The Cursed Extra: Twin Souls Against the World

Someone else who stood a bit far away asked, "Hex Master, is this the new patient you told us about?"

Zayn suddenly felt a small hand on his chest, and he heard the low-pitched hex master's voice. "Yes. You see, this person suffered a big injury to his head, which messed up his brain."

Someone else asked, "Hex master, can't we use some kind of hex art of life engraving to fix that?"

Zayn felt a finger poking around his heart. "The hex art of life engraving deals with the restoration of the body. If you check this patient's heartbeat, you will see that physically his body is functioning fine."

Zayn shouted in his head. <Fck, don't tell me we've become some specimen for a hex master.>

[Well, at least the one touching us is female.]

But just as Xane said that, he heard a commotion and then, one after another, different people started touching his chest.

A few were softer hands, but then these thick, big arms started going through his body.

Xane even noticed that while the softer hands stayed there for a couple of seconds, these big hands took their sweet time. Some of them even moved around his chest. All of this sent shivers through him, but too bad that nothing reflected outside. [Shit, this is worse.]

<Yeah.>

Just then, Xane once again heard another random voice. "Hex master, is there no way to treat a patient like this?"

This perked both Xane and Zayn. Just like the students, they also waited for the hex master's answer.

The hex master said in her soft voice, "Well, the best case here is for the patient to self-recover."

She tapped back onto his chest. "You see these runes? All of them are currently working, supporting, and enhancing the patient's self-recovery."

Xane heard her students marveling, and a couple of bastards even moved their fingers on his chest, likely tracing the runes with their fingertips.

Xane wanted to get up and smack the shit out of those guys, but too bad he was helpless.

Zayn said to him. <Maybe that self-recovering rune is one reason we came out of the void.>

Xane didn't react much. Just then, one girl asked, "Hex master, what about this patient? Is there any chance he would self-recover?"

To his surprise, he heard an unexpected answer. "Nope, self-recovery does not affect this guy. His injury is much worse, and likely he will never be able to recover in this life at all."

Before Xane could even process that, another boy asked her, "Is there no other method?"

The hex master sighed. "There are a couple of hex masters who have developed hex arts that send a jolt of lightning into the patient's body."

"It's just that you need extreme mastery over those kinds of hex arts. There are still chances for things to go wrong, and in that case, you would just fry the patient's brain, killing them on the spot."

Zayn shouted to him. <Shit, this is getting worse.>

Xane mentally nodded his head. [Yeah.]

The hex master clapped, breaking the silence. "Ok, everyone, let's move to the next patient."

Xane heard the others talking among themselves as their voices continued to get lower and lower.

A couple of them even talked about his red hair and how they believed he could be from the top family, and so on.

They got so far that all he could hear was just this incomprehensible buzz, and a few seconds later, everything went back to silence.

Zayn was the first to break the silence as he said, <I just hope they're not going to use those hex arts on us.>

Xane mentally clicked his tongue. [We can't waste much time. You were talking about the hex skill, right? Tell me about that. Maybe understanding it might help us get out of this situation.]

Zayn paused for a bit as he collected his thoughts. <Oh, sorry, I got sidetracked with the cursed object.>

[Yeah, let's leave that topic for some other time.]

<Okay, so as I was telling you. Those with dark gold potential have a powerful active or passive hex skill. But from adamant potential onward, each hex skill starts to have two components.>

Xane thought for a bit and asked, [What about those with gold and lower potential?]

Zayn didn't have to think much as he said. <They are like the dark gold ones, just lower in effectiveness. Now, Xane, I think because of our mythic potential, our skill must have an active component to it.>

[What kind of active component?]

<I don't know, but think about the void. In my case, all I got is the emptiness that slowly swallows me. I feel like that is related to the hiding passive effect, the one that hides the hex energy.>

Xane thought for a bit and clicked. [I don't see that. I feel like you're just making stuff up in your mind.]

Zayn frantically shook. <No, Xane, the name of our hex skill is 'Shroud of Madness'. You see, these hex skill names are not random. The names always relate to how these skills function.>

Xane mumbled the hex skill. [Shroud of Madness.]

