Every child knew the name of the Witch of the White Woods. It was an only wives tale that mother would tell their children to behave, or the Witch would come and grab you in the night and make you into soup. Asher wondered just how real the stories were. But now before him stood the woman that inspired those nightmarish stories.
Elysium was a paradise that was located on a floating island. It was inhabited by the Alf, an angelic-like species with powerful magic and a long life span. It was the closest the world got to heaven on earth until the Witch of the White Woods looked at the paradise and craved it for herself. She took the power of Elysium, and the floating island fell from the heavens into the ocean and was lost to the sea.
The story was passed down through families till it became a legend. 'Be a good child, or the Witch of the White Woods will come and eat you,' mother would tell their children. Several versions of the stories have appeared. Some say a demon tempted her, others say that she went mad, but they all have one thing in common: she caused the fall of Elysium.
Asher took a deep gulp as this woman, that could only be described as a monster, was looking him over with a decerning eye like a jeweler would look at a precious gem. "Well, I am waiting." Her voice was soft and pleasant, but it carried a hint of annoyance at the boy's presence in her workshop.
Asher realized the lightning spear was still in his hand and quickly put it back. "Sorry, my name is Veras Loki. I am a mercenary with the mercenary guild. I was told to come and find Cynthia to discuss a deal involving her order."
Cynthia pursed her lips like she was about to pout. It was like she clearly had difficulty believing Asher's story, but she forced herself to regardless. "I am she what is wrong with my assignment? Did someone die was there not enough money? I swear you mercenaries should be ashamed trying to bleed a young thing like me dry."
"No, nothing like that. I accepted your quest, and I have more than what you paid for. I was told to come here and sell you the extra." Asher pulled out the canister so she could examine it.
"By how much?" Cynthia opened the canister and lifted up to her nose to check the smell.
"25 Liters in total. They recommend that I come directly to you with the material and sell it to you directly." Asher stated flatly.
"You collected all this by yourself?" Cynthia glared at Asher. Her question was clearly made with disbelief that he could accomplish a feat like this in the time given. To be fair, someone without the interdimensional pocket would have a hard time collecting the residue as they would only be able to collect a few milliliters before the entire thing became unusable. Asher could just put the whole slime into his pocket and not waste a drop.
"Yes," Asher puffed out his chest at his accomplishment. After two days of grinding slime, he filled up the maximum he could carry. "And I got these." He pulled out the two slime cores he got from fighting the blue slime and liquid mass.
Cynthia snatched the liquid mass core. She examined it closely. "How did you get this? Did you steal it from someone?"
"No, I would never." Asher retorted.
"You should not lie, and if you do, you shouldn't make it that obvious. You do even have a solid core yet. You can't do magic, and, therefore, couldn't take down a knight-quality slime by yourself." Cynthia spoke in an all-knowing manner. "If you steal something like this, you are sure to make some enemies that you won't be able to handle."
"You're wrong." Cynthia snapped her attention with a glare that made Asher's boldness quickly disappear. "I mean...I can use magic and was able to get the core by killing a slime."
Cynthia sighed. It was clear that she would have to humor him "I will bite. How did you do it?"
Asher held open his hand as shards of light formed a single arrow. Cynthia's eyes went wide with disbelief. "That shouldn't be possible." She quickly grabbed Asher and examined him closely as if she was looking for some physical flaw. "You don't have a core yet. There should not be any reason you should be able to perform magic."
"That's the second time you mentioned that. What do you mean I don't have a core?"
Cynthia shook her head as if the act of explaining why he need core was so basic and elementary that he was an idiot for even asking. "All creatures with any form of magic have a core. We call them monster cores for monsters and magic cores for humans. Like there is a distinction. The core regulates mana flow through the circuits and converts aether in the air into mana when it enters the body. Without it, you should not be able to perform any feats of magic because your body can not regulate a stable mana flow. Not unless you have a strong magic foundation in mana manipulation or magic theory."
That sound familiar. Wasn't magic foundation one of my skills? Asher thought to himself. "So, how do I get one of these cores?"
"No one taught you advanced magic, have they? What happened to your parents? They should have taught you this."
"Umm...they"re dead...yeah. Died in a monster raid." Asher panicked and quickly made up an excuse. Unfortunately, the only thought he could think of was killing off his father and stepmother. He would only be upset about one of those.
