Micah didn’t level up from his trip into the Tower. As he lay awake in his bed before the sun rose, he didn’t know how to feel about that. Disappointed? A little, true, but not much. It was a familiar feeling after all. He’d spent months without leveling up before. So long as it didn’t stick, everything was fine.

And if not ... he would have to switch back to repetition or learn how to meditate, and he didn’t want to do either of those things. So more importantly, he just hoped it was fine.

The first thing he did when they arrived at Lisa’s on Sunday was organize their loot. It made him feel better, even if Ryan watched him leaning against the couch in the other room, like a constant, glowing reminder that he should be studying.

He had seven ant legs leftover, both heads, two pointy legs, some shell, and a tiny bit of healing goop that filled a small jam glass he owned. He also had fourteen flesh crystals, seven poison ones, five nectar, three mist, and three fire crystals with one scale, since Lisa had used four as “snacks” for Sam—they both knew she’d been experimenting with something. He just didn’t know what.

Those were a lot of ingredients; more than Micah had known he owned. He could definitely make something with them, but he had seven tests coming up in the next two weeks and no time to experiment.

His teammates also had equal claim on most of the items, of course.

As he organized everything, Ryan pushed himself off the couch and made a quick assessment of what he’d laid out on the table.

“You won’t need strength potions, really. At least, not yet. They take too many ingredients, don’t last very long, and don’t work long, either, so they’re not well-suited for repetition. We should probably sell the ant legs.” He shifted them to one side of the table. “You don’t have enough Salamander parts and their values are up, so you can sell those three.” He pushed them over, too. “I don’t know about the heads, can you make something with those?”

“No,” Micah confessed, “but I want to experiment with them.”

He was curious about the ants communicating with scent-based—or at least, essence-based scent-like—signals, and wondered if he could make something similar. Ryan and him both used different scent potions. Maybe he could brew some kind of simple communication effect to tell if the other was in danger?

And if not, he at least wanted to know if he could disrupt the ants’ communication. It was worth a shot.

“We can always get more,” Ryan said. “These won’t last forever.”

He was offering to go into the Tower again. Micah had no objections.

“Everything else is too useful. Unless you want to sell the poison crystals?”

He shook his head.

“I’ll take the two fire crystals as the rest of my share,” Lisa said.

“Really?” Ryan asked. “Isn’t that too … little?”

“I can make use of them.”

Definitely experimenting with something.

“Ryan, what about you?”

“I’ll just take a little bit of the sales. You make healing potions for us and I wouldn’t be going in the Tower anyway without you, so I don’t mind.”

He didn’t like that answer, but he supposed it at least made sense. After a little more discussing, they swiped the items into a bag and brought them to a loot shop Ryan knew in the Bazaar.

A nice, elderly lady attended to them there. She was incredibly patient, friendly, and gave them good prices from the start; not at all what Micah was used to from elderly women. His Nana had always said there was only one way to do things, the right way. And thanks to her ancestors, she knew it and so she could "teach" it to her grandchildren, even if her daughter didn’t want to learn.

The contrast made Micah not want to haggle, like he was being greedy or harming something innocent and pure.

Ryan haggled anyway.

They got an iron coin for the two pointy legs each, half as much again for the regular ones and the fire crystal plus scale, and double for the heads, totally eighteen iron coins for their efforts. Ryan got her to throw in another one since she liked him and he made a loose promise to continue doing business with her.

The values didn’t quite match what Lisa had listed all those weeks ago, but they were higher than what they would have gotten at the Guild.

Micah forced half the coins on Ryan with the excuse that he still had the rest of the loot to experiment with. They put the last one into an imaginary “group savings fund”, Ryan said. It disappeared into his pocket, so Micah was happy enough and didn’t ask any questions.

That left him with almost two weeks worth of allowance—less money than he had spent on entrance fees and ingredients lately.

If he didn’t sell more of what they found, he’d have to start using the money he kept in the shed. Especially since his parents had cut off his allowance for skipping work and getting into a fight with ... the person walking right next to him.

