Play some epic music while reading. Makes everything much more intense.

'This is bad!' Narlou thought with gritted teeth as his mana continued to clash against the spirit's.

Not only could he feel it being pushed back, but he could also sense his own mana work against him, licking at his mind to let the corruption in.

He needed to end this quickly.

Narlou retracted his mana with a pounding hearth and immediately jumped back a fair distance with only a second to spare. The spirit's mana crashed into the ground where he had been standing with fear inducing power, creating a low rumbling that shook the ground and made the trees shudder.

But Narlou was already on the move again, leaving the spirit no time to think.

Kicking up dirt due to his sheer speed, Narlou dashed behind the spirit and jumped up at it with enhancement magic already coating his fist. His arm sped forward, and the punch connected perfectly, but instead of drawing blood or sending the spirit flying, something else happened.

Crack

A small fracture appeared where his fist had landed, but Narlou had no time to think about it as a long, dark purple claw came speeding towards him from the side.

Swish

He could feel the wind rush past him as he just barely ducked under the swing before smoothly landing on the ground, but his thoughts were anything but smooth. Not only did the spirit have some kind of barrier over its host's body, but it also used a type of magic that Narlou was knew for a fact was very dangerous.

"You have to be kidding me, dark magic?!"

He didn't know much about it, but a feeling told him that it would be better to not let the magic even touch a hair of him, or it would end badly.

The spirit finally turned around, and Narlou quickly jumped back to get some space between them and start to form a plan, because there was no way in heaven and hell that he could beat someone using Dark magic without abusing his own corruptive magic to its fullest potential.

"Surprised, little human? We spirits are masters of rare magic. It's one of the reasons why we are so superior to your species!"

Instead of answering, Narlou tensed his muscles. From what he had observed, he was much faster than the spirit, but the spirit's magic was much stronger than his, if he could even properly use his in the first place.

In other words, he was at a huge disadvantage.

"Too scared to answer? As expected of a human. Then let's continue our little fight, shall we?"

His only warning was his senses screaming at him to dodge, and he did. Not even a fraction of a second later, a dark spear of mana exploded where he had just been standing, making his ears ring and his skin tingle. The ground where it had hit was scorched and not a single fallen leave had remained, confirming his feeling that it would be wise to not get hit directly by the magic.

Narlou couldn't help but gulp.

"You're a slippery one, aren't you?"

Boom

The young fighter swiftly threw himself to the side again, another explosion just barely missing his body. Quickly jumping back up into a standing position, his eyes darted upwards to scan for an opening he could exploit, but instead of finding any, he discovered another dozen dark spears lazily floating behind the spirit.

Narlou's eyes widened.

'I won't be able to dodge all of them, I have to keep moving.'

And moving he did.

Narlou weaved in between trees, ran circles around the spirit and dashed from side to side while trying to find another opportunity to attack the back of the spirit. The crack on its back might not be big, but he was confident that it would eventually break if hit enough times.

BOOM

An explosion way too close for comfort pulled him out of his thoughts, and he dared to sneak a look at the spirit again. His opponent looked mildly annoyed, but the spirit wasn't showing any kind of exhaustion whatsoever despite throwing around his magic like an idiot. Luckily, the number of spears floating around it had lowered to 5 now.

"Ugh!" Narlou grunted as a sudden wave of pain shot through his head.

The corruption was getting worse. He needed to hurry, but the risk of getting hit by one of those spears was just too high for him to recklessly run in!

'As much as I don't want to, let's wait for another minute. Maybe he'll become exhausted.'

Another explosion shook the ground.

"Are you really only going to run away like a coward!?"

Narlou abruptly came to a halt before jumping back, dodging two spears the spirit had thrown to intercept him.

BOOM BOOM

'He is becoming frustrated.' Narlou realized with a small smirk appearing on his face.

Before he could even think about the consequences, he raised his hands to his mouth and started shouting.

"Maybe you should just learn how to aim better, idiot!"

It was childish and should have been ineffective by all means, but in its endless arrogance, the spirit raised its hand with a deep growl, sending the remaining spears down at him with frightening speed.

