Chapter 6 - Duelling Club

“Ok students, today you will be receiving a rank 1 high-grade potion of cultivation, one of the benefits of being in class A. Also, remember that the exam is in 2 weeks, a practical exam to see how you’re faring with spell casting, and a written exam to determine your knowledge on rune theory. After that we will have semester break.” Teacher Leon explains as he paces around the front of the class.

It’s been 10 weeks since the start of my academy life. All the students in our class can now freely practice magic missile, and we even received a spell book for the spell ‘lesser magic shield’ 2 weeks ago. It wasn’t a textbook because we already learnt many of the fundamental theories for basic spell casting. I’m close to learning it because there seems to be some overlap between the mathematics to cast lesser magic missile and lesser shield.

The teacher passes a potion to everyone, I’m not too well informed on potions, but I easily spot the excited glee showing on almost everyone’s faces. Once the class ends our usual group meshes together, Hugo enthusiastically waves the potion around sayings, “This is some good stuff, it’ll save like 2 months of cultivation, I heard the B class only gets medium grade potions.”

Emilie’s eyebrows raise, “Aren’t those like only half as good as ours.”

“Yeah, only saves about a month.” Hugo says with a nod, he then makes for the door in a hurry, waving goodbye while saying, “Well I’m going to use it immediately, I’ll skip dinner, see you ladies tomorrow.”

Turning back to Emilie and Aurelie I ask, “Let’s head back too then?”

As we walk towards our dorm I feel a bout of anxiety, speaking my thoughts I say, “I thought I would have opportunities to earn money, how on earth am I going to pay for another year.”

Emilie turns toward me and tilts her head at me before laughing, “Goodness, I always forget you’re not a noble. Maybe you should finally check out the duelling club.”

I mull over it while walking, “You’re right, I should, I’ve just been so busy with study and practice for the exam.”

“But you’ll still be able practice your spell casting in the duelling club,” Aurelie remarks.

I nod in agreement, “You’re right, but not as effectively as just focused casting, I think I’ll check it out after the exams during the break, and after I’ve learned the ‘lesser magic shield’ spell.”

“Ok, I’ll join with you,” Aurelie says happily before turning Emilie asking with slight accusation, “What about you Emilie?”

She looks are Aurelie weirdly, saying, “I’ll see what Hugo’s doing.”

I smirk with amusement, “You guys are dating for real now?”

Emilie’s face flushes a bright red, quietly murmuring, “Yeah.”

Aurelie face flashes with scorn, but I congratulate, “That’s great! You guys are cute together.”

We arrive at Emilie’s dorm room who she shares with a second year, she embarrassedly smiles, saying, “Thanks, I’ll see you guys tomorrow.”

“See you.” I say, as Aurelie and I walk towards our room, I reprimand her, “You shouldn’t be so rude to her.”

Aurelie grimaces, “Well, I don’t like Hugo.”

“You also seem not like Emilie too, why are you so withdrawn from them? I at least think Emilie is a nice person.” I remark as we enter our room.

She plops down on her bed while I do the same. She shakes her head while smiling at me intimately, “For someone so mature you sure are clueless, there are political motivations behind this so called ‘dating’, Emilie is from a meagre baron’s family whereas Hugo is the son of a count. I wouldn’t be surprised if Emilie’s family encouraged her to get involved with Hugo.”

I frown, asking, “How would her family know what’s going on here?”

A wry smile forms on her face, “How wouldn’t they, if they don’t have a sponsored student spying for them, Emilie herself is certainly remaining in contact. Look don’t worry about it, your only goal should be to become powerful and stay ahead of the others, you may not have the highest cultivation talent, but your talent with mana manipulation and your will more than makes up for that.”

Sighing darkly, “Ha, you’re right, I just still concerned over next year’s payment.”

She waves me off with a positive laugh, “Just do what you said you were going to do, join the duelling guild, from what I’ve found, you should be able to get some low-level adventuring work, but as a mage, you’ll get good money. Also you won’t need to worry about losing your life, I’ll be coming with you.”

I lean back slightly with a smirk, “You’re that confident?”

Shrugging she says, “It’s justified, I’ve already learnt most of the stuff you have so far, and a lot more, including some of our family’s personal spells.”

I grow thoughtful for a moment before I inquire, “If that’s the case, why do you even need to attend an academy, it seems like you’re just wasting your time.”