As soon as they got back to Lisa’s, Ryan sat Micah down on the couch and put a math textbook into his hands. He groaned as he slipped to the floor. With the couch to his back, it was more comfortable and easier to write. Ryan scooted over to sit behind him, and Lisa showed up with a bottle of glowing blue liquid.

She broke a seal around the neck and plopped it open, handing it to him with the command, “Drink.”

“What is that?”

There was a pattern within. A potion?

“I told you I’d get you something to help you study, right? Well, this is it. It’s like coffee, except it’s nothing like coffee at all and the comparison is totally inapt.”

“I’ve never drunk coffee before,” Micah mumbled with a frown. He … didn’t understand the pattern inside. At all. Because he didn’t recognize it from any of the ingredients he’d used before. It was the same for its essence. There was something leafy there. Maybe it was a kind of tea? Glowing blue tea made of Tower herbs?

“Well, then you have nothing to worry about, right?” Lisa asked.

Did that make sense? Probably not. Ryan didn’t object and coffee was the opposite of comfort, so Micah drank it all in one go.

[Skill — Lesser Focus obtained!]

For a moment, he froze. Then he shouted, “I just got a Skill!” He wiped some of the stuff off his chin and licked it off his hand. If that liquid had given him a Skill, he didn’t want to waste any of it. And it didn’t taste bad besides.

Then he added, “[Lesser Focus].”

Had Lisa given him a potion that gave permanent stats? Was this her way of sharing with them? … Or was it to indebt him to the Chandler family?

Micah glanced back at Ryan, but he seemed bemused. When he turned to Lisa, it was only confusion instead.

“Yeah … “ she said slowly, like this was no big deal. “It’s a Stat potion?”

The two potions Micah had made yesterday had been listed as Stat potions. But they … they hadn’t … Micah sputtered something incoherent before he managed to say, “They give Skills?”

“Apples, you’re an [Alchemist]. You really need to know that.”

“Didn’t your strength potion give you a Skill yesterday?” Ryan asked him.

“No?”

Should it have?

He looked at Lisa and she seemed to be wondering the same thing. They jumped up—Ryan scowled—and went to go get the second, larger dose of the strength potion they’d stored in her icebox yesterday. It had been meant for Ryan.

Lisa suspected he might just not have drunk enough or made a measuring mistake when splitting the portions.

“I told you to put it on a flat surface!”

Apparently, the effect being recognized as a Skill was all about a figurative threshold.

“But it still worked, right?”

He had felt stronger yesterday, but he still lost in arm-wrestling, so he wasn’t so sure anymore. Even if he had [Lesser Strength], Ryan was stronger than him, so he probably would have lost anyway, right?

He glanced at Ryan’s arms, then his own, and nodded a little. Right.

“Mostly,” Lisa said. “You probably got nine out of ten of its effect, or some such number.”

Oh. That was reassuring.

After finding and shaking the bottle violently, the potion went down like liquid ice. The glass stung his hand and Micah’s head hurt while his whole body shuddered at the taste, but a few anxious minutes later, he didn’t care at all about that because—

[Skill — Lesser Strength obtained!]

This morning, he hadn’t even leveled up. Now, he had two completely new, if only temporary, Skills.

Alchemy was awesome.

He wanted a rematch.

“Sit down,” Ryan told him, but practically dragged him down himself anyway. He seemed angry and impatient. Micah recognized it as him being worried. About what? “Study,” he said. “If you do, I’ll give you a rematch later.”

Oh. About him failing his exams.

Micah studied until he lost his first Skill ever.

[Skill — Lesser Strength lost!]

It was such a simple message, but if he’d been half a year younger, Micah thought it might have made him cry.

It felt … wrong. Like something taut had been cut inside of him. For a little while, he thought he could still feel the severed strings lying around, slack now, as the effect wore off. After a few more minutes, they were gone entirely.

He went back to practicing math problems to distract himself. After a few more hours, he lost the other Skill, too.

[Skill — Lesser Focus lost!]

If he hadn’t been so focused on studying, Micah might have wondered why people didn’t drink Stat potions all the time, if they could experience getting Skills from them. But he thought he now knew why.

