“[Perfect Body Control],” Maximilian responded in a smug tone.

Zeke searched his memory for any mention of such a spell. He had gotten to know a couple of famous spells by reading his Magic theory books. He was certain that a spell with a pompous-sounding name like that would have to be mentioned somewhere. Nevertheless, even after a while, he couldn’t recall ever having heard of it.

“Never heard of it,” Zeke finally admitted.

“No wonder,” Maximilian exclaimed, “I invented it myself.”

Zeke was speechless. Why had the old man even given him the name then, instead of explaining what it did? There was no chance the name would mean anything to Zeke. Maximilian saw the disgruntled look on Zeke’s face and chuckled.

“Don’t worry,” he said in an excited tone, “the spell is just as amazing as the name makes it out to be.”

“Let’s hear it then,” Zeke said with a glint in his eyes.

“ok, so it’s like this. This spell is supposed to… give you perfect control over your body,” Maximilian said with a proud smile. There was silence for a while after the proclamation. Nobody spoke for a long moment.

“…Thats it?” Zeke finally asked.

“Stupid brat! What do you even know? Thats an amazing ability!” Maximilian exclaimed.

“Doesn’t sound too amazing,” Zeke grumbled. “I can already control my body pretty well.”

“Ohh, you think so, do you?” Maximilian jeered, “Just because you can wiggle your toes, you think you have perfect control over your body? Don’t make me laugh!”

Zeke realized that he had gone a bit too far in mocking the spell the old man had invented himself. From all he had learned, inventing a spell was a process that took decades, and even then, there was no guarantee that one would succeed.

He raised his hands in surrender and admitted defeat. “Ok, ok, you win. Please tell me about the wonders of your spell, wise master.”

Maximilian also realized that he had gotten a little too worked up. He cleared his throat and explained. “It’s good that you see the error of your ways, my boy. Now let me tell you about the spell. [Perfect Body Control] is obviously not limited to your arms and legs. No, where this spell truly shines is in the control of the internal functions of your body.”

“What do you mean?” Zeke asked, genuinely interested now.

“Do you know how the body processes pain?” Maximilian asked. Zeke shook his head, he had no idea about how a body worked in detail.

“When your body is damaged, your nervous system sends signals to your brain so it can understand what is happening. Your brain has different parts that help it to process these signals and decide how much pain you are feeling,” Maximilian explained.

Zeke nodded. Even though he had never heard of the nervous system, he could imagine its function from the explanation. Maximilian nodded in satisfaction upon seeing that Zeke was following the explanation.

“So what if I told you that you could learn to control that process?” Maximilien asked.

Zeke remained silent for a moment, thinking of the implications of what Maximilian was suggesting.

“I could turn off the pain I was feeling,” Zeke said after a moment.

Maximilian nodded his head slightly, “Good, what else?”

“…If It is possible to control that, then I should also be able to control my heart, lungs, and other organs to a far larger degree,” Zeke mumbled while still deep in thought.

“What else?” Maximilian prodded again.

“I would be able to better control the flow of magic through the channels in my body, as well as…” Zeke’s eyes shot open at the realization he had just had.

“Say it,” Maximilian urged with a smile.

“My core,” Zeke finished his sentence.

“Well done!” Maximilian praised. “You figured it out even faster than I had thought. You obviously won’t be able to control your core fully, as it is not a purely material object, but what you will be able to control is the interaction between your core and your body. This will make it much easier to understand what is happening in your body when casting Magic.”

Zeke was so shocked by Maximilian's revelation that he was momentarily speechless. His mentor waited patiently, watching Zeke as he processed the implications of this incredible ability.

After a moment, Zeke snapped out of his shock and began to think. He realized that the ability to observe the Mana in his body in such detail would make it child's play to learn new spells. He could simply follow the flow of Mana and figure out where the problem with the spell occurred, and what the issue was. Even the creation of new spells would be much more manageable with such a method.

Zeke looked into Maximilian's eyes, stunned by the potential of this spell. He knew that mastering it would be a major undertaking, but he was more determined than ever to succeed.

