Jaux Ballad has always wanted to enter the realm of magic, but could not do so by regular means. In his desperation to become a magician he finds himself with more power, and more trouble, than he could ever have imagined.

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Suhara stood before the mirror-like portal, looking at her reflected image. "I'm not sure about this, Theema."

"It is our contract, as well as your payment to me." said Theema.

"I know." Suhara sighed. "You said I had a year though, didn't you? I don't think I'm ready to fight something as powerful as a ghost."

Theema's voice continued to smoothly echo in Suhara's mind. "You are strong, child. I will help if I can."

"I-I couldn't even beat a student. Let's just try again some other time." said Suhara.

"Even if you decide that, I have no power to bring you back from another immortal realm," said Theema. "If you do not defeat and claim the powers of a ghost here, you will not be able to open a way back to your mortal realm."

Suhara grumbled in frustration at the news. "Oh hurrah, be trapped forever or die. That's great, really."

Suhara reluctantly stepped through the reflective portal.

=+=+=

Frey stepped out from the store, and looked around. "Aw shoot, she ran off. One of us should have stayed out here with her."

"She'll be fine," said Tricks. "She can take care of yourself. What did you expect, anyway? We were in there for like, hours."

All three girls searched around for the familiar black hair of their roommate. It was an uncommon hair color in Orouna, so they hoped it would be easy to spot.

Desyi saw something peculiar as she scanned through the crowd. She pointed towards the marketplace, where an old wizard was currently casting some kind of spell next to a merchant stall. "Hey, isn't that the teacher?"

"Oh, yeah. I wonder what he's up to..." said Frey.

The three girls walked over the to teacher, and found two other students by the stall.

Frey greeted the mage she recognized, a dark haired boy from the student council. "Hey Brimsix, what's the supervisor doing with that stall?"

Brimsix gasped as he saw Frey. "Y-your roommate, Ballad. She disappear here, kidnapped by a merchant or something. It happened so fast..."

The statement took a moment to register in the girls' minds.

"WHAT?!" The three girls nearly shouted in harmony.

Frey lunged forward and grabbed Brimsix by his shoulders. "How could that possibly happen?! How did they even get away with Suhara in broad daylight?!"

Tricks didn't know what to do with her arms, so she shook them violently through the air. "Kidnapped?! How the fuck... why the fuck..."

"It was dimensional magic, they were here, and then they were gone!" said Brimsix.

"Wait a second, were you here, Brim?!" said Desyi.

Brimsix stammered soundlessly for a few seconds. "Y-yes. There was nothing I could do!"

"Bullshit!" Frey yelled and wildly shook Brimsix. "You're from the student council! You're definitely powerful enough to stop something like that!"

"I wasn't prepared!" cried Brimsix. "It was over in seconds! I could barely blink!"

"Settle down, children," said the teacher, Korol. "I have retrieved the coordinates, we just need to wait for a dimension genre staff member to arrive."

"Why are we just waiting?!" said Tricks, "Can't you open up a portal to the place?"

"The location is an immortal realm that I do not recognize. I do not know where it is, and I can not reliably open a gateway. I also must not jeopardize any other student." said Korol.

Frey let go of Brimsix and pushed him down onto the floor. "I'll go, I can protect myself!"

Korol shook his head. "Absolutely not. I am responsible for your safety. I can not put any of you in danger. We will wait for the Lyceum to send specialized personnel."

=+=+=

The ground beneath Suhara's feet was incredibly cracked. The cream colored land looked like it had been deprived of moisture for years. A land of drought. If this place had any wind, it would be easy to cloud over everything with a dust storm. The sky was chalk white, but not empty. Distant dots were flying through the air in loose clusters. It was impossible to make out what they were.

The merchant was nowhere in sight. It was likely that he had opened a portal back to the mortal realm.

Suhara's Winter Sight was able to make out several specks of turquoise light buried a bit under the ground. They didn't move around. That meant she would have to personally inspect them. She looked back at the portal one last time, then headed towards the closest glow.

The cracks in the floor divided the ground into shapes of random edges and sides. However, the land just above the turquoise glow had a circular disk of rock. Suhara suspected that it might actually be a trap. She didn't know much about spirits, but this seemed too simple to be one.

If this was a ghost, it was far smaller than she imagined. The disk was stone was a couple dozen centimeters wide, at best. The girl cautiously kept her distance from the stone disk. She armed herself with her staff and wand, then shot a small ball of her raw curse magic at the circular disk.

The rock immediately erupted out from the ground. A geyser of dust exploded out the floor, forcing Suhara to back away.

When the obscuring cloud settled, there was a head-sized cone of cream yellow stone floating in the air. The cone's pointed side was directed downwards at first, but then the flat side turned down to face Suhara. If it had a bit more features, it could be mistaken for a giant eye staring her down. The circular side of the cone began to glow once it faced the girl. Suhara couldn't tell that it was visibly shining, since the cone was already glimmering under her Winter Sight.

