I stifled a yawn, my eyes beginning to droop.
Regular classes had begun, each day had four two-hour sessions. We were also required to wear uniforms, which were quite simple. The male uniform was a white shirt and black trousers, while the female uniform had the same white shirt with a black skirt. Not gonna lie, I felt pretty uncomfortable wearing white, Persia didn't look too thrilled either.
The first session was combat and martial art classes, basically fighting without the use of magic, taught by the guy who had been our exam administrator, Liga Dile. It was quite a breeze for me, since I'd received plenty of training back in my assassin days, and I had a decent amount of real-time experience too.
We were allowed to change into our battle gear for the first session to prevent our uniforms from getting messed up. The last two sessions were magic training classes, the first was something called General Magic, which is different to Elemental Magic and is activated differently.
I'll go into more detail about that when we get to that point in the day. The second magic class, and final session of the day, is an Elemental Magic class. Both magic classes are headed by Instructor Cora Tabbs.
I was currently in the second session of the day, which was a theoretical class. Stuff like geography, economics, law, and other things we'd need to know if we ever planned of accepting Quests that would take us close to the borders of one of the other countries.
I got that this stuff was going to be pretty important to know, but the problem was the teacher. Professor Rebo Tolsh, an old man with short gray hair, round glasses and an extremely boring teaching style. His voice was mild, and he spoke really slowly in a monotonous tone.
Basically, take Rai's personality and turn it into the complete opposite. I felt myself beginning to drift off, before a sharp whisper woke me up a bit.
"Hey, you'd better not be falling asleep, we've already made a pretty negative impression after our failed Quest, you know!"
"Quiet, Cat Girl. I'm way too drowsy to talk right now," I whispered back groggily.
"That's your own fault for showboating during the combat session, you just wore yourself out! And carelessly flaunting like that while we're still thought of as the failures is why we're stuck with being called the Leftovers!"
Right, so each group had been labeled A, B, C and D, we were D, but the other groups all referred to us as the Leftovers. To be honest, I've always enjoyed underdog stories so I didn't mind that name so much, but I probably shouldn't say that out loud.
"Hey, don't blame me for that, it's not like I told those douchebags to call us that."
'Those douchebags' referred to some of our other classmates.
The worst of them was Arg Lehosa, he was in group A, which was the group that had six members, he was the long haired blonde guy who had been acting up back when we were selecting our Quests. He was unbelievably arrogant, had a huge superiority complex and was your typical, generic narcissistic bully, though after whatever it was that Instructor Tabbs put him through, he had been making an effort not to get on her bad side, and was visibly intimidated by her.
He had what looked like wolf ears, and his hands and feet were also mutated, but he still had opposable thumbs so they looked more like werewolf hands than a regular wolf's paws, he had dark blue eyes and his long, straight blonde hair framed his face and neck.
Then there was Lamasa Phiban, also in A, with an extremely annoying personality. She was callous and rude to anyone she saw as beneath her, and sickly sweet and polite towards the teachers and anyone she felt was above her, which, in this class, was just Arg.
Basically, she was a huge two-faced bitch.
Her appearance would be considered pretty attractive, with a great figure and complexion, and she had shoulder length hair that was dyed purple, but her awful personality totally offsets her appearance. She didn't have any noticeable physical mutations, though I'd heard that her Anima was a salamander.
Next was Gela Sorr, of group B. She didn't seem too bad at first glance, appearing to be the cold, quiet type. Her group made fun of us just like the others did, but she herself hadn't been very vocal in that regard, she seemed disinterested.
But there was something I noticed during today's combat training. When she really gets into it, her bloodlust feels malevolently violent. While she was sparring against one of her group-mates, she seemed to get a bit too into it, and for a brief moment that cold, emotionless look disappeared and was replaced by one of pure sadism, before she appeared to snap out of it and regain her self-control.
Remember how I enjoy killing but I don't like drawing out my target or opponent's suffering? She seemed to be the complete opposite, I could sense it, she delighted in the thought and act of inflicting pain, while killing was completely secondary to her.
She had an average complexion, was rather slender, her hair appeared to have dark brown and white bird feathers on top, and her left hand looked like a bird's talon. Based on how sharp those talons looked, her Anima was probably a hawk, eagle or some other bird of prey.
