Reader Mage 167-One Of My Newest Spells

rlin’s idea was absolute insanity. Yuri didn’t need to say it for him to know that it was. Who in their right mind advised soone to create a spell that mimicked the explosion that occurred on the sun’s surface? This was like asking a mage to recreate the big bang on Earth. It was madness.

And yet, Park Yuri didn’t object.

She was now seated with her legs crossed, fumbling with the projection from her smartwatch as she ca up with the necessary formulas to ensure her spell didn’t evaporate the whole school when she tested it out.

And that brought about a change of plans.

Initially, rlin was ant to have a duel with her, but it seed that would no longer be possible. Yuri’s task for the day would be to create her two newest spells and perfect them, while he and Jaehyun would duel.

rlin wouldn’t say he was annoyed. This was more interesting. Considering he and Jaehyun had been in the school for months, they had never dueled before. Since he had made a deal with Yuri, she had milked his stamina for their fights. Of course, he was more excited about this. And he would get to feel how gravity magic acted upon him, and how deconstructing it would turn out.

Talking about feelings…

“Are you all right?” rlin asked as Jaehyun flexed his arms. They were both standing in the transford podium now, which had beco an hexagonal ring barred by mana surges, across from each other.

Jaehyun raised a brow. “I’m fine, yeah. Why do you ask?”

rlin would have called it a hunch a few months back, but ever since his Perception had been seeing sufficient growth in its stats, he had been coming to notice things clearer than ever. And that included a distortion in a person’s emotions.

“It’s just that ever since the day you missed practice you haven’t been, well, yourself,” he explained. “You went ho that day, right? I’m an expert on weird family scenarios, so if you wanna talk about it just know that I’d be glad to listen.”

Jaehyun stared at him for a few more seconds, and then he smiled.

“Thank you, rlin. But I’m fine,” he said. “We should train.”

rlin nodded and put his caring deanor aside.

He knew how hard it was to talk about family; sotis he couldn’t even talk to his own sister about sothing bothering him concerning his parents. Forcing Lee Jaehyun to let it all out would be sowhat selfish. He had offered to be a listening ear, that was more than enough.

rlin’s eyebrows suddenly jumped up as he recalled sothing that had been eluding his thoughts all this ti. He hadn’t contacted Sunny ever since Professor Dmitri’s pictures had co in. Everything had happened too fast on that day; the pictures, and then the mysterious man who had paid him a visit.

And now that he thought about it…

“Hey,” he called out to Jaehyun. The boy raised his brows at him. “I’m not going insane, right? Have you seen Professor Dmitri since the festival?”

Lee Jaehyun blinked and tilted his head slightly. “Now that you ntion it. No, I haven’t.”

rlin’s brows furrowed.

Had the headmaster done sothing to the man, or had he run away after realizing that he had been exposed. Also, that mysterious man had said the pictures were his gift to him. What did that an?

rlin’s mind ran amok. He was almost on the verge of completely forgetting that he had a duel to tend to when he snapped back, and shook his head free from his thoughts.

Those things were worries for later. He had to take it one step at a ti.

rlin cleared his throat, smoothed out his tracksuit so that it sat comfortably on his body, and turned to Lee Jaehyun.

“Enough about that. I’m ready.”

Jaehyun nodded. “So am I.”

His Grimoire flipped open and flew to the sky, and rlin decided to remind him of their discussion before they’d stepped into the ring.

“Don’t forget,” he said. “Mana is an extension of—”

“—myself. I just have to think of it as an extra limb, control it, and my Grimoire will be safe in every fight. Yes, rlin. I rember,” Jaehyun interrupted with a shake of his head.

rlin scoffed. “I was just confirming.”

No further words were said. rlin rushed through the ring, his first attack directed at Jaehyun’s Grimoire. He was the president’s grandson; he would be able to get it all sorted out in less than a day.

However, Jaehyun was a fast learner. As rlin jumped through the air, coating his hand with his mana as he attempted to smash the book to the ground, it eluded him like a rat would a cat. rlin missed just narrowly as he landed on the floor.

