Enjoy!

Mu

Book I

Chapter 9: Happy birthday

The week following Owen’s arcane assessment, Owen had refrained from combat training, focusing rather on consolidating his mana foundations. The weeks following one’s mana pool formation was an exponential growth phase, and most aristocratic families would spare no amount of resources in nurturing their younger generation at this phase. Ed and Rana, being fourth circle mages, had personally instructed him in mana manipulation and meditation. Mana reinforcing and stabilization pills were taken out of the treasury to aid in the process. Under these favorable conditions, Owen rapidly advanced and neared the threshold of being a rank three initiate. Owen would continue training with the Steele family until the beginning of the next year, when he will be enrolled in the Royal Institute as a student, with other aristocratic children of his age who had coalesced their mana pools in the same year.

While Owen was undergoing arcane training, Aran had yet to resume mana cultivation. After the bracelet was removed, Aran realized that the mana in his body grew restless, like a caged beast regaining its freedom, and moved in his body wildly. He had spent the week suppressing and controlling the mana, trying to stabilize it before attempting to cultivate.

At the meantime, he continued to advance in his studies and training. Having learned much of the culture and history of Iridis, Mihail and Erika proceeded to instruct Aran on the other countries in Ares, starting with Hassius, information with which Aran consumed rapidly. With this new information, Aran had slowly begun to understand the power structure and relationships of the different countries in Ares.

Mathematics proved a little more difficult. Mathematics in Parthenon was more advanced than that of his previous world, with the complexity compounded with influences on and from arcane theory. However, George, being a patient and experienced teacher, was able to break complex theories down to help Aran understand them.

For combat training, Jacob had begun having Aran spar with soldiers of the Steele army. While his mastery of the sword and dagger was phenomenal, his disadvantage in stature and reach had made it challenging to fight against trained and experienced soldiers. This had forced Aran to repeatedly experiment and refine all aspects of his swordplay and footwork, something he had never thought possible. Making minor adjustments to his footwork with every move, Aran had slowly discovered a new level of mastery of the skills that served him well in his previous life.

Ada had procured mock animals, targets, of life size and shape, of actual beasts for Aran’s training. Made of fortified dirt, the only areas an arrow would penetrate were thin slabs of meat pinned to actual vulnerabilities of these beasts. Ada had made Aran repeatedly shoot at these spots, increasing the difficulty with every successful shot. Aran often found himself being barked orders to move further away or attempt to shoot at these targets from tricky angles and through obstructed flight paths. Aran’s vast experience in projectile weapons often had human targets, and found this exercise surprisingly challenging. Not one to shy away from challenges, Aran had immersed himself wholeheartedly in these trainings, discovering a new fire to aim for perfection in fields he had thought himself a master in.

***

“300?!” repeated Gerand incredulously while rapidly stroking his well-trimmed beard with his thumb, “Are you certain? Could the mana compass be wrong?”

Luca shook his head. “No. At least we don’t think so. We inspected the mana reserves in his body manually and had sense a large amount of it, expecting him to approach the realm of a rank one initiate. The mana compass … confirmed that and more,” he said, hesitating on the last point.

Gerand, remembering the incident a little more than a year ago, asked solemnly, “Are you sure he has yet to coalesce his mana pool?”

“No. His body was saturated with mana, so it was difficult to sense any mana pockets, but his Gate and Tower foci did not have any fluctuation reminisce of one with a mana pool,” responded Celeste.

“But 300? It’s difficult to swallow. I mean, I don’t know of any precedence. Do you?” asked Gerand.

Both Luca and Celeste shook their heads and the room fell into silence. After a few minutes, Gerand broke the silence, looking expectantly at Celeste, “So?”

“I … honestly do not know. Our saving grace is the fact that his body seems to have adapted to it and should not pose any immediate risk to him. By all measures, he is a perfect candidate for mana pool coalescing. However, if we were to move forward, I dare not predict how much mana he will absorb, and if his body could withstand it before his mana pool has coalesced,” Celeste spoke slowly, emphasizing the last sentence.

Luca interjected, “I agree, but there may also be harm in doing nothing. We don’t know how much his body can withstand this amount of mana without a mana pool to store the reserves, and how long before it reaches a tipping point.”