Losing them felt just as bad as getting them felt good.

He was exhausted, too. He told Ryan he’d get his rematch in a year when he’d had time to train and could offer him a better challenge. Then he wanted to take a short nap, but his senior made him drink more water and do some exercises instead. After a few minutes of that, he felt mostly back to normal. He thought he understood a little more about temporary effects, then.

In the end, the experience still made Micah happy. He’d made a potion that had actually given him a Stat, if only for an hour. When he had the time, he wanted to make and experience all the other ones, too.

Monday began with three more students standing in front of the classroom because they had new Skills to share. That much was normal. What wasn’t normal was that Lang was one of those three, grinning like an idiot until it was his turn.

Ryan tried and failed to catch his eye, wanting for answers. When had he gotten a new Skill? And why hadn’t he told him yet?

“I got my Class on Friday,” Lang said then. “I’m an [Athlete]. I’m actually level two already, meaning I’m going to get first place on Sportsday”—Not if Ryan had something to say about it—”Skill-wise, I got [Lesser Resolve] and [Controlled Breathing]. Those are pretty neat.” He stressed the “t.”

Ryan poked Micah out of habit, to make him stop gawking and finish the better half of that habit.

“Huh? Oh, tier two! A mixture of [Fortitude], the ability to act over fear or pain, and [Foc—” He broke off and mumbled, “Wait.” Then he got up and shouted down from the front row with his hands cupped in front his mouth, “Hey, Lang! Can you always study for hours on end now?”

Lang looked surprised, but quickly recovered his grin, and yelled back, “I can go all night long, Micah!” He even winked.

Ryan wondered why he was best friends with these two idiots.

When he realized everyone was staring at him, Micah immediately panicked and slid halfway under the table.

That’s how Lang invited them to his “Class party” on Friday and Ryan, in turn, invited him to go running with them from time to time. For some reason, Micah said he could only stay for a little bit on Friday, because he had a “family thing” to attend to.

Lang said he was he was going to bail himself at the first best chance he got, so it was no big deal.

“From your own party?” Micah asked.

“Definitely.”

“Oh. Cool.”

As a present, Micah made him a breeze potion. Ryan bought a proper cologne bottle that just so happened to be empty so it could fit the aforementioned breeze potion. Not that Micah knew about it. He also bought two more for the both of them. Not that he knew about those either.

Their first four tests came and went with the youngest of the classroom getting lots of half-days off. Ryan did well, aside from getting a few numbers wrong during the geography exam. That landed him an “A-”. He immediately found the section in his textbook that covered that topic and studied, so he wouldn’t make the mistake again.

Micah had actually gotten an “A-” in math, too. That seemed to surprise him more than it did Ryan. He got the same grade in history and grammar, which was great, and a “B-” in geography. Apparently, he’d panicked and forgotten basically all of the mountain and river names, then placed Ostfeld beyond the border.

Ryan didn’t know how to feel about those results. They were much better than what the boy usually got, but they weren’t perfect. Would they really be enough? He hoped Lisa had a few more of those focus potions, so Micah could keep it up for the entrance exams. That way, Ryan wouldn’t have to go to a new school all on his own and share a room with a bunch of strangers.

… And sometimes he hoped he wouldn’t.

The “Class-party” consisted of mostly alleyball, cake, and food. Lang lived three streets down from him, so getting there on time was easy. His parents came along, and Finn, Billy, and Lang’s cousin Sol were all there. Finn also brought his on-again, off-again girlfriend along, whose name Ryan could never remember.

They played in an alley opposite his house and split the teams almost-fairly, meaning their victory was almost-deserved. Then they split them by classrooms and still won, crowning theirs the one true classroom of Westhill.

Sol was not happy.

Micah showed up late, played a single game, gave Lang his present with a brief explanation, refused a slice of cake, and wanted to run off again. In exactly that order.

Thankfully, Ryan’s dad grabbed him before he could and led him back to the crowd, asking, “It’s almost like a birthday party around here, eh, Micah?”

“Uhm, yes, sirrr-avid? David?” he said.

