Book Six: Chapter 93

Mike shivered involuntarily, recalling the memory as though it were happening again. Some nights, even now, he dreamed of having Leeds pinned beneath him, feeling that raw surge of destructive power thrumming through his limbs. It was intoxicating, the sense that the air itself was charged, hovering between restraint and release, just begging to be unleashed. His hand flexed, the knuckles whitening, and a faint twinge traveled up his forearm—a reminder that even a fraction of that magic carried weight. If that force had been allowed to transform him fully, he wondered with a shudder, what would he have become? A monster? A god? Something entirely unrecognizable?

He turned his gaze to the frozen remains surrounding him. The ice, jagged and cruelly sculpted by years of magical tension, reflected the dim light in sharp, fractured angles. Shadows seemed to linger longer than they should, coiling between the shards like serpents