My palm was hot.
Not from pain.
It was… warmth.
A living warmth.
The energy moved through me, rose within me, breathed with me—
and still, it didn’t burn.
It was the first time.
It didn’t crash over me like a wave,
didn’t explode outward,
didn’t thrash wildly, desperate to escape.
It simply…
flowed.
He was right beside me.
Not in front.
Not behind.
Right there.
And that alone—
changed everything.
There was no time.
I thought it, but I didn’t speak it.
He felt it anyway.
I guided the magic.
Just as I had been taught—
but with a sensation I had never known before.
This time… I managed it.
No weight.
No tearing pain.
No fear.
It was nothing like any catalyst I had used.
Magic had always surged into me too fast,
overwhelming me before I could shape it,
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breaking itself—and me—in the process.
Gauntlets split.
Rods shattered.
Grimoires burned before I could turn a single page.
Magic had always been a wild fire.
A flame that would rather destroy me
than stay confined.
But now—
It was clear water.
Warm light.
A steady, certain weight.
All at once, filling me completely.
No pain.
No violent backlash.
No desperate thrashing.
Just… being.
And he was there.
He was the boundary.
The channel.
The river that gave the flow its direction.
He didn’t restrain me.
He didn’t block me.
He simply supported me.
The spell formed on its own.
He looked at me.
That alone quieted the trembling.
No clogging.
No suffocating pressure.
No fear.
I guided it.
The same sequence I had failed at so many times.
But this time—
The world answered.
Magic surged.
A clean light,
no deviation,
no smoke,
no sparks—
just a straight, sharp, resonant line.
As if the world itself whispered:
At last.
I saw the spear shatter.
Saw his arm vanish.
Saw fear bloom in the enemy’s eyes for the first time.
I didn’t scream.
I didn’t cry.
I only… breathed.
For the first time,
without asking forgiveness.
Without apologizing for existing.
Just me.
And magic, the way it was meant to be.
