Alice spent the next day detailing her plans to Illa – she asked a lot of questions about the north, and Illa was more than happy to provide Alice with crucial information.

First, Alice was told she should expect tuition to cost around 100-200 gold suns for a year. Magic academies usually awarded a certificate of completion after a certain level of proficiency in magic was acquired. Unlike schools on Alice’s home world, there were no strict ‘year’ requirements – the certificate was awarded solely based on ability. Most academies assumed that you would be somewhere between level 30 and 50 in a tier two class by the time you graduated. In other words, you needed to acquire an apprentice class, level it to 25, and then evolve it to a level 1 ‘normal’ class before levelling it back to an appropriate level. The exact requirements differed a fair bit based on what school you went to. Cheaper schools usually had lower level teachers, and also tended to have lower graduation requirements. Most people finished their education somewhere between 3 and 5 years after they started.

Alice couldn’t help but grimace at the thought. A magic academy was expensive. Even if she had already guessed she would face a steep paywall, having actual numbers laid out in front of her made her wince.

“Do you have any ideas where I might be able to acquire a large amount of money in a short period of time?” Alice asked, looking at Illa.

“The easiest and fastest way is to join the army. If you serve in the army for a number of years, the army will pay for your education. The army is always looking for more mages, since there is a chronic shortage of competent mages in the north. Furthermore, the Crown has a System set up to give you preferential treatment in a number of other respects. While several of those benefits would be useless to you, since you don’t have any family members in this world, I definitely think you would be interested in benefits such as library access throughout the city and special training, right?”

“I really don’t want to join the military,” said Alice flatly. “It’s not an option, or at least not one I’m willing to consider unless I have no other choice. I would have to spend around a decade in the military if I joined, right? In that case, I would probably have a very hard time focusing on magic research. I want to use a magic academy as a way of furthering my understanding of magic and progressing my studies and my research projects. If it comes at the cost of losing a decade of doing experiments, the value of a magic academy as a whole becomes questionable.” Illa seemed taken aback for a moment, before she nodded.

“I suppose you also wouldn’t feel any particular patriotism towards the country either, since you’re from another world. Hmm… All right. If you aren’t interested in joining the military, things become much harder. Let’s see…” Illa began tapping her finger against her cheek as she sank into contemplation.

“There are a few jobs that would probably be available to you while you are in the North and getting an education,” said Illa, finally. “First and foremost, you could be a research assistant – that would probably suit your tastes fairly well, at least. But it might be difficult to amass the funding you would need just from that. After all, research is usually funded by either a wealthy merchant or merchant group, unless it is directly useful to the military. In that case, it is funded by either the crown or the nobility – after all, nobody in power wants merchants to gain access to mages screwing with military technology. That would just be begging for trouble to happen someday in the future. Strangely enough, nobody in power seems very keen on the idea. I can’t imagine why,” said Illa drily.

“Since the funding for magic research tends to be mixed, the amount of money you could make as a research assistant would also vary quite a bit depending on what project you attached yourself to. And, obviously, how much the people in charge of that project valued you. That being said, for the kind of funding you need, it probably wouldn’t be possible to support yourself with just work as a research assistant. Unless you volunteered yourself to be a test subject in some sort of experiment related to your status as an [Outworlder.] Obviously, that would be a terrible idea. Hmm…” After a minute, Illa shook her head. “I can’t see it working out for you on its own. Maybe if you work multiple jobs you could scrape together the funding? However, it seems like it would be very difficult to make work. It might still give you access to magic research you wouldn’t otherwise see, and it will probably get you some amount of money if you can find a position, but I don’t advise using it as a primary method of funding. Perhaps as a way to grab some levels in research classes it wouldn’t be a bad idea, though.”

Alice thought about it, before she nodded. Even if it wouldn’t generate large amounts of income, being a research assistant fit her interests. In the future, she would at least consider it as an option if she had enough free time.

“If you manage to get your enchanting up to par in a reasonable time frame, you could sell enchantments to get money. I recall that [Outworlder] grants a boost to learning Attributes and levels. Even if it doesn’t boost you in learning [Skills], it would still be a fairly big bonus to your learning speed.

