by M E Robinson
“Please distribute these beginner’s wands to the recruits,” he instructed her, turning to retake his place in front of the group.
Calyn quickly handed each student a wand from the box. As Eric received his, he examined it. It resembled a tapered stick, with a handle carved from the wood of the base. A small clear crystal adorned the tip of the wand, giving it a slight resemblance to a children’s toy with a glass ball on the end.
“Ahem, now that everyone has received their wands I shall explain how to cast the most basic of arcane attack magics. While I would prefer to teach you something more practical such as a light spell, someone has deemed it necessary to begin with attack magic.” Here, Arthal glared at the ceiling of the tower before continuing.
“The name of the spell you shall be learning is Arcane Strike. It is the most fundamental of all attack magic, nearly every offensive spell you learn from this point on will have arcane strike as its starting point. That is because arcane strike at its core is simply the act of gathering mana and causing it to shoot outwards. Watch as I demonstrate.”
Arthal walked towards the center of the room; unbeknownst to the students, Calyn had set up a target dummy behind them while Arthal was giving his speech. Pointing his wand at the target, Arthal performed a quick circular swishing movement with his wand, upon the completion of which a ball of brilliantly glowing violet energy shot out and impacted with the dummy.
“Whoa.” The students quickly gave Arthal a round of applause which he waved away with an embarrassed look.
“That is the most basic of attack magics. All you must do is create the form of a circle using the tip of your wand and then will the mana in your mana vessel to fill that circle. Once the spell is created, you may direct it to shoot in any direction you please. I would ask that you all shoot it towards the dummy though. Now does everyone understand?”
Calyn gave a short cough.
“Yes?” Arthal asked, perplexed by her sudden intrusion.
“Maybe you should tell them how to draw the magic from the mana vessel, Arthal?”
“Ah yes,” Arthal responded with a small blush. “Your mana vessel is located just below and to the right of your heart, next to your sternum. Simply imagine breathing only with your blood vessels instead of your lungs. You should be able to feel the mana moving. That is the mana moving through your mana vessels. The most simple explanation I can give you is that your mana vessel is the magical version of your heart. Easy right?”
Calyn sighed, shaking her head as she did so. Then she walked over to where Arthal stood and took aim at the dummy, her fishing rod clutched tightly in her right hand. Looking closer, Eric suddenly saw that her fishing rod had bits of crystal embedded in the tip, as well as along the sides.
“In order to cast a spell, there are three basic conditions you must fulfill. The first is that you must create the magical formation using arcane magic. This is the vessel of the spell. The circle is the most basic formation and only creates a minor arcane attack. It is not even at the level of a single mana arrow.”
Demonstrating, Calyn first created the circle that Arthal had created, firing an Arcane Strike at the dummy. Then she created a slightly more complex formation, a circle with a triangular head. No longer a circle, the formation now resembled a teardrop. As she cast the spell this time, instead of a shapeless orb of arcane energy, a much more powerful arrow of arcane energy shot out and slammed into the head of the dummy, sending it reeling backwards.
Turning back towards the group, Calyn checked to make sure they all seemed to understand before continuing her explanation: “The second condition is that you must designate an attribute for the spell; for arcane spells, there are no attributes. And you may skip this step. But you must add a second formation to the first in order to meld the structure of the spell with a secondary attribute. The most common example of this would be an element. For example, if I add the fire element to the Mana Arrow I used just now, I would cast the Fire Arrow spell.”
Turning towards the dummy, Calyn again formed that teardrop shaped spell. Only this time instead of shooting it instantly, she added a second formation around the teardrop, this formation resembled an enormous triangle missing the bottom line. As she finished the second form, the arcane lines hovering in the air in front of her took on an amber hue. Aiming away from the dummy, Calyn pointed towards the window and released the spell. With a roar of burning flames, a blazing version of the mana arrow soared past the players’ wide-stretched eyes.
