"As you all have been practising since your first year in the academy, this is just basic training to see your progress toward your magic control."
Professor Danstirl put his hand on his waist.
"Show what you have been capable of and how much you have progressed since the last class. I want to see if you guys have done any practice."
He eyed all the students with his judgmental purple eyes before his eyes stopped at one student.
"You."
He pointed his pointy finger, showing his well-carved and shining nail, at the student.
"New student, am I right? This is the first time we've seen each other due to my absence from our classes. What's your name, boy?"
"Shuu Orion, professor."
Professor Danstirl put his hand on his chin while eyeing him up and down.
"I heard a lot of praise from the principal and Professor Mary about you. I am not someone who is easily swayed by people's words, so do not expect to be treated as someone special in my class. Everyone is equal here."
He uttered it with confidence in his tone while scrutinizing Shuu under his gaze.
"Everyone in my class needs to know the basics of magic, as I have taught them."
Professor Danstirl propped his chin up, moving his finger back and forth as a signal for Shuu to come forward. The black-haired boy did as instructed. Everyone gave their way for him to walk forward; however, he could hear a faint whisper among the students.
"He is at it again."
"You will be fine, Shuu."
"Just act cool and answer his question."
"Can't he stop looking down at people?"
"You know that his pride was too high."
He stopped in front of Professor Danstirl.
"Your posture was slouching. You should stand straight while looking at me with confidence. I don't like how you stand; chin up!"
Michael overcame the urge to frown before he postured his shoulders.
"Hm, this is what you should do from the start. I guess you were not told in this simple manner since you were uneducated and not from a noble household."
From just that, he now knows Professor Danstirl's personality. He didn't know the principal would let someone like this who downgraded their students be an educator.
"Well, now, before we start, Tell me about magic that you understand, Mr. Orion. Everyone here already had in their minds the basics of magic and its fundamentals. You should know by now, but not if you have not been taught about it. This is just a basic requirement to enter the academy, as you should have known since you took the special exam."
"Of course, I know, Professor. Magic has always been the power utilized by people in Dradgim. Magic was already utilized millennia ago, even before Dradgim was established as a kingdom. As you know, there are three stages for a magician. First is the beginner, who needs to make an incantation before activating their magic. The second one was intermediate, which can shorten the incantation, but you need full control over it because changing the incantation might lead to destructive magic. The third stage is an expert mage, which is someone who can cast magic without incantation. However, magic would not be activated if there was no trace of mana inside their body."
"Very well, you know the basics, which are compulsory for you. Then, tell me what mana is and how to know if we have it or not."
Michael wanted to frown, but he avoided such a facial expression. Professor Danstirl must wait for him to fall into a helpless situation by asking him questions until he can't anymore.
"Mana was inside everyone's body. Mana also exists in nature. You could replenish your mana by becoming one with nature and taking in nature's energy through meditation. If we wanted to know if we have mana or not, it would be easy. We just need to say one incantation, for example."
Michael pulled out his palm.
"Reservoir of dried land, grant me a piece of thy manifest blue, solid thy hest."
It was different when he used aura, which is the power coming out of his body. Right now, water was created out of thin air before it slowly turned into ice. He touched the ice, which was smaller than his palm.
"You would know your mana level by saying the incantation. In the book for a beginner magic user, they would provide a simple incantation to check the mana in the user's body. This was the first incantation I learned from the book unintentionally, and I didn't know that it was the third level of mana practice."
He ended his explanation by adding some bragging, for which he could see a slight twitch from Professor Danstirl.
"Hm, very well. A beginner's luck, but I might reprimand you that someone underage needed to be supervised by someone older of a magic user when used outside."
"Ah, that would not be a worry, professor. I have an older brother who was a hunter who specialized in magic."
Professor Danstirl clicked his tongue faintly, but enough for him, who was near the old man, to hear.
"That was assured to hear then. Question again: Would you tell me the difference between magic and aura?"
He could hear gasps from behind him, and another round of murmurs circulated among his classmates.
"Professor, we—"
"Did I ask you to say anything, Miss Collins?"
"Professor, this question—"
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Moulton; it was rude to interrupt someone's conversation. It encompassed all of you."
He gave a glare to each one of his students. Rezal rolled his eyes at the warning. He muttered slowly while looking at the back of the black-haired boy.
"When will he change his prejudice?"
