At this moment, Zevien and Touma were in front of each other on different couches with a table in between them.
Zevien's expression was pensive as a drop of sweat trickled down from his forehead.
"So? What is it? If you answer me honestly, I can try to help you, but if the academy finds out, you will get expelled," Touma said as he used his finger to prop up his glasses with a genuine smile.
"You know as well as I do that the academy won't waste its resources on you if you are a faulty magician," Touma said as the smile vanished from his face.
His face turned somber, and he continued, "if you can tell me what problem you have, I can try to help you and will even convince the academy to give you some time instead of direct expulsion because I see a lot of potential in you."
Zevien's expression broke as he released a sigh, "you are right. I have a problem with my magic eidos body. The mana coming out from me turns volatile after leaving my body. It can stay in my control as long as it is inside me, but the moment it comes out, I lose control over it."
"I see…,' Touma nodded as his brows creased slightly, "I expected something similar but didn't know it was this straightforwardly serious."
Tapping his fingers on his chin for a few seconds, Touma spoke, "show me. Release your mana and show me."
Zevien nodded and stretched his hand forward a bit before releasing some mana. The mana looked white-blue with extremely light blue sparks.
The moment mana came out of Zevien's hand, it turned volatile as he lost control over it. The mana he released eventually disappeared as it got mixed with the invisible mana in the atmosphere.
Touma observed from the start till the end with squinted and focused eyes as his lips twitched slightly, "fascinating…."
"What?"
"Ahem, nothing," Touma adjusted his glasses as he leaned back on the couch and adopted a severe expression, "this is indeed serious. It's really troublesome if you can't cast an external spell. Such a disability is like crippling half of your magic capabilities. All occupations also require external mana controlling, so if you came to the academy tomorrow to join the Alchemy class and the class teacher of that class found out about this problem, you would have gotten expelled after determining that you really can't control your mana outward."
'Well, it's not like I have to attend the academy every day since I've already graduated once,' Zevien thought internally before awkwardly smiling and nodding, "that's why I was going to skip academy tomorrow."
Shaking his head, Touma stood up and spoke, "let's go to my private laboratory in the city. After returning from the war field, I have only spent time in interesting magic theories and magic science. After reaching there, I will tell you about some things and then give you two options."
"What options?" Zevien asked with a cautious light in his eyes as he also stood up.
"I will tell you at that time," Touma said with a faint smile, "don't worry. I am under the government contract and have legal papers for my laboratory. I am not doing anything shady."
'Shady and government are two sides of one coin,' Zevien thought, but he still nodded as he knew from before the time rewind who was Touma and his background so he could trust him. After all, he and Vernisia managing to own their laboratory after graduation was due to Touma-sir.
…
After ten minutes, the two of them left the academy and arrived at Touma's laboratory in Touma-sir's car.
They spent one hour inside before Zevien left the lab with Touma. "Should I drop you back to the academy?"
Zevien answered without turning around, "no need." His eyes danced with nervousness, anxiety, hope, and several other emotions.
"Give me your answer tomorrow morning, and we will start right away."
"Ok," Zevien plainly answered as he continued moving and arrived on the main road where cars were floating to and fro.
After one and a half-hour of walking at the same pace, he arrived in front of the academy gates.
However, he didn't enter inside but activated his Digi-watch and sent a message to Vernisia.