Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to shake the last vestiges of his displeasure with the day’s lack of progress on the doing real magic front by the time he sat down next to Yvessa at dinner, late as usual. “Where’s Felix?” he asked, gesturing to the filled plate and empty sit opposite him.
“Bathroom,” Sarah answered.
“Hm… took him long enough. So what were you talking about before I rudely interrupted?”
“You didn’t interrupt anything.”
“Not right now, maybe. But I saw you talking about something just a few seconds ago, and you stopped talking shortly after spotting me.”
“Are you trying to make some sort of joke about how just your visual presence is a rude interruption or something?”
“I wouldn’t put it quite as unfunny as that, but sure, something like that, definitely. So, what were you talking about? Or is that secret cadets’ stuff that I’m not allowed to know about yet?”
“I wouldn’t think so,” Yvessa said, “but maybe Sarah would disagree…”
Sarah pursed her lips and squinted her eyes, as though the accusation were completely unjustified. “Yvessa was just asking me about body nourishment patterns. She was thinking of replacing some of hers.”
“I was wondering whether I might be better off doing away with my patterns that help with muscle nourishment, as I might not need any help in that department due to how much I exercise daily.”
“For what it’s worth,” Sam said, “I recall Farris saying something about the patterns being unnecessary for me. But I don’t remember if he was just talking about the muscle nourishment, or in general. Also, if he was talking about me as I am now, at level 1, or whatever… Sorry I couldn’t be of any more help.”
“That’s alright. I’m just at the thinking stages right now. One of my combat instructors mentioned it being unnecessary for most cadets with how much we work out and that got me wondering for myself.”
“I’m assuming it wasn’t the one instructor we don’t like?”
“No. It was an instructor for magical combat.”
“What did you suggest?” Sam asked Sarah.
“I told her that the relative gain there is to be had from having a more optimized set of nourishment patterns isn’t that great. And it’s not worth the hassle and worry that comes along with having to make sure that you’re always working out enough. Especially since once we graduate, our ability to exercise as much as we’d like is going to be much more limited.”
“So I’m assuming you’re still running on roughly the same set of patterns that Yvessa has? Despite the fact that you exercise way more than her?”
“Yep. I’ve just finished imprinting a level 3 version of one of my two nourishment patterns that helps with muscle reinforcement.”
“But you still imprinted that one last…” Yvessa said.
“Out of only three I needed to re-imprint. And it’s not like I disagree with the notion that our muscles need the least amount of help from nourishment patterns. That’s a known fact. I simply think that there isn’t a lot to be gained by doing away with muscle nourishing patterns completely. Especially since you will have a much greater need for them in the future, so it’s best to keep yourself familiarized with imprinting them.”
Yvessa turned over her hand, conceding to Sarah’s point. “I agree with you in principle. But I’ll be remiss not to ask Dan about that subject. Do it for me tomorrow, please, Sam?”
“Sure thing.” He nodded. “But if you don’t mind me asking, what actually is there to be gained from switching up your nourishment patterns? Up till now, I assumed that you build the set of them to always nourish as much of your body as possible on any given day. So how could your nourishment be any better?”
“That’s true. Optimizing my nourishment patterns isn’t supposed to help me better my nourishment. That is already built to be practically maxed out. As evident by the fact that for the day to day, nourishment patterns are the most basic sustained patterns, preceding even passive gathering in importance for keeping active. But, by getting rid of two of my nourishment patterns and replacing them with one that’s much more efficient but doesn’t help with the muscles at all, I can gain back some patterns capacity for use someplace else. I haven’t done the math just yet, but I’m thinking that I’ll be able to add in one more minor recovery pattern, and more importantly, a passive sculpting pattern.”
“Oh,” Sam moaned. “Of course those are a thing.”
“There are also conscious patterns that help with active sculpting. And active imprinting. Although the active part is redundant for the latter.” She smiled mischievously.
He pointed at Yvessa with his left hand while holding out his right one to inform the responsible adult at the table of her breach of etiquette. “Ms. Saaarah… She told me stuff I’m not supposed to know yet.”