Gerand sighed; both of them brought up really good points. But with no precedence, they had no idea on how to proceed. The methodological Celeste leaned back into her chair and drummed her fingers on the armrest. She slowly suggested, “I think we can at least wait till his upcoming birthday. We will make sure that he approaches us if anything feels odd. In the mean time, I will look into books of ancient mages, who had the practice of starting arcane training at a very young age. And I see no harm in testing his aptitude, as long as we proceed with caution on the mana pool coalescing end.”

“That is as fine a plan as any,” agreed Gerand. He added solemnly, “But we must keep this a secret. We don’t know how the other families or the Magician’s Society will react to this.”

Luca nodded and added, “I’ll look into trying to procure a mana compass and an aura gem over the next month.” Luca and Celeste stood up and started for the door. Before they left the room, Gerand thought out loud, “With his mana reserves, can he cast spells?”

He was greeted with blank stares.

***

An arrow struck the slab of meat, an inch tall and 5-inches wide, right above the eyes of the fake armored lizard. Ada pulled the arrow out and yelled, “Good. Move five meters back and shoot again.”

Aran obliged and moved backwards. He removed an arrow from his quiver and nocked his bow. Steadying his breath, his slowly pulled the bowstring and aimed at the same spot he shot at moments ago. He gauged the wind’s direction, rightwards, and aimed a little to the left. From the corner of his eyes, he noticed a projectile hurtling at him. ‘Two seconds,’ he estimated and took a final look at his arrow’s flight path. He released the taut bowstring and rolled to the left the moment the fletching left the bow. He heard a thud from the direction he was standing a second ago as he nocked another arrow and pointed it towards the direction the projectile came from. Aran found himself aiming at a grinning Ada, who was leisurely throwing a rock, half the size of her fist, upwards and letting it fall back down onto her open palm.

“Impressive,” she mocked as she caught the rock and motioned towards the armored lizard target with her head. The arrow was embedded squarely in the center of the slab of meat, an inch about the point between the eyes of the mock beast.

“I could’ve shot you,” quipped Aran, unamused, as he slowly relaxed the bowstring and stuck the arrow back into the quiver.

“You were far enough for me to dodge. Besides, no beast will stay still for you to take your time to aim at it. I’m just introducing a little more… realism into your training,” shrugged Ada as she dropped the rock and walked towards Aran, “I think you’re ready for your first hunt for big game.”

“Really?! What are we hunting,” remarked Aran, pretending to perk up.

“Boars. Or deer. Whichever’s track we come across first,” she responded. Aran suppressed a sigh, ‘Well, at least I get a chance to prepare its carcass.’

“When?” asked Aran, continuing to feign interest. Ada, buying into Aran’s acting, smiled.

“In about two weeks or so. Owen will be joining us for that trip and both of you will be doing most of the work; tracking, hunting, and preparing the animal. He resumes training today, which should give him enough time to familiarize himself with the condition of his body,” she responded. Ada made Aran try a few more variations of his archery practice until Owen came to the training grounds. He promptly greeted Ada, who smiled warmly back. Ada took the bow off Aran and walked towards the armory, “You’re Jacob’s problem now.”

“Aran!” Owen called out, beaming.

“Owen! It’s been a week. How do you feel? More importantly, can you cast any spells?” greeted Aran.

“I feel great! It’s good to be back here. I missed sparring. It is infinitely more exciting than sitting down and meditating all the time,” responded Owen, cracking his fingers, itching to move around. “As for magic, father had taught me how to conjure a simple tongue of flame, shape it, and maintain it. I don’t fully understand the theory, so I’m only successful one out of a dozen times or so. I haven’t learned any wind magic. Mother wants me to focus on the basics of fire magic first. Here, let me try it out.”

Owen motioned Aran to step back, who happily did so. Owen held his right hand up, a few inches from his face, with index his finger pointing upwards. He furrowed his eyebrows and stared intently at the tip of his finger. He spoke softly, “Fire.”

