August 1st, Year 2 AC (after Cleansing)

Timothy looked out over the large circular room. He had a commanding view from where he sat, In his large comfy bean bag chair, further raised by a 3 foot tall circular stone dais in the exact center of the room. Looking out he could only see about half of his 53 new students, spotted about between the ever-present columns. It was a big room, had to be to fit the numbers of students they were expecting, and that came with limitations.

Molding earth and stone was fairly easy. Getting it to hold up on its own over large expanses? Not so much. He spent a moment looking from child to child, each situated in their own little 5 by 5 platform, slightly raised off the floor but without a chair. A flat pad was offered but nothing resembling a desk either.

The lack was deliberate. These children were old enough to remember schooling in the old world. Each to his own boring chair and attached desk and many used to running roughshod over their teachers. Some were well-meaning idealists fighting to educate the youth, but the rest were underpaid rejects from other jobs. Either way, they didn’t have much authority to actually punish bad behavior and with predictable results.

To his right, he picked out the petite blond form of little Rachel. Though he reminded himself again not to use that name. True names were dangerous for a pathfinder. Dangerous for guardians too, for that matter. Most were moving slowly but steadily towards usernames. Nicknames by any other term. Something descriptive enough to indicate a person, but not personal. It was harder for adults, already stuck in their ways and to their names, but youngsters like the ones in front of him had no such problems. They likely all had a handle already… and that was a different kind of problem. Names like cricket, pudgy, waddles and leaker were hardly appropriate to future leaders. It was time to give them a clean break. Away from the holds and the people who gave them those names, they were free to make new names for themselves. For good or ill.

He moved on, having to suppress the desire to smile or nod at her. She didn’t need special treatment. She had it in her to succeed all on her own. Moving on he tried to make mental notes on each of them. From the small chubby paradisian he somewhat recognized to an even smaller golden-skinned boy with distinctive epicanthic folds. Possibly from the Vietnamese community about 6 Holds downstream. That or the Korean one up one of the river branches. That thought broke his stride.

Perhaps he shouldn’t be so sure about all of them having bad disciplinary habits. What he'd experienced in the good ol' US of A certainly wasn’t universal.

But it didn’t matter now. Good schooling or bad he still needed to make a clean break. The style he was going to have to use was completely different.

So instead of a chair, they had a platform with a pad and permission to move around however they liked. Just so long as they stayed on the platform. And no desk. Just a large stone plinth. Tri cornered and 5 feet tall with about 2 feet to a side. It even had sharp edges, no safety bull shit tolerated here.

Not that they were capable of using it correctly yet, but they would get there. Until then they had a few other tidbits to get their thoughts moving in the right direction. A sheet of very special paper and two page-sized wooden plaques. One of which was a full 3 inches thick and made from polished hardwood. The other was barely a half-inch and soft to the point of being slightly springy to the touch. A sharp essence stone chisel with a V-shaped chisel head sat between them even as a small piece of charcoal, wrapped on one side in jungle cloth sat beside the paper. The only other thing on the platforms at the moment was a small clay fired brazier about half-filled with sand.

He had plans for all of it. But plans were plans and actions actions. It was time to move from the first to the second. He made a few last mental notes, rotating the platform he stood on like a lazy susan to see the full room.

Almost regretfully he stood up from his obscenely comfortable bean bag. Chameleon cat hide, complete with well-preserved fur wrapped around a center filled with soft pellets of molded plant matter. The plant matter filling would rot and need replacing every other week or so, but it wasn’t exactly difficult or expensive to do.

Enough! He was procrastinating again.

“Welcome! You may call me Runefather and I am here to welcome to your very own version of Hogwarts!” He waited through a few gratifying but ultimately inappropriate exclamations of happiness, only to quickly dash such hopes. “Only not really. You will not find a class here that will tell you how to wave a little stick and say a few words to do magic. More’s the pity. It would be nice if magic were that easy!” Well, it would be nice for teaching at least. He rather enjoyed the complexity it offered. But this wasn’t the time for that. The happy background murmurs had cut off abruptly, replaced with a combination of uncertainty and angry defiance. Not unexpected, shocking them was half the point of this exercise. He pressed on. “No, here we must always consider -” he paused dramatically, “The Pink Elephant.”

With a snap of his fingers, an illusionary pink blob popped into existence above his head. It trembled for a moment, then stretched itself out into a distinct, if cartoonish and humanized, elephant standing on its two hind legs like a person. Beginning to dance it reached up with decidedly non-standard prehensile hands to grasp its own trunk. Fingering it like the trumped it morphed into even as the music chimed in to match. Disney in all its drug-addled glory! He’d managed the hologram-esque illusion, although getting it to move and pulse-like this had taken some real experimenting, but the music to go with it was completely out of his reach. So he’d gotten a bit of help. Not that their resident bard had been amenable at first. It had taken some… persuasion.

Who was he kidding? It had taken a bribe. And a fat one at that. The man had some standards, after all. Or so he liked to say. Freaking minstrels were the new world's version of the press, just slightly more entertaining. But unfortunately not any more truthful!

Toss a coin to your witcher…. Right.

And there he went off on a tangent again. Good thing he’d set the full illusionary rendition of the bad trip waltzing technicolored elephants to not require his input after the first trigger.

Seriously though, what had they been on when they wrote Dumbo?

He shook off the thought for a moment. Enjoying the blank-faced incredulity of his young audience. At 12-15, it shouldn’t be that far outside their age group, right? Then again, if a bad trip had made a movie, this would be it… Ah well, what’s done is done.

The short illusionary clip drew to a rapid close. He remembered it vividly, but like many such memories, it was unclear and didn’t include everything. A minute-long section without lyrics was all he'd managed to piece together, and without the almighty google to check it against, he couldn't even guarantee he was remembering it correctly. Not that it really mattered, he mused.

“Yes, that pink elephant. Just don’t think about it. No, seriously. Don’t. Because we are about to play a game. It’s not really a new one, although we’ll play it in a new way. Have any of you perhaps played the game Taboo?”

