Asra made the list, may not be in top tier, though the bottom one, better than the ones who haven't made the list. They now live a lives of normal people. Normal people has to work their ass off to live a decent life.
When he was a kid, all he wanted is a life like his father but the day he saw what sacrifices his father had to make day to day life possible for their family, he decided to become a mage. There was a little problem though, Asra was never good at studies.
He worked day and night to even make the bottom of the list. Now he faces even more problems to be either defeated or to overcome in order to be a mage.
---
The class is filled with fifty students. Students are allocated depending on their grades. Each class has fifty students, with a total of five hundred which made to ten classes.
Asra being in the last, was assigned to class 10. Each student was assigned a identity card with a unique number, which used to identify a student.
Asra's number is HMC-TV2126-500.
Here HMC represented Hatheren Magic Council.
TV2126 is Treaty of Verlon, year 2126.
500 is the number in the school, since he is the last in the school.
---
A female entered the room, suddenly the entire class room fell silent. She was wearing red lipstick, which highlighted her lips and long robe over her skin-fit skirt, showing her legs. Boys are drooling while checking out her. Unluckily, her boobs are pretty well covered by her robe being tied over her upper body. The girls felt envious of her spectacularly perfect body, as boys who showed interest to them suddenly shifted their gazes.
"Good morning class, I'm your Homeroom teacher, Samara Kell.
Before we divulge into your magical studies depending on your awakened element, we will discuss about the basic of the mages. Most of this would have been covered in your earlier classes, but since i don't know any of you i like to refresh some basics.
Every mage has a Mana Core. It is like a reservoir, which defines the mage, what he can do and what not. A mage draws his power from one of the sources depending on his or her core. There are level one to hundred. Increase in level means increase of mana storage, there by increase in spell usage.
Using mana we draw different powers. It depends on the person. Commonly each mage can use single power or two. If they can use three elements, they basically are in top. The power we draw is from mana, which comes from source.
Basically there are two roots of sources, one is 'Existence' and the other 'Void'. We draw power from Existence. Even then there are many categories, two mainly that defines a mage. One is 'Planetary' which any mage can draw his power from and the other is 'Cosmic' which is very rare and as today no one can.
We do magic based on planetary sources, which gives advantages to certain mages in certain locations.
Mages are categorized not only on the source but also their level. The most bottom is Basic tier, then Medium tier and then comes Top tier. Basic has one level which classifies all of you, anyone who has potential to access magic. Medium and Top has Entry and Advanced levels. When you reach Advanced level of Top tier, you will be recognized as a mage, until then all you will be is an acolyte.
Once you reach that, you graduate school and you can enter an university, depending on your power.
Once you become a mage, the levels differ. There is Bronze, Silver, Gold. Each as five levels, named as Bronze One, Bronze Two and so for all three. Once at Bronze Five you can graduate University. Gold Five gives you the tile Archmage.
Above Gold, there is Diamond and Platinum which also has same classifications as the other three.
When you reach Platinum Five, you get the tile Magister. As you as of present, there are no mage alive with Platinum level power."
"Miss, what about Monster Hunters?" a chubby girl asked.
"They are trained by Monster Hunting School. They are basically same as you, in-fact you will have yearly exam. If you can't use magic, you will be mostly likely sent there. There they see attributes like physical strength, agility, intelligence.
Mages have resistance against some weaker forms of magic. Monster Hunters have higher resistance. There are ten star points, basic level starts at one and the value increases in multiples of one-ten-thousandth.
Most mage reach three or four. Highest reached as per records is six star.
Hunters are different, most reach seven or eight and top is ten.
The number of stars determine your resistance to spells. A ten star Hunter can withstand spells to a greater degree. The damage done by higher spells will be reduced to basic spell damage, which puts the opposite at disadvantage, because the higher the spell is, the more the mana burnt. The restoration takes a time. More over their attributes are better than most of mages. They are good at evading too, which is wasting mana for the other. The opponent maybe a evil mage or a monster, they are all restricted by either mana or attributes, so the Hunters are like bodyguards of mage.
When a mage reach Bronze Three or above, they get to partner up with a Monster Hunter. Mage are long range combatants while hunters are close range, though they can use long range weapons.
We use magic, they use enchanted weapons such as blades and such for close range, bows for long range. Their attacks are instant where as mage attacks are time consuming, which will give for the monsters to attack us easily.
This makes them an extremely important partner for a mage during a fight but their number is far too less than mages. So if you are favored by one, then most likely you'll live longer than most.
So if you want to be alive, you better cultivate and practice to become stronger. Otherwise you'll be worse than a normal citizen, who would do a job or a business, making money and living a life."