- Julia -

I understood that we were going to their offices, but this isn’t exactly what I had in mind.

Looking around Stella’s lab, there were various cylinders, beakers, and general glassware placed on the tables, as well as documents of various chemical formulas lying about. Contrary to the general principles of lab organization, the tables were cluttered with textbooks and sticky notes practically waiting to fall off the tables. The sanitation wasn’t much better as I felt the crunch of glass and miscellaneous gravels under my shoes.

“Don’t mind the mess. I’ll clean it up later.” She waved it off as if it was an everyday thing. Well, I’m sure it was for her.

She led me to her desk in the corner of the room and we sat down across from each other. The desk was surprisingly neat, containing a few stacked books, some simple research equipment, and a notebook opened under an active desk lamp. From what I could see, there were various symbols and intricate pentagrams sketched onto the notebook paper. One of the first things we learned when we came to this academy was the concept of essence pooling, to form a magic script. This is one of the fundamentals of casting magic and is what sets magic apart from the rudimentary essentia arts of old.

Stella leaned back in her seat and reached for the bookshelf behind her. After shuffling through the selection of items, she retrieved a microdisk and stuck it into a speaker next to her lamp. At the press of a button, the speaker activated and the upper portion of the device popped up. A slow country tune quietly played from the speaker and she laid against her chair with her eyes closed, lightly bobbing her head to the beat.

“So how’s life?” She asked randomly.

“What?”

“We gotta get to know each other right? Tell me what’s on your mind.”

I paused at her question and thought it over. “Well I’ve hit a wall in my magic and-”

“No no, none of that boring stuff.” She interrupted. “Tell me about yourself. Like your love life and stuff.”

“Love life? I haven’t met anyone like that.”

“What about that boy from earlier? He catch your fancy?”

“Ugh, not this again. He’s just a friend. I’ve known him since childhood so… yeah, we’re just friends.”

“Really? What a shame. He looked to be quite a capable male. Alright, then why do you want to become a mage?” She said, looking me directly in the eye. She was still leaning back in her chair with her posture completely relaxed, but It felt like she was watching my every movement and analyzing it.

“My dad was an academic and we used to hang out together and talk about his work.”

“So you want to be like your father?” She asked.

“Yes. I want to discover the things that mankind has still yet to see. That’s why I signed up for the combat division. Magical engineering allows you to create things in the safety of the sector domes, but as a challenger you can truly delve into the mysteries of this world with hands-on experiences.

“Hm. But you’ve hit a roadblock in your magic right?”

My mood dampened on the topic of my magic.

“No matter how I think of it, I can’t find a way to effectively bypass my weakness with vector magic and conventional combat. I’ve tried creating spring loaded weapons, swords, you name it. But none of it is up to par with the pure destructive power of your average type one mage.”

Stella tilted her head to the side and raised a brow.

“Why does it have to be?”

“What?”

“You’re a type two mage, why does your magic need to be as strong as a power type’s?”

“...”

She walked away and grabbed two beakers from the table, then grabbed a metal ball from the shelf before returning to the desk. The first beaker contained a clear liquid while the second had orange powder in it.

“Can you tell me what the difference is between a type one and type two mage?”

“Of course.” I said. “ A type one mage uses broader, less complex scripts to create change, while a type two uses more detailed scripts. Type ones are usually considered power types due to their low scripting time and raw strength while type twos are usually seen as technical mages, better fit for engineering than combat.”

“Okay, then why are you trying to increase your power when you’re a type two mage?”

“Why? Because I need to fight! I can’t fight if my attacks are weak or insignificant.”

“You don’t need a sword or bow to fight.”

She finished writing an artificial script while we were talking, and placed her hand on it. Essence seeped out of her fingers onto the lines of the treated chalk and the script began to glow dimly.

“As you know, Magic by itself cannot be considered a tool. It must first be applied to a medium in order to truly become a tool, whether for constructive or destructive means.”

The metal ball that was in the center of the paper floated up, as did some of the water in the adjacent beaker.

