The light coming from the window shone on my eyes waking me up from my sleep. “Uhh…” I let out a groan like one of the undead would make, annoyed that my sleep has been disturbed. I faced away from where the sun had been shining down on my face and tried to sleep again. But after a few minutes of just lying there I gave up trying to sleep.

It was only yesterday since the incident with the dragon and my dad just immediately resumed his duties as the village chief as soon as we got. Starting with looking for the people who separated from us during the encounter with the dragon. I just wish he spend more time with his son sometimes.

I sat up on my bed, stretched my arms and wiped my eyes with my hands. I then stood up and made way to the bathroom. Of course hygiene is important so the first I do is brush my teeth. I looked in the mirror and saw my disheveled hair. My black hair that was long enough to cover the top part of my ears was very disheveled, it made it look like I just passed through a terrible windstorm.

I looked away from the mirror and walked to the bathtub, I waited till it was full and soaked myself in the tub. ~Ah! So good…~ Baths are the best, they make you feel completely refreshed, both mind and body. I then immersed my head underwater to wash my head.

I emerged my head and started getting ready for some Water and Ice Magic training. I gathered the Mana coming from myself and prepared a spell that controls the Water. Once the image has been completed in my mind, I released the spell and a tiny waterspout appeared on the surface of the water. I then readied another spell. One that would freeze the water to ice. I released the spell but I made a mistake and froze the whole bathtub with me in it.

I immediately readied a Fire spell and attempted to melt the ice. But again, the fire that I made was too powerful and nearly burned everything including me. I stopped the fire with a Water spell that spreads water around.

After that whole mess up, I decided to get out of the bathtub. “…Why do I suck at Magic…?” I questioned myself and just sighed at my shortcomings.

I got out of the bath and put on a set of clothes that I thought would be comfortable; a set of jogging pants and a black sweater over my white shirt since it’s currently Autumn and almost Winter. I only ever put on what I think is comfortable.

I walked towards the living room and prepared my breakfast, usually I’m the only one in the house because that practically lives at the Village Hall now.

I made my favorite combo; bacon and sunny-side-up eggs on rice. I started eating my breakfast and savored that good taste of bacon. ~Ah… Life is good…~ I thought as I drank my cup of cold water.

Whenever I’m not a part of a hunting expedition, I don’t know what to do for the rest for the day and staying in the house just made me bored and restless. So I decided to take a walk outside the village.

As I exited my house, I noticed that there have been some damages to my ears because of the dragon’s roars as I can’t hear very well. The usual sounds of people chatting and going about their business is very hard to hear at the moment.

 In the distance, I saw the man in black robes sitting under a tree and reading a book. ~Hmm, I wonder if he’ll be willing to teach me Magic~ I thought to myself as I walk towards him.

Under a tree that’s just a few meters away from him, I saw the woman that was dressed in white robes, the one who used some kind of Spatial Magic yesterday.

I saw her perk up and look towards us when I approached the man in black robes.

“Um…” I tried to talk to the man about the book but I didn’t know what to say, thinking that suddenly talking to a stranger I might come off as a weird person. Not only that, after seeing his Magic from yesterday, and how he destroyed that dragon so easily, I’m a bit intimidated.

“What is it?” The man asked me before I could say anything without even looking up to me.

I decided to go with a simple introduction first. “I’m Chris” I told him my name, trying to urge him to tell me his.

“Gabriel” He told me his name, but again without looking up to face me.

“Um… Thank you for saving us yesterday. We wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you.” I thanked him as I bow my head.

He closed the book and looked up to me before saying, “No need to thank me, it was only by coincidence that I landed where you guys are.” he then stood up and waved his hands as if telling me to stop.

"Yeah, but it still doesn’t change the fact that we still live because of you. But I have a request!”

“Hmm? What is it?” I look up to him as he asked what I wanted.

“Would it be possible for you to teach me Magic? My progress is a bit slow you see.”

“Ah, well, I’m not very good at teaching, why don’t you ask that woman over there? Oh, she’s coming over. See you around.” He patted me on the shoulder and walked away, or rather, ran away from the woman.

I looked over to the woman who was walking towards me. Her robe and hair swaying with the wind. She was indeed a sight to behold, but instead of a feeling of admiration swelling up it was a feeling of respect.

