Why it work?

This gun doesn't kill people Seb! I did!

That is how people should be treating magic, sure they used it as a weapon, but... I'm seeing the gun more as a utility than just a weapon.

You see, magic is just more than a weapon. But as a weapon, it is still bland, like okay, I throw big fire at the enemy, and they die, mission complete. But, it's so redundant...

I grew up in a place where we should save every penny and leave every plate squeaky clean.

I thought of trying Ara's magic and improving it, even though she mainly uses water, using earth magic can result in a fairly good strategy. I wanna try it, making a barrage of just tiny preckle at the speed of sound.

In short, Earth Magic is like a machine gun.

Ara has trained her jet water magic to have a devastating effect. That's the result of training for a month and a half.

But there are still some flaws with it that I think will take the longest.

The first obvious reason is time. For one jet water bullet, it takes about thirty seconds, when it has the power equal to a bolt-action rifle, making it faster is an idea.

But that's why it was difficult; if she were casting magic faster, there would undoubtedly be some panic, and the result of the magic would have lower power.

And I couldn't just try it myself even though I want to... Why? Because I don't have the magic affinity.

I think I should address it, this place is not my home, a quiet forest.

I discovered this place just shortly after I could walk, when The Cynic told me to follow the mana trail.

This quiet green forest, with some monkeys and a mini lake, is now becoming a perfect place for spending time. Nobody was here, I was alone... And after balancing my vision, I could see using the mana vision more clearly and actually tell my affinity.

How? By looking in the water. Every person has a potential for a certain magic, and that potential, along with the affinity and mana capacity, was put in some kind of aura around that person.

If we take Ara again as an example, she has a bluish with some kind of brown aura, the size of half a meter.

And me? By looking at this lake, I could tell that I have the darkness and light affinity. Pretty fitting for Blanc et Noir if I must say.

"And the best part is there's nobody here!" I yell out loudly. "It's not like the monkeys could understand me or anything."

Dude you need to shut up...

"Why?! It's not like there's someone here beside me..."

"Hei!! I'm a reincarnator! Do you believe it?!"

Oi...

The light passes through the leaves, and they circle around the lake. It's been noon, I think I'm gonna stay for a bit more...

The soothing sound of water rippling, and a gentle breeze inside this forest.

And also the sounds of someone crying? No, probably just my imagination... There's only me in this place...

"I should probably check that."

I took a stone, engraved it into another stone, before I get more paper and ink, this is the way to write something.

Okay, let's check the sounds. I used my mana vision that can convert sounds into colors, tracking the colors themselves, meaning I'm following the sounds. And there it was, someone crying...

A kid, around my age... A girl with green hair. A switch flipped in my head.

But wait, why is she here? Why is she crying? Why does her body have so many scars and wounds?

"You okay?" I approached from a boulder she was leaning on.

She looked at me, and our eyes met. Then she felt intimidated.

"What?"

She kept on crying and didn't even answer my question. It's kinda pathetic.

I sigh.

What should I do? This girl's Mana is impossibly huge. About four meters, and I see four colors... What an abnormally huge power for a child.

So that's what's handy, the things that the Cynic said.

I picked her up from the ground, carrying her into the small lake.

Smooth move!

Shut up.

"What are you doing?" She asked, "Where are you taking me?"

"Do you hear?"

"Hear what... I don't hear anything."

Great, she didn't hear me screaming. I should probably heal her wounds first, but how? It's not like there are any bandages here...

Silk in clothes works just fine, also I should clean the area and stop the bleeding.

Water from the lake could probably wash off the bacteria and then just close it with some of my clothes. She also felt incredibly cold, even though it was the middle of the day.

I washed the wound one by one, then just ripped off some of my clothes.

"Why are you doing this?" She asked as I was washing her. "Why did you help me?"

I can't think of a good answer, I couldn't say that I need to befriend her because of the Cynic's request.

"Your crying is loud, and I want to relax, those cannot exist together. So that's why I'm making you stop."

"So it's like that..." She pushed me away. "Leave me alone..."

This girl, I've seen her before. But when?

She hurriedly left, running off into the unknown. I've failed?

This is just the first step. From here it would be difficult.

"What do you mean by that?" I sat on a boulder, looking into the small lake. "I fail, aren't I?"

I know you're not the type of person who's able to befriend someone in a few minutes...

"Shut up!"

Can you fight? The Cynic asked.

No? Maybe one person I can beat in another life. But if you're talking about my current physique, then I don't think I'll be able to take on anyone...

No that's fine! You could just reset.

What?

I have found a way to enter my subconscious again, meet with the Cynic.

At the top of a boulder, I lay down and closed my eyes.

Opening them makes me wake up in an obscene dimension, a grayscale world. The place where the Cynic lives.

"What do you mean by I can just reset?" I ask.

"That's your power, right? From the drugs? Veritas-7?"

I nodded.

"Good, you need to search for her... Now go!"

"Wait I just entered this place, why a fast scene-"

It's already close to evening, the sun has begun to sink down, creating a purple accent in the sky. I began to run back home, a few minutes later.

