Many months had passed as Rielen had worked to master her new abilities. After she had awoken her fire mana, she had gone into deep contemplation about the source of different mana. After working with her magic theory professor, she had awoken with other such powers.
Rielen's current mana:
Air
Enchantment
Fire
Ground
Ice
Lightening
Nature
Reinforcement
Solar
Teleportation
Water
Rielen was starting to feel like some overpowered person she had read about in the times she took off from studying to read for fun. Some of these new abilities she had learned from the basics of other magics, like Ice magic, which stemmed from Water Magic and Air Magic.
Solar Magic came from Nature Magic. Even Reinforcement Magic had come from descriptions from Eon on their weekly meetings.
She had not mentioned her new abilities to him. She felt guilty, but she knew that her time was limited with him so she instead used it to discuss other things. Like how she had received a chest full of letters from her Mother and Father. She had only been allowed to reply with one letter, which was carefully reviewed and edited before it was allowed out.
Still she was able to share with him things his Father and Mother had been doing back in their old village. Eon smiled gently at that. Small tendrils of homesickness had trickled in after a few years. He missed being surrounded by the forest with one laughing girl.
The muscles she had grown accustomed to seeing had changed her childhood friend. She no longer contemplated the strange connection she had with Eon. To her, it didn't matter anymore. She chose the feelings she had, and there was no one to tell her differently.
She had but one goal in her mind. She would earn the achievements needed in order to guarantee her freedom. Her lessons with Charla had come to an end. At her last lesson, she had been passed a note from her teacher.
"Rielen,
I believe you can find a way to secure your own fate. You will need to gain power in order to gain your freedom. My thoughts are with you and the others.
C"
Charla had disappeared from the Academy. Rielen suspected that her presence in the station she was in was unique. The extensive knowledge she had imparted on Rielen made her suspect that she held a very interesting position in the Kingdom.
She felt that the details of which were not something she could simply ask the woman. Rielen ate with the three new girls that had entered the Academy. She had been here for five years now, and Trina, Allora, and Nya had all left the Academy. Trina and Allora were sent to the Military. Nya was assigned to the Healer Area to further her training as a Healer; Water mages were almost always sent there. Trina's Wind Magic and Allora's Fire Magic were more attack based.
Rielen rarely saw Nya. She was often busy with many tasks the times she had to visit Karla for basic training in Healer Arts. Rielen had focused her Water Magic training in the healing arts. Things went well with her Nature Magic, allowing her to make and administer her own herbal medicines.
Each awakening of a new ability had lengthened Rielen's stay at the Academy. Apparently, the King had given her special compensation due to the special abilities she had been learning. She learned at a faster pace than usual, so that also helped her case.
She often wondered what kept Eon in the Academy. It was an unspoken rule for Selected not to talk about their abilities. She didn't know why this became a thing; it just had. She thought the Selected were meant to unconsciously forget about the things that caused stress in their daily lives. She only hoped that he would continue to be in her life.
Eon laughed at some joke she had come up with. He had received his first letter from his family. Rielen could only assume he had achieved something to allow Grend to let him start receiving letters as she had. "Mother says that your parents and mine get together once a week to pray for our safety at the old clearing, where we liked to play as kids."
Rielen's heart hurt thinking about the bare letter she was allowed to send to them. She had basically only been allowed to tell them she was alive and at the Capital. She was not allowed to describe her daily life, or what she did every day.
'Mother,' she wrote, 'I remember your garden as if it were yesterday. I often think of the roses you worked so meticulously to grow. Please think of me every time you tend to the flowers you love so much.'