Hatred

Life as a resource with no upper bound: that is the whole design here. Most pump spells fix the bonus or scale it against mana, which caps the damage swing at whatever your land count permits. This one indexes the entire boost to a number you set yourself, paid in the one resource a player has the most of and values the least until it runs out. The result is a finisher disguised as a combat trick. Slap it on any unblocked evasive creature, pay your life total down to one, and the swing is whatever you need it to be. The instant-speed casting buys a narrow but real window: you can wait until blocks are declared, so the spell never overpays for a creature that gets chumped. What it does not buy is protection against the blowout. Because the life is an additional cost to cast, it is paid the moment Hatred goes on the stack; if the opponent has an instant-speed removal spell, they kill the target in response and you have spent your life total on a fizzle. The risk lives entirely on the caster's side of the table, which is why the card has always belonged in the same neighborhood as evasion and protection effects rather than as a generic pump. You are not buying a bigger creature; you are converting your remaining life into a single point of lethal pressure and betting the game on connecting once.