"Good morning Sylas, are you ready for training?"
Fleur greeted Sylas with a warm smile, all the while Sylas was still amazed at the scenery outside of the cottage. He was too preoccupied with everything that had been revealed to him the past two nights that he did not notice the grand landscape he was staying within. The cottage was the one he saw in his dreams. It was nestled in the middle of a field surrounded by a forest. The walls were built of a warm, honey colored stone, with ivy creeping up the sides, threading between wooden beams. A thatched roof, dotted with tiny glowing mushrooms, slopes gently over the structure, with curls of sweet-smelling smoke drifting from the crooked chimney.
"I saw this.... this cottage it was in my dreams... days before I came here I kept dreaming of this place. Who knew it would be your house Fleur. Where are we exactly? Are we far from Auris?"
They were currently in the forest of Zyrellia in the southern region of Dravareth. I tucked this place away from Auris so I would not be bothered by anybody. While not far if you were to know the exact location of the cottage, It was separated from the forest using illusion magic. To any random adventurer this place looked like just another thick patch of forest that is nearly impossible to get through.
Sylas looked around in amazement. He was just excited to get to learning, but worried nonetheless. "What if someone were to walk into the forest illusion anyways?"
Fleur smirked... "Well we are pretty deep in the forest. The forest dwelling creatures would get to them before I could."
Sylas chuckled nervously at Fleur's comment. Not knowing what to make of it.
"Well shall we begin Sylas? We shall begin with magic theory."
Sylas could not have been more excited to begin on his lesson.
"AM I GOING TO BREATHE FIRE?! OOH OOH AM I GONNA FREEZE SOMEONE BY JUST TOUCHING THEM?"
Sylas found his mind wandering the realm of possibility. Could he decimate his foes at the snap of a finger? Could he summon powerful spirits to do his bidding? Fleur managed to cut off his train of thought.
"Sylas you do not even know how to summon a spark of fire, yet you wish to breathe fire? Does a baby walk before learning to crawl?"
She let out a jolt of laughter at the thought that Sylas did not know what in world he was in store for.
"No, but...."
But nothing came out of his mouth. He knew there was truth behind her words.
"Magic is everywhere Sylas. It is in the air we breathe, the nature that surrounds us, mana flows through us and everything in this world. Think of mana as an invisible force that we cannot see, but we can feel it. Although as I said last night you specifically will be able to see it and manipulate it someday."
He did see it though. This radiating glow it all made sense to him now. It was mana manifesting itself. While he could not grab it he could see it.
"Um Fleur I don't know if I already mentioned this, but I can kind of already see mana."
Fleur's face was one of pure astonishment. She sighed wondering if he was just joking with her or if he was actually telling the truth. She knew that someone with the Silver eyes needed to train properly to be able to utilize them properly before being able to manifest the ocular interpretation of mana. It should have been causing immense strain to his vision and unbearable headaches, but here he was with no training whatsoever, and perfectly healthy as far as the human eyes could see, but Fleur knew something else was going on.
"Sylas does your head hurt?"
"No, why?"
"Do you ever feel like you have to strain your eyes to see well?"
"No, what is this about?"
Fleur thought that Sylas could actually stand a chance against the entrance exams if he was already able to see mana, now getting him to the point where he could use even basic magic was a whole other problem, but they just might be able to do it.
"Sylas I am about to use my Silver Eyes to check on your mana pathways, so give me a minute."
"Mana Pathways? What is that?"
Fleur explained that mana pathways are like an intricate system of veins, but instead of blood flowing through them it was mana that washed through them, for all those who could use magic it collected in the hippocampus of the brain, just how the heart pumped out blood, the brain dispersed the mana. It was believed by the high scholars of the world that since magic was used using the imagination to create and further develop new spells and runes, that it gathered where the imagination itself came from, but that was just common theory. Fleur was astonished by what she saw. Throughout Sylas' skinny and frail body an enormous amount of mana was flowing through him. An amount that normally would equate to a mage in the Provecta Triangulus tier.