“Ha! You should see your face, brat!” Maximilian teased. “What did you say about my spell earlier? Useless?”

Zeke turned slightly red but still countered. “Surely, somebody as old and wise as you, mentor, would not be so petty as to bring that up again just to tease me?”

It was Maximilian’s time to get red. “Darn brat, who told you to have such a sharp tongue,” the old man mumbled. “Anyway, we should start on the training right away. Who knows how much time we have left, with your core being the way it is.”

Zeke nodded gravely, he was also afraid that they wouldn’t have enough time for him to master the spell. In that case, he would have to settle for a different spell or engrave an unfinished version on his core. None of those two options appealed to him whatsoever.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

“What do I have to do?” Zeke asked with steel in his eyes.

"Usually it would take months to learn such a spell,” Maximilian explained. “But, as luck would have it, I have been preparing for years for just this moment…”

“…These contraptions around us," he said, gesturing to the various magical devices neatly arranged on the ground, "are my own creations, and they are the aids you'll need to learn this spell."

Zeke inspected those so-called aids. Some of them looked quite fearsome. Zeke found several contraptions he had seen before. One of them was the harness that he had picked up upon visiting Maximilian’s mansion for the first time. Maximilian noticed his lingering gaze and walked over to the tool.

He picked it up and returned to Zeke with a weird smile on his face that scared Zeke slightly.

“I see you remember,” Maximilian said with a glint in his eyes. “Since you are already familiar with this tool, we might as well start with it.”

Over the next few minutes, Zeke was pressed into the harness. The contraption made from leather bands seemed to have an uncountable amount of fasteners and buckles. When Maximilian was done strapping him in, Zeke could not even budge it at all, so tight did it adhere to his body.

Zeke looked down, still unsure about the function this device served. It was almost completely made of leather straps. The only metallic part was a round plate that was attached to his chest, right above his heart. Now that he looked at it more closely, there was a needle attached to the back of the plate. He could see that it was slightly swaying.

“So, I guess it’s time to explain what we are going to do,” Maximilian said. “You have probably noticed the needle by now. If you look even more closely, you’ll be able to see the markings on top of the disk as well.”

Zeke took a closer look and noticed that his mentor was right. There were tiny markings at the top of the plate. They were spaced equally and there were numbers next to the bigger notches: 50, 60, 70… and so on.

“What are those for?” Zeke inquired.

“Glad you asked,” the old man said with a smile. “This device will measure your heart rate. It will help you learn to control your heart. I’ll call out a number from 30-120 and you will try to match it with your heartbeat as fast as possible. Any questions?”

“Yes,” Zeke replied seriously. “Why are there so many straps? If it was just to secure the plate, one or two would have sufficed. Surely I’m missing something important again?”

Maximilian mumbled something incomprehensible, causing Zeke to walk closer in order to hear him properly. But even after he was standing right next to his mentor, he could only understand snippets of what the old man was saying.

“…didn’t know much about building stuff… was still young back then… didn’t want to take any risks,” Maximilian murmured.

Zeke understood that this might be a touchy subject again and left it alone. He quickly changed the subject. “Anyway, it’s not that important. How about we get started?”

Over the next few hours, Zeke tried to match his heart rate to the numbers Maximilian called out, but progress was slow. When it was time for his morning classes, Zeke was about to take off the harness, but he was stopped by his mentor.

“No time,” Maximilian said by way of explanation, “I have already sent somebody to inform your teachers that you will not be attending any classes for the time being.”

“So I just stay here and do this all day?” Zeke asked with a growing sense of horror.

“Indeed,” Maximilian said with a nod.

“…At least there’s still lunch and dinner,” Zeke mumbled.

“We’ll also have our lunch and dinner down here,” Maximilian interjected, stealing the last glimmer of hope from the boy’s eyes.

“Can I at least get rid of the harness before I go to sleep?” Zeke asked desperately.

“We could do that,” Maximilian said with a nod, causing Zeke to perk up slightly, “But I think it would motivate you more if we didn’t…” he said in the next moment.

