Marissa’s behaviour had been subdued in the days following the arena games, but about a week later she was back to her usual energetic self, exploiting the time between classes to engage in conversations with as many people at the same time as humanly possible, and sleeping through every lesson to make up for the energy spent between lessons. Alan could only laugh at the situation, as he was completely the opposite. He hadn’t found any solution to his conundrum about Marissa being a substitute for Emily, and didn’t plan on doing it either. He was fully content to interact with the selectively energetic girl, and pushed away any thoughts and feelings to the contrary.

The weeks had passed by in a flurry, and while Alan had learnt more about the amazing magic of this world, he was still no closer to completing the simple temperature control exercises that Sir Rhodes had recommended. But he had made progress in an entirely different direction, purely by accident.

It happened on a Friday evening, while he was just about to give up on his daily magical training. Fall had begun, and the temperature had fallen somewhat, so he had been wearing some additional clothes and shoes out on the balcony, still insisting to stay out there in case the temperature difference could help him make a breakthrough. While warming his hands by rubbing them on the rug, he had noticed a particularly strong build-up of static energy. It had of course happened from time to time before, but it had suddenly felt like an entirely new sensation. He took his time exploring the prickling in his fingers, and felt like he actually had a modicum of control over where the prickling was strongest. He concentrated on the tip of his finger, but it didn’t seem to increase or decrease the temperature like he wanted it to do, but it didn’t go away either. The prickling feeling stayed, and almost felt like it was increasing in intensity.

Alan carefully made his way over to a set of armor his father had standing in the second floor hallway. The metal was bent and damaged but still well cared for and polished to a nice shine. He tapped the metal with his prickling finger, and strength of the static discharge took him by complete surprise. It was clearly loud enough to be heard all the way from the kitchen, as Naida quickly entered his view at the bottom of the stairs.

“What in the name of Gaea was that noise?” Naida’s gaze flickered about uncertainly, looking for anything out of place.

“It was just a static discharge Naida, nothing to worry about” Alan managed to say, still stunned by the power and not really considering his own words.

“Uh-huh, and translated to our language that means exactly what, Mister?” Naida was eyeing him suspiciously, clearly not about to let it go with an explanation like that.

“Ehh.. you know, sometimes when you touch metal or grounded objects you feel a small shock. It was like that. ...maybe a bit stronger than usual.” Alan hoped his earlier words were glossed over as just him being him again, but Naida didn’t seem impressed. Actually locking eyes with her told him that she was still waiting for an explanation, but Alan was reluctant to continue, as he had already let slip more than he wanted.

“Alexander Moltus, I expect that you tell me the truth about any serious matter that affects anyone in this household. This is one such matter.” Naida scolded sternly, her hands waving about. “Something clearly happened, did you break one of the straps on the armor stand? Are you playing with a slingshot inside? Answer me, young man.” Naida’s tone offered no chance of backing out, and she glared at him while waiting for a satisfying answer.

Alan was taken aback, not expecting the strict tone. “It really was just a small discharge! I kept trying to get the temperature exercise to work outside, then I felt this prickling sensation in my fingers, like..” He trailed off, suddenly feeling the prickling again, and inadvertently followed the same actions as last time, concentrating it in a single finger. “..this” Alan finished, touching his finger to the armor again. Another zap followed, with similar intensity as last time.

“Mana..” Naida almost whispered, “your mana has manifested”. She ran up the stairs and crushed Alan in a bear-hug, squealing out with glee “You did it, Alexander! You managed to manipulate mana! It’s amazing!”

Finally calming down a bit, she disengaged from the hug, but held him in place and locked eyes with him. “I have no idea how you did it, or what this discharge that you are talking about is, but I’ve never been more proud of you.” She suddenly remembered that she had food in preparation, but still took time to plant a kiss on his forehead before heading back down to continue baking. “Just wait until your father hears about this, he’s going to be ecstatic!”

The rest of the evening saw Alan repeating his little magic trick several times, until he felt so drained of energy that he collapsed in front of his parents. Alexar had been surprisingly restrained in his reaction, but he still seemed happy about it.

The following day, Alan spent most of his time producing small shocks, trying to control the strength of the shocks, and alternating between different fingers. It didn’t seem like it mattered where he decided to accumulate the energy, it worked quite consistently every time. He had to limit the strength, as he could only produce around a dozen discharges as powerful as the previous day, before he was completely exhausted. On the bright side, it didn’t seem like manipulating the charge around inside his body took much energy at all, and he could continuously move the energy around for as long as he managed to concentrate on the task.

His father sat down with him on Sunday morning, seemingly planning for a serious discussion.

“Alexander, my son, I am very proud of you. I only know of a handful of cases where children as young as you have manifested their mana, and even if I don’t understand exactly how you did it, you have every reason to be proud.” Alexar had been smiling widely down at Alan to begin with, but his smile faltered somewhat at the end of his sentence. “With that said, I would like to move on to discuss the kind of magic that you have performed so far. After consulting with a good friend yesterday, I have identified it to be an early kind of lightning magic. I know you’ve been going through the different schools of magic the last few weeks, but am I correct when guessing that you haven’t talked about the school of lightning?”

