When i woke up grandma had already left. My days continued same as before with two main differences. One: miss fire (who i found out is called Renee) would sometimes read for me, she likes sappy romance. And two: Father sometimes would teach me magic again, but from now on mother would always be nearby.

I learned that the magics father has taught me are mostly tricks and exercises used to build a foundation in mana control and intent clarity. Actual spells are cast using runes that are both more stable and restrictive. For example, if i could imitate my 'flame burst' using runes i could limit the amount of mana to put in the spell and not pass out every time i use it, although that would also weaken its effects.

People who can use these magics are called mages, mother is a mage herself although she mostly just uses strengthening magic. People who use arcane runes to cast spells are called sorcerers, and that's what father is.

Over the following months i also learned a few more magics: magic sound; light structures; color, smell and taste changing; dirtying and cleaning; growing a seed into a sapling and rejuvenating a flower; calming and scaring an animal; weaken or strengthen fall; and last but not least, weaken or strengthen shadows.

Magic sound obviously makes a sound; light structures can shape light into something that seems physical (but isn't really); there's not much to say about color, smell and taste changing aside that it is temporary; dirtying and cleaning are pretty much a specialized variation on telekinesis for using on spread out objects, like dirt; growing seeds and rejuvenating flowers is pretty much using self-enhancement and self-healing except without the self part, also, no, i cannot make myself grow faster, it only works on seeds because of the seed's simplicity.

Calming and scaring an animal is pretty freaky in how it borders the territory of telepathy, we used a small rabbit to practice, i feel father went overboard in showing off when scaring the poor thing; weaken or strengthen fall essentially increases or decreases the acceleration of gravity on an object; weaken or strengthen shadows makes a source of light seem brighter or darker.

Father said that these are all the exercises he knows that aren't mana-intensive and that pretty much all spells are built on top of these magics one way or the other.

He also mentioned that some living beings can somehow be born with or develop an instinct to cast certain magics. Humans, for example, often develop instinctive self-enhancement or fire-based magics. When one develops an instinctive magic, that specific magic becomes extremely mana-efficient and easy to control. That's normally how beasts and the untrained become able to wield magic.

Sometimes this magic instinct can be passed down hereditarily, and that's what's going on with my mother's side of the family. The name of the country we live in is Sylvian Queendom, yep, queendom as in ruled by a queen. It seems a woman who had a magic instinct for self-enhancement, general mana-sense and control founded the country. That magic instinct was passed down between her female descendants very frequently and only sometimes would there be a male inheritor.

My mother's family is an offshoot from the royal family that began when a princess who didn't want to compete for the throne started her own family and became the first entitled as a royal knight. Turns out my family name is just another word for 'knight', Chevalier. This family of ours occupies most of the top ranks in the military. I hope i'm not forced to join the military when i grow up.

Yes, my name is Lance Chevalier. Yes, it pretty much means 'spear knight'. No, i don't plan on becoming a spear wielding knight.

Oh right, the royal magic instinct comes together with vertical pupils and slightly sharper teeth, and as it turns out, i have those. Mother said that it's normal for the instinct to only manifest properly later in life, for now self-enhancement will only be slightly easier than normal for me, but it seems i have the mana sense and control for the most part.

Back to the present, it's been a long time since grandmother came to visit and i'll soon become a year old, i'm mostly able to speak properly, though there's still the occasional lisp. I can read, although sometimes i need someone to explain some new words, and write, although with magic, my hands are too small to hold a quill properly. I can eat baby food and more importantly: i can 'do my business' by myself... Yes i need magic to do it, but that doesn't change the end result.

I'm getting pretty good at magic, both my control and mana quantity have improved greatly. Today, dad taught me my first arcane rune, it's a general rune for projectiles. The effect of the rune is pretty much just sustaining a magic with no need for the caster to keep pumping mana into it, this allows for the effect to be activated at much greater distances. The most basic usage for the rune is combining it with telekinesis to create a force missile. The effect can be described simply as a ranged punch (not a baby punch, a normal one).

