With a bit of time, the attack was a thing of the past. Prota slowly recovered and took a break, while Fate did the same. He’d been forced to rest for a bit longer after indirectly taking a Final Stand, but eventually, he recovered.

Even the addition of Danjo felt natural, as if he’d been a part of the team the entire time.

However, as soon as Fate recovered, he called everyone together. He hadn’t said why, but John and Prota had nothing to do anyway, so the next day, the four of them were sitting in a clearing in the forest. Snow slowly drifted through the air as winter arrived, the branches rattling together in the wind.

“We’re not strong enough,” Fate said as Prota sat down. John was leaning against a tree, clearly uninterested.

“...that’s how you’re gonna start this?”

Fate shook his head. “I don’t know what you did, but those two were strong. Scarily so. At the pace we’re going, we’re never going to win our battles.”

“Huh. What a defeatist attitude, Fate. I thought you were better than this.”

“I’m stating the facts. Their mana cores were probably at least A rank, maybe even S rank. I didn’t get to see them fight, but from what I saw, it looked like the dwarf might’ve been at least a 5th circle mage.”

“5th circle?” John frowned.

Everyone turned to John.

“...let’s not do this again. Just explain it.”

Danjo continued to stare at John, but Fate just sighed.

“Do I really need to explain this?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“It’s, uh…” John hesitated. He couldn’t say, “it’s for the [Readers],” without provoking some questions.

“Just do it.”

Fate nodded. “Do you at least know about casters and fighters?”

“No.”

“Seriously… well, we’ll have to start from the beginning, I guess.”

Fate crouched down, picking up a stick while talking.

“Everyone is a mage. Everyone- well, at least most people- have a mana core. This automatically qualifies you as a ‘mage.’ Your mana core can be ranked from D rank to SSS rank.”

“D to- huh? Why three S’s? Why not just start from F rank?”

Fate shrugged. “Why’re you asking me that? I didn’t make the system.”

“...good point,” John grumbled. “The guy who did must’ve been a total moron.”

Fate just shrugged and continued.

“However, your mana core rank just determines how much mana you can hold. Just because you have a lot of mana doesn’t mean you can use it well.”

Fate dusted the ground off with a little bit of wind and started drawing in the dirt. They were crude stick figures, but they helped.

“Now, people tend to one of two ways of using mana; they use it to reinforce their body, or expel it as magic. People who expel mana as magic are known as casters. People who fight using their bodies are called fighters.”

“Kinda on the nose, no?”

“That’s what you’re concerned about?”

John shook his head. “Keep going.”

“Alright. Now, while the mana core system applies to both classes, each class has their own identification of what kind of mastery you have over your skills.”

Fate turned to the stick figure of a man throwing a fireball and drew nine circles.

“The casters have the circle system. See, spells are divided into circles. Fireball, for example, is a first circle spell, while fire arrow is a second circle spell. A flame pillar is a third circle spell. Your classification is simple; the highest level circle spell you can cast is your identification.”

“So what’re you?”

“Uh… I think I’m a fourth circle mage, last time I checked.”

“Is that… impressive?”

Danjo turned to John, pure confusion in his eyes. “Is that impressive? Some adults never reach fourth circle in their entire lives!”

Apparently, John’s lack of common knowledge was so bizarre that Danjo’s shyness had completely melted away. Was he really the strange one here? Even Prota was looking at him funny.

“Now, ninth circle mages are a bit different. They’re also known as archmages, and they’re typically people who’ve researched magic for much of their lives. K-”

Fate was about to say something about Kit, but probably realized Danjo was nearby and continued.

“A ninth circle spell isn’t one people typically use. It’s a customized spell that only the creator can use. Although, I guess it could be copied… but the time it would take to copy a ninth circle spell would be so long that you might as well make your own. It’s not that they’re just unique, but they’re also incredibly powerful.”

John nodded. He felt like he’d heard of this setting from some other book he’d read, but that wasn’t important.

“What about the other class?”

