"Cast it faster! You waste too much time separating the components of the spell, if you can do each of them individually, then you can do all of them at once!", Regal was lecturing Anne on her magic circle casting, aiming to improve the overall efficiency and speed to his standard.
However, they were also joined by another small individual who seemed to be doing a better job than Anne. That individual being the prince of the Kingdom of Prevalis, the crown prince at that.
"Hehe, what do you think?", Alba had just formed a magic circle and held it together with a smug face, looking toward Anne, despite the question seemingly being directed at Regal.
Regal narrowed his eyes and the atmosphere got a little heavier, "Faster", he said coldly.
Alba whipped his head toward Regal once he heard this with a concerned look on his face, "F-faster!? But it's alread-"
"Faster", Regal repeated with a similar tone. His menacing expression convinced the prince to shut up and continue his training.
'What an annoying brat...', Regal thought, recalling the many other times since earlier that this child seemed to try and show off and brag. Even weirder was that it didn't seem directed at his teacher who he admired so much, but towards his fellow student who was focused on her own task at the same time.
Whenever Alba makes such an attempt to display his abilities, Anne always reply's with an awkward smile as she tries to maintain her concentration on her spell. Somehow this still pleases him.
'Well, the both of them are able to understand my instructions well, so progress is smooth. This training is especially important when going into battle.
Enemies will do anything in their power to get close to a mage, and while a mage can cast a barrier in response, it's rare to have a close range spell to deal with the situation. And even if they did, they would need the corresponding control for it to be of any use.', Regal thought to himself while also analysing their training.
The two students are currently trying to cast their spells faster while also reducing mana waste.
A spell is normally split into different components. The first is the container, it's usually a shape like a circle which represents the mana that will be divided for a particular section of the spell, for instance the entire spell would be within a circle, but the specific functions may be split by a triangle or lines.
The next step is drawing the incantation into the circle, and this would obviously come after drawing the containers. However, the size of the circle won't change by a significant amount for each spell, so for spells that will be used often, it's a good idea to memorise the incantation's size and position alongside the container to draw both at the same time.
There is one more step, however it usually occurs before drawing the magic circle. That is converting mana to an element.
A mage's body converts mana to a certain element, affinities measure how well the body converts that mana into any such element. Beginner mages have no choice but to do this on the spot when they're casting spells, but stronger mages with higher capacities will have a store of mana within them for a particular element beforehand. This process is difficult to train since the mind, just like a regular person before becoming a mage, doesn't recognise the difference between elements.
"One more time! Once you form this spell, I want you to direct your attack to the target and activate it", Regal pointed at a training dummy with a makeshift paper 'target' pinned to it. It was the best he had within his storage in the capital, but it was more than what he has available in his regional residence.
'She certainly wasn't lying about being able to memorise a page of a book from a single glance', Regal approved. Anne showed expert skill in writing the exact incantation for a spell, something the prince struggled with from time to time in comparison.
Having the correct incantations is important, if something is off, then the spell may end up taking a strange shape, reduce in power, or not work at all. Worst case it explodes in front of you, but that's more likely for a fire mage like the prince.
Anne was forming her spell, both the incantations and container were forming at the same time, a single error meant needing to restart the spell so her focus was firm. Her speed was still lacking, but the correct formation of the spell mattered more. Around 6 seconds passed before a small but fast ball of water was shot from the mage circle toward the target.
Unfortunately, the target remained perfectly standing, without even a dent.
"I missed...", Anne sulked.
"That's alright, it had the power it needed at least. Look over there, you hit Ruk with it", Regal comforted as he pointed at the annoying Ruk. Clearly he was satisfied that the spell was of use in some way.
"Training misfire~!", Regal shouted with a wide grin on his face, Ruk showed a lacking reaction in response as he went back to training Eric.
While it seemed to not affect him, Eric suddenly began taking more of a beating than a moment before.
Satisfied with this sight, Regal turned to his other student.
"Your turn", he stated to Alba.
Alba broke his gaze toward Anne as he faced the training dummy's. Regal returned to his strictness, as if he was bipolar.
"Get on with it!"
Alba jumped before quickly forming his circle.
3... 4...