It was no surprise that he had mana since he was her biological son, but to have that much without any training on how to gather mana was astonishing. At this revelation, Fleur decided to speed up the process at which Sylas would need to learn since he already had the mana capacity. Instead of working on magic theory, they were going directly into conjuring mana.
"Sylas we are skipping magic theory, you already have the mana in your system, and an abnormal amount at that."
"Well doesn't everything have mana in their being, at least according to what you said?"
Fleur went to explain how while all beings did have mana in their bodies, as well as how mana could be found in their surroundings, the reason that not everybody could wield magic was because of two reasons. One being that they did not have proper training, and second being that not everybody had the capability of storing vast amounts of mana in their bodies.
Mana was hard to manipulate. Like a smith battered tempered steel in order to form weapons time after time again, mana was similar just harder to control. It took immense mental fortitude to control and give shape to mana.
After Fleur finished explaining the very basics to Sylas, they moved on to practical training. This was Sylas' best hope. All of a sudden the air around Sylas became heavy, it felt as the an intense heat was radiating. Sylas throat dried up and, he could feel the drops of sweat flowing down his pale whit face. It felt as if all humidity in the immediate area was being sucked up. Sylas looked to see what was happening when he noticed a bright white glow emanating from Fleur, specifically her hand.
She began to speak, but Sylas was not able to understand the words that came out of her mouth.
"O Ignis in me lucidus ardeat, et mandata mea manifesta facias."
The only word that Sylas could understand was Ignis, knowing that meant fire, but that was the least of is concerns. After Fleur finished chanting those weird words a ember appeared above her head, then another, and another. A total of six bright yellow embers of Flame surrounded Fleur in an arc above her head.
It was beautiful. Sylas looked at Fleur and at the Floating embers, and they were radiating in white glow. Stronger and clearer than Sylas had ever seen. It made the hairs on his arms stand straight up.
This demonstration of magic was something on a scale that Sylas could never imagine. The feeling of being able to see magic up close and personally was something that he never dreamt of happening. What could possibly compare to this moment? Flushed Sylas watched in amazement as Fleur controlled the embers of fire. They swirled around her in helix-like fashion doing her bidding, but the thing was that Fleur was not saying anything. She stood their motionless as the embers of flame just danced around her. Sylas wondered how Fleur was capable of making them move. It was as if the magic had a mind of it's own.
As the day went on Fleur explained the basics of magic. Showing him the fire embers, and the she was mentally commanding them to move about. Continuously pouring mana into the form of magic she was creating. Sylas was eager to attempt to summon flames of his own. He felt that he needed to give it a shot. From what Fleur explained to him magic had its own language known to all of those who practiced it as the runic language. Different words caused different effects. The amount of mana also determined the capacity and intensity of one's magic.
Sylas felt lost not even knowing where to begin. The first spell that Fleur wanted Sylas to learn was one who's enchantment was 'O aqua, attende vocationem meam'. It translated to a basic conjuring spell that summoned small water droplets in his hand. Sylas began chanting over and over again, but to no avail
Sylas was already cursing to himself.
'DAMMIT WHY WON'T IT WORK, I AM SAYING IT JUST LIKE HOW SHE SAID TO'
Sylas was trying to strain himself into conjuring the water. His muscles and veins strained as he focused so intensely on this task, minute after minute soon turned into an hour. Still nothing happened. The only water he felt was all of the sweat streaming down his head from how hard he was trying to complete this task.
If he could not even summon droplets of water then how was he supposed to get into the academy on scholarship. Fleur looked at him sitting beneath a tree sipping on her tea, amused at the sight of the young man attempting to learn his spell. Suddenly she spoke her voice as sweet as honey.
"Sylas you may be focusing, but you the reason it is not working is because you are forcing the magic to come out. When you block a river what happens? The pressure builds up and suddenly it burst. You will pop a blood vessel if you continue to strain yourself to this extent. Think of mana as a river and you the land that guides it to where you want it go."
Suddenly a clear image popped into Sylas' head.