On the way back from his third visit to the psychologist, Mathew went a station beyond his home, stopping at "Center". He came out to a vast plaza filled with parks, small caffees and bars. It was surrounded by shopping centers and restaurants and brand stores inside buildings imitating 20's style. At a little after eight in the evening the city was still alive, crowds passing in all directions. Just outside the subway students were playing on various instruments, some spread awareness on issues they deemed worthy and some were giving out leaflets about langague classes, the new quick methods to learn magic and the up and coming Michelin prophets who would take the culinary world by storm.
Mathew took it all in, turned to the right and pushed his way through the crowds towards the "Crystal Abode". "I wonder how that goddess feels about this name. A shopping center in her honor." Mathew shook his head, while avoiding some people taking surveys. They were speaking loud about animal cruelty on the Mars cat girl colony. While he usually didn't mind taking part in surveys, these pollsters seemed a bit too passionate and would likely take up quite a bit of time. When the man reached the shopping center he noticed it has changed quite a bit. What used to be a blue glass dome, now was a network of blue and black crystals resembling a spiderweb. "I suppose she decided something bearing the name of her home should also look the part. Well, the place still stands so there are probably some blessings added to it." Before the rotating entrance some religious folk were arguing with catholic priests. The latter claiming the Pope Francis accepted the various Deities, while the other party called it blasphemy exclaiming God will smite the devil spawn. Mathew looked over the clearly not smited building and came in. The Pope himself was rumoured to be one of the handful of people who were close to deification and often spoke about being thankful to various Deities that helped clean out corruption and other unpleasantries from the Church.
Thinking that he didn't have the humour to stew over complicated subjects, Mathew hurried over to a sports shop. He was failing physical exercise at home and decided to try out a gym membership. Previous week he went back home to grab some sweatpants and a shirt to exercise in, and didn't have the energy to go back out. This time he would just buy something on the way to the gym. He grabbed the first M sized outfit he saw, black pants and an orange shirt with a picture of a golden haired carrot, paid quickly as there was no line and came up on the escalators to the top, fifth floor. The gym called "Fitness Planet" stood next to a cinema and a sushi restaurant and was open 24/7. It had three floors and a roof space with a garden for yoga, tai chi and similar activities. The interiors were white walls and black floors. The third floor was filled with treadmills and machines for warming up, while the second had everything for packing muscles. Behind the reception were various rooms for exercise involving moving in rythm with music. Mathew came up to the black desk.
"Welcome to Fitness Planet, how may I help you?", in a deep voice greeted a hulk of a man sitting at the reception. While sitting, he was at eye level with Mathew, his shoulders could hide a wardrobe and stretched the black shirt with the logo of the gym, a planet held up by a Hecatoncheires. The giant continued, "I'm Stefano, I haven't seen you here before sir, may I offer our membership options, or are you a patron from one of our other facilities?"
"I'm new, I'd like a membership." Mathew replied, while studying the other mans face. Black hair in waves cascaded down to his chin, his messy bangs stopping just above the eyes that were closed. Above them were thick eyebrows and between a roman nose. Beneath the nose thin lips, on a clean shaven strong jaw. Where the jaw connected with the neck, on the mans right were two long scars that disappeared in the collar of the shirt.
"In that case we have...", here Stefano offered a leaflet, "... three basic options and two for magically enchanced." While pointing to the options on the leaflet the receptionist explained, "First there is a basic option for ten moollars a month, it offers entry during less frequented hours and booking of classes a week in advance. Second option is for eighteen and offers 24/7 access, additional facilities for discounted fees and discounted brand products, of course, it also includes booking classes a week in advance. Last but not least the premium offers all of the above, but you can book classes two weeks in advance and you can ask for the help of a proffesional trainer once a month for free, you can also freeze your account for up to three months, bring guests without a fee five times a month and have slightly larger discounts. It costs twenty four moollars." The man reached out for a second leaflet, but Mathew stopped him.
"I'm not interested in magically enchanced options, I'm barely managing basic exercise." Having said that, the mage thought for a second and continued, "I think I would like the premium."
"Perfect, in that case we offer a discount of five percent if you pay up front for three months, ten for six and fifteen for a year." The giant pulled out a form, before continuing, "You can mark the option you prefer and if I may ask for your name?"
"Thank you, I'm Mathew," the mage began looking over the form and took out his wallet, pulled out his ID and slid it over the counter, "Here. I will take the six months option." He said while ticking off boxes.
Stefano took a few minutes to enter the information in the holographic screen of a PC and gave Mathew his ID back. "Would you like to pay in cash or card?"
Instead of replying the mage pulled out his red credit card and waved it over to the register, a moment later the transaction was finished. The receptionist asked, "One of our trainers is free right now, would you like her free help today, or on a future visit?"
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"Today would be perfect, thank you." Mathew said and in reply heard, "If you could wait a minute, she will come down in a moment."
From a higher floor came down a tall, fit woman in an outfit similar to the receptionists, a black shirt with the company logo, black yoga pants and black and blue brand sport shoes. She had dark blonde hair gather in a pony tail behind her head, green eyes and a light, natural makeup. Stefano got up, he also wore yoga pants, and gestured towards the woman, "Mr. Mathew, this is Claudia, one of our best trainers," he then gestured towards Mathew, "and this is Mathew, a new premium member."