“Do you really have to leave already?” Ryan asked as he walked up, keeping the ball trapped under one foot. “If you stay, I’ll gladly tell Prisha it was my fault.”

She switched between hating him, because he brought her little brother into the Tower, and loving him, for tutoring him and promising to keep him relatively safe, anyway, so Ryan really didn’t mind.

“Ryan, give back the ball!” Lang called.

“Gimme’ a minute! ‘Trying to recruit someone here!”

“Am I not enough? You’re breaking my heart, man!”

“—Ryan’s birthday,” Micah was asking.

Oh no.

“He’s our New Year’s wonder,” David said, and Ryan was much too late to shush him. He stepped off the ball and Sol quickly stole it away. Behind them, the others started playing again.

Who was breaking whose heart now? Well, considering their history, it was at least fair.

“New Year?” Micah asked. “Really?”

“Yep. He wanted out the moment the first fireworks burst.”

“Dad.”

His mom appeared out of nowhere, a plate full with food in hand, and said, “Ryan, why don’t you ask Micah when his birthday is?” She spoke as if she had been a part of the conversation all along.

Ryan thought about it for a moment but realized he didn’t know yet. He felt like he should, though.

“Yeah, when is your birthday? Was it this year already?”

Was he born 96 or 95?

“Oh, mhm,” Micah said, shrinking down a little. “You, ah, might have missed it.” That last bit was barely a whisper.

So 96 then. That meant he’d turned thirteen this year. He was younger than Ryan had thought. He looked older, though. That made him even more uncomfortable about bringing him into the Tower. Maybe Prisha was right to hate him.

“When exactly,” his dad asked with a stilted tone, arm still wrapped around Micah’s shoulders.

“Yeah, when exactly,” his mom echoed.

They were acting weird.

Micah shrunk down a little more and mumbled, “Today.”

Oh. So 95 then. That made more sense. Ryan nodded a little, scratched his elbow, and asked, “Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Iunno. I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it.”

Yeah, but this is kind of making a big deal out of it. Idiot.

He nodded a little more because he knew Micah didn’t like the attention. It made a little sense. Then he turned around and shouted, “HEY EVERYONE! IT’S MICAH’S BIRTHDAY TODAY!”

“Really?” Lang asked, spinning around.

“YEAH!”

“Why didn’t you say anything, Flower Boy?” Finn asked. He was the goalie and nearest, so he walked up and reached out to shake half of the birthday boy’s arm from a mile away, saying, “Happy birthday, man.”

“...Thanks,” Micah replied, but he wasn’t looking at Finn. He was glaring at Ryan.

His dad finally let go of him, his job done, and congratulated him as well. His mom did, too.

Ryan scowled at the three of them and wished Micah a happy birthday with a wide smile. He was fourth in line. Then the others all came along and forced a slice of cake on him after all.

When they headed to Prisha’s for more of the same with just the family afterward, Micah mumbled, “I told you I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it.”

Ryan grinned. “Yeah, but you didn’t tell me it was your birthday.”

Thankfully, he had bought something he could pass it off as a present.

He sighed. “And if I remind you next time, you won’t do that again?”

“Exactly.”

Not that he would have to remind him again.

Micah walked back to his sister’s place with Ryan in tow, after they’d made a short stop at his house so he could give him an impromptu gift. At least, it was something simple yet awesome. A proper cologne bottle already half-filled with his current perfume potion. When had Ryan done that?

Micah tucked it into his pocket with an honest thanks.

His birthday party tripled as a belated and repeated one for two of his cousins. There was a snack table, and a food table, and cakes, and lots of tea, hugs from his extended family for presents, and enough commotion that the two of them could duck out and hide in other rooms from time to time.

Prisha and Neil gave him clothes. Micah liked … some of the t-shirts. One was blue on top and grey everywhere else. He switched into it. They hadn’t seemed surprised when Ryan trailed in after him.

His parents did, though, and spent a minute interrogating him about how his studies were going, how he’d been, how Micah was keeping up during their evening runs, was he giving Ryan any trouble?

“All the trouble, sir,” Ryan joked.

