"You're doing quite well," Iris told Cyne as he was disinfecting her wounds and putting up bandages, "And you're well-equipped too. Are you used to it?"

"Kind of. Believe it or not, I was once supposed to become a doctor."

"Huh, really? This image doesn't suit you..."

"I couldn't see myself in that role either. That's why in the end I became an adventurer instead of inheriting my father's clinic."

"Oh... If your father is a doctor, how come you're broke?"

"... Same reason as you. I've got no financial support from him because I didn't follow the route he had chosen for me. Well, I'm done with your neck. Do you have any other wounds?"

"Thanks. This was my only one."

As Iris started to put her hood back on, Cyne turned to the beast girl who sat uncomfortably at some distance and had not said a thing for several minutes now. "You, what's your name?"

"... Rina."

"Nice to meet you Rina, I'm Cyne. Do you need me to check your wounds before his?" he asked while he pointed to the party leader who was watching over the bandits despite showing multiple lacerations on his body.

"... It's fine. He needs it more than I do."

"Alright. I'll tend to him first, then."

Left alone, an awkward silence settled between the two girls. This silence wasn't like the comforting ones that she sometimes experienced with the people she knew, however. It was the heavy kind that made both of them uncomfortable.

"S-so... Your name is Rina, right?"

"... Yes."

"..."

(... No follow-up? Ask my name, at least!)

[https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1099093161634189313/1146936930974584902/SPOILER_Rina.png]

Perhaps sick of having Iris staring at her ears, Rina decided after a bit to revive the conversation herself. "... Are you a mage?"

"I am. Otherwise, there would be no way for a girl of my stature to defend against those men."

"So you did save me back there with your magic..."

"In the strictest sense, it was not magic as the mana was uncasted. If you ask me, you did something."

"I... did?"

"I'm confident you are awakened."

Seeing the girl tilt her head as she heard this term, Iris could imagine that it had no meaning to her. Just as elves referred to magic types as spirits, beastfolks might have used another term for the awakening. It was even possible they had no word for this.

"It refers to the moment you finally obtain your unique magic. I heard beastfolks don't bother artificially inducing the awakening, but it should still happen naturally at some point. Probably sooner than us humans."

"I don't remember anything like this..."

"Well, awakening isn't usually too eventful. For most people, at least..." Iris said while reminiscing that time she slept for days after naturally receiving her element. "Awakening naturally is one thing, but I gather from what you said that your mana veins were never activated either."

"I... don't know about this either."

"You would recall it due to its peculiar sensation. Still, it's a bit surprising that you could cast any magic like that without having your mana veins activated. Do you mind if I realize some tests to pinpoint the conditions for your magic?"

"Mmh. Go ahead." Rina declared, a tad of curiosity showing on her face.

(She's getting hyped by this. Well, it's understandable since beastfolks are said to be incompatible with magic.)

Their alleged incompatibility largely stemmed from the fact that their mana pools were only a fraction of an average human commoner's. Moreover, beastfolks supposedly had trouble manipulating their own mana outside of their mana veins.

(If she has enough mana to cast one protective spell in a dire situation, even once in a while, it's worth mastering it.)

Iris racked her brain, recalling the earlier events. At that time, Rina's arm had seemingly denied the blade's work. In a way, it had been the polar opposite of the spell the bouncy bandit used, which absorbed shocks. In Rina's case, the poor sword had received all its energy back in one go as if it had hit a boulder, which was too much for the poor-quality weapon.

(Let's see... To explain this phenomenon, there are a few candidates that come to mind. I am sure it's not strengthening or reinforcement magic, at least. Even if her skin was incredibly rigid, her arm would have recoiled when it collided with the sword.)

***

"You should be fine now," Cyne told Patry. "You should go see a doctor and show them that wound on your waist though. It's a bit nasty."

"Thank you, Cyne. I'll attend to yours, now."