“I’ll let it slide this time.” Sarah smiled. “It’s relatively minor information and totally harmless.”
“What is?” Felix asked as he sat down.
“Yvessa spoiled me on three kinds of patterns I didn’t know existed,” Sam said.
“Oh… This because she wants to switch up her nourishment patterns and get a second passive sculpting one instead? Yeah, that sounds like too much of a headache to me.”
Sam nodded and pointed at Felix with his thumb while turning to Yvessa. “See, now that’s a good friend you have there. He wasn’t here for the entirety of our conversation and yet he knew just what you were thinking about so that he could jump straight in.”
“He left for the bathroom just before you got here…” Yvessa rolled her eyes. “He was here for most of the same conversation that we just had.”
“Well, this just goes to show what happens when I try to act out of character and be gracious to my friends. Let this be a lesson to us all.”
“Speaking of lessons,” Felix said, “how was yours? Pretty big day today, no?”
Sam gave him a middle finger. “Stop trying to play both teams, asshole. Pick a lane. But yes, very big day. Learned a lot of stuff. Some actual spoilers to contrast with Yvessa’s middling attempt. Very fruitful day, etcetera, etcetera. You know what I haven’t learned today, though? Actual magic!”
“What do you mean?” Sarah asked. “I thought Dan was starting you today on foundational tracings.”
“He did, and we covered all ten types of those. Then we started going over Posterior Physical Foundational. I even managed to succeed in about a fifth of every attempt (in the very last part of the lesson). But that’s not real magic! That’s just the preamble to doing real magic, the prelude, the required preceding substance, the—”
“We get it.”
Sam upturned his palms in dismay. “But not any effect having magic. Stuff that you can point to and say, ‘Hey! That shouldn’t happen in real life. That’s gotta be magic.’ And I was really looking forward to looking myself in the mirror and saying that.”
Felix laughed. “Complaining about needing to learn foundational tracings before moving on to affecting tracings is like complaining about needing to learn how to load a gun before learning how to shoot.”
“So? I’m sure rich enough people can go to gun ranges where someone does it for them and all they need to do is aim and pull the trigger. Also, we don’t train with guns here. Use another analogy. Like crying about needing to hold a sword handle in order to swing it.”
“What’s the big deal?” Yvessa asked. “You’ll just have to finish Posterior and Prior Magical and Prior Physical before moving on to the practice tracings. By the rate you’re progressing, it’s not going to take you more than a couple of weeks.”
“Actually, we’re doing the practice tracings before the magical foundational, so even less than that. But that’s not the point! The point is that I wanted to be able to do real magic today and I’m still not able to. And that sucks. Am I not allowed to develop my own expectations for how reality should behave in this strange magical world I found myself in?”
Yvessa shrugged. “Do you really care about that?”
“Of course I do! Just not enough to affect my actions and behavior. Probably. One can never be too certain when it comes to one’s self, especially when the one in question is the one and only, yours truly. Also, do you—”
“Why is Dan having you learning practice tracings before magical foundational?” Sarah asked.
“Because he wants to rush me to start on recovery tracings as soon as possible. So he figured that having some extra time in which I can train with some affecting tracings before that will be very helpful.”
“Yeah, that makes sense. Hopefully, you’ll be able to pick it up fast and we can start making active use of them.”
Sam narrowed his eyes at her seemingly innocent remark. Surely she wasn’t planning any further increase in exercise difficulty before his start on recovery tracing? Especially with one starting next week. He shuddered and tried turning his mind to other, less scary prospects. “Anyway, do you guys know how those last two foundational tracings work?”
“You mean the out of pathways physical one and the core magical one?” Felix asked. Sam nodded. “Nah. That’s third year material. And that’s just the theory. Executing them is high-level stuff.”
“How high level?”
Felix shrugged. “I don’t know. Level 8, I think.”
This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
“Level 8 is for the core foundational tracing,” Sarah said. “For the purely physical, I don’t know.”
“Level 8?” Sam asked. “You don’t think it has anything to do with the level 9 and 10 patterns?”
