Andric’s only path was forward. Every morning and evening, Andric spoke the chant for the fingernail-growing spell, and each time he felt less of a headache and more of the mysterious flowing.

By luck or by design, Wolter and Lieve were there to help him understand the perplexing transfer that happened each time he said the chant. As soon as Andric could use the chant without feeling a headache, Wolter explained it to him, saying, “Feel for the mana being generated inside your brain. When you say the chant, you’re forcefully squeezing mana out of your brain. If you can get the mana to come out without saying the chant, then you can use magic.”

Wolter said it rather simply for anyone who had begun their first year in magician school, but Andric wasn’t even a year old. With the help of hand motions, Andric could understand slightly more of what Wolter said, but he still needed Wolter to repeat himself several times with different vernacular.

Upon reaching full-comprehension of the instructions, Andric almost couldn’t believe how simple it was. Suddenly, at all hours of the day, Andric found himself reciting the chant whenever possible. He still felt the characteristic headache return after using the chant several times within a few minutes, but he managed to repeat the chant hundreds of times per day while he attempted to grasp ahold of the mana flowing from his brain.

When he finally did grab onto the internal energy, he accidentally pulled it out beyond what he was capable of, and he instantly lost consciousness.

Wolter and Lieve, the relatively young parents they were, nearly died when they saw Andric passed out on their sitting room floor, face down on the run that laid across the wooden floor. Wolter was the first to rush to him and check his vital signs, but Lieve soon noticed the horrendously long nails Andric sported on both hands.

Lieve shook Wolter’s shoulder with one hand and said, “Look at Andric’s nails.”

Wolter looked and, a second later, deeply exhaled. He said, “He must have used the chant too much and used up all his mana,” and picked up Andric’s limp body. He stood, then continued, “I’ll put him in bed.”

He and Lieve walked upstairs, talking along the way, “Quite frankly, I’m surprised he hasn’t done this to himself before now.”

“He’s so eager to learn how to use magic; I hope this doesn’t scare him away from it,” Lieve said and followed behind Wolter.

“I remember, when I first passed out from mana exhaustion, I didn’t use magic for a month,” Wolter said and slightly laughed.

“What a baby. Andric will be back to chanting within the week,” Lieve teased her husband and sighed. Though she too stayed away from using magic for almost a month after having her first mana exhaustion episode, she knew she couldn’t hold Andric to those same standards.

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Ordinary children would wait until they were at least two years old before learning their starter spell chant. They would then practice the chant for a few months and adjust to piercing headache that came with each repetition of the chant. Then, months or years later, they would find how to control their mana without using the chant. At that point, they could use magic just like adults.

While having completed up to the mana-controlling stage within a single month wasn’t unheard of, and it was thought to be impossible for a child Andric’s age to have done it. Usually, at that age, they would be scared by their first headache and not attempt magic for several months or years.

In the same way that one might abandon learning to ride a bike after falling on a gravel road, many children cast aside magic upon feeling a massive headache or experiencing a bout of mana exhaustion. However, in a feat that made him the envy of magic teachers around the world, Andric persisted through all the negative determinants of learning how to use magic.

Andric fell unconscious in the morning, before Wolter left for work. Two days later, in the evening, he woke up. Wolter and Lieve, each having experienced mana exhaustion a dozen times in their lifetime, took care of Andric’s resting body for the entire duration, and they weren’t at all worried about him not waking up. After all, almost everyone suffered from mana exhaustion in their lifetime, and they didn’t know anything who died from it.

“If you have a headache, you shouldn’t continue,” Lieve warned Andric when she went to check on him and saw him awake. “Headache? Wait.” Lieve didn’t think that Andric had actually gotten to the point of controlling his mana, and thus thought he received mana exhaustion from overusing the chant. She didn’t begin to expect that Andric had manually exhausted his mana - an incredibly foolish thing to do.

After waking up, Andric felt a strong headache, which was perfectly normal. As Lieve suggested, he held off on using magic until his headache died down, which didn’t happen until the next morning.

The chant had already been imprinted in Andric’s mind, and he didn’t even need to fetch the slate before speaking aloud and readying himself to grasp his mana for the second time.

“Growth from longevity. Eternally cast upon the veil of advancement. With bound nail to produce infinity.”

He felt the familiar sense of mana pouring out of his brain, but only a small amount came out compared to when he first started practicing with the chant. Using a mental method, Andric reached out for the dissipating mana and seized it, and his control over it was absolute.

He followed the tendril of mana back to its source, like following a strand of hair to find the follicle, and was led inside his cerebrum. The magical energy inside Andric’s skull swirled and twinkled, and he felt a deep connection with it. However, deeper inside, he felt a far more nefarious force. If his outer cerebrum mana was blue, the mana inside his amygdala was red.

At the moment, Andric couldn’t know if his mana harbored any abnormal qualities. As far as he knew, everyone had darker, inherently sinister, mana in their amygdala. Regardless of how his mana felt, Andric didn’t have time to analyze the fundamental nature of his mana.

His control over the mana had been established; utilizing its power came next.