I stared at my nemesis through the one-way mirror, growling as some pathetic hawker managed to cheat him out of a pouch of gold. "Have you ever considered that you may be aiming too high?" Diginn asked as he sharpened his axe.

I won the election fair and square. The gem stayed in a box for the duration of the election time. Somehow, the shifted reality was very much for the restoration of environment; it seemed that many factory workers who had been unhappy had enjoyed the restoration work at the field. The change worried me, but I reminded myself that there was no going back. The investigators came and went, never apparently finding the gem despite the mages that started walking around the town.

The goo eventually disappeared with the smoke-or-miasma and I was able to move on what was now a lush field. There was not even a hint of the factory I — and many others — had worked at left. It was like it had never even existed.

I had a terrible, terrible feeling as I walked to the ruins of the factory. The gem in my hand left my chest feeling tight. My body was telling me that this dark magic, whatever exactly I was holding, was not something I was meant to wield.