Aurelie gets comfortable on her bed before explaining, “Higher level knowledge, the academy is just an in, all academies have association with the mage’s guild, and they have knowledge that far exceeds any mage family, most accomplished mages are made through the mage’s guild. As a matter of fact all ranking systems were created by them so according to the mage’s guild we’re not even considered official rank 1 mages. We have to take a special exam from them, which we should be taking at the end of this year.”

I feel my eyes raise slightly in astonishment, “Oh wow, that’s a surprise, how have I not heard of them until now?”

“While their power and influence are far greater than the empire, they are highly decentralised. After all, mages tend to care only for knowledge, not political power. So they don’t care about exerting their authority, only creating skilled researchers, I personally believe that’s why they don’t teach combat at most academies, because they don’t want us to fight.” Aurelie passionately explains.

I nod slowly in understanding, as I play with the potion in my hands, I suppose I should just take it now. We’ve been told in class that to take a standard cultivation potion all you do is drink it then cultivate like you regularly would. I cross my legs on the bed then chug the aqua blue potion. It’s quite viscous so I feel it inch down my throat slowly, as it enters my body, I feel a burst of energy spark in my chest. I begin cultivating, as the mana passes from the outside into my body, it seems to collect a little bit of the potion’s fluid with it, entering my core and tangibly increasing the cores mana. After about 12 hours I feel the energy of the potion disperse, but my core feels substantially fuller, wow, that was great. feeling sleepy I decide to get some shut eye, not caring that I’ll likely miss class.

While in practice the following day I realised that my mind wasn't strained at all anymore while creating an external rune. So why don't I create two? Starting with a simple equation, I mentally calculate two of the same equations, slowly forming two small identical runes. I then continue with the rest of the external rune, slowly calculating two equations concurrently and straining my mind. After about a minute and a massive headache I feel the two fully formed external runes. Moving one to each of my hands I manipulate two strands of mana into each of the runes, straining my head yet again. Suddenly the pain becomes piercing, forcing me to stop as my two half formed fiery magic missiles involuntarily let loose and hit the wall with underwhelming might. It’s possible, that’s for sure, but extraordinarily difficult, either way it’s good practice for will and mana manipulation.

Two weeks later, it was the day of the practical exam, our whole class is currently inside the training facility, although we’re in one of the exam rooms which I haven’t seen before. These rooms are just bland rooms made of a metal alloy that don’t deteriorate under constant attack from low level spells. The exam room was almost the same except the wall had counters, which I’m guessing take measurements of some kind. Teacher Leon was currently explaining the exam, “So this exam will be to grade how quickly you can construct the lesser magic missile runic structure, and we will also be grading you based on how little errors you made when constructing the spell. So, let us begin. Mage Hugo, you’re first.”

Hugo steps forward, walking to the middle of the room he enters a spell casting stance, suddenly I begin to feel the fluctuations of mana and notice one of the counters on the wall counting in seconds. Eventually I feel the vague outline of his external rune appear in his hands, it begins to swirl around as a fiery magic missile begins to form, not a moment later it fires, smashing into the wall creating a mini explosion, one of the counters shoots up to 7.9. Comparing his performance to mine, he took about twice as long to cast it, and the power of the spell was quite a bit less compared to me on a good day. Hugo seems a little downcast at his result, while teacher Leon nods, “Very good mage Hugo, 4.6 seconds to cast, and a perfection rating of 7.9.”

Teacher Leon calls everyone up individually. Emilie took 5.1 seconds and had a perfection rating of 8.8. Aurelie blew everyone away with 1.7 seconds and with a 9.8 rating when she constructed a magic missile of condensed air, but Leonore overshadowed even her with 1.5 seconds and a 9.9 rating, even her missile was more of a spectacle when she constructed a lightning attuned magic missile. I couldn’t help but sweat slightly, these two are considered the lesser talents of mage families, yet I can’t help but feel entirely inferior to even them. “Mage Agnes, it’s your turn.”

I breath in deeply as I step forward, positioning myself in combat position I begin my practiced method of casting. Constructing the rune and moving it to my right hand, I fill it with fire attuned mana causing my missile to form, once it’s fully formed, I let loose into the wall. Looking back, I see Teacher Leon with a pleased smile on his face say, “Most impressive mage Agnes, 1.3 seconds and a rating of 9.5.”