“Fighters have a bit of a different system. They’re ranked in this order: novice, warrior, knight, expert, master, and then grandmaster. Grandmasters are the martial equivalent of archmages.”

Fate drew a little man with a sword.

“Novices are simply people who’ve chosen to be fighters. Technically, even a caster could be a novice. They simply reinforce their body with mana reinforcement and fight. The mana reinforcement of a novice tends to be a bit better than that of a caster, though.”

Fate then drew little muscles on the stick figure.

“Warriors are those who’ve strengthened their mana reinforcement to a level that casters could never reach. Well, maybe a seventh circle caster or higher could match it, but a caster would never land a hit on someone that strong anyway. Regardless, they’re much faster, stronger and durable than those who aren’t warrior rank. A peak warrior rank could probably take a few hits from a sword and remain relatively unharmed.”

Fate then drew a little barrier around the stick figure. John wanted to laugh, but the visualizations were actually helping a bit.

“Knights start to manifest what is known as “aura.” Simply put, it’s a physical manifestation of mana. It’s almost like a physical barrier, but it’s not just that. Aura hits hard. Like, really hard. Even a newly formed knight could probably split boulders in half with their bare hands.”

“Ah, yes. Cracking boulders. My favorite activity.”

“Do you want me to explain or not?”

John put his hands up in surrender. Fate just sighed and carried on.

“Experts are pretty simple. They’ve just mastered aura. It doesn’t waver, it’s constant, blah blah. Masters, though, are on a whole different level. They’ve learned aura blades.”

“Aura blades?”

“It’s a misleading name. It doesn’t have to be a blade. See, fighters can be anything: swordsmen, spearmen, martial artists, whatever, but for some reason, they decided to call it aura blade. However, it has nothing to do with blades. It’s simply the action of also coating your weapon with aura.”

John nodded. It was probably called aura blade since that was the term used in other novels, and the [Author] probably was just too lazy to come up with new terms.

“Grandmasters can manifest their aura without a weapon. They can make weapons purely out of aura. They can also control their weapons, make them fly… John. Please do not mess with a grandmaster or an archmage.”

“Yeah, yeah. I would never. Really.”

He ignored the glare Prota was giving him.

“Good. Now, speaking of messing with people, you shouldn’t just go messing with people just because of their rank.”

“Hm?”

Even Danjo seemed interested in this.

“K- my teacher taught me something interesting. Fighter’s titles tend to reflect their strength, since certain amounts of mana are needed for certain techniques, but casters’ titles can be misleading. Just because they can cast a high circle spell doesn’t mean it’s all that strong. A fireball can outpower a fire arrow if the caster knows how to put more mana into the fireball.”

Fate pointed back at the mana core system.

“On top of that, a large mana core doesn’t mean they can cast super powerful spells. Just because they have lots of mana doesn’t mean they know how to use it. So be careful.”

John nodded. The titles weren’t strength indicators; they were just names that told you what your opponent could do. You could put a professional racecar driver in a go cart, and they’d get nowhere. Similarly, you could give a child the best racecar possible, and they’d have no idea what to do with it.

The possibility of winning couldn’t be determined only on titles.

“How about those… uh… something about elementals? I heard you were a double elemental or something like that. Quadra elemental?”

Fate just stared at John. So did everyone else.

“What? Do you think I’m trying to trick you guys or something?”

“Maybe you are actually stupid… were you ever dropped on the head as a child?”

“Just answer the question!”

Fate chuckled and continued. “People naturally tend to find certain kinds of magic easier to use. Devices have been made to help people find their affinities, which are simply the kinds of magic someone will find easier to cast. No one is ever bound to one magic. It’s always possible to use any kind of magic you can see.”

“How about fighters?”

“What about them?”

“Well, it’s not like they can use magic…”

“But they can?”

John frowned. “What? How?”

“What? You’ve never seen me light my sword on fire? That’s not really casting, is it?”

“So what, you’re telling me that fighters can use magic, but just on themselves?”