She was just a bit taller than I am, me being 5’4”, then she must be somewhere around 5’6”, she had to slightly look downwards to look at me in the eyes.

“I overheard your conversation with him. What do you say I teach you some Magic?” She waved her hand to gesture a greeting.

“Please! I’ll do my best to learn and not be a bother!” I once again lowered my head.

“Eh… You don’t need to lower your head… For now, let’s go to a suitable place for training.”

“Okay.” I followed her as she walked towards the village gate.

“So how old are you?” As we go around the village, she asked me a bunch of questions about myself, like my hobbies and my favorites. Just some idle chatter.

“I’m eighteen and turning nineteen in a month.” I replied to her while we went past some stalls. I then realized that I still don’t know her name so I asked. “So, what’s your name? And your age?”

“My name is Claire. As for my age… Give or take a century…” She answered with a joking tone.

“Eh… you look so young! There’s no way you’re that old!” I replied as I move wave my hand from side to side as to signify; impossible.

“Hahaha” “Hahaha” We both laughed as we were walking. Until we heard a man yelling at us.

“Chris! Come over here! I need your help!” An old man that looked to be in his sixties beckoned at me.

Claire and I walked towards the old man and I asked: “What’s wrong?”

“Well, you see, I dropped the bucket to get the water in the well.”

“I see, here.” I walked towards the well and looked down.

I started gathering my Mana for two spells; a Water spell and a Wind spell. I held out my hand to aim my spell accurately. What I was trying to do was make the bucket float up to us and drag the water and put it in the bucket.

I released my spell and the bucket flew up and landed on the old man’s hand and water was rushing up the well and into the bucket.

“Oh! Thank you so much!” The old man bowed at me to thank me.

“It’s only natural to help!”

The old man then walked away from us with me waving him goodbye.

I glanced over to Claire and she seemed to be pondering at something. “Where did you learn Magic?” She continued with a question.

“I learned through self-study.” I told her and she let out a sigh when she heard my answer.

Enjoying the story? Show your support by reading it on the official site.

“I see… Isn’t there anyone else who can use Magic in this village?”

“None, as far as we know, I’m the only one.” I replied to her with a questioning face.

“Hmm… I see… I see… You know, if you do Magic like that, your progress will be very slow and you won’t be able to cast even more powerful Magic.” She put her right hand on her waist and held up her left index finger close to her cheek and leaned her cheek on her finger.

“Well, I do know that my Magic right now is very slow and inefficient, it usually takes me about five seconds to cast a single Ice Spike.” I told her about my struggle in Magic. Expecting that she can take me out of this slump.

“Okay, let’s get to the training place.” She started walking again towards the village gates.

We walked past the village gates, “We’ll be back…” I told the guards as we pass by the gate.

““Understood!”” Both of them replied immediately at the same time.

We continued walking for a good couple of minutes. We were walking straight towards a river that was a few minutes of walking away.

We reached the river and stopped there. “Here is where you will train.” She declared while presenting the river with her hand.

I just looked around, it was a very peaceful place, only the sound of the river and the wind can be heard and the vastness of the plains can be seen all around it.

“Now, let’s begin the lesson.” Claire sounded very excited and pointed at me.

It made me jump back a little, but I nodded, excited to learn and finally improve my Magic skills.

“Alright! Now what I want you to know first is that there are two kinds of Mana; Natural and Inner.” She started explaining to me. “There’s also two ways to invoke Magic; by willing your Mana to do as you desire or by manipulating the surroundings through Mana Manipulation.”

“Huh… I never knew, I always just gather the Mana from my own body, so I guess that would be Inner Mana?” I deduced just from the words alone.

“Very good. But the Magic that you invoked earlier could’ve been done way easier than how you did it, since willing Mana to do a spell is usually only done at the higher Attunements like Spatial Magic” Claire snapped her finger and pointed at the river that was to her left in one smooth motion, signaling me to look over there and what I saw was a bubble of water floating out of the river.

“Woow! There was no cast time at all! How do you do that?” I asked very excitedly and eager to learn.

“All I did was infused the water with Mana from the surroundings and manipulated that Mana in order to manipulate the water. You try it. Natural Mana feels exactly like Inner Mana except it comes from the surroundings, not from your body.”

