An Unborn Hero

Light (Common)

Evocation spell created by Ugg the Wise. Summons a spherical light source of a size, colour and luminosity of your choosing. Maximum size, brightness and duration increases with level.

First Spell (Common)

Congratulations on successfully casting your first spell! May it be followed by many more.

"Guess that confirms I've never successfully cast [Magical Girl Transformation]," thought the hero. "Then again, I didn't get [First Skill] until my third skill, either. And spells show up as skills, anyway. I really wish someone would explain the rules to me."

Alas, the one best positioned to do the explaining was staring slack jawed at the tiny orb of light floating in the air. It lasted a further ten seconds before winking out, during which none of the three spectators made a sound.

Once it did switch off, the guard was the first to speak. Or, more accurately, yell. "You taught it to spellcast! Why the hell did you teach it to spellcast?!"

"You did what?" asked an incredulous Hayedalf.

"I didn't teach it. I just demonstrated a basic light spell a few times!"

"Bloody hell," stated Hayedalf, giving his perfectly honest but unfiltered opinion.

"You didn't answer my question," snapped the suddenly unfriendly guard. "Why?"

"Because it was trying to cast spells with my mana, so I knew it was interested in magic, and thought I'd show it something easy."

"And again, why?"

"Why not? It's not like it's going to do any harm with [Light], and now it can signal me."

The guard opened his mouth, paused, then closed it again, finding the explanation surprisingly reasonable. "Well, please don't teach it anything else," he muttered.

"I'm hardly going to teach it to throw fireballs around," she replied, hands on hips.

"Bloody hell," repeated Hayedalf.

"Yes, we've already covered how stupid that was," said the guard.

"No, not that! There was no communication, and you just demonstrated it a few times? How long ago?"

"Five minutes?"

"Bloody hell..."

"What's your problem?" asked the guard.

"Five minutes to learn a spell? Without any actual teaching taking place? Do you have any idea how insane that is?"

"Yes, your mysterious little parasite is a fast learner. We're already aware of that."

"I suppose, but while it's one thing to hear third-hand how quickly it earned [Novice], it's another to see it cast like that first-hand, even if it's just [Light]."

"Now I want to teach it some divination spells," said Kellela.

"Seriously? After all the trouble it's caused with its scrying, you want to teach it divination magic?" complained the guard.

"Not scrying spells. I was thinking of [Translate]."

"Okay. I'll admit, maybe, that might be useful."

"Good. So..." Kellela took a deep breath, took on a look of concentration, and was interrupted by the guard.

"It's gone, by the way. It ran away the moment the light faded."

"... Oh. Well, I've packed enough for now. We'll finish off in the morning."

"I'm worried that you suddenly seem to be rather trusting of this utterly unknown thing that's living in your body and messing up your life. Maybe it's starting to mess with your head after all..."

"... But we decided together to teach it to communicate. It wasn't that odd to teach it [Light], was it?"

"It wasn't the least explicable decision anyone has ever made," replied Hayedalf diplomatically. "But we have a busy day tomorrow, so let's drop it for now."

As her parents prepared for bed, Mystery was buzzing. Not in the whizzing-in-circles-around-Kellela's-womb sort of way, but she was still very much in the grip of excitement.

"I cast a spell! I cast a spell! I cast a spell! I can do magic!"

Had she been calmer, she would have thought to use her new magic to signal to the others, but she was currently far too lost in her excitement.

She once again played back the coloured pattern that activated the spell in her mind, imagining it collapsing into a blinding miniature sun in front of her. A pinprick of light appeared, just bright enough to light things up in dull reds, her level one spell being insufficient to fulfil the demands of her imagination.

Still, that was easily solvable; she just cast a few dozen more. Such a basic spell was hardly a stress on Kellela's mana reserves, so much so that she didn't even notice what was happening. Mystery simply kept going until the first lights hit their maximum duration and started to blink out.

ding

For redecorating a womb like a Christmas tree, [Light] advances to level 2.

"Oh? They have Christmas here? Or is it just part of my English interface? Also, that's kinda gross."

