POV Aron Brightcloud

Miles had guided me to another location. We stood in an abandoned classroom, located in the upper-part of one of the towers. My gaze was focused outside the window. Taking in the spectacular view while he gave me a short introduction.

“The Academy was built over hundred-thousand years ago. It is one of the oldest relics from ancient times. Earth-magic flows through its very foundation, keeping the structures strong. The name all-enduring earth has been chosen for a reason. The castle itself has ten towers, Each one associated with an element. Water, fire, air, earth, wood, metal, lightning, shadow, light and arcane. Apart from the earth, wood and arcane tower, the rest have been built later to accommodate the other elements.”

I felt surprised hearing that. “Why arcane as well? Shouldn’t it be only earth and wood?”

“In the ancient past, more magicians had arcane magic as their sole power-source or used it to supplement their other chosen elements. Because of that arcane towers had been built in every academy.”

Each tower had a specific appearance, corresponding to its chosen element. As the Institute focused on earth and wood, they were the most magnificent. The earth element so immense and sturdy, the tower would never fall. The wooden one appeared to be a self-grown tree instead of a tower. Each of them had different proportions. The fire tower radiated arrogance and opulence. Built from black lava stone, red lines of power flowed through it.

“And which one is the arcane tower?”

Miles moved his finger further west.

“That one. We don’t know what had happened to it, but due to the low number of pure arcane mages the tower never has been rebuilt.”

That was a tower? It looked more like a tree stump, having its top cut off. Blue lines flowed through the lower part. But where the red lines of the fire tower glowed in majestic red, the turquoise lines lacked power. The arcane tower clearly fell short from the rest.

“As you might guess, the magicians have two different classes. On one hand, the general classes were they learn about the general spells, other elements and how to defend against them. The classrooms for them are in the main-building. And the element specified classes where they focus on improving their own use of the elements. They are located in the respective towers. As most of the magicians have only one element, they are divided with that in mind. For the people with more elements, one has to be chosen to function as the main element to be allocated a tower and class.”

I nodded, that made sense.

“You will also have free time, which you can use at your own discretion. The Academy offers much more, but telling you all would overdraft the time I have. Use this memory-sphere at your discretion to find out the things you want to know.”

Having said that, he threw a round object which I caught easily. Opening it, a sleek obsidian stone with a rune on it lay in my hand.

“Use your mind to connect to it, you will be able to call up all the important information.”

Great, it would answer a lot of my questions without letting them wonder why I asked them.

“You have been assigned to class 1C, the others have already started with their first lessons on how to access your magic and build the first rudimentary spells. I will give you a short introduction for you to get a feel of your own magic. After that you will join them in their classes.”

He moved from the windows to the open area in front of the student tables.

“To use your mana, you have to focus your mind on your core and will the mana to flow through your pathways. As first exercise, try to let it flow through your right arm pathway and let it form above your opened hand.”

Following his words, a round orb of brown earth mana appeared on top of his opened hand. Floating there motionlessly.

I followed his instructions and tried to replicate his action. At first it went well. The arcane mana flowed from my core into the root-pathways, there my problems started. Instead of one big pathway that connected directly to my hand, I had a maze of smaller ones. My energy breached out into the different paths. It cost me considerable focus to keep it in the designated pathways, leading it up to my hand.

At last I brought it out into the open. Yet the amount of arcane mana was only a fraction of what Miles had. It flickered in and out unstably. Without a doubt, my smaller pathways hindered me in that regard as well.

Miles hid his contempt at my, in his eyes, atrocious control only marginally. Yet it didn’t deter me. I would get this to work. This was a magic world, I couldn’t believe there wouldn’t be a cure for my problems.

“Okay, good. Now let the mana float from the right to the left hand.” He opened his left hand and put it two feet away from his right, then let the earth mana orb move to his other hand.

“Doing this will allow you to train your control.”

I followed his instruction and did the same with my own. To his surprise, the orb immediately repeated his own feat. I read his thoughts on his face. How could someone that had so shoddy control over his mana move it so well outside his body? The other students needed much longer.

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What he didn’t understand was that I had will power and control in spades. That was not the problem. My restructured pathways hindered me from moving mana easily. I needed much more control to bring it out. After it was out I had no problems any more. Besides my already sharp and controlled mind, the manipulation affinity in my core improved this another step, putting my mastery even higher.

“Good, you seem to have fewer problems with this step. Now picture in your mind an arrow and let it fly. Pushing your arm out toward where you want to trow it will make it easier.”

The earth mana changed into an earth-arrow. It hovered above his hand before suddenly speeding away, crashing into the wall at the other end of the room.

He gazed back expectantly at me. It was my turn.

My orb transformed into a pointy arrow. I felt complete control over it. I knew I could let it fly without a problem, but I didn’t want to show him the extend of my abilities. I played up the difficulty and slowly pushed out my arm. The arrow wobbled towards the wall, dissipating after half the way.

Yet Miles seemed surprised at my mastery.

“Not bad for a first try. I would have thought you’d need longer to accomplish this. That should be enough to let you join the others in class.”

