Onyx Mage

A repeatable deathtouch grant on a body that wants to be the deathtouch creature itself: point the ability at this 2/1 in combat and any blocker it bites dies, or aim it at something larger and force a favorable 1-for-1 trade in every red-zone exchange. The leverage is the instant-speed timing, which rewrites blocking math during the Declare Blockers step. Once attackers and blockers are locked in, the grant fires before damage is dealt: an opponent who blocks your small creature with a fattie watches the fattie die anyway, and an opponent who declared a block expecting a clean trade can be made to lose the blocker to a creature that was supposed to die for free. The mana sink is the whole point: with mana untapped, every creature you control becomes a deterrent, and a stalled board becomes a string of attacks the other side cannot make profitably. The modest Wizard stats place it among the unglamorous black creatures whose job is to convert excess mana into combat advantage rather than to win on their own. It does the structural work pingers do in blue (Prodigal Sorcerer turned spare mana into incremental reach; this turns spare mana into a removal-shaped threat), but contingent on combat rather than firing freely. Nothing about the rate is flashy, and that is honest: it is a grinder's piece, built to make every attack and block a question the opponent has to answer correctly.