After the attempt at kidnapping him, Alyx swore he had been joking, but Tesilim wasn’t so sure. Luckily, Lili was there to stop him if he tried anything else.
However serious Alyx had been, Tesilim wasn’t going to deny that the guy knew magic. The rest of the afternoon was spent with Alyx teaching him how to properly intermingle the various spells that transform mana into actual magic. The whole thing was rather intriguing, as a spell could easily be changed from one aspect of magic to another by changing only a few words.
For example, Tesilim tried his magic missile spell but changed key aspects of it. However, he didn’t do it well enough or fast enough, and only a few flame sparks came out. Still, it was still a good example.
“From my palm, let flames take flight;
With fiery force, unleash your might;
Flame missiles, heed my call;
Strike my foes with searing flames.”
The idea was for flame missiles to shoot out and strike an enemy. The number of missiles depended on the caster, who would impose the number of missiles wanted with their will, along with assigning their targets. After seeing that, Tesilim understood the concept, but just because he understood it didn’t mean he was good at it, and he dutifully continued the practice with a new chant from Alyx.
"From my hand, let frost take flight;
With icy force, scatter their might;
Frost missiles, heed my call;
Strike my foes with bitter frost.
That chant gave Tesilim a chilled hand, but it was enough to further his understanding of the whole thing. Effectively, a spell can be easily configured to suit a variety of needs. However, there were a few things that might hinder such a change, such as the attunement a creature had. A good example would be a Sun Elf attempting to use dark or curse magic. The magic would simply not work or be heavily weakened due to the elf being aligned to a much more positive type of magic. On the other hand, restoration or light magic would be really good for that elf.
Another example would be a Dark Elf using light magic, which would be much more difficult than dark or shadow magic. Naturally, there were some workarounds to everything, as with magic not everything was set in stone. The primary workaround was magical items that could ignore a creature's natural attunement. Finally, there was the fact that some creatures had no attunement whatsoever and could use any type of magic freely.
Another event caused by his chanting was the first appearance of a spell in his little crystal system.
🔷 Crystal Notice 🔷
Congratulations! You have learned the spell Magic Missle. Check your known spells to see more information.
🔷
And, of course, Tesilim just had to.
🔷 Crystal Notice 🔷
🔷 Spells 🔷
- Spells Concentration: 0/1.
- Known Spells: 1.
🔷
Clicking on Known Spells caused a small list containing his one spell to appear. Then, clicking on magic missile, a description appeared.
Magic Missile: A simple spell capable of shooting a basic magical missile whose magical affinity wholly depends on the chant used by its caster. The missile's target is chosen by the caster, and with enough control, the caster is able to change targets while the missile is in flight.
Current Rank: D.
Magic Type: Simple Magic*- Abjuration, Evocation.
Concentration: No.
Mana Use: One-Off.
Use: Damage.
AoE: No.
Multi-Target: Yes.
The description was rather straightforward, as were most of the details. The spell was D Rank because he was D Rank. The magic types were rather curious but were rather similar. He just needed to learn what simple magic was. Something he was sure to learn at some point. Concentration was rather obvious, and so were mana cost, use, aoe, and the target details. Tesilim figured different spells would obviously have different details, something he would learn sooner rather than later.
Especially since after that first day with Alyx, Tesilim effectively began what could amount to a training montage. Lili assisted him in all things close combat, and Alyx with everything magic-related, causing his growth to erupt upwards.
The first thing he learned after the missile spell was a body enhancement spell.
Body Enhancement-General: A simple body enhancement spell that enhances every aspect of your body, from speed to resilience. This spell has two modes. The first allows you to feed it extra mana to empower its effects and is activated by default, though no extra mana is spent unless otherwise willed to do so. The second mode lets you alter certain aspects of your body enhancement to achieve extra effects. Only one mode can be active at a time.
Current Rank: D.
Magic Type: Simple Magic* - Enhancement.
Concentration: Yes.
Mana Use: Constant.
Use: Self Buff.
Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.
AoE: No.
Multi-Target: No.
Something else he learned was just how flexible magic was, as apparently all spells could be cast without chants, much like enhancement magic. Of course, it wasn’t as easy as it involved some mana complications that Tesilim was nowhere near ready for. Additionally, though enhancement magic did not need words from the Language of Creation, some could still be used to provide certain boosts to your enhancement. These were often associated with techniques which were a whole other aspect of enhancement magic that melee folks used to dish out serious magical damage. A simple version of this was a dagger user creating a simple phrase around agility to gain a movement boost at the appropriate time. It also helped if they infused mana into the words, kinda like Tesilim did with the whole flame situation at the shop.
That actually gave Tesilim an idea for his combat style. He totally planned to create a phrase that would give him immense speed and would also represent Earth rather nicely.
Anyway, that second day, when he learned enhancement magic, he was mainly beaten up by Lili and Alyx, who could use his wizard staff for more than just spellcasting. And just like every other day, he did some body refinement, though it was starting to get a bit more painful than he liked.
After that body enhancement day, which was used as an excuse to beat him up, the rest of his training montage went rather well.
The days went much like they did before, except now that he was finally starting to show some more muscle, he was mainly focusing on improving combat, which would also build up his muscle but help him stay alive longer in a fight. Effectively, it was morning combat training with Lili in a random park with some specific agility training to get him even more accustomed to his new physical limits. Lili did mention that he was getting better at fighting humanoids and that they would have to go do some basic hunting soon to get him used to fighting monsters as that was the biggest challenge for his adventuring career.
