The mid morning sun was shining brightly in the overcast and gray winter sky. The clouds carried not snow but simply floated wistfully on slow easterly winds. Thus did a slight breeze of chilled air flow inside the castle window of the small room. This room was a somewhat simple study considering who owned it and showed its use by the relative lack of dust. There were several large bookshelves filled with various tomes and scrolls on the walls showing a scholarly resident. Then there was the pair of chairs, one wooden and one upholstered, that each sat before wooden tables of different size. On the floor was a multicolored rug and on the walls were tapestries displaying illustrations of majestic magecraft. Several light sources of combined wall sconces and candlesticks would have lit the room at night. The last feature of the room was the wooden door that attached it to elsewhere.

Ferherlyn huffed in frustration and hurried over to the windows, closing the wooden shutters with a clatter. He then pulled over the thick fabric curtains in order to shut out the cold. This put an end to the draft and brought a slight smile to his face.

"Finally that blasted cold is shut out!" he said rubbing his hands together. "Why would that servant leave the window open of all things? It'll take hours for the fireplace in the main room to warm in here!"

The tall and thin old man turned around and tucked his robe around himself to keep warm. He was wearing his standard creme colored robes. They were long and thick, embroidered with fancy markings of various avian creatures to show his mastery of wind magic. His graying long auburn hair and beard were dangling down in an unkempt state as he hadn't brushed them recently.

No he had no time for such things now! He was much too busy researching the recent mana activity in the kingdom. This research mainly done of course through use of liaisons who went out into the world to collect readings for him. It was here in his study that he took the information and sought out patterns. The rise of an actual goddess was... Affecting things.

Just as he was about to return to his papers a loud and frantic sounding knock came upon the main door of his room. Whoever it was seemed to be in quite the hurry. What sort of frivolous emergency could they possibly be bringing to interrupt his important research?

With a sigh of frustration Ferherlyn left the study into his main room. Here was his large bed and fancy couch. There was also the various paintings on the walls, rugs on the floor, and drapes across the windows. The other furnishings of the room were typical of nobility in this kingdom and included things like chairs, a desk, and a fireplace that was currently alight. The two doors here led to the latrine and the outside hallway.

"Who is it?" he asked annoyed.

A frightened voice came from the other side of the door. It was one of the male castle guards.

"S-Sir master F-Ferherlyn! The g-goddess is here to s-see you!"

"The goddess?" Ferherlyn retorted in confusion.

What in the world was this man talking about? The goddess was a titan that stood taller than the castle. Her approach was heralded by the thundering quakes of her footfalls. If she was here he would already know about it as would everyone in the city. He had never seen her use any other size and she was obviously doing it for a reason. There was no reason for her to stop this trend now. Additionally what reason would she have to come see him? He had figured now that she was in league with the crown she would be busy enough. Too busy in fact to drag him into whatever bizarre conduct she had as a atypical goddess.

The voice on the other side of the door was more panicked now.

"Please Master Ferherlyn open the door! She looks very angry!"

With an angry grunt Ferherlyn gripped the door handle in his right hand and swung it open. It would seem confronting the guard would be the only way to end this farce. The door swung into the room and he glared out at his tormentor.

What he saw was of great surprise to him and almost caused his heart to stop beating in his chest. In fact it did for a moment! There standing before him next to the panicking guard was the goddess herself! She was there in the hallway the size of a human child of her age but otherwise unchanging in appearance from her normal self. There was a strangely happy grin on her face as she waved to him with her left hand.

"Hello Ferherlyn!" the goddess said cheerily.

Ferherlyn looked at her still in shock. However he quickly regained composure and quickly bowed deeply to her.

"G-Goddess Jenna! What a surprise to see you here! And in your human form as well!"

Jenna simply crossed her arms over her chest which puffed up.

"Ha indeed! You're dazzled by my presence I know! Try to contain yourself old man."

She then waved the guard away before dropping her arms back to her sides.

"You're dismissed. Thanks for taking me up here."

Without further invitation the guard bowed quickly and then vacated the hallway. He was almost sprinting with the speed at which he went. His armored boots clacked on the stone floor until he vanished somewhere into the castle.

Ferherlyn stood back up and gestured into the room, holding the door open beside him.

"Please come in Goddess Jenna. What pray tell brings you to my room today?"

Jenna dashed through the door and quickly looked around the room. Her eyes were glowing and she seemed worried about something. Her behavior made her seem like she was nervous or embarrassed. It took only a moment for her to appear satisfied and relax herself. She then walked over and shut the door herself before returning to the middle of the room.

"Hey um Ferherlyn" she said in a hushed tone. "I'm going to ask you to do me a favor ok? If you refuse its fine." Her face darkened. "But if you ever tell anyone about this I'm going to kill you for real."

