“Spiritus terrae mando tibi ut facias coram me globulum terrenum, spiritus terrae mando tibi ut facias coram me globulum terrenum.” Arthur chanted the verbal vocation of the Earth Orb spell twice as it was the only way for someone of his skill level to cast it properly. In the future he might be able to only chant it once, but that would be at least a year away from him.
All the other students stood around the room as they also chanted the spell of their choice. ‘At this rate around half of the students here are likely to pass the course, the rest will need to return in a week to start again. That puts my class well above the average of the 39 percent pass rate. I wonder what the Archmage will offer me as a reward for my results this time.’ Primus was of course only worried about the numbers, he did of course care about his students but he felt that his success was best displayed in a percent.
Several of the students were starting to make progress and occasionally succeed in casting their spell of choice, unfortunately Arthur was not one of those lucky few. Although he did manage to collect enough of his internal mana to cast the spell, the only thing left was the assembly. But that would need to wait for when he got home, as the course finished for the day and he along with everyone else were forced to leave.
Arthur went straight home and immediately started practicing the Earth Orb spell again and again. When he found no such success even going till dinner time he simply took a small break to eat and started all over again until he went to bed. But even as he sat in bed he continued to think about casting the spell. ‘Can feel it, I am so close. I'll use those few hours I have in the morning and hammer out the last few touches, I'll even put off potion brewing for the time being to do this.’
Arthur followed through with his thoughts and instead of jumping up and brewing potions when Gaelin brought a batch of ingredients he instead just put them away and continued practicing the spell. When the time rolled around to eleven o’clock Arthur was just about ready to give up and go to the guild, but something in the back of his mind egged him on. ‘Just one more try.’ It practically whispered in his ear. ‘It’s not like things can get any worse for us.’
Arthur paused for a moment. It wasn’t just his internal thoughts bouncing around, it felt more like someone was trying to tell him something. But that raised the question of who it was and what they were trying to tell him. ‘The what is quite easy, whoever it is wants me to cast the spell again. The who is a bigger question and one I have no answer for.’
Arthur attempted to call out within his own mind hoping that it was someone reading his mind and sending messages that way, but for the whole three minutes he tried that for he heard nothing. Instead of continuing such a pointless task Arthur turned towards what the feeling told him to do, and that was to cast the spell again.
Arthur took a deep breath and stretched out his arms and legs as he prepared himself and got into position, when he was ready he raised his hands and began chanting. “Spiritus terrae mando tibi ut facias coram me globulum terrenum, spiritus terrae mando tibi ut facias coram me globulum terrenum.” Arthur put forth all the willpower he had towards managing the mana and the amount in the spell. It was mentally and physically straining activity that had every part of him moving in tandem.
Then suddenly as if everything was happening in slow motion an orb of earth was conjured through the spell. Arthur nearly dropped to his knees out of pure shock and the quick depletion of his mana. As if he was doubting the orb being his own creation Arthur used his mana and skill in geomancy to slowly move the orb around the room.
When Arthur saw the orb was following his commands he let out a small laugh and dismissed the spell making it disappear. When that was done he casted the spell a second time just to be certain it wasn’t a fluke. “Spiritus terrae mando tibi ut facias coram me globulum terrenum, spiritus terrae mando tibi ut facias coram me globulum terrenum.”
Like clockwork another earth orb appeared before him and was fully under his control. “Shit… I did it.” Arthur was quite stunned by the development. ‘Based on my own personal estimations I would have likely needed another few days of non-stop casting of the spell to succeed, but I guess I just needed a mysterious feeling in the back of my mind telling me to try again.’
**********
Once he gathered himself Arthur finished dressing himself and decided to leave without wearing his overcoat today. Recently it had been getting hotter and the sun had been out for a bit longer, it wasn’t too hot to wear it but it was getting quite close and things looked to be continuing that way for the time being.
But that did not mean that Arthur would be leaving without his bag and mage staff, he brought those along with him as normal to the guild. He arrived at the guilds main building at around eleven thirty and quickly squeezed past the lines and go down into the underground hallways. With around an hour of time to spend as he wished as his mana recovered from the two castings of Earth Orb he elected to go around and see if he could find Calavia. It has been around a week since they had last spoken, and now would be a good time just to talk about everything that has been going on since then.
Arthur looked all around the underground portion of the guild for her, he checked the mail room, the magic item hall, and the cafeteria that he did not know existed until now. He eventually found her in the library in the evoker section, because he wasn’t allowed in there he had to call her from a distance. Luckily there weren’t very many people in the library to hear him, and he wasn’t all that far from her so he did not need to speak all that loudly. “Hey! Calavia!”
Calavia looked up and smiled when she saw Arthur standing near one of the tables just past the bookshelves she was surrounded by. She quickly ran over to him and nearly jumped on him while hugging him. “Good morning Arthur. How have you been?”
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“Good, what about you? Something great must have happened for you to be so happy like you are now.” Arthur couldn't help but smile as well, seeing his friend happy also made him happy.
