“Alright, Kiara. Before we start the lesson, I have to complement you for your creative use of magic circles during your battle at the port town. While you aren’t the first to activate a flawed magic circle intentionally to create magic blowback, your trust in my enchantments’ protection and your armor’s natural frost protection made this calculated risk a good decision. Well done!”
As I was taking my seat in front of her desk, mom started clapping, and I stared at the ground as my cheeks began heating up.
“Yeah, yeah, it wasn’t that big of a deal, to be honest. It was just a spur of the moment thing.” I said, trying to deflect her praise.
Mom just looked exasperated as she took her seat behind her desk.
“Do not undersell your achievement, darling. I’ve been trying to get you to take calculated risks when necessary, rather than the reckless ones you’ve been taking so far.” She said happily.
“Speaking of that fight; apparently, when one of my allies tried to pull me out of the ice crystal I’d created, I was surrounded by a complicated magic formation. Do you know anything about that?”
“I did add an enchantment to your armor that would place you in a stasis sphere once it judges that you are about to die. I’d avoided telling you about it out of fear that you’d be trying to leverage it instead of treating it as a last resort, but thankfully, you seem to be showing greater restraint lately.”
I raised an eyebrow at that.
“And if you’d judged I still couldn’t…?”
“I would have dragged you to the Isles and locked you up until I was sure that you were strong enough to protect yourself.” She said without missing a beat.
“…”
I sank in my chair in relief, not eager to be grounded again after being locked in the house for nearly a month.
“In any case,” she said, “it’s time we pushed you through to your next evolution and advancement as soon as possible. Only then will I be able to relax a little.”
A dangerous glint appeared in her eyes, and I shuddered slightly.
“…How long is that going to take?”
Mom smiled.
“Like I said – as soon as possible.”
***
Over the next two weeks, mom spent nearly the entire time teaching me how to move mana in more advanced magic circles.
Apparently, it wasn’t just as simple as flooding the construct with mana and expecting an outcome that doesn’t involve blasting myself into smithereens.
Mana lines could be modified to be directional, and lines connecting magic circles inside a bigger magic circle could not simply be connected haphazardly. The borders of magic circles can contain restriction over the effect inside of it, but they can also serve as a port specifying what a connection from the outside is supposed to put in and integrate it. Likewise, they can also specify what the magic circle is outputting through mana lines and connect that in turn. A single magic circle can contain hundreds of these ports at once – assuming the caster knew what they were doing.
Once mom was done drilling these concepts through my head, she finally showed me the magic circle I’d be casting.
“Now, try to tell me what these magic circles do and how the mana flows through them. You don’t have to get the effect right, but if you get the flow wrong, I am making you start studying once more from scratch.” Mom said with a smile.
If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.
I shuddered, then tried to push the disturbing thought away.
On the whiteboard, three intermediate-grade magic circles were drawn. Arranged like an upside triangle, the circle on the upper right corner was the smallest, while the one at the bottom was the largest.
The circle on the bottom seemed to use a lot of words for the capture of thoughts and intent and processing them into commands of their own. Most of its lines were inner, connecting nearly a dozen elementary-grade and apprentice-grade circles, with only a single line moving to either of the two upper intermediate-grade circles.
The circle on the upper right was intriguing in that it only contained four elementary-grade circles, largely including words about receiving, sending, and processing mana. Despite being the smallest of the circles, a whole bunch of mana lines were moving all over the place, with several connecting to each of the other two intermediate-grade circles. That circle had more mana lines emerging from it than the other two put together.
Last was the circle at the top-left, which contained about two apprentice-grade circles and three elementary-grade circles. Trying to figure out its effect was confusing, but it seemed to be involving commands that requested information from the system, a bunch of commands involving bodily changes, and a whole host of restrictions and safety mechanisms.
The circles inside of that one had the thickest circle borders, filled with a great number of restrictions, and the largest of the apprentice-grade circles was built entirely around restricting what the other circles could and could not do.
Taking in the whole structure, I felt like I had a gut feeling as to what this was supposed to be.
“Is this the transformation spell…?” I asked.
A bright smile colored mom’s face.
“Correct! To be specific, it’s a version I’ve designed to accommodate your needs while fulfilling the conditions for your evolution. All you have to do is think about a race that you’d seen before, and the spell will ask the system if that race exists, obtain the necessary information, and transform you into it all on its own.”
She said, tapping her finger on her desk.
“This spell is also continuous, which could be dangerous in the hands of an inexperienced caster – since you might not know how to turn it off, but in this case, it’s useful because it will respond to your commands dynamically. I’ve filled it with layers upon layers of contingencies and safety mechanisms, so you don’t have to worry about being unable to turn it off. Since it’s going to be continuously active, the magic circle is set to move into your chest and near your mana core, so that it is within your core’s mana field. Foreign mana can’t interfere with it easily while it’s there.”
My eyes lit up with understanding.
“I didn’t know you could do something like that! I thought magic circles were incredibly rigid and could only handle simple instructions. Also, why did you choose the transformation spell in particular?”
Mom chuckled.
“We’ve no clue what kind of evolution you will be unlocking, and you seem to be interested in blending in with human society, so I thought it prudent to teach you this spell so that you aren’t reliant on me casting it for you if you lose your racial transformation abilities. It’s also a way of insuring that I won’t be hindering your development by giving you too strong a tool for you to rely on repeatedly. More importantly,” she said addressing my first question, “You’re not wrong about the rigidity of magic circles. However, with detailed enough instructions, and enough mana, you can create highly advanced and complex commands. If any spell exists in the system, then you can cast it yourself.”
Feeling the implications, a strange question began to form in my head.
Still, I felt that I had to ask it anyway.
“…Is the system itself a spell?”
This time, it was mom who was surprised. Her surprise vanished quickly as a wily smile took its place.
“Well, that is the subject of great debate. Humans assume that the system is the source of powers granted to all creatures, and a few even used to worship it long before the celestial war, but the truth is that the system itself is a spell, as you suspect.”
I tried to think of the implications of that, but there were just too many to consider. Taking my silence as an indication to continue.
“Since humans have no knowledge of an Akashic language, it’s not surprising that they couldn’t reach this conclusion. What seems to be a complicated yet mundane effect to us looks like an act of divinity to the humans. The system simplifies magic casting and allows you to consume the resources of creatures you killed in the form of experience, storing it for you as a form of ‘credit’ until you seek to trigger your own line’s evolution – or jumping into another one entirely. Classes, meanwhile, are the amalgamation of both your knowledge at your profession and system-granted abilities, which is why only sapient creatures can possess them.”
Huh. That makes a lot of sense.
“That’s neat and everything, but I’d like to know a few things. Who created the system, when and why did they do so, and where is its magic circle located?”
Mom thought for a moment before answering.
“No one I know is aware of who created the system or why they did so, but the system was created long before my hatching, and research by dragon historians seems to indicate that the system’s magic circle is located deep within the Unfathomable Abyss. It was dubbed ‘The Akashic Records.’”