I took one last look at the cityscape before turning back to the man. He was an adult though I was unsure if he worked for The Academy, the guild, or the administration.

Making small talk, I asked, “So, who sent you to fetch me?”

The man with golden eyes and jet black hair was even lankier than me. Showing no emotion, he replied, “Your teacher requested your retrieval.”

Realizing I didn’t get any information, I continued, “Do you work for the school.”

He held out his hand in invitation and replied, “I am an instructor at the school. I teach advanced dark magic.”

Since he was so vague with the information, I decided to look him up.

Name

Shaldor White

Class

Void Hopper

Level

54

Affection Level

Intrigued

Shaldor didn’t waste time when I took his hand. As soon as he got a grip the world around me began to fold into itself. Once again, I felt as though we were walking through darkness. It crushed in around me, constricting my breath.

Fighting the urge to blindly follow as I had the previous two trips into the void, I opened my eyes. The vision I saw staggered me. A thousand galaxies floated in a great void all around me, all interconnected by a stream of light.

Before I had a chance to take it all in, we stepped out into a dark classroom. Shaldor spoke to someone though I wasn’t paying attention. My eyes were closed as I attempted to make sense of the magic I had just experienced.

Teleportation was similar to what I had done with the wind. Each of the times I had done it, my body had become a part of the shadows and I had been pulled into the rift.

Another sensation pulled me back from my thoughts. Kalliphae was sick. Sharing my experience had made her queasy and she was currently hunched over a trash can in her classroom.

I’m sorry, Kalli. I didn’t mean to make you sick.

She heaved and gagged a few times in response. It’s okay, Mel. That feeling sucked the air out of my lungs then I just felt sick.

Thinking back to the times I had teleported, Kalli had been distracted when it happened. The first time was while we were on the side of the highway and the man in red had taken me. Then it was when Lady Shaw had rescued me after I escaped.

“Melvin Murphy”, a familiar voice called, “Are you with us?”

I opened my eyes and found myself face to face with Mrs. Ramsey. When I nodded, he continued, “You never cease to amaze me. We might have to move you to a more advanced wind class. I am not quite sure what spell you cast from what was described to me. Your instructor says you became the wind.”

Laughing at the description, I said, “You should have felt it from my end. Quetzy told me about it.”

“Quetzy?”, the headmaster asked confusedly.

The snake in my head hissed at me. Do not tell others about that foolish nickname your mate gave me.

Grinning at the opportunity to both annoy Quetzalcoatl and shock the headmaster, I asked, “Would you like to meet him?”

Quetzalcoatl roared. Don’t you dare.

At the same time, Mr. Ramsey replied, “Sure.”

The serpent emerged coiled around me and hissed in my face when I evicted him from my core once more, “If you dare to do that one more time, I will devour you, mortal.”

Sighing back at the snark, I said, “Mr. Ramsey, meet Quetzalcoatl. Quetzalcoatl, meet Mr. Ramsey. He is the headmaster of The Academy.”

The headmaster took several steps back and twisted his hands together, muttering a spell under his breath which I understood to be a clone spell. Five more copies of the man appeared in a circle around the snake who hissed threateningly, “Do you mean to attack me?”

One of the headmasters, which I could tell was a copy, stepped up to the snake and spoke, “That depends. Are you a hostile deity? My young pupil might not know what he’s summoned but you must swear an oath to do no harm if you wish to grace these halls with your presence.”

Quetzalcoatl uncoiled from around me, sniffing the air as he slithered about. The tension in the room was staggering before the serpentine dragon spoke, “A clone huh? I have not seen such magic in quite a long time.”

Mr. Ramsey held his ground, “We aren’t here to talk about me. Swear the oath.”

The snake rose until he was face to face with Mr. Ramsey, “I swear the oath. There is one caveat, however. This boy is currently on a quest for me. I cannot guarantee his safety until his quest is complete.”

As suddenly as they had appeared, the clones vanished. Mr. Ramsey returned from the back of the room with Shaldor at his side, saying, “That is all I ask. We welcome the gods here. I trust that this quest doesn’t involve you slaying Mr. Murphy should he fail.”