Three loud explosions rang though the forest, but Narlou dodged them all with his superhuman reflexes, only dirt hitting his back as he positioned himself behind the spirit in the confusion of the aftermath.

His blood was pumping, and his heart was pounding, but despite everything, Narlou found himself grinning like a madman. The thrill of battle was undeniable.

'This is exciting!'

And then he jumped, his fist filled with magic and his body leaned back to gain as much momentum as possible. He could see the spirit turning towards him, but it was much too late.

CRACK

His blow hit with a devastating force. His arm vibrated, the air shivered and it was all accompanied by a beautiful cracking sound that was like music to Narlou's ears.

And then the spirit struck back.

Narlou could feel it more than he could see it. An impenetrable wall of magic suddenly pushed him away from his opponent's body much faster than he could react. Only by pure instinct did Narlou focus much of his enhancement magic to his back, trying to shield himself from the impact. At first, he just sailed through the air, trying to get his body into a landing position, but then his back hit a tree. And then a second one. And a third one, until he eventually hit the ground and slid to a stop.

It was painful, but not so much that he could not fight anymore. No, Narlou was far from done, his endurance stat was not for nothing after all.

Not wanting to get hit while still down, the hurt teenager quickly pulled himself up with practiced ease, facing the being responsible for all of this.

"Is this all you got? How pathetic. And here I was, expecting a good battle."

Narlou eyed the spirit still hovering above the ground with evil mana clinging to it like a parasite, his eyes narrowed in anger and all resemblance to a smile gone from his face. As much as fighting was exciting, this was a battle that he needed to take as serious as he could, since not only his life, but the lives of all the remaining villagers and his brothers was on the line.

"Alright then." He muttered while his body rapidly adjusting to the pain.

Carefully bending his knees, Narlou glanced at the spirit one more time, and only now did he notice how the mana seemed more calm and less aggressive.

'That attack must've cost him quite a bit of mana.'

That was good, because Narlou wasn't sure what he would do if the spirit would do that again. Against attacks like these, he was pretty damn unequipped without his main source of power.

Talking about mana though, Narlou could feel the corruption becoming harder to suppress, and it was beginning to stress him out. His head was already pulsing painfully, and it was harder to concentrate than before.

This battle was literally a race against time.

Without any warning, Narlou dashed forward so fast that the spirit couldn't even react, appearing behind it with his fist already on course to strike its back. The hit was not nearly as strong as before since he put speed above power now, but it still caused the crack to widen ever so slightly.

"You want a good battle?" Narlou snarked as he landed and immediately dashed to the side, not giving the spirit any chance to track him properly.

"Then stop complaining and fight me!"

The only answer Narlou got was hundreds of dark crescent shaped blades suddenly flying from the spirit everywhere around it, slicing through everything they hit like butter. It was a smart move since any other spell wouldn't hit him, but Narlou was still evading every single blade, slowly getting closer to a position where he could strike again.

Luckily for him, his opponent stopped the wild attack not long after, giving Narlou the small window he needed to try another attack to the back. It hit with a satisfying crack, and he quickly dashed back again, dodging another mana claw that had been aiming to take his head off.

"Stop being so damn annoying!"

What followed was a game of dodge and attack. The spirit continued to throw spell after spell at Narlou, ranging from huge attacks that covered the entire area to small and sometimes downright sneaky ones that were meant to just trip him or keep him in place.

Being as agile as he was, Narlou managed to evade most of them, but even with his speed, he couldn't escape every single attack. Slowly, burns and bruises started littering his body, though he had managed to not get hit directly by any of the stronger attacks, since that would've most likely been much more devastating. Dark magic was not a rare magic for nothing.

Besides that, the constant dodging and running was also becoming quite exhausting, and Narlou could feel himself slowly tiring out. The corruption wasn't helping the matter either.

On the other hand, though, the young fighter had also managed to get a few more hits in, expanding the crack even more. He was pretty certain that he'd only need one strong hit to break the barrier, and he had just the idea to create such an opportunity.

"STAY STILL!"

BOOM

Another big explosion shook the ground, and Narlou felt the heat nibble at his back as he kept moving, his brows furrowed in concentration. One small misstep, and he would be completely fucked.

