Liana sat on a wooden stool in the center of a circular room. The floor was tiled with a circular pattern filled with various spell symbols she’d been slowly getting familiar with. The ceiling was roughly 6 meters tall with narrow windows at the top on all sides, shining a small amount of sunlight down on her. Lining the walls around her were small training dummies dressed in various attire. Some looked to be dressed as adventurers, others as monsters and beasts, though they all looked rather cartoonish, as if a child had painted their faces to try and make them look scary.

The room was completely silent save for Liana tapping her feet, looking around to see several paintings on the walls underneath the windows. After a solid few minutes of waiting, the singular door into the room swung open and her instructor walked through it, closing the door behind himself. It was a lizardfolk with a mix of blue and purple scales on his back, white and yellowish scales on the front. He wore no shoes so the tapping of his talons could be heard on the tile floor, but he wore long black robes bearing the blue eagle symbol, the symbol of Avistion. He made it all the way across the room and stood on the far wall, roughly 5 meters away from Liana, all the while looking down at a parchment in his hand.

“You are the one called Liana.” He finally spoke, looking up from the parchment.

“Yes.” She said as politely as she could, noting the name above his head. ‘Varasoth - ???’

“And you wish to learn Aura Mastery.” He asked.

“Yes.”

“And you have learned Life Mastery thus far.”

“Yes.”

“Tell me, what do you know of Aura Mastery?” He asked with an inquisitive stare.

“I only know that it is about using magic to affect the area around you, and that I need it to obtain my Cleric Affinity.” Liana replied.

“I see..” He said, looking at her with judgemental eyes. He began pacing around the outside of the room. “Quite the difficult path you have chosen. I’ve seen many in love with the idea of becoming a great cleric to protect their friends and family. The sentiment is nice, but in reality, it is not so easy. I trust you have already understood the difficulties of converting magic to an energy that restores life.”

“Yes, at first I was relying on my Sphere Mastery to handle the basic magical conversion, but after studying hard I was able to learn how to manipulate magic to heal many types of injuries.” Liana said with confidence.

“Good. you’ll need that here. You see, it is quite easy to convert your magic into a standard Spell. Turn it into a ball of fire, or a bolt of lightning, then just throw it at your enemy. You don’t need nearly as much care, because all that matters is that it hits your target and hurts them. As you’ve learned, it’s not so easy when you want to restore a friend and cure a wound. You must meld the mana into a form that gently recovers their life force. But I have some terrible news for you.” Varasoth stopped pacing, rolling up the parchment.

“Aura Mastery is much more difficult than that. You are going down a path that is much harder than other magics for the sake of your friends and family. There is a reason that Aura Mastery is the least popular of the Magic Masteries. It would certainly be much easier to instead learn Conjuring, or Spell Mastery. Are you sure you wish to proceed?” Varasoth asked. Liana nodded back with determination.

“Very well. Aura mastery is about spreading your mana out around you, evenly, and not allowing it to disrupt or be disrupted by the mana manipulation of others in that area. It requires incredible levels of concentration and control, and in a real combat situation you’ll need to be able to do it while moving and utilizing other spells. Compared to simply shooting a bolt of ice, the difficulty is 10 fold. We’ll start with the most basic practical use of Aura Mastery, a spell known as Mana Shield.” Varasoth said, then waved his hand in Liana’s direction, and a pulse of blue energy shot through her.

Varasoth is trying to teach you a skill: Aura Mastery(?)

Accept(x) Decline(x)

Varasoth is trying to teach you a skill: Mana Shield(?)

Accept(x) Decline(x)

Aura Mastery - Rank 1

Improves your manipulation of mana when spreading it into an area around you to affect your surroundings, as well as your concentration, mana efficiency when using aura-related abilities, and the range of your aura-related abilities. Higher ranks increase your concentration level.

Concentration Level: 1

Mana Shield - Rank 1

Envelopes your body in a barrier made up of your own mana, blocking incoming damage from reaching you and instead redirecting it to your mana.

Damage Blocked: 30%

Damage to Mana Cost: 10mp per 1damage.

Initial Mana Cost: 250mp

Concentration Level Required While Stationary: 1

Concentration Level Required While Moving/Casting: 3

“What is Concentration level?” Liana asked as she accepted the skills and read over them.