Quetzy didn’t wait around to continue the conversation, vanishing in a puff of smoke to take his place in my core. You’ll pay for that. Stop summoning me for your own amusement.

I sighed inwardly, feeling a little guilty about abusing the dragon.

Okay, sorry. I’ll ask next time before I bring you out.

Mr. Ramsey turned his attention back to me, “It might be a good idea to report to me should you befriend any additional gods, especially if you want to bring them to show and tell.”

I nodded again, “Yessir.”

Compared to the morning excitement, summoning class was boring. I decided to give Quetzy a break considering I had summoned him twice already. The teacher made me summon household items over and over but all I could think about was my experience teleporting. I wanted to try it myself but I was a little intimidated by the vast universe I had observed in the void. If I failed a teleport there was no telling where I might end up.

I ran to meet up with Kalliphae for lunch. She was in a foul mood after having to spend an hour with Alex and his gang. The thought put a smile on my face which earned me a punch to the shoulder from Kalli.

She scowled at me. Don’t laugh at me. Those guys are really annoying now.

Rubbing my arm, I gave Kalli a suggestion.

You know you can ask the teacher to put you in a different group. You don’t have to keep crafting with those guys.

Kalli sighed and finally smiled. I don’t want to cause any problems for the rest of the class. They don’t hurt me. They’re just annoying.

Since we didn’t hang out with the cool kids, we decided not to visit either of the two cafeterias. I did poke my head into one of them looking for Kiki but she was still missing.

Joe told us about an unused stairwell that his group liked to hang out in and we met there for lunch. The technomancer produced remarkably tasty sandwiches. He managed to reproduce the taste of brisket on a sandwich, topped with molten cheddar cheese and barbeque sauce. The kid was great at making food.

Wendy showed off her party trick and turned our water bottles into tea. I was amazed at how outgoing Wendy was being.

She’s really letting everyone taste her mana?

Kalli giggled in my head. Half of Little Tokyo has tasted it. Mine too. You know what we do for work right? We flavor the food at the cafe.

I had forgotten about that considering it had been half a week since we last worked. However, I was still refining my mana. Looking inside of myself, I discovered my core had swollen since I took in Quetzalcoatl. I couldn’t be sure, but it felt like it was purer than it had been.

The next class after lunch was the one I had been looking forward to, mana fencing. When I arrived early, the only person there was the instructor. She had red hair like Kalli but she kept it short in a pixie style. The outfit she was wearing was form-fitting for maximum movement and flexibility.

Name

Lalyn Hawkins

Class

Rune Fencer

Level

25

Affection Level

Motivated

She noticed me when I walked in and said, “You there, come over here. You’re the new kid, right? Let’s teach you the spell to summon a weapon so you can get a headstart in class. Do you have any weapon preference?”

Never having used a weapon, I couldn’t decide what to use, “I don’t think I have a preference. The only thing I ever used was a wand.”

The teacher sighed, “I see. This class doesn’t focus on wand work. That’s more of a magic-based class. Don’t get me wrong, we do use magic, but only to manifest a weapon so we can fight with it. Are you sure you picked the right class?”

I nodded vigorously, “Yes. I chose this class so I can learn to make weapons when I need to defend myself. The last time I was in a fight I had to stand back while the fighters defended me.”

Mrs. Hawkins nodded while she listened to me. After I stopped, she said, “Okay. I suppose I can work with that. We will start you off small and mold your mana into a dagger. Start by following my lead. This is the magic word.”

“Avora”

When she spoke the word, a blue ball of mana appeared in front of her. The teacher held her hands out on either side of it and closed her eyes in concentration. The ball of mana began to shine and slowly shrank until she was holding a blue blade in her hand. It still appeared to be made of mana but it looked solid and very sharp in her hand.

She let out a breath she had been holding and said, “Now you try.”

Deciding to learn the technique the way it was being taught, I used the magic word.

“Avora”

I was disappointed when I felt a dollop of mana pop out of me to hover in the air. The spell was rather basic. Holding my hands around my white ball of mana, I began to push at it, sculpting it into a crude dagger.

