When Valentine regained his consciousness he found himself tied onto a chair by thick rope in a small gray room with no visible windows or doors. It was cold, humid and smelled like sweat. Valentine's fight or flight instincts kicked in the moment he assessed his situation and he started thrashing his body around to loosen up his binds as silently as he could to avoid detection but one misstep made the chair tip over and caused him to slam into the pavement.
"Tsk, the least you could do was shout a little to let me know you came to. I'll have to reorganize everything now." a man said from behind him in a deep, gruff voice.
Valentine felt a hand grabbing the ropes that were holding him and pulling him and the chair back up, causing their eyes to meet. And what Valentine saw was no man, it was a black tar-like substance in the shape of a human with glaring red eyes.
At the sight of the creature Valentine froze up, his face turning pale and not a single sound coming out of his mouth. The creature seemed to laugh in reply and lifted its misshapen arm to the air.
"I forgot about this one. Release." The creature said, its mouth moving slowly without matching the words it spoke.
In a single moment, the gray room was replaced by a small office with file cabinets and paperwork all around and in place of the tar creature stood a large, muscular, middle aged man with bright green eyes and brown hair dressed in a white button up shirt with a loose black tie and jeans who had a very prominent scar spanning from right under his left eye and all across his cheek.
"Are you with Merlin?" The man asked before Valentine could make a sound.
"W… what? Where am I? How did-?" Valentine stuttered.
"Don't try to play dumb. One of our guys saw that bastard Sean being all buddy buddy with you." the man said, interrupting Valentine.
"What are you talking about? I don't get it. He just helped me up one time." Valentine spoke with a trembling voice, his eyes fogging up.
"Tsk, I'm not falling for that. I can clearly see traces of his mana lingering in you. Oh and the painkillers keeping you functioning right now are about to stop working soon. I'd spill it if I were you," the man spoke nonchalantly yet his tone seemed to grow annoyed.
"Painkillers? I was drugged? I'm sorry, I apologize. I didn't mean to hurt him. That's how he wants me to act, you see. Sean just helped me up before it happened. Please don't kill me. It won't happen again, even I don't know how I did that. Dennis is so strong I won't be able to do anything against him. I swear, it was a fluke." Valentine started apologizing, barely holding back tears as he realized the situation he was in.
"The fuck you talking about?" the man barked, his words had a prominent hue of surprise but his face seemed calm.
"I'm sorry I hit Dennis. I'm sorry. Please. My mom won't be able to handle losing me too." Valentine continued
"Who the absolute fuck is Dennis?" the man shouted in frustration.
"You took me here because I hit Dennis right?" Valentine asked.
"I don't give a flying fuck about that Dennis guy. Tell me how you're connected to Merlin." the man barked.
"I, I don't know what you're talking about, I'm sorry, please let me go home." Valentine begged, choking on his words.
The man seemed to calm down as he let out a deep, loud, sigh and rested his hand on Valentine's shoulder.
"So you're telling me that Sean helped you out one time and you've never heard of Merlin?" The man spoke.
"Y.. Yes" Valentine stuttered.
The man's cold, impenetrable expression changed to one of utter frustration. He took his hand off Valentine's shoulder and started pacing around the office, mumbling barely audible swears under his breath between steps.
"Fuck it. Kid, do you want to live or not?" He said.
"I...I want to live." Valentine replied
"Good. So let me clue you in. Magic is real, and not only that but you're deathly sensitive to it. I am the only one that can save you right now but there are some conditions." The man said.
Valentine looked puzzled but recognizing the severity of the situation chose his words carefully.
"As long as the conditions do not harm my family, I agree no matter what they are." Valentine spoke, with a newfound confidence in his voice.
"Hahaha, that's the spirit." The man said amused, grabbing a knife out of his pocket and cutting off Valentine's restraints before putting it back in his pocket.
"From now on, this is what happened. You were a normal student when the magic organization Merlin got an interest in you because of your mana hypersensitivity. Only the most rudimentary info was revealed to you. Magic is real and mana is the energy that fuels magic. You were about to visit a Merlin base with Sean when you lost consciousness and don't remember what happened after. You woke up here and I saved your life after making you believe Merlin wanted to experiment on your body. Got it?" The man instructed Valentine.
"Yes." Valentine replied.
"Good. Now let's save your life. Sit the other way around and take only deep and slow breaths." The man said.
Valentine followed the man's orders to the tee, he was struggling to believe the man's words but had to do so anyway, that being the only way he could conceivably make it out whole. Valentine rested his head on the back of the chair and the man approached him from behind. The man put his hands on Valentine's back and took a deep breath.
"Oh yeah, it will hurt a lot but you're going to make it. I think." The man's tone seemed to mellow out into a more playful one.
Valentine started feeling what he felt before passing out, the feeling of boiling hot oil and shards of ice along with another pain. A pain that could only be described as an amplified version of the pain one feels the day after working out when they haven't for a long time.
But the pain wasn't in a familiar place. It was in his body but he could not pinpoint where it was. Just as if an entirely new body part he never knew of came to his attention. He felt on the verge of unconsciousness yet kept his breathing steady and consistent until the extreme pain started to fade. And though the pain faded, it did not stop.
"We are done. You are a mage now. The pain won't quite go away yet but once you reach the third circle you will be pain free. Though managing more than that will be….difficult." the man said
"Erm. Sir. Can you explain to me what… this is? You told me about magic being real and after all that happened today, I do believe you but I'm a bit lost." Valentine admitted.
"Oh sure, go ahead with any questions you have. By the way, my name is John. Just use that. No sir or mister bullshit. If all goes well you'll start calling me coach soon. If not… let's not worry about that now." the man replied.
"So, uh, John. You said magic is real and if that's real then are spells a thing? What about curses and magical creatures? What's Merlin? Where are we? Oh and what are the conditions?" Valentine spoke fast but with little confidence.
"Oh there buddy, take it slow. Spells are real, curses are a kind of spell and as for magical creatures… well. People claim they used to be. Merlin is the magic coalition, the largest mage group around. As for where we are, we are at Eclipse. We are the bane of those bastards' existence and the group you blindly swore loyalty to in exchange for your life. Does that cover it all?" John said.
"You did say something about me having some condition. What is it?" Valentine asked, this time more confidently.
"Yes, that. You have a rare version of an already rare condition called mana sensitivity. Mana sensitivity usually helps mages grow faster than others due to mana working better on them. But yours is… not that. You have is basically the magic version of a bad peanut allergy but instead of peanuts it's the most basic aspect and building block of the magical world you just stepped into. So it's quite bad." John answered bluntly.
"This sounds bad." Valentine spoke emotionlessly .
"Oh come on. You'll manage just fine. Let's teach you your first spell. Follow me." John said nonchalantly as he walked out of the office.
Valentine followed John out of the office and into a large basement area with multiple human shaped wooden targets that had red target marks on the head, the heart and the sternum. Some had a bit of wear and tear but otherwise were in perfect condition.
"This will be the first spell I'll teach you. It's simple but reliable." John continued.
John shaped his right hand into a finger gun and aimed it towards the target. He breathed in deeply and closed his eyes for a second.
"Behold, Magic Missile." He said, giving more gravitas to the second part of the sentence.
A tennis ball sized white orb of pure magic shot out of his finger and hit the target almost immediately, causing a chunk of wood to break off from the target's sternum.
"This will certainly come out of my paycheck. Anyways, time to teach you how to do this." John said with a pained smile.