“It’s how Aura Mastery measures your ability to maintain your Auras and control your mana around you. There are tales of Aura Masters able to maintain 10 auras at once, but most give up after having just learned Mana Shield.”

“I’m not going to give up.” Liana replied back with fire in her eyes.

“Very well. You should think of concentration as a resource that you never lose, you just allocate it in an aura. If you for example reach Aura Mastery Rank 20, you should have a concentration level of 5. If you were to activate Mana Shield and run around, you would be using 3 of those 5, and have 2 remaining. If you stopped moving, you would get 2 back and only be using 1. If you try to go over your maximum concentration level, you will lose control on all of your auras and drain your mana to 0. Understand?” Varasoth asked, sounding slightly condescending.

“Y-yes, I get it.”

“Good, let’s see what you can do. Activate Mana Shield.” Varasoth said, he faced towards her and crossed his arms expectantly.

“Okaaay.” Liana nodded, looking at Varasoth stare at her, then quickly breaking eye contact. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes for a few seconds, then shouted the spell name out. “Mana Shield!” As she said it, there was no spell circle that appeared, instead she felt a force pulling on her.

It felt as if air was leaving her body when she exhaled, but instead of through her mouth, the exhale happened all over her body, like it was pulling out of her skin but without actually touching her skin. She visually saw a brief glow of blue light around her hands in front of her face, and a light breeze pushed on her hair, then the feeling got stronger and blew outward in a sudden wild gust of wind.

Mana Shield Concentration Failed.

“Disappointing, but to be expected.” Varasoth said as Liana looked to see her mana bar empty.

“Wait what? What happened? Why did it fail? I just have to cast the spell right?” Liana asked in confusion.

“I told you, Aura Mastery isn’t like turning your mana into something and throwing it. It’s about pushing your mana out around you to change your surroundings. To maintain an aura needs control.” Varasoth sighed. “It’s unfortunate you’ve been a part of our world for 7 days. This will slow the learning process as I cannot directly rejuvenate your mana supply. Are you still sure you want to learn Aura Mastery?” This time he spoke almost in a mocking manner.

“I’ll learn it.” Liana nodded back at him, clenching her fists.

“Very well. Methalo.” He chanted, a purple spell circle appeared in the air behind him, and out of it a bright purple light appeared for a moment, afterwards leaving behind a big glowing purple bell floating in the air.

“Whoa, what is that?” Liana asked as Varasoth walked towards the door.

“Simple conjuration spell. It’s a bell. With intermediate Aura Mastery, you could place an aura around it that will cause the bell to ring if anything gets close enough, like an alarm. The potential of Aura Mastery is vast.” Varasoth bragged. “This bell however will simply alert me when it is rung. Ring it once you’ve successfully maintained Mana Shield for 1 minute.” Varasoth said as his last words, he left the room and shut the door behind himself, leaving Liana with the bell and the stool in the middle.

Looking at her high mana regen and the initial cost of Mana Shield, she’d be able to make an attempt once every roughly 45 seconds. She took this time to send a message to Darith through the party interface.

“Darith… the way this guy is making me learn spells. It’s not like I’m using a skill anymore, it’s like I actually have mana and need to learn how to use it. Are you sure this is really a game?”

“I don’t know… all of these books I’ve been reading are so elaborate, it’s hard for me to believe it. If it is a game, it must have a really powerful AI.” Darith replied. “Is it that hard to learn those masteries?”

“Y-yeah it’s pretty tough, but honestly…” Liana smiled to herself. “It’s so damn cool! I feel like I finally get to go back to school but all the teachers are wizards! For Aura Mastery I have to control the mana, and he taught me Mana Shield like that Thomas guy had. You gotta try it out. The teacher was all like ‘you can give up if it’s too hard’. I wanna see the look on his face when I learn to do it.” Liana shouted excitedly.

“You sound like you’re having fun.” Darith chuckled.

“This is so fun. Oooh I can’t wait, I’m gonna fill you up with all my auras soon.” Liana exclaimed.

“That sounded kinda weird.”

“Yeah it did didn’t it. Ok back to practicing!” Liana replied, seeing her mana was high enough to try again.

