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The defence mechanism even reactivated, as the spell felt it was being torn apart.

With more and more vines lashing at him, Alex frowned.

"This spell… It\'s far more intricate than it appears. Who could have crafted such a thing?" Alex mused, his voice tinged with a mix of curiosity and concern.

But he couldn\'t take the time to ponder. The snare was already dangerously close to crushing Killian\'s soul.

Alex was only here to ensure his rune circle could function, though. He had reacted to the attacks, but he didn\'t need to be in here at all.

With a motion of pulling, Alex drew the circle into Killian\'s mind space, where it snapped onto the walls, before pulsing with mana.

The brambles shook and writhed as they started burning away increasingly fast. Alex could see the soul was bleeding energy through the gaps, and he extended his hand toward it.

He managed to hold on to the bleeding soul essence, buying himself some time, as the snare was slowly being burned away.

But as the soul snare burned away, the energy contained in the vines amassed over Killian\'s soul.

Alex looked at the smoke, and a frown appeared on his face.

"This isn\'t something a normal human can do. Show yourself, whoever you are," he said, locking his eyes on the smoke.

There was a moment of silence before the smoke shaped itself into a head, a face with sharp features morphing into it.

"Who are you, and why are you trying to break my hold on my descendant?" a baritone voice boomed.

Alex smirked at the face, which had no colour to it, aside from the black of the smoke.

But some traits were unmistakable.

A glowing pattern shimmered through the dark smoke in the left pupil of the smoke face, and Alex grinned.

"So that is who you are, sorcerer," Alex said, recognizing the symbol.

Long ago, he had seen it in a fable when his mother still read him stories before bed.

"Answer my question, human," the smoke face repeated. n/o/vel/b//in dot c//om

It was pressed for time, as it felt its hold on Killian\'s soul diminish by the second.

At a single glance, the face in the smoke realized that the runes on the inside of his descendant\'s mind were way past an average caster\'s reach.

As it focused its eyes on the human again, it realized that he was now much closer, floating in front of his face.

"Here, let me make this easier for you," Alex said, stabbing his hand into the glowing sigil in the left eye.

Instantly, Alex\'s vision swam, and he entered another mind space, this one much more filled.

One could even say it was cluttered…

The mind space was an echo of a study, with books lining the walls higher than the eye could see, and garnishing the floor, making it almost impassable.

And at the end of the study, in a lavish chair, with red velvet and golden trims, an old man glared at Alex, a crystal ball still shimmering before him.

"How did you get inside my head, young man?" he growled, his face a mask of anger and distrust.

"You aren\'t the only one who can connect to minds and souls, old man. But I am surprised you aren\'t just a memory, an echo of a distant past. To think the great sorcerer would dabble in magicks as dark as possession," Alex said, walking toward the old man.

The old man frowned, as his interlocutor grasped concepts that no other mage besides him should know—at least not on Earth.

"How do you know who I am?" the old man asked, fear creeping up in his heart.

If he were discovered now, after so long of existing, his prestige would wane, and his legend would be spun into a dark tale. He couldn\'t afford that.

Not now, as the world teemed with an energy that could make his life goal a possibility.

"Who I am doesn\'t matter. On the other hand, who you are is a much more interesting subject. I wonder how many would pay to know that the great Merlin still lives. And how many would rejoice at the thought of taking you down themselves, given you sully the legend of your name, Merin Ambrosius, or rather, Myrddin Emrys?"

The old man jolted to his feet, a great staff appearing in his hand, as it glowed with power.

"I know not who or what you are, and how you know all you know. But I cannot let you leave here alive," the old man scowled, as thorns of pitch black shot out of his staff.

But they hit nothing, as Alex reappeared next to the old man, forcing him into his chair with a shove.

The old man was almost immediately reminded of a reality that he hadn\'t experienced since his last fight against the dark witch.

If someone could enter your mind, it meant they were, at the very least, as powerful as you…

"Sit down, Merlin. I didn\'t come here to fight you. Only to talk," Alex said, smirking at the old man.

Contrary to how the legends depicted him, with long flowing robes and a beard that almost reached his feet, the Merlin before him looked a lot sleeker.

His short trimmed beard, and business-cut suit, seldom made him look like a sorcerer. He resembled more like someone in Jack\'s entourage than a sorcerer of old Britain.

His pearl-white hair and beard almost flickered with the fireplace flames to his left, as he glared at Alex.

Alex looked into his eyes and knew he wasn\'t facing an imitation or a doppelgänger.

This was the real Merlin.

Merlin\'s family crest was glowing in golden light in his left pupil, as the other eye, steel grey, was almost too plain in comparison.

Alex sat on a pile of books across the small coffee table in front of Merlin\'s chair, on which the crystal ball rested.

"Now, tell me. Why are you still alive? And why are you tormenting your descendants like this, you remnant of a time that should be lost?"