It was simple enough to find a test subject. I just used Air detection magic to find a group of soldiers, incinerated all but one, and then used Shadow magic to impale the guy on a spike created with his own shadow. I teleport the corpse with me back to the dome, pick him up, and then throw him into it. After a quick minute of waiting he never disappeared so at the very least he isn’t made of magic. Maybe I’m a bit too quick in my judgement, but I’ll happily pin the blame on the figure creating some fake duplicate world instead of assuming this is another weird Shadow magic induced hallucination. Now that I’m reminded about the figure, where the fuck did he go?

Based on everything else that’s happened tonight I kind of expected him to pop up out of nowhere again. I guess I should be thankful I don’t have to deal with him anymore. It's just kind of unnerving to have no idea what happened to him, especially with how strong he was. Wait! What if he got bored with me and went after Lotus?!

I quickly used Air magic to check in on Lotus and thankfully she was still in Nyx’s mansion. She was even peacefully sleeping in my bed. God I wish that was me right now. My body may never get exhausted as long as I have magic power, but falling asleep and just checking out of the world for a few hours sounds really nice. 

Guess I should hurry up and actually continue my original goal of killing the soldiers in the capital. Then again, I do want to experiment with a bit of magic to try and come up with some better specialty spells considering how ineffective my flaming boulder spell was. It's probably not bad against buildings and groups of people, but it was completely ineffective against someone who was ready to avoid it. I could chalk it up to the figure being incredibly powerful, but I'd rather have more options in case someone forces me into a one on one fight I can't brute force my way through. It's not like I actually want to end up in a fight with someone instead of a one-sided victory, I just don't want anyone to toy with me ever again.

Now that I'm actually thinking about this, how am I supposed to create a new spell? The only reason I succeeded the few times that I’ve tried creating a new spell was because I already had an idea in mind. I had an idea of what the spells were supposed to do, but my current goal is just 'create a spell that can kill people effectively.' I guess I should just choose a random magic type and try to do something with it. Yeah this plan is starting to sound like a waste of time.

Fire and Shadow magic already have a decent amount of simple ways I can kill people so I don't really need to create more. Earth magic can be used to kill, but it's more suited for defense so why should I bother. Water magic generally sucks unless you’re thirsty. I don't think Nyx even taught me a single Water spell aside from creating water. Can Water magic do anything at all? I don't really remember any stories about famous Water Spirits. I guess the ability to create drinkable water is useful, just not exactly heroic enough to write a story about.

The final magic type is Air magic and... I guess it's decent? I already use it a lot for detection magic and of course I was experimenting with creating music. I could also create a gust of wind, but what purpose would that serve? Air magic has more promise in terms of spells I like, but I still don't really know how to kill someone with it. I could probably push someone off a building using Air magic, but why should I bother doing that when I can instead incinerate someone with fire or impale them with shadows. Eh, I guess this is exactly why I'm trying to figure out other ways to quickly kill people.

With my mind back on track I cast the usual Air magic to find some soldiers. The soldiers were in a street that was pretty open; which is probably an ideal situation to test out offensive Air magic. I teleported on top of a nearby building so that I could scope out the area since I can’t just use my Shadow detection magic to do it. Never realized how much I used Shadow magic as a second set of eyes until I couldn't use it anymore.

Anyways, the soldiers seem to be taking a temporary break after fighting. At least I assume they just got done fighting because there are some bodies on the floor. Not a single one had a clue of what I was about to do to them. Then again, I have no clue what I'm about to do to them either. 

So how am I supposed to attack them with Air magic. Strong winds would be more of a nuisance than anything actually deadly. I’ve heard rumours of incredibly fast winds ripping apart buildings and people alike, but sadly I don’t know how I'm supposed to picture it. How fast would the wind have to go in order to tear apart tough buildings?

Maybe I can solidify wind into a physical object like I do when I impale things with Shadow magic? I tried compressing the Air into a shape like I do with the Shadows… and nothing happened. Well, I can tell that I did actually use magic power which means I was successful in compressing the air. It just doesn't seem to actually do anything. Maybe it’s a problem with the air around me? The world around me may be fake, but I don’t think the air is. I mean, I think a skilled Air Spirit could create breathable air. Though I doubt that the air is actually made from magic because I could still breathe in the dome of darkness. 

Oh shit, the soldiers are starting to leave. Guess I should just hurry and kill these guys before they make me have to chase them down. It wouldn't be anything difficult, but there's no reason to actively seek out annoying situations. Besides, if there really is something wrong with the air around me then a change of scenery should help. I think. I wish I could just read a book to learn good spells instead of just randomly doing things.

With a single fire spell I burned all the soldiers up and in the process I happened to set a nearby building on fire. Eh, I can’t be bothered to put it out. Capital’s fake so I’m not hurting anyone’s house or business. With business done here I teleported to another group of soldiers that was way bigger than the previous one. I didn’t exactly count how many there were in the last area, but it couldn’t have been more than thirty. This group has got to be a base of operations or something since I’m counting 400 and up. How many guys did they even sneak into the capital anyway? Wait, it's a fake capital so they probably wouldn’t have even needed to sneak anyone in. All they would need to do is set up camp and then bring Lotus, Leila’s guards, and of course me. 

While I used Air detection magic to investigate I began to think about how nice it’d be if I could create a fake world like this. It sounds like an incredibly convenient thing to have as well as something fun to mess around with. If I could create one on the spot I wouldn’t even need to care about getting in trouble for injuring innocents since I could just kill everyone in there. Sadly I have no clue how you’d go about producing a complete replica world.

