With a sigh Vuthe fell onto the fake throne at the back of the rather impressive throne room. The throne room itself was designed nearly identical to the one she had in Thelvadore before it was bombed into smithereens in the last large scale conflict. The spells flung around during that assault were powerful enough that not even Tizanta’s defences were able to keep up.

“I hate public appearances, especially ones with such an impact…”, she muttered as she went boneless. With her youthful appearance she looked like an annoyed teenager forced to rule, which was not entirely incorrect all things considered.

“I wanted to ask earlier”, Silk spoke up, “But didn’t want to interrupt. What the hell was that out there? I’m pretty sure it was some kind of magic or whatever, but it felt all weird.”

“That’s because it was, well, compared to normal spells. You didn’t have the chance to learn magic, so you wouldn’t know”, Vuthe began, looking at her, her tail swishing from left to right lazily while she lay boneless on the oversized throne, “What you felt out there was organic magic, the magic invigorating the world. It’s different from your racial magic that you know of instinctively, and the arcane magic that you can learn to cast spells. In general, there are four types of magic. First and most well known is racial magic. It’s instinctive, like I said, and is based on your racial heritage, not necessarily your own race. There is a general truism that those magic abilities can be categorised into two main topics, both of which again have another distinction between them.”

She waved a hand and shadows rushed from the darker parts of the throne room, manifesting into a black lecture board with white text next to the throne.

“The first distinction is active and passive abilities. Let’s take Light dragons, since you are one. You have a passive ability shared between all members of your race, light magic affinity. Your body is naturally inclined towards light magic, or to be precise the magic to manifest and control light. Some are better at manifesting, some better at control, if you are anything like Calagrophy your strong suit should be manifestation. That doesn’t mean you can’t learn control, it just means you need to put more effort into it. Active abilities are racial spells. Those have no names, as normal spells usually do, although some people name their spells. Within both categories exist specialised abilities and those with a lot of variety. Specialised ones are, as the name suggests, highly focused on one particular thing, while the other is generally weaker but with a lot more options. You can have a mix of both, although most races tend towards one over the other. As draconic beings we fall outside of that, however, since our bodies are magic made manifest.”

As she spoke, text appeared on the lecture board in simple bullet points. It was simplified and easy to understand, but not childishly so.

“Every being with magic has racial abilities, although depending on what race you belong to it might show itself very differently. Humans, thanks to their long evolutionary focus on diversity and tool usage, can have a wide variety of abilities, often without any obvious constants, although they are magically generally a lot weaker as a price for their diversity. That doesn’t mean there don’t exist strong humans, the father of Vixus was one for example. It was one of the reasons I even accepted him impregnating me, although that’s not important right now.”

She ignored the questioning looks from Silk and friends, not wanting to get into that topic too deeply just then.

“Next up we have arcane magic. It’s your ability to shape the mana in your body into spells with specific purposes. Other than racial magic that form of magic is quite limited and, while still decently diverse, by far not as much so. Everyone can learn arcane magic if they have the mana and the affinity for it, although unlike the books of old we read before we were reborn, not having an affinity doesn’t mean you can’t learn it. It just means you will take longer to make a spell work. Arcane magic in general is probably the most widespread form of spell casting, as it is the simplest to get into. There are variations, like miracle magic, magic based on faith, and natural arcana, magic focused not on shaping a spell, but controlling your environment to get the outcome you desire. It’s the simplest to cast, but also the weakest in any combat situation. That one is a little bit of an offshoot and doesn’t really fit into the generalisation of magic very well, but at the moment it isn’t important.”

By this point Tizanta had summoned chairs for everyone to sit on, and Scarlet was making her way through the massive throne room over to them, obviously impressed by the architecture.

“Then there is organic magic. You can’t control this one since it’s usually the domain of gods, which is why it’s often confused with divine magic, but that is not true. Organic magic is the natural flow of the world, and controlling it would mean controlling the very aspect that makes our reality. Some beings can do so, like I said, but as far as I know only the ten Celestials, the Ten True gods are able to do that. Lower gods, those not born with divinity but merely achieving it, are unable to control that aspect of magic, but can often substitute it with their use of divine magic, which is closely connected to faith magic. You can imagine divine magic as the source and faith magic as the tool made from that source. Organic magic can, however, be nudged into a direction you want it to go in, like I did earlier, trying to use it to stabilise the magic around us, but it’s very hard to see the consequences. And often enough it goes completely wrong if the spellcaster attempting to nudge it doesn’t know what they were doing or tries to impart too much intent onto it. Entire countries were rendered wastelands by failed attempts to manipulate organic magic.”