"There's no need for that, I was only grazed by their blades. You should rest while I monitor those criminals."

"That won't do. Please let me treat you."

Cyne shrugged and sat down. "Fine. Thanks."

Before he started disinfecting, Patry looked at the girls that were left alone. "... Do you have any idea of what those two are doing over there?"

"Beats me. I just hope Iris won't mess up the bandage I put on her..."

At some distance, Iris was adopting a fighting stance while Rina was preparing to parry.

"Here I go," Iris warned. "Chop attack!"

"Ngh!"

"... You felt it, right?"

"I did..."

"So it won't activate for any attack... Either your magic type will activate only for lethal attacks, or there is some other condition to activate it. Or maybe you don't have enough mana anymore. How much mana do you have left?"

"I don't know..."

"I figured. You wouldn't know unless your mana veins were activated. Alright, I'll try to reproduce the conditions from earlier."

"O-okay..."

"Chop attack, mana-infused!"

"..."

This time, Iris sensed that something happened.

(That felt like hitting a wall... And I lost track of my own mana once again.)

"Did you feel the strike?"

"I didn't!"

"So contact with mana is necessary for the spell. It must have activated earlier because I had enveloped the blade with my mana."

(What even happened to my mana...?)

Iris crouched down, produced a bigger clump of it from her hands, and gently made it touch one of the beast girl's legs.

(... What the heck? Only a part of it made contact with her, but the whole thing disappeared.)

"Can you move your right leg properly?"

"Ah...?! I can't! It's stuck!" Rina cried out as if she had only now realized.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

(She didn't react to the foreign mana touching her...)

"That suggests that neither a hit nor even physical contact is a necessary condition for triggering the spell, and also that the mana hasn't just disappeared. We're making progress."

(Has she absorbed the mana? Or is it still there, hiding its presence...?)

Iris focused on the area where she last saw her mana and tried to think of it as an extension of her body, just like she did when she was retrieving mana from her pendant.

(It is there! I felt it for the briefest moment, but now I lost it again.)

Losing track of one's mana. The only comparable situation she could think of was the process of neutralization she regularly experienced while making her abundant mana react with chemicals to get rid of its color. Even so, while it was difficult to pinpoint the exact location of her neutralized mana within a potion, the imperfection of the process was such that it wasn't impossible either: her unique signature remained, although it was faint enough to be overwritten by another mage.

(But here, there's nothing left. Can she overwrite the color with hers...? But if so, I wouldn't have been able to take the mana back for even a moment. Then... Has my mana been perfectly neutralized?)

Iris had been told that, besides some king-tier artifacts, there was no such thing as perfect neutralization. If that young beast girl could make this possible and people were to realize it, there was no telling what would happen to her.

"Um... I still can't move... What do I do?"

"Ah, right. We still need to determine the nature of that spell," Iris said as she approached her hands to Rina.

"Wha-?! Where do you think you're touching?!"

"I'm just checking which parts of your leg are frozen and which aren't... Please don't make it sound like I'm a pervert. I'm doing this for you."

"F-fine..."

(I expected beastfolks to be much hairier than that, though. Color me surprised. God, please forgive me for mentally picturing her as a Xolo.)

"So... Only the front is affected while the rest remains normal." Iris tried moving Rina's right calf in different directions. "Hmm... The affected area seems to be held in place. With barrier magic, I would expect completely different behavior. Unless this is an unheard type of barrier, I should probably cross it out."

"What is it, then?"

"I have a few other ideas but, before that, please break through your magic."

"... Break through? But I can't, you saw it!"

"Believe in yourself, Rina. You're a beastfolk, so it should be easy for you to kick through."

"O-okay..."

For some time, Rina remained still, her face slowly turning red as she focused on this physical endeavor.

(Yep. Right now, she's just wasting all the work of her muscles.)

"U...ryaaa!" she exclaimed and managed a powerful kick in the air right after.

