I finished my meal and returned to my room. many things were on my mind, however, I had to focus on being the best.

Many people obviously had some kind of advantage over me. my own advantage would be my hard work!

I came back to the room and seated on the chair. I looked at the curtain that was over the window. I had ignored the view because I was focused on the books, but I turned my attention to the window. I took the curtain out of the way, and the sunlight entered through it.

"WOW" My mouth unconsciously opened and I was amazed by the sight.

There was a huge forest that extended to the horizon, many strange and exotic birds were flying through the air and many different animals.

I was amazed by it. How could there be a forest outside my window if I was inside the building, and there was no forest out there?

How could they do this? I took a closer look at the window and saw that many runes were inscribed on it. They were so tiny that I had to get close to see it.

The amazement was even greater now. Those mysterious runes… could I learn how to use them as well?

I looked at one of the books that was on my table 'Introduction to runes'. The path was laid before me, I just had to take it.

I eagerly opened the book and began to read it. I decided that I would spend the rest of the morning and the noon reading it, and would cultivate at night.

Each page that I read was a new world appearing before me! Runes had more used than I thought!

Runes were the written form of concepts. there existed many tiers of concepts and the primordial ones.

The original concepts were the four elements: water, fire, air, and earth. The four laws: Space, time, light and darkness. And the two aspects: Life and death.

These ten original or primordial concepts were the ones that gave birth to every other one. The concept of sand was the fusion of the elements of wind and earth, and a tier 2 concepts.

If a concept was a primordial concept, it was tier 1. If it was formed by two primordial concepts, it was tier 2, and if there was more than 2, it was tier 3.

The tier of the concept didn't mean power, but how hard it would be to master. The higher the concepts, the harder to master. however, the laws and aspects were as hard to master as high tiered concepts, even if they were tier 1 concepts.

I learned from the book these things and more. There was a specific rune to each concept in existence, and to learn them, you had to have a basic comprehension of all the primordial concepts.

There was a total of 6 levels to each concept. They were mortal, domain, earth, sky, heaven, and universe. Mortal was the lowest level, and the Universe was the highest. each level was divided into low, middle, high and peak.

To learn the runes, you had to have at least a low mortal comprehension of the primordial concepts.

In theory, that was an easy thing, after all, getting the introductory level as they called low mortal was pretty easy, but the truth was not like that.

The affinities of a person dictated that they had an easier time comprehending a concept, but the ones on the other side of the spectrum became harder to learn.

An example, I had an affinity for the concept of wood, that was formed by the aspect of life and the elements of earth and water. If I tried to comprehend the elements of fire and wind, and the aspect of death, I would have a harder time due to my affinity.

Many apprentices couldn't surpass the limitation of their affinities and never learned how to use runes to their fullest.

Many apprentices struggled to learn how to use runes, only to fail.

Concepts were limited in use. They could mostly be used in combat, however, runes and formations could be used anywhere, for almost anything!

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You wanted a flying machine? Done! With runes, you could build it! You wanted to construct a magic carriage or a building that had a bigger space inside than outside? You could also do that!

The only limitation to runes was the power source. You could inscribe them, but you needed a power source to make the formations work.

An example would be the magical carriage of Leam, he must have been powering it while he was inside.

There was still no cheap source of magic energy that could fuel formations and make humans take the next step in rune smithing.

However, these things were not my concern, for now, I should focus and study the book in front of me. All this introductory information could be left for later.

***

I studied the rest of the day and meditated at night. In the book about mana cultivation, it said that at some point, you could substitute sleep with meditation, but I was obviously not at that level yet.

I woke up early in the morning, took a shower and wore the school uniform.

I tapped the badge three times and followed its direction.

I walked through the many buildings of the school, imagining what amazing things could be inside of them. Many students were walking on the streets by now, some of them even had some magic bags floating behind them, or even were seating on a magical chair that was floating around while taking them where they wanted.

After a few minutes, I finally arrived in front of a big building. There was a statue of a woman reading a book in front of the entrance, and the big wooden door behind her was wide open.

I followed the badge and finally arrived in front of a door. There were many people entering the other classes. I opened the door and entered.

There were many chairs all over the classroom, organized in lines. A big blackboard was in the front, with a table and a chair.

I saw that there were already some students in there, and between them, was Imir. I seated on the first chair and waited.

