Tales of Demons and Monsters

After walking Ye Xinxia back to her aunt's place and staying for dinner, Mo Fan was just about to get some Lightning Element practice in. But the moment he tried to enter Control the usual way — instant skull-splitting headache. It felt like he'd just ground through three consecutive all-nighters at an internet café playing League of Legends. His entire body was on the verge of collapse.

*What the hell?*

Mentally wrecked. Completely drained.

*Is it because I used Lightning Seal twice today? Did burning through that much Lightning mana leave me this wrecked?*

Two uses — that was all. Counting the incomplete Release on the bus, he'd only fired off Lightning Seal twice in one day, and somehow his mana was already bone dry?

He'd spent five solid months on Meditation specifically to build up his Star Dust reserves. He'd assumed that would be more than enough. Two Lightning Seals, and the whole thing had gone dim.

Ordinarily, his Lightning Star Dust was a spectacular sight inside his Inner World — the violet radiance of seven Star Motes in harmony, like a gorgeous painting of the night sky. Now the entire thing had lost its luster, sinking into a bleak and lightless murk.

That gave him a fright. But as he relaxed and let himself rest, he noticed the Lightning Star Dust beginning — very slowly — to recover its glow.

*So the Star Dust isn't radiant enough yet. Every casting dims it a little. When it goes completely dark, the energy inside has run dry.*

Star Dust was his mana tank.

No wonder homeroom teacher Xue Musheng hammered on it day in and day out: no matter how tedious it gets, keep up your Meditation. A mage, no matter how gifted, becomes utterly mediocre without disciplined Meditation.

In plain gaming terms: *Doesn't matter how insane your skills are — no mana means you're dead weight.*

Fine. No point dwelling on it. He needed sleep before his brain completely gave out.

Mo Fan curled up in his room and slept straight through to broad daylight.

Ye Xinxia, sweet as she was, hadn't had the heart to wake him even when it was nearly noon.

He climbed out of bed feeling sharp and clear-headed, slipped into Meditation without thinking, and checked his Star Dust. It had recovered well over half its brightness. Full restoration was only a matter of time.

*Right. I can't afford to let the Lightning Element slip out in front of people. Even in a society governed by law, jealousy is dangerous — and nobody's more dangerous than the Mu Clan, who practically own Bo City. I'd better get the Fire Element cultivated too. A much better cover story.*

He brushed his teeth and turned the problem over in his mind.

The trouble was that a day only had so many hours. How was he supposed to keep his Lightning main wife well-fed while also getting his Fire concubine fully tamed?

The only reason he'd mastered Lightning in five months was that he'd devoted every single cultivation minute to it. No matter how enticing that Fire Element vixen was — and she was plenty enticing — Mo Fan had stayed completely faithful.

With the annual magical assessment roughly six months away, if he didn't want to expose the Lightning Element too soon, he'd need to spend the entire next semester locked onto Fire — pushing the Fire Element's basic skill to completion.

But that meant his Lightning Star Dust would stop growing for six months.

Star Dust didn't strengthen itself. Without Meditation, it stagnated.

After thinking it through, Mo Fan laid out a rough schedule for his Meditation hours.

With the assessment about six months away and his daily limit sitting at ten hours of Meditation, he settled on a split: eight hours for Fire Element, two hours to maintain and temper Lightning.

Lightning's growth would be slow at that rate — but it would at least hold its Control proficiency instead of deteriorating.

Eight hours a day on Fire was already a staggering advantage. Most of his classmates could only manage five hours total.

At lunch, his aunt Mo Qing came home from work.

Mo Qing was about as ordinary a woman as you could find — thin, slightly sallow-faced, but genuinely warm.

"Oh, Mo Fan's here! Your dad told me you've been putting in the work over at Tianlan Magic High School. Keep it up! If you ever manage to become a Basic-Level Mage, that would bring more glory to our Mo family than anything in living memory!"

*A Basic-Level Mage is the greatest glory in living memory?*

*Just how many generations of poverty have we been grinding through?*

*And honestly... does whatever I am now even count?*

"Where's Uncle?" Mo Fan asked. "I haven't seen him around."

"He's off delivering supplies to some hunters in the mountains. I really cannot understand that man — he's completely ordinary, not a drop of magic in him, and he just strolls into the mountains without a care. One demon and he's done for. It'd swallow him whole."

"Aren't the demons supposed to stay in the deep wilderness, far from the cities?" Mo Fan said.

This world was nothing like the one he'd grown up in. Outside the city walls of this magical world lurked creatures — demons — that posed a genuine lethal threat to humans. Mages died out there regularly, let alone ordinary people.

"Oh, are they?" Mo Qing said. "Haven't you seen the warning the Hunters' Alliance put out? Demon activity has been surging lately. Sightings have been popping up all around the outskirts of Bo City. They specifically warned civilians like us to stay inside the Safe Zone."

"Isn't that a bit of an exaggeration?" Mo Fan said with a smile.

He was new to this world, but he wasn't uninformed. From everything he'd read, demons kept well clear of human settlements. And major organizations like the Magic Association, the Hunters' Alliance, and the great magical clans all conducted regular patrols and clearances to keep the cities safe.

"You." Mo Qing shook her head. "You've read yourself into a stupor. Think about it — what mayor doesn't want his city to look peaceful and prosperous? Even if demons had already broken in, they'd still announce everything was under control just to stop the panic." She dropped her voice. "Truth is, there have always been demons near this city. Some of them might even be inside it. Ordinary people like us just can't see them."

Mo Fan found himself growing uneasy as she spoke, though he kept a skeptical smile. "Come on, Aunt. That's a bit alarmist."

"Fine, don't believe me. Let me tell you something that actually happened — and I mean actually happened, don't give me that look like I spend all my time chasing gossip." She paused. "You know I work in the hospital's logistics department."

"Yeah." Mo Fan nodded.

Good thing she hadn't mentioned working in some Sacred Healing Hall. He'd have had a very uncomfortable few minutes.

"One night I was delivering wound dressings to one of the attending physicians, and there was a mage in the operating room — a Healing-type. He was absolutely tearing into our Doctor Wang: *'Even a healing apprentice should know the difference between marsh poison and water poison! And these people have been bewitched — that's why they're all glassy-eyed and vacant. Now stop cluttering up this room and go find the Hunters' Alliance. Track down that Evil-Eye Marsh Demon before more people in this district end up the same way!'*" Mo Qing leaned in close, her voice falling to a hush.

Mo Fan studied her expression. She didn't look like she was making it up.

*So demons really do lurk near the city? Inside it, even?*

Ice shot through him. Demons were killing machines. Cross paths with one, and that was the end of you.