"My arms!!!"
A howling scream echoed through the silent infirmary. Ethan jolted awake in panic, cold sweat drenching his body. His crimson eyes were wide open in sheer terror.
He could feel it... No, he felt 'nothing' at all.
From his shoulders down to his fingertips, it was empty, weightless, and devoid of sensation, as if those limbs had never existed. The final image in his memory was the Pitch-Black Inferno devouring his flesh and the agonizing pain that felt like his soul was being torn apart.
"No... No, it can't be..."
Ethan tried to lift his hands to look, but both arms lay motionless by his sides, wrapped so thickly in bandages that they looked like a mummy's. He tried to command them to move, but there was no response, not even from a fingertip.
Fear began to grip his mind. He did what he had done naturally all his life... he circulated his mana.
Mana... My mana...
But then...
"ARGHHHHHHH!!"
The moment he tried to gather his focus, a sharp, piercing pain shot through his entire body like a thousand needles stabbing his chest.
What was more terrifying than the pain was the 'Emptiness.'
The reservoir of mana that had once overflowed like an ocean within his body was now completely dried up. All that remained was a black hole—empty and silent. No matter how much he tried to call upon it, there was no reaction.
"Why... Why can't I sense my mana!? What happened to me!"
Ethan thrashed on the bed like a fish out of water, tears of despair streaming down his cheeks.
"Calm down, Ethan! You are safe!"
A familiar voice rang out, accompanied by the tall figure of Duke Orwin, who rushed in to press his son's shoulders back down onto the bed. Beside him, an elderly doctor stood with a grave expression.
"Father... My arms... My power..." Ethan looked at his father with pleading eyes. "Tell me it's just a nightmare... Tell me!"
Duke Orwin looked at his son with eyes full of agonizing pain. He bit his lip until it bled before speaking the cruelest truth.
"You were asleep for two full months, Ethan... The Hellfire destroyed almost all the nerves in your arms. The doctor says rehabilitation will take years... and even if they heal, they will never function as they did before."
"No..." Ethan moaned softly.
"And what is worse..." The Duke swallowed the lump in his throat. "The backlash of the Forbidden Magic... it shattered the magic circuits in your body into dust."
The words struck Ethan like a sledgehammer to the skull.
"You... can no longer use magic."
Ethan's entire world collapsed in that second.
The great 'Son of Mana'... the genius mage of the century... the hope of the clan... All of it was over. He had become nothing more than a powerless cripple.
Silence blanketed the infirmary, broken only by the sound of Ethan's sobbing.
"It's not true... I don't believe it... I am the strongest..." Ethan muttered over and over like a madman. "It must be because of her... Yes! It's because of that woman!"
Sorrow transformed into rage. He bellowed, "Alicia! It's her fault! If she hadn't messed with me, if she hadn't acted so arrogant, if she hadn't used that ice magic on me, I wouldn't be like this! She did this to me on purpose! She was jealous of my talent!"
"Ethan! Stop this nonsense immediately!" The Duke tried to intervene.
"Father, you must deal with her! Order her execution! She made me a cripple! She destroyed my life!" Ethan shouted maniacally, his face twisted with hatred. "It is her fault alone!!"
SLAP!!!
Ethan's face whipped to the side from the force of the blow. The Duke's thick palm left a bright red mark on his son's cheek.
The pain on his cheek was nothing compared to the shock. Ethan slowly turned back to look at his father, his eyes widening.
This was the first time in his life... that his father had slapped him.
"Stop blaming others and look at yourself!"
Duke Orwin shouted in his son's face, tears welling up in the father's eyes. "The one who cast the Forbidden Magic was you! The one who was arrogant and refused to listen to any warnings was you! And the one who almost killed himself was YOU!"
"You... You are taking her side..."
"I am taking the side of righteousness!" The Duke grabbed his son's shoulders and shook him violently to snap him back to reality. "Do you know that the Hellfire was about to burn you until not even bones remained!? I couldn't help you... Roger couldn't help you... No one could help you!"
The Duke stared deep into Ethan's trembling red eyes.
"Only Princess Alicia risked her life to rush in... She used all her power to freeze that fire and preserve your body from burning any further. If not for her... you would have been turned to ash long ago!"
The Duke released his son's shoulders and stepped back, looking at the powerless figure on the bed with a mix of pity and wretchedness.
"Engrave this into your skull, Ethan... The reason you still have breath to sit here and scream is solely because of the mercy of the person you are cursing."
With that, the Duke walked out of the room, leaving Ethan sitting frozen on the bed, alone.
The pain on his cheek still burned... but the truth he had just learned burned even more.
He hadn't just lost completely in power... he had lost completely as a 'human being.'