The next morning, Lucia and Alex stood outside the house in the early morning facing each other. As she was older and taller than him, Alex had to look up at her, he had a blank look on his face while she looked down at him with a puzzled look on her face. A few metres away, Samuel was concentrating on training Luna in further developing her energy control.

“They're having it easy, knowing each other and everything,” thought Luna to herself, “but how am I supposed to address my student?”

She was thinking about how to tackle that first problem, which Alex witnessed but assumed wrongly.

“The teacher must be thinking of how best to teach me,” he thought, feeling amazed as he assumed from seeing her facial expression, which was far from the truth.

She shook her head to clear her head and decided to ask the very person how they wanted to be called. So, she looked down at her student and asked in a curious voice.

“So, um… How would you like me to call you? Al?  Alex? Or Alexander?”

“Alex,” he replied promptly with a small smile forming on his face. “Please call me Alex, miss.”

She liked his quick response and smiled widely at him as she replied, “Great! So, Alex, would you mind telling me what you know about magic?”

“Um… Other than that I was magically sent to the past to reborn, I have no knowledge of magic,” he thought wryly to himself, “but I can't reveal that.”

So, he merely shook his head in response, and she nodded in understanding.

“That's okay. It's only natural to not be aware,” she said to him kindly, “but do you know about elements?”

“I know there are ten elements,” he replied in a firm voice.

“Oh! Good! Can you list them for me so that I can verify?” She asked him with a keen look on her face.

He nodded and recited what he had learnt from his mother's teaching, “Here's the list. Fire, Water, Wind, Ground, Wood, Ice, Metal, Lightning, Light and Darkness.”

“Very good!” She complimented him and rubbed his hair happily. “Your mother did a good job of teaching you the basics.”

He smiled proudly and said, “Thank you, miss.”

She leaned back and said, “Okay. From here on, I'll be teaching you new things, and if you're confused, it's okay. I'm always here to answer your questions.”

He nodded his head, looking eager to learn about magic. She further liked his enthusiasm to learn something new and went on to give him an explanation about magic.

“The fundamental thing you should keep in mind is that there's not much difference between Energy and Magic.”

“Huh?” He asked, looking surprised. “They're the same?”

“Please wait, Alex. Let me continue,” she requested him, and he quickly apologised because he realised that he had interrupted her. Smiling, she went on explaining, “Magic and Energy are not much different because all living things possess energy and use it in conducting any kind of activity.  Even I'm using energy to give you this explanation, so it's partially same thing with magic. However, how we use it is very different; it's through chanting magical words that invoke the spell into activation and execution.”

“Ah! I get it!” Alex said, nodding in understanding. “It's something like, I suppose, ‘summon fire’ and fire gets summoned in your hand. It's like that?”

Lucia looked at him in amazement and remarked, “Wow. You picked up fast.” As he grinned broadly from the satisfaction of impressing his teacher, she went on to elaborate, “Yes. The chant is similar like that, but you're asking the spirits to help you guide your spell to take action.”

“Spirits?” He asked her, looking confused.

“Spirits of Life, to be exact,” she explained. “They are always around us, watching us, helping us, and living together with us. It's just that we're unable to see them. A pity actually.”

She said the last sentence in a sad voice. It was obvious that she wanted to see the spirits that coexist alongside them. Her student looked at her for a moment with a blank expression on his face before raising a question he got.

“Miss, would the spirits assist anyone?” When she looked at him in surprise, he went on to ask, “I mean, are they able to categorise a person based on their actions? Like good intentions and bad intentions?”

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Lucia seemed to ponder his question for a moment before looking down at him and asking him a question in turn, “How do you define what is good and what is bad?”

“Eh?” He asked, taken aback by the sudden question.

Realising that she was waiting for his answer expectantly, he quickly thought of what to respond to his teacher. The only thing that came to his mind was the destruction of his world in the past, and he decided to lay that out as an scenario.

“Destroying a world is bad, right? They're condemning the entire existence of that world and its inhabitants for whatever reason. Doesn't that make it bad?”

His teacher appeared to be impressed by his question, but her next question stunned him.

“What if it's their duty to destroy that world? What if their duty is to oversee worlds and destroy those that don't meet their requirements, or don't show a level of growth, or are too dangerous to allow to exist?”

Her question made him feel troubled because what she said made perfect sense. Even he admitted that destroying a dangerous world was the right thing to do, but he was unsure about the other two things that his teacher asked him.