People didn't often get the chance to view a body from the inside. They weren't missing out on much.

She left her embryo again and dropped through the floor, practising her new spell in the unoccupied room below. It didn't take her long to learn she could change the colour, but without Kellela's mana to support her, she could only maintain a few lights at once, and was soon feeling the effects of mana deprivation.

"This feels like when I was floating too close to those mana-draining handcuffs. Should I head back indoors and use Mum's mana? Or should I keep trying out here and try to gain a new skill for increased mana pool or regeneration? Yeah, let's do that. I've never tried to cast [Magical Girl Transformation] outside, but given that Mum's mana gets dimmer when I do, but it didn't change even after spamming [Light], it must take far more mana. I doubt I could cast it outside even if I was full."

And so she continued casting [Light], blissfully unaware of the full effects of mana exhaustion. If Kellela had used up so much mana, she'd have been debilitated by nausea and tiredness. If she continued to force out spells, she'd throw up, and, if she pushed herself yet further, faint. Running out completely would result in hours of coma.

If a non-biological being like a mana-beast used up all of its mana, it would simply cease to exist.

Mystery, who had a physical body that was yet to develop a stomach, and had only the barest hints of what would one day become her brain, was as yet capable of neither nausea nor sleep. She happily pushed herself beyond the limits of any regular human, thinking only that it felt uncomfortable, which was a tiny price to pay to be able to cast [Magical Girl Transformation] without stealing Kellela's mana.

ding

You really have no idea what outrageous things you keep doing, do you? Fine, here you go: have both [Increased Attributes] and [Mana Storage].

For continuing to function despite a level of mana deprivation that should have left you a drooling floor decoration for days, [Robust] advances to level 10.

And yes, you can have a couple of [Light] levels, too. I especially liked the fuchsia.

"Thank you very much," thought Mystery. She also thought several other ruder things, but felt that the thoughts she framed with words should be polite, given that she'd just gained two skills and three new levels.

Increased Attributes (C)

Faster. Stronger. Tougher. Brainier. Wittier. Better. Rise above the limitations of your puny flesh and become more than you are. Each level slightly increases your general abilities.

Mana Storage (U)

For mages, the depth of their mana pool is a direct measure of the amount of useful work they can do without rest. With this sub-skill, each level of [Increased Attributes] will provide you with additional mana.

Or one new skill and an immediate sub-skill for it, as it turned out. Not the rarest of sub-skills, and one that any professional mage would own, but they would have gained it through weeks of carefully pushing themselves in numerous short sessions, preferably while sitting comfortably with a sick-bucket to hand. They wouldn't earn it within a few minutes on a whim. And so the accidentally named Mystery carried on casually breaking the balance of the world.

The rapid ascent of the hero was an event of which, far away from Flinel, in the depths of the demonic forest, no-one was aware. That was entirely expected; no-one in Flinel knew, so how were any outsiders supposed to have found out? Heck, no human, jellax, zycrian or even grachen yet knew that there was a hero.

There was a clearing in the forest, if 'forest' was the correct word for the sparse collection of dead, leafless trees that existed in its depths. The ground was grey ash, without a hint of green. Not that the ground colour was visible from above; it was completely covered by a carpet of monsters. Chitinous beasts with too many eyes and even more legs. Boneless forms of flesh, leaving trails of blood as they travelled. Great, featherless birds, gaunt skin stretched over bony wings, tipped with vicious claws. A swarm of spikes and fangs.

The monstrous tide was deepest in the centre of the clearing, a bulge suggesting they were crawling over a small hill.

Appearances could be deceptive; it was not a hill of any size. Rather, beneath the chitinous coating was a pitch-black egg, tens of metres tall, the base embedded slightly into the ground to keep it upright. Anyone with a skill to visualise mana could have seen it rushing towards the egg, but they wouldn't be able to see what it was feeding inside; the black shell was a barrier to more than just light.

An observer might ask themselves what sort of creature could lay an egg that large, but that wasn't a useful question. Rather, they should ask what manner of creature was going to hatch.

