After Breakfast, Nikola had his morning and afternoon classes with Isabella, which included language, History, etiquette, and swordsmanship, Catherine had hired the local priest to teach them Language and History,

It was during his language class that the priest started a conversation, “I heard you are still having those nightmares, Nikola,”

“Yes, Father, they happened again last night,” Nikola responded,

“I see, Care to elaborate?” the priest asked. Isabella looked at him too, interested in the story.

“I don’t know what to make of it yet, my father was there, but not there, he seemed different,” Nikola said,

“A man in your father’s body, there are a lot of creatures who can take the form of your loved ones, and most do not have good intentions,” the priest warned, “be careful what you listen to,”

“It was weird, I do not think he wanted to harm me, actually, he seemed to be in grief, as if I didn’t have long to live,” Nikola said,

“I see, did he say anything?” the priest asked.

“He said, you may see my face in the future, but I won’t see yours,” Nikola had a tear start streaking down his face, with his vision turning watery. After mentioning it, it was like his body suddenly felt heavy. “I’m sorry, father, I don’t understand why I would be so emotional over a dream,”

“Listen Nikola, not all dreams are an act of malicious intent, there may be a bigger meaning to what you saw, only time will tell whether you can unlock your secrets.”

They went back to studying, when Nikola was finished for the day, he went to the family library, which had a small collection of books, Nikola was skimming through the collection when he came across two that caused him to pause, they were near the end of one of the shelves, almost hidden in the back of the library,

“The beginner’s guide to magic, by Nicolas Gauss, Year 348”

“Class book: To become a Railmancer, by Nicolas Gauss, Year 528”

“Gauss, that’s my family’s name, but this dates back to before the era of death over 1000 years ago, nothing is supposed to have survived since before then, and if these two are the same author, then he lived well over 200 years.” Fred was confused, the church always cursed the era of death. Fred had only heard the priests mention the era of death as some doomsday event, but they kept the details about it very vague.

According to what he knew of that era, was that it ended in the year 890.

He quickly hid the two books on him and carried another book as a disguise, he left the library and headed to his room, his maid was currently out doing chores, which gave him a perfect time to read over his findings,

He started reading the beginner’s guild first,

“Magic is the life forces of the worlds, through it we can manipulate reality…” the first chapter was an introduction to what magic is, once he read that, the next section was a meditation manual, ‘hmm, it says here that one must first be able to sense mana to first be able to control it,’ Nikola read through the meditation manual and tried it out.

He hid the books under his bed and sat down cross-legged on his bed, as the book suggested, with this, he began meditating, he went through hour after hour without realising, he had lost track of time, and his body was sweating, and yet he felt nothing, he felt like his mind was standing in a dark void looking out for the slightest glimpse of light.

Suddenly he saw a small flash of light in the corner of his eye, and had just turned to look when he was suddenly brought out of his trance, he was all sweaty and gasping for air on top of his bed. He looked out of the window to see that the sky had gone dark, he could feel the presence of his maid, standing in the corner of the room, although there was no candlelight,

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“How long have you been there?” Nickola asked.

“Since before dusk young master,” the maid commented, that should hopefully mean she wasn’t the course of his trance breaking,

“What time is it?” Nikola asked,

“Your mother had gone to bed not long ago, young master, I told her you were meditating Master, so she ordered a meal prepared for you, would you like me to go and warm it up.”

“Meditation?” Nikola asked, he had to be very careful about this, he was still in the dark about the norms of his world.

“Yes, young master, were you not meditating to learn magic, like your siblings?” the maid asked,

“I did not know they learned magic,” Nikola said, “What do you know about magic?”

“it’s something only the nobles and merchants can afford to practice master, It falls into the Tactical battle class,” Emma explained.

“Tactical Battle class?” Nikola was puzzled.

“Tactical battle class is one of four main battle classes, you also have infantry, Skirmisher and cavalry, Tactical class focuses on Magic, but I heard the dwarves found a new path under tactical called cannoneer.”

“Ok, what about my siblings or parents, what about them,” Fred asked.

“Your father is Cavalry type, like most of your siblings, except, your 2nd sister who hasn’t been baptised yet and 3rd brother who only just got baptised last year, your brothers and father both take tactical for the second class to aim for Paladin.” the maid explained.

Nikola had 3 brothers and 2 sisters, with the 2nd sister being 1 month older than him, from the main wife, and he had heard that he had other bastard siblings as well from other women.

Nikola sent the maid off to warm his meal, as he went to get some water to wash his sweat off,

___

The next morning, during breakfast, his mother brought up the issue of him meditating, “So, your maid told me you started meditating last night,”

“Yes mother,” Nikola responded.

“Can I start learning magic, Mother” Isabella joined in.

“You shouldn’t copy your siblings yet, you won’t be able to see anything until your baptism, as it is through that which opens up your body to the world’s mana,”

“Aww” Isabella was saddened, it would take her 2 more years before her baptism.

“What do you mean?” Nikola asked, he was sure he felt something last night.

“Did they not tell them when you asked them to teach you meditation?” his mother said,

Nikola was confused, did his mother believe he had learned them of his brothers, except his 3rd brother, who was a month older than him, they didn’t get on, why would they teach him anything. “Er, no mother, they didn’t say,” well, better to play along with it.

“Not to worry, it would make great practice for you, but as I said, you won’t achieve any results until your baptism.” His mother explained.

After his lessons, he returned to his room to try again,

He went over the manual one more time, and then sat on his bed to meditate, he found himself back in the void again, he began to focus on his surroundings, as the manual suggested and allowed his mind to reach out into the void, only this time, it took him about an hour to have that same spark of light show up,

It was far in the distance, and Nikola struggled to focus on it, he continued to reach and reach for it, which felt like forever, when suddenly he managed to grasp it with his mind, this sent an electric shock throughout his body, forcing him out of his trance and tumbling to the floor,

At this, the door suddenly opened, and his maid came rushing in, “Young master, are you alright?” when she came over and tried to grab his arm, she received a static shock, “ah,” this caused her to reel back in panic, Nikola managed to stand up on his own, he to noticed the shock, but thought nothing of it, right now he was staving,

“Are you ok, young master,” the maid asked, panic written all over her face.

“I’m fine, just a bit hungry.”

“Hu,” she blanked out for a minute from his response, “Erm, yeah, dinner will be done shortly, your mother is about to head to the dining room, I’ll go and get some water to wash you.” She quickly bolted out of the room and down the corridor.

Nikola looked down and noticed he was covered in sweat again.

___

Later that night, Fred started feeling hunger pains, he had felt this pain constantly throughout the last couple of years, but normally it would only come about once a month, however, his last hunger pain was 2 days ago, while the maid was sleeping on the floor, he got up, and snuck out of the window, careful to not make any noise.

Hidden under a bush, he found his knife that he kept there, the town was asleep, with a few yawning guards on watch, with very little light.

“I can’t go for the chickens again, they are already noticing,” Nikola said to himself, luckily the village boarded the forest, allowing him to slip in there quite fast, he ran through the forest a bit until he spotted movement.

He crouched down, and stared in the direction he saw movement, he was able to spot a small deer, Nikola felt his mouth salivating at the sight, and he crawled forwards towards his prey, getting as close as possible.