With a tired look as he opened the door, there was indeed Bregane standing there waiting for him. "Im sorry I didnt realize you needed your beauty sleep princess!" Was the first thing he said. Samuel was too tired to notice the sarcasm and annoyance. He yawned, "I didn't think we would start this early!"
Bregane scoffed. "If you want to catch up to be able to take the exams that are happening in slightly less than three months then you are gonna need all the time you can get without complaint." He shrugged and started walking away. While Samuel quickly grabbed his things and locked his door to rush after his new mentor.
He caught up with him pretty quickly and saw that it was only about 5 in the morning from a big clock, he had seen the big clock before but he still got stuck looking at it for a few moments. Something about clocks just felt good to him, it was probably because it was a technological marvel he had never really seen before though. But he had understood how it worked from reading about them.
He realized to be falling behind and ran to catch up with his teacher who heard him catch up so he continued speaking. "This time every morning for 12 hours we are going to spend time studying and training. Mostly practical training because its the fastest way to actually get experience. The reason why there is so much theory training involved in regular classes is because one teacher has to take care of a whole class." Bregane sighed.
"Since you have me as a personal mentor its a lot safer to often practice actual magic instead of so much theory. Whenever large classes have magic practice there needs to be at least 2 teachers and 4 assistants helping, just in case something goes wrong." Bregane said while he continued walking in a fast brisk pace.
Samuel followed him all the way to the main building where they entered a weird oval chamber with several signs. Bregane noticed Samuels curious look and nodded at one circle. "Teleportation circles that can be activated by anyone with clearance, they lead to different places, and this one!" Bregane stepped onto one and motioned for Samuel to stand next to him. "This one leads to a forest training area that is barely used anymore. Thats where we are going!"
Samuel stood there waiting with a nod still remembering the last time he teleported and prepared for the worst by closing his eyes. A hum surrounded him for a few seconds and then it was gone, before suddenly he could feel the chilly wind breeze through his hair.
As he slowly opened his eyes they were outside in a very dark forest area with the sun just barely starting to light the sky. He noticed a few crystals light up in front of them as Grenger walked forward.
Almost like a lightshow Bregane kept walking forward the structured treeline. After about 5 minutes of walk they reached a gigantic tree that looked like it had been remade into a house. Bregane just kept on walking without stopping so Samuel followed, as they entered the house he noticed it was like one large empty hall that was lit up. But what confused him was the fact that the tree was not hollowed out looking like a tree, it was instead white marble like most of the academy.
Samuel was once again amazed by everything, he started to wonder how long it had taken to build the entire academy and all places like this. Not able to hold himself back he asked. "So where do I start?" With a full smile, making Bregane not so impressed.
"You start with this!" Bregane made a small table appear and he laid several stones on it. "These are magic affinity stones. Most people can learn how to cast magic of any element, but learning your affinities first is a good idea. Which is why we are taking the most basic of affinities first." Bregane laid them all out in order while Samuel walked closer.
"Fire, Water, Earth, Air, are the basics. I also got two stones for energies based on Life & Death here. Very few people are naturally attuned with life and death magic but it does not hurt to check, there are also several variations of the basics like: Ice & Lightning and many more, but those are too advanced to start out with." Bregane nodded.
"So what do I do with them?" Samuel asked while taking the Fire gem up first. "Well your first lesson begins here, you know of magic. Its all around us with every breath we take - its in every living being. Try to focus your mind on the gem! Try to feel its fire energy take shape in your mind." Bregane conjured another table and a chair and sat down while taking out some food for himself to eat.
'What an asshole' Samuel thought at the fact that he had not eaten any breakfast. But he turned to the stone and tried to focus on it like Bregane had told him too. It took several moments of taking deep breaths and tried to imagine the shape of fire. For several minutes nothing happened, until he finally shaped fire in his head, he opened his eyes to feel the magic of the stone and see that the stone was lit up. Samuel turned around with a smile showing the gemstone.
