24
Cursed energy.
It was an impure form of the magic that flowed through the universe, nourishing it and blessing its inhabitants with spiritual strength.
One can not deny one very significant truth about the universe; every act, every emotion, every single existence is created in a pair.
For every right, there is a wrong.
For every light, a shadow.
For every good, an evil.
For every pure magic, there existed an impure counter part.
One called it cursed energy and it originated from the very core of one's desires.
Desires, a single word that enclosed within it an infinite meaning.
That impure energy was the wrong, the shadow, the evil of pure magic.
It was its mirror image and a forbidden art.
But there existed mages who had lost their sensibility to temptations, using the cursed spells to fulfill their unachievable wishes and to quench their lusts.
One such mage was present there in a dry valley laying between two rocky cliffs.
His eyes reflecting the trance he was in as he held his friend close to his cold chest unaware of the danger lurking near him.
Hundreds of knives emerged out of the magic circle that the man had casted, its bright gray radiance illuminating his form. A motion of his finger and the arrows dashed towards the boy.
Just then a portal opened up behind Rin's back and one could see pitch black clouds swirling around inside it. It created a negative pressure, sucking the approaching arrows inside it and then the portal closed just as fast as it had appeared.
Rin looked over his shoulder and seeing that look of indifference on his face, the man felt himself annoyed.
It was as if that boy was showing him how much great a difference there was between their powers.
"Why you arrogant brat!",he cried as he kicked the rocks beside his feet, the vein on his forehead visibly pulsating.
He tapped his feet on the ground, rising up in the air. He clenched his fists, a magic circle forming above the knuckles of his both hand.
He dashed towards the boy and threw a punch. It was stopped, his hand hitting a magic circle that had appeared behind Rin's back, its dark red glow illuminating the boy.
The man cursed before punching the circle again. A crack appeared in it and with his next punch, it shattered, the pieces fading away but the boy didn't seem to be faze by all that, he hadn't even taken his eyes off the boy in his arms.
The man raised his palm, a magic circle opening over it.
SLICING AIR.
He casted the spell and a strong gust of air blew past him, his gray hair and clothes fluttering vigorously in its course. He curled up his palm into a fist and that wind took the shape of two spears, one hovering on either side of the man.
With a slight motion of his wrist, those spears moved, turning their sharp tips towards the boys before they were fired, advancing at an alarming velocity.
Rin disappeared.
The spears hit the ground instead splitting open the earth.
The man raised his head and found the boy hovering above in the dark sky, his bright eyes glaring at the man.
A sword swished by the man and hit the ground behind him.
His gray eyes wide, he raised his hand to touch his stinging jaw. There was fresh blood on his fingertips.
That boy's sword had barely missed his neck.
A scowl appeared on the man's face when he realized that the boy had done that on purpose. It was a warning to that him to stay away from them or Genki wouldn't miss its target again.
He had held himself back or maybe that wasn't the case for the man found himself standing in between two large magic circles, their red lights bathing the encaged man.
He hastily put his hands together, summoning a magic shield around him just before those circles spitted flames at him; scorching black flames instantly swallowing him up.
The flames gradually subsided and revealed the man whose shield now held cracks in its gray surface. The man took a breath, he was drenched in sweat, his gray hair sticking to his sweaty forehead.
His throat was dry from all the heat that surrounded him. He gulped bringing his hands down to his side.
The circles began to resonate and the man cursed, raising his hands back up and putting them together to regenerate his shield just seconds before the flames were blasted again.
It felt as if he was standing inside a furnace and those aggressive flames were ready to mercilessly roast him up.
His shield cracked loudly and the man could feel the heat crawling up from the tips of his fingers.
From the sky above, Rin was watching the whole ordeal with an expressionless face.
In his arms, those black sparks had faded away after healing the boy of all his visible and hidden wounds but Thor still hadn't regained consciousness and that only made Rin's anger boil his blood more.
He raised his index finger, muttering something.
Down on the ground, the flames surrounded the man had died out at last.
The circles on either side of him vanished and the man waited for a while before cautiously lowering hands.
He stumbled forward, the tips of his finger burnt up, his hair singed at their ends. Wetting his dry lips, he looked up only to find a magic circle hovering right above him.
It had been a long time since he had felt that irritated and furious.
Wait till I get my hands on you, you pest, he thought.
He watched as another black circle appeared above it; that one a lot bigger and brighter than the former.
The man raised his hand but it was pulled down. He looked down and found vines coming out of the ground beneath his feet.
They raised up, snaking around the man's leg and pulling it down. He stumbled forward, falling on the ground.
Those slender black vines were quick to wrap around his body, completely immobilizing him.
He couldn't summon his kemono again, not when that cursed boy had so ruthlessly roasted it up.
Above him, the circles began to resonate, radiating vast amount of magic energy. The dust began to rise around the man before strong shock waves swam across that barren valley.
His cheek pressed against the hard ground, he peeked up at the danger lurking above him.
In those wide gray eyes, one could see hundreds of swords that were coming out of the circles.
Yards way from that subdued man in a crystal man, a painful gasp had escaped the fairy's thin lips, wrinkles appearing on her closed eyelids.
She opened her eyes a little, catching a glimpse of something glowing in her peripheral vision.
There was a dull, burning sensation in her chest, right where her core was and she could feel her magic energy continuously escaping from her body.
She blinked twice, slowly opening her blue eyes. She placed a hand on the crystal walls that confined her and a feeble smile appeared on her lips when she saw the soft blue light that they radiated.
It was Rin's magic.
But that smile turned into a frown when she saw the heavy, gray clouds that suffocated the sky.
A loud blast sounded behind her and she turned around inside the ball, her pupils going wide for what she saw was something she could never have dreamt of in her wildest dreams.
Rin had used cursed energy.