He didn’t wait for a response. With an exaggerated wave of his wide sleeves and a much less obvious mental trigger, he flung a spread of incense sticks up in the air. Magically propelling them outward like a spreading flower to stick upright in the incense urns placed in front of each child. He’d always wanted to do that. It sounded so badass in Wuxia novels and while his version had required several weeks of prep work, it was definitely worth it!

All that preparation wasn’t just about looking cool, after all. Another snap ignited each stick and the light, fragrant smoke they gave off rose up a bit then stuck. Eddying about in an invisible box of repulsive fields generated by the simple-looking brazier. It couldn’t float away, but that didn’t mean it sat there calmly. It twitch and pulsed in time to no noticeable breeze or beat. Forming half-seen shapes and with a slight quiver destroying them to start again. Nothing was really recognizable, not yet, but each in its own way was a barometer of the mood of the child sitting closest to it.

This was what had taken most of his time and some help from Jenney not to mention a senior citizen norm by the name of Pak-Sung. Incense-making wasn’t something either Mason had messed with. Thankfully they’d been able to borrow this old man from Mong Hold. A lifetime of hobby crafting. First for himself, then as date gifts for his not-yet wife, then to help his children sleep and study, and now grandchildren to do the same. A lifetime hobby that suddenly was quite marketable. Even as a norm he had 4 adult guardian students and the only reason he didn’t have more was he didn’t feel he could teach more than that at once.

Timothy wasn’t among those students. It was interesting but he just didn’t have time. Thankfully he didn’t need to. When provided with the prepared plants Pak-Sung took care of the rest. Drying, mixing, forming and all the other little tasks it took to take a sludge of plants fresh from Jenny’s cauldron and turn it into a brown skinny corndog.

A corndog whose smoke would react to the slightest amount of intent. Intent that these youngsters, mostly newly broken through, were pulsing out left and right in uncontrolled flares.

“In front of you is your canvas. Fix your mind on what you want to see then will the smoke to obey. Show me something completely new and creative. Could be an animal, could be a plant, from the smallest flower to something with a towering trunk. Just make something new. The more you focus on the image, the more detail you will be able to incorporate. Understand, this is not a test. It’s a game. It will teach you something, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be fun.” He ignored a few raised hands. He would answer many questions in time, he was sure. But this wasn’t the time for it. Not yet.

With a once again exaggerated gesture, he floated an hourglass up into the air above his head and flipped it over. Or rather a ¼ hourglass, the pure white grains of sand inside quickly trickling down, but at close to 4 feet in height, it could trickle quickly down for quite some time while still clearly visible from all sides.

A simple work of polished essence glass with hover croc hide coating each end, it was a considerably easier task to float than it appeared at first glance. Once there he discreetly attached it to a cord hanging from the ceiling. Made from more Cat hide it was damn near invisible even if you knew to look for it. An easy lift and no attention or mana needed to maintain it, all the while looking like a fairly impressive bit of magic tossed off casually. That was often the case with really good magic. Half mana and half misdirection. In time they’d figure it out. But hopefully not yet, being impressed might just get them to listen enough to not kill themselves.

“No questions, but also no rules except don’t bug your neighbors. That means stay on your platform and don’t make noise. You have until the sand runs out. I expect amazing things out of all of you!”

He retook his seat, still smiling for all he was worth despite a certain tightness between his brows. A tingle that was ever so slowly growing worse. Holding 53 active enchantments, even small simple ones, at once was proving to be a bit more trouble than he’d expected. If he had to do bigger classes in the future then he had better improve quickly. That or higher some guardians to trigger a few from hiding. Smarter not harder and all that.

All set up he had a moment to reflect. Reflection rapidly turned to humor as he listened to the Hum-Di-Hum-Di of barely audible horns and he wondered if any of them could avoid falling for his little trick. It was unlikely. It wouldn't be much of a trick if it was easy to avoid. And he had definitely stacked the deck against them.

Na, he had them hooked right and proper. All he had to do was wait. In the meantime, he kept an eye on them. It shouldn’t be possible to overdraw their wills or cause a backlash. This was basically the same task they’d already worked at for well over a year. Willing something to move was the basis of self-awakening. Everyone here had practiced it thousands of times with no results. This time they would get those results in spades. It should also help to build their willpower. A not inconsiderable side benefit.

But the results weren’t a spell on their part. The spells were all from Jenny and himself. They made the incense smoke highly sympathetic. The slightest touch of intent would move them. It wasn’t safe for the children to cast, not until they developed their mana and will a good bit, but they weren’t casting here. Just thinking strongly. Not that there was much of a difference at higher levels. But they weren’t at those levels.

Still, he paid close attention. ‘Should not’ wasn’t ‘could not.’ He was actively maintaining these enchantments rather than adding a sustain rune for this very purpose. He had a tether of will connecting himself to each brazier. Sure it kept the spells activated, but it also put his will right next to each child. He could feel their auras. Pain and stress were old friends of his and he could spot them a mile off, in his own aura or in another. Well, in most others. With enough discipline and practice, it was possible to hide that sort of thing. But these youngsters were just starting out. Even if they magically (scientifically?) had the discipline, they definitely didn’t have the practice.

He couldn’t say it was the same for everyone, but he saw it as a combination of colors and scents. Just ones not seen with his eyes nor smelled with his nose. Magic senses were weird that way. Stress was orange and had an acrid tang to it, like highly acidic sweat. The kind that tarnished copper. The color would deepen towards the red hues as stress became pain and the scent would stink of sulfur.

So he dropped his sight down a level, ignoring the physical to focus on the magic field. Unlike the physical, it didn’t have the same distance constraints. Not unless the user brought in preconceived notions and handicapped themselves. That could and did happen. To Timothy in fact. It had taken some serious pain and weeks of effort to get over it.

In this field, he had an eye and a nose in each brazier. Each was as much a sensory organ as the ones he was born with.

