Chapter Eleven

The Wind Spirit

Twelve years, eleven months, twenty-nine days I had spent in this obscure world where magic was real and adventure wasn't just a fantasy, and it was about to become exactly ten years.

It was my birthday! Seven years had flashed by in what felt like only a few months of training with my father and learning new spells. Since learning the wind blade spell, I had learned a few more spells. Not all of them were spells meant to harm. Hell, some of them were even for elements outside of wind.

One of my favorite spells that I learned not too long ago and was currently practicing with my father was a simple fireball spell. It was a simple spell, but it was extremely customizable. I could make the ball larger or smaller. I could make it fly through the air extremely fast or slowly, but my favorite part was something that apparently not everyone could do; it was changing the shape of the fireball.

The first time that I had done it in front of my father, he nearly spat out his mouthful of coffee, exclaiming, "How, wha- when did you learn how to do that."

Safe to say, it took some time explaining to him that I simply had to think about what shape I wanted the flames to take, and it would take that shape. After he finally grasped that, he spent the rest of the day grumbling about how rare it is to be able to change the shape of the mana that you influence so easily and how normally, only lighting mages can alter the form of a spell that well. Together we spent the rest of the day testing out new shapes and configurations for my spell, some being harder than others, some being easier.

A few days later, coincidentally my birthday, my father had the great idea of heaving me try lighting magic even though fire was my weakest element. Soon after realizing that neither of us knew how to wield lighting magic, we turned to something that may be able to teach us. We uncovered the first spellbook that I had ever received.

It had been quite some time since I had gotten this thing out. When I was younger I read the thing cover to cover, even folding specific pages to mark important pieces of information, but after reading the whole thing and learning all that I could at that time from it, I chucked it in my closet and forgot about the thing for years.

Gradually we began to unbind the leather strap holding the book closed. The moment that I completely unclasped the binding, I saw a silver-green streak flash out of the book straight towards my head.

I belatedly tried to block what was shooting at my head, only for it to flash around my hand quicker than I was able to react. After failing to block whatever just shot out at me, I jumped up off the ground and looked around my room only to find nothing there.

"What the hell are you doing?" My father loudly asked, seeing me flail around.

Confused, I asked back, "What do you mean? Did you not see that thing?" Which only served to confuse my father even more.

"No, I didn't see 'that thing,' what 'thing' are you talking about?"

"I don't know what the thing is. It was just some silver and green light," I snapped back, starting to get annoyed at my father for not seeing it.

My father was beginning to say something back about the silver flash when in my head I heard, Well, isn't it a bit rude to call me some silver flash. It was a weirdly familiar feeling when I heard the voice, but no matter how familiar the voice that I just heard was, it still caused me to jump and let out a squeal. After all, it's not quite normal to hear a mysterious female voice in your head.

After my squeal, the voice spoke again, I'm sorry for startling you. The way that the voice said it was slightly playful but also sincere. Now somewhat more concerned that it was a real voice and not just something festering in my head due to my lack of sleep recently, I interrupted my dad while he was asking me why I had just screamed, "Did you hear her? Did you hear the voice?"

Concerned, my dad responded, "What voice? Are you ok you just started screaming, and what silver flash?"

"You really didn't see it? When I opened the book I saw some silver flash shoot at me, and now I'm hearing voices."

I told you it was rude to call me 'some silver flash,' my name is Kaze, The mysterious voice said. Now slightly getting used to it, I spoke allowed to both my father and this so-called Kaze, "The voice, did you hear it just now? It called itself Kaze."

"No, I didn't hear someone call themselves Kaz- AHHH WHAT IS THAT?!" My father screamed.

Immediately I shot myself towards my father while turning around using my burst spell to help accelerate myself only to see… only to see a small fairy-looking thing hovering around where I was standing.

Scarred, my father asked, "Is that a fa-fa-fairy?"

