The two of us walked up the stairs back to the ring-shaped corridor. She was in front and I was following after her. Every so often I could see her look back at me, presumably to make sure I was still there. As we ascended the stairs I began to feel sick again. I could feel the mana of countless human mages and sorcerers from every direction. And when we reached the top of the grand stairs I couldn't help it anymore.

"I-I'm sorry b-but... but I need to go to the toilet," I stammered.

"Oh, is something wrong?" she asked, holding me as I was about to fall over.

I was grabbing my stomach and I was in pain.

"Y-Yes... ju-just a-ate too much," I said, not even convincing myself.

"You should probably go to bed then," Elsa said, sounding quite concerned.

I shook my head.

"It's fine..." I said.

As much as I'd love to skip over classes there is some valuable information to gain there...

"If you say so, the room where I teach is over there-" she pointed to a large wooden door "-come by only when you feel better, alright?"

I nodded and stormed off as quickly as I could, towards the staircase embedded in the wall, then towards my door. Throwing it open I stumbled into the room, kicked it closed, turned and threw open the bathroom door. I practically jumped towards the toilet, managing to open the lid just in time.

My eyes widened and all my muscles tensed up as I threw up anything I had eaten for breakfast. The vomit left a taste in my mouth that was so bad that it made me throw up yet again. The whole thing continued for a good ten minutes or so until I only managed to bring forth saliva.

'You really think it's smart to play tough now?' Ira asked.

I chuckled.

"Of course I do. I need this knowledge. And this might help me get closer to that woman, if I can get close to her I can get close to her brother!" I punched the wall at that moment. "Don't you understand?! That will make it possible, that will make my revenge possible! I don't care what happens to me in the process! I want them dead, everyone involved in that incident! I'll start with Lestul and not stop until I have destroyed the entire church." I got quieter at the end, fearing someone might accidentally overhear my ramblings.

'If you say so, just make sure not to fully lose yourself on the way there,' Ira said. 'Don't be like we were...' She whispered the last part making it difficult for me to hear it through my chuckling even though she was right inside my head.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

I pulled on the chain, flushing down my puke, washed my face and left the room. My chuckling was back under control and I slowly walked towards the staircase embedded in the wall so I could get back to the lower floor and go to the room Elsa had shown me. On my way there a few of the volunteers that had arrived with me passed by me, all of them were so small compared to me it was almost hilarious. I reached the room by the time my arm ring vibrated and beeped. When I pushed open the large double door I noticed almost all of the volunteers were already inside. About four or so were missing, among them was Ivory.

Good...

The room was large, had four big windows built into the wall on the side that actually faced out, through those windows one could see the mountain and nothing else but a bit of light did come in through them. On the right side of the room when coming in was a large desk and a board while there were tiered rows of desks and chairs spanning the entire room except for the stairs going up on the right and left side of the room, only a single chair on each tier between them and the wall. From the ceiling hung a chandelier with small lightbugs flying around it, they were currently glowing, giving off a dim yellow-orange light on their own but glowing brightly as a collective, or as a lamp, as a group of lightbugs was called...

I walked to the back of the room, there were a few paintings of strange figures I assumed to be spirits Some looked humanoid while others were more anthropomorphic and a few were simply animals. I sat down at the table that stood right up against the wall. There was already a pen and a piece of paper along with a small vial filled with ink on it. The pen looked intriguing. It looked similar to the ones we had in my own world but the vials of ink were larger and thicker so instead of putting them inside the grip they were more or less part of it in a way where you could directly see the amount of ink you still had while you were writing.

I put up my legs on the chair beside me, blocking it and looked down at Elsa who was currently checking a few documents. Every so often she would look up to check who was there, her gaze lingering on me longer than on the others.

'Think she wants to use me?' I asked Ira.

'For what?' Ira asked.

'Look at these people, most won't survive very long out there or do you think anyone in this room besides Elsa can kill Terror for example?'

I could hear Ira scoff.

'I guess you're right about that. The only one that might stand a chance is that girl... what was her name? Ivy?'

'Ivory,' I responded at the exact moment the blond girl walked in, covered in sweat.

"I'm sorry for being late... instruc... instructor Laura wanted to test us a little more..." Ivory said, completely out of breath.

Entering after her were three others I didn't recognize, all of them looked physically fit and they were covered in sweat as well.

"It's alright, we haven't started yet," Elsa said with a smile on her face.

It was a smile I could tell wasn't genuine... it was strange, just hours ago I wouldn't have noticed but this smile was completely different to the smiles she gave me during the advanced mana lesson.

'Maybe she really does like you,' Ira said jokingly.

'Oh, maybe I can kill her brother on our wedding night,' I responded, internally rolling my eyes.

Elsa squared up the papers by tapping them on the table a few times, put them down and looked over her classroom one last time before saying something.

"Alright then, now that everyone is here I'd like to begin with our lesson!" she said loudly. "This lesson will be about the basics of sorcery and also about spirits, so if you aspire to become a sorcerer you should pay attention here!"