《World of Laws and Magic》 World of Laws and Magic Pologue The year is 2495 of the McMillan calendar. People from dozens of countries are watching their holographic televisions during midday as the various Presidents and Prime Ministers addressed everyone in their best suits and ties, saying variations of: "God bless this wonderful world of ours!", "Grand Earth will never fall to its enemies." and "For every civilian watching, happiness be to you." Then after almost all of the various leaders gave their own monologue, the Director of the United Realm stood up and gave his speech, the Director seeming to be a slim but muscular man in his mid forties, wearing a plain, black dress shirt tucked into his black dress pants carrying a stern look on his face: "As you all know, my name is Sylvester Rowland and I am the current Director of The Order of the United Realm. We are here today to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the end of the world war that united our nations and various realms and that has created the current world peace and scientific and magical progress that we have all come to know." "I don''t have much to say as our prosperity and cohesiveness is already self-evident but for the benefit of the young ones who have neither known the loss nor the despair that previous generations experienced in the ten year period prior to the last twenty years, I will say this!" "Just as there are many hardships and challenges that we all need to face throughout our lives there are just as many wonders to behold and embrace, not because we happen upon them as generations long since gone had done but because we can take it upon ourselves using our own might to determine our future. This world is based on laws and for those of us with courage and determination we can create our own laws, and by using these, whether blessings or curses, our peace in and rule over this world will never fall away." Director Rowland then raised his hand and moved his lips as if to speak but no words could be heard; a great number of symbols that seemed to appear from nothing, each symbol written in a language that looked similar to Sanskrit, blazed with fire, and the sky then shone with a blinding bright, blue light and rays of light that seemed palpable descended on everyone in the world besides those that were in attendance themselves at the assembly, filling them with energy and vitality. Five seconds later the light disappeared and the the world assembly program had ended and almost everyone went back to their normal daily routines. One young man who the light touched, however, continued to stare blankly towards the direction where the light came from as if he was wandering how the light was able to move pass solid walls in order to fall on his body. When his eyes became focused again he put a smile on his face and although he was alone in his almost empty room, to him, it felt like this place radiated an endless warmth and liveliness. His smile collapsed and with a determined expression, he whispered: "I''m definitely going to create my own laws and be just like Sylvester Rowland. This really is a wonderful world, ha, ha, ha..." Laughing uncontrollably, he fell off of the bed that he was sitting on. He stared at the ceiling for five minutes and then fell into a deep sleep, dreaming of a future where he too could use magic to create miracles.The author''s content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. ................... Irene Capitol removed her ear from Nick''s door. "That boy is so worthless, wasting his time watching such a program. People like us should just be content with our lot. Hmph, that boy bearly even talks to me or his sisters so he must be some sort of idiot. Although he gets pretty decent grades in school, he''s ultimately a dunce and I shouldn''t expect anything from him." Irene went back to her room with a contempt filled expression. (I''ll make sure that boy comes to understand his place in this house!) .................... Jerry Davis of Kinderton Primary School was currently in his office grading papers. The students were all at home today because of an administrative mandate. Jerry looked at a set of papers with interest. "This Nick Capitol sure does have potential, he understands everything I teach so easily and he accomplishes tasks in class with such efficiency. It''s too bad that he doesn''t get along with the other students. He also bearly talks at all in class so the children have started spreading rumors about him." "Sigh, I hope he doesn''t let all the gossip get him down. Hmmm..." Jerry looked at a section of Nick''s test paper that asks him what he wants to be when he grows up. Nick answered: "I want to be the strongest Magician in the world." Jerry smiled, releasing a short lived chuckle. "Ha, ha. You''ve got the right idea kid. Kids like him tend to have a hard time in regular schools but for some reason, I think that he will be fine." ................ Dreyfus Gray walked into director Rowland''s temporary office and spoke to the director plainly: "Sir, we have received recent reports about magic energy from unknown realms that are being dumped onto Grand Earth; these events have been tracked by our realm exploration and investigation unit. The magic energy is mostly the same as ours but with slight differences that we are unable to properly analyze. I believe that the source of the magic energy is somehow preventing us from properly being able to analyze the complete natures of the magic energy." Director Rowland turned around from the window that he had been looking out of and asked: "Is the magic energy harmful in anyway?" Dreyfus shook his head, saying: "No, it doesn''t seem to be but as you know, unknown magical natures can cause problems if unscrupulous Magicians are able to grasp them. What makes things worse is that we won''t have any information on these unknown types of magic until some persons develop an affinity for them which could take years." Director Rowland lost interest in Dreyfus''s report and said: "If someone develops an affinity for any of these unknown types of magic, it is their fortune and I''m certainly not going to get in the way of their destiny. Now, if some Magician grows arrogant and acts wildly I''m sure he''ll be taken care of like all the other rogues before him. You may leave." Dreyfus nodded his head and left the office. Sylvester Rowland continued looking out the window with eerie, dark eyes. (Unknown realms and types of magic, huh?) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 1 Introduction The year is 2500 of the McMillan Calendar. "Today is the start of the final week of your high school lives in London. What are you all planning to do next?" Asked Theo Williams, a 26 year old teacher of Bayor High School located in the northern part of London, England. A student got up and asked: "Teacher, why ask? Everyone here wants to go to an academy to study magical laws so that we can become Magicians, right, isn''t it the obvious thing to do?" Theo replied: "Yes, while it is the obvious thing to do, things are really not that simple. For those of you that do choose to attend one of the laws and magic academies, the next few years of your supposed ''magical'' training would determine your base proficiency in using laws or rather magical laws in your daily life. It would not only affect you, but may also affect your families. Your proficiency with magic would determine whether you work as a civilian like me or if you become part of the Magician Association and become a licensed Magician." A boy with dark brown hair and eye glasses stood up and asked: "Teacher, honestly, we haven''t been taught much about laws and magic so we don''t even know the right things to say and questions to ask, could you go over what you can tell us about how laws and magic work?" Theo smiled and rolled his eyes at the student, because he new that since the start of high school they would all be taught introductory information on laws and magic but it was his favorite pass-time lecturing the students about this topic because of the smiles that would come on their faces when he did, so he gave in to the student''s request: "This world is filled with an energy that most of us commonly call magic and to use this energy we manipulate it using what we call laws which, without going into too much useless details, are inscriptions that Magicians can carve out to create supernatural or similar phenomena like lifting a mountain 20 feet into the air or setting the sky on fire or even making your plastic toothbrush a very handy butcher''s knife. These so called laws are the essence of what being a Magician is all about. If you are able to create or replicate the right laws, using magic to manipulate magic further, you could do things from healing the sick to creating a source of fresh water from seemingly nothing. I''ve even heard once of a Magician using laws and magic to create a herd of cattle by using the flesh from one young calf. Don''t ask me how that works because I haven''t got a clue." Most of the students then began to cheer. Theo gave them a minute, quietened them down and got back to lecturing them: "Remember, when I say that Laws can be carved, I mean that they can be carved into inanimate objects, flesh and blood and even thin air, anything might be possible as you all may have observed if you have ever watched a world assembly television recording. How well you can carve laws and make them effective will determine your future pay and job placements so work hard because from my own personal experience, the road of laws and magic is not for the feint of heart. Too bad my heart isn''t so bold, ha, ha..." This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.Theo gave an awkward laugh. Then a 19 year old young man in the far back of the class raised his hand and asked: "Teacher, do you think that anyone, even if they don''t come from a good family can be a Magician?" Suddenly, the whole classroom burst into laughter when they realized who asked the question, it was their seemingly shy and introverted classmate Nick Capitol. He was infamous in the school year for being apparently book smart but did not like to interact with his fellow students or even the teachers, so much so that many of the students maliciously spread rumors about him being a mute and him being stupid and weak. Theo looked at Nick with a smile because he knew that he was a good student and was asking because his family situation might not be the best, so Theo replied: "Although more well to do families have a certain advantage, in the beginning, as long as you can get into a laws and magic academy, what''s most important is probably hard work. Our society is a meritocracy after all." Nick Capitol smiled and put his head down to continue reading a book. Most of the students near him gave a sneer in his direction but Nick ignored them. "Alright, home room class is dismissed for today, please get to your next class!" Theo shouted and left the room. Nick got up from his seat and also left the room to head to his chemistry class. "I hope Mr. Theo is right, even though I can''t exactly afford to get into an academy, I''m going to at least try to reach my dreams. I think Naruto would do a fist bump and say: believe it, but that seems kind of lame for me to do... whatever." When he was walking to his next class, he met a girl from his class at the door as she was going in, she looked at him from head to toe, sneered and walked inside. Nick didn''t mind because he was used to that, people didn''t like him because he never smiled and was always by himself, not to mention his clothes were kind of baggy and his shoes were visibly worn out, making him look poor. He even once heard a girl whisper to her friend that he was "the ugliest brown boy she had ever seen". "I guess she''s having a bad day, ha, ha..." After a painful and awkward little laugh, Nick took his seat and waited for his class chemistry teacher to arrive. .......................... About six hours later, school came to an end and Theo was making his way home with the same indifferent expression he always wore when he was in public. Fifteen minutes later he got to the bus station and there was a bus waiting. "Excuse me, young man, may I trouble you to help me carry my things onto the bus?" Asked an elderly, short woman with gray hair and visible wrinkles on her face who had a heavy looking bag that she was almost dragging across the pavement. Nick''s indifferent expression turned into a little smile and he replied: "Sure thing miss, don''t strain yourself." Nick carried the bag onto the bus, paid the fare, left the bag on the front bus seat and took a seat at the back of the bus. The elderly woman waved at him as if to say thank you. Nick only smiled in response and turned his head to watch as the bus moved through the streets. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 2 Happy Home? Nick got home at around 4:00 pm; school ended at 3:20 pm and it was a 15 minute bus ride to get home. His two sisters and his grandaunt were already home. He didn''t greet any of them and just went to his room. His room had nothing in it but an old television projector, an old bed with slightly torn sheets, a rickety desk and an old chair. Most televisions these days created holographic video displays rather than there being a LCD or LED screen which was considered old technology as far as televisions were concerned, Nick loved this TV because the videos on it were his only means of seeing any meaningful human interactions growing up. Since as far as he can remember he didn''t have anyone he was especially close to. As far as he new he had an absentee father and a half crazy mother that he only ever saw once when he was a toddler. "None of that really matters, huh?" muttered Nick. "I should do a few push ups, take a shower, eat and then start studying". Nick spent the next 30 minutes doing 4 reps of push ups: two reps of 22 and two reps of 30. Nick wanted to create a habit of training his body in someway because he understood how important physical fitness was. He didn''t do too much because he thought that that would get in the way of his studying which he did everyday along with the push ups. He once heard someone say that its the little repetitions each day that create big results, the person went on to say that if you only cared for your teeth by going to the dentist twice in a year, they would fall out but if you just brushed them twice daily, they would be fine going into old age, it''s small habits everyday that make the man. Nick didn''t really know if all that was true but he liked the concept of building good habits. After he finished his pushups and showered, he left his room to get something to eat. On his way to the kitchen he came upon his grandaunt who was making her way to her own room, she spoke to Nick in an accusatory tone: "How could you just come home and not greet me or anyone, that''s not very good behavior. Why are you so worthless and good-for-nothing? Remember to rake up the leaves in the yard tomorrow before going to school." Internally, Nick felt enraged at the insult but he kept an outward appearance of calm; Nick silently clenched his right fist and nodded his head. He was all the more angry because he heard his sisters'' laughing in the next room. He went into the kitchen to get some of the food that had been prepared and went straight back to his room. Inside his room, Nick dejectedly muttered to himself: "So what if you hate me, I''m still going to do what I have to, I''ll fight for myself." As is evident by Nick''s interaction with his grandaunt, he didn''t have a very peaceful home life because his grandaunt was a bitter and abusive woman, especially toward him, and his sisters were, as far as he was concerned, just miniature versions of her, less abusive, a little less dishonest but with the same amount of hypocrisy and hate between them. Anyway, to him, none of that even mattered anymore, all that mattered was getting into a laws and magic academy. After spending 10 minutes on eating, he began studying mathematics, which to be honest, is probably his worst subject but Nick believed that it was the most important subject in terms of understanding science and by some extension, laws and magic. He read a math text on the the theory of numbers for three hours and went to bed at around 9 pm. The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.He woke up when the alarm rang at 3 am. One minute later he heard a voice coming from his old cell phone saying: "Young man, if you will change, then your whole life will change..." It was an old speech by Jim Rohn, a motivational speaker who lived a few centuries ago and it always put a smile on his face in the morning, reminding him that if he wanted to get better and stronger, he had to continue changing everyday in the right direction even by a little. He set the message to play a minute or so after the alarm. "Let''s get this yard work done OG." Nick cheerfully whispered to himself. Nick went outside with a rake and a few trash bags to get rid of the leaves that had fallen onto the ground from a few fruit trees that were planted in the yard. He always wondered why his grandaunt kept fruit trees that never bore actual fruit but only shed leaves. Then it crossed his mind: (She might not have cut them down so that I would have to clean up the leaves...yeah...that''s completely possible...whatever, lets hurry up and get this done before school.) It took Nick about two and a half hours to rake up and dispose of the leaves. After all that, he took a shower and got ready for school. It was 7 am as he was leaving the house when Nick walked past his grandaunt''s bedroom, he heard her speaking on the phone, saying: "That boy is so lazy, I have to even rake up leaves and bag them because he refuses to do so..." Nick put on a awkward smile when he heard the conversation, he didn''t know what was funnier, her lying about doing some yard work or the fact that she doesn''t know that her bedroom is not soundproof. Nick then put on an indifferent expression and left the house. As he was closing the gate to the yard he heard a loud roar above him; he looked up and saw something shocking. There was a creature that looked like a European dragon that you would see in old video games flying over his house, it seemed to be 30 feet tall, had fiery red scales covering its skin and had glowing green eyes and what was even more shocking was that there was someone ''riding'' it, standing comfortably on its left shoulder. The spectacle was obvious to onlookers because all the houses within this neighborhood only had one storey and were very well spaced apart. A minute after seeing the ''dragon'' and its rider flying west, there was a loud voice that spread all over the neighborhood, as if for an announcement, "Citizens, an apology has been released from the Order of the United Realm for the disturbance caused by one of its Regular Magicians and his magic beast. They were dispatched on a mission that required them to fly over this area. Things will return to normal in a few minutes. Thank you for your patience and understanding." After staring for another five minutes, Nick whispered to himself: "I have to become a Magician, that was so awesome." Nick then went to the bus station, got on a bus and took the fifteen minute bus ride to school. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 3 That Doesnt Matter Nick arrived at school at around 7:40 am and went to his home room class and took a seat at his desk. Since all 13th graders were graduating at the end of the week there wasn''t much to do here at school besides preparing for the transition to the university of your choice or to a laws and magic academy. Nick''s older sister who was about two years older than him went to a small local university to get a diploma in gender studies but Nick had no intention of going to a normal university. Nick has been obsessed with being a Magician since a very young age and to that end, he would have to go to a laws and magic academy. There were two laws and magic academies in London, one of which Nick hoped to get into somehow. They were Raylam Priest Academy and Richter Order Academy. They were both schools that famous Magicians once attended. The difference between laws and magic academies and universities was that you had to have a certain academic track record to get into a university but literally anyone could get into a laws and magic academy as long as they were willing to pay a fee and commit to working for the Order of the United Realm for a decade or so after graduation. So, why didn''t everyone try to join the laws and magic academies since those schools would lead to learning magic and probably a far better life than being a magic-less civilian? The reason is that learning magic is HARD. The graduation rate for both academies is around 2 percent and over 50 percent of the students that enter as first years end up dead or crippled by their third year because of practical exams gone wrong, accidents, suicide and unsolved crimes. The main reason for that is that Magicians and Magicians in training, that is, apprentices, are not protected by normal legal proceedings and have no rights under the constitution while attending these academies so there are little restrictions as to what happens in the academies besides the rule that students and teachers cannot openly harm each other unless certain events are arranged by the school. The government does this to both weed out the wannabe Magicians in training who are likely to just waste resources and to foster courage and independence in its students. The rewards are great though, anyone who becomes a licensed Magician is above the rule of law in none magical society, they are exempt from all taxes and they can roam the world unhindered by immigration concerns as all Magicians are welcomed in any country or realm at any time. What do I mean by realm? Well, it is commonly known that magicians can go to other worlds via space portals but the public generally does not know anything more regarding the matter. After thinking through some information regarding the academies and Magicians, Nick Capitol readied himself for his first class of the day to begin at 8 am. ................................... After 4 hours of classes, it was lunch break at which point Nick went to the administrators'' office to ask about a scholarship to the laws and magic academies that he had applied for some months ago. The British government is willing to give graduating students of 13th grade scholarships to attend a laws and magic academy if they had high enough grades in their core chosen subjects. Nick did eight subjects over the last 2 years and he was definitely the best performing student in his year so he new that he would be getting the scholarship, he just had to make sure that it was approved before the new school year started. He walked into the administrators'' office and went to the clerk at the counter, he was a thirty something year old man wearing a light grey suit and had a shaved head, his eyes were piercing. He spoke to Nick from the counter when he approached: "You don''t have to bother asking young man, I know what you came here for." The clerk who according to the name tag he wore on his coat was named Carl took a file from beneath the counter, looked at it and said, "Your scholarship has been approved so all your fees for whatever Magician academy you choose to attend will be taken care of, you just have to tell me which one that you will be attending." "Richter Order Academy!" Shouted Nick. "Okay lad, you don''t have to shout, I''m standing right here." The clerk wrote something down and as if out of thin air, a document appeared in front of Nick with information confirming that he was awarded the scholarship. Nick wasn''t surprised at what the clerk had just done; there were many civilians that knew how to use magic or magic tools in their daily lives, although, the latter was much more common than the former. If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.Nick was so happy that he was at a loss for words; all of his studying efforts have finally paid off and he could now attend the Richter Order Academy with all his fees paid for, which includes tuition, meals and room and board along with some other minor allowances. He can finally leave his grandaunt''s house this coming school year. "Ha, Ha, Ha..." Nick''s usually indifferent expression turned into a crying laughter which made the clerk cringe a little but he did not say anything because he too was happy for the young man. He had heard that some rumors were being maliciously spread about this young man that were evidently not true and felt some sympathy in that regard. The clerk interrupted Nick''s celebration by saying: "Alright, young lad, be ready for graduation on Friday, you should be proud of yourself." Nick looked at the clerk and nodded and then left the administrators'' office, heading to the students'' restroom. When he entered the restroom, he found an empty stall and took out his phone and used its holographic display to go to the Richter Order Academy''s application portal. To complete his application, all fees must either be paid up front or he has to fill in information regarding a scholarship that he has received into the portal. Nick slowly filled in the application with the required information. He also signed an electronic contract where he promised to work for the Order of the United Realm upon graduation; after entering his scholarship identification number that he got from the document that he received earlier, Nick submitted the application and he received a notification in just a few seconds that his application was approved. Starting this fall he would be attending the Richter Order Academy for Magicians. Nick walked out of the bathroom with his usual indifferent expression but internally, he was happier than he had ever been; Nick headed to his next class and acted as if nothing happened. When he was near the class, he heard someone whispering: "Look, there''s the dumb mute." Nick ignored the student and kept walking, walking towards his future. Three days later.... At the main hall of Bayor High School, as the clock struck 8 pm, the graduating class of 13th graders stood as the valedictorian gave her address. She was a 19 year old young woman with braided hair, wearing an all black dress underneath her graduation gown. While Nick continued sitting in the front row, because he didn''t feel like standing, she spoke earnestly and Nick thought to himself: (Isn''t that the girl that always sneered at me when she saw me during chemistry class...small world, huh?) Nick let out a chuckle. Two days ago, a teacher had come to him saying that he, as the male with the highest grade point average in his year, was to give the valedictorian speech but he said no, because although it was his right, he did not feel like he had the public speaking skills to do that at this time, in fact being on stage in front of so many people would give him too much anxiety to perform a speech well. During his time in high school he learned that one should know their own limits in order not to make a fool of themself, and he new what his currently were. What did the Greeks say? The beginning of wisdom is to know thyself...that''s so true. The funny thing was that the administrators didn''t even consider giving the male with the second highest grade point average the opportunity and broke tradition in order to let that girl, who apparently had a grade point average fairly close to Nick''s, make the speech. Nick thought with a bit of realization: (Despite all the rumors that they spread, those morons weren''t even considered for the opportunity to deliver the speech. There is indeed no such thing as an accomplished critic.) After the young lady gave her speech, all the students clapped and she was escorted from the stage. The principal then came to the stage to hand out the award for the highest academic achievement in the year: "Nick Capitol, please come to the stage in order to receive your award." Nick got to the stage and shook the principal''s hand, receiving a small gold colored trophy for his accomplishment and as he turned to face his peers, there was abject silence. None of the other students cheered for him. (Yeah...thought as much. But I''ve already won, haven''t I, what can your dislike do now.) After that thought, Nick went back to his seat; as he glanced at the left of his row, he could see the young woman that gave the valedictorian speech staring at him. Nick turned his head and slowly whispered: "That doesn''t matter." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 4 The Fuck? The Saturday morning after graduation, Nick got up at 3 am to rake the leaves in the yard and put them in trash bags. While doing so, a series of thoughts ran through his mind: (The school year starts in early September so that''s when I can move into the dorms, all I need to do now is to continue my daily routine of small workouts and studying, mostly studying.) About two and a half hours later Nick finished his yard work and went inside. When he went to the kitchen for some water, his grandaunt was sitting at the kitchen table with a natural looking smile on her face, as if she was waiting on someone; there was a plate of food that was covered beside her. When she saw Nick walk in, she spoke: "Good morning Nick, I got a call from your school yesterday after you left, one of your teachers, a Mr. Theo Williams called to congratulate you on getting top scores in your school work and on being accepted to Richter Order Academy. Why didn''t you tell me that you were doing so well at school and that you were planing to go to a laws and magic academy, you never even told me that the graduation ceremony was held yesterday? Mr. Williams kept saying, ''Miss Irene, you must be so proud''. I was really surprised, we are family and so we should be more open with each other. Here, I already made you breakfast, have a seat." Nick only stared for a few seconds before saying: "I will eat later, I only came in here for a glass of water." After getting the glass of water, Nick hurriedly went back to his room under his grandaunt''s stare. He was not surprised that Theo new about his acceptance to Richter Order Academy since that information would of course be made known to the Bayor High School since he was awarded a scholarship while attending there and used the scholarship to complete his application to the academy. Since he now knew that Irene got informed of his acceptance to Richter Order Academy, he isn''t surprised about her sudden change in attitude, after all, if someone became a Magician, it would not only elevate them, but also their family and so Irene just wanted to try to ease the negative feelings that she felt that Nick probably had for her and his sisters. Unfortunately, Nick never had any intention of remaining associated with them after graduating from high school. If going to the 12th and 13th grade wasn''t mandatory to be considered for government scholarships to a laws and magic academy, he would have already left this place when he turned 18. (I''ll admit that I don''t like Irene and my sisters very much, but I''ve no real ill will towards them either, what would that achieve? I just want to become a Magician. I''ll just play along with Irene''s bullshit until the school year starts and then I won''t have to see them again. Although trying to be a real family might be nice, but I don''t like hypocrites and pretending that people are different from what you know they are like isn''t very intelligent.) Just as he got to his room door, One of his sisters, the older one named Narrisa left her room. She was wearing a purple night gown and blue socks. Honestly, that night gown looked better than any piece of clothes that Nick ever had, that just goes to show you the difference in treatment that Irene gave the two siblings. She looked at Nick with some tiredness in her eyes and said: "Auntie told me that you were going to Richter Order Academy. I thought that you would be going to a university like me, guess I was wrong. Don''t get a swelled head, a dummy like you won''t get very far there, you can''t even talk to people." Nick only stared at her for a few seconds with an emotionless expression, then he slowly walked into his room and closed the door. He thought: (What the hell is wrong with that girl, she doesn''t even really know me?) Nick couldn''t understand the thought process that would make someone talk like that for no reason and he didn''t want to. (They don''t even treat you like a human being if you''re different from them.) Nick went to his desk to pick up his phone and then he decided to play one of his old audio clips to cheer himself up. "Your story may not have had a happy beginning but that isn''t the end. It''s what you choose to be that matters." It was a line from an old movie that Nick watched when he was much younger. It always made him feel better when someone tried to bring him down. (Alright, I have two months before the academy welcomes me. I''ve got o continue grinding.) Nick then spent the whole day reading one of his mathematics text books. For the next two months Nick would wake up at 3 am, did his four reps of pushups and went outside to rake any leaves that had fallen to the ground of the yard. He would then spend the rest of the day studying mathematics. He did not speak much to his grandaunt except the occasional morning and afternoon greetings and he did not speak to his sisters at all. .............................................. If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.On the morning that Nick was supposed to report to the Richter Order Academy in early September, Nick decided to get up at 2 am. He spent 20 minutes showering while everyone was asleep, he put on a pair of jeans and a decent looking polo shirt and got ready to leave the house. He didn''t have much in terms of possessions since he only had a few pieces of good clothes which he stuffed into his old travel bag. He also had a backpack with some personal effects like an old laptop he got as a gift from Mr. Theo Williams recently, his former school teacher, that had visited his house and told him that he should do his best and some other things not worth mentioning. Nick couldn''t help but feel grateful to Theo for the gift because having a laptop would allow him to store his books electronically and read them wherever he went without having to carry a heavy load. Of course he could always read them on his phone, but that just never felt comfortable to Nick. Nick got out of the house without waking anyone and before he closed the gate to walk down the street he turned to look back at the house that he had lived in for almost two decades and thought: (I''ll never have to come back here again. I guess that''s a little victory for me.) Nick closed the gate and walked down the street with a smile on his face. It''s the lightest his heart had been in a long time. Nick got to a bus stop and waited for a bus for about ten minutes. These days the public transportation system accommodated transport for 24 hours and there was little risk of anything bad being done to him even this early in the morning because of all the street lights, they were set up so that there would hardly be any darkness along a public street or side walk and each one of them was equipped with multiple security cameras. There were also security cameras at other parts of the street and hoisted on most buildings, they even had thermo-vision and night-vision features. The also had magical laws inscribed on them that could be used to identify anyone that stepped into their range. Along with the fact that police response was usually in minutes, street crime was really rare in London. Nick got on the bus and spent the next 40 minutes riding towards Richter Order Academy. The bus stopped right at the academy''s gates which were closed at this time so Nick sat at one of the rest areas near the school gate, took out the old Exus laptop from his backpack and began reading a math book that he had converted to a pdf file. It was now 3:45 am and Nick proceeded to read the e-book until 8 am, at which point the academy finally opened to the public. He walked beyond the now open gates; the gates were at leased three times his own height, painted silver, engraved with strange looking carvings that Nick couldn''t understand and they were cold to the touch. As he got to about one foot beyond the gate, he felt a sudden pressure on his body like you would feel from being in a swimming pool, as if there was something pressing against him from all directions. That feeling only lasted for a second and then went away. He made his way towards the auditorium that was mentioned in the acceptance message that he received from the academy; it was where all new students had to gather to meet the faculty and complete their registration, the students would also be addressed by the dean of the academy while there. Nick got to the auditorium where there were lines of students doing their registration with the academy staff at kiosks that were spread neatly near the entrance. Nick got in line and waited fifteen minutes to have his registration completed. On his way towards the entrance of the auditorium, he witnessed a young man around his age that was wearing an all black, three piece suit that looked brand new shouting at another young man: "Get out of my way, do you think that I, Thomas Markland, should have to wait for your fat ass to squeeze through the entrance before I can get in? " The slightly chubby young man, obviously offended, responded: "What''s wrong with you, who the hell talks like that to someone they just met? Well Thomas, you can just keep your rude comments to yourself and suck on these nuts." Thomas seemed visibly enraged by what the chubby guy just said and reached out to grab him; Thomas grabbed the chubby guy by his collar and punched him in his pot belly but the chubby man''s belly just jiggled, like all the force was dissipated somehow. Then the chubby man pushed Thomas about five feet away and proceeded to rush at him, tackling him to the ground. The two of them spent the next fifty seconds punching and scratching each other while on the ground and when both seemed to have developed bruises, something miraculous, or rather, unfortunate happened. POOOFFFF!!!! Nick stood by 20 feet away and watched as the two young men suddenly exploded into what seemed like a red colored mist, a blood mist. Then a middle aged man wearing a grey suit with a white dress shirt suddenly appeared hovering over the blood mist. The middle aged man then proceeded to spit at the blood mist saying: "You fools are too loud! Oh...I guess I should say that you two fools were too loud, hmmm...yeah that''s right." Nick looked at the scene dumbfounded, with his mouth opened enough to fit a chicken egg. When Nick came to his senses and took another look, focusing on the middle aged man, then the blood mist, he muttered audibly: "The fuck?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 5: New Home Nick had never seen something like what had transpired except in movies and video games. Nick new that the middle aged man had to be responsible for causing it and while pondering on how the middle age man had turned two young men into mist, he heard the middle aged man speak: "Good day, my name is Ray Menzes and I am an administrator within the enforcement office of this academy. Please be aware that once you have completed your registration at one of these kiosks you will be considered a full fledged member of this academy and if you were not aware before, one of the major rules of this academy is that students and faculty are not allowed to openly harm each other. For now you can take ''harm'' to mean: to cause injury. Just like the laws involved in the magic spell that I cast on those two young men earlier, this school has its own laws that must be obeyed and if they are not, dire consequences will follow. This world that you are entering is not an elementary school yard, be smarter than those two young men." Ray Menzes only seemed to be moving his lips but his voice was heard by everyone who witnessed the spectacle. As soon as he stopped speaking, Ray hovered towards the entrance and after placing himself on the ground, he walked into the auditorium. The scene was completely silent for a while with over 100 new students not moving a muscle and just staring at the entrance of the auditorium. After about two minutes, Nick snapped out of his daze and proceeded to walk into the auditorium, thinking: (So that was magic that could be used to harm others. That scene from earlier was pretty scary, no one noticed Ray until it was too late. It seems that this place is as dangerous as I thought it would be. I should probably keep my head down and avoid doing things that will attract unwanted attention.) After seeing Nick walk into the entrance, the other people who had finished their registration sobered and walked into the auditorium as well. Upon entering the main hall, Nick saw dozens of rows of chairs positioned before a podium. Most of the seats having already been filled, Nick took a seat on a chair at the far right of a middle row. (The faculty should be here to address the new students soon. After this, I should probably get settled in the dorm room that I was assigned at registration....) While Nick was lost in his thoughts about what he would be doing later, the rest of the students walked into the auditorium. Most of the students were wearing casual clothes such as jeans and polo shirts; most of them were also white with very few persons of other races. Nick himself was more brown that white as his father is white and his mother is black. After waiting an hour, the faculty finally entered the room and moved to stand on the stage where the podium was; there were 12 faculty members in all. Nick looked around in order to spot Ray Menzes but he did not see him anywhere in the auditorium even though he saw him enter. The twelve persons wore a variety of different clothes. Some had on three piece suits, some had on jeans and t-shirts and some wore fancy looking robes. The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.One man who stood out was wearing a golden colored robe that reached down to his ankles that had black stripes, he had a shaved head and both his ears seemed to droop down by a few centimeters. This man stepped forward to the podium and began his address, speaking without a microphone, his voice was still amplified somehow: "Welcome to Richter Order Academy. For most of you, this is your first time on our campus and I''m sure that it has been an exciting experience. My name is Xavier Gecko and I am the dean of this academy. We, the faculty are also excited to have a new batch of students to teach. Many of you will spend the next few years here learning about magic and the various laws that we may use to control it. Let me tell you, the path to becoming a Magician is filled with danger and you will be required to make personal sacrifices that most people will never have to make, but on the upside, you will have a chance to learn how to do things that most people can only dream of and see places that most people can''t even imagine. To become a Magician, you must be brave in your own ways, strong hearted and indifferent to failures, setbacks, mockery and pain. To create laws that can control magic, one must have the resolve to persevere through any and all resistance that may arise and see opportunities where there are losses. The faculty members behind me are some of your teachers and they will take you to your dorms and inform you of further details regarding your class placements and what is expected of you going forward. I want to remind you, each student has been given a handbook that has currently been placed inside your rooms. This handbook lists all the rules of the academy and you would be wise to memorize them because our faculty will not hesitate to punish anyone who is caught breaking them, no matter who you are. Work hard, walk your own path and be careful. The teachers will now escort you to your dorms." Dean Gecko then left the podium and one by one, the teachers came to the podium, telling students that were assigned to a certain dorm to follow them. There are apparently eleven dorms, each one accommodating about five dozen or more students. A female teacher came to the podium after the first four teachers had already taken away some students. She said: "Hello, my name is Rebecca Jones. Everyone that was assigned to the River-Run Dorm, please follow me as I leave." Nick was assigned to that dorm so he picked up his travel bag and backpack and followed Rebecca. The crowd of students walked together for about 25 minutes before they got to a building with an exterior that seemed to be kept in a decent condition and that was about eight storeys high. It had a large sign near the front of the entrance that read: "River-Run Dormitory". (This is my new home, huh? I hope the food''s good.) Nick smiled slightly but went back to his usual indifferent expression soon thereafter and followed Rebecca into the dorm''s lobby. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 6: The Library The dorm lobby is a spacious room with wooden paneling on the walls, it is probably large enough to fit over one hundred people. Rebecca stood near the entrance of the room waiting for all the students to enter. Rebecca was a fairly tall woman at about six feet. She looked to be in her late twenties to early thirties and had the appropriate curves to match; she was wearing an all black pants suit that was fairly fitted and her hair was light blonde and reached down to the middle of her back. When everyone entered the lobby, Rebecca moved to the front of the room and spoke, her voice was audible despite her not shouting at all: "Listen carefully because everything I say is important. You will all have your own room within this dorm. That is because the cultivation of magic is an arduous process requiring focus and an extreme amount of attention, so each room is reasonably self contained so that you will not get in each other''s way. As the Dean mentioned before, you will find a book of rules within each room and you should memorize each rule because everyone of them involves an adverse consequence if broken. As you can all see, both males and females live in the same dorm because you are all adults and as long as you don''t break the rules, we do not care what you do. You will all need to go to our academy''s website to view and register for your classes which start in one week. Laws and magic are both complex and both have to be studied separately at first for you to even understand what they entail. There are over 50 classes on the fundamentals of both of them and it is up to you to decide what you want to focus on and that will most likely be true up until graduation. After the first week you can even decide not to go to classes at all if you rather self study, however you will all have to participate in exams and other such activities scheduled by the school. Since you have some time before your first classes, I advise you to go to the school library to read up on some fundamentals so that you''re not completely ignorant during your classes. You''ll find that the books that are available at the library have very concrete and specific information about laws and magic unlike the books from public bookstores and libraries so make use of the opportunity here to educate yourselves so that you can become great Magicians. You were all given your room number at registration and there are twenty rooms on each floor starting at the first floor and they are in sequential order so you should be able to find your rooms easily. You are all dismissed." After she finished speaking, Rebecca left the dorm by going through the entrance, at which point most persons went to find their dorms and some people formed groups and stayed in the lobby to talk. Nick didn''t bother going to his room yet because of his eagerness and so he proceeded to leave the dorm and head to the library with his travel bag and backpack. (I will finally be able to get books with specific details about laws and magic. I''m not going to waste any time.) After ten minutes of asking around, Nick finally found out the library''s exact location. It was a huge building that sort of looked like a gothic styled church. It had two adult sized stone statues of what looked like gremlins standing at the door, one on each side. As soon as Nick walked to the doors, both statues literally turned their heads to look at him. (The fuck? This is creepy, why would they put these things in front of a library?) When Nick saw them look him over and turn their heads back to their original positions, he guessed that they were some sort of security system. Nick entered the library and unlike other libraries and book shops he had been to, this place had a smell of fresh air, fragrant like being in a garden. The library was clearly huge with many large book shelves and many books resting in them. Nick didn''t know where to start so he looked around for someone to help him. He saw who he assumed to be the librarian sitting at a desk in a corner of the room; he was a slim, white man with squinted eyes. Nick went to him and asked: Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings."Excuse me sir, where do I find introductory books on laws and magic? I would like to borrow some if that is possible." The librarian replied: "We have many of those kinds of books but since you are a new student you can only borrow one book at a time." "How do you know that I am a new student? I might just have my own collection of books so I just came here to check yours out." "Ha, ha. Kid, by the time students get to their second year, they don''t ask for introductory books on laws and magic because they would have already copied what was in here if they were so inclined. Not to mention, the statues that you saw at the entrance transmit to me information about whoever enters this library. Stop trying to act mysterious. I hate that the most." Nick rubbed his nose with an awkward smile. He didn''t know why, but he was always more talkative in a place with books. "You''re right sir. Please give this young man some guidance." The librarian liked Nick''s humble attitude. "Hpmh" With a sound, the librarian waved his hand and about thirty books suddenly appeared on his desk, all with varying sizes, shapes, and colors. "This is a collection of the best introductory books, I won''t help you any more than this, just choose one." Nick didn''t want to waste any time and since he didn''t have much information anyway, he just chose one with an appropriate sounding title: "What is Magic and What are its Laws?". "Thank you, sir." "No problem, just remember to return the book before the end of the school year and you can''t borrow another book until you return that one." With that, that librarian waved his hand and the rest of the books disappeared. Nick looked at his phone and saw that it was only 12:30 pm and so he decided to stay in the library and read a little of the book he just got. He found an empty table and sat down and began reading. By the time he lifted his head and checked his phone, it was already 7 pm and so after rubbing his eyes, he picked up his book, left the library and returned to the dorm. (I''m hungry, good thing I have some snacks in my bag. I''ll eat them in my room and review what I''ve read thus far.) Nick got to the dorm and took the elevator located in the lobby to the forth floor because his room, numbered 32, had to be there. When he got onto the fourth floor he could see a room door at the side further in front of him with the number 32, so he started walking towards it. When he got to room 31, however, he realized that the door was open and took a glance towards it. To his surprise, he saw a man that looked his age pinning a woman against a wall in the walkway to the living area from behind. He had her skirt elevated with his crotch against her bottom. Her face looked flushed as it was turned facing the door but she failed to notice Nick and she was clearly sounding a muffled moan that was just barely audible with her hand over her mouth. The man seemed to notice Nick and turned his head to face him. They looked each other squarely in the eye for a moment, the man smiled and turned his attention back to the girl. Nick walked briskly to his room next door, entered and closed it. He stood with his back against the door for five minutes staring blankly at the ceiling. When he snapped out of his stupor, he threw his bags onto his bed and focused on his new book. "This place sure does have some strange people, first a guy that kills two young men without saying a word, now a sex fiend...I should just focus on my studies." Nick got a little notebook and pen from his bag and placed them on a desk beside his bed. He sat down and started making notes. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 7: The Rules Nick felt excited about the information he had received from reading just some of the introductory book. He started writing in his note book in order to sort and condense what he had learnt. (The book had some of what I already knew. Magic is an energy that exists all around us that requires special methods to be manipulated. The very nature of this energy is conversion and manipulation, that is, magic can be converted into other energies or matter and can be used to manipulate natural laws to create specific phenomena.) (Laws are mystical languages that can be used to manipulate magic and it is expressly written that laws and magic are not the same but somehow are both required for Magicians to cast ''spells'' and do other supernatural things. Laws by their nature work just like instructions, the same as a programmer would give to a computer for it to perform something. These instructions somehow command the magic energy within them or around them to perform things according to the will of the Magician. These laws can be, lets say carved, into physical objects or based on the nature of the instructions, they can be ''carved'' into reality causing changes that are in conflict with natural laws or enhance natural laws.) (The book had some interesting examples that I''ve never heard about. It stated that commonly, Magicians are identified by the characteristics that their magic seem to take on. For example, Magicians who use laws related to heat and fire have magic spells and methods that are mostly related to fire manipulation and they are called Fire Magicians; there are also Magicians that have laws that result in their magic creating illusions such as an image of a target''s home, a useful way of using this being to have the target believe that they are walking into their home but are actually entering a trap - the book says that these types of Magicians are the most troublesome.) (It goes on to say that most Magicians simply learn someone else''s laws and use the same kind magic as them. It says that the people who actually create original laws are usually masters in a certain scientific or artistic field that use their knowledge to create the laws that their magic responds to. The book also says that a novice should not try to create their own laws because this often leads to a backlash that can vary in terms of characteristics and can be fatal; it gave an example of a Magician that tried to create a spell for manipulating the space around him but the spell didn''t work as expected and actually collapsed the space around him, resulting in the creation of something that seemed like a ''black hole'' that sucked everything into a central point, everything in the vicinity was crushed including the Magician.) (The book says that there are even Magicians that embed laws into machines so that they obtain extraordinary characteristics such as machines that can duplicate their components endlessly or machines that can move at the speed of light without damaging their components. These Magicians are commonly but incorrectly called mechanics. There are even persons that carve laws or have laws carved into their body to enhance their physical characteristics.) That was all that Nick was able to read today. Nick thought back to the last world assembly where director Sylvester of the Order of the Unite Realm made almost the whole world shine with blue light, the light even moved through walls to reach people. "I''m definitely going to be a great Magician, I just have to focus on the right things. Trouble is...I don''t know what the right things are, it looks like I''m going to be doing a whole lot more reading going forward." Nick decided that he should get some rest before reading the rule book that he got from the school. He first did his usual reps of pushups, showered in his dorm room''s bathroom and went to bed at 11 pm. RIIIIIIINNNNNNNGGGGG!!!! At the sound of his phone''s alarm, Nick slowly got up from bed. It was 3 am, Nick''s usual wake up time. Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.(I don''t have to rake leaves anymore, huh. I guess that''s also some progress.) Nick washed his face in the bathroom, picked up the book that he had found on his desk when he came into the room last night that had the title: "Richter Order Academy Student Handbook" on its cover. Nick opened the book to the first page that had the title: "Seven Absolute Rules of the Academy". The page listed seven rules that it claimed were absolute in the sense that the academy won''t tolerate them being broken no matter what the circumstance. They are: 1. Students and faculty may not openly injure each other unless specifically allowed to by the academy''s administration. 2. Students may not leave the academy grounds unless given permission by the academy''s administration. 3. Students and faculty must not share learning and instructional materials with the outside world. That includes information found in the library''s books or laws that can be purchased from the academy. 4. Students are not allowed to conspire against the academy or its faculty. 5. Students are not allowed to use their magic on the academy''s property that has been placed for public use unless told by an administrator to do so. 6. Persons that are not students or faculty of the academy must not be brought onto the academy grounds unless permission is expressly given by the academy''s administration. 7. Students must participate in mandatory exams and special events unless a proper reason approved by the administration is given. The handbook goes on to state that breaking these seven rules will and must be punished and the punishment will either be expulsion or death and can be carried out on the spot by personnel from the enforcement office or via a trial done by the administration. (So that''s why Ray Menzes was able to kill those two guys yesterday in public. The enforcement office is probably filled with dangerous people.) The rest of the book listed other miscellaneous rules and the consequences for breaking them. Nick was done reading it by 5 am so he did some pushups, showered and then left to get something to eat at the dormitory''s cafeteria. When he left his room, so did his neighbor from room 31. He looked at Nick and said: "Greetings neighbor, hope you enjoyed the scene last night. I got special permission for one of my family''s maids to be here on the first day to help me get settled and I guess I got a little excited. Ha, ha, ha. Don''t worry, I''ll be more careful to close the door next time, wouldn''t want to ruin my rep this early. Oh, by the way, my name is Don Bartholomew; remember it because I plan to be the best in our year. I''ll be seeing you around." Don monologued and then left with his head held high. (Is that guy an idiot? Who fucks their maid with the door wide open. He didn''t even ask for my name, not that that matters anyway. ) Nick shook his head and left for the cafeteria. When he arrived at he cafeteria, it was almost 7 am and there were many people already getting their food. Some sat at the tables to eat and some left after getting their food. Nick waited in line for about 10 minutes and when he got to the front, he presented his ID card, the clerk did something with his computer and took Nick''s order. Since Nick was at the academy on scholarship, all his meals were free within a certain threshold of cost. Nick had ordered two simple egg sandwiches. He left the cafeteria to go back to his room so that he could continue reading the book on laws and magic, he still had the math texts on his laptop to read also so he didn''t want to waste his time since class started in less than a week. Nick got to his room, locked the door and ate at is desk. When he was done eating, he started reading again. The page was titled: "Becoming an Apprentice Magician". "Ha, Ha. I''ve gotten to the good part!" With some excitement, Nick dived into his reading for the next few hours. To him, there was nothing more pleasurable that making progress on his goals and his personal growth. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 8: A List When Nick finished reading the book, it was already 6:30 pm. In summary, the book stated that to become a Apprentice Magician, one had to use a meditation technique in order to form something called a ''mindscape'' where a person''s affinity with magic would be nurtured. To be able to manipulate magic, however, the Apprentice Magician had to inscribe certain laws within their mindscape that would process raw magic energy, making it their own. Nick got to thinking. (The mindscape, on the face of it seems to be similar to a world, existing in someone''s mind or something similar. The book says that after the laws are carved into the mindscape, magic will be attracted to the mindscape and processed in a way that gives that person''s magical powers certain characteristics. The level of development of the mindscape apparently determines what ''rank'' that person is as a Magician.) (There are in total, ten ranks within the system used by most Magicians. Magicians within ranks 1-4 are considered Apprentice Magicians, within ranks 5-7 are considered Regular Magicians and within ranks 8-10 are considered World Class Magicians. The book goes on to say that as a Magician''s rank increases, the difference in magical power between them and the lower ranks will become increasingly significant; it also says that each rank beyond Apprentice Magician has its own name besides the general classification but those names are not listed.) (In regards to the mindscape, the book says that in the distant past many persons became Apprentice Magicians by interacting with certain magical phenomena for a period of time and the laws associated with those phenomena would form their mindscapes but in today''s age, persons can take the initiative to form their mindscapes through some kind of meditation. This meditation is usually encoded in a language known as Valteese but other mystical languages can be used as well.) (The book says that a person can carve laws that are identical to an existing set into their mindscapes in order to have a predictable path of development and this is what most families with Magician ancestors do or a person can carve laws unique to themselves using Valteese or another mystical language into their mindscapes to create unique magical characteristics and powers. The former is the common and easier path because there is a predefined route up to a certain rank and since these laws have been around for a while, all the related spells and skills are encoded in Valteese which is the common language for all laws which makes it easier to modify said spells and skills according to ones own taste; the downside however is that a person''s advancement slows drastically once he gets to the highest point that those laws have been developed to, because of the knowledge and understanding of a certain area of magic that would be required to further develop those laws which you will need to have in order to progress beyond the limitations of your ancestors. The route of creating a set of your own laws using Valteese is the more difficult route but doing this at the start will give you a significant advantage at the higher ranks; apparently some of the strongest mages in the world have taken this route. The book pretty much ended after getting to that point so I don''t even know what Valteese looks like or how to actually begin the meditation to become an Apprentice Magician.) Nick got up from his desk and rubbed his eyes. He went to the bathroom to take a shower and when he was finished he left his room to go to the dorm''s cafeteria. On the way, he was immersed in his thoughts. (Tomorrow, I should return that book to the library and pick up a book on Valteese. I could probably get a book on meditation but from what I''ve already read, that''s probably useless without knowing Valteese.) (I wonder...should I go the common route of using an available meditation and set of laws to form and develop my mindscape, respectively or do I create my own laws using Valteese or some other mystical language as the foundation? I guess the answer to that question will become clearer the more I learn. I should just work on my base knowledge for now. I think I heard it said before that knowledge was the basis for action...yeah that sounds about right.) This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.While Nick was thinking, he reached the entrance of the cafeteria when suddenly, a young woman bumped into him and fell. "Huh? Are you okay miss?" Nick reached out a hand in order to help the young woman up but she slapped his hand away and got up on her own. "A less than shouldn''t even think of touching me." "A less than?" Nick repeated, confused. He didn''t know why this girl who he had never even met before was insulting him when she was the one who bumped into him. (Aren''t you supposed to say I''m sorry after bumping into someone? I''ve met rude girls before but this is on another level.) Nick was pissed off for sure and ended up taking a closer look at the woman. (Hold on, isn''t this the woman that that Don Bartholomew guy had pinned up against the wall the other night.) Nick felt so awkward that he forgot what he was going to say and so he said nothing for all of five seconds, creating an awkward silence between the two. The girl scrunched her face, thinking that Nick was a retard and was about to say something when a voice called out. "Marcia, why are you wasting your time with that guy. Lets hurry and meet up with Don so that we can talk about the upcoming school year." A tall woman with long bluish hair shouted at the woman in front of Nick who was apparently named Marcia. "Hmph" With a sound, Marcia squinted her eyes at Nick and ran over to a group of girls, about six of them. All of them being very pretty, not that Nick cared much about that. Nick stood there looking in their general direction, not really understanding what all the rudeness was about. "Do you want to know why she called you a less than?" Nick turned around in response to the question to face a young man that seemed to be around the same age as him. This young man was white and had an athletic build with short, silverish hair; he also had a sharp look in his eye. "Sure, I''m a little confused. My name is Nick Capitol by the way." "Ha, ha. I already know your name. My name is Marcus Delvey of the Delvey family. We are a family with a long history of Magicians in our bloodline. Never mind that, that girl called you a less than because she knows that you are not affiliated with a family of Magicians. You see, after registration is completed, all the families with some influence would find a way to get a list of the new students attending the academy. This is usually for reasons such as recruiting any talents they can find later on. They usually pass on this list to their family members and servants that are attending the academy in order to help them in building relationships with seemingly worthwhile individuals. I also got a list, and your background information and photo was on it. The information pretty much said that you had no background other than that you got the highest grades in your last high school year. That doesn''t mean much around here and especially to the women as most of them study the list in order to attach themselves to promising Magicians in training. Studying laws and magic is a hard and dangerous path and most people here don''t waste time acting nice with someone they think can''t help them." Nick was startled by the information that Marcus conveyed. "You mean to say that there are people who''ve actually done a background check on me and are discriminating against me just like that. Damn, and here I thought that things would be great after coming to this academy." "Ha, ha, your troubles are only just beginning, these people operate like hyenas, they bite anything that doesn''t walk, talk or shit like them. Good luck and no need to thank me for the info, I just hate seeing those bitches act like they own the place. See you." After replying to Nick, Marcus went past him and went into the cafeteria. Nick thought about his circumstances and internally affirmed some of his beliefs: (I don''t care what anyone else does, as long as they don''t touch me or my benefits, I won''t even bother to spit in their direction. Other''s contempt didn''t matter to me in high school and it doesn''t matter to me now. I just have to keep moving forward.) Nick also entered the cafeteria. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 9: Lets Begin! Nick got a meal of fried chicken, rice, gravy and vegetables and left the cafeteria. The cafeteria was on the eighth floor so he took the elevator back to the fourth floor; the dorm had 9 floors in all including the ground floor. On the way to his room he ran into Don Bartholomew as he was leaving his own room. "What a good evening, isn''t it Nick? Good enough to go out to taste some delicacies, am I right?" Nick really didn''t like how Don just said that, after all, he knew he was probably going to meetup with those girls from before. "I''m not going to bother asking how it is that you know my name since apparently you rich people have the free time to run background checks on students. Let me ask you this though, didn''t you say that the girl you were with the other night was your maid, why is she now a student?" Don chuckled. "Ha, you''re talking about Marcia. Well...not that it''s any of your business but she is still my family''s maid but since I had such a good time with her the other night, I had my people call in some favors to get her last minute admittance to the academy. Why else do you think that she would let me do what I did to her, because I''m so nice? Anyway, it looks like you ran into her. My best advice bro, keep away from girls like that unless you have some ''protection''. Who knows what they''ll do for a favor. See you later...or not." Nick shrugged his shoulders. "Ha, Ha..." Don let out a laugh and walked past Nick, going into the elevator. "What a weird guy." When Nick got into his room, he took about fifteen minutes to eat his dinner and then he took out his laptop to read one of his math textbooks. (Although a laws and magic academy isn''t like university in regards to what they teach, I still believe that mathematics could be useful in terms of understanding magic because, as they say, math is the language of God. Scientists use math to understand physical laws and from what I''ve read, since laws and magic is used to alter or enhance those laws, it will probably be useful if I can understand physical laws too.) Nick spent the next four hours reading about the theory of numbers and a little about probabilities and statistics. Despite the tedium, Nick thought that his life was a little better and more interesting than before. Nick stopped reading at about 12:30 am and went to bed. RIIIIIINNNGGGG!! Just like that, it was 3 am when Nick''s phone alarm sounded. In the past, Nick promised himself that no matter what, he would always get an early start in the day unless he was sick, so he ended up getting only a little over two hours of sleep. "To be the best, you''ve got to work over time. Ha..." Nick said that and chuckled. Nick got up, drank some water and did his usual reps of pushups. He liked the feeling of exercise but kept it to a minimum so that it would not get in the way of his studying or force him to increase his food intake and budget. "I wonder if I''ll ever be ripped like those guys in the movies...ha, ha." Nick looked at his slim but slightly muscular and toned arms and chuckled. He took a shower and then proceeded to eat some snacks that he had in his bag. (I should probably buy more of these for late night and early morning study sessions.) Putting that thought to the back of his mind, Nick turned on his laptop and started studying some math concepts. He liked geometry the most because to him it was the most intuitive math discipline. He didn''t know what good derivatives or functions could do for him but anyone could understand the importance of lines, points and object dimensions. Anyway, Nick didn''t mind studying these things, having only a slim hope that they would be useful. For him it was all about increasing his future prospects and to do that, a wealth of knowledge about something useful couldn''t hurt, right? Nick had already done about three hours worth of studying by the time 8 am came around and so he turned off his laptop and headed out to the academy''s library. Nick walked past the two weird looking statues at the door and entered the library to see the librarian at his desk reading a book. (A typical librarian, huh?) Nick took out the book on laws and magic from his backpack and walked over to the librarian''s desk and said: "Good morning Sir. I''m returning the book that I last borrowed." Nick placed the book on the desk and the librarian took a few seconds to look it over and nodded his head. "Assuming that you actually read the book, you took only two days. When most first years borrow a book, they keep it for a couple of months before returning it, saying that they couldn''t finish it because it was boring. Although a lot of students here come from well to do families, many of them are lazy and only end up becoming Magicians because of their family''s help and resources. You seem to be different...keep up the good work. Now, are you interested in another book?" Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.Nick was pleased at hearing some words of encouragement, they were rare for him. "Could you please give me the best book you have on the Valteese language? Also, why did you assume that I already read the book, I could just be returning it because I found it boring and wanted another book?" "Kid, most people don''t get it but when a man finishes reading a book, that''s an accomplishment that may forever change his life and even if subconsciously, there is a little more pride in his steps as he walks forward from then on. The way you''re walking changed a little, that''s how I could tell." Nick didn''t know any of that. He had a feeling that he should take that information with a pinch of salt though. "The Valteese language? Kid, do you know how very few students try to study it on their own? It took you such a short amount of time to take the initiative to try to learn it. Decisiveness is a good thing for a Magician in training." The librarian waved his hand and a slightly thick book appeared out of thin air. It had a leather cover and smelt burnt but clearly it wasn''t. "This is an introductory book on the Valteese language and it has around 1500 pages. You better be serious about reading it or you won''t get very far." Nick nodded his head. "Thank you sir, I''ll try my best." With that, Nick left the library with the ''new'' book in his backpack. Nick could feel the librarian''s support of his actions with the fact that he brought out only one book instead of just piling multiple on the table and telling him to pick one like the last time. Of course it could be that this is the only book on Valteese that they have, but Nick thinks that is probably very unlikely. Nick made his way to his dorm''s cafeteria to get some breakfast, making sure not to bump into someone else again. After getting two egg sandwiches and an orange juice, Nick went back to his room. He got excited and took out his next book and started reading it and did not stop until about 6:30 pm when he went to the cafeteria again for some food. When he came back, he turned on his laptop to read one of the math texts. After reading for a few hours, at around 11 pm, he decided to go to sleep so that he could wake up early tomorrow to start his grind all over again. Nick then spent the next few days following a routine of doing pushups, eating, showering and reading books. That is literally all that he did for almost an entire week. He didn''t even bother trying to speak with the other students because he thought that that would be a waste of his time. Just like that, it was the Monday morning when classes would officially begin. Nick woke up at 3 am like usual, did his pushups, read his book on Valteese for about two hours and then he showered and got ready for class. He came to the academy with very little so all he had to wear was a couple of jeans and a few polo shirts. Others might say that he was poor, and they would be right, but Nick had hope that the future would be better than it was now. By the time Nick got to the Main building for first year classes, it was already 8:30 am. He took out his phone to look up his schedule. He had chosen his courses two nights before; he had classes every day but they would be only a few hours and he had to decide how he would spend the rest of his time. (I can''t help thinking that that is the right set up. if students'' days were really filled with formal classes, when would they have time to actually learn how to control magic? I think I read once that the purpose of knowledge was not information, it was action. We should spend most of our time actually practicing creating laws and trying to control our magic.) (And I do mean ''our'' magic. From what I''ve read from my book on Valteese, when you carve laws into your mindscape the magic energy that they posses are so imbued with characteristics that are related to whatever laws that you have, that the energy basically becomes available only for your use. For example, if someone created a spell that could steal your magic energy, that energy would be useless to them unless they figured out how to convert your magic energy into their own which apparently is very difficult and generally can only be done by World Class Magicians.) "Laws and magic are so cool." Nick got the directions for his introductory class from his academic schedule and reached his class after a few minutes. When he opened the door he saw a room full of people, varying in age, some seemed to be about his age while some seemed to be middle aged. The room was like a university lecture theater and there was about 30 plus people already inside. Nick looked around and took a seat at the end of the third row from the front of the lecture theater. At 9 am, a tall, black, middle aged man in an all white suite walked in and shouted: "Let''s begin!" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 10: First Laws "My name is Ron Gordon and I will be lecturing in this introductory class on laws and magic. Do not interrupt me when I am speaking. When you have a question, silently raise your hand and I will get to you shortly." Nick thought that this man seemed to be kind of stern but a little amusing, wearing an all white suit, almost looking like the guy who founded Kentucky Fried Chicken, Colonel Sanders. "Alright, let''s get down to brass tax. I will be lecturing under the assumption that you know very little about laws and magic for the benefit of those who were not born to affluent and/or influential families. Laws and magic are often spoken about together but they are two very different things. Magic is the energy that is all around us that is used to create supernatural phenomena while laws are in essence the instructions that are used to manipulate magic giving it characteristics and effects that suit the Magician''s will...." Ron Gordon went on to lecture on most of what Nick already knew from reading the introductory book from the library. That''s the clear advantage of reading books, you are never ignorant while in the presence of professionals. The lecture was mostly focused on definitions and basic information that someone looking to be a Magician should know. The lecture went on for forty minutes before Ron said something that really caught Nick''s attention. "Most of you would have never used magic before and have not formed your mindscape for various reasons, one being that creating the mindscape too early and without sufficient information can lead to never being able to use magic due to ''accidents'' that lead to the corruption and destruction of your mindscape. Now, the school provides a general guide for meditation that will help you to form your mindscape." Ron waved his hand and a small book appeared in front of all the students, titled: General Meditation Technique. "This meditation technique is pretty much all you need to form a basic mindscape and it would be very helpful if you knew what the Valteese involved in the meditation meant but that is not strictly required, however, please note that the mindscape is the foundation of a Magician and this meditation technique will only help you form a basic one, meaning that at least until your knowledge of laws and magic increases you will probably be average among your peers regarding your ability to process and use magic energy, after all, one size fits all is never the most efficient or effective concept. As for the laws that are required to activate the mindscape''s ability to process magical energy, you can get those from your families or from the academy''s magical archives office. Take another note, whatever laws you carve into your mindscape will affect your future development so choose carefully. Of course you do not have to use non-original laws and can develop your own set of laws but that is usually very difficult for persons of your age and skill level but it does happen. I know some of you will be eager to form and develop your mindscape because that is the most common of the few ways that you can start using magic to cast spells and do other ''magical'' things but you have to be careful in terms of your own development and you should not rush into things without knowledge of the matter at hand. You have the benefit of being in an age of information and now that you are at the academy, that information is mostly unrestricted and plentiful." Nick raised his arm to indicate that he wanted to ask a question and he waited a whole minute before Don temporarily stopped his lecture to allow Nick to speak. "You mentioned that the meditation method you gave us only creates a basic mindscape. Do mindscapes have something like ranks and if so how do we increase the quality of the mindscape we form?" Ron smiled. "A very good question. Yes, mindscapes do have something akin to ranks, they can be graded as basic, divergent and special; the grade of mindscape you have directly determines the quality and power of the magic you can use, basic being the worst and special generally being the best. Basic mindscapes take the shape of a predictable template and most Magicians start out with this kind of mindscape because it is the easiest and least dangerous to form and after all, you can always increase the quality of your mindscape later on, it''s just a little difficult. Divergent mindscapes aren''t much different from basic ones in form but allows one to process significant more amounts of magic within a certain period of time and at better quality; the spells that someone with a divergent mindscape casts tend to be about 20% more effective than someone with a basic mindscape because of possible characteristics bestowed on their magic by their mindscape. Special mindscapes are different in form and power than the other two, these mindscapes take on a life of their own that resemble the will and character of the user. They also better accommodate the Magician in carving their original laws into them because they have a greater affinity to the Magician''s own creations. In terms of power, now that is the interesting part, because special mindscpaes vary so much, it is hard to say whether they offer greater power than either of the other two, but one thing is for sure, special grade mindscapes give the Magician''s magic power characteristics unique to the Magician and that are usually far more bizarre than characteristics bestowed by a divergent grade mindscape. These Magicians are very difficult to deal with in battle and other areas related to magic because they tend to be unpredictable. However, special grade mindscapes are relatively rare on Grand Earth...I think there are only about thirty three people with this grade of mindscape in England at this time...well, that are recorded anyhow." This story has been taken without authorization. Report any sightings.Nick nodded his head and Ron continued his lecture. "...Alright, if none of you were aware, the first two years of your life at Richter Order Academy will just involve getting your feet wet. When you get to your third year, that is when you will be pushed to do all sorts of magic related activities, missions and advanced research so for now, learn as much as you can and build your foundation for the days to come." With that, the introductory class on laws and magic came to an end. Nick looked at his phone and saw that it was 12 pm; he had no more classes for the rest of the day so he decided to go to the magical archives office to find out what laws he could obtain. Nick spent twenty minutes trying to find the magical archives office. When he arrived at its glass doors he was awe struck. The building is probably 30 storeys high but you can only see that clearly after getting within a few feet of it, its glass walls radiate some kind of weird yellow light and there is constantly swirling smoke going around the higher floors. Nick walked in and beyond the glass doors was a clean and beautiful reception hall. The walls were filled with antique paintings and there were statues made of various materials scattered throughout the area. There was a woman sitting behind a desk that was positioned in front of a tall wooden double-door; she smiled while looking at a set of documents on her desk. Nick walked up to her desk. "Hello miss, I am a first year student and I would like to obtain a set of laws to carve into my mindscape." The woman looked away from her documents to face Nick and replied: "Oh well, if you''re referring to foundation laws that are used to process magic energy, then those are easy to find. Please hand me your ID." Nick handed her his student ID and she appeared to do some checks on her computer that was at the corner of her desk. She looked at its holographic screen for about a minute before facing Nick again. "Since you are on scholarship, one of the sets of laws will be provided to you for free if you so desire. There are three varieties of laws but only one imbues your magic with a special characteristic. Please take a look." A holographic screen appeared in front of Nick with the information on three sets of laws. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Jacob''s Laws: This is a rudimentary set of laws created by one of the founders of Richter Order Academy. When carved into a person''s mindscape, they will allow that person to process magic energy at 100 magical units per second until the mindscape is saturated. Laws of Syracuse: These are elementary laws found in a tomb in Syracuse thousands of years ago. Although they only generate magical units at 40 magical units per second, they are easily modifiable for someone who is fluent in Valteese. Modification may result in special characteristics being imbued into these laws. Falcone Family Laws: Members of the Falcone family were convicted of treason by the Supreme Court of England and had to relinquish their various laws. This is a set of laws taught to their Magicians in training to prepare them for their future. These laws generate magical units at 70 magical units per second. Magic processed by these laws have a chance of causing sudden internal bleeding when used for offensive spells that come into contact with a living target. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Nick read the descriptions and gave a low shout: "Hand me a set of the Laws of Syracuse!" When Nick saw its description, he knew that he had to have it. Why? (There is no way in hell I''m going to carve some dog shit laws within my mindscape if there is a chance to modify these laws into something special. I''m going to try for a special grade mindscape as well by developing my own meditation and create a special set of laws to match by modifying the Laws of Syracuse. Ron Gordon said that it is unlikely that someone at my skill level could create original laws but it does happen. Unlikely simply means that is difficult but I know that as long as I put in the work, it''s entirely possible) (What? You say that failure is likely. So what? For the first time in my life I''m surrounded by an endless amount of information on laws and magic, why would I settle for being average. From my perspective, the only failure is not trying to create something special, be something special.) The woman smiled and went through the double doors behind her desk. When she came out, she had a booklet with her. "Although this booklet seems fragile, it has some serious information in it. There are special laws imbued within it and if you purposefully share it with any other person, we will know and at the very least you will be expelled, at worst you will be executed. Even if you do not share the booklet, sharing the information contained within to people who are not apart of Richter Order academy carries the same punishment. As soon as you touch the booklet, these rules will apply." She opened the booklet in front of Nick but he saw nothing, not one word. Nick took hold of the booklet and after a second the words appeared but they were all in Valteese. Nick started learning Valteese only a week ago so it was barely readable. (Well...it''s a start.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 11: Magical Combat Nick hurried to his dorm room and got there at about 2 pm. He opened his new booklet with the Laws of Syracuse and took a close look at it. He was right before about it being barely readable. Valteese looks like a variation of Asian symbols but different somehow. He could make out a few of the symbols but as a whole it seemed like gibberish. (More like rubbish...) (Anyway, now that I have a book of laws that is supposed to be modifiable, I have to focus my efforts on learning Valteese. After I finish reading the book on Valteese, I should get a book on mindscapes to see how I would be able to alter the meditation technique that I got from the school.) Nick looked at the meditation technique as well and the process looked simple enough. It only stated that one needed to study the words of the meditation which were all in Valteese and chant them while sitting quietly, taking deep breaths, and focusing on one''s mind. The problem was...the words of the meditation also seemed like gibberish except that they were represented in English letters as opposed to Valteesian letters. (Since the mindscape was so important, who in their right minds would chant these words without knowing what they mean? Well, most of the people in my year are around my age and should probably be really excited to learn magic...still, I''m not going to use this meditation technique as it is, I''m going to try to change it to suit my needs or rather my wants.) When Nick thought about all the work that was ahead of him, a vein became visible on his forehead. (I have to do this in small steps, first things first, I have to thoroughly learn Valteese.) With that thought, Nick took out the book on Valteese and started reading. When it became 6:30 pm he went to the cafeteria for food and returned to his dorm room where he read one of his math texts for 3 hours. When it was about 10 pm, he went to bed. On Tuesday morning Nick got up at 3 am, did his pushups and read his book on Valteese until 7 am, at which point he showered, got dressed, had a meal at the cafeteria and made his way to his next class. (Today is combat simulation. The teacher will show us magic used in a combat scenario. Some of the students might even get to show off their own magic.) On his way to the combat field where the class would be held, he actually saw some of his classmates hovering to class instead of walking. "Some people can''t help but show off their newly awakened powers." Nick turned his head to see a woman around his age walking beside him. "Oh, was I thinking out loud again. My name is Cindy Reece and I think we are going to the same place. The people you see hovering probably just formed their mindscape, carved out their foundation laws, learnt a little spell and Bob''s your uncle, they''re using their magic." Nick didn''t know this woman but didn''t mind having a conversation. "How do you know that they just formed their mindscape. They could have learnt that spell a long time ago and are just using it today?" "Are you a pleb? Oh, sorry that was rude. Well...to answer your question, most families with Magicians usually forbid their relatives from forming their mindscape until they are within a magic academy or at least until they are a certain age. This is a practice supported by the government and other humanitarian groups so as not to harm children in their formative years so most persons would be without a meditation technique to form their mindscape until the academy gives them one, after all, if they wanted to improve their mindscape they could have their family send them a better meditation technique after they have gotten used to the feeling of controlling magic. Anyway, the meditation technique that the school gave us has a flaw, that is, magic processed within the basic mindscape that it produces gives off a certain feeling that is commonly known. As for the hover spell, you can easily recognize that it is the one from the academy''s magical archives office because there is also a certain sensation that it gives off that''s unmistakable. I even saw plenty of my classmates buying the spell when I visited the magical archives office yesterday." Nick was confused. "Why would the academy''s techniques and spells be so easily identifiable? Also, what exactly is this sensation that they give off, how comes you are able to feel it but I cannot?" "You really are a pleb, the academy purposely puts those flaws in their techniques and spells and meditations to either force its students to improve them or find or create their own. Students can even get meditation techniques from one of the independently run stores on campus. At least that''s just how it is until we are third years, then the academy makes available spells and meditations without flaws because at that point we would probably be faced with life or death battles which would get very sticky if the opposing side knew what our tricks were so easily; to be honest, although there are independently run stores on campus that sell meditations and spells, they sell them at a huge premium with limited variety and also, those spells and meditation usually have limited potential for improvement. As for how I feel the sensation...." Cindy shrugged her shoulders and said: "I''ve already formed my mindscape but not with the academy''s technique. When your mindscape is able to process magic, you will also have an increased sensitivity to the magical disturbances around you." Nick pondered for a moment then asked: "Why is it that the independent stores sell meditations and spells so unappealingly?" Cindy wasn''t surprised that Nick asked that question. "That''s because of pressures from the government and the academy. Most of the established high level Magicians don''t want top quality goods to be easily available to the public so they force independent merchants to sell meditations and spells at unattractive terms. Despite this, those stores usually gain large amounts of revenue because of the scarcity of the product and all that." Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.Nick looked at Cindy seriously and squinted his eyes. "Is it fine for you to be telling me all these things?" Nick didn''t know why but he felt suspicious about this woman''s ramblings, they were helpful...too helpful. Cindy shrugged her shoulders. "Just making polite conversation old chap and its fine if I tell you about my mindscape. Probably most people you meet have already formed one, either due to preparation or excitement. Don''t be so stiff" She proceeded to pat Nick on the back thrice. Nick jumped away from her, staring at her almost menacingly. "Don''t ever touch me." Cindy looked visibly surprised. "A little sensitive, are we? Fine, I''ll be more mindful next time." Nick loosened up and said: "As long as you understand. Anyway, thank you for the information." "No problem mister sensitive. See you in class." With that, Cindy also started hovering her way to class. Nick reacted before to Cindy patting his back because he honestly didn''t like when people touched him and he didn''t like touching other people. (Old wounds I guess.) The combat field was actually just a slightly large gymnasium with fortified walls and a retractable roof. It was certainly spacious inside as 30 plus students stood there with what seemed like a national soccer field in front of them. A tall, burly man stood before the students staring down at them. "My name is Thompson Varrow and I will be your combat instructor, you are to refer to me as Mr. Varrow at all times or else you and I will have problems." Varrow said that with an expressionless but impactful face. "For today''s class, I will be showing you combat spells, so watch carefully. This one is called ''Earth Uprising''" Varrow proceeded to lower himself quickly and punch the ground. A slab of stone fifteen feet away then violently rose up out of the ground into the sky. If someone was standing there, they definitely would have probably been broken apart by the velocity and hardness of the impact. "You will notice that during the entire process you saw no laws being written to produce the effect you just saw but laws are necessary in order to cast spells, the spells themselves consist of laws. The more complex a spell, the more laws it contains. Can someone tell me how I cast a spell without visibly carving laws." A middle aged man in a tan jacket with a shaved ahead stood up and answered: "Mr. Varrow, that''s because you formed the laws temporarily in your mindscape, combined them into a coherent spell and projected them in an instant when you punched the ground ." CLAP! CLAP! Varrow gave a couple of loud claps and replied: "Yes, that''s correct. That is how most combat spells and even other spells work. No one would stand and watch you carve out your laws in the air or on the ground for them to take effect, so most spell casting is done by forming the laws within your mindscape and projecting them out onto reality within an instant. Normally you would only see people creating magic circles and inscriptions before casting spells in video games and TV shows or if the spell''s effects affected a large area, after all for those of us with unique laws if you have an especially astute opponent, showing him your laws might just give him the chance to copy or break them like how if a programmer showed a hacker their code, the hacker would have no problem breaking their program..." Varrow lectured for about 30 minutes on battle tactics before using another spell. This one was a fire related spell that he used to inflame a grass puppet 20 feet away from us. It was spectacular in its own right. Near the end of class, Varrow shouted: "Is there anyone that wants to try out one of their combat spells on this old man. I know that most of you are in some way new to magic. Don''t be shy." Varow smiled. It was the first time that Thompson Varrow had shown a smile since class began. Nick stood at the back observing the seen, guessing about what was to happen. "I will challenge you!" The same middle aged man from before stood up and literally jumped towards the field to stand in front of Varrow. That jump was clearly done using magic. "Wow...you got some skills, whats your name?" Varrow asked with a sarcastic tone. "Jean Raymond, Mr. Varrow" "Okay Jean, these are the rules: cast any spell that you want, If one of them hits me, you win. I won''t use any defensive spells through out the match. Begin!" With that Varrow took a few small steps forward. Jean then took ten steps back and clasped his hands, his eyes shone a little and a figure of light seemed to manifest right in front of him. This figure was ten feet tall, almost looked like Jean and was shining with a crimson light. Even Nick who had not formed his mindscape could feel the magic energy that the figure was radiating. Varrow stopped walking forward and squinted his eyes. "You seem to have more than just ''some'' skills. Please proceed." Varrow said with a playful smile. Jean look visibly strained while maintaining his spell but persevered. He shouted: "You lose." The figure of light in front of Jean opened its mouth and shot out a crimson ray of light towards Varrow. The air around us seemed to visibly heat up. Nick thought: (With such a short distance between them there is no way that Varrow can dodge this. Considering the rules of the match, is he really going to lose?) Just before the crimson light reached Varrow, however, Varrow ever so slightly flicked his wrist towards the figure of light and its attack. The attack and the figure of light then shattered like they were made of glass. In the next millisecond, Varrow disappeared and reappeared right in front of Jean; without giving Jean time to react, Varrow reached out his hand, grabbed Jean by the head and slammed his face into the ground. Varrow said slowly but loudly: "You lose." The match ended in eighteen seconds. Everyone including Nick stood there with mouth agape. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 12: Meditation While Jean''s face was still pressed into the ground Ron Varrow looked up at everyone else and said: "This is usually what happens in combat when there is too big a difference in, first, rank - I''m a Regular Magician and an Apprentice Magician simply can''t defend themselves because of the sheer difference in our magical power, second, skill - in front of my eyes his magic spell was so basic and worthless that I ''broke'' it by simply improvising a spell that would disrupt his spell''s laws and therefore his spell shattered like glass. Look, I haven''t even hit his body with a spell and he''s bleeding from his orifices, see the blood coming from his ear. That''s the backlash that happens when someone forcefully breaks your spell. Of course it helped that I knew the spell he was using. Listen up, I know some of you are up in age and might know a thing or two about magic but unless you work harder, increase your rank and make your magic and spells truly your own, you will likely be defeated everywhere you go." With that said, Varrow got up from is low position and also raised Jean up. He tapped Jean on the forehead and all his injuries and the blood coming from his eyes, mouth and ears disappeared. Varrow who almost seemed to be in his late twenties patted middle aged Jean on his shoulders and said with a stern face: "Work hard." It was a comical sight to say the least. Nick finally saw magical combat and it was everything he hoped it would be. (Hair raising and spectacular. Not the most objective description but it''s good enough.) (One day, I''ll make even better spells than the one Jean used. I wonder where he got that spell from, maybe he''s from a Magician''s family, then again, Varrow said that he knew the spell, maybe its one of the academy''s) Varrow looked at his students expressions and after feeling satisfied that they felt the weight of his lesson, he announced: "That will be the end of class for today. Remember, almost all Magicians will be faced with a combat situation in their lifetime. Being some what proficient in combat spells may just save your life someday, think about it" With that Varrow ended class and he disappeared from where he was standing like he was never there. Nick didn''t want to waste any time so he rushed to the magical archives office. He saw the same beautiful woman sitting at her desk in the reception hall and went up to her and asked: "Do you sell a magic spell that creates a crimson figure of light that launches attacks?" The woman looked at Nick, seemingly taking a few seconds to think and replied: "I think you are referring to this spell." A holographic screen with information appeared in front of Nick. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Red Effigy: This is an apprentice grade spell that has characteristics related to both fire and light magic. The spell involves creating a live effigy of the person who cast the spell out of a red light. The effigy is able to launch one laser like attack at a target and then the spell will unravel. This spell consumes 270 magical units per second. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Nick had guessed that Jean had purchased the spell from the academy and he was correct. Varrow''s demonstration might as well have been a warning not to place too much importance in the academy''s apprentice level spells. Nick thought that it could be useful as a reference though. "May I buy this spell?" The woman asked for Nick''s ID and after doing some checks she said: "Your scholarship does not cover the purchase of spells so you will have to pay for it yourself. The cost is ¡ê500,000" Nick was taken a back. That was what some doctors earned in a year, where would he get that much money? The woman saw the distress on Nick''s face and said: "Pardon my bluntness, are you not from an affluent family? Learning magic is costly and that is why the British Government even gives out scholarships, so that everyone has a chance to learn it. If you are unable to afford the spells here, you can always learn the spells that they give you in some of your introductory classes or you can take the initiative to join the spell creation club. Their members tend to have limited access to the spells that they possess. Be aware that generally, anything magic related has a high price tag and most persons who do not come from affluent families either seek out a ''mentor'', becoming someone''s disciple or learn how to create magic related things to sell in order to afford spells and similar magic related items." Nick listened attentively and engraved every word into his mind. "Thank you for the information." Nick thanked the woman and left. (Spell creation club, huh? That seems to be the only option since I''m just a poor boy with no background and I haven''t even formed my mindscape yet, who would take me on as a disciple? Anyway, I''ll look into the club tomorrow. I should get some food and get back to my room for now.) This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.Nick made his way to his dorm, he decided to eat his meal in the cafeteria for a change since it was just midday. He bought a ham and cheese sandwich with orange juice. His meal was uneventful but watching the rest of the room, he saw that cliques were forming, at least within the dorm. He was kind of the odd one out since he was eating alone at his table. Nick didn''t mind though, studying was more important to him than relationships, at least for now. Besides, Nick wasn''t naive, the basis of most relationships was give and take. Nick didn''t have anything to just give and if he wanted something from someone, who knows what they would ask for, that is, in this place. Putting those thoughts aside, Nick finished his meal and went back to his room; today is going to be a good day, if he pushed his math studying aside for today, he could definitely finish his book on Valteese. The time was now 12:43 pm, Nick sat at his desk and studied Valteese until 8 pm. (Although I don''t know it fluently, I should be able to start writing and speaking Valteese. The academy has a book store, I should invest in getting a dictionary on Valteese and I should copy the book I have now before returning it to the library. I should get a book on meditation next.) (Valteese...in order to modify the foundation laws that I plan to carve into my mindscape, I need to be able to encode concepts and ideas into Valteese. These ideas have to be coherent and meaningful for them to become laws. Haaah, this becoming an Apprentice Magician thing is going to take a while for me but at least at this point, it is probably the process of becoming that is the most important, the result of becoming an Apprentice Magician would be worthless without the right foundation.) Thinking back to how easily Ron Varrow defeated Jean in class, Nick new that his thinking was correct. After Nick thought through his next steps, he took an hour to rest before reading one of his math texts for about an hour and then he went to bed at around 10 pm. Nick got up at 3 am like usual, did his pushups, read one of his math texts, showered, ate breakfast at the cafeteria and by the time he was in his next class, the time was 9 am. Today''s class is ''Introduction to the Concept of Meditation'', I should get some good insights. Suddenly a flash of blue light appeared in front of the sitting class of almost sixty students. A woman appeared when the light disappeared; Nick recognized this woman. "Hello, my Name is Rebecca Jones. I''m sure that at least some of you recognize me from the first day you came to the academy. I will be lecturing you on meditation." Rebecca snapped her fingers and the room changed into a scenery like that of a starless sky. We all seemed to be floating with our seats within this sky but Nick could feel his feet touching the ground so all this was probably an illusion. Rebecca continued to speak: "This scenery is infamously called ''empty skies''. This is what your mindscapes look like before you engrave your foundation laws into it, this is also what a mindscape looks like if the Magician somehow loses his foundation laws and becomes crippled, so to speak. The largeness and profoundness of this space will greatly be determined by your meditation technique and since some of you have already used the meditation given by the school, you know what I am talking about. Along with your ability to carve better and better foundation laws into the mindscape, your meditation will determine the level of the power and characteristics given to your magic. Let me show you." Rebecca snapped her fingers again and the space was suddenly lit up with a white light, by the time the light dispersed, the environment changed into one with a black miasma all around, there were what looked like ghosts with indiscernible faces flying around as well. We were all surrounded by a black spiraling fog and it felt slightly suffocating to be here. "This is a rendering of a mindscape that belonged to a dangerous criminal that was caught and executed about a decade ago in Italy. He was called a Death Magician because the nature of his magic stole the life force from whatever it touched and many of his spells made that characteristic apparent. He had once covered an entire city with and dense fog that turned everything living into a shriveled corpse. See how his mindscape gives off a feeling of dread and doom, although this is a special mindscape the idea is similar for all mindscapes. His meditation gave his mindscape this nature and appearance, warping it according to the laws in his meditation, after all, laws are just a way to express our will, desires and beliefs in magical terms. The Death Magician was obsessed with negative energies and the end of life and that is what his mindscape represents and therefore that became the overall characteristic of the magic processed in his mindscape. You should now see the importance of using the right meditation technique, am I right?" After hearing this, Nick looked around focusing on the feeling that he was getting. This feeling was probably generated by Rebecca''s illusion but he still felt enlightened. Nick thought: (Will, desires and beliefs, huh? Interesting.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 13: Mindscapes and Foundation Laws Rebecca snapped her fingers and with a flash of light all around us, the illusion dispersed and we had the view of our classroom again. "Meditation is both simple and difficult. Simple in that, once you have the right meditation technique it is easy enough to use it to develop your mindscape by just focusing and chanting the necessary laws but difficult in that you have to decide what meditation is right for you because if you choose a certain meditation technique but foundation laws that you decide to carve within your mindscape is in any way contradictory to that meditation, the best case scenario is that you will have weak magic energy, the worst case scenario is that you end up with ''empty skies'' because the conflict destroyed your mindscape''s ability to maintain any special form , characteristics and cannot hold magic energy. The mechanism by which this happens is fairly complex so I won''t bother going into it with first years..." Nick thought for a moment on what Rebecca was saying: (So, apparently the laws of your meditation have to somehow be in harmony with your foundation laws. From what I''ve learnt so far from classes and books, the mindscape exists to attract and nurture magic energy, giving it characteristics unique to the Magician. The foundation laws seem to work like a processor for that magic energy; the foundation laws can also give magic energy characteristics but they should not be in conflict with the characteristics bestowed by the mindscape. That begs the question, what is the range of characteristics that the mindscape can give as well as what characteristics can the foundation laws give?) Nick only took a second to process his thought and didn''t waste any time in trying to ask Rebecca for an answer. Nick raised his hand while Rebecca was lecturing and waited for about a minute before she asked him to stand and ask his question. Nick got up with a serious expression and asked: "Ms. Rebecca, you keep saying that meditation develops the mindscape by giving it characteristics, which from my understanding comes from the laws involved in the meditation and these characteristics also give the magic energy within the mindscape characteristics. The foundation laws are also said to give magic characteristics by processing it. What exactly is the range of characteristics that can be given by both the mindscape and the foundation laws, as well as, what would a conflict between both even present as?" Rebecca looked at Nick for a second and with a sincere expression answered: "For me to answer your question fully, let''s start with the laws that make up your meditation. For meditations that create basic mindscapes, the laws don''t do much more than form your mindscape giving it some basic appearance and giving your mindscape the ability to hold magic energy as well as a degree of resistance to forced invasion; for divergent mindscapes though, the laws enhance the magic energy contained within by maybe amplifying its nature or increasing its potency or giving it a qualitative attribute. Let me give you some examples of each: the laws of your meditation can make the magic energy within your mindscape have a certain feel to it or have it behave in a certain way like before when I said that the Death Magician''s magic was prone to sucking the life force out of anything living that it came into contact with when the Magician used certain spells and that''s what I mean be ''nature'', I suppose you could also use the word ''affinity''; by ''potency'', I mean that there are mindscapes that give the magic the characteristic of longevity, meaning that the effects of the spells done with the magic last an extremely long time just like how the smell from a skunk''s defensive spray lasts for a long time, the mindscape could also have the effect of reducing the magic''s potency; finally when I say that the mindscape could give your magic a qualitative attribute, I mean that it could literally embed absolute laws within your magic that create supernatural phenomena wherever it goes, not just when it''s used in spells, for example, there exists a Magician living in the Unites States than can make time move slower or faster wherever he walks and there is a Magician in Germany that can heal people of non-life-threatening wounds simply by touching them. As for the characteristics that are given by your foundation laws, these often involve giving your magic a strong affinity with certain elementary phenomenon like making your magic especially suitable to be used in water related spells, shortening or lengthening the time required for your magic to initiate phenomena or even altering the magic energy requirements for casting spells, in truth, anything is possible and this really depends on the Magician''s skills in creating and using laws. As for an example of a conflict between the laws your meditation gives to your mindscape and the foundation laws....imagine that you have a meditation that made your mindscape resemble a fiery hell and by extension would give your magic extraordinary fire related powers, however, your foundation laws process the incoming magic energy to have a strong affinity for water or ice related laws and therefore a weak affinity for fire related laws, I can tell you from personal experience that it would only take a few months for that Magician to experience ''empty skies'' because the nature of the laws between the mindscape and foundation laws conflict, creating a backlash that completely spoils the mindscape''s ability to do what it is supposed to do because it now cannot maintain a certain property in the magic that it holds. Whether the Magician can fix this in time is usually a very uncertain matter, so be careful." If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.Nick nodded his head and sat back down. "Okay, that''s enough for an introduction on meditations, you should try to get your hands on multiple of them and compare their laws and see how they work in principle, you could possibly end up creating an original meditation, unlikely at your level but possible. Class is dismissed" Rebecca ended class and walked through the room door without saying another word. (She arrived in class so spectacularly but then just left through the door...was she trying to impress us at the start?) Nick didn''t really care about the answer and he was in a really good mood because Rebecca answered his questions so well, giving him invaluable information. Most of the other students seemed either bored or indifferent to the lecture. (Maybe they already knew the information that Rebecca gave us, after all, this is an introductory class and considering how class went yesterday, a fair amount of first years have probably already formed their mindscapes.) Nick left the room, making his way to a group of buildings that is supposed to be about a twenty minute walk from the main lecture halls. Last night before bed, he already researched the various clubs that the academy had and found out that these ''clubs'' are really instruction centers for students that want to continue their formal learning outside of the scheduled classes but in a flexible manner. There is always an instructor assigned to the club during business hours and all you have to do to join a club is to state your intention to the instructor and promise to do some tasks each week to maintain membership. Nick finally found ''Club Building Number 1'', at least that was what the sign at the front of the building indicated. The building was nothing special in comparison with the others, being in a gothic style and made of bricks and concrete; it was certainly a large building but compared to the magical archives office, it felt boring. Nick entered through its automatic, glass front door that slid all the way to the left so that Nick could pass through. Nick left the ground floor and made his way to the first floor where he found a room with a door that had the words: ''Spell Creation Club''. "Alright, let''s see where this goes." Nick opened the door and entered the room. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 14: Magic Scrolls The club room wasn''t all that spectacular, contrary to what Nick thought it would be like. The room was actually the size of a normal high school classroom, about half the size of one of the academy''s lecture halls. There were desks and chairs placed at seemingly random points in the room, there was a large whiteboard at one end of the room with some Vatleese written on it and finally there was a wooden door leading to another room. There was no one else currently in this room so Nick went to the other door and knocked. Nick heard some shuffling on the other side and a few seconds later, a middle aged man came out of the room with a young woman following behind him. The Man appeared to be white and had messy looking brown hair; he was wearing a pair of dress pants, dress shoes and a sweater vest. The young woman was fairly pretty and had bright, long, green hair; she was wearing a blue buttoned-up long sleeve shirt with a black skirt that reached down to her knees. (I don''t know if I''m just being too observant, but is it weird that her skirt''s zipper is only half way up and her shirt is clearly wrinkled from being tucked but was now not tucked, while he missed a loop in his pants with his belt and has what seems to be pink lipstick on his lab coat''s collar? The woman is wearing pink lipstick...none of my business.) "Hello, my Name is Nick Capitol, a first year and I am interested in joining the spell creation club, can you walk me through the requirements?" The middle aged man rubbed his head a little bit before replying: "My name is Norman Foster and I am the instructor of the spell creation club as well as one of the academy''s potion masters. There is no special requirement to join, since you''ve told me your intention, I will fill out the paperwork later. Every now and again you will have to complete a set of tasks given by me to maintain your membership but to be honest this club doesn''t do much activities and only has two members besides you." Norman pointed at the woman with green hair and said: "This is Lana Parsely and she is a second year and a spell enthusiast. Your other club mate is Derek Drake, another second year but he isn''t here today. Now, this club''s mission is to study and create useful spells. If you have already been to the magical archives office, you should know how expensive spells are and how much they can probably be sold for." Nick was confused so he asked. "If spell making is that lucrative, then why does this club only have two members?" Norman rubbed his head again and gave an awkward laugh: "Ha, ha. That is because spell making is difficult, dangerous, time consuming and it is not a guarantee that once you make a spell that anyone will buy it. Lana here has made a few spells but since they are just variations of what is already on the market, she hasn''t been able to sell any. As for Derek, he''s made a few excellent spells but doesn''t need to sell them because he has the support of a wealthy family that is looking to recruit him. Spell making is an important field but without the support of an organization, persons tend to leave it alone in favor of less dangerous and just as profitable work. The upside about the field though is, just like potion making, if you are very good and can make unique creations you can probably become a billionaire within a few years but to be honest most professional spell makers die from accidents with their research before that happens. So...what will it be kid, still want to be a spell maker?" Nick thought about what Norman said. (Even if it''s dangerous, I might as well give it a try, after all, I''m too poor to buy the academy''s spells and I don''t have anyone''s support.) "Yes, I want to be a spell maker. I have a question though, you said that you were a potion master, what does that have to do with spell making?" Norman''s eyes became sharp as he looked at Nick almost looking like he was implying that Nick had asked a very stupid question. "Young man, it seems that your knowledge is lacking. Potions are spells in essence. A spell is a collection of laws that create a specific magical outcome while potions are liquids produced by materials that contain certain laws that are combined by the potion maker to create certain effects. There are many wonderful or dangerous effects that can only be created with potion making. You could say that potion making is a specialization of spell making." Nick felt enlightened. Lana, who had been standing beside Norman since the beginning decided to speak: "Spell making is one of the major economic activities in magic society although there are only a relative few successful spell makers. I''m studying to be the best. You better work as hard as me and Derek." (Work hard, huh?) Nick looked again at her half done zipper and as if feeling his stare, Lana got flustered and quickly pulled the zipper all the way up. Nick decided to ignore her. "Teacher Norman could you please get me started on how to make a magic spell." "Well...you don''t seem to have formed your mindscape yet because I feel no magic energy coming from you so you won''t be able to make anything complex or cast any spells with your own magic but I can get you started on something simple. Go and wipe the whiteboard for me while I look for something in the other room. Oh, and stop saying ''magic spell'', that''s redundant, spells can only be done using magic, it''s like saying ''wet water''." After saying that, Norman went into the other room, Lana went to a desk and took out her phone, not paying any attention to Nick and Nick went to the white board, picked up the eraser and cleaned the board. (I guess this counts as a ''task''.) When Nick was finished, Norman came out with a box of what looked like old fashioned parchment paper and placed them on a desk. He called Nick over and started speaking: Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation."Okay, these are called ''magic scrolls'', I know, I know, they don''t look like scrolls but that''s just what we call them. Since you don''t have a mindscape yet you''ll have to learn to create spells using these. The spells written out on these scrolls are initiated by a generic set of laws that are activated by tearing the paper apart or if you were the one that wrote the spell in Valteese, by holding it and willing the spell to cast." Norman tore one of the scrolls and a loud screech could be heard in the room. "That was the spell ''Swarm Calling''. If we weren''t within the academy grounds right now that screech would have attracted a swarm of locusts to us. Hmmm...I should do one with a more evident effect." Norman tore another scroll and one of the desks beside him turned to ash instantly. Nick was amazed. "The advantage of scrolls is that they allow someone to use magic energy in the atmosphere to cast spells and spells with incredible effects can be developed in a non-complex format at the cost of power and range. The downside is that the spells are usually far less effective than those cast by a Magician if you are not a very skilled spell maker and if you write your unique laws on the scrolls there will be a chance that your spells will be stolen and analyzed, making you easier to deal with. Anyway, I''ll give you a few harmless ones with their descriptions to look over. When you return another day you can ask questions. Oh, you do know Valteese, right? I''m asking because you can''t write spells without knowing at least Valteese." Nick nodded his head and said: "Yes, I know Valteese, but barely." "Well...I suppose that''s good enough to analyze the spells on the scrolls, just don''t try to alter them. Oh, here is some blank papers to practice writing laws with. Remember this part is the generic laws having to do with initiating the spell." Norman pointed to a paragraph written in Valteese. Nick thanked Norman and promised to return another day. He made his way to the bookstore where he purchased a Valteese dictionary and copied the book he got from the library. It was all technically free since stuff like this was covered by his scholarship. Nick made his way to the library where he returned the book on Valteese and obtained a book on meditation. After some words of encouragement from the librarian, Nick went to his dorm. It was now 6 pm so Nick went to the cafeteria and had a meal before going to his room. Nick sat down to analyze the scrolls he had been given. Honestly, they just looked like old pieces of paper with writing on them but Nick had already seen their value. Nick looked at one with a spell called ''Blue Paint''. The description he got from Norman stated that this spell would instantly paint whatever the caster wanted blue. (Doesn''t seem very useful. Is that what Norman really meant by ''harmless''?) Nick decided to spend the night translating the spell into English from Valteese to see what wording constituted a spell. After four hours, Nick was finished translating the spell. (Hmmm...this is a spell? This is just describing what the word blue and paint means as well as what it means to paint something. It also details some ideas involved in painting such as paint brush strokes, blending, contrast, etc. It also has small diagrams of what constitutes a fully painted object and what does not. This is weird...this spell almost takes on the structure of a ''math proof''. There are definitions, what could be called axioms - meaning things that are assumed to be true at all times, explanations of what has to be true if the expected result is obtained and even diagrams to justify the result.) After thinking about it, Nick got a crazy idea. (What if.....) Nick turned on his laptop and looked for one of his geometry text books. He looked up a chapter on transformations and found a proof on dilation, which is the concept of stretching or shrinking a shape by a constant factor. Nick decided to reword the proof in a manner like ''Blue Paint''. The proof was for the theory that any regular shape could be shrunk by a constant factor. Nick wrote down definitions, axioms, explanations on the process of dilation and even included a diagram, all supporting that an object could be shrunk down by half uniformly. Even though he was tired, Nick spent the next six hours translating the proof into Valteese with his new dictionary and with the help of the information from the book he copied at the bookstore. When he was done, he took a red inked pen and wrote down the proof on one of the special papers Norman had given him along with the generic paragraph that appears on all the scrolls. One hour later Nick had a finished new scroll in his hands. "Norman warned me not to even alter a spell on these scrolls but I ended up trying to create my own; this might be a mistake but I''m going to try. Let''s hope I don''t mess something up too badly, especially myself." The time was now 5 am. Nick looked at the rug in front of his room door and then at the scroll in his hands. Nick focused, trying to will the scroll to activate. After 10 seconds of trying, the words on the scroll lit up and then disappeared in sequence. (Huh? Did it work?) Nick looked at the rug and after waiting one minute and seeing nothing happening, he gave up hope. "Guess I was wrong. I should have known that creating spells wasn''t that easy." Suddenly, Nick heard a steaming sound coming from his rug. He looked closely enough to actually see something like steam coming from the rug and then the rug visibly started shrinking. After ten seconds, the rug was half the size it was before. Nick stared at the rug with his eyes wide open. "Holy shit!" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 15: A Success or Failure? Nick couldn''t believe his eyes, somehow his pitiful attempt to create a simple spell worked. (I guess I shouldn''t be surprised since the definition of a magical law is an instruction that initiates supernatural phenomena using magic. I created this spell on the basis that spells were similar in substance and form to mathematical proofs after seeing the structure of the spell Blue Paint. What is a mathematical proof? It''s a deductive argument that demonstrates wheteher a mathematical statement is true or false. So in essence I wrote down that a certain circumstance had to be true based on mathematical reasoning and translated those reasonings into Valteese. The result was that the conclusion of my arguments became reality.) (All that sounds reasonable but I feel like I''m missing something.) Just then, the steaming sound that was coming from the rug became a sizzling sound. "Huh?" The rug suddenly burst into orange flames in front of Nick and two seconds later became nothing but grey ash. (Now I see why Norman said that spell making was dangerous. If I had attempted that on a living creature, the same result would have probably followed. But why did the spell end up failing after the intention behind the spell was carried out?) Nick was excited but confused. (It could be that my arguments used in the spell weren''t good enough or my conclusion was bad but it is difficult to say. I''ll have to ask Norman when I see him.) The time was a little past 6 am so Nick didn''t have time to follow his normal routine so he went to the bathroom and took a shower, then got dressed, he copied his failed spell on one of the special papers and put it into his backpack and went to the cafeteria to eat breakfast and then went on to class. On his way to class, Nick did some thinking: (The next class is on the use of Valteese so maybe I''ll learn something that can help explain my failure this morning.) At 9 am the teacher walked into the room and Nick recognized him. He was a black man wearing an all white suit. (Ron Gordon.) "Good morning students, as some of you should already know, my name is Ron Gordon and I will be lecturing today on the use of Valteese. Now, all of you should now what Valteese is. It is the universal language of magic, meaning, it is the one language that can be used to manipulate all magical energy. The mechanism by which it does this is too complex for an introductory class like this so I will put it in a way that new students can understand. Valteese projects the will of the Magician into a form that makes magic respond. Not to say that Valteese is the only language that can do this but it is certainly the foundation of every Magician''s spell casting and magic usage, that is, when you have learnt sufficiently, you will probably be able to create your own language that controls magical energy or continue using Valteese, that''s up to you..." Nick listened for a while but couldn''t bother to wait for Ron to stumble into what he wanted to discuss so Nick wanted to take the initiative to ask his questions by raising his hand half way through Ron''s lecture. Ron eventually gave Nick the approval to ask his question. "Sir, how exactly do you use Valteese to create spells, like what exactly must be written in Valteese for a spell to be effective? Also, under what conditions can your Valteesian instructions fail." Ron Gordon rubbed his chin for a while as if he was trying to fully appreciate the meaning behind Nick''s question. "Spell making is not really what this lecture is about but I''ll humor you for the benefit of the class. Like I said before, Valteese is a language used to project the will of the Magician using magic energy, creating all sorts of phenomena so for a spell written in Valteese to be effective, it must take the form of instructions. I personally like to liken Valteese with computer languages such as C# or python that you would use to make computers do something. All computer code is ultimately written as instructions for a computer to follow; there may be sample data and explanations written in code for a compiler to analyze such as in machine learning but if the computer code doesn''t actually tell the computer to do a coherent action, what use is it, after all, we could write in python what it means for the computer to make the screen light up but that''s not really the same thing as telling it to light up the screen now is it? So, the conditions under which most spells written in Valteese fail have to do with the Magician not stating his intentions clearly enough in the form of commands, so to speak." Ron ended his explanation there, so Nick nodded his head and returned to his thoughts. (Is that my problem, I didn''t state my intentions clearly enough? Most of my spell was just filled with arguments that I got from my math text but I feel like my intentions were clear...I guess they weren''t.) Nick silently shrugged his shoulders, he couldn''t be sure until he spoke to Norman so after about three more hours of Ron''s lecture Nick made his way to the spell creation club. When Nick walked in, only two people were in the room, a white young man with short black hair and Lana, the woman Nick had met yesterday. Nick thought that he might as well greet them. "Good afternoon Lana, it is good to see you again." Lana looked up from some papers she had on the desk where she was sitting at and replied: "Same here." She then returned to her work. Nick then turned his attention to the young man. He was wearing a white buttoned up shirt with a pair of tan long pants. He had been writing some Valteese on the white board but stopped to pay attention To Nick. "Hello, my name is Nick Capitol, a first year, it''s nice to meet you." The young man nodded with his right arm stretched out for a handshake. "Hello, my name is Derek Drake, although I''m in a higher year than you we can probably both learn from each other, welcome." The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.Nick looked at his hand for a while and said awkwardly: "Sorry, I''m a bit uncomfortable with touching other people, do you mind if we don''t do handshakes?" Derek took back his hand, rubbing the back of his head awkwardly. "No problem Nick, we all have our quirks, I don''t have a big enough stick up my ass as to mind." Nick nodded his head, saying: "Thanks, I''m going to speak to Master Norman about something." Derek nodded and got back to his work but before Nick turned around, he heard Norman''s voice. "You want to speak with me? So did you practice duplicating the scrolls that I gave you yesterday, did you learn anything?" Nick turned to face Norman with a sincere expression. He took his scroll out of his backpack and gave it to Norman. "Well...after analyzing the spell Blue Paint, I kind of jumped the gun and tried to create my own spell. You see, I''m interested in mathematics so I realized that the spell looked similar in structure to a math proof and tried to create one using a proof in one of my texts. The spell is supposed to shrink something by half but...it worked then it caused my rug to burst into flames and turned to ash." Derek and Lana both looked over at the same time that Nick finished speaking and burst into laughter. Derek said: "You actually destroyed your own rug trying to cast such a spell on it when you just started...wait, did you say that you actually got the spell to work on your first try?" "Yes, it did work, before my rug became ash, that is." Nick confirmed. After fully understanding what Nick had said, Lana also stopped laughing. Norman raised his hand and a scroll paper appeared in it. Norman looked at Nick''s scroll and the same writing appeared on Norman''s scroll. Norman gave Nick his scroll back and tore his. Norman didn''t speak, but waited for about one minute to see the effects of the spell. One of the desks started steaming and ten seconds later it indeed became half its size but soon after burst into flames and turned to ash. Derek and Lana seemed impressed for some reason. Norman looked at Nick and said: "Well Nick, it looks like you have some talent for spell making. Although your spell is a failure, the fact that you were able to make it this far on your first try and without instruction is pretty impressive, although...trying to create your own spell so soon was not such a wise decision because if it had resulted in a more severe backlash, your rug''s fate could have been yours." Nick swallowed his saliva. "Well..anyway, what''s done is done. Aright, let''s discuss what''s so amazing about your feat. Usually a novice can''t create effective spells because, one, their Valteese is poor and they aren''t able to write coherent instructions and two, they don''t understand what they are even trying to do, at least not enough to make a spell. Think about it, even if you have all the ingredients to make a cake you can''t make the cake without even knowing what a cake is. You said that you wrote this spell based on a mathematical proof, hmmm...well I suppose mathematical proofs are akin to instructions, granted that you have the write theory but they are only similar to instructions and are not actually instructions, that is, they make arguments for something that could be true but that''s not the same thing as laying out how something can be done practically and that''s probably why your spell failed in the end, the laws aren''t coherent enough. If you were not trying to cast the spell using a scroll, the spell would have probably never worked. You see, in scroll making, the unprocessed magic in the atmosphere is used as the catalyst for your spell and so nature fills in the gaps within your laws as much as it can to get the spell to work as long as there is a plausible foundation. If we said that your spell was a construction company, you have all the materials and people to build a house but you have no directions and methods to do so and that''s why that desk there turned into ash after your spell was used on it. I''m still impressed though, as you should already know, writing a spell in Valteese is all about projecting your will into a form that can direct magic, you did that without even knowing all that much. It''s easy to duplicate a spell once its created successfully because Valteese makes your instructions via your will a universal ''law'' so once a spell has been created successfully, anybody can copy it once they have the Valteese that was used to create it but making a spell from scratch is difficult because it is very much dependent on the unique will of the Magician as well as the instructions the Magician uses according to his knowledge. You did great but be more careful." With that Norman raised his hand and a book appeared in front of Nick floating in midair. "Your next club task is to read that book within the next two months and at the end of every week, you have to tell me what you have learnt until you finish the book." Norman gave Nick a stack of special papers and left for the other room without even waiting for Nick to respond to any of what he had said. (I guess talking more won''t make too much of a difference, I have to work harder.) The look that Derek and Lana gave Nick had changed from one of friendly indifference to one of ambivalence. Nick recognized that look, it was the same one that his peers in high school gave him when they found out that the quiet, simple boy got higher grades than them. Nick ignored it. He said his goodbyes and went back to his dorm room. First, he did his pushups since he didn''t get the chance to do them this morning, he then showered and then ate some snacks that he had in his bag that he got from the cafeteria that morning. He sat down at his desk and put a fairly thin book in front of him, its title is "The Art and Method of Meditation". It was the book that he got from the library and since it was just 6 pm he was going to spend the next three hours reading it. "Okay, let''s begin." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 16: Special Mindscape The ''Art and Method of Meditation'' isn''t a very complex book, it has about 100 pages but each page has information that Nick finds invaluable. When Nick finished reading at 1 am, he picked up a pen and paper, trying to sort through his thoughts. (Meditation is the method commonly used to form and develop the mindscape. From what I''ve read, the meditation techniques seem no different than spells to me. Spells seem to be the crystallization of the Magician''s will through, at first, encoded form using Valteese or some other language unique to the Magician. Meditation is also done using laws made from a language like Valteese and also has to do with manifesting the user''s will, the result is the mindscape; it seems to me that meditation isn''t just about manifesting the Magician''s will but also developing it and/or transforming it. That''s probably what causes the mindscape to give the magic energy stored inside it special characteristics - by imprinting a special will onto the magic. That therefore means that laws are our intentions, convictions and knowledge combined into encoded and magical forms. So that''s why the academy''s generic meditation only gives a basic mindscape without any special characteristics, it probably contains a will that only has the intention of forming a mindscape, that is, there is no special intentions within the laws of the meditation. Hmmm...I first heard the word ''will'' used by Rebecca when she was explaining laws and now I see it again when reading this book on meditation. It seems that, to be a good Magician one has to develop themselves according to their own ''will'', just using generic methods, whether it be mediation techniques or spells won''t get you very far. Of course that''s just my speculation but then again that woman, Cindy Reece, told me that the academy''s magic spells give off a specific sensation. Could I say that the sensation is some manifestation of the academy''s will or the will of whoever designed the spells for the academy? That may not be all the way right but it seems close. Anyway, my goal is to create my own meditation technique and that means I have to design a meditation that nurtures my own will. That begs the question, what is my will?) All this thinking started making Nick confused so he decided to get some sleep. Nick fell into a deep sleep the second he got into his bed. RIIIIIINNNNGGGG! One and a half hours later, Nick''s phone alarm rang. "Fuuucccckkkkk, this 3 am thing really sucks sometimes. Why the hell do I keep doing this to myself." When he said this, a thought came into his mind seemingly from nowhere. It was a flashback of a morning back at his old home a few years ago. Nick stood in front of his grandaunt saying: "I don''t want to rake the leaves every morning anymore. I''m not going to rake them today." Nick''s grandaunt sneered at him, saying: "The bible says that a lazy man must not eat, so until you get your priorities straight, I''m not giving you any food or even bus fare, you can walk to school!" Nick clenched his fist and left the house that morning having not eaten and having to walk about one hour and thirty minutes to get to school. When he reached the school there were tears coming from his eyes but he still went to class, going through the day hungry and tired. Nick hurriedly pushed those thoughts aside. (I hated that life, having my life in the hands of someone else. I''m working to control my own life so that I can decide my future and that''s why I keep doing this to myself.) "Ha, ha..." Nick chuckled, sometimes he had to laugh at himself. Asking stupid questions like ''Why am I doing this to myself?'' doesn''t help anyone, especially himself. Nick spent thirty minutes doing pushups and after washing his face he sat down to start reading the book that Norman had given him. Its title was ''Modern Spell Works''. He read it for two hours then Nick turned on his laptop to read one of his math texts which he read for about two hours. Its now around 8 am but Nick wasn''t in a rush because today''s class starts at 11 am. Nick showered and got himself dressed. Since he was done with the book on meditation, he placed it into his backpack in order to return it to the library. Nick left for the cafeteria where he ordered two egg sandwiches and an orange juice. Nick sat at a table in the corner and observed the rest of the cafeteria while eating. It didn''t take him long to notice his neighbor Don Bartholomew sitting in the middle of the cafeteria with an entourage; there were two other young men with him and about eight girls. They were laughing and talking with Don who was at the center of it at the center of it all, he certainly looked pleased with himself. Nick didn''t have a problem with people being social, after all, that''s probably a human instinct but he didn''t see himself being involved in that scenario. Nick finished eating and got up to go to class. Today''s class is once again in one of the main buildings; it''s supposed to be ''Introduction to Spells''. Nick took his seat in a very large lecture hall that was already filled by the time Nick got there. (There should be about one hundred students in here right now.) Nick decided to take a seat near the front of the class so that he could more easily ask questions if he had any. At 11 am, the teacher noticeably walked into the lecture hall. For some reason as soon as this man stepped into the room the temperature fell to a point near freezing. There was no air conditioning because the lecture rooms had laws in them that kept each student cool enough to avoid temperature related discomfort. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it"Good day, my name is Ryan Grayson and I will be your instructor on spells for today." As he was saying this, he raised his hand with his index finger pointing out towards the ceiling, glowing red. Some blood red writing appeared on the ceiling and the room went back to the normal temperature. The writing remained on the ceiling, glowing red, it was hard not to stare at it. Nick noticed something a little obvious about the spell on the ceiling. "That spell is not written in Valteese." Nick said that out loud without thinking. The second he finished speaking Ryan looked in his direction, almost as if he was looking directly at Nick and he smiled. "You''re right, that''s not Valteese, its my own little mystical language and I''m using it to control the temperature of the room." Nick could hear Ryan''s voice clearly but Ryan had not moved his lips to speak, he just stared in Nick''s direction. Ryan is a white young man and is wearing a pair of dark blue jeans pants with a black polo shirt and a thin leather jacket. He really didn''t look like a teacher. The most noticeable thing about Ryan though, is his apparent age, he looked like a teenager. Ryan rubbed his black hair and took a deep breath in, looking away from Nick. "What is a spell? You should all have some idea of that by now; the textbook definition is that a spell is a collection of laws used to create a certain effect by manipulating magic. I have my own definition though; spells are the use of magic to bring a Magician''s desires into reality. That''s not as proper sounding as the former definition but it gets straight to the point. Just like how I adjusted the temperature with that spell on the ceiling, all spells are a means of manifesting a Magician''s will into reality... " Nick thought: (There''s that word again: ''will''.) The lecture went on for two hours with no one interrupting with questions. Ryan was eloquent and spoke in a way that even a child could understand. Nick felt that the lecture was very useful to him though there were parts that he couldn''t understand at all because of an obvious lack of knowledge. Near the end of class, Nick raised his hand to ask a question about something that had been bothering him since the beginning, something in regards to what Rebecca had said in her lecture. Ryan motioned for him to stand and ask his question. "When you walked into the room, the temperature fell so much that the room became almost freezing despite the laws that are already in the lecture hall to control the temperature. Was that the effect of your mindscape? In my last lecture, the instructor said to the effect that divergent and special minsdcapes could give the Magician''s magic energy qualitative characteristics that can affect the environment. Is that why you had to use your own spell to fix the temperature." Ryan smiled at Nick. "You''re a very sharp young man. Yes, the temperature fell so drastically because I have something of a ''special'' mindscape that causes the temperature to fall wherever I go if I''m not paying attention. I purposely let my magic do that to create a spectacle so its something I can control to a degree, if you were wondering that." After hearing that, Nick felt so exited that he almost tripped in place. He asked another question without thinking it through. "How do I form a special mindscape?" When he finished asking that question, the whole room went into an uproar of laughter. "Ha, this guy want''s a special mindscape, I have a list of all our year-mates and this guy isn''t anything special, not even from a decent family." "This guy''s crazy, asking teacher Ryan that in public. Hmph, if he can form a special mindscape, this daddy here will eat his own shoes." "Sigh, why are the young ones so excitable these days. Young man, let me advise you, your goals should always be realistic. Do not indulge in fantasies." .... The room became filled with such comments. Nick felt a little hurt by the comments but remembering his time in high school, he steeled himself and continued looking at Ryan, waiting for an answer. Ryan began to laugh. "Ha, ha...you''re an interesting one, implying your intentions so openly...but I''ll answer your question honestly, who knows, maybe you will surprise me. If you want a special mindscape, you need a special ''will'' of your own. What does magic mean to you, what are your aims, what do you want and how do you plan to get it?" With that, Ryan slowly began to disappear and in five seconds he was gone. That was probably the signal for the end of class so people began to leave the lecture hall. Some students looked at Nick with a sneer before leaving the room. Nick noticed them all but he didn''t let them bring down his mood. (A dramatic exit, huh? The faculty at Richter Order Academy really like to show off. Oh, the spell on the ceiling disappeared too. He said I need a special ''will''...that''s still so cryptic. How the hell do I get one of those, anyway? Hmmm...my aims...what I want and how to get it.) Nick knew he had many things to think about so he made his way to the library while trying to sort through his thoughts. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 17: Five Months of Progress When Nick got to the library, he returned the book on meditation and obtained one on foundation laws titled, ''The Foundation of the Mindscape''. After thanking the librarian for his recommendation Nick went back to River-Run dorm. Nick bought lunch at the cafeteria that included pasta, chicken and orange juice, he ate in the cafeteria. After finishing his meal, he went to his room; the time was now 3 pm. Nick spent the next three hours reading the book on spells that Norman had given him, then he spent another 3 hours reading one of his geometry text books. He finished reading at 9 pm. Nick left his room to go to the cafeteria where he got a dinner of rice, fried chicken, gravy and vegetables; he returned to his room to eat his meal; it''s great that the cafeteria operates all day, everyday. When he finished eating Nick took out the magic scrolls that he had gotten from Norman as well as the blank special papers. Nick started practicing writing scrolls by copying various spells onto the blank papers. He didn''t bother testing them because he didn''t want to mess up his room or anything in it. He still remembered what happened to his last rug and he didn''t want to become a victim of his eagerness. By the time the blank special papers were finished, it was 9 am on Saturday morning. No classes are held on the weekends without special reason so Nick had the whole day and Sunday free. (Then again, the rules state that classes must be attended in the first week of school but after that you can decide whether to schedule classes or not. Hmmm...although I like the lectures, I have a clear lack of knowledge which makes the help the lectures give to me limited at this point. For now I should focus on building my knowledge by reading books and practicing writing scrolls. So its decided, for now I won''t be scheduling anymore classes and will be spending my days reading books and translating and writing scrolls.) Nick spent about thirty minutes doing pushups and then he showered and got dressed. He went to the cafeteria for breakfast. He ordered a meal of eggs, sausages and pancakes with syrup as well as some snacks so that he would not have to leave his room again today and tomorrow. Nick took all his food back to his room, he spent thirty minutes eating and then he went to sleep. RIIIINNNNGGGGG Nick woke up via his phone alarm at 3 am. (That''s more than twelve hours of sleep. I guess I was more tired than I thought. I''m used to pushing my feelings aside so I didn''t notice until now but I''ve been doing nothing but studying and going to classes and its clearly taken a toll. I feel like shit.) Nick didn''t care about his temporary feelings of fatigue because he knew that what he did in these moments were what really counted. Nick played some old rock music that he had on his phone, trying to get his energy up; it was Centuries by Fall Out Boy. "This song is a classic." Nick spent almost the next hour doing pushups. When he finished with his exercise, he showered and got back to studying. He started with his book on spells and didn''t stop until it was around 2 pm. He ate some snacks and began reading one of the geometry texts on his laptop. He finished that book at around 9 pm. Nick took a two hour nap and when he woke up he washed his face and then started reading the book he got from the library on foundation laws. RIIIIINNNNNGGGGGGG Nick''s 3 am alarm went off while he was still reading his book. He stopped reading and decided to practice his scroll writing. (It''s Monday now but since I haven''t scheduled any classes, I don''t need to leave my room except to go to the cafeteria. It''s pretty handy that new toiletries appear in the bathroom at set intervals, I don''t have to buy them myself.) Nick found that out recently when a new set of bath soap, toothpaste, deodorant and similar things just appeared on his bathroom''s counter; the entire room was even self cleaning. He didn''t have to do chores or go to a convenience store. He had all the time in the world to study. "Magic''s so awesome, ha,ha..." (I have to go to the spell creation club every Friday to report my progress regarding the book on spells that I got from Norman as well as to get new scrolls to translate and more blank papers to practice with. Besides that, I''m going to spend most of my time in this room studying from here on out.) ... For the next five months Nick did not leave his room except to go to the cafeteria, library or the spell creation club. In that time he finished reading and reporting on five spell related books to Norman. Norman was pleased with his progress but still put most of his effort in instructing Derek and Lana. Nick did not interact much with Derek or Lana and would just greet them whenever he came into the club; they were busy with their own tasks so they didn''t pay much attention to Nick anyway. Nick made other progress in that time as well, at the end of a little over five months Nick had read thirty books related to meditation, foundation laws and Valteese and eleven books related to geometry and number theory. Nick had also practiced translating and writing scrolls everyday so he was now almost fluent in writing Valteese, although, he still had some issues speaking it coherently. If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.Nick was currently in the spell creation club giving a report to Norman on what he has learnt from the last spell related book he had read. "...In conclusion, spells are absolute manifestations of the Magician''s will. A Magician''s will is related to his desires and knowledge and is like the ignition that causes the laws written in Valteese to manipulate magic energy. Spell usage requires absolute conviction on the Magician''s part and that cannot be lacking if he is to cast a spell successfully. I''m not a religious man professor but I found a verse in the bible that I think perfectly describes the mindset that is required for a Magician. Do you want to hear it." "He, He...go ahead young man." Norman approved. "Mark chapter 11, verse 23: `Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ''Go, throw yourself into the sea,'' and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them.`" CLAP, CLAP, CLAP. "I swear you are the most thought driven student I have ever met. You certainly love the ideas contained in the books that you read. You''ve even read the bible, in today''s age who even does that? Anyway, you''ve done well so far, upholding my expectations, even becoming fluent in writing Valteese; good, good, good. You should have a mid-year exam coming up soon, since you haven''t formed your mindscape yet, you''ll be at a disadvantage compared to your other classmates. Since your such a ''good'' young man, I''ll tell you something beforehand. In the next two weeks, students must participate in a little magic sparring and they will be given a grade based on how well they execute their spells and the quality of their magic or whatever magic or spell they use. Are you prepared to get a good grade?" Nick scratched his head. "Professor Norman, I''m just a bookworm, I don''t know much about using magic to spar but I''ll try my best. Why is the mid-year exam a sparring battle instead of tests of our knowledge?" Norman rubbed his beard. "Hmph...young man, the purpose of knowledge is action. Being a Magician is dangerous, no one cares how much you know if you can''t produce anything worthwhile or make effective use of your knowledge to help yourself. Take that to heart. We are not scholars alone and this is not a university, WE ARE MAGICIANS! Our jobs involve making societies better through adventure and discovery. You''ve got to be tough to endure the tribulations ahead. Being a bookworm isn''t enough so do some preparations and make me proud. It''s against the rules for me to give you any direct help for the exam but if you have any questions, I will answer, you don''t need to do anymore tasks until the exam is over. You can leave now." "Thank you professor." Norman went back to speaking with Derek about his spells. Lana took a sharp look at Nick for a few seconds when she thought Nick wasn''t looking but went back to checking her documents soon thereafter. Nick sighed internally at this, as they say, ''success breeds contempt''. Nick made so much progress in the past few months that even Norman openly praises him. This clearly displeased Derek and Lana, especially Lana but there was nothing Nick could do about it so he simply ignored the negative emotions of his club-mates. Nick knew that they were also doing well for themselves so they shouldn''t do anything to him, at least for right now. Nick said his goodbyes and left. He returned to his room to sort through his thoughts. He checked his phone and saw an email detailing that there was indeed going to be a special exam in two weeks and that attendance was mandatory. The email also said that he would be notified of the exam''s details in one week. It seems Norman gave me an extra week to prepare for the spar. Nick could feel Norman''s support from this since probably not all students would know that the exam would take the form of a spar. (I''ve returned my last library book but haven''t picked up another one because I want to just focus on writing scrolls for now. Since the exam is a spar I need some battle related spells in order to do well. Hmmm...I have in mind some spells that I want to create but it''s a long shot since their creation involves me making original laws. Sigh, I''ll just have to do my best.) (I''m only in the initial stages of creating my own meditation and modifying the Laws of Syracuse so I have no hope of using my own magic energy, that''s disadvantageous but if I can''t get through just this little hurdle, I should just give up on being a Magician.) Nick spent the rest of the afternoon planning out what he would be doing for the next two weeks. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 18: You Two Should Work Harder To participate in the upcoming spar and do well Nick knew that he needed to use his scroll writing skills or he would have no chance. (The spells that I got from Norman won''t cut it, they''re mostly for doing harmless, miscellaneous things. I don''t know much about battles but I''ve watched anime and movies since childhood so I can roughly guess what kind of spells I need to succeed against an opponent.) Nick took out his laptop and started sorting through his math text books, looking through the definitions and theories that he had in mind to use for creating three spells. (Why three? Because I need one spell each for attack, defense and movement.) After spending five hours looking through his math texts he found three concepts that he would use to create his spells. The first is the theory of rotation, which in transformation means that a figure can be rotated around a fixed point by a specified number of degrees. Nick plans to use this as an attack method. How successful would that be? Well, how damaging would it be if your heart or lungs was rotated 180 degrees in any direction? The next concept is for defense which is the parallel postulate, one of the axioms of Euclidean geometry which states that through any given point not on a line there passes exactly one line parallel to that line in the same plane; by extension parallel planes are those which do not meet one another; the best defense was often not letting your opponent hit you in the first place. The third concept is probably the most difficult to understand. Nick wants to use it for movement and the spell it will be involved in will probably be the most complicated; the concept is related to spherical geometry which can be explained like this: there are no parallel lines on a sphere because all great circles, which are the straight paths on a sphere, intersect in two opposite points. There are an infinite number of great circles that can be drawn on any perfect sphere. Nick has great hopes in using these concepts to make spells because, one, their actual simplicity - they may be math concepts but they are actually simple parts of bigger theories, Nick understands them enough that he is confident in applying them magically, two, there is hundreds of years of literature for each concept, more than enough for him to make use of in writing the laws for these spells. Nick resolved not to waste any time. He took out a pen and notebook and using his laptop he made notes for each concept, theorizing how they could be used in battle and creating his own proofs to show that each theory was correct, at least in a circumstance where magic is involved. This was difficult because of it being novel to him - writing proofs for theories involving mathematical and magical concepts. Each mathematical concept had a mountain of information associated with it and Nick had to condense the most important parts in a way that made sense and try to write them in magical terms using Valteese which proved to be exceptionally difficult. Five days later, Nick had written a large number of notes on each concept including definitions, explanations, theorems and proofs. He even translated each point into Valteese to make it easier when writing his spells. He had a little over a week left until the exam. (I''ve already collected the raw information and translated them to Valteese. What I have to do now is put each point into a coherent sequence and combine them logically. The Valteese will need to be altered when I combine them but there shouldn''t be too much more difficulty involved with doing that.) Nick spent the next five days going over his notes organizing the information for each concept according to his intentions for the spell it would be used for. When he was certain that the organized information made sense he translated the whole thing into Valteese with the help of his previous translations having to make adjustments all the way through for the Valteese to make sense. Nick hardly left his room during this time except to get food at the cafeteria; he didn''t even eat in the cafeteria, spending all the available time he had working on his ideas even when he was eating. With four days left until the mid-year exam, Nick finally took out his stack of special papers and started writing each of his three spells one after the other. During a period of two days he constantly reviewed the laws he had written, deciding what needed to be changed or improved based on the magic energy that was being attracted to the scrolls; normal people could feel magic energy if it was intense and condensed enough. Nick had learned over the course of five months that magic energy would be intensely attracted to a scroll with well written and correctly defined laws. Nick used up almost his entire stack of papers rewriting his spells after making correction after correction. Two days before the exam Nick had three scrolls in front of him that exuded an intense magic energy, so much so that he, who didn''t have a mindscape, could feel the intensity so clearly. If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.(I did it...or at least I hope I did it. I have to make a few copies of each and test them. Hmmm....I can''t just test them myself because if they fail, with the intensity of the magic I''m feeling, I could really end up dead. I''ll have to have Norman supervise me while I test them.) With that thought, Nick made the necessary copies and placed them into his backpack. He showered and got dressed after which he went to the cafeteria and ate lunch there. He hadn''t eaten here in weeks; a change of routine is refreshing after living like a hermit for so long. After his meal, Nick left his dorm and headed to the spell creation club. When he got there, as usual, Derek and Lana were there working on their own spells, Derek writing Valteese on the whiteboard and Lana sorting through spell related documents. They both looked at the door when Nick walked in. "Good afternoon club-mates. It''s been a while." Derek nodded his head in reply and turned to the white board again, Lana replied: "Good afternoon Nick, shouldn''t you be busy preparing for your exam. It''s going to be hard for you since you don''t have a mindscape." "Yeah...I know but I have some business with professor Norman." Nick replied dryly, he new that Lana was trying to bring down his mood but he ignored it. After Nick spoke, the door to the other room opened and Norman came out of it. "You have business with me. Speak, be direct, are you trying to get my help for the exam?" Nick answered in a matter of fact manner: "Yes I am but I''m sure my request won''t break the rules. I have a few new magic scrolls that I developed and I would like you to supervise me while I test them so I don''t die a meaningless death. Is that okay with you professor?" Norman rubbed his beard, looking amused. "You developed a few new magic scrolls on your own? You probably thought that you needed to be original to get decent marks on the exam, right? Well, I can''t knock you for at least trying, it''s smart of you to ask for my help with this. Okay young man, show me these scrolls." Norman waited for Nick to present his scrolls. "Professor, if you don''t mind, can we go to a practice field in order to keep things more private and so I don''t ruin your club-room." Nick has always been wary of other people and he simply didn''t trust Derek and Lana. It''s not like he trusted Norman either but Norman was already a Regular Magician, there was no need for Norman to plot against him. "Hmph, trying to act mysterious. Fine, I have a practice field that I use regularly for testing dangerous potions, we''ll go there. Derek, Lana, don''t you dare slack off while I''m gone, you also have your own exams in a few days." With that, Nick and Norman left the club-room heading to Norman''s practice field. ............................................................................ At sundown Norman returned to the club-room where he saw Derek and Lana still working on their own. Both of them looked at Norman with slightly interested gazes. Derek was the first to speak: "How were his spells teacher Norman?" Norman could tell that Lana wanted to ask the same question. He looked at Derek, then at Lana and sighed. "Sigh, you two should work harder." Saying that, Norman went into the other room and locked the door. Derek and Lana looked at each other with puzzled gazes. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 19: To Be Exceptional RIIIIIIIIINNNNNNGGGGGGG! Nick woke up at 3 am on a Monday morning to his phone''s alarm. He jumped up out of bed despite his feelings of tiredness. "Today''s the day of the mid-year exam. I''m going to have to mess someone up with my awesome magic scrolls." Nick said that to psyche himself up but truth be told he didn''t have much confidence in winning in a spar with his magic scrolls, after all, one of the cons of magic scrolls was that they were not as effective as spells cast by Magicians. Even Apprentice Magicians ought to be able to overcome spells from scrolls, at least scrolls made from a novice like himself. SLAP! SLAP! Nick caught himself in thinking self defeating thoughts and decided to use both hands to give himself good slaps on the face. (It''s not time to be talking about why I am going to lose. I already did the work. I should just do my best and whatever happens happens.) Nick pushed the negative self talk aside and did pushups for almost an hour. Next he washed his face and decided to look over his scrolls, making sure that each one was free from flaws. The testing supervised by Norman went well enough so Nick was confident in the quality of their laws at least. Nick made copies of fifteen scrolls for each spell; since the exam was only a spar, it should be enough just to show off his spells a little so fifteen scrolls each should be more than enough. Nick bought 4 special holsters to hold his scrolls during battle, two for the attack scrolls, one for the movement scrolls and one for the defense scrolls. He is going to attach the attack scrolls to his arms and the movement and defense scrolls to his thighs. Nick realized another disadvantage in using scrolls, one had to consider the logistics involved in carrying them around. The only advantage that Nick saw was that he could use an unlimited amount of them provided that he could create them in large amounts and nothing was wrong with any of them. At 6 am Nick showered and then got dressed, putting his holsters with his scrolls into his backpack. (Just do your best Nick, nothing else matters.) After some self encouragement, Nick left his dorm heading for the exam venue. There were a little over 800 students in Nick''s year and five exam venues. Based on the email that Nick received a week ago he had been assigned to Exam Building number 1. When he arrived at Exam Building number 1 there were many other students waiting outside for the doors to open. Everyone seemed to be excited, most people were in groups discussing possibilities for the exam or bragging about their magic power. Loners like Nick were few and far between. "It''s been a while Mr. sensitive, did you miss little old me?" Nick turned towards the voice to see a fairly pretty woman with short blond hair wearing a pair of navy blue jeans and a green blouse. "Cindy Reece." Nick uttered without thinking. It had been months since Nick last saw her, come to think of it she might be the first girl to ever remember Nick after not seeing him for so long. (Sad but true.) "Awww, you remembered this old lady here, that''s sweet." She gave a wide smile with absolutely white teeth. Nick almost squinted because of the ''brightness''. "So, I couldn''t help but notice that you still haven''t formed your mindscape yet, that''s so weird. Did you know that there is absolutely no magic energy coming from you, you do know that this as an academy for Magicians and that this is a magic based exam, right?" Cindy teased and Nick replied: "As a matter of fact smart ass, I am well prepared for the exam, as for my magic power, you are just not perceptive enough to notice it." Nick spoke in his defense, feeling awkward. "Oh, is ''your'' magic power related to what I''m feeling coming from your backpack, ha, ha, fine, I won''t bother prying into that but could you at least tell me why you haven''t formed your mindscape yet?" Cindy asked with an almost serious expression. (Nosy, isn''t she? Well...it probably won''t hurt to try and have a discussion with her while to building''s doors are still closed. She at least had the sense not to ask me what was in my backpack.) If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it."Well...I don''t mind telling you. I''m not from an affluent family so I don''t have access to good meditation techniques and I''m not satisfied with the generic one given by the academy either so I want to try to create my own before forming a mindscape." Cindy''s expression turned into one of amusement after hearing that. "You want to create your own meditation technique? I understand that the academy''s technique is lackluster but do you know what the consequences will be if you create a faulty meditation technique then use it on yourself. At best you become a retard, at worst you die. I''m not trying to play down your ''abilities'' but why risk it? Wouldn''t it be better to settle for the academy''s technique for now and then use a better technique later, I mean, you do kind of stand out right now for not having a mindscape, but not in a good way, aren''t you afraid that people might target you for being ''special''?" Nick understood Cindy''s thinking but that didn''t mean that he agreed with it. (Settle for the academy''s technique? I, Nick Capitol will never settle for anything but the best. Afraid of being targeted? I''m even more afraid of being average like the rest of you, I''m not living my life in fear of others.) Nick had experienced plenty of conversations like this in the past with people who just couldn''t understand why being exceptional was more important than fitting in and being like everybody else. When he was in high school spending all of his free time studying, all the people around him looked at him like he was a freak for putting in so much effort. While all the popular guys were only half-trying, getting mediocre grades and still being invited to parties, having a bunch of friends and getting with all the ''hot'' girls, here was little Nick with his head in a book trying to act like he was better than everyone else. ''He doesn''t have any sense.'' That''s mostly what Nick heard from people''s mouths when they referred to him. There were a few times when his grandaunt would catch him doing pushups in the morning and she would laugh at him saying: ''Why are you exercising, you don''t even play sports? What could someone like you who doesn''t even know how to talk to people do even if they let you on a team?'' Nick learnt a long time ago that most people will never understand the plain desire to want to be better, not in order to play status games with the people around them but because you know that you have something to offer the world that has to trained and honed to be useful; in other words you just wanted to develop yourself for the sake of just being better and it didn''t matter who was watching or who liked it, it didn''t even matter if you were ever acknowledged for it. (Fuck what anyone else thinks, this is my life and succeed or fail, I''m going to do things my way.) Nick looked calmly at Cindy and scratched his head while saying: "Ha, ha, I hope that won''t happen. I just think that being exceptional means to be an exception. I can''t to what everyone else does and expect to get above average results, am I right?" Cindy Reece''s amused expression intensified when she heard Nick say this and replied sarcastically: "You''re right, I wish I could be as brave and smart as you." With that Cindy stood quietly, putting earbuds into her ears, listening to music and waiting for the exam venue''s doors to open. Nick said nothing more, Cindy wouldn''t be interested in what he had to say anyway. When people think that you are the same or even worse than them, they will resent you for trying to be better, Nick didn''t know why that was and he stopped caring when he graduated from high school. As long as everyone stayed out of his way while he was trying to achieve his dream everything would be great, however, if you actively tried to bring him down... (I''ll bury you.) At 9 am the building''s door opened and everyone was told to come into the main hall by the administration staff present. The whole group of students flooded into the main hall. "Show time, huh?