When Jeb had finished the rest of his final examinations and said his temporary goodbyes to Declan and Catherine, he returned to the plot of land he used to grow Managrass. The Enchantment he had placed around the perimeter of the plot finally seemed to have evened out. As the Enchantment kept working, Jeb noticed that it did more than simply Attune the Mana within the soil to something useful. It also worked, somehow, to monitor the soil health and help maintain some mineral composition. It was not perfect, certainly, but Jeb was noticing that he needed to replenish the soil far less often than he otherwise would.
Over the break, he spent his time much as he had the term break before. In the morning, he would wake and begin growing Managrass or one of the Elemental Managrass variations he had created. At some point during the day, he went to the Workshop to work on gaining his Weaving Skill with the Weaver. He took the occasional meal with Dean Aquam when their schedules lined up.
The rest of his days were spent in the Stacks, trying to find anything that spoke of the interplay between Theoretical Enchanting and Theoretical Glyphs. It mostly consisted of reading a single aside in one of the textbooks about someone who had experimented with the other style of Magic, finding Margaret or Philip, and asking them if there were any books by the person cited. More often than not, the Researcher in question had never formally written up any of their results, and Jeb was forced to return to the Stacks to keep hunting. Every so often, though, the Librarians were able to find Preliminary Research Notes, and they revealed a mess of contradictory results. It seemed like every Researcher found a completely distinct set of ways that the two Magics were the same at a Theoretical level.
Despite the lack of any clear patterns, Jeb enjoyed the project. All too soon, though, the term break came to an end. Truthfully, Jeb might not have realized he was supposed to go to his first course of the day, even with the schedule he had been given, if it wasn’t for the surprising crowd in the cafeteria. As he thought about what could have caused the crowd, Declan came up to him.
“Good morning, Jeb!” he called out cheerfully.
Understanding quickly dawned on him. “Good morning,” he replied. The two compared their schedules, curious whether they would be taking any courses together. Jeb saw with some sadness that the two would not be taking any courses with each other.
I suppose it does make some amount of sense, he thought to himself. Declan wants to learn Enchanting for practical purposes, and right now my interest in Enchanting is almost entirely at a theoretical level. Still, Jeb was nervous about not sharing any of his courses with someone that he knew. After Declan left, heading for his first course of the term, Catherine came by.
Jeb was relieved to see that the two of them would be taking Intermediate Lute Technique together. It was still strange to Jeb how much the College of Music focused on the non-Magical aspects of their craft compared to the other Colleges. He commented on that to Catherine, mind still thinking about the ways that Glyph Magic and Enchanting were alike.
She cocked her head as though confused. “Of course we need to focus more on the non-Magical portions of the Magic,” she said. “Unlike Glyph Magic, there is an actual physicality to what we do. And, unlike Enchanting, most of us were taught how to draw and spell well before we were taught to play an instrument.”
Jeb nodded. The two continued chatting before both had to go to their own courses. Jeb’s first course of the day, he confirmed, was Introduction to Alchemy. The classroom had twelve seats, each behind a complex setup that reminded Jeb of the Distilling setup that his uncle used.
In the front of the classroom, another setup was facing the opposite direction. The Professor for the course was sitting there, and he looked up when Jeb entered the room. “Good morning,” he said, “are you enrolled in Introduction to Alchemy this term?”
Jeb nodded. “Yes, sir. My name is Jeb.”
The Professor pulled out a sheet of paper and made a mark. Seeing Jeb’s puzzled look, he shrugged. “Unlike most of the Professors in the Academy, I find that taking attendance is a necessary task for me. My memory is not what it once was, and I struggle to remember everything that happens in the classroom.”
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Jeb nodded slowly. There was no polite way to ask what had happened to his memory, for all that he was very curious.
“Now then,” the Professor continued, “what brings you to Alchemy?”
Jeb thought about the question for a moment. “Truthfully, I don’t have a great answer. Before coming to the Academy, my family did their best to provide me with the Skills and skills I might need for a career as a Mage.”
The Professor looked at him in confusion.
