Day 43
The third day was the turn of the spirit reading and spirit control lessons. Magus Nayla entered the room and started her lecture.
Today's she would focus on the important skill of defending oneself against the attack of spirit readers.
The magus scanned the students and decided to call upon Micah to stand in the front. Micah was chosen for the demonstration as it was well-known he had the best defensive spells among all the elite class students. Emery had seen his crystal barrier in action and it was strong enough to withstand multiple tier-4 spells.
Confident with his prowess, Micah stood up, walked to the front of the class and cast his spell. Magus Nayla merely watched him walk to the front of the class before starting her spirit reader demonstration.
There was no actual spell shown but within the span of a second, Micah's earlier confidence completely disappeared and he fell kneeling on the floor while clutching his throbbing head. The shield he had manifested instantly broke into pieces and disappeared in particles of light.
Magus Nayla gestured towards the fallen Micah and explained she did no enchanting spell or anything similar, all she did was direct her spirit power to forcefully attack Micah's mind.
She explained about how spirit energy works and taught the acolytes how to defend against an opponent trying to probe their mind. The first trick, as she had demonstrated, was to quickly use one's own spirit power to protect the mind and attack the opponent. The second trick, which was to use loud sounds or inflict pain, was best reserved for when they have to face a powerful spirit reader, who could withstand their spirit attack. If all else failed, there was always the third trick, that was to retreat from the fight.
After the lecture, Magus Nayla spent the latter half of the class by letting everyone be probed, to make sure each of them knew what to do and learn how to withstand the attack.
As a talented spirit reader and a light element acolyte, Anas was able to withstand the attack for more than 5 minutes, while Klea was able to withstand it for 3 minutes. The others were usually only able to hold out for around a minute, while the untalented ones or the ones who were not fast enough to defend against the mind probing were only able to last less than five seconds, just like Micah did before.
As for Emery, he was able to hold out for more than 2 minutes. According to Magus Nayla, his resistance might come from his powerful dark core.
The second day rolled in and it was time for the Ethics and Principles lecture by Magus Minerva. In this class session, they were focusing on races.
Unfortunately, even in such advanced civilization, racism still existed, just in different forms. From Magus Minerva's lectures, it seemed lower world racism would happen between humans with different skin colors. In middle worlds, racism usually happens between humans and half-humans or even non-humans, while in higher realms no matter how advanced their civilisation, racism still happens between those of high-born society and those of lower-born society.
There would be no perfect society free of racism as long as humans still had the desire to commune in a group. Therefore no matter the level of the world, humans would always favor one group over the other, and racism would always be there.
Time passed quickly, Emery almost did not realize the class time was up.
On the third day, Magus Clio explained about artifacts, specifically weapons and fighting equipment Magus and acolytes could use. There were several different tiers of artifacts depending on their craftsmanship, strength and levels, but Magus Clio focused more on unique weapons, such as projectile weapons and energy weapons. The two aforementioned weapons were stand-alone weapons that didn't get affected by the user's power, hence almost everyone used them.
To demonstrate the strengths of each weapon, Magus Clio asked everyone to clear the middle of the class and used each weapon against a defensive barrier to see how many attacks it took to shatter the barrier. The test fire piqued everyone's interest and every acolyte in the room looked at each demonstration intently. The excitement only intensified when Magus Clio used a screen to show some of the most powerful weapons ever created in action.
The class watched a flying machine around the size of the moon fire an attack at a planet with billions of people, vaporizing the planet and every single living being on it into a fine mist.
The weapons he showed could erase a whole plane from existence.
Though it was awesome, it was a reminder that with certain artifacts or technology even the strongest magus could be defeated.
Among the five friends, Julian was the one most interested with this information. With such technology, even the simplest projectile weapons were enough to destroy a whole Roman legion.
When the lecture ended, Emery still had a question lingering in his mind. A question that would lead to big problems if not solved as soon as possible,
Julian's example was one of the main reasons acolytes from lower worlds were restricted from bringing items back to earth. However, without the item, he would not be able to finish the quest from Kilgragah and the scroll given by the patriarch would just be sitting uselessly in his ring if he couldn't bring it back.
Emery decided to meet the magus and ask for ways to bring back an item as an acolyte of a lower world.
Fortunately, Magus Clio said there was a way. As an acolyte of an elite class, there was a certain privilege that was rarely used.
An acolyte from the elite class could access the magus hub to purchase certain special storage. The storage would let him store restricted items to be brought back to his world. But it had limits of what item it could store and it would cost him contribution points.
This system was set up as a reward for acolytes who were deemed worthy of the Magus Academy's special services.
Emery had to restrain himself from jumping in excitement along with his friends. Thanks to this hint, he knew what to do next.
It was time to go to the hub and spend his contribution points. He had gathered a bunch from his efforts and it would be a waste to not use them.
Hearing the plan, Klea becomes excited "Yes! Shopping Time"