This sudden hostility caught Ferherlyn off guard and he actually gulped nervously. He turned to face her properly and bowed again.

"Of course goddess. I'd never imagine spreading rumors about you."

This seemed to reassure the girl goddess. She crossed her arms over her chest and nodded knowingly.

"Mmm. Mmm. Of course." She then looked to the side to avoid eye contact. "See I need you to teach me about magic. Like the elements your world uses and whatnot."

She hesitated a moment then looked at the mage head on. Her gaze was intense and her cheeks were blushed.

"Will you teach me?"

Ferherlyn took a step back as he was staggered by the extreme shock he was experiencing. This was the supposed goddess of knowledge asking for education? Not to mention why him of all people? It was almost too much to process. His mouth was agape and his eyes wide.

Jenna was obviously embarrassed now. Her face was red and she stomped her foot like a petulant child as fitting her appearance. Both of her arms were down at her sides with her hands in fists.

"I'm serious! I'm not from your world remember?"

Her pose then returned to a more guarded one. She put her arms over her stomach and turned her head to the side, the blush diminishing but not vanishing.

"You're the only mage I can trust at all ok? I could just go read books to learn this stuff but I'd rather have it explained to me."

This explanation didn't lessen the shock Ferherlyn was experiencing though it did lessen the impact. The fact a real goddess trusted him enough to show him some of her weakness was an honor he- well he'd never heard of such a thing before. It was unprecedented and awe inspiring. Pride swelled up within his chest in the fact he could be so trusted. No goddess would humble herself for a joke and so he would prove her trust in him was well founded.

Quickly he stood up straight and readjusted his robes. He then once again bowed to her and smiled pleasantly.

"Yes Goddess Jenna I'll teach you. It's an honor I'll never deserve in a thousand lifetimes."

He then gestured to his study's open door.

"Please wait in my study while I make myself a bit more presentable. I need to gather my thoughts for a moment."

Jenna looked back at him and nodded, her expression blank. She was clearly thinking about something but didn't seem angry. Without further emotion she walked into the study and out of sight. However as she went she called back to him over her shoulder.

"Just the basics mind you! I don't have all day. Unfortunately..."

That last word was spoken under her breath and seemed to trail off. It was as if she wanted to spend all day learning about magic but something prevented her from doing so.

Ferherlyn was feeling another emotion he hadn't felt in who knew how long: excitement! The pleasure of having a willing student had long since been absent in his life. His teaching days at the various mage colleges was long in the past. But now he had a chance to relive those glory days if only for a moment.

He quickly collected his thoughts and brushed his beard with his hands. Just the basics was it? Perhaps starting with listing the elements and relation mages have with them would be a good start. He didn't know how much she did or didn't know after all. But as she's from another world he would have to test the waters.

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Once prepared he stood up straight and walked back into his study where the goddess had disappeared to. It was there he was met with another shocking sight!

The goddess was sitting in the middle of the room. It wasn't on one of his chairs oh no, it was on some kind of strange desk. There was a simple wooden chair with a tall back connected by metal tubes to a flat wooden surface directly in front. The result was her sort of tucked into this contraption in which she was sitting almost dutifully.

Her appearance was another thing that had drastically changed. No longer was she in the flowing winter outfit he had always seen her in nor the new colorful one she had recently worn. This was some kind of plain pair of pants with a matching long sleeved shirt. It was a drab brown and he could see a plain white undershirt of some kind in the chest area of the vest shirt. There was also some kind of red fabric streamer tied around her neck and draping in front of her chest.

Jenna looked at him as he entered and just stared at him expectantly which was also bizzare.

"Goddess?" he asked confused.

Jenna put her elbows on the desk and laced her fingers together.

"Yeah? What's up?"

Ferherlyn put his hand to his mouth and cleared his throat.

"What's with this outfit goddess? And is that some kind of desk?"

The goddess rolled her eyes. "Don't worry about it."

She then reached into her new outfit and pulled an apple out of apparently thin air. It was shiny and red. Then without warning she tossed it to him.

"This is for you."

Ferherlyn barely caught the apple and looked down at it in confusion.

"Why are you giving me an apple goddess?"

This got a sigh out of Jenna and she held out her left hand.

"Well if you don't want it..."

Ferherlyn gripped the apple and shook his head.

"No I'll take it" he replied. "Thank you goddess."

He then walked over to his desk and put the apple down on it. It was so strange, receiving a gift from a goddess. Whatever this apple represented it was something so trivial to her that she did it without even thinking twice about it. At the same time however she didn't want to explain its significance either. So mysterious.