With a smile, Calyn turned back towards the group, “The final condition is that you must inject mana into the spell formation in order to cast it. If you do not have mana, you will be unable to cast a spell. Also the more perfectly you draw the spell formation, the less mana it will consume. To inject mana, focus on your mana vessel and focus on that mana you can feel. Bring that stream of mana and let it flow through your outstretched arm towards your wand; once it reaches your fingers, imagine injecting that mana into the wand. If you reach sufficient levels of talent, you will not even need a wand, and can use any tools or even your own body to directly create mana formations. For now though, just try it with the wand.” Finishing her explanation Calyn walked back towards Arthal who was grumbling off to the side.
“Your explanation is far too simplistic,” he grumbled.
“They’re otherworlders. They know nothing of magic. You were teaching as if you were still at the Snowpoint Academy, teaching rich scions of noble houses who’ve had tutoring in magic for years,” she chided him gently.
“Even so, the secrets of magic are deep and varied. One should not simply be taught how to cast a spell, but why the spell works as it does. There’s a reason most mages are given a formal education,” he muttered.
“The Gods have decreed that they be taught in as quick a manner as possible. Your style is fine for those who know the basics, but these otherworlders know nothing about magic. For as much as you love to talk about the basics, you need to remember to also teach the fundamentals,” Calyn responded gently.
Arthal sighed, “I just hope that these otherworlders will be up to the fate that the Gods have in store for them,” he muttered, looking towards the balcony and the wide open sky that stretched beyond.
As the two teachers discussed amongst themselves quietly, the players were hard at work attempting to cast their first spell. Eric gritted his teeth as he tried to coax the mana flowing through his body towards the wand. For some reason, no matter how hard he tried, the mana refused to leave, stubbornly remaining inside his mana vessel.
Relax, he told himself. Imagine it like meditation in Tae Kwon Do. Relax your body and allow the mana to flow naturally.
Closing his eyes, Eric began to regulate his breathing, gradually shutting out the sounds of his fellow players beside him. Feeling the wand clutched in his right hand, he began to circulate the mana inside his mana vessel. Rotating it clockwise, he slowly coaxed it towards his arm. This time, instead of attempting to immediately infuse his wand with the mana, he allowed it to flow back towards the mana vessel, feeling it coalesce with the mana still inside. Before the mana could settle down, he once again sent it streaming towards his arm, sensing the mana as it flowed down towards his fingers, reaching the fingertip before turning and flowing back towards his mana vessel. Again and again he repeated the process, like the tide impacting upon the beach. As the surge of mana became increasingly powerful, he opened his eyes. Pointing the wand at the dummy, he once more allowed the mana to reach his fingertips, only this time instead of allowing it to return along his mana paths to the mana vessel, he forced it towards his wand, infusing the crystal at the tip with his mana. Feeling it working, he quickly seized the opportunity to draw a crude circle. As the shining form was completed, he felt some mana disappear from his body drawn into the circle.
“Hyah!” With a shout Eric released the magic, watching as the circle glowed a brilliant violet before coalescing into that shapeless mass and shooting towards the dum
my. As the Arcane Strike smashed into the dummy, Eric felt himself collapsing on the ground, his knees quivering with the excitement of having just used magic for the first time ever.
Staring at the wand in his hands Eric quickly returned to his feet, not wanting to let go of this feeling of the mana flowing through his body.
This time, instead of drawing a single circle, Eric was struck with inspiration. Infusing the mana into his wand once more, he drew three interconnected circles, the line not faltering but connecting all three seamlessly with two circles on the bottom holding up another circle on top. Following this, he also recreated the symbol he’d seen Calyn use, that two sided triangle, using it to connect the three circles with lines beginning in the furthest corners of the two bottom circles and meeting in the middle of the upper circle. As he prepared to fire this spell, Calyn and Arthal paled, the wands in their hands moving at lightning fast speeds to create a dazzling array of runes.