“Type one mages attack with this medium in order to deal damage to enemies. But if a type two attempts to do the same…”

The floating water splashed on the metal ball, doing nothing besides making it glimmer lightly.

“...it has no effect. So should I try to make the water move faster? Sharper?”

She demonstrated turning the water into a long strip and passing it through the ball, only to be deflected again.

“No, because that is what a type one mage does. A type two is only capable of performing a poor imitation. But if I do this…”

The powder from the second beaker flowed out and collided with the floating water, mixing and dissolving. The acid water then began to steam as it completely encumbered the metal ball and spun rapidly on its surface. The ball began to melt and chip, eventually breaking apart within the mixture.

“...then I can produce an effective result without using power.”

I stared at the broken pieces of metal in the water and realized what she was saying.

“I was being too short sighted!”

She nodded her head. “Correct. As far as I can tell, you have the unique ability to systematically process large data sets in short amounts of time. But because of this talent, you limited yourself to the possibilities of one application of your magic, and hadn’t considered the many others available to you.” She guided the mixture back into the beaker and disabled the script. “Always keep your mind on the bigger picture. Understand the root of your goals and identify the many options available to you. That is how you can become a great mage.”

She smiled at me sincerely and I found my mouth curved into a stupidly wide smile. I quickly sobered up and lowered my head. “Thank you. Honestly, I wasn’t sure how much this tutoring was gonna help when I was told about it. But in just one conversation, you were able to get me through my slump perfectly.”

“Hey, I only gave you a hint. You still have some practice to do. ” She quipped while turning her head to the side.

I observed her subtle shyness at my gratitude and laughed. “You’re right Stella.”

“Ella.”

“Huh?”

“Just call me Ella.” She said while putting away her equipment.

I smiled and stood up. “Thanks, Ella.”

- Michael -

We took a turn at the central hallway and walked along the corridor. The walk there was silent, though there wasn’t really much to talk about anyway. Well, it couldn’t hurt to try.

“So uhh… nice weather today huh?” I blurted. As it turns out, I suck ass at starting conversation. While it’s nothing new, it doesn’t hurt my soul any less when I say cringy lines that I’ll remember for the next 20 years.

We reached a doorway, the label reading ‘Practical Application Hall D5.’ He punched in some numbers unlocking the sliding door and walked into the large room that was about the size of a half gymnasium with a tiled floor.

“Uhh, I thought we were going to your office first?” I said while walking in behind him. He continued on to the control panel and began working on it.

“A quick spar is a better way for a student to understand his teacher.” He finished entering the preferences and the circuits running along the edges of the room flickered. “By that, I mean it sets a precedent.”

“I’m getting a bad feeling about this.” The student doesn’t ever beat the teacher on the first try. It’s more like the poor kid gets his ass beat so that the teacher can flex his superiority. I guess that’s what he means by it ‘sets a precedent.’

Well, I still don’t know anything about Eric. This is a good opportunity for me to grasp his personality and more importantly, his fighting style.

I walked to the side of the room and slipped off my uniform. Walking back to the center, I faced Eric who was standing across from me.

“Are you sure you wanna do this? Someone could get hurt.” I taunted while warming up.

“Getting cold feet now? You sure looked eager to fight on the walk here.” He quipped while removing his glasses.

Wow. I thought he was gonna be stiff through and through but he sure knows how to talk up a good game. And how did he know I wanted to fight?

“You’re free to use whatever weapons you prefer.” He said while fastening black gloves to his hands. “All types of magic are permitted.”

“You do realize I fight with a sword right?” I asked, raising a brow.

He lifted his hands into the air to show off his gloves. “These’ll be enough.”

We got in our positions and stood ready.

“You’re not going to use your sword?” He questioned. I held my hands in front of me with the palm of my right hand on top of the other.

“These’ll be enough.”

