Aurelius woke up.

  He found himself surrounded by a crowd in the middle of a bustling market.

  Covering his view of the clean blue sky was a round, annoying face scrunched up in a rare look of worry.

  He was a short, stocky, and immature looking teenager in his Academy robes. His brown eyes held the depth of soil. His hair was unkempt, and his round glasses hung crookedly on his round nose.

  He was Tiberius Valcor, one of the most insufferable students at the Academy. And also, rather unfortunately, his closest friend.

  “YOU FUCKING IDIOT!” he roared, followed by a hacking coughing fit as he leaned back into the pavement in pain.

  “I’m so sorry! I didn’t realise it would go off like that! Thank goodness you’re alive! I would not last long in jail after all! I have such an attractive body! Thankfully, it seems to have been a dud! The bomb didn’t go off with the usual KABOOM, more like a BOOM!” Tiberius rambled.

  Aurelius felt incredible pain in his chest. He had definitely fractured or broken a rib or two… or three.

  One of the faces in the crowd hurriedly pushed forward with a glass bottle filled with neon-blue liquid as Aurelius’s face contorted in pain.

  “Young man, drink this. It should help with the pain and keep you going until you reach the nearest church,” the merchant said nervously.

  He was one of the merchants selling dungeon crawling kits. And also the man who had sold Tiberius the fateful mana bomb.

  “Thank you.” Aurelius managed hoarsely, carefully sipping down the drink.

  The merchant breathed a sigh of relief. Had an academy student died from his mana bomb, the resulting investigation and questioning by the Magic Commission would have been unpleasant. He was probably glad to sweep the incident under the rug with a simple healing potion.

  The coolness of the potion spread through Aurelius’ body, cooling the burning in his mangled ribs. As the crowd dispersed and the street returned to its usual bustle, he unsteadily rose with Tiberius’ support and made his way toward the nearby church.

  “I’m sorry! Are you better? If you see the light, ignore it!” Tiberius rambled as he served as a crutch for Aurelius.

  “Why the fuck did you buy that mana bomb anyway?” Aurelius wheezed furiously in pain, momentarily distracted..

  “Well, I thought I’d get Lucina a gift…” He replied timidly.

  “What the FUCK TIBERIUS”, yelled Aurelius indignantly.

  Lucina was a Caelestis noble in a miraculous ongoing relationship with Tiberius. Somehow, despite his shockingly below average looks, Tiberius had managed to womanise himself into her arms. This had been disastrous for Aurelius. He was a victim as a bystander watching this nightmare unfold.

  The couple’s constant bickering had even made Aurelius consider buying an underground curse toolkit just to end their relationship.

  Of course, an extremely viable alternative was to put an end to Tiberius himself, whose hopelessness in dealing with the opposite sex drove Aurelius mad.

  But he had refrained. Barely. However, he had apparently, once again, been victimised by their relationship.

  “A bomb for your girlfriend? Who the FUCK gets that kind of a present? This is exactly why your ex LEFT YOU, you dense sack of dragon dung!”

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  Tiberius had thought it wise to take his ex to an elf bar over the holidays the year prior. Given the less than ideal location, this would have been a tumultuous date at the very least, but Tiberius took it to a whole new level, commenting in her face, about the elves and their “bodacious bodies”.

  The poor girl had flown into a rage, nearly separating Tiberius’s head off of his body. Aurelius personally would have preferred it to have been lobbed off, but alas, Tiberius had managed to get off relatively unscathed from the incident.

  “I thought we’d go dungeon crawling for a date! It’s a perfectly reasonable present!” Tiberius defended.

  “Not if you waste it by throwing it AT YOUR BEST FRIEND.” Aurelius managed.

  Sure, mana bombs were fun to fool around with and useful in dungeon raids, but to throw one casually in a marketplace? Was he that stupid? Aurelius lampooned inwards as he sulked, out of energy to scream at Tiberius.

  As they walked, the riots of colourful tents and yelling vendors gave way to the city proper. Regal shophouses with polished windows and carved wooden facades lined the roads, their banners fluttering lazily in the breeze. Magicars rolled past, gliding smoothly against the stone streets, and a few pedestrians scurried along the sides, casting curious glances at the pair.