“Maybe not with the patterns, but it definitely has to do with what happens to your core around that time.”
Sam chuckled while shaking his head, alternating pitying looks at the two other first years at the table. “Man… with every passing day, with every new nugget of wisdom and piece of knowledge I obtain, it just gets more ridiculous that you guys didn’t know about what happens after level 8. That’s the kind of unrealistic stuff that can only happen in real life.”
“Don’t take your frustrations of being unable to do any real magic out on me, mate.” Felix wagged his finger at him.
“Is that what I was doing?”
“No,” Yvessa said. “You were just trying to make fun of us because you’re a bad friend.”
“Bad person, surely?”
“Nah.” Felix shook his head. “If you were a bad person but a good friend, then you wouldn’t be making fun of your friends anyway.”
“Let’s say I agree… but if I were a good person but a bad friend, then I wouldn’t be making fun of anyone at all, friend or not.”
“I guess you’re both right then. You are a bad person and a bad friend.”
“I can roll with that.”
“Can the both of you eat a little faster so we can roll out of here?” Yvessa said.
“I most certainly can. Felix?”
“Yeah, alright.”
Yvessa then used the opportunity of Sam and Felix being less disposed to intervene in the conversation, to reengage Sarah in a conversation topic of her choice. The overly womanly topic of which combat healing course is the best out of those available for the next trimester.
“It really depends on whether you’re willing to take the two specialized courses,” Sarah said. “If you want to truly cover all of your bases, then you need to take both. Healing patterns are very different from tracings, so you can’t make do with just the knowledge of the latter if you want to imprint a pattern. And tracing for healing also has its nuances and techniques that you’ll need to spend time practicing with. From my understanding, the general course teaches roughly half of what the patterns course teaches and two-thirds of the tracing course. With a lot less time to practice. So if you don’t have time for both courses, the general one is definitely the only correct choice. But, if you want to take both courses, then if I were you, I’d take them at the same trimester.”
“Tsk. I’m not sure I have the time for two more elective next trimester.”
“Not to mention having that time slot open,” Felix put in.
“That’s also true.” Yvessa frowned before turning back to Sarah. “Maurice teaches only the general course, right?”
“Yep. The rest of his courses are way more advanced than just basic self-healing. But I wouldn’t advise you to take his course. Not if you’re just interested in it for the combat utilization. He likes to… veer off topic. Proselytize about healing magic in general, if you get my drift.”
“And the other teacher?”
“They’re pretty good, from what I understand. Same goes for the two that teach both of the specialized courses. And I’ll also advise you to study with the same one, if you’re going that route. Time constraint notwithstanding.”
“Hmm… I’ll have to check my schedule. Dammit. I was really hoping for a clear-cut answer.”
Sam chuckled. “Welcome to the wild jungle that is making your own university schedule. It’s awful. I at least hope that the overall quality of education here is good enough so that there aren’t any real awful lecturers who you don’t get anything out of studying under besides a headache when you have to write a shitty essay for their shitty self.”
“I keep forgetting that you’ve studied at university,” Felix said. “You don’t complain about it all that much.”
“Don’t I?”
“Relative to all your other complaints, I meant.”
“Can’t you ask Dan to help you with this kind of stuff?” Sam asked Yvessa. “That is what he’s here for.”
She shrugged. “I’m pretty sure that if you weren’t here, then he wouldn’t have had a reason for being here right now. But, fair enough, if he’s already here and doing his job, I might as well avail myself of his help.”
“Then remind me tomorrow to ask that of him as well, just in case I’ll forget.”
“No need. I’ll just send him an email for both questions. Better use of all of our time.”
“If you say so. And speaking of a better use of our time… let’s go?”
“I’m literally on the last bite, mate,” Felix huffed.
“Oh, my apologies, then by all means, do finish.”
“I can’t do it with all of you staring at me.”
“Don’t tell me you’re one of those people who can’t eat while other people are looking at them?”
“I think most people would be uncomfortable being the sole object of attention at the table while trying to eat.”
