Silence reigned for a moment. Gaus thought about using his 'insane' affinity for time magic and also keeping it hidden from the rest of the world. A task that was already difficult because of the two girls in front of him. To Rewind and erase their memories would be the easiest and the most effective way to deal with the situation, but even if he went all out and Rewound for 76 seconds straight he still wouldn't erase their memories. Initially, Raya tested his affinity and thought the tester was broken. She then tested Antelina four times just to confirm. When they realized the tester wasn't broken, Antelina tested him again and then asked him some protracted questions about himself and vegetables before she tested him again several times. Later on, Raya told him about her uncle before she also tested him again. The whole ordeal had taken more than five minutes which made it impossible to just Rewind.

"What now?" Gaus prompted.

"Now you're more than qualified to join the ranks of the elite," Raya said excitedly. "If my uncle is here he will probably ask you to marry me and have.. ha.. h..." she choked and just fainted. Antelina supported her before she hit the ground.

"Hey, what's wrong with her?"

"She's fine," Antelina said.

Gaus looked from the unconscious girl to Antelina and frowned. "She doesn't look fine to me."

"She's fine. Give her a few minutes and she will wake up just fine except she won't remember what happened in the last five minutes."

What?

He slowly stood up, observing Antelina's unperturbed expression. "Did you knock her out?"

"I did."

He took a step back, hid his hands behind his back, and Rewound.

Magiwatch has saved 10 seconds.

You've Rewound for 10 seconds, effectively erasing everything in the said period. Only you will remember.

Do you want to turn memory into a book? Y/N?

Warning: no skill detected.

He'd expected to copy the skill but the save library didn't even recognize it. He observed the whole process again just to make sure she didn't cast some spell on him too. Mind mages weren't to be trusted, that's what everyone kept saying.

"May I ask why you feel the need to knock your friend and training partner out?"

She sighed as if struggling to explain herself. "Who will you suspect if the academy suddenly finds out about your affinity? It's either Raya or me. By erasing her memory, I'm doing her a favor. Now it's just you and me. If word about your affinity or my skill goes out then it's either you or me."

This girl is dangerous.

"What skill was that anyway?" Gaus asked.

Antelina smiled. "It is my watch skill. You did say you want to see it, right? In exchange, you'll let me lead the team into the spirit realm."

"The more you show your desperation the less I'll be willing to give up the role. But you know that, don't you?"

"I do," she said, shrugging. "Does it matter? A deal is a deal. I show you my watch skill and provide the information you requested about every class member in exchange you will let me lead the class into the spirit realm."

"If I remember correctly we didn't reach an agreement and we left it to consideration," Gaus said thoughtfully. "However, it's your lucky day, I don't feel like backing out now. A deal is a deal, right? However, you still didn't show me your watch skill."

"What do you think that skill was? It was my watch skill, rep. Do I have to spell it for you?"

"It's not your watch skill, ex, so don't lie to me. I was observing you closely and I didn't see you touching the watch in any way while executing the attack. I may not be attending any elite class but even I know you have to touch the watch to activate a watch skill."

Antelina frowned and murmured a few curses about intelligent people and class reps. "Alright," she said, adjusting the girl in her arms and looking around to make sure no one was looking or eavesdropping. "I'm sorry I lied."

"You owe me two more favors for lying," Gaus said nonchalantly.

"Huh? That's unfair. I just..."

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"A deal is a deal." He interrupted.

"Ok, let's settle it, here and now."

Gaus sighed. The girl was too smart for her age but he was still winning.

"If I were you I wouldn't be attending the elite class to prevent others from finding out about my affinity," she said, looking at him inquisitively.

"I have no plan of attracting any unwanted attention to myself if that's what you mean," Gaus said.

"Good." She smiled. "Then how about I tell you gossip and in exchange, you'll forget about what just happened?"

"A gossip? Haha.. you think I'll settle for gossip when you owe me two?"

She moved closer and lowered her voice. "Look, this isn't just gossip. I've confirmed it myself. It has something to do with time magic." She paused to gauge his reaction. "Do you want it or not?"

"You can speak but I have the right to reject it the moment I realize it's bullshit."

"What? That's unfair. What's bullshit to you may be gold for us girls. I want you to promise me you'll only reject it if it's worthless and it won't benefit your time magic in any way."

"Just speak we don't have all day." Gaus snapped.

She hesitated.

