Chapter 9 – School

Yay! My first day of school! I’m so excited … or no, not really. Today is beginning of new term in the school I will be attending. I admit I was a bit excited about this at first but when I think that I will have to spend half a day with a horde of five years old kids is depressing.

In those four months my magic skills improved drastically … or that what I would like to happen but in reality I made no progress at all. I tried to create basic spells I once learned from the books but it’s hard for me after all. Although I can do it, it takes me about four minutes to create a basic fireball. In a battlefield where every second counts it would be a suicide to stay still and concentrate on a spell for so long. But I already got over the fact that I can’t be a mage.

Sniff…. Really!

Anyway. I quickly eat breakfast and go out with father. He lead me to the school. It’s a big three story building like many others in the capitol. He wanted to go with me inside but it would be embarrassing so I told him to leave.

I notice I’m nervous after all so I try to calm down and then enter. What I see inside can be described with one word. Chaos. A mob of children running in every direction. Some crying and clinging to their parents, some laughing and playing with other kids. Ugh … those will be my friends from now on? What should I even talk with them about? Now that I think about it, I never really interacted with children my age in this world. The only one close to my age that I ‘play’ with is Cril, and she’s barely one and a half. Well, I guess I will play the role of a lonely bookworm here. Easier this way.

After some time teachers finally manage to get all the children to their respective classrooms. Though I bet it was decided at random who goes where. I’m in class with twenty nine other imps. After another ten minutes of crying, laughing and screaming everyone is seated. When finally everybody calmed down, a young teacher start his introductions. And no, it’s not a hot, young woman with big breast, just a very normal looking black haired man.

“Hello children, my name is Berar. I will be your teacher this year. Today I will explain to you our school learning system and what you will be learning this year.

Every day you will have six hours of lessons. Every lesson is more or less one hour. There are five mandatory classes you have to attend. Math, History, Language, Magic Arts and Combat Arts. Besides these you have to pick five more. I will give you list of available subjects to pick from later.

Now the teams. All of you will be grouped into teams of three at random. Every time there’s a task or test you have to do as a team, you will do it in teams we decide today. We do it to make you learn how to work with different people and also so you will make friends faster. Every year we will change teams compositions randomly so you will have a chance to work with as many different people as possible.

First we will create teams and then you will pick your classes. You may like to choose similar classes as a team.”

After this speech teacher brought a big jar with paper scraps from under his desk.

“In this jar are pieces of paper with your names on them. I will randomly choose three names from it for every team. OK, let’s start. Team one, Jomel, …..”

He start calling names and selected kids from the same team look at each but don’t move from theirs seats. Wow, I’m actually really nervous about this. I hope I won’t end up in a team with some loud and obnoxious brats. Time goes on and there’s finally that moment.

“Team five, Kriss, Nela Reisia, Kevin. Team six, …”

Wait, wait, wait! Too fast! I hadn’t had a chance to see who is in my team! And how come there’s a noble kid in this school!? It’s a school for commoners! In Reiran only nobles have surnames. My family may be more wealthy than most of the nobles but we don’t have one either. Damn it. I specifically told father that I don’t want to go to the school for nobles because everyone would have just tried to approach me considering my family position. Well, if she is in the school for commoners then maybe she’s not that bad. Time will tell.

After every time is decided we are given list of available classes and told to gather as a team at one table. Most of the kids don’t know their teammates so they just walk around asking everybody what’s their team number. I also don’t know who is in my team so I make them come to my table. I stand up and say with loud voice.

“TEAM FIVE COME OVER HERE.”

Everybody in the classroom look at me in sudden silence and a moment later two kids walk over to me. One is a girl with shoulder length black hair, sharp black eyes and a wide grin on her face. Ugh, I’m not good with this type. I read her aura and unlike her appearance she has pure light affinity. The boy on the other hand seems to be very timid. He’s nervously clenching his hands and looking at me from under his bangs as he slowly approach. How to say it, his appearance is kind odd. His hair has gray color. Not like an old human grey hair bot more like stone gray or smoke grey. I can barely see his eyes but those are also odd. They are green, so green that I could swear they would shine phosphorescent green in darkness. Let’s check his aur….

HOLY FUCKING JESUS CHRIST !!! What the fuck is this?! His aura is so thick that I can’t see him through it. But it’s not its strength that is freaky. It’s his attribute. Death. Once I tried to create every kind of element just to see if I can so I know how they look like. Death mana is the most particular one. It doesn’t has an uniform color like others but look like a grey fog with phosphorescent green spots. It has an eerie feel to it. But still, just how high your affinity have be to alter even your appearance. Who is this guy? A friggin god of death in disguise? And of he has so strong affinity then why is he here and not in Reiran Academy? I start to wonder if this school has a hobby of gathering weirdoes.

They take chairs from nearby desks and sit at my desk. I hope my shock was not shown on my face. OK, time for introductions. Smile, smile, shy expression, have to give off bookworm atmosphere, first impressions are important after all.

