The sound of leaves rubbing against each other and birds chirping on its branches was carried by the gentle breeze of the afternoon.
The students sat side by side, forming a circle, their legs crossed and their eyes closed. Their hands placed on their knees, relaxed, along with their muscles, which hadn't moved for moments now.
"Remember the magic circle, only then you can reach enlightenment," Javarius said, his voice hoarse but his tone soft, reaching the ears of the students like a demonic symphony.
Though they may have been distracted by his voice, they sat there as they meditated, doing their best to gain enlightenment, to feel mana.
Hubert was one of them. He closed his eyes, trying to remember the magic circles Vinc showed them in his presentation previously.
"Here, the magic circle of the beginning, a simple star shape in the middle. Only if you understand what each part means, then you are halfway done in the enlightenment of mana," Vinc's voice echoed in his mind.
It's as if, amidst the black landscape of his closed eyes, Vinc appeared and began teaching him.
"What does the star mean? What does it have anything to do with mana?" he asked Vinc in his mind, detached from real life, immersed in his meditation.
"That's something you've got to learn yourself!" Vinc responded, his annoying round glasses reflected Hubert's imagery.
"But it's all blank and void in here… what can meditation even do?" Hubert asked, his eyes peering into the infinite darkness around him.
"That's where you are wrong, Hubert," Javarius came out from the shadow. His huge muscly arms crossed, and his head shook in disapproval.
"Wh-where did you come from?" Hubert said, his tone slightly high pitched, influenced by his surprise.
"What you are doing is not meditation, it's just emptying your thoughts," Javarius added.
"How do you two even appear here?! And how can I actually converse with you?" Hubert asked.
Clap!
Javarius united his palm together, his clap echoed in the air, pulling up the student's conscioness from their meditation.
"Alright, that's enough meditation today!" he said.
Hubert looked around him, the place was already dark, the sunlight nowhere to be found. The crickets have chirped since long ago. It felt short, a few exchanges of words, yet time passed too quickly in the real world.
"That was… quick," Hubert muttered.
"I hope any of you got a hint of enlightenment during meditation, but normal people usually take around 5 days before feeling mana, don't street it!" Javarius continued.
The students supported themselves as they stood up. Their knees were shaky and their backs ached from the constant sitting.
Teng!
The bell atop the massive clock rang once again. Its dull sound pierced the air.
All of them looked at the clock, its short hand pointing at the number 7.
"Ah, would you look at that? The dinner time has arrived, don't forget to take your daily dinner! It's important for your growth!" Javarius exclaimed excitedly.
"Volare!" Javarius chanted with closed eyes.
The students chattered around as the instructor did so.
Then his feet went off the ground, his body levitating slowly but stably in the sky. Gradually, he went higher and his speed accelerated.
"Adiós, amigos!" Javarius said. Then he sped away into the distance.
The students' eyes widened, flabbergasted by what they saw.
"There's no way that guy just levitated, he's as big as a bear!" one of them muttered.
"It doesn't even make sense that he's a magician!"
"Same! I thought he was someone from the second hall,"
"You thought so too?!"
"You too? I thought I was the only one!"
"Of course not, no one expected him, to be so similar to lord Marcus, yet be so different,"
The crowd chatted in the middle of the field as the dark cloudy sky and moonlight blessed them. Soon, the crowd grew thinner and thinner as all left for dinner.
Hubert did the same.
After dinner, he sat on his bed, meditating once again.
His eyes had just closed when he felt another pat on his shoulder.
"What, Ron?" he asked, bothering not to open his eyes.
"..." Ron's silence spoke. Yet his hand remained on Hubert's shoulder.
"What? I'm meditating here," Hubert asked again.
"Elements…" Ron muttered, soft and bored.
"Elements?" Hubert repeated, confused, as he opened his eyes, staring at Ron.
"Think…" Ron added before turning around and jumping face first into his bed.
"Think…? Alright, let me try," he muttered to himself, grasping Ron's word.