"You call all our trainers, one of our best Stefano," she smiled towards the receptionist and looked back towards the guest, "Shall we begin then? Follow me."
Mathew trotted towards the woman and the two made a tour around the facilities. She asked about the man's gym experience, his work out goals and the like. Once they were finished, she waited for Mathew to change into gym clothes and proceeded to teach him proper warm up exercises for about fourty minutes. The mage then excused himself to the bathroom, where he meditated shortly, by now it was no longer painful and he only exhaled a bit of dust. Refreshed thanks to meditation, Mathew rejoined Claudia and she taught him to use the work out machines, explained how to best pace himself and when and how to start upping the difficulty. After an hour he was done and spent, took a shower and after exchanging goodbyes with the employees came back home.
In the morning he woke up early, sore all over and before eating breakfast and showering, meditated a bit. After breakfast he left to the park, where he sketched his hands, the statue of the sorceress and the students who had their classes there. Whenever he was bored or tired of sketching he would memorise and engrave within himself the runes provided by the System. From the Fitness Planet he recieved an email pointing him to various diet plans, deciding to keep to one, he did some groceries involving plenty of grains and chicken.
A week later, going to the gym every two days and keeping the daily meditation, Mathew finally finished the first rune. It was a basic one for sucking in energy, leaving behind a frosted over area around him. More runes would allow Mathew to direct and focus the spell, later forming ice projectiles. In the current form the magic first caused the mage to feel like his body froze over when he released a spell and warmed him up when the surrounding mana flowed into him. Even though the spell had plenty of drawbacks, the man was excited. After a long time, he was able to do magic again.
"Hell yeah!!", with a yell Mathew stood up. Sudden dizziness made him sway, but he kept himself from falling and once blood flowed through his body properly again, stretched. He wanted to test out the limits of the spell, but looking over the frost he thought it might damage the wooden floor, so he changed into his exercise clothes and left to the park.
The mage found a dirt circle where people sometimes organized grilling meet ups, there he stood in the middle of it. He focused on the rune and slowly released the magic. The spell only drew on the mana that flowed through his body, the core wouldn't support his spells, until Mathew formed the final Apprentice runes. The cold spread through him and then warmth rushed into him, as the ground in a circle of about a one meter radius, frosted over. The mage shivered a little and continued the exercise. Five minutes later his body was trembling, he was sweating and feeling cold at the same time. Mathew took a step out of the now iced over circle, slipping and falling in it, he just rolled out onto the warmer ground. As he trembled on the ground, the man promised himself the next time he would prepare a thermos of some nice herbal tea to wash out the cold. Lying on the dirt, he laughed and coughed. Suddenly he felt, there was less of a sensation he was used to over the years. After now month of exercise, there was less fat on his body and laughing didn't make it jiggle as much as it did ever since, "Huh, I don't actually remember how it felt to not have the fat jiggle." After those words, Mathew sighed with a content smile. "Maybe this time I will take those few extra steps and develop a six pack? Though, I recall that losing fat is supposed to be harder the older you are... worst case scenario I suppose I could play-pretend a chubby and buff biker." After that thought he said with a sigh, "Gotta get a leather jacket."
On the way back home Mathew stopped by a Starbucks and grabbed a large cup of sugar, whipped cream and a shot of espresso. He was growing bored, the exercise, drawing, meditation and visits to the psychologist were all nice and dandy, but he lacked entertainment. He didn't want to get a new computer or even get sucked into his phone, so he was on a bit of an impasse. It wouldn't be a couple more months before he became an Apprentice and he didn't want to go to a dungeon as less. Without coming to any conclusion he got back home, still lost in thought took a warm shower and sat on the sofa next to his bed, the coffee left on a chair in front of it. He stared at the wall for a while, just letting his thoughts wander. Finally Mathew reached over to the cup, when he noticed the bartender wrote on it "Have a nice day" and drew a heart below the message. The man chuckled and leaned forward while shaking his head. The long hair whipped his face and hanged in front of it.
"Oh, I forgot to get it cut," the mage said to himself, played a bit with his bangs and continued monologuing, "Maybe I should keep it, do something with it. I don't really feel like tying it into a ponytail... Right, I could braid it! I can take braiding lessons." In lifted spirits, having figured out something new to occupy his time, Mathew began looking for his phone. The little thing hid under the bookshelves in the larger room, the man dusted it and plugged it into a charger. Then he went over to his bedroom to finish the happy coffee and with the cup in hand came back to the other room. As the phone wasn't being cooperative after being turned off work few weeks, a waterfall of notifications from twitter and spam on his email clogging it upon reactivation, Mathew waited while sketching his feet on a nearby piece of paper. Once the phone was functional, the man googled for a bit and after thirty minutes of searching finally found a place doing braiding courses that was relatively nearby. He sent them an email and went off to prepare dinner.
With a plate of chicken breast on buckwheat and some salad Mathew went to the painting room, gathered some drawing supplies and sat in front of the mirror. It was as good time as any, to draw a self-portrait, the last one, he made when he was still in university. Four pictures later, the dinner finished, the man still wasn't satisfied with the results. Drawing a face was significantly harder than simple objects and hands. He shrugged, checked if he recieved a reply, since there wasn't one, the mage focused and began forming the second rune.