Darith began loading books back onto the shelves in the library, trying to return them where they had been taken from. He saw nearby another human player, level 12, searching the shelf for a book in the same section as him. Darith looked away from the player for a moment to pick a few more books to read, but his attention was quickly pulled back.

“Fuck me!” The player shouted suddenly. Darith turned to see the ghost girl’s head in the middle of the book shelf staring at the player. “Aw damn it.” He sighed, as hurried footsteps rushed over. A Library attendant donning the Avistion Eagle symbol on their robe arrived around the corner of the shelf and made some angry gestures at him.

“You, outside.” The attendant scolded the player. He hung his head down in shame as he slumped past Darith and was led out of the library. Darith looked back at the ghost only to see she was gone, then suddenly out of his peripheral vision he saw her head lowering in front of him, upside down as she levitated midair, staring directly into Darith’s eyes.

He remained stoic, staring back at her. Eventually she spun herself rightside up, then walked away through several bookshelves towards one of the walls and disappeared through it. Darith watched her disappear, something felt strange about her behaviour. He grabbed a few more books he found interesting in the fire spell section, then returned to his table where Kenneth was sitting.

“Poor guy, happens to the best of us.” Kenneth commented as he watched the player get escorted out. “Except you apparently.”

“At first I was just relieved one of my skills prevented her from scaring me… but the more I think about it…” Darith said.

“Hm?” Kenneth asked.

“Eh, it’s nothing.” Darith replied as he opened the next few books.

Scholar Mastery is trying to teach you a new skill: Fire Wall(?)

Accept(x) Decline(x)

Fire Wall - Rank 1 (Intermediate)

Requirements: Spell Mastery 50, Firebolt 50/Fireball 1

Create a wall of burning flames, the longer the wall the less height it will have. Enemies that stand in or pass through the Fire Wall will take fire damage. Damage, length, mana cost and upkeep improve with each rank.

Damage: 25 + Intelligence (111) per second

Maximum Length: 3m

Initial Mana Cost: 300

Upkeep Mana Cost: 50 per second

Cast Time: 9.5s (-5%)

Cast Command: Fire Wall(change)(?)

Darith hit accept after finishing the book in 20 minutes, closed the book, then prepared to read the next one. The bell in the library rang, signalling the hour change.

“1361.” Elise threw a Kunai, it bounced off the side of the target. She snapped her fingers, it returned to her hand. “1362.” She threw it again.

“Mana Shield!” Liana shouted out, holding out her hands on either side of her with her eyes closed, doing her best to focus. The blue glow remained steady for a second, then blasted out in a burst of wind, draining her mana. She sighed, opened her eyes, and looked at the purple bell.

“If there’s no force behind the swing, don’t bother swinging.” Cho’ruk shouted into Gabriel’s ear. Gabriel took a swing and hit a training dummy, to which Cho’ruk swung beside him and hit the neighboring dummy so hard it pulled loose from the ground and went flying while breaking into pieces midair. “Come on, are you really an orc?” He shouted. Gabriel wiped the sweat away and grunted loudly as he took another swing.

“Your enemies aren’t going to wait for you to grab an arrow and take aim. Faster!” Luryala shouted at Jaese as he fumbled to reach over his shoulder for his quiver to grab an arrow. Trying to shoot immediately after retrieving it, the arrow went wide and hit the wall behind the archery targets. “Again!” Luryala yelled.

The bell in the library rang.

Scholar Mastery is attempting to normalize the Melt Ice spell to the spell Thaw(?)

Accept(x) Decline(x)

“Eeeeek!” A girl screamed from across the library, a young female Elf. Immediately afterwards, she put her head down in shame as a library attendant approached. “I know, I know” she grumbled as she made her way out of the Library. Darith looked to Kenneth who just shrugged.

“2108.” Clink. Snap. “2109.” Clink. Snap. “2110.” Clink. Snap.

“Mana shield.” Liana shouted, she held the shield up for 5 seconds, then it faded. “C’mon!” She shouted at herself.

“I used to swing like that when I was an infant! This training dummy thinks you’re massaging him!” Cho’ruk shouted at Gabriel as he pulled back another swing.

“You’re in front of the target…” Jaese said to Luryala as she leaned against it.

“It’s the safest place to stand when you are shooting.” She said, then faked a yawn.

