Illusion of Success

"Well that's a nice picture" Lillith turned the page again.

'MindBreak is an umbrella term encompassing an extremely rare combination of all other debilitating effects of illusion, such as confusion, mindflay, mindblast and others, many of which are taught of Power Words to voidlings.

A successful mindbreak requires mastery of all of them and even then, it takes practice or talent to be able to use it without error.'

"Great just more things to learn. This might take longer than I thought."

'Once you do nail it down to the timing and performance, only thing that can stop you is someone who's faster than you or an assassin.'

"Heh...or an assassin... funny." Lillith smiled a tad and moved to the next page.

The next page was just a shortened history of illusion magic and so were the next four or so pages.

Lillith rolled her eyes. "Come on get to the interesting pary!"

The part she wanted, which came after thirty more pages, was written in a language she didn't understand. It looked like some sort of runes.

"Are you serious?! I can't even read this!!!" Lillith almost slammed the book on the floor. Instead she just put the book back and tried to find a beginners book for illusions or something.

She found a book called 'Card Tricks and Others – The Complete Beginner's Guidebook to Illusion'.

Lillith took a breath." Baby steps" Lillith said as she opened the book.

And it really was just cards tricks and the simple stuff magicians do, nothing even remotely involving magic.

"I already know this stuff!!! UHHHH!" Lillith shoved the book back where it belonged. She took a deep breath. "Calm down Lillith. Just need to look harder." Lillith searched for another book.

The the first book she came across had a label that read 'Mind Games – Fear & Frenzy'

"Please be a good book." Lillith whispered as she turned to a page.

It was short and straight to the point, with the author called Mortimer I. Grand. This was supposedly the second book in the Mind Games series.

No introduction, no warning, it immediately started with the teaching of two spells – Fear, which made virtually anything flee from the caster for a limited time and Frenzy, which made anything attack anything also for a short time.

"Hmm sounds promising..." Lillith read more.

'People have many fears. Fears of losing something, someone, heights, spiders.

Clowns.

But all of them share a single fear unique to us sentients – a fear of time running out, a fear of everything fading away. 

A fear of death.

Fear does not work by giving them images of nightmarish creatures or beings, but by reminding someone that they'll die someday, like all of us do, with the exceptions of wizards, by reminding them of their mortality, how they're just one gear in a big, clockwork machine.'

"Fear of death... how do I illustrate that to people though..." Lillith flipped the page.

'Sounds simple, but isn't.

Just imagine the worst possible death scenario and just keep trying what works on everything.

Casting the fear spell, which is included on the next page for the impatient, is highly recommended using a wand or a staff, as casting by hand or scroll has very little range.

For the purposes of practice, however, your two appendages are enough.'

Lillith turned the page. "Worst possible death scenarios. I can think of a couple."

The next part was the spell itself.

It heavily referenced how elemental magic works and gave a very bried explanation.

'Elemental magic and it's granddaddy, material magic, work by the magic user projecting his thoughts to make something solid.

What we want to do is to project a thought and keep the way it looks abstract, unimportant. Most commonly, it is projected as a whirling cloud of energy, though it really boils down to the caster.

As long as it works, you're set.

However, knowing just what to do and how is not enough — you need practice.

Voluntary assistants and test subjects are recommended, but not required. If you have access to slaves, use those instead; no one will miss them in case anything goes wrong.

Good luck.'

That concluded one half of the already short book.

"Hmmm....keep the thought abstract. Ok It didn't have to be a cloud of energy. " Lillith put the book aside. She took a deep breath. (Lillith just focus. Make something a solid that isn't ink. Something tha doesn't matter...) Lillith really made an effort to focus.

A ball of energy appeared in front of her. It had the colour of her ink, but was transparent.

Lillith gasped. "I... actually did something!?!" Lillith was surprised and quite happy. She tried to wave her hand through the ball of energy.