In this world, Magic is Everything. All people, all races, are granted with the power to perform mystical and magical feats via grimories, mystical tomes granted to each and every child on their 15th birthday. Those blessed by the mana can have their names written down in legend.
Shattered Grimoires is the work of the mind(s) of Ardere & Shattered Grimoire's staff. All characters and content are copyright their creators, and may not be replicated without their creators' permission. Black Clover is owned by Yuki Tabata and published by Viz Shonen Jump. All images belong to their original owners. The theme you are currently viewing was made by Eliza of ElizaCodes exclusively for Shattered Grimoires.
Some time had passed since the last time Griswold had gone out to truly train his magical prowess out in the wilderness of the Clover Kingdom. It would come as a surprise to no one that quite a lot had happened in the meantime, as the Crimson Lion was never really one for sitting still and just letting things pass him by while doing nothing. Whether it had been because of his last training sessions and the fruits it bore or if things had been entirely unrelated, he had been handpicked to be part of not one, but two different missions. One of these missions had taken him into the forsaken realm, a place he had not exactly been expecting to visit for an official mission such as this. The mission briefing told of a place that had been dubbed the “Cursed Forest” by the locals due to the unnatural darkness caused by the dense foliage and treetops that let little to no light through.
While that much was enough reason to be frightful of certain places, especially in the rural areas where people had more trouble taking care of themselves, the main reason why people had come to believe that the place was cursed was because of more nefarious reasons. It would come as no surprise to anyone that the outlaws and rogues of the country would prefer to stay as far away from the royal capital as possible, which made the forsaken realm ideal for them as it also allowed them to push around those beneath them. Now, where things were starting to get shady was the point where it had been made clear that people went missing in these woods. But not just civilians, wanted rogues and proven murderers too. As easy as it might have been to pin things on wolves or a bear or something along those lines when talking about missing civilians, it became a different story when skilled magic users went missing there too.
And so, it had become his task to figure out what had been going on around there, as well as figuring out what might be behind these missing persons cases. Even during the briefing, Griswold could already feel deep in his gut that there was something going on there that would take its toll on him. As a former resident of the forsaken realm, he felt for the people there very strongly as he knew their daily struggles quite well. After all, he had lived it for several years before he became a magic knight. While his own village was not exactly in the direction that this mission would be taking him, the very idea that the people he cared about might venture near that place and ended up getting lost or worse was not exactly feeding into the good mood he had woken up with at the time.
The woman he had been going on his mission with, the one called Demiari, or Demi, was not exactly what one might consider to be the best traveling partner. As such, he had been quite happy that they had decided to meet up at the very doorstep of the cursed forest rather than traveling to the place together. To say that she had behaved in a rather antisocial manner would have been quite the understatement, though somehow the two managed to at the very least put up with one another long enough to get down to business. Some of the things he had seen in the forest were things he wished he could forget as they were the very embodiment of the words “nightmare fuel”. Partially devoured corpses, bodies that had been dragged into the ground and had roots going all throughout them as they were being used as nourishment for plant creatures known as Mandrakes and more.
While setting those creatures on fire had managed to also deliver a blow to the impact they had on the forest, namely the part that made it look so incredibly haunting, it did not bring back the people that had died there. Truly, when forest rose up in such a manner as to let creatures made out of plant material use human bodies as fertilizer, dubbing a place a forest as “Cursed” was only fair. Still remembering the time in his life when he truly experienced fear for the first time, which was without a doubt the one thing he felt when he realized that everything and everyone he had ever known was gone, the time he spent in the forest was pretty much a close second. Experiencing his own fear, as well as being able to sense the fear of all those that had been taken to the forest or got killed there in a very palpable manner, it was not so much a thing he wished to go through ever again.
With what he could do, he should never have been sent to that dreadful place, and neither should Demiari. Though she had some serious skills that could not be ignored, the two of them were not equipped to deal with what the dark heart of the forest had to offer them. If anything, they should have sent in at least a senior magic knight along with them, maybe two, though no one could have known that a very cunning and powerful Hag had been behind just about all of the bad things that had happened. Even though he knew that this had been no one’s fault, Griswold could not keep himself from thinking about what might have been if the roles had been reversed. Had the people that disappeared been of noble birth, had these things happened closer to the royal capital, chances were that they would have dispatched an entire team of senior magic knights and their captain to handle the issue.