The bell in the library rang.

Scholar Mastery is attempting to normalize the Scald spell to the spell Searing Bolt(?)

Accept(x) Decline(x)

As Darith moved to return the books he'd just finished reading to their places on the shelves, he saw the ghost girl appear at the end of the aisle he was in. She suddenly rushed at him with unnatural speed, twisting her limbs in unnatural directions and seemingly skipped around, teleporting to the left and right sides of the aisle until she was directly in front of him, her nose nearly touching his. She stood there for a moment while Darith stared back at her with wide eyes. She eventually lost interest, turned and walked towards a wall, disappearing through it.

He let out a sigh of relief, turning around to see Kenneth give him a thumbs up, some other library visitors gave him nods of respect. Darith shook it off and continued his book search.

“Got any extra?” Gabriel asked as he joined Jaese and Elise standing together drinking water out of bottles.

“Yep, here.” Jaese tossed him a bottle and a sandwich.

“How’dya get that?” Gabriel asked as he opened the bottle and drank some.

“Inventory.”

“That’s convenient.” Gabriel commented.

“This kunai stuff sucks.” Elise sighed.

Liana sat in the kitchen of their home eating a plate of spaghetti with Kristen, wrapping it around her fork.

“And so It was like - whoosh- and I’m like, hnnnnnng. You know? But it’s really hard to hold it. But then I remembered that other guy was holding it and casting all those spells at the hospital so I thought, if he can do it, I can totally do it.” Liana said excitedly.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Kristen replied while sipping coffee.

The bell in the library rang.

Darith stepped out of the library to use return and get back home. He moved to the kitchen to see a plate with spaghetti on it already waiting for him.

“The spaghetti’s already made?” as he sat down and started eating while Kristen sat in the living room watching tv.

“Yep, Liana poofed in already and said she was hungry.”

“I love cold Spaghetti!” Darith cheered as he began wolfing it down.

“Why do I get the feeling this house is turning into a magical land pit stop.” Kristen grumbled to herself.

“3094.” Elise said as she watched the kunai fly over the target, then paused to look at the gloves with disappointment.

“Sweet!” Carsie shouted out suddenly. Elise turned to her as Carsie looked back. “Oh sorry, not you, the story - it's really good.” Carsie replied while motioning to her book. “I mean, uh, keep up the good work, you’re doing great!” She forced out enthusiasm before going back to reading. Elise shook her head to herself, snapped her fingers, then prepared to throw again.

“Now you’re talking.” Cho’ruk grinned as Gabriel slammed his maul into a target and cracked the wooden chest of the dummy. “Keep that up and you just might be worthy to wield this fine weapon.”

“Your aim is alright, but your draw is too slow. I know 200 year old elves that draw faster than you.” Luryala said to Jaese after he had landed an arrow near the center of an archery target.

“What, really?” Jaese asked as he straightened his back to catch a small break.

“Of course, I’m 230 myself.” Luryala replied.

“You look so young though.” Jaese answered with confusion.

“Oh why thank you.” Luryala smiled shyly

Liana kept her eyes closed, focusing on the blue energy of the mana shield around her. It held steady around her skin for 1 second, 2 seconds, 3 seconds. She focused as hard as she could, standing completely still to maintain concentration. After 10 seconds passed, she opened her eyes to look. 11 seconds, 12 seconds.

“I’m doing it…” she whispered to herself excitedly, but the moment she did, the spell went wild and blew outward in a gust of wind, draining her mana. “Damn it.” She sighed.

The bell in the library rang several more times.

Darith finished off the fire magic section. As far as he could tell, he had acquired every fire spell possible at this time. He’d learned about a lot of others, but almost all required higher ranks of intermediate. There was basically nothing outside of Firebolt for beginners.

He’d managed to learn about quite a few more affinities in the process of studying the golden book, but still hadn’t found any that stood out to him. He thought about going for fire again for a moment, but shook it off. He needed to be more versatile. And if he wanted to accomplish the goals he had in the game, to be strong enough to stop anyone he needed to, he would need a very strong, very versatile affinity.

He stood in front of the shelves for a long while, deciding what section to read next, until he suddenly heard the scattering of paper.

