Liliana shifted uncomfortably in her seat. She had never received a compliment before meeting Petra. The first few times, she had responded modestly, but she knew better now—the mage always protested, insisting that Liliana was promising and encouraging her to be more confident.
“Hexes don’t require mana, so even people without it can use them if they know how. At least, that’s the common assumption.”
“Is that not actually true?” Liliana asked, confused by her teacher’s roundabout phrasing.
“Nope,” Petra said, beaming. “Nobody knows why, but the more mana someone has, the better their hexes.”
It had apparently been proven through several studies, which Liliana found convincing enough. Perhaps unraveling the link between the amount of mana a person had and the potency of their hexes would shed light on the nature of mana itself—if such a thing were even possible.
“What is mana?” feels more philosophical than anything else. We’d probably have as much luck defining it as we would explaining why a cation carries a plus sign and not some other arbitrary symbol.
Indeed, definitions were a labyrinth without end. Liliana gazed absently into the air before snapping back to her senses.
“So, what happens to the target of a hex?”
“They’re affected whether they have mana or not—though the presence of mana changes both how the hex affects them and the means by which certain, more noticeable hexes are applied. Some hexes are lethal only to those with mana, while others are lethal only to those without. In that sense, they’re more varied than magic. You could use a hex to make an invisible monster—we call them spirits in the world of hexes—possess your victim. That’s not something magic can achieve. Then again, I doubt you’d find someone who wouldn’t burst in the process.”
Petra paused to take another swig of alcohol, her smirk betraying how much fun she was having. She must have been enjoying her drink as well, as she took several generous gulps in a row. Liliana had recently realized that her teacher favored hexes over magic, and as a result, her own knowledge of hexes had been growing exponentially.
“You can incorporate magic into hexes,” Petra continued, “though it doesn’t work with just any spell. Dark magic blends fairly easily—it has a high affinity with hexes, since both are curses. Light magic, on the other hand, resists it, mixing about as well as oil does with water.”
Liliana sipped her juice, savoring the crisp apple flavor. She then accepted a piece of dried meat from Petra and took a bite, though the taste was too strong for her.
“It’s the same wild boar we had for dinner,” Petra said, stuffing her cheeks. “It tastes so different because of the way it was cooked. I prefer it like this, personally.”
Liliana wasn’t at all used to tough food; she was barely halfway through her first piece when Petra reached for seconds. A fond smile tugged at the corners of the mage’s lips as she watched her student gnaw at the meat.
“Hexes are barely studied in this kingdom,” Petra noted, diving straight back into her lecture. “That’s why people assume all magic tied to hexes is dark magic. You can incorporate hexes into magic of other elements, though.”
Not just dark magic...?
Liliana was taken aback. From the various books she’d read, she had assumed dark magic was banned primarily because of its strong affinity with curses. Learning that hexes could be integrated with other kinds of magic changed everything.
“You can incorporate them into the four basic elements, though people in this country aren’t aware of that,” Petra added, noticing Liliana’s astonishment. “They even work with light magic, but that’s no easy feat—you’d need a good sense for it.” The mage took another bite of dried meat, then mused aloud, “Maybe I should get more of this. For gifts, I mean. It’s great, and the fact it keeps so long makes it even better. We’ll stop here on our way back, right?”
The meat’s long shelf life made it an excellent gift, Liliana thought, but that wasn’t why Petra wanted more. Clearly, the mage wanted more snacks for her evening drinking sessions in Fortier. Liliana had to suppress an awkward smile.
“When you think of it that way, hexes can be considered a kind of magic,” Petra continued, returning to the lesson’s focus. She always became livelier when speaking about hexes. “Of course, there’s a key difference between the two. With magic, the effects appear almost instantly after activation. Hexes can also produce immediate effects, but they don’t have to. What sets them apart is their potential for delayed attacks.”
“‘Delayed attacks’?”
“Yep. Take a hex that uses seeds, for example.”
Petra picked up one of the beans she’d bought to snack on, and an aura dark enough to inspire a shudder began emanating from her. Liliana’s eyes were glued to her teacher.
