The flames of the stove crackled in the background as we sat in a comfortable silence. The kitchen was warm despite the autumn wind howling outside the manor. The flickering light of the fire cast dancing shadows over our faces and the magical light orbs were almost depleted. I had to lean forward to have a clearer view of Elincia’s face.

I savored the wine. It tasted like berries, grapes, and alcohol blended together. Simple. Just like my life in the orphanage. Going out drinking with my old coworkers never felt like this. This reminded me of the evenings I spent watching movies and drinking fancy wine with Laura before our relationship went to shit.

Nothing could bother me except the fact that tomorrow I had to get up early.

“I’m going to bed. Tomorrow I have morning drills with the kids.” I said as I emptied my glass.

Before I could stand, Elincia caught my arm over the table.

“Don’t be a killjoy and stay a bit longer.” She said, raising her glass. “This is nice, you know? Having a moment of the day without kids running around and climbing on your legs. Just two adults doing adult things.”

The picture of Elincia’s character sheet popped into my mind. Much like my [Lonely boy], she had her own [Loner] stuck between titles. With twelve orphans in her care and no helpers, it must have been next to impossible for her to maintain an active social life.

“Alright, but only one more glass. I’m a responsible teacher after all.” I smiled and signaled for her to refill my glass.

Elincia grinned back and filled my glass with gusto. After she pulled the wine cask away, I could notice the surface tension of the wine in action.

“Do you want to get me drunk?” I pretended to be shocked before taking a sip so it wouldn’t spill.

“That would be quite the show. One of the orphans my age liked to climb to the roof and howl to the moon after having one-too-many drinks.” Elincia replied. “Hated that bitch.”

We drank small sips in silence, exchanging an occasional glance. The mere company of each other was enough to make the evening enjoyable. For a moment, all my worries disappeared. No Marquis, no Imperial Academy, no Alchemist Guild. Just me and Elincia with the flickering light of the stove.

I really wished I could retrieve my laptop and a projector. The mood was just right for a movie, even without popcorn. I wondered if Elincia would like action movies or horror movies the most.

“What are you thinking about?” Elincia’s words brought me back to the kitchen.

“Movies. I was thinking about how much I miss seeing a movie.” I replied, remembering why I avoided alcoholic drinks. When I drank too much, the ‘lying switch’ in my mind was automatically turned off.

“If we get out of this mess, you have to figure out how to do movies here.” Elincia said. “If you miss them, I bet they are really cool.”

“I’ll do my best. Although it might take a while.”

I might not be able to screen a Hollywood production, but I could think of a few nice visual tricks to fake pictures in motion. More if I could replicate a camera. Having a picture of Elincia and the kids would be worth the effort of figuring that out if I ever had the time.

Once again, the kitchen fell into silence.

I cradled my cup with both hands and focused on the crimson liquid inside it. In the absence of something to distract myself, I used my mana to make the wine swirl. No matter how much I used [Mana Manipulation], the nature of mana always ended up avoiding me. Maybe the System was to blame but I had no evidence to prove it.

As far as I had experimented, I could only do a few useful things. Produce sparks, warm up water, use it as a torch to light dark places, and use it as a fake [Mana Blade]. No matter how much available mana I had, I couldn’t turn it into straight fire or flying daggers.

The wine hypnotically swirled inside my glass when a sudden idea popped into my mind. What if it wasn’t a matter of quantity but a matter of control? I closed my eyes and focused on emptying my mind. Given how peaceful the night was, it didn't take long for my mana pool to materialize. A blue flame intensely raging in the deepest part of me.

As I did earlier that day, I put my mind at ease and tried to consciously take control of the blue wildfire. The wild flame morphed into a bright orb made up of thousands of strands of silvery-blue mana. This time, I carefully extracted one of the silvery filaments and molded it. I didn’t bother trying to raise its temperature or making it solid as a steel knife, I just gave it a form.

It was easier than expected. The mana gave in to my wishes and took the form of a simple boat. Then it hit me. I was getting ahead of my actual skills trying to turn my mana into a flamethrower. As a teacher, I felt ashamed. Kids didn’t jump directly into calculus, they had to master the basic operations and a whole lot of other concepts first.

“Rob? Are you sleeping?” Elincia’s voice brought me back from my meditative state.

When I opened my eyes, I didn't remember having closed them. I noticed a small mana ship slowly revolving around the wine vortex inside my glass. The ship almost faded as surprise caught me.

“I’m awake.” I replied, focused on my glass.

I wondered if I could improve it.

The ship was basic at first, a bit more than a blue mana raft floating on top of my wine. As the seconds passed, I was able to give it more details. Keel and stern, masts and sails, gunports and cannons. I didn’t stop there and summoned a second ship. Soon enough, both ships were trying to sink each other with ethereal mana cannonballs.

The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

It felt like the System wanted me to cast small illusions of sailboats.

“That’s pretty.”

Elincia’s tipsy voice broke my focus and the naval battle dissolved into a bright blue cloud. As I raised my head, I encountered her face in close proximity to mine. She was practically knelt over the table, staring at the contents of my cup.

“Don’t tell me you have been in a naval battle fought in the middle of a maelstrom.”

Elincia’s striking emerald gaze was fixated on me. Luckily, the part of my brain that short-circuited every time Elincia came near me was numbed by alcohol.

Effects of Denial are subsiding. You have obtained Denial Lv.7. Temporary.

