Occult Awakening: From Commoner to Archmage

"I've been thinking too small this whole time."

He stared between the shard of Lightning Glass in his hand and the whirlpool of dark legacy energy.

Aside from the whirlpool, there was a faint imprint of the Light spell he'd just cast lingering in the air. The intent had begun in his sea of consciousness; that was where every spell was born. It started inside him, in thought, then was projected outward into the universe.

It started with him. And so the thought struck him.

What if the most perfect way to bypass the issue wasn't removing the glyph-drawing process, but removing the catalyst requirement altogether?

What if he became the catalyst?

Luca's heart hammered against his ribs. The excitement surprised him, considering he had never properly studied the Legacy and had mostly taken its existence for granted.

If it could absorb catalysts, if it could give his body their properties, then he would be able to cast spells with his body itself.

It was one thing to use the body as a medium for channeling mana. It was another to make the body itself the instrument, to cast spells as naturally as lifting a hand or throwing a punch.

He shook his head.

"I need to calm down and be a little realistic here. How would it even work?"

He began working through the thought.

"The magical process is Intent, Medium, and Glyph. There's no catalyst mentioned in there."

Catalysts could be called the original form of magic, but they were outdated. The only reason weaker mages used them was because they didn't possess enough mana to directly call upon magical effects with glyphs alone.

"If I absorbed a catalyst right now, would I not need glyphs anymore?"

That wasn't entirely wrong, but it wasn't correct either.

Catalysts were prized for their resonance. Lightning Glass was useful because it simulated electrical discharge under the right conditions. The same principle held true for every other catalyst.

If he merged a few catalysts into his body, he would still need glyphs to direct their resonance. That didn't solve the main problem.

But then... He remembered the faint imprints spells left in his consciousness after being cast.

"This truly might be the key."

Luca suspected absorbing catalysts wouldn't just boost his magic. It might unlock something altogether different, something beyond the system of magic as he currently understood it. He had no idea what it would lead to.

He stared at the shard of Lightning Glass. He had long since stopped injecting mana into it, yet it still seemed to call to him, glinting seductively.

Of course, it couldn't be all peachy.

He weighed the disadvantages against the advantages. What would happen to his body if it worked? What if he merged too many catalysts into himself? Would he even remain human? Would he still be able to reproduce?

Several long minutes of heavy rumination passed, but the allure was too much.

In the end, Luca decided quickly. All his caution boiled down to one blunt question.

"Who the hell would… care?" He grinned. "Who gives a shit if I stopped being human? Who gives a shit if I can have children?"

None of those things mattered. Right now, all he could see was power. Power, power, power! He wanted it all, and he would grasp any chance offered to him.

His only true concern was how much strain his body could handle—and there was no way to know that without trying.

Luca gave one last look at the swirling whirlpool of dark energy. He knew Crowley's intentions were never pure, but he doubted this was meant to harm him. If Crowley had wanted him dead, he would already be dead.

The teen sat cross-legged at the center of the room, holding the pouch of Lightning Glass in his left hand.

He sucked in a deep breath, steadied his nerves, and reached into his sea of consciousness, prodding the dark whirlpool.

'Here goes nothing.'

The Legacy opened like a greedy monster. It reached beyond the walls of his consciousness and into the physical world.

A tornado of darkness spilled across the cellar, smothering the glow of the Light Crystals until the entire room was drowned in shadow.

It lasted only a second. Then, all at once, the swarm of energy converged in a single direction. It was though a flood had collapsed on his arm, devouring the Lightning Glass in an instant.

The next moment, Luca's body betrayed him.

He couldn't properly describe the feeling. It was as if worms were crawling under his skin, slithering through every vein, pressing between every pore.

"ARGHHHHHHHHHHHH!"

The scream tore out of his throat, ricocheting off the stone walls of the cellar.

The invasion didn't stop. If anything, it intensified. His mana ignited against his will, sparking faint streaks of blue lightning across his left arm, the epicenter of the sensation.

"ARGHHHH!"

The pain stretched far beyond endurance. He had no more tears left to cry, no more breath to scream. His jaw locked as he bit down hard enough to draw blood.

Seconds felt like hours. Minutes stretched into centuries. Time itself seemed to dissolve, leaving only the endless tide of pain.

At last, after what could have been moments or millennia, the storm subsided.

The dark energy ceased its violent spinning and retreated back into his consciousness, curling into its former, deceptively dormant state.

The cellar looked unchanged. All the other catalysts scattered on the floor lay untouched.

Only Luca was different.

His shirt clung to his back, soaked through with sweat. His entire body dripped, leaving a pool beneath him. He felt violated, as though every inch of him had been broken apart and stitched back together.

And yet, something inside him had changed. It was just from the pain of the experience. This was something that he could tell instantly.

There was something in his body that wasn't there before.

His left hand felt strangely light, almost unburdened. Blue sparks skittered across his skin like restless snakes, hissing softly in the dim air.