And finally, Tuck Lehosa. He was in group C, and Arg's twin brother. He was pretty arrogant and rude too, though not as bad as his brother. Also, it was pretty apparent that he hated and felt inferior to Arg. He had the same blue eyes, and wore his long hair in a ponytail, with the sides of his head shaved, and he had a single hound dog's ear. I assumed he must have lost the left ear in an accident or something.
As for the rest of my classmates...eh, consider them extras, they aren't going to have any major roles in the story, so no need to learn their names or appearances, for now at least.
Oh, and I had dozed off, by the way. Not for long though, as I felt a pinch on my side.
"Ugh, what's the big idea?" I groaned, rubbing my eyes.
"The session's over, idiot," Replied an annoyed looking Cat Girl.
"Having trouble staying awake are we, Leftovers? You really ought not to be here if you are unable to keep up with the rest of us," Sneered Arg, as his group passed us while on the way out of the classroom, heading for the magic training hall where our last two sessions were to take place.
Man, even the way this guy speaks felt arrogant!
"That's right, you guys think you're hot shit because you made a flashy impression during the exam, but when it came to an actual quest, you miserably failed a lousy D-Ranked assignment!" Laughed Lamasa, walking alongside the blonde douchebag.
We were on rough terms with all three of the other groups, but group A was definitely the worst by quite a distance. Gela's group B mostly ignored us besides a couple of members giving us the occasional condescending glance, and Tuck's group C were like a more tolerable version of group A.
Huh, given his obvious inferiority complex towards his twin brother Arg, I should probably mention that to him sometime, I'll save it for when he really asks for it.
"We should probably get going too," Sighed Persia, as the last of the other groups left the room.
"Um...what about them?" I gestured towards the two sleeping figures in front of us.
The row in front of us had a frustrated looking redhead in the middle, with the occupants of the two desks on either side of her fast asleep.
"I'll wake Azyl, can you guys handle this idiot?" Groaned Key, leaving Rai to Persia and I.
Azyl sleeping was pretty normal, the guy was asleep or at least daydreaming at every possible opportunity. This was a first for Rai though, guess the professor's low energy teaching style was our hyperactive pinball's kryptonite.
"You know, when three out of the five members of our group are fast asleep during class, it's no wonder that the others look down upon us," Sighed an exasperated Persia.
"Does it really matter? That failed Quest was hardly our fault, there's sure to be plenty of opportunities to prove them wrong," I shrugged, placing a finger on Rai's neck and running a small bolt of electricity through him, waking him up with a yelp.
Of course, none of our other classmates actually knew what had happened to us in that cave, and we had no intention of explaining it to them, it'll just come off as an excuse.
"You should take this more seriously, Kuro," Sighed Persia.
"Impressive, that's quite an efficient way to wake someone up," Stated Key, more to herself than to me, as a dazed Rai sat up in confusion after being shocked awake.
She then lit up a small flame at the tip of her finger and moved it closer to Azyl's sleeping face. Uh, a jolt of electricity was one thing, but waking someone up with fire was kinda...
"Y'know, you probably shouldn't-," I began.
"I'm awake," Said Azyl, suddenly sitting straight up, before flicking a few water droplets from his fingers at the flame that was barely a few inches away from him.
That was the most alert and urgent I'd ever seen him act.
We then made our way to the magic training hall. Now this I was looking forward to. Especially the first session, I was curious about General Magic. We entered the large hall and made our way towards the front, where Instructor Tabbs had gathered the others around her.
"Looks like everyone's here now. Alright, let us begin. Now, this session normally involves practical training and application, but for today, I'll just explain how General Magic works."
She then proceeded to go into great detail about General Magic. Allow me to simplify it.
General Magic, which is also known as Artificial Magic, is not the same as the magic in your body.
Elemental Magic and physical mutations or effects from Animas were known as Natural Magic.
The main difference is this; Natural Magic is something that varies randomly from person to person, not everyone has an equal standing with it, but Artificial Magic is different...while it does require a lot of technical knowledge, so long as you understand the concept, it's something that anyone can do.
