After allowing the discussion following this to die down, discussion primarily focused on the surprising effectiveness of elemental attacks when extra manipulation has been applied to them, Sir Lector continues: "Now, let's continue our practice. Whether it's through leveling a skill or increasing one's experience in the art, there is no doubting that practice improves one's capability. Please allow me a moment to summon the metal cube that you are to attack."
Just as I saw him do during the previous class, he draws up millions of tiny metal granules from in the ground before merging them into a cube about a foot along each edge. Also like the previous class, this one is quite intrigued by the way the particles join together, gathering into one solid mass.
Once the cube has fully formed, he turns to us again. "Now, again. No need to hold your attack prepared; once it is concentrated to your liking, attack the cube. Begin."
This time much more prepared, I start with a rather small amount of wind elemental particles, which I compress till I can compress no more. I at first contemplate releasing it then, but quickly come to the conclusion that I should add more wind particles to it until I no longer can. After all, these skills seem rather akin to muscles, in that through overuse they become stronger. If that is actually the case, would it not be best to exert myself in areas regarding my skills as often as possible in hopes of strengthening them?
With this in mind, I continue to add additional wind elemental particles to my compacted, swirling green sphere. Once I reach a point that I feel certain I will lose control over my attack if I attempt to let it grow any further, I release it to drill into the metal block, where it goes marginally, but still noticeably deeper than before.
While I catch my breath from the inexplicable exertion, I observe the other soldiers in their attacks. In addition to those who succeeded initially, a handful more now succeed as well in their attempts. A wide variety of attacks of a large handful of elements rain down upon the surface of the metal cube, until it reaches the point where it is as crater-laden as the moon.
Once I feel ready to do it again, I form, compress, and release another attack. Over and over I repeat this process, residual exhaustion building up until I am certain that I will injure myself should I continue. Of course, I don't really care about that anyway so I continue on. And on. And on. Until, eventually, I pass out.
I awake to Sir Lector pouring one of his special sleep resistance potions into my face. I look around to find that no one is left on the field other than us.
Noticing my confusion, my master informs me that he had us practicing elemental particle concentration until the end of class, so, knowing that I wouldn't be fit to continue on practicing if he woke me then, he just let me sleep.
I only have time to mentally comment on how thoughtful he was in doing such before he begins to lecture me. "You must learn your limits when working with spells of all types. While the backlash for overexertion tends to be more severe in straight magic, since a primary component is mental willpower, even in elemental manipulation it is important to recognize when continuing on will cause more harm than good. In the future when your mental exertion reaches a point of absolute exhaustion, you must cease your manipulation at once. The risks of overexertion can include the lowering of one's elemental manipulation related skills and even permanent mental damage. Am I understood?"
"Yes, master," I answer. [It does seem a bit irresponsible to only warn me of this now, though.]
Displaying an almost uncanny ability to know what's in my mind, he then adds "It is a well-established precedent to not warn new mages of the risks of overexertion until they do it at least once. That way, they will know what it feels like and know what to be careful of in the future."
"Well, I suppose I ought to say thanks for teaching me yet another lesson, my great master."
"Ha ha ha! It is only natural for a master to impart his knowledge to his apprentice through the best methods of which he knows! Now, come, let us go to eat. The best way to counteract the symptoms of magical overexertion is to eat and to rest."
"Actually, now that you mention it, I do have a bit of a headache."
"You're lucky if that's all you've got, though the symptoms get much worse as a wizard becomes more powerful. For example, if I were to overexert myself, I would almost certainly die. It is for that reason that it is standard practice to allow a young mage to make the mistake once. Otherwise, they will know to avoid overexertion but not exactly to which point they can push their body to. Should they reach a certain level of power before ever pushing too far, their first overexertion backlash could very well be their last."
"Well, I'm very glad to have had this opportunity to learn," I reply as we reach the doors to the dining hall.
"And so, too, am I glad to provide such an opportunity. Now, excuse me, I must take my seat. We will meet again for further training at my residence after dinner. Understood?"
"Yes master."
"Good. Then I'll be off."