5 seconds, that's how fast Alba could perform compared to Anne.
He shot off a bullet of of small and compact flames which hit the dummy but were off target. Regardless he puffed out his chest in satisfaction.
"Both of you need to work on your aim", Regal criticised.
Alba dropped his shoulders as he went back to forming magic circle as quickly as possible with a gloomy aura.
Regal left the two of them to their training as walked back the entrance of the training grounds where Pamel also seemed to be waiting.
"Please tell me it's something fun, this teaching stuff is boring when all I can do is say 'repeat this, repeat that'. I can't even have them fight each other yet as training because they're so terrible.", Regal complained.
Neither of them were actually terrible for their level, but it's true they weren't at a level where they could have a proper spar, mainly due to Anne being particularly new to magic as a whole.
Pamel handed over a letter.
"What's this?", Regal asked with a raised brow, it was a letter bearing the seal of the royal family.
"One of the guards accompanying the prince passed it on to me, stating that it was a message from the king about an urgent matter", Pamel explained.
Regal frowned at the information. He wanted something fun to do, but almost anything to do with nobles had nothing to do with him using magic for anything productive. More often than not, he needed to flaunt his power and authority to settle disputes or increase another persons standing during an event.
Though at the same time he thought that since it's from the king, maybe it wouldn't be the useless stuff he is requested from most nobles. After all, the king wouldn't need the Archmage to raise his standing during a meeting.
Regal opened the envelope and began reading the contents.
'Just a bunch of formalities...", Regal sighed.
However as he reached the latter half of the letter, his expression improved.
'Demons? Strange activity in the Lucus forest next to the capital? Lack of communication with the elven border...? Many interesting things are occurring.', Regal smiled at the fact that he may actually be able to do something.
However his smile quickly turned to a frown once again.
"You seem to be frowning a lot today sir Regal", Pamel commented.
"That's because unpleasant things keep happening today...", he replied while staring at the letter, reading it until the end.
The initial problems of the letter, despite making Regal interested, was actually quite the concerning news.
The capital of the Kingdom was founded next to the Lucus forest. For a little more than a century after the formation of the Kingdom, they expanded in all directions other than the forest, because the forest was well known for being the habitat of dangerous monsters. Monsters of all ranks would appear, the lower ranked monsters would appear on the outskirts of the forest where an occasional C-Rank may also appear, even rarer being a demonic beast as they usually live deeper in the forest.
They rarely left the forest however so there was little risk, and it stayed that way for a very long time, generations passing believing it was no problem.
That was until the demons began their conquest. Their conquest to eliminate humanity.
Demons were humanoid creatures with obvious distinguishing features such as wings, horns, red eyes and multiple other differences based on their own cultures and races. They saw humans as vermin, there was too many of them to the point that it was getting dangerous, reproducing at an extreme rate compared to the demons.
Even more of a problem was the fact that the Lucus forest was the only landmark standing between demon territory and the Kingdom of Prevalis, placing them almost directly at the forefront of their aggressors.
The capital at the time had many warriors who found a job in eliminating monsters and demonic beasts in the Lucus forest for their expensive resources. Because of this, they were able to handle the first attempt at an invasion from the demons and reach a stalemate. High ranking individuals ready themselves in the capital for whenever the next attack may be.
Over the 3 years since the beginning of their conquest, they've only attacked 4 times. But it was enough times to put the Kingdom of Prevalis in a difficult situation.
This meant that strange activity within the forest meant that a potential attack may occur in the near future. This didn't make Regal feel any concern, but what did concern him was the news he read after the demons and the forest nonsense.
'The Chaos Gate... those bastards never cease to make trouble', Regal thought, but this time it wasn't a simple joke, he wore a genuine serious expression.
The fact that both communication with the elven border has ceased, AND that the Chaos Gate seemed to be moving had quite the implication.
The Chaos Gate was an organisation of humans with an unknown goal, all humanity knows is that they possess strong people who are the enemy of humanity. Even worse was the fact that they were located within the elven territory... close to the border between the elves and the Kingdom.
Regal looked at the heroes who were leisurely training without any awareness about the current situation.
'Did they perhaps hear about the heroes...? Or is it just bad timing"