Zayn continued. <You know that "shroud" means covering something to obstruct others' view. Which, in our case, is our hex energy. This hex skill obscures our hex energy so that others won't see the true power of our skill.>

Xane said in annoyance. [Come on, let me think for a moment!]

Zayn said in a low tone. <Oh, sorry, sorry. Take your time.>

Without Zayn's interference, Xane started to think about his experience in the void.

If what Zayn said was true, then his experience should be related to the madness element.

Xane thought of thousands of selves shouting in the void. It sure was chaotic, but was it madness? He wasn't so sure.

Xane had experienced a lot of things in his life, and there were a few instances that would fit the madness.

That scene in the void was bizarre, but he wouldn't count that as madness.

A question suddenly popped up before him. What if this madness is also related to hex energy, just like the shroud?

He suddenly asked Zayn, [Hey, Zayn, is it possible that madness is also related to hex energy? I mean, just like how the shroud obstructs hex energy, maybe madness infuses some other property into our hex energy.]

Zayn thought for a long time and said. <You mean like our skill has two passive modes. One for madness and the other for the shroud.>

Xane mentally rolled his eyes. [You're the one with experience. So, do you think it's possible?]

<Two modes… two voids. This sounds plausible. I mean, we are talking about something beyond adamant potential. Well, we can try to see if that works.>

Xane asked in confusion. [But we are paralyzed. I'm not sure if you know, but I even tried to draw out the hex energy by calling status, but that failed.]

Zayn sighed. <If it is also a passive mode, like you said, then I think just thinking about switching the mode would work. But in that case, I'm not sure if switching modes would make any difference.>

[Well, it's better than nothing, right? So, Zayn, just do it.]

Zayn took his time and thought loudly in his head. <Switch to madness mode.>

Xane focused on the body, but even after waiting for a minute, he saw no change to it.

Zayn said to him. <Hey, you have experienced the madness void. So it's better if you do it.>

Xane wasted no time and shouted. [Switch to madness mode.]

Just like before, both of them waited, but still nothing happened.

Xane sighed. [It looks like both of us were wrong.]

Zayn urged him. <No, Xane, let's try again. And this time, I want you to think about your experience in the void while you do that. Maybe think about the big moments you experienced in that void.>

[What kind of big moment?]

Zayn said in an uncertain tone. <It could be anything. Maybe some realization or the urge you felt inside the void.>

Xane thought about the void as he remembered the very first realization: how the other voices were just part of him.

He even remembered the first time he summoned the 7th voice, how he wanted to know how his past innocent version would react to everything he went through.

That was a big moment for him. Thinking about that, he mentally shouted. [Switch to madness mode.]

Just like the other times, nothing happened. But Xane did not stop as he thought about the very last version before the rumbling in the void and once again shouted. [Switch to madness mode.]

Once again, nothing happened as Zayn sighed. <It looks like we failed—>

But just then, Xane once again shouted while thinking about the moment before he decided to call his other version.

The time when he wanted to fill the entire void with himself.

The one he imagined his entire life to engulf the void, as he said in a deep tone, [Madness mode.]

Nothing happened for a couple of seconds, but then he heard this clicking sound.

It was like someone had turned on some kind of switch inside his body, and the very next moment, he started to hear a rumbling sound.

It was like thousands of soldiers were stomping past him.

Not only that, he even felt like hundreds of creatures had started crawling on his body.

He felt like he was back in some past illusion, but this time he heard Zayn scream. <Stop using hex energy?>

Xane shouted back. [I am not using it! Hey, fast—think about shroud mode. Think about how you want to be one with the void.]

Zayn felt the insects crawling inside his body. He wasted no time thinking about the time he wanted to be one with the void.

That urge to be that vast and that quiet helped him calm down a bit as he said in a low tone. [Shroud mode.]

The very next moment, everything stopped, and he once again found himself back on the bed.

But before the two of them could rest, they heard loud footsteps from the side. It took them a moment before they heard the hex master shout. "What's going on here?"