“Exactly.”

“That’s stupid,” John muttered. “Hey. Wait a minute. Can’t you do both? Cast and fight?”

Danjo looked at Fate. What?

“Ah… there’s a third classification. Battle mages.”

“Of course there’s a third classification,” John grumbled.

“They’re very rare,” Fate said, shaking his head. “It’s to the point where there’s no need to give them their own categories because they’ll never show up anyway. They just take categories from the other two classes.”

Danjo looked surprisingly calm. John didn’t pry into it, but he just assumed that Fate had already gone over this.

“So what are your classifications?” John said, sitting down.

“Fourth circle caster, and a knight class fighter.”

“Hm… interesting. So what about Prota? What would you say she is?”

Fate froze. “Hm… that’s an interesting case. Do you care if Danjo knows?”

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

John personally didn’t think it would matter if Danjo knew, but he looked at Prota. She was the one that would get affected. She looked uncomfortable, but in the end, she shook her head no.

“Guess it’s ok.”

“Prota… is hard to classify. In the first place, the fact that she can cast without chanting is unique. However, on top of that, her ability to manipulate mana is much different than most.”

“Huh?”

“John, most people learn spells. They learn chants to cast fireball, icicle, whatever. They can’t just make fire or ice appear. For Prota to make her Blossom of Ice… that would technically put her at ninth circle, but it’s not a strong enough spell for that. Someone could copy it relatively easily, but they’d still have to have a deep knowledge of magic.”

“...so you’re saying Prota’s been strange, casting magic without chanting this whole time?”

Fate sighed. “Well, I’m sure some people have found it strange. It’s not entirely unheard of for people to learn up to second circle spells without casting, but it’s not common. Most people just stop using them after a while, and anyone stuck on those levels of spells aren’t talented enough to cast without chanting.”

“Then…”

“Yes, Prota is just incredibly talented. She’s using magic in a way that’s beyond logic. For her to simply take mana and manipulate it at will is something that’s not supposed to happen.”

“John.” Fate looked at John in the eyes. “We can’t be telling anyone about this, ok? Danjo, that goes for you too.”

Danjo nodded, feeling very small. He was standing in front of two prodigies that the world had never seen. Was he supposed to bow down and worship or something?

“Um… what about you?” Danjo asked John, almost fearful of the answer. What would John be? A grandmaster? Some kind of genius tactician?

“Oh, me? I’m manaless,” John said, giving Danjo a thumbs up. “That’s why Prota is my protector.”

…manaless?

“Oh. I’m… I’m sorry. That must be-”

“Nah, don’t worry about it. I’m all about fucking around and finding out.”

Danjo nodded slowly. Manaless people were rare but not unheard of. The stories of them were typically those of ridicule, though. Most ended in either insanity, suicide, or some other kind of tragedy. No one treated a manaless person with respect, because in the end, they were much more useless than everyone else.

However, it seemed that John had no such issues.

“Anyways, cool. Info dumps out of the way,” John sighed. It seemed that he was relieved that the whole thing was over. “What are we supposed to do about this?”

Fate looked at John. “Hm… well, it’s not like you can do much. I’m assuming you’re gonna stick to the weapons you have right now?”

“Yeah. They work, right? And besides, it’s not like I fight that much in the first place.”

Fate nodded. “Fair enough. It might be useful for Prota to learn some spells. Actual spells. never really thoughts about this before, but someone might pick up on her chantless casting. If her ability is as unique as I think it is, it’d be best to hide it unless absolutely necessary.”

“Well, yeah. So what, have her learn chants? Even thought she doesn’t need them?”

“That’s… well, it’s for her safety. It’s not meant for efficiency.”

He turned to Prota. “What do you think?”

“Hold on, that’s not all,” Fate added. “If she can copy magic without being taught how it works, then her understanding of mana control would probably improve. I’ll…”

He gave John a look that probably meant “let’s talk about this later.”

“So? Any thoughts, Prota?”

