Theo sat on his bed, eyes closed as he focused. He breathed in, seeing the faint glimmers of mana shining in the darkness.

He activated Self Awareness, savouring the heightened sensitivity of his own body, feeling every shift of his muscles. He layered on Owl’s Eyes, then Bat’s Ears, then Dog’s Nose. At each step, he felt the load increase, until it became a burden that he had to force his way through. It felt like his mind was going to snap -

Until suddenly, it didn’t.

It was like he’d squeezed his body through a too-small gap in a crumbling wall, and now he was marvelling at his newfound freedom on the other side. It was still a heavy burden to manage all the internal magic at once, but it was manageable.

Theo focused on the sound of carriages rattling by on the cobblestone outside. Moving mana into his ears, the sounds of the outside world were…preserved. It wasn’t that he heard them again, or that they were clearer; they simply existed in his mind, like he’d written down every aspect of their being until he could recreate them in his head as he pleased.

He opened his eyes for a moment, allowing mana to flow through them, before closing them again. In that instant, however, he managed to see the state of his shack, every errant piece of discarded clothing, all the dust and dirty and collections of sand.

Theo cycled the mana around, infusing it into his head, and it didn’t feel like anything happened, but it didn’t feel like something went wrong, so he just trusted (well, hoped) that he was on the right track.

Regardless, he felt confident enough to say that he had finally understood and activated Tome of Memories. Doing a little fist pump, Theo stood up, and felt his legs preserved as jelly. He grabbed onto the side of the shack to steady himself.

Looking outside, it was much darker than he remembered when he sat down.

Theo pumped Striding Wind through his body, letting it wash away all the pins and needles and cramps, before he stretched and started moving in the direction of The Pub.

---

Even without Tome of Memories actively engaged, things felt a little more memorable. The route between his shack and The Pub felt simultaneously familiar and foreign, as small details his eyes had glazed over the past 300 times were now filed away in his mental notebook.

He noticed a chipped brick here, a small anthill there, a dark spot of what was vomit in the dirt, liquid soaked into the ground, with a trail of ants leading to the anthill carrying big chunks on their backs.

Theo paused outside of The Pub, taking in the details on the exterior he’d never really paid attention to before. The wood was smooth and worn, except for two new pieces in the foundation that were put in to replace old ones that had been broken (totally not from any fights that got out of hand).

The door didn’t fit (as it was regularly replaced) and the seal wasn’t tight, letting a gnarled, flickering rectangle of light filter into the street as the sky transitioned fully into night.

Stepping inside, the contrast between the familiar and foreign grew again. He saw all the chips and cracks in the wooden furniture, and the smoke stains on the ceiling above the candleholders, and how even though everything was old, it was all still polished without a speck of dust on their surface.

Looking behind the bar, Theo found that to be true for the whole establishment. The bar counter had the scars of many errant blades sawed into its surface, and years of people learning their elbows on it had worn in grooves. But even so, it was well-oiled and taken care of and clearly shown great care.

Even Alan.

Theo had never realised how old Alan was. The entirety of his life, Alan had been bald and stern, but now he could see crow’s feet crowding around his eyes, and his eyebrows were starting to grey.

And as he polished another mug, Theo could see how his arms, although wiry and lean and still strong, had a very slight tremor to them.

Alan stared back at Theo, cocking his head and raising an eyebrow.

“I taught you not to stare unless you wanted to get stabbed years ago.” Theo snapped out of his reverie, and realised that he had, for the past few minutes, slowly scanned and stared at The Pub, before focusing his attention on Alan without speaking. He flushed.

“Sorry, I – uh, it’s…new internal magic.” He finished, lamely. Alan snorted, eyes raising by the fraction needed for Theo to know he was more amused than anything else.

“So what’s the fancy thing that has you slack-jawed like a noble slumming it for a night?” Alan’s attention wasn’t focused on Theo, keeping an eye on the door, as well as keeping his hands busy with mugs and glasses and writing things down every now and then.

“It helps with remembering things.” Alan just nodded, eyes casually scanning the space thoroughly.

“Right. I’m going to forget that you just mentioned that, and I recommend that hypothetically anyone who talks about a piece of advanced internal magic in a space with lots of ears should be more careful in case there’s anyone listening.” Alan spoke casually, no change in his tone or any emphasis, almost saying something just off the top of his head (which definitely made Theo pay attention).

Theo looked around at the people. There were a few regulars sitting around, as well as some on the far end of the bar having drinks. Some tables had people eating food with friends, including one table with Simo, Jenny, and Bruce sat there.

As they made eye contact, Jenny waved, half-getting out of her seat as Simo and Bruce nodded in acknowledgement. Theo waved back, raising his head slightly at Simo and Bruce.

While there were mostly regulars and people Theo half-recognised from his years of performing, there were a few in earshot that he couldn’t place at all. He saw Alan’s point.

Something slid on the bar behind him, and Theo looked back around to see a beer ending up directly in front of him, and Alan staring intently into his eyes.

Theo blinked, swallowed, and nodded.

Alan closed his eyes, gave an almost imperceptible nod, and got back to work.

Theo drained the beer (confirming that Tome of Memories did in fact work on taste in a way that he could have done without), and started preparing to perform.

---

It was a good performance. Theo performed the way he always did, but found it easier to come back to ideas and things he half-knew. It was still wandering and meandering, but he felt more confident in his improvisation. It was still improvised, but more confident that something good would come out of it, and not just running purely on the adrenaline of dancing on the precipice of success.

At one point, he even ended up riffing on songs he’d never heard of, merely just hummed by someone in the audience and letting his mind wander.

It was also slightly odd to know that Simo was a regular, and he tried to not focus his attention on their group, but without any special lights in The Pub to give him a spotlight he could still see everyone pretty clearly.

As Theo headed back to his shack, pay in his pocket next to the Coins of Unity held reassuringly in his hand, he passed by the chipped brick, the anthill, and found that the echoes of the vomit had disappeared from the dirt, as if nobody had ever had too much to drink in that general vicinity.

He mulled over the feeling of singing and performing with the changes to his memory.

Theo was looking forward to trying out the differences in his Magic class on Valday.

He whistled a tune as he walked home, mingling with the raucous song of a drunken night.