“The orphan Emily has an affinity for Flower Magic!” The mage decreed with his hand on her head.

Out of all the other orphans that weren’t fated to become normal citizens, she was the only one that had an affinity for a sub-branch of magic. Probably the only citizen in the kingdom with talent like hers for such a useless sub-branch of magic. Her affinity was only in Flower Magic. She would become an unparallel genius in the field of Flower Magic with a Supreme-grade affinity for Flower Magic. The reason why everyone was snickering and looking at her with pity was because of the fact that Flower Magic was borderline useless!

Forget the fact that Supreme-grade talent is a talent only seen once in every thousand or hundred thousand years. Flower Magic has such an unimpressive and lackluster history that it has never produced any noticeable talents since its affinity became known worldwide. No powerful mages, warriors, or beneficial contributors to economic gain. Nothing at all! As far as the powerful and knowledgeable figures in the kingdom knew, Flower Magic was useless and unfit for anything related to war or commercial gain.

The mage that spent the time to come here to this part of the slums and measure their potential on behalf of the kingdom couldn’t control his facial expression when looking at her. Emily could tell that he was disappointed by finding that probably the only Supreme-grade talent in the kingdom had an affinity for a branch of magic considered more of a lifestyle type of magical branch. But she didn’t care about how anyone else felt! Nobody believed she could become great with her Flower Magic.

However, Emily said screw them all! She was going to show them all that Flower Magic was nothing to be fucked with! So, she put up her middle finger to everyone making fun of her and ran out of the orphanage, ready to prove them all wrong. But proving them all wrong and showing them the greatness of Flower Magic isn’t her goal. No, far from it. Emily would become the greatest mage that ever lived with Flower Magic. Better than that stupid mage that measured their potential, better than everyone else that lived outside the slums, and even better than the king and his army!

Screw everyone else that got affinities for magic that people considered good or average. Emily made her way to the outskirts of the slum to the forest’s edge in search of flowers. If she wanted to become a Flower Mage, then she’d have to know how the heck flowers even worked, right? Maybe her magic could give her some hints on how they worked. All she knew about flowers were that they smelled pretty, looked pretty, and grew in the ground. If that weren’t enough, she’d have to go into the city and ask one of those ladies that sell flowers about them. That was if they didn’t kick her out for how she looked.

Emily wore simple brown cloth as Miss Elga couldn’t afford many clothes for them all. Miss Elga said she was a very pretty young girl, but her attitude needed a little work. Apparently, no one liked a pretty face with a strong attitude. Hearing that made Emily want to put up the finger at Miss Elga, but she knew better than to do something like that in front of her. That would only lead to her butt getting spanked with the wooden paddle. And that stupid thing hurts. So, screw that too.

“Flowers! How lucky!” Emily spotted a small field of flowers just at the edge of the slums and the forest.

She crouched down to grab one. Once she made contact with the flower, Emily felt a strange feeling in her stomach reacting to the flower. The feeling frightened her before she remembered that she had a Supreme-grade affinity for Flower Magic. But she wondered why did she feel this way now. Emily touched and played with flowers before having her talent measured by the mage. When she did it then, she never felt weird.

“Whatever. Now let’s figure out how to make you the most dangerous thing in the world.” Emily smiled as she gently rubbed the flower’s petals.

Emily focused on that feeling in the middle of her stomach, and instead of directing it to her hands to affect the flower like an average person would, she spread it equally throughout her body. Now every portion of her body, along with her internal organs, was radiating with mana. This quickly grabbed her attention instead of the flowers gently swaying in front of her, dancing as if they were begging her to touch them. Despite their urgent dancing in the wind, Emily spent several hours playing and learning how to better control her mana instead of figuring out how flowers worked with her magic. Once she opened her eyes again, the sun had already set; it was basically nighttime.

“I gotta get back before I get in trouble!” She ran to the orphanage without stopping.

Not for any grownups calling out for her, even if they seemed nice. Which happened to be more than a few who did. Emily wondered why they never called out to her when she passed by them this morning and only now when it was dark out. That was weird, but then again, it wasn’t like she was going to go over to them in the morning, either. Unless they had money or good food. Then she would maybe be interested.

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“Emily! Where in the world have you been?!” Miss Elga questioned, standing in front of the orphanage’s door.

“Sorry! I lost track of time, Miss Elga!” She apologized.

“Hurry up and get inside. Just because everyone was mean to you earlier does not mean you can run off like that again. I already gave them a talking-to for making fun of you.” She brought her inside.

