Inflame (The Completionist Chronicles Book 6) by Dakota Krout (best romantic novels in english TXT) 📕

of magic and forbidden lore to Joe. If he would just look closer, if he would just follow the light to… Joe blinked as a notification appeared.

Illusion Breaker’s effect successful! You have been caught in ‘Fae Beckoning’ for four minutes and five seconds.

Joe was standing in a corner of the building with his nose pressed into the smooth surface of the wall. He stepped back and looked around; somehow, he hadn’t been noticed during all of that. A glance revealed no enemies near him, just small growths of crystal slabs with shaped crystal ornaments displayed on them. Oh. A random dais as well; just to be consistent with the fantasy setting, he was sure. Beams of light reached from the pulsing glow in the ceiling, filtering down to each of the shaped crystals.

They had a look to them that Joe was familiar with, and if he was correct, it meant the crystals were stabilizing mechanisms for whatever spell was being continuously cast from this place. “I bet those are important for the continued successful camouflage of this place. Right, well, enough of that!”

He pulled out the Ritual of Raze that he had decided against using outside and stuck it in the corner. “If I get trapped here, I need to make sure that the Dwarves can figure this out. Activate.”

A ring of light expanded from the pre-charged ritual, moving to surround the building and commence destroying it. A secondary ring appeared under Joe, indicating that that ritual was still active. Joe turned his eyes on the patterns etched throughout the walls as cries of alarm rang out. “I need to do more. I need to fully sabotage this place.”

Chapter Forty-Three

Joe sprinted to one of the many strange objects that were scattered through the room on the crystal slabs and small plinths, skidding to a halt and slapping his hands on the perfectly triangular crystal. A flash of mana seeped out of him, and information appeared in his mind.

Item: Illusion Prism Focus.

Reduction value: 99 Rare aspects, 129 Uncommon aspects, 910 Common aspects, 7,991 Trash aspects.

Reduction cost: 125 mana per second.

“Yes please, and thank you. I wonder if it has no damaged aspects because it’s in a perfect crystalline form? I really need to learn more about my abilities and what each aspect does.” Joe let his mana seep into it for one second, two, then intentionally let go. He didn’t want to fully destroy these, since that would be noticed. If he could weaken a bunch of them, then even if he were killed and his ritual was stopped, Joe would be able to feel secure in the knowledge that the illusions would break at some point. He hurried to the next one, then crossed the room after heavily damaging it. On the tenth, his reduction went too long and accidentally fully destroyed the prism.

The room strobed red as the beam of light that had been attached to the prism recoiled up into the mass of pulsating illumination. The lights that were attached to the other prisms thickened slightly, the surviving crystals needing to handle slightly more energy. Joe heard an Elf shout, “I don’t care what the orders were, if this goes down, we’re all abyssed! Just try not to kill him until it’s ready!”

“Oh, I don’t like the sound of that.” Joe rushed over to the next plinth, destroying the prism entirely. Then the next. They were going down, but the effort was hard and draining. The light was pulsing harder, and the beams were growing thicker with each crystal destroyed, but it wasn’t enough yet.

Capture field activated!

“What does that mean?” Joe’s answer was a burst of mana shooting into the corner where he had activated the ritual. In the next instant, the ritual ring under his feet vanished. The ritual had been deactivated, at the least, in an instant. “Oh snap-”

In the next moment, he was flying across the room, a mana-made hand having slapped him harder than a train could have. Joe impacted a plinth at speed, his Exquisite Shell fracturing into nothing as blood splattered from his mouth. Joe’s fuzzy thoughts reminded him that this was a good indication that his internal organs were damaged.

Damage taken: 4,308

Exquisite Shell: 0/3,586

Health: 920/1,642

“A human? Of course it was a human; a Dwarf would have been too obvious.” The voice reaching Joe’s ears was sharp and hateful. There was very little trace of an accent or strange dialect, making Joe nervous about the rank or power level of this particular individual. He turned his head and watched her as she walked toward him. “I am Lady Elfreeda, known as the Lady of Light, and you-”

A Dark Lightning Strike bounced off her, dealing no damage but managing to interrupt her train of thought. Elfreeda stared at the human in astonishment, and Joe let out a wet chuckle. “Mandatory quest. Need to try to kill you whenever I see you.”

“A follower of Havoc. I should have known it from the start.” Lady Elfreeda actually took a step away from Joe, for whatever reason. “Was this your great plan, human? An unguarded ritual? Breaking a few toys and diminishing the stability of the grand illusion an insignificant amount? What are you, a child? Let me explain to you what happens now. You go onto a small island surrounded by magma, unable to escape and tell anyone of the impending attack. Daily, you will be… pressed for information. Information that I know you’ll have, as a follower of that animal.”

Joe tried to use Dark Lightning strike on her again, but the spell failed. She smirked at him, “You think I can’t lock down magic in my area once I’ve seen you use it? You poor, simple-”

A stream of acid sloshed over her, doing nothing but making her flinch. Anger colored her features as much as the strobing light did. “Enough of this. Take him, and we’ll see how long he can last-”

As soon as she started giving orders, Joe reached up to the