After a few seconds of inactivity, Owen took a deep breath and squinted his eyes together, “Fire!” A small tongue of flame flared upwards from the finger and floated a few centimeters above the tip of the finger. It flickered and danced, as Owen clenched his teeth together. The flame slowly twirled and formed a small ball of flame, 5cm in diameter. The ball’s shape continually distorted, as Owen focused to maintain it. After a few seconds, he closed his eyes and the ball of flame dispersed into a small wisp of cloud.

“That’s amazing!” remarked Aran, genuinely impressed by the display. This was the first time he had seen magic up close.

“Not really. It’s really tiring even doing that much,” said Owen, visibly drained.

Jacob, who had observed the exchange from the side, chuckled and said, “Actually, that is very good progress. Many initiates have trained much longer to achieve what you have just shown. You are talented in magic, it seems.” Owen sighed exasperatedly, his lips curling up a little. Jacob continued, “Welcome back to training, Owen. Let’s start with having the two of you spar. Go get your swords.”

The two boys promptly walked towards the armory and returned, each holding a training sword with blunt edges in their right hand. Aran had rapidly approached Owen in stature, and his sword is the same length as Owens, being just a few pounds heavier.

“I’ll win today, Aran!” declared Owen with confidence, having recovered from his magical display earlier.

“We’ll see,” smiled Aran.

Owen instinctively took a defensive position. In the two years that these cousins have been sparring, never once had Owen been able to take the upper hand against the much younger Aran. However, he was able to extend the fight by taking a defensive stance, and had even gotten a few strikes in. Despite them being dodged effortlessly by Aran, it still gave Owen a small sense of satisfaction of actually making it a spar.

Aran took the first initiative and dashed forward, chopping diagonally downwards from the right. Owen parried that with an upward slash and immediately stepped to the right, dodging Aran’s follow through; a downwards slash after recovering from the parry by deftly turning a semicircle. Aran fluidly slashed leftwards, to which Owen blocked vertically with his sword. Owen kicked outwards with his left foot and Aran rolled backwards, avoiding it. When Aran recovered a second later, he barely saw Owen as the latter kicked leftwards, flickered out of his sight, and circled around. ‘Fast!’

Aran rolled to his right, shot forward, and turned around to find Owen’s sword slashing upwards towards him. He slash downwards, meeting Owen’s sword with a loud resounding clash as both boys retreated a few steps backwards. Both boys grinned from ear to ear, looking at each other with burning resolution in their eyes.

Owen tensed his muscles and darted forward, using the momentum to slash from the left. The air whistled as the sword sheared through it with immense force. Anticipating Owen to lose his balance with this move, Aran deftly stepped backwards to avoid the blow. To his surprise, Owen turned his body and swung his sword upwards in a spiraling arc; the sword a pendulum and his body the pivot, borrowing force from the momentum and generating centrifugal force as he brought the sword downwards. Aran relied on his fast footwork to jump backwards as Owen’s sword found the ground, creating a resounding crash and a small crater to match. Aran took advantage of the split second Owen’s sword was on the ground and slashed at the hilt. Owen rapidly released the sword and jumped backwards.

“You win!” Owen yelled as the hilt of his sword touched the ground. His face was flustered and breath was rapid, “How are you still breathing so steadily?”

“I wasn’t the one who put everything in a single grand maneuver,” grinned Aran, “But, I am surprised. You’re faster. And stronger!”

“Father said that when my mana pool was formed, some of the mana I absorbed had nourished my body and made me stronger. I didn’t truly believe it, until now,” Owen responded with a shrug, still unwilling to believe that Aran won despite his gain in strength. “Wait till I learn combat spells.”

Jacob laughed, satisfied by the performance of the two boys in front of him, “What your father said is true. When a mage accumulates mana, a very small amount is absorbed by the body, which will nurture it. This effect is most evident when coalescing one’s mana pool, but slowly becomes less effective after. Unfortunately, it is sorely lacking for an initiate, where you need to rapidly improve your constitution to allow your body to adapt to housing more mana and resist any backlash from casting spells. Therefore, it is important to continue your physical training.” Jacob paused for the last sentence to sink in and continued, “Owen, you lost. Ten laps around the grounds.”

Owen groaned, “It’s my first day back. Do I have to?”