She looked down at his troubled face for a few seconds in silence before grinning and saying, “Relax. It's not a scenario a twelve-year-old is capable of understanding, but the point is that the Spirits of Life will assist anyone so long as they have conviction in what they're doing. Otherwise, their spells tend to be weak and may even not function at all.”

“I see,” he said, nodding in understanding, realising he had much to learn about the Spirits of Life. However, he still had one more question to ask, and he raised it by asking, “Miss, do you have any idea why I'm unable to feel my energy?”

It looked like that this question took her by surprise, and she fell silent for a few seconds while deep in thought. A few seconds later, she looked at him and simply spoke with a cool voice.

“I don't know.”

“What?!” He exclaimed, looking stunned by her simple answer. “B-But, I-I thought you'd know, miss. I mean, you're confident that I'm capable of using magic, right?”

She nodded with an apologetic look and said in embarrassment, “Actually, I've only assumed you're capable of using magic because that's how it's always been in the past. My father failed to feel his energy and learnt magic instead. I'm the same, and so I assume it's the same for others as well. I mean, it has to be since it doesn't make sense that we can't use our energy since we're using it to live.”

At her claim, he nodded in agreement and said, “That's true, miss. I understand.”

“Good,” she said with a smile. “Now, let's see if you can conjure a basic spell.”

“I won't disappoint!” He replied firmly, excitement coursing through his veins as he waited for her to instruct him.

She saw his excitement and became excited herself as she held out her hand and said, “Watch closely.” As he looked very intently at her hand, she said, “O spirits of life, come together and form into a blazing flame.”

As she finished chanting the spell, a fire suddenly got lit and hovered above her palm.

Alex was staring at the suddenly ignited flames with great interest. His eyes were also sparkling with excitement and joy at seeing magic for the first time since he lost his memories. Even now, he had this feeling that he was capable of using magic in his past life, and so it was very thrilling to see actual magic used before him.

“Please, let me try!” He said eagerly, becoming impatient to try.

She nodded and closed her hands, causing her flames to die out, and told him, “Okay, Alex. Hold out your hand like me and recited the spell I just used.”

“Yes!” He said excitedly, holding his hand out and reciting the spell. “O spirits of life, please come together and form into a blazing fire.”

Once he finished chanting, the spell took effect only instantly and ignited a considerably smaller flames compared to her flames. Still, the fact that he was able to conjure such a simple spell was proof enough that he was indeed capable of using magic.

“I did it!” He shouted out loud in great excitement, startling his teacher, father and Luna, who both were in the middle of training. “I did it! I did it! I did it!” In his excitement, he ran forward and hugged Lucia around the waist while shouting, “Did you see that, miss? I did it! I cast your spell and it worked! It really worked!”

He was almost overcome with strong emotions of happiness that he began to cry into her clothes. She was startled at his sudden behaviour, realising the great amount of stress that had been on his mind due to the constant failure of feeling his energy.

“What’s happened here?” Samuel asked, coming over with Luna with curiosity. “Why's my son shouting so excitedly and… why're you crying, Al?”

His father suddenly became shocked when he saw his son crying into her clothes. Hearing his father's voice, Alex withdrew from Lucia and ran over to his father with excitement.

“I did it, dad! I used magic!” He told him happily. “Watch!”

He repeated the process of holding his hand out and chanting the magic spell to conjure the small flames that hovered above his palm. Both his father and his childhood friend looked amazed at the sudden ignition of magic that had happened out of nowhere.

“That's so cool!” Luna exclaimed, looking enviously at him being able to use magic.

“It is,” Alex replied excitedly.

Samuel did not say anything, but simply pulled his son into a hug. As he did, Alex closed his hands in surprise and the fire instantly vanished. Then his father knelt down and looked into his son's face with an extremely proud expression on his face.

“II knew you can do it, Al I’m so happy for you!”

“Thanks, dad!” Alex replied. Suddenly, he got an idea and said, “I'm going to go and show mom as well,” and he hurried away into the house while shouting, “Mom! I've got to show you something!”

They watched him run into the house, and as Samuel rose to his feet, they heard a loud cry of surprise and amazement of a woman's voice, indicating that he had demonstrated the same to his mother. The three people outside smiled as they could only imagine the great happiness the mother must be filled with at her son making progress in controlling his powers.

“Thank you, Lucia,” said Samuel, turning to look at her with a warm expression on his face. It's thanks to you that's he's returned to normal and managed to use magic.”

She shook her head and said humbly, “Sir, it was nothing. If my teaching was one factor, the other factor was his ability to learn so quickly and implement it on his very first try. Besides, our lessons have just started, so expect to see more development in the future,” and she looked towards the house with her eyes glittering with great excitement.