2 days later.
Lena has just come back from a quest. She's at the adventurer's guild submitting her report. The receptionist this time around isn't the enthusiastic over the top usual one since of course she wouldn't always be the one behind the desk. Lena gives her report to the more self-collected receptionist and turns around to leave, but right before leaving she hears someone calling for her from the door that leads into the backside of the adventurer's guild's building where all the workers would be. Lena turn's to the voice just to see trestina waving at her while slowly jogging towards her.
"Lena you could've at least asked about me you know!" trestina said while panting.
"Well it isn't the first time where you weren't there so I thought it was a simple shift change, plus is it okay for you to just leave work like that?" Lena said while looking down at trestina who run out of breath because of a short jog.
Trestina straightened her pose after catching her breath and continued.
"I was helping out the information division since something pretty terrible came up, and don't worry about it I asked uolya take care of my work for a second." Trestina said.
"So what is it?" Lena asked.
"Do you remember when I told you about how you should learn more magic? Have you really even tried to expand on it?" trestina asked.
Lena gave a nervous laugh while scratching her head.
"*sigh* though so, Lena your a gold adventurer now knowing even the simplest of magic is important, do you even know the basics of magic?" Trestina asked.
"Even though I do know one spell and something weird, I don't really understand how it works so I guess no..." Lena said.
"I can't believe this... ok good thing I came for you then. Look Lena If you want to- actually no it's against your will. 3 days from now, you're gonna meet up with someone who is gonna teach you about magic, sadly he's just a silver adventurer but you aren't a magician so just the basics would be more than enough for now. Getting him to accept this was hard on me so if you don't show up I will be pretty upset!" trestina said as she pointed at Lena.
Lena thought about it for a second then accepted the opportunity.
3 days later.
Lena goes to the planned meet up location with the silver magician, He is already there by the time Lena shows up.
"Oh, there you are. Tres did say there is a chance you might not show up so I was about to leave in a bit." The man said as he picked up the staff he had on the ground next to the tree he had his back laying on.
The man slowly moved towards Lena. With a hand on his chin he looked her up and down.
"So you are The Lena huh? The same one who jumped up to gold in just a short what 3? 5? month period. That's pretty fast you know, some people like me get stuck in silver for years, I've already been at it for what 2 to 3 years now you know, and then there's people like you, people who in mere months, hell some even get over it in weeks. They make us who slowly grow or never grow look like waste and garbage. It does make me question the fairness in life you know. It's not like there is some kind of system that magically tells you 'oh you're now stronger', It's all pure talent and inheritance. Someone from a knight family might not always grow up to be a knight, but when they do they sure are good at it, and those who just randomly pick up something and realize their gift at it aren't they just the best? People just love to talk about them. From papers to gossip all you will hear is 'oh yeah this kid from the boonies is apparently a Legendary poet.'. People like to talk about how hard work will help you and about how hard work isn't for nothing, yet still absolutely favor those with talent over those who work. It's funny it really is don't you think so too Lena? Oh right of course you wouldn't laugh with us." The man ranted while circling Lena.
Lena only stayed silent and looked at him straight.
The man sighed and shrugged.
"Well complaining about life Isn't why I'm here. Tres told me about how you want to learn magic, and since it was Tres I agreed you're lucky it was her. No one else would've been able to convince to do anything for them except for her." said the man.
Lena kept silent.
"you look down at magic don't you?" the man said while looking at Lena fiercely.
Lena didn't say anything but she couldn't deny it for she has never seen Octan use any magic aside from that one strengthening spell and a weird move. Even though he had slain countless colossal monsters not once had she seen him rely on magic, so she did look down on it.
"I see. Have you ever fought a magician before?" the man asked.
"No, but I did fight monsters that use magic." Lena said.
"Haha, I see. Get ready." The man said throwing away all the extra luggage he had.
Lena confused for a second asked what he meant.