For the rest of the day, Zeke practiced with the harness. Despite his convictions to prove himself and to get stronger, he was teetering on the edge of giving up. No matter how hard he tried, he barely made any progress. Even worse, Maximilian seemed to be content with the way things were going.

“Fuck this!” Zeke screamed after failing one more time. “I’m never going to make it in time like this!”

Maximilian just stood by and watched the fuming boy in silence for a while. When Zeke had calmed down slightly, the old man spoke up. “I told you it would be difficult. Don’t tell me this is the extent of your convictions?”

“No…” Zeke responded quietly. “I-I am just frustrated. We will never make it in time like this. There are so many other organs, and I barely made any progress all day. What am I supposed to do?”

“I wouldn’t worry too much about that,” Maximilian tried to reassure the boy. “It’s like learning a language. The first one is really hard and takes forever. But for each one you master, the next one because that is much easier.”

Zeke considered the old man’s words. This comparison made sense to him. There would be a lot of overlap between the different organs. If he developed a good system now, the other ones would be that much easier. Maximilian noticed that his student’s expression had brightened and nodded in satisfaction.

“If things get hard, and you start to think that giving up might be your best bet, remember this: Sometimes, a moment of pain in the present can save you from a lifetime of suffering.” Maximilian cautioned.

Zeke nodded gravely. He would take those words to heart. He had suffered the bullying of his peers for long enough to understand the kind of life he would lead if he made a habit of giving up.

“What do you think?” Maximilian asked. “Time to call it quits for today?”

“…Maybe a little more,” Zeke said, causing a smile to spread across the old man’s face. It was way past midnight when the two finally made their way to the two beds that had been brought to the training room.

The same pattern repeated itself on the next day, and the day after. Only on the fourth day, did Zeke finally have a breakthrough. He had finally found a way to change the intent of his Blood Magic in the exact right way to influence his heart. From then on, it was only a matter of hours until he mastered the first exercise. A huge smile spread across Zeke’s face when he finally untied the belts he had been stuck with for the last couple of days.

Next, they worked on his brain. Zeke was trying to stimulate the organ in order to increase his ability to multitask. Even though the exercise was not physically demanding. He was still plagued with severe headaches after the first hour. But he didn’t complain even once, and it only took him slightly over a day to complete the exercise.

From then on, he would go through multiple organs a day. Zeke was hopping from one contraption to the next. Lungs, Liver, Kidneys, Stomach, Intestines, Spleen, Gallbladder, Bladder, Skin, Bones, Muscles, Eyes, Ears, and Nose. The list of ordeals seemed endless, but Zeke never complained and never quit.

Toward the end, even his control over his reproductive organs was trained. Luckily, the awkward exercise didn’t last long. As he could pretty much learn any function in a matter of hours now.

“It’s time for your final test,” Maximilian proclaimed one morning. Zeke nodded seriously; he felt ready.

The final test was comprised of Maximilian pointing at one of Zeke’s organs and giving him a specific task, such as: “Goosebumps, here.” or “Heart rate, 90.”

Without the devices, They only had Zeke’s own intuition to go by, but the boy had gotten so good at recognizing the processes of his body, that he was oftentimes even more accurate than the machines. The test lasted for a full three hours.

After almost two weeks of nonstop training, Zeke and Maximilian emerged from the training room looking like beggars, with their tattered clothes and gaunt faces. But despite their disheveled appearance, both of them wore huge smiles on their faces.

Zeke knew that he had accomplished something truly remarkable. He had mastered [Perfect Body Control]. A spell that even Maximilian had considered highly advanced and difficult to master.

By this point, Zeke felt the pain in his core twice every single day, and even at this very moment he could feel it painfully throbbing underneath his skin. He knew that it would only be a couple of days until his core would completely collapse, but it had all been worth it.

Maximilian patted Zeke's shoulder. “Take a shower and get a good night’s sleep. You’ve more than earned it. Tomorrow we are going to engrave your first spell.”

Zeke nodded, grateful for the opportunity to rest, but already looking forward to what was going to happen next.