It was also making him nervous having a goddess sitting so casually in his study. Her eyes were following his every move as if she was studying him. There was no hostility though and her eyes were shining from genuine curiosity. She had also summoned one of her books and with it a pen of some kind. It looked quite different from the quills everyone used but was clearly a pen nonetheless.

He decided not to keep her waiting any further and pulled his cushioned chair to sit across from her. She would be sitting about ten feet away from him which he felt was a good distance.

Ferherlyn cleared his throat. "Ahem. To begin I suppose I should go over the elements themselves."

Jenna wrote something down in her book and nodded in silence. She was using a writing he couldn't understand. The language of goddesses perhaps? Her silence also seemed permission to continue.

"Firstly there are the twelve elements of the natural world."

Jenna was still looking down at her notes and blurted out in surprise.

"Twelve? Not four? I've heard of four or three, even five!" She then put her left hand to her chin and paused. "No actually I've heard of that many before. Please continue."

Ferherlyn was surprised by the outburst but continued regardless. He wasn't sure what she meant though.

"As I was saying. The twelve elements are: Air, Earth, Fire, Water, Plant, Anima, Electricity, Ice, Light, Darkness, Void, and Vitality. Here are the colors they are associated with as well."

Besides speaking the information he also pulled out a chart with the color associations. In order of his speaking the colors went: creme, brown, red, blue, green, orange, yellow, cyan, white, black, violet, and pink. With an additional prism of multi-color.

At this point he paused to allow Jenna to seemingly write all this down. He noticed she was chewing on the end of her pen and seemed in thought. Not wanting to interrupt her he stayed silent for a few moments more.

Jenna then raised her right hand into the air above her head and left it there. Her eyes remained on her notes and she was clearly waiting for something while simultaneously confusing her teacher.

"What're you doing that for?" Ferherlyn finally asked.

Jenna looked up at him with an annoyed expression as if he should've already known.

"I'm raising my hand? It means I want to ask a question."

This took him completely by surprise yet again, something he figured today's events would have immunized him against by now. She was acting respectful, obedient, almost submissive. Was it an effect of her outfit? Regardless the behavior was kind of freaking him out.

"So all of those elements are pretty self explanatory" Jenna said. She removed the pen from her mouth and leaned on her right fist. "Well except anima, void, and vitality. You mean like controlling animals and life itself? What about void if darkness is already listed?"

Ferherlyn was surprised by her apparent pre-knowlege but it was to be expected of a goddess he supposed. Was this all a test perhaps? No that was a genuine question beyond a doubt. He decided to explain just to be sure.

"Well anima does mean the manipulation of animals including humans. It also allows one to speak with them and speak any human language as well."

Jenna wrote something down and muttered to herself. "Auto-translate..."

He continued as she did this. "Void allows the user to alter gravity in all kinds of ways and also banish targets to another plane of existence. Vitality is quite versatile as well. It lets one heal the sick, cause direct harm to the body, and even the forbidden act of necromancy."

"Necromancy!" Jenna shouted.

She had been furiously scribbling notes down until that last word. After her outburst she blushed and hung her head.

"Sorry..." she apologized. "Go on."

Ferherlyn nodded and blushed some himself. This was all quite exhilarating. Even if it was a goddess that could end his life with but a thought. Maybe that made it more exciting?

"Void and Vitality are very rare types of magic. You see humans can only be attuned by birth to one or two elements maximum, and mastering them takes a lifetime. Even goddesses are subject to limitations on how many elements they can have affinity with. Though goddesses can manipulate the last and hidden thirteenth element: Aether. Pure mana itself. It allows them to alter the world as they see fit. You knew that already though Goddess Jenna."

Jenna nodded and wrote something down. She then raised her hand again.

"Yes?" Ferherlyn asked.

"Could the goddesses of old grant spells to their worshipers?" she asked. "You know like a paladin or cleric. Special magic of an element that goddess had dominion over?"

He put his right hand to his chin thoughtfully. "What's a paladin? I've heard of a cleric before."

"A holy warrior basically." Jenna replied writing more notes. "Gods granting spells is part of any magic system with merit."

This caused her teacher to get lost in thought himself. However after several moments Ferherlyn put his hands down and collected himself.

"You mentioned numbers earlier when referring to elements: four, three and five. What do those mean goddess? Also what do you mean by 'magic system?'"

It was Jenna's turn to be the teacher it seemed and she lifted her head and propped her elbows up on her desk again. She sighed softly and tented her hands together.

"Well there's different main element groupings for different worlds. The super classical four are air, fire, water, and earth. But there's also the three grouping of ice, lightning, and fire." She dropped her arms to her desk. "The five I mentioned was an Asian- I mean a group of people from my world's thing. They were fire, earth, water, wood, and metal. Weird grouping I know. The rules of magic also differ drastically from system to system, even with ones that utilize the same element grouping."

