Second day of Decay, and also the second of the first year’s final semester. Classes were boring and mostly useless. I only remotely learned something in Language and History classes. Especially in History since there was so much about linguistics that you could teach to a child that learned to read less than one year after being born.
I enjoyed History classes because of my lack of knowledge about the outside world. Not only could I obtain information about what had happened in the past and beyond Ferilyn’s walls (seas? or should it be borders?), but also decipher the politics of the Tilean continent.
I know, I know. It sounded like a rather boring topic, but when you factor in the fact that a centaur horde and an empire of half-dragon men were neighbors, things suddenly became a lot more interesting.
As Ferilyn maintained a secluded diplomatic approach, we weren’t really involved in the events of the world. It saddened me a bit that the beings who were basically incarnations of living mana had more political ground than our eccentric and nihilistic civilization. Yes, ellari were far from perfect if you looked at our inner power struggles.
Still, the isolationist policy reminded me of the wood elves more common in fantasy. Both were apolitical civilizations centered on a single place, sure. But ellari weren’t exactly pacifists as their fantastical counterparts from my otherworldly knowledge. I wouldn’t say that our country laid upon a foundation of carnage (basically because they wouldn’t tell that to a child in History class) but it was true there was some bloodshed.
Why was I saying all of this, you ask? Because school day ended with History class at the last hour and it was still fresh in my mind. I directed myself to the infirmary being a bit nervous, this was nothing but rambling to calm me down.
Somehow, I always felt unnerved when I thought of nurse Decourse. I didn’t know why, but I could presume it had to do with when she healed me with soul magic. I wasn’t in my right mind after the flashback of the River of the Damned, and it didn’t help that her magic was so similar to the touch of the Lady. Even after so many years I could clearly remember her porcelain white skin and her fancy Victorian dress. A memory well-printed on my very being.
I stood before the nursery, and with a deep inhalation, I knocked on the door.
“Come in.” A feeble, melodious voice said.
After a deep exhalation, I entered the room. I found Alatea Decourse before a Petri plate as she read a book on her left. Alatea wore rectangular glasses, the type used for short-sight or occasional reading, not for common use.
“Sit around there, I will be with you in a second.” The nurse told without taking her eyes off the book.
She pointed at a bed without sparing a look, so I followed her advice and sat on top of it. I was in no rush, and I had no intent on interrupting her experiment, whatever it may be. I wouldn’t like having my meditation hour cut by someone, that was for sure.
I wasn’t paying attention to the passage of time as I was half-sleep with my pseudo-meditation as I looked at Alatea doing her work. Whatever she was doing, I could appreciate the effort and the professionality behind it.
There wasn’t a line of sight between me and the book, but I could presume it was related to the soul as I felt weird vibrations in the air. Not sound or currents of wind, but as if someone was manipulating the flow of mana in the room.
At fear I would interrupt her experiment with my meditation, I stopped it, severing my connection with the atmospheric mana. Looking at the movement of mana (it was something more instinctual as I couldn’t actually see mana, though I knew for a fact it was possible) I noticed that soul mana was the one that was being gathered. This practically confirmed all my doubts.
“Sorry for the wait, what did you want?” Alatea asked as she slightly groomed her hair. “Oh, wasn’t your name Edrie?” She asked when she saw me. I didn’t expect her to remember me as we had talked two times three seasons ago.
“Yes, nurse Decourse.” I nodded and saluted her. “I came here looking for advice.”
“That’s a bit weird coming for advice at nursery, definitively a first, but I can help you if it is well within my reach.” She took her glasses off and left them on the desk.
While the rectangular glasses do give her an intellectual look, she was more eye-catching without them. Long platinum hair which reached her thighs, elongated beautiful ears, powerful purple skin tone, a welcoming face, and a thin body. Decourse was the perfect image of what an ellari should be.
“What did you want?” She asked me.
“Oh, sorry.” Damn, I lost my concentration there for a second. “I want to practice soul magic, but I know no one that is able to do it.”
“And why do you think I am able to help you?” Huh, what was she implying?
“Because you use soul magic?” I responded with doubt in my tone.
“And how do you know that?” Now that I think about it, she never told me she was a soul practitioner, but that was rather obvious to me.
“Well, when you healed me the first day of school I felt as if you were touching my soul.” I explained. “And now you were doing some experiment that required soul mana to do so.”
“Huh, could you notice that?” Alatea asked.
I nodded. “I became acquainted with soul mana lately.”
“So, I suppose you have already done some spiritual meditation.” Did that mean she agreed to help me?
I nodded once more. “I have been doing spiritual meditations daily for the past few weeks indeed.”
“If you are already able to do meditations on a daily basis with ease, and can also perceive soul mana, then why exactly do you want my help?”