Once his combat training ended around mid-day, they would have lunch, and it would turn to Alyx’s magical training with some assistance from Lili. The magical training consisted of getting better at chanting by learning proper pronunciations and by increasing his speaking speed. And naturally, as the days went by he learned new spells while gaining some presence training from both Alyx and Lili. Alyx’s training consisted more of the technicalities of using your presence, which Tesilim failed at. His failure was due to Tesilim not even knowing how to cast spells normally just yet, so trying to use magic through his presence was out of the question.
Thankfully, Alyx realized this and gave Lili the floor. Lili mainly taught him about subtlety, basically, how to spread your presence and senses as stealthy as possible. Tesilim was a bit better at it, but still, he was effectively a baby with all this magic stuff, and his learning speed showed that. Even so, both teachers told him it was important to at least learn this aspect early on as it would help him see things differently as he grew in power.
So, even with his low start, things eventually picked up as he got better at pronouncing things, and he properly shot his first magic missiles.
However, that particular feat caused the next training phase to kick in. He began to learn how to draw magic. Literally. The concept was effectively what he had done with the finger flame thing. He needed to focus the man in his finger, then infuse it with his will and cause it to manifest into something. The process was a bit like casting a spell with enhancement magic.
He legitimately drew the words in the air by willing the mana to become somewhat physical, yet as he drew the words, the very will he imparted to them came alive, and it caused the words to change themselves to embody the aspect of reality aligned with said word of creation. Of course, the strength was still based on his mana purity, which was not very high but it still helped empower his spells.
The whole thing had been a big fucking mess at first because he was fucking slow. However, repetition was the mother of all learning and all that, and he eventually got it down. Truthfully, it was weird seeing a flaming magic missile shoot out of a red circle, but hey, it was magic.
Thankfully, after learning to draw magic came the easy part, at least for him. Essentially, you wanted to draw at the same time as you chanted the magical spell, then link both the newly created magical circle and the words you were saying. You did this by channeling the mana through the circle, which would then empower the already aligned mana from your words and push it to the next level. For Tesilim, the linking part was easy, but doing both simultaneously took a lot of work.
However, with the literal chosen of the Goddesses of Magic and Knowledge as his teacher, he eventually nailed that down, at least with the magic missile spell.
Slowly but surely, that's what he was told.
Honestly, at that point, he was going to become the magic missile master. It was the 11th of the month already, and things were looking good, considering they had started on the 6th.
Anyways, what really mattered was that with those two things out of the way, all he had to worry about was casting with his will and imagination, period, and he was assured that there was a higher chance of his chaos power turning him into a goat than he getting that down.
Still, he finally began learning more freaking spells.
Basic Heal: A simple spell capable of restoring a minor amount of damage taken by a creature. The damage taken must be inflicted on the body directly. This ability cannot remove curses, necrosis, poisons, or other such things. It can heal open wounds, burns, and slight bone fractures.
Current Rank: D.
Magic Type: Simple Magic - Restoration.
Concentration: No.
Mana Use: One-Off.
Use: Healing.
AoE: No.
Multi-Target: No.
He was taught that spell so he could heal himself after getting beat up. After that, he also got two very important spells down.
Shield: A concentration spell that focuses on constant defense. The caster must constantly spend mana to keep the shield active. The shield has two modes. In the passive mode, the shield spends an amount of mana equal to the amount the caster can regenerate to stay active. This constant shield keeps the caster in a semi-safe and isolated bubble. The shield’s second mode is its active mode and only activates when unwanted magic strikes the shield. The magical strike causes the shield to drain more mana from its caster's soul in order to repel the unwanted magic. Naturally, the mana drained is usually equal to the mana spent on the magical attack. Additionally, shields do not require a chant and are partially considered presence and enhancement magic. Finally, shields can be attuned to specific magic, which can greatly boost or lower the effectiveness of the shield.
Current Rank: D.
Magic Type: Simple Magic*- Abjuration, Evocation.
Concentration: Yes.
Mana Use: Constant.
Use: Defense.
AoE: Yes.
Multi-Target: No.
Barrier: A simple spell capable of creating one-time barriers. The barriers created can be made as large and as powerful as the caster wishes as long as enough mana is fed. Unlike Shields, once mana is fed into the barrier, the caster is cut off from feeding it additional mana. Attempting to do so will cause the barrier to transform into a shield, and if a shield is cut off, it quickly fades without a constant mana supply. Finally, barriers can be attuned to specific magic, greatly boosting or lowering its effectiveness.
Current Rank: D.
Magic Type: Simple Magic*- Abjuration, Evocation.
Concentration: No.
Mana Use: One-Off.
Use: Defense.
AoE: Yes.
Multi-Target: No.
They taught him those so he could better protect himself when something explosive finally did happen due to his chaos.
The plan had also changed regarding his chaos. No longer were they going to wait 24 hours for his inevitable randomness; instead, they wanted to finally boost a spell with his mana and see what would happen. They were still gonna go outside the city, but Alyx wanted to see what his magic missile spell would do when empowered. For reference, Tesilim could currently cause a small flame blast against a tree, and considering it had been a Dryad’s magical reinforced tree, that was pretty decent.
However, after hanging from branches for a couple of hours and promising never to blast another tree again, he was let go. Though, to be fair, Tesilim was totally gonna break that promise, but definitely not in front of that particular dryad.