As cheap as it felt to think like that, he knew that there was truth to it, and that the lives of commoners were just not worth as much as those of noble folk. During the days after the events of the cursed forest, there had been plenty of opportunities for the Crimson Lion to vent some of his frustration, as well as do some good in the world. A prime example of the latter would have been his encounter with the two trolls that had kidnapped a person on the main road near Nairn, Gresk and Greur. Even though they had violently taken a man against their will, one could argue and make the case that he had deserved it. Given the intellect of a troll and how it rarely ever peaked far above that of a child, tricking them and stealing from them was never a good idea. In a way, Griswold would have much enjoyed just leaving the guy in the care of the troll duo.
However, seeing as the two were both hungry and angry and locked the man inside of a large pot, the unlit timber at the base of it told the magic knight that they would have cooked and eaten the man for his crimes if given the chance. Feeling like that would be too harsh a punishment given the crimes, he instead offered to give them the loaf of bread, the lettuce and the large chunk of dried beef he had brought with him to what was supposed to be his training day. Taking a bit of plotting and negotiating on his part, as well as some attempted aid from a magic knight to be, the man managed to escape the pot in one piece. Leaving Gresk and Greur in their cavern home to do with Griswold’s food as they pleased, he gave the rescued man quite an earful, as well as making sure he got compensated for the food and the time he had lost on his day off work.
And that was just one of the things he had taken on as a means of distracting himself from the things he had seen in the cursed forest, which had really only worked to some extent. But he imagined that such a thing was only natural, given the things he and Demiari had seen. While it did seem like she was more calm about all of it, at least more than he pretended to be behind a face as stoic as he could make it, he did not believe for a second that it did not reach her. No person was ever so cold as to just be able to brush such things off, no matter what they might project to the outside world. Loss of life was always a thing to feel bad about, that was a fact. But all of that, it was in the past now, and he would very much wish to leave it there if he could by burying it under as many new encounters as he could.
Compared to all that had gone down in the forest and their battle against the Hag that had seemingly been pulling the strings from behind the scenes, the first real “Dungeon” he had been requested to visit had been filled with all sorts of nightmares of the living fossil variety. Never having been much of a disbeliever when it came to there being other creatures that lived long before humanity had inherited the planet, that did not make it any less terrifying to be standing eye to eye with actual, living dinosaurs. Creatures that had been thought long extinct by most, and were considered to be mere myth by others, there was nothing that could have prepared him for his first encounter with these amazing creatures. Had they not been so eager to devour him as well as the party of knights he had come with, he might have even taken the time to admire them properly.
Alas, they might not have been in the business of using magic like the Hag had done at the heart of the cursed forest, though they really did not need to. They were either in their element as an aquatic creature that could attack from beneath the waves, a place where Griswold’s own fire magic would be entirely useless, or they would attack in packs that could easily overwhelm junior knights such as himself and the majority of the people he had come with. Then there was the one that had been capable of taking to the skies and attacking from above with powerful gusts of wind, as well as sharp talons it would use to rake at occupied targets. While others had come up with entire strategies in order to overwhelm, kill and consume their prey, there had been one that had no need for such games.
The massive Juvasaur was a sight to behold, albeit from a safe distance on account of how incredibly hostile and violent it was to any and all that so much as got within sniffing distance. And because it had senses that went well beyond what the average human could pick up on, it had been aware of their presence about as soon as they made their way to the general space in which it lived. There was no telling how the creature had been alive, or how long it had been alive for, though it seemed that the tower had preserved these species safely inside. Either that, or it had somehow managed to capture certain pockets of time within itself through some mysterious means. Whatever the case had been, there had not been a whole lot of times when he felt so on edge as when he had been put up against the gargantuan beast from a now lost world.
