Occult Awakening: From Commoner to Archmage

Luca's jaw went slack at the sight.

It was one thing to think about the result, and another to see it happen before his very eyes.

No amount of pain could subdue his curious spirit. He rose from the pool of his own sweat and studied his left hand carefully, eager to catalogue the changes.

The first was the sudden lightness of the limb. It felt strange, even uncomfortable, compared to the heaviness of the rest of his body.

Visually, the arm looked the same as before. Inwardly, it was an entirely different story. When Luca spread mana through the limb, the remnant sparks erupted with a fierceness he had not expected.

There was no need to activate a glyph. His arm itself had become the catalyst, and simply charging mana through it triggered the magical effects.

Luca stared at his hand in wonder. Was he even human anymore? Humans could not do this at will.

He pushed more mana into it, causing larger streams of lightning to crackle and shoot from his fingers. With focus, he found he could slightly manipulate the shape and form of the discharges.

"I'm closer to an Esoteric Beast than a human at this point," he muttered.

The assessment was uncomfortably accurate.

After two straight minutes of spewing electricity, his mana fell below half. More troubling still, his arm grew stiff and difficult to move unless he cut the flow of mana.

"The limit falls to about three minutes with a continuous stream," he noted aloud. "That means I can probably maintain it far longer in short bursts during battle. Still, the arm stiffens if I do not stop."

Luca suspected that overuse might even leave it paralyzed.

Those were the observations he made, but nothing compared to the sheer realization that he had done it.

He activated the arm a few more times, just to ensure he was not imagining things. Sparks flew and died on command.

"I have become a catalyst. A living one at that."

Originally, he had only been searching for a way to bypass strict casting requirements at the lower rank. Instead, he had stumbled onto something entirely new, perhaps even a hybrid path between man and magic.

It was more than he bargained for, and it had not come free. The pain was unforgettable, and he still did not know the exact negative effects of his new Lightning Arm.

He sat down cross-legged once more, closed his eyes, and meditated to restore his mana.

His thoughts turned back to what catalyst integration truly meant. It did not free him from the study of magic. If anything, it made study even more important.

Integration was a shortcut. A powerful one, yes, but still a shortcut. He needed to expand his knowledge of spells and glyphs while uncovering more of what the Legacy energy was capable of.

So far, he had discovered two things. It could reveal hidden mages, and it could allow him to absorb catalysts, granting their properties directly into his body. Who knew what else it could achieve?

The thought was thrilling, but it also demanded caution.

How many more catalysts could he absorb before reaching his limit? His body would likely warn him when that point came, but it would be reckless to test blindly. Random absorption was too dangerous.

If he had known this was possible from the start, he might have used a more significant catalyst than Lightning Glass. The Sky Tyrant feathers would have been ideal. But there's no way he could have known, and regretting it now served no purpose.

Another thought crossed his mind.

"Could this be the interference that blocked me from seeing my fate?"

He considered casting Scry again, but quickly dismissed the idea. This alone did not feel like it would be enough to completely derail his divinations to such an extent.

More likely, the Legacy itself existed beyond the bounds of regular divination. It was something he could not yet properly categorize.

In the end, it did not matter.

Luca's gaze sharpened as he wondered if Crowley had anticipated this. Did Crowley know that integration was possible? Was that why he had given him an outdated combat spell at the start? Had Crowley expected his successor to modify the process itself

However, that was just speculating, with very little evidence behind it. Part of him felt embarrassed to have only discovered this side of the Legacy now. Still, beating himself up over it was pointless. He pushed the feeling aside and focused forward.

When his mana was restored, he stood.

"There is still much to do. I need to restock Talismans, set a new spell into the Ritual Pendant, and more."

He looked around the cellar. Over the past weeks, his "study room" had grown more cluttered. Near his feet sat several catalysts, such as vials of Starmetal Dust and bottles of collected rainwater. In the far corner, beside the wine barrels, rested a pair of deer antlers he had obtained from a hunter.

A small section of the antlers had been cut away. It was the piece he had used to cast Carrion Stag into the pendant. Luca planned to study the spell in more detail now that he had time. He also wanted to see if he could apply its principles to reverse-engineer his own necromancy spell from scratch.

Against the wall, beside the antlers, leaned a long, polished stump of wood. From it, he had carved talisman tiles.

Little by little, he was improving.

Luca charged mana into his arm and slammed his palm forward. A massive bolt of lightning erupted and struck the wall.

BANG!

The blast tore into the bricks, leaving a smoking hole where solid stone had been. It was far more destructive than Incinerate, and the drain on his mana was negligible.

He clenched his fist, a wide grin spreading across his face. He could not have hidden it even if he tried.

"It will be far different the next time they see the Burning Man."