Stone engraved with runes settled into the ground. Their main purpose was to stealth parts of the mountain. A bolder and more wasteful mage would have swallowed the whole mountain in stealth, and probably gotten themselves killed via Meteorite. A gap in the space was flashy to the naked eye, the exact opposite of stealthy. Sure, there were confound wards, but they don't work on dragons, mage gods, observers, and whatever other magic creatures lay out there.

No, Aria did not get old by flaunting her magic. Aria was subtle. She hid away a few passageways and tunnels in the already dark cave. A few low powered shields would protect her from any widespread spells. Only natural light entered the cave from far above, and barely a sheen entered this deep into the cave where Aria hid herself.

Every mage had three spells. Aria had learned hers when she was sixteen. In order to grow more powerful, you had to swap out the spells, or upgrade them.

This was the most vulnerable moment of any mage; while swapping out or upgrading, mages could use neither magic nor spell nor artefact.
Which was why Aria went into seclusion. Her fireball sat on level nine for the longest time, and it was time to swap it out for a proper Meteorite.

With a hiss, the last of the engraved stones settled into the ground. Everything was ready. It all came down to Aria.

Aria sat in a lotus position on top of a pillow. She folded her hands, and focused deeply on herself. Her mind felt like a spark within darkness; so bright, so weak in the vastness. Three smaller sparks surrounded her light; her three spells, Fireball, Waterwalk, and Fae's Kiss. They whispered to her, words of power, incantation.

She focused on the spark. There was a shimmer, and the light. The shimmer connected all of her spells into one tight net, and bound it to the light. The light was her mind, or her soul.

She left that discussion to the mage philosophers.

She concentrated, and broke the shimmer. Her three spells wisped away, as if they never existed to begin with.

She took the light, and wove it together in specific constructions. First, her old spells, Waterwalk and Fae's Kiss. Then, her new spell, Meteorite.

The three sparks were tightly bound to the light, and not floating around at all. The shimmer had retracted into the light, to make up for the lost light. In time, the shimmer would recover, and the spell would be useable. For the next two weeks, however, Aria was stuck without magic. She flipped an hourglass, and remained in the lotus position.

After around half of the hourglass was gone, suddenly the air was reverberating slightly. It could have been an animal entering, but Aria doubted so. No, it was much more likely, and much safer to assume that someone was coming for her.

She opened her eyes and remained vigilant. Her current position was decently well defended, and hidden to begin with.

Then, startled, Aria turned her head.

A voice was resounding through the cave, young, innocent, and very familiar to Aria.

"Grandmother! Where are you?"

Aria grimaced at her runic formations. Ema would never find her, not if she didn't exit it. But first, she listened intently. Was Aria alone? She heard a cacophony of boot steps, but with how much the cave was echoing, it might as well could have been one pair of boots.

Aria decided to sneak out and see the situation. There was more than one stealth formation, though she did give up her protection formation.

She picked up her mage staff and sneaked out, her steps muffled by the pair of rubber boots she wore. It did not take long for her to find Ema.

She was alone, and didn't seem to be wounded. If anything had happened to her, it must have been many months in the making.
"Ema," Aria called out. "You should not have come here. I'm in seclusion."

"Grandmother!" Ema stepped forward, eyes wide. "I- I came in to check on you. I was so worried."

"This is not my first seclusion," Aria replied, her tone a bit cold. She inched away from her granddaughter, and put her mage staff in between them.

Ema had never treated her this friendly in the last year. It happened shortly after the death of Ema's father spread.

"Grandmother! Is that blood on your face?" Ema stepped forward, almost running at her. "Let me wipe it away. I have a few towels with me."

"Ema. I am disappointed." Aria's words were caught in her throat. "You are acting so rash, just like your father."

Ema's face turned cold, her eyes now with a steely iron glint.

"You killed him."

"That I did." Aria looked down. Ema wore city shoes.

"YOU KILLED PAPA!" Ema rushed at Aria with a dagger in her hand.

Aria whacked her staff, knocking away her feet. "Cool your emotions. They distract you in a fight."

Ema hissed from the ground. She slowly got on her feet. Then, she looked at Aria. This time, she didn't rush, but approach slowly, steadily.

Aria whacked her with her staff again, knocking her dagger away.

"You need to reverse your grip on the dagger, or you have no hold over it. Aim for short, swift slashes. Cut the skin open, then let the enemy bleed out."

Aria waited, as Ema screamed at her again, scrambling for the dagger off the ground. She glared at Aria, then reversed her grip.
She approached Aria on her toes, lightly hopping around.

Aria stabbed the staff forward, once again knocking Ema to the ground.

"Move in three dimensions. If you just hop forward and backward, a stab will always hit you. If you hop left and right, a slash will always hit you. You can try to parry, but your dagger is not suited for parrying, because I have more momentum. You need to get close, but not lose your cool. In close range, I cannot wield my staff well."

Ema stared at her, outside of whack range. "If you had taught me magic, I would have killed you long ago."

"Do you have the ability to get distracted? Focus on your kill, don't suddenly waver just because your target is saying something to you. There is no return. And to answer you: If I had taught you half as much magic, you would have done the same mistake your father did."

At these words, Ema grimaced, and ducked low. She rushed at Aria again, but then suddenly rolled on the ground. Stone pierced into her back, but the swing whiffed above her back. She rolled up, and her knife, in reverse grip, naturally found its way into Aria's stomach.

"Good!" Aria huffed, then sat down. "Ribs are surprisingly hard to go through. The stomach area has many vital organs, you can't go wrong stabbing there instead. Especially with your short stature."

"W-Why—" Ema stammered "Why are you teaching me how to kill you?"

"This is what you want, right?" Aria smiled at Ema. "How can I deny my granddaughter's wish?"

"You, you are crazy."

"Then shut up and let this crazy bat talk. Your father, rash moron he was, was upset that he was falling behind, and committed the number one mistake in magic."

Ema whimpered.

"He bound four spells to himself. Then, it was five, then six, then seven. Greed never stops after three. The spells use up a piece of your magic to bind a foreign will to your soul. When he had bound ninty-nine spells, there was one hundredth of your father's mind trying to rule over ninty-nine foreign spells."

Aria smiled bitterly. "He killed himself, and I killed the magic that took him."

Ema stared at the ground, lost in thought.

"Now, do you have bandages on you? Otherwise, this old bat might die for real. And that won't do, not before I fulfil your father's dying wish."

Startled, Ema looked up. "His dying wish?" she breathed.

Aria smiled. "He always wanted to see a Meteorite."