“Lightning magic, hmm,” Alan responded, taking some time to recall the latest sessions on magic schools. “No, I don’t think we’ve talked about that school. I haven’t really thought about it much yet, but now that you mention it, my magic doesn't seem to fit any of the schools we’ve been through so far. Why is lightning magic different? Is it very rare?” Alan asked with almost childlike curiosity. This was a completely new field of study for him, and he was itching for any information available.

“It’s not much rarer than the other schools in terms of how often it manifests as the first kind of mana manipulation one can do, but full fledged lightning mages are exceedingly rare, and there is to my knowledge only a single accomplished lightning mage in this city. The reason for this is that lightning magic is extremely dangerous to practice, and even accomplished lightning mages have trouble avoiding accidents happening to their acolytes,” Alexar informed Alan with a frown on his face. “The history books at the academy are full of examples of eager acolytes and experienced mages alike, that have perished in the pursuit of the secrets of lightning magic. I expect you remember your lessons on mana, and that it is the same mana that is used in every school, although in different ways.” Alexar looked meaningfully on Alan, finally arriving at the reason for the conversation. “Don’t end your days as another one of those examples Alexander. You have proven that you can manipulate mana, and I will arrange for a suitable teacher of the school of fire, so you’ll have a safer goal to focus on and work towards. Fire magic is well understood, and a powerful school as well. Every graduate of the school of fire is guaranteed a high rank in the standing army, and a high salary and comfortable lifestyle to go with it. If you don’t want to fight in the army, you can be employed in a number of other interesting areas, or you could return to the academy to teach. What do you say, son?” Alexar looked expectantly at Alan, probably hoping that he had convinced his son with his efficient explaining of the advantages of the school of fire.

Alan sat in thoughts for a while, not able to find an answer right away. His father had pointed out a very important aspect of what he had been doing that he had completely forgotten about so far. Electricity was dangerous. It wasn’t necessarily dangerous to get shocked, and small electrostatic discharges as he had been doing the last two days were fairly harmless, as the electricity mostly passed through the thin skin on his fingertips. No, the danger he had exposed himself to was moving charges around internally in his body. He couldn’t remember the exact number, but somewhere around a few milliamps passing through the heart was enough to kill a person, if they were unlucky. No wonder lightning magic was considered dangerous. It didn’t even have to kill the mage instantly, as electric shocks could kill someone even a day after an incident, through a seemingly random heart attack. It would make the entire school of magic seem almost haunted, as practitioners died seemingly at random, with no apparent cause.

Electricity was definitely dangerous. On the other hand, it was also incredibly useful. Despite the dangers of electricity being clearly documented and very often exemplified through accidents on Earth, it existed practically everywhere on the globe. It was just too useful a tool not to use it.

Alan knew that it was possible to manipulate mana outside of the body, although he was far away from anything like it in his current state. If he could train up his manipulation skills to the level where he could manifest mana outside of his body using a safer school, he could start working with electricity-based magic in a much safer environment. Sure, it would still be dangerous, but he could take precautions and follow strict protocols for how he did anything. He could make it work. All he needed was a teacher to get him through the first stages of manifesting mana outside his body. He looked back up at his father, Alexander Moltus, and considered his proposition in light of his new plans.

“I’ll accept your proposal” Alan said, eagerness seeping into his voice.

“Great choice, son!” his father beamed, before continuing in a more somber mood. “But before I get you a teacher, you’ll have to promise me one thing: Never to practice lightning magic again. It’s not worth it, whatever you imagine it to be, and I can see that you are imagining a great many things. You have to promise me that you’ll never touch lightning magic again.”

Alan fell back in thoughts again. He was expecting the ultimatum, from his father’s earlier descriptions, but the question in his mind wasn’t whether or not he could give up controlling electricity. The question was this; could he look his father in the eyes and lie?

“..Is there no other way that you’ll help me learn magic?”

“No. I refuse to help you in killing yourself.”

“What if I said that I know more about what I’m doing than the average acolyte or even mage, when it comes to lightning?” Alan asked hopefully, almost ready to explain everything about his previous life to his father.

“Then I would call you an arrogant idiot, and I would accept no explanation to the contrary. I did mention experienced mages that perished, did I not? This isn’t a game, little one. Magic isn’t for children, and there is a good reason to stay away from certain parts of it. No, you either promise me this, or we will have severe problems in this family going forwards.”

Alan had never seen his father this serious. He wasn’t even sure he’d seen his other father this serious either. He took a deep breath, and plunged into a new and uncomfortable territory.

“I promise never to do lightning magic again,” Alan said with a slight shiver in his voice.

“Thank you.”