The spirit was pretty angry by now, which was good, since it made him much more open to Narlou's attacks, but it also meant that his spells became much more unpredictable.

'Now!'

Suddenly, Narlou stopped dead in his tracks. The spirit didn't waste any time and shot a beam of concentrated darkness out of its palm, but before the devastating attack could hit, Narlou rushed underneath the spirit and positioned himself behind it as quickly as he could.

It was a simple distraction that no one would've fallen for, but in its enraged state, the spirit didn't even think twice before attacking, and it gave him just the time he needed.

One big jump into the air catapulted Narlou on the spirit's eye level, but instead of seeing eyes, he saw the huge crack on his enemy's back, seemingly inviting him to attack again. And Narlou gladly obliged.

His fist was already pulled back as far as possible, and since the spirit still hadn't fully comprehended what had happened, Narlou took his sweet time preparing for a strong punch that would destroy the barrier for good.

With a combination of colossal strength and impressive momentum, Narlou struck.

The moment his fist smashed into the center of the crack, the whole barrier that surrounded the corpse shattered like glass in a beautiful show of dark particles slowly evaporating into thin air.

As quick as the satisfaction of his accomplishments had appeared though, it was drowned out by his instincts howling at him to dodge an attack from the left. It took only a short fragment of a second for Narlou to look to the side and asses the danger, and what he found was not to his liking at all.

A giant dark purple hand, easily twice as big as him was approaching him like he was a fly about to be swatted.

In his momentary victory, he had been careless, and now was already too late to dodge.

The terror of the situation slowly set in, and Narlou's eyes widened as he tried to come up with a solution for this problem. But there was only one solution, unless he wanted to find out what dark magic did when it touched skin and flesh.

And that solution was using his own magic.

In a flash, a thick white shield appeared between Narlou and the giant hand just in time. The palm hit his defense, and they stood at a standstill for just a second before the attack began to rapidly overpower his magic.

But the second was just what Narlou needed. With his chest heaving and his head screaming, he let gravity take control and fell towards the ground just as the dark hand rushed over his head.

He landed on his feet with a quiet thud, and then there was silence.

Narlou stared at the spirit quietly hovering in place, not moving an inch besides the gentle up and down motion that his wings caused.

His head was empty, and he couldn't even hear his heart pounding anymore. It was as if someone had flipped a switch that disabled any sound.

But as blissful as the silence was, no good things lasted forever.

Without any warning, pain shot through his head far more intense than before, sweat began drenching his cloths and his thoughts suddenly seemed to be less tangible. It was as if something was worming itself into his brain.

Narlou's eyes shot wide open.

Whether it was tensing every muscle in his body, pulling at his hair or clawing at his neck, the terrified kid tried everything to stay conscious. Normally, casting such a shield would've only caused a headache, but since he'd been around the corruptive mana for so long, even the smallest spells were a big no-go.

Slowly, oh so slowly, Narlou could feel his mind winning against the corruption, giving him back the delightful clarity over his thoughts and the control over his body. Immediately, Narlou glanced up at the still unmoving spirit. To the human eye, it looked like a dead corpse hanging mid-air, but Narlou could feel the dark mana mildly swirling around the spirit, showing that it was still very much alive and kicking.

'What the fuck is going on?'

He had no idea why the spirit was not moving, but he could guess that it had something to do with the barrier breaking. Whatever it was didn't matter though, because Narlou could feel the mana picking up its pace again.

'It's waking up soon. I shouldn't waste this opportunity!'

Whit a deep breath, Narlou forced his sore body to move. It was more difficult than before to control his enhancement magic, but he still managed to flood his limbs with it, before bending his knees slightly.

He could feel the dark mana becoming more violent by the second, and his senses were starting to tingle uncomfortably.

'It's now or never.'

So, before he could chicken out, Narlou jumped up, only for his eyes to widen in surprise as the dark mana suddenly became compressed into the spirit's body. It was the same feeling he'd gotten before the wall of mana had pushed him back earlier.

But it was already too late to change course.

No matter how much he wanted to get abandon the attack, there was only one way, and that was forward.

It was a race of who hit first, and even his senses couldn't tell him if he could reach his target before he'd be hit by the attack, but he pressed forward, nonetheless. Finally, just as he could feel the spirit's spell being released, his fist reach its face and it did so much more than Narlou could have ever hoped for.