Yvessa sighed. “Just go already!”
“Fine!” Felix took the bite with a frown, keeping it all the way until they were outside when he asked Sam, “So how are your spear lessons going?”
“Seriously, Felix, you can’t keep asking me questions and then complain that our conversations are Sam centric. If you’re against something, then you have to stand against it. You can’t keep promoting it with your actions.”
“That’s your idealism speaking. Your naive and optimistic view of the world and how it should be. But I, as a practical and realistic person, can recognize the state of our social fabric for what it truly is. Which leads me to the understanding that we’ll never be able to do away with most of the time we spend talking about you. However, what I can do, is choose to better allocate that time. Promoting the conversation to circle around you when it is most convenient for me in order for us to be able to get it out of the way.”
“That’s a nice rationale. Pretty convincing. Just one question, though.” He turned to regard Yvessa and Sarah. “I wasn’t going to bring up my spear lessons right now, probably not for the rest of the day as well. Were any of you?”
Yvessa shook her head. “No,” Sarah said. “We’ve already talked about it.”
“We did?”
“Yeah. During breakfast. Before Felix and Yvessa joined us. I asked how your morning went and then you tried to making a joke about being forbidden by Lin from participating in the tournament because he’s still mad about the Soviet Invasion of Afghanistan.”
Sam chuckled. “Oh, right. Yeah… that wasn’t a very good one. I’m glad you guys didn’t have to hear it.”
“What’s this about Lin forbidding you from participating?” Felix asked.
“Well, I’m not sure if he’s really forbidden me, speaking of the end-of-year tournament, of course. But he’s certainly worked hard on trying to convince me that I don’t have anything to gain by participating. And then something about not rewarding a revisionist state actor with the legitimacy that an international competition brings. That was a 1936 joke… Also wasn’t all that great, I apologize.”
“Why won’t you gain anything by participating? How the hell does that make sense?”
Sam told them. “All in all, his words do make sense. But I honestly don’t care either way, all that much. I’ll probably just end up doing whatever Dan, or Farris, I guess, tell me to do.”
“Not that there are all that many other tournaments available to you,” Yvessa said. “Just the end of this year and year three. And I don’t think you’ll be able to get out of the latter one.”
“That’s probably true. And I certainly don’t want to avoid participating in that one. If I can’t hold my own in two and a half years, enough to make a respectable showing of myself, then I shouldn’t be graduating.”
“Well said!” Felix clapped him on the back. “We’ll show Lin the error of his ways. Competition brings the best in all of us. Matter of fact, I’m thinking of helping you train so that you’ll be able to join the end of the year competition as well, no matter what Lin says. You’ll see what an explosive growth you’ll experience after competing with other people.”
“Yeah… Lin was way more convincing in his arguments. So if it comes down to you or him, I’m going to leave the choice of whether to participate in his hands. Also, there’s no way that I’m going to be good enough to win the tournament in half a year and if there’s no chance that I’m going to win, what the hell am I even participating for?”
Yvessa raised an eyebrow. “You think there’s a chance that you’ll win in two and a half years?”
“Sure. It’s further away, so it’s easier to be delusional about it. It’s kind of like my delusion that if I work out really hard this week, next week’s jump in difficulty wouldn’t feel all that hard.”
“I’m sure it won’t.” Sarah smiled reassuringly, and in a way that told Sam all he needed to know.
It didn’t stop from working out really hard this time, but it certainly made the prospect of keeping it up for the rest of the week seem less likely. Those recovery tracings couldn’t come into play fast enough. Sam only wished that he could practice some tracing in his free time to help speed that up. So he had a think about that while on the way back to his room, stupidly keeping it to himself and not engaging Sarah in the dilemma. He carried the think all the way through his shower and managed to put it on hold long enough to finish the small part of his studying time dedicated to some patterns homework. But then he had to recalibrate in preparation of moving on to statistics and so his thoughts on the subject resurfaced once again, and in greater intensity, enough for him to decide to do something about them.
So he called up Dan. Should’ve sent him a message first, but oh well.