“Hi, I’m Kriss. I’m a little shy so sorry if I don’t speak a lot. I hope we will get along.”

Yess! Perfect. Now how will they respond? First to speak is Nela as expected.

“Hi there Kriss, I’m Nela. I may be a noble but please treat me as a normal girl. But still, you say you are shy Kriss but it’s kind of hard to believe with that stunt you pulled of a second ago. Hehehe …. I have a feeling you are a lot more interesting than you appear to be.”

Damn it, fail. I shouldn’t have done that one before. I may have failed with her but let’s see what Death God will say.

“Ummm … I’m Kevin … ummm … umm … nice to meet you.”

Wow, who knew that Death God is so shy.

But it really bugs me, why are they in this school? Neither one should be here. Let’s ask Nela, I yet have to think of an excuse to ask Kevin about his affinity.

“So Nela, why are you in this school, I mean isn’t it strange for a noble to be here right?”

“Hmm? I don’t really know myself. I want to be a royal guard in the future so I was supposed to go to the Warriors School but half a month ago father told me that I will be going here instead. I protested but it’s not like he will listen to me will he? I hate him for this!”

Somehow she got angry at the end. I think I know the reason why she’s here. Her father had to pull a lot of stings to put her in the same class as me, not to mention the same team. Now Kevin. But how to approach him? Arghh I have no idea. I guess I will just ask him directly.

“I don’t want to be rude but you have a strange hair and eyes color Kevin, can I ask you why is that so?”

Though I already asked you.

“Eehhh? … My hair color? … When I was tested for magic abilities they told me that it’s because of my affinity.”

Bull’s-eye!

“Affinity?”

“Yeah. I’m not too sure about this myself … but I have a high death affinity they say.”

So it’s just like I though. But it doesn’t explain why he’s here.

“Then why are you here and not in Reiran Academy?”

Instead of Kevin, Nela answered me.

“Isn’t it because death magic is useless?”

“Useless? Why is that so?”

“I only know what my sister told me so. She said that there are no death mages in Reiran Academy because they are useless.”

Useless? But doesn’t even the name ‘Death Mage’ sound op? And he have ridiculously high affinity. Screw that. Let’s choose our classes and be over with it. I will ask Ane about that death magic later.

“So, what classes you want?”

“Advanced Combat Arts!”

Well, that’s to be expected.

“Ok, and what do you want Kevin?”

“Umm … Biology? …”

Why do you ask me? And why Death God wants to study biology? To find more efficient ways to kill perhaps?

As for me … hmmm … I guess I want to use magic after all.

“For me Advanced Magic Arts.”

“Alright, that leave us two more. Personally I would like something combat related but what do you want boys?”

“Can it be … umm … something that deals with life?”

Life hmmm? Combat and life. I would choose Advanced Healing Magic but there’s no way Kevin can use life mana with his affinity. Hmmm. Oh, this one should do.

“Maybe Magic Beasts Study?”

“Yeah, will do.”

“Umm .. ok.”

“That leaves us one more. Personally I would like something easy. But what do you want?”

“Don’t care. I only wanted Advanced Combat Arts.”

“Can we … umm … choose Botany?”

Botany? Just how much does he want to deal with life? Although it seems to be an easy class so why not.

“I guess we can.”

Like this we picked our classes for the next year. We didn’t thought about it too hard if you ask me but whatever. They won’t demand ridiculous things from five years old kids right?

After we picked our classes we are free to go home so I quickly leave and head to the bookstore. Inside I look for Ane. I find her aura on the second floor so I quickly go there. She’s talking with Faro like usual. I think he’s the only reason she is still working here, she finished her studies in academy last year. I don’t really want to interrupt them but I know that they will stay like this for hours.

“Hi Ane, hi Faro. It’s a beautiful day isn’t it?”

“Oh, hi Kriss, wasn’t you supposed to be in school right now?”

“It’s too boring there so I came here.”

“Yeah right, so? What do you want?”

“Hey! Why do you think that the only reason I talk to you is that I want something?”

“Because if you didn’t want something you would just take a book from somewhere and start reading it. You never look for me just to say hello.”

“Ok fine! I want something. Can we talk now?”

“Sigh. Let’s go downstairs, I don’t want to talk for hours standing.”

Sigh, somehow it didn’t bothered you when you were talking with Faro. We go to the ground floor and sit at one of the tables.

“So? What do you want Kriss?”

“What do you know about death magic?”

“Death magic? Why so sudden?”

“Well, I saw an amazing kid at school today. He had that unbelievable death attributed aura and …”

Oh crap!

“Death attributed … aura? What is that aura you are talking about Kriss?”

Damn it. I forgot that I never told anybody about this ability of mine. Now that I think about it, when I decided to keep it secret, the reason was that I don’t wanted to be considered a demon or some kind. Now I know I’m a demon and magic abilities are a norm in this world. Then why I still keep it secret? Habit I suppose. I guess I can tell her about it.