“Oooaah dang it!” Kenneth shouted. Darith turned back to see Kenneth fall backwards out of his chair with the ghost girl standing in the middle of his table. Kenneth didn’t bother getting up right away, he laid on the floor looking defeated for a moment as a library attendant ran up to him. “Guess that’s my que to go Power Nap.” He sighed to himself as he stood up. He looked in Darith’s direction to give him a wave, and Darith waved sympathetically back and watched as Kenneth left the library.

The sun had long since set and the number of occupants in the library dwindled. Looking around, Darith couldn’t see anyone else sitting at any of the tables anymore, just a few people browsing through the shelves by lantern light. He watched as the ghost walked towards the wall of the library and disappeared through it.

“She always leaves through the same wall.” He said to himself, standing idly and looking at the spot where she had disappeared. Suddenly a light flicked on in his head. “She’s not trying to scare us, she’s trying to get our attention.” He whispered out loud. Darith quickly walked towards the wall that the ghost had disappeared behind. When he reached it, he felt around the wall. It was made of large white stone bricks, they appeared normal, just like the rest of the outer walls of the library. He felt around all of the stones, hoping for one to push in or something of the like, but nothing.

He took a step back and thought for a moment.

“Magic Reading.” He whispered,

Magic Reading spell failed to cast. A more powerful spell is preventing it.

“What?” He whispered to himself in confusion. He took a few steps back from the wall. “Magic Reading.”

Magic Reading: The area in front of you is under the effects of a powerful spell you are not familiar with. It appears to block the use of magic.

The magic reading indicated on his interface that it was only a specific section of the wall under the influence of the spell. It was the exact area that the ghost had been disappearing into the entire time. A giant grin grew across Darith’s face. He walked back to the wall and began gently knocking each brick with his knuckle. He felt the wall nearby, loud clunks, solid. He knocked on the wall around where the ghost had gone through, light clunks. Hollow.

He took a step back again, glancing around the library while putting his hand on his chin, then spotted a lizardfolk who had just sat down at a table with a book, looking barely awake. Darith hastily walked towards her, getting close enough to see her name and level. ‘Samantha - 7’.

“Hey there, my name is Darith.” Darith said as he sat across from her, she looked up.

“Hello.” She whispered back sleepily.

“Are you planning to read here much longer?” Darith asked.

“N-no, I’ll probably return in a bit, why... do you want to read this?” Samantha asked as she motioned to the book in her hand.

“No, not that. I was wondering if you could do something for me. I can pay you, 10 gold.”

“10 Gold?” Samantha asked curiously, she straightened up her long lizard neck. “What do you want me to do?”

“I need you to go all the way into that area of the library.” He pointed in the part furthest from the suspicious wall. “And scream as loud as you can, nonstop, until you get the attention of as many attendants as possible.” Darith asked.

“Huh? Why? They’ll kick me out for 24 hours.”

“I just, I wanna try something.”

“Make it 25 gold.” Samantha replied. Darith hesitated, he wasn’t exactly rich, but his curiosity was burning inside of him. Darith took 25 out of his inventory and placed it on the table. Samantha took it, closed her book and stood up. “That corner over there?” She asked, and Darith nodded.

“Just count to 30, then start. Really loud and for as long as possible please.” Darith replied.

“Alright, whatever.” She shrugged, looking at Darith like he was the weirdest person she’d ever met. As she walked towards the corner, Darith walked back towards the wall and took his staff out of his inventory. He moved as close to the wall as possible, glancing around to make sure no one was in this part of the library. Luckily the books on the shelves near the wall were mainly children’s stories, which were not popular reads for players with Scholar Mastery.

“AHHHHHHH!” Darith heard from across the library. The scream carried, echoing throughout the entire place so that all players and attendants began rushing over. He put all the force he could into his staff and swung at the hollow section. The bricks pushed back off the mortar as it chipped away, but it made a loud thunk. Only a few bricks came loose from the strike, but Darith’s nemothyne body was small enough that he didn’t need to loosen many. He swung again, and a second time, more bricks loosened, but the screaming stopped.