“I really did just lose track of time. I would’ve come back sooner if I saw it was getting dark out.” Emily tried explaining.

“Go eat your leftovers, then get into bed.” She told her.

“Okay.” It looks like she wasn’t that mad with her. She didn’t even bring up her giving the other kids the finger!

Emily quickly ran to the kitchen and began eating her cold leftovers before Miss Elga could remember. That thing inside her was all she could think about while eating. She tried messing around with it while eating and nearly dropped her food on her dress! This made her understand that trying to control it and do other stuff was harder than just focusing on it.

So, for the next several weeks, Emily did nothing but explore the various ways she could control this feeling inside her. She didn’t leave the orphanage, play with the other children, or mess with any flowers. Instead, she learned how to control how much stuff she wants to use, twist it, shape it, spread it outside her body, stretch it, harden it, and more! Then came the day when she felt that she could no longer do anything new or fun with the stuff. That was when she brought her first flower into the orphanage.

Her Supreme-grade affinity for Flower Magic kicked in at that moment. Instinctively, Emily knew what she could do to this flower and how many ways she could change how it worked. Her mana basically moved on its own to alter the flower in her hand, but she stopped herself from transforming it that way. Not yet. Just like how she spent all that time learning about the thing inside her, she would do the same with flowers. Which meant she had to get more flowers somehow. She didn’t have any money to buy flowers at the flower store.

“Miss Elga, can you help me get a job at the flower shop?” Emily asked.

Miss Elga looked at the small white spiral-shaped flower on top of her head and realized that Emily smelled really nice for some reason. She smelled too nice for a girl that hasn’t been washed in days. She didn’t understand it but guessed it had something to do with that flower on her head. Did that flower have something to do with her Flower Magic? None of the other kids that learned of their affinity have been able to perform any magic yet. So, that couldn’t be it...

“I’ll see what I can do, but you need to take a wash before you go anywhere.” Miss Elga was happy to see that someone wanted to be a productive member of the kingdom.

“Heck yes!” Emily ran to the bathroom to use the leftover water to wash.

Water was a sparse resource in the orphanage and was mainly used when the smell of the kids reached a certain level of bad. So, it was unusual for Emily to use it for herself when she smelled so nice. Except Miss Elga washes all the children. So, she knows exactly who had been washed and who hasn’t.

After her wash, Emily was taken to the florist shop with Miss Elga in the city. The store was pretty small at first glance compared to all the other stores in the central part of the city. All sorts of pretty flowers were displayed out front in their pots. This made Emily wonder if there was a better flower shop deeper in the city because she was not impressed at all. At least, that was how she felt before she walked into the store. Then, it hit her all at once.

Emily’s stuff inside her body began reaching out to all the flowers inside the shop. It touched all of the many plants, and learned much about them just by touching her stuff. She didn’t understand how it worked; she just knew that she knew more about flowers now than when she walked in. Maybe she didn’t need to get a job here after all!

“Sure. Emily can work for me. I could use a little help taking care of the flowers in here.” Ms. Joan said to Miss Elga.

“That’s perfect! When should she start?” Miss Elga was all too happy to hear her response.

“She can start right now. It's kind of a slow day today, so I can spend most of it teaching her her responsibilities as my worker.” Ms. Joan responded.

“Fantastic! I’ll come to pick you up later, Emily. You best be on your best behavior, young lady!” For some reason, Miss Elga seemed to be in a rush to leave her here. She was already out the door by the end of her sentence.

“That’s a pretty flower you got in your hair Emily. I’ve never seen it before. Where did you get it?” She asked.

“I found it.” Emily lied.

“Where? I would love to grow it in the back and sell it. It smells very nice...” Ms. Joan was now taking a deep sniff of her flower, making her feel weird.

“The smell is almost enchanting... I simply must know where you found this flower, Emily. My customers won’t be able to help themselves from buying something as great as that.” Ms. Joan finally had enough of sniffing her hair with a big smile on her face.

“I can bring you some seeds tomorrow,” Emily told her. The flower wasn’t that hard to make; if she made Ms. Joan happy, maybe she would pay her more.

“That would be absolutely perfect, Emily! Now follow me on out to the garden. I’m going to teach you what you’re going to be doing as my assistant.” She walked to the door leading into the back.

“Okay,” Emily responded

Learning some more about flowers couldn’t hurt. She was going to become The Flower Mage. It would be for the best that she learns everything she can. With and without her Supreme-grade Flower Magic affinity. Emily still didn’t think that Ms. Joan could teach her anything that the flowers themselves couldn’t tell her. But free money was always nice.