With the barrier gone, the spirit's body was only that of a human, and his strike send it flying like a leaf in the wind, where it eventually crashed against a tree with a loud thud. The spell was completely gone as well, and Narlou watched with a pained smirk as the wings seemed to struggle to keep the body afloat.

The barrier was destroyed, the spirit was pretty low on mana, and he had just hit a strong attack straight to the face.

'But why am I feeling so anxious?'

The spirit was obviously confused if his wild eyes and jerking limbs were any indication, and it was a perfect moment to finish him off. Yet, his senses were telling him to wait.

Since his senses rarely lied to him, Narlou stood still and waited with bated breath and his strained muscles tensed.

…

A few seconds passed, and Narlou was seriously debating just ignoring his instincts, but at that moment the spirit's body suddenly started convulsing.

Its limbs trembled, its face distorted into an ugly snarl and its fingers twisted and folded like paper. But none of that mattered to Narlou, because something much more worrying was happening right in front of him.

If the spirit's mana had felt like a violent wave before, it now felt like it was towering over the forest like a raging storm, swallowing up everything in its path. Narlou could only stare with astonishment and unease as the spirit's eyes suddenly turned purple, mana so dense that it was visible rushing out of the sockets like a waterfall going upwards. The same suddenly happened with the mouth, then the nose, and even the ears. Soon, dense mana was shooting out of every facial opening into the sky above the spirit, gathering in one spot.

'Wait a minute…'

His face paled, and he watched with wide eyes as the swirling mass of mana slowly began to spin around an invisible point while rapidly expanding. The lower end cautiously expanded downwards into a thinner spinning circle, while the upper end quickly expanded further into the sky, widening the circle as it went.

He had never seen it personally, but he'd heard plenty stories about those forces of nature that could tear apart cities with ease. But this one was not only such a force of nature, but also one that was made of dark magic.

'I have to get out of here!'

Before he could even take a step though, his legs folded under him, and he fell to the ground with as the winds around him picked up in speed. His body had gone beyond his limits, and it couldn't support his weight anymore.

Deep panic immediately numbed his mind, and Narlou's headache doubled in intensity. Not only his body, but also his mind was overused and sore.

His mouth suddenly went dry as he felt a small tendril of corruption pierce through his mental defense. He couldn't stop it much longer.

Yet, despite the already horrible situation, there was something much worse quickly forming on the horizon.

"I… Will take you down with me!"

Narlou flinched at the voice and dared a glance at the spirit. But he couldn't see it anymore. It was hidden behind an enormous tornado of dark magic that was picking up more and more speed as it approached him.

'Is this how I die?' He couldn't help but ask himself as the unstoppably powerful spell came closer and closer, winds gnawing at his burned cloths.

There was absolutely nothing he could do to stop it. Even if he would use his pure magic, he was pretty sure that nothing he could create would even slow that monster down. His mind was at the edge of being corrupted, and his body wouldn't listen to him anymore.

Everything hurt.

Were Yone and Yasuo alright?

A cough escaped his dry throat. There was blood on the ground.

'At least I could help Yasuo and Y-'

Suddenly, everything was calm. No howling winds, no screaming explosions or oppressive dark mana.

Nothing.

He glanced up, and the tornado was gone. The last thing he saw was a body falling from the sky, hitting the ground with a dull thud.

He fell unconscious not a second later.

"…sle…!"

"…can… do… t…!"

"Y… re… clear… tired… me!"

"I'm not… sleep!"

"I'm not either!"

Narlou awoke with a start, his unfocused eyes trying to take in his surroundings and failing spectacularly at it. Everything was blurry, his thoughts felt slow and his whole body was aching intensely.

"Ugh…"

He fell back onto the comfortable mattress with a groan, shutting his painfully pulsing eyes.

'What the fuck happened?'

"Are you awake?" A worried young voice said from his right, and Narlou frowned as he tried to match the very familiar tone to a face.

"Give him a minute. He's probably very disoriented." A much calmer voice spoke up, and like switch had been flipped, Narlou remembered who these voices belonged to.