At that he heads towards the commanders' table, leaving me to search out Jorgenson within the crowd of already eating soldiers. While looking for him, I realize that I forgot to ask Sir Lector about when I could get an opportunity to learn to read. [Oh well. I guess I'll just have to ask tonight before training starts. I should probably ask for advice for tomorrow's monster hunting as well.]
Once I finally spot Jorgenson after nearly a minute of looking, I head over to him. I sit across from him before continuing my questioning. He patiently answers all of my questions, clarifying for me when necessary.
Taken by a thought, I ask him "Have you ever considered being a teacher? Your capabilities in imparting information are truly exemplary."
"Heh heh heh… the only dedicated places of learning are dominated by nobles, how could a commoner ever be allowed to teach noble children? The education of commoners obviously takes place almost exclusively within a family, why would I ever be hired to teach commoner children? The only place for commoner teachers is in instructing the children of wealthy commoners, such as merchants. However, that would require a range of knowledge far more expansive than my own. I mean, I can't even read, remember?"
I sigh. "Yeah, I suppose that that is true. It's just that you are quite good at imparting what knowledge you do know."
We eat in silence after that, time that I spend ruminating upon the lack of opportunity in this world. Even if Jorgenson had established from a young age an eventual desire to become a teacher, such a goal would have been nearly unobtainable from the start. And that is even with Jorgenson's family being shopkeepers, a position almost certainly well above the common farmers and laborers! And that is with him being free; what would the prospects be for your average person born into slavery?
[Honestly, the more time I spend in this world, the more hatred I feel for it. From the sliver I have seen of it, I have observed only total depravity and general awfulness. Slavery, torture, rape, war. Haughty nobles who lie entrenched in a rigid class system. Mistreatment of the weak while the strong go unpunished. Injustice to be found all around.
Compared to my old world, the situation here seems almost unsalvageable in its wretchedness. In my own world we had worked as a society to combat these ails and had had relatively great success in our endeavors. Yet here such things still go nearly unchallenged, the people unaware of how bad they truly have it, unaware that better things exist.
Of course, I am well aware that the portion of the world that I have seen, almost exclusively the military and slave trade with nearly all knowledge of the rest of the word coming from a former slave who is my master and an unusually righteous individual, would lend itself to an unfavorable impression of this world. Perhaps as I see more of it, my opinion will improve; but for now, from what I have seen, this is truly a rotten place.]
My, I have gone off on a mental tangent yet again, haven't I? Well, at least I have the ability to blame my distorted mental state and relative pessimism on my madness, eh? Not that I am at all insane of course. I still choose not to believe in that, of all things.
I try to enjoy my meal as I try to keep myself from thinking too much about how much I hate this world. It would probably be easier if the meal didn't consist of only bread and water. There are, thankfully, no stupid info dumps (or announcements, whatever one may call them) by Lord Lion today, meaning that people leave whenever they see fit. Once a handful of people have departed, I take my leave as well.
I return to my master's residence and practice my spell concentration until I feel on the edge of passing out. Noting that my exhaustion, though immense and seemingly physical, doesn't inhibit my ability to wield my sword, I practice with that as well. I go over my basic moves, those that can only be improved through repetition, those that we should have been learning in that useless swordsmanship teacher's class.
The terror that I have felt creeping up over me during the last couple hours does not dissipate; instead, it only heightens. Why such terror? Well, as I contemplated the ails of this world I again realized how likely I was to fall to them. And not in a distant, abstract future. If I don't increase in power to such an extent to ensure my safety [before] my deployment in at most a few months, my life could very well end within a few months from now. At that point, my second life would be over having been spent almost exclusively in wretched circumstances and I would have no guarantee of a third chance. And without a third, I may well be returned to the dreaded blackness.
And so, I train. I'm currently in the best possible place to get more powerful. Here, in this military, everyone is invested, to at least a certain extent, in seeing me become more powerful. Furthermore, my situation is not entirely bleak. I have been provided with the opportunity that this apprenticeship should provide. In addition to that, I was lucky enough to be given the powers of elemental manipulation, without which my situation would certainly be much worse. I have at most three, and let's just assume two, months to grow powerful enough to stay alive on the battlefield, though hopefully not so powerful as to warrant me being given a solo mission. Of course, I'm not going to intentionally limit my growth by any means; any opportunity to increase my strength, any opportunity to practice, to train, to study, I shall take. And so, I train.