“I received a letter from my brother, he has plans to come and visit sometime when he is given leave. He doesn’t know exactly when it will be, but when it does happen he is coming right here to Antium then he is going to visit my parents.”
“Wow, that's great. You must be excited to see him again.” Arthur said as the two took a seat at the nearby table.
“Of course I am. I am really close with all my close family members, and I try my best to keep in touch with the rest as well, but that is a lot harder.” Calavia’s voice began to trail off as she spoke about her extended family. “But enough about me and my family, what about your family? Are you still close with them?”
Arthur paused, he didn’t recall his family or anything prior to waking up in Dom Badaher. “Well, I don’t actually remember anything about my family. The first thing I remember was waking up in the ancient dwarven city of Dom Badaher and that was around four or five months ago. Before that I don’t remember anything about who I was or where I have been.”
Calava looked at Arthur as if he was a war veteran explaining how he lost a leg, to her it was something terrible not to know anything about your family. “You don’t remember your family? Do you think they still care about you even if they don’t know where you are?”
“Maybe they do, but I honestly don’t know the first thing about them. I wouldn’t even be able to recognize them if they walked right up to me. Perhaps it is best if I move past the idea that I might run into someone I knew from my past, it might not be worth digging up.”
“But it's your family, aren’t they super important to everyone? They always care about you and send letters to you when they are far away. Why would you want to give the possibility of that up?” Calavia didn’t really understand Arthur’s opinion on the matter since she had practically been showered with love from the moment she was born.
“I don’t know them or anything about them. Even if I did want to meet them again I wouldn’t know where to look. And besides I have new friends that mean so much to me right now, like you for example.”
“Well obviously, if we weren't friends I would have stopped talking to you a while ago.”
The duo continued on with their conversation that covered a range of topics from the kingdom's current state of affairs to even coming to Arthur’s success on casting a tier two spell.
“You have!? Can you show me?” Calavia practically shouted when Arthur told her of his success.
“Sure, just give me a moment.” Arthur said as he stood up and walked a few meters away. He readied himself and began the chant. “Spiritus terrae mando tibi ut facias coram me globulum terrenum, spiritus terrae mando tibi ut facias coram me globulum terrenum.” Shortly after an orb of earth was conjured before him and to prove it was his he had it float around the table they were both sitting at.
“Wow, good job Arthur. I have no doubts in my mind that you will pass and become a certified mage that can cast tier two spells. You would not believe just how many doors will open up, you will have so many more opportunities for jobs and spells you would not believe it.”
Calavia continued her explanation, while most of it was stuff he already knew Arthur was still more than happy to listen to his friend. But soon enough time drew short and Arthur was forced to leave so that he could attend the last day of the course and do the test. The two friends said their goodbyes and promised to speak again soon.
“When you pass the test I expect you here right away to tell me about it!” Calavia shouted as Arthur began on his way out of the library.
**********
Like normal Arthur was the very first person to enter the classroom at 12:10, but surprisingly the second person to enter was Primus with a variety of what appeared to be enchanted equipment on a cart. The equipment in question were a bunch of these large round things that looked like they all fitted together along with a few large rods.
When Primus entered the room he looked up and saw Arthur there. He paused for a moment and then invited Arthur down. “Come down here and help me would you Arthur, you would be doing me a favor.”
“Do you need help with something sir?” Arthur asked as he walked down the stairs along the right side of the room.
“Yes I do. Help me set this isolation circle up. Don't worry it isn’t a hard thing to do, it's a lot like putting together a puzzle, a big and expensive puzzle that is made from limestone.” Primus said as he placed a few pieces of the isolation circle on the floor. Arthur followed his lead and began placing a few pieces while joining them together when they fit. In about a minute the two were done with the actual circle part and moved onto the rods.
The circle part had a diameter of a few meters and was made up of about fifteen pieces and five rods. Every three pieces had a small hole that one of the rods would fit into and the two spent the next handful of seconds doing just that. When they were all done Primus reached out and touched the largest rod and muttered something under his breath, when he was done the isolation circle began to glow lightly showing its magical power.
Arthur was quite interested in the device, given the name of the isolation circle it was quite easy to understand what it did, isolate the thing inside from everything else. ‘Given that Primus brought it here for the test it must have a purpose relevant to it. I should ask him and see what he says.’
But as it turned out Arthur did not need to ask as Primus noticed him looking over the strange device. “The isolation circle will isolate anything standing within it from any magical influence outside of it. For tests such as this one the guild and its higher ups like to be certain that those that pass are actually doing so of their own ability.”
“Was cheating such an issue in the past that the guild was forced to start using these.” Arthur asked as he stepped inside the device to see if he could feel the effects, unfortunately nothing noticeable happened.
“For a while we mostly used written tests, when that proved to be ineffective we moved onto practical tests and that was when the cheating started to kick up. Some of the students from wealthier backgrounds would pay or threaten other more skilled students to cast the spell from a distance when it was their turn to be tested. There were of course ways to prove it such as asking them to perform highly specific actions with the spell, but the teachers started getting tired of constantly being required to ask these questions, so they collectively demanded that the higher ups do something about it.”