"The missile rune is extremely versatile in that it can be modified and combined with a large variety of other runes to change the effects." explains Father. "A sped up missile becomes a bolt, a bolt of greater power becomes a spear, a overcharged missile can also become a bomb. The possibilities are endless. Also, just to clarify, terms like missile and bolt are just nicknames in essence, there is no need whatsoever to conform to these presets."

I managed to cast missiles with force, fire, wind, light, lightning, water and stone. The first two went as you'd expect. The wind one ended up simply as a sudden breeze with longer range. The light one ended up as a flying ball of light that flashed when it hit the target. The lightning one ended up with a very short range, it seems lightning only remains stable for a short time, after that it simply dissipates. The water and stone ones went similarly to the force one except with more weight behind the punch. I didn't want to use ice because freezing water takes a lot of mana (for a baby).

After that i just kept experimenting with the force missile in order to understand the rune's limits. I tried making it bigger, faster, pointier and so on. I ended up with a pretty strong force stab. Although it was only strong when compared to a normal force missile. It did end up with a high mana-efficiency though, so that's good.

I spent the next couple weeks experimenting with various missiles, since father didn't want to teach me more runes at the moment. My favorites are the force spike, force cut and the stun missile. The stun missile is essentially a combination of light, sound and the missile rune. When it hits, it let's out a bright flash and a loud sound. It's a little lacking in raw power, so i could really use that bomb rune on this one.

I also made an incendiary missile that combines fire and wind to spread out the fire when it hits, but honestly, it's just a poor man's fire bomb at this point.

Today we are getting another visit, this time it's one of my mother's cousins, so i'll just call her my aunt.

"Good to see you, Isabel." Says auntie with a big smile while she hugs mother. She has auburn hair unlike my mom's blood-red, her face is softer and her body is less toned. Good, grandma looked so much like mom it gave a feeling of my mom time traveling from the future. Auntie is also different in that she is wearing a casual dress.

She also greets dad and Athena before moving on to me. "So this is our family's little arsonist, huh?" She asks with a big smile.

Geh, that's rude. "Hello, auntie, my name is Lance."

"Hello Lance, my name is Alexandra, i'll be your teacher for the foreseeable future." She'll be my what?

I look at dad and he only shrugs his shoulders at me, the traitor. I look at mom and she only nods at me, she was the enemy all along! I look at my last hope, Athena, she only gestures towards auntie with her chin. Oh right, auntie is waiting for my answer.

"... Okay?" Is my answer.

Auntie's smile widens. I have a bad feeling about this, she won't teach me etiquette and detailed history, right? I've seen Athena study that and it just seems like torture to me. In history, for example, there is a bunch of failed rebellion attempts that the teachers made Athena memorize, i'm pretty sure that is done just to demotivate any rebellion ideas.

"Isabel, how about we have a talk in your office, just the two of us?" Suggests auntie, and mother leads the way for her. Now it's just me, Athena and our father.

I look at dad and say, "Dad?" He seems to read my mind and answers. "Don't look at me like that, it's your grandmother's orders." Oh, no... The game was rigged from the start!

~time skip~

From that day onwards, auntie started living with us. She would teach me various topics in the mornings and i'd practice magic and rest in the afternoon.

Right now she's teaching me about the potential problems for an army during winter.

"Hey, auntie." I raise my hand.

"I already told you to call me 'teacher'." She answers with a stern expression.

I sigh. "Teacher."

"Ask away." She answers with her smile back on her face.

"Why do i have to learn about this stuff? Athena is the one who will lead armies." I ask dejectedly.

"Hm? You don't want to help your sister when you grow up?" What a hypocrite, she taught me it's impolite to answer a question with a question.

"Sure i want to, i'd just rather not be in troublesome kinds of leadership positions." Mom's work seems extremely stressful, i'd really rather not.

