I closed the booklet on this world history and breathed out.

That was an interesting learning experience. This world is more interesting than I thought, but really nothing is known about it. Also only ancient history to the time of the creation of 'Magia' was recorded, with nothing more recent. I would like to assume that this booklet is old because of how worn out it is, but it might actually be modern and I am just misreading the entire situation.

Either way, I can ask Grandma Sophia or Julie for information regarding the current situation in the world or be patient so that I experience everything myself.

After pondering about this decision for a small while, I decided to go with the second option of going out ignorant to the world and making decisions about it with as little outside opinions as possible. Betty would also likely enjoy it, so it kills two birds with one stone.

Still, the facts presented by the books are very interesting, and actually gave me some information about the characteristics of my race. So I have three times the lifespan of a regular human.

The information doesn’t really help too much however, because I have no idea what is the average life expectancy in this world. Either way, I can’t help but feel as though I was given an extra long life by Betty so he could enjoy this scenario for a longer time.

I placed the informative booklet onto the ground and stood up with the assistance of wind element infused ‘aura’. I picked up the booklet and the ‘weapon’, coated both with ‘Fear’s Illusion’ and then proceeded to sneak back into the Grandma’s annex to return the booklet.

Weirdly enough, Grandma still hadn’t returned even then, so it wasn’t anywhere near as difficult as it would be to normally place the book back on the shelf while hiding it. I used a combination of wind and fire magic to cool down the area underneath the booklet and the area leading it to the top of the shelf so as to create an artificial updraft.*

This updraft carried the book up to the level of the shelf I wanted to put it on, and then I moved the air particles away from the book and that in turn lowered the atmospheric pressure of the location. With this decrease in pressure, a gust of wind was generated that would push the book onto the shelf.**

This was actually a method that I created by analysing the fireball creation method that Betty taught me about. It seems to be that using physics and understanding science seems to be one of the greatest factors for creating a cost efficient spell.

For example, normal mages would manipulate the air particles in a large area and then attempt to compress them into a tight pocket of air with their ‘aura’. Then they would push that pocket upwards with incredible speed and have to calculate the exact force required to reach the correct height. Then they would use another pocket of air to push it straight onto the shelf, and they would use this method in combat as well.

Unfortunately for them, this took far too much ‘aura’ consumption because of the pure amount of air particles that had to be affected for them to create a powerful enough air pocket. This differed when using my method because of the limited amount of particles used and instead the usage was replaced with the natural, fundamental laws of physics as substitutes.

Afterwards, I decided to go look for another source of information on one of the most interesting things in the history booklet: Magia and the Academies. This source of information was of course, Grandma Sophia.

I had an incredible amount of curiosity felt towards this country and what I could potentially learn in the academies. Although it technically wasn’t really necessary for me to go to any school or academy to become proficient in magic, I felt like the greatest advantage that I could receive from such a school would be some kind of degree.

It would be logical for a school to give out some kind of degree or certificate upon completing its courses after all, and this would be a great supplier of money. Being completely honest here, I don’t really care much about money, since I can easily survive in the wilderness completely broke. But the same cannot be said about Grandma and the children here at this orphanage.

I enjoy the idea of ‘give and take’, where a person who provides help for someone else has to be repaid by the person cared for. Grandma has taken care of me for a long time, along with this orphanage in general, so I believe that providing them with a slightly better financial situation is the least I can do.

I walk up to one of the boys that looks about 8 or so years of age, and ask with a sweet, childish, slightly slurred voice that I managed to perfect by going through my memories for tips on this. It is a truly effective way of getting things that you want, honestly I am surprised at how powerful the effect of the voice is when paired with a 4 year-old.

“Brother, do you know where Grandma is?”

All the children within the orphanage are like one large family, with no bullying and nothing less than a positive relationship between all of us. Because we are a family, we refer to each other as brother or sister, and I have noticed that they have begun to refer to Julie as Mother, whilst still referring to Grandma as well… Grandma.

She was slowly making her way up the social hierarchy in this orphanage, and her face was relatively entertaining to watch whenever one of the kids called her Mother. It was a cross between bliss and ecstasy, kind of off putting, but still entertaining.