“Sorry,” Jeb amended, “everyone else in my family is a Farmer. As a result, they were not entirely certain how to best prepare me. One of my aunts is a Brewer, though, and she thought that Brewing and Distilling could be useful to someone attempting to do Alchemy.”
The Professor nodded. “And do you have those Skills?”
“I do,” Jeb replied.
“Well, then,” the Professor said, “would you mind doing your entrance examination before the class period begins? It can be slightly overwhelming to monitor twelve new Alchemists at once.”
“Absolutely!” Jeb replied. “What do you need me to do?”
The Professor walked Jeb through a number of different tasks. First, he needed to disassemble the still, which the Professor called an alembic. Once he had, the Professor walked him through cleaning and reassembling it. Jeb apparently did not assemble the setup to the Professor’s standards, because he was told to disassemble it as soon as he had finished building it.
By the fourth time through the process, Jeb realized that the Professor was giving him fewer and fewer directions each time through. With the understanding that the goal was learning to perform the entire process from muscle memory, Jeb stopped keeping count of the repetitions. When the Professor was finally satisfied with his ability to set up and dismantle the alembic, Jeb was told to light a fire.
He took a moment to debate between using the provided sparking tool and just using his Least Create Fire Glyph. Jeb quickly decided to use his Glyph. The Professor hadn’t been specific in how he wanted Jeb to create the flame, so Jeb assumed that he was allowed to choose the method. When the fire appeared seemingly from nowhere, the Professor nodded.
“A Glyph?” he asked.
“Yes, sir.” Jeb replied.
The Professor seemed satisfied with that answer and had Jeb begin distilling alcohol. Jeb felt the Distilling Skill start to guide his motions, and went along with them, shifting the alembic’s position slightly.
“Are you using your Skills?” the Professor asked.
“Yes?” Jeb replied hesitantly.
The Professor nodded and let Jeb go through the entire process of separating and collecting the liquid. When he had finished, the Professor glanced at each of the flasks he had filled, nodded, and poured them back into the base of the still. “This time without your Skills,” he said, walking back to his desk.
While Jeb worked, trying to suppress his Skill and not make any mistakes distilling, a part of him noticed that the room had started to fill. As each new person entered the room, the Professor asked them about their history and started walking them through the assembly and dismantling of the alembics. Jeb was distracted for just a moment before refocusing on his work. The last thing he wanted to do was learn that he was only as good as his Skills.
The Professor came to his desk just as the last drop came out of the alembic. Once more, he looked at the different flasks Jeb had filled. “Satisfactory,” he said, pouring the flasks into another student’s alembic.
After a moment, he came back to Jeb’s desk. “My apologies. I tend to give minimal feedback where it is not needed. The Academy has encouraged me to be more specific with my feedback, especially in the early portions of the term. When I said ‘satisfactory’, I meant that your ability to work with the alembic are above the level that I hope my students enter the course with. If they were not, I would recommend that you enroll in Basic Alchemic Preparations, because this course presumes a background level of proficiency with the apparatus we will be using. Do you have any questions for me?”
Jeb nodded. “Will I be expected to do my work this term without my Skills?”
The Professor shrugged. “That is up to you. If your goal is simply to explore the field of Alchemy, then you are welcome to use any and all Skills. If, however, your goal is to gain the Alchemy Skill, then I would highly advise that you avoid using your Skills as much as possible. If needed, Skill Suppressors are available, though I would counsel against their use.”
“Why would you advise against using Skill Suppressors?” Jeb asked. It seemed like this would be his first term not having a Skill externally suppressed.
“It teaches bad habits,” the Professor replied. “When you are forced to suppress your Skills on your own, you learn how to recognize the way that the System guides your actions. By using a Skill Suppressor, you do not develop this ability.”
Jeb nodded. “Thank you.”
The Professor nodded back. “If you have no other questions, you are welcome to leave today. The only item I had scheduled was this entrance examination.”
Jeb nodded and left the room. He quickly made his way to the Library and started reading the recommended text for the course.