With that ended my first magic lesson. Miles showed me around the castle before we made our way to my new class. The assistant knocked on a wooden door at the end of the corridor and opened it. I followed him inside. We had reached another classroom, similar to the one I had practiced earlier. Only this time it was not empty.

I let my gaze wander over the new faces. The students were already clothed in the colors of their elements. I noted the absence of turquoise on them. I would be the only pure arcane mage in this class.

The teacher had been prepared for my arrival. He nodded to Miles. “Come in, Aron. You can sit at the back.” He seemed rather dismissive of me. The students looked at me like I was sick. No surprise there, in their eyes I had the weakest element, paired with a sup bar will.

“Yes, Sir.” I bowed my head and followed his order.

Miles bid far-well to the teacher, not paying attention to me. This seemed to be the new norm.

“Good, let’s proceed with the lesson. It doesn’t matter what sort of element you have, there are spells which each element can create. For example magic-arrow, shield, lance or storm. Depending on which element you use, the spell will have different properties. Now proceed with building them as you have before. Don’t let them fly conjure them and disperse them afterward. For today creating an arrow will be enough, through the rest of this month we will slowly learn all of them.”

I observed my classmates as they followed his instruction. I had known that I had shown too much, yet I had underestimated the difficulty. Only one of them mastered the spell enough to conjure it repeatedly more or less correct.

As I already had achieved a better result I didn’t immediately start but mustered them in more detail, taking in my future “comrades”.

The Class consisted of twelve people, myself included. Four of them were girls. Taking in the refined behavior of most people, I guessed only a third were commoners.

One could estimate a noble’s rank by the angle of their head, at least for the men. The women were a bit more reserved. With them, one had to derive the rank from their shown coldness.

Naturally that didn’t apply for everyone, but it allowed a first assumption.

The lesson progressed. I joined in, conjuring an arrow out of thin air. My problems remained. I needed a lot of time to push the energy through my root-system. Additionally, I lost a big part of it due to out-branching into pathways I hadn’t intended to flood. Another problem I found after prolonged use was that my thinner roots didn’t offer as much protection against radiation than the sturdier pathways of the other students. The damage to my body felt negligible, but it was still there. I essentially burned myself if I used too much magic.

That cut short another Idea of mine. Namely, to flood all of my pathways and use them as a second storage facility. It would shorten the distance between the energy and outlet considerably and at the same time get rid of the out-branching problem.

With no solution for the moment, I trained further, trying to improve the energy control in my body. Once out of my body, the problems disappeared.

I could show the other students my high manipulation mastery, but that would only point to my affinities. It was better to be known as inept, than having disproportional skills.

Otherwise, the old geezers could get curious. That had to be prevented at all costs. Some of them were already suspicious about my miraculous rebirth. Combine that with me having two familiars, and I suddenly look like one big black box of mystery. And what do magicians love more than even a treasure chest? Exactly.

So inept student it was. At least until I had the chance to have a “fortunate” encounter in a dungeon or something similar to have a believable excuse.

I toned it down, focusing even more on the energy in my pathways. The damage to my body had to be minimized. Luckily, my upgraded body had developed certain self-healing properties. It would not be enough for extensive magic use, but for now it sufficed.

“Good, some of you are already able to conjure an arrow. Others need to invest more time to practice it.”

The teacher grabbed the air and suddenly the fire arrow that had been conjured by one of the nobles in front of me got pulled into his hand.

He inspected it then pushed it into a piece of wood he had lying on the table. With a bang the arrow exploded, charring the wood black where it hit.

“Pay close attention to the impact location. I will repeat the same action with an earth arrow now.”

Soon another nick had appeared on the piece. This time the damage didn’t spread over a wide area. Instead, a simple hole had been cleanly shoot trough.

“Anna, what do we see here?”

One of the noble girls, sitting on the left side in front of me, answered his question.

“Even though the spell is the same, because of the different elements we see a different behavior and effect on the test-object. A flame arrow has additional explosive damage, while an earth arrow pierces cleanly through it due to its additional weight and sturdiness.”

The teacher nodded.

“Splendid answer. So keep in mind when you use your spells or fight against people wielding different elements, you have to factor in the additional effects their elements provide.”

One of my fellow novices raised his hand.

“Yes, Erik.”

One of the commoners spoke up “So which of the elements is the strongest?”

“There is no strongest element, each element has their strength and weakness.”

Another hand went up.

“What about the arcane element? It is neutral.”

“That is the exception, I have talked about strength, not about which is the weakest of all. That is naturally the arcane element. Due to its neutrality it lacks the specific strength the others have. You will never best another element with arcana magic alone, if measured in a direct comparison. Fire burns, earth pierces, air slices, wood whips, light decomposes, darkness/shadows corrodes, metal cuts, water washes away and lightning electrocutes it. Some argue that the lack of specialization and therefor inexistent weakness against another element is a strength in itself, yet it is the public acknowledged truth that arcana is the weakest element.”

I felt Stonewall’s contemptuous gaze on me. We would see about that. I was of the firm belief that not the element was responsible for the strength of a magician, but the magician for the strength of the element.