“Really?” Jaehyun asked.

“I was testing,” rlin replied with a smile and rushed forward again. This ti, it was for Lee Jaehyun.

Just like his Grimoire, Jaehyun escaped rlin. His body was pulled to the sky as though by an operating line during a stage play, and he hovered there, locking eyes with rlin from below.

rlin wasn’t bothered, though. He couldn’t fly, but he had ways of reaching soone who could. After all, half his battles involved him soaring through the air, as hard as that was to believe.

He took a few steps back, channeled mana to his back, and activated his very own skill: [Mana Spider].

Thick strands of mana shot out of his back, eight in total, and rlin wasted no ti sending them at Lee Jaehyun.

If he recalled correctly, the boy couldn't move that much in the air. Gravity was a hard thing to control, and from what rlin had gathered from watching Lee Jaehyun’s few fights was that he was not yet in full control of his Hex.

But he was proven wrong a second later.

Despite his mana reaching for Lee Jaehyun at the sa ti, they were finding it hard to touch the boy. He was being pushed and pulled in the opposite directions of rlin’s attacks, and there was no end in sight to it.

Of course, rlin had the larger stamina here. He knew that if he kept going at it, Lee Jaehyun would eventually run out of breath while he would still be left with an abysmal amount to dish out. But where was the fun in that? And, besides, he was trying to create a skill here. Or rather, boost his efficiency.

rlin increased his concentration. Controlling his mana had beco second nature to him now; it wasn’t problematic to channel or use it to attack from different angles at the sa ti. The problem ca when he tried to do sothing else entirely at the sa ti. Like now. A slight disruption plagued rlin’s [Mana Spider] as he stretched forth his hand and tried to activate Reader Mage. One of the strands that reached for Jaehyun’s leg dispersed like mist, and was only brought back when rlin shifted his concentration from Reader Mage to his skill.

He sucked air through his teeth, annoyed.

It was one or the other.

He shook his head.

No. It didn’t have to be. He was training his efficiency here. It was always stated to be impossible to do two things at once, but what he was attempting was different.

Every spell was dependent on mana. If he could control several strands of his mana at the sa ti, then it wasn’t impossible to use Reader Mage, as he was simply controlling his mana to do sothing a little bit different from reaching for soone.

Basically, it was like casting spells. At the start it was highly difficult for a Mage to cast two spells at the sa ti, but he had already seen it more than once with his mates—with his sister. Granted, Nora could be considered an outlier to the general consensus, but she was human just like the rest of them. If she could cast two spells at the sa ti, then he could technically do it too.

Reader Mage was his own magic.

rlin bit his lower lip and focused even harder. He let his consciousness flow into his mana in the sa way he did when he was transitioning into a trance, but he ensured his eyes were kept open and he was only a quarter into the state. The world stretched out before him, everything he could hear muffled out, and his breathing beca pronounced in his ears.

Bit by bit, the strands of mana reaching out for Jaehyun beca closer to him than ever. Previously, it had simply been like controlling his fingers, now it was as though he had an extra eight arms.

He was halfway there, rlin could feel it. He was becoming one with his mana, and that ant he could cast Reader Mage while being involved with other things.

This was it.

He stretched his hand at Jaehyun and was just on the verge of casting Reader Mage, when suddenly the world shifted. rlin snapped out of his trance as he noticed his vision blur for a mont; Jaehyun slanted in the air above, and it almost felt like earth had tilted.

“What?” rlin mumbled as he slamd into the floor of the ring, rolling across it as his stomach turned. He almost felt like vomiting when whatever had happened to him suddenly rescinded. He gasped, drawing in air sharply as his chest rose and fell. “What just happened?” His brows furrowed as he wondered if it was as an effect of his attempt with boosting his mana efficiency. That was disproven with Jaehyun's words.

“Gravity Tilt,” the boy said from up above and rlin turned to behold him smiling. “One of my newest spells. What do you think?”

rlin gulped.

What did he think? What else could he think?

“I hate it.”