Their present for him was a large, wooden chest.

“We noticed you’re still keeping your alchemy things in that battered up, old thing in your room,” his father said.

Battered up old thing?

“So we thought you might want to finally throw it out and get a replacement.”

Oh. They meant the Salamander’s chest. Micah still kept most of his things in it. It stood exactly where Ryan had placed it back then.

“So, here’s the replacement.”

“Go on,” his mother said. “Open it.”

Micah knelt down and did.

The lid opened easily and the chest unfolded almost on its own into a bunch of drawers of all shapes and sizes. There were leather pouches that hung from folds and even a “hidden” compartment that his dad pointed out to him. And yet, there was still enough space in the main compartment for one side to be filled with brand-new potion bottles and a journal identical to the one Micah had gotten last year.

The other half was empty and had a sign that simply read:

Reserved. —Aaron

“Now that’s a proper alchemist’s chest, don’t you think?” his father asked.

Micah stared in open wonder, imagining where he could place all of his things. His journals could fit in the hidden compartment or the folds, he could sort his crystals into the various drawers, his herbs and barks could go in those pouches. His tools would fit snugly in there. Maybe he could put the jars with monsters parts in the main compartment? Or would that take up too much space? He still had his jam glasses, too … Well, it didn’t all have to fit inside.

Maybe he could place some jars on shelves and get a proper alchemy feeling in his room.

“Thank you, dad,” he said and turned around and giving the man a spontaneous hug.

He guffawed and laughed as he hugged him back. How long had it been since Micah had last hugged his dad?

“Did you see the sign?” his mom asked.

“Yeah.” Micah brought it out. “‘Reserved’? What does that mean?”

He felt giddy. He’d gotten a letter from his brother Aaron, if only one word long. That was rare.

“He ordered something for you. You’ll find out what it is when you start at Millford’s this Fall.”

His smile slipped.

Oh. Right.

“I can’t wait,” he lied. “I love it. Thank you.”

Micah bailed on his own birthday party the first best chance he got. With Ryan in tow, he went to search for Lang and found him lying on a tree’s branch in the park. There, they joined him and talked about nothing.

Lang’s aunt apparently wasn’t too happy about his Class after all, despite throwing a party for him. He said he wanted to apply to a school in Nistar, but had no idea which Path to pursue.

Ryan and Micah confessed about wanting to apply to the Guild and told him a few stories about fighting monsters, about how awful Salamanders were, and how the Sewers smelled like wet dog. Then they talked about what kind of treasures they had found.

Apparently, Ryan had found four treasure chests in his two years of climbing, which was a good amount for first-years. Early Birds rarely went in too far, following school regulations. Safety was the official, number one concern nowadays.

Sadly, since he had been an Early Bird back then and escorted by older students, he only got to pick out a part of the spoils during one of those times.

The choice had been between a mysterious potion of no color, a bag full of glowing brown crystals, a pair of gloves that were too big for any of them, and a sealed scroll.

Ryan had picked out the gloves and given them to his dad. There was nothing special about them, aside from being of a high quality and tight-fitting fabric, but his dad still wore them sometimes today, to haul things around at work. And apparently, Ryan wore them sometimes, too, to chop wood. They barely fit him, though.

Micah said he would have looked at the potion, but picked the scroll. A sealed scrolled sounded tempting. Who knew what kind of secrets it hid? Ryan laughed and revealed it’d been a drawing of an Earth Boar, one of the more popular monsters in Hadica.

What kind of treasure was that?

Lang said he would have picked the crystals and used them to buy something “actually useful.”

His party guests eventually found them and they went back to his place to play some more rounds of ball. It was the first time Micah played against girls in years. Lang’s sister Sol played just as rough as he did. She fouled Ryan from time to time, but the boy didn’t seem to mind. It was fun.

Over the weekend, they threw a blanket over the Salamander chest and moved it to Ryan’s room, since Micah’s parents would throw it out if he didn’t. Ryan looked at the chest standing in his room funny but said he didn’t mind.