The saddest thing about that encounter however had not been nearly as bad as the things he experienced in the accursed forest home of the Hag, where so many had died because no one had gotten to them in time to save them. This had been sad for a different reason, sad because they had ventured into a place where these ancient creatures had survived, only for them to have to kill the vast majority of them in an effort to just survive the tower. Had it been possible, Griswold would have appreciated it if they could have left those creatures alive, though that was often not one of the available options in a kill or be killed type of situations. At the end of the day, he had just been glad that they had survived the encounter and could learn from the events of the tower. And learn from it he would as it was there that he had first come to figure out that there was more to his grimoire, more to his magic than just fire.
Even though he had not dared try it in the dungeon, a new page had appeared in his grimoire that spoke of a spell called Starfall. Utilizing a magic type known as solar, the very first thing Griswold thought of was the sun, which really did not seem all that much different from fire in itself. Finding what he could in the library, it was a magic that had to do with the sun, the moon and with stars in general, making it somewhat more diverse than what he had initially imagined it would be. But that was a good thing. The more diverse his magic was, the more useful he could be in different kinds of situations. Because if there had been anything to learn from his encounter with the marine dinosaur, it was that his fire magic had been beyond useless. It also made him into somewhat of a liability, a position he loathed to be in.
But that had been his reason for coming here again today, to the same place where he had initially started his first real training after becoming a magic knight of the Crimson Lion squad. If there was one place where it was safe to go about studying and putting new magic into practice, it was going to be here. Throughout his battles, his grimoire had constantly been expanding along with how he had been rapidly growing in terms of experience and actual power. To say that he had been adjusting as if fueled by the thrill of battle would have bordered on the territory of gross understatements, as he felt so much stronger than a week ago. After all, only a week had passed since his initial training session and learning his first two spells in these very same fields. This was likely his latent elven potential unlocking new avenues that had been closed to him since he was a child.
While everyone passed him by, even the younger children within his settlement, he could only work hard just to experience some semblance of skill and power development. Had he known back then that he was the kind of person that grew when under pressure and bearing the weight of his own potential death, Griswold would have sought to be out in the field with the other hunters and huntresses far more often. But it had taken meeting trolls in damp caves, dinosaurs in what seemed like pocket dimensions inside of an old tower, corpse devouring plants and spores and scheming hags for him to finally realize that his true potential was only now starting to reveal itself. Causing him to be about as joyful as he had ever been prior to this moment, he sat himself down by the banks of the ever so gently flowing stream in a lotus position with his grimoire placed over his lap.
Simply reading the names of these new spells filled him with a resounding pride that echoed throughout his body. While “Starfall” sounded a bit too much like the title of some cheap novel and “Moonshard” sounded like a form of drug, “Ignite” at least sounded like it would be quite capable of dishing out some hurt. And spells that could really bring the pain was exactly what he had been in need of during his encounters in the field. Determined to turn the feelings of helplessness and uselessness he had felt during his dungeon time into something positive, he started reading into the first of the spells that really drew his attention. Holding out his hand and channeling his mana into it, a ball of fire formed that rapidly grew in intensity as he fed more into it, but not in size. Pressing more and more mana into the baseball sized orb, it eventually reached the proper intensity.
Aiming at the rocks on the other side of the stream that had remained ever since his first training session in which he had been doing some marksmanship training with the firebolt spell, he launched it forward with the same accuracy. Not entirely sure what he had been expecting of this particular spell, the moment the spell collided with the rock, the sphere erupted in a burst of flame that rapidly covered a fair distance of grass. Incinerating everything within the area of the blast, all that remained was a black patch in the middle of an otherwise green field, surrounded by a ring of smoldering cinders. One thought instantly came to mind, this being “Why did I not possess this spell when I was forced into dealing with a roving band of goblins”. Quite frankly, it was a fair thought, seeing as his grimoire had usually grown along with him, evolving as the need for more cunning or simply more destructive spells rose.
Having to deal with the goblins with only his firebolt spell, Gris was just glad that he had mastered it to the point where he could fire various projectiles in one salvo, as well as being capable of firing the same spell twice as long as he used both hands for it. It had been one of those developments that allowed him to keep his distance from their little blades and daggers while releasing one salvo of fire after the other. Had he been able to cast anything more powerful at the time, he most certainly would have, even if only to quicken the battle and hasten it towards its end. The clever little creatures, believed by some to belong to the same genus as trolls, did not rely on their strength like their supposed cousins. They used their minds and slender forms to come up with tactics and maneuver around people so they could strike at their backs.