"Does this mean im attuned to fire?" He asked gleefully, but Bregane looked unimpressed and shook his head. "Good job on feeling the fire and shaping it, you succeeded in making the magic respond to you, but if you were attuned to the fire element the stone would crack." He said making Samuel's smile turn into a sad frown.
'Oh well I got several more to go!' Samuel inwardly added to himself and put the Fire back to pick up the Water stone next. "Water is a bit more tricky to shape with your mind, not a lot of spells are based on water so much as its deadly counterpart of Ice and Cold." Bregane said.
Samuel spent several minutes more before finally feeling the flow of water, where the fire had been a nasty force of nature that burned everything - water was calm and serene but unstoppable like a river at times. The stone glowed but showed no cracks in it making Samuel lose a bit more hope.
Samuel then picked up the Earth gem, unlike the other gems, the Earth one was more like a rock.
"Earth is sturdy, so you haveto pick it apart to understand it! You haveto be equally hardheaded as the rock. Unlike burns and freezes from fire and ice. Earth is more about smashing or building things." Bregane nodded for Samuel to continue.
Samuel catched on quick with that in mind, he started imagining himself as a child building dirt houses, and started building earth houses in his mind. The rock glowed up pretty quickly when he did so, but no signs of cracks to Samuel's dismay. "What if I am not attuned to any element? Is that possible?" Samuel asked as he turned around to Bregane to show him his progress.
"Its not impossible!" Bregane said with a shrug. "But I know plenty of people that become amazing mages anyway. Some people are not attuned with specific elements, but instead can be attuned more to magic itself. While some are both." Bregane nodded to the last of the basic elements.
Samuel put the rock down with a sign and picked up the Air gem. Trying to conjure a slight breeze in his mind on a nice summer day. But in his mind suddenly a storm took shape instead and he could see the unbridled storm tear away the land before returning to a nice breeze. Samuel must have forgotten to breathe because he took a big gasp of air as soon as he opened his eyes again. Bregane walked forward and collected the 4 gemstones and took a closer look at the air one.
"Interesting!" Bregane nodded to himself. "What is?" Samuel quickly asked as Bregane put out the Life and Death gemstones on the table. Before he took out the air gemstone and showed it to Samuel.
Samuel looked closer at it and saw what looked like miniscule cracks. "It would seem you have some minor affinity for something connected to the air element. If it was the air element as a whole the stone would have cracked but a few mini cracks mean that you are attuned to a certain tree of the air element." Bregane nodded while Samuel thought that that info could have been told earlier. He actually just nodded though and looked at the Life and Death gemstones.
Bregane looked at him and then at the stones. "Life and Death are always seen as two sides of the same coin, but that is not really true. Life energies and Death energies dont mix well at all, they are in reality opposites." Bregane shrugged while giving him the Life gem. "Its all about feeling the life of magic and understanding that magic is also alive in a way." He nodded.
Samuel took the stone and started to try and feel it while Bregane sat down again. It took him a lot of effort to finally find a slight strand of life from the gemstone and when he was done he opened his eyes and felt like he had been running for ages as he was covered in sweat. Before turning to Bregane who was reading a news letter.
Bregane looked up from his letter as he saw the young man move. "That took you almost half an hour." Bregane said and stood up looking at the stone. "I guess you aint qualified to become a healer kiddo!" Bregane shrugged, making Samuel look at the life stone that was barely lit at all. It was more like a flickering light than anything else.
Making Samuel inwardly swear and sigh amid the pants as if he had been working out for hours. Bregane shrugged, "Dont worry about it, I had a slightly better result than you when I started out as a student when it came to Life energies." He took the gemstone back and pointed to the final one on the table. "Just one last and then you can take a small break!"
Samuel nodded simply because he was just looking forward for it to be over so he could take a break. So he extended his hand toward the gemstone filled with Death energy on the table ready for it just like the others to just be another dud.