The boy turned around and saw me looking at him while using the divine technique (Chapter 7). He couldn’t resist ‘spilling the beans’ about Grandmas location and actually gave a decent explanation along with it.

“Grandma is outside with Mother and they are talking with one of the children who left us about 8 years back and managed to get a job as a transporter who would move goods from place to place via a carriage.

Apparently he came to deliver some free goods that he managed to buy with his saved up money. Make sure you don’t go outside as you’re too young and not allowed okay? I wasn’t supposed to tell you anyways.

I would love to be a transporter and move goods around as well because of how well payed it is and its…”

At that point I completely tuned out and after applying a coat of ‘Fear’s Illusion’ on myself, I quietly but quickly ran outside with assistance from a bit of wind magic. Outside I saw a person in his early 20s leaning against the carriage whilst talking with Grandma who had Julie by her side who seemed to be entranced by the person.

Her appearance towards him wasn’t that strange considering how he looked. He was a human who was about 6 foot 3, with short dark hair, a short beard of the same colour and tanned white skin. He had clearly defined muscles visible through his black shirt and he also wore some dark shorts. His whole wardrobe basically spoke the colour black.

Seeing the enamored appearance of Julie, I had a divine vision of a perfect scenario that I could cause. With a grin on my face I decide to begin the steps that would lead up to the divine situation.

This will be fun.

I manipulate my ‘aura’ that I infuse with the wind element and make it enter the particles in front of Julie's feet. I then use the same trick that I used for the book placement and lower the atmospheric pressure in that area by manipulating the air particles into the area where the man stood.

I made sure that the particles moved towards the man since he was leaning against the carriage and that would keep him from falling over because of the sudden push of particles towards him. I then retracted my ‘aura’ and released control over the particles.

Let all hell break loose.

With the release of the particles, they moved very quickly towards the low concentration zone, creating a wind in front of Julie’s feet which caused her to lose her balance and fall forward. The best part of it was, that straight in front of Julie was the man, so she basically fell into his arms.

Although I was incredibly exhausted since pushing a grown up requires an amount of ‘aura’ capacity which I barely had enough of, I didn’t regret the decision. With the success of my magic, it felt as though my lips were tearing apart from my attempt to stop myself from laughing.

Luckily I succeeded and was able to watch the reactions of the two without cracking up.

The man was completely stunned by the situation, and Julie reacted much worse. She went completely red a few seconds after falling into his arms as she realised what had occurred. While this was all happening Grandma looked at her with a surprised reaction, but it was the quickest to settle, being replaced with an omniscient expression. She said with incredible sincerity the words that would fuel the already raging hot fire.

“So that’s how it is.”

After those words Julie went even redder and quickly pushed herself off him with all the force she could muster, but you could see her reluctance in her face when she did this action. I would have kept her in her previous position if I had the ‘aura’ capacity to do so, but alas I did not, so I will have to live with it.

Still red-faced, she opened her mouth as to try to explain the situation but the words she spoke were completely unheard under the laughter that the man released.

“HAHAHAHAHA, Girl, I know that you might have feelings for me, but there are steps to this that have to be achieved before just diving into my arms.”

Although Julie turned the pinnacle of the colour red from the entire situation, she still managed to rebut the point he made quickly and actually explain herself, albeit she was stuttering.

“N-no, I was actually pushed by an unnatural wind at my feet, didn’t you guys feel it?”

Grandma quickly spoke up her answer to the question:

“I for one did not feel any wind at all, and do you realise how flawed your argument is? Why would there be wind only at your feet?”

The man frowned upon this argument but actually supported Julie with his answer.

“Although it is true that the wind is strange, I also felt wind pushed against my feet, but since I was leaning against the carriage, it didn’t really do much. I don’t really know how that wind could be natural, without me feeling it affect any other part of me.”

The 3 of them then went deep into thought with Julies face cooling rather quickly. Quite regretful really, I wanted this situation to be awkward for longer. Then Grandma seemed to notice something and as I was wondering exactly what it was that she noticed, she looked straight at me and said:

“Sephtis, what are you doing here?”

Only then did I realise that after my little prank, I lost quite a large amount of my coating of ‘Death’s Illusion’, making myself and the ‘weapon’ visible to everyone.

Oh, shit.

*Google is your best friend

**Google is still your best friend

-Waffle Fluff