Third Person's POV
[It's time for you to start learning the real thing, you have complete control over the mana inside you now.]
The bright ball of flame in Alaric's hand flickered from existence as he curled his fingers to form a loose fist before letting his hands fall. Alaric's eyes gleamed under the moonlight. The lights in his room were turned off, so no one realized that he was awake inside. Getting up from his spot, Alaric took a healing potion and started talking to Boon in his head.
'It took four months, huh.'
[Four long months. Honestly, if you were to try setting a record for the slowest progress, you might just win. Get a grip already.]
A muscle jumped in Alaric's temple as he glared at the obnoxious red panel floating above his head. 'What do you mean 'get a grip'? I did all that I could,' Alaric whined in his head, complaining to himself but Boon could clearly hear him, and the sound of someone clicking their tongue got projected in Alaric's head. It was Boon.
[Just take your position already.]
Alaric put the vial down in the stash of the empty ones and returned to his spot near the window.
[Form a [Fireball]]
A ball of flames appeared in Alaric's hands, flickering.
[Now carefully add mana. You will know you are doing it right when you see it grow in size.]
Alaric concentrated. A stream of mana came out of his core, slowly reaching the palm of his hand and going into the ball of fire. The sensation felt somewhat soothing. The flickering ball of fire in Alaric's palm pulsed as it began to grow, heat licking at his fingers.
"Oh!" Alaric looked excited, the flames slowly catching speed and wavering, and the intensity of heat from the growing ball started to spread.
Alaric funneled more mana into the flames, the heat scorching his fingertips. "Boon when should I st—" Before Alaric could complete his sentence, with a pop, the flames exploded, searing his fingers. The sting didn't bother him even though it did cause him pain—he was used to that—but the hole singed into the curtain? That was going to be harder to explain.
[You aren't supposed to just pour mana into it, make it swirl around in the same direction as the flames.]
'Thanks, Boon. I am sure you could have held onto that information till I turned into a scorched pig.'
[I thought you were a human...]
Alaric snorted, annoyed by Boon, very much aware of Boon simply playing it dumb but Alaric didn't have time to bicker. He quickly downed another healing potion and stared at the hole that had formed on the curtain.
"I will have to ask Eirlys to change and hide the curtains now... I am drowning in the favors she has been doing for me."
Alaric looked out of the window, the soft breeze of night was pleasing, calming him as he took long deep breaths.
"The wind is starting to get colder, winter will be here soon..."
[And you would have barely made any progress. Stop blabbering and start again.]
Alaric gritted his teeth, Boon's words felt like a stick slammed to his head by a teacher who found him in a daze, staring somewhere on the horizon.
Alaric used [Fireball] again.
[Start with itsy-bitsy amount of mana. Swirl it gently, in the same direction as the flames are moving.]
Alaric was listening and following what Boon said but he still couldn't be less annoyed, "You could have done this from the start. The burnt hole will give away the use of fire."
[If I did, you wouldn't get the idea of how things could go wrong. That was the least of what can happen during this, once you start improving, the fatality of your mistakes will become more grave. If you make the mistake of swirling the mana too slowly or too fast during later stages of our training the skill would go haywire and it wouldn't be a simple pop like now. You can't brute force your way through it… Practicing and proceeding slowly and properly is the only way. Now continue as I said earlier, you will know you are doing it right when the size of the ball starts increasing.]
Alaric began with a nod but it wasn't very long before frustration started gnawing at him. Before, the ball of flames grew in size very easily but now that wasn't the case. The fireball in Alaric's hand flickered, barely growing while Alaric tried to create a spin while supplying mana to it.
"Ugh."
*Pop* The skill went out of control again, but this time it was just Alaric's arm. He groaned, it wasn't that the burns didn't hurt, he simply got used to the feeling of small burns due to the unbelievably large number of times he had burnt himself before today.
[Sit. Too inefficient to get up for a healing potion every time you fail. That's doing nothing but allowing you to be careless and not fear your mistakes. 10 times. Try that many times before taking a healing potion.]
Boon. It is a ruthless being. Every single time Alaric fails, Boon has something to say that pokes fun at him in the worst way possible, irritating him. But Boon isn't useless.
Right after having a good look at Alaric's face, boiling from frustration, it would point his mistakes out. He listened, but the itch to strangle Boon simmered under his skin. If that red panel had a face, Alaric was pretty sure he'd be knocking its teeth out by now. Too bad Boon was just a disembodied voice with too much attitude.
The days started slipping by.
The passage of time whispers only to the idle, for those who chase dreams or cradle purpose hear nothing but the song of their own stride.
Before Alaric knew it, another month had passed in a haze of exhaustion from his arduous routine.
All he did was train.
Train by running laps around the training grounds and train till late at night, in the attempt to seek mastery over [Fireball].
[Task: Run laps around the training grounds. (123/125)]
[Reward: 100,000 Aurel points]
"Haah... Haah... One mo—" Alaric met the ground with a thud, his body went limp after running around the whole day. Aurelia was still in the arbor and watching the final stretch of his running.
"Jeez, stay within your limits," Aurelia grumbled, her face a mix of concern and annoyance as she walked to where Alaric was lying, In all honesty, Aurelia knew that those limits were far gone before he even collapsed.
In five months Alaric has reached as close to his goal as one can be. Sparing one more week to this running around and Alaric was sure to run past the goal and not collapse.
Obviously, no one doubted him; they knew he would be able to do it but to reach it even before the unreasonable deadline he had put on himself was a shock to every single one who had been tasked the same in their life by Elowen.
When Novius and Xironia found out that Alaric could already run a hundred laps in one go, they were simply flabbergasted. They didn't wait to inform Elowen about it and she had a similar reaction.
Elowen had assumed it would take at least eight months but Alaric proved her wrong. It was simply running, but for a child who was about to be eight, running a hundred and twenty-three laps was more than just impressive.
Aurelia picked Alaric up to earn a groan from him as he resisted her, "One more... only one more lap is remaining... let me go."
"First of all, you will fall again in two more steps. Second of all, it is two more laps."
Alaric's eyes looked at the floating panel above his head and he groaned, Aurelia was right, Alaric realized he had made a mistake while counting laps.
He looked at the field and gulped, one round was something Alaric believed he could grit his teeth through but one more, no thanks. Alaric's body slumped in exhaustion as he got carried back to the arbor to rest.
"Thanks."
"No worries." Aurelia chuckled.