For most of that class, Lukas had been attempting to get through as many aspects as he could. Though, even with his new skill, that number seemed to be lower than his sapphire peers. Poison came easy to him, which was unsurprising. But the antithesis to poison, healing, was giving him quite a bit of difficulty. By the end of class, he had made progress with poison, life, flesh, and metal aspects.

It wasn’t as much forward progress as he would’ve liked to see, however. He was an incredibly competitive sort. Not so much with other people as he was with himself. He couldn’t stand not feeling good enough. His sister on the other hand was much better at reflecting that trait outwards, competing with others. He knew this was a much healthier mental approach, but he couldn’t much help it.

His two friends, Atel and Atsix, on the other hand, were doing leagues better than him. Despite the flack they got from the teacher, they were exceptionally talented at most things they tried to do and were determined enough to see their failures through to success. This, combined with their experience, meant it was completely understandable that they were ahead of him academically. Hell, it was understandable that any of the students in the class were ahead of him. He was the only tan cloak, and was new to the entire idea of magic; four months wouldn’t make up for a lifetime of lived experience.

With the four aspects he could get to cooperate, he was most interested in the flesh aspect, and metal to almost the same degree. From what he had read, the flesh aspect wasn’t as common and could be considered a sub-aspect of life, but it was particularly useful for alteration of one or another’s body. Something very beneficial when your native form was shin-high like him. The other aspect, metal, looked to have its uses with alchemy, as well as many practical concerns like mining and shaping pre-existing materials for jewelry and other fine operations. More relevant to him was its ability to replicate reactive metals, invaluable in alchemy.

Though both of these were very useful for their own respective purposes, both were more consumptive than their parent aspect; life for flesh, and earth for metal. They could accomplish more specific and complicated tasks to a more detailed degree, but their cost reflected this. Likewise, flesh couldn’t interact with flora, but life could, and metals couldn’t interact with any old dirt.

Regardless of that, he was pleased that both of these aspects synergized well with his alchemy skill, which was level 6. It was his highest level combat applicable skill, unless one counted flight, which was maxed because of his race. Lukas hadn’t had too much of a chance to play with alchemy yet, they were still hell-bent on teaching him the basics so he didn’t wind up hurting himself somehow. It was beyond frustrating, but he had made the mistake already of trying to urge either Rasdogir or Lady Sar to hurry up, and he was sore for hours before he could see a healer as a result.

Atel was especially good at water and ice, and as a bit more of a surprise, had a knack for poison as well. Lukas was eager, because that meant he’d share more classes with the boy. His sister, Atsix, was better with ice than water and was quite good at death as well as healing, which made Lukas particularly jealous. When the class ended, Lukas meandered off, trailing behind the twins. They were gossiping about the people and class and what they were good at, as well as almost anything else that could be classified as gossip.

Lukas recalled that Rasdogir suggested he go to the library for books on growing basic mana manipulation skills, but for now more classes were the name of the game. The day blazed forward in a blur. He didn’t feel particularly nostalgic for his years in college, and it was no less boring than he remembered, despite the added interest of magic and fantasy.

School was school, no matter how you changed the details. By the end of the day, as was typical for college, he was mentally tired. Less so physically, but staying on point for hours on end through multiple classes was incredibly mentally taxing. Although all he wanted to do was fall in bed and nap so he could get on studying, Lady Sar had invited him out for an early dinner. Social etiquette dictated that he probably shouldn’t say no to the obvious noble lady, especially since she’d done so much to help him throughout his time here, answering the simple questions that would be considered too mundane to be worth educating on yet were foundational for key subjects. Things like how big the world was, how compasses worked here, how long the day was, what the seasons were, and the details of the calendar system. He didn’t know when the nearest holiday was unless he studied a calendar, and even then he had absolutely no social context, so all it did was leave him anxious about gaps in knowledge.

Because of that, internally he wasn’t super enthused about a dinner invite, but externally he didn’t let it show. He was a master at putting on a good social face. He just didn’t like feeling at a disadvantage. If he was in a better, more advantageous situation, he’d positively love socializing, but he was always worried about stepping on someone’s toes by accident.

But there was nothing for it. He’d just have to learn quickly.

Leaving the school grounds, the city changed almost immediately. On the north side of the college was the Aura Twilight Forest, a vast place that had many mysteries and was almost entirely lawless in any sense understood by mortals. What they knew was that the Fae Lord was in charge and the Norns served under them as some kind of mercenaries almost, but even the latter was only understood among the college because of the density of fae living there and their tendency to chatter. Most people knew next to nothing about them.

Passing through the city felt odd. It was almost what you’d expect from a city you’d find in a world like this, of magic and kings and the like. Everything was made of shaped stone, though it was all smoothly melded together in singular stone pieces. More of a pueblo-style material-wise rather than European brick and mortar. The actual appearance of the buildings was more European though, with sloped roofs also made of single stone pieces, making it a very strange mix.

Most names of buildings and logos were actually built into and on the sides of the structures themselves, often rendered in very fine detail with contrasting colors making them stand out and pop. It may have been because of the finer nature of the area right outside of the college, which got great deals of business since the college was also home to the adventurer’s guild, but the whole area felt almost otherworldly. Or at least, nothing like the all-wood interior of the college itself. The dragon had never actually been outside of the college and into the world proper at all, so all he had was his predispositions to assume off of… but he realized that he had no idea what it would actually be like in a world where wood was such a luxury and stone magic was so much more common and was the main way anything got built.

Not to mention the fact that no one here aged, so the best builders had been at it for hundreds of years. Even thousands, in a few cases.

This fact was only made more apparent when he found the restaurant in question. It was a little different than nearby buildings, made of darker stone and with no windows. All the tables were made of stone and the staff was actually mortal, unlike the college’s food areas. Just as fantastical, however, was that they had a couple of orbs of color-changing light floating around them. They seemed to be tiny fireballs that emanated no heat and let out soft humming noises that were deeply relaxing to listen to. Moreover, they were the only lighting. There was enough staff for this to keep the place lit, but it still created an ambiance of constantly shifting lights and colors. It was all a little hypnotic. Something he was wary of, spending so much time around fae, but it was undeniably pleasant.

Lady Sar was seated at a table near the back.