Weird.
It is just weird.
Jane is eating her lunchbox by her lonesome. She is still in the training facility, but alone. Hans has to leave because he has to do something. Now, Jane has to train by herself.
While eating, she comes contemplating Hans's demonstration. She can understand most of what he says like the Keywords and attributes, but the last one is a mystery.
'Dethronement,' he says.
According to Hans, that magic draws purely from the power of colors. Though not at the level of an archmage, it is his strongest magic.
Jane is not well-versed in judging the strength of mages, but she understands that Hans is strong. He is a third circle, and in City Z, a third circle is at least an assassin for hire who receives quite a generous amount of money. Carlos for one is a manager of several brothels which is triple an assassin's annual salary.
If not for Carlos being in debt, their orphanage wouldn't need to be so miserable sometimes. Well, they are lucky, because 'miserableness' only happens sometimes unlike the other children in the slums whose miserableness is all the time.
Jane shoos the annoying thoughts away and focuses on her training after she finishes her lunch. Her Geass is a gear, and according to Hans, symbolism plays a great role in understanding attributes.
Since the concept of Gear only exist about one hundred to two hundred years, ago, this must mean her Geass is pretty new and very unique. This in itself makes her special. She has no magic spell formulas she can follow like the famous fireball that must have been existing since the discovery of magic.
Jane has to come up with a 'formula' of her own. This must be why Hans is straight throwing her to magic creation and skipping the lessons on magic development. Well, he has a demonstration of magic development in the form of 'Flametongue', and while she is very eager on improving her own magic, she first has to create one.
"Ah~" She feels like a light bulb glows up in her head.
With a little bit of magic, she conjures a small 'gear' in her palm the size of a pinky finger. She tries to enlarge it until she cannot anymore. Apparently, her limits are at a diameter of eleven meters which is… enormous! She cannot increase its size anymore, so she goes on the other way, she tries to shrink it only to find her limits at the size of a ballpoint pen's rotating ball ink.
"Ugh…"
Jane is wishful thinking that maybe she can squeeze people with giant gears, but that is too much. "What can even small gears do? What does the world want me to do? Build an airship?"
Wait. It is crazy, but that might be possible.
Not an airship though, but something smaller. Jane has a tablet she can use for research purposes. Hans obviously buys Jane one of these just for this purpose.
In her research, Jane realizes an interesting trivia. The smallest or biggest gear she can conjure is the same as it is done historically possible. She finds this relevant. Perhaps, there is a way that she can conjure other stuff.
Jane finds an image of an electronic printer. She tries conjuring one for herself, but it doesn't work. Next, she tries to find a blueprint of an electronic printer, but still it doesn't work. Even going as far as understanding the blueprint doesn't help her.
Then she realizes. Electronic printers don't have a 'gear'. Jane tries searching blueprints for more steampunk models. She manages to find one, however, its specs are not as good as an electronic version.
In the end, Jane is able to conjure a steampunk printer with gears… with exceptionally better specs than the electronic printer which is a great surprise for her.
"YES!" She squeals in joy at her achievement. Moreover, the only energy the printer needs is her magic. She can even print without the use of any paper. She sense there is mana leakage from the paper, so she assumes that the printed copies should not exist permanently.
Hans finally returns to the training facility.
Jane immediately perks up, and immediately presents her creation to Hans.
"I did it! I used magic! Real magic! Not just doping and stuff! I cast my magic, and present it to you."
Hans accepts the printer from Jane's hands and inspects it with professional suspicion and intellectual curiosity.
"Good. You now know how to devise magic. After the first, you should be able to create more. But… How are you gonna hurt someone with this? Are you going to hit them with this printer?"
Jane goes quiet at Hans's sudden inquiry not even able to celebrate the compliment of her harsh tutor.
"You silly, of course, I am going to print rolls of paper with your face and hit my enemies with the wad of it. Let's see if they survive that."
"Well, good luck to you."
"Please help me, teacher!"
"Maybe, you can use it as a shield."
In the end, Hans and Jane challenge the printer with several durability tests. It appears the printer has immunity over physical attack, and has some degree of defense against magic at the first circle. Every magic Hans has to cast will end up a third circle, so they have to contract a first-circle mage to test the printer.
Jane wants to test it with a second circle, but Hans declines her request as he has something better to do with his money.
Hans knows several ways Jane can use her magic more destructively, but he has to wait until she exhausts all of her imagination until then.
Jane tirelessly surfs the net in search of blueprints.
In this world, guns don't exist yet. Hans suggests the idea of Jane trying to invent stuff in the future, but for now, she has nothing in terms of theoretical knowledge to support her magic. But it will come to that.
Moreover, understanding blueprints are quite a difficult endeavor. In fact, it has taken Jane nine hours to understand the printer blueprint, and that is even with the use of her mage-level brain. Mages are not a normal existence, and their brainpower speaks much of their prowess.
Still finding nothing useful, Hans starts hurling his suggestion at Jane.
"Jane, remember what I said? You should ignore the technicalities for now. Let's focus on helping you get a pass on the Academy of Magic. It is not just the enrollment money they will be asking you. There will be an exam, and the combat portion in the academy is always a big point to decide whether you pass or not."
"What do I do?"
"Choose the more brutal and savage method. The biggest gear you can summon is eleven meters wide and several inches thick. You can manipulate them via semi-telekinesis. In the next days to come, we are going bowling magic style. We are also trying it Frisbee style. We will also improve your physical abilities. I know that you are physically strong already, but we can do better."
At Hans's words, Jane blanches in utter fear at the prospect of 'power lifting'.