They spent the rest of the weekend cramming for three more tests, focusing mostly on biology and chemistry, since most of music classes were spent singing out of tune.

Before, Micah had usually slept through or thought on recipes during that. Now, he played a game where he tried to get Ryan to laugh. It usually ended up with him fleeing and squeezing himself next to Lang between songs … where Lang would try to get him to laugh, too.

After his anti-venom healing potion experiments turned to essence sludge and Micah worried he might not level up again in time for his application, he decided he needed another way to get a new Skill without meditating.

So he stole Ryan’s more advanced biology textbook and looked ahead, looking for mentions of something specific. The texts made off-hand comments here and there, but never offered a full explanation.

On Monday, immediately after the test, Micah crouched down in front of the front row and asked Camille, “What’s mana like?”

“Huh?”

She seemed caught off-guard.

Micah greeted Darren to give her some time to think. Tests could be demanding, he knew. Ryan looked like he was sleeping in his seat.

Oh. Should Micah have brought him along as an excuse to talk to Camille? ... Probably. Great. This would nag him all day.

“Hey,” Darren greeted him back. “How did it go?”

Micah weighed his head. He considered saying something humble, but then again, he had put a lot of effort into studying, so he confessed as much and added, “I better get an ‘A’. And you?”

Darren smiled and said, “Biology is my favorite subject.” That meant he’d done well, but wouldn’t say it out loud. Micah immediately liked him a little more. “Isn’t it yours, what with alchemy and all that?”

Considering most of what he had to learn was about evolutionary theory? No. That had little practical application worth for alchemy. Human anatomy was more interesting because he could think of ways to better adjust patterns and annoy Ryan with pictures; animals adapting to the environment they lived in was also cool, but Micah didn’t really have time to think much about that right now.

He also couldn’t explain that he was using monster parts, so to Darren, he said, “Uhm … not really? Alchemy has two sides, you know, and, uhm; there’s a nature-side and a thought-side, and I’m focussing more on the thought-side right now. It’s kind of a pseudo-alchemy, honestly.”

“Really?” Darren asked. “Isn’t the thought-side supposed to be, ah, ‘unreliable at best’? The nature-side is easier to observe, study, and predict.”

“Well, yeah. But—” Micah blinked. Something was wrong here. He glanced around, but most of their nearby classmates were too busy talking about the test to pay them much mind, so he whispered, “Are you an [Alchemist]?”

Darren was obviously trying not to grin. “No,” he said. “But I got the Path a week ago.”

“Really?”

He nodded. “Really. I’ve been reading books for weeks, ever since you did your presentation.”

Micah blushed a little, thought about it, and blushed a little more. Was it conceited of him to think he had something to do with someone getting their Path? Yes. Yes, it was. He did it anyway.

“Congratulations,” he said. “Ooh, which Skill did you get?”

“[Identify Ingredient]. I think I got it because I spend so much time reading up on and imagining what I could do with various things. I’m hoping to make it an appraisal spell one day, but the Skill somehow tells me the names of ingredients I don’t even know yet. It’s freaky. I’ve been identifying everything I can get my hands on.”

That did sound kind of freaky, and more than a little familiar. Micah was also wondering how the Skill decided what an “ingredient” was, but most importantly—

“...Normal ingredients?” he asked carefully.

“Yeah, herbs and the likes.”

They both glanced back at Ryan then, who immediately shut his eyes again.

Micah considered using the news as an excuse to call him down, but in the end, it was Darren’s decision to make.

And Micah wasn’t sure, but he thought the two of them might not like each other for whatever reason. They always seemed to avoid each other, or ignore each other when they were close, and Micah thought he might have … glimpsed Ryan shoving Darren out of the way once? Maybe? It might have been an accident or a joke. He didn't know.

Maybe he should talk to him about that. He almost asked Darren when Camille butted in, “Uhm, mana?”

“Oh. Right!” He'd almost forgotten. He leaned closer and asked, “Can you tell me about it?”

“Why do you ask? Do you want to be a [Mage]? I can, uhm … maybe teach you a little sometime, if you like?” She switched her braid from one shoulder to the other and fiddled with it.