He was stultified by this routine. Professor Danstirl will always find fault with every one of his students to show his superiority. He will not do it to anyone with a high nobility title, such as a duke, but it is a different case if they are lower than a duke or a commoner who doesn't have a title at all.
His prejudice was clear as day among students, and he would always suck up the asses of the students from the duke household or royalty from another country.
Shuu was getting it hard by getting Professor Danstirl as his magic instructor in his only year in the academy. That old man would find every fault, even if Shuu was someone who passed the special exam. Professor Danstirl judged people by their status.
Asking questions was one of his ways to humiliate his students, especially if they were commoners. He would ask more and more questions until the students didn't know the answers anymore. He would spit out some hubristic answers to downgrade the student.
Moreover, now. He is sure Shuu has ticked off Professor Danstirl with his answer just now. Everyone noticed the bragging in his words about his first attempt at using magic. All of them were in awe of it, but surely not Professor Danstirl.
That is why that older man was asking about a topic that was not in their learning yet and was forbidden to anyone until four years ago. It was a precaution from the emperor; he didn't want to let the incident occur again in his empire, but by making the citizens aware of the dangers of an aura user, the students became more attentive in their learning and didn't dare learn about the aura.
However, it was only taught to the students of last year's academy. They have not yet been taught about this by Professor Danstirl. It was a trap because people couldn't carelessly retrieve the books about aura outside.
'Childish.'
"May you answer my question now?"
Michael smiled cheekily.
"Absolutely, professor. Magic and aura are two different powers that existed long ago. Aura has become a fatal power that was forbidden to learn and to know; however, four years ago, Emperor Asteric declared to create learning about aura to make the students aware of the dangers of using an aura."
Professor Danstirl squinted his eyes.
"That's not answering—"
"The difference between aura and magic is simple if we know their fundamentals. Magic is from nature and is created by using mana; however, aura is created inside our bodies. Unlocking the aura was done by using meditation, which was more difficult to learn than magic, which relies on the amount of mana in our bodies. Magic, just like I have demonstrated just now, is created from nothing into something different than an aura, which is the power created from our body."
Professor Danstirl widened his eyes at his explanation, but he didn't stop.
"Think of it like this. You see that I have created the ice from thin air. That is because that is how magic works. If I used aura to create ice, it would manifest directly from my hand; imagine that ice coming out of your hand."
Some of the students open up their palms and imagine the ice being suddenly created in their palms without incantation or mana. They couldn't comprehend that their hands could suddenly turn ice.
"If you look at this, this is magic.
Reservoir of dried land, grant me a piece of your manifest blue, round sphere."
A small ball of water manifested in his hand. He showed his hand to his classmate.
"Look at this; the water was not touching my hand when it was first created."
He lowered the water ball before he squeezed it until it broke, wetting his hand.
"We could control it after we created it. Nevertheless, aura could make my hand wet from the start because the water would flow out exactly from my hand. I would show you the example if I could use aura."
He turned back to face his professor.
"That is all I could grasp about aura, professor. Ah, right. Just to let you guys know, aura was forbidden because of its destructive power. No one managed to handle the aura properly, and if an aura outburst occurred, death was inevitable for the user. Learning aura has its pros, but the cons are not worth it."
He looked at his speechless professor with a smile.
"That is the knowledge I have come upon from the academy's library, professor. Reading books is always my preferred activity, though I am still lacking in this field. Please correct me if I am wrong."
He could continue, but that might seem suspicious. His knowledge about aura was beyond what the books in the library could give the people in the academy. By letting them know a little bit about it and how detrimental aura is, he could put the idea in their minds to not seek knowledge about aura beyond what will be taught later.
"Ahem, that's enough, Mr. Orion. You did well."
Of course. He knew that this was the first time Professor Danstirl had taught magic to the last-year students since the prohibition on learning about aura had been lifted. Thus, the professors in this academy would need to learn about aura beforehand.
By the way, Professor Danstirl reacted, this guy must not have fully digested the concept of aura yet. That could be a reason he did not teach about aura until now.
"Ahem, you guys should learn from Mr. Orion to do some research without me telling you to. Alright, let's start with the magic training. Line up!"
Michael smirked. He turned back to see that Rezal was having a similar expression as him.
"You know a lot about aura."
He shrugged.
"I just read masses of it."