Others shortly arrived, and the class was full after a few minutes. everyone was talking in the class. Imir, who was seated beside me said. "Hey, your name is John right?"

I nodded and answered. "Yes, and you are Imir if I'm not wrong."

"Nervous for the first day?"

"A bit, and you?"

Before she answered, the door was opened and everyone turned their attention to the door.

A middle-aged woman entered through the door. She was wearing a purple robe, full of strange runes, she had a powerful air around her.

She walked to the front of the board and seated on the table while looking around at the students. Her eyes passed through each one of us and after a while, she said. "Welcome to the first year of the Hestia magical college. My name is Ana Darksky, and I will be your teacher this year."

Everyone respectfully nodded to her and she got up. She walked to the board and said. "Open the book 'Introduction to magic'."

She began to talk about basic topics, and explain the bases of magic, just like in the book. I could see that most of the students didn't read the book before coming to class.

I asked her some of my doubts and many things were made clear to me!

Reading a book and understanding it are two different things. It was obvious to me that I didn't have the necessary base to truly understand these books. I was reading while struggling to understand them!

Even if I had a bigger mental age and was more mature than the other kids around me, I was born and raised on a farm. I had some knowledge that was acquired through reading, but the books that I had contact with were mostly stories and books about farming.

These new names and stuff were very complicated for my uneducated, but I would work hard and resolve all of my doubts.

Most of the students only heard what the teacher said, and what was shown on the magic board. The board could project images that made understanding everything easier.

The class went on through all morning, and she spoke about many subjects, they were: Introduction to magic, Magical alchemy, and magic creatures. All of them had their own uses, mainly magic creatures.

According to what the teacher said, the magic creatures rarely left their lairs. However, the most precious resources were in their lairs. Knowing them was important because mages would need resources to create potions or rituals. And these resources were with the creatures.

Everything that the teacher said was honey to my ears. I absorbed everything that I could and took notes to read the material that would be studied the next day.

And like this, my magical studies began.

***

The week passed, and now, on the last day of the week, the most awaited class would begin. 

Teacher Darksky said that today we would receive guidance on how to cultivate mana properly and how concepts could be used. The second part was only to show us the importance of concepts, we would not learn anything.

Today, instead of being in class, we were in one of the training hall of the building. The place was huge. There were many targets and contraptions to help in learning how to properly wield mana.

We were seated on the ground, organized in groups of three. My group had Imir and Ron.

Mister Darksky stepped in front of the class and said. "Today, I will show you how to refine mana and reinforce your cultivation. The purpose of being in groups is for later activity." She looked around and saw that everyone nodded in understanding.

"Who here already followed my instruction and can already perceive the innate mana of your bodies?"

When she asked this, everyone in the class raised their hands. She nodded and continued. "Well, let's see how well you can feel it."

"To go up in tiers and get stronger, you have to refine the natural mana in the air around us. The first thing you have to do is to use your innate mana and grab at the natural mana." While saying this, she released a ball of mana of two different colors, one green, and one blue. "Imagine that the green mana in the natural mana and the blue one is my innate mana." After saying this, the blue sphere surrounded the green mana and began to "spin" and "burn" the green mana inside of it, making it become blue as well.

"The natural mana around us already has an inherent concept to it. We cannot absorb it naturally like this, so we have to get rid of this natural element through the refining techniques known as mix and burn. The spin is the process of slowly infiltrating your own mana and conversing the natural mana into your own, and the burn is the process of forcefully spurging the concept from the mana."

After saying this, the blue sphere disappeared. "Normally, mana can't be seen. Only at a higher level, it's possible for you to see it, or for you to make it visible. Now, you can try and refine the mana."

Everyone nodded and began to follow the steps just like the teacher instructed.

I used my internal mana and grabbed at the natural mana around me. In these last few days, I had refined my control over my mana. Feeling it was the first step, and after it, controlling was only a matter of time.

My classmates were struggling around me. The teacher had only instructed them to train for this class two days ago, so they didn't have much time to work on it.

I slowly refined the mana in the air. The process was so slow because of my own low mana, something that everything in this class also had, after all, everyone in here was from some far-away place.

They preached freedom in the college but didn't put the country bumpkins like us together with the rich people in the school.

I concentrated in the mana and kept refining it….