“Even more so,” grinned Jacob, crossing his arms.

Aran smiled and patted Owen on the back, “Come on. I’ll run with you.”

The soldiers and guards who were training looked respectfully at the two cousins. That was a fine display of strength and agility, comparable to recruits, often teenagers, a few years into their training. It soon struck them that these children were three and seven. A chill ran down their spine. ‘Monsters.’

***

Arcane instruction during ancient times began young, often after the child first understood the spoken language. Scholars have hypothesized that this was in part due to magic being a relatively new entity to ancient mages, but was in greater part due to the constant threat of magical beast attacks, where the benefits of having another able-bodied mage outweighed the risks of harming the child.

…

Methods used to measure mana force were crude and non-standardized; either inspection by an elder mage or using mana lodestones of different grade and purity, both susceptible to variations and fluctuations in measurements, leading to improper classification of ones mana force. Therefore, it is difficult to estimate the extent mana force in child mages post mana pool formation. Scholars have speculated, however, that the value is comparable to those of initiates today, with the advances in magic circles and mana pool forming methods making up the difference of a few years of meditation.

Celeste sighed and rubbed her temple. ‘Speculations. Bloody speculations. All of them!’ She closed the book titled [The practice of magic in ancient times] and pushed it towards a pile of half a dozen books further away from her, each bearing a title related to ancient magic or mana force measurement benchmarks. She sank backwards into her chair and scanned the bookshelves around her. ‘There’s nothing here. I need access to current research texts.’

The next morning, Celeste rode to the nearest branch of Magician’s Society, located at Vilna, a three-day ride away.

***

The days passed relatively uneventfully, and Aran had resumed cultivating, pleasantly surprised by the speed of his cultivation, which had increased two fold after the bracelet was removed. With the feeling of yang saturation became increasingly common, Aran had further limited his cultivation to an hour a day, and had even skipped days where the feeling did not subside. This was a looming reminder that emphasized to Aran the urgency of forming his mana pool.

Aran had hunted for big game twice, nabbing a boar each time. Owen and he had the opportunity of cleaning and dissecting the carcass both times, learning to recover parts in order of importance, without damaging the rest of the animal. After properly recovering the material and preparing the carcass, Ada had stored them in a spatial ring and took them to the market, where they sold the unneeded parts, everything but a few pounds of meat, to butchers and tanners. The second time around, the boys had elicited a “Decent.” from one of the tanners as he handed over fifty copper coins. Ada had let them split and keep the earnings.

Three weeks later, Aran’s fourth birthday arrived. Non-royal birthdays, with the exception of specific milestones, were usually small affairs in Iridis. Typical of a lesser aristocratic family, Aran’s birthday was celebrated with a slightly more sumptuous than usual dinner, in the company of family members, mentors, and several family friends. Gifts were not commonplace and were only given by parents; often something practical, like a blade or a book. It was quick and uncomplicated. Aran had preferred this; his birthday had long been forgotten in his previous life, and any attention on him was truthfully a hassle.

This year’s celebration was like the past three, with one single exception. An extra guest was present; Mr. Gallen, who had came bearing a gift, a simplified book about trade routes pertaining to Iridis, compiled by the Merchant’s Union for aspiring traders. Dinner was a short and enjoyable two hours, where pleasantries and stories were exchanged, and Aran had learned more about the Merchant’s Union from Mr. Gallen. After the guests have left, Gerand ushered Aran and his parents to his study.

When they entered the study, Aran’s eyes lit up at the sight of a mana lodestone and an aura gem sitting on the desk. He was trembling in anticipation, a rare show of emotion for him.

Celeste’s literature search had proved fruitful. While there was nothing resembling Aran’s case, research in young magical beasts, even amongst the weakest, domesticated species with constitution weaker than humans, have shown that many bore mana force in the hundreds pre-mana pool formation. Despite the anatomical differences between humans and magical beasts, Celeste found solace in the fact that there were examples of a living being with the same phenomenon reliably forming their version of a mana pool. As such, both Luca and her had decided to move ahead with testing Aran’s magical aptitude and decide on his mana pool coalescing after.

Celeste and Luca spoke at the same time, “Happy birthday, Aran.”