It is alive

The lonely flickering flame of the oil lantern shone its weak light on the rather smooth stone floor. On it, drawn in blue mana, was a circle of runes shining with dim light.

Vincent moved his trembling finger over the limestone, he was doing his best to complete the last lines without flaws. Only the hellish training his brother put him through helped him stay conscious.

A single drop of sweat rolled down his cheek.

He collapsed back, lying on the floor. Next to his heads a hundred and thirty uneven and furious strokes had been made into the windowless wall.

"Fuck yes, finally."

One of his steel rings melted over his skin, coating it.

He slammed his fist against the stone, the metal destroying the engravings.

Slowly, unsteady Vincent stood up, excitement in his blue eyes. The line toga and pants were covered in stains of blood and soot.

His blue eyes stared into the circle reflecting the dim light of the spell, fascinated by the beauty. It was his circle. His creation.

To be fair, it looked similar to the one already in his mind. He had modified it rather than start form scratch , Arminius gave the suggestion. It would have taken years otherwise, hindering his progress.

Reaching his hand out towards the large spell ring, he could feel the mana vibrating in the air with power.

The stone held the magic ready to unleash it into the world.

Every rune felt mighty and deliberate – he knew their deepest meaning and function.

One of his rings morphed again, slithering towards the tip of his fingers. It transformed into a needle and pricked the skin.

The humming got stronger.

Like wax the steel dropped of his hand, onto the circle, carrying with it his blood. It flowed along the engraved lines in the stone.

With every bit covered, drums sounded in his minds, louder and louder. Railing his body and mind.

He was fully awakened and focused as he completed the ritual, all sign of his earlier sloth vanished.

Then Vincent entered a state of perfect focus.

Only the chanting circle of blue light seemed to matter. Than the floor and celling disappeared, and only he floated in the void, the magic in front of him.

It started rotation, revolving around his almost drained magic core. With the other, already completed spell it formed a beautiful and mesmerizing dance.

Faster and faster it spun.

And then he could feel it, his magic was growing. At least twice as fast.

When he needed four hours to recover previously he now only needed two.

~

This time no one came to interrupt him. After he was finally able to tear himself from the sensation he returned to the quit room.

It looked so ordinary, plain.

The single lamp illuminated the simple wooden door that lead out of the small cellar.

A wooden table stood on a now boring limestone floor.

Deposited on it was bowl filled with bloodied parts of animals. He had requested the chief to give some of the wastes to him. Until now they always became pigs food.

He hesitated not a single moment to place his hand on the mixture – he had seen worse in his training sessions.

Bones and soft flesh was felt on the palm.

Vincent closed his eyes – he did not need to, jet he wanted to make sure everything worked.

Reaching out for the magic, letting it be converted by the spell circle and guiding it thought his arm took him but a thought.

He felt a small resistance and than came the hard part.

The spell was much much more precise than manipulate metal. His brother had told him that spells, especially first ones, only had a limited amount of power to distribute. If he wanted the spell to do one thing, he had to sacrifice another.

A fact that often drove him on the walls when he tried to replicate a computer, only to find his magic unable to form anything other than round and pointy things. He could not even produce a sharp edge.

Mold flesh, sacrificed the useless part about moving the material, and added it to other areas.

He pushed the magic to shape the flesh and bone, recombine them and drawing on his vast drove of knowledge, perfectly preserved in his memory, to reconstruct his picture of a mouse.

They were one of the animals he was most familiar with, millions died in his labs.

He opened his closed eyes.

Before his pupils Vincent saw bones growing, getting covered in flesh and muscles, then hide and fur. The animal snapped open its glowing red eyes.

"IT IS ALIVE"

He spread his arms out, his rough voice echoing through the room.

In the next moment however, the animal collapsed under the weight of its own body. It tried to raise a small squeak, jet it only spat blood.

Flesh melted, filling the bowl with a mixture of goo and blood.

White pristine bones stood defiant in the air, displaying a small skeleton.

Vincent just put away the failed test and reflexively searched the computer to fill in the failture parameters, obliviously his hands found nothing.

"It should have something to do with the cells themselves. Somehow I butchered up their composition."

He mumbled to himself, while he extinguished the light.

"I will get it fixed in no time. This spell is an investment, it will take work to be useful."

The darkness seemed to hinder him not a single bit, as he left the room eager to come back and try again.