Chapter 98 - The Correct Way (Patreon)

Matt StonewallBrown hair, tall, broad shoulders. Combat focused, stubborn, grounded, and loyal. His father is a general. Fire and Earth Aspects.

Reyna VoltoreyLong red hair. Sharp, composed, and currently the top ranked student in the year. Comes from one of the Old Houses and is already deeply familiar with their politics. Fire and Air Aspects.

Porietta “Pori” MileyLong, fluffy chestnut hair, a round face, and hazel eyes. Gentle, well mannered, and socially perceptive. Sole heir to an aristocratic family and a close childhood friend of Mel. Earth and Air Aspects.

Sebastian VinteyBlack hair and grey eyes. Reserved, analytical. Comes from a wealthy aristocratic family and is currently ranked just behind Reyna. Water and Earth Aspects.

Gilly SunderhallBlonde and slender. Competitive, energetic, and very serious about magic. Daughter of Kevin Sunderhall. Fire and Water Aspects.

Madri SunvalleyCurly, fluffy hair. Bookish and curious, with a strong interest in artifacts and how magic works. Daughter of inventors. Earth and Fire Aspects.

The next day, when they entered Master Vizimir's classroom, most of them looked ready to faint. The walk to the Tower had been quieter than usual, and even the bonus Attributes gained after passing through the Barrier had done little to improve anyone's mood.

This time the lesson was held at noon. When they entered the darkened classroom, Vizimir was already sitting behind his desk, either lost in thought or simply napping.

Arien had spent the morning in Life Aspect class with Lamaral. Fortunately, his Mentor had focused mainly on correcting minor flaws in the matrix of his wound sealing technique, so he had not arrived completely drained of mana and energy.

With the Academy's only other Life Aspect student away on an eighth-year Expedition, Lamaral had invited Arien to her office for the lesson and even served him tea and cookies. Spending an hour and a half in an armchair discussing magical theory with her was a rather pleasant way to study.

It only made the contrast with Vizimir's class worse.

When all twelve students whom Vizimir had allowed to remain after the previous lesson had taken their seats, he stepped into the center of the room without so much as a greeting or attendance check.

"Basic Five."

That was all he said, looking directly at Arien.

Arien took a deep breath and focused on the pen. He lifted it into the air, broke it apart, fused the pieces back together, changed its colors, and finally formed a Shield around it, which even withstood the light touch of one of Vizimir's mana threads.

When he finished, Arien looked to the Master for a reaction, but Vizimir's expression gave nothing away.

“Still a pathetic level,” the mage declared. “But I can see you've at least practiced something.”

You have no idea, you old bastard.

Since the previous lesson, Arien had spent well over a dozen hours drilling the Master's stupid Basic Five.

“By tomorrow, your Fusion must be faster. You may begin practicing immediately.”

The man moved on to the next student.

Arien spent the next half hour tearing apart and reassembling the artifact, barely paying attention to anything else. When Vizimir suddenly clapped his hands, Arien glanced around and realized three students were missing, including Madri.

Everyone who remained looked even worse than before the lesson.

“Good. Each of you knows what must be improved by tomorrow, and you'd better not waste time.” Vizimir surveyed them sternly. “I will know whether you practiced or not. The fact that you control magic slightly better than your classmates will mean absolutely nothing if I do not see constant progress. And now we'll begin with the simplest spell. I cannot believe that every single one of you casts it wrong.” He paused. “Though I cannot blame only you. Such is the price of the kingdom's policies, where quantity is valued above quality. Watch.”

At his command, a spell matrix appeared in the air around him. It was the familiar three-dimensional structure of Levitation, a spell all of them knew by heart, but Vizimir had expanded it to several times its normal size so everyone could examine it clearly. Every line, point, and node shone brightly enough that Arien had to squint.

He had never seen a matrix rendered with such clarity. Normally, that was one of the reasons seats in the front rows were so coveted, but Vizimir had made the spell large and bright enough for even the students at the back to study every detail.

More importantly, something about the spell itself was different. The pen floating before Vizimir responded in a way Arien had never seen before, though he couldn't yet tell what the Master had changed.

“All right. Who can tell me how my spell differs from yours?”

No one answered. Arien suspected he might have kept quiet even if he knew.

“No one? Should I dismiss every one of you today?”

“The Master's spell doesn't have the support lattice beneath the area occupied by the pen,” Reyna said.

Arien looked again and finally saw it. Though he wasn't sure he understood it completely.

“Such a lattice is unnecessary,” the Master declared. “Magic is an elegant art. Your spells, on the other hand, resemble a collapsing shack built beside an elven palace. Your Levitation works by enclosing a portion of space and lifting everything contained within it. It's as if, in order to catch a single fish, you drained an entire lake.”

He pointed toward the pen.