Activating a General Magic spell is very different to discharging Elemental Magic, it required special scrolls made of an unique type of parchment found in this world, simply known as Spell Scrolls.
Certain command lines would be entered into the scroll, and once that was complete, to activate the spell you simply run Mana through the scroll, and it begins executing the entered commands. It was a very similar process to coding in software programs in my old world.
The most common type of Spell Scroll used by Adventurers were defensive barrier scrolls. For a simple barrier, you'd need to enter at least three command lines to determine, for instance, the shape, size and durability of the barrier. A more complex and powerful barrier would require a lot more command lines.
However, if there's even a tiny mistake in a single command line, the entire scroll becomes worthless and no spell will activate, just like with coding.
Of course, it wasn't just limited to barriers, you could use these scrolls to create literally any spell you could imagine, stuff like teleporting, invisibility, illusions, and so on, just so long as you have a good grasp of how to enter the commands.
I'd briefly tried my hand at programming and coding back in my old world and, to put it briefly, I sucked at it.
Most Adventurers rely on their Natural Magic and store-bought Spell Scrolls, very few actually make their own Spell Scrolls. It's obvious why, an average person would need to dedicate a lot of time into studying how to string the command lines together, and most wouldn't take the time to do that.
Instructor Tabbs then explained a few basic command lines, and showed us which command lines need to be written on a scroll, as well as how to write them, to activate a simple barrier, which is the easiest and most basic Spell Scroll to create.
...yeah, impossible.
This was way more complicated that Java or any other coding language from my old world, even the most basic spell was all Greek to me.
Without a doubt, creating a Spell Scroll, especially one with any degree of complexity, was absolutely impossible for me.
Yeah, forget about even considering learning how to stitch together command lines to create these spells, I'll just have to stick to my Elemental Magic, if I needed other spells, I could just buy ready-made ones at the Adventurer Guild and equipment stores. I probably wouldn't though, not right now anyway.
The more powerful and elaborate a spell was, the more complicated the command process became, so the more complex and useful a Spell Scroll was, the more expensive it was bound to be.
As for Mana consumption, that also depended on the complexity of the spell, but generally, these scrolls use up very little Mana. Oh yeah, and these scrolls aren't just single use or disposable, so long as the scroll itself remains intact, you can activate its spell as many times as you want, unless you're out of Mana, of course. Some spells might require a sort of 'cooldown time', but probably not more than a few seconds.
If the scroll gets damaged, then the spell will no longer work, but this parchment was surprisingly durable, it was both water and fire proof, and significantly harder to rip apart than regular paper. It wasn't exactly indestructible, but if you keep it carefully, it was unlikely to get damaged.
As the session came to an end and Instructor Tabbs began preparing for the final session of the day, I turned to my teammates.
"So...any of you guys think you'd be able to create Spell Scrolls? Because I sure as hell don't."
"No way, that looked way too convoluted for me to grasp," Replied Persia, firmly shaking her head with a bemused look.
"Yeah, just trying to figure out that simple barrier spell gave me a headache, I'm not even going to try!" Declared Rai, saying that with confidence.
"How do you say something so pessimistic with such an optimistic tone? But, I have to agree, I doubt I'd be able to wrap my head around how to string together commands either," Admitted Key, with a sigh.
That left one. We all turned and stared at Azyl, who looked a bit taken aback at suddenly being the center of attention.
"Uh...I guess I was able to make sense of it. But it seems like a pai-."
"Sweet! We'll be counting on you in this department from now on!" Grinned Rai, smacking him on the shoulder.
"No, I just said-."
"That sure is a relief! You know, between the maze and now this, you're pretty reliable when it really matters, aren't you?" I added, folding my arms and nodding.
"...You're making fun of me, aren't y-."
"I'd expect nothing less from my oldest friend," Nodded Key, as he gave her a sleepy glare.
Oh, right. I forgot to mention, these two are neighbors and grew up together, they had mentioned it to us at some point during the last week.
"You know, we'll be able to save a lot of money if we can make our own scrolls instead of buying ready-made ones," Chimed in Persia, at which point Azyl had completely given up on retorting.
Poor guy, he looked like he was immensely regretting his words.
