One spring morning, a young Sean Thiel, who had already been practicing dark magic using his mother's books – against her wishes – was with two school friends when they were confronted by a pair of street thugs. 

They had gone walking on the outskirts of the city, and while crossing through an abandoned lot, they were threatened at knifepoint by the two men who had been following them, and who now demanded they hand over their belongings. 

Sean knew that the use of magic was forbidden; thus, he ruled out attacking with the fire element. However, as he watched his friends struggling to fend off the thieves, he decided to use two dark magic spells to target the thieves' internal organs. 

Dark magic had the ability to corrupt matter, causing immediate and fatal damage. 

The spell was almost impossible to detect, and took Sean mere seconds to cast. Almost immediately, the thieves began to shriek in pain, one struck with an intense stomachache and the other with an unbearable headache, leaving him babbling incoherently. 

The two men fled to a nearby open field. Sean, intrigued, did not follow his friends as they ran back home, but instead chose to pursue the attackers. Both of the would-be thieves were lying on the ground, almost a hundred yards away. By the time Sean reached them they were already dead, still gripped with expressions of horror. 

One of the men was hemorrhaging blood from the mouth, nose and eyes. The other was lying in fetal position, in a pool of blood – mixed with the feces that streamed out from between his legs.

A flood of thoughts invaded Sean's mind. 

It was the first time that he had felt the enjoyment of inflicting an absolute defeat on another. He realized that he was nearly immune to such horrific sights, and this only confirmed his suspicions; for even as a child, he had never felt sadness or pity upon seeing dead animals. 

This time they were human beings, but his reaction was the same: indifference. Sean was a mere observer, with no connection to what he was seeing. This was his first opportunity to truly witness the power of dark magic. He could see why other mages had rejected it so sternly. Yet he felt no regret. If he had not been so quick to cast the spell, and if the thieves had not been so sure of themselves, he might not have defeated them. 

He had to admit that luck had played a part. And thus, he vowed to always calculate his next steps; he would minimize any chance there was for failure. When he returned home, he could think only of obtaining more power, of becoming stronger, of needing never again to depend on luck. Mastery of his actions was essential. 

His mother – who had always been his teacher in magic – noticed the change in Sean. She deduced what had happened after reading newspaper reports about the dead men and receiving letters from the families of Sean's schoolmates. There was nothing she could do to stop her son; she was now resigned to witness his rise to power. It did not take long for Sean to grow into one of the best mages that the Principality had ever seen.