Marc sat at the table, his apple half-eaten and the grimoire splayed open before him. As he flipped through the pages, he noticed the book was unusually heavy, carrying a scent of fresh leather and ink that suggested it had been recently created. The structure was impeccable, designed with a nearly scientific clarity: magic was not a miracle, but a discipline that operated through Mana.
That energy, according to the text, resided in every fiber of living beings and the environment surrounding them, though only a few possessed the internal "engine" to process it.
One in a thousand, like Amir said? Marc thought, drumming his fingers on the wood. I guess for the first time in my life, the statistics are on my side.
His eyes scanned a underlined paragraph: "Magic Power is the ability to transform Mana; it is the engine. But verbal spells are required, acting as keys to release that potential. Without a minimum spark of power, the incantation is nothing more than an empty word."
The system was hierarchical: basic, intermediate, and advanced magic. While the first was accessible, the higher scales demanded not only a massive Mana reserve but decades of technical discipline.
Years? Marc cocked an eyebrow. Well, time is the only thing I have plenty of now.
The grimoire detailed the four elemental branches: Fire (aggression and heat), Water (fluidity and light healing), Earth (resistance and defense), and Air (speed and climate manipulation). The book warned that most mages only achieved affinity with a single element. Cases of duality were rare, and those of a triad were almost forgotten legends.
I hope to be the exception to the rule... I'll take all four, if possible.
Beyond the elements, there was Healing Magic. It wasn't control over matter, but a biological manipulation of Mana over living tissues. It was the most elusive branch: only one in five magic users was born with that affinity.
If only one in a thousand has magic, and only one in five of those heals... healers must be treated like biological diamonds. Pure gold for any army.
Finally, the book introduced Magic Circles: complex diagrams that acted as external Mana processors, allowing for advanced spells without having to recite kilometer-long incantations.
I can imagine. There are spells here that look like a damn postgraduate thesis! Who has time to memorize something like that in the middle of combat? Marc cracked a smile. Luckily, I now have an entire century to become a scholar.
The grimoire was so illustrative and professional that Marc felt theory had occupied enough space in his brain. It was time to test the hardware. He looked for the most rudimentary spell: a small ignition flame.
I shouldn't play with fire inside a wooden cabin, but it's just a spark. What could go wrong?
Following the instructions for neophytes, he closed his eyes and searched within himself for that current of Mana Amir had promised. He visualized the energy flowing toward his palm, opened his hand, and with a voice seeking authority, he commanded:
"Oh, primary spirit of fire, hear my will. Ignis, ignite!"
An indigo-blue glow—the exact color of his new eyes—enveloped his palm. A solitary spark crackled in the air, vibrating with electrical intensity for a second before extinguishing, leaving a trace of ozone in the air.
Marc jumped, losing his balance and falling from the bench directly to the floor. The snap of the spark and the sudden glow of his own eyes had caught him completely off guard.
"Ouch! Shit..." he groaned, bringing a hand to the back of his neck. "I hit my head."
He stayed on the floor for a moment, waiting for the throbbing pain, but it never came. The impact had been dry, but his skull felt as solid as granite. It was more the shock than the actual damage.
I'm stronger. Definitely stronger, he thought with a mix of relief and wonder. In my old body, a hit like that would have split my head open. Every minute I spend here, I miss my old life less. My former fragility feels like a bad memory.
Marc got up and sat back down, adjusting his posture with new caution.
What really rattled me was the flash from my eyes. I had forgotten what Amir said about them glowing when channeling magic. Did he warn me because he knew exactly this would happen? Marc grit his teeth. I bet right now he has that damn mocking smile on his face, enjoying my clumsiness from his throne.
And Marc was not wrong: at that very moment, in the ethereal void, the God Amir watched the scene with malicious satisfaction, enjoying every stumble of his chosen one.
Marc shook his head to clear the remains of the shock and fixed his gaze on the grimoire once more. His fingers brushed the yellowed pages, feeling the tingling of latent energy.
"Right," he whispered to himself, his voice thick with cold determination. "Let's try again. This time, I'm ready."
Marc took a moment before invoking the spell again. He closed his eyes and began to inhale and exhale deeply, forcing his will to focus on a single point. When he opened his eyes, his gaze was steel. He observed his open palm with surgical concentration and pronounced the words with a firm voice:
"Oh, primary spirit of fire, hear my will. Ignis, ignite!"
