It was time to enroll in the next courses. I was excited.

I entered the imposing Arcane Academy and asked the clerk about joining for the beginner courses. He pointed at a board with all the classes and dates and had me compile my schedule. I studied the board for a while in order to cram the most I could into my schedule. I wanted to milk these classes to their fullest.

In the end, I took Alchemy, Temperature manipulation, Illusory magic and Magical Defense.

Illusory magic comprised both illusion projection and hallucinatory induction, which are from different schools of magic. Two birds with one stone.

In preparation, I spent two days grinding my magic fundamentals and rereading my notes.

I was ready for the next round.

Thankfully, this time I wasn't the only adult student in the class. The beginner classes were much more varied in terms of age. I let out a sigh of relief. No more feeling self-conscious surrounded by rich brats talking behind my back.

Alchemy was difficult. It was a like a mix of chemistry class with magical toppings.

The teacher, Lopu Gredannis, was an old man with drooping eyelids, bald head, and long grey beard. He explained many reactions and complicated theories. Is this really beginner level?!

I did my best to follow, but I already felt it wouldn't be easy. Furthermore, in order to use the laboratory, I had to buy the reagents from the Academy at a premium or bring my own. Thanks to Vargas, I was able to secure the necessary reagents at almost half the price.

I had just to endure an unending tale of food adventures. My brow twitched at the memory.

Anyway, alchemy is... pretty boring, yeah. I had this dramatic mental picture of alembics and vials filled with boiling mysterious liquids and dramatic sparkles and smoke. It shattered the moment I set foot in the workshop. It gave me the same feeling of the chemistry classes I had back at school. The feeling of not having fun.

But the teacher guaranteed we would learn the basic potions, healing and mana restore. I will endure.

Temperature manipulation was much easier, just as Ellin said.

In just a few days I was able too faintly cool or heat with my hands.

Pretty cool. Still useless but cool. And hot.

The teacher, Ahnelm Medritch, had long black hair and a shaved face, his eyes always looked angry, even when giving compliments. I wasn't the only one with the same impression. It was hard to tell when he was pleased or displeased.

Under his guidance, we would learn how to harness fire and ice without hurting ourselves, and the most basic form of attacks, burn and freeze.

This class is gratifying. Every lesson feels like I'm making real progress.

Illusory magic was maybe the most interesting of the lot, probably because it was part of my plan to make use of my dev skills. I learned that projecting an illusion is much more complicated than inducing hallucinations. The first requires the caster to be able to model and visualize a realistic image or sound to be able to give it shape, while the latter can leave most of the work to the subconscious mind of the victim.

The teacher was a woman of around forty years, long brown hair in a ponytail and a gentle smile. Her name was Jalatine Val Kordaste.

I'm glad she didn't hit me repeatedly with her staff for my failings.

We started with simple things like manifesting a light, making it move and change. Emitting simple illusory sounds. Then we would finally move to make shapes and full-fledged figures. I couldn't wait.

Also I uh... almost made a big blunder. A lewd thought crossed my mind... it's good nobody was looking at me at that moment. Thinking and remembering are dangerous with illusory magic... they leak into the illusion. It would have been terrible if someone had noticed my sphere with boobs. Focus, Allen!

These projected illusions are much harder to pull than expected. Maybe I'm justing expecting too much from myself, some of the other students have probably repeated the class more than once. Some of them seemed already good at manifesting lights and geometric shapes.

But I'm motivated. I'm living the dream. I can do this.

Magical Defense, well that one was a must. I simply had to learn it. Being used like a pincushion for arrows is just so much fun. Fucking goblins. Next time I'm going to deflect all their shitty arrows and crush their fucking skulls with my fists.

Anyway, we learned how to harden our skin to receive less damage and deflect incoming projectiles. In theory, the more advanced mana shield is just a stronger more focused deflect projectiles.

The teacher looked unusual, he was well built for a wizard. Like my idea of a muscle wizard. He also said he literally punches monsters to death. He had red medium short hair and an impressive mustache. His name was Vallachio Restgart.

He laughs a lot and does weird poses. It's like he's trying to pose for a bodybuilding contest or something. Everyone looks uncomfortable, myself included.

I'm sure he's strong... but why does have to act like an idiot?

I'm curious to see how this is going to turn out.

I continued attending classes, but I had to tone down my visits to the library to keep up. A necessary sacrifice.

On the side, I kept experimenting with spell triggers. They can accept high-level commands, but doing so makes the magical construct "bulkier".

I bought a silver cube with acceptable magic potential. I had transcribed the theory of magical enchantment from one of the books I read in the library. At first, nothing made sense, the texts talked about seeing the magic space. How do you see a magic space? I had no fucking clue. But after countless trials of pushing my trigger spells inside, I started to get a feel of... something. Like fumbling in a closet in complete darkness. What matters is that I was able to tell, more or less, where my spells were placed and linked to each other.

That gave me a spur of inspiration. I started building logic gates in order to create something akin to a processor. These simple building blocks require very little "space" compared to the higher level commands.

The higher level commands are akin to artificial intelligence, it's fascinating.

I couldn't wait to make a working prototype and link it with input and output interfaces. If all goes well, I'll be able to build a rudimentary computer, able to fit in a ring! All with magic!

From there I can go anywhere.

But enough for now. I put the silver cube back in the drawer and dumped my tired body on the bed.

I had lots of plans and ideas. But I had to get better to make them happen.

One step at a time, Allen.