[ L 1 4 R Mode: Engaged.]

[Error: subject already knows truth]

[Error: Task failed successfully]

[Rebooting…..]

Fuck, liar mode wouldn’t save me now. Time to pull out my trump card.

“Sʅҽҽρ”

She looked at me with a confused tilt of the head, probably having heard that same stutter I did before unlocking the elements.

Perhaps 20 seconds of silence later, her eyes widened, and she started heaving. Sorry sis, it’s for your own good? Oh wow, I sound like a villain huh.

She collapsed after another few seconds, unconscious. I quickly slipped the book out of her hands and replaced it with a random one on the table. Then I laid her back into the chair, and started lightly tapping her face to get her to wake up.

“Charlie?... What happened?”

“I was about to head out when I found you sitting here, asleep, with a book in your hands.” You’ll be late for school.”

“Oh shit!” She replied with sudden frenetic energy. “Gotta dash, love you bro!” She scampered up the stairs, probably to put on her uniform.

I went back to my room and quickly reset the alarm, before double checking that there was nothing that would lead to an awkward situation. Except the porno mags but eh, hiding big secrets behind smaller ones was one of my better techniques.

Hurrying back to the train station, I got the soonest train to the Academy. Walking in the door, my new snow elf friend led me to a set of double doors that, you guessed it, I hadn’t seen before. You’d swear this place was magic or something.

Walking through the doors, I saw the other three sitting on a bench, looking bored.

Shit, I was late.

“You’re layte.”

A voice echoed from behind me as I approached the bench, while I froze at it’s depth and accent. I slowly turned around, as I heard loud thuds echoing behind me.

*Clop* *Clop* *Clop* *Clop*

*inhale*

I had finished turning, only to get smoke blasted in my face. When my eyes cleared I was looking into the deep gray eyes of the most weathered face I had ever seen.

“Shto, Comrad? You have a problem?”

“Nope, no problems here. Just a quick family disturbance, made me miss the train.”

“Okay, is acceptabuhl. Congratuhlations, you are now primary demonstraytion candidite.”

Eh, at least I wasn’t going to be given too much shit, and it might be useful to learn from this… I looked down only to realise that I was looking at my first centaur, as he stopped leaning forwards and reached his full nine-ish foot height.

“Okay then. We will begin with basic shield technique. I will show if no one has. Raise your hand if you have shield.”

I mean….. Fuck it, may as well. I raised my hand.

“Late boy has shield? Show me.”

He gestured me over to an area with padded flooring.

“Sԋιҽʅԃ”

He looked my shield over for a few seconds, and then flung a bolt of lightning at me. Yeah, you heard me right. A bolt of fuckin’ lightning.

It….missed?

All of a sudden, I felt like the entirety of my body was getting a static shock. I collapsed to the ground, spasming. I slowly got back up, the stunning sensation fading quickly. He turned back to the rest of the ‘class’.

“This is why you use good spells, buying spells is shit.”

“This is my damn shield spell.”

He glanced back at me.

“Then problem is your lack of creativity.”

Motherfucker I couldn’t care if you were the last centaur alive, I’m going to kick your ass. Weave the mana, call the Air, assemble the hexagons. Only this time, the structure would completely surround me, an entire orb, with a small gap at my feet.

“Sԋιҽʅԃ”

“Would you like to try that cheap trick again, comrad?” I asked.

He had a fucking grin on his face.

“Congratulations, you have met my requirement.”

He turned back to the others.

“This is most important thing in combat situation. Ability to adapt. Late boy was able to immediately fix mistake. This is requirement for combat. Anyone who cannot succeed in this is failure, does not belong in force. Well then Late boy, are you going to make me show my shield, or have you no balls.”

snap *Fwooooooosh*

The firebolt was speeding towards him before he was even finished speaking. As it reached a few feet away, a blue shimmer appeared around it, slowly increasing in brightness as it got closer. The brighter the light got, the slower the bolt travelled before reaching a near stop a few inches from him, before winking out as though it never existed.

“My name is Sergei Marenovic of Clan Kosaka, 8th degree wizard, warding specialist. Your lesson today: Adapt or die.”

And with that, he simply started trotting away. This guy was someone I could learn from. Based on the scars covering his body, both halves of it, he had seen his fair share of fighting, and walked away. Nothing beats experience.

Minutes later, a weirdly dressed woman emerged from the doors, turtleneck and big round glasses, combined with a skirt and massive boots. When she was a few metres away, she began speaking, her voice melodious and soft.

“Sorry about that, Sergei is oft among the soldiers, his star shining bright and burning hot.”