“Well… It’s true I can do all of that, but isn’t soul magic dangerous?” I spoke. “I wouldn’t like to shatter my soul or something like that.”
Alatea began giggling and she covered her mouth. Huh? More than being angry or confused at her reaction, I found it quite cute.
“Sorry, sorry.” She excused herself. “You won’t be able to damage your soul, let alone scratch it. Souls are extremely resilient, a beginner soul practician is in safer hands than a soul archmagi in that regard, Edrie.”
“Wait what?” I was soundly confused. “All the books I read said that I should have someone who could watch over me so as to not cripple me.”
“That’s probably because the books are written for adult newcomers to read.” The nurse explained. “Adults have more mana and sometimes have difficulties controlling it. If you don’t watch out how much soul mana are pouring in your soul, then you may end up fracturing it.”
“Oh.” Then even the books about time and arcane magic were also the same? That would explain some incongruencies.
“So, as you can see, you don’t have to worry about sending your soul to the afterlife with a casting gone wrong.” She patted me on the head. “You don’t need me to practice.”
Alatea turned her back to return whatever she was doing, but I didn’t want to let the matter go yet.
“Either way, I still want you to teach me.” I told her and she gracefully turned to look at me.
“I told you you can learn by yourself. You don’t have to worry about hurting yourself.” She justified.
“Even then, I want you to teach me.” I reiterated. “It’s better to have a teacher than self-study, no matter the subject.” I said that as I looked at her pristine emerald eyes.
“I see you won’t back down.” She sighed in defeat. “Come tomorrow at the same hour.”
I jumped out of the nursery bed. “Thank you so much!”
“Beware, I’m not a teacher. So don’t expect me to be a good one.” She told me before I left the nursery.
“I think you will be a good one, nonetheless.” I said as I stepped outside.
****
I felt butterflies in my stomach. Even though I was the one who asked nurse Decourse for her instruction, I was nervous on my way to the nursery. Not because of the unspecified soul shenanigans that were happening, but pure, unfiltered nervousness that a child would experience on his first day of school.
It was stupid, I know. But something about it was primordial, beyond my reach. A dissonance between my body, my mind, and my soul. My inner child reacted differently to what I would like to do. Though I wouldn’t back down now. Just because you were suffering from an extracorporeal ailment was no excuse to skip a class.
I knocked on the nursery door and was responded by a “Come in.”
The nursery wasn’t empty. Except nurse Decourse, a child was also beside her.
“Give me a moment while I’m attending her, Edrie.” Alatea told so I waited in one of the chairs at the edge of the room instead of the nursery beds.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
The girl who was older than me seemed to have a stomachache as she grabbed her torso in pain and the nurse gave her medicine instead of a soul magic treatment. Weird that someone would wait until school ended to go to the nursery instead rushing to it at first notice, but hey, I was the one who asked a nurse for classes.
In any case, I was the weird one.
Alatea did use a bit of soul magic to ease her pain but even I, someone with no background in soul magic, could tell that only helped to soothe her pain rather than help against it. That seemed to be a recurring thing with healing soul magic, not actually healing, just deflating the damage.
The exchange lasted for a pair more minutes before the girl left and Alatea talked to me.
“Are you ready then?” I nodded. “Well, it seems you already have the basics, but let me make sure. You know that casting is recommended for soul magic, right?”
“Yes,” I answered, “I have read it in books, but they all commented on it as being better because the soul is a field guided by instinct.”
“They aren’t wrong, though a bit lacking.” Alatea affirmed it. “If I should explain it better, it’s because we need to have a clear understanding of the matter to spellcast it. And the soul remains vastly undiscovered to us. That’s why we, soul mages in general, default into casting.”
“Why’s that, though?” I was curious about the lack of investigation in the field. “At the Open Archives there were thousands of books about arcane magic, yet I only found tens of soul magic ones.”
“You probably know why, the answer is rather simple.” She said as she approached her desk. “Would you like an infusion? I trust my tea-making skills far more than my magic if I say so.”
“I would love to.” As soon as I replied, Alatea began boiling water at a small burner that looked taken off from a laboratory. “Why is the soul unknown? Hmm…”
I pondered the question as nurse Decourse took some herbs out of a closet with glass doors. As she had stated, I already knew the answer.
“It’s because of the lack of mages with soul affinity and the baseline difficulty, am I wrong?”
“No, you have stated it perfectly.” Alatea slapped gently a chair next to the coffee table and I went there to sit as she continued speaking. “It happens all the same with the Time, Space, and Void elements. Too few practitioners and a demanding starting difficulty make them vastly uncharted. Though there isn’t a lack of interest in the subjects. Mystics are often forgotten, but chronomancers, telemancers, and void-walkers are prominent figures in literature.”
“Huh, I have never heard about void-walkers.” I told as I fidgeted my fingers under the table.