“The northern cities have a lot more wealthy people in them, so if you make decent enchantments, it’ll be much easier for you to sell things if they’re high quality. Of course, the downside is that the competition will also be much fiercer. In Cyra, there are basically no highly competent [Enchanters] after Erik’s death, so even though the people here aren’t as wealthy, they will also buy pretty much anything enchanted if it’s usable. This is why Cecilia is able to survive in Cyra, even though she doesn’t really have the levels to compete in the North. I do wonder what she’s planning, but I’m sure she must have something in mind if she’s adamant about leaving. It could work as a path to pay for your education…” Illa grimaced, as her thoughts seemed to trail off for a moment.

“Enchanting seems like a really tough path to go for funding in the short term,” said Alice, feeling a pang of regret. “Even though it has very high rewards, I will also need to invest a huge amount of time and money to learn how to Enchant. In order to learn it, I’m practically going to be lighting money on fire. Cecilia is helping me learn it for free, but I can’t just keep using her materials forever – even though Cecilia said lower quality materials are often mass-produced artificially, they certainly cost something. And my first attempt at enchanting was barely functional. I can learn it with enough time and patience, but I’m going to need to keep working at it for a while. Are there any other ways I might be able to fund my education?”

“Well, I think you have basically two options left. You can find a way to work several jobs while you are in Magic Academy, or you can find a Patron.”

“Patron? What does that mean in more precise terms?”

“A patron is, fundamentally, someone who you convince that you are worth investing in. For example, Viscounts often set up funds to sponsor talented young mages, with the caveat that those mages MUST work for the viscount for some number of years after graduating. In short, they pay for your education, and you work for them afterwards. It’s the major way the nobility competes with the crown for talented mages. Of course, the requirements aren’t always working for the viscount for a number of years.

“There are a lot of other kinds of funds that exist, and most of them have wildly different requirements. Some demand that you do some sort of task. Some demand that you build your classes, Perks, and Skills a certain way, and then truthfully report the results. This might allow a noble to test how well a certain skill and Perk combination works. If they are planning on trying to change how they train their troops, they have some feedback in advance. Of course, these kinds of offers are rare, and are usually given to people who have some level of combat proficiency.

“The most interesting Patronage offer I have ever seen was a requirement that the mage getting funded needed to tutor the daughter of the noble in question.” Illa cracked a grin at the thought. “The noble in question didn’t offer to pay for the entirety of one’s schooling based solely on that. Instead, they offered fifty gold suns a year. The requirements were very detailed – not only did the sponsored mage need to tutor the girl for at least two hours every day, six days a week, they also needed to escort the girl once per month on an expedition into the wilderness. There would be other [Guards] and [Soldiers] that went along with her to ensure her safety, and the mage was responsible for getting the girl some ‘real combat experience.’ The girl in question was seven. She had barely unlocked her status screen. I have no clue what the noble was expecting his daughter to do. Just being able to use magic doesn’t make you somehow transcend your age and become proficient in combat.” Illa actually chuckled. “Unusual, but it gives you an idea for how patronage requirements can work, and how much variety there can be. There are also other types of Patronage, where a mage goes to a Noble or Merchant and tries to convince them that they have some sort of idea or ability worth investing in. This tends to require a much higher level of connections, and tends to fail much more often. However, sometimes it ends up happening.”

“How do you usually find these people? And how would you convince them that you’re worth investing in?”

“Well, normally, you would tap on a network of connections. Then, you have a chat with the noble or merchant in question and try to convince them that you’re worth investing in. [Nobles] and [Merchants] both have access to truth-detecting Perks, since those Perks are theoretically quite useful in both lines of work. Of course, there are also several Perks that [Nobles] in particular have to fool truth detection, so if you’re chatting with a noble they might try to verify your words through other means. The point is that you would need to have a network of connections that you could consult to get access to patrons looking for people to sponsor, and then you would need to actually convince the patron that you are the right person for the job.”

Alice nodded as she thought about her financial situation. After some thinking, a few ideas came to mind.

“So I need a network of connections, and I also need a possible Patron. From there, it would become a matter of convincing them that I’m worth investing in?” Asked Alice, thinking. Then, after almost a minute, Alice’s face lit up as she thought about what Achievements and Status Screens meant for her in this world. “Say, how impressive is it to have a rarity 8 Achievement and a rarity 10 Achievement? Not to mention, I’m only 16, and I managed to get my rarity 8 Achievement as a result of my experiments on the nature of mana. Do you think that, perhaps a Merchant or noble might be willing to fund some of my research, and possibly my education?”