“Real or not, it doesn’t matter. The seed is just a metaphor, at the end of the day. So, what you do is plant this into the target.”
Petra held the bean between her thumb and index finger, showing it to her student. It was fried, but it sprouted anyway. Liliana couldn’t hide her surprise.
Pleased with the reaction, Petra tossed the bean into her mouth. “Beans use mana to grow inside the target’s body. When the right time comes, or some trigger occurs, they bloom, completing the hex and cursing the target. Any seed will work, though poisonous ones have a stronger effect. Of course, there are other ways to hex people as well.”
Petra laughed unreservedly, lifting the mood that had begun to turn heavy. Liliana released the breath she hadn’t realized she was holding as her teacher reached for more beans, perhaps having grown tired of the dried meat.
“There’s a lot to be said about hexes, but what’s both annoying and interesting is that they’re not as systematized as magic. Magic has spells, so even if your mana goes haywire or your spell fails, there are ways to deal with it. Hexes, however, don’t follow fixed models. If someone using one loses control, there’s nothing anyone can do. It won’t stop until it affects the target, bounces back on the caster, or produces some other consequence.”
“Hexes aren’t common in Slivegrandia or its neighboring countries, I suppose. Are there any countries where they’re more prevalent than magic?”
Even in the vast Empire of Yunatian east of Slivegrandia, magic was said to be more common than hexes.
Petra flung a handful of beans into her mouth, chewed for a while, then nodded and swallowed. “I’ve heard there’s a place far east of the empire where hexes are more common. I can’t speak for the present, but many years ago, they even considered words to be curses. From that perspective, curses are a hex thing. Magic has spells that can bring misfortune or disasters, but they’re all banned and aren’t technically curses. Besides, there aren’t as many types of spells as there are hexes, and their effects are weaker. In that sense, magic is for amateurs.”
Liliana found her teacher’s explanation remarkably easy to follow. Hexes had no fixed models, making them harder for amateurs to use—but the idea of wielding such unrestricted power was exhilarating.
Petra continued, seemingly fanning the flames of Liliana’s imagination. “What this means is that new hexes are being created all the time. Dispelling a hex is far harder than dispelling magic, mind you. With magic, you can examine the spell to figure out how to undo it, but hexes don’t have spells.”
That, Liliana realized, was precisely why Petra found hexes so alluring. After coming this far in the lesson, she finally understood what her teacher was getting at.
“So that’s why we need to analyze the hex on my throat.”
“Exactly. Only after analyzing it can we understand what effects it might have when dispelled and how best to deal with it.”
Sometimes, analyzing a hex could cause it to transform. Given the risk of adverse effects during the process, such an analysis couldn’t be undertaken lightly.
“It’s a real pain,” Petra grumbled. It was strange to hear her openly annoyed, but Liliana paid it no mind.
“We’re going to the Ministry of Magic to minimize the risks of analyzing the hex on me. Is that it?”
“Yes, exactly.”
Liliana now understood why Petra had invited her to the ministry, but the mystery only deepened. In the game, how had she learned hexes and cursed the crown prince and the heroine? She remembered being convicted of using dark magic, but judging by Petra’s explanation, her in-game self had probably relied on hexes rather than dark magic.
Maybe someone helped me.
The topic of hexes was far too complex for Liliana to have mastered alone. She must have had an accomplice. Yet no matter how hard she racked her memory, she found no answers. Information about the villainess Liliana was scarce to begin with, especially compared to the protagonist and the romanceable characters. The game unfolded from the heroine’s perspective, meaning all facts were presented as she understood them. Objective truths were almost never revealed.
Liliana stared at the woman before her. Petra had never appeared in the game. Her name hadn’t even come up in any related materials. The game’s events were still seven years away, and the mage wouldn’t be present for any of them. If she had been the one to teach Liliana hexes, her absence seemed strangely abrupt.
Unsure what to think, Liliana let out a quiet, inward sigh. I just don’t understand.