Flame-Blessed Bolt

Two damage for a single red mana is a rate that would be unremarkable on its own; the exile clause is what earns the printing. Attaching a graveyard exile to a burn spell answers the one problem cheap red removal has never solved: the creatures that come back. Recursive threats, undying and persist bodies, reanimation targets, anything that treats death as a speed bump all die permanently here, because the card does not remove the creature on resolution but rewrites the outcome of any death it takes this turn. That last detail is the sharp part. The rider is not "destroy and exile"; it is a replacement that fires on the next death event through end of turn, so the two damage does not even have to be the killing blow. Chip the creature, let combat or a second spell finish it, and it still gets exiled. The design cost is deliberately narrow: the ceiling is two damage, so anything with three toughness survives the bolt on its own, and it never touches a player's life total. The card trades reach and range for a specific job, killing small recurring threats and making sure they stay dead, and prices that job at the floor red removal has always occupied.