Pain was a constant companion for Kaito. Not a sharp pain, but the deep stiffness of muscles torn and bruised by Zylpha's punishments.
After a week in the Ash Citadel, his body was a blackboard of bruises, but his Chaotic soul was surprisingly more stable.
The Shadow Cloak was no longer an agony effort, but a cold second skin.
He found himself in a different area of the Citadel than the Forge. It was the Forbidden Library, a circular chamber where books weren't made of paper, but thick obsidian plates engraved with runes that pulsed faintly with dark energy.
The air here was cold, full of ancient minerals' scent and centuries of secrets' silence.
Seated at a desk carved from a single basalt block, his new mentor waited for him.
She was an Elf, but her age was impossible to determine. She had pale gray skin, and her hair, braided with fine silver chains, fell to the floor.
She wore seamless black silk robes, and her hands were covered in tattoos of runes that moved and changed shape.
This was Elora, the Queen's Master Arcanist, the mind behind Shadow magic.
"Sit, Specter," Elora said. Her voice wasn't threatening, but indifferent, as if Kaito were an annoying math problem.
Kaito sat on the floor, immediately recognizing the difference with Zylpha. The Dark Elf was brute force and coercion; Elora was intellect and control.
"Zylpha taught you to use pain to forge your Shadow," Elora began, without looking up from a floating parchment. "I'll teach you to use your *mind*.
"Your magic, Chaos, is an anomaly. It doesn't respect Light or Shadow rules. But even anarchy has a pattern."
Elora raised a finger. A small sphere of energy materialized between them. It wasn't dark Shadow or white Light, but pure *nothingness*, a void absorbing light and sound.
"This is Concentrated Chaos. It's what you are. A singularity.
"Lysandra and Zylpha have only used brute force to keep you from exploding. I'll teach you to *draw* Chaos into the world."
"Draw? With what? I don't know how to write Eterea's runes," Kaito asked.
Elora laughed softly.
"Runes are the language of the weak. They use symbols to force magic to obey. Reincarnates like you don't need runes. Your *soul is your brush*."
Elora stood and approached him, her cold aura penetrated his body.
"Your Chaos doesn't respond to anger, Kaito. It responds to the unbreakable will of your previous life: the will to *protect your brother*.
"Ren is your anchor. But you must transform that protection anchor into a *weapon of destruction*."
Elora gestured. The small Chaos sphere moved toward Kaito, and he felt immense pressure on his chest, as if the void tried to suck out his soul.
"Your task isn't to fight Chaos. It's to *accept it* and force it to replicate your enemies' Light structure.
"Your brother uses the Conclave's Forged Light Magic. I want you to create a perfect Shadow *copy* of his spells, so when he uses them, your power will completely *nullify* them."
Elora's lesson was an intellectual trap. To master his Chaos, Kaito had to first understand Ren's power.
"How can I copy something I don't understand?" Kaito asked, struggling to reject the Chaos sphere.
"Through the *bond*," Elora replied with a malicious smile. "The Queen has allowed me to open the channel connecting you to Commander Ren.
"Right now, he must be near some power source in Aethelgard. Use the bond not as a wound, but as a psychic *telescope*. See his magic. *Listen* to it. And reproduce it."
Elora extended her hand and touched Kaito's forehead, infusing a torrent of energy.
It wasn't painful, but a shock of clarity.
The Library, the Elf, the Citadel, everything vanished.
Kaito felt the connection with Ren flood his mind, but this time, it wasn't an emotion. It was a detailed *map*: he felt Ren's Forged Light's cold discipline, the arrogance of his will, and his Rune Blade Magic's power.
In his vision, Kaito saw a flash image: Ren, alone, in a grand golden hall, activating a powerful magical barrier.
The barrier was complex, woven with high-level protection runes.
"*Copy it*!" Elora's voice ordered in his mind. "Reproduce the matrix with *Chaos*!"
Kaito focused.
The Chaos within him stirred, wanting to explode.
But Kaito used Ren's magic's image as a template.
He forced Chaos to mimic the shape, structure, intention of the Light spell.
A pulse of pure Shadow emerged from Kaito, exactly replicating Ren's barrier's structure, but with a dark *negative*.
The effect was instantaneous: Elora's created Chaos sphere disintegrated, as if Kaito's anti-magic had absorbed it.
Kaito returned to reality, panting.
Elora looked at him with reserved respect.
"You did it. The Perfect Negation."
"Why is the Queen training me to face a single Paladin?" Kaito asked, still feeling Ren's power's echo in his mind.
Elora moved closer and her voice dropped to a whisper, revealing a crucial secret.
"Commander Ren isn't important. He's the *template*. Forged Light Magic is a fragment of Aethelgard's true Celestial King's power, the deity of Aethelgard.
"If you can nullify the most powerful Paladin's magic, you can nullify the god's magic."
The Queen doesn't want you as a weapon to kill, Kaito. She wants you as an *antidote* to Eterea's divinity.
Kaito's value was far greater.
He was the key to dismantling the religious and magical power base of the Light.
"Your next task: the *Infiltration Cloak*. A Shadow veil that doesn't just hide you, but makes you look exactly like Aethelgard's *Forged Light*.
"Rest now, Chaos. Tomorrow, your training will be in the air and in *concealment*."