Chapter 44: Chapter 44 — The Gray Moon Mage
The evening wind carried the scent of damp pine and freshly turned earth, slipping through the cracks of the wooden windows. Exactly one week had passed since the end of the hunting festival—seven days in which a silence had settled over our house unlike any I had ever experienced before.
From the kitchen, while I wiped the wooden table with a damp cloth, I kept my gaze fixed on the backyard. Through the fogged glass, I watched Harold.
He was sitting on a cut log, holding a small wooden figure he was trying to carve for Lia. His fingers, once restless and clumsy, now moved with an almost solemn patience, paying attention to every grain of the wood.
That week had changed everything. I, Samira, who prided myself on knowing every corner of his mind through our bond, felt as though I was looking at a different man.
The arrogant young man who had blindly depended on the dictates of a floating screen and who had enjoyed killing creatures in the forests to accumulate invisible numbers had vanished.
In his place stood someone who carried the weight of having crossed the threshold of death, of having been forgiven by the ghost of his mother in an incomprehensible limbo, and of having felt the agony of a giant father from whom he had nearly taken what he loved most in the world.
"He’s changed, hasn’t he?" Chimera whispered, appearing beside me with wild stealth. She rested her chin on my shoulder as her amber eyes followed Harold’s movements in the yard.
"Yes, he has," I answered quietly, carefully folding the damp cloth over the sink. "He no longer seeks violence simply to feed his ego. He has begun to understand the weight of the lives we take in this world."
"It’s strange," Chimera murmured, furrowing her brow and crossing her arms over her prominent chest. "His scent is no longer that of a frightened pup trying to roar loudly. He smells of tempered iron. Of old pain. But I like him better this way. He’s more... male."
I smiled slightly at my companion’s words, though a constant worry lived in my chest. Harold had become extremely considerate. He spent hours holding Lia, as if he feared the world would snatch her away at any moment, and when he shared our bed, he sought us out with a silent desperation, clinging to us as if we were his only lighthouse in the midst of a dark storm.
Our thoughts were interrupted when, suddenly, Hal stood up in the yard. A flickering golden light began to emanate from his right hand. The System had manifested. The glow was not the common blue flash of ordinary summons; it was a dense radiation, a violet and golden hue that made the air in the house vibrate. The floating dust particles gleamed like tiny stars, and the atmosphere grew heavy, charged with the scent of fresh air and old paper.
"A seven-star elite ticket?" Hal exclaimed out loud from the yard, his tone one of absolute disbelief reflected on his face as he stared at the translucent screen that only he could see.
Chimera and I immediately stepped out onto the porch, alert to the sudden buildup of energy. The ground beneath our feet began to tremble slightly. In the center of the yard, space itself seemed to tear open, revealing a rift from which a silvery mist spilled forth, reminiscent of moonlight on a winter night.
From that haze emerged an imposing silhouette.
The woman who stepped forward possessed a cold, aristocratic beauty. Her skin was of an almost translucent paleness, akin to polished marble, contrasting sharply with a long mane of ash-gray hair that fell in perfect waves over her shoulders.
Her eyes, an intelligent electric blue, scanned the surroundings with glacial calm. She wore an elegant, immaculate white mage’s attire, meticulously embroidered with intricate gray lines that shimmered with a subtle magical flow. In her left hand, she held a heavy dark leather grimoire, reinforced with silver corners and carved runes that seemed to pulse in rhythm with her breathing.
"Well... So this is the plane to which I’ve been dragged," the mage said, closing the grimoire with a dry snap that echoed across the entire yard as she adjusted the sleeves of her white attire.
"Welcome. I’m... Harold, your summoner," said Hal, stepping forward with a mix of respect and nervousness, shyly rubbing the back of his neck.
The woman walked slowly toward him. Her presence was so overwhelming that I instinctively stepped forward, placing myself slightly between her and Hal, while my hand unconsciously sought the pommel of my weapon. Chimera, at my side, tensed the muscles in her legs and bared her fangs with a low growl. The newcomer didn’t flinch; she simply looked at us with a mixture of scientific curiosity and subtle condescension.