"So you don't want to learn how to lead armies?" I shake my head as fast as my baby neck will allow me. "I see. Well, to answer your question, because you are a Chevalier. Everyone in our family needs to learn the basics of warfare."

That's horrible! "T-then, could we at least focus more on magic for now? You know, since i'm too young to move around much, i have plenty of time to practice magic, but i have only learned a single rune so far so i have stagnated on that side of things." I ask with the last of my hope.

Auntie has a thoughtful expression. "Well, i suppose that's fine. Let's see... Show me the magics you already know." Thank all that is holy.

We go over the magics i know and i show her what i can do with the missile rune. I don't cast fire burst because i don't want to run out of mana at the moment. She teaches me some variations on the magics i know, like specializing heat to either just heat up or cool down something or using telekinesis on only a specific kind of target like pyrokinesis and hydrokinesis.

We end today's class with learning a rune for propulsion (also called direction), when used with missile it can increase the projectile's speed, power and range. Although it increases the mana cost and makes it harder to home in on a target. It works really well with my force spike.

After lunch, i want to practice more, but my mana is too low... Is there any faster method to regenerate mana? I lie down and close my eyes as if to take a nap and concentrate on my mana. Going by generic fantasy logic, one would either circulate the energy to promote regeneration, absorb the energy from the air that one breathes or... meditate?

Might as well try all of them at the same time. I circulate my mana while breathing deeply and trying to pull mana from the air in my lungs... I'm not sure on the meditation part though, should i just contemplate the meaning of life?

Pushing meditation aside for now, breathing and circulating seems to work in promoting regeneration of mana, but the difference isn't that big... Well, since i'm pulling mana from the air, how about i use magic to help my breathing?

I control the surrounding air to go steadily in and out of my lungs while i enhance my body to assist, don't want to end up with oxygen poisoning or whatever that's called. All the while i'm circulating the mana through my body before using it to to pull in more air and mana.

The resulting process ends up feeling as if i'm circulating mana both inside and outside my body, quite the odd feeling. But it works! I think my mana regeneration almost doubled by doing this.

After my mana is full again i ask Lana to take me to the practice range and i start experimenting with the propulsion rune. No, i'm not playing with magic, this is serious research.

Turns out you don't even need to combine it with the missile rune to use it, I can use it as is. For example, if i combine it with fire it results in a flamethrower. I can do a flamethrower even without the rune, using only raw magic, but with the rune controlling the direction and speed becomes quite easy. Another example is combining it with breeze can result in a very strong wind with minimal mana cost.

Of course, i also combined it with missile to make bolts, making various spells become viable, like lightning bolt, while the range is still pretty short, that's only relative to other bolts. I also managed to make a wind blade, although i'm pretty sure a force blade is better in every possible way.

I also spent some time practicing curving bolts and trying to combine various magics. After a while i started running low on mana so i did that breathing/circulation thingy again. Should i just call it meditation and be done with it?

Now i want to practice advanced raw magic like my fire burst. But where do i even start?

Oh, i know! I will try to make illusions! That ought to help me practice mana control. Let's start small and try to make a butterfly.

I make the shape of a butterfly using light structures and delicately use 'change color' to fill in the details. It's a little hard to maintain the structure and details at the same time, but that's the whole point of this exercise, so it's ok.

I made it into a monarch butterfly, its wings are orange with black lines and white spots. A problem is that i don't remember exactly how the torso of the butterfly looks like so i just made it similar to a dragonfly and made it black with white spots. Good enough.

Right now i have a floating light statue of a monarch butterfly. Now i need it to flap its wings... there we go, that looks natural enough. And now i need to have it rise and fall together with the flap of its wings realistically... Okay, i think this is the hardest part. Having to maintain the illusion while at the same time bending it and moving it across the air is very difficult.

I only succeeded near dinner time. There must be an easier way to do this, i should ask auntie tomorrow.