"It's obvious isn't it? A spar. We're gonna spar. After all how there isn't a better way to teach something than hand on experience." The man said as he prepared his stance.
Lena followed his example thinking this wouldn't be so difficult given their ranking.
Lena holds the sword she had gotten from the wild land's guilds blacksmith one that is almost a replica of her previous sword.
They enter a short staring contest and then Lena quickly with a single step appears in front of the man swinging her sword to his neck.
In a panic the man quickly puts his staff in between his neck and the sword, he quickly holds the staff with one hand stopping the sword from cutting his head off and with the other hand he aims it at Lena's face.
Lena not knowing what he is about to do jumps back.
'T-This bitch was about to kill me for real?!' the man said to himself.
'What part of this is a spar does she not understand?????' the man panicked inside
'But I can't backdown I believe my chances of winning are still high and I do backdown it would ruin my whole point.' the magician calmed down and decided as he chose magic over life.
He took a deep breath and quickly figured out what he is about to do.
Lena Looked at him fiercely and then a short while after ran towards him straight on again planning to turn around him last second and attack from behind, But while she ran at him, He raised his hand and shot some kind of water into the ground in front of Lena trapping her leg into the ground as if it had turned into a swamp.
'w-what is this' Lena thought.
The man then raised his staff and aimed it towards Lena which made her quickly pull out her right leg and jump to the side as a fire explosion replaced her on the mud.
Lena looked at the explosion distracted for a second then quickly turned her head towards the magician who was pointing a finger at her with water cover it's tip.
Lena quickly stood back up only to then kneel back down from a quick shot of pain that came from her knee seemingly out of nowhere.
The magician then Looked down at Lena as she was kneeling down.
Lena with tongue click quickly got up and started running around him.
The man placed his staff down with its lower tip piercing the ground while it stayed in his hand.
Lena seeing it as an opening quickly jumped in on him only for a wall to appear out of nowhere making her hit it head first.
Lena cursed at all this magic tricks and jumped back.
The man came from the right of the wall and continued to look down on Lena.
"What happened miss gold. You were pretty pushy at the start." the man said provoking her.
Lena knew better than to be provoked, but with all those surprise attacks she was already annoyed so it made it harder to control herself. Angered she gave a sprint towards him.
The magician quickly makes a fire ball that he shoots towards Lena.
Lena in the spur of the moment with her sword in her hand cuts through it and continues moving.
'What?!' the magician panicked put his staff and back to the ground.
Lena thinking he was gonna bring out another wall prepares her sword, but instead he just raises his ground level by making the ground under him elevate quickly.
Lena then quickly follows him by jumping as high as she could.
'shit that was quick.' said the man.
As soon as she reached his height level Lena with her right hand holding the sword she prepares to attack his neck from the far left to the right.
The magician quickly raises his right hand towards Lena's stomach as he slowly moved backwards, only to then have an explosion in between Lena and himself knock them both in different directions.
Lena who was a second away from cutting the man's head off is now blown away with her stomach exposed from the explosion.
The man who prepared himself for the explosion gets up before Lena and quickly puts 3 earth walls around her while aiming his staff straight at her with a fireball at its tip that would indeed deal damage..
Even though the explosion from before was a bit weak Lena knew that was merely to keep distance and that if she were to take a real one head on she would have to pay for it with a couple of days.
She looked around her only to see that the walls are very close to her from her behind and sides while in front of her its a bit of a walk. Making an immediate escape impossible.
She throws her sword away and raises one hand signaling her defeat with a look of disappointment on herself.
The magician then shot up the ball towards the sky only for it to be a normal fireball and not an explosion.
"We can bluff too you know." the man said with a smirk.
"You can't compare human magician's to monsters. While some monsters could have stronger magic power they rarely ever apply strategy or use their surroundings so to compare one who thinks to one who just acts is quite unfair don't you think miss gold?" said the man as his slow breath slowly showed itself.
"Again... Let's go at it again!" Lena said mad.
