"Dona mihi aqua!" the enemy witch chanted a water spell.

"Dona mihi fulminis tonitura spiritus." I fought with thunder against her water spell. My magic was focused on driving her water back to her and sending thunderbolts her way.

The witch stopped spell before I managed to hit her and started chanting again. "Donna mihi motus terra spiritus."

The ground violently shook and I lost my balance. As I was falling to the ground I saw that Leo also lost his balance.

"Dona mihi crustallum!"

The earthquake didn't last long but it bought just enough time for the witch to send freezing bolts towards me. I rolled to my left to avoid freezing. Leo was still on the ground but the witch didn't focus her attacks on him. It would be best if he stayed on the ground so I can focus on my attacks and defending without worrying about him.

When I got up the witch seemed to be exhausted from casting all the magic. She was breathing heavily but I couldn't relax yet because I could still feel the dreadful menace coming from her. Our magic levels were the same but from her voice, I could tell she was much older. She must have had a lot more magic experience she could use against me.

"Dona mihi flamma ignis spiritus."

I called forth flames to encircle the witch but she quickly dispelled it and called forth water. "Aqua"

"Dona mihi potens amnis aqua spiritus!" she immediately chanted another spell.

The heavy water she called forth, broke my barrier and completely showered me. Water spells were my weakness and I hated how easily they could be used against me. She probably anticipated this when she saw my red lock.

I couldn't use spells one after another without taking breaks like her. The situation looked bad but I couldn't run away. If I tried that she'd hit me with a spell and it would be all over.

"Dona mihi magnus crustallum spiritus!" she started chanting a spell for heavy ice crystal attacks.

"Ignis!" I quickly called forth my flames to melt the ice.

I managed to melt some ice crystals but it was not enough. I felt the sharp ice ripping the skin on my shoulders and my hands. It hurt so much, but I couldn't call forth any magic to protect me in such a short time.

"Dona mihi..." the witch started chanting again.

She is going to defeat me at this rate. I needed to do something to overturn the situation but I couldn't think of anything but my magic. I focused really hard on casting a new spell but it proved to be very difficult. I just got a huge headache and I couldn't get any spell to work.

"Spiritus!" The witch finished her chant.

She was too quick for me and I embraced myself for the worst. I closed my eyes and prepared myself for a terrible scenario but nothing was happening. I heard a loud thud and noticed that Leon was standing behind the witch holding a large, thick book. She was knocked down on the floor and seemed unconscious.

"Did you just hit the witch with that book?" I asked with my eyes wide open because I haven't anticipated such a conclusion.

"Yes, mistress," Leo answered.

"Well, that was an effective way of solving the problem," I said.

"Thank you, mistress. I'm glad I was helpful," Leo said happily. "But you're bleeding a lot mistress."

He came close and examined my wounds worriedly, but after the initial pain when the wounds opened it was only a small pain now. It wasn't anything to worry about.

"Curatio!" I chanted a spell to heal my wounds.

My spell worked like a charm and no wounds or traces of blood were visible anymore.

"Amazing. It looks like you were never hurt." Leo was impressed by my spell. "Does this mean you're immortal like me?"

"No way!" I said quickly. "Healing powers usually don't work well on mortal wounds."

"That means you must be careful," Leo warned me.

"I'm susceptible to all problems humans have but I can solve a lot of problems with magic," I explained. "Besides if I was mortally wounded I wouldn't have enough focus for strong healing magic and I wouldn't be able to heal myself at all. Maybe another witch could heal me but it's a gamble if she could do it."

I quickly looked at the hole in Leo's stomach and turned my gaze away because I felt like I saw something I shouldn't have.

"Does it bother you mistress?" Leo asked me as he pulled his hand through the hole."I don't feel anything."

"Don't put your hand there!" I said almost shouting."I can't heal it, but I'll cast a spell to hide it because we'd get too much-unwanted attention if you walked around like that."

Leo just noded and I chanted the spell. "Abscondam foraminis et ostende pellis." The hole in Leo's stomach wasn't visible, instead, a layer of healthy skin made its appearance, but it was just a cover spell, an illusion for others. 

When I patched Leo up the best I could, we finished our conversation and I turned my focus to the book Leo was holding. It looked like a grimoire but I wanted to check on the witch before doing anything else. I uncovered her face which seemed to be young, but her hair was completely gray-white like an old woman's. I could sense magic on her that probably worked as a youth spell. She was hiding her real age, but that wasn't something I was interested in because I had more pressing matters. The witch didn't receive any wounds from our magic fight or from Leo's hit. She'll probably wake up after a short period of time. I put her in a sitting position and leaned her back against the cavern wall.

