’ve seen all your pieces now.’ It was a voice that pierced through the loud-rattling rain with sharp clarity. Surprised, her heart skipped a beat, Elaine stared with her eyes wide toward the source of the sound.

She could see a figure emerging from within the diminishing flames.

The leader of the monster worshippers remained standing, parts of his facial skin seared red. His eyes, which had been that of a deformed circle was now a vertical ellipse like that of a beast. Like that of a monster.

His right arm, which had before been normal, had now been transformed into an inhumane form: a large, blackened claw, as big as an adult’s body, with spikes jutting out. That arm seemed to have a rhythm of its own, breathing—or beating out-of-sync from him.

Transmutation… Elaine thought.

It was an act of infusing a human with monster parts, one which had been declared forbidden by the world. However, it seemed apparent that the monster worshippers cared not about the consequences.

He had blocked the brunt of my flames by using his right arm as a shield…

‘Now, this truly is checkmate.’

The leader raised his monstrous arm, enveloping Elaine with its thick shadow.

Elaine was at her wit’s end. She doubted that her method of landing the previous attack would work again, as it had depended on element of surprise. Not to mention, she didn’t have the leisure to think about how she could achieve victory, not when she might not even escape this one attack unscathed.

The leader swung his arm down.

Not being able to react on time and facing imminent doom, Elaine cursed her failure.

Cursed her uselessness.

I couldn’t do anythi—

Elaine felt a rough tackle from the side, pushing her away from that monstrous arm that was about to hammer her to the ground. Brashk! The arm slammed the watery ground, destroying the pathway’s foundation.

Elaine fell with a splash—and saw… Ray.

‘Where in the world have you been?!’ Elaine protested, half by reflex. Seeing his face somewhat filled her with unexplained irritation.

‘Really? That’s the first thing you say after I saved you?’

‘If you had hold him off properly, I wouldn’t be in that trouble!!’ Elaine knew that her protest wasn’t making sense. Her head wasn’t in the right place; after all, she had experienced an array of emotions within a short time frame: victorious, despair, glad… ‘Fine. You’re right. Thanks for saving my life. I guess I owe you a favor.’

‘… We’ll discuss that favor later.’ Ray shifted his sights toward the leader of monster worshipper, who had pulled out and lifted his plummeted monstrous arm from the ground. ‘We’ll first have to deal with him.’