Then again was he actually born with his magic sensory organs? Or, considering the awakening, was it more like born-again? He mentally slapped himself. Pay attention!

He sat back in his absurdly comfortable chair, apparently oblivious and uncaring while the children mind-painted in three dimensions. Combining the two opposed disciplines of creativity and discipline. Unaware that the two were opposed and thus unbothered by the preconceptions of the psychologists of what seemed more and more to be another world entirely.

Good riddance!

Half of life was balancing between opposing principles. Not too arrogant, but humble got you walked on. Too much caution was cowardice, but too much bravery was foolhardy. Empathy provides understanding, but it also removes the willingness to act forcefully. It went on and on.

Everyone had to find their own balance points.

That didn’t mean they would end up happy with their choices.

The last grains of sand finally made their way through the throat of the glass above and called an end to this oddball art project.

“Time is up.” He triggered another portion of the spell. A funny side of the effect that contained the smoke made it very easy to preserve the shape and form once the kids stopped concentrating on it. Walls that could repel the special incense could also be repelled by it. The box-like walls collapsed into a skin-tight outline. Add in a small additional stasis enchantment to make sure not to lose any small details or colors and they were set.

Another grandiloquent gesture brought all 53 braziers snapping back towards him. The flower closing back up till each art project sat on the edge of the dais. The tingle was definitely on its way to a headache, but he couldn't afford to hurry this. Not after going through all this trouble to wow them.

But neither could he drag it out too much. He'd considered sending them for a bathroom break at this point, but while he might be able to handle the load, he was still pushing it. It was never wise to really run yourself out of mana. Something might come up. An attack, a broken sewage rune. He couldn’t guess, but if he was empty something would come up!

“Alright youngsters, come.” He gestured for them to gather in the center, waiting a dozen seconds or so for them to leave their platforms and cluster up around the dais, most trying to get next to their own work. Seeing that he casually flipped his hand, sliding the braziers closer together, all on one side instead of equally spaced about. He waited a bit longer for everyone to find their place then asked. “Did any of you pick up on the trick?”

The gangly blonde Brit, one of the older children in the room, he must have barely squeaked through under the 15 years of age cut off, immediately opened his mouth. “You stuck that damn Elephant in my head and I couldn’t get it out. Everything I tried kept turning into it!”

“It’s not his fault you couldn’t focus. I didn’t get caught by it!” A coltish brunette, also on the older side, but he was much less willing to guess her age. Her features were decided of nordic origins though and already strikingly pretty with a few indications that more was to come. She was going to break hearts, that one.

She gestured at a beautifully creepy weeping willow offshoot. Instead of drooping branches, it had a mass of tentacles. Dotted about with white and purple flowers they moved and pulsed like a beating heart. Animal as much as plant. Slowly swayed back and forth along the ground, looking for prey. Grasping for prey. Timothy suppressed a shudder.

The brit's mouth opened as he turned to face her, then abruptly closed on any angry words as he got a good look. Ah, hormones in action. Angry words were only for people he wasn’t attracted to. Not that that was entirely a bad thing. At least he was thinking far enough ahead to control himself. But even hormones took a second seat to ego at this age, he reopened his mouth and spoke. And if his words were considerably more diplomatic than he’d first intended Timothy could only applaud his self-control. “I love it. Creepy as hell, but it's not Frankensteined. Every piece fits together smoothly. It’s awesome! But is it just me or do all those tentacles resemble elephant trunks?”

Timothy kept his face as still as possible. Even though he wanted to jump up and down and crow in victory. Double win! Not just hooking them with the elephant imagery, but he didn’t even have to step in to point it out. They were going over the images themselves. It was getting pretty loud, but he didn’t mind. They were getting the point on their own far better than if he had to spoon-feed it to them.

Elephant trunk tentacles, a fancy horn instrument more convoluted than a french horn that still resembled the elephant trunk horns of his little display more than any real instrument he was aware of. Rachel even made an arachnid-legged rhino with distinctly dumbo-style ear wings... No one got a pass, even if they managed to avoid full-out copying the malignant pink elephants, and more than a few didn't manage that, they still had something from it incorporated in their images. He let them argue over it a bit longer before finally triggering a runed nautilus shell to silence the area.

“Alright everyone. Well done, and yes, I set you all up. Despite that, I see some truly imaginative and fascinating images in front of me. Take a few short moments to take in what you made. Feel some pride in yourselves. Then I'll dispel them. We do need to move on.”

That got a few cries of rejection. To the point that the small Asian boy from earlier took a careful step forward and bowed slightly. “Please sir, May I keep it?” Or at least that was the gist of it. It really came out more like- Respectful greeting. Request/desire for ownership. Timothy didn’t actually speak whichever Asian dialect the child had spoken, Vietnamese he suspected. That might have been a problem if he didn’t have a workaround. The child's intent clearly held his meaning. It might lose some subtleties in the telling, but at least he could understand it. In return, his own words were matched with intent that he pressed against the non-English speaking children. It was going to be interesting, and who knows. Matching words with intent he might be on his own road to learning a number of new languages.

And the rest of this class all at the same time. Their perception was rough and ready, but with their neighbors practically shouting their inner thoughts and feelings it was hard not to understand one another. At least when they were this clustered up.

That was a major reason they’d decided to separate the children from their homes and have them live in dormitories, at least for a time. It wasn’t healthy for normals to be exposed to that kind of intent.

Those were different worries for a different time, he let out a sigh. He hadn’t quite thought this through, apparently. Of course, they wanted to keep their artwork. How many times had he wanted to post some painting or other on the fridge? And finger paints and glued macaroni paled in comparison to some of the righteous monsters these children had thought up. In particular, the little man in front of him had finagled a nightmarish mishmash of dragon and toad with a prehensile elephant-trunk tongue. If Timothy’d made something that looked this cool as the boy he’d want to keep it as well.

“I’m sorry, but it’s-” He paused, he was going to say an active spell effect, but they wouldn’t necessarily know what that meant. And telling them might cause the damage he was being so careful to avoid. “-the spell has to be maintained. You don’t have the skills or knowledge to do so yet and I have far too many other burdens to maintain it for you. Even if I did, they would go away as soon as I went to bed tonight.”

Seeing the sad, watery look in what looked like 12-year-old eyes he caved slightly. “You can’t keep this one, but I don't mind letting you guys play with the smoke images at a later time. Maybe as a reward for good behavior.” He looked away quickly before those big eyes forced him to promise something he shouldn’t.

“Now get a good look, then how about we take a short bathroom break? There are 10 bathrooms equally spaced about the outer wall.” He didn’t bother with any more instructions than that. These children had self-awakened. That took a degree of willpower, but it also took a certain kind of go-getter attitude. You couldn’t force someone to do it. They had to want it. Then go after it with a single-minded focus that was a rare thing in a child. Even worse they had to hold to that focus for a significant length of time. A year and a half was the record at this point.

With a wave, he dropped the spells holding the images together and with a gesture summoned a small breeze to disperse the smoke. He spent a few more minutes cleaning out the old incense sticks and placed a small cup of water and some tasty snacks on each of the students' mats.

Thankfully he didn’t have to wait much longer than that. They returned in a hurry and found their seats again without prompting.

Good kids.

“Alright, so I pulled a little trick. Once you see it, hear it. It’s really hard not to think of the pink elephant, isn’t it?”

He waited out the mutters of agreement. “So if I knew that, why go through all this rigmarole? I’ll get back to that. First I want to ask you a simple question. Why, when you are looking for something, do you always find it in the last place you look?”

He flicked his hand, sending the now empty braziers back to their original locations. Giving him an easy close-up once again of the children's reactions. A close-up he let drop swiftly before it burned more of his reserves. Still, it was enough. Mostly variants on confusion. He could get used to this easy empath thing. There were very few auras he couldn’t read, but doing so took time and effort. Here he was reading 53 at once and not half trying. For now at least. Once they started controlling their auras it was going to get quite a bit harder.

He let the seemingly non-sequitur sit for several moments, but the young were resilient; it didn't take much more than that.

“Is this another trap?” The brit accused. He really needed to find out what they all preferred to be called at some point. Not that he was looking forward to it. Memorizing 53 nicknames? Blegh. He’d rather learn 5 new languages. Ah well, needs must. He echoed the boy's question, and the feelings he gave off with it, to the rest of the class. Their flaring auras didn’t stretch far enough for communication to work while they were on their platforms. And that was deliberate after all, but it did mean he had to help keep the communication going.

“Of course it is!” Timothy laughed back.

Several half-raised hands dropped back down at his admission. Pity that. He simply waited. These were not wallflowers. They had the drive to push forward through such minor adversity.

Eventually, a short, stocky sandy-haired girl raised her hand hesitantly.

He gestured for her to speak.

“My dad quoted a comedian who asked that. He said you have to be pretty dumb to keep looking after you found what you're looking for.”

Probably Foxworthy. Then again Timothy doubted he was the only comedian to joke on that topic. “Excellent! Your dad hit the nail on the head. For the physical world at least. But let me tell you how magic is different. If you’re looking for your toy and you keep looking after you found it you might have a few screws loose. But if you keep looking after you found a magical way to solve a problem then congratulations, you might be a wizard!”

He smiled, giving that a second to sink it then continued. “Let’s put those two, the dancing pink elephant and the cliche of finding something in the last place you looked, together shall we? This is the main point of your first lesson. I can’t teach you magic.” He paused, enjoying the shock and growing outrage that pulsed from their auras. “Because with magic there isn’t just one way to do something. Even worse, there isn’t even a single best way to do it. Each of you will hopefully find what works best for you. The way that resonates with your own preconceived beliefs, personality and unique awakening. And what works for you likely won't work for your neighbors.”

Outrage was dropping, but confusion and resentment were ticking up. Best rush to the conclusion. “If I tell you how I did it, then like that pink elephant, no matter how you try your solution will have pieces of mine in it. A trunk, big billowy ears or stumpy feet. Or worse, perhaps like finding it in the last place you looked, you will stop looking for your own way.”

“I have a class, twice a week, where I train guardians in exactly how to use my enchantments. How to think, how to gesture, how to act. Wing-whatever Levitate. Complete with little wands to do it with. That works for guardians because they are using my magic. Not something they discovered for themselves. They will never be as good at it as I am. It will always cost them something more to use my tools. But the closer they are to emulating me, the better the magic will perform. But what about those guardians who are nothing at all like me? Who can’t wrap their minds around my way of thinking? They will get nowhere.”

“That is the difference between us and guardians. We are pathfinders, trailblazers and perhaps a dozen other names in dozens of other languages. All with a similar meaning. We create new paths for others to follow, we can’t do that if we follow someone else's path. But in turn the more paths we can create, the better chance that our guardians will find a path that is fairly close to them.”

He paused, feeling the germs of understanding even if it was only sporadically appearing even as he levitated his dais slightly, spinning it like a lazy susan as he made eye contact with each child in turn. “Guardians require teaching.” He waited a few beats. “But wizards cannot be taught. The question then is, what are you all doing here at a magic school?“

He couldn’t help it. He laughed as nods and confusion broke out across the room. Why indeed?

“I can’t teach you my magic. But I can help you find your own. That's what we'll be doing. Not telling you exactly how to do something. But showing you tasks that others have accomplished, and requiring you to find your own way to do the same. Then the same task over again in a completely different way. Again and again. In between, we will work together to safely increase your pools. Preferably in a way that doesn’t kill you. A non-trivial task.”

“And that’s a great lead-in. Please listen carefully as it might be the difference between life and death. Your life or your death! I’m here to help you, if you run into a magic problem or just have a new spell you thought up and want to try, please run it by me first. Preferably not for at least a few weeks. But after that, I can’t think of a reason I would stop you from trying, though I do reserve the right. What I can do is monitor you in the attempt. If you screw it up I might be able to save you from overdrafting or backlash. Both things that can, and have, killed pathfinders and guardians alike. I can help you avoid those ends, but understand that my help is not a guarantee. It will always depend on you to think before you cast.”

“The pathfinders who went before you, myself included, ‘killed’ ourselves more than a few times in training. When you first awaken you have a very tiny pool of mana and willpower to use. And it's ridiculously easy to overdraft those pools with fatal results. The tutorial let us survive our early screw-ups. You don’t have that safety benefit. Please, please take it slow. Better a bit behind your classmates and alive than leading the pack into a 6-foot deep hole in the ground.”

He looked around, not enjoying the fear his blunt words had created, but even more not liking the lack of fear in a few faces. Fear might keep them from dying. The brash baseless confidence he spotted would get them killed. He wasn’t looking forward to it, but he wasn’t fool enough to think he could totally prevent it. There were going to be deaths among these bright eager children. He had made that very blunt to their parents and the leaders of their holds. Hopefully, he would be able to prevent some of those deaths, but he wasn’t a golem. He would not be able to save them all from themselves.

He’d chosen to change the trolly’s path, it remained to be seen how he would deal with it. Less should die under his care, but the ones who did would be his responsibility. And it was going to tear at him, he knew it. There was a reason he’d been stuck with this job. Sure, the flexibility and variety of his magic skills made him a good choice, but that was only half of it. Many others who might have pulled it off hadn’t wanted the blood on their hands. He hid a deep sigh. No use borrowing trouble now. It would come in its own time.

Giving them a solid minute to think about it, he spoke again to break the rapidly growing ice. “Along those lines, I have a few simple rules. The first of which is that you don’t share what I teach or what you learn with others without my permission. You can show each other what you’ve accomplished or created. I even encourage it. But you can’t explain the details. Show them what you did, do not tell them how you did it. Like the pink elephant, It’s not being helpful, it's dosing them with a mental poison and I will punish it as such.” He turned the stone disk below himself again to make eye contact. “You are pathfinders. That means your actions have made you a member of the elite. The ruling class of our little portion of the world. You have a great number of privileges waiting for you when you finish training, but with privileges comes responsibility. Foremost among which is self-discipline. I won’t accept ‘oops’ as an excuse. Nor ‘I didn’t mean to, it just slipped out.’ Please, don't test me on this."

He pushed out even harder his intent. Drowning them with his implacable determination and a few drops of ruthlessness. Pulling back, individually, before it completely overwhelmed them, he didn’t need to deal with a rash of feinting, but he played slightly with that line to make sure this point was driven in deeply. From experience, he knew how this felt. Like the walls were rapidly narrowing in and something large and vicious was just waiting for them to screw up.

Then he abruptly pulled it all back in. Forcing himself to stay stone-faced as the children trembled and a few even collapsed. Even that was better than the tears. He felt like a complete ass, and that was despite knowing that he didn’t have a choice. Fear and tears now might just save lives. Their own first, if it kept them from overreaching. But each of them would soon have power far in excess of their maturity level. They must think before acting. Just school children, he reminded himself, young ones at that. But, and it was a big but, old-world school kids didn’t have the power to level their schools with their minds.

“Alright. There is water and a Berry beside you. Take a bit of time for yourselves.” He closed his eyes, giving them a few minutes of silence to recover.

Judging that they were as recovered as they were likely to get he continued. "Many of you may have younger siblings or friends back in your holds. At some point or another, you are going to feel tempted to help them. To give them a boost on the path. To tell them how it felt to break through, or what to do afterwards. Don’t. You don’t know enough yet to do it without hurting them. That dratted pink elephant again. What works for you might not for them and if you tell them your way, it could poison their minds and stop them from ever finding it.“ Or it could do nothing. It was better not to try, but that didn’t mean the results were always quite so vicious.

He stared at them, letting his intent flex out, but not nearly as harshly as last time. “I need each of you to stand up and tell me you understand. If you don’t I’ll go over it again and again as necessary. Let’s start with you -” He pointed to the Brit, already half raising his hand, “then travel clockwise around the room.”

A mental gesture engaged a truth field under his feet as the child rose, cladding his gangly figure in a glowing green outline. “I understand.” It remained green but the colors dimmed a bit. He thought he understood but wasn’t fully confident in that fact. But it was just a bit dim, not fully. He wasn’t fully confident, but he wasn’t unconfident. It wasn’t a bad place to be at this level. Believing he fully understood with what little he knew would have been arrogance.

He repeated the question until he fully circled the room. Making notes of the children whose green light dimmed significantly and even more careful notes of a few whose lights turned outright red or the brightest of green. He’d follow up on both ends of the spectrum later. In the worst case, he might have to kick some of them out of the program. Overconfidence would kill, but blatant lies were insulting to his intelligence. Not to mention a waste of everyone's time. How did teachers do this without a truth field? Shaking his head he finished writing a few more notes and set the wooden tablet to the side. Beginning to ramp up his intent but with a much happier emotional mix this time. Excitement and joy.

“Alright then, enough of the serious stuff, we are going to play another game. Probably not quite as fun as the last one, but without the trap that one contained. Get used to this, you will be playing it at the start of every class for quite some time.”

He smiled out at them, pushing tuning his intent to communicate the genuine cheer he felt at this opportunity. It was a welcome relief from thoughts of death and responsibility. “It's called ‘What else is it?’ And the name explains it all. I will show you something. Anything really. We’ll start with this.” He gestured and an illusion snapped into place hovering over his head. A stately massive brown-furred animal took center stage, appropriately sized against the trees in the background as few things seemed to be these days. “This is something I saw in a zoo in the old world. But-” Timothy paused a half-beat, then quickly pointed a red-headed boy off to his right. “What else is it?”

Startled, the boy stood up and haltingly muttered. “A bear?”

“Yes! It’s a bear.” Timothy nodded, then rapidly pointed the other way to a young lady who was maybe 15 and trying to appear 20.

“An animal?”

“Yes! Next” The finger pointed to an Asian girl, probably 13 in an ill-sized but painfully neat tabard-like dress over leggings.

“Umm...” She shook a bit, perhaps unused to the attention, or perhaps unhappy that many of the easy options had been taken. Timothy didn’t rush her, keeping an easy attentive smile on his face. Soon enough the girl’s face and aura firmed up and she almost forcefully pushed out a few words. “It's not real.”

“In what way? There are many ways what you said could be true, tell me how you meant it.” He gave him what he hoped was an encouraging smile. An illusion was a fake reality perhaps. Or because he’d recreated it from memory it wasn’t even a real image?

“It's from before.” She muttered, somewhat flushed.

That was something. He was a bit disappointed. There were many better options out there. Still, he could sympathize, many things from before the ‘cleansing’ seemed unreal to Timothy now. “Be careful with that, little one, things from before were not made up, but I will allow that they seem less and less relevant as time goes by. That's good enough for now. Next.”

He pointed in almost the opposite direction to the young nordic looking lady. “A memory.”

Ahh, the benefits of going after someone else. “Yes! Be sure to thank him later for the hint, hmm? Next!”

He continued around the room. Letting each child have his say. It was a quadruped, it was a mammal, it was brown, it was furred, it was a male, it was an illusion, it was a movie (a bit of a stretch but Timothy let it slide), it was a predator, it was dangerous and so many other little things.

“Exactly, and thank you all for playing along. We will do this every day. I hope you enjoy it, but if you didn’t let me try to convince you that you should.” he snapped his fingers, for the drama rather than necessity, and the image twisted and morphed into a familiar scene. A small group of hogs against the background of the massive jungle. One hog standing half again as large as the rest of its group.

“What is this?”

He waded through the expected responses, dangerous, a passel, a group of pigs, beasts, An alpha Hog and its mates, death. Almost losing hope before a slightly timid voice said. “Valuable meat.”

“Yes!” Timothy quickly broke in. “All the previous things had some truth in them as well, but I want you to think about this one. You can look at the beasts as dangerous opponents. As dumb beasts and so many other things. But you also have to be able to see them as opportunities. As bundles of strengths and weaknesses. At some point, you are going to have to create a way to kill these beasts, and many others like them. All of you will. But it’s much easier to create that way if you spend a bit of time and really observe. Understand what else they are that might offer you a weakness worth taking advantage of.”

With another snap, he dispelled the image. “Now take a look at the tall stone thing next to you. What do you suppose that is?”

“An Obelisk?” One boy asked.

“A pillar?” Another asked. Timothy refrained from disagreeing. Arguing semantics would only ruin his image. Even if it made any sense to the non-English speakers. Even if a pillar should support something.

It ran on for a bit, although he did appreciate the child who simply said “Rock!” Captain obvious perhaps, but ignoring the obvious wasn’t wise either.

He broke in after a bit. “How about trying for context. Treat it and the wood and paper in front of you as part of a set.”

That made it obvious. Still, a few errant calls came before the obvious. “It's a blackboard!”

“Yes. It is. But it is all those other things as well. Now, why do you suppose you each need your own blackboard?” He paused a half-beat then continued. “For those of you who haven’t fallen afoul of it already, I invite you all to try writing me your guesses on the piece of paper in front of you.”

Keeping an outward expression of benevolent ease, he pulled his intent back inside his skin. He hadn’t found a way to lie with intent. Nor was he interested in attempting to do so. The very idea felt deeply wrong. Intent was the inner thoughts and feelings directed and enforced by the will. To fake it, you would need to lie to yourself. And worse, you would have to ardently believe that lie. Believing your own lies… That was dangerous. Just a small step away from drinking the kool-aid.

Still, it did make things occasionally inconvenient. Confidence was self-reinforcing. If he had confidence in them, and they could feel that confidence, then they were more likely to be confident in themselves. And confidence had a direct connection to success. That had always been true, but it was even more so now when belief was magically potent.

Unfortunately, he had no confidence that they could pull this task off. Even worse, he was worried they would hurt themselves trying. And if confidence was self-reinforcing then so was doubt.

So he pulled his intent back inside his skin and watched them like a hawk. Watched as they set charcoal to a loose weave wood pulp paper, soaked in a brine of the same plants that went into the incense from earlier.

It would have had the same results even if he hadn’t stacked the deck. It just would have taken far longer to occur. Something like 2 or 3 hours to a full day. Regardless he was ready when pieces of paper fragmented as they tried and failed to contain the children's spiking intent. Snapping up motion damping fields in a few cases to prevent flying paper ninja stars from causing mass paper cuts. And perhaps more worrisome, dumping a cup of water over a patch of flames that burst into existence. Burning the little girl's hands before he could react.

He kept his face blank, even as self-reproach ate at his guts. He hadn’t seen that particular response before and he hadn’t been prepared to deal with it. Thankfully she hadn’t drunk much water.

He could reproach himself, but he had to keep it inside. They needed to believe that he was in control. Feeling safe was next to feeling confident as nervousness was next to doubt.

Thankfully, one area he hadn’t failed to prepare for was injuries. It took barely a moment to pull a wooden plug from the end of a stone jar and dispense a globule of burn cream. He floated it through the air and directly to the injured appendage. He glanced around dispensing a few bandages the same way. Paper cuts mostly. Still, he noticed a good quarter of children who hadn’t even tried. The looks of sympathy and remembered pain on their faces told the full tale. They’d been there before.

“Now, if I knew that was going to happen, why did I let you do it? Hell, why did I ask you to do it?” He paused, giving a sympathetic smile to the few injured children. “The answer is that I didn't know. I suspected. But much like I can’t tell you how to do something. I also need to avoid telling you what you can’t do. Not shouldn’t, but can’t. I will often tell you you shouldn’t do something. But what might be impossible for me, maybe something easy for one of you.” He paused, “And yes, that even includes letting you get injured in the attempt. Maybe, just maybe, someday there will be a child coming through these halls who will manage it. Remember this, just because we haven't found a way to do something, doesn’t mean there isn’t one.“

“Now, moving on. Who would like to guess at what will happen with the rest of your proposed writing surfaces, hmm?”

“They’ll explode too?” The brit muttered, sucking on a cut finger.

Rising briefly from his seat, Timothy kneeled next to it above a copy of the smaller board and a chisel. Making sure to tamp his intent down, only allowing a carefully metered amount to flow out of the chisel's tip. It didn’t take effort or training to carve with intent. But it took both not to. Carving, especially when he was carving letters, was a way of communicating. Communication could also be described as conveying one's intent to others. It took a lot of discipline and control to moderate the amount.

Like infants trained their voices by screaming at the top of their lungs, so too did intent bleed out in shouts and screams, at least at first. As a 9-year-old, Timothy was capable of speech and even whispering! He snorted.

Still, his control did let him write on many of the frailer materials. In this case, he didn’t control himself to that extent. More like a normal speaking voice. The point wasn’t to show off. Quite the opposite. It was to show them a problem. He spent about 30 seconds carving three short words into the soft balsa wood. The magically dense stone of the chisel carved through with little resistance, but it was still a bit of a hassle to make a round O. He really wanted his pen-is-mightier for this sort of thing. “NOT FOR ME!” and held it up. And that would be even more true when he got to the hardwood.

“By all means, give it a try. I chose all four options for a reason. There's a lesson in each. I strongly suggest you do your best to learn it.”

He carefully set the plaque down, hiding for a moment the way the carved letters were slowly growing larger. Balsa wood was very easy to work with, to the point that he’d used it for models in the old world, but it was still the weakest he’d been able to find. . It wouldn’t last for long either. But at least it wouldn’t explosively decompose like paper.

He waited a few minutes, smiling encouragingly where he could at the children as they flubbed their way through using the unfamiliar tools. Catching one young man barely in time to prevent pushing the chisel through his other palm. He didn’t stop a few other mistakes where a chisel slipped and put in a nasty gash. He merely dispensed bandages and some healing cream. Nothing yet was bad enough for him to use a potion on.

Good thing too. They didn’t have the skill to activate it on their own, and he really didn’t want outside intent messing with their immature auras. Still, if he had to he was prepared to apply a few drops topically to serious injuries. But no way in hell would he let them drink any.

“Everyone finished with the Balsa wood?” He paused, hearing a number of yeses and no noes he nodded. “Let's move on to the thicker one.” he held up the thick piece of nearly violet wood well threaded with black grain lines. He’d lightly oiled it to bring out the grain structure but that was all. It grew this color. “I love this wood. It’s a reminder that we don’t know everything. Would any of you have believed that some trees grow purple?” He shook his head in admiration. “But beside its beauty, I picked it for a reason, even before the ‘cleansing’ it was a fairly hard wood. Resistant to water rot and most fungi. With the presence of magic? Well, you can figure that out for yourself. I’ll just say we build most of our riverboats from it. This is Amaranth, sometimes called purple heart. It’s not uncommon in the surrounding jungle, but it doesn’t grow at the edges. This puts it in a very nice range of valuable, but still affordable. Something you will all come to appreciate.”

He picked up the chisel again but had to really lean on it to carve anything. Even pulling out all the tricks he’d picked up, like working with the grain and keeping his weight centered he could only barely and time consumingly carve out a single word. “Hard.”

He held up the plaque, smiling at the children below.” Well? Go ahead.“

The doubt on their faces pushed him to the limits. He was barely holding in his laughter. It boiled over though when a bright little guy child simply grabbed the charcoal. Timothy loudly laughed as he quickly drew up to walls of mist between the kid and his neighbors. Suddenly enclosed the child froze like a dear in the headlights. Timothy pressed his intent against the tyke. Approval and encouragement in equal amounts. Releasing a relieved breath the kid quickly sketched out “I did it!” on the surface before holding the plaque up triumphantly.

He wasn’t the only child to have some form of success of course. More than a few scratched a short messages when using the chisel to remove wood didn’t work. Another smashed the remainder of his snack berry into a pulp and finger-painted it. The blue didn’t show up well against the purple, but he got points for creativity.

Not everyone managed such, but enough did to excite Timothy. They were good kids, and most were young and open-minded enough to not be stuck in the proverbial box. “Alright children, hold up your plaques and show each other what you have.” He dropped the mist walls that surrounded the more cheaty of children. Not that that was an objection. He rather approved of their workarounds.

“Now, even those who managed something, it was a lot of work wasn’t it?” He paused, giving them a chance to air their complaints and agreement in equal measure. Sneaking a quick wink at the charcoal child. He would have to remove the charcoal before he had them try this again in the future. It was far too easy a solution.

Then again, only one child thought of it so…. He’d have to think about that later.

“But what if I do this?” He pulled his trusty pen-is-mightier from a belt pouch. The silly little gizmo had been with him from the beginning. It was the first thing he’d made after exiting the tutorial and as such was likely one of, if not the oldest human enchantment in existence. It wasn’t anything fancy. Just a simple stone cylinder the shape and thickness of a sharpie. It wasn’t even made from essence stone! Just a simple hardwood branch. It should have decomposed from his intent long since. And yet it outperformed the models he’d made later. Models backed by a much stronger will on materials so much grander and more magically potent that it shouldn’t have been a contest. It was the first of its kind, and as that kind grew so did it. He always kept it by his side. It was a constant reminder that magic didn’t follow the same rules that he’d grown up with. And the earliest, simplest of magics often had disproportionately powerful effects.

It took merely a hair of intent to activate the much-loved enchantment and he quickly carved out a message. “So long and thanks for all the fish.” He didn’t stop there though. Pulling out an array of different tools he began to repeat the message over and over with different methods. One way forced the wood to grow out into words. Another simply changed the color. Another moved the grain patterns around to show the letters. Then burning out a few letters with an arc of fire, even a spell on the chisel to make it magically sharp, easily cutting through even the massively tough wood.

He held up the results. “A stronger material can better hold your intent. But it is also harder to use. One of your first tasks will be to think up ideas on how to accomplish this. I’ll get to why in a little while. But first, I suggest you all try to use the chisel on the stone plinth. It might surprise you.”

He waited another 5 minutes. Smiling at the surprise on more than a few faces. The stone was actually easier to use than the Amaranth. Stone, at least unaugmented feldspar, was no match for formerly living hardwood. Trees lived and in living had some small amount of intent. He hadn’t noticed it at first, and still wasn’t completely sure about it even now, but perhaps over a hundred years of growth, even a tiny tree ‘mind’ could generate enough intent to remarkably strengthen the wood. Still, easier wasn’t easy. Even with a magically dense and sharp chisel, they were still young. At 15 years some of the older children were managing it, if slowly. But the youngsters were having a hard time.

“Alright, that's enough for now.” He didn’t ask them what they learned. There were a number of different possible lessons, from don’t trust appearances to age and size mattered. He’d leave those thoughts to percolate in their little minds for now.

“It’s time we discuss the all-important ‘why.’ Why are we doing this? It’s not complicated. I’m going to be asking you questions at various points and I will need you to respond in writing. There is an additional benefit to this as well. Writing is a fairly safe way to train your intent.”

“Unfortunately as you have seen, writing is a non-trivial task. And there is an additional issue you might not have noticed. Please hold up your balsa wood plaques.” Matching his words, he reached down and picked up his own. Holding it up in the air while slowly spinning to show all sides. He grinned at the exasperated sighs and complaints that echoed around the room as they witnessed the crumbling cracked mess that used to be a writing plaque. The balsa held for a little while, but his intent was deliberately too strong for it to do so for long. The plaques around the room weren’t quite as bad as his. They didn’t have the strength of intent for that, but select words had crumbled, burnt or shattered in a way as to make themselves unreadable. Not all of it, but in keeping with the random intent flares they were all somewhat prone to.

“Now I could explain what’s going on. But I won’t. After all?” he paused, holding up a hand to his ear.

“The Pink Elephant!” They coursed back.

He grinned, smiling widely. “Indeed. So instead I’m going to set you all your first homework. Find a way to communicate your intent to me. It must last at least a week. If you want to work on it in your dorms then it needs to be portable. If you want to use your blackboards, then what are you going to do once the entire surface is covered in writing? On top of that, wood isn’t free. You will have to purchase supplies and while some variants of wood are cheaper than others, they might or might not survive your writing on them.” he glanced up significantly at the balsa wood he was still holding up.

He grinned. “Cheap or expensive doesn’t even matter at this point. I made a point of telling all of your parents, guardians and Hold leaders not to send you with any money or trade goods, if they did you will shortly be sending it back to them. That leaves all of you at the same level. Broke.”

His grin threatened to split his face. Ahh, the sound of expectations and entitlements being shattered. “To fix that problem I have an entire list of necessary chores you can do for pay. Each of them is as dirty, uncomfortable or just plain nasty as I could find. None of them are busywork. They are important jobs that will help out those around you. Both here and in your own holds later.”

“You will start by doing them by hand, but like the difference between these-” Timothy held up the chisel in one hand and a handful of his enchanted writing tools in the other, “I hope that you will figure out ways to work smarter, not harder. Remember though. Only think about them at first. Try to use magic before you’ve built up the mental ‘muscles’ and you can do worse than hurt yourself. Bring your ideas to me and I'll let you know when I think they are safe to try.”

He grinned out at them. “That will take a bit and meanwhile you will be charged for nearly everything you get here. From food to lodging to school materials. That should be a reminder to you all, someone always has to pay. If you think it's free, it's just because someone else is paying. And they likely expect to make that money back in some other way.”

“Personally, if you owe me money I can use that debt magically to do very not nice things to you. And all of you are about to owe me money. In particular, I am personally paying for your first week of food, housing, clothing and a few supplies like the chisel in front of you. You are already in my debt and it’s not a state you should allow to continue. To remind you of that fact I will be using the debt connections to play pranks on you. On a somewhat regular basis. Not because I mind, but because I want you to be fully aware of how dangerous it can be to owe people.”

“Be very careful who you let help you. All of you are potential leaders of our communities. It would be foolish not to try to build connections with you now while you are young, impressionable and in need of easily provided help. Now, that doesn’t mean don’t take help. Connections can go both ways. As it's good for them to be connected to you, it is also good for you to have links to the community. You will have a class later, and not taught by me, on how to tread the line. Accepting gifts of goodwill, but being clear on the extent of debt incurred and the expected methods of repayment. If someone offers to help move your stuff with the expectation of you doing the same for them should it come up, then there is nothing wrong with that. If you are given a bunch of money now with the expectation that you will do what you're told once you grow into your power? Not so much.”

“With that in mind, I will not be holding your debt for long. I expect every one of you to pay me off in the next six months. The jobs I have lined up for you to do won’t do that if you have to do them manually. Taking several hours each. But if you develop your magical muscles and start creatively solving them? You will do so easily.”

“Eventually, and this is a long ways out, all of you may grow beyond the chores and go out with a hunting team. Harvesting the flora and fauna around us is extremely lucrative. You won’t always have money problems. And it will be a great learning experience for you. Just not yet. I’ll let you know when I think you're ready. In the meantime this is Parkour.” He gestured and the previously camouflage middle-aged man seemingly stepped out of nothing to mount the dais and look out at the children. “He is in charge of your next class. A bit of exercise and mental training. He’s a well-experienced guardian. Taking time away from his very lucrative hunting team, over 20 tier 2 kills under their belt, to try and help the future generation to think. Listen carefully when he speaks and don’t give him any grief. You are not at home anymore and he has full authority to tan your hides should you give him a reason.”

He paused, nodding to the man briefly before standing up and beginning to walk out. He paused at the doors and tossed a last reminder over his shoulder. “Be careful. What you don’t know can and just might kill you.”