“They are uncommon, even among void practitioners.” She responded. “Only common in theatrics and fantasy as they have fascinating properties to even the highest tier mages. But we are getting out of the subject.”
Alatea got up and picked up the same book she was using the day before with her experiment. She let it drop to the table.
“While the water starts to boil, I will teach you some basic cantrips.” She pointed at the dark brown leather cover book. “This book may be too advanced for what I’m trying to teach you,” she rummaged through the pages as she talked, “but it thankfully has the framework of a healing cantrip as an example.”
The book showed an unintelligible splatter of ink. Oh, wait, sorcerer’s frameworks were different than wizard’s ones. Discrimination jokes aside, it was true I had problems giving heads or tails to the magic circle described by the spell.
“Judging by your expression, it seems you aren’t used to sorcerer’s frameworks.” I rose my head to look at Alatea.
“That’s true.” I struggled to contain a sigh. I should end this nervous tic, I sigh far too much. “I have a smaller-than-average mana pool, so I was forced into wizardry, more or less.”
“Oh, you don’t have to worry about mana spending then.” Alatea circled her finger around the cantrip’s magic circle. “Soul magic is not mana intensive as there isn’t a physical construct, saving a lot of mana that other fields of magic would need.”
This was a rather obvious prospect. Spells that summoned greater and more complex magical constructs took more mana than others that didn’t. Mana Pond took more than five times as much mana as Arcane Chip even if they were around the same difficulty just because of the difference in mana used to create the construct.
“This cantrip is basic enough that you won’t have any problems casting it.” Nurse Decourse snapped my attention towards her. “This spell intends to soothe the soul of the objective in a smooth and non-intrusive way. Which is another way to say that it has a superficial effect. I will cast it to you, so don’t alarm.”
Alatea swayed her hands around. Classical sorcerer moves of relying on other parts of your body instead only with your mind. I casted the spell as slowly as possible to get a solid imagery of its workarounds.
In a matter of seconds, I noticed how she threw a wave of soul mana toward me. Once again, I wasn’t able to see it, it was more akin to a sixth sense. The cumulus of mana collided against my own soul, instead of being a harmful clash, the mana enveloped me like a cold breeze on a hot day of Scorch.
Instantly, I felt more relaxed and serene. It wasn’t a great effect, not even close to the spell she had used when I first came to the nursery, but it was considerable.
My moment of inner introspection was cut short by the hiss of boiling water.
“The water’s ready.” Alatea commented. “What do you think if you try to do what I did after a short break?”
“I gladly accept.” I bowed slightly instead of nodding. I felt it appropriate as this resembled a tea party at the moment.
Alatea’s tea-making skills were certainly prodigious. While the activity was basically resumed by dropping some leaves into boiling water, she made an infusion worth of the greatest perfumes by its aroma.
“It has relaxing properties and also helps with hypertension, though I doubt you will suffer such ailments as a child.” She explained as we waited for the beverage to cool down.
“The aroma is soothing enough already.” I couldn’t pinpoint exactly what was the scent. “What are these leaves?”
“Oh, nothing fancy.” Alatea responded. “Some edible ter’nar leaves.”
“Wait, are you talking about those common ashen trees?” This surprised me greatly. “Are you saying that they are edible?”
“Not all of them, but yes.” She looked at her cup, still too hot to drink. “Only special ter’nar of blue leaves are consumable by ellari.”
“The blue ones?” Weren’t those the most influenced by mana? “Then the infusion has mana regeneration capabilities?”
“The infusion? No.” Nurse Decourse swayed her head slightly as her glowing green eyes wandered towards the ceiling. “I can see where you are coming from, though. There are indeed beverages that boost mana regeneration, but this isn’t one of those.”
I was satisfied with the answer, even if I already imagined myself going to the Thal’mer park recollecting leaves from the blue canopy of ashen trees so I could have an even more enhanced mana regeneration combined with Mana Pond. Would they stack in this hypothetical case? Probably not, but I was nothing but a dreamer.
I put my hand on top of the cup, the quantity of steam had decreased drastically. As the white cup was less hot to the touch, I approach it to my lips.
Slurp~
“Oh!” While the infusion was hot, its delicious flavor couldn’t be hidden by the high temperatures. “It’s so good!” I drank more of the beverage.
“Slow down.” Alatea said as she also took a sip. “There’s more in the teapot, the tea isn’t going anywhere.”
Even as a child I liked tea a lot. Mother was an avid tea-drinker, and father didn’t fall short either. So, it was common for me to share a cup with them. While mom preferred more flavorful drinks, the bitterness of the ter’nar infusion had its good parts.
“Here I was thinking it was too bitter for a child and that I should give you some sugar, but you seem to like it.” She commented between sips.
“I can appreciate the taste.” I replied. “My mother buys a lot of different teas, but all of them are too sweet, so the change of scenery feels good.”