She sighed, waving at Scarlet absentmindedly who had sat down to listen as well.

“And last but not least there is void magic. This one… is weird. First created by an entity known as ‘The First Voidborne’ it isn’t so much a type of magic as it is the absence of it. Void magic is inherently dangerous as it eats magic, not mana, actual magic, and shapes the world by removing what usually animates all. Learning it is nigh impossible, since learning it means using it, which will erode your magic and your body in record speed. If you ever meet someone who can use void magic get the fuck out of dodge, not even we can deal with that.”

She looked over the assembly with a serious expression for a moment, driving home the point, before she continued.

“Of course there are a lot more nuances, like Apocalyptica’s runescript, a form of magic created by and unique to him, as well as all the different elements. But, while I have promised to teach you, they aren’t as important right now. Well, all but dream magic, since Blight is a dream dragon”, she waved at Grunt, “Your type of magic is a lot different from the rest of us. Dream magic doesn’t have any direct offensive uses, outside of putting people to sleep, but are highly sought after. Castaphiel for example is able to induce restful sleep or nightmares, can easily read and edit dreams and even pull multiple people into the same dream, which is incredibly useful for practical training, as nonsensical as it sounds. Keep in mind however that you can’t do so unless the person or being you try to manipulate isn’t stopping you. Dreams are an aspect of the soul and the soul is inviolable. You can’t hurt someone in a dream, at least not to the point of any actual consequences just as real pain or wounds, but you can shape dreams otherwise as you wish, should you learn how to do it.

The five friends took that in for a moment, before Scythe spoke. “Aight, so what can you teach us then? Like, we know how to shift and we know how to manipulate our elements, but that’s about it. It has been enough so far, but I guess we can do a whole lot more if whatever the fuck you did in our fight is any indication.”

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Vuthe nodded, and Calagrophy looked intrigued, but she didn’t speak up. She would be filled in eventually by either herself or Tizanta, Vuthe was sure.

“Yeah. You know the bare minimum of the basics, but that’s about it. Honestly you are under utilising your magic to the point of embarrassment. It was almost trivially easy to inflict fear into you, even though you should be nigh immune to it. We are true blooded shadow dragons, one of three, or well four, in existence. There is a reason our kind is hated and feared and almost universally killed on sight. Or well, our half-mutated relatives are.”

Scythe looked surprised, maybe even a little eager. “Oh?”, she inquired with a gleeful tone, “Do tell.”

Once more Vuthe had to sigh, “Yes. Nearly all shadow dragons are a mutation of some normal dragon. They are nearly mindless, although still extremely dangerous, and incredibly aggressive. Most shadow dragons are killed on sight, and even those who retain their mental capabilities are either locked up or closely watched. We are the exception, we are true blooded shadow dragons, third in line from the original shadow dragon, and that means we have much better control over ourselves. The aura of a shadow dragon is enough to make some people die from fear, our ability to control shadows is unmatched, and since fear is an advanced form of shadow magic we can control that as well.”

She decided to not inform Scythe about the identity of Ga’zeith, she still wasn’t sure how the other her would react to that particular information.

“That being said”, she said with a stern look focused on Scythe, “While we are incredibly powerful, that means that it’s very hard not to kill the wrong people. I spent my entire life focusing on control over power, and even now I’m much more powerful than I am focused, meaning that I can very easily wipe out a city by accident. We have an obligation to make sure what we have isn’t misused, either by us or by manipulation. It’s part of the reason I’m so reluctant to bend to the government. I advise you to be very careful.”

There was a sudden tension in the room, but Scythe nodded after a moment, even if a little reluctantly.

“Good. So, let’s start with the lessons now. We are already at it and the aura apprentices could use a new target to play with. Calagrophy, could you get them? We will meet them in the training space out back.”

The training space in question was of course not present. At least not on the outside. The camp didn’t have the space to house a training space sized for dragons, but that didn’t matter much as Tizanta could just magic it up, literally.

The Astral Serpent in question nodded in understanding and got up, looking at Cluster. “Come. I can give you some pointers since your talent doesn’t fit well with Vuthe’s teaching style. Maybe you can even help a little.”

Cluster got up, taking obvious issues with the last statement, but she knew as well as the rest that Tizanta didn’t mean it is a jab, but just as a plainly correct statement to make.

The group made their way to the back of the throne room which had doors leading into the Council rooms, even if they were very rarely used. The group stopped and watched Tizanta and Cluster work, during which Tizanta explained the usage of her own element.

