✨ A Little Bit of Magic || READER X RAY || The Promised Neverland

✨ Chapter Forty Seven

A strangely sick sort of deja vu. Whenever I came to his office, I'd get some sort of shitty awakening. Today, it won't be mine. But I'm nervous for Zack. I know very well how hard life can beat you down, and we both didn't want to hear bad news.

A pyro affinity that may or may not be real, because I'm not particularly human.

A broken wand that's altered my magic, though erratically.

And maybe a curse that can't be lifted.

What would the consequence be? If we don't find a way to retract the spell? Will he... Will Zack die? I glanced to my left, at the grinning black haired boy who didn't seem to mind wearing a stuffy black glove. Either that, or he was to ignoring it. I nudged his shoulder with my elbow, giving him a reassuring smile. "We'll figure it out, Zack. And I'll give that idiot who hurt you a combustio to the face." He pulled his headband down, chuckling at my joke. "That'll be gross. I won't stop you though."

The limestone brick floor clicked underneath my flats, our casual conversation the only air of comfort in our situation. I would protect Zack with my life. It was the least I could do.

"So Zack, how did you know that I saw the cursed magic before?"

He frowned, as if it was a question he wanted to avoid. "I just... had a feeling, I guess. And the way you looked at me, like- like you were horrified but not surprised? Does that make sense?"

No. No it didn't. But I just nodded my head, going along with whatever theory he'd made up. I couldn't question him. He was suffering, after all. "If you don't have any ideas on who the fucker is, I might have a lead." Zack tilted his head. "Oh really?" We stopped at Professor Lucas' door. "I'll tell you later. We should get you checked out first. Have you asked Krone for a diagnosis? She is our resident hydro user." Zack opened the door, gently shoving me inside. "I don't think she'd know much about magical ailments, y/n."

"Who's doing what now?" The crimson haired man called from behind a shelf of books and jars. "It's me!" I called, skipping to the front of my instructor's piled, messy desk. I glanced at the first sheet, written in a sloppy, tilted script. "What tongue is this?" I asked, shifting through the other similar stained yellow papyrus, also in the same font. The professors's messy red hair peeked our from behind a large glass vase. "So you can distinguish tongues from languages, y/n? I'm impressed." I giggled embarrassedly. I only have Ray to thank for my newfound nerdiness. He made me write a paper on the primal forms of hydro, dendro, and pyro. Which by the way, was pretty fucked up.

The first hydro users were more... aggressive... than the healers they are now. A forbidden, forgotten, art of hydro was blood bending. Literally controlling someone's blood. Wars involving blood bending always had the highest death count, but that was thousands upon thousands of years ago.

Dendro users were pretty much just cracked versions of what they do now. Sure, they can create mountains, throw boulders, and create canyons. But the dendro users of old had far more power over the natural domain, unironically shaking the world's core. They shifted the tectonic plates, bended lava, metal, or anything that the earth had created. After an accident, where they'd accidentally sunk almost 40% of the old world's landmass underwater, they'd vowed the restrict their power so they couldn't bring such destruction ever again. The relic that held this vow was the Goblet of Archaic Petra, which is lost. Maybe if we looked hard enough, Professor Lucas would have it somewhere.

And as for the old pyro users, their forbidden skill was blue fire. Heat shields, hydro, metal, and reinforcement had all become things to easily deal with their destructive power. So in order to cope with the uselessness of heat, they'd created a 'freeze'. A fire so light of a blue, it was often mistaken as white, or those who lived to witness it, the "cold fire". A new sort of destruction, killing the life of anything it would touch. Hypothermia, frostbite, cold winter nights and snowy days are all a result of the second Pyro Apocalypse. The ice age. And just like the other two forbidden arts, blue fire was forgotten, locked away and never spoken of again.

Blood bending. The murder of the masses.

Tectonic trembling. Changing the face of our earth.

Blue fire. A cold that froze over the earth for five decades.

It was impressive yet horrifying. How much you could do with magic. Bards sang songs, disguising their spells. More powerful wizards abandoned their wands and staffs, refusing to limit their strength to a conduit. And there were those who insisted on using forbidden magic. A broad, yet unfamiliar term to many today. I don't know why Ray would make me study such strange things, but it was probably just common core. I wouldn't know, haha.

"Hi, Professor," Zack called from behind me. "Do you remember me? Zack? From your dendro class last year?" Mr. Lucas shuffled his way to the worn, wooden chair, a sorry excuse of a pillow shrinking underneath his weight. "How could I forget?" He chuckled, glancing at both of us. "Football boy who slept in class." Zack gagged at the remark, making the professor and I giggle. "Now, y/n. You only seem to come to me when something strange has happened. What'll it be this time?" I gently pushed Zack forwards, watching their exchange from over his right shoulder.

The color instantly left his golden eyes, the sight of Zack's wound causing the professor to go pale. A simple question left his lips, but I couldn't find myself to give a simple response back. "What the hell have you kids been doing?"

Oh god. Where do I even start?