I slashed my hands outward in a horizontal motion, flinging blades of compressed wind at Eric. As they whizzed toward him in the blink of an eye, he sidestepped one of them and redirected the other one using vector magic. The two wind blades nicked the stone floor, leaving light scratches on its surface.

“Not bad, teacher.” I cupped my hands together and began to conjure a spiral of wind within them. Wind magic isn’t very strong, but excels in high speed attacks that are nearly invisible. The fact that Eric was able to not only dodge but also accurately pinpoint and redirect a wind blade shows his high observational ability, skill, and overwhelming battle experience. My only saving grace is that he isn’t attempting to attack me at the moment and I’m going to take full advantage of that.

I released the compressed spiral from my hands and amplified the rampant vectors flowing out in the air. They blew towards Eric in a violent tornado of wind blades coming from every direction possible.

The drawback of this program is that it takes a long time to cast and requires a lot of focus. While it doesn’t deal a lot of damage, in exchange it covers a wide area and is nearly impossible to avoid. Whether he blocks it, parries it, or somehow avoids it, I’ll be able to get a good grasp of his fighting style from his reaction to this attack.

The tornado closed in on him in less than a second and instead of counter attacking like I predicted he would do, he just… stood there. The blades that flew at him simply died out and the room went silent.

What just happened?

“Is that all you can do?” He said calmly, walking towards me.

How did he just cancel my program like that? There’s no way he manually calculated the positions and velocities of the hundreds of wind blades. That’s not even possible. The only person who could do something like that is…

I knew something was off since the fight started. His quietly intimidating presence, his skill with hands on magical combat. This person reminded me of my mentor, the man who wields the all powerful perception magic.

Edward Charestor

But there's no way a junior in high school could master Edward’s unique Algorithm. Even I, who has understood almost every magic I’ve come across, couldn’t even grasp the basic principles of his magic. There has to be some kind of trick.

If speed can’t overwhelm him, maybe power will do the job. I activated my movement enhancement algorithm, connecting all the veins and links in my magic aura. I stomped my heel against the stone ground, shattering it, and created a cloud of dust using the debris. The storm of sand enveloped the approaching Eric and surrounded him, blocking all his lines of sight.

I crouched down and jumped high into the air, looking over the cloud of dust Eric was in. If I came from the front or sides, Eric would expect that. Now that I’ve blocked off his sensory information, he has to rely on his reflexes and the minimal intel provided to him to avoid me. No matter how experienced or skilled you are, let’s see you avoid this.

I leaped into the cloud from above and pinpointed where Eric would be. I spun my core, creating momentum with vectors, and crashed my leg down into the strike zone, dispersing the sand storm in an explosion of force. As the dust settled, I pulled my leg out from the ground and looked up at Eric standing ten feet from me.

“You tested me with wind based programs and after determining that you couldn’t beat me in a contest of skill, you aimed to hinder my observational ability and strike me with a powerful attack from my blind spot.” He combed his hair back with one hand and took a step forward. “Not a bad effort, but your movements are still unrefined.”

He dashed at me with a quick pace and I readied myself. I have to end this quickly. If he’s running at me, he’ll have less time to react to my movements. Not to mention that my essence pool is running low after all those high power programs I casted.

Turning my movement algorithm from fifteen to twenty percent, I jumped at Eric from a low stance. Hanging low, I extended my right leg and feinted a leg sweep, then pushed off of my left leg, swerving around him while pivoting on my right heel. He stepped back to avoid my sweep feint and I propelled a full power spinning axe kick at the back of his head.

Right when I thought my leg made contact, his head suddenly jerked downward and gravity took hold of my body. Next thing I knew, I was lying on the stone floor with a huge headache, Eric standing over me casually putting his glasses on.

“I more or less understand your fighting style. We’ll be going over your habits and weaknesses tomorrow afternoon.” He walked away and fiddled with the control panel again, reverting the room to its original state. He started towards the door as I sat up.

“Hurry up. We don’t have all day.” He ordered. I rubbed my head and got up to retrieve my stuff.

This is going to be a painful two weeks isn’t it?