Restart Again: Volume 1 by Adam Scott (pocket ebook reader TXT) 📕

was a mixture of shock and happiness as she stared at me with tears on her cheeks. “Lux, I...I don’t know what I did to earn this from you. I’ll never be able to repay you.”

“A long time ago, I made a vow. I vowed that I wouldn’t let those in power take advantage of the people they were supposed to protect. Not while I could do something about it.” I motioned to my surroundings. “Clearly, it’s time for me to step up and fulfill that vow.”

Lia slowly fell to her knees and began to weep. I could vaguely make out the words, “Thank you...th-thank you…” as she cried I moved to respond, but thought better of it. Clearly, she needed some time to process the information. I turned to face the back wall of my cell to give her the most privacy I could, given the circumstances, and resumed my calisthenics. After a few minutes, as I was finishing up my routine, I heard her attempt to clear her throat as she sniffled.

She was sitting on the edge of her cot now, looking down at the floor as she swung her feet back and forth lazily. “So...what are you going to do?” She was avoiding my eyes again, but it didn’t seem to be out of awkwardness. “Do you know someone in the prison that can help you out?”

I laughed, surprised by the line of questioning. “Ha, no, I don’t. To be honest with you Lia, I don’t necessarily have a fully formed plan yet.” Walking to the front of my cell, I examined the steel bars as I continued. “Before you were brought here, my initial plan was to continue experimenting for a while, until I figured out a way to break out of here without alerting any guards. With the advanced timetable, though, it might be a little more…” I knocked on the bars lightly. “...A little more hectic.”

“Experimenting?” Lia cocked her head to the side, curious. “I’m not sure what you mean.”

“Lia, do you know anything about magic?”

The question caught her off guard. “Magic? No, I don’t really...well, I mean, I’ve heard about it, and I know what it is, but I’ve never met anybody who could do it before.”

I suppose it was too much to hope that the prisoner I’m about to save would be able to teach me how to control this world’s form of magic. “I’m pretty unclear on the specifics as well. But, over the past day or so, I’ve made some helpful discoveries that might aid me in getting out of here.” Holding my palms out flat before me and calling on my mana, I wrapped my right fingers down until I felt the familiar grip of my sword and pulled the weapon from the ether.

Lia jumped to her feet, her eyes wide with shock and excitement. “You’re...you’re a wizard!”

I grinned and shook my head. “No, I’m not a wizard. Or at least, I don’t think I am.” I stopped, tilting my head and thinking for a moment. I’m not a wizard, right? “It’s a bit of a long story to explain, so I’ll just say, I am very slowly teaching myself how to use magic, and I’m most likely doing it all wrong.” Moving to my cot I sat down to face Lia, setting the blade next to me. “My experimenting has mainly been trying to figure out how magic works in this world, and how I can use it to escape from here.”

For the moment, it seemed as though Lia’s mind was focused on thoughts other than the potential dangers coming tonight, and I was happy to keep it that way for as long as I could. “So, can you cast some sort of...unlocking spell, or something?”

“No. At least not yet.” I tapped on the sword. “I use this sword as my casting implement. Unfortunately, I don’t know how to use magic that affects other objects yet. I certainly have some ideas to test on that front, but I haven’t gotten to them yet.” Tracing my finger absentmindedly along some of the runes on the blade, I gave Lia a smile. “While I start working on that, can you try to think of anything you’ve heard about magic that might be able to help? Even the simplest things you’ve heard about it could end up being extremely helpful.”

She nodded enthusiastically. “Of course! I’ll do my best to make a list of everything I know!” Lia leaned back on her hands, staring through me off into space as she began to organize her thoughts. She seemed engaged in the task, at least for now, which was all I had hoped for.

I took a moment to join her in thought, organizing my list of ideas to test. Now that I have someone else around, I should probably be a bit more careful with my testing. Of all the ideas I had to test, more work with runes seemed to be the safest for now. I winced pre-emptively at the thought of cutting my hands to write again, but I couldn’t think of a better option. Finding ink should be higher on my list of priorities after this.

Turning away from Lia, I pricked a finger on the tip of my sword. After my last experiments I had realized that the amount of blood needed to trace out a simple rune was relatively small, and the cut I had made on my thumb was much more excessive than was necessary. I took the small woolen pillow from the cot and walked to the back wall, settling down on the floor next to it. Welling the blood up to the tip of my finger, I carefully began to draw the rune for fire on the face of the pillow.

Once I was satisfied with the symbol, I held the wool in both hands and began to tap into the energy in my core. It felt sluggish at first, like trying to flex a muscle the