"hey hey now! only reason I beat you was because you were taken by surprise. Next time we spar I won't be even able to lay a hand on you.
"Anyway, that's enough I did what I wanted to do now onto your lesson." the man said as the ground he had altered slowly broke down.
"You don't have to be so tense sorry about that earlier, here go sit there as I explain the basics of magic first." the man said as he pointed at the grassy ground.
Lena listened and sat at where he pointed.
"Ok first, anything you know about magic? anything at all?" the man asked as he put the staff down.
"It makes thing appear out of nowhere." Lena said.
"ahh.. yeah I guess you can see it like that, But come one there is something behind it nothing appears out of nowhere, what makes it appear is something called mana. Basically mana is the essence of life or that's how we understand it right now at least. It's what keeps someone moving and what keeps nature green. Everything has mana in it from you to the small rock there. Without mana everything would just shrivel away and die. Now people at some point discovered that and thought about what would happen if they could control mana, and that's how magic was first thought of. It's the idea of using the mana in you and turn it into whatever you desire. First of all, turning mana into something that has a hard layer is very difficult, There is only so much in the world who can do that. That's why Magic is mostly used with elements such as fire, air, water and earth. With the fire, air, and water its merely changing the mana into such an element, while earth is a bit more difficult with you having to send your mana into any type of surface around you and turning it into the dominant mana so you could control those surfaces. Here an example." The man said as he raised his staff pointing to the tree.
he held it for a second and then a ball of fire started forming as it spun at the tip of the staff, and short while after it had hit the tree. Then seemingly out of nowhere air started shooting from his location to the tree spreading the fire to the couple of trees around, and then at the tip of his staff a ball of water this time started forming which he shot up above the tree and made explode making it seem like rain as it put off the fire.
"Ok so, first these are what we would call spells. as you could see even though my fire was generated from mana it still stayed and burnt the tree, and when air was blown it even expanded and spread around, then when water was added to the mix it immediately put out. Even though the fire was made from my own mana as soon as I disperse it it becomes a thing of it's own. Unless I put some more of my mana into it I can't control it, and that goes for all elemental magic. Now the power of a spell. The power of a spell is completely dependent on how much mana you put into it, you would think that means that the bigger a spell is the stronger it is, which is technically right but not always. There are those who can condense their mana turning a little fireball at arms size be as deadly as one that would be double their body size, such magic is difficult to obtain is made from hard training or those who are born lucky. There are levels to how much you can condense your magic so the more you train the more magic you could condense down, but you see different condensed elements make different things. A condensed fire ball would cause an explosion dependent on the amount of mana you put in, A condensed water ball would make the water's pressure raise dependent on how much you condensed it and how much mana you put in, some are even able to pierce human bodies using water. Condensed air isn't that useful as it's just merely making wherever you shoot at just have a burst of quick air disperse in all locations for example." The man said pointing his staff to the ground under the tree.
And then out of nowhere a quick gust of wind quickly had Lena's hair and the tree's leaves fluttering around.
"*sigh* I guess that's the best I could do. anyway something like that. Sadly my condensed water wouldn't be strong enough, but from a stronger magician he could pierce the tree trunk if he's that good. Fire being the most dangerous with it's explosive nature so I'm better off not showing that." the man said as he held his staff.
"Ok for your final lesson before you start practicing. You see this?" the man said as he pointed at an orb like thing near the top of his staff.
"Oh I know that. That's uhhh what was it called... Oh right, A catalyst. It's a type of rock which can hold high amounts of mana, so magicians use it by placing it into the staff they use to expand their mana pool. Every magician's mana pool is limited and can grow by either aging or training, so those with low mana or those wanting even more mana compensate by using one of these rocks." Lena said.
"T-that is correct... Then why do we use staffs?" the man asked surprised by Lena's sudden interaction.
"I know that wait a second..... oh right, it's so that you could get a more precise shot at whatever you are aiming at." Lena said.