Whew, I did well, third best in the class in fact, behind only the two from mage families, I could tell that teacher Leon was even more surprised with my result. Aurelie runs up to me a gives me a congratulatory hug, “Damn that was so good Agnes!”

Hugo offers me a wane smile in contrast to Emilie’s excited smile.

One week later Aurelie and I received mail with our results, on my bed I open the letter and hunch over to read it.

Theory

Mathematics: B

Spell theory: B+

Practical

Spell perfection: A+

Spell casting speed: S

Indeed, even though I studied so much, likely more than anyone else, I didn’t even get an A, I’m sure this has to do with my rather average intelligence, I say average, but I mean average for a mage, Aurelie told me that I’m likely near bottom of the class in terms of intelligence, and that’s even after my 10% from my internal runic structure, I may have not even made it into A class if I didn’t get that rune.

I’ve been able to cast the lesser shield for a few days, now that I’ve got my report card, I think it’s the perfect time to enter the duelling club. I throw my report card across the room, hitting Aurelie on the top of the head, she yelps, “Hey!”

Giggling, I ask, “Pass yours, I want to see.”

Smirking she throws hers at my head, although I catch it, taking a gander.

Mathematics: A+

Spell theory: A+

Spell perfection: S

Spell casting speed: S

Meh it’s expected, actually I’m surprised not everything is S graded. I perk up, suggesting, “How about we check out the duelling club now?”

Later that day, we go to the duelling clubroom, it's one of the few clubrooms that are in the main building. There are a few older mages students hanging around and chatting casually. These students immediately seem different to the students I typically see walking on campus. There's a peculiar pressure that seems to radiate from them incurring a weak tremor of fear to run through me. Our entrance alerts everyone as they turn to us, I notice Rachel, our dorm prefect in the room, her presence no less intense even when surrounded by others of similar bearing. A tall bulky mage with a long scar across his cheek walks up to us, “Well well, who might you two be?”

Rachel butts in, saying, “I know them, first years in the A class.”

The man’s left eyebrow raises as he asks with amusement, “First years? Why are the newbies this year so rowdy?”

“Well like Leonore, Aurelie here is also from a mage family, so their capabilities and talent aren’t up for debate,” Rachel explains as she gestures towards Aurelie, she then looks at me with a quizzical look, “Agnes here though, I was under the impression she isn’t even a noble.”

The scarred man looks at me with calculating eyes, saying in surprise, “A commoner first year wants to join? That’s a little ridiculous.”

I just awkwardly stand there not sure what to do, Aurelie suddenly steps forward loudly saying, “Mages, as a child of house L’Estocq I vouch for Agnes, while her arsenal of magic is rather small, her proficiency in spell usage is quite exceptional, especially after such a short time.”

A weak grimace forms on the man’s face before he says, “Bah, fine, we’ll test her, follow me to the training facility you two.”

The man and Rachel bring us along to the training facility. We enter one of the exam rooms just like a week ago. The man turns to Aurelie, saying, “Show us what you can do.”

She confidently steps forward, casting a strange spell that obscures her somewhat, then she instantaneously dashes side to side as she casts spinning disks of condensed air at the wall. I barely even know what’s going on or what spells are being cast, all I know for sure is that she’d defeat me in a few seconds. She stops, a slight unevenness to her breath as the scarred man nods approvingly, saying, “As I’d expect from the L’Estocq house, even a declined mage family is still incomparable to most others.”

Pointing at me he demands, “Now you go.”

Breaking from my awed reverie I can’t help but feel nervous, my skill isn’t even close to Aurelie. Timidly stepping into the middle of the room, I position myself and start casting lesser shield. After about 5 seconds and a few mistakes, a non-attuned transparent blue shield forms around me. I decide to use my practiced trick, forming two external runes concurrently and rapidly casting magic missiles from both my hands, a fire and ice one, creating a continuous mini explosion of ice and fire on the wall. Once my mana is nearly depleted, I cease. I spot a slight nod from the scarred man before he says in bewilderment, “Ice affinity and dual casting? Even dual casting the same spell is inordinately difficult in such a short period of time. How long have you been practicing spell casting?”

“Since school begun this year,” I state as I try to regulate my breathing.

His brows furrow before requesting, “Can I have a look at your results sheet, that is if you brought it.”