"Ariwen always comes to the academy with two babies," she finally said. "There are currently two rumors about her: one, she is accused of being a young mother; two, she is accused of drinking baby's blood and using it for rituals. It was disturbing, so I went to check it out. To be honest, I don't believe either rumor. I mean, it's bullshit to even think she will be drinking baby's blood openly and there's no way a noble girl like her will have a baby at this young age. But as it turns out, she takes a one-on-one class on chronomancy. It's very suspicious, isn't it? Besides, a time magician training with babies does ring a bell, right?"

No, it didn't.

"Oh come on. Stop giving me that look like you've never read Introductions to the Dark Arts by Snulshatt."

"I haven't."

"Really? I have a copy if you want but it's going to cost you."

"Just tell me what she's doing with the babies."

"Don't be hasty," she whispered as she looked around again to make sure they were alone. "I saw a passage in that book where the author describes something called 'immature cord' that allows mages to practice time magic. It's like the umbilical cord or something like that, I don't know. Babies have this immature cord thing and it's much easier to connect with them than with adults' mature cords. I think she's using the babies to train her time magic. Ariwen lives in district 7, room 12. You should find some time and visit her. Are we good now?" She ended her explanation with a question.

Gaus scratched his temple, staring at the ground. "Give me the book."

She retrieved an old, paperback book from her inventory and gave it to him. "I'll need it tomorrow."

She glanced at the unconscious girl. "You should leave. She's about to wake up."

"What are you going to tell her when she woke up?"

"Leave that to me."

After asking about the book and where he should pay more emphasis, he left for his room thinking about Antelina and how to appropriately deal with her. Once inside, he closed the door, lay on the bed, and opened the book.

The book provided an extensive review of affinities and their relationship with mana, and it also introduced the darks arts and explained some basic skills.

Like in every field of magic, the dark arts were also controlled by mana. But unlike in other specialties where the mana was pure and automatically regulated to suit the cost of every skill, the dark arts required the mana in the body to be channeled and mixed with the surrounding world essence before it could be used. 1% affinity for any branch of the dark arts would allow you to channel 1% of your mana to control the same type of world essence, so did 2% and 3% affinities, up to 50% affinity. The law changed when an affinity exceeded 50%. In such a case, the attraction between the world essence and its corresponding mana would be too strong that the mana would be naturally flowing out of the body and into the surrounding world essence to maintain the equilibrium at 50% affinity. Hence any mage with affinity above 50% didn't need to learn any channeling skill because their mana was in a natural connection with the world essence.

Mana was meant to be in the body and it would resist any attempt otherwise. As such, learning how to successfully channel mana from the body and mix it with the surrounding world essence was a difficult task that could take months. Gaus and any mage with an affinity above 50% were spared from this, but they would also have to pay by constantly losing some portion of their mana to the surrounding world essence. For Gaus with 79%, he was constantly losing 29% of his total mana to keep his affinity at 50% at all times just to maintain the so-called equilibrium. In other words, his total mana was more than the 305 MP in his status. It would be around 480 MP if you included the 29% he'd been losing unknowingly. This was a huge downside of having an affinity above 50%. But because their mana was in a natural connection with the world essence, constantly enriching it, any being that needed world essence as a growth factor or was solely powered by world essence would be attracted to them. Call it natural favor if you would.

Many scholars would consider you a practitioner of the dark arts if you could fully connect with the world essence. The only thing left was to pick a specialty depending on your affinity. For Gaus, it was time magic. The book gave two basic skills for time magic: longevity sense and cord pulling.

Longevity sense was similar to mana sense but it focused on the person's longevity instead of mana. The root of longevity in the body was in the umbilicus and the longevity energy there was greatly higher than in other parts of the body. For newborns, the energy was so blatant it could easily be picked by anyone who could connect with the surrounding world essence and had an affinity for time. But as you grew up, the energy matured and it became increasingly difficult to sense. Probably that was what Ariwen was doing with the babies.

Cord pulling was even more impressive. It allowed you to create a set of invisible hands using pure world essence and use them to pull a person's longevity root in the umbilicus. A successful pulling would destabilize the person's longevity and prevent them from using their skills. Longevity was the building block of everything - it supported the soul, powered the mind, and replaced lost mana. A well-executed pulling would not only stop a person from regenerating their lost mana but would prevent them from launching any attack by disrupting the connection between their mana and longevity. And although a time mage wouldn't be able to temper with the mind like a typical mind mage, they could knock you out by severing the connection between your mind and longevity. Even the soul wouldn't function properly if longevity was destroyed.

Gaus was a natural time mage, meaning his mana was constantly and effortlessly connected with the surrounding world essence, and he didn't have to learn any skill for that. All he needed was to learn the other skills.