“I’m not adventurous enough to have fought in a naval battle. I barely left my home town the whole time I lived there.” I laughed, ignoring the System prompt.

“Are you sure? You seem to be a knowledgeable man.” Elincia backed up to her seat and rested her chin in her hand.

Elincia was right and wrong at the same time. I grew too used to having the complete recollection of human knowledge within my hand’s reach to really train my memory. Without access to the Internet, I was limited to the knowledge I kept inside my head. Which wasn't a lot and was widely composed of movie quotes and useless trivia.

“Wanna see something cool?” I asked.

Elincia nodded vehemently.

This time, it took me a second to focus, knowing that Elincia was watching me. In any case, the process was faster than last time. I managed to pull more silvery-blue threads from my mana pool to weave with, this time on top of the table.

With some effort, I shaped my mana in the form of a chariot with four horses. At first, the chariot was a rough cube pulled by plain rectangles but as I poured more of my mana onto the table, the ‘hologram’ started to take shape. I gave more and more form to the environment around it. A colosseum, a long race track, sand, giant bronze statues staring down at the track, a formless audience watching from the stands, and a small person whipping the horses. The chariot lapped around the track kicking up a blanket of dust.

The more I molded the illusions, the easier it became. The System really wanted me to use [Mana Manipulation] this way.

Elincia stood up to see the living diorama from above the coliseum’s wall. Her eyes were wide open and her face was lit with an expression of childlike joy.

I added more chariots, copies of the first one. Everything was of the blue hue of my mana and I couldn’t give the chariots distinctive colors. However, that didn’t seem to bother Elincia. She glanced at the scene with fascination as it developed further.

The chariots drifted across the curve with the small, low resolution riders hitting their horses and throwing murderous glances to their contenders. Suddenly, two chariots crashed in a spectacular explosion of splinters and debris. The stranded rider was suddenly run over by the horses that came from behind, eliciting an audible gasp from Elincia.

The competitors ran a few more laps and I orchestrated a few more accidents that resulted in Elincia jumping on her seat. Her reactions were cute considering how crude and silent the show was. Then, the race ended and the crowd rushed onto the track, surrounding the victor and silently cheering. Slowly, the scene dissolved until we were left alone with a plain wooden table.

“What was even that! Do you have that kind of entertainment in the City of Light?!” Elincia slammed the table with both her hands as she intensely glared at me.

“It’s from a book, and a popular movie. This is the climax scene where the hero overcomes the final test of his journey. It’s a shame I can’t replicate the color or sound, though.” I said, downplaying the demonstration.

Elincia was having none of it.

“This is wonderful! If you have these ‘movie’ things, how do your lords force people to go to work every day?” Elincia forcefully sat back and her chair dangerously tilted backwards.

“You need money to see the movies, so...” I replied.

“I guess you are right, movies suddenly don’t seem so alluring when you are cold and hungry.”

That word was enough to dispel the cheerful atmosphere.

“Cheer up, Rosebud. We managed to save the farm plot from Holst, and we scared off the city guards. We even have Captain Kiln’s support.” I said as a sudden surge of confidence seized my body. Maybe it was the wine speaking, but for an instant I felt like I could move mountains to save the orphanage.

“I trust you will manage.” Elincia shook her head and put up a smile.

“You are underestimating yourself, Rosebud. Keeping the orphanage running for all these years is a greater achievement than anything I have done since I arrived. You are great, Rosebud. I admire you.” I said without thinking.

“Why do you take such joy in using that name?” Elincia asked, all flustered.

“It’s a charming name. Why don’t you like it?” I asked, curious to know more about Elincia’s past.

The elven woman bit her lip and for a moment I thought she wasn’t going to answer.

“Despite my elvish blood, I wasn’t the most refined orphan. The other orphans used to call me Orcbud, so I beat them until they only called me Elincia.” She shrugged her shoulders but her eyes betrayed her carefree facade.

Expectations were a double edged sword. It could push someone to perform beyond their limits or it could drown them in pressure.

Elincia crossed her arms and gave me a glowering look. She was more than tipsy.

“Humans have it easy, Robert. You can be as brutal as wild orcs or as refined as high elves and nobody would bat an eye. You can be inventive as the best gnome tinkerers or elusive as the slipperiest snakefolk and people will only find it natural.” Elincia complained as drops of wine fell from her glass. “I do blame high elves for this, screw them. The fact that the Farlands ate the corridor between our kingdom and the elven territories should be considered an absolute victory.”

She violently tapped the rim of her cup and I promptly filled it.

“You are right, Rob. We have to take the risk, we have to go to the Farlands, brew potions, and sell them on the black market. It’s not like the Marquis has spies looking through the window while we craft them.” Elincia suddenly said, taking another sip of wine.

The plan wasn’t flawless. It entailed traveling deep into the Farlands for a week or more. And there was the fact I was effectively out of ammo. Fighting monsters in close quarters combat was dangerous for both of us given our lack of defensive skills.

“We have to do it.” Elincia said with fire in her eyes.

“Let’s depart by the end of the week then.” I said, fueled by the wine’s liquid courage.

Elincia grinned at me and raised her cup for a cheer. The cask was practically empty.

“You don’t fool me, Rosebud. You are loving the idea of going to the Farlands.” I mockingly raised my cup.

“I’m not going to deny it, Robert. I’m dying to go camping with you.” She grinned back at me. “Now we have set that aside… Can I see more movies?”