"I see. I am sorry for your loss." Cynthia felt embarrassed just having ridiculed an orphan's parents. She leads Asher back downstairs and to a small sales counter. She took her time examining the cores and canisters. "I will give you 30 bronze for the lot, and I will buy the advance core off you for 2 gold. For the knight core, I can give you 5 and 20 silver. If you have any broken cores, I will add 7 silver for each."
"I will keep the knight core for myself. I have 10 broken cores, but why do you need them." Asher questioned his motives.
"I am going to grind them up to make alchemist tools. It is a good way to use damaged materials, so they have some use. So that comes out to be 2 gold, 70 silver, and 30 bronze." She pulled out a bag and place all the coins in it, making sure Asher could see how much was going in. She handed the coin purse to Asher. She quickly when away with the canister and cores. As she walked away, Asher's system gave a notification.
[Mission "Aquire Slime Residue" Has been completed]
[20 exp has been added]
After about 5 minutes, Cynthia returns with the canister and returns it to Asher. "Will that be all?"
"Actually I was wondering if you could teach more about magic?" Asher was blunt about his request.
Cynthia was a little taken aback. It was obvious to her that this boy was a rare existence. After all her years, she learned one thing that was truly any era. The appearance of a rare existence meant either a great event or disaster. After carefully considering the pros and cons, Cynthia spoke. "Fine I will teach you magic," Asher celebrated for a second before he was cut off, " But you will be my apprentice. You will follow every instruction and every lesson, understood?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Oh and another thing." Cynthia slammed her fist on Asher's head. "Don't call me Ma'am. I am still a vibrant young beauty, you know." Yeah being over two millennia kinds disqualifies you as being young and vibrant. Asher thought as he rubbed his poor head. He wasn't stupid enough to make his thoughts known. Another fist hit him over the head.
"What was that for?"
"You were thinking something rotten I can tell." Oh great, she can read minds. Asher was now starting to regret his decision. "Oh and one more thing. Until otherwise absolutely no magic."
"But why? I can already use it and it would kind of defeat the purpose of asking you to teach me magic."
"If you continue to use magic without a core, you will become overdrawn." After she explained this, Cynthia saw Asher's confused look and continued. "The body has to maintain a certain level of mana concentration. This is why your body naturally recovers mana over time. Overdrawn is a condition when your body can't keep up with the mana you are using. Normally this happens when you use a spell that uses more than your natural mana limit. But for you, it could happen because you don't have a core to convert aether into mana to replace what you use."
'So that's what happens to me. Yeah, I don't want that to happen again.' Asher thought to himself. "So how do I solidify my core."
"You collect aetheric essence. It is a dense cluster of aether that appears in the area of dense magic. You take these fragments into your body then use your mana to condense it inside your body creating a core." Cynthia started to rifle through a shelf of glass vials. "You will need to collect essences for each element you have. That is a great balance."
"Great balance?"
"How mages can be strong without having a large number of elements. An omnimage will have to take more time to create their core than a monomage because they have to collect more aetheric essence. How many elements do you have? And Which ones? Do you know which ones you have an affinity for?"
"I am a hexamage. Spatial, illusion, alchemy, enchantment, enhancement, and taming, and what do you mean by affinity."
As if to respond, Cynthia grabbed a few vials as he listed each of his elements. "Not a bad assortment. Not much in the way of power, but a decent variety of skill sets. An affinity for an element just means it comes easier. Anybody with at least two elements will tell you that certain elements just are easier for them. When you start collecting aetheric essences, the affinities will be easy to discern because they will be ones that take the least effort to collect."
'By that description, I guess I have the strongest affinity for illusion magic and weakest for Alchemy.' Cynthia with vials in hand led Asher down a hidden flight of stairs into the basement. "Does that mean that the lowest affinity will be the most difficult to master?"
They came out to what looked like a lab. There was a work table circle sketch on a chalkboard and chemical apparatus with glass vials and tubes attached. "Not necessarily. It will just take some time to get accustomed to where as high affinity needs little to no adjustment." She set the vials down in front of the apparatus as she prepared for something. As she did, a chime from his system came.
[New quest, 'Create the Core']
[Create the Core]
[Thanks to Cynthia, you now know enough to take the next step to becoming stronger. You will have to gather aetheric essence using meditation for the material. Then you will have to form the core itself.]
[Objective]
Gather Aetheric essence
[Conditions]
Illusion essence 30/500
Enchantment essence 13/500
Spacial essence 11/500
Enchantment 7/500
Taming essence 19/500
Alchemic essence 0/500
[Objective unknown]
[Objective Unknown]
Failure conditions: None
Time limit: None
Rewards: Novice Mage Title