Lin sat on the floor, bored out of her mind. Colette sat next to her, she seemed to fall asleep in her hands. Lin sighed as Arran went red in the face, waving his hands wildly as he tried to make something happen.

Malavan explained, what seemed ages ago, that most magic users could cast a very basic spell that was innately found in their souls.

Yeah, souls were a thing and it made the church altar place so much more of a place to avoid until Lin could go home. What if she sneezed on a statue and the gods in this place smited her? Lin grimaced at the thought, not so much the smiting but the idea of beings that watched them all like a soap opera.

Malavan had hesitated before suggesting Arran went first. Lin guessed this was more of the Wild Mage fear thing. At least Colette was kinda nice when she was awake.

Arran sagged, gasping for breath and Malavan looked stony faced. Lin had to give it to him, the man was being very patient. Lin guessed when you kidnapped people and forced them to be pawns in a war you felt a little guilty and cut them some slack…

Lin winced at the nasty thought and shook her head. Arran crossed his arms, his shirt advertising some band looking a little damp with sweat.

“I can’t get this to work,” he admitted and Malavan stroked his beard.

“It can take years for an apprentice to reach an understanding of the energy one's own body. Asking for results in a single day is cruel of me, I was hoping already having a title would make the task much simpler,” the man said and Arran hesitated.

“Any tips?” he scratched at his neck and Malavan hummed.

“I used to pretend my body was a series of canals and empty trenches, I would envision magic, glowing pure water, would travel down the dry lines. If I needed to cast magic with my hand, I would picture the river flowing down my arm,” Malavan offered and Lin blinked. She was expecting a ‘figure it out yourself, it's tradition!’ speech.

Arran stared down at his palm and clenched it. Lin watched as he closed his eyes and a second later his hand hissed. Arran yelped and shook his hand. Malavan gave a delighted clap.

“Well done! Oh well done!” the archmage cried and Arran held out his hand where his skin was bright red. Lin winced and stood, startling Colette out of her nap.

“Wh-waht? I’m up, I’m up,” she yawned and stumbled to her feet. Malavan looked at Arran’s hand.

“Hm an ‘Ice Snap’ spell, quite good, I will say that it works better with your hand open, but I suspect you know this now,” Malavan smiled and Arran glared at him.

“Yeah, thanks,” he muttered and slowly opened his hand fully and Lin saw his arm shake a little as a tiny ice ball shot out his palm and feebly crashed to the floor, smashing into countless pieces.

There was a beat of silence before Colette, her eyes still bleary, spoke.

“Performance issues are no joke, don’t worry about it,” she clapped Arran on the shoulder. Lin bent down and picked up one the pieces, the slightly warm room already making quick work of the ice.

“Quite, practice is key. Now, Colette, I like you to try next,” Malavan said calmly while not looking in Lin’s direction at all. Lin didn’t let it bother her. She really tried.

Walking away, she felt someone tap her shoulder. Lin spun to see Dayla’s smile.

“How is it going?” she asked and Lin shrugged, her heart beating wildly as the surprise wore off.

“Not bad, Arran froze his hand and can hit things about a foot away. Colette is up next, not sure how long is going to take-” Lin was cut off as a flash followed by a swirl of smoke covered her.

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Lin turned to see the smoke clearing. Colette was looking down at a small black dog. It looked up at her with the same level of excitement… which was to say they both looked rather done with everything.

Colette looked at Malavan.

“Y-yes, well done! A ‘Summon Beast’ spell, quite a bit rarer but it makes sense with your class,” Malavan cleared his throat and tried to sound like he wasn’t caught off guard by a girl that only came up to his chest. Colette raised one hand in cheer with no energy.

“Woo,” she muttered and looked at the dog. The animal flicked one ear.

“Don’t bark in the night and you can stay,” she ordered and went to a bench to lay down, the dog followed her without a sound and laid on the ground under her.