"That is correct too, even though using magic with your hands only is possible, It is still very unprecise and could end up sending whatever you just turned your mana into at random directions, Staffs are made to counter that, and since you can't really implement a catalyst into your own body staffs are more commonly used than self magic." the man said as he put down his own staff.
"then time to start your own training." he said gesturing Lena to stand up.
Lena stood up and followed his gesture to get closer.
"Now raise your dominant hand forward and all you have to do is will. If I'm right Tres did mention you knowing a strengthening spell. It's the same principle of applying magic as this except this time instead of putting it on yourself just think about how you want the manifestation at the front most point of your arm."
Lena was a bit confused at how he explained her spell, but decided not to say anything.
And then slowly a little ball of fire start forming around the tip of Lena's hand as if she was holding it.
"Nice! now aim it up and shoot so that you don't end up burning anything, all you have to do is just think of it as if you're pushing it way, just think 'disperse'!" The man said with excitement in his voice.
Lena nodded and did as the man said. The ball of fire shot up and then slowly faded into nothing.
"Nice!" the man almost jumped from excitement.
Lena gave the man a weird look which he nervously laughed to.
"haha... It's the first time I've thought anyone anything so I got excited at how quickly your learned, made me feel like a good teacher haha..." the man said with an awkward smile.
"By the way, when we sparred. I saw you cut through the fireball I shot towards you. If it was a normal sword cutting through it the fireball shouldn't have been affected at all, but your cut made it disappear as you cut it in half. A normal sword Shouldn't be able to do that so can you tell me what you did?" The mans asked intrigued.
"trade secrets." Lena said remembering the spar.
"haha..." man laughs nervously thinking he had over done it.
"here as a sorry I will tell you something I didn't in the lesson. Even though you can condense fireballs to make explosions you can still make explosions in other ways. Such as when I was demonstrating it you saw how the water ball I shot up just exploded mid air, you can do that by keeping a bit of your mana still under control when you let go of your projectile and ordering it to disperse in all directions inside of said projectile making the other mana follow. So a fireball even though it wouldn't be condensed it would still explode if you ordered it too, while a condensed fireball would explode whatever you say."
Lena went to pack get her stuff and leave, but as she slowly got away the man stopped her.
"Hey Lena, are you going back to tres?" the man asked.
"No. I'm just going home for today." Lena said.
"*sigh* well then just please, whenever you see her p-please tell her I'm..." the man said as he slowly turned her face to the side.
Lena looked at him waiting for him to finish.
"p-please t-tell her I said 'I'm s-sorry f-for everything'" the man said flushed in red while looking away.
"sure." Lena said and left.
The next day.
Lena is on her way to her guild to pick up a quest to get her day started.
As she enters the guild she is greeted by some but she doesn't greet back. Her behavior has already became common place between the guild members, they are all used to how silent she is.
Lena picks a quest about hunting down a small orc tribe that have been disturbing a near by village. She accepts it and goes after them by herself. It was a bit more challenging than usual since she was training her magic while doing so.
by the end of the day she headed towards the adventurer's guild to submit her report where Trestina was back to her receptionist spot.
"Yo! How you doing today Lena!" Trestina asked.
"About as good as can be expected."
"So, how was yesterday's magic lesson you learned anything?"
"Yeah, it was useful I guess."
"And, what about the tutor, did he do anything? or say anything?" trestina asked.
"well of course he did he was teaching me after all." Lena said not understanding why she would ask that.
"No no, like did he do anything out of the ordinary? or mention me?" trestina asked again.
Lena then remembered his message to pass on.
"oh right he tell me to tell you something."
with her interest peaked Trestina quickly told Lena to say it.
"'I'm sorry for everything' something like that" Lena said in a monotone voice.
Trestina usually enthusiastic look turned quite down.
Lena noticed her sudden shift in mood and decided to leave it at that.
"anyway I guess I will leave now here's the report, I've got some stuff I need to take care of" Lena said as she turned around to leave.