  The aroma of roasted meats mingled with the faint tang of the river, carrying a pleasant scent amid the chaos still lingering in his chest. The hum of city life continued around him: distant laughter, the sharp call of a merchant, the jingle of coin purses.

  Aurelius could not find himself enjoying this joyous atmosphere. With a dry throat and incessantly growling stomach, the still bubbling anger at his idiot friend rounded out his overall terrible mood.

  And under all of that was a writhing pit of anxiety. A burning uncertainty at what his experience in the void meant.

  ???

  “Do all children nowadays engage in such dangerous activity?” the priest asked with venom as Aurelius laid down awkwardly on the chapel’s bed.

  He wore a simple clergyman robe, his wrinkled, angered face a sharp contrast to its plainness.

  “As a priest, I am happy to see the youth so eager to return to the gods,” he continued, dripping with sarcasm.

  Tiberius did his best to look ashamed, though it was barely convincing on his immature face.

  The chapel was a small but unignorable local building, Adorned with the intertwing carvings of dragons along its walls up to its curved roof, it was an extravagant construction for its size. The small bell tower that should have looked comical, looked impressive on it with its dragon pillars.

  This impressive construction was no surprise given the popularity that the Church of Dragons had with Earth elemental mages in Tlacualtzin.

  The infuriated priest continued to channel mana into Aurelius as he continued his lecture on the irresponsibility of modern mages. The chapel’s guardian spirit floated incorporeally beside him, nodding gravely as it assisted.

  Aurelius felt the warmth of mana once more. His ribs, already roughly mended by the potion, settled properly. Relief flooded his body, accompanied by the itching of the dissolving bone fragments and the feeling of new bone filling the cracks left behind.

  Pain no longer clouded his brain and the numbing effect of the drug washed away.

  However, now, it instead raced over unpleasant options: confess to the priest, report to the Magic Commission, or tell his faculty first.

  Each carried significant consequences—purification at a cathedral, then monitoring at some faraway chapel, or a mental asylum, or straight up death.

  Then there was Quetzalcoatl. How would He react? Smite him into dust? There were even more endless ways for the deity to destroy him. A significant spiritual connection had been established through His honorific name!

  In his small eternity trapped in the void, Aurelius had considered many possibilities. None had ended with him returning, intact, to the world.

  Additionally, less than three minutes seemed to have passed between the mana bomb striking him and regaining consciousness, though hours had passed in that void. This would be an insane feat of mind magic at the very least, or a miraculous feat of temporal magic at the level of gods.

  Hunger and thirst had continued to gnaw at him. While the priest had given him water, it did not resolve the deep gnawing in his stomach. He intended to make Tiberius take responsibility and buy him a large, expensive meal after healing.

  I was definitely trapped by Quetzalcoatl’s insane temporal magic. I can tell from this hunger and the clear memory of His honorific name, which I had never encountered before.

  Additionally, that mana bomb should have killed me, given my ribs. The shockwave alone at that proximity would have been enough to burst my heart.

  The bomb did go off, indicating it wasn’t a dud. Even at half power, I still should have died.

  Organising his thoughts, he suspected he would soon find hints of the real purpose behind his abduction. And given the unpleasant consequences of confessing, he resolved to do what people his age did best for now: keep everything to himself until absolutely necessary.

  As the priest and spirit finished their work, Aurelius gained clarity.

  He had escaped death and had yet to find any evidence of anomalies despite his conversation with a legendary god.

  As far as he could tell, he was free to do what he wanted for the time being. He had possible contingencies too!

  A spirit warding charm and a contract with a lesser spirit could give him at least a few more options if Quetzalcoatl prodded him again. Or hide him from whatever he had gotten involved in!

  And maybe, just maybe, given that he played his cards right, he could even escape from His clutches!

  After all, he was a mediocre mage with no use whatsoever. Regardless of the schemes that churned behind the scenes, he would at most be a tiny cog. If he made some small trouble for the god, maybe His gaze would turn elsewhere!