“Ummm … I probably never told you but I can see a sort of aura around people that reflect theirs affinities. Have you ever heard of something like that?”

“No, I haven’t. How do you ‘see’ this aura?”

“When I release my mana around someone I can see what affinity he have and its strength.”

“Hmmm. I wonder how it works. I can sense areas with more fire and earth mana in similar way but not to the extent you describe it.”

“But you can sense something.”

“Yes, because I have high fire and earth affinity so the regions where my mana can turn nature mana into fire or earth mana faster than normal can be somewhat sensed. But I don’t really use my mana to sense it, it’s more of an instinct.”

“Then what if I had all of affinities? Couldn’t I sense auras thanks to that?”

“…”

“Hey! Why do you look at me with pity!?”

“Kiss, you can’t have all affinities, it’s impossible.”

“But if I had all affinities then wouldn’t the result of my affinity test been the same as if I had only neutral mana?”

“It’s true but … let me explain it to you. Try creating two equal balls of mana. One of fire and one of water.”

Haaa. I calm down and do as she ask me. Hope that maybe I can use magic after all made me a bit too excited I guess. After six minutes I’m finally done with the mana balls.

“OK, now try to merge them into one ball of mana of water/fire element.”

I bring the balls together and instead of water/fire mana there’s a flash of light and both mana balls disappear.

“You see Kriss, mana with one element will always negate the mana of opposing element. Because of that there’s no person alive with opposing affinities.”

“But nature mana consist of all the elements. How come they don’t negate each other?”

“Look closer at the space you negated the balls. What do you see there?”

I focus my mana in that space and try to see what she is talking about.

“There’s some fire mana … “

“Yes, you haven’t created two equal balls but one was bigger than other, because of that there’s some leftover mana that wasn’t negated. If you created equal balls then you would be able to merge them into water/fire mana because it’s the only state that opposing elements can coexist, but that’s a feat no mage ever was able to achieve. Nature mana is special, it’s a perfect equilibrium of all eight elements, it’s one of the wonders of nature how it became like this.”

“But … but.. but what if I was born with a perfectly equal mana?”

“Then you would die the moment you use your first spell.”

“Ehhhh? Why?”

“Sigh. Sometimes I have a feeling you just pretend to read all those books. Do you know how you can gain affinities?”

“When you cast a lot of spells?”

“Yes, but more precisely, when you convert nature mana you turn your own mana into specific element. Mana can be called an extension of your soul so when you suck your mana back to your body, it will automatically revert into your basic mana. But this process is not perfect. Some of that mana retain its the elemental attribute. It’s really small amount so to increase your affinity even slightly you have to cast tens of thousands spells.

So if you had had perfectly equal opposing affinities and casted a spell using only one of them you would destabilize those affinities and end up exploding yourself.”

Damn it. So there’s no hope I have some mysterious powerful affinity. Sigh, and this was my last hope to become a real mage.

“Then why I can see auras?”

“When a mage with high affinity release his mana, the part of his mana already is elemental because of his affinity, the neutral part of his mana will slowly turn into the element of his elemental affinity. But because you have almost pure neutral mana so it get more affected by outside sources elemental mana than your own elemental affinity mana.

Every person release bits of their mana constantly if they want or not. It’s really small amount so you don’t even notice it normally but your neutral mana is affected by this leakage. I guess that if you increase your affinity with some element to a certain point then you will lose that ability to see auras.”

“Sigh. So it’s like this hmmm?”

“I may be wrong about that aura thing but I’m confident that you don’t have any affinity.”

But really, does she know everything? This Ane. I guess she really has been one of the best students of Reiran Academy. Ahh. I almost forgot about that death mana thing.

“So Ane, coming back to my first question, what do you know about death magic?”

“It’s useless?”

“Why is that so.”

“Because death mana can’t affect anything with life mana, which means every living thing.”

“But I thought that living beings have personal mana, not life mana. And can’t death mana just negate life mana?”

“Life mana in living beings come from their bodies, not soul like personal mana. You can say that you are made of life mana like rocks are made from earth mana. And no, life and death mana don’t negate but repel each other, and also no, you can’t have dual affinities of life and magic. Instead of explosion of your body, your soul would be torn apart.”

“Then what uses death magic have?”

“You can decay dead things with death mana and that’s basically it. Maybe there are a few spells more but none are useful.”

“So that’s why it’s called useless magic hmmm.”

“Yes, and if you have high death affinity it will be harder for you to become a warrior because life mana in your body will interrupt with your strengthening magic.”

Wow. Kevin has it even worse than me. I should be nicer to him in the future.

I talk with Ane about some meaningless things for a bit longer and head home. It’s still early but I feel like brainwas..*cough* playing with Cril so she will respect her older brother.

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***Author corner***

A bit longer chapter than usual because I wanted to explain that Kriss is by no means some kind of ultra OP character from birth.