❖ Chapter 6: The Light That Didn't Explode
The night had passed, but Jio hadn't moved.
Crouched near the old stone wall, his scarf still hanging loosely around Havella's shoulders, he didn't seem to breathe like a human anymore — he was listening. To the dirt. The silence. To something else.
The torchlight had long faded down the slope. Smoke curled faintly from the village, distant and heavy.
And then, finally—
Jio turned his head slightly toward Havella.
"Teach me," he said, his voice dry, like cracked earth.
"…your magic."
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Havella blinked at him.
Then blinked again.
"…Are you serious?" she asked, squinting.
He didn't look away.
"Right now?" she asked again, a little louder, incredulous. "Did the raid knock your brain loose?"
He didn't reply. But his eyes — there was something strange in them. Not eagerness. Not ambition. Just… a decision. One already made.
Havella scratched the back of her neck.
"Okay, okay…" she muttered, "First of all, it's not magic magic, alright? That's just what people call it. I call it steal because it's not like I make something — I take it. I pull it. From somewhere. Like... potential that forgot where to go."
She paused, thinking.
"It's not like spells. I don't chant. I don't focus. It's more like— like you notice something that nobody else is using. And you borrow it."
Jio stared at her like that made perfect sense.
Havella folded her arms. "There's no way this makes sense to you."
"Keep going," he said.
"…You reach in. You don't feel with your fingers — you feel with the part of you that still believes you deserve to live. That's your center."
Stillness.
And then—
Something shifted in Jio's gaze.
He didn't close his eyes. He didn't mutter a word.
But something in the air tightened.
A tension. A hum. Not sound — just sensation, like something old recognizing a name it hadn't heard in centuries.
Then, without warning—
A line of light shot out from Jio's open palm.
It wasn't violent.
It didn't explode.
It simply was.
Like a line cut through the fabric of the world. Sharp. Clean. And gone in an instant — leaving behind a faint warmth and a smell of scorched silence.
Havella stared at him.
Her mouth opened.
Then closed.
Then opened again.
"…Excuse me, what the hell was that?!" she shouted, grabbing him by the collar.
Jio blinked slowly.
"You said reach in."
"I didn't mean — do it perfectly the first time! That's not— that's not learning! That's cheating life itself!!"
But Jio wasn't listening. His eyes had narrowed — not in confusion, but calculation.
He looked down at his hand.
Then at the ruined trees.
Then at the burnt-out campfire.
"…If I can pull a line," he muttered to himself, "I can draw."
"What—?"
"If I can draw, I can cut without cutting."
"…Are you even hearing yourself?"
But Jio was already on his feet, eyes tracing the air.
Something old stirred in him. Not magic. Not power.
Just... clarity.
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End of Chapter 6
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