The sidewalk tiles shifted under his boots. Half were cracked. A few glowed faintly from embedded mana lines, pulsing like veins under cheap stone.
Lucen kept his head down and walked.
The air stank of pavement heat and auto-smog. Sunlight bounced off the mirrored panels of a mid-tier guild branch across the street. Steelhearts, the sign read. Giant chrome letters. Two guards in matching jackets stood outside, pretending not to flex.
A kid no older than him was inside, posing for a photo in front of the logo.
Lucen didn't stop.
He passed a mana-repair booth on the corner, one of those mobile pop-ups where washed-out healers sold rejuvenation spells for five credits a cast. A line of workers stood there, all of them sweating, most of them limping.
The healer inside the booth yawned as he cast.
Lucen checked the blinking display above the booth window.
"Available Buffs Basic Cleanse, Joint Stabilizer, Burnout Flus…4 remaining"
'Four spells left. Guy's nearly tapped. Shouldn't even be on a shift.'
He crossed at the next light. A half-dismantled beast skull hung from the roof of a fried skewer stall. The sign beneath it flashed.
"A-Rank Killed in One Strike. Taste the Difference.."
Lucen didn't bother reading the fine print.
Buses hissed past on rubberized wheels, rune arrays etched into their sides to keep monsters from sniffing them out on the long routes between gates.
A woman in a white guild coat stepped off one of them, flanked by two armored aides. Her ID tag flashed silver-blue.
S-Rank.
Everyone gave her space.
Lucen didn't.
He walked straight past, hands in his jacket pockets, eyes forward.
Four blocks down, the buildings started to lean. Paint peeled from the walls. Mana shields over doorways flickered with unstable circuits.
An old man sat outside a corner store, cigarette burning low, watching a pack of feral caster hounds root through a trash bin across the street.
Lucen took a left at the vending tower. Half the rune seals were broken. Someone had tried to pry the panel open with a crowbar.
His apartment was three stories up, wedged between a massage parlor that never had customers and a repair shop that didn't sell anything that worked.
He climbed the stairs slow. Each step creaked in a different key.
After unlocking his door he just pushed it open with two fingers and waited.
No sound. No movement.
Inside, the apartment looked exactly how he'd left it. Cracked screen on the wall. Fold-down bed.
Kitchenette with one working burner. Stack of old dungeon reports on the counter.
He shut the door and dropped his bag by the sink.
Then sat on the edge of the bed and opened the system.
[Level: 1]
[Talent: Spellcraft Sovereign]
[Class: SSS-Rank]
[System Mode: Adaptive Spell Designer Interface]
[Quest: Design and cast an original spell]
[Reward: +1 Skill Point | +150 EXP | Unique Spell Slot]
[Mana: 54/54]
[Stat Points Available: 5]
He stared at the screen.
Then leaned back slowly, stared at the ceiling, and let out a quiet sigh
"Shit."
—
The system prompt floated in front of him, annoyingly patient.
[Quest: Design and cast an original spell]
[Reward: +1 Skill Point | +150 EXP | Unique Spell Slot]
[Progress: 0%]
He stared at it.
'Design a spell. Sure. No big deal. I'll just whip up some fireballs in between dinner and screaming.'
He muttered, "You couldn't give me a tutorial? A manual? A magical kindergarten?"
The system didn't answer.
Lucen sighed, flicked on the tablet, and connected to the apartment's unstable mana-net line. The screen blinked.
Loading took a full ten seconds. The lockscreen background showed a smiling dog wearing hunter goggles.
He swiped it away.
He searched…How to design beginner spells
The First result was.
"Top 5 Mistakes First-Time Spellcrafters Make..Number 3 Will Kill You.."
'What the hell?'
Second result was.
"Is DIY spellcraft illegal?"
'Seriously?'
The third was.
"You Can't Make Spells, You're Not Special—Here's Why"
'Bro are you kidding me…'
Lucen scrolled down.
The first decent-looking post came from a public education forum, probably written by someone's underpaid uncle.
"Beginner's Guide to Mana Theory (for Non-Gifted)"
Lucen tapped it open.
The article had diagrams, shaky ones. Mostly shapes with brief labels.
Spells are made of three components: Form, Flow, and Trigger.
Form = containment structure (circles, squares, triangles)
Flow = how mana moves within the shape
Trigger = what activates the effect (gesture, voice, mental command)
Lucen leaned forward.
'Okay. That actually helps.'
He checked his system again. The [Spell Designer] interface still hovered, blank and waiting.
He placed a single circle in the middle.
[Form created.]
[Stability: 10%]
He added a triangle inside it.
[Stability: 24%]
[Mana Flow: Incomplete]
He frowned, looked back at the guide.
It said triangles focus direction, circles hold energy. He needed flow lines.
He dragged a line through the middle.
[Stability: 42%]
[Mana Flow: Weak]
[Trigger Condition: None]
He tapped the + symbol. Added a node at the edge.
Then whispered, "Activate on release."
The system blinked.
[Trigger Condition Accepted.]
[Estimated Mana Cost: 3]
[Spell Classification: Unstable Projectile]
[Warning: No element specified. Default: Kinetic]
[Cast?]
Lucen sat back.
The spell diagram hovered in front of him. Simple. Crude. But it looked like a real spell. Sort of.
His heart thumped once.
'If this explodes, I'm going to haunt whoever invented mana.'
He raised a hand toward the center of the room.
"Cast."
The air in front of his palm shimmered.
A ripple. Then a soft thud as something popped. A marble-sized pulse of invisible force zipped across the room and hit the cupboard door.
The door creaked. A shallow dent appeared.
Lucen stared at it.
Then at his hand.
Then at the system screen.
[Quest Complete.]
[+1 Skill Point]
[+150 EXP]
[Level Up: 2]
[New Feature Unlocked: Spell Archive]
[New Spell Saved: Unstable Kinetic Point]
Lucen's fingers were still tingling.
He sat there for another few seconds, blinking at the screen.
'I just built a spell off a blog post.'
He exhaled through his nose.
Then laughed once, not because it was funny, but because it made slightly more sense than crying.