Oh well, moving on to the final session, Elemental Magic. For this session, Miss Tabbs had four assistant instructors with her, each one in charge of a different Elemental Magic.
She herself was in charge of wind magic. They split up the students by Elemental type, which meant I was stuck with Rai and a bunch of extras. The Lehosa twins both had Earth Magic, Key and Lamasa had Fire Magic, Persia and Gela had Wind Magic, and Azyl had Water Magic.
Like I already mentioned before, the rest of our classmates are too insignificant to bother mentioning at this time.
Apparently, each type of Elemental Magic worked differently, so there was no single explanation or training method that would work for all five types. The assistant instructor in charge of Lightning Magic was a young guy who looked to be in his early or mid-twenties named Paark Trocuelo, he had light brown short hair, and a pretty short height too. He had two twisted horns on his head, they made him look kinda demonic at first glance, but they were probably results of a goat or sheep Anima or something similar.
After quickly introducing himself, he began explaining Lightning Magic. Once again, I'll simplify it for you.
When it comes to discharging Lightning Magic, it wasn't something that could be reliably taught, it was something you had to get a feel for by yourself. And once you do, the two things you need to be able to control is output and, well, control.
This varys from person to person, people with weak Elemental Magic would almost never be able to properly discharge it, let alone control it. I had figured most of that out already, but it's what he said next that really caught my attention.
"Lightning Magic can be applied in a few other ways besides simply discharging an attacking blast, but it's most unique application method is something none of the other Elemental types can do; internal enhancement. This is arguably the most difficult technique to master of any Elemental Magic, but if you do, you'll be able to boost your speed and strength quite significantly."
"That's the advanced technique I mentioned before, I totally forgot to tell you more about it," Whispered Rai apologetically, as Instructor Trocuelo continued his explanation.
The technique involved running streams of lightning within your body through your nerves and muscles in order to make them move and react faster. You could boost your speed by anywhere between two to five times faster, depending on how much lightning you spread out through yourself.
No one in the world, historic or presently, had successfully managed to boost themselves beyond five times faster yet, most attempts to do so had resulted in fried nerves and permanent internal damage.
It uses up Mana at a pretty slow rate, so if you have a decent amount of Mana in you, you'd be able to use it for quite a while, but it's a fairly risky technique to even attempt, even for a minimal boost in speed.
Namely because you had to maintain the consistency and flow of the lightning streams even while moving, if it increases, decreases, fluctuates or wavers for even a second, you'll feel excruciating pain and will inflict internal damage upon yourself.
Some Adventurers with Lightning Magic try simply running lightning through certain parts of their body instead of a full body enhancement, such as just boosting their legs and feet to run faster.
However, practicing that too much was highly NOT recommended, as the rest of your body will feel a lot slower and overtime, you'll end up slowly but surely losing control and synchronization of you body's movements.
I began to feel excited.
A powerful yet risky technique that, if done wrong, causes immense pain and damage? That sounded tailor made for my abilities.
My threshold and tolerance for pain had been significantly boosted by my three years of torture, most of which was, ironically, getting electrocuted, and my Healing Factor would take care of any damage if I messed up.
Practicing and attempting to master this technique should not be a problem for me at all.
Instructor Trocuelo then moved on to the other ways Lightning Magic could be used. The first was a sensory type spell.
You spread out a web of Mana around you, effectively creating a field of static electricity that would as an extension of your nervous system, allowing you to sense any movement in your surroundings.
That...would have been really useful while I was fighting in the dark down in the Goblin maze. Another use of Lightning Magic was streaming it through weapons to enhance them, the way Rai streamed lightning through his chain-sickle. The rest of the Lightning Magic applications were just combo moves with other Elemental types, like combining with Water and Wind Magic to create an artificial storm.
Hey, that sounded pretty cool.
"Well, that wraps up today, first years! Tomorrow we'll be doing more practical training during these sessions, so please change out of your uniforms and into your Adventurer gear before coming to the training hall. You are dismissed for the day!" Stated Instructor Tabbs.
As we headed out, I could hardly contain my excitement. I could feel my hunger and desire to get stronger growing, now that I had a clear picture of how to do so. I could hardly wait for tomorrow.
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