Magics and the spirits. An intermediate guide

‘Magic, is not all powerful. It is a gift from the gods to their children, the demigods. However, the demigods gifted it to mankind and in time people gained the power to use magic depending on the amount of demigod blood they’d inherited.’

All this time I thought the book was about spirits and monsters. Not magic. I was wrong, I was stupid… nay, an imbecile for not actually looking up the proper word. Now granted it was written in mostly Western and I didn’t know how to read Western for a while. Even now, I had issues with certain words. But I’m sure I read Magic back then too. So had I forgotten or just… anyway, I flicked it open and began to scan the contents.

Unlike the textbooks, this wasn’t a mess and nor was it boring. Actually, I found the contents rather engaging. I did have to look up a lot of words but the librarian was kind enough to actually sit with me and help me read. Apparently, she got excited every time someone showed great interest in books… at least that was my hypothesis.

Speaking of hypotheses, this book had a lot of them. The book introduced me to the concept of magic and what it did: aka, affecting the natural order of the world. However, the author did not know how. And no one knew how for that matter. People didn’t even question it. They just accepted the fact as a gift from the gods. But the author explicitly tried coming up with theories. Something about magic running in our blood: mana. Something about how we draw energy from nature (Cultivation thingy maybe?) and even a theory regarding how drinking virgin piss gave you supernatural powers! I wasn’t buying it. Doesn’t hurt to try though, right? I mean, I was a virgin myself….

Of course, I didn’t say it out loud but the librarian was giving me quite the look. I shook my head vigorously and ejected the piss drinking notion immediately. Instead. I kept on reading.

You could only learn magic if you had demigod blood in you. Luckily most people did. how? Well, that was tricky. I wasn’t sure if it was because demigods in the past were really inclined to have fun with mortals or maybe there was some sort of ritual involving eating of the demigods and….

“How do I find out if I have any their blood in me?” I asked.

“Flick your finger and imagine a loud crack.”

Flick!

I hardly ever flicked in this body, so no sound produced. “You don’t,” she said. She was reading something herself.

“Oh, okay.” I shrugged.

I mean, I already knew I didn’t have talent for magic and stuff. So that was that. I still had half of the book on magic remaining. But that bit was no longer important since I couldn’t use magic to save my life. Spirits however-

‘Spirits are a manifestation of nature itself. When the gods granted their children magic, they also granted them divine vestige. Their divine blessing reached the earth, reached the seas, and even the sand beneath.’

“If nature turned to spirits, then what about fiends?”

“I’m sure all is contained within the book. Or are you having trouble recognizing words again?”

“No, I’m fine.”

Yeah, I was bothering her at this point. She was reading yet generously offered me help when I needed but I kept barraging her with questions. It wasn’t like I was paying her to teach me or anything. She was here on her own volition.

I kept reading. Spirits first showed up during the first great war along with the demihumans. And that was fine. But fiends apparently also multiplied a lot at that time. It wasn’t like they didn’t exist before the war, but only after the war did they spread so quickly.

One key characteristic separated a Spirit from a Fiend: hostility. No, not towards men, but rather towards anything. As long as the thing wasn’t hostile to things around it, it was considered a spirit.

Basically… both of them were same fucking thing. “Then Fiends are spirits,” I mumbled.

“Exactly,” the woman didn’t even glance at me, Unnecessary.

It was a lot to take in so I decided to take a walk. But then realized, it was already… evening. Oh no… oh no, no no no!

FUCK I PROMISED I’D BE THERE!

The Librarian frowned but I gave my book to her and ran like my life depended on it. It did.

***

I was supposed to meet Shia behind the red roofed building this afternoon. But thanks to me being an idiot I forgot. As I kept on running there, a rather odd crowd blocked my way. Yeah, this wasn’t good. This wasn’t good at all.

“COMING THROUGH!” I screamed and just rushed through the damn crowd.

I got annoyed grunts all around me but pushed through hard, and someone actually helped me through too! Mike!

As I thought, not good.

Why?

Both Shia and Nisa were there. But… the situation was pretty terrible. Like actually terrible, terrible.

Blood dripping, they were glaring at each other. No… that wasn’t it. Shia was bleeding. And Nisa had people on her side but- no one was doing anything and things weren’t good as they were.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“What the hell’s going on here!” I yelled.

Their eyes snapped on me. All of them were now looking at me… all of them. Quiet, deathly quiet. I could hear my breath, my coarse breath. A twinge of shiver ran down, but I just glared.

“She attacked me,” Nisa said.

“I just tried talking and one of them punched me,” Shia said.

“So, you returned the favor by having your goons beat her up?” I said, staring at Nisa. “And you claim she attacked you.”

“No, I-”

“Hey! Watch it!” One of her followers raised his voice, dude had turned pink with excitement. Big, like actually big. Yet, for some reason he looked comical. Like your typical school bully, just fat. What is up with rich people and fat….

“Fuck off Mongrel,” I said. My heart started pounding. Really so. “I get that your mother never loved you. I get that you need to get your anger out on innocent girls or you have to cry yourself to sleep. But, seriously, just fuck off. No need to harm others because you were never loved.”

He stared at me, kind of shocked. And then started sniffling. I was half expecting a swing but he just fell on his knees. Well, that’s new. Dude was more unstable than I thought. Who’d have thought my words would actually hit home. I was seriously prepared to take a hit… and then take them to the headmaster or principal or whoever was running this place.

I went over to Shia. She was bleeding from a cut lip. I stood before her, glaring everyone down. “I knew this academy had issues but I also thought I wouldn’t have to deal with aristocratic bullshit bullying here.” I spat on the ground. “I thought wrong.”

