Fel groggily rose, clutching his head, trying to cope with a blistering hangover. Through his blurry eyes, he saw a well-dressed maid clearing up a chaotic mess. Crystal cups littered the floor along with all manner of miscellaneous items and about a dozen inert bodies that reeked of alcohol. The fact that the maid could so calmly clean up the place was a testament to her training and dedication.

“The fuck happened here?”

A muscular man with ruffled hair flopped over, “Yo Fel, you’re up? Wild night eh?”

Rubbing his temples, Fel was catapulted back up the river of time.

---

It was a few hours after Fel had settled into his new home; a pagoda south to the lightning pool, when he had heard a knocking at his door. He had answered the call and opened it up, finding himself face to face with a bustling group of Mages. Most of them wore fashionable, lightning yellow robes, while others wore long, plain ones. Two of them, a muscular man and a tall woman wore more casual clothes instead.

The muscular man slapped Fel’s shoulder, “Hey new guy! I’m Verres, nice to meet you.”

Before Fel could reply, Verres pressed on, “We thought, y’know, that you might want a little celebratory greeting, so here we are!”

A smile stretched across Fel’s face, “Why didn’t you say so earlier! Come in!”

Fel was never one to reject a good party.

Verres looked back to the group, “We got the go-ahead, bring in the drinks and snacks!”

Fel stepped out of the way, allowing the flood of people through. Most of them had elvish features while others were far stranger, possessing entirely black eyes, bird heads and even goat heads. Other than their humanoid bodies, they were a diverse bunch.

As Fel was occupied with his thoughts, the gang had already set up camp in the living room, whipping out a crate of crystal bottles and light snacks out of nowhere. Though the building looked oriental from the outside, it looked western within, with large sofas, coffee tables and cabinets, lit up only by faint tendrils of lightning that drifted through the air.

Verris poked his head from around the corner, “Hey, you coming?”

Fel gave a loose smile and walked over, “Sure sure.”

After Fel made himself comfortable, Verris continued to chat, “Sorry that only ten of us came, the other eight are old buggers who prefer holing up in their hovels!”

He then procured a crystal glass out of nowhere and filled it up with a semi-transparent yellow liquid, “Diluted lightning essence, doesn’t do much for your cultivation but sure as hell tastes good.”

Before he could even taste it, a young girl who looked to be around 15, with short, curly gold hair with streaks of sapphire in it, sidled up to Fel while holding a massive bottle full of an amber liquid. She swiftly confiscated Fel’s cup and shoved the bottle into Fel’s hands, “Don’t drink such weak shit, heard you’re from the countryside, so let me tell you, that stuff’s like juice to us Mages, have this instead.”

Verris looked worried, “Hey, Milli, not everyone can drink Baelfire y’know?”

Unfortunately, Verris’ warning came a little late. Fel had already taken a sip. A fiery heat spread out within him. Initially, it was soothing and warm, but it grew stronger and stronger, before running rampant like a herd of wild horses, tearing his body apart. Fel cycled the energy through his body to quell the wild energy, eventually calming it down. He let out a long breath, letting out a small puff of impurities. Though he felt as if a thug had beaten him with a baseball bat, it was definitely effective.

With a gleeful expression, Milli patted his back while grinning at Verris, “See, he was fine.” She then turned back to the pale Fel, “Wasn’t too bad eh?”

Under the pitiful gazes of the gang, Fel forced out a smile, “It was great! Though I’ve had a long day so a softer drink would suit my palate better.”

As Milli turned to rummage for more drinks, a goat-headed man stretched out an arm and stopped her, “Lightning essence is special in its own way, he doesn’t have beast-blood, well, at least I don’t think he has.”

“I'm pretty sure I don't.”

“See?”

“Fine then Maevin, I’ll settle with shockberry wine.”

A woman with black and white hair, separated by a gold streak down the middle, chipped in, “Why are you trying so hard to get him drunk?”

“Rana, you don’t get it. You only get to know a guy when he’s stoned on the floor.”

A sliver of sweat dripped down Rana’s face, “You really are something.”

“Before you complain, look at the corner over there.”

In a corner of the room was a full-blown party. In fact, it was a miracle they went unnoticed so far.

Verris strode over to the trio and picked them up by the collars, “This is supposed to be for the new guy, get over here.”

He plopped them down on a nearby sofa where they immediately began drinking and chatting again. A platinum haired woman, who was sipping lightning essence in the corner, rubbed her forehead, “God you guys are hopeless.”

Fel sunk into his seat, “Are you all like this all the time?”

Milli tried to sling her arm around Fel’s neck, but found that he was too tall and so instead dragged him down to her height, “We’re usually holed up in our pagoda’s researching new spells and cultivating. We only get to let loose at times like these.”

“Sounds depressing.”

“Not really, you lose track of time when you get in the zone. Speaking of which, I forgot to ask. What’s your name?”

“Fel, Fel Evenstar.

“Nice, what level? How old?”

“Err, Initial Level 1, 19 years old, though that’ll be 20 in a week.”

Milli clapped his back again and yelled out to Rana, “Hey, you’re no longer the youngest in the group!”

Rana rolled her eyes, “Sure, at least you’ll stop taunting me about that.”

“Wait, Milli, how old are you?”

Milli puffed her chest out, “25 in dark-elf years”

“Though 38 in standard years.” whispered a hooded figure from the corner

“Hey, Mysvain.”

“Yea?”

“You want me to pummel your emo face to the other side of the underground?”

