The Mysterious Black Magician

"Ngh!" The Wisp groaned. A painful feeling must be attacking it because of the transmission he forced into it. "I-I was only drifting in the woods yesterday night when I heard a buzzing sound. After I looked behind me, this thing was already at the back. I tried to run away from it. But this thing followed me.

While I was running away from it, I found myself staring at a fierce-looking creature. The creature was attacking the pitiful band of bees. Sucking them into its wide gaping beak. As a Wisp, I have no way to help them as I am a ghostly creature. I couldn't touch any physical objects, nor could I interfere with them?

Then this creature once again came rushing into me. And the unexpected happened when we crashed into each other.

I found myself inside it!

The weird thing is, I couldn't escape from it as it was like a vacuum that prevented me from escaping.

After a couple of seconds of struggling to escape. I found out that I couldn't do it as this thing was slowly sucking my life force. To protect me, I created a thin layer of protection. Then I found myself suddenly in control of it!"

Said the Wisp in a slight long explanation. "Then, after that….. I obtained the ability to interfere with physical objects. At first, I was surprised. This thing didn't only give me the ability to touch. It also gave me the ability to use some helpful skills!" The Wisp's voice turned from pained to an enthusiastic one as it was telling its story.

Yman and Sistela were listening to it without intervening as they were very amused by its story, although it was very unbelievable.

He could not help feeling doubtful about it. Then again, what it said might also be true.

In any case, none of them were knowledgeable about Wisp.

But the words of the Wisp made him ponder. It was a realistic outcome, to be honest. One is a drifting soul without a shell, and the other was an empty shell. Though, Yman was puzzled as to why the Wisp attracted the scout bee. 

While Yman was pondering he noticed the Wisp was not finished with its explanation and it continued saying, "...I tried saving the pitiful bees and succeeded. After that, they appointed me as their savior.

I didn't think about myself, but it was a good feeling to help them.

But then an unexpected problem occurred…"

Yman's brows slightly frowned. "A problem? Can you tell me what you mean by it?"

"Yeah, a problem. I found out that this thing was consuming my energy to remain in existence. And because of it, my existence was in danger of vanishing."

Yman remembered the thing he saw, a while ago, when the scout bee or the Wisp sucked the Teardrop Magical Herb.

He concluded that it must be refueling itself to remain in existence. "Are you the one responsible for devouring the plants and herbs outside?" Although his belief about it was strong, he wanted to make sure about it.

"Hm? Do you mean those leftover leaves that look like they were eaten by worms?"

Yman narrowed his eyes. The way the Wisp saying it was like it wasn't it's doing.

"Yeah, you are the one responsible for it, right?"

"Ngh, of course not!" The Wisp strongly denied.

Yman frowned. He stared at it, trying to figure if it was lying or not.

<Could it be….. it was lying?> Sistela commented.

'Can we appraise the truthfulness of its words?' he asked.

<Of course, we can't.>

Yman scratched his face. "But I caught you devouring the Teardrop Magical Herb." He said to the Wisp.

"No, you're wrong. I wasn't devouring it. I'm just taking a little bit of magical energy from it. Getting a little amount of magical energy from the magical herbs or plants won't affect them that much."

"Hmm…" 

Yman went into deep thinking while staring at the Wisp. Now, it's getting more mysterious. But Wisp's words had a point.

"I see, in that case—"

<Partner, you agreed with it?>

Sistela suddenly exclaimed. 

'Hmm, yeah. Why?'

<I mean, we caught it in the act.>

'I think the Wisp was right with what it said ."'

Yman said his thoughts. <What's your basis, partner?> Sistela asked and thought that his partner was getting so trusting. It wasn't good if they encountered a vile scheming person. Could it be, his wittiness shrouded after he became stronger? After all, some people who were leaning to strength would lose their ability to think rationally. They were prone to think, 'why waste their brain cells if they could settle everything using their unmatched strength?' Sistela was bothered by these thoughts.