Whatever the hell that meant.

“I’m to fill you in on the truths beyond this phase, that which cannot be seen nor heard, birdsong in the eye of the gods.”

She went on to spend about two hours using the most flowery, vague and uncertain language I have ever heard to describe what can basically be described in like three points.

1. The Wizard Division and other wizards generally specialize in one type or ‘school’ of magic, of which there are hundreds, or even thousands.

2. As part of the Division, we would choose, and be guided along, one of the seven main schools of magic, and assisted in unlocking and developing our skills in it. Each school was some combination of three elements.

3. The seven main schools were Warding, Necromancy, Illusion, Conjuration, Divination, Mind and Transmutation.

She took two fucking hours, to say all of that.

We didn’t have to pick right away, but I was interested in Transmutation.

Although Warding had seemed cool from what we had seen of Sergei’s shield, it would take me forever to unlock.

Divination was right out the window, at least for now, based on how flighty and ephemeral Ms. Ar’ti was.

Transmutation had piqued my interest, for a few reasons. One, I was pretty close to being capable of it, with my tier two connection to Fire and Earth I could theoretically start trying to unlock Metal, and I already had access to the two other components, Water and Fire.

Secondly, it sounded dope. Altering the fabric of reality and the nature of existence at my will? Changing the way the laws of the universe acted upon an object? Flying? Sign me the fuck up.

I had a new goal then. To master Transmutation. Only bad news? Transmutation didn’t have any teleportation spells. At least, not yet.

The next two months passed in a bit of a blur, so I’ll tell you what I remember. Training with Sergei was harsh. Like really harsh. We basically went through boot camp, at the standards of a russian ex-soldier.

Nox popped in now and again to teach some fine mana-control and tell us anecdotes about times he almost died on the job. There were a lot of those.

The others went to their respective teachers, with Alex refusing to specialize in a school, instead preferring the element of Fire itself, much to the chagrin of the instructors, which I suppose I could understand. Told’ya she was a pyro.

Let’s see, what else happened….. I struggled to unlock Metal for about a month and a half before finally getting it…. And let me tell you, metal was a doozy. Dicking around with magnetic fields was a hell of a lot of fun, as well as messing with Amy by making a coin lighter on one side, then changing it back before handing it to her for inspection.

With the first tier of Metal, I came up with some more ideas for the manaphone, but I was still missing something to make it all work together. Something to make it….click.

I got another few of my spell ideas made, with a couple of.... mishaps, here and there.

The tracking spell I devised was just the next logical step past the alarm spell. Stick a bit of mana into three small orbs, give the orbs the sticky properties I had figured out from Alarm, have them send pulses of mana at a specific wavelength and bam, instant triangulation.

To be honest, the hardest part was the maths to work out the triangulation itself. The tracking itself only lasted about an hour, but that was the best I could do with a pure mana construct.

I managed to make the ‘Earth Wall’ into a proper spell which was cool, but my proudest achievement was achieving the second tier of Air and Water. Water was required for getting into Transmutation, and Air because, well, I wanted to advance, and also because I had some nifty ideas about a few spells that would require it.

Remember how I wanted slow falling, and a slow spell? Turns out I’m a genius because I could just make them the same spell. Surround myself in a bubble of air that was ‘stilled’ and I would move like I was pushing through molasses, even while falling. Just apply that spell to someone else, and you’ve got a slowing spell.

Doing the opposite didn’t really work for a haste spell though, it just made a light breeze similar to the cooling effect from Temperature Control.

As for the mishaps…. Turns out sinking your feet into a wall leaves a mark. I was able to pass the footprints snaking up the wall beside my door as another art project, and Amy thought they looked cool, so, win/win?

I now had a dozen or so spells in my spellbook, and I was able to handle almost all of them subconsciously, but I still brought the manaphone with me almost everywhere.

Advancing this time around was pretty similar, only afterwards I wasn’t left with an orb of azuralite, but an intense calmness and clarity that I could turn on or off, almost at will.

From what we were told, I figured I would now live to be about 200, then 400 the next advancement, but after that I would need to figure out my own life preserving measures, as flooding the body with mana can only do so much.

I also learned the required spells for the 4th tier, besides a shield, which I already had, there was a heat-vision spell using Fire, which was incredibly cool and a basic ‘magic missile’ which was an Air and mana-construct using mana so dense it became not only visible, but tangible, coupled with highly pressurized air in the center, which was then released to propel the missile.

I was now, officially, a Novice Fourth Class.

