Ch #4
"Practical Training"
Today was the 10th day he had been in the trial. Over the week Kai had learned a lot about Velir from his enthusiastic professor. Other than the magic language course he had also enrolled in the Ancient history course and Wilderness and Ruins exploration course. He had found a few clues about his trial after thinking about his situation.
‘The trial must be related to learning… The academy setting and the incessant push of the professors for learning is surely a clue. On top of that, how mages are glorified and magic was emphasized in learning seems unnatural.’
But thinking about how the trial had started and the condition of the academy he had seen gave him pause.
‘It might not be completely about learning…’
Anyway today was the first practical training class. Professor Aionos was taking them to the fields near the academy to try out the basics of Velir. Gathering everyone together he started to explain.
“Today we are going to cast a low-level spell using Velir, specifically fireball. You might know that as Kindled you can’t control mana outside your body and thus cant cast spells, but there are ways to circumvent that using artifacts and spell systems. To cast the spell you don't release the mana and shape it outside your body but hold it in and shape it using Velir and then release it. The language will act as a relay and shape the mana outside without your direct control. It will cut off a lot of versatility of the spell but allow you to cast nonetheless. Now Gram whats the symbol for Fire in velir?”
“Fire would be Ignis professor.”
“And what is the symbol for ball in velir Syiu?”
“Tetros professor.”
“Good and to bring the symbols together we add a joining symbol of speed which is? Kai?”
“uhh, Volvo I think professor?”
“Correct, now pull the mana toward your palm from your core and shape it to the symbols Ignis and Tetros and join them using the symbol volvo and then release.”
Gram and Syiu tried as professor said while Kai observed them from the side. The mana seemed to become agitated around Kai. He felt as if the mana had become warmer. Gram seemed to be struggling, but Syiu succeeded in her first try as a small ball of fire flew out of her palm and hit a tree in the distance scorching it’s bark. She seemed spent completely casting that fireball. Professor seemed satisfied and then turned to Kai.
“You still haven’t advance to rank one so you can’t hold mana yet, but I have prepared an artifact for you. I made it specially for you.”
Taking out a star shaped necklace with a crystal bead in the middle, he handed it to Kai. Holding it in his palm, Kai observed the necklace and specially the bead. It was bright yellow with some inscriptions around it. Wearing it Kai was amazed as his mind could feel a source of mana connect to it. Looking at him professor Aionos smilled.
“Thank you professor, I’ll cherish it.”
“Now now, let me tell you about this artifact. It’s simply a mana storage, I have inscribed the artifact using a rank 1 mana crystal. But unlike a normal crystal that breaks after emptying, this one can recharge slowly and when you become a kindled you will be able to use it as a pseudo core too! Now go and try to cast the spell. Try to pull as much mana out as you can.”
Kai did not know the value of the crystal bead now but he would later. No bronze or silver core bead could take the pressure of a recharging inscription, only gold cores could do so.
As Kai pulled on the mana inside the necklace he found no resistance at all, as if the mana had a mind of it’s own it followed Kai's wishes and started concentrating on his palm easily. Kai seeing how much mana was rushing out thought of something and hastily stopped trying to pull out more mana and started shaping it.
The mana seemed alive, helping him correct his mistakes by itself and forming a nearly perfect symbol. As soon as he released the mana he felt the temperature around him rise significantly and a huge fireball formed in front of his palms and rushed at the tree blasting the trunk apart. If the spells Syiu and Gram cast were like a bull rushing at a tree, then his was like an elephant completely trampling it.
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Kai looked around only to see the others and professor looking at him shocked. Although the Professor quickly collected himself.
“My my, that was some fireball Kai! How much mana did you pull out of the necklace?”
“A tenth of the mana I think professor.”
“That's... simply amazing Kai. You really are talented in magic.”
Kai smiled and shook his head.
“I'm not really talented professor, I was just a bit lucky that’s all.”
“No need to be humble. Normally mana is very hard to control and shape for beginners. Look at Syiu and Gram there, they're completely tired mentally after casting only once and they didn’t even draw that much mana, but you seem like you could cast a few more even after pulling out almost 3 times the amount they did.”
