“Sit down here, the same as you would if you were going to sharpen a blade.”

I followed his instructions, sitting cross-legged on the ground in front of him.

He pulled out his massive greatsword and knelt down, placing it on my lap. “Send you’re mana into this blade, and then make it come back. I’ll help you the first few times”

It wasn’t a hard thing to do. All magic involved manipulating mana, using it to manipulate reality and, by that same coin, objects within reality. His mana entered the blade first, lighting up the veins within it like diamond dust sparkled on the blade, then mine followed closely behind.

“Now, what did you feel.”

“It felt… Pure. It’s not like the earth that's loose and grainy, it's smooth, but it's nothing like water either.”

He scratched his head. “Water and earth you say… Well, either way, pure is a fine way to describe it. Now do it again, only slower, and try to find any places that seem impure, different than the rest.”

I repeated the process. “I can feel it, like bumps, or little holes that my mana flows differently through.”

“Right, so using that information, how pure would you say it is? 60, 80, 90 percent?”

“Maybe like… 98 percent maybe?”

His bushy eyebrows raised, wrinkling the stoney skin on his forehead. “That’s actually pretty close. The impurities you feel aren’t iron, but rather the runes engraved in the blade. They fundamentally change the metal into something more like sky iron. Otherwise, it would be 100%”

“Oh, ok. So it’s technically pure then.”

“Right, that sword is pure iron, but this shield is sky iron, try and feel the difference between them and again tell the purity.”

“It’s… It feels off…” My whole body started to sway as if I were on a ship at sea, braving a storm. “the outside layer is completely pure… But it feels almost like it's uneven, rather than grainy it feels wavy, even closer to water.”

“Steady now.” He said with a grin. “See why I had you sit down?” He placed his hand on it and sent his own mana into the metal, “feel it now.”

“Ah… It’s fixed, what did you do?”

A small laugh escaped his lips as he lightly shook his head, making me a little embarrassed at how excited I was acting. “When metal takes damage it slowly loses durability over time, much like how a river chips away at a stone. This damage changes the way the metal feels. With sky iron, it’s even more so, because it’s more reactive to magic and thus magic sense. I simply fixed the damage that it had taken while we were out hunting today.”

‘He did it so fast though… Is it because he's a dwarf or…’

“Anyway, now that you are getting a feel for it, try doing the same with your sword.”

I pulled it out and laid it across my lap. “It's pure… Well, mostly, but it's wavy like the sky iron.”

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“Ok, that's good, don’t try to fix it yet, for now, let’s set it aside. Pull out that knife you showed me, the shoddy one.”

I sent my mana through it and felt a sharp pain trying to bring it back, almost like I was tearing my fingernails off from trying to claw at nail heads. At the same time, I started to feel lightheaded as my mana circuits reminded me they were still sore.

“Woh there.” I looked up to see his out-reached arm steadying me. “You good?” He asked.

My vision blurred, but my mind still seemed sharp… Almost too sharp. It was almost like I was a bit tipsy, but instead of dulled, my mind was thrown into overdrive. “Uh… Yeah, I think so. Wait, define good. Like I’m breathing, but everything is spinning and I can’t feel my hands.”

“So not good…” He let out a short sigh under his breath and sat back down. “It must have felt a bit overwhelming for you. Just give it a minute.”

I nodded, losing my balance with the movement of my head and falling on my back. A few minutes later I finally recovered and it felt like nothing had even happened. ‘What even was that? I never felt anything like that working with the other elements.’ Slowly touching my fingertips to my thumbs, I felt a faint chill run down the outside of my arms, only making it stranger since the chills didn’t cover my arms entirely.

“How are you feeling now?”

“It was like…” I muttered trying to explain what happened. “I don’t even know how to describe it. What makes metal magic so different? I… I’ve never felt anything like that, not even when I was learning earth magic.”

“Still unresponsive then. Got it.”