"Easy, wild ones," the mage said, flashing a sly smile that betrayed absolute confidence. "My name is Odessa Jones, scholar of the great Gray Moon Circle. And from what I can see, my supposed ’master’ is a young man with the most disastrous mana flow I’ve encountered in my entire academic existence."
"Disastrous?" asked Hal, blinking in confusion, lowering his arms to his sides in bewilderment.
"I’ve learned a few things on my own," said Hal immediately, straightening his back with a touch of wounded pride. "When we were in the golden fish dungeon, I understood that magic requires concentration. I just have to focus my mind, feel the energy, and will the element to manifest for it to happen. It can’t be that disastrous if it works."
Odessa raised a gray eyebrow with evident skepticism, and a soft yet cutting laugh escaped her pale lips. She slid her slender fingers along the silver edge of her grimoire before replying.
"The golden fish dungeon?" Odessa asked, tilting her head as she appraised him with her gaze. "A rather peculiar name for what must have been a nest of common monsters. And your theory about ’concentration,’ my dear, ignorant master, barely scratches the surface of a much deeper truth. Magic is not a capricious wish that is fulfilled simply by thinking hard. That is a childish and lazy view."
The mage took a firm step toward him and placed the tip of her right index finger, cold as ice, directly on Harold’s sternum. He flinched slightly but did not step back.
"True magic," Odessa continued, raising her voice with a didactic and firm tone that demanded attention, "is divided into three fundamental pillars that every respectable mage in the Kingdom of Mouka and the Church academies must master: Circulation, Resonance, and Projection."
She withdrew her finger and began to walk slowly around him, gesturing with her hands as she explained.
"First, Circulation," Odessa said, glancing meaningfully at Harold’s abdomen. "You must extract pure mana from your core and guide it through your internal channels in a fluid manner, like a steady river. If your flow stagnates, your organs overheat. Second, Resonance. Once the mana is moving, you must attune its spiritual frequency to that of the element you wish to invoke. If you want fire, your soul must vibrate with the warmth of the blaze; if you want wind, with the lightness of the breeze. And finally, Projection. The molded mana must be expelled outward using a suitable catalyst, such as my grimoire, so that it interacts with the physical laws of the world without destroying your own body in the process."
"And what’s wrong with the way I do it?" asked Hal, looking at his own hands with a mix of amazement and frustration.
"What you do with that strange artifact you call a ’system,’" Odessa explained, stopping in front of him and opening her grimoire with an elegant flick of her wrist, making the yellowed pages flip rapidly on their own, "is force the mana to skip Circulation and Resonance artificially. It’s like lighting a fire directly inside a wooden pipe. It leaves your channels clogged, exhausted, and full of microfrictions. That’s why you feel so weakened after a simple spell. You are damaging your own spiritual temple."
Hal fell silent for a few seconds, processing the seven-star mage’s words. He looked at the palms of his hands, clenching his fists with a mixture of revelation and concern.
"That makes sense," Hal admitted, letting out a long sigh as he looked Odessa in the eyes. "Every time I used direct magic from the system, I felt a tiredness that wasn’t physical, but like I was being hollowed out inside. I thought it was normal, but... I see I’ve been doing things wrong."
"Hey, old woman, watch your words with our lord," Chimera intervened, stepping forward with her eyes blazing in anger, irritated by the mage’s dominant tone.
"Age is not an insult, wild girl, but an accumulation of knowledge that you are clearly lacking," Odessa retorted, without even looking at her, keeping her blue eyes fixed on Hal. "Lord Harold possesses immense potential, but currently he is like a child playing with an artifact far too dangerous. If he wishes to survive what lies ahead, he will have to learn to be a true mage, not a mere user of gacha tools."
"I accept the training," said Hal suddenly, interrupting the dispute with a firmness that surprised us all. "You’re right, Odessa. I can’t keep depending on a screen to do all the channeling work for me. I need to understand how my own power works if I want to be strong enough to protect the people I love."
I watched Hal in that instant. The determination in his eyes was not that of an arrogant, bloodthirsty warrior, but of a leader who takes on his responsibility with humility.