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 20: First Battle When all the students were gathered, a middle aged man in an all gray suit and a white dress shirt stood out to address the students. Nick knew who this middle aged man was. "Good morning students, my Name is Ray Menzes of the enforcement office. I am here today acting as the chief invigilator for this exam venue. Let me explain what you will be doing here today. The exam will take the form of one-on-one battles that will conclude if a student becomes incapacitated or a time limit is reached or an invigilator feels that the match needs to be stopped for whatever reason that they find worthy. The rules of the match are simple: defeat your opponent within the time limit without killing or permanently crippling them. Now, let me warn you of that latter part, If a student purposely kills or permanently cripples another in this exam, that student will be immediately executed on my authority. These rules are in place with the idea of: it is better not to clip the flowers before they have had time to bloom. The purpose of this exam is to show off your magical prowess to the judges observing the match so that they can give you a biased but semi-rational evaluation, nothing more. Each match will take place in one of the rooms in this building and all at the same time with a time limit of one hour. Don''t worry, there are more rooms in this building than are plainly visible so you will definitely be assigned one. Each match will have two Regular Magician judges who will be watching at all times until the match is concluded. You will have twenty minutes to prepare before you are each randomly teleported to a room with your opponent. That is all." When he finished speaking Ray Menzes disappeared as if he was never there. (No wonder I didn''t see him after he entered the orientation hall on the first day, it seems that he can make himself imperceptible. Whatever...I''ll be doing cooler things than that with my magic someday.) Nick went to the side and took out his holstered scrolls. He attached two sets of attack scroll onto his two forearms, one on each arm and attached his movement and defense scrolls to his thighs, movement on the right and defense on the left. Some students looked over at Nick''s weird accessories, probably due to the magic energy that was being attracted to the scrolls. Nick didn''t know how well his scrolls would do against another students'' spells but he had great hopes that the intensity of the magic that the scrolls attracted wasn''t just empty flash. Some students seemed to want to talk to Nick about his scrolls but they decided against it due to the current circumstance. (Well...at least they can read the room.) It might be because Nick was very perceptive towards the mood changes of others but when Ray Menzes finished his speech the temperature in the room dropped by a few degrees, figuratively of course, everyone became on edge, eyeing each other warily. Even those that acted like the best of chums before were smiling at each other awkwardly now. (That''s probably typical in a situation like this. Competition often brings out the worst in most people.) When the preparation time was over, Nick suddenly felt light on his feet and then the entire scenery in front of him changed from that of the main hall to a closed room with a raised concrete stage and three other people sitting at the far right of the room. There was a flash of light at the opposite end of the stage and another student appeared. "Hmmm...this student looks familiar...oh!" Nick couldn''t help but be surprised, it was his neighbor Don Bartholomew. Nick hadn''t seen him in a while because he hardly left his room in the last few months. Don looked almost the same except that he was more muscular now compared to a few months ago. Nick didn''t notice him in the sea of students earlier. When Don saw Nick he gave a smug smile and spoke: "Well...if it isn''t my quiet neighbor, Nick Capitol. I haven''t seen you in a long time, man. Looks like you''ve been holing yourself up in your room this entire time but haven''t made any real progress. Did you know, a lot of the girls in our dorm are talking shit about you behind your back because apparently you are the only one in our year that has not formed a mindscape yet, they say that they are embarrassed for you. Don''t you worry though, I took some revenge for you by fucking some of them real hard. Some of them even had some really tight pussies, I almost hurt myself a few times in your defense bro. Be a pal and just be my punching bag so that I can look good in front of the Regular Magicians" Nicked scrunched his face and raised his eyebrows when he heard that. "I really don''t like the way you talk." "Ha, ha." Don laughed and shrugged his shoulders in response. One of the three people sitting at the side of the stage spoke, he was a man that looked to be in his early thirties and was wearing an all black suit with a white dress shirt: "My name is Frank Wright and I will be your invigilator for this exam. The two gentlemen to my left are Regular Magicians that will act as judges for the match, you do not need to know their names. The match begins in one minute. Please get on the stage and get ready." Both Nick and Don followed Frank''s instructions and took their place at opposite ends of the stage. Nick purposely stood exactly opposite to Don and when one minute had passed, Frank shouted: "Begin!" Don immediately clasped is hands and after releasing them, four soccer ball sized fireballs appeared above him, glowing orange-red. Don chuckled and spoke: "Ha, Ha, although I''m not sure what magic scrolls you have attached to your arms and leg, I know that you come from a poor background so you definitely couldn''t afford to buy top quality ones to compensate for having no magic of your own so I''m sorry for what''s about to happen." After giving a hypocritical speech, Don willed for the four fireballs to approach Nick''s position at high speed. Even as Don was speaking Nick reached for a scroll on his right thigh. As soon as he held it, the entire scroll crumbled into dust, as the four fireballs were about to reach Nick, there was a blue flash of light and when it disappeared so did Nick. At the moment the fireballs hit Nick''s previous position with the concrete at that position being scorched black from the heat, Don noticed a shadow come over him and he raised his head slightly, with wide opened eyes he saw Nick in mid-air above his head. Nick, remembering the movements of Ron Varrow in his first combat class grabbed Don by the head and used his momentum and gravity to push Don''s face hard into the concrete. Nick now being low to the ground, holding down Don''s head said to him flatly: Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators!"You talk too much." After that Nick quickly removed his hand and grabbed another movement scroll from his right thigh and as he willed, it crumbled, there was a flash of blue light and when it disappeared Nick was at his initial position. One of the Regular Magicians who was reclining in his chair actually stood up as soon as Nick got back to his initial position. Frank and the other Regular Magician also looked surprised. Nick stood calmly but was inwardly excited. (Shit, that actually worked so perfectly. My movement spell ''Great Circle'' is based on the principles of spherical geometry. All spheres have an infinite amount of great circles which are circular planes that cut through the center of a sphere and they all meet at opposite ends of the sphere.My spell allows me to move myself along a great circle of an imaginary sphere that I dictate the size of, towards the opposite end. The most special thing about this spell is that the imaginary sphere can take shape ignoring the obstacles in the way such as the walls or even the concrete stage that we are standing on as long as I don''t attempt to move through any solid objects. This spell was a pain to conceptualize and put into practice but thank God it worked. I purposely stood exactly opposite to Don for a chance to act once he let his guard down. Its a good thing he didn''t move from his initial position when he cast that spell.) Don raised his head from off the ground. There was blood coming out of his nose and his eyes shone with anger but realizing his loss just a moment ago, he decided to stand up and calm himself before making any more moves. Nick wasn''t in a rush to fight directly with Don because the goal of the exam was to show off their magical prowess to the Magicians, not to have a heroic battle. Don took a deep breath in and began running towards Nick as if he had nothing to lose. When Don had halfway closed the distance between him and Nick he yelled and stomped his right foot. "Ahhhhhhhhhhh, you ungrateful bastard, I tried to be civil but you don''t know how to appreciate favors so take this, `Vulcan''s Fissure`." (Did he seriously yell out his spell''s name like what they do in an anime. Is this guy retarded?) The ground cracked at high speed moving towards Nick; powerful blasts of fire moved along with the growing crack and even though Nick ran to the side trying to dodge the attack, it changed trajectory toward wherever he moved to so Nick decided to meet the attack head on. He quickly grabbed his defensive scroll from his left thigh and as he willed it the scroll crumbled just as his eyebrows were starting to be singed by the heat of Don''s attack - that was how close Nick was to being hit. Don saw the strangest thing he had ever seen since coming to this academy, Nick met his attack head on but slid right past it as if his attack was somehow repelled, his attack making no contact and dispersing as it reached the end of the stage. Don''s eyes became wide open in shock but he caught himself and ran towards Nick who was a lot closer to him than before. Don activated another spell, both his hands and forearms being enveloped in fire. Nick was so close to Don that he could feel the heat coming from the flames; Nick quickly grabbed another movement scroll from his right thigh and with a flash of blue light, he appeared in mid-air in front of and slightly above Don. Don couldn''t believe it, his opponent was actually delivering himself to him to be burnt up. (Maybe the heat from my spell made him go confused. No, that''s not likely, this guy''s scrolls are weird, I should end this quickly.) Don swung both his fists towards Nick knowing that Nick couldn''t dodge because he was still in mid-air, however, Nick already had a scroll in his hand by the time he appeared in front of Don. As Nick willed, the scroll crumbled and Nick used both his hands to grab Don''s fiery fists. The smell of burnt flesh emanated from the stage when their hands made contact but then Don let out a loud shriek. "Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh! What the fuck, my hands." Don jumped backward, freeing himself from Nick''s grasp, he cancelled his spell unconsciously and started rolling around in agony. Don was in so much pain that he couldn''t even think, both his wrists had somehow changed position, causing his palms to be facing the opposite direction of their normal position. Nick didn''t want to waste any more time because he was in great deal of pain himself, with his burnt palms, he tore another attack scroll and pounced on Don, this time grabbing his knees. RRRIIIIIIIIIIPPPPP! With a ripping sound Don''s two knees along with his lower legs were twisted in the opposite direction. Nick quickly backed away to see Don convulsing in place from the pain. With that, Nick felt a force that he couldn''t resist push him softly off the stage while the invigilator appeared beside Don seemingly using magic to stop his convulsions and heal his injuries. Nick felt tired but satisfied, he almost didn''t mind the stinging pain that was coming from his burnt palms and fingers. (All of my magic scrolls worked well in the battle, the spell I used to defend against Don''s Vulcan''s Fissure is called `Parallel Pass` - it forces two figures into separate planes for a few moments resulting in them never ''meeting'' during the duration of the spell. That''s why it would seem to Don that I slid past his attack, because it came right at me but once my spell activated, it had no chance of crossing paths with me; the spell makes use of the principles of Euclidean geometry''s parallel postulate. My other spell that I used to hurt Don so badly, I call `Rotational Change`. It''s nothing complex, it uses the principle of transformational rotation to rotate whatever I touch by a certain amount of degrees above 20 degrees. I can''t actually control the number of degrees of the rotation but lucky for me that both times were an almost 180 degree rotation. My spells aren''t perfect but their effects helped me show off so I''m so proud of myself right now.) Nick was truly glad in his heart. After the invigilator healed Don''s injuries, one of the Regular Magicians appeared in front of Nick, cast a spell by raising his hands emanating a soft white light, healing Nick''s burnt hands and demanded: "Boy, you''ve got some interesting spells, be my, Devon Mason''s disciple." Nick looked squarely at this Magician and thought: (Not this shit again.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 21: Disciple Two days prior. ............................................ Norman''s practice field was enclosed in a large gymnasium like building. He opened the doors to the building with what Nick assumed was a spell by placing his right hand on the door for 5 seconds upon which a large number of laws written in Valteese glowed on the doors until they were finally opened. "Impressive, right? I use this building to house and test experimental potions so I use a rather complex security spell to keep others out. Don''t pay attention to the laws that you just saw on the door, I don''t mind telling you that they are traps for whoever wants to break in here by trying to translate and analyze them. Of course, my club member would never try to trespass on my property, am I right?" Norman said that with a carefree but almost menacing tone. "Of course not professor Norman. Since you must have other important things to do, I won''t waste much of your time." Norman looked at Nick with squinted eyes. "You know, you act polite and quiet but with my years of experience I can tell that there''s something very ''peculiar'' about you. Derek and Lana don''t sense it, but I''m older than you can possibly imagine so it''s clear to me - the ambition in your eyes." The next moment Norman''s eyes and tone returned to being genial. "Ha, ha don''t mind this old man''s ramblings, just be mindful, sometimes things go better with people if they don''t feel like the person in front of them is trying to mislead them in some way." Nick remained still for a few seconds, looking at Norman and then slowly nodded his head. Norman then silently led Nick to the inner area of the building containing the practice field. The field was clearly larger than what the building would suggest from the outside. (Spacial manipulation? From what I''ve read that kind of magic is very rarely specialized in by individuals because of the difficulty involved in developing a Magician that can manage the complexity of spacial characteristics within their magic. Usually those Magicians work for large organizations and are used to manage environments like this one.) Norman stood on the field and said to Nick: "Let''s not waste time, start testing your magic scrolls!" Nick nodded. "Sure thing professor, first I need to test a scroll that I intend to used for defensive measures; honestly it''s more evasive than defensive but I consider evasion the best defense. Could you send a light attack my way so I can see its performance?" Norman nodded, helping Nick was the reason that he came out here anyway. "Get ready." Nick took his scroll with the spell ''Parallel Pass'' in hand. Norman then pointed his finger at Nick and a green ball of light was formed and was launched at running speed towards Nick. Nick actually ran towards the ball of light and when he was only a feet or so from coming into contact with it, his scroll crumbled. Norman looked on, amused at Nick''s display. The ball of light seemed to approach Nick by a hair''s breadth but then slid past him in a straight line at an angle that was definitely different from its initial trajectory. When Norman saw that, he nodded his head but thought that that spell looked simple but felt a little strange; Norman took this feeling seriously because after over a dozen decades as a potion master, he had a sort of intuition towards strange magical happenings, the same as any Magician with years of experience would have. Norman decided that he needed to pay closer attention. "Next I''ll test out my movement spell." Norman nodded. Nick readied his scroll with the spell ''Great Circle'' and after taking a deep breath he willed its activation and the scroll crumbled. Nick shone with a blue light and appeared three feet behind Norman. Nick smiled at his second spell working so well because in his opinion, it was the most complex of his three spells. Norman this time was secretly shaken, a drop of sweat ran down his cheek; this wasn''t because Nick''s spell was awe inspiring or powerful, in fact, the power of Nick''s spell was worthless in his eyes but that spell gave him a feeling that a Magician would only get from facing something that was unknown, after all, every Magician knew that facing unknown kinds of magic could easily lead to a premature death. (Am I overthinking it? What''s so strange about his little spell? Hmmm...it seems that I can''t tell what kind of magic that his spell is making use of. Was it space magic, or maybe light magic?) Norman turned towards Nick with his usual confidence and said: "This is taking too long, just show me your last spell and be done with it!" Nick smiled at Norman''s impatience and took out his third and final scroll but felt a little awkward; this was supposed to be his attack spell called ''Rotational Change''. Its test would work best with a live target but he doubted that Norman would let him use it on him. Norman sensed Nick''s awkwardness. "What''s wrong?" Nick scratched his head awkwardly. "I didn''t think to get a live target like a small animal to test my attack scroll on. Can I go buy one from the academy and come back?" "Hmph!" Norman made a sound in slight annoyance and waved his hand and a toddler sized goat appeared on the field lying down with its legs tied and mouth muffled. "If you want to be a good Magician, you should learn to prepare like one!" Nick nodded seriously and replied. "Understood professor." Nick walked towards the goat with his scroll. It looked at him with seemingly pleading eyes but Nick had to test his scroll. Nick pushed aside the uncomfortable feelings he was getting from thinking about what he was about to do. When Nick reached beside the goat he willed the scroll to activate, it crumbled and Nick stooped down to touch the goat''s neck with his right palm. RRRRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIPPPPPPPP! The goat''s neck instantly twisted all the way clockwise until it was back to its original position, blood oozed out from the goats mouth, nose and eye sockets. Nick was so surprised at the sight that he took five steps back, fairly disturbed. Norman looked on at the scene with bewilderment. (What is the nature of the magic that he is using? It''s not spacial, psychic or mechanically based; one second the goats neck was fine and the next it was twisted 360 degrees but I can''t identify the nature of the magic that the scroll used to do it?) Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation."Strange." Nick was visibly ecstatic. All three spells worked like they were supposed to and so he had enough confidence in not failing his upcoming exam because of not having any strong enough magic to use. Nick heard footsteps and noticed that Norman had walked next to him. In Nick''s excitement, he almost forgot hat Norman was even there. Norman looked at Nick seriously and spoke: "Nick, how did you go about creating the spells on your scrolls, of course, I''m not asking for in depth details but they are strange in a way so I would like some insight as to their nature?" Nick was puzzled at the professor''s question. "Well...professor, just like I read in the spell creation books, I basically conceptualized what I wanted my spells to do and based on my own knowledge of mathematics, I developed theories for how they should work, developed proofs, condensed them and translated them into Valteese. I continued to make adjustments and corrections to the spells until the magic I felt emanating from them felt just right." Norman squinted his eyes. "Is that so? Well, in that case, do you want to become my disciple? I think that you have some significant talent and if honed correctly, you could be a real force to be reckoned with. The terms would be that I will teach you as much information about becoming a Magician as possible over a period of time as well as give you magic and economic resources and in exchange, you will help me with my research, share information related to your development and when you become a Magician, help me in the future with magic related tasks. Do you agree with becoming my disciple?" Nick felt excited, he didn''t completely understand what was so impressive about his magic scrolls but the opportunity to become the disciple of a Regular Magician was really tempting. (I should say yes.) "Y..." Nick only made an utterance before a scene from his memory resurfaced in his mind. It was when he first met Norman. After having knocked on the door, he heard shuffling and after some time Norman came out with Lana walking slowly behind him with her clothes slightly out of place in certain suspicious sections, as if she had just hurried to put them on. Not to mention Norman had noticeably missed a loop on his pants'' waist area, a grand Magician that didn''t know how to wear his belt around his waist, that''s not likely; it was as if he had rushed to put his belt on and happened to miss the loop; Norman never missed a loop again. Nick lacked certain ''experiences'' but he wasn''t naive. Lana had definitely made an ''agreement'' in order to get Norman''s support. Nick looked at Norman''s calm smile and thought: (Norman, are you trying to fuck me?) Of course he didn''t mean that literally, but something about Norman''s proposal seemed odd in that he only made it after seeing Nick''s spells. He even asked how Nick went about creating his spells. Nick got all his spell creation knowledge from Norman and Nick did in fact create his spells using that knowledge. (The only reason he would ask his initial question is if there was something peculiar about my spells that he couldn''t understand. It seems to me that he want''s to make me his disciple to gain a better understanding of that peculiarity.) Nick didn''t trust Norman and his intentions. A Magician''s success is clearly dependent on the uniqueness and effectiveness of their methods. If there was something so peculiar about Nick''s spells that they even made a Regular Magician interested in them, why should he just share his results for a vague promise of support. Nick had an intuition, one born from nearly two decades of being mistreated and taken advantage of, that if he said yes to Norman, he would be the one on the losing end. (A mature person relies on themselves morning, noon and night. While I''m not mature yet, that''s my aim and if I want to climb all the way up the mountain, I have to to it the right way - with my own developed strengths. Not to mention, Norman''s offer sounds too good to be true.) Nick steeled himself and said: "Thank you for the interest professor, but I like to work on my own. I don''t want to have a master, at least for now. I''m still trying to find out who I am and I don''t want any undue influence from someone as powerful as you on me while I''m doing that." Nick clasped his hands and did a slight bow while saying these things to make himself look apologetic; he had seen this stance in a Japanese drama once and the guy on the receiving end looked real understanding. Norman looked at Nick for close to thirty seconds and then said: "So be it." With that, the scroll testing ended and Nick and Norman left the building, not a word being exchanged between them. ................................................................... At the present time. "Thank you for your interest Magician Mason but you should get a talented disciple. This one here is naive and clumsy, in addition I have my own plans with another Magician." Nick used the same bow he did with Norman and made an excuse to get out of the situation. "Hmph." Devon Mason made a sound of annoyance and returned to his seat. The invigilator stood up to speak, with Don Bartholomew now laying unconscious on the floor. "The match has concluded with you, Nick Capitol, being the overall victor but ultimately your grade for this exam will be determined by the judges. I will return you to the main hall and you will have to wait for the results with the other candidates. Be aware that you may see students from other exam venues within this building''s main hall when I send you back." With that, the space around Nick momentarily warped and he was returned to the main hall. He was actually the only one to finish at this time. Nick took out his phone to look at the time; his match had actually lasted only 20 minutes. "I suppose that''s a good thing in terms of a spar." The next moment, someone else appeared in the room a few feet away from Nick. Nick turned his head to take a closer look at who it was and he put on an indifferent expression, seeing that it was someone he knew. (Cindy Reece.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 22: Rank Spell creation club around the time of the first year exam. ......................................... Norman Foster sat at his desk in his personal section of the club room looking over large and clearly very old books. He had been doing this over the past two days while he was in the club room. The reason - Nick Capitol''s magic scrolls. "The spells contained in those scrolls felt odd to me. After looking over my texts, I can now with certainty intuit the cause of my restlessness. The spells'' effects aren''t very special for someone at my level but it was the magic energy involved when the spells were cast that have my attention. Usually a Magician''s spells exude magic that take on a certain nature when creating an effect. The most common natures are associated with the elements or a combination of them such as, water, fire, iron, even darkness could be a nature involved in magic energy. All this depends mostly on the laws used but the nature of a spell''s required magic can also be altered by the Magician''s mindscape. This is clearly not the case for Nick as he does not have a mindscape and he used magic scrolls to cast his spells." Norman rubbed his forehead in annoyance. "That has to be why Nick''s spells felt foreign to me. What a lucky kid. magic scrolls work by using the magic in the atmosphere to cast a spell and based on the laws of the spell, the magic attracted would have a certain nature, for example, if the spell involves creating a ball of fire, then magic energy with characteristics related to fire would be attracted to the scroll. Whatever kind of magic energy that Nick''s spell attracted to the scrolls is unknown to me. Thinking back on the twisting of that goat''s neck, usually all that is required is a spell that can produce a force to cause that effect, such as, a psychic spell that used magic related to the mind''s will, or spacial magic that could rend the goat''s neck or even magic that enhanced Nick''s strength enough to twist the neck with very little effort on his part but I clearly felt that there was no external ''force'' acting on the goats neck, magically or otherwise. It was as if whatever caused the goats neck to twist was borne from the goat itself influenced by Nick''s magic spell but at the same time his spell did not directly use force to cause the twist. There are dozens of natures that magic energy could take on and some are so special that they are treated as national treasures and some are even outlawed." Norman, in his dozens of years of being a Magician have seen many kinds of magic but he had never come in contact with magic that had the nature that Nick''s scrolls possessed. Norman had come to a conclusion. "That young man has seemed to have stumble on magic with a completely unknown nature; based on my studies, I know that there are many types of magic that are not practised on Grand Earth but are widely practised in other realms and that''s usually the case because of a difference in the composition of the surrounding magic energy. Hmph, I tried to find out more by getting him to become my disciple but the boy actually refused. If he had agreed to my proposal I could have used tens of excuses to forcibly take possession of his scrolls and do research." Norman was left with no choice but to leave Nick alone, after all, the academy had its own rules, even ones that were not written in the academy''s handbook that were just as important as the ones written down. If I stole a student''s magical possessions, especially one that that student created himself, that would be a serious crime and not even he, a Regular Magician, could avoid punishment if he was caught. The academy does this to protect the students from predators within its own walls and to foster their individuality and growth. In this case, Nick''s magic scrolls represented a great fortune because introducing a new kind of magic energy for public use always had opportunities attached to it, the more special and rare the magic energy the more opportunities would open up. If the magic involved a nature that was difficult to deal with in battle, that could even establish a country''s supremacy over it neighbors for decades to come. Norman remembered a story he had heard, detailing when magic that had nature that affected a person''s ''luck'' was discovered. The person who introduced this magic energy to the public was able to kill people by giving them bad luck, using the person''s own circumstances to deal with them. Before that kind of magic became more commonly used, it was practically unstoppable because it was so difficult to defend against because it was not truly understood how it produced its effects. Norman could only sigh at his loss, he could only try to entice Nick later when the opportunity was right? Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author."Sigh, if only Nick was as naive as Lana." Up to now Norman had only valued Derek as a person worthy to be his disciple. Although Lana had real interest in spell making, she was unwilling to do the actual work it would require to become an excellent spell maker. Recognizing this, Norman used his position and the benefits he could offer to turn Lana into his plaything, promising her that if she pleased him he would teach her the shortest way to become a powerful spell maker. Norman may be over one hundred years old but Magicians aged differently than normal people and do still indulge in their vices even after living for so long. When Norman had first met Nick, He was in the middle of ''taking care'' of Lana and in his hurry to attend to whoever was at his door, he might of left traces in regards to his lechery. He only rushed because he thought that since the person that knocked probably wasn''t Derek, it might be someone from the enforcement office. While it is not against the rules to have intimate relationships with students, politically, it was a no, no. The Magicians'' world is cruel and one should never let anyone get a hold on their weakness, politically or otherwise. "For now, I''ll continue helping him in order to observe his progress and if there is an opportunity, obtain whatever results he has in relation to the strange magic." ...................................................... "Mr. Sensitive, how did you do in your match? I hope you didn''t lose too bad." Nick was honestly tired of this woman. The more he interacted with her, the more difficulty she had in hiding her condescension. He simply shrugged his shoulders in response and started to think back on his match with Don. Cindy seemed to take the hint and stood quietly at the side waiting for what would happen next. (I did pretty well for a complete novice in combat. My spells worked well and there were no surprises. The most important thing out of the whole situation wasn''t the match, it was the fact that another Regular Magician was interested enough in my scrolls to want me to become their disciple. I don''t think that Devon Mason had good intentions though, that''s just my intuition, the same one that warned me when Norman proposed the same thing. I need to study my scrolls carefully for any peculiarities when I get back to my dorm.) Over the course of the next fifty minutes almost all of the students were teleported to building number 1''s main hall except for those who were seriously injured during their match. It was at the end of the fifty minutes that Ray Menzes made his appearance, saying: "Listen up, all of the judges have submitted grades for the matches that they watched. If you are concerned with the fairness of your grades, don''t worry, the academy has methods to compel even Regular Magicians to act honestly. You were all graded based on a certain criteria and you will all be ranked according to this criteria. You will be emailed the breakdown of your individual performance tomorrow at midday. For now, pay close attention to your rankings. The ranks are separated into ranks E, D, C, B, A and S with E being the worst and S being the best. Honestly, they are only significant for the top 10 students as they will receive the reward of having an audience with the Dean to ask whatever magic related questions they wish. " The whole room went into an uproar, apparently an audience with the Dean was attractive to the the students. Nick had a thought: (If I could get an audience with the dean, I could ask him what was so special about my scrolls, that would be very helpful.) Nick had that wonderful thought but had very little expectations towards being ranked within the top ten of students. Ray Menzes looked at his wristwatch, nodded his head and shouted: "It''s time! Students, take a look at your rankings." A large blue holographic screen appeared in front of the group of students separating them and Ray. The screen showed the rankings of over eight hundred students and each student had their eyes glued to the screen searching for their name. Nick went with the most obvious strategy. (I''m going to look at the names starting from the top until I find mine.) When Nick reached the fourth name on the board, his jaw almost dropped from shock, he ended up uttering the words without thinking. "Nick Capitol, Grade S, Rank 4. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 23: Visiting The Dean (Grade S, rank 4.) Nick was bewildered to say the least. Out of over 800 students he ranked fourth and not only that, he was given the highest grade classification possible. (Why would my grade and rank be so high? I only used scrolls to fight while everyone else are actual Apprentice Magicians. Then again, I did beat Don Bartholomew but from my inexperienced perspective Don was probably also inexperienced and seemed to have the temperament of a boastful child. Did beating him really earn me such a high grade and rank?) Ray Menzes spoke from behind the hologram: "These grades are final and your ranking will not change until your end of year exam. Traditionally, the end of year exam is talked about at this point to prepare you for what is to come. The end of year exam will be a sort of survival challenge that we have every year and will be hosted within a private realm that the academy controls. Let me be clear, the mortality rate of students at Magician academies is so high because of challenges like this so from now on you should focus on improving yourselves because if you don''t you will eventually become meat on someone else''s chopping block. Ranks 1 through 10 of grade S, stay here, I will escort you to receive your reward. An audience with the Dean that involves you asking him magic related questions is an opportunity that should not be wasted. Think properly about what you are going to ask." Nick was very happy but that feeling was disturbed by a uneasiness that rose up within him, he could feel someone watching him closely; this awareness was also a skill he developed from growing up, always being the ''weird'' one. Nick glanced at his right side to see Cindy Reece staring him down. She had an expression of clear confusion. Nick didn''t really care about her confusion and wasn''t going to interact with her unless he had to. (That''s the look that you give someone when they''ve done something that you didn''t think they were capable of. You don''t even know me idiot.) Nick ignored Cindy and decided to think about his reward. (What should I ask the Dean? Maybe I should ask why I got such a high grade and rank because I''ve got no clue. Come to think of it, two Regular Magicians saw something about my scrolls that interested them, could it be that whatever they were interested in is the reason for my high results? Hmmm...that seems to be very likely. If Norman and Devon noticed, then it is very likely that the academy''s other faculty noticed as well when I fought Don so it should not be all that harmful to ask the dean questions about my magic scrolls.) "All students that are inferior to grade S rank 10 are to leave this building right now!" With Ray''s command, dozens of students left the exam building talking about their experiences during this exam. Cindy also left while continuing to stare at Nick. When she left the building, the uneasy feeling that Nick endured suddenly went away. (That woman''s weird herself, giving me such unease.) After almost all the students left, there remained only ten students, four women and six men. They all seemed to be around Nick''s age or a little older. Nick kept to himself and waited for instructions. Ray walked towards the students saying: This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon."All ten of you, follow me to the dean''s office, no unnecessary talking is allowed." Nick preferred that also but he had to ask something. "Mr. Menzes, why are we walking to the dean''s office? With your awesome powers, couldn''t we teleport there or something?" Ray stopped walking, turned around and squinted his eyes at Nick. He answered with clear annoyance in his tone. "While there are general spells and tools that allow Magician''s to do similar things, you should stop thinking that all powerful Magicians can do anything with their magic. Almost all of us have our area of expertise and don''t use magic beyond that area of expertise very much. What you are referring to is space related magic and while there are Magicians and tools that can teleport people, I am not such a Magician and I do not have such a tool. Although, I do know basic space magic, my magical affinities and my expertise are not related to that kind of magic energy so it would not benefit me to learn a teleportation spell. Although the exam buildings have within them magic that allows us to teleport people at will, the destination has to be within one of the exam venues. Take note students, almost all powerful Magicians are specialized. My unsolicited advice is that you should learn what kind of magic best suits you and limit yourself to mostly those related spells in preparation for your end of year exam. If you don''t heed my advice, you may not make it to your second year." All ten of us silently nodded in response to Ray''s advice. Thirty minutes later, we reached a cube like building with many carvings on it''s exterior walls. The symbols carved into the building almost looked like Valteese but due to his constant studying, Nick knew that this was not Valteese. Ray spoke when they reached the building''s entrance. "Do you see these carvings. They are the laws left by a former dean of this academy. With them here, even if a spell was cast that is powerful enough to destroy the entire academy, this one building would still stand." Ray then led the students into the building. Based on a map put in the lobby reception area, this building actually had thirty floors but from the outside it seemed to be only five storeys high. Ray made us take the elevator to the 29th floor. It was a quiet ride and even the feeling of inertia was absent the entire time. When we got off the elevator we could see a hall with five doors on each side of it and there was also a door at the end of the hall, it was a fancy looking wooden double door with markings carved into it that were similar to those on the exterior of the building. Above the door was a sign written in a cursive styled font that read, ''The Dean''s Office''. The group walked up to that door and before Ray opened the door he turned to us saying: "Act with caution in this room, the dean is not as tolerant as he may look. You should always assume that you are under surveillance and for your own sakes, do not ever attempt to lie to the Dean when he asks you a direct question." With that, Ray Menzes opened the double doors and the group walked in. Nick thought while entering: (This is my chance to learn more about magic. I''m going to get as much useful information out of this old man as I can.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 24: Congratulations The dean''s office had a waiting room equipped with several rows of chairs and a receptionist''s desk. A black woman seemingly in her mid thirties wearing a well fitted pants suit who also had straight black hair that reached down to her shoulders sat behind the desk. Ray turned to face the group and told them with a stern expression to take a seat; the chairs were made of plastic, positioned side by side with every two rows positioned closely facing opposite directions. All ten of us sat in a chair belonging to the first two rows. Ray Menzes spoke to the receptionist: "I am Ray Menzes of the enforcement office. I''m here to escort the first years with the top ranks to see the dean. We''re expected so please notify the dean." The receptionist nodded, picked up her phone and made a call. After speaking to the person on the other end of the call for about a minute, she ended the call and said: "Mr. Menzes, please follow me to see dean Xavier Gecko." The receptionist and Ray walked towards a door near to the far left corner of the room. Nick was facing that direction and now that the receptionist had left her desk to lead Ray to the dean, Nick had a clear view of her; she had a very athletic but curvy body. Nick had never paid much attention to women, probably because of his harsh upbringing and constant studying but as he looked at the receptionist walking to the door, he thought: (She''s got a nice looking ass.) Nick had mixed feelings about the thought that he had because he didn''t normally have any opinion of women no matter how they looked but after thinking a bit, he just silently shook his head. (Of course I''m having these thoughts, I''m almost 20 years old and I am still a virgin, not to mention that scene with Don and that woman on the first day is still fresh in my mind. Never mind all that, magic is more important than women right now.) Both the receptionist and Ray went through the door. This door had the name Xavier Gecko carved into a gold plate that was attached to the door. While they were gone some of the students began to speak, one in particular, a white haired, white young man addressed the group: "I was a somewhat surprised when they teleported me into a building that was different from the one that I did the exam in but it looks like that was all to get the ten of us in the same place. I was assigned to exam venue number 5 in the beginning." A short woman with pink rimmed glasses and curly brown hair spoke next: "I started off in building number 3. They must have teleported all the students to one place after the exams ended. What buildings did the rest of you start off in?" Most of the ten spoke excluding Nick and another young man that had a shaved head and a constant frown on his face. Nick actually seemed to be the the only person here that started off in exam building 1, the rest of the students started off in one of the other 4 buildings. Nick took notice of what the other students were saying immediately. (The hall of building number 1 did seem more filled with people than it was originally, the invigilator already told me that would be the case when my match ended but it seems that the rest were caught by surprise. Just like Ray mentioned earlier, persons can be teleported from one building to another. Space magic seems very convenient, I wonder if that is what I should specialize in?) The young man with the shaved head and frown suddenly spoke: "Can''t you donkeys shut up? We''re not here to make friends so just mind your own business and wait for that suit wearing bastard to get back here." The rest of the students frowned upon hearing this but no one responded to him, instead they all went back to minding their own business. Nick looked at the situation and was a little irked by he young man''s tone but since his remark wasn''t directed at him personally he wasn''t planning to say anything. Ray and the receptionist came out of the Dean''s room in a few minutes. Nick had his eyes on the receptionist rather than on Ray and feeling his stare, the receptionist returned one of her own. Nick got flustered and turned away. The receptionist returned to her desk and ignored Ray''s group. Ray Menzes spoke: "One by one according to your rank, you will each go inside that room to speak with dean Gecko. Rank 1, Daryl Smith, go into the dean''s room." The young man with the shaved head stood up and made his way into the dean''s room. The rest of the student''s patiently waited for their turn. While occasionally stealing glances at the receptionist, Nick thought: (That bald guy is rank 1. What is the criteria that determines our ranks? I guess I''ll find out tomorrow when I get the breakdown of how I was graded like what Menzes had mentioned.) Twenty minutes later Daryl emerged from the dean''s room and quietly took a seat in the third row. He still had a frown on his face but less so than before. "Rank 2, Mary Thomas, enter the dean''s room." A woman that looked the youngest of the group stood up. She looked like a teenage girl that still had baby fat on her face, she had long black hair that reached to her knees and she seemed to be of Indian descent. She made her way into the dean''s room and was in there for about 25 minutes before coming back to sit where she had been before. "Rank 3, Jerry Taylor, enter the dean''s room." A black young man with low cut hair wearing a pair of jeans and a hoodie stood up and made his way into the dean''s office. (This is taking a long time. I should invest in a pair of headphones to use in times like this. I''m bored out of my mind and I think I''m staring at the receptionist too much, the others are starting to notice.) Some of the other student''s noticed Nick''s constant glances at the receptionist. Most said nothing but a short girl with curly brown hair winked at Nick and gave him a thumbs up. Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.(What the hell does that even mean?) Nick ignored her and after fifteen minutes, Jerry returned to his seat. "Rank 4, Nick Capitol, enter the dean''s office." Nick got up and made his way into the dean''s room. The dean''s room had a red carpet with gold symbols scattered all over it leading from the door to his desk, the walls were paneled with wood that had designs that looked like scenes from action films with men fighting monsters and the like. When Nick looked up he saw a strange white light that made it impossible to see the ceiling. On a slightly raised platform, behind a wooden desk sat a man with a shaved head and drooping ears wearing a gold colored robe. He looked at Nick with a calm smile and spoke as soon as Nick was a couple feet from his desk. "Nick Capitol, out of all the ten students brought here you are the most ''special'', do you know why?" Nick didn''t like the way that dean Gecko had said the word special but he answered the question anyway. "Is it because I''m brown, juicy and jacked?" Nick had heard that joke in an interview of a business man on TV when he was younger and decided to use it now since the dean had asked such a cryptic question. The dean squinted his eyes and spoke: "Hmph, no. It''s because you managed to get such a good ranking on a magic related exam even though you do not have a mindscape. The children that came here with you are definitely wondering why that is, in fact, the previous three students asked about your situation in passing. I told them nothing though." Nick shrugged his shoulders. (Those students didn''t have to ask the dean. I would have told them the answer myself. I would have said, "It''s because of these nuts.") (Ha, ha.) Nick chuckled internally but had a serious face when speaking with the dean. "Dean Gecko, this is what I most wanted to ask you about. Why did I receive such a high ranking in the exam, I don''t think I did anything special? The reason I probably won was because my opponent was somewhat retarded and all I did was use magic scrolls which are inferior in power to an Apprentice Magician''s spells." The dean seemed amused. "While it is true that magic scrolls aren''t usually very strong but that mostly depends on the Magician that made the scrolls and the quality of magic stored in the scroll. Give me one of your scrolls...don''t worry as long as you are a student of this academy your creations are protected from being stolen by anyone, especially the staff." Nick didn''t know whether he should believe the dean''s words or not but the fact of the matter is that the dean definitely knows what happened in Nick''s match anyway and the power of a Regular Magician is not something Nick could resist so he decided to hand over one of his scrolls to the dean. The dean spent a minute looking at the contents of the scroll and gave it back to Nick. "As I suspected. I was sent a recording of your match and the academy''s recordings also carry the details of the magic used by the students including the nature of the magic and the intensity of the magic energy at every moment. Do you know that the enforcement office could not identify the nature of the magic coming from your scrolls?" Nick was puzzled. "How could that be, my scrolls have simple spells written in Valteese on them?" The dean looked at Nick, even more amused. "You may not have noticed but a certain portion of your spell is in fact not written in Valteese." Nick became even more puzzled when he heard that and took out one of his scrolls to take a look. (What is this old man saying? If it''s not written in Valteese then how could the spell work?) "Look closely, the clues are subtle." Nick started reading through his scroll and the dean waited patiently for Nick to pick up on the subtle anomaly in his scroll''s laws. Nick read the scroll over and over again until he found the supposed anomaly. (There is actually something wrong with two of the paragraphs in my spell. I didn''t notice until the dean pointed out that something was wrong with the Valteese but some of the symbols look similar to Valteese but aren''t really Valteese. How did this happen? Hmmmm....I guess I made so much corrections to my initial scrolls that at some point I stopped paying attention to how I wrote the symbols and paid more attention to the magic energy that was being attracted to the scroll. I didn''t feel anything change about the magic energy other than the concentration but that''s probably because I don''t have a mindscape yet....) It was as if Nick was struck by lightning, he came to a realization. (So that''s what going on, Valteese is a very precise language and the symbols used in the construction of laws for spells have to be written or carved correctly for the correct effects to be created. Some of the symbols in my laws are actually incorrect but the spell still worked. If that is the case...then did I actually luck into creating an altered version of Valteese that works? I practically discovered symbols related to another mystical language!) Nick eyes opened wide at the realization. With wide opened eyes he looked at the dean''s smiling face. "Ha, ha, so you''ve realized. Congratulations are in order. Whether by luck or by fate, you''ve done something that most Magicians never do. You''ve created completely original laws and yes I do mean completely original. Because Valteese is such a precise language, if it is changed even slightly, it is no longer Valteese which also means that the nature of your spell as a whole, in magical terms, is completely different than what you probably envisioned." Nick took a deep breath and remembered all the days that he had spent studying, all the sneers and ridicule he got for his focus and dedication to something that most people found boring, all of the times he heard, ''He doesn''t have any sense.'' Right now, Nick truly felt that it was all worth it for this moment. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 25: Uncertainty Nick was feeling extremely pleased with himself. (Never mind the emotions that I''m feeling right now. The dean says that the type of magic attracted by the laws of the spell on my magic scroll is probably different than what I probably envisioned...well, I actually didn''t consider the nature of the magic when I was creating the spell. What an oversight! Also, since my spell involves a new mystical language, how exactly do I continue exploring this language, after all, I wrote it by accident?) The dean waited patiently for Nick to sort out his thoughts. "Dean Gecko, I actually didn''t think at all about the nature of the magic that would be used in the spell since I was unfamiliar with that line of thinking. Can you explain what determines the nature of the magic." The dean rubbed his chin and spoke: "The reason that expert spell makers are so rare is because creating laws that are suited for a certain affinity is quite difficult if you do not possess that affinity yourself. Of course to determine what nature the magic in your spell and by extension the nature of your spell will take, you need to assess the purpose of the spell. The magic scroll you gave me earlier with the spell ''Great Circle'' is very good in a theoretical sense but to make it applicable, the right kind of magic must be involved in its application. Normally for that kind of spell, space magic would be the most suitable but apparently you discovered a kind of magic even more suitable via your spell''s laws. That is also what tends to determine the nature of a spell and its magic, the laws that are used to create it. Most Magicians that have their own mystical language say that the language is borne from their own specialization and affinities with a specific kind of magic." Nick was starting to understand. (So he is saying that my spells work the way they do because: 1, the purpose of the spell and 2, the likely affinity that my spell''s laws have with certain kind of magic.) "How do I explore the mystical language further so that I can determine its affinity for a certain kind of magic?" The deans eyes shone when he heard Nick''s question. The dean raised his right hand and pointed at Nick. "Well, my dear student, do you know where all the affinities of a Magician stem from? It''s their soul, the soul is closely linked to the mind and is the ultimate source of all their memories, wills and emotions. You discovered this mystical language, and believe me, it was likely not a complete accident that you did, it''s likely that you have a certain affinity for a kind of magic and the mystical language was borne from that affinity in order to better make use of your affinity. If so, the laws involved with the language''s affinity is definitely somewhere within your soul because affinities are themselves borne from laws, laws that you do not yet understand. My specialization happens to be soul magic. I can help you interact further with your soul''s affinities, but there is a ''small'' price to pay. If I help you, you must agree to continue exploring the art of spell making and in the future, when I want you to create spells for me, you must do it, of course I''ll pay you appropriately for your services. Do you agree?" The dean still had his right hand raised at Nick when it started emanating a deep purple light. Nick looked at the dean''s hand and it was like all of his conscious memories since childhood flooded his mind at this time. (What the fuck? That''s some really creepy magic, dredging up all my trauma like that. He might as well be giving me a mental prostate exam. Whatever...his offer is compelling since if I had to examine my soul''s affinities myself, it would take a long time since I don''t even have a mindscape yet. Sigh, this is one those times where it''s more profitable to take a risk and see what happens.) Nick decided to humor the dean. "I agree to your proposal." The dean smiled in response to Nick''s consent. "Good." The dean said slowly while the deep purple light coming from his outstretched right hand intensified. Nick felt an intense pressure come over him, his entire world was now bathed in purple light and he was unable to move. In a moment, Nick was unable to bear the pressure he was feeling and completely collapsed, his vision going dark. (What the hell is going on, is the dean trying to kill me? No, that''s not right, the academy''s faculty are not allowed to kill students willfully, those are the rules.) The author''s narrative has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon."What do you know about the rules, fool?" Nick heard a voice that he could not recognize. He could not tell whether it was male or female but it had an imposing base. "Huh, who are you?" Nick heard no reply in response to his question, instead his vision returned and the pressure on his body went away. Nick realized that he was now lying on the ground in a grassy field, the sky was dark and gloomy with no stars. He could now see, but the place was so gloomy that he couldn''t even tell what time of day it was. Standing up, Nick could see an area filled with trees in the distance. "Go to that forest, there is something waiting there for you." Nick heard the imposing voice once again but no matter how much he tried to ask the voice for an explanation, he received no answer. "I should just do what the voice says, not like I have any alternatives." Nick made his way towards the forest. He walked a distance that he felt was about one kilometer before getting to the edge of the forest. "God, I hope I don''t die from entering this place. That dean really screwed me, putting me in whatever situation this is. Note to self, don''t trust other Magicians no matter what their titles are." Nick grudgingly entered the forest. After walking some distance Nick heard what sounded like speaking so he decided to walk towards the voices. Going past the trees and forcing his way through bushes, Nick eventually came to small clearing where six figures surrounded another figure that was chained up on the ground. The six standing figures seemed to not be wearing clothes at all, they had yellow eyes, yellowish fangs protruding from their mouths and thick brown hair visible all over their bodies. They were pointing at the shadowy figure chained on the ground in turn, encircling him, saying: "Bastard! Did you think that we, difficulties, would not finally encircle and bind you, making you as pitiful and helpless as you are now. This is what you get for walking down a path that you are ignorant of. We will definitely tear you apart." The six standing figures laughed and jeered at the shadowy figure on the ground. Nick didn''t know what was happening but decided to wait from behind a tree to see what would happen. The shadowy figure spoke in the midst of all the jeers: "Difficulties, I did not mean to aggravate you but the only reason you found me was because I chose to sing my favorite song while going on my journey. Even now, while you are encircling me I will still sing my song." "On my journey in the distance far away, I see my desires clearly." "My soul aches for change and grace." "No matter the pain, I will carry on..." The shadowy figure on the ground started to sing amidst the difficulties. The yellow eyed, hairy figures sneered at the shadowy figure and one of them that was bigger than the others spoke: "This bastard is a lunatic, not caring about us difficulties and still singing his song. Brothers, lets stop wasting our time with him, destroying such a lunatic has no value for us. You better not come our way again or we will not let you go." After making that declaration the six hairy figures left. After waiting some time to make sure that they had really left, Nick went over to the figure on the ground and asked: "Do you need some help?" The shadowy figure groaned and said: "Please pull these chains apart, the difficulties can chain you down for a time but their bindings are always loose, easily unraveled by purposeful effort." Nick took hold of the chains and pulled. The chains actually came apart fairly easily and the shadowy figure stood up. This figure was shaped like a man with an athletic build and had a stern, gravely voice but no matter how Nick looked, he could not make out the man''s features, his whole body seeming like a shadowy blur. Nick asked: "What is your name? What were those six creatures from before and why were they here?" The figure looked at Nick and spoke: "My name is Uncertainty and I walked into this forest in search of something." Uncertainty looked towards the direction that the hairy figures left in and said: "Those creatures are known as difficulties. As for why they were here...don''t you know young man? Uncertainty will always be found in the midst of difficulties." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 26: Rules (Okay...I''m just going to pretend that what this guy said makes sense.) "Well then Uncertainty, my name is Nick and we should leave before they decide to come back. I am supposed to be getting answers for some very important questions that I have, but instead, I ended up in this crap hole and I don''t know where to go from here." Uncertainty looked at Nick and spoke: "When there is uncertainty, you will find answers in the strangest of places. I myself am looking for something. I came to this forest because I heard that at the northern end of it there is a mountain that has a cave where someone who can help me achieve anything successfully lives. I was making my way there to get him to help me with my search but the difficulties found me while I was singing while walking on my path. I sang my song again while the difficulties had me bound and they left and so I avoided being torn apart by them. It''s a good thing that difficulties shun perseverance." Nick felt that this man''s words had a deeper meaning but decided to ignore that for now and pay attention to what Uncertainty said about the mountain. "If there is such a person that can help me with getting some answers to my current predicament, I will accompany you to him. Do you mind?" Uncertainty made a low groan and he seemed to grow a few feet taller at Nick''s question. "Yes, you can come along but with two of us there will be more uncertainty on the path. Let''s set off now. I know what direction north is in so we will find our way as long as we persevere." Nick and Uncertainty spent what seemed like hours walking through the forest. There were several times when they encountered the creatures calling themselves difficulties and had to run from them or hide behind a tree or bush, both Nick and Uncertainty stumbling on the path, getting cut and bruised along the way. Eventually Nick and Uncertainty reached the end of the forest where a tall mountain stood stretching beyond Nick''s field of vision, he could not even see it''s summit. Uncertainty looked up the mountain and said: "It is hard to see the ending of the tallest mountains but we still have to walk on the path in order to eventually find it. The cave is supposed to be at the summit of the mountain. We shouldn''t stop here." Nick gave a silent nod with his head and proceeded up the mountain with Uncertainty. After a long time climbing the mountain they came upon a group of trees and from them a creature jumped out. This creature was red eyed with a pig''s head and a teenage boy''s body; It was truly a strange sight to Nick. The creature spoke with a squeaky yet loud voice: "You cannot climb this mountain, it is too high. Look at Uncertainty, see how big he has gotten. The more you climb the mountain the more uncertain things become and the bigger the risks involved." Nick looked at Uncertainty and he had indeed grown taller, at least by two feet. Nick was unsure of the situation but at this time Uncertainty spoke: "This fool is named Doubt. He appears whenever someone attempts difficult things in order to mislead them. See how irritating his voice is, it has loudness but no substance or real effect. If we ignore him and persevere we will not hear him anymore." Nick and Uncertainty ignored Doubt and continued up the mountain, soon they could no longer hear Doubt''s voice. Nick was relieved. After continuing for what seemed like hours Nick''s shoes were starting to become uncomfortable. He stopped walking to take them off only to find that his feet were bleeding and Nick became visibly frustrated, making a low groan. Uncertainty noticed Nick''s feet and his bad mood and spoke: "What did you expect? Climbing to the top of a mountain is painful. The bleeding and discomfort is a part of the climb. What is the point of becoming upset? Look, there is a pond over there, go and wash your feet so that we can continue the climb." Nick listened to Uncertainty and went over to a small pond that was a short distance away from their path. Nick spent some time washing his feet, the water felt cool and refreshing. Nick was starting to feel that it was better to stay here instead of continuing to climb the mountain. At this time a beautiful blonde woman came out from the pond. She had pale blue skin, pink small lips and a curvy figure; her tongue, however, was long and protruded from her mouth seemingly like that of a snake''s. She came close to Nick and spoke: "Young man, how did your feet become so badly hurt, why do that to yourself? Come, I have a cottage at the foot of the mountain. If you walk back down with me, you will have an easier time and you can rest and be comfortable in my cottage for as long as you want." Nick felt that what the strange woman was saying sounded good. Uncertainty saw Nick''s situation and quickly ran over screaming: "Begone devil! Nick, this temptress is named Betrayal. She comes along during periods of comfort telling you lies about the peace and rest she can give you but you should know, turning away from your goals and mission for a promise of comfort is a betrayal of yourself. You will find no peace doing that." Nick heard Uncertainty''s reasoning and agreed with him. He left the pond with Uncertainty and continued up the mountain, his feet hurting the entire time. Eventually they reached the summit of the mountain and found the cave that Uncertainty had spoken of. Before they could enter the cave, a creature jumped out from a clump of bushes and blocked their path. The creature looked like a bipedal goat but had a human like torso and a head with two horns attached. It spoke in a confident tone: "Travelers, you have done well to get to the top of the mountain, is there really a need to stress yourselves out by entering that cave? Let me tell you, that cave is dark, there are sharp stones everywhere and you may not be able to find your way out once you enter. It is better to relish in your current accomplishment and take it easy for a while." This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.Uncertainty sneered at the creature. "Nick, this creature is named Complacency. It wants you to believe that you have really achieved something while you have not. The top of this mountain is just a milestone on an even longer journey, how could we let ourselves be misled and stop here while we can see our goal right in front of us? We have to continue. Complacency only leads to regret." Nick and Uncertainty pushed complacency aside and entered the cave. Nick and Uncertainty walked together in tandem so that they would not lose each other as the cave was dark and they could not see where they were going. They stumbled a few times over sharp rocks and were cut in many places. They walked into dead ends and had to feel around for another passage to take, sometimes they even bumped into the cave walls and each other but eventually Nick and Uncertainty finally came across a room carved out in the cave walls with a figure sitting within. It was still dark so Nick could not see the figure clearly but it spoke to them, noticing their arrival: "Hello travelers, why have you come here?" Uncertainty spoke first: "I am here to get your help because I know that by being together with you, I can accomplish anything successfully." Nick spoke after Uncertainty: "I am here for the same reasons as my friend. I want to find out what my magical affinities are." The figure in the darkness spoke: "You are not the first to come here to ask for my help but I can only help you if you can tell me my identity. I''ll give you a little riddle to help you guess my name but I will absolutely not help you with anything else unless you can solve it and tell me my name. Listen to this, I am bound to all things and all things operate according to me within their own time and place, some people resent me, some people love me but what is for sure is that very few people truly know how to use me." Nick heard the riddle and became troubled. (What the hell does any of that mean? How am I supposed to guess your name from that?) Nick looked beside him waiting for Uncertainty to speak but there was only silence. (Like usual, I can only rely on myself.) Nick started calling out words that he thought could be the answer to the riddle. He did this for what seemed like hours but got no reply. All his answers were apparently wrong. Suddenly the figure spoke when Nick became exhausted and hungry: "Human, you are really stupid. I thought that you could easily answer my riddle since you know my brother but it seems I was wrong. You should leave this place, you have no food or water and you don''t seem all that close to the answer." At this time Uncertainty finally spoke: "Remember Nick, perseverance is required in times of uncertainty." Nick was encouraged by Uncertainty''s statement and persevered in calling out words that he wasn''t even sure would answer the riddle correctly. He knew that he had to try anything to obtain the answer. Time went on until eventually Nick''s mouth became parched and he was starving; he was dying of hunger and thirst but he still persevered in calling out words until he called out a certain word: "Rule." When Nick said that word, the figure spoke in a cold voice: "Sigh, well done human, you have guessed my name." The room suddenly lit up, revealing the figure to be a bipedal wolf like creature with pitch black eyes and menacing looking teeth. "My name is Rules and I am the thing that you are looking for Nick. My brother led you here but clearly provided you with very little information. He sometimes goes by the name Uncertainty but only with those that don''t now his real name." Nick was confused. "Your brother?" Nick looked at Uncertainty for clarification. Uncertainty looked at Nick and spoke with a different but familiar voice: "It''s not my fault that you took this long to answer the riddle. I told you his name when you first came here." Nick thought back to the voice that spoke to him before he realized that he was in a field. It said, ''What do you know about the rules, fool?'' "That was you? Does that mean that the thing you were looking for was me? If Uncertainty isn''t your real name then what is it?" Uncertainty shook his head and spoke: "You are still too weak to know my real name. If you knew it, I would have to help you and that would be like a baby trying to use a sledgehammer. You''ll just have to make use of my little brother for now, he will give you what you want for the moment since you now know his name." Suddenly, Uncertainty disappeared and Nick turned to look at rules who rules spoke plainly: "Young man, when you know the rules everything becomes clear. I am the very thing that you are seeking and as for the mystical language that attracted me to you, I will teach it to you in full, it was borne from your own soul anyway, you just aren''t consciously aware of it. Also, you should get it out of your head that I may be some kind of ''new'' kind of magic energy, I am as old as the concept of time. I am the rules! I am intertwined with all magic just like how time is required to perform all actions. It''s just very rare in your realm for someone to use my powers outright." Nick was happy that he had gotten this far but he was left with another question. "What now?" Rules looked deeply at Nick and then in an instant he appeared in front of Nick, his wolf like features on full display. He breathed heavily on Nick''s face and at that moment Nick passed out, his vision going dark. When he awoke again he was on the floor of dean Gecko''s office. Dean Gecko looked at Nick with a calm smile and asked: "So, did everything go well on your little journey?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 27: Marsha Cassidy "Journey?" Dean Gecko nodded his head. "When interacting with the soul, that interaction usually takes the form of a scenario that you can understand. For most people that could involve reliving scenes from their own memories or experiencing imaginary events related to to your soul''s laws and affinities. For example, if you had a strong fire affinity, you might have seen visions of a volcano and ended up speaking with something crazy like its magma. I caused you to interact deeply with your soul but with you being a student at the academy, I did not interfere or observe whatsoever...don''t worry whatever secrets you have are safe for now." Nick was secretly glad about that. (Should I be worried that he said, ''for now''...well, its not like I can resist the dean anyway? I should just focus on becoming stronger in case the dean is lying and has ill intentions.) Nick stood up and gave the dean a slight bow in thanks, saying: "Thank you for your assistance dean Gecko, I think that I have much to think about. May I go back to the waiting room?" Dean Gecko looked at Nick deeply for a few seconds then said with a smile: "You can go back. By the way, do remember our agreement young man." Nick nodded and left the dean''s room. When Nick left, the dean''s smile transformed into a stern expression. "Well, the academy''s rules prevent me from forcefully examining the boy''s soul so all I can do for now is to wait for him to develop results. Hmmm...It''s probably a good thing that I left a little tag on his soul, I''ll be able to observe how strong his magic gets in the future from a distance." ........................................................ The waiting room was the same as when Nick left it. Nick took a seat in the fourth row after taking a glance at the receptionist and Ray Menzes quickly ordered: "Rank 5 Marsha Cassidy, enter the dean''s room." Nick couldn''t help but smile considering the results of his meeting with the dean. The whole interaction actually took about twenty minutes but was probably a turning point in his life. Nick was now able to recall clearly a mystical language other than Valteese with very little effort. (Rules wasn''t bluffing but who was Rules and and Uncertainty really. Were they figments of my imagination or something else...?) Nick couldn''t determine the truth and he would definitely not ask the dean about it since he did not trust the dean. At the very least he had somehow received information regarding his affinity. (Rule magic? I have not come across that kind of magic in my reading. Apparently, it is magic related to the workings and manipulation of natural phenomenon. That''s all the information I obtained from my soul''s laws but it''s a good start, at least it''s better than what I knew before which was nothing. With my new language and now that I know I have a strong affinity for rule magic, it will be easier to create my own meditation and foundation laws...) While Nick was wrapped up in his thoughts, he heard someone call to him. "Hey you, what exactly is your deal? How did a magic-less loser get such a high rank in the exam? Is it those scrolls that you have on you, where did you buy them?" Nick turned towards the voice and realized that it was rank 1, Daryl Smith that had spoken to him. Nick decided to not reply because of his rudeness; he continued to mind his own business. "Not talking, huh? I''ll find out eventually using my family''s influence so it''s not like I have to ask you directly but let me make this clear, everyone in this year is bound to end up as my stepping stones. If you ever want to work for me, just come find me and I''ll see how well I can make use of your talent." Nick ignored Daryl completely after hearing that. (This bald guy is clearly an extreme egoist. I should stay away from him going forward.) Daryl returned to sitting quietly after his little speech. For the next five hours, the group remained in the dean''s office until the last candidate returned from the dean''s private room. At that point Ray Menzes spoke with a light tone: "Alright, you''ve all gotten your reward. After we leave this building, you may do whatever you want, my supervision will end." With that, Ray escorted all the students out of the building and once they were all outside he suddenly disappeared. Nick and Daryl were the first to leave the group. Since it was only 4 pm Nick decided to go to the bookstore and pick something up. "Hey, wait!" While he was quite a distance away from the dean''s administrative building, he heard a voice calling him. He turned around to take a look and saw that a short woman with brown curly hair was chasing after him. (Rank 5, Marsha Cassidy. What does she want?) Marsha was winded when she arrived in front of Nick. She panted for a while and then spoke: "We weren''t formally introduced so I thought I should take the initiative. My name is Marsha Cassidy. Honestly, I ran you down to ask about your scrolls. I''m sort of into magic artifacts and tools and since you got such a high rank without having a mindscape, I wanted to ask if you used only those scrolls during the exam." If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it.Nick didn''t mind answering honestly. He was never opposed to having meaningful interactions with others as long as the other person was respectful. "My name is Nick Capitol and yes, I only used these scrolls during my exam. I might have gotten my rank because of luck so you shouldn''t pay too much attention to it." Marsha''s eyes gleamed with excitement. "I don''t know much about magic scrolls but I''ve seen them in my grandfather''s collection. Did you buy them or make them yourself?" Nick felt that this woman was being nosy but since she was speaking so earnestly, he would feel awkward if he just blew her off. "Yes I made the scrolls, I joined the spell creation club a few months ago and since I don''t have a mindscape and can''t cast spells myself, I can only use these in order to manipulate magic." Marsha nodded three times. "I understand. I, myself, am studying to learn how to create magic tools and I find them really interesting. Most of the time I''m studying so I don''t have any friends to speak to about magic. Is it possible that we could exchange phone numbers so that we could talk about magic together, I figure that there might be an advantage in discussing the things we learn with interested parties instead of just keeping them to ourselves?" (Why is this woman so earnest? It''s so unexpected...but I guess its not the worst thing. I don''t mind speaking to someone about magic if they''ve got useful things to say.) Nick didn''t want to be blinded by Marsha''s passion anymore. He said yes to her request and they exchanged phone numbers. Nick didn''t want to spend time speaking with her right now because he still had things to do so he bid her farewell and continued walking to the bookstore. She stood on the spot and waved him goodbye. "Talk to you later Nick." Nick smiled. (What a weird woman.) When Nick got to the bookstore he went to the miscellaneous isle and picked up a bouquet of fluorescent but artificial flowers. Nick didn''t know why the bookstore sold these but he had seen them on his previous visit and now thought that they might be useful for something considering how beautiful they looked. Nick received ¡ê100 every week by direct deposit to his bank account as a result of his scholarship so he paid ¡ê1 for the artificial flowers and returned to the dean''s administrative building. Nick took the elevator to the floor of the dean''s office with the flowers in hand and entered the dean''s office. When he entered, Nick saw an almost empty room with the receptionist at her desk lifting her head from her documents as soon as Nick entered. Sweating profusely, Nick walked up to the receptionist''s desk and spoke to her: "Hello miss, thank you for attending to our group earlier. You were so graceful while doing your job." Nick handed her the flowers with both of his arms and hands shaking. The receptionist looked surprised for a moment but then smiled and said: "Thank you young man, you know, you should be more careful about your stares. Some female Magicians take that as a serious offense towards their dignity." Nick felt like he was struck by a thunderbolt. "Oh..." Nick felt embarrassed because he knew that she was talking about his stares at her earlier. He read somewhere that a man should always express his interest in the women he likes even if its just in a small innocuous way; the book said that he could gain confidence from doing that. Nick bowed slightly and apologized like what he saw in a Japanese drama once and said goodbye. "Have a good day miss." The receptionist smiled lightly and replied: "Goodbye and good luck with your studies young man." Nick left the dean''s building and made his way to the library. He walked up to the librarian who he had learnt was named Jack Macy and spoke: "Hello Mr. Macy, I haven''t been here in a while, the place still looks great under your dedicated care. Could you please recommend me a book on the natures of magic, especially, anything related to rule magic?" Jack looked at Nick and said: "Hmph, kid stop kissing my ass, I don''t like guys. Rule Magic? Where did you here about that from. I once read that it was a magic widely practiced a long time ago but it fell out of favor for some reason and isn''t practiced by Magicians on Grand Earth or in its associated realms and to be honest, not much people even now it exists these days and I don''t know a single person that has ever interacted with it. Anyway, if it''s a good book on magic natures that you want, here." Jack raised his hands and a thick leather bounded book appeared in his hands. He gave the book to Nick and told him to leave. Nick thanked Jack for his help and returned to his dorm room. So much had happened today that Nick was completely exhausted and as soon as he laid down on his bed for a little rest, he fell into a deep sleep, only thinking about magic. A smile was plastered on his face as he slept. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 28: Lana Parsely RRRIIIIIIINNNNNGGGGG!!!!! Nick''s alarm went off at 3 am. Nick slowly got up from bed with tired eyes, feeling incredibly sore. (What the hell. Why do I feel like shit all of a sudden? Hmmm...I guess I''ve been stressed out more than usual during the past few weeks and ignored it. Now that the exam is over, I''m feeling the aftermath of the non-stop grind.) Nick smiled. "The pain means progress, I have to continue." Nick picked up his phone and started playing some rock music. "Some legends are told Some turn to dust or to gold But you will remember me Remember me for centuries And just one mistake Is all it will take We''ll go down in history Remember me for centuries (Hey yeah, oh hey, hey yeah) Remember me for centuries..." Nick nodded his head and spent the next thirty minutes doing a few reps of pushups and then took a shower. When he finished with his shower, he sat at his desk to think about his situation. (Ray Menzes said that the end of year exam will take the form of a survival challenge and apparently that those challenges are the reasons for the high mortality rate among Apprentice Magicians. I have to use this time to become an Apprentice Magician. For the next few months, I need to create my meditation technique and foundation laws and form my mindscape. I have a new mystical language to use other than Valteese but that probably doesn''t make it easier to conceptualize the before mentioned. My next move will be to read the book on magic natures and then solely work on creating my meditation and foundation laws.) The book that Nick got from the library on magic natures has about 2000 pages, each filled with important information. Since he still felt some fatigue from all the excitement yesterday he went back to bed to get a few more hours of sleep. Nick woke up at around 7 am and left for the cafeteria and had a breakfast of three egg and cheese sandwiches with orange juice. Nick didn''t plan to leave his room for a while so he went to the academy''s convenience store and spent much of the allowance from his scholarship that he had saved so far on food. Next he went to the spell creation club to tell Norman how the exam went and also to obtain more special papers to write magic scrolls. Norman told him once that the club was supplied with a large number of boxes with these papers and since no one except him was making scrolls, there was still thousands of them and Nick could get them for free by coming to the club and requesting them. When Nick walked into the club room, he saw both Derek and Lana having a conversation but when they noticed Nick, they stopped to greet him. Derek spoke: "Good morning Nick, how did you do in your exam?" Nick shrugged his shoulders and replied: "It was pretty tough since I only used magic scrolls but I managed to get a good score so I''m not complaining. How about you guys, how did you do on your exams?" Nick quickly tried to take the attention off of himself. Usually one''s own success was likely to attract the envy of others and Nick didn''t want the extra attention because he was ranked 4th within his year. Lana concentrated on Nick and replied: "We did okay even though the exam this year was battle based and since neither I nor Derek have much magic particularly suited for that, we stumbled a bit but pulled through with our skills. Considering that you haven''t formed your mindscape yet, it''s good that you did okay for yourself." Derek nodded his head in agreement with Lana''s words. Suddenly, Norman''s room door flew open and Norman emerged from it walking towards Nick. He asked Nick seriously, skipping the basic greetings: "Is it true, you received a class S grade and the rank 4 position in your year by only using your magic scrolls? The dean himself called me this morning to commend me on my instruction regarding you." Nick sighed internally. He didn''t expect Norman to spill the beans so quickly and in front of Derek and Lana. Nick wasn''t naive, Norman was definitely not ignorant of Lana''s and Derek''s negative emotions regarding his progress. (Sigh. He''s saying these things publicly with special intention. Probably trying to stir Lana and Derek, either for their motivation or just to poke at the green eyed monster within them - envy.) Nick had a kind of high awareness for these things but with Norman''s status it would be too troublesome to reproach him, so Nick mustered a genial smile and replied: "It is as you say professor. The dean wouldn''t lie to you. I came here to obtain a lot more special papers and ask if I could skip the club''s tasks for a few weeks so that I can focus on forming my mindscape." Norman smiled at Nick''s reply, thinking that his little student was very astute. (Hmph, did he notice the purpose in my actions? Well, it doesn''t matter even if he did but this kid sure is sharp, trying to use my outburst to skip his club tasks. Considering that he wants to use this time to form his mindscape, refusing at this point, especially considering his recent results would be unreasonable. This kid certainly has some ''skills''.) "Of course I will give you the papers, they''re cheap anyway. As for skipping your tasks, I can allow that for two months but you still have to at least make an appearance at the end of every month. That''s not a problem is it?" Nick knew that there were no rules in the academy regarding mandatory club attendance, Norman was probably forcing him to make an appearance to observe his progress. "I''m fine with that professor." Derek and Lana looked at Norman then at Nick. They were a little surprised at Nick''s result, when they were in their first year, neither of them ranked higher than rank 200. (How did he do it?) That was the thought going through both of their minds. Norman gave Nick the papers that he wanted, telling him to continue working hard and that if he needed help with his spells, he could always ask him for help and then Norman returned to his room. Nick left under the watchful gaze of Derek and Lana; Derek soon after returned to his work but Lana kept staring at the door that Nick left through and didn''t retract her gaze until about ten minutes later, a determined expression on her face. Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more............................................................. Back in his room, Nick put his food and supplies aside and picked up his book on magic natures; it was now 10 am. Feeling excited Nick sat at his desk and begun to read. He did not stop until about 9 pm. He started sorting out his thoughts on what he had read thus far. (It seems that all magic energy has some kind of nature(s), usually these natures are evenly distributed while in the atmosphere except in special environments where there is an especially high amount of magic with a certain nature, for example, near a volcano the magic energy will have a high fire nature about it. The book goes on to say that all magic energy can be used to cast spells but spells cast with magic energy with a high associated nature would be especially strong like if one tried to cast a fire spell near a volcano but if you cast a spell with a type of magic energy that is in conflict with the surrounding magic energy the spell is likely to be weaker than normal like if one tried to cast a water spell near a volcano. Apparently, most Magicians have a kind of magic that they have an especially high affinity for; some high affinities are rarer than others and in most cases Magicians specialize in using magic energy associated with their highest affinity. Some of the common highest affinities are water, fire, earth, wind, soul and metal; there are even some natures and affinities that I have never heard of like sword, blade, phantom, shadow, strength and wisdom. Some of the rarest natures and affinities are luck, qi, decay, space, time and blood.) "I know that my highest affinity is for rule magic which is apparently not practiced openly on Grand Earth, at least it was not included in the list of natures in this book." Nick new that he had to create a meditation technique and foundation laws that complemented his affinity for rule magic so that became his current medium term goal. For the next two weeks, Nick spent most of his time reading the book and using a portion of the day to do push ups and practice writing magic scrolls. When he was finished with the book, he returned it to the library and picked one up called, ''The Theory of Meditation: Practical Guide''. He returned to his room but before he entered he caught sight of Don Bartholomew leaving his room and the two young men locked eyes with each other for about ten seconds. Don spoke: "Well, If it isn''t our year''s rank 4 ''Apprentice Magician''. Look, I apologize for the way I spoke during our exam. I didn''t think I''d lose and lose that badly. Your magic scrolls were pretty weird. I was wearing some protection related artifacts from my family during the match but they didn''t protect me from your spells. In addition, because I was wearing these artifacts my rank and grade were abysmal. I won''t make the same mistakes again I''ll definitely work harder and surpass you." After saying that Don left quickly for the elevator. Nick didn''t care much about Don''s declaration, after all, once he surpasses someone, in Nick''s mind there was almost no hope of that person catching up. Speaking of the exam, when Nick received the breakdown of why he was graded the way he was, it seems that his grade was almost entirely due to the fact that he created magic scrolls with spells that could completely get past the protection of C grade artifacts and clearly used magic energy of a rare nature that even the invigilator and Regular Magicians could not identify; the academy probably new that the magic scrolls were his own creations from contacting Norman and of course Don''s artifacts didn''t protect him from Nick''s magic, rule magic isn''t practiced on Grand Earth and is only referred to in books with vague descriptions. There is no way that someone would create an artifact that protects against it; from this Nick saw the advantage in having unique and rare magic and spells. Nick got inside his room at about 6:30 pm and took a shower. When he was done he decided to take a look at the new book he had just gotten and then he would read one of his mathematics texts before going to bed. While he was planning out the next few hours, a knock was made at his door. (What the hell? I don''t even know anyone personally, why would someone be knocking at my door?) Nick put on a shirt and his shorts and went to open the door. As he opened it, a woman for some reason jumped to hug him. Nick felt that this was weird but knew that she was probably not trying to hurt him because of the school rules. When Nick took a closer look, he saw that it was Lana. She was wearing a black pleated skirt that reached down to her knees and an orange blouse. While still hugging Nick, she spoke softly: "I haven''t seen you at the club in a couple of weeks so I came to check up on you. It''s fairly cold out here, could we talk inside your room?" Nick didn''t know what was happening but it was like a fog suddenly developed in his brain stopping him from thinking rationally, not to mention that a bulge was starting to grow in his shorts. Nick took Lana by the hand and took her into his dorm room and closed the door. While inside, Lana hugged him again and spoke: "You know, I was surprised at your ranking when I heard it. It looks like you''ve been working hard all on your own. When you''ve achieved something, you should celebrate. I know it''s pretty late but let''s celebrate together." Nick didn''t hesitate when he heard that. He moved his hand and firmly grabbed one of Lana''s ass cheeks, making sure that his index and middle finger were anchored near her anus. "Ahhhhhhhhhh." Lana moaned softly. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 29: Success? Nick held Lana firmly, his left hand around her waist and his right hand kneading her ass gently. Lana continued to moan softly, her warm breath flowing towards Nick''s neck as he held her closely. Nick''s thoughts were simple at this moment, it seemed to him that his only concern right now was to enjoy Lana''s body for as long as he could until he was satisfied; this was Nick''s first time being so intimate with a woman and to him it felt as pleasant as he thought it would be, all his pent up stress was slowly going away as he felt up Lana''s body. (This feels great but its sort of unexpected. I know that women tend to go after guys who they think are better than them but I didn''t think that my new ranking would have this sort of effect.) Nick then released Lana and told her to get on his bed. Lana complied with his demands obediently, saying: "I''ll do whatever you want. Maybe after we''re done we can talk about magic together, I''d like to see the scrolls that you make, rumors are going around that they are pretty unique. Is it okay if I see them?" Lana said this as she was lying on the bed while on her back with her knees bent pointing towards the ceiling and her legs locked together, as Nick was trying to part her legs, she held them firmly together refusing to let Nick have his way at this moment, seemingly waiting for an answer. Maybe it was due to his lack of experience but Nick didn''t care about what she was saying and didn''t think too much about the implications before answering: "Sure, don''t waste any more time, open your legs." Lana smiled and parted her legs letting Nick see beyond her pleated shirt. She was wearing plain white panties and the split of her vagina was clearly visible to Nick. Nick reached out his right hand and caressed her private part. "Ahhhhhhh." Lana began to moan softly as Nick played with her. As Nick continued to move his right hand''s fingers and listened to Lana''s moaning, the fog in his mind began to clear. Something about this situation started to appear fundamentally wrong to him. Since he was a child he had never received that much positive attention from others so now that he was receiving that from a woman his age, something in his mind started to ''poke'' at him, telling him that something was wrong. For some reason Nick started thinking about the scenes from his experience with his soul''s laws in the dean''s office, from start to end. (Betrayal...Complacency. I haven''t really achieved anything, this woman is clearly tempting me so that she can have a look at my spells, the thing that got me my ranking. She says that rumors have been going around, that''s probably Don Bartholomew''s doing. Anyway, just like what Uncertainty warned against, this woman is trying to tempt me with comfort and pleasure, disrupting my thoughts and threatening my goals for her own benefit. I know I''m inexperienced but I cant believe that I let things get this far.) Nick retracted his hand from Lana''s pussy, his fingers having now become wet from the experience. Lana noticed the change and stopped her moaning. (Huh? What''s wrong, he''s just standing at the side of the bed now?) She looked at Nick''s now stiff standing posture and shifted her attention to his eyes. What she saw was a cold and indifferent expression, as if Nick was looking at a block of wood and not a young woman on his bed. (What is wrong with him?) Nick felt horrible in this moment, not especially because Lana had tried to trick him but because he had almost betrayed himself for a worthless comfort. His heart had chilled and he looked and Lana Parsely with abject indifference and thought: (You are nothing, just mud on my path yet you wanted to use me. Mud using me? Hmph!) Uncharacteristically, Nick took the initiative to reach out and grab Lana by her hair, lifting her off of the bed and bringing her face close to his. He spoke in an almost menacing tone, the malice rolling off his tongue: "I''m going to warn you once and only once. Don''t ever try to impede me on my road to ''success'' ever again. Get out!" Nick''s indifferent gaze and strange actions scared Lana. Nick released her from his grip and stood aside and watched as Lana quickly ran out of his room. Nick stood next to his bed staring at the closed room door for about twenty minutes, thoughts swirling in his mind. It was about 7:30 pm before he snapped out of his trance like state. "FFFFUUUUCCCCKKKKK!" "I almost let myself be used and for what? Some zesty pussy?" Nick shook his head and attempted to calm down. (That can''t happen again. I don''t mind others obtaining advantages from me but I absolutely can''t let myself fall into indulging in cheap and harmful pleasures like that.) Nick thought back to when he first met Norman and Lana. (I don''t want to be like that fucker Norman and I should definitely keep away from women like Lana. Both of those people seem to have a sort of poison inside of them and it makes them degenerates as Magicians.) While Norman was probably a decent potion master, the fact that he was in this academy answering to the dean meant that he was a subpar Magician at best. Nick wanted to be the best, there was no way he was going to soften his advantage because of cheap thrills. (To be the best...that''s definitely what I want. I want to be someone who can ignore all the bullshit and keep a calm mind that gets increasingly calmer as things get more ''interesting''. Wait...) As Nick had this thought, he turned to look at the book, Theory of Meditation, on his desk. (Maybe...) Nick felt that he was on to something with his previous line of thinking. Nick didn''t waste any more time, he read the book on meditation until 11 pm then went to sleep. He woke up at 3 am and after doing pushups, showering, reading one of his math texts for two hours and having breakfast, he dived into the book on meditation again. He followed a similar routine until he was finished with the book one and a half weeks later. At that point Nick was locked in his room, thinking: Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.