I felt that our magical levels were the same but unlike me, she could chant spells very fast one after the other. The fight wouldn't be a problem if I had more time between the spells. I guess that means I'm slow at casting magic and I should work on it. But how? Nobody ever really thought me anything in practice. The precise time needed to cast a spell wasn't something that I read about in books.

"Prohibere et rigescunt indutae motus!"

I chanted a spell that would paralyze all of her movements except except for speech. Although she treated me with great hostility I'll try to clear up my name and get more information about Akios from her.

"Do we run away now mistress?" Leo asked.

"No, we'll stay here for a little longer. I put a paralyzing spell on the witch and I'll try to talk things out with her."

"It will be okay this time. This spell won't fail on me." I tried to persuade him.

"What do we do now? Wake her up?" Leo said.

"No. I'll let her wake up naturally. "I said. "But in the meanwhile, I want to check the book you hit her with. Where did you find it?"

Leo pointed at a small table in the far left corner of the cavern. I didn't notice my surroundings because I was putting all my focus on the fight. With the heavy book in my hand, I approached the table and found out that there was a potion stash. The table was made from metal which I found odd because I've never seen a metal table. Except it, there was nothing else in the cavern. 

There was nothing else of interest in the room and I switched my focus to the witch's grimoire. It was a big leather-bound book with at least a thousand pages. My own grimoire was only a third of its size. I used clean, sturdy black covers. Her grimoire contained a lot more information than mine which was an advantage but if somebody were to hit me with my grimoire I wouldn't get knocked out. Everything had its flaws and strong points.

I flipped through the pages of her grimoire. The spells were explained in great detail but in a very simple manner. Even beginner witches could use it as a learning reference. Some of the spells were familiar but I also found some completely unfamiliar spells. I would have loved to study the grimoire but I didn't have enough time.

I quickly skipped through the pages as I looked for a way to cure zombie injuries. The first part of the book contained all elemental spells after it were healing spells and some miscellaneous information in the end but there wasn't anything about written zombies. I guess my enemy witch didn't use black magic and anything related to it. If I want to treat Leo I'll need to look for a black magic witch or ask Akios but both were equally undesired solutions.

After I saw there wasn't anything that could help me with Leo I checked the part about magical contracts. I must somehow terminate the magical contract with Akios before he takes more of my magic. The termination was neatly explained like everything else in the grimoire:

Only the witches involved in the agreement may terminate a magical contract for the following reasons:

1)Impossibility of Magic Performance.

2)Breach of Magic Contract.

3)Termination By Prior Agreement.

4)Rescission of the Magic Contract.

5)Completion of the Magic Contract.

It wasn't anything I didn't know prior but somehow I thought I could find more information from an experienced witch. Out of the five ways to terminate the contract four were impossible: it was possible to do the magic performance, the second option was also unavailable because even if I tried to breach the contract Akios wouldn't terminate it and would seek ways to extract my magic, rescission also wasn't an option because I have no valid excuses for entering the contract such as undue influence and lastly I surely didn't want the contract to be completed. Akios did his part of the bargain when he revived everyone in Leo's mansion and in exchange he's able to extract my magic. Since contracts work for mutual benefit and should be equally proportional it surely meant he could extract the same amount of my magic he used for the reviving spell. That was a lot more magic than even have. 

Any kind of negotiation wasn't an option so my only way out was Termination by Prior Agreement. Magical contracts usually have a termination clause, a list of specific reasons for which either of the contract sides could terminate the contract. Mine had also had one, but my magical contract was written in a language I didn't understand. The letters on my hand were unfamiliar to me. If only I could read them the situation would be solved with ease. I started looking through the pages of the grimoire to find the letters in this unknown language but I couldn't find anything. As I was frantically looking through the pages of the grimoire Leo was shaking my shoulders.

"Mistress! Mistress Calytrix!" he was shouting. "I've been calling you for a some time, but you didn't respond." 

"What's wrong?" I asked as he snapped me back to my senses from being lost in my thoughts.

"It's terribly uncivilized to look through another witch's grimoire without asking!" the old witch scolded me.

"I didn't know that. Wait- I don't think I need to apologize to someone who tried to kill me even if it's an older witch," I concluded.