“Okay. First off, a little bit of trivia. While it sounds boring it is important to know should you ever run into one of our kind”, she said to Cluster in a voice that booked no argument. Vuthe took teaching seriously, but Tizanta did so even more.

“First and foremost, while we are draconic beings, we aren’t dragons. We are Serpents. There is a difference there, a small but important one. Serpents don’t have the same combat strength as a dragon or hydra of their element, but they are much smarter and much better at magic. There is more to it, of course, but that isn’t important right now. Being better at magic means a few things for you and your spellcasting. You will find it incredibly easy to pick up new techniques and spells compared to your friends, almost trivially so. Any form of Astral magic should come to you almost instinctively, as you are an Astral Serpent, but that doesn’t mean you don’t have weaknesses. Astral Serpents are kind of unique with their element, as Astral magic is a more general term and has two main subcategories. Those are temporal and spatial. If you are anything like me you will feel useless with temporal magic, but can weave pocket dimensions in no time.”

With a swish of her tail she created a portal into a pocket dimension, although it was still empty. Vuthe knew she could’ve magiced up the training grounds in a heartbeat, but she most likely wanted Cluster to learn.

“Tell me, what did you feel when I opened up the rift?”, Tizanta asked her twin.

Cluster thought for a moment, looking at the rift. “Shit feels really weird. Almost as if something in my body was ripped open, but without any pain. Like, it’s distant but also weirdly intimate.”

With a nod Tizanta continued, “Good. It’s as I thought then. Not a surprise, since we are more or less clones it seems, but it was good to check regardless. You should be able to… touch the dimension, for a lack of a better word, and shape it. There is a lot of unused mana in there, go ahead and make the best training space you can.”

For anyone else such a task for training purposes would be an impossible task. But while Cluster was untrained, she wasn’t weak. It took her the better part of an hour, mainly because Tizanta had to correct her on the detailed usage of her magic, but eventually the group stood in front of a door straight out of a sci fi movie with an equally advanced training room beyond.

The aura apprentices had arrived only a few minutes after they had started and were watching with wide eyes as Cluster shaped reality.

Vuthe took note of the person from the church and watched him closely. He was afraid of their power and she could almost taste the divine power radiating off of him the same way it always did from prayers. He was obviously trying to console himself with the help of his beliefs, which she couldn’t fault him for.

Eventually they stepped through, although outside of the Loltharim Siblings the apprentices were very cautious, almost expecting to be locked in the futuristic room.

Once everyone was inside Vuthe turned towards the small group of apprentices, “Okay. I know you are here for aura training, and you will continue for a while, but you will also be taught the basics of combat and the usage of magic. I will not tolerate incompetence in my students.”

There was a finality in her voice that brooked no argument. After their first introduction to her none of them were about to question her goals or to voice their objections if they had any.

She overlooked the seven apprentices. “The majority of you are human. Therefore we will start with the basics of arcana, since racial magic would mean trying to figure out each of your peculiar abilities.”

With another flick of her tail a group of black target dummies manifested in the distance, about three hundred metres away. She pointed at them with her bladed tail while looking over the collecting of apprentices. “To start with you will learn the magebolt spell. It is the most basic form of offensive magic that exists and also the easiest spell to cast. All you need to do is take your mana and push it towards the target. Your element doesn’t matter so choose what you are most comfortable with.”

Four of them stepped towards the dummies to start, while the other three awkwardly stood there.

Vuthe raised an eyebrow, then sighed. “You don’t know how to manipulate your mana?”, she asked, resignation in her voice. She should have expected it to be honest.

With a sigh she shook her head, “Okay… Let’s start with the basics.”

For the next three hours she drilled the newcomers on the basics of magic, while simultaneously helping Scythe and friends with their respective magic.

While it was a lot more enjoyable than the execution had been, at the end of it she was exhausted.

At least she had been able to discuss things one on one with the rest of the Council and with Scythe’s group. While they still had to settle a lot of things, they at least were able to sort out the living arrangements. Cluster wanted to create their own pocket dimension in the camp, and Tizanta had allowed it, both for her twin to train and to be nearby if things went sideways.

Tizanta in turn had furnished the palace a lot more. With the tents already slowly being replaced with houses the camp started to resemble a small town in the old Thelvadore countryside.

Anyone from Earth would find it very mediaeval, but for Vuthe and her charges it was a lot more homey than the camp had ever been. Maybe things would finally look up.