We thought we might need it, so brought our report cards and talent sheets. I dip my hand into my robe pocket, fishing out my folded talent sheet, handing it to him. He glances through it remarking gleefully, “Ah ha, your will and mana manipulation are unusually developed, how that happened is beyond me, maybe you’re a reincarnated sorceress, haha.”

Handing back my paper he assesses me again, “You need to work on your mage shield, but what you got is already satisfactory for a mission, we’ll train you up a bit, then it shouldn’t be too long before we can send you out on missions, Rachel will be in charge of your training and mission assignment.”

That’s how I ended up in one of the duelling arena facing Rachel as she stoically stands with her hands behind her back, explaining, “Unless a mage learns specialised spells for defence, mages want to be able to dodge adequately. Lesser magic shield would be rather ineffective against monsters because they generally use their physical body. Sure, you will mostly be relying on your defensive warrior to take most hits, but what happens when a small monster passes by, you may not have enough time to cast a spell, or what is usually the case, a new mage is too scared to cast their spell fast enough. This is when dodging will save your life, you don’t need to be some master rogue, but mages have an improved physique and perception so we may as well use it. So let us get started, ready yourself mage!”

I cast lesser magic shield, then she starts firing air attuned lesser magic missiles at me. I dodge to the side, trying to cast a spell while on the move but I find that like dual casting, my mind strains if I try to do so. So I dodge around, my shield getting hit a few times reducing its efficacy somewhat, after about 30 seconds I finally construct my spell albeit with quite a few errors. I fire it at Rachel who easily sidesteps it before continuing her onslaught. This repeats for a few minutes until my shield breaks, and Rachel yells, “Stop!”

While I’m panting, she walks up to me, praising, “That was good, your dual casting practice has obviously helped in casting while on the move, although your dodging is subpar. We’ll start again after you cast another shield.”

I recast my shield and we get straight back into training until my mana pool depletes.

Our practice has continued for another week, I can now cast a single magic missile at about my fastest speed of 1.3 seconds while moving, however I have quite a few more errors, how much is lowers my perfection I have no clue. At the end of this session Rachel smiles in satisfaction, “You’ve done well Agnes, I believe you’re ready to take on an adventurer’s job if you wish.”

I nod eagerly, saying, “I’m prepared to go as soon as possible.”

“Ok good, tomorrow I’ll take you and Aurelie to get your adventurer’s license, then we’ll attach you two to a team, mages are always in high demand so I’m sure we won’t have any trouble.”

Later that day Aurelie and I met up with Hugo and Emilie. We were leisurely relaxing on the grass upon the academy grounds, Emilie casually cuddled against Hugo as Hugo talks in amazement, “Wow, can’t believe you guys got into the duelling club, and not only that you’re both already going on an adventure. I mean Aurelie makes sense, but you Agnes, ha, clearly we aren’t working hard enough.”

Aurelie nods animatedly, saying with great enthusiasm, “Agnes is naturally talented in combat, I haven’t seen anyone improve as fast as her in combat training, she’ll be a fine battlemage when she’s older, I’m sure!”

Hugo shrugs with slight scepticism before darkly saying, “Have you all heard, apparently the entire southern region has allied in war against the empire, along with the dukedom of Shimiat rising in revolt and joining the invaders.”

Emilie’s mouth drops in horrified surprise while Aurelie dourly says, “I never liked those Elyptians, they always seemed shifty to me.”

I internally scream, ok just casual racism. Hugo nods ardently, “The world’s going mad, first the war in the usually peaceful west, and now those southern barbarians have finally become smart enough to ally. What next, will a true demon arise in the empire’s capital.”

Aurelie leans forward as she dismally explains, “My family is on the frontier of the west, before I left, things were going terribly, we’ve been drawing troops from central and the eastern dukedom for years.”

“What about those monster surges we’ve been getting up north, they used to happen every other decade, now they occur with increasing regularity and greater numbers,” Emilie adds.

Hugo shakes his head, “I’m not too sure about them, it’s usually the adventurer’s guild that happily takes on those jobs, my house doesn’t have close ties with them.”

“Yeah no clue,” Aurelie says, Emilie then looks at me inquisitively, I shake my head too. There really does seem to be a lot of major events going on, I just hope it isn’t anything that’ll greatly affect me.