But Yman's next reply made her realize. 'I mean….. that thing only devoured the magical energy and not the leaves itself. In this regard, the leaves would supposedly dry and lose a little of their vitality. But the leaves we saw had different outcomes. So it must be caused by a different reason,' he said to his Deity.

An "Aha!" The expression seemed like it rose inside Sistela after hearing her partner's simple explanation. <Oh, I see, you are right, partner.> Sistela finally understood why his partner agreed at the Wisp. Looks like her partner was still the witty person he used to be. She was glad. Then again, she was still the slow Deity that could not measure her partner's way of thinking.

(Sigh!) 

She was supposed to be his source of guidance. But he was the one that mostly explained all the things that she failed to understand. She was starting to wonder if she was a defective Deity like what her partner used to tell her.

This made her doubtful of herself for some reason.

While Yman and Sistela were conversing. They noticed the Wisp continued saying, "I swear I'm not the one responsible for it. My friends can testify to me about it!" The Wisp shouted. Yman saw the bees seemingly nodding their heads while noisily buzzing their wings. Or maybe it was only his imagination.

"Do you know the culprit?" He directly asked.

"Of course, it was the same culprit who attacked these friends of mine! The wait can you stop transmitting to me! It's painful, you know! Urgh!" The Wisp shouted and groaned. Its voice couldn't be identified if it was a female or male, though Yman didn't care about it.

Yman remembered the Wisp line a while ago, it called the enemy with a wide gaping beak. "Do you mean the bird?" It was his initial thought upon hearing the word 'beak'.

"No! It wasn't a bird!"

"Eh?"

"It was a worm! A Big beak worm!"

This further puzzled him. He never heard of such a creature before. Based on the name alone. It was already unbelievable. He stared at it.

"Mister, if you don't do something about those pests, they will become a big problem later on!" The Wisp suddenly added.

"Didn't you get rid of it already?"

"Yeah, but I only defeat one there's multiple of them!"

"What?!"

After hearing it, "WRING!", "WRING!", "WRING!"

A noise coming from the direction of the entrance. "What was that?" He subconsciously asked.

"No, they are coming!" The Wisp shouted. "Please, Mister, release me from this transmission, I will deal with them!" Said the Wisp.

The Wisp couldn't move as he was trying to take control of the shell which is the scout bee—his creation.

<What we should do about that Wisp? And our bee? Are we going to retrieve it?> Sistela asked. He planned to retrieve it. 

Yman chose not to answer Sistela and went to ask the Wisp, "Do you wish to free yourself from that thing?"

"I-If I freed myself from it, what happened to this thing?"

"Probably, it will dissipate," apparently he could avoid it by reinforcing it with his black mana, but he would only do it if that thing was able to copy some useful spells.

And after hearing thee Wisp's words, he thought that it would be fair to ask it first.

When the Wisp heard his reply, "No, please, I don't want to free myself from this thing!" The Wisp resolutely said. After all, being inside it gave many benefits to the Wisp. Especially the feeling of being able to touch a physical object. And most importantly, it could protect its new friends.

Yman glanced at the mug-like stone. The opening of it was covered by a black web from his spider enhanced fire dolls.

"Okay, it's your choice," he said.

"WRING!", "WRING!", "WRING!"

The weird noise was coming closer.

"Regardless, Mister, you need to escape now! Those creatures are very vicious. I couldn't protect you if I fight with multiple of them!"

"Aside from that, can you tell me about that thing over—"

"No! They're here!" 

He was about to ask about the mug-like stone but the enemies already arrived.

Yman glanced behind and saw the enemies. Their reddish bodies were as big as the cat. And they were flying with transparent wings on their back.

Their movements were not a bit slow compared to the scout bee and the guardian bird.

Just like the Wisp said, in front, a big beak was noticeable.

<What kind of creature is that?>

Yman's mouth hung open.