“Only one of you came up with a better solution, though even that person is still doing it incorrectly. A properly executed Levitation acts directly upon the center of the object being lifted. Not only is it more efficient, it also consumes less mana. Watch how the lines intersect at the pen's center. I possess complete control over it. If I wished, I could throw it with enough speed and force to pass straight through you.”

The Master waved his hand.

The pen vanished.

A thunderous crash came from the opposite side of the classroom, and everyone turned to find a fist-sized hole in the stone wall.

“I will demonstrate the spell three more times. For the remainder of the lesson, you will attempt to replicate it. From now on, this is the only way you will cast Levitation. Understood?”

Watching Vizimir perform the spell made Levitation look absurdly simple. Trying to reproduce it quickly showed Arien why most mages preferred surrounding an object with a bubble and lifting the entire enclosed space.

Acting directly on the object's center of mass required far more precision. It felt like trying to balance a small sphere on top of a larger one while both spun in opposite directions. The slightest mistake sent everything off course.

And this was only a First-Circle spell.

After ten minutes and yet another failed attempt, Arien crouched in the dim light to search for his pen.

He had expected the exercise to be easier, especially since he was apparently the student who had ‘come up with the better solution’. He had stumbled upon it while experimenting with the possibility of levitating himself, discovering that he could attach the spell's anchors directly to an object's edges rather than surrounding it completely.

After losing control of the pen for what felt like the hundredth time, Arien was tempted to simply pretend he was practicing. Then he looked at the hole Vizimir had punched through the wall.

I want to do that too.

He pictured himself crossing a battlefield with dozens of swords and spears floating behind him, ready to launch at anyone in his path.

He sighed and tried again.

The pen hit the floor with a quiet clack. Arien bent down to look for it.

The rest of the lesson passed almost entirely in silence, broken only by pens striking the floor and the occasional frustrated groan.

Sitting in a classroom and listening to Master Serloy explain how different Mana Aspects behaved depending on the surrounding environment had never felt so relaxing.

Nobody was shouting at Arien. Nobody demanded that he correct some microscopic flaw in a spell matrix. He could simply sit, take notes, and occasionally join one of the discussions Serloy liked to start during his lectures.

By now, Arien was almost embarrassed by how pleased he had been when he first saw fewer classes on his fifth-year schedule. On paper, they spent less time in classrooms. In practice, nearly every free hour disappeared into exercises assigned by their Masters. It felt as though the entire faculty had collectively decided that fifth-years no longer deserved free time.

“If you ever travel outside Wyndor, which I strongly encourage, you must remember that your favorite spells may behave differently depending on the environment,” Master Serloy explained. “For example, when I traveled through the jungles of Kos, my Fire magic was considerably—”

“You already told us that story, Master,” Gilly interrupted. “Can you switch the artifacts to Lightning now? It has to have been half an hour already.”

“It has not,” Sebastian objected immediately. “There are still five minutes of Water left.”

“Why do you care about Water? You already have the Aspect assigned.”

“And why do you care about Lightning?” Sebastian shot back. “I'm sure a Rare Aspect is going to magically appear this time.”

Gilly glared at him. “I've been feeling something lately!”

“Children, please.” Serloy wiped his forehead with a handkerchief. “Gilly, we are following the schedule. After Water comes Shadow, then Death, Spirit, and Space.” He looked around the classroom. “And which of you wouldn't like the chance to discover the mythical Space Aspect, hmm?”

That bought him several seconds of silence. Arien suspected every student in the room was picturing what they could do with Space magic.

“After Lightning, Space will be the next Aspect I discover,” Gilly declared.

“If you discover a mythical Aspect, I'll become an Archmage,” Sebastian said.

The classroom immediately broke apart into half a dozen arguments. Gilly began defending her chances, Madri started speculating about applications of Space magic in Artificing, and someone at the back insisted that Spirit was more useful anyway.

Serloy stood at the front of the room with his handkerchief still in one hand, watching the discussion escape his control.

When the lesson finally ended, Arien left without a new Aspect. As usual.

Still, there had been a few moments when he'd thought he could almost sense something unfamiliar. Whether that meant he was genuinely getting close or simply becoming too eager to find another Aspect, he had no idea.

On the way back, his thoughts returned to the first week of fifth year. Between the mana they burned during lessons and the amount of practice expected before the next class, Arien had barely spent any time at full mana since the semester began.

Arien was starting to appreciate his unusually high Vitality more and more. Other students had already begun comparing the prices of different elixirs and debating which combinations worked best for mana regeneration and concentration.

For now, however, it was finally the weekend.

Which meant his first Duel awaited him.

Hey, when I get a chance, I'll try to put together a collection with just the chapter illustrations, so you won't have to download them individually. Right now, I'm slowly finishing up the faction descriptions.