Chapter 25) Controlling the Darkness.

Justin gasped. "Ghost Boy?"

Xavier didn't miss the shock on the faces of Selena and her human partner as they watched him emerge from the portal. He was surprised, as well. The way out of the void had suddenly appeared for reasons he could not guess. He felt that something important that changed everything had happened in the void.

"That's not possible." Selena cried, fire flowing down her hands as her anger grew.

Xavier shrugged, feeling weirdly confident. He was face to face with a much stronger Mystic, about to go toe to toe with her in battle. Even so, he felt unafraid. He felt different. What had happened in the Void? He couldn't remember anything. He had just been in the darkness when the portal of light appeared.

"You should be trapped in there! You should not be here!"

If looks could kill, then Xavier would've died from the intensity of Selena's eyes. He should be scared but he wasn't. Ok, the familiar ache of nervousness filled the lower part of his stomach but his resolve to save his mother and defeat Selena was more potent.

"What's going on?" Justin wanted to know. He reached for Selena's shoulder. "Has the ritual been disrupted—"

Selena released a wave of energy from her body that sent Justin flying wide to collide with a medical contraption at the other end of the lab. He shot to his feet immediately.

"What the...what the..." His eyes rolled to the back of his head. He fell face first to the floor and remained still. The impact had knocked him unconscious.

Eyes blazing with fury, Selena uncurled the Lasso of Infinite Blaze from around her waist. It caught fire immediately, blazing a bright yellow that didn't give off any smoke.

"You have ruined everything!" She screamed, stalking towards Xavier. "All I have worked for! All my sacrifice! How dare you oppose me? Who are you to stand against me?" She was beyond mad and livid.

Xavier clutched his daggers tightly in his hands as he braced for an attack. "I am the weak mystic you sent into the void. I am the son whose mother you were about to kill. I am the one who would stop you from having victory. I am Ghost Boy."

Alright, Where was this bravery coming from?

Selena seemed to be wondering the same thing as well. Her eyes narrowed for a flitting second before the initial rage returned.

"There is something you should know before I burn you with the unquenchable fires of Abyssal." She gathered fire into her free hand to form a huge ball of flames. "Your boldness is a little unsettling. And I may not know how you managed to escape from the void, but that doesn't change the fact that you can never defeat me. You? A novice mystic without even a rank? There is no way for you to do that. Do you know who I am? Ask your system to give you my current stats. Go on. Do it. I don't want you to enter into combat with me blindly."

Xavier didn't want to check but his curiousity got the better of him. He instructed the system to pull up information about the Mystic once more. The stats were different now. Somehow, Selena wasn't a Wizard mystic anymore. He stared back at her, his boldness reducing drastically.

Selena nodded knowingly. "That's right. I'm a Phantom Mystic now. I've activated new skills that would decimate you with just a single thought...a flick of my hand if necessary. What can you even do to me, Ghost Boy? Throw your daggers at me? They would be reduced to ashes before they get within striking range. I am that powerful now and you have no idea the sort of things I can do to hurt you. I would spare your life if you simply walk back into the void and stay there."

Xavier turned away from her, searching the lab. His heart jammed in his chest when he saw his mother lying motionless on the bed as he had seen her the last time. Something rose up in his body to give him strength.

"I am not letting you go on with the ritual." He declared, taking on a defensive pose. "I may be a novice mystic, true. I may be a lot less as strong as you. But you know what I have that you don't?"

Selena stopped short to laugh in amusement. The sound of it came off as bitter but sure.

"You never seize to surprise me with your foolishness. What do you have that I don't?"

"Eh...my conscience?" He offered before sending his daggers flying. He had gotten the goons with one lucky shot. Would it work a second time?

Selena waved her hand and the daggers stopped in mid air mere inches from her body. Giving Xavier a death glare, she closed her outstretched fist. The daggers glowed for a brief second before exploding into a million pieces of gold that rained down to the ground.

Xavier couldn't stop the surprise from spreading all over his face.

"You...You broke it!" He stared around at the pieces of gold on the floor. His heart severed in half, and tears came to his eyes. Despite their little time together, he cherished the daggers.

Xavier felt a surge of an emotion he'd never experienced before. Pure rage. He was angry with Selena for causing all this. He glared at her, his arms trembling.

"Yes, I broke it just like that. I am going to tear you apart in the same way if you don't get back into the...what are you doing?"

Xavier had no idea what she was staring at behind his shoulder, but all of a sudden he felt a strong connection with the void. The anger in his body reached out to the darkness of the void, and something clicked into place. It tingled at the edge of his senses, urging him to take over. To take control.

Darkness as thick as night poured out of the void portal and twisted around him till his entire body was shrouded in the black mist. Energy surged into his body, setting off flares in his nerves and blood.

He felt high on power, heavy with it like a balloon about to burst. He felt immense strength, his senses were sharpened and he had the feeling he could even fly if he wanted to. What was going on?

Once the darkness cleared, Selena launched her attack. She came at him swinging the fiery lasso in a wide circle in front of her. Xavier raised his hand and a wall of darkness rose up before him, taking the full strike of the lasso.

"That was strange." He stared down at his palms in awe. Black mist sizzled all over his skin and disappearing through the arms of his hoodie.

Just by thinking about it, the mist gathered into a ball in his hands. At his command, they shot towards the Phantom Mystic of the Fire Affinity.

She easily dodged them, but took a while to regain her composure. She stared as if in a trance as the balls of black mist struck the wall and evaporated into nothing. Afterwards, that part of the wall faded away until there were huge holes right where the balls had hit.

Selena gasped, glanced at Xavier and back at the wall. When next she looked at Xavier, her confusion had given way to panic. Her face was pale, and she took a couple of steps back. The Lasso of Infinite Blaze hung uselessly at her side.

"You!" She stumbled over the body of one of the doctors but righted herself immediately. "You are the one. You...you...You are the Death Warden."

Xavier couldn't resist laughing out loud. "What is wrong with you? What are you blabbing about?"

There was nothing strange about his powers. He was a mystic, right? Surely controlling darkness was one of their secret special abilities. But Selena looked especially frightened and surprise. No big deal. He must've managed to mistakenly activate a very rare special skill while in the void.

Without moving his hands this time, he used his mind to gather the darkness. It twisted and enlarged till a mighty sphere of black night hovered right above his head.

Selena's eyes went wide at the sight of it. She glanced to the left for one second before returning her eyes to Xavier. He realized a little too late what she was planning to do.

Moving faster than even his eyes could follow, she appeared beside the bed that held his mother. Selena quickly wrapped the lasso around his mother's waist.

"One more move from you and I will reduce your poor mother to ashes." There was a desperation in her voice and a craziness on her face that scared Xavier.

The sphere above his head vanished. "Please, don't hurt her."

Selena smiled devilishly. "Remember what I told you? You are weak. I don't know what happened to you in the void to change you like this, but the fact still remains that your emotions will always be your weakness." Still smiling, she released a trail of fire into the lasso, setting it ablaze.