Actually, is this even a perfect replica in the first place? The figure mentioned some stuff about being unable to see or only being able to see what they want me to see. If I once again assume he was speaking literally then maybe the capital isn’t fake, it’s what I’m seeing that is fake. Is there even a magic spell that can affect eyesight, especially to this extent? I have been experimenting with a spell that mimics sounds so I guess it's theoretically possible for eyesight affecting magic to exist. My eyesight being affected could explain why Shadow detection magic only shows complete darkness. Perhaps everything here is just shadows that mimic the feeling of touch while the finer details of everything is just magic telling my eyes what they want me to see?

My theory does fit the information I know, but surely it can’t be possible? Wouldn’t they need a Shadow Spirit to create everything? I refuse to believe Nyx would ever help them if it put me in danger and obviously I never helped them. Is it possible that Nyx was incorrect in saying we’re the only Shadow Spirits in the world? Or is there another explanation? Ugh, this night keeps making no sense. At this point I’m just bullshitting random ideas that could theoretically be true just because I don’t know enough information to logically conclude what’s happening.

I breathe a quick sigh to release tension and realize I should just completely forget about the fake capital until I need to escape. It’s distracting me too much and I’m sure I can ask Nyx about some of this stuff tomorrow. Though surely Nyx or at least Mary already knows about what’s happening. 

Actually, do they know what’s happening? This isn’t the real capital so they might not even be anywhere near me. They’d notice I’m missing, but how would they figure out where I am? I don’t even know where the fuck this fake capital is! Calm down… I’m sure Nyx is currently helping or trying to help me. Nothing has ever stopped her and I bet she knows exactly where I am. …At least I hope she does.

For now I really need to stop letting my mind wander and divert my attention back to the enemy base sprawled out in front of me. It seems to consist of multiple buildings that are mainly located underground. Sadly there isn’t enough airflow underground and I still can’t use Shadow detection magic so I don’t know the complete layout. Though it’s not like it matters that much since I don’t actually have to risk going inside.

Most of the soldiers seem to be resting or preparing weapons and armour. Nobody seems to be leaving at the moment, maybe they’re reinforcements that haven’t been called to battle? Regardless of what they are, they seem pretty relaxed even though this is supposed to be a combat zone. Well, it just means that they’re allowing me to decimate them, but first a little experimenting. I only have one last idea to try out before giving up so I might as well get this failure out of the way. 

My idea is that when I tested the spell earlier I may not have compressed the air enough. So this time I created a bunch of air and forced it to compress into an extremely tiny spiky ball. With the Air still compressed I found a target standing next to an open window and launched the ball through it. The ball hit the soldier and then disappeared. Did the soldier even notice he got hit by something? Did the spell even do anything, cause it sure as hell doesn’t look like it did. I can’t stop consuming my magic power, but why? Why does the spell continue to use magic power after disappearing?

Although I had no idea what it was doing, I could tell that the magic quickly traveled through the building and consumed a lot of magic power whenever it touched someone. So much magic power was consumed that I started struggling to stand, yet I still couldn’t stop the spell. This isn't the same as unwillingly casting a spell. Why and how did I lose control over my own magic power? It’s possible to lose control over a spell, but it should always be possible to stop using magic power.

Before any of my questions could be answered, my magic power finally stopped disappearing. Even after all of that happened the spell still didn’t seem to do anything. Time to forget about it and quickly destroy the other buildings. I decided to send a few flaming boulders crashing into the other buildings so I could see if this spell actually has some uses. My question was quickly answered as the flaming boulders landed with enough force to destroy the underground rooms and collapse the few floors above ground.

Most of the soldiers died instantly, but a few managed to escape the rubble and group up. For some reason nobody is coming out of the remaining building. Did they not hear the mass destruction? I used Air detection magic to investigate, and while I couldn’t see the exact state of everyone, I could tell that everyone inside had collapsed dead on the floor. What the hell happened here!?

The only cause of this I could imagine was the spell I cast, but how? It was essentially a toy ball made of air. Before I could ponder more, the soldiers had split into two groups. One group walked into the last standing building while the other investigated the rubble. The group inside the building came across the creepy sight of everyone that had suddenly died, many who were in the middle of doing something. Everyone in the building had died the same way and the soldiers hesitantly continued through the building. When they got to the basement I realized that there were some prisoners kept underground. However, they were killed as well.

The soldiers quickly got out of there as soon as possible after they learned that not even the prisoners were spared in this mysterious massacre. The two groups met up only for the building group to soon collapse in front of their allies. The group left standing fell into chaos as some hid themselves among the rubble, some ran away, and others calmly knelt to check on the state of their dead allies. After finding them to be dead the living soldiers tried to reestablish order. 

Before they could do anything worthwhile I sent a bunch of flaming boulders down to completely destroy the remaining building as well as the grouped up soldiers. I really don’t like what just happened and I have no desire to stay here any longer. Half the time I can’t even control if I cast a spell or not, and now I can’t even control what a spell fucking does! I have no idea how my spell even killed everyone. What if I accidentally cast it and die just like they did? What if I accidentally kill someone I care about? 

There are too many unknowns involving this spell and experimenting will just likely kill me. Technically speaking, this spell was an outstanding success, but I will forever consider this a failure. I refuse to cast this spell. No, I refuse to even just think about using this spell. A lack of control will only make me suffer like it has in the past. I will never willingly put my trust into something completely out of my control. I should quickly finish everyone off so this terrible fucking night can finally end.

Topgun1908

Chapter is a bit longer than usual but splitting it in two didn't feel right. Only checked over this chapter once so hopefully it doesn't have like 50 spelling errors and cut sentences that weren't fully cut left in.