Prota thought about it. Fate was a fourth circle caster, and a knight class fighter on top of that. A battle mage.

Could she keep up with that?

The dwarf she’d been up against was fifth class? No, there was no way. She’d seen Fate’s magic. Was the difference between a fourth circle and a fifth circle that large?

Prota had never met a caster before, but that dwarf was strong. Really strong.

He’d been going easy on her, that much was obvious, and even then she’d barely managed to keep up. Granted, she hadn’t had her staff, one of the most important resources to her in a fight, but still…

Wouldn’t it be better to take anything she could get?

“Mm,” Prota nodded.

“Sounds good. I’ll talk to John later,” Fate nodded. “In the mean time, though… Danjo. Do you think you can fight?”

“Uh… that’s…”

Danjo fidgeted nervously. “I’m a second circle caster…”

He expected everyone to laugh or criticize, but the only sound anybody heard was John sneezing.

“How about your mana core?”

“Rank C.”

“Hm… so, it’s the same as Prota’s… no, one lower? I don’t know…”

“What’re you?” John blurted out, turning to Fate.

“A rank. If you really need to know.”

“What, did you level up during the last fight?”

“How- forget it,” Fate muttered, shaking his head. He couldn’t let John get the best of him forever. “Then… Danjo. I know you can make some pretty cool stuff, but how about I train with you?”

“Wh- what?” Danjo stammered. “But… what about you?”

“I can train on my own as well. Danjo. You said you wanted to save your sister, right?”

Fate’s tone turned serious as he looked Danjo in the eyes. The dwarf was averting his gaze, but his fists were clenched.

He did want to save his sister.

“You wanted to do it with us, right? Then we’re a team. And that means that we take care of you. Got it?”

Tears started to form in Danjo’s eyes. He looked like he was about to cry from pure joy, but unfortunately, such a touching scene would have to wait until later.

“Well, that’s settled then,” John yawned. He got up, stretched, and turned to leave. “Well, good luck, everybody!”

“You’ve seriously got a knack for bad timing, you know that?” Fate grumbled. “And what about you? Surely you don’t plan on just relaxing again, right?”

“What do you want me to do? Dream prophetic visions or something? I’ll be fine.”

Fate wanted to say something, but he remembered the look in John’s eyes when he’d come back, holding that man’s head. Face and hands painted in blood, casually tossing a human head to the ground…

Yeah. John could probably manage. Fate wasn’t sure how John had done it, but surely he knew something. He just had to leave it alone.

“Fine,” Fate sighed. “Then I’ll work with Danjo later. Speaking of, do you want to stay with us, Danjo? Are you gonna be ok living at your home?”

“Ah- oh, yes, I’ll be ok,” Danjo stammered. “I’ll head on back now.”

He got up awkwardly and trodded off awkwardly. No one made a move to stop him.

“So,” John sighed as he watched Danjo disappear. “Do you plan on telling him you’re the hero?”

“No,” Fate said, shaking his head. “There’s no need to tell him. I don’t plan on getting him involved.”

“...suit yourself. So you don’t plan on telling him about Kit, either? Or your powers?”

“No. So don’t bring it up.”

John nodded, but it didn’t add up. Danjo was surely meant to be Fate’s companion. But Fate said that Danjo had no reason to join him. John’s hunches were usually correct, though. So all that Danjo needed was a reason for him to join Fate. But what kind of reason would-

Oh. Oh, no.

“Hey. You said that Danjo has a sister that’s captured, right?” John said quietly.

“Yeah. What of it?”

“No, just checking,” John said, but he felt a chill run down his spine.

Trauma. Hadn’t he just been thinking about it? A character was forced to go through trauma in order to grow. Growth, in this scenario, meant becoming a hero capable of standing up to the demon king. It was a bit of a stretch, but John knew his theory was probably correct.

John had no idea of knowing whether or not his theory was correct. Danjo might not be Fate’s companion. He might just end up joining Fate for no reason.

But his gut told him no.

