"Okay, I thought about it a little. What I'm good at, I mean."
"Yeah, tell me."
We cleaned the floor a little and found a blackboard and chalk. I sat on the floor while Ai-nee stood beside the blackboard.
"Prayerless Quick Casting."
"I thought you'd say that."
She sighed.
"You do understand that your lifespan shortens with each spell, right? No one knows by how much, but the theory is that the stronger spells one uses without incantations, the more time is taken from them."
Indeed, I don't plan on dying, but it's the only thing that I'd say I'm good at when it comes to combat.
"Since you're so determined, I'll have to."
She wrote 'Spells' on the blackboard and mind mapped it.
Ai-nee then attached a couple of words to it.
Mana, Lifespan, Spells.
"Firstly, before we do anything, we need to measure how big your mana pool is. I have... just... the thing for it."
She looked around and grabbed a crystal ball.
The woman sat down in front of me and placed the ball in between us.
"Put your hand on it."
"And that's all I need to do."
"Yeah, you'll see after."
I gave Ai-nee a hesitant look but followed her instructions once she nodded at me. I slowly placed my hand on the crystal ball.
The crystal ball filled itself with black smoke. The process was almost instant. Seconds later, pink text appeared displaying the following numbers:
'23,400.'
"Is that good?"
"Yeah... It is..."
Ai-nee murmured.
"You're barely under Anastasia when it comes to mana and she has the largest mana pool in the class."
That's a good thing then.
"What about the black smoke? What's that mean?"
"It's your affinity. I haven't seen black before but from the textbooks I've read, black stands for shadows..."
Black Exodia and Shadow affinity for magic. That's definitely not a coincidence. Guess this ability runs deeper than I thought.
I heard a crack.
Glancing down, I saw a long streak, going across the crystal ball. The black mist started to leak out.
Then, I noticed the number.
"Ai-nee."
"Uh, yeah, I see it."
"No, not that. You said that my mana pool was 23,400, right?"
"I did, what are you-. Nevermind. I see what you mean."
Ai-nee also saw it. The number had changed, however, the crystal ball couldn't decide on a number. It was constantly changing and glitching.
My sister forcefully snatched my hand off of the ball. The mist vanished along with the number.
We both sighed.
"Okay, well, now that we know that either the crystal ball had a problem or your mana pool is indecipherable. I've never seen a crystal ball crack, so I'm guessing it's the latter."
"Does this change things in any way?"
I asked.
Ai-nee stood up and placed the crystal ball on the nearest table. I was expecting her to say, 'Yes,' but she smirked instead.
"It doesn't. It makes them even better."
She picked up the chalk and started writing under 'Mana.'
"Since you don't seem to have a limit to your mana, you can try out different spells and raise proficiency with them."
Reminds me of a fantasy game I played. When I started, casting spells took long, but the more I used them, they became faster and easier to use. That's probably what she means by raising proficiency.
Ai-nee moved from the board.
She wrote:
'No Limit'
'Proficiency Rise'
'Different Spells'
'Shadow Magic Problem.'
"What's the problem with my Shadow magic?"
The woman seemed too hesitant as I asked my question.
"It's... You know when I said that I've never seen the black mist in person."
I nodded.
"You did say that. But you also said that..."
My voice faded away as I began to realise what she was trying to say.
Despite being a teacher here, she had never seen shadow as someone's affinity. That alone says something, but that's not what she's trying to say.
The fact that she had to know that Shadow magic existed from books means that not many people know spells of Shadow magic.
Saying 'not many' is being optimistic. There may be no one in this era who knows about Shadow magic.
"I see you get it. Teaching someone the same magic as their affinity makes everything faster and better. If you use your affiliated magic, then that spell will get a boost. If we don't know any Shadow spells, then... That's not possible."
"It's fine though, isn't it? Since we can just learn another affinity. I've used Fire magic before."
Something came to Ai-nee's mind.
"Speaking of which, could you cast a Flare?"
I dithered.
"I don't know the spell..."
My sister glanced at me, and then stuck her hand out.
"Fine, I'll do it first."
She breathed in.
"Spirit of fire, heed my call and answer my flaring desires; Flare."
An orange magic circle materialised and disappeared. In its place was a flame. It was around the size of a football.
It dissipated as Ai-nee shook her hand.
"Alright, now you try."
I nodded.
I stuck my hand out.
"Ignite; Flare."
The magic circled appeared and disappeared, and a flame appeared in its place. The flame was bigger than Ai-nee's.
"Oi. You just used one word. How'd you do that? Even if you don't pray to the spirits, it should be impossible to only use a single word."
Ai-nee pestered me. I pushed her away slightly and explained.
"I didn't do anything different. I just did what I did last time. It's slightly different though. Last time, I used connotations and associations of the incantation, however, this time, I did it of the spell."
"Come again?"
She questioned, tilting her head.
"I thought about what things I think about when I think of 'Flare.' A lighter instantly came to mind, maybe because of that cigar you were smoking earlier."
I said the latter under my breath.
"Anyway, I thought of a lighter igniting a cigar and it worked."
Ai-nee looked at me, confused but it seemed to come to her eventually.
"Okay... I think I just got an idea of what we should do."
Now, it was my turn to tilt my head.