Seeing the enemy that was engulfed in flames right before my very eyes, I wasnt able to contain my happiness. So this is magic! It really is as amazing as I imagined it to be!
Eventually the fire stopped burning, and when it did it became evident that it wasnt as strong as my attacks with Durandal, because even when it was set ablaze, the Needlewood was still standing. With its entire body covered with cinders and clouds of heavy black smoke, it slowly made its way towards us. But I wasnt disappointed with that a result, not in the slightest. Moreover, I guess you could say that such a result was what I was expecting. After all, Durandal is an uber OP weapon obtained from investing my Bonus Points into Bonus Weapons Skill all the way to Lv.6 and most of my stat points have been allocated into STR to make sure that it will always kill enemies with one blow no matter what. On the other hand, I only just got my hands on the Mage Job so it was still at its default, lowest level, Lv.1, and Fireball was a part of Beginner Fire Magic Skill, meaning that its inherent damage likely wont be all that high, and my rather low INT stat probably wont do anything to change that fact either. Anyway, maybe it was because it only had a tiny sliver of its HP left, but the burning Needlewood was exceptionally sluggish, which made disposing of him easier than taking the candy from a little kid. I didnt even have to put any strength in my next slash to turn it into a cloud of green smoke.
Okay, so now that we know how the Orb, or rather Ball type of magic works, lets try taking the Wall-type magic for a spin, shall we?
Hmm, lets go with the most obvious one first: Fire Wall!
When I thought of those words in my mind, a literal wall of flames appeared before me. Both its width and height were about two meters, making them quite reasonable measurements for that type of spell, but I bet that on higher levels both of those parameters could be sufficiently increased, so I have to keep that in mind as I continue to level the Mage Job and obtain new spells from it. The flames continued to rage of for a dozen seconds. And that takes care of the Fire Wall test. I guess in conclusion it could be said that it more of a defensive than an offensive spell that sets everyone who tries to walk through it on fire. My guess is that it would be at its most useful when there would be a lot of enemies in a small, confined space like the entrance to the trap room, for example! Oh baby, you can be sure I am going to be using that then!
Roger!
Once we reached the second floor and found a sufficiently large group of monsters (for the record: they were all Needlewoods) I chanted the Fire Storm again, targeting it towards them. When I did that, the air around them has been filled with a myriad of red sparks which illuminated the caves walls with a shade of red in much the same fashion like Fireball and Fire Wall did before them. Maybe its going to sound a little bit too poetic, but it was kinda sorta as if I was watching fireflies gather only to explode in a fiery all-consuming blaze that swallowed everything in its vicinity, burning everything to ashes. The Needlewoods just burned and burned and burned until there was nothing left of them or at least thats how I envisioned it, because once more the spell itself was not enough to one-shot the enemies, leaving me to finish them off with Durandal, which I promptly proceeded to do, leaving Roxanne to collect any items that dropped out of them in the process of turning the stragglers into the puffs of green smoke.
My thoughts on Fire Storm? Unlike Fireball and Fire Wall, it is a spell which works best when targeted in the middle of a group of enemies, since you cannot specify the direction where it should be going. The only question that is left unanswered for now is whether or not it can distinguish friend from foe, or is it that kind of spell which works on everything in its range indiscriminately?
I wanted to go an and test the rest of the spells from the other branches of Beginner Magic that I unlocked, but for now I decided to go out of the Labyrinth and have a short rest after everything we have been though today. Just let me say one thing in advance:
Magic is absolutely the best!