He then closed his eyes. Continuing meditating
There, back again in the dark and empty, abyss-like space. The previous Vinc and Javarius were nowhere to be found.
But Ron stood in the middle of the blank space, facing Hubert.
"Elements… Think… Think… Think… Think…" Ron repeated.
"Elements? Like water, fire, earth and wind? That element?" Hubert asked.
Ron answered with a nod.
"Think of them? Like, here?" Hubert asked, even more confused than before.
Ron repeated his answer with a nod.
"Alright, let me try," Hubert responded. Then closed his eyes as he thought of the element.
First, he thought of the fire.
Sizzle!
A searing pain jolted on his feet.
He quickly opened his eyes, then looked downward. An inferno surged from below him, burning him alive, like in hell. Its heat was intense and blazing, fiery and red, torturing and burning.
"Aw! Aw!" he jumped left and right as he dodged the fire, yet it continued to follow him like a loyal dog.
"Another…" Ron muttered as he watched Hubert running around with the fire chasing him.
Hubert quickly understood. He closed his eyes once again and thought.
Second, he thought of the water.
Plung!
He felt coldness and wetness around him. Then he opened his eyes, only to be greeted by the scenery of a dark blue infinite body of water, of which he was sunken into.
"Glup! Glup glup!" Hubert gasped for air underwater as bubbles came out of his mouth.
Hubert's vision was blurry, water filling his lungs as he slowly closed his eyes. His muscles tensionless, giving up after their last flurry of movement to escape the unending water.
"A-noa-ther…" Ron added, his voice transformed and disturbed by water as it reached Hubert's ear.
His voice was barely heard as his eyelids were closed fully. He thought.
Third, he thought of the wind.
Whoosh!
Buzzing sounded in his ear as if an ant's nest was inside of it.
The infinite, dark space turned bright blue as he opened his eyes. The color of the sky pierced his eyes, cloudless, as dust flew into his vision, blurring him.
His eyes squinted, trying to see what he was inside of. His head was nauseated, puke wanting to come out of his closed mouth.
Only then did he perceive, he was in a whirlwind.
"WAAAAAAAAAAAA!" he shouted as he was thrown and rotated inside the whirlwind countless times.
"A-bzzzzzzzzzzzz-ther," Ron's voice heard again, barely piercing the huge wall of whirlwind that imprisoned Hubert.
He felt sick, yet he forced himself to think. He closed his eyes once again. He thought.
Fourth, he thought of the earth.
His body felt compressed from all directions, he felt the dryness, yet it was silent all around him. His nose was struck first by the smell of dirt, smelly yet refreshing, but suffocating.
His eyes hardly opened, barely winning against the resistance something outside put up. He prevailed and saw brown, everywhere brown, once the bright blue sky turned into the infinite brown.
"Ha-" he tried to make a word from his lips, but he failed. Upon then he just realized where he was.
In the ground.
Stuck and encased by the ground, he felt suffocated. His lungs slowly filled with dirt and dust. But his mouth couldn't utter a single word.
He struggled, moving his hands and legs like a drowning person. But the earth had him completely surrounded, dense, and sturdy. Where he barely could even move his eyelids and lips, not to mention his whole body.
Hubert waited for Ron's voice to come through the crack of the earth. He waited as he tried to survive, believing and hoping for a voice, the familiar voice, to come to him through a crack.
Yet it never did.
His vision blurry as his lungs failed in gathering any air. He knew he would die here if he didn't do something.
Dying in his own mind.
Then he remembered his life, since the start.
Opening his eyes, he found himself in a crib. Then the scene was replaced with him getting bullied, of which his mother came and scolded the village's kids.
Then it changed to the outpost, where he was told to run, and was replaced yet again by him crying for help in the slaves' quarter when being beaten by Brad's underlings.
Hubert felt, for the first time, worthless. He had always despised the cruelty of the world, he had always prayed to the goddess about why he was so miserable and put in infinite agony during his puny life.
But for the first time, in his whole life, he felt weak, he blamed not the people, not the environment, not the goddess of this world.
But himself.