Seemingly insulted, the 'fairy' snipped back aloud, "For your information, I'm not a 'fairy.' I am Kaze, a sylph."

In almost perfect synchronization, my father and I blurted, "What is a sylph?" and on my own, I asked, "And are you the one who had been talking to me in my head?"

The sylph slyly responded, "First, my master's question, yes, I am the one who had been talking to you in your head, but not just in the past few minutes. I was also with you in the past.

"Secondly a sylph is a spirit made from wind mana and only wind mana. We are beings that have the highest cooperation with the wind. There are other spirits for the other elements, and of course 'him' but lets not talk about that right now."

There was a lot of information to take in from her little dialogue, but there were a few important questions that I had to ask; before I asked, I looked down at my father only to see him staring up back at me. As we made eye contact, he asked, "Did she just call you her master?"

Realizing that he was still on the floor, my father slowly started standing back up while I said, "I'm not sure that was one of the things that I was going to ask about."

Continuing, I spoke to Kaze and said, "There are a few things that I need to ask, is that ok with you?"

"Sure thing Adam!" Kaze said back cheekily.

I stood there looking at Kaze, confused, before saying, "While I originally wasn't going to ask this because I didn't know you did. How in the world do you know my name?"

"Well I have been by you since you were five so I'd like to think that I would have learned your name. Next!"

It was slightly off-putting, Kaze being so excited to answer my questions and all, but nevertheless, I continued asking questions.

"Ok, I can understand that you learned my name by now, but why did you say something about me being your master?"

Kaze chuckled before saying, "Well that's simple. It's because you were the person that I made a connection with or bonded with originally. The word master may not be the best word. It's closer to the bond between beast and human, that's also why I can talk to you in your head."

Kaze's answer only opened up a whole new line of questions like how did we end up bonded, was this something that I could end, were there any perks from being bonded to a sylph, hell was there any disadvantages.

Deciding to only pick one, I asked Kaze, "How did we end up being bonded?"

Kaze was seemingly embarrassed by her response as she mentally communicated, Well, it was a bit of an accident, before switching back to speaking allowed saying, "It happened when you first awoke. I was snooping around the house that my book had just been brought into, and I felt mana being drawn together, and out of curiosity, I slipped under the crack in your door only to find a small boy meditating.

"Out of curiosity I slowly began to get closer to you and try to examine what you were doing. After a while of watching you meditate I was about to leave when you awoke. If you don't know right before a person awakens the absorb most of the mana in the surrounding area only to redistribute it through their bodies and back into the atmosphere, but when you awoke you stole the majority of my mana causing both of our mana to mix and forcing us to create a bond." Kaze let out a hollow breath and a sigh before saying, "That was a lot."

I stood there and looked between my father, who was staring at kaze blankly, and Kaze, who was staring back at me, trying to process what she had just said. After a little while of waiting, I said back, "Ok, I understand how you and I ended up bonded, and this is my last question, but what do you mean when you said you used to talk to be with me in the past?"

Kaze's miniature head gave me a look of astonishment before saying, "I'm surprised that you weren't able to figure it out yet. I was the person who helped you learn wind burst and wind blade."

It was like the look of astonishment the Kaze was giving me was transferred to both my father and me. Both of us were left dumbfounded. That was why I learned those spells so well and so quickly.

"So it was you who gave me the instructions to those spells," I blurted out, surprised.

"Yes, it's almost like that is what I just said," Kaze said while chuckling to herself, "I am also the reason that you have your aptitude for wind magic. I'm just surprised that even with the power of a spirit, my element still falls behind too the gravity mana that you have inside of your body. It's like you all redy had another spirit companion for gravity magic, but god knows 'he' would never pair with a human."

The way she said it was so casual that I had almost missed it. It was something that I had been curious about since my awakening, the large segment of my mana that was a dark color and unusable. She had told me that it was actually one of if not the most powerful element that could be beckoned by the hands of a mage.