Five years old.
At an age where my so-called "peers" were learning to eat their vegetables without throwing a tantrum, I, Fuoco Cattivo—former Sovereign of Hell, now miniature mortal noble—was deep into reconstructing the fundamental architecture of magic itself.
Because why play with wooden toy horses when you can play with cosmic annihilation instead?
Today's project: how to integrate holy magic—those nauseatingly pure, sparkle-infested mana threads—into my own devil magic without melting my tiny mortal body into a smoking puddle.
I lounged on a tower of spellbooks, a half-eaten biscuit dangling from my lips, scrawling formulae so dense they would have given an Archmage an aneurysm on sight.
It all started, naturally, with the mana core.
In humans, the mana core is an organic, semi-spiritual construct. Think of it as a living prism compressed into the heart of your soul, refracting ambient mana into forms you can actually use without exploding.
In demons like me—well, formerly like me—the core is far more brutal: a crystallization of pure willpower and affinity, forged under pressure that could shatter mortal minds.
No fancy resonance nonsense, no "harmonizing with the world." Just dominance. Consumption. Control.
In short, humans used mana like humble artisans.
Demons used mana like drunken blacksmiths who set the forge on fire and called it a good day.
Now, as a half-mortal child with a freshly formed human-style mana core, I was facing a dilemma:
My devil mana didn't want to gently harmonize with holy magic.
It wanted to bite it, chew it, and spit it out while screaming blasphemies.
Not ideal.
Thus, I had to rebuild the foundation.
Step One: Core Property Recalibration.
The typical devil mana core operates on a triaxial structure:
Destruction Vector (D): the drive to consume and obliterate.
Corruption Field (C): the diffusion of impurity and entropy.
Willpower Amplifier (W): the sheer stubbornness that multiplies mana density.
Normally, these three vectors form a stable loop, a vicious, self-sustaining cycle.
But the holy attribute throws a wrench into the loop because it introduces the Purification Constant (P), a property that actively cancels out corruption fields.
In other words: my mana core, as it stood, was incompatible with holy threads because it naturally tried to annihilate or be annihilated.
I would have to modify the loop.
Specifically, introduce a Neutral Bridge Element (N)—a transitional buffer that neither fully corrupted nor fully purified the mana flux but acted as a molecular negotiator.
In mathematical terms:
Original Structure:
D -> C -> W -> D (Cycle)
Revised Structure:
D -> N -> C -> N -> W -> N -> D (Expanded Cycle)
N would function as a quantum equilibrium point, absorbing volatility between opposite mana properties.
Easy to theorize.
Utterly stupid to attempt without the right conditions.
Which is why, obviously, I was going to do it immediately.
Step Two: Magic Circle Resonance Programming.
The second major problem: even if the mana core could survive the fusion, I needed a way to use the resulting mixed mana without detonating my own flesh like a water balloon at a gladiator festival.
Enter: Magic Circles.
To the average scholar, magic circles were simple geometric amplifiers—crude conduits that shaped mana into spells by routing it through runic channels.
But to me, an ex-tyrant of Hell?
Magic circles were the language of reality written in symbolic calculus.
A true magic circle was not just a fancy shape.
It was a living equation.
An algorithm.
A machine made of intent and geometry.
Thus, I would need to construct a new magic circle that could:
Accept both devil and holy mana inputs.
Pass them through Transmutational Harmonics Filters (THF) that realigned their conflicting waveforms.
Output a hybrid mana signature under my direct mental control.
I started sketching.
First: a dual-source vortex at the center—two interlocked spirals, one of dark mana, one of light.
Then: a four-layered resonance ring around them, embedded with both devil sigils (entropy modulation, chaos vectors) and holy runes (stability matrices, soul purification).
Around that: twelve stabilizer nodes inscribed with ancient transitional glyphs I half-remembered from the forbidden archives of Pandemonium.
It looked like a cross between a demonic summoning circle and a child's overly ambitious attempt at drawing a flower.
Perfect.
Now, the secret sauce: the Synchronization Phases.
Normally, a magic circle operates in a single, smooth phase: input mana, manipulate it, output spell.
Mine would have six mini-phases that each handled different mana properties separately before merging:
Attunement Phase:
Sample ambient mana, detect input polarity.
Polarization Phase:
Separate positive (holy) and negative (devil) energies.
Neutralization Phase:
Shunt extreme resonances into the Neutral Bridge Element.
Compression Phase:
Densify harmonized mana into a usable, stable flux.
Synthesis Phase:
Realign compressed flux under the Renewal Concept.
Emission Phase:
Deploy as coherent, integrated Damnatio Lux spell.
Simple, right?
It would require absurd precision.
One misplaced rune, one error in flux compression, and the circle would collapse into a beautiful, screaming singularity of failure.
But again: what's life without a little mortal peril?
Step Three: Conceptual Anchor Creation.
Even after the mana was stabilized and channeled, it would revert to chaotic hostility if I didn't fix the emotional side.
Mana responds to emotion as much as it does to math.
Thus, I needed to create a Conceptual Anchor within myself.
A core philosophical principle that permanently harmonized both mana types.
Hence: Renewal through Destruction.
Where destruction isn't the end.
It's the catalyst for rebirth.
Ashes to soil.
Death to life.
A phoenix cycle.
Not salvation through mercy.
Salvation through catharsis.
A beautiful, poetic kind of violence.
Honestly, I almost teared up at my own genius.
I mean, who else could combine the fundamental nature of sin and sanctity into a working combat doctrine by the age of five?
Nobody, that's who.
I sat back, surveying my scrawled diagrams, feeling the kind of satisfaction normal children must feel after finishing a really good mud pie.
Then the door creaked open.
Millie, my long-suffering nanny, poked her head in.
She took one look at the sprawling chaos of papers and glowing experimental mini-circles and sighed the sigh of a woman who had resigned herself to babysitting a small god of madness.
"Master Fuoco," she said gently. "It's time for your nap."
I blinked at her.
Then blinked down at my diagrams.
Then blinked back at her.
...
Maybe a short nap would help me come up with the stabilizing mana frequency equations.
You know, before my tiny mortal organs decided to sue me for magical malpractice.
With a grand, weary sigh—one worthy of a tragic opera hero—I closed my notebook and allowed myself to be scooped up like a misbehaving kitten.
But as she carried me off, humming a lullaby, I glanced over her shoulder at my messy desk and smiled.
Not a child's smile.
Something older.
Hungrier.
Because it was only a matter of time.
The theory was there.
The structure was there.
Soon, I would master it.
Holy and devil magic—two absolute forces—merged under my will.
And when I did?
Not even the gods would know whether to bless me or fear me.
And honestly?
I was counting on both.