Infusing his mana into the formation, Eric aimed once more at the dummy, ready to see the results of this formation. As his spell came to life, a series of dazzling shields suddenly surrounded the dummy. One of the shields was a shimmering curtain of water, creating an oval membrane directly between Eric and the dummy. The other had the telltale violet hue of arcane magic and was formed with multiple layers stacked one on top of the other.
With a powerful roar of flames, Eric’s spell took shape: nine flaming spheres roaring to life and blasting powerfully towards the dummy. As they struck the shields, they exploded.
Boom! The room was suddenly filled with smoke and dust, the sunbeams dancing wildly through the smoke, forming tiny rainbows as they came into contact with the mist from Calyn’s slowly vanishing water shield.
- Chapter Fifteen -
Reprimands
“WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?!” Arthal’s furious roar filled the room. Dashing over towards the smoke, he quickly ground to a halt as the smoke and steam surrounding Eric began to clear. Eric lay on the ground, barely conscious, with his wand smoking quietly a few feet from his sprawled out form.
Arthal growled and pointed his wand at Eric’s form, creating a formation at a speed faster than the students could see; a green light shot from the completed spell and merged immediately with Eric’s unconscious body. As the light disappeared completely, Eric stirred and let out a groan.
Hunching down in front of him, Arthal’s face was the first thing he beheld as he returned to his senses.
“And what do you think you were doing there?” Arthal asked him, his voice ice cold, without a hint of its former burning anger. The fury in Arthal’s voice woke Eric up; looking around, he quickly beheld the results of his spell.
Eric was surprised, he hadn’t expected the spell to contain such power. He’d just been intoxicated by the beauty of magic and wanted to create something even grander than the Arcane Strike.
“I. Uh. Sorry. I don’t really know. I just wanted to cast something really cool.” Eric said miserably, dropping his head as he beheld the anger in Arthal’s gaze.
Seeing Eric’s miserable attitude, Arthal let go a short sigh.
“Calyn, take over the class. I’m going to have a chat with this one,” he told her, yanking Eric out of the room as the other players stared in shock at the devastation caused by Eric’s spell.
Dragging Eric out of the room, Arthal quickly pointed his wand at Eric’s face.
“Are you really an otherworlder who has never used magic before?” He asked seriously, his wand flaring dangerously as he did so.
Eric gulped. “Yes sir, I’ve never used magic before just now. After I cast the first spell, I felt incredible. It was a euphoric feeling, like I’d just discovered I could talk after a lifetime spent as a mute,” he explained, laying out exactly what he’d done to Arthal.
Dropping the wand, Arthal sighed, “I didn’t expect to meet a natural spellcaster among the otherworlders, at least not among the first batch.” He muttered, returning his wand to the sleeves of his robe.
Giving Eric a proper look for the first time, Arthal observed the young half-elf. He wasn’t all that remarkable looking, with perhaps slightly above average features, dark green eyes, and hair that hung low just above his eyes, slightly obscuring them from view.
Fetching a potion from his robes, Arthal thrust it into Eric’s hands. “Drink,” he commanded.
As Eric looked between him and the potion questioningly, Arthal explained.
“The reason you fainted was because you overdrew the mana from your mana vessel. You cast a spell beyond the capabilities of your body and the backlash you received caused you to faint. The fact that you could cast the spell at all is slightly impressive but both the spell and your mastery over mana are very sloppy.”
Eric’s face fell at these words. Despite the fact that he had done something he shouldn’t have, he’d been hoping that perhaps he was a prodigy in magic and that he’d somehow triggered a hidden quest. Instead, he was being scolded by the magic teacher and told his magic was sloppy.
Seeing Eric’s crestfallen gaze, Arthal smiled to himself. It would do the boy no good to be told he had talent and make him conceited. Instead, he should be given honest criticism, and encouraged to seek magical education once he left the floating island. Clearing his throat, Arthal continued.