I listened to her lesson as I try to redirect Mana from around to the water. At first I could only make ripples on the water, but after four hours of practicing, I finally did it. I finally made a ball of water the same size as hers float out of the water. I then started to form different shapes and it only took me another hour to get a hang of it.

“Nice job!” Claire applauded my success. “Now try it on the other elements.”

“Okay!” I started doing the same thing with the Wind, making it blow where I willed it and form mini tornadoes.

With the Earth I formed various sculptures of animals, trying to make them as detailed as possible.

Fire was the hardest, I was basically making something out of nothing but I finally did it after Claire told me that Fire is created when a material is combined with oxygen and a sufficient amount of heat. I didn’t know what could be used as a combustible material, but realized that the grass under our feet can be used to make Fire.

I had cheated at one point, using my Inner Mana to invoke a Fire spell when I was specifically told to just use Natural. I was pretty sure Claire noticed but she didn’t press the issue. I had also noticed that when I used my Inner Mana, the incantation time has been greatly reduced. It was probably because I had been improving at manipulating Mana.

All this training went on for another two hours and the sky started getting dark. “Let’s head back.” Claire told me and we started walking towards the village.

  The sun has set as we were walking. At that time, Claire gave me another set of instructions. “Focus all of your mana into one point.”

“Okay” I held out my index finger and willed Mana to gather at the tip of my finger. After several minutes of trying, a ball of light lit up on my finger.

“Light Magic!” I shouted very loud while walking down the street of the village, undoubtedly waking some people up who were already sleeping.

“Congratulations on using Light Magic for the first time!” Claire tapped my shoulder as she congratulated me. “This is also where we part, I’ll meet you again at the training ground.” She then told me goodbye.

“Thank you so much!” I waved my hand goodbye at her figure.

The sun has already set but I still have one more place to go. I walked to where Karen’s house is, which is not very far from the Village Hall.

“Oh hey!” Karen greeted me as she opened the door. “Come in.”

I walked in her house, it was an average sized house all in one floor, despite that, it has all she needed; a kitchen, a bedroom, a living room and of course a bathroom. The living room greets you as you walk in, there weren’t very many furniture in her living room, just a couch, a table and a bunch of chairs made of wood.

“Are your ears fine?” Remembering the incident with the dragon whose roar could’ve probably been heard a continent away.

“Ah, that dragon’s roar was very loud, I thought my ears were going to fall off. I do have some trouble hearing for a bit, but I figure it’ll be fine in a couple of days if not weeks.” Hearing her say that, made me a bit worried. “How about you?” She asked me as I thought of what would happen if she lost her hearing.

“Oh, my hearing’s not affected at all” I answered as I took a seat on her couch.

“Wait here.” She walked over to the kitchen to get something.

A moment later she came back with two cups of tea in her hands and handed one to me. “Oh thanks.” I took the cup and took a sip. It was sweetened tea, just what I liked.

“So, what have you been up to today? I visited your house but no one was there.” She took a seat next to mine on the couch, leaning her body against mine.

“Ah, I had Claire teach me Magic.”

“Claire?” She lifted her face to look at me with a questioning look.

“She’s one of the Magicians that came with us after the dragon incident yesterday. She offered to teach me so I accepted.”

“Hmm…” She put her cup down onto the table. “Just remember…” She paused her sentence and brought her face close to mine, and then a peck on the lips. “Okay…?” The kiss had me surprised for a moment.

There was no need for words; I am hers and she is mine. We both understood and wouldn’t dare make her sad.

I then put my arms around her and brought her in for an embrace. She put her arm around me, her other hand up to my chest and settled her head to my chest. I could smell the aroma of her shampoo. Adding to the fact that we were alone in her house, the current situation was very… arousing.

But I still remember making a promise to her parents; to not go any further than this until she turns eighteen, so I just held my urges in.

We shared another hour with each other just locked in an embrace and talking about menial things.

“Why don’t you stay the night? Both of us practically live alone anyways.” She asks as she broke away from our embrace.

“Okay, but I’d rather not break my promise to your parents… They’ll kill me if the find out.”

We walked over to her bedroom and shared the bed. Sleeping next to each other is how we spent the night.