The constant training of my magic and learning from Sergei, Nox and the Metal expert, who was a dwarf, was some of the most enjoyable moments of my life. Unfortunately, I had been conned, as after the two month training period expired, I was in for hell on earth.

*Ken Lαɳყιɳყιɳɳყιɳ Pov*

Ken wasn’t worried. Now way in the Abyss those pigs would get him. After all, fleeing a country was just about the best he could manage, and no one would be looking for him in America, never mind Los Angeles of all places.

The tribe could go fuck themselves. Ken had gotten an offer for some quick and easy work, and the pay was enough to start a new life, outside their fucking customs and traditions. He would miss Ava though.

How was he supposed to know the guys he was sneaking into the facility would cock it up, and let the Arachnos out? They said they were there to steal some azuralite, and he wanted a piece of that action. Azuralite was shiny, after all.

At least that’s one thing the tribe got right, naming him BrightClaw was spot on.

Ken shivered in the cold of the frieghter’s hold, his heat charm was starting to wear off. It didn’t matter, he was nearly there anyway.

As the freighter pulled into San Pedro port, Ken scuttled out through a porthole in the side of the ship, and carefully slunk through the city nightlife. It was right about then that Ken’s Heat Charm shitted out for the last time.

Unaccustomed to this bitter cold, Ken snarled to himself in the alley he was hiding in, scaring away a homeless orc. ‘I thought Los Angeles was meant to be fucking warm’ he thought, as he picked up his meagre belongings and started searching for the nearest place that even held a whiff of the arcane.

Soon enough he was greeted by what on the surface level appeared to be a woodcarvers shop, but Ken recognized the markings on the shopfront that alluded to something more magical. This place was probably a charm shop. Excellent.

Ken pulled out his gun, held it down by his side and walked confidently into the shop. May as well make something tonight, besides just getting a recharge.

As he approached the counter the wood elf working at it looked him up and down wearily, as though he was expecting Ken to beg for a handout. Well, Ken wasn’t gonna beg.

A click rang out in the acoustically perfect shop, the wooden figures everywhere reverberating with the sound of Ken pulling back the hammer on the revolver, the barrel now resting comfortable on the elf’s nose.

“Gimme a fuckin’ heat charm recharge right this second mate. And if you try any other magic, I reckon you’ll look good with a hole right about here.”

The elf reached out with shaking hands, and Ken ripped off the sun-shaped charm around his neck. The elf poured mana into it, the flame nearby flickering with the presence of so much Fire.

Snatching the amulet back, Ken gestured towards the cash register.

“Be a fuckin’ dear, hand me any dollarydoos you’ve got in that till there mate.”

The elf’s hands began shaking more violently, but he complied. As he opened the till, he pressed a red button on it’s side, and suddenly the elf was cocooned in a block of orange gel. Ken tried hitting it, but nothing happened.

Then the shop doors and windows morphed into another part of the wall. Ken was fuckin’ stuck. Of course.

He tried shooting the walls and the orange gel block a few times, but other than a crack or two, nothing was really working. Then he heard the sirens.

A few hours later, Ken was in a cell, fuming. Of bloody course this shit had to happen to him. Stupid bloody tribe. Stupid police. Stupid Ava, why wouldn’t she come with him. Oh she loved Terok did she? Stupid bitch. This was all their fault, somehow. Ken just knew it. Maybe they had even called the American police.

Ken was brought to an interrogation room, ready to get the shit kicked out of him. Everyone knew that was what was going to happen to him. He could see it in their greedy, sadistic eyes.

In the room was a young fella, probably a bit younger than Ken. ‘Course, Hit ‘im with Good Cop, Bad Cop, eh? Well that shit wasn't gonna bloody work on Ken. No siree.

“For the record,can you state your name?”

This fuckin’ child wanted to know his name, eh?

“It’s Ken you fuckin’ moron, I can see it on your little sheet there.”

Ken spat at the bastard, only for the glob of spit to stop midair.

“Ken you’re going to want to listen very fucking closely to what I am about to say. Your species has acidic spit, Ken. Do you understand what that means, Ken? It means you just tried to assault a police officer. Do you know what that lets me do, Ken? It lets me wipe you out of existence, Ken. Gone. Poof. Dust in the wind. But I don’t think I’m going to do that. You know why?”

Ken’s eyes dried up as he realized what had happened. Fuck spitting at a pig, he had spat at a fucking human wizard. Everyone knows they’re fucking nuts. Ken started flicking his tongue in and out of his mouth, desperate to find a way out of here.

“You know what Ken? Let’s start over. My name is Charlie.”