Did he really have to wait until she was on her deathbed before she would leave her abilities behind?
"No, when I get back this time, I have to sound her out indirectly. She can't just keep leaving me hanging like this."
His mind made up, Lucian raised his right hand, pressed his index and middle fingers together, and deftly traced circles in the air before him.
Faint golden sparks danced at his fingertips. Ripples of magic spread through the void as the outline of a circular portal rapidly took shape.
But just as the frame was about to solidify completely, something suddenly changed.
Hum!
A dull vibration sounded in the air. The golden sparks abruptly scattered like glowing coals doused with cold water.
At the same time, excruciating pain erupted inside Lucian without warning!
"Ugh!"
Lucian grunted and staggered, bracing himself against the rosewood desk beside him.
Strands of crimson, pitch-black, and eerie purple chaotic energy erupted from the deepest recesses of his marrow and organs like venomous snakes that had long lain in hiding, viciously gnawing at his flesh!
Strange patches of light instantly appeared across his skin. His veins bulged, his blood vessels seemingly on the verge of bursting.
"The debt collectors are here..."
Lucian gritted his teeth, a sheen of cold sweat forming on his forehead.
No practitioner of the Mystic Arts could escape this ordeal. The underlying principle of mystic spells was borrowing: mages borrowed power from extradimensional demon gods to cast powerful spells, and the more they borrowed, the deeper their debts grew. If, like ordinary mages, they only dealt in white magic-that is, used the Vishanti's power-these small bills were usually repaid through cultivation and meditation. Even those who borrowed heavily merely faced a reckoning after death. But Lucian had recently been borrowing