Even Kai was surprised at that. Professor Aionos simply smiled and told them to rest while he walked around observing the burnt tree stump.
‘It seems I was correct. Mana around him is very gentle almost friendly. He’ll do great things in whatever field he goes into. Is he the one?’
After a while professor Aionos lead them back to the academy while explaining the problems they faced while casting. Back at his dorm Gram was sleeping soundly on the bunk bed while Kai looked back at the day. It wasn’t that eventful other than the field trip.
He took off the necklace and held it up, observing the little trinket. Professor Aionos had been awfully nice to him. Helping him understand the lessons and explaining things in detail not only about how they worked for the kindled but also for an unranked like him.
‘And now this necklace… Does professor like guys? No no, he would definitely like Gram better than me then. Does he know something?’
He was reminded of today’s incident. He had tried to pull mana out but it was like there was no resistance at all. He thought if he tried he could probably pull all of the mana out at once possibly. Calling out the records he looked at it again.
***
Dormant Kaiser
Class: ---
Profession: ---
Core: ---
Attributes: {Moerei}; {Mark of the raven}
Artifact: {epoch}
***
And the artifact was now showing in the records as well. Concentrating on the artifact Kai looked at the description provided by the records.
***
{epoch}
Rank-1 Artifact
Tier: 3
Type: Charm
[A necklace made by a greatmage for his pupil to use mana]
***
'It seems artifacts have tiers along with ranks. A tier 3 charm type artifact...'
Kai didn't know much about artifacts but he knew it should be rare. Professor Aionos must be very talanted to create such an Artifact. Then taking a look at his attributes Kai sighed,
{Mark of the raven: Mana is your friend}
'It must be because of this.'
Mana did not resist him, instead it helped him like a friend. Professor must have thought Kai had an enormous amount of focus or mental fortitude, but in fact it was one of his attributes.
He did not know where these attributes came from, but he assumed this one was because of his Mark he had for over 5years or more. He hadn’t really seen it at first, where would he find a mirror in the outer walls? and what would he do with one too? He had only seen it when it was creeping up on his chest, around the age of 11.
‘Shit, now my moods all bad’
Not wanting to think about his past he focused on the symbols, trying to remember them in his mind and draw them in his imagination. Mana might help him draw it easily but he would have to hold the image in his mind nonetheless. So practice was the only way to go. He wasn’t thinking about the fireball spell though. He was about to experiment with other combinations.
‘If I take the symbol for energy and the symbol for barrier, and merge them with the symbol for solid… Would it work?’
Unable to sleep Kai thought about it a bit and decided to try it out. Wearing the necklace he tugged on the mana ever so slowly, pulling a little bit out of it and concentrated it on his palm. Then forming the symbols he carefully merged them, holding the image in his mind, and released the mana. The mana seemed to dissipate…
‘It didn’t work… Why? The symbols were correct though.’
He tried a few more time but they all ended the same way with the mana fizzling out. The mana around him seemed to be distressed, he felt they were telling him something. Looking back at the fireball spell he imagined it again and tried to understand where he had gone wrong. Ignis, volvo, tetros…
‘tetros, ball... Shape, I’m missing shape! The mana dissipated because it had no shape to take.’
Kai quickly pulled another stream of mana and formed the symbols again. This time he merged them along with the symbol for a sphere. Moving away from the bed, standing in a bit of open space he cast the spell. The mana rushed out trying to form a sphere around him slowly but it did not fully form. Seeing the mana provided would not be enough he supplied more mana to the spell. Soon a perfect sphere of mana formed around Kai.
“Looks like it worked.”
He touched the barrier as if it was solid. It seemed strong enough to take a few hits as long as the mana remained. Once the mana ran out it would crumble.
“All spells have a baseline mana requirement it seems and supplying more mana makes it stronger too.”
As Kai fiddled with a few more spells he had theorized the academy was suddenly rattled with a massive explosion. The silent halls started being filled with screams and shouting. Kai bewildered rushed to the bed and woke Gram up. The boy might be a researcher but he was still a Rank 1 Kindled, physically much stronger than Kai.
‘Looks like it’s the time of the siege’