Jina was giving me the quick and dirty, more like an information dump than formal training. I was being shown everything precisely once, and then allowed to ask questions. Either she didn't care if I actually got it, or she was hoping I didn't. Though with my memory I could just replay all of this again if I did need a reminder.

That was one of the weird things about elven education, repetition wasn't really a thing. You got shown what to do, and told if you did it wrong, and told why you did it wrong, and then expected not to make the same mistake again. It meant that it took a long time for people to get a feeling for something, but that base knowledge was very fast. The rest of it was your own experimentation, to perfect what you had.

I of course had tons of questions. What happened if this or that material was washed, or if it was the sap or the leaves of that plant that mattered, was it the oils or the composition of this that was important. Sadly many of those Jina had no answer to, there was no scientific method, so she didn't know why things worked, just that they did.

“Anything else?” she finally asked, it was getting very late at this point.

“Lots of questions, but I think some of them won't be answered today.” At least Jina didn't comment on that one, she knew that I was unhappy with some of the holes in the knowledge.

“Good, let's continue to the next subject then, tattoos and inks.” She turned and began to pull even more reagents off of the walls, setting them down before me.

“Jina, it's nearly dark. Should we perhaps continue this tomorrow?” I asked.

“No, this is taking enough of my time, and I'm finishing it all in this sitting.”

I gawked. Hours, we'd been here for hours as she lectured almost nonstop and she wanted to keep going? I liked learning, but at some point I was going to need to sleep. Maybe she was using something that kept her from needing to?

“Aren't you tired?” I finally asked.

“Hmm? No, ah, here, let me.” She turned and flicked me on the forehead and it felt like my whole body had been electrified briefly. I gasped as soreness fled my muscles and my eyes opened like I'd just chugged a pot of coffee. It was like instant sleep, only it felt amazing.

“This is amazing!” I half-yelled.

“Can't do that too much, it'll hurt you in the long run, but just this once will be fine.” There was a bit of a chiding tone to her voice.

Thus began part two of her verbal book on magical materials. This time we were covering the magical tattoos that some people had. They were actually quite different than the lethal empowering potions, in nearly every way.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

To increase someone's magic meant that you needed to force just as much magic into them as you could at once. This granted great potency, but came at the cost of burning the person physically as a sort of fuel. It occurred to me that my own first death might well have been something like this. My body had been immolated in order to move my soul, but was it the body or the soul that held the magic? Maybe it was both, there was no way for me to know. Also, I'd never controlled that particular move, so it was unclear how it had worked at all.

The tattoos on the other hand were much more benign, at least on their own. Each was comprised of a primary ingredient, that which determined the effect. This could be animal or plant and was what formed the basis of the whole ink. Behind that there were one of several binders, these stabilized the mixture and kept it in place, some were also just for color. People liked colors so that wasn't at all surprising.

Each tattoo would only work when it was powered, which meant that some were by definition more useful than others, but that was the way it was I supposed. You could tell when one was working because the materials always shone when magic was pumped into them. Some were brighter and there were even a few that were just the equivalent of a flashlight, though they were rare. As for the shape, it didn't seem to really matter at all, whatever the artist thought looked good would work so long as enough of the skin was covered.

As I learned more and more of the ingredients though one thing that struck me was that all o them were organic, or at least from living things. Even those things I'd thought were minerals, and were, sort of, came from animals or plants, having grown on their surfaces or insides. There was something there too, some deeper metaphysical truth that I couldn't see.

It was as I contemplated this and prepared to ask even more questions that something unexpected happened. We were interrupted.

“Your guest is here,” said a servant from the door, she didn't enter, clearly this place was for the invited only.

“Send her in,” Jina said almost boredly.

Quickly a familiar figure appeared in the door. I'd met this girl in my first day in the city, though I'd known little about her then. Over the years I'd met her many more times. As a point of fact, we met almost every time I used the services on the street of flowers, which wasn't too often, but was periodic.

“Oh, how unexpected,” Sina said, a mischievous smile creeping up her face.

“You two know each other?” Jina asked with a slightly raised eyebrow.

“Sort of,” I answered.

“Oh, yes indeed,” she countered. “One of my favorite customers.”

“Fine, then there should be less awkwardness. Sina here has requested a tattoo to help her not get pregnant. Come in, do you know what you want and where?” Jina asked impatiently. “We'll have to remove the hair from it, so decide, or I'll decide, and you'll be bald.” It was odd to see how she interacted with people that weren't me.

“Oh Justin, I had some ideas, but if you have one... why don't you decide?” the girl coo'ed, still trying to flirt even after the threat from the older woman.

Fine, if she was going to be like that, I could too. I let my own smile flash.

“Alright, come here, undress, and lay on your back,” I instructed.

She did as I bade and soon Jina was looking at me. “Hair?” I pointed and after scoffing she ran her hand over the area, every follicle shedding and wiped it clean, much to Sina's embarrassment.

“Do you have something to draw with?” I asked, and was handed a small brush made of hairs tied to a stick.

I began to draw, channeling every bit of naughty animation I'd ever seen. If Sina was going to be a pervert, I'd mark her as one. Line by line I drew in my design, a mix of overlapping designs in an almost Celtic form. When I was finally finished anyone familiar with certain Asian animations would recognize it perfectly as an inmon.

“I hesitate,” Jina said leaning over, voice hard. “To ask how and why exactly you know precisely what a woman's internal organs look like and where they are to that degree.” Her eyes fixed on the stylized womb, ovaries, and associated plumbing.

“Uh... reasons,” I answered.

“Can I see?” our patient asked. It wasn't much more than a flex of will for me to make a mirror over her so she could, something that earned me a smile. “Oh, I love it.”

“Alright, no more flirting, you two are done.” She looked at Sina. “You, hold still, actually, never-mind.” With a wave of her hand the girl's body went limp.

“I can't move,” the younger girl said.

“By design, but you'll still be able to feel luckily. Now, this won't work unless you're powering it, and you will need to sleep, so it won't be perfect, but it will work pretty well. Just push a little bit of your power into it while you're awake, enough to keep it glowing slightly. You'll need to do that for about five days after your last... interaction.” She didn't even wait for Sina's response before taking what looked like some kind of quill and beginning, based on the gasps and groaning I guessed it was quite painful.

Well, at least I was learning how this was done.