Dark Magus Returns

The Light Faction members had made it to just under the arena. It was harder for them to navigate through the place than they thought. Due to a lot of the fighting, many of the structures had been destroyed underneath.

Rubble had to be removed to even make their way to the main room. When finally making it, they could see the artifact in the middle.

Ricar walked over and placed both of his hands by the side of the artifact.

"I'm going to have to try and do some small tests to get the hang of this thing. I haven't really used it before," Ricar explained.

While Hannah was looking around, she could see a bunch of rubble that would lead up to the surface. She quickly climbed up it and took a peek through the cracks and could see the arena from where she was.

Surprisingly, through the crack, she had a pretty good view of what was happening. For one, when turning her head, she could see the man known as Murkel, the Red Hybrid, with parts of his skin crystallized and other parts red.

Then, when she turned to look at what she expected to be a student, it was almost as if a completely different person was standing there.

"Who, who's he? I don't remember seeing him… but he's wearing the same strange blazer as the person from before. Wait, they kind of look the same but different?" Hannah explained to the others.

"What happened in the short time we were down here?"

Beatrix was looking around in the dark hollow room for another pile of rocks that she could climb up to head to the surface. When touching one of the walls, she saw the edge of it light up, and now appearing in front of her were two screens.

These looked exactly like the large displays that showed the fighting to the rest of the public of what was occurring in the tournament. As for the angle of the two screens, they were appearing from somewhere in the stands.

"Ah, these show the display from those other artifacts. Now that there are no users controlling them, they must have just fallen," Beatrix said.

"I see, and the displays inside must be how the team down here was also able to change the landscape of the arena. They needed to know what was going on out there as well," Ricar commented. "But Hannah is right. That student doesn't appear to be the same person as he was before."

———

Everyone in the crowd was looking at Raze, they could see the drastic changes that had occurred. It was twice now, once when he had black hair changing to white, and now his white hair changing to long red.

Some who didn't understand what was happening were wondering if this was his true appearance or not.

"The chalice, what did it do?" Alba said to herself. "I thought it was meant to summon someone from the Divine Realm, not be used like this… and why do I have this strange feeling, as if I'm somewhat familiar with what I can see in front of me?"

It wasn't a familiar feeling in a good way either. She was reminded of the shivers she got at one point when she had tried to help Raze, when he was fighting against the mages.

When she came close, an invisible force pushed her away. But none of it made sense, the chalice was meant to summon a Divine being, back then Raze had used no such thing, and why did she feel something similar right now.

"What do you mean, Safa? I don't understand, is that Raze down there?" Simyon asked.

"It's hard to explain," Safa replied. "There's always been this thing, this thing that has been following Raze around, following him all the time. Sometimes, the feeling is stronger, sometimes weaker, but right now, when I look at Raze, I can see that thing now is no longer around him, and instead, it feels like it is him."

Simyon was incredibly worried, for more reasons than one, and in particular, if something had taken over Raze, then would the real Raze come back at some point.

——

On the ground, Raze was looking at his own body, staring at his long nails, at his skin. He swung his hand through the air, dragging the wind with it.

When Murkel saw this on the ground and stood up, he too had a familiar feeling.

"I know that feeling, I know that look before, I experienced it, we experienced it before," Murkel said. "You, just what are you, who am I speaking to now that has taken over his body?"

Murkel remembered the sight well. When the Hybrid took control of his own body, its actions then were the same actions as he was seeing now, and with the appearance change, it was quite obvious what had occurred.

"Even in this state, I am limited by what I can do," Raze finally spoke. "It's been a long time since I stepped into the world of Pagna. It smells a lot different, there's no iron in the air, the smell of rotting stench has mostly disappeared."

"I didn't think I would ever come back here, but I had no choice."

Murkel believed he had it figured out. Remembering the energy from the chalice reaching high up in the sky, and then coming down and the change of appearance in the foreign body, with everything the person was saying, he was pretty sure this person was from the Divine Realm, and that was why the student was so confident when facing him.

"What faction are you from, what clan are you from?" Murkel asked. "Maybe there is something that the both of us can do together. After all, I will be the leader of Pagna soon."

Raze, no, the blooded woman, looked at her own hand.

"I'm not used to it looking like this." It was then that her skin was turning a darker red than even that of Murkel's body. It was only her hand, but it was soaking it until the very tips of her fingers.

"What clan I'm from, what faction… none of these things existed when I was here, and you made a mistake. This body is not to be harmed, and since you are a threat to this body, I'm going to have to kill you now."