I continued on. It wasn’t that I didn’t hear him, I was just too curious and excited to bother talking about anything else. “Ted what was that?!? I don’t even feel like that when I’m hammered. It was like… It was like…”

“You were getting high on your own mana…”

“Exactly, that’s what it felt it felt like… I guess? No, it was more like something in between being buzzed and the weird feeling you get when you have a really high fever that almost kills you.” I slowly looked around, suddenly realizing I was standing up again.

He just rolled his eyes with a sigh. “I wasn’t giving a suggestion, I’m telling you that’s what happened. Now sit back down before you hurt yourself. You being hyper is only making it worse.”

“Oh…” The moment my eyes traveled back to the ground my body followed. Before I knew it I was face down in the dirt. I’d think I was unconscious if not for his voice clearly sounding in my ear.

“Your mana doesn’t match your level of control at all. Your body continued regenerating mana as if life depended on it… Even after you were at full capacity. You said you know earth magic so just let it seep into the earth. When your head starts to ache a bit you should be back to normal. I’ve never seen it this bad though. How many elements do you know?”

“Now… Everything but shadow. From the base 11… Then I know acid, lightning, and a few others from advanced…”

He let out a much heavier sigh. “It’s a miracle your body is holding itself together. Make sure you pick an element and get it to at least tier three before you learn shadow magic, the control will help with things like this.

As my head started to ache like a tooth that had been ripped from my jaw I could only respond with a loud groan. “My head already hurts…” I pushed myself back up and rubbed my eyes. “Well, the world isn’t spinning, so maybe I’m fine…”

“Good. If you're feeling up to it, try again… If you’re not…”

“I-I can keep going.” ‘I can’t let it end so soon, I haven’t even done anything yet.’

He took the knife, sending his own mana back through it until it levitated above his palm. “2 percent silicon, 3 percent phosphorus, small amounts of sulfur and manganese… There are just too many flaws, it must have overloaded your senses. Each element on its own feels different and reacts differently to mana, that’s why it’s hard to learn without someone explaining it to you. With other elements, you are only focusing on one substance, metal is different.”

Scratching his chin, he let out another groan as he thought. “Try it again, but this time don’t force it, if your mana doesn't come back easily just let it stay in the blade. If it helps, think of making it flow around the sticking points instead of through them.”

I took a deep breath and made sure to steady myself. “Right.” The mana flowed freely, some of it getting caught up in the impurities, but most of it flowed back naturally, all be it at a snail's pace.

It took a while, but with his continued teaching, I slowly learned how to weave my mana through and around the impurities. After that, It was just a matter of manipulating the metal after intertwining it with my magic.

In just a few hours I was able to properly manipulate the metal to repair its integrity and reshape it to fill in any chips. It made sharpening a breeze too. Although, I still wasn’t the best at it, so finishing touches still needed a whetstone. I couldn’t be that fine, but the change in quality, was remarkable, even having dulled it.

“That's so cool… I… I did it! Thank you so much, teacher.” I literally jumped for joy, well, it was more like a few bunny hops really. I was so happy my whole body tensed at once. ‘I’m going to save so much money from this!’

He hardly moved, completely frozen in place. “Oh uh… It’s nothing. You almost didn’t even need me…”

I shook his hand. “Don’t say that. I’ve been trying to figure out how to learn for years! I thought I might never get it.”

His dumbfounded expression turned to a soft smile. “Well, with how easy it was for you I wouldn’t be surprised if you had a bit of dwarf blood in you. It’s the duty of all stonefolk to help their brothers out so don’t mention it.”

I made my dagger gently float above my hands, trying to stop myself from jumping up and down more than I already had. ‘I can finally do it! Now the only magic I’m missing is shadow…’

I felt chills run through me so strongly that my head shook as I stared at the dagger levitating in the air. ‘I still can’t throw it or anything, but even just making it float like this is so cool…’

When I finally came out of my trance we returned to the inn and celebrated with enough beer to cover the smell of burning rot that still followed me like a skunk. By the end of the whole day blurred together and I remembered very little. I didn’t drink much because of my headache, but even despite that, it felt like I was wasted and hungover all at once from my body adapting to another layer of mana as I learned metal magic.