“It’s cute, in a way,” Dayla suggested and Lin felt the word wasn’t quite right but nothing else sprung to mind.

"So if we get skills based on our class, then why did I get an ice spell?  Why not a grow a bush spell or something?"  Arran wondered and Malavan raised one brow.

"Winter is a part of nature as well, a Druid deals with all parts of the cycle,"  he explained and then went quiet as his moved over Lin.

Malavan turned and without looking back, spoke to them.

“Take a small break, we shall continue when I return,” his voice faded as he left the room. Lin stood there as Colette looked at her with a look. It wasn’t like the girl’s other looks, this one held a glimmering calculating look and some pity, Lin turned quickly to see Arran quickly avert his eyes.

Lin didn’t notice she was breathing a little harshly until Dayla pulled her towards a bench.

“It’s not going to be easy, being a Wild Mage is going to take some use for the kingdom to get use to. Malavan just doesn’t want to be the one that caused the kingdom to…” Dayla paused and looked embarrassed.

“I’m no better, am I?” she said, more to herself. Lin felt her eyes go wet and she would not let this happen.

She was a mage that wasn’t going to be allowed to use magic. She was sure, almost positive, that Malavan would come back and hand her a staff, or something with build in magic or whatever, and tell her to get good with them.

Lin was going to be told to sit down and behave herself because she had something wrong with her.

Standing abruptly. Lin held out her hand, trying to imagine rivers traveling down her arm. Dayla stood abruptly, one hand reaching out to soothe Lin.

“Don’t c-cast, just wait!” Dayla spluttered and Lin watched as Arran managed to swirl his ice ball into a slush of a snowball.

Lin met Dayla’s wide eyes and then grinned.

“Don’t worry, I got this,” she said and fire rose above her hand. Dayla reeled back as Lin watched the fireball forming begin to move oddly.

“Lin, watch out!” Dayla yelled and the fireball that was a mix of reds, oranges and yellows went pure orange as something crashed through her rivers. Lin could almost see her crystal blue magic become dyed bright orange by something beyond her understanding.

The fireball expanded like balloon and pop.

Lin coughed and reached down for the bench to steady herself, she missed and crashed to the floor.

Her status menu went wild, flickering to life.

 Fireball learned!

Then another window opened and Lin shut her eyes as this window went wild with orange lights.

Q%D@{“$%^...chQW£%WW...C-H-A-O-S…

Then another.

CHAOSCHAOSCHAOSCHAOSCHAOSCHAOS

Lin screamed as the status window flared the brightest light yet before it stopped suddenly. Lin opened her eyes, stars exploding in every direction, as she read the new orange window. 

Chaos activated! Caster is teleported to the middle floor of the nearest Dungeon!

Lin looked around to see she was alone. She was alone in the tunnel that had weeds and wildflowers growing through the cracks in the path.Lin blinked and reread the screen before it blinked out of existence leaving Lin in… tunnel with torches and moss growing on the bare earthen walls.

The box had said dungeon… Lin remembered the Queen had said something about dungeons. Her mind leapt from dot to dot as it tried to understand what was going on.

Was she in the castle dungeon? That wasn’t so bad…

Lin paused a something scraped along the wall down into the dark tunnel to her left.

“H-hello?” she called and there was silence before the darkness was broken by two dark red glowing embers.

It walked forward and Lin stopped breathing as the embers were inside the eye sockets of a walking skeleton. It dragged an ax in one hand and held a shield in the other, the dirty moss covered bones creaked slightly as it moved.

Lin began to crawl backward as three more sets of embers appeared in the darkness. Lin ran, she turned and ran as far as she could.

The tunnels exploded with sound as the skeletons burst into a run after her, axes screaming along the ground.

 Lin just ran, her mind blank as any rational thought was shoved aside for the simplest thought of all

Live live live live live.

She ran down a flight of stairs and she never saw the skeletons paused at the top, hesitating to follow.

Lin just ran.