John had been annoyed at the amount of boring exposition he’d just received, but now that new information had slapped him in the fact, he wished he could’ve gone back to the info dump.

“Hey, you good? What’s going on with you?” Fate said, waving his hand in front of John’s face.

“Huh? Hey, I was just thinking.”

John wracked his brain for some kind of excuse and landed on the first one he could think of.

“Your ability. It’s like a sword aura, right? But what is it, specifically? I understand your blessing or whatever is probably related to how you can be a battle mage, but what about that sword of yours?”

Fate looked at his katana and unsheathed it.

“Oh, this? Ah, I used to take some swordsmanship classes. Not much, but I learned a little. So when I came into this world, I was given the option for one special skill… call it nostalgia, I guess.”

“So what’s the ability?”

“...I guess it doesn’t really hurt if you know. God Slaying Sword. It’s essentially an aura that allows me to cut through anything, even through, well, gods. It draws directly from my mana and stamina, so it’s not like I can use it forever, but it’s quite strong.”

“Cut through anything, huh… So I’m assuming your actual mana core is much larger than A rank?”

Fate flinched. “What makes you say that?”

“Come on. It draws from your mana. You can’t be going around with an ability like that and have a piddly little A rank core.”

Besides, the hero always has maxed out stats. That’s just the kind of [Character] you are.

Fate hesitated. “Fine. It’s something known as EX rank.”

“EX rank? Seriously?”

“Again, I didn’t name it.” Fate sounded exasperated. “It’s a mana core level specific to a hero. It’s almost limitless. The thing is… my body can’t handle it. The goddess gave me a limiter so that I wouldn’t explode, and it grows as my body can handle it.”

“Yeah, sure. Alright.”

“What, you don’t believe me?”

“No, I do. It’s just… never mind. I’m assuming you wanted Kit to teach Prota some more, right? Just didn’t want to bring it up in front of Danjo?”

“Yeah. Come here tomorrow. She’ll set up a mirage field, it’ll be fine,” Fate said as he got up. “I’ll be busy with Danjo.”

“...what do you see in that kid?” John blurted out. It was still bothering him.

Was Danjo a [Companion]?

“I… feel bad for him,” Fate said. “And he’s a genius, even if he doesn’t realize it. He wants to save his sister. Is that really so bad? Even you can relate to that, right?”

~~~

“So it was confirmed. She is indeed a Soul Steal user. The details line up.”

Doctor nodded, spinning around in his chair. He seemed pleased.

“Good. Did anything else come out of that?”

“They plan on taking a break, it seems.”

“A break?” Doctor asked in a disgusted tone. “Why?”

“Doctor,” Breaker sighed. “It’s only been about a few months since that boy came into town. They’re not going to just charge into here right away unless they’re complete idiots.”

“How about last time?”

“That was a recon mission. They weren’t supposed to engage.”

“But they did.”

“...I don’t have a response to that.”

Doctor nodded. “I’ve also received word that the boy is a battle mage.”

“A battle mage?!” Breaker exclaimed. “Are you serious?”

“Do I look like I’m joking?”

Breaker sighed. He could never tell if Doctor was serious or not.

“I’m not,” Doctor grinned. “Isn’t it exciting?!”

“I don’t know if unknown variables like that can be considered exciting,” Breaker grumbled. “Seriously, there’s something wrong with you.”

“We cannot possibly lose, Breaker. The power I have is beyond that of most. It is… beyond mortal comprehension,” Doctor giggled. “Surely you know that.”

Breaker just sighed.

“So what are you going to do next?”

“Wait, I suppose,” Doctor said with a theatrical sigh. “After all, that’s what you said we should do, isn’t it?”

Breaker nodded. He didn’t show it, but he was immensely relieved. At least Doctor wasn’t taking any stupid actions.

“Oh, if I might ask. How did you find out about the boy? As you know, I receive all the messages that come through our spy, and I received no such news.”

Doctor got up from his chair and winked.

“That’s a secret.”