"Aight, all you fuckers here are part of Combat Class One. I'm Berthard, dean of the College of Combat. As part of Combat Class One, you have the privilege of having your core subjects be handled by people like me or of similar ability."
Reina, as bold as ever, raised her hand. Berthard gave her a nod.
"Will we be Combat Class One until graduation? Will there be any addition or removal of members in the class?"
"Good question. Most likely not, but maybe. Any changes will not be on an individual level, unless if the circumstances are just that special."
"Anyways, as a special class, you're also held to a higher standard."
"Group One; composed of two close combat majors, a rear combat major, and a support major. Group Two; composed of a close combat major and two general combat majors. I trust you're already familiar with your group?"
We nodded.
"First lesson for the class General Combat is physical fitness. Second lesson is physical fitness. Third lesson is... any guesses?"
The forest elf from Group One supplied the thought running through all of our minds. "Physical fitness."
"Wrong. Mana circulation." He guffawed and slapped his knee.
"The basis of combat will always be in your own physical ability. Take away your mana, and what are you? Physical ability will always be useful to you in combat no matter the situation. You can never be too fit, too strong, too durable, too fast."
"After that is mana circulation. What makes us people in the Northern World different from those outside it? It's mana. When you throw a punch without mana, it's equivalent to an outsider throwing their best punch. Maintaining a constant mana circulation allows for each action you take to be infused with mana."
"With that said, proper combat techniques and strategies are all useless if you're not fit enough to take advantage of them. So class will now start."
The class General Combat was every weekday at 8 AM for two hours. Elementary Mana I class was after that for another two hours. The afternoon was spent on electives from Monday to Wednesday. On Thursdays, we had the class Team Combat for the entire afternoon. On Fridays, we had the class Dungeon Combat instead of Team Combat.
Starting today, Petra wouldn't be always with us during classes. Apparently, she had some stuff she had to do in Lady Artanis' behalf. We would still meet up for lunch though in an unused room in the College of Mana, through the benevolence of our wonderful benefactor Professor Ilmarë.
Berthard had us do the workouts during the first hour without any usage of mana. This was to build up our base physical fitness. In the second hour, we were free to start circulating mana into the workouts. By circulating your mana around your body while doing physical activities, you promote and accelerate muscle recovery in addition to the boosts in strength, speed, and the like.
By mixing both styles of workouts, Berthard made sure to balance the growth of our physical abilities and of the flow of our mana circulation. The smoother the circulation, the more efficient you were with the mana you use. This helps in boosting your abilities even more.
Our General Combat class was in the College of Combat, our next class — Elementary Mana I — was located in the middle of the College of Mana. There was a bit of distance between them, but it was fine.
I and Reina were both in agreement to run all the way to the next class while circulating mana. This way, we could apply our improvements in class right away. Vera pleaded with the both of us to just take it easy, her blue eyes shimmering in faux tears.
Over the weekend, Petra and Professor Ilmarë taught Vera a simple spell to visibly change her eye color to something much more common for snow elves.
Vera, as reluctant as she was, had no choice but to go along with our whims. Cheers for democracy!
Besides, even if we were a little bit late, our professor for the next class was Professor Ilmarë. She would probably give us some slack, right?
We entered the lecture hall and it was already filled with students. Parts of the front row was purposely unoccupied due to the note on the table saying 'Reserved for CC1'. The parts of the front row that were already occupied had a similar note that read 'Reserved for MC1'.
MC1 probably stood for Mana Class One — the College of Mana's equivalent to Combat Class One. A specialized track that focused on mana analysis. From what Professor Ilmarë mentioned, the students needed to have achieved a certain grade in the written exam scores to even qualify for the class.
It made sense for this class to be more than just CC1 and MC1. It would've been a huge waste of resources having Professor Ilmarë just teach several students when she could teach multiples of that number and be just as effective.
Professor Ilmarë was still nowhere to be found. We took our seats at the exact center of the front row and chatted, while waiting for the professor to arrive.
We felt her presence, before she entered the room. All chatter in the room stopped when a force started pressing down on everyone. It was a super light pressure, completely incomparable to what she exerted on us last week. It was way weaker than the very first mana field she did when she separated Combat Class One from the rest.
I guess the reduction in intensity was out of consideration for the students who weren't from the College of Combat. They wouldn't really need to be able to handle a mana field anyways, so there was no use in inflicting that much force on them.
A relaxed languid figure entered the room, a cigarette in hand. Her cool image enhanced by how her blonde hair flowed as the wind brushed past — where that wind came from was better left unsaid. As soon as she got on the lectern in front, she dove right into it without any pleasantries.
"I'm Ilmarë, this is Elementary Mana I. A copy of the syllabus will be handed out after class. For today, the class will be an introduction to mana."
"She's really completely different, huh." Reina whispered to us in amazement. We nodded and quickly shushed her to stop talking about it. It wouldn't be completely out of character for her to dole out unnecessary treatment on us if she caught us talking about this.
"Mana is, simply put, a type of energy that we are able to directly manipulate after it has merged in our bodies. When this modified mana is released from the body, we are still able to exert control over the released mana to a certain extent. Spells is what we call the act of inducing certain phenomena through the use of mana."
She paused. "Standard Magic is the standardization of the formula, process, and chant to induce a specific effect."
She stretched out a hand and chanted, "0.8 Mauss, ignite oxygen at a rate of 80W, tip of right index finger."
A small candle-like fire emerged from the tip of her finger. "Standard Magic allows those without the strength of mind to be able to cast the same magic as those who do. This is an example of a standard magic that strips any and all other aspects of casting. Any of you can cast this magic, provided you have sufficient mana."
After ten seconds of burning, the fire quickly vanished.
"Any standard magic that has the same level of extreme particularity in their chants can be used by anyone at any time. Even someone whose mana was just awakened can use the spell right away. We call this kind of standard magic as 'Methodical Magic'."
"Of course, not all standard magic is that particular. Standard Magic breaks down spellcasting into three distinct parts: Allocation, Invocation or Evocation, and Execution."
"Allocation is the first part of the chant. It will determine the amount of mana to be supplied into the spell. Invocation or Evocation is the second part of the chant. It determines what mana does. Execution, the third part, determines how it's done."
She raised her left hand and chanted, "Miniscule amount, burn, left hand."
The exact same small candle-like fire emerged from the tip of her left index finger. "It's a different chant, but exactly the same spell. The difference between the two is how much processing my mind needs to do in order to generate the same result. In this chant, I have to manually control how much mana I use, the process of burning, and I have to concentrate every speck of mana into the tip of my index finger."
Just like the previous one, after ten seconds, the fire extinguished.
"These two chants are exactly the same spell; they're both Standard Magic. You can have your own preference on what style of Standard Magic you prefer. For fast-paced magical combat with the constant chaos and dynamic changes, the latter tends to be more useful due to how it relies on feel and how versatile it can be. While for controlled experiments and such, Methodical Magic is much more useful."