My heart beat hard in my chest. That determined man was the master to whom I had sworn eternal loyalty, a king who was beginning to forge his own path from the ashes of his mistakes.
---
The rest of the afternoon was a demonstration of Odessa’s relentless character. The seven-star mage didn’t mince words. She subjected Harold to a series of exhausting exercises in meditation and mana flow control in the backyard. She taught him to feel the heat of his magical core, to guide the energy through his shoulders, and to project it without burning his own nerve channels.
It was an exceedingly painful process. On several occasions, Harold fell to his knees on the grass, sweating cold and breathing with difficulty, but Odessa remained standing by his side, unwavering, guiding him with precise instructions and elegant gestures from her grimoire.
Chimera and I watched from a distance. I noticed that, despite her stern and somewhat haughty attitude, the mage took meticulous care that Harold did not exceed the limits that would permanently damage his body. There was a deep, maternal concern hidden behind her cold scholar’s facade.
When night finally claimed the sky, dyeing it a dark blue dotted with silver stars, silence returned to our dwelling. We ate dinner in relative calm. Odessa displayed impeccable manners that contrasted with the rusticity of our table, though from time to time she threw out subtle intellectual jabs that made Chimera grumble under her breath as she devoured her meat.
Hours later, the house lay shrouded in darkness.
---
In the main bedroom, the air was mild and still. Harold lay in the middle of the large bed, sunk in a deep, restorative sleep, completely exhausted by the rigorous physical and mental training Odessa had put him through. To his right, Chimera slept on her side, one arm wrapped possessively around our master’s waist, breathing with a slow rhythm that spoke of her absolute tranquility.
I, however, could not sleep.
I propped myself up slightly, resting my elbow on the pillow, letting the sheets slide down my body. The silver moonlight filtered through the window, illuminating Harold’s face in an almost angelic way.
I stared at him for a long while, feeling an immense warmth spread through my entire being.
I slowly extended my hand, careful not to wake him, and began to gently stroke his red hair. The crimson strands were soft between my fingers, and he let out a faint sigh of contentment in his sleep, tilting his head subtly toward my touch.
As my fingers ran through his hair, my mind traveled through time. I remembered the first day I met him, in that forest near the Kingdom of Mouka. Back then, Harold was a frightened, confused young man who looked at me with evident lust but also with the fear of someone who knows he is unprotected in a hostile environment. He believed himself the master of the world just for having a gacha system in his hands, treating us at first as mere trophies from a game of chance.
"How little you knew of life back then, my lord," I thought, a melancholic smile crossing my face in the dimness of the room.
I stroked the contour of his jaw, noticing how the lines of his face had grown more defined, losing the roundness of idle youth to acquire the firmness of a man who has known true pain.
The week that had passed since the hunting festival had been a journey of silent redemption for him.
Having seen him cry in this very bed, confessing his past sins and the guilt he carried for the death of his human mother, had made me love him even more.
He was not a perfect hero from the legends, like the acclaimed Kirishima so talked about in the kingdom—a being said to be immaculate and ruthless with his enemies. Harold was real. He had cracks, he had fears, and it was precisely that humanity that made him extraordinary.
The arrival of Odessa Jones only confirmed that Harold’s fate was tied to things far greater than this small village.
She had mentioned the Church and the intrigues of the Kingdom of Mouka. I knew the outside world would soon discover the anomaly that our master represented. The twelve dark figures lurking in the shadows of this continent, those beings who committed horrible acts in the name of a forbidden power, would sooner or later cross our path.
I looked at Hal once more, leaning down to place a tender kiss on his warm forehead. The bond that united us vibrated with a note of absolute devotion.
"No matter how dark the path becomes, my lord," I whispered inaudibly, settling back beside him and intertwining my fingers with his. "No matter if the Kingdom of Mouka, the Church, or the shadows of the world try to destroy you. I will be your shield. Chimera will be your sword. And now, Odessa will be your guide. We will learn, we will grow, and when the time comes, we will face whatever comes, together."
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