Ferherlyn sat back in his chair and marveled at these revelations. There truly was a goddess of knowledge sitting in front of me. She knew so much about other worlds. Had she traveled to many before ending up here? Why did she end up here and what was her purpose here? Maybe this class had really all been a test to find out what he knew about this world's system. She was obviously familiar with it before this conversation. He decided to take a risk.

"Goddess Jenna" he asked as innocently as possible. "You've said you were a stranger to this world. Yet you seem to know much about its workings despite also claiming not to know how its magic works."

Jenna sat up in her chair and let out a small laugh. She then lifted up her left hand in front of her as she looked at it.

"Oh I didn't know what kind of system this world used, that much was true. However I suppose I know so much about magic systems that once I got the basics a lot more could be applied to this one."

She stopped to think for a moment.

"This pure mana thing though. A lot is starting to make sense. The hidden element of Aether. Very fantasy."

Then to Ferherlyn's utter astonishment the unthinkable happened. There in the palm of the child goddess's hands the various elements began manifesting themselves. One after another they came into existence in a flash of fire, then water, then ice. The display of pure magical mastery cycling through every single element possible before ending on a glowing light of pure radiance.

The light hovered in Jenna's hand for a few moments before she closed her fist in an instant. The light vanished and she looked up at her supposed teacher with glowing eyes. Her eyes then returned to their normal megenta.

"Thank you Ferherlyn. This has been very- enlightening."

She then stood up from the desk and the entire thing vanished into thin air. It had been summoned into the world by the little goddess and surely was vanished from it just the same. Her reaction to the unprecedented and impossible display of magical power was utterly non-existent.

"You know you've been acting very strangely this entire time" Ferherlyn risked to say. "Are you sure you're ok with me seeing you like this goddess?"

Jenna flipped her hair behind her shoulders and huffed. "I don't know what you're talking about."

It was clear to Ferherlyn that she didn't seem to notice her own shift in behavior. Fascinating. It clearly had something to do with that desk and outfit as she was already shifting back to her normal attitude before his very eyes. Best to let sleeping dogs lie, or goddesses in this case.

Jenna had reached into her vest and once again produced an item. She then approached her teacher and presented it to him. It was clear she wanted him to take it.

"Here. This is for you."

The object was some kind of odd thing made up of thin metal tubing. It was the size of a large potato and was two squares connected at the top point by a pair of bars a short distance apart. The oddest part was that on that bars across there were even thinner wires hanging down with tiny metal balls attached, one wire from each bar that met at the ball in the middle. All the orbs were touching at the moment but they could clearly move about.

Ferherlyn took the item and the orbs jiggled about.

"Thank you goddess. What is it?"

Jenna simply nodded and put her hands on his hips in satisfaction. For whatever reason she was clearly happy he took it. Her response to his question was another dismissive name as she turned her back on him.

"It's a Newton's Pendulum. Don't ask its a other world thing."

She then walked over to the closed window and tossed the curtains aside. Then reaching up with her short legs she opened the shutters and grinned as the gust of cold winter air rushed over her face and through her hair.

Ferherlyn clutched his robes over himself as the frigid air hit him. Though of course the little girl goddess was unaffected.

Jenna then turned around to face the mage and raised her left hand to her forehead, her first two fingers out with the others curled up. Then she shot her hand away from her face in a salute.

"See ya later stinky old man!"

Sudden bursts of intense flame burst forth from the soles of her feet and palms of her hands, scorching the floor with dark blotches. Her body was shot up into the air and out the window in an instant, the rush of heat filling the room like a fireplace. She was gone, the window shutters rattling from the gust of wind.

Still in shock Ferherlyn stood up and walked over to the window. Looking out of it he couldn't see her anywhere, though looking at all surely lacked a point. He then turned his attention to the object she had handed him. His natural curiosity overtook him and he walked to his desk while leaving the window open.

He put the thing down on the flat surface and used his fingers to settle the orbs into place. They seemed to jiggle so closely together. Just to see what would happen he lifted one furthest to the outside up and let go.

The wires held it attached to the two bars and the ball flopped down with a loud clack into the next in line. Then the most surprising thing happened. Instead of all the balls moving and shaking about only the ball on the exact opposite end moved. It shot into the air almost as high as the one dropped and clacked back into the row itself. This process then repeated itself over and over again, each swing slightly lower than the previous until all the balls were still once again.

This was simply astonishing! Ferherlyn couldn't believe his eyes. He checked for magic and found none detected in this small item. Then this was purely a natural phenomenon? He simply must figure out how it worked.

Perhaps the goddess had given it to him as yet another test?