I had no idea what happened here. But it was half my fault. I agreed to Shia’s offer. Maybe she planned on using me as an excuse and exacting revenge on them or something. But since I wasn’t here, that turned out be a major fuck up and she ended up getting beaten instead. Now granted, I didn’t have anything to do with it and it wasn’t really my fault when you considered the whole thing. But… although fake, she was still my family right now.

I had two siblings in my past life. They never stood up for me. Never. I despised them for it. And Maybe Shia would despise me for actually standing up for her. But who cared. I was doing this to satisfy my ego. I couldn’t give a fuck.

“Was anyone here from the start?” I asked.

“I was,” Mike said. “Your sister said something and they attacked.”

“And only then she attacked, right?” I said.

“That’s right,” Mike said, proudly too. “She never hit Nisa though.”

Some of their faces went pale. Particularly the three hanging in front of Nisa. Nisa herself looked unconcerned. Stuck up bitch.

“Thanks,” I took a breath. “The headmaster’s in the white roofed building, right?” I asked.

“Yeah? But,” Shia sighed. “Let’s just go. Not worth it.” She grabbed my hand and pulled.

“Okay.” I sighed and stared around the crowd. “Why are you cowards still here? Go and suck your mother’s tits you fucking losers!”

We had a rather surprising end to the farce. Apparently neither party was interested in fighting. The whole thing was a misunderstanding between that fat moron who misheard Shia and punched her. Shia punched back but by then people surrounded them and thanks to Shia’s reputation things just escalated quickly as people sided with Nisa’s group. Of course, Nisa could have dissolved the whole thing immediately but she didn’t.

“I didn’t know you had such a terrible mouth,” Shia mumbled.

“Me neither,” my hands were shivering. My whole body was shivering for that matter. The whole thing felt like a literal fever dream. What did I do, what had I said and what just happen? Did I just fuck up exceptionally? What about my plans on starting a new religion and using Nisa as a pawn?

Sigh.

Yeah, I fucked up. Badly. I could have handled that situation way better than I did. I could have prevented the whole swearing shitshow. I could have even made them apologize on the spot if I used my cards right.

But I didn’t.

I raged. And I ended up losing instead.

So what the fuck changed? Isn’t this the same as last time… sigh. “There was an infirmary in the administrative building (blue roof) right?”

“I’m okay. This is nothing, really.” She didn’t look at me, and she didn’t let go of my hand. She just pulled along as we strolled by everyone.

“If you say so.”

“I didn’t think you had it in you.”

“Me neither.”

“I didn’t think you’d stand up for me.”

“Me neither-”

“You’re supposed to say, ‘I love you sis’ or something like that.”

“Didn’t you tell me to call you Shia?”

She chuckled. “Sure, whatever.”

We made it back to the dorm. It was already pretty much night. Shia didn’t let go of my hand the whole time and took me straight to the girl’s side into her room.

I got a lot of weird stares but nothing out of the ordinary. I suppose it wasn’t unnatural for brothers to enter their sister’s rooms. Besides, we were too young to be suspected of anything.

Why the fuck am I even thinking about that?

Unlike my room, Shia’s room was a double and this one had a shower attached. Just a shower though, not a toilet.

Which was good cause she needed a shower. Her roommate wasn’t around so I made some nice use of the top bunk. She immediately went into the shower.

The sound of water was pretty refreshing. She didn’t lock the bathroom door for some reason. “Hmmm… hhmmm…mmhhh.” Nice voice.

She was only humming though. Few minutes later she emerged from the bath in a towel, steaming, trying to smirk. Wasn’t working with that lip. And I of course didn’t bother staring at her. Rather, I focused on the room. Pretty decent room with books, some clothes, some furniture. That about it. Girls have warm water….

“You can at least blush?” She said, putting on underwear. Was she lacking shame or just teasing me?

“Sorry sis, but you’re just not my type. You sure you don’t want to put anything cold on that?”

“Tch.” She finished dressing and lied down on the bottom bed. “Why weren’t you there? Thought you’d abandoned me.”

“I..uh… sorry, I was reading an interesting book and forgot.”

“…”

We stayed quiet for a while. Kind of awkward but, hey, at least she wasn’t screaming at me for being an idiot. Though I would have just preferred to be screamed at….

“Why didn’t you hit her?” I eventually said.

“Cause you wanted to be friends…”

Arrr… what?

Squeak. The door opened and a lady came in. She looked… fifteen? Perky skin, two mounds on her chest. And some freckles on her face. Definitely going through puberty…. “You have a guest,” she said eyeing me.

“Soler A. Barack. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.” I sat down.

“Jessica Wilder. Pleasure’s all mine.” She dropped her coat on a chair and just sat down on it backwards, pressing her chest into the chair. “Heard about you. Thought you’d be cuter.”

Cuter? Was she calling me cute then? Nah.

“And I thought you’d be prettier, miss.”

A snort. “Oh, you’re calling me pretty?”

“Alright,” Shia said. “Little early but let’s go get dinner.”

“Lunch for me. Forgot to eat.”

“You weren’t kidding when you said you were engrossed in a book. What was the book even about?”

We both got down. “Magic and spirits.”

“Would you mind showing me?”

“Sure. I gave it to the librarian though. We could read it tonight or maybe tomorrow if you want to.”

“Let’s go there after dinner.”

“Okay.”

“Sorry about the whole thing earlier,” Shia said as we strode out.

“Wait, you’re ignoring me?” Jessica attempted but gave up.

“Don’t be. I’m sorry as well.”

That said, we shook on it. I didn’t know who was wrong, who was right. I didn’t know if this lady before me was evil or something.

But at the end of the day, I didn’t really care. Guess I’ll have to find a different pawn.