“The spell you just cast was a modified version of Flame Strike. By linking three flame strikes together as a single spell, you do not merely triple the power of the spell, but rather square it. You also performed another modification that I can’t quite figure out, but that modification caused the fire mana inherent to the spell to strengthen the bonds between the individual strikes. Rather than nine bolts firing and striking separately, you caused all nine to link together and strike the target as one.”
Moving towards the window, Arthal demonstrated, using his wand to slowly draw three interconnected circles, each marked with that reverse V that gave them the flame element. Satisfied with the form of his spell, Arthal nodded once and cast the spell. As his spell flared to life, nine flaming bolts emerged from the formation, furiously streaking off into the distance where all nine slowly grew closer. As the orbs touched, they suddenly exploded into an enormous burst of flame and smoke, obscuring the sky just beyond where the island dropped off into nothingness.
Eric watched in awe. Arthal’s spell had been far more complete than his own, or from what he had seen of his own before passing out, he thought wryly. Where the orbs of flame that Eric had summoned had been erratically shaped, with obvious protrusions emerging from their forms, Arthal’s had been perfectly formed spheres of fire. The fire dancing within tiny globes of arcane power. In addition, Arthal’s spell had been far faster than Eric’s own. And while the explosion had not been as destructive - owing to the individual flame rune in each strike rune rather than having a single flame rune merging each of the three strike runes as Eric’s had - the concentration of Arthal’s explosion had been far deadlier, causing an enormous explosion to ripple out from the space where the nine orbs had met.
Turning back to Eric, Arthal was pleased to see the admiration and awe in Eric’s eyes.
“You do have a small degree of talent in magic. If you work hard on the formation of your runes, the proper use of mana, and perhaps find a tutor to teach you the structure of magic, then you may become a fairly decent mage in the future. However, all of this you must work hard for. Magic is not like swordsmanship or archery, one cannot get by merely through increasing his strength or his accuracy to increasingly high levels. No. Magic requires finesse, it requires quick thinking, and above all it requires ingenuity. The modification to the Flame Strike spell you performed was quite good. However, Flame Strike is an extremely basic spell - modifying it is simple. As you reach greater heights in the world of magic, you will see that spells become masterworks of mana and artistry. Many mages dare not even draw the runes of higher level spells themselves lest they make a critical mistake and find their spell backfired upon
themselves. It is a harsh and unforgiving discipline, but it also rewards its practitioners the most of the three main branches of combat arts in Nasvencia. If you would like, I can give you a recommendation to a magic academy. There, you might find yourself a tutor who can teach you the secrets of magic.”
Eric’s eyes began to sparkle, this was a hidden quest! And not just any hidden quest, but a hidden class quest! Bowing quickly, he responded before Arthal could take back his words.
“That would be an amazing gift, my lord. The secrets of magic truly do dazzle and astound me. But learning them on my own seems to be a daunting task. I fear I would end up dead if I tried to divine them without learning first the knowledge of my betters who have come before me. Please grant me this recommendation.”
Arthal broke out into a wide smile, this brat sure knew how to flatter a man!
“Ahem. Yes,” he said, causing Eric to look back up. As he did so, he noticed a slightly yellowed piece of parchment clutched in Arthal’s hand, extended towards him.
“Here is the letter, if you go to the town of Filoketh, somewhere to the north of where you will be teleported concluding these classes, you will find a mage academy. Deliver this letter and give them my name and you should be accepted as a student.”
Taking the letter, Eric burst into a smile, “I shall do my best to make you proud, my lord.” He responded, tucking the letter away safely into the small pack he’d been given by Calyn.
“Alright, let’s get you back to the class. You may practice Arcane Strike with the rest of your comrades. But I had better not catch you trying to cast anything else for now.” Arthal warned as they returned to the upper room of the tower. As they entered the room, Eric could see that his fellow players had begun to grasp the use of magic. Several of them were firing Arcane Strikes at a row of dummies that had been set up in front of the balcony. Among these players were Astrid, the shy brunette, and the middle aged man who’d excelled at fishing.