A low and stale voice began to radiate from the cone. "Individual trespassing upon the sector of the third, state your intent."

"Uh, are you a ghost of this realm?" said Suhara.

"Affirmative. I am Monitor Seventy-nine of the third sector. Known by mortal entities to be a spirit: class ghost." said the cone.

Suhara's stance relaxed as she listened to Seventy-nine speak. It didn't seem to be as threatening as she imagined. "Right... I am here to, uh... fight you... I guess"

"Request accepted." said Seventy-nine.

Suhara's browed arched up at the quick and emotionless acceptance. "Oh, okay."

Five flat and silver triangles appeared around the cone. The triangles were each under a meter long and several centimeters wide. From Suhara's viewpoint, the combined image of Seventy-nine and its triangles resembled a flower with very pointy petals.

The sharp tips of the triangular blades angled forward to face Suhara, then shot towards her.

"Gah!" Suhara dodged out of the way as the silver blades struck the ground.

The blades dug deep into the cracked floor without much resistance, like hot knives dipping into a bar of butter. They cut up everything they touched, leaving deep lines etched into the cracked ground.

Suhara activated her strength-absorbing aura, halving her physical power. Then she placed the motion-enhancing enchantment on her staff. "Geez, those look sharp."

"Correct. Thirty-iso eighty-degree shards are optimized for physical spacial division." said Seventy-nine.

Suhara paused and glanced over at Seventy-nine, which still floated in the air. Its statement had utterly confused her. "What?"

The cone ghost repeated its last statement, which wasn't much help.

The silver blades lifted out and returned to Seventy-nine. The ghost retook the shape of a flower.

The cone was floating above Suhara's melee range, so she had to rely on her magic. The girl jumped backwards and pointed her wand at Seventy-nine. Several sky blue orbs fired out from the tip of the demon root. The orbs became denser and more opaque as they traveled through the air.

The further Suhara jumped back, the harder her motion missile curses became. She was sure that they would do some damage if they hit, but three of the silver triangles hovered in front of the cone and blocked all the projectiles. The motion missiles were also difficult to aim, even with all the practice Suhara had. The cone was an annoying tiny target.

The two remaining silver blades flew at the girl.

The triangles were razor thin, so Suhara nearly lost track of them a couple times. They surrounded her and sliced through the air like dancing swords. Vampire augmented speed allowed the girl to dodge the two silver blades, but it required most of her focus.

She couldn't attack and dodge at the same time under these circumstances.

Remembering her silver anklet, Suhara activated her protective blessing. The glass-like coat of protection cloaked her body.

It was no use.

One of the silver blades sliced at her, and cut a deep gash into her left shoulder. The protective blessing was ignored.

The wound was so cleanly cut that it didn't even feel damaged at first. Then Suhara cried out from the abrupt pain in her shoulder. Luckily, the wound was quick to heal thanks to the vampire regeneration.

The three blades that defended Seventy-nine switched over to offense and streaked over at the girl. She barely saw them flying towards her, and jumped away right before they stabbed into the ground she stood at. All five silver triangles circled around the young curse magician, stalking her like birds of prey.

Suhara couldn't keep track of all of them. She wasn't sure if her staff could withstand the sharp edges, but they would cut her into chunks of meat if she didn't try fighting back. In her cornered desperation, she started to strike the silver blades with her black stone staff. It worked, to her surprise.

The silver blades were frighteningly sharp, but light and flimsy compared to the staff. Suhara was able to knock each of them away by multiple meters. If she paid attention to the trajectory of the blade, they couldn't touch her. The staff, Sevla, was fantastically durable.

"Weapon resistant to spatial division." said Seventy-nine.

All of a sudden, a large ray of light shot out from the circular face of the cone ghost. The laser nailed the girl on her back and burned through her cherry red robe.

"Arg!" Suhara winced and staggered from the unexpected burn.

She had forgotten about the actual ghost while defending herself from the triangles. Although she didn't really expect any other attacks from it in the first place.

One of the triangular blades sliced out from the floor behind Suhara while she was stunned. It flew forth, and cut straight through the middle of Suhara's outstretched right forearm.

Suhara screamed out in pain as her right hand was severed. The hand was still holding the staff as it fell onto the dusty floor. Blood burst out from the gaping wound, spilling into the cracks on the ground. The detached muscles contracted back towards her elbow, and she collapsed in agony. It was too much damage for her mimicked vampire regeneration to heal. She couldn't regrow a whole limb.

Theema was trying to tell Suhara something, but it was drowned out by terrifying wails.

"Combat complete. Imminent death for trespasser: blood loss." Seventy-nine's triangular blades faded from existence.

The cone-shaped ghost slowly sunk back into the ground until it was once again a flat circular disk in the floor.