Marcella’s words lingered in the room.
“A Military Duel is a long-standing Elven tradition. Elves have more [Mages] than any other race in terms of absolute numbers. Relative to population size, Hydras are the greatest magic users, and as much as half of their population has the [Mage] class. The strongest [Mages] appeared among Hydras, Elves, and, as with nearly any other strongest class, the Vanedeni.
“In our traditions, a Military Duel is something that was implemented a long time ago. To win wars, you need [Soldiers] that are physically fit and more than capable of marching for days, weeks, and even months in the worst conditions. Mobility is what makes an army so mighty. The Vanedeni and their legendary flying vessels are famous for that exact reason. They could attack and retire faster than anyone else. So, a Military Duel is the oldest way you could rise through the ranks. It’s a type of duel where a lower-ranking officer could challenge the strongest one to a purely physical confrontation. Only basic enchantments on weapons and armor are allowed. No magic, Luciani. Do you understand?”
And as soon as I nodded to the weird impromptu explanation, she left.
Why would I care about a Military Duel?
I mean, even with my terrible memory, this was so out of the blue that I’m left thinking about it for good ten minutes.
What was she trying to say?
And while pondering the question looks like fun, it doesn’t erase what happened before.
My hands twitch at the thought of what I have been offered.
Marcella used some kind of a skill. Two of them. One clearly gave her a great sense of what I wanted to do with Happy Bakery, and the other was some kind of a shared vision of the future for it.
It’s enticing.
No.
It’s much more than enticing.
As the skill’s name suggested, it’s perfect.
But then, why does it feel like the magical monkey’s paw? Why does it feel like accepting it would bear terrible consequences for me?
I honestly doubt that Marcella was trying to scam me. At least not in the usual sense.
But it felt so much… it felt…
Not me.
That’s what it felt like.
It felt like a deal that any other person should take.
But not me.
“Why?” I mutter to myself.
Why shouldn’t I take it?
My whole being is telling me so, but it’s not giving me any explanation.
And the more I think about it, the angrier I get.
“Why can’t I fucking understand?!” I growl to myself. “Why do I have to be like this?”
I just want my brain back for a second. I just want to be my old self, my child self, to understand what’s going on.
The current me struggles.
I try to envision what could go wrong with the deal, but that capacity of mine is long gone. That sort of precognition I could use to solve problems, to plan for my future…
It’s gone.
For the first time since I started suffering from whatever psychiatric disease messed up my memory and gave me the weirdest brand of anxiety and anger issues, I am frustrated.
For the first time since then…
I just want it back.
“God, please, give it back to me,” I feel tears forming at the cusp of my eyes.
What happened to me?
I never looked for an answer.
Sure, I answered all the questions that psychiatrists would ask me, but I never looked for one myself.
“Why, why am I like this?”
I look around the messy room, the small apartment. It suddenly feels minuscule—it feels suffocating.
“Goddamn it!” I kick a chair upside down.
My arms feel like they are being injected with adrenaline as I approach the wall with the hole and bang my palm against it.
“Why? Why?”
I curl my hands into fists and hammer the wall as sobs erupt out of my mouth.
“Why?!”
I rest my elbows against the wall and lean my forehead against the wood.
“Why can’t this just go away?” I whisper.
I turn my back to the wall and let myself slowly slide to the ground. I rest my face in my hands, crying to myself.
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I don’t know how long it took for me to calm down.
Still, with a heavy heart, I have only one question left in me.
“What am I supposed to do?”
I speak my question in the faintest voice, thinner than a sewing thread. No one can hear me. Nothing.
Or so I thought.
When I raise my head, I find the Omnium Compendium levitating in front of me.
‘Congratulations on completing the Eight Cantrip. Beware, the ninth one is much more difficult than the first.’
‘For the Ninth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make a [Light] spell move in a spiral pattern. Begin at a central point and gradually expand outward, maintaining a consistent spiral shape.’
I prop myself up on my elbows, standing up again. The Omnium Compendium hovers higher, resting a foot from my chest.
I suppose there’s nothing else for me to do. Magic is the one avenue of this world I can explore without regrets.
And perhaps, it is the answer that I am looking for.
Who knows, one day, I might even be able to fix whatever is wrong with me.
…
I went to sleep for three hours before waking up again in perfect shape, more rested than ever.
This is getting freaky, I think to myself. Is it a side-effect of doing magic? Am I missing something?
Anyway, after eating something and drinking some water, I finally calmed down; I took another look at the next Cantrip.
‘For the Ninth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make a [Light] spell move in a spiral pattern. Begin at a central point and gradually expand outward, maintaining a consistent spiral shape.’
What’s interesting is that I see how this would be more difficult than just making a circle with one [Light]. But it’s that much more difficult… unless you try to control the [Light] directly instead of using anti-matrixes, I suppose.
[Advanced Mana Sense]
[Deep Focus]
I take a deep breath and visualize an additional vector going upward on top of the same type of spell matrix I used for the enchantment. This time, though, I weaken the anti-matrix that keeps it in place so that it can expand outward slightly. Well, more outward than it already did, anyway.