“No.” Micah shook his head. “I have enough on my plate for now, but thanks for the offer.”

Plus, if he wanted to learn he could just ask Lisa.

“I just get spells as an [Alchemist], so I’d like to know more about them. Plus, my instructor tasked me with figuring out what mana is ages ago, and I still don’t know, so I want to get behind that.”

Those were all great reasons. They were also all great lies. Micah couldn’t tell her the truth. He needed to have some kind of revelation that gave him a Skill without meditating, so the principal of the school he was applying to wouldn’t think he was capital-S Stuck on his Path and he could qualify for a scholarship. Only then could he tell his parents that he hadn't thrown out the Salamander chest after all.

“If you know what mana is made of, I don’t want to know,” he said. “But if you could tell me what it’s like…?”

Camille frowned softly, but quickly switched back to her bright smile again, and said, “Sure. It’s, uhm ... Well, the textbooks always describe it as being a force of possibilities, you know?”

Micah nodded along.

“Like when you touch it, you’re supposed to feel like you could do anything with it. For some, it’s supposed to be like all the colors in one place, but not a rainbow. It’s all chaotic. And colors that aren't part of the rainbow are also mixed in, too. If that makes sense? Some say the end result glows a soft blue. Others say it’s entirely blue. I always thought of it as a soft green instead. And it’s supposed to be kind of tingly, like electricity—ah, lightning.”

Tingly? So it was like an actual energy source then. He also noticed something else, “‘Supposed to be?’ What is it like for you?”

Immediately after, Micah worried she might not be able to sense mana properly yet and he was putting her on the spot, but then she got a far-away gaze and said, “Like taking a deep breath with your eyes closed”—She took a deep breath—”and the feeling that follows.”

Next to her, Darren seemed to try it out. When he opened his eyes again, he asked, “Memory?”

“Huh? Oh, yeah,” Camille said, cheery again. “It’s like remembering things.”

Memory was different from the other descriptions she had offered, but it fit into Micah’s hunch that mana was related to the mind. So "mind essences"? What else were aspects of the mind? Emotions? And maybe thoughts and memories?

For now, he said, “Thanks, Camille!” When he shot up, he spotted Ryan again though and reconsidered. “Maybe you can teach me more again, sometime?”

She nodded once. “Sure.”

He could just make an excuse to bring Ryan along then. Perfect.

Micah nodded at Darren as he headed back up to his seat. There, he searched his stolen textbook for mentions of energy in the human body. Most of them were supposed to come from chemical reactions and imbalances, but there was one huge form that dug its roots throughout—the human nervous system.

That just left him wondering, if it was the culmination of essences of the mind, why did only the Tower people have mana? He was missing something else.

On Tuesday was Sportsday, when the classrooms and schools of each district met up separately to spend hours doing activities in the scorching sun just so the teachers could write down a bunch of numbers on a piece of paper that would be forgotten a week later.

Or at least, Micah used to think of it that way.

This year, he did much better, hung out with Ryan and his friends in between events, or cheered them on as they tried to outdo each other. It was fun.

Ryan cheated when they played alleyball against the other schools afterward by drinking the Potion of Least Agility Micah had made for him.

He only found out because he went searching for more water in the boy’s bag and found a bottle with a few leftover drops of glowing green liquid instead. He hadn’t planned on saying anything, but Ryan revealed it himself soon after—and Micah along with him—and the others chased him with half-full bottles of water, wanting to dump them over his head.

Some approached Micah and asked if he had more of the stuff for them, and a teacher or two seemed to have noticed and looked like they were about to investigate. Micah awkwardly brushed them off and fled to the shade of the stands. There, he found Camille refilling some of the water bottles for those who had run out of ammo. When Ryan noticed, he cursed at her with a smile.

After spending the next two days studying for his chemistry exam, Micah fell asleep in his seat right after he'd finished the test and handed it down the row. Ryan shook him awake sometime later, when the classroom had long since been empty.

He leveled up.

[Fighter level 2!]

“You can level up from studying?” Ryan asked him then. “That’s so unfair. I’d be level 100 already.”