(So that''s it, I wanted to create my own meditation, thinking that I would end up creating something that had the structure of the academy''s meditation. The academy''s mediation is written in Valteese and mostly involves some kind of idealistic mantra on what it is to be a Magician stating obvious things like: to pursue the truth of the world, to battle and destroy our enemies and to become stronger through our continued enlightenment. All that sounds very good but it is actually all very vanilla. It doesn''t involve the specific will and desires of the Magician. I doesn''t detail what magic means to the Magician and their purpose for wanting to use magic. None of that is stated in the academy''s meditation but it seems to me that those things are what the meditation should be about, that is, a perpetual reminder to the Magician on why his magic should be the way it is, why it must grow stronger and how his mentality and convictions should influence that growth. In other words, to create his own meditation with the chance of forming at least a divergent mindscape, he has to determine all of these things with his own being in mind.) "What does magic mean to me?" (Magic is the method through which I can have limitless adventure and limitless learning. It''s both knowledge and power wrapped up into one. The thought of it gives me peace and reassurance that my future is boundless and something that I can control. It is almost like I am contributing to making laws by which the universe is governed by and that influences people''s lives.) Nick thought back to his last interaction with Rules in his ''soul state'' while he was in the dean''s office. Rules said, "I am the rules!". Nick thought for a minute and laughed. "Ha, Ha. No, I am the rules!" Nick didn''t notice but the moment that he said this, his eyes became eerily calm, his irises almost dark and still like the night sky. Nick picked up his notebook and used his new magic language that he has decided to call ''Nickel'' and made his notes in regards to his meditation. He didn''t leave his desk for the next day and a half except to use the bathroom and do pushups, he ate at the desk. He just wrote and rewrote notes using Nickel. At the end of this long session he looked at his papers filled with the language that seemed similar to Valteese and smiled. He read the first line out loud: "My path is limitless. I am the rules." Nick took a shower and went out to buy a large amount of snacks from the academy''s convenience store. When he came back, he immediately dived into continuing to work on his meditation. Unbeknownst to Nick, the magic energy in his room started moving in irregular patterns as he wrote and rewrote his notes. For the next almost two months, Nick followed a routine of working on his meditation, reading math books, doing pushups, practicing writing magic scrolls and occasionally going to the spell creation club; that was literally all he did besides the basic things that he had to do like eating and sleeping. At the end of that almost two months, one night Nick held up a page with words written in Nickel on it. This was Nick''s new ''meditation technique'' and it had taken him hundreds of hours of writing tens of thousands of words and two months to finish. All that work was now condensed into a single page, every word being like written gold - for some reason the words were literally glowing in a gold color. Nick took that as a good sign, it''s not like he could go around asking others the value of what he had written, so now he had to take a risk in using the meditation. If he notices even the slightest negative effect, he would immediately rewrite the whole thing even if it would take another two months. The survival challenge would be in another two months so he hoped that wouldn''t be the case. "It''s time." Nick had already memorized the words.He sat at his desk, closed his eyes and started to chant in Nickel. "Keath ehtds ourhd gosh" -> {"...I am the rules..."} Nothing seemed to happen for what seemed like an hour. Nick felt a little frustrated but persevered anyway. (Nothing truly good or special comes easily.) Suddenly, almost like he had lost control of his own body, he could no longer move. he felt like his consciousness had been forced into a world that he barely recognized. The world was mostly empty with what seemed like the night sky. "Empty skies? No, that''s not right. There are several stars shining brightly in this sky with the biggest star giving out a bluish red glow." Nick could also see a human figure made of what seemed like pure darkness hovering in the sky. Nick moved his consciousness closer to better observe and saw that the figure was in fact not hovering, it was walking on what seemed to be a floating road. This road looked like it was made of a thin layer of concrete but it was riddled with cracks and pieces of it kept crumbling away and falling off. The pieces that fell off seemed to turn into dust and seemed to flow to the end of the road where it was reformed as part of the road and so when it seemed like the figure would have to stop because he had no more road to walk on, he kept walking on a road newly formed but still full of cracks - a never ending road. Nick looked on for what felt like hours but nothing changed. Soon his consciousness was forced out of the space and and he could move his body again. Nick didn''t feel much different, however, before he could properly move his body away from his desk, he noticed something. "Why does the air in here seem so perceptible now like there are waves of it subtly flowing around me?" The phenomenon was subtle enough that everything seemed almost normal but Nick could definitely tell that some kind of formless miasma like substance was flowing around him. "Hold on, is this the magic energy in the atmosphere? Does that mean that my meditation worked?" "Success?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 30: Only Results Matter Nick felt that he had definitely succeeded. He gave himself a few minutes to rest from the previous attempt. After about ten minutes, he used his meditation once again; his consciousness moved into the same space from before and Nick decided to look at the entire environment. Like before there was a seemingly vast night sky with five stars shining brightly with the largest of them emanating a bluish red light. There was also the floating concrete road with a figure made of darkness walking endlessly along it. There was something else that Nick did not notice before, below the floating road there seemed to be nothing but darkness but upon closer inspection, the darkness turned out to be really dark colored, still water. "This is a strange sight. The difference between my mindscape and empty skies seem to be the five stars, the concrete road, the dark figure and this ''sea''. Hmmm...What does all this all mean?" Nick was curious and puzzled at the same time. "Unfortunately, this space can''t process and hold magic energy without a set of foundation laws. I also can''t identify its effects without being able to use magic assuming this is not a basic mindscape." Nick felt that there was a low possibility of this being a basic mindscape. In fact he would be very surprised if it was. "Following persistent and informed effort, successfully achieving your goal becomes the natural conclusion. My mindscape may have formed but without the magic energy, it seems like it''s in an inactive state. I read from a book before that that would be the case so I''m not so surprised about all the darkness in here." Nick willed for his consciousness to leave his mindscape and the sight of his room appeared to him again. (Alright, I was successful in forming my mindscape, now I need to work on modifying the Laws of Syracuse into something suitable for me. I''ll be pretty much shooting in the dark since I don''t even know the effects of my mindscape but improving the Laws of Syracuse by even a little bit would be a major success.) Nick felt incredibly excited, his hard work for all these months was not wasted. He got up from his desk in the hopes that he could go to the cafeteria to get something to eat as a form of celebration but as soon as he got up, he was hit by a wave of fatigue. His mind became almost a completely fuzzy mess, his muscles also felt like they were weakening. Nick used the last bit of his strength to walk over to his bed and lie down in it. Nick then fell into a deep sleep almost like he was forced into it by something that he didn''t understand. ........................................ When Nick woke up, he first reached for his phone without thinking too much and the first thing that he noticed was that it was now midday on Thursday. Nick knew that he had formed his mindscape on Monday night so he had apparently been sleeping for over two days "Does forming a mindscape cause extreme fatigue?" Nick wasn''t sure since he had not seen information stating that in any of the books that he read. The second thing Nick noticed was that he was hungry...very, very hungry, almost unbearably hungry. Nick quickly took a shower and got dressed and then proceeded to the cafeteria. He ordered two portions of fried chicken, gravy, vegetables and brown rice. Nick sat in the cafeteria since he didn''t think that he had the strength to carry his food back to his room. Nick ignored what was going on around him and just ate, not caring to pace himself. His hurried and messy eating attracted the attention of the nearby students, at which point some of them sent sneers in Nick''s direction. Most of them had come from privileged backgrounds and they saw the way Nick was eating as disgraceful. Among the students in the cafeteria that noticed Nick was Don Bartholomew. He looked at Nick but lost interest as soon as he saw how he was eating. (Did I really lose to that boor?) Before he turned his head away completely, he notice something subtle. Some of the magic energy in this area of the cafeteria was seemingly being drawn into Nick''s direction while he ate and the amount of magic energy that was being drawn seemed to increase as time went on. This went on for twenty five minutes until Nick finished eating his food. Nick then got up from the lunch desk, threw his trash away and left the cafeteria. The whole seen played back in Don''s mind; because of training that he had received from his family, he was especially attuned to the flow of magic energy wherever he went and that''s why he noticed the strangeness of Nick''s circumstance. Don looked around and seeing that a few others had watched Nick leave the cafeteria, it probably wasn''t just him that noticed. (All that magic energy being attracted to him meant that he has definitely formed his mindscape. He''s probably more difficult to deal with now, I should also continue improving my skills.) If you discover this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation.Don ignored the girls around him including his ''special'' maid Marcia and headed for his room. Marcia shouted after him: "Don, where are you going? We are supposed to meet up with Josh''s group after this to discuss magic spells." Don heard her question and was immediately annoyed. (At first I thought that interacting with the children of other influential families would be absolutely beneficial but most of what we did was not discussing magic. The meetings actually took the form of social gatherings where most would boast about their power and make jokes. Most of my peers were simply put, time wasters. All that was fine before the exam but after I lost and I got a dog shit rank, the effects of wasting my time with those sort of people became apparent. They might all become Magicians in the future but they would never be exceptional people; that''s not the kind of life I want, I may have been born to wealthy parents but I refuse to be just another rich kid. I have my own dreams too! This bitch Marcia was the one who encouraged me into these meet ups saying, ''Master Don, you can''t make it in this world alone, magic power is secondary, you need to make sure that you develop a network of support to give you protection and security.'' I should have known better than to listen to a woman with the mentality of a bitch. In this world, only results matter, period. Hard workers are really the ones that run things and no amount of fucking around and socializing is going to change that.) Don looked towards the direction that Nick left in and knew that his thoughts were correct. He continued walking and spoke to Marcia with his back turned: "You meet up with them if you want. I''m going to my room to study. From now on, do not disturb me unless it is an emergency." With that, Don left the cafeteria with Marcia staring blankly in his direction. She quickly snapped out of her stupor and bit her lip in anger; blood flowed from her lip to her chin. .............................................................. Nick got back to his room and sat at his desk. Maybe it was his imagination but he felt as if something changed while he was eating in the cafeteria; this feeling was very similar to intuition, it just poked at Nick from out of nowhere. Nick closed his eyes and started using his meditation and his consciousness moved into his mindscape. Nick was slightly surprised at what he saw, his mindscape had changed somewhat since the last time he was here. There were now around twenty stars shining in the night sky and the figure of darkness was now a figure of golden light. The dark sea below was also no longer still and continuous waves on its surface could now be seen. "Hmmm...is my mindscape still developing and on its own?" Nick was puzzled for sure. The literature stated that one had to actively use their meditation along with their foundation laws to develop the mindscape further after it was formed. Nick''s mindscape was behaving differently. Suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere golden clouds appeared in the sky and moved towards the now golden figure walking on the road; when the clouds reached the figure it slowly dispersed flowing into the figure and into the crumbling road. The figure glowed slightly before going back to normal when the clouds had fully dispersed; the road also seemed thicker and a large portion of the cracks in it now seemed to be mended. "Those clouds...I think they must be raw magic energy that is entering my mindscape and nourishing the surroundings; they feel exactly the same as the magic I sensed when I first formed my mindscape, although, I haven''t actively had the same feeling since I woke up. It seems that this space has not been fully formed yet and is continuing to do so as it is being nurtured by that magic energy; the magic energy is being converted into the surroundings and not being kept in its original form. That makes sense since magic energy has to be processed by foundation laws before it can be stored for use in the mindscape." Nick had seen enough for now, he willed it and his consciousness left his mindscape. Nick smiled because of his progress. "My mindscape is definitely not basic, a basic mindscape would not continue developing on its own after being formed. I know that at least." Nick looked at his phone and saw that it was almost 2 pm. "I should make an appearance at the spell creation club. I''ll need more special papers to practice making scrolls with and since I intend to work on my foundation laws next, I don''t want to be leaving my room unnecessarily so I should request that my tasks be related to things I can do from here. With my newly formed mindscape, Norman definitely won''t be able to come up with a good enough excuse that he can use to refuse my request." Nick left his room full of confidence, heading towards the spell creation club. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 31: Meet Up With Marsha Nick arrived at the spell creation club''s building. Nick was about to enter the building when his phone rang. RING RING RING RING Nick took his phone out of his pocket and saw that he was receiving a call from someone with the caller ID: Marsha Cassidy. Nick thought for a second and the image of a short woman with brown curly hair came to his mind. (Oh, I haven''t seen her or talked to her since the day of the last exam, I almost forgot about her. Why is she calling me now?) Nick swiped his finger to answer the call and spoke: "Hello, this is Nick Capitol." The person on the other end replied to Nick''s greeting quickly: "Good afternoon Nick, this is Marsha Cassidy. Do you remember me, we exchanged numbers after visiting the dean''s office a few months ago." Nick replied: "Yes, I remember you. What''s going on, do you need me for something?" Marsha was pleased that he remembered her as that will make their conversation less awkward. "Well...My grandfather sent me this cool magic scroll that he got while he was visiting some rural areas in China. Most of my knowledge of magic tools doesn''t involve magic scrolls because they are not so widely used anymore. I remembered that you can make magic scrolls and was wondering...if you don''t mind could we meet up with me and discuss them, I would like to hear about your experiences in making them? Of course, in return I''ll let you see the magic scroll that my grandfather sent me, you can even copy it if you want. I would also like to get your opinion on the quality of the scroll anyway." Nick thought that talking to this woman might be interesting, he hadn''t had too much interaction with people his age since coming to this academy and Marsha seemed genuinely interested in something cool that was magic related; more importantly, she didn''t seem like the conceited and envious type that Nick was so wary of when it came to other Apprentice Magicians. Nick felt like he should meet up with her, if for nothing else, to see this Chinese magic scroll. Also, maybe this Marsha woman has some interesting things to say about magic. "I''m okay with meeting up, how about we meet at the library in two hours?" Marsha felt pleased with Nick''s agreement. "Yeah...It''s great that you agree but why meet up at the library? Why don''t you just come to my dorm room where we won''t be disturbed?" Nick was puzzled. (What? You want a man your age that you barely know to come to your dorm room so that you and him can be alone? Is she drunk?) "Ahhh...is that a good idea? Won''t you feel weird being alone with me in your dorm room?" Marsha knew what Nick was getting at but pretended to be oblivious. "Huh, what''s wrong with that? The school rules almost guarantees that you won''t want to harm me and I don''t see any problem with you being in my room." Nick almost felt hurt. (Is it that this woman doesn''t see me as a hot blooded man so she is not afraid that things will get ''weird'' if I''m in her dorm room alone with her or is she just that innocent? Either way, I don''t think that it''s a good idea for me to be in her room alone with her.) "Well...even if you don''t have a problem with it, I have a problem with it. If you insist on meeting inside your room, we should just pretend that this conversation never happened." Marsha felt that Nick''s adamance was a little strange but tried to put her feet in his shoes, so to speak. (Nick must not trust me enough yet since we haven''t interacted much. I guess I jumped the gun in asking him to come to my room.) "Hmmm...fine we''ll do things your way and meet at the library. Shouldn''t a gentle man be more willing to acquiesce to a lady''s request. Girls aren''t going to like you with that my way or the high way attitude." Nick felt that this woman was slightly ''cute''. "I''m no gentleman and girls already don''t like me anyway. Meet me at the entrance of the library in two hours. We''ll have our meeting inside." Marsha felt that this Nick was being a little cold but since she didn''t have too much experience with men her age, she thought that his attitude wasn''t all that peculiar. "Okay Nick, see you in two hours." Marsha hung up the phone. Nick proceeded into the club building and went to the spell creation club room. When he walked inside he saw Derek and Norman sitting at a desk speaking to each other and looking at documents. Lana was also in the club room looking at her own documents. Much of spell making involved writing, working out and assembling theoretical concepts and so most spell makers could usually be found working through large amounts of documents. Nick had not spoken to Lana since the last time that she came to his room and she actively avoided speaking to him or even looking at him; Nick was fine with it though so long as she didn''t do anything negative to him. Norman looked away from Derek and the Documents for a moment in order to pay attention to Nick. He spoke: Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel."So it seems that you''ve finally done it, you''ve officially become an Apprentice Magician. Congratulations." Norman got up from his seat to walk towards Nick. He stopped just a couple feet away from him and silently observed him for a while. Nick felt awkward with Norman looking at him like a zoo animal so he spoke: "Professor, I''m here to ask for more special papers, as well as, I''m planning to do some important work during the next few weeks and I''d rather not have to spend my time coming here to do tasks. Can you exempt me from them for another two months?" Norman nodded his head once. "I sense that you have formed your mindscape but I don''t sense any magic energy coming from so you must not have carved your foundation laws into your mindscape yet so I''m assuming that you want to spend the next few weeks doing that. Why would doing that take so long?" Nick didn''t want to tell Norman too much so he said the bare minimum necessary to feed Norman''s curiosity. "I want to properly analyze the set of foundation laws that I have and make preparations before I engrave them into my mindscape. I don''t have anyone''s support so I feel that doing these things are necessary." Norman nodded his head again. "Well it just so happens that I will be doing some important research during the next few weeks and I won''t be coming to the club room much. I''ve already asked Derek and Lana to help me out in order for them to gain additional experience and they''ve agreed to act as my assistants; I was going to ask you as well but since you clearly have other plans, then I won''t bother. You don''t have to come to the club room for the next two months or do any tasks but let me tell you, I am only cutting you so much slack because it''s your first year and you are just getting your feet wet. During your second year, you will absolutely have to do tasks for this club or I will kick you out. Do you understand?" Nick felt no surprise at what Norman said and replied: "Yes, I understand professor. Now, about those special papers..." Norman raised his hand and a stack of scroll writing papers appeared on the desk beside Nick. Nick said thank you and placed them into his backpack. After that, Norman went back to sitting with Derek. Derek looked at Nick before diving into his documents when Norman returned and said listlessly: "Congratulations on becoming an Apprentice Magician. In the future, if you have any questions, It''s okay to ask me." After saying this he returned to speaking with Norman. Lana also looked at Nick and Nick looked at her. Both look at each other for about a minute, saying nothing. Lana was the first one to give in to the awkwardness and spoke: "Congratulations." Nick replied without a change in his plain expression: "Thanks." With that, Lana returned to looking at her documents and seemed to ignore Nick once again. Nick left he spell creation club room and made his way to the library. When Nick got to the library, there was still about thirty minutes before the agreed meet up time so he decided that he would wait by the statues at he door entrance for Marsha to show up. When he got to the two statues, however, he saw a short woman with brown curly hair, wearing a pair of jeans shorts and a baseball shirt screaming at one of the statues: "Come on, how do you guys work. Are you actual magical creatures or some kind of artificial life created using magic tools. I''m not leaving this entrance until I get an answer!" Nick looked at the scene with his brows raised. "..." (This woman really is weird.) Nick smiled. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 32: New Deal "What are you doing?" Nick asked loudly enough for Marsha to hear him. Marsha turned away from the statue, looking towards the voice and discovered Nick walking towards her position. She ran towards him and patted him on the shoulder three times when she was just in front of him. It was a weird sight since her forehead practically just reached Nick''s shoulders. "Welcome to the library Nick, I got here early because being early for things is a behavior that I like to practice." Nick felt a little bothered when Marsha patted him on the shoulders but it was a short-lived interaction so he ignored it. "Okay...but why are you screaming at the statue at the entrance?" Marsha''s eyes brightened. "I am trying to figure out whether they are magical creatures or artificial lives made from magic tools. Did you know, despite Grand Earth being full of magic energy there are no magic creatures that are born here, only normal animals. Even when magic creatures are brought here from other realms, they are unable to breed, isn''t that interesting. Now, although those seem like statues with magic imbued within them, my trained magic sense tells me that they are very similar to magical creatures and I wanted some clarification. What do you think?" Nick looked over at the statues for a moment and thought. He didn''t know much about magical creatures and was fairly surprised to hear that there weren''t any that were born on Grand Earth, on the other hand, the fact that Marsha was able to give him such information meant that it probably would not be a waste of time meeting with her. Nick spoke: "I think that since their function is to surveil the entrance, they might not be able to speak. Can magical creatures normally talk?" Marsha looked shocked upon hearing Nick''s question. Nick became concerned that he had asked a stupid question. Marsha spoke: "Oh right, that''s a good point. I, myself, have never heard of magical creatures being able to talk. Good thing you came along, huh? I might have been screaming at those mute statues the whole morning." Nick squinted his eyes and looked at Marsha, wanting to say something but not sure what exactly to say to that. "..." (This woman seems to be a little touched. I guess I should''ve expected that, this place is full of weirdos.) "Alright, let''s just go into the library." Marsha nodded in agreement. "Sure thing." Both Nick and Marsha entered the library through the wooden double doors. The library was quiet as usual with very little people inside of it. Nick waved to the librarian, Jack Macy, at which point Jack gave a simple nod in reply. Marsha and Nick found a table in the area of the library farthest from the front door and sat opposite to each other. Marsha spoke first while taking out an object from her backpack and placing it on the table. "This is the Chinese magic scroll that I was talking about. My grandfather sent me a description of it along with the scroll. Here take a look." Marsha handed Nick a piece of paper with a correspondence from her grandfather. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I found this scroll in an abandoned village in the remote parts of a Chinese province. My guide who is a Regular Magician informed me that hundreds of years ago this area practiced scroll writing as a kind of art form and most of their scrolls were renowned for being able to summon animals and magical creatures. This scroll is no different. Based on its inscriptions which are not written in Valteese but are written in a mystical language that I''ve managed to translate, this scroll is called ''Basic Beast Scroll''. The locals used to use scrolls like this one to store beast of burden or cattle such as cows and oxen and transport them to other places at which point the scroll would be used to summon the animal at which point the laws written on it would disappear. Here is the translation of the scroll''s laws translated to Valteese: ... --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The translation didn''t seem all that complicated. It detailed the principles by which the spell worked but Nick knew from his readings that spells written using laws in a certain language will probably not work when translated to another language unless it is reformulated by the Magician translating it. Laws are a depiction of a Magician''s will and a plain translation simply doesn''t carry the same power as the original but one would be able to recreate the effect based on their own understanding of the translation and their own spell making skills. Nick spoke to Marsha: "From my perspective this is a pretty useful spell and should involve space magic. That''s one of those types that people rarely have a strong affinity for so using magic scrolls to facilitate the use of such spells is pretty smart..." While he was speaking, inspiration struck Nick like a lightening bolt. (So that''s the usefulness in scroll writing. To make use of spells that requires affinities that rarely anyone strongly possesses. If they have such a use, then why is scroll writing barely practiced, even with the downside of being less effective than spells cast by Magicians that have similar characteristics? I''ll have to ask Norman later.) Marsha listened to Nick and nodded in agreement. "Check out the inscriptions of the actual scroll. It should be written in a mystical language called Kantone. The Chinese commonly used it a long time ago but it died out when they fully adopted Valteese like everyone else. My grandfather studies dead mystical languages so he goes crazy over stuff like this." Marsha unfurled the scroll and Nick saw its contents. The paper was clearly old as it had yellowed on most of its surface but that did not take away from its magical splendor. The laws written on the scroll were actually moving around on the paper and although Nick did not understand the language used, he could clearly tell that the constant random order of the symbols made the spell seem incoherent. The magic energy emanating from the scroll felt interesting though. Ever since Nick had formed his mindscape, he developed a keener sense of magic energy but because of his lack of experience, Nick still couldn''t identify magical natures from just the sensations he felt. As Nick looked through the scroll, Marsha spoke again: Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author."Really interesting, right? My grandfather said that all that moving around by the symbols is an attempt by the spell maker to encrypt his magic scroll. Too bad for him that my grandfather is skilled in magical cryptography as well. Also, do you feel the magic energy that the scroll is attracting and giving off? I noticed when I first came into contact with you at the entrance that you''ve formed your mindscape. Can you tell? Yup. That''s true blue space magic being attracted to this scroll. As a part of my training before coming to the academy, my parents made me interact with all sorts of magic everyday so after a while it become easy to tell different kinds of magic apart. I think most families with Magicians do that, did your family do that?" Nick''s examining of the scroll was interrupted by all of Marsha''s talking, Nick felt slightly annoyed but he spoke to her calmly: "My family doesn''t have any Magicians so, no, I did not receive any special training. I''ve also just formed my mindscape a couple of days ago so I can''t tell magic natures apart yet." Marsha looked a little surprised at Nick''s response. "You don''t come from a family of Magicians? That''s weird since you seem to have a talent for magic. I mean, you did create magic scrolls that won you a match against someone from a very influential Magician family, the Bartholomews. Don Bartholomew let everyone one know that you must have gotten help from someone in order to get your hands on those scrolls the minute that he left the exam venue, although, he got quiet after a day or two. He must''ve figured out that you are the one who made the scrolls. To be able to make magic scrolls that can compete with spells cast by a Magician on your level, that''s actually pretty special." Nick looked at Marsha blankly and thought: (Talent? Special? No, No, I''ve no talent and I''m not special. I just grind everyday, not that you need to know that.) "I thought that most people with influential families would have gotten a list of the students in their year along with their background information, didn''t you?" Marsha looked confused. "Why would I do that? Oh...I did hear that there are many people who do background checks on the other students so that they can form cliques but in my opinion those people are losers. If they had the skills then they wouldn''t need to waste time forming cliques and also, if they were working on their magic like they should, they wouldn''t have the time to maintain them either. I don''t believe that having a bunch of people around you or having a lot of social connections is the key to success, at least for most normal people. If you want something like respect or authority and have it be genuine and lasting, you''re going to have to work for it. That''s what my grandfather taught me and I think he is right about that." Nick looked at Marsha squarely in the eyes and thought: (If this woman actually believes that, then she is not so simple. I should be careful when dealing with her.) Nick had an appreciation for people that thought like Marsha, after all, he grew up watching motivational videos with very successful people that spoke the same. The message was, ''Nothing beats hard work and discipline.'' Because Nick had a similar line of thinking, he knew that Marsha was probably a troublesome character despite how wacky she acts. From Nick''s own understanding, based on his readings and the videos that he has seen online, those people who go around talking about how important relationships are, and they are, but put too much emphasis on them almost to the point of constantly relying on others in their daily life don''t usually end up all that competent or in control of their circumstances; they emphasize using others to help them achieve their goals because they don''t amount to much themselves and that''s fine when you''ve already been through enough ''battles'' to develop your competence, confidence and talent but doing so early in your growth may leave you an incompetent busybody for the rest of your life; Nick thinks that kind of habitual behavior of ''group think'' causes a lot of problems in society. "I think so too..." "Alright, you said on the phone that you wanted my opinion on the quality of the scroll. My opinion is that I''m too unskilled to be a judge of that. You also said that I could get a copy of the scroll if I came here. This encryption makes things difficult for me so I''ll just take the version that has been translated to Valteese. Is that okay with you?" Marsha''s eyes brightened. "You''re planning to use the translated version to make a similar magic scroll right. New deal! If, you are willing to sell me a few copies of the new scroll that you make from our interaction, I''ll bring you more magic scrolls to look at in the future so long as you give me the option of buying any one that you derive a new magic scroll from. Do you agree to those terms?" Marsha sat across from Nick, looking him shamelessly in the eyes and waiting for an answer. Nick squinted his eyes and thought: (Hmph, so that''s what you were after. You didn''t care about my opinion of the magic scroll, you just wanted me to recreate a working version of it and get me to do so with other scrolls in the future. I suspected that this woman wasn''t simple and I turned out to be right...) Nick thought for about two minutes on what his answer should be. (Agreeing to her terms means that I might get to see more interesting scrolls and I get to make some money on top of that. It''s a good deal.) Nick didn''t mind people gaining an advantage from his efforts so long as they didn''t turn around and create disadvantages for him. He found no good reason to refuse since this was a good chance to test and improve his abilities, in addition, it might not be such a bad thing to get to know another committed Apprentice Magician. Nick steeled himself and spoke: "I agree." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 33: Translation Completed "Ha, Ha, we''re partners then. Lets shake on it." Marsha spit in her right hand and reached out towards Nick for him to shake it. (Is she serious? Man, that''s gross.) "Ahhh...Marsha, no offense but I don''t like to touch people so lets not do a handshake." Marsha wasn''t pleased at hearing that. "What kind of man are you? Everyone knows that handshakes are necessary when making a deal and doing business." It was Nick''s turn to be displeased. "I don''t care what ''everyone'' else knows. Who even spits in their hand and then expects someone else to shake it? Where were you raised, a farm?" Marsha looked shocked for a moment. "My older brother told me that this was how real men did handshakes and I had to do it if I wanted to do business with men. Do you mean to tell me that he was lying?" Nick didn''t know what to say. "..." (It seems that this woman is missing some common sense...) "Marsha I''ve already agreed, just give me the translation and everything will be settled." Marsha nodded with some embarrassment on her face. She took a copy of the translation out of her backpack and gave it to Nick. (That definitely proves that she had planned for this scenario. Note to self, in the future, never assume a meeting with another Magician is just a friendly get together to exchange ideas. Hmph, plotting against me, Marsha I''ll excuse you this once but if you do it again, I promise that I''ll rip you apart someday.) Because of his harsh upbringing, Nick detested when people made schemes with him as the target instead of just being straight with him. He would definitely not tolerate the behavior from anyone going forward. Nick''s face became visibly displeased. Marsha noticed this and winked at him. "My bad for concealing my real intentions. I just didn''t know if you''d agree If I made the request over the phone." Nick''s face returned to a plain expression after hearing Marsha acknowledge her actions. "I understand your actions but that doesn''t mean that I like them. If you ever do that again, just do both of us a favor and erase my number from your phone." Marsha looked at Nick seriously for a few seconds and said: "...Okay I get it. You look simple but I can tell that you''re a super cold guy. I can''t really tell whether that''s a good or bad thing." Nick replied: "I don''t care. If that''s all then we should end our meeting now, I have other things to do. As for the translation, I''ll need a few months to make a new magic scroll based on it. I''ll call you when It''s ready. That''ll probably be around the time of the end of year exam. That''s okay with you, right?" Marsha seemed unbothered by Nick''s timeline, she carefreely said: "Kay, Kay. That''s fine." Nick was internally glad that she didn''t seem to be in a rush. "Oh, by the way, I want to ask you a question. With how expensive magic spells seem to be, how is it that people like me who are on scholarship afford to get spells, it seems unlikely that they would be able to? Since the end of year exam is a survival challenge, wouldn''t that be an obvious problem?" Marsha thought for a while and then answered Nick''s question: "It''s not like there are absolutely no way for poor students to afford spells. You can complete missions given by the academy at the Mission Hall to gain school credits that can easily be exchanged for spells. You can also choose to become the disciple of an instructor; once you become a Regular Magician, getting a hold of low tier spells is as easy as taking a deuce so many Apprentice Magicians become disciples and in exchange for some assistance, these instructors give them spells that are in their collection. While the latter seems normal and okay, the world of Magicians is often cruel and many instructors use the arrangement to take advantage of students. Many students end up being used as lab rats and there are a lot of females that..." Marsha suddenly stopped speaking but Nick could guess what she was going to say so he spoke instead: "Alright, I''m ready to leave. How about you?" Marsha placed her things back into her backpack and got up from her seat. Nick and Marsha left the library and separated, walking towards their dorms but Nick stopped halfway from the library and waited another hour. Nick then returned to the library and returned the book, Theory of Meditation, back to librarian Jack. Jack nodded his head and spoke: "You left without returning the book and then came back so that your little friend wouldn''t know what you were reading, right? That''s very smart kid. Let me give you some unsolicited advice, although, it doesn''t seem like you need it but I''m old so I''m going to say it anyway. If you want to live long enough to become a powerful Magician or anything else that you''d like to be, don''t trust anyone that you didn''t raise or bring back from the dead, do you understand?" Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators!Nick was a little caught off guard by Jack''s advice but he knew what Jack was saying so he replied: "Thank you for the kind advice Mr. Jack. Can I borrow a book on the basics of modifying laws?" Jack was pleased to see that his advice did not fall on deaf ears. He waved his hands and a book appeared on his desk. He handed the book to Nick and waved him off. Nick looked at the book and the title read, "All Laws Are Not Made Equal". Nick left the library and returned to his dorm room. Nick didn''t waste any time because the end of year exam was in two months. Nick sat at his desk with his new book at around 6 pm and kept reading until 10 pm. He took a one hour break and took about one hour to practice some math problems from his text books. All along, he had just been reading math texts but now he decided that he needed to put major emphasis on actually solving problems, after all, math is a problem solving art. After absorbing enough theory, he decided that the next logical step would be to focus on pre-calculus problems to really build a foundation for the application of his mathematics. Since the mid year exam, Nick has learnt a lot and by this time he feels that his first three original spells were just a happy accident. To be honest, by now he can see that they were shabbily made and if put up against an experienced Magician, even if that Magician did not know anything about rule magic, they would find a way to overcome or break his spells. Nick''s intuition had been whispering to him since he left the dean''s office that there were some problems with his spells and so he wanted to create better spells and maybe improve the ones he had, but for right now, his foundation laws took precedent. After an hour of practicing math, Nick closed his eyes and begun to chant his meditation. His consciousness entered his mindscape and he watched the golden figure of light walk endlessly along the slightly cracked and crumbling road under his feet. Nick watched seemingly for a long time until his consciousness was forcibly pushed out of his mindscape. Nick felt light headed and he could barely stand. (It seems that when I reach a certain point of mental exhaustion, my consciousness will leave the mindscape on its own.) Nick slowly got up from his chair and walked to his bed and collapsed on it. Nick fell into a deep sleep for hours, even his alarm did not wake him. When he did wake up the time was 11 am and he felt very hungry. Nick got up despite the pain and sadness he felt; he realized a long time ago that pain and a feeling of sadness was commonplace when you spent all of your time improving yourself so he didn''t mind it too much, instead, he took it as a sign that he was making progress down his path of life. Nick did his usual reps of pushups, showered and went to the cafeteria for breakfast. When he finished eating, Nick bought snacks at the convenience store and holed himself up in his room for the next two weeks reading his books, doing his pushups and practicing writing scrolls. Nick realized that most of his time was spent doing the same thing until he reached some sort of growth. the process was boring, depressing and pain filled but he knew that the results would be worth it, so he persevered through his feelings of doubt, sadness and pain. (Nothing''s going to stop my progress, nothing.) While getting up another morning, this thought permeated his mind as a few tears rolled down his red and blood-shot eyes. Nick once again did his pushups, showered, ate and read the book that he received from the library. At around 12 pm, Nick finally finished the book. (Alright, I think I feel confident enough to start trying to modify the Laws of Syracuse, at least enough for a good start on my journey.) First Nick needed to translate the Laws of Syracuse from Valteese into Nickel, his own mystical language. The Laws of Syracuse was about five textbook pages worth of symbols so Nick picked up his notebook and started making translations slowly. Ever since he had his encounter with Rules, he was able to recall Nickel without much problem, although, he had trouble speaking it out loud, writing it was fairly easy. The real problem was that translating Valteese into a another language was always difficult because the magical meaning imbued into the laws had to be reinterpreted precisely in the other language and that required some experience. Nick mostly stayed in his room for the next three weeks just working on the translation alone. He only left his room sometimes to get food but did not go anywhere else. When he wrote the last symbol of the translated version, Nick felt so mentally drained that he didn''t have time to get into his bed before he fell into a deep sleep at his desk. When he woke up ten hours later Nick lifted up a set of documents glistening with a dull grey light. "Translation completed." