Masteria Online: Shattering the Dark God's Grand Scheme-Chapter 165 - To Circus

The dark wisps slammed into her chest. "Nghh~" They lightly knocked her back, creating a wind causing her hair to flow.

"What...?" A pixie couldn’t help but comment at the acne. It was impossible not to. A human had been spreading their arms and catching the breeze of a curse?

Huh?

[Debuff Applied: Intelligence Drain]

[INT reduced by 30% for 3:00]

[Debuff Applied: Mana Burden]

[Spell costs increased by 200% for 3:00]

She immediately felt the difference as the curses settled on her. "Hehe..." It was funny to her, actually. "Hahaha!"

How could she not laugh? When her intelligence went down and her spell costs increased, she felt a physical burden settle in on her mind. She felt slow, she felt wrong.

Yet when her intelligence went up, she felt no different.

Truly, it was easiest to appreciate things once they are gone.

Watching Lena take the curses after attacking herself, and begin laughing manicacally, the two pixies froze completely in mid-flight.

Their wings stopped beating for a fraction of a second before they caught themselves and resumed hovering.

The green-winged one’s mouth opened slightly. "What..."

The yellow-winged one just stared, its expression completely blank with confusion.

What the fuck was she doing?

The green-winged pixie looked at its companion. "Did she just..."

"She shot herself." the yellow-winged one confirmed, its voice carrying utter bewilderment. "She definitely just shot herself."

"Why?"

"I don’t know!"

"Aren’t you supposed to be good at curses!?"

"What does THIS have to do with curses!?"

They both stared at Lena, trying to process what they’d just witnessed.

A human mage had just cast offensive magic on herself, injured herself significantly, and then allowed their curses to land without any resistance.

That made no sense to them, none whatsoever. What were they even supposed to do now? Continue on as if nothing was happening?

The green pixie’s eyes narrowed suspiciously. It began looking around frantically, searching the area. There were countless other fights going on. It did its best to ignore the fight, thinking back to Nolan. Its gaze swept across the nearby branches, the shadows, the empty air itself.

"Check for portals!" it hissed to its companion.

The yellow one immediately complied, its eyes glowing faintly as it scanned for dimensional distortions, for hidden magic circles, for anything that might indicate a summoning ritual in progress.

In their heads, this could only mean one of two things.

Either she had gone completely insane. If that happened, then their follow up actions don’t matter. The other option was that she was performing some kind of dark magic ritual they didn’t understand. Some human technique they’d never encountered before.

Which meant they had to be extremely careful.

If it was a summoning, there could be a demon about to manifest. If it was a curse reflection, their own magic might be about to rebound on them. If it was some kind of sacrificial technique, she might be preparing to detonate herself in a suicide attack.

The green pixie raised its wand defensively, ready to teleport at the first sign of danger.

The yellow one spread out further, increasing the distance between them so a single area attack couldn’t catch both.

"..."

The tension settled, dragging off uncomfortably as nothing happened. Not a bomb, no spell, nothing.

And then Lena raised her wand again.

"Heal."

A wave of warm, restorative light washed over her body. She let out a satisfied smile.

[HP +201]

The pain faded to a mere dull ache.The two pixies exchanged another glance.

The green one spoke slowly. "Did she just... heal herself?"

"Yes."

"But... Holy Arrows? Heal?" Its voice rose in pitch. "She’s a priest?"

"She has to be. Those are priest spells."

"Then what the hell is she doing!?" the green pixie practically shouted. "Why would a priest shoot herself and then heal it!?"

The yellow-winged one had no answer. It just shook its head, completely at a loss. "D-does it... mater?" The pixies seriously couldn’t understand what was happening. Regardless of their screams, Lena understood perfectly.

She checked her status display, examining the debuff information carefully.

[Debuff Applied: Intelligence Drain]

[INT reduced by 18% for 1:47]

[Debuff Applied: Mana Burden]

[Spell costs increased by 24% for 1:51]

Both the duration and the intensity of the effects had been reduced significantly.

What was once a 30% reduction was now only 18%.

What was once a 40% increase was now only 24%.

The timers had been cut nearly in half. 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

She grinned.

The pixies would have known about this interaction if they had ever bothered to properly study the underlying principles of curse magic. If they’d read the actual theory instead of just memorizing spell incantations and rushing into battle.

When it came to most pixies, they learned spells by rote, by practice, by watching others cast. They didn’t study the why. They just learned the how.

Curses targeted someone’s identity.

But what did that actually mean? How did they function mechanically?

These pixies were nowhere near skilled enough to target something as abstract and fundamental as a soul. That required mastery far beyond their current level. Instead, their curses targeted the physical body as a proxy for identity.

The curse attached itself to the physical matter that composed Lena’s form, spreading through her flesh and blood.

So what would happen if the following sequence occurred?

One, the curse lands on the physical body.

Next, part of that physical body is destroyed.

Last, the body is repaired with new matter.

This led to a predicament. The new matter wasn’t cursed. Only the original matter retained the curse.

Which meant the overall curse effect was diluted proportionally to how much of the body had been replaced.

Lena had just forcibly destroyed roughly 40% of her body’s mass with her own Holy Arrows, then regenerated it with Heal.

The curses were now only affecting 60% of her.

It was a technique she’d theorized after reading through some of Merath’s introductory texts on curse theory. She’d never had a chance to test it before now.

Apparently, it worked.

Lena’s grin widened further.

The fight was about to begin for real.