"You do have magical potential but as an enemy to witches you should be eliminated." she stated."Are you going to hand me over to your masters Andrezey and Akios?"

"No!" I said firmly.

"If you're not here to eliminate me or hand me over to your masters why are you here?" she asked interested.

"I'm actually looking for a way to terminate my magical contract with Akios," I said.

"That makes no sense," she said.

"It is the truth! You don't know me so you can't judge me that easily."

"What I know is that this world will collapse soon and being in good terms with someone from another world could prolong your life," she explained.

"Andrezey said that he won't let that happen."

"Did he now?" she said with scorn in her voice."It bet it's a real coincidence that the black holes appeared after his first visit to our world."

I didn't have enough information and irrefutable evidence to accuse anyone of what's happening to our world so I shared the information I had, "Andrezey said it was the work of Princess of Darkness."

"I heard of their existence but I never met a single one of these Princess of Darkness," she said with distrust. "Another strange coincidence is that Andrezey and Akios crushed our guild when we refused to swear our allegiance to them."

"What? The guild of witches is disbanded?" I was in such a shock that I felt like my facial expression froze for a few moments.

"The world is ending, everything is purposeless," she said "This were our headquarters but everyone ran away. In the end, I wanted to take revenge on you, the traitor of this world and witches, somebody who made a magical contract with the enemy and I was unable to do that. You know, yesterday, before we got crushed I only blinded you because I thought I could give you a chance to redeem yourself but it's not possible anymore."

"I am not a traitor. I don't want the world to end! If I knew how I would do everything to stop the black holes," I justified myself. "How do you even know I made a contract?" My magical contract was camouflaged with a heat tattoo in front of her. 

"You might deceive everyone else but you can't deceive an experienced witch. It was clear that there's a magic exchange, a flow between the two of you. It can be felt in the air, " she explained.

She made a good point but I didn't want to think about Akios too much so I switched the topic. "When did the witches guild disband?"

"Yesterday, " she answered with one word.

"Leo, did you know anything about Akios's and Andrezey's plan?" I asked.

"Nothing mistress," he answered and I was sure he wouldn't lie to me.

"You're either a fantastic actress or you really don't know what's happening around you," the witch remarked."Tell me, dear, have you ever worked for the theater?"

Theater. Art town. Jacob. I felt a pang in my chest.

"You're making the mistress sad, you old hag," Leo said.

"Who are you calling a hag, you collapsing zombie!" The witch was furious.

"I can see your ugly face beneath the cover you put on," Leo answered back.

"Don't put my face on the same decay level as you. My face is still pretty. Zombies like you shouldn't sense any decay where there isn't any." she said. 

"I'm okay Leo, don't argue with her," I tried to end the conflict."What happened to the guild? What did Akios and Andrezey do?"

"Ask them. I don't feel like talking about it, " she was still angry."You should really discipline your rude and blind zombie."

"This will be my last question. Do any of the witches know how to stop the black holes?" I asked seriously.

"They don't."

"Nobody? That can't be true!" I felt a sudden weakness in my knees.

"If we could do anything we would have already dealt with it and our guild wouldn't fall apart," she said.

"Somebody must know something and I'll find that person!" I said as I tried to regain my strength.

"As I said everything is pointless now. You are on your journey, right? I remember we scolded you about the king, " she recalled the past. 

"What about it?" I asked.

"Your journey is pointless now too. Even if you manage to find your place in this world it would soon be gone," the witch predicted.

"It is not pointless!"I said as I felt the weakness all over my body again.

"I can predict with accuracy that you'll suck up to Akios the best you can and that'll be your path in life. You've already found it congratulations."

"I've never been this humiliated in my whole life!" I felt that my cheeks were flushed red and I was boiling on the inside.

"Mistress!! Mistress!! You're on fire!" Leo panicked.

I looked at my hands and noticed I was unconsciously producing fire that covered me but it wasn't burning me. The flames I produced would never hurt me.

"Let's get out of here Leo," I said while I was still on fire. "My journey in this world isn't even close to its end."

Leo listened to me without any questions asked and the witch didn't say anything anymore. She was just waiting for the paralyze spell to wear off. I felt that she won't come after us anymore so we didn't have to get out in a hurry. When we walked out of the mines dawn greeted us. It sent shimmering rays over the snowy landscape, bestowing a golden path from where we were standing to the horizon. It was high time to leave Lumi.