“Everything all right, Sam?” Dan answered after two rings.
“Yeah, sorry about the hour. Did I interrupt you in the middle of something? Sorry about that again.”
“It’s fine. I was just in the middle of some light reading. How can I help?”
“Well, I was just wondering… Seeing as how we want to rush recovery tracings, right? And how there’s no need for me to keep my core filled except for when cultivating… So wouldn’t it make sense for me to practice tracing after I finish my cultivation for the day? There isn’t any danger in me practicing what we went over today, is there?”
“No, the only danger is that your time will be wasted somewhat. And that it will wear you out, of course. Were you planning to practice after your extended cultivating practice or instead of it?”
“Instead. So, on average, this will actually get me some free time back. Making everyone happy.”
“Hm… Alright, go ahead. But don’t do it on nights where you’re going to be cultivating the following day before meeting me. So that’s Fridays and Saturdays. At least as long as you didn’t deviate from that part of the schedule as well. I’ll send you a link to a PDF of the textbook so that you’ll be able to use it if you need it. Make sure not to read any chapter that we haven’t gone over yet.”
“Of course. Thank you! Sorry again for calling you so late.”
“It’s alright. It’s what I’m here for. Take notes on how it was to practice today so we can go over them tomorrow. Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.” Sam disconnected the call. Releasing a breath and adopting a self-satisfied smile, he marshaled his resolve and mental focus in order to square off with a subject that, while he didn’t hate quite as much as math, he was probably way less proficient in. With the call to Dan taking a couple of minutes of his study time, it was no wonder that he was almost twenty minutes into his cultivation time before he finished the day’s material. He opted to move up the alarm for only those twenty minutes and not include the extra two that he took in order to go to the bathroom and drink some water. Still, a level zero didn’t have much magic to trace with, so it ran out pretty quickly, and without Dan there to refill him back up, that meant that he finished his training for the day with, if you rounded up, an hour to spare. Well… it would’ve meant that, if Sam hadn’t gone back to reread some of the textbook after he finished practicing his tracing. As it was, Sam’s first foray into independent tracing practice was mostly an abject failure when compared to the abilities he displayed while under Dan’s watch, but he still considered it a very good use of his time.
He was incredibly satisfied with his new plan, particularity with the fact that he envisioned it, formulated it, and implemented it all in the same evening. And he made it pretty clear to Sarah when he met up with her the following morning.
“So, what you’re happy about is that you finally found a legitimate excuse to reach into what was supposed to be an untouchable hour and a half of free time?” she asked him with undisguised weariness.
“That’s not it at all. Besides, I don’t think an excuse can be legitimate. Forget about the bit with the free time, don’t focus on that. Focus on the part where I had an original idea on how to better train, and that I managed to make it a reality on such short notice. That’s the part I’m happy about. This actually feels like taking some measure of control of my life back.”
“Well, if you’re happy, then I’m happy. About that, at least. I’m still not happy about how much little time you have in the day for relaxation. Just don’t try and make up your lost cultivation time on Saturday, alright?”
Sam held up his hands. “I won’t, promise. Say… does cultivation count as work for the purpose of religion and whatnot?”
“There’s actually a lot of theological debate about it. And the usage of patterns. But pretty much every religious interpretation that disallowed the active usage of magic on a holiday has made an exception for people in the military and in vital industries… and people under eighteen.”
“Ah. Until that last part, I would’ve given it the benefit of the doubt. But with it, I imagine the government had something to do with that decision.”
She shrugged. “Probably. Never looked too deeply into the topic. You can ask the chaplains at the religious hall if you’re interested. Come to think of it, you’ve never been there yet, right?”
“Nope. And I’m not going to. I like my religious buildings to pick a side.”
“That’s a shame. It’s a beautiful building. Inside and out.”
“I got enough of beautiful exterior and interior to see right here,” Sam said and, after a moment’s hesitation, looking up and down and left and right, pointed at her.
“Were you thinking of pointing at yourself?”
“No. At the gym. But that’s almost as ludicrous as calling me pretty.”