When I arrived, dinner was already on the table. A little scolding from my mom, and I went straight to showering.

After changing my clothes, I joined the dining table.

"Noir, why did you come home with tattered clothes?" My mother asks.

"There was... Something that happened."

She sighs.

"Why are you like this?"

My mom became more careful towards me after the thing that happened during the ritual.

Ara still stays the same, but my father comes home much later. Last time he arrived around nine o'clock, and now he's late again.

"Ara, I have a new magic idea that I want you to try..."

"Huh?! What is it?"

"I'm going to tell you tomorrow."

...

And tomorrow comes, in the morning, when the sun has just surfaced.

I was already awake before the sun, then Ara came behind the door and approached me. She's wearing the usual white clothes with a leather vest. And a new hairpin?

"New hairpin?"

"You noticed it?" She asked, tying her long hair. "I just got it yesterday."

I nodded.

"So, what's the magic?"

I handed her a paper with all of the instructions. Today, I wanna relax for a bit.

"I want you to have a faster casting speed, thirty seconds for one attack is wasting time. Or better yet, I want you to be able to cast multiple at a time."

She laughs and puts the paper in her pocket.

"Look at this..."

She cast one, two, three water bullets at a time. And throw them at a fast speed. This jet water magic, just takes fifteen seconds...

"You've trained it to be faster?"

"Heh, looks like I'm faster than you after all~"

I smiled. That's nice.

"But I'm still only able to bloodbend one part at a time. And one bullet still takes five seconds."

"No, that's nice," I approached her, and she was already exhausted. " Here's some water."

She takes the water and drinks it, then gets back on faster casting speed training, but no, I want to see what a tank-sized water bullet could do. Wait, I couldn't do that, there's a limit on how fast the water moves.

That's what I want to improve, by using Earth magic to be the bullet. Hmm... What else can I improve? Maybe the shape? If the shape is like a bullet or a spiral, maybe it could move much faster.

I point a the mountains, the top.

"Sis, imagine a little rock," I say.

She nodded, then proceeded to do so.

"What's next?"

"Shape the rock to be this shape..." I showed him a picture on paper.

A spiral-like bullet, it has a shape that looks like a Jagdkommando knife, the most dangerous knife. And by making it spiral, it could 'drill' through the air and be faster.

"A sniper rifle of some sort..."

"Noir did you say something?"

She launched the stone as fast as possible, probably reaching the speed of a sonic boom.

"Nothing."

"This is amazing Noir! How did you come up with this?"

"Instinct." I smile proudly, even though it's just simple paper plane knowledge.

"Now, sis, you just needed to be faster at making those projectiles; ten seconds is fine by me."

She smiled loudly, "Okay!"

I went in front of the house, something caught my attention...

"Mr. Bootes?"

"Ah, Noir... How's your sister's training going?" He asked.

"It's going great!"

"I'm sorry to hear that Mr. Bootes..." My mother said.

"Don't worry, it's not your fault. If you see her, let me know as soon as possible."

I looked at Mr. Bootes with confusion. What happened?

"My daughter has gone missing, Noir. She's a girl with green hair, have you seen her?"

The green-haired girl is the girl from yesterday, her daughter? If so, then I don't know where she went actually...

"No, what happened?"

"It's been a trainwreck, firstly, she has the potential of being a quad caster that uses four elements. At that time when the ritual happened, she unlocked her magic prematurely."

I nodded, she just like me.

"And then?"

"She grew more sick, it's kinda of close to what happened to you. But when she used her magic, her ability to use any magic was gone."

I looked at Mr. Bootes, like gone gone?

He nodded.

"What could be the reason..."

Probably, because of other people in families. When one achieves a great thing, envy is the things that always follow. If magic has infinite possibilities, then maybe antimagic or a curse that prevents someone from using magic is possible.

"And then what happened to her?" I ask, what happened after she left me in that forest?

"She just went..."

Follow the mana!

Cynic, should I just tell them where she was? Or is this why you ask me, can I fight?

Yes! This night, if you didn't save her before midnight she would be dead.

"Hah?!"

Mr. Bootes and my mother looked at me with utter confusion.

"What happened Noir?" My mother asks.

"Nothing, good luck Mr. Bootes. I hope your daughter can be found soon."

He nodded, then left goodbye.

I grab a knife from my father's drawer, a hunting knife, kinda rusted. I also wear a gray cloak to hide my face, and then I run into the Forest. In the last place, the lake.

Looking through the Mana vision, her leftover mana made a trail, and I followed it.

It drags me deeper and deeper into the Forest, jumping through the mud and roots of a much bigger tree.

The more I go, the darker it gets. But because of my mana vision, I could still see clearly.

After traveling for, I think half an hour... Just traversing the trees, there's a house in the middle of the forest. More of a hut.

"What are you doing?" A voice from behind me, an old lady. Witch?

Seeing the lady made me want to throw up, what an amazing mana potential.

I couldn't win...

Before I could do anything about it, I was knocked unconscious. I only knew that my body was being dragged inside the hut.

Wake up! Noir! Wake up!