Their underhanded tactics had apparently cost quite a few people their lives already as they took out any who ventured near their domain, which was ever growing as they expanded upon their ranks in a matter of weeks. Creating new lairs and coordinating between one another to perform the most well thought out invasions, they would pillage and plunder their way through entire towns, villages and even cities if their numbers were great enough. Killing those that opposed them and taking those they could use back with them, goblins were vile and repulsive creatures that Griswold did not feel a whole lot of remorse for when he dispatched them. He had even heard stories of goblins that had access to magic just like elves, humans and dwarves, though he would believe that when he saw it. Hopefully though, he would not need to see a whole lot of goblins again after the preventive work he had done with a fellow magic knight at the time.
Having the ignite spell would have made the fighting so much easier as it would limit the places they would be able to hide behind such as bushes and the like, keeping them from executing any kind of sneak attacks. More importantly, had he been able to use such a thing, he would have been able to go find their lair and set the whole thing ablaze. At the time, Griswold knew that he would have been able to find their lair if he really tried, what with his tracking skills and heightened senses. He had decided against it because the ones they had dispatched had proven to be fairly annoying and bordering on being plain difficult. If they went for their lair, chances were they would run into a whole lot more than they could handle, as well as any traps they might have set in the area. After all, it was their territory, they knew it better than they did and had undoubtedly fortified it against trespassers.
Because they were not the fighting type if they could help it, they were the kind that relied on foraging and the use of traps, meaning they most likely checked them regularly and reset them after one had sprung. So the idea of heading into the belly of the figurative beast did not seem like a good idea, given how ill equipped he was for such an undertaking. But with spells like these, he would actually stand a chance of doing exactly that if the same tribe of goblins ever acted up again in the future. Holding out his hand and channeling mana to it, Griswold began casting the same spell again, feeling how it was much more draining than his firebolt spell had ever been. Even if that one had felt draining in the beginning too, it was clear that this particular spell just gobbled up way more of his mana stores than the lesser firebolt spell.
Compressing the mana into another sphere to be shot to the other side of the stream, he had it strike at roughly the same spot a second time so as to not scorch the green fields of the common realm too much for no reason. Given the amount of training he had put into mastering his firebolt spell to the point that it was at in this time, learning how to throw around this new spell did not take him a whole lot of time either. In fact, by the time he had performed it three times, he had already gotten used to exactly how much mana it drained with each use, knew how to channel and compress the mana in a fast and safe manner and could aim it with the same precision as his firebolt spell. For Griswold, that was about all that he could ask for after spending such little time with it.
Taking a quick break in order to get some water and a bite of bread, he knew how important it was to remain hydrated and filled with nutrients during training sessions. Giving his body a moment to rest up and regain the mana it had expended trying to get a good feel of his first new spell, the next one would be to do something entirely different. Though it was just another spell just like the other one, the foundation for it seemed entirely different as it was in no way linked to the sun, fire or heat. It was a solar spell however, using the same universal building blocks as were likely used in the formation of their planet or the moon. In that regard, this spell was more like an earth based spell than a fire spell like the other two he had learned so far, though he did not really imagine that that would be an issue for him. At the end of the day, magic was magic, and all it required was effort and training.
Performing the spell, he formed a magic circle, after which two shards of a solid, rock-like substance shot forth and smashed into the markers he had placed on the other side of the stream a week ago. From what he could tell where he was standing, one had shot right past the target, though the other had pierced right through it, sticking out by roughly ten centimeters on the other side. Proving that this was not the kind of spell that was to be used on quick and agile targets, which seemed to be more the forte of the other spell due to it’s combustive element, it did seem like it would be incredibly useful against the slower and more heavily armored targets. Showing how accurate and fast it was, and how it used all of that speed and accuracy in order to puncture and penetrate a single point from one side to the other, there was no doubt in his mind that it had the potential to kill on impact.