His eyes exploded in an indigo radiance, and a living flame instantly sprouted from his hand. Marc flinched out of an ancestral instinct, but forced himself to stay calm. This time, the fire was stable—a dance of amber and gold that refused to go out. The heat didn't burn; it felt like an extension of his own blood.
"Oh, hell yes, you sons of bitches!" Marc shouted, breaking into euphoric laughter as he stood up. "That's how it's done! Tremble, because your damn Demon King has arrived! You better be ready for me to kick all your asses!"
He paced back and forth through the cabin, observing the flame with the fascination of a child who had just received his favorite toy. However, after a few minutes of celebration, technical reality hit him all at once.
Wait... how do I turn this off?
He mentally reviewed the pages of the grimoire, but he couldn't remember instructions for closing. He tried clenching his fist tightly, but the fire simply filtered through his fingers, enveloping his hand in a sphere of heat.
I guess that's not it. What if I shake it like a match?
He shook his hand violently, but the flame remained imperturbable, mocking his movements. Desperate, he brought his fist to his mouth and blew with all his might, as if trying to blow out candles on a birthday cake. The fire didn't even flicker.
Useless. Maybe... visualization?
Marc closed his eyes, pushing aside the euphoria and concentrating solely on the void. He imagined the flame consuming itself, the energy flow cutting off sharply. When he opened his eyes again, the darkness of the cabin surrounded him once more. The fire was gone, and the glow in his eyes had vanished.
"It worked," he whispered, letting out a sigh of relief. "But there must be an easier way than spending so much mental energy. I suppose it's a matter of practice."
He stood in the middle of the silence, scanning the endless rows of books crowding the walls.
I've barely lit a match and I'm already exhausted. I have an ocean of knowledge ahead of me. This is going to be a very, very long road.
A particular volume caught his attention. It rested in the grimoire section, but unlike the tidiness of its neighbors, this one looked like a pariah: ancient, neglected, and burdened with a historical heaviness. It was a hardcover tome, devoid of ornaments, whose leather binding was so cracked and faded it seemed ready to crumble into dust. Marc hadn't noticed its presence until that exact moment.
Curious.
Marc slid his fingers between the shelves and, with almost surgical precaution, extracted the grimoire. As he opened it, the spine creaked in a dry protest. The book was written entirely by hand; the pages, thin and yellowed, were visibly battered, with edges frayed by time.
I can barely make out the handwriting. I don't know if I'll be able to decipher it in this state. Read... Marc stopped short, his finger brushing a word. Wait, how the hell can I read the language of this world? Is it identical to mine, or is it another translation "patch" Amir installed in my consciousness?
Without giving much importance to the linguistic enigma—assuming it was another courtesy from the God—he took the book to the table. He brushed aside the previous technical manual with a sharp movement, as if he had lost all interest in the conventional. That volume was not a simple instruction manual; it didn't start with rules, but with a story.
"My name is Zylos, and in these pages you will find the echo of my life using this power that God granted me... or was it a malevolent being? It has been both a blessing and a bane. But it all began with a curse. It was the year 260 of our lord Amir. Back then, my parents succumbed to illness, following the usual fate of almost all the adults in the village. Medicine was a mystery and a cure, a myth. If someone managed to reach forty years of age, they were anointed with the respect due to a sage…"
Marc grimaced, letting the book rest for a moment.
Ten more years and I would have been a Grand Master of Wisdom in those times.
"...My father departed on the third day of Firefrost, the month that opens the year and the cruelest of winters. He left just one day after falling ill; the cold spared him the suffering. My mother was not long in following his footsteps; five days later, on the eighth day of the month, she gave up. She fell ill alongside him, but swore to my brother and me that she would fight not to leave us orphans. I wish she hadn't. She only managed to prolong her agony. Even today, the screams of her last night tear through my memory. Two days later, my brother and I were little more than starving ghosts. Without coins and with empty pantries, we understood that in a village so poor, no one would feed two extra mouths, much less in the heart of winter."
"A week later, the cold and starvation claimed my older brother. He died giving me his last breath. He deprived himself of every crumb so that I could eat, and gave me our only blanket without hesitation. He was my shield until the end, hiding his own weakness so that I wouldn't have to carry his fear…"
"Damn, this is way too depressing," Marc muttered, feeling an uncomfortable knot in his stomach. "I don't know if I want to keep reading this."