After making my way through my basic move set, and some of my magical exhaustion alleviated, I practice infusing and removing elemental particles from my sword, it acquiring and losing its green glow again and again. Feeling a small burst of inspiration, I try compressing the infused elemental particles into the tip of the sword. When I succeed in doing so, the tip glows a vibrant green, lighting up the surroundings like a torch. I am briefly distracted by the question going through my head - namely, why do elemental particles glow - but like my question regarding why wind has color, I cast it aside.
I try poking the ground with my blade, to a rather surprising result. Once the tip comes into contact with the ground, the condensed wind elemental particles detach from the tip of the sword and drill a hole into the ground, about an inch in diameter. I want to check how deep it is, but it is too dark out to see. Summoning a tiny fireball about a centimeter in diameter, I do something that I have never tried before: I push it away from me without fully releasing it. The exertion greatly increases, but I am now holding the fireball in the air ahead of me. The exertion continuously increasing as the distance between myself and the fireball increases, I direct the fireball down the hole. Where it keeps going down until I lose control over it at perhaps a dozen meters down the hole and it crashes into the wall.
[Though I would have liked to see how deep it goes, I guess it is enough that I found out that the attack is quite powerful.] I had been lying face down on the ground, my eye lined up with the little hole that I drilled, so once my fireball disperses I stand up. And there, right in front of me is my master.
I quickly crush my impulse to cry out in terror, instead, bowing before him. "This apprentice apologizes for not noticing master."
"Ha ha ha! You were engaged in your practice, it is fine. And well done on maintaining a projected elemental attack, that was actually tomorrow's lesson."
"Well, it's a good thing that I figured it out now as I will not be in your class tomorrow." I say, intending to remind him of what the swordsmanship groups will be doing tomorrow.
Displaying that he already knows this information, he says "Yes, I heard that you will be going out of the city tomorrow with your swordsmanship instructor. I actually wanted to briefly warn you of that. Though you, as someone capable of magic, should be relatively safe, his classes have the highest rate of casualties among any here when out fighting monsters."
"Yeah, that does not come off as particularly surprising. He seems to have a 'learning through doing' mindset, not exactly ideal when you take out soldiers new to their weapons to battle."
"'Learning through doing,' that is a good way of describing it. Yes, though he has the highest casualty rate he also produces the most powerful swordsmen in this training facility. Considering our military's current objective of making soldiers of quality instead of quantity, his strategy does make sense, which is why he is allowed to continue teaching with such rates of death. I briefly considered doing the same before realizing that the high proportion of nobles in my classes would result in me being put in a very bad position if I got a bunch of powerful families' heirs killed simply because I don't want to teach them in a normal manner. The swordsman, Commander Reinart, doesn't have nearly as high a proportion of noble students, and those he does have are usually fairly proficient with the sword, so he can get away with his methods."
[Of course the likelihood of death in a class would be inverse to the number of nobles who are in it. Even when playing with their soldiers' lives, the military gives extra consideration to the whims of nobles. This world, truly, absolutely, and completely, sucks.]
As we enter into his house, which I have been standing outside of for some time, Sir Lector continues "Anyways, how much did your elemental manipulation skill do up by?"
"Well, it was at lvl. 2, and now it is at lvl. 7."
He just nods before saying "I think that you would benefit from devoting tonight to magic practice. Through the use of my energy restoration potions, you can almost wholly subdue the effects of magical overexertion."
"Didn't your sleep nullification potions have the effect of energy restoration?"
"No, they simply combat sleepiness which feels similar to a lack of energy but really isn't the same. Now, stop dawdling and drink this," he says, giving me an orange potion.
I do as he commands, ignoring the taste, and the lingering effects of my overexertion fade away.
"Now, maintain a ball of earth elemental particles three inches in diameter at five feet away until you can do so no longer."
And so a night of training my elemental projection and elemental condensation capabilities commences.