Whether it would be locked doors, stone tablets of reasonable side and average pieces of armor, Griswold was quite confident that this spell would be able to punch through. After all, where other spells had the ability to just explode or possess other useful gimmicks, this one only served one single purpose and had but one true power; penetrative force. By expanding upon the kind of spells he could actually use in battle, he made himself into a much more versatile combatant that could adapt to a variety of situations with greater ease. One thing he had learned while going through a dungeon, fighting his way through variations of hungry wolves and goblins, wrangling angry plants and bouncing back and forth between trolls, was that there was really no limit to the amount of varying spells and weapons should have within their repertoire. There was no telling when something might show up that was entirely too well adjusted to the kind of magic one would normally wield, his case being fire.
Moving on, a few more attempts at aiming both of the rock spikes were made before Griswold was content enough to move on. The final spell that had shown itself to him was one that seemed quite interesting as well, this being the one known as “Starfall”. Without giving it too much thought, he used the spell as described and let loose a bunch of star shaped spheres that radiated with a bright white light. As soon as they shot forth, there was one thing about them that he could sense straight away, this being the fact that as they made their way over to his targets, he seemed to be capable of bending or altering their trajectory a bit. Frowning a bit at the notion, he could tell that these stars did a fair amount of damage, as well as coming down rather quickly once called into being through his spell. By changing their trajectory a bit, Griswold imagined that he would be able to use it to strike his mark, believing that they had done enough to properly dodge the line in which his other spells usually moved.
As such, it seemed like the kind of spell that might change things up a bit in the heat of the moment, as well as potentially catching more potent enemies off guard and changing the scales in his favor even a little bit. Using the spell again as a means of seeing by exactly how much he could alter their trajectory right now, he could feel that he was quite limited in those regards. For now, he could change their path by roughly one meter, which would not help him a whole lot unless he was fighting the kind of cocky prick that tried sidestepping his spells, only for it to bite them in the ass. Continuing to practice for a little while longer, the ability to just cast these spells alone was a huge boon to him already. The way he saw it, the more he got to use them in battle, the more his control over them would inevitably grow beyond what they were at right now.
With the addition of three new spells that he could at the very least utilize, he cut his training exercise short. Today was not like it had been during his last training session where the concept of a grimoire was new to him, just as their use in the casting of unique spells tailored to their caster. In the past week, getting used to what little spells he had to go with, as well as the relatively large pool of mana that he could draw from had turned him into a rather formidable combatant. Or rather, it had laid out the foundation for him to become a formidable fighter once he obtained more spells, more training and the means by which to unleash his latent potential in a meaningful way. Taking his things and preparing to leave, he made his way over to his broom. Grabbing it and placing it between his legs to hold it in place without the need for hands, he took off to the sky while chowing down on his post-training sandwich.
Aware of the fact that he had burned through quite a bit of mana and energy during his practice session, and that the way back to Hage was quite long, Griswold knew that putting some food in him was not the worst thing he could do right now. Up until now, he had been fairly busy in the town of Hage as it had been terrorized by wolves and wargs, all while they were still in the process of rebuilding the damage that had been inflicted upon them during the shattering. As a result of his aid being required, he had not exactly managed to do a whole lot of other things, though there was a lot to do within the confines of the village itself. To name a few things that had come up would be to bring up the initial band of wolves that had threatened a farmer and his livestock. This was followed up by more wolves showing up, as well as their larger cousins, the Wargs showing up near an orchard to threaten the lives of all who worked there.
Finally, there was the sudden opening of a dungeon in the nearby Fringe area that had called his attention towards it in the name of the Crimson Lions. Being quite capable of estimating threat levels, he knew that it would be best to go to the dungeon first and continue rebuilding afterwards. If a band of rogues or one of the other nations got their hands on whatever kind of potentially dangerous weapons might be in there, the forsaken realm would be the first to get struck by it after all. So, to say that there were not a whole lot of dull days during his stay in Hage would have been quite the understatement. As such, he could not wait to get back into the rebuilding process, as well as everything else that might get tossed his way.