Inside the egg, the nascent demon lord stirred. Unlike the hero, no impatient goddess had granted it premature intelligence, and its thoughts were wordless and shallow. If they did need to be summed up, perhaps it would be best done as, "Hungry."

The steady flow of mana into the egg stuttered and then accelerated as the embryonic king of monsters and demons drunk deep of its nectar. The creatures above skittered in excitement as they felt their master stir, and then froze up as the egg burped, launching a ring-shaped shock-wave of corrupted mana—miasma—into the forest.

At the edge of the clearing, demons sat and waited for the birth of their lord. Far closer to humanoid than any of the monsters swarming the egg, but nevertheless alien. Some were coated in chitin. Some had ten eyes, or none at all. Extra limbs, warped dimensions, claws and fangs. Some had leathery, bat-like wings curled up behind them. None made a movement or a noise. They knew patience, and they would wait.

A little further away, the wave hit a cloaked and hooded individual, leaning against a tree and, for some reason, being utterly ignored by the roving monsters. Her response was a happy smile of anticipation, looking forward to the monotonous world once again growing interesting for a few brief decades. A hand vanished into her hood, clutching an earring on its return as she began her preparations.

At the forest edge, where monsters were weaker, the terrifying touch of the demon lord drove them into a blind frenzy. They fled from it on instinct, leaving the forest and rampaging through the lands beyond. On the northern border of the forest, that was the kingdom of Flinel.

A horn blew from a watchtower in Karn's Vigil and a party of adventurers issued forth, flying over the walls; the monsters were weak, so the party was selected for mobility above all.

"Wonder what's got them all riled up?" muttered a guard as he watched a flying mage rain lightning bolts down upon a pack of wolves below.

"Who knows? Probably a bigger beast stole some territory further in, and they're being pushed out. Happens from time to time."

It was a shame he had no idea how accurate his guess had been.

The adventurers made short work of the fleeing monsters, with neither them nor civilians taking a single scratch. That didn't mean the farmer whose field had been trampled by a pack of wolves and then set on fire by a pack of flying mages was particularly happy about the situation, though.

Some people might ask why anyone would set up a farm so close to a foreboding expanse of evil monsters, but the increased mana density rolling out of the forest permitted the growth of magical crops that weren't viable elsewhere in the kingdom. Ice berries grew in frozen fields of blue. Golden apples grew on trees with yellow leaves, although despite the name, only the pips were actually made from gold. A hundred varieties of the more literal sort of magic mushrooms were in massive demand by alchemists across the kingdom, vital ingredients for their high-end potions.

Alas, none of that mattered when people kept setting fire to everything. A couple of years previously, when monster incursions had come once every few months, it was fine. In the past month, they'd been coming every few days.

The [Frontier Farmer] was a hardy chap, more than willing to punch a few wolves in the snout when required, but having lost a field for the second time in the week, he decided enough was enough.

As soon as dawn broke the next morning, he headed into town to sell up.

μ̵̼͉̐υ̴̡̽̿σ̷̭͓̃̀τ̸͉̤̾̆ή̶͎̱͌ρ̸̤͕̏̿ι̷̬̾͜ό̸͈ (Human)

Age: -9 months

Occupation: Hero (L)

Skills:

- Soul's Eye (U) (19/60)

>> Sense Vitality (U)

>> Sense Soul (R)

>> Sense Mana (U)

>> Sense Light (C)

>> Sense Sound (C)

- Astral Projection (U) (13/30)

>> Sure Navigation (U)

>> Uncontainable (U)

- Robust (C) (10/30)

>> Hardened Soul (R)

>> Secured Mana (U)

- Stealth (C) (3/20)

>> Camouflage Vitality (R)

- Magical Girl Transformation (R) (3/10)

- Light (C) (4/10)

- Increased Attributes (C) (2/20)

>> Mana Storage (U)

Achievements:

- Early Bloomer II (R)

- First Skill (C)

- Novice (C)

- Survivor of Zarklaxxos, the Arcane Infernal (R)

- I Broke The System, And All I Got Was This Lousy Achievement (E)

- Astral Explorer I (R)

- First Spell (C)