"O-oh. So you did break through... I didn't think you would."

"Why did you tell me to do it then?!"

"Well... See this as a rite of passage. My magic tutors also made me do quite a few useless things to pinpoint the limits of my element."

(... And I must admit that it's a bit pleasant to be the all-powerful instructor for once. I guess I can no longer blame Viktor and Serena for messing with me.)

"It appears as though your spell uses up the mana when a force tries to make the frozen part move. Hmm... But it could also be that it's expending the mana continually and it just happened to run out at the exact moment you yelled."

"How can we make sure...?"

"There are a few ways, but the ideal solution would be to have you tell me yourself. For that, I would like to activate your mana veins. I will basically jump-start your mana system for the first time. Some people call this the second awakening."

(Surely, the activation of the veins works the same way for beastfolks.)

"If you're serious about becoming a mage," Iris continued, "This is another rite of passage you'll have to pass. I'll tell you, though, that the first time can be quite unpleasant. That's why I need your consent."

"... Consent?"

"Yes. You could say that I'll be forcing my way into a part of you that has never been used for its true purpose before, so your body might instinctively try to oppose me. I won't know how intense your reaction will be until we do it."

Rina's ears perked up, her tail moving back and forth. "F-forcing your way? Do it...? Eh...?"

"It would of course be better to choose someone you know and fully trust for this, but you don't necessarily have to. In my case, it was a man I had just met who did it to me."

"..."

"D-did I scare you with my explanation...? Well, it might have been a bit rough, but it ended fairly quickly so..."

"It sounds a bit... messed up?"

"Well, it's a pretty standard thing to do for instructors to their pupils, I think. It might just be customary to humans, though..."

"But... You're a girl, aren't you...?" Rina bashfully said. "I... I am female, too..."

Iris tilted her head, "What does that have to do with anything...?"

(Wait, maybe it is relevant. Viktor, a man, activated both Rachel's mana veins and mine, after all... Ah, but I'm pretty sure Serena told me her first instructor was a woman. It probably doesn't have any importance...)

Seeing Iris in a sort of existential crisis, the beast girl felt like she had to clarify her remark. "I-I'm not judging you or your way of life! It just... doesn't feel right to me..."

"Hmm... I suppose it all comes down to preferences. Do you want me to ask the guys to do it instead? Maybe one of the two has done it before."

"N-no... I'm not even of age..."

(S-she isn't...? Beastfolks really are something...)

"Well, I was a minor as well when I first went through it," Iris said. "So long as you have awakened, I'm certain there isn't any problem with doing it at any time."

"Eh...? You were...?"

"Listen, I won't force you, but I think you're missing a good opportunity. A bit of foreign mana in your arm might sound alien to you, but it is not that big of a deal if you mentally prepare yourself."

"Wait... Mana?"

"... Yes? What else would I put into mana veins...?" Iris pondered before she was struck with realization. " Oh, did you think I would put my blood into your veins or something? They might have a similar name, but mana veins aren't quite the same thing."

"Nevermind... Can you explain the whole process from the beginning...?

"Sure..."

Iris went through the entire procedure and explained in detail what she had experienced after she had her mana veins activated, including her newly acquired mana manipulation inside her body or the imagery supposedly related to her magic type when she closed her eyes with her mana running through her veins.

"You sure don't look as reluctant as before, Rina. I guess knowing my blood won't run into you has put you at ease, huh?"

"Y-yes..."

"Great. Are you ready?"

"... Please do."

"Well, if you're fine with me, then..."

Iris carefully took hold of the beast girl's arm and started focusing while closing her eyes.

(Ngh... As I thought, passing through the neutralization will make it much harder than it should be. Maybe nobody other than me would have ever managed to activate her veins because of that.)

"Don't worry, I'll be gentle," Iris assured in a calm voice.

Hearing Rina's audible sigh, she asked, "Did I do something wrong?"

"It's... nothing. Just continue."