"...Three days after his burial, with the strength that fits in a sigh and my father's old bow, I went out to hunt. Fortune allowed me to take down a rabbit emerging from its burrow. When I looked inside, I discovered its young waiting. It broke my heart, but hunger is an implacable judge. In the shack, I skinned the catch and tried to light the last piece of wood from our home. I failed again and again. Desperation mutated into rage, and the hatred accumulated over weeks exploded. I cursed God and life itself. I cursed my parents and my brother for leaving me alone in this hell. A soul-shredding scream erupted from my throat... and then, the impossible happened. Fire sprouted from my palms."
Marc straightened up on the bench.
Is he talking about the same spark I just invoked?
"...Panic devoured me. I thought it was a divine punishment, that I would burn for my sins. I ran screaming, but the flames pursued me, clinging to my skin. I buried my hands in the snow, but the fire mocked the cold. Upon returning to the shack, the touch of my hands ignited the walls. In seconds, my home was a pyre. The villagers came, but the village was a day's journey from the nearest river, so if something burned, nothing could be done; you just watched it burn. My screams didn't stop and the fire kept pouring out of me. Terror turned to hatred in the eyes of my neighbors. They called me a heretic, an offspring of evil, and under a rain of stones and sticks, they banished me from the village with the promise of death if I dared return…"
I thought magic was commonplace in this world, Marc analyzed, frowning. Maybe it's much less common than Amir led me to believe.
"...I cried until exhaustion dried my soul. Only when my mind sank into calm did the flames extinguish. That was the first time I used my power. The same one that, after several centuries, men have learned to accept and systematize under the name of 'Magic'."
Marc felt a chill.
Wait... does this mean I'm reading the diary of one of the founding fathers of magic? The origin of everything?
Absorbed in Zylos's words, Marc devoured page after page, losing track of time as the sun sank into the horizon and the shadows of the cabin lengthened, letting only the glow of his curiosity illuminate the story.
Daylight had completely vanished, leaving Marc in a gloom broken only by the embers of the fireplace. A roar in his stomach brought him back to physical reality; hunger was starting to claim its due. However, his mind was still buzzing with the discoveries of the diary.
It's late, and my stomach sounds like a war zone. But what Zylos describes... is another level.
Through the chronicles of that first mage, Marc understood that the limitations of the basic manual were, at best, suggestions. Zylos hadn't stopped at the four elements or healing; after centuries of pure experimentation, he had learned to bend gravity, to tear through space for teleportation, and to weave impenetrable barriers. He had mastered Mana detection, the enchanting of objects, and the physical strengthening of his allies. Even the immortality Marc now carried—the cessation of aging—was one of the branches Zylos had cultivated.
I wonder if these techniques are hidden in the rest of the grimoires on this shelf. But something doesn't fit...
Marc frowned, reviewing the notes. What disturbed him most was the methodology. The first grimoire insisted on verbal spells as mandatory "keys" to release power. Zylos, instead, reduced everything to a single word charged with intent, or even to absolute silence.
It's a technical contradiction. The manual says you need the key, but Zylos simply kicks down the door. Could it be that words are just crutches for those who don't have enough will?
He closed the old book with a dry thud, kicking up a small cloud of dust. The mystery of magic was much deeper than he expected, and he had an entire century to crack the code.
Marc prepared his first meal in that new world with an unusual calm. From the corner of the kitchen, he drew from one of the small barrels and poured himself a glass of wine to accompany dinner; the liquid was dark, dense, and had a berry-like aftertaste he had never encountered on Earth. When he finished, the exhaustion of a day that defied every law of physics finally took its toll.
Training starts at dawn, he promised himself, leaving the empty glass on the oak table.
As he sank into the mattress of his new bed—whose comfort was almost sinful—he noticed the fire in the fireplace was still burning with a soft, steady dance, keeping the air at a perfect temperature. Before closing his eyes, he stole one last glance at Zylos's ancient grimoire, resting on the table like a silent promise.
One hundred years of training. It's a long and surely tortuous path, but it doesn't matter. I will make sure this is the best life I've ever had. No matter the cost.
With that determination etched into his soul, Marc closed his eyes. That night, the man who had no purpose on Earth fell asleep as the future Demon King. Thus concluded his first day in the world of fantasy.