It was enough. He looked into the hole to see it was a large, dark empty space, like a hidden room. He dug in his tiny hands and pushed at the loose bricks to widen the hole, just wide enough for him to fit through. He heard the sound of footsteps coming closer from across the library. Head first, he forced his way into the hole, despite the other side being pitch black. He pulled and clawed and wiggled desperately to get through until he made it, falling a few centimeters down onto the ground below. The only light was coming from the hole he had climbed through, but it suddenly began to mend itself until it was sealed shut.

It went quiet. It was pitch black, and he knew he couldn’t use magic. He gripped his staff tightly with one hand, feeling around the walls with his other. He felt webs tangling around his fingers as he rubbed the cold stone walls. The place he was in was narrow. Using his sense of direction, he knew if he went left he’d be going in the direction of the center of the tower, and to the right was away from the center.

With this in mind, he decided to go right, following the narrowing path aimlessly until he felt with his feet that the floor stopped. Walking carefully, he was able to avoid falling in, but it was very apparent even in the darkness that there was a steep drop ahead of him. He tried prodding around with the staff to see how steep the hole was, or how wide, but he couldn’t get an answer to either using just the length of his staff. When looking down however, he could see a very faint light. It took a second for his eyes to pick up on what he was staring at, but eventually he could focus in on the light in the darkness to see that it was a pair of eyes staring back at him, the little girl’s.

“Thank you Gamer’s Mind.” He whispered to himself. He knew that without it, he’d probably have wet himself by now. “You want me to jump?” Darith asked her. Using her as a judge of distance, the drop was at least 10 meters. She didn’t reply to his words, instead she disappeared leaving him in the dark again. “Hoh boy, this’ll probably hurt.” Darith sighed to himself, then jumped forward into the hole.

You have taken 56 falling damage.

A red message warned him, but he didn’t need it, he felt the excruciating pain in his legs when he landed. Luckily the pain faded quickly and he still had plenty of hit points left. It was still very dark, but he could now see the outline of the room. The walls gave off a faint glow of light in some spots.

“Magic Reading.” Darith tried shouting.

Magic Reading spell failed to cast. A more powerful spell is preventing it.

“Figures.” He sighed.

“Darith are you okay? Why’d you take damage?” Liana messaged him with a worried voice through their party chat.

“I’m okay… just falling damage. I think I found a secret area.” Darith replied back, addressing his whole party.

“Really? That’s awesome?! What’s in it?” Liana said excitedly as the others listened.

“I don’t know yet, I’ll keep you updated.” Darith replied.

“Be careful!” Liana answered. Darith took a deep breath and gripped his staff tightly. He took the time to take in what he could see. The room looked to be roughly 3 meters wide, the ceiling 2 meters high. The walls were made of the same stones as the tower above, but they looked to be stained with a strange greenish-blueish liquid that was giving off the faint illumination which was allowing him to see. There wasn’t much of it on his side of the room, but the further down the narrow halls in front of him he looked, the more prominent the stains on the walls seemed to be. He could make out broken stones and damaged sections of the walls and ceilings, as well as endless cobwebs laid out in front of him.

Darith glanced back to see the hole he had come through, wondering if it would be possible for him to climb back up. Half of his mind was beginning to think this was a one way ticket to game over, the other half was excited and curious. One of his favorite parts of playing games was finding secrets like this. That part of his mind got the best of him and he began walking forward. He didn’t need to get very far before he saw something in the hall that he couldn’t see from a distance, a fork in the hallway.

The path split off to the left and right, but continued forward as well. Looking down each corridor, it split multiple times beyond this intersection. He had to choose which way to go. He looked to the left, then straight ahead, but as he turned right, once again the ghost was standing there in front of him, she had appeared silently and stared at him blankly for a moment.

“Uh… you want me to go this way?” Darith asked hesitantly. A small red ball appeared above the ghosts head.

Quest: Find the resting place of the young girl.

Requirement: This quest must be completed alone.

Reward: ??

Penalty: Abandoning the quest or leaving this area will make this quest permanently unavailable to you. Once accepted, this quest cannot be taken by another player.

Accept(x) Decline(x)

“It’s red instead of blue like the rest of the quests so far. Is that because it has a penalty?” Darith asked the ghost, but she didn’t reply. “Alright. Fine. If a quest is hidden like this, it’s gotta be worth trying.” He said to her, and hit accept. The moment he did the girl’s ghost disappeared.

Quest accepted.