The Bookstore Mage

After a while, Lucien regained his calm and sat down in the middle of the plateau-shaped peak. He took a couple of deep breaths and glanced around him, his eyes were following the mana particles of this world.

The mana flow appeared to be similar to that of his world. If only a bit denser. The surprising part, however, was the fact that the particles seemed to be connected to the mountain itself by some strange force.

"Weird," he muttered in confusion.

Lucien wasn't sure why, but the longer he focused on the mana the easier it was to feel it. He had spotted the first difference between this world and his.

Back home, mana was present all around. It wasn't bound to anything, or at least Lucien didn't feel that it was. The particles freely floated about with no obstructions.

Here, however, the particles seemed to follow a defined pattern. They moved closer to the mountain and maintained a particular distance between the ground. They would occasionally float closer to it, but never further than the set distance.

The longer he watched, the more amazed he became. It was not a matter of a single particle, nor a dozen- no, the entire mana in the area followed this strange rule.

This made him think, perhaps it was something in the mountain itself that trapped the mana in this place. He wondered. Lucien could imagine the benefits of gathering the particles around in one place.

For one, the time it took to cast the spells would effectively lower. It would no longer take as long to gather the mana and- that was it...

He was sure that there were some other benefits to it, but he couldn't think of any at the moment. After a while of contemplating what to do, Lucien finally decided to scale down the mountain and do some exploring.

At first, he was reluctant to do so. He had thought that maybe he missed something. But besides the strange situation of mana, the mountain peak was extremely ordinary. It was honestly quite disappointing.

Shaking his head, Lucien walked around the edges for a few minutes as he studied what he thought would be the best path to follow. After a while, he was finally satisfied and took a narrow route from the north.

He wasn't completely sure where this route would lead him as it was completely covered in clouds, but he trusted his instincts and convinced himself that it was alright.

The descent was surprisingly not bad at first. The path although narrow was easy to follow. Lucien even began humming a happy tune as he admired the extraordinary view. He felt as if he was walking above the whole world, and in a sense, he was kind of was.

The true danger, however, only appeared as he approached the clouds. It slowly became harder and harder to see ahead. Lucien did not hesitate to cast Tafat; the floating light spell.

The small sphere of light appeared right next to him and illuminated his surroundings. It was still not the best, but it was certainly better than before. He willed the sphere of light to move ahead of him, that way he could see the path.

The descent continued without any problem until suddenly a shadow lunged at the floating ball of light. Lucien was so surprised by the sudden attack that his body momentarily froze. This made his concentration waver causing his connection with the spell to break.

He was once again plunged into a grey world. His heartbeat thumped loudly in his chest as his breathing turned ragged. He didn't see why attacked the ball of light, only a blur before it disappeared.

His enemy was unknown, his location was also unknown. Hell, even Lucien was not sure where exactly was he standing. Thus after a not-so-careful consideration, he decided to run. And by run, he meant to go back home.

Lucien was about to reach out to the strange bond located in his hand, the one that connected him to the door. When all of a sudden a low growl made him freeze. He smelled the beast before he saw him.

A sudden strong gale of wind caused his clothes and heart to flutter. What was supposed to be an aimless descent had turned into a horrible nightmare.

A sudden chill tore up and down his spine as the head of a villainous monster emerged from the fog right in front of his face. Lucien stood as still as a statue, he observed the large monstrosity for a second.

It had the face of a menacing bat-like monster. Its giant fangs dripped with saliva as it hungrily eyed him with its cold piercing yellow eyes.

That was all Lucien needed to see before he reached out to his bracelet and used Tajajiht. The massive fireball appeared almost instantly and collided with the monster's face. An explosion soon followed sending Lucien flying back.

He had no time to check if the monster was dead or not, instead, he quickly turned and ran with all his might. He cast Tafat to help illuminate the way as his strides got longer and quicker.

He felt weak with pain wracking all over his body. Maybe it wasn't very smart to shoot a fireball so close to his face, but there was no use crying over spilled milk. He panicked when that monster appeared so abruptly.

Thankfully he had a Tadawsa spell stored in the bracelet as well. The healing spell worked wonders as he never stopped moving. Just as he thought he was going to make it, a sudden blur followed by sharp pain, and then darkness.

"What the-" lightly concussed, Lucien grunted as he opened his eyes. He was on the ground with something wet and sticky underneath.

Confused he raised his hand closer to his eyes only for it to come up red.

"Blood?"

First was the confusion, then the realization, and after that was the pain. He was hit. His side was cut open and bleeding profusely. His eyes widened in shock as he stared at his wound.

The low growl of the monster shook him out of his daze as he glared at the bastard that did this to him. The monster slowly circled him. The fog in the area they were currently at was not as thick as before, so he could see the monstrosity's full figure.

It looked like a deformed goblin of sorts, but only much, much taller, and bigger. It was standing on both its hands and legs like some sort of animal. Its claws were bloodied from the attack on Lucien.

Lucien didn't care at the moment, instead, he glared at the monster and spat:

"Well, you just got a whole lot uglier," he said.

It appeared that Tajajiht was not completely useless. Half of the monster's face had melted from the sudden attack. His left eye was gone along with a large chunk of its cheek, revealing the rows of sharp yellowed teeth.

Lucien struggled to stand up as he pressed his left hand on his wound. His eyes, however, remained on the monster as he considered his chances. It was going to take a few seconds at best to summon the door. And if he did, he would be a sitting target to the bastard circling him.

"F*ck, I shouldn't have wasted Tadawsa," he cursed under his breath. The monster was glaring at him with rage burning beneath its remaining eye.

Still, it didn't rush. It looked like one fireball was enough to make him hesitate.

"F*cker, why did it have to be so smart?"