Courageous Resolve

One instant that behaves like two entirely different cards depending on how close you are to death. Cast it while your life is high and it reads as a tidy protection cantrip: shield a creature from every opponent, slip an attacker past blockers and removal, replace itself in hand. That version is a fine combat trick and nothing more. Drop to five life or fewer and the fateful hour clause converts the same spell into a hard lock on your entire life total: you cannot lose life, you cannot lose the game, and no opponent can win, all until end of turn. Protection from opponents stacked on an unloseable turn is a deliberate escalation, the card handing you its biggest payoff at the exact board state most players are scrambling to avoid. The life-total condition is what keeps that ceiling honest; the bailout unlocks only when you are already one swing from dead, so it cannot anchor a game plan, only a last stand. It belongs to the small white tradition of low-life triggers, effects that reframe a dwindling life total as an asset, though most of those are static creatures or single-line pump. Folding a targeted protection cantrip and a full turn of survival into one instant means the card stays quietly useful when you are comfortable and turns game-warping when you are not, and the same three mana buys whichever half the situation hands you.