It doesn’t take more than a couple of minutes to calibrate it and have a spiral.
“Next, I suppose,” I tell the Omnium Compendium.
‘Congratulations on completing the Ninth Cantrip. Beware, the tenth one is much more difficult than the first.’
‘For the Tenth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make two [Lights] spiral around each other for thirty seconds without touching.’
“Huh?”
Wait.
“Can you show me the Ninth again?”
The previous ink reappears on the pages of the tome.
‘For the Ninth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make a [Light] spell move in a spiral pattern. Begin at a central point and gradually expand outward, maintaining a consistent spiral shape.’
“Goddammit, I didn’t even read it properly. I was supposed to use only one [Light].”
Whatever.
I simply recast the exact same spell I just used for the Ninth Cantrip.
‘Congratulations on completing the Tenth Cantrip. Beware, the eleventh one is much more difficult than the first.’
‘For the Eleventh Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make three [Lights] form a triangle and move in unison in a circle for fifteen seconds.’
“Huh.”
This is getting similar to the first ones.
It takes me exactly ten seconds to cast this spell.
‘Congratulations on completing the Eleventh Cantrip. Beware, the twelfth one is much more difficult than the first.’
‘For the Twelfth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make two [Lights] circle one after another at increasing speed for a full minute.’
And so on and so forth, I suppose. It’s just miserly variations of the same exercise. Even math books get harder than this in a few sets of equations.
…
‘For the Thirteenth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make three [Light] spell spin on themselves for one minute.’
…
‘For the Fourteenth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to cast ten [Light] spells in under two minutes.’
…
‘For the Fifteenth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to create a [Light] as big as three Human heads.’
…
‘For the Sixteenth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make four [Lights] go in opposite directions and back, starting from the same starting point. Get them about five feet apart at the widest.
…
‘For the Seventeenth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make three [Lights] spin to form an eight. Keep the path mostly steady for all its duration. Do three laps.
…
‘For the Eighteenth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to get your casting speed of [Light] under five seconds.’
…
‘For the Nineteenth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make two [Light] spells move in a spiral pattern of their own. Begin at a central point and gradually expand outward, maintaining a consistent spiral shape.’
…
‘For the Twentieth Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make four [Lights] spiral around each other in pair of twos for thirty seconds without touching.’
…
‘For the Twenty-First Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make six [Lights] form a hexagon and move in unison in a circle for one minute.’
…
‘For the Twenty-Second Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to make ten [Lights] move in unison in a circle for one minute.’
…
‘Congratulations on completing the Twenty-Second Cantrip. Beware, the twenty-third one is much more difficult than the first.’
While the Omnium Compendium’s message for the introduction of the Twenty-Third Cantrip is nothing special, the actual content is finally different from the rest.
‘For the Twenty-Third Cantrip, Magister Mulligan wants you to cast a [Light Shield] that can withstand an arrow shot from a short bow without skills.’
Alright.
This is actually interesting.
I look at the Omnium Compendium still floating. I’ve completed the first twenty-two. It’s clear that number twenty-three is different—special, if you will.
Now, I know absolutely nothing about how you would make a shield. And any other day, I might have asked the book for some directions. But at the same time, breezing through the Cantrips has reminded me of something.
I can do magic. I can do magic pretty damn well.
So, why ask? Why should I tamper with the fun?
Am I not good enough to figure it out myself?
And that is exactly what I set out to do.
“I’m Joey Luciani, baby; we got this,” I say to myself as I reactivate [Deep Focus] and [Advanced Mana Sense].
I visualize the most basic [Light] matrix. It’s three lines going from point A to point B in squiggly patterns. Wait, sorry, that is how I solve it. It’s basically three lines. The point A to point B is how I picked it apart to cast it more efficiently. When I multi-cast, I don’t actually use the points, just the lines.
“A shield that will resist an arrow,” I mutter to myself.
That is one tall ask.
An arrow? How much kinetic energy does that carry?
Mh.
I take a piece of paper and start jotting down some math.
Assuming a typical arrow weighs around 75 g and travels at a speed of around 61 meters per second from a short bow, the pressure exerted by the arrow on impact would be around 68.95 to 82.74 MPa if the arrowhead had a surface area of around 0.64516 square centimeters.
It might be silly, but looking at these numbers makes me feel so alive.
A big smile appears on my face.
Wait.
How did I summon those numbers?
As I’m looking at them, I hear someone bang on my door.
“Joey! Joey, are you home?”
Huh?
I walk up to the door and open it.
“Tiberius?”
It’s pitch dark outside.
“Are you ok?” Tiberius asks, concerned.
I lean to look outside the door and see that there’s also Quintus, Lucillus, and Antoninus.
“What’s happening?” I ask, confused.
“You are two hours late for work,” he replies. “We went in early, but we got worried when you weren’t there.”
“Oh, damn. I… lost track of time. Sorry. I’ll come down in a second; wait for me.”
I close the door behind myself, my eyes wide.
“What the—” I mutter.
I look at the piece of paper on the table and then back at the door.
“Yeah,” I sigh, “I guess it’s time to work.”