Illa grinned. “Now you’re asking the right questions. I would say that’s pretty darn rare, now that you mention it. Achievement rarity is determined by 2 things – the difficulty in acquiring something, and the number of people within the population that actually have the Achievement in question. Even though that can create some oddly high or oddly low rarity Achievements sometimes, having two Achievements at ‘high’ rarity should still be sufficient proof that it wasn’t a fluke. Just don’t tell anyone what the Achievements actually are. Most people will be respectful about privacy for that sort of thing, especially if you mention they are somewhat related to combat.

“And most people can still pick up at least a lesser Achievement for participating or helping to discover something, even if the reward is usually much lower. If a noble or merchant had a child that was a bit low on Achievements, they might be very willing to sponsor you in exchange for a slice of the potential Achievements you might pick up in the future. You would need to include another person in your experiments, and that person may not be particularly interested in what you’re actually doing, but,” Illa shrugged. “Even if they need to participate in the experiment without knowing or caring much about it, it IS a way to pick up some funding, as long as you can produce results. Plenty of nobles and merchants are willing to ‘buy’ a few decent Achievements for their children this way. It’s definitely worth a thought if you can find the right people.”

Alice nodded as she mulled over Illa’s words. From what it sounded like, Patronage would be the most preferable method of paying for her education. However, this path also presented several problems for her that she would need to deal with. She would need to learn how to present herself in a way that would make potential patrons want to invest in her education and future, and she would also need to find a way to actually get in touch with the people who were looking for young mages to sponsor. As of right now, she didn’t know anyone outside of Cyra, so getting in contact with people who were influential enough to make things happen would be difficult.

Alice suddenly thought of something, and turned back towards Illa.

“Didn’t you say that your husband is a successful merchant in the northern cities?”

Illa actually chuckled. “I did indeed. He is leader of a very successful merchant group that specializes in trading enchanting materials. Though they have been branching out into other things as well, especially in the past few years. To answer your follow-up question, I don’t mind sending a letter to tell him to watch out for you. However, your ability to impress him into either finding you a sponsor or sponsoring you himself is entirely on you. I don’t mind providing you the opportunity to grow, but you will be the one responsible for determining the outcome. Think of the letter as a final bonus for how everything turned out in regarding your job in Cyra, all right? Of course, I will also publicize the matter in Cyra as a way to boost my prestige. Being known for being generous is never a bad idea when you’re trying to recruit manpower, after all.”

Alice thanked Illa. The woman may have placed Alice in a dangerous position in Cyra, but she at least seemed willing to provide bonuses equal to that risk. Even if it wasn’t a huge benefit from Illa’s perspective, since she was only providing a letter, it meant a lot to Alice right now.

As for Illa using this as a new form of ‘promotional material,’ Alice didn’t really care. She did find it amusing that Illa had claimed on more than one occasion that she hated politics, yet seemed so good at ‘promoting’ the image of herself that she wanted other people to be familiar with. However, Illa was also very open about when and how she was doing so, perhaps as a remnant from her time as a soldier. The woman was, in many ways, a unique person who both hated politics and seemed rather adept at managing them. However, Alice was glad that she had come to Cyra instead of one of the other towns. Meeting Illa and spending time as her student had been both fascinating and helpful, and Alice certainly didn’t regret the time she had spent here.

After Alice thanked Illa, the two made small talk for a while longer. Eventually, Alice left, deciding that she would head to Cecilia’s workshop to grind out a bit more work on Enchanting before she started working on the docks and learning under Illa again tomorrow. As she walked, she continued to think about the future, and what she needed to do in the last month and a half she would be staying in Cyra.

Illa was providing Alice an opportunity, but Alice still needed to be able to take advantage of it. For that, gathering levels, furthering her research, and learning enchanting were all things she needed to focus on. In short, what she needed to focus on was learning everything she could in the time she had left. Alice was already starting to hit the limit of the amount of information she could collect from books while she was left in Cyra, so there wasn’t much she could do about that. She would get the [Bookworm] Achievement soon as long as she finished reading through Illa’s library, which was the main Achievement she thought would be both useful and (relatively) easy to acquire while she was in Cyra. Moving out of the town would provide her with some opportunities to pick up a few of the other Achievements she thought might be nice, but had never gotten around to grabbing. The only other thing she needed on was setting up and performing her manaless box experiments, if she could get them set up in time.

There was only a month and a half left before she left, and she needed to make use of every moment she could.