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 34: Weird Things Are Bound To Happen Nick looked at the translated Laws of Syracuse and felt pleased. What Nick was especially pleased with was that he had an intuitive feel that these laws were now closely related to rule magic after his reformulation. Nick didn''t completely understand rule magic but the understanding that he has so far was enough to restate some of the original Laws of Syracuse in terms of it. Nick of course was not done here. based on his readings, he knew how important it was for the foundation laws and the Magician''s meditation to be closely related. If the mindscape was basic, then that relation need not be so close because a basic mindscape did not have special characteristics that could come into conflict with the foundation laws anyway, but Nick''s mindscape was clearly different. Nick knew that his mindscape had to be at least a divergent mindscape so he had the idea that he should try to create some harmony between the laws of his meditation and the newly translated Laws of Syracuse. Nick took out a copy of his meditation, he had made a few so that if one was destroyed he would not have to rewrite it from memory. Nick placed his meditation on one side of his desk and the newly translated Laws of Syracuse on the other side. He read them both for hours trying to decide what parts to change in or add to the Laws of Syracuse; Nick couldn''t just change his meditation because that would have harmful effects on his mindscape. Nick was so busy pondering on his task that he didn''t even realize that a new day had arrived while he was working out the ideas in his mind. He looked at the room''s window and saw a large beam of sunlight shining directly through it. That only happened at around 7 am everyday. "Fffuuuucccckkkkk! This is hard and it''s already morning. Just how long did I spend thinking about this? The final exam is in two and a half months and I''m stuck. I need a breather, I''m going do my meditation and then get some sleep, then I''ll get back to this." Nick closed his eyes and started chanting the words of his meditation in Nickel. As his consciousness entered his mindscape, in the real world something peculiar happened. Suddenly, as Nick was chanting his meditation out loud, the symbols on the paper containing the new Laws of Syracuse began to glow intensely, from a light grey to an intense white; the whole room was filled with the glow of white light. The rule magic inside the room began to move towards the papers violently and Nick found himself caught up in the surge of magic energy. While continuing his chanting unaware of what was taking place inside his room, Nick''s consciousness entered a space that was different from what his mindscape looked like, he found himself standing with what looked like his usual body inside a cavern that he did not recognize. There were stalactites on the ceiling and gray colored rocks all around. The walls looked hard and rocky and were also grey colored. The scene was fairly dark but Nick could see just enough so as not to bump into the walls when he moved. (What the hell is this place, this isn''t my mindscape?) Nick was confused. Normally during meditation, the Magician''s consciousness would enter the environment of their mindscape and stay there until the meditation was concluded by the Magician or until it was forced out. Nick tried but he apparently could not conclude the meditation as his consciousness still remained in this unknown environment. (If I can''t end the meditation myself then I''ll just move around and see what I can find that might help me. In almost every book that I''ve read it was emphasized that practicing magic was dangerous for beginners and there was always the chance of unexpected things happening for any number of reasons and that is why many Apprentice Magicians opted to become disciples so that they could benefit from their master''s watchful and experienced eye. Hmph, those people are cowards, if I can''t even overcome something like this, I might as well just give up on ever becoming a Magician. Even if I reached that goal, it would definitely not last if situations like this could put me in trouble.) Nick knew that he was thinking a little arrogantly but he needed to psyche himself up as much as possible so as not to lose his cool in this unknown situation. Nick walked throughout the cavern for over forty minutes with no clear sense of direction and found nothing but rocks and walls. "Damn it!" In anger Nick picked up a rock and threw it into the distance. (Well...that was pointless. What should I do now?) Nick heard the stone that he threw hit something and fall and then unexpectedly, an angry voice came from that direction. "Who the hell threw this at me? Are you trying to start a fight, C''mon, I''m ready for your ass!" Nick was surprised but excited for the chance to talk to another person in this place. "Hello, my name is Nick Capitol and I somehow found myself in this dark and rocky place. Can you help me leave here." The voice replied sternly: "I can''t be bothered to come to you so you should find your way over here to me so that we can have a proper talk." Nick moved along in the darkness towards the voice, sometimes he stumbled over rocks and scraped his knees but got up each time with even greater determination to find the voice and sometimes he found only a hard wall facing him but that made him even more certain that he would find his way to the voice very soon. After some time Nick did find his way towards a small human figure at a far corner of the cavern he was in. "Oh you found me, now we can talk like strong men. I saw your entire ordeal boy, you clearly need to work on your physique more if you want to go adventuring in places like this." Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.Nick was relieved that he found the voice''s owner. "Who are you?" The short figure was about four feet tall but since it was so dark Nick couldn''t see his features clearly. All he could see was that the figure was wearing leather shoes with cloth pants and a cloth shirt. "Who am I? What a question to ask, Isn''t it obvious? I am the one and only Strength." Nick felt weird about hearing such a name. "Strength, huh? Okay, Mr. Strength, you said that you could see my ordeal which means that you can clearly see through the darkness. Why didn''t you come to me if that is the case and why are you even here?" Strength laughed at Nick''s questions. "Ha, Ha, me come to you? Are you crazy boy, one can only find strength through their own efforts, it does not just come to them. As for why I am here, I was born in this dark place, that is why I can see through the darkness so clearly." Nick was puzzled. "What are you talking about, how could someone survive being born in a place like this?" Strength''s tone became that of someone who was annoyed. "Ignorant boy, don''t you know? All real strength is born in harsh and gloomy places." Nick felt that Strength''s words had great meaning but for some reason he couldn''t comprehend them at this moment. "Okay, I agree with you. Now, how do I find my way out of here?" Strength replied confidently: "Boy, you really are blind. Don''t you see that big boulder over there, all you have to do is push it out of the way and you can leave here." Strength pointed to a place a few feet from where they currently were. Nick looked towards the direction that Strength was pointing in and saw the boulder. (Huh? How comes I didn''t notice that huge boulder before? Come to think of it, things seem a little less dark now. I can even see Strength''s face clearly now. He has a bushy mustache and looks middle aged. He really looks like a dwarf from one of those old movies I watched when I was younger.) Strength spoke at is moment: "Hmph, boy do you think that you can hide those weak thoughts of yours from me, Strength. I can see through all weakness including this darkness. You are starting to see through the darkness as well because, in hard times if you look at the darkness for long enough you don''t just see the darkness, you see the light too. That indicates growing strength." Nick felt that there was something important in what Strength just said but his mind grew fatigued every time he tried to think about it. "Fine, can you help me move this boulder?" Strength nodded his head and followed Nick towards the boulder. When Nick tried to push the boulder, it didn''t budge at all. Tired and winded, Nick fell on his back out of breath. Strength stepped up and said: "Watch me and see how I move this boulder." Strength bent his knees and began to push. The boulder moved by about a feet but still blocked the entrance. Nick was shocked. "I couldn''t move this boulder at all, how did you do it with your small size and middle aged body?" "Hmph, ignorant boy, strength is not a matter of size or appearance, it is the culmination of one''s internal vigor and determination, only fools judge by appearances. As for my middle aged body, I became like this almost as soon after I was born. Didn''t you know boy, you have to sacrifice your youth in order to gain real strength? Can a child throw a sledgehammer or can a baby swim upstream. Strength does not exist in youth but youth can be exchanged to gain it." Something about Strength''s latter words seemed familiar to Nick but it wasn''t the time to be pondering his words. "Strength, this is a big problem. Even with your strength, we are unable to move the boulder aside, how will I leave now?" Strength looked at Nick''s worried expression and spoke confidently: "Give me a moment, let me call my friend, Big, over to us. He and I can work together to move this boulder, together we are Big Strength." Strength screamed: "Big, come and help me!" The next second, Nick saw a figure walk from out of the darkness that he could not see through. The figure looked like a larger version of Strength, being about eight feet in height, towering over Nick. Big spoke: "You called me over friend, what do you need?" Strength spoke confidently: "Lets combine our powers and use our big strength to move this boulder out of the way to help this weak fellow." Big nodded in agreement. "I''ll help you and this fellow." When Big finished saying those words, he looked into Nick''s eyes with a glowing red hue within his own. Suddenly, Nick''s eyes also had a red hue in them, then in a moment it was gone. Big turned away from Nick and walked to the boulder with Strength. Both of them bent their knees and pushed, moving the boulder. In about fifteen seconds the boulder was almost completely moved from the entrance, revealing the outside of the cavern which was bathed in white light. Before the boulder was fully moved, Strength spoke to Nick with a stern voice while pushing: "Remember boy, big objectives require big strength or you''ll always fall short." Saying that, Strength and Big pushed the boulder aside and the whole cavern was filled with a white light. Nick''s consciousness returned to reality and he could see his room once again. He was sitting at his desk with his papers laying on it. The papers with the Laws of Syracuse were out of place but Nick thought that he somehow moved it during his meditation. (That entire experience was weird and what''s even weirder is that now I have inspiration for how to modify the Laws of Syracuse.) "I don''t know what just happened but since it''s magic I''m dealing with, weird things are bound to happen from time to time, right?" Nick said that with a little worry in his voice. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 35: Loss "Big strength, huh?" Nick wanted to become the best Magician. Ideally that would mean becoming a rank 10 World Class Magician. There were less than 8 of those people to have ever existed on Grand Earth. If Nick wanted to reach such heights, big strength was indeed required. Now that he was back in reality, Nick could understand all of what Strength had said to him. (What a weird ''vision''. It was similar to what I experienced in the dean''s office. It seems that it was trying to teach me something. Strength said that you could only find real strength through your own efforts and that it is found in harsh places. I pretty much already knew that but a reminder is a good thing. I know how to develop strength but how do I develop ''big strength''?) Looking back, Nick remembered that Big appeared as just a larger version of Strength himself. (Does that mean that I should put in more efforts in the things that gave me strength in the first place? That sounds about right.) Nick decided at that moment to recommit himself to his dream of being the best Magician and he would do that by continuing to work hard and the stronger he gets, the harder he would work. Determination burned in Nick''s eyes. "Now, to improve the Laws of Syracuse, I''ve already received some inspiration that I can tell has something to do with Big. Somehow my understanding of rule magic also increased by a little, it''s an intuitive feeling but I can definitely sense my improvement." Nick thought back to the moment that Big looked into his eyes with those glowing red eyes of his. (Big...) Nick picked up his notebook and began working on reformulating his new Laws of Syracuse with some improvements and additions. For the next week, Nick continued his routine of pushups, practicing math questions and working on the Laws of Syracuse and so he barely left his room. At the end of the week. Nick looked at his new set of Laws of Syracuse as it shone with a dull red light. Nick decided to rename his new laws, ''Big Improvement.''. He would only know their true effects after he engraved them into his mindscape. With the magic energy he was feeling from the written laws, Nick could intuit that they were satisfactory enough to carve into his mindscape. Nick decided to get some sleep before his attempt. He did his usual reps of pushups, showered and then went to sleep for six hours. When he woke up, he ate some snacks and then sat at his desk for his attempt. Nick closed his eyes and begun chanting his meditation. Nick''s consciousness appeared in his mindscape and after making sure that the surroundings were the same as before including the endless road with cracks in it that was crumbling continuously, the figure of golden light walking on the road, the turbulent sea below and the night sky with around twenty stars shining brightly, the biggest one shone with a bluish red light. "Okay, time to get started." Nick had already read a few books that described the process of carving the foundation laws; it was not a difficult process. Nick willed and symbols for the laws of Big Improvement appeared in bright light in front of him one by one; it just so happened that forming a mindscape significantly improved one''s memory and because of this, Nick actually remembers all the laws for Big Improvement. An hour later Nick had created many symbols made of white light, they remained stationary in midair. Nick thought that everything was going fine until... "You''re worthless!" A scene of his grandaunt looking down on his younger self played out in his memory. The memory appeared so suddenly and brought up so many negative emotions that his carving of his foundation laws was momentarily interrupted. The symbols Nick had already formed crumbled and his consciousness was forced out of his mindscape. Nick jumped up from his desk because of the pain; he was bleeding from his eyes, nose and mouth. The next moment he felt completely light headed and collapsed where he stood. Before he lost consciousness, he whispered from his lips: "A failure." Everything turned dark for Nick. After what seemed like a long time Nick opened his eyes to see a full moon above him. He was currently lying face up on the ground and so he turned his head to have a look around. (This isn''t my dorm room.) Nick was currently inside a small space that was barley lit and seemed to have narrow walls. The only light source seemed to be the full moon that appeared in the sky above him which he could see through an almost circular opening. "Am I in a hole? What the hell? I have to get out." Nick tried to move with all his might but he could not, it''s as if his back was glued to the ground where he laid and like there were boulders holding his limbs down. (Since visiting the dean''s office, these visions have been coming to me. Did the dean do something to me?) Flop! Nick grew suspicious but before he could think more about his suspicions, something fell through the opening above him and fell near him a few feet away. Nick looked over and saw a small dog with brown fur and a bushy tail lying on the ground in the same situation as him. Next, unexpectedly, the dog looked at Nick and spoke in a worried voice: "Damn it, I was so close to reaching my goal but I slipped while walking down the path and ended up falling down a deep hole. Who are you?" Nick answered in a matter of fact manner: "My name is Nick Capitol and I just woke up down here and I have no idea how I got here and I can''t move either. What is your name?" The brown dog answered in a less worried tone: "My name is Failure. I was on my way to my goal but something unexpected happened and now I''m in this hole. Do you know the way out?" Nick spoke with an uncertain tone: "No, I do not know the way out." After hearing that, Failure started to loudly wail and continued to do so for a long time. Nick tried to get him to stop but Failure was inconsolable. Nick was annoyed but could understand Failure''s emotions so he stopped trying to get him to stop wailing and went silent. The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.Hiss Hiss Hiss. Suddenly from the unlit part of the hole, a very menacing looking green snake emerged from the darkness. Nick could not see the end of the snake''s body as it moved towards him and Failure. When Failure saw the snake, he wailed even louder. Nick screamed at the snake, trying to intimidate it: "Who are you? Why are you here? You better not come over to us, or else!" The snake slithered on the ground moving towards the wailing Failure but momentarily spoke without even bothering to look at Nick: "Foolish boy, you ask who I am but who else could I be but the one and only, ''Loss''? Don''t you know that the presence of failure is likely to attract loss. Look at how loud Failure is being, if he had been quieter, I may not have come so quickly." Loss sped up his movements and arrived beside Failure. In the next moment Loss opened his mouth and slowly began to cover Failure with his mouth, all the while Failure was crying and begging for his life. In a few moments Loss had swallowed Failure and Failure could no longer be heard. SILENCE For a moment there was complete silence. Loss looked over at Nick with its glowing green eyes and spoke confidently: "The consequence for failure always ends in loss." Loss slithered towards Nick slowly, Nick still being unable to see the end of his body. Nick tried to buy himself some time by insulting Loss: "You wicked bastard! How could you eat Failure like it was nothing? Do you even have a conscience?" Loss scoffed at Nick. "If you were so concerned about Failure''s well being, then why didn''t you stop him from all his wailing earlier, after all, that''s the reason that I came so quickly." Nick didn''t have much of an answer, he opened his mouth to speak and then closed it. "..." Failure adopted a sinister smile and spoke: "I''ll tell you why. It''s because you sympathized with him, didn''t you, so you let him be, wailing for the whole world to hear? If you actually gave a damn about his condition you would have told him to stop wailing and to get up from his failure. Only a fool or a saboteur sympathizes with failure, even someone else''s!" Nick felt enlightened. (I can''t lie down like this in my own failure.) Nick tried to exert strength over his body. To buy himself time he screamed at the approaching Loss: "I know my failure is why I am here and so helpless but I''m going to do all I can to escape from this predicament and stomp on your neck!" When Nick finished saying this Loss was already beside him opening its mouth in order to swallow him. Suddenly, Nick felt like there was no more pressure on him keeping him on the ground and so he jumped up and dodged Loss''s attempt to devour him. Nick jumped behind Loss''s head and indeed stomped on his neck, keeping him in place. Nick was exhilarated but puzzled. "Why was I able to stand up so suddenly?" Loss heard his question and replied grudgingly: "Foolish boy, don''t you know that accountability mitigates the weight of the failure that kept you down? Holding yourself responsible for your circumstances is the first step in getting up from failure." Nick felt that Loss''s words were really profound but he was still unsure of one thing. "Loss, you were very menacing just a moment ago but how comes you seem so weak and powerless now." Loss stopped struggling against Nick''s foot on its neck and spoke listlessly: "Sigh, loss always looks more threatening when you are feeling the weight of your failures but once you stand up in spite of them, I, Loss, have no more power over you." Nick felt that what Loss was saying had a powerful lesson within it. (So...persevering through failure makes the losses I suffer trivial. I understand now.) Suddenly, Nick''s vision went dark and when it returned, he found himself on the ground of his room. Nick''s eyes were filled with determination; he picked himself up, washed his face, ate a few snacks and sat back at his desk ready to try carving out his foundation laws again. (I''m truly ready this time.) As soon as his consciousness entered his mindscape he willed for the laws of Big Improvement to form in midair. Hours passed by with scene after scene of his past traumas entering his mind, scenes involving his grandaunt, his sisters, his high school peers, his teachers and even other people who he barely knew. "Why are you so useless, can''t you do anything right?" "Why doesn''t he talk to us? Is there something wrong with him?" "That boy clearly has no sense." "You''ll never amount to anything." "Hey sis, that idiot is leaving now. Why does he even bother going to school. Someone who can barely talk to people can''t possibly do anything in school, right?" In the last scene, a girl from his high school science class looked him in the eye and said: "You really are an ugly little duckling." In the real world two lines of tears trailed down Nick''s eyes, falling off of his face and onto the desk. (I won''t ever stop going after my dreams.) At that moment the last symbol appeared in midair. The symbols shone a brighter white light which quickly changed to a dull red. The symbols floated into the night sky, enlarged to seemingly encompass Nick''s vision and then disappeared. "Carving the foundation laws is complete." Nick''s consciousness immediately left his mindscape. Nick''s mind was now hazy; he felt his face and realized that there was a trail of tears leaving both of his eyes. He looked down at the desk and saw that they had formed a small pool on his desk after falling off of his face. Nick clenched his right fist and spoke: "No amount of failures will ever stop me." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 36: Magic Whirlpool Nick finished carving his foundation laws into his mindscape at around 4 pm, Friday afternoon. Nick felt too tired to do anything afterwards so he took a shower and went to bed, falling into a deep sleep. When he next awoke, it was around 6 am Sunday morning; he had apparently missed his phone alarm twice. Nick got up out of bed and his mind was a little hazy and he was also incredibly hungry. (I''ve had a good amount of rest, I should start by getting some food in me before looking at my mindscape.) Nick took a shower, got dressed and left his room heading to the cafeteria. When he got there, many people were also buying breakfast or eating at a table. Nick bought double portions of sausages, eggs and pancakes with maple syrup along with a bottle of orange juice. Nick sat down at a table to eat and only focused on the food, not paying any attention to his surroundings. .................................................................................. Marcia was alone, eating quietly at the far left side of the cafeteria. Normally she would be eating with a group of friends but things had been rough for her lately because of Don''s change in attitude, mostly spending time in his room supposedly studying and practicing magic. Once Don stopped meeting up with them, Marcia''s usual group of friends seemed to not want to readily include her in their activities. Marcia bit her lip. (Damn it! Since Don decided to focus on his magic training, my ''friends'' have been completely ignoring me. Sigh, it looks like they only tolerated me because I was close to Don but since he no longer hangs out with us, they stopped caring about me.) Marcia was born into a life of servitude as both of her parents were servants of the Bartholomews, a powerful Magicians'' family, and she was expected to be the same. Many Magician families guarded against outsiders by choosing their servants from one of or a few families that they had history with. To regular society, this was a normal and fair arrangement since the family of servants would receive protection and financial support in exchange for their family members providing the Magicians'' family some kind of service but the length of service usually extended until the end of the servants'' life. Also, usually the Magicians'' family would decide what purpose any servant would serve and that servant could not refuse so long as there was no obvious reason to. Marcia was sick of this life, since young she was made to accompany Don Bartholomew. This was somewhat arranged by her parents who had some influence on the management of the Bartholomews'' household in hopes that Don would take a liking to her; she had known and attended to Don since she was 10 years old but Don only started paying special attention to her when they were both around 16 years old and this was because she had started to develop physically, looking more and more like a woman. Don became nice to her in contrast to his usual indifference and treated her well up to the day that they first came to this academy. At first she was only sent here to help Don settle in but at student registration, when she saw how Ray Menzes had killed two young men who got into a physical altercation, a desire welled up in her for that same kind of power. How would she get it? She was already in the place where she could get that kind of power. Knowing Don''s ''playful'' nature, a plan came to mind almost immediately on how she could become a student of this academy as well. The Bartholomews are a very influential family even at Richter Order Academy and Marcia knew that as long as she could get Don to request that she accompany him as a student, she could gain enrollment and a chance to get rid of her servant status. After orientation when they were taken to the dorms and Don and her entered his room, she made her move. Knowing that Don was attracted to her, she hugged him and whispered to him that she wanted to accompany him in going to school here and that she would do anything as long as she could be admitted. Her intentions were obvious but Don had always been a very practical man, he did not hesitate to take the chance to make use of her body in exchange for getting her admitted to the academy, after all, it was as easy for him as making one call to his father, Richard Bartholomew, who was on the board of directors of the academy. After he was done with her, Marcia thought that they would become closer but in fact, Don became more distant until she convinced him that building a strong network would be a wise course of action and that she would help. Things were going well because the name Bartholomew attracted a lot of interest, that is, until Don Bartholomew lost a spar against Nick Capitol in the mid year exams and decided that actively building a social network was useless. Once that happened, all of her hard work in cultivating relationships using Don was destroyed as she could no longer arrange friendly meet ups without him and she was left to her own devices. This was not surprising to her since she knew that she was actually just a commoner in the eyes of the wealthy students, in addition, she did not have a strong talent for magic as her rank was 650 during the mid year exams. (Sigh, I should just continue preparing for the end of year exam while trying to build my own social network. It will probably be difficult but I should be able to build a support group with the students that did not come from affluent families.) Suddenly, Marcia noticed that the flow of magic energy subtly changed. She had become an Apprentice Magician about two months after being enrolled thanks to her parents support from the Bartholomew''s main house as well as the support Don gave her in exchange for some intimacy. Currently she had a basic mindscape and a set of complementing foundation laws that she received from Don and with some practice during the past year she could sense magic energy keenly, after all, that helped her much in gauging the power of the people that she met on a daily basis. Generally, as far as the first years were concerned, that skill was enough to gauge who could be offended and who could not be offended. Right now the magic energy in the cafeteria seemed to be moving in a strange pattern towards a central point in the cafeteria This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.It did not take long before Marcia found that central point and she was not the only one as other students started taking notice. As time went on more and more magic energy was being drawn to a certain section of the cafeteria and very quickly this energy became frenzied. Marcia looked at the person in the midst of all the frenzied magic energy who was sitting at a table absentmindedly eating his food. She had only interacted with this person once when she had accidentally bumped into him, but instead of apologizing, she had called him a ''less than''. She had partly done that because she did not want the other women seeing her on good terms with someone with no background and because Don told her that this person had seen them being intimate on the first day that they came to the academy and she was embarrassed for herself and didn''t want to show any more weakness. Marcia said that person''s name softly without thinking: "Nick Capitol?" ....... Nick continued to eat his food for about 20 minutes. He was also thinking about his circumstances and what do next, not paying attention to the phenomenon that he was causing at the moment. (There is less than two months until the end of year exam. I don''t know much about other realms and the quality of my magic spells are suspect right now, also carrying around too may magic scrolls during a survival challenge will be troublesome. I should work on a spell that I can use as a trump card if necessary and thinking of my vision involving Big and Strength, I have an idea of what kind of spell I should make. Since this spell won''t be used via a scroll, I have to be more careful than I was when creating my first spells, I don''t want to die from an unexpected backlash. Oh, I also have to make a magic scroll using the translation that I got from Marsha.) Nick stopped eating to rub his forehead for a while. He was starting to get a headache, probably from thinking about all the work that he had ahead of him. "Ha, ha." Nick chuckled, knowing that the amount of work involved was a small concern in comparison to the trouble he would have been in if his final attempt at carving his foundation laws had failed. While Nick was engrossed in his thoughts, he noticed something strange. His headache was getting worse and since he stopped paying attention only to his thoughts he noticed the strange movement of magic energy in the surroundings; the movement was so strange that even someone like him with no training in sensing magic energy could feel it clearly. Nick looked up from his meal and saw a literal whirlpool of magic energy swirling above him with a section of it continuously entering his body. He was shocked to say the least and his headache kept getting worse to the point that it became difficult to even think properly. Nick saw all the students in the cafeteria staring at him and thought: "Just how long has this been happening before I noticed it?" Soon Nick realized that not only did his headache become head splitting, he was now unable to speak; Nick held his head as the pain grew worse. While Nick was struck dumb by the current happenings and as the students watched on, a man in an all black suit and a white dress shirt suddenly appeared in the middle of the cafeteria near Nick, further shocking the students. The man raised his arm and with a downward movement, tracing a silver line in midair, the whirlpool of magic energy dispersed and Nick''s headache slightly eased. The man who appeared to be white and seemed to be in his early thirties and had short black hair walked towards Nick slowly and spoke: "My name is Thomas Wiser. Nick Capitol, your circumstances were noticed by this academy''s enforcement office. It is against regulations for a student to actively withdraw large amounts of magic energy from the surroundings of a public place. You could have put yourself as well as the students in this cafeteria in great danger. I will now take you to our office for questioning." RING RING RING When Thomas arrived at Nick''s table, his phone rang and while motioning Nick to stand up and follow him, he answered it. "Hello..." He and Nick stood there while Thomas talked to the person on the other end of the call and strangely enough he only heard Thomas greeting the person before he somehow became unable to understand what Thomas was saying. Everything he said while on the phone now sounded like gibberish. Nick''s headache had eased by quite a lot so he started looking at his surroundings and he saw the multitude of students within the cafeteria looking at him with shocked and suspicious expressions. It could be seen that they wanted answers for the events that just took place but unfortunately for them Nick had none to give them. (How the fuck am I supposed to know what just happened? Then again...I am the one that caused it....sigh.) Nick sighed internally because he knew that things were going to get more difficult for him in the future. He could practically see his quiet life of just studying and practicing magic waving him goodbye. (Don''t go...) Thomas hung up his phone, looking sternly at Nick and spoke just as sternly: "Change of plans, we are going to meet with the dean instead of going immediately to the enforcement office." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 37: Interesting Specimen Nick followed Thomas to the dean''s administrative building. Just like before when he was escorted by Ray Menzes, after entering the dean''s building, they used the elevator to get to the floor of the dean''s office. When Nick and Thomas entered the office, the only person that they saw was the receptionist that Nick had met before. She raised her head from her documents in response to their arrival and got up to greet them: "Welcome, the dean has already given instructions. Nick Capitol, please enter the dean''s room, he is waiting for you." Thomas nodded his head and motioned Nick to go along with what the receptionist said. Nick walked towards the dean''s inner room with an uncharacteristic smile on his face. (Even in this situation, I can''t help but notice how fine miss receptionist is.) When he got to the door his smile collapsed into a plain expression. (Alright, what happened in the cafeteria was probably caused by my mindscape so it''s likely that the dean and the enforcement office will only do some slight probes to make sure I wasn''t planning to do anything to the other students. Come to think of it, why would a relatively minor disturbance like that attract the dean''s attention?) Nick had realized earlier that ever since he had let the dean use his magic on him, he has been having strange visions making him concerned that the dean had done something to him. Nick knew that now was the time to inquire about the cause of his visions. Nick entered the dean''s room and saw Xavier Gecko sitting at his desk with a plain expression, looking at Nick as he made his entrance. "Please take a seat." The dean spoke while pointing at the chair in front of his desk. Nick walked a few meters towards the chair and sat down facing the dean, waiting for the dean to speak further. "You were brought here because I received an alert that your magic power was causing a ruckus in your dorm''s cafeteria. Apparently you were withdrawing a large amount of magic energy from the surroundings and doing that, as you should now from the rule book that the academy has given you, is a big no, no. Do you know why that is not allowed?" Based on his current understanding of magic, Nick could make pretty good guesses for why gathering so much magic energy in a public place wasn''t allowed in the academy. "Is it to protect against the use of powerful, large area of effect spells on the students or to prevent someone from depleting the surrounding magic energy, leaving the other students at a disadvantage if a battle was to take place for any reason." CLAP CLAP The dean clapped his hands and spoke: "All those are good reasons to keep people from just sucking up too much magic energy but those are not the crux of the issue here because the academy has measures to prevent magical battles from occurring on campus and anyone stupid enough to try to launch an area of effect spell on campus without permission would find himself dead before putting the final law in place. The enforcement office is not full of salted fish. Do you know that magic energy is the most concentrated where there are may Magicians and the more Magicians there are, the more concentrated the magic energy?" This was new information to Nick. "I didn''t know that but what does that have to do with the reason that students aren''t allowed to withdraw large amounts of magic energy in public places?" The dean looked at Nick with a slight smile and spoke: "The rule is in place because if a student absorbs too much magic energy, worse if the magic energy is highly concentrated, there is a very big chance that they will explode into a million tiny pieces from an over-abundance of unprocessed magic energy being within their body." Nick''s plain expression froze into one of shock, thinking back to the head splitting headache that he had felt when the whirlpool of magic energy was above his head and how the headache eased when the whirlpool was dispersed. (Did I almost die?) Nick looked at the dean with a questioning gaze. "So you realized, huh? You were a about a minute or so from exploding, considering all the magic energy that you were absorbing in such a small amount of time. You now have your mindscape and you''ve clearly carved your foundation laws into your mindscape; I can the feel magic power emanating from you. Remember that there is only so much magic energy that the mindscape can store and your foundation laws allow you to process a certain amount of magic energy at a time. From what the enforcement office had recorded, it seems that your mindscape has an above average capacity, for an Apprentice Magician you are impressive in that regard and your foundation laws seem to give your mindscape fairly decent processing capabilities but you should be more wary because if you absorb too much magic energy passively, the unprocessed magic energy becomes extremely toxic and volatile once it remains within your body for too long. You can process the magic energy faster if you use your meditation while you absorb the energy." Nick listened and took every word the dean said to heart. He didn''t know why but it seemed that the dean was teaching him information that one would typically have from experience in cultivating magic energy. The dean continued to talk: "You should have a fair amount of magic energy that is still unprocessed lingering inside your body. I want you to process it here using your meditation so that you know the feeling that doing so gives you." Nick understood what the dean was saying and since it was probably in his best interest to do what the dean said, he closed his eyes and internally chanted his meditation, trying to process the magic energy inside his body. The dean looked on with an expectant gaze. He knew that Nick had not been going to classes so he should be lacking some common sense that most Apprentice Magicians have. He was instructing him right now because, based on Nick''s results and progress so far, dean Gecko felt that Nick was a promising student and didn''t want to see possible talent go to waste. (Not to mention that the soul tag that I had placed on his soul in order to monitor his magic power had been stimulated a few times since our last meeting. The tag is only supposed to feed me information about his magical power every time it is raised past a certain threshold but since he did not even have a mindscape at the time I did not expect to receive an alert for a while but considering that he had clearly only just recently even carved his foundation laws into his mindscape, how did he trigger the soul tag, sending me useless data in the process twice before today; the only time that the soul tag activated because of an actual increase in magic power was today? Does he have an affinity with soul magic that made the laws in his soul harmonize with the laws in my soul tag? Or is it that my soul tag stimulated his soul''s laws causing some kind of unexpected reaction? Him absorbing the magic energy in his body should give me some useful information.) Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.Nick sat in front of the dean absorbing the magic energy within his body. While he was meditating, his consciousness entered his mindscape, it being the first time since carving his foundation laws into it. (This...) Nick was shocked at the changes. From there being around twenty stars in the sky, there were now thousands of stars shining brightly with a white light and the star that had previously been the biggest was now far bigger than the others, still shining a reddish blue light and so much so that unlike before, his mindscape was no longer dark and gloomy but appeared to be having a daytime with the bluish-red star being a sun like heavenly body above. The crumbling road from before was no longer crumbling and no cracks could be seen. It still hovered in midair and extended when the golden figure of light walking on it seemingly reached its end. Wherever the golden figure walked, there was always a road to step on. The figure of golden light was the same as before with no distinct features, being only a human shaped body of light. Major changes happened to the sea below the road. The water was no longer dark and now had a bluish, clean color with waves undulating continuously. Nick looked at the sea and felt as if there was a very close connection between it and him. His consciousness moved closer to the sea and at that point he could truly appreciate its vast size, it seemed almost endless. Nick''s consciousness tried to interact with the sea and when he did the waters seemed to move and undulate according to his will giving of a feeling of extreme closeness; Nick also felt that this water felt very similar to the whirlpool of magic energy that he had seen in the cafeteria but different somehow. Nick continued to interact with the waters for a seemingly long time, then a thought came to his mind: (Is this water the magic energy that is stored in my mindscape?) Nick looked around at the seemingly endless sea and had a hard time believing that that was the case. "There''s so much water." ................................................................................. Back in reality, the dean looked at Nick with surprise. Not only had Nick absorbed all the unprocessed magic within his body in less than a minute, more magic energy was being attracted to Nick, but that wasn''t the part that surprised the dean. What surprised the dean was that the more magic energy that Nick absorbed, the greater the magic power the dean could feel from him but also the greater the amount of magic energy that he was attracting became; usually as the mindscape became saturated with magic energy, the surrounding magic energy would be repelled slightly until the mindscape needed to be filled again, never would it gather so violently the more the mindscape was filled. The magic energy that Nick was attracting was so concentrated and flowing so quickly that it was on the verge of forming a whirlpool. (Hmmm...it seems that this young man''s magic power has a quality that attracts raw magic energy and the greater his store of magic energy the greater the amount of magic energy that he attracts and absorbs. How is his mