"Want some magistone trinkets?" A middle aged woman held an expensive looking jewelry in front of Eon. "You do want to get a head start against your mage classmates, don't you? This trinket would do just that! Keep one near your body and your spells would be far more effective than anyone of your calibre!"

Eon knew that. Coming from a town that excels at supplying these shiny colorful gems to the rest of Primora, it'd be a shame if he didn't know what magistones are and how they work. Magistones are basically very densely crystalized ambient mana. They can be described as a solidified mana source or a mana battery of some sort. But one can not directly absorb mana from the stones. The high density of mana is considered very toxic for living beings. So they're basically used as an accessory to power up spells that mages cast, or to power up certain weapons. They're also used to fuel mechagical engines, a perfect example would be the train that Eon departed from a while ago. They're also used as ship and airship fuel, as well as fuel in certain factories.

But he didn't need one of these right now. He politely turned down the trinket seller, and marveled at the grand road in front of him. Grimoria was indeed the magic capital of the kingdom. The city was flourishing with buildings as tall as five storeys. There were beautiful fountains, fancy shops and all kinds of attractive stuff. Aside from humans Eon noticed some Saurians and Elves walking by as well.

"Ah damn I got distracted again." Eon looked at his pocket watch. "I have to locate the Magic Academy before anything else." He looked around and sighed. He was definitely lost. Maybe he should ask that trinket seller lady for directions.

"Whom are you calling a lizzard, kid?" A commotion caught Eon's attention.

"There is some form of misunderstanding.." a silver haired boy of Eon's age was being cornered by two saurian warriors.

"Think you can jusst play dumb and get away with thiss, human kid?" The other saurian said in a threatening voice.

Saurians usually took great offense being compared to reptiles. They shared uncanny familiarity with them too. Saurians were generally muscular in build, body covered in scales, density thicker in males than females. They were also stereotypically branded as very hot headed and battle thirsty. But Eon was sure they also saw humans as too soft hairy beasts. And Eon would also be slightly offended if he was compared to a monkey.

The saurians were getting more and more aggressive as seconds passed by, and when one of them was about to punch the silver haired boy on the face, Eon decided to step in.

"Excuse me, mister green lizard and yellow lizard!" Eon shouted, drawing the attention of the saurians. "Could please show me the way? I'm lost."

After spitting some colorful curses, something about getting intimate with one's progenitress or one's fondness of male genitalia, the two saurians glared at Eon.

Seconds passed by.

"Ah okay I was getting slightly worried. The spell worked just fine." Eon sighed in relief. He believed the Glare would buy him a few minutes. "Let's leave the perimeter before the effects wear off."

The other boy gestured to follow him and the two were soon far away from the two reptilian warriors.

"I'm Razor, from Rubiona. A first year in the Magic Academy." The silver haired boy introduced himself. It was the first time Eon noticed the boy had bright purple pupils, something only common in the almost extinct society of Dragon kins.

"I'm Actaeon, from Aeria. Just call me Eon. I'm also in my first year of the same academy."

"Oh.. I'm so glad I met you here! I've been wandering through these roads for an hour now and I got seperated from my familiar as well. I can't seem to find the goddamn academy."

"Oh... You too .."

Both of the boys sighed in unison.

***

"So your familiar looks like an overgrown lizard?" Eon asked curiously.

"Two headed, overgrown lizard. It's actually a baby hydra. My dad got it for me." Razor explained. "But I can't just openly reveal that without people feeling panicked. So I just call it a mutant lizard."

"And that's how you accidentally offended the two saurians." Eon guessed, taking a sip from the coffee cup in front of him.

The two continued to idly chat in the academy café. It took them quite a while to figure out the location of the Magic Academy but they finally reached their destination. After a while they went their separate ways to look for their dorm rooms. Eon decided to look for Eve along the way and give her a visit while at it.

"You were lost?" Eve laughed.

"What's so funny about that?" Eon asked.

"Well I agree, the streets can get a little confusing for a newcomer. But I was basically born here."

Eon silently rolled his eyes.

"Oh and have you heard? This year a few very interesting people will be our classmates." Evelyn's orange eyes gleamed with excitement. "Rumors say, the famous spellblade Renzero Shiftblade's son also got admitted to this academy this year."

Renzero Shiftblade was a famous hunter, and a formidable fighter. Well-known across the continent. His spellblade techniques were somewhat of an inspiration to the spellblade community. "I wonder what his son would be like." Eon muttered to himself.

***

"Welcome to Grimoria, dear students. Hope your journey was a pleasant one." Eon quietly observed the huge classroom they were sitting in. "Many of you are actually from Grimoria, so maybe not everyone had much of a 'journey', but you are about to have a journey here in the academy. A journey of magical knowledge."

Eon decided to shift his attention to his classmates. The class was filled with people of different races, he expected that. But it was mostly Humans and Elves. He did notice a pair of rabbit ears on a dark skinned girl's head. "A foreigner?" He thought to himself.

Even among the humans alone he could see some tattoo-like patterns on skin or unnatural hair colors in his class. He heard it was an effect of the broken mana jewel piece guarded beneath the city. The jewel's effect was all over the town, bathing the whole city constantly with ambient mana. Apparently children born in this city were blessed by the jewel and often sported unnatural hair color or congenital tattoo.

"It's like a class filled with Evelyns."

He shifted his attention back to the lecture. "Magic not only helps one in self defense, it makes our daily life easier. I'm sure not all of you present here are aspiring to become battlemages. Some of you might want to become a tinkerer or a healer, some might research magic, some might study it for knowledge and some might just want to make their daily life easier. Nothing is wrong with that." Miss Camper lit a magical sphere of light and floated it on her palm, a demonstration probably to attract the attention of distracted students.

"In our world, magic is omnipresent. Mages are not the only fighters who use its power as a weapon, most other fighter classes use some form of magic in their attacks. How subtle they may be, in the end it's all magic." She continued.

***

A serpentine shadow lurked below the city, crawling around in the sewer system. A mutated rat attacked the creature invading its territory. The eight feet long snake slapped the rat with its tail, sending the latter flying against the sewer wall. Then it finished off the rat by a concentrated magical blast from its mouth, before slowly getting back to its track. A couple of long white feathers floated on the sewer waters.