“That’s good, that’s good.” The nurse nodded to herself as she put some loose strands of silky hair behind her long purple ears.
We spent some uncounted minutes talking about trivialities, mainly me. I told her how Marissa and I had skipped from the first year to the fifth, and how I thought classes were still easy. She asked about my soul affinity as I was highly competent when feeling soul mana movements. I couldn’t tell the truth but underselling myself wasn’t an option as I could raise alarms.
“I have a medium-high affinity with Soul.” I told her as I left the teacup at the table.
“Oh.” She sounded surprised. “So, you have high Arcane affinity and then medium-high with Soul?”
“Basically.” I scratched my ear.
“Aren’t you a little prodigy?” Oh, sweet Alatea. Only if you knew the truth.
The conversation became stagnant until we had finished our cups. Without saying anything, Alatea refilled both teacups.
“By the way, what’s the formal way to refer to soul magic?” I asked her as I remembered that in the books I read, I couldn’t actually discern how they named soul magic so I just interpreted it by the context.
“What do you mean by ‘formal way’?” Alatea asked in confusion.
“Ermm…” Yeah, maybe I hadn’t expressed myself that well here. “You know how fire magic is called pyromancy, right?” She gave me a slight nod. “Then what would be the equivalent of soul magic?”
“That’s actually an interesting subject.” She said with a giggle. “It shares the same problem as other types of magic. For example, space magic is categorized into two sub-types: telemancy and locumancy. One is specialized in movement, while the other one is in the manipulation of space itself. In the case of soul magic, there is animomancy and psychimancy. The first one is about giving life to inanimate objects, this school is mostly related to golem-making. The second one is about interacting with the spirit, whether friendly or foe, shaping it in multiple ways.”
“That’s… a terrifying prospect.” Animomancy seemed more family-friendly compared to psychimancy.
“Well, all magic is terrifying in and of itself.” Alatea told with a bright smile. “It depends on the conjurer and how may they use it.”
“I see…” I drank from my refilled cup, to end this conversation from going in a worse direction.
“Well, now let’s get going with the casting.” She pointed at the ink splatter on the book. “The spell is called Soul Touch. It isn’t difficult nor dangerous, so I would like that you to cast it onto yourself.”
“Is it safe?” I asked as the images of the dragged souls in pain flashed through my eyes.
“If it was really dangerous, I would have no problem with you casting it onto me. But I do believe you would use more from the experience, even if that meant some damage to your soul, as minimal as it may be.”
“I’ll trust in you. You are the expert here.” The nurse nodded to my words.
As she had stated, the spell was indeed a simple one. Unlike the complicated mess of spells that I saw from time magic, soul magic was accessible for total beginners without magical background.
To me, who had spellcasted four-star spells and was on the way to the fifth tier, a cantrip that was classified as a two-star was no challenge. There were some problems when trying to understand the framework as I was not used to it, as I hadn’t even tried one-star soul magic yet, but Alatea quickly dispelled my doubts (pun not intended) when I asked her about them.
“You don’t need to look at me to cast the spell.” Once Alatea told me, all my doubts were clarified. “Close your eyes and focus on your soul. You aren’t affecting the physical plane with your magic, but the spiritual one.”
Whilst her words may have sounded like some cult propaganda, she was strictly telling pure objective facts. Soul magic, or psychimancy in this case, was more efficient than others as it didn’t interact directly with the physical world.
I followed the nurse’s advice and closed my eyes. Following the same process as spiritual meditation, I left my mind blank and flowed mana across my body. After a few seconds of concentration, I could say I was in touch with my soul.
“Look deeper.” Alatea’s voice wasn’t carried by sound, but by soul mana. She directly communicated soul to soul. Her non-physical approach avoided any chance of making me lose concentration.
Heeding her orders, I went deeper. Darkness surrounded me, I felt as I returned to the underworld. Not to the River of the Damned, but the coast before the souls drowned into it.
There was no otherworldly force that commanded me to go forward this time though. I was alone in the void, with no influence telling me anymore to dive into any stream of souls.
As I relaxed further and further, I became able to discern my own shape. The shape of my soul. The previous oval shape of my soul had transformed into a more humanoid one. It didn’t have yet the exact silhouette of my ellari body, but it was getting close.
“A pure white soul flowing the rivers.” The voice came from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. The familiar melodious, divine voice reverberated in my soul. Then I noticed it was no voice, but an old memory that still resonated inside me.
I knew why I just remembered this quote from the Lady of the River. While my soul used to be the purest shade of white, untainted unlike all the others at the river, it now had specs of purple around.
There was no grey or black in my soul, even if they were the utmost common with the souls I had seen at the river. Yet my perfect whiteness was tainted by surging tendrils of purple.
Of arcane.