“Ok, I’ll shut up now.”

“Good.”

“What’s this about standard and dark-elf years?”

Maevin, as helpful as ever, filled Fel in, “Every race has a different life-span. Out of all the sentient races, dark-elves have the shortest one, 200 years at Level 1, so everyone uses it as a basis to compare their ages. Standard years are well, normal years.”

“So it’s like how humans compare dog years to human years,” thought Fel

Another round of laughter roared out from the trio on the sofa causing Maevin to roll his eyes, “Let’s ignore them for now, you’ll get to know them later.”

“Is lightning your only affinity?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, that’s rare.”

“Why would that be?” Fel panicked, his whole plan was to not stick out too much and sneak back up to the surface.

“Lightning is rather rare in the underground and few creatures down here are pure lightning beings. For the most part, only those with mutations get a significant affinity with it.”

“Ah, that’s interesting.” Fel thought it would be best to take the honest route. He couldn't hide it forever, “Well, to be honest, I didn’t want to stick out too much, so I only listed lightning as my attribute. I’m also an energy Mage.”

“Type A or type B?”

“???”

“Ah, sorry, are your affinities similar in strength or is one weaker than the other?”

“I would say they’re about equal.”

“Mmm, why did you choose list lightning in the first place?”

“It was cooler.”

Verris, who had been sidelined up to this point, roared out in laughter, “He’s got his priorities straight. I’ll give him that!”

“Now, enough serious talk, we’re here to party!” He said while pouring out another round of drinks, this time with a strange, purple hue.

“Nis, stop hiding and join us!”

From the shadows emerged a woman with solid black sclera, who took a glass and sat down to the side, “Sarcayn wine? How did you get this?”

“From a friend of a friend of a friend, don’t mind it too much, drink up!”

It was from that point onward did the situation slide downhill. Maevin, who was surprisingly susceptible to alcohol, went down first while Nis, who was very silent until this point, suddenly changed her dark eyes and hair to gold, with tendrils of lightning hovering above her skin. Though, in the next moment, she followed Maevin to the realm of dreams, the gold receding from her person. Not long after, all hell broke loose, with the aloof Mages performing all sorts of idiotic acts, though fortunately, they retained a shred of decency.

After the last person had fallen, the room was an absolute mess, with all manner of things strewn about the place. The maid, who arrived early the next morning, almost had a heart attack from the scene. She thought a burglar had made his way in. Though it was impossible this deep in the Academy.

Now back to the present.

“Are all parties like this here?”

“Nah, those water zone Mages are all about ‘etiquette’ and prefer tea parties over proper liquor.”

“What about the metal zone?”

“Them? They’re even worse than us. Because of their strong bodies, they drink Baelfire like water. God knows what they drink to get purposely drunk. Bunch of muscleheads.”

“Says the musclehead.”

“What?”

“Nothing. So what do we do here?”

“I forgot about your situation. Right. Normally, by the time you become a Mage, you have already mastered a specialisation, so you’d take on your own research. But in your case… how much do you know?”

“Combat techniques and cultivation.”

Verris smashed his palm onto his forehead, “God, that’s like, the bare minimum. How did you even become a Mage?”

“No idea.”

“Ok then, since it’ll be embarrassing for you to study with the apprentices-”

“-actually I don’t mind that-”

“-but we do, we’ll have to give to some private tutoring.”

He then whipped out a roll of parchment from his robe.

“Jarvis said you might’ve needed this, I thought that you wouldn't need it, though I realise why now. This is the list of all the available courses, tick off as many as you like, though unless you’re a masochist, I suggest you only choose three at a maximum.”

Fel took the list and unfurled it, finding a massive wall of text. There were around fifty courses on it, each with a quick description to go with it. Sucking in a breath of air, Fel got to work, sifting through the rows of dense ink.

After about an hour or two of reading, Fel chose his courses. Artificing, physical combat and energy conversion.

At this point, most of the crew had woken up, all of them clutching their heads in pain. They swore that they’d never party again, yet they’d leap at the next opportunity to go to another at the drop of a hat.

Verris walked up to three figures in the pile and pulled them out, dragging them up to Fel. Fel recognised the figures to my Mysvain, Rana and one of the trio, a woman with large black horns on her forehead.

“You’re familiar with Mysvain and Rana. Mysvain is an artificing expert and Rana is an energy conversion expert. Nis is too, but her area of research is… special.”

“This one on the other hand,” said Verris as he pointed to the horned woman, “Is Lisby, she’s the expert at physical combat.” He then whispered in Fel’s ear, “Try not to die.”

“Wait, what?”

Verris acted as if he hadn’t said anything and turned towards the group, “Alright guys, time to get moving. Keyla, don’t you have a seminar to conduct? And Nis, you still haven’t prepared for your mission next week haven’t you?”

Fel looked at Verris, impressed. In Fel's eyes, Verris was keeping everyone together.

“Mysvain, you’re free right?”

“Hmm? No.”

“What do you have to do then?”

“I still have to complete my chaos sphere’s.”

“Oh, those things, can’t you let Fel watch and explain a few things as you go?”

Mysvain turned to Fel, “Why do you want to learn artificing?”

“It’s simple. If you encounter someone with a weapon, and you’re weaponless yourself, how will you win? Even if you have spells, what if that weapon can cast powerful spells with the flick of a button? You wouldn’t stand a chance?”

“You got a point, though my reason was to create cute automaton maids. Well, doesn’t matter too much, weapons of mass destruction are fun too. Follow me.”