The finished product was not as refined as the teacher’s but I was confident that it could still cut things. Mrs. Hawkings walked over to me and looked at my creation, commenting, “That is very good for a first try. Try to imagine weapons that you’ve held in your hand. The better you are at understanding the weapon, the better you will be when you summon one during battle.”

She led me to the wall inside of the classroom that held an assortment of weapons, continuing, “Feel free to handle any of these weapons to familiarize yourself with them. While we don’t use physical weapons in this class, we do keep them so students can study them.”

Other kids began to trickle in while I tried out different weapons. The class allowed all different kinds of weapons. There were even some guns on the wall though I was unsure how that would qualify as fencing. The weapon that caught my eye was a greatsword that was a little taller than I was.

When I reached for it, I overheard one of the kids say loudly, “It’s time for a little entertainment. The new kid is going for the greatsword.”

As soon as I freed the weapon from its hooks I realized my mistake. The weapon weighed a ton. It had dropped about a foot before I reinforced my arm with mana. Spurred on by the collective gasp behind me, I hoisted the sword over my head using just my left hand.

I was forced to push mana into the rest of my body and anchor myself to the floor when the sword threatened to topple me over. It felt like it weighed more than I did.

Mrs. Hawkins walked over to me quickly and said, “Please be careful with that. It’s very heavy.”

I shrugged and gently put the weapon back on the rack. Once I made my way over to a seat, the teacher began the lesson, “Good afternoon class. As you can see, we have a new student, so I am going to be spending time with him getting him up to speed while you continue your exercises from yesterday.”

The other kids gathered into groups of four and quickly began summoning weapons. They seemed to be much more advanced than me because they didn’t need the magic word and their weapons came out pre-formed. When I thought about it, summoning a ball of mana and molding it into a weapon wasn’t a very efficient thing to do in the heat of battle.

I also noticed that each of the kids summoned different weapons and their unique mana gave their weapon a unique color and texture. Mrs. Hawkins pulled me to the side over by the weapon board and asked, “Did you pick a weapon you’d like to summon yet?”

Nodding, I said, “That one. I’d like to summon the big sword.”

She gaped at me, “Are you sure? That sword is impractical. It also takes three times as much mana to summon.”

I nodded again and replied, “I’d like to try it. Besides, I can always summon something else next time right?”

The teacher sighed and shook her head, “It’s not so easy. I teach my students to become familiar with a single weapon they wish to summon. If you were to learn multiple weapons, each one would be less effective.”

Giving the board a cursory glance, I pointed to the greatsword, “I’m sticking with this one. I want to summon a greatsword.”

Sighing at me like a disobedient child, Mrs. Hawkins said, “Understood. Summon another ball of mana and let’s see your greatsword.”

I didn’t like the mana ball spell. It didn’t make sense for the new mana instructor to have to use magic to summon mana. Dipping into my core, I held my hands out and willed my mana into action. Rather than starting with a ball, I immediately put it to work in the shape of the greatsword I had recently held.

I formed a handle that fit perfectly in my hands and forged a blade that matched my mental image of the greatsword on the all. The mana sword was weightless, making it much easier to hoist.

While the teacher inspected my work, I looked around at the other students who were sparring with one another. They didn’t seem to be hurting each other even though I saw them landing hits with the blades.

Mr. Hawkings got my attention by handing the greatsword back to me, “This is decent but how did you summon it? You didn’t use the spell.”

I grinned, happy I was able to surprise the instructor, “I am the new mana teacher. Making balls of mana is easy. How did the other kids summon the weapons directly? That seems much easier than what I’m doing.”

She returned my smile and explained, “That’s an advanced technique that I will show you once you make a satisfactory weapon. You can store a completed mana weapon within yourself and recreate your weapon with a thought.”

It all made sense to me once she explained it. I held out my hand and brought the dagger back out. Once I shaped the mana and felt it, I was able to recreate the design.

Mrs. Hawkins said, “I see you are a fast learner. Still, your weapons are very crude. Keep making the greatsword. I’ll let you know when it’s good enough.”