"Yasuo? Yone?"

He slowly tried to open his eyes again, and sure enough, the two were sitting next to his bed, smiling at him.

"How are you feeling?"

"like shit. Everything hurts. Can I get some water?"

Yasuo quickly handed him a mug, and Narlou greedily gulped down the refreshing liquid like it was made by gods. His dry throat immediately felt much better, and he finally managed to sit up, turning to the two kids next to him.

"You feeling like that is to be expected, considering the state you were in when we found you."

The sudden reminder went through his brain like a bolt of lightning, and all the memories quickly began to resurface in his mind. His eyes widened and his heart started pounding.

"What happened? Is everyone alright?"

This time, Yasuo leaned forward to answer.

"Don't worry. Everything's fine. We don't know what exactly happened, but when we woke up, we were on the hill in the village. There were explosions and stuff somewhere in the forest near us, and it was pretty obvious what was happening considering how we got caught in the first place, so we tried to reach you as soon as possible. But then there was this giant dark storm and we had to wait for it to stop, and it suddenly did so we immediately ran over to you and took you back to the village to get you treated."

There was a small pause, before Yasuo spoke up again with a bit of color leaving his face.

"You looked like you were about to die. You had so many wounds and there was so much blood. We were really worried, you know?"

Narlou's heart became heavy at the younger brother's vulnerable tone, and quickly gathered the two in a hug despite his body screaming in protest. After a moment, Narlou let go of them again, his face turning serious.

"Did you see any evil looking flying corpses with huge black wings on your way?"

The kids shook their heads, and Narlou let out a sigh of relieve. The spirit was gone. It felt like a heavy burden had been lifted from his shoulders.

'But that sill begs the question, why didn't I die?'

He could come up with a few theories, but only one of them seemed logical. The spirit had been using immense amounts of mana throughout the whole battle, and that last attack must've just been too much.

'He was probably already dying after his barrier was destroyed and I hit him really hard. He must've not been able to hold that last attack for long enough with his lack of remaining mana, and simply died before it could reach me.'

Shaking his head, Narlou focused on the kids again, his brows furrowing.

"So, what happened to you guys?"

Both teens suddenly seemed much smaller, and it too a few seconds before Yone eventually answered.

"After you went on a walk, we were very exhausted and went back to the tavern to rest a bit, but we met Martel and Jolune on the way. They insisted that we followed them, and they led us into the forest."

Narlou quirked an eyebrow.

"And you followed them? Just like that?"

"Well… Yeah."

He really wanted to lecture them for just following strangers, especially to a place like a forest, but the look on their face already told him that they regretted it, and he settled for an exhausted sigh.

"What happened after that?"

Yone hesitated for a bit, but a nudge from Yasuo gave him the confidence to keep speaking.

"I'm not quite sure how, but they knocked us out cold before we could even defend ourselves, and the next thing we knew we were in an underground room with some other villagers."

He took a second to collect his thoughts before continuing.

"I guess the old man used some kind of spell, because we suddenly became really exhausted. That's the last thing I remember."

Yasuo nodded in agreement.

"The next time we awoke after that, we were on the hill in the village. I guess it was you who brought us there?"

Narlou nodded as well, taking in the information that Yone had just provided. He had left the kids for just a short time, and people had immediately done something bad to them.

'This world was so fucked up.' He thought with a feeling of anger invading his mind, but he quickly suppressed it. The people who did this were already dead, getting angry would accomplish nothing.

He needed to teach them magic soon, so that they could start defending themselves better as well.

'And I also need to get stronger if I want to keep them save.'

It was a conclusion that caused mixed feelings for the young man. He didn't want to use his powers again, the risk of hurting someone was simply too high, but it was something he had to do if he wanted to keep the people close to him save.

'And no matter how much I wish it weren't true, the battle against the spirit had been extremely exciting.'

Just the thought of training until he couldn't even stand anymore and fighting strong opponents that could force him to use every bit of his strength caused a wave of excitement to flood his body.

'But before I even think about fighting anyone else, I need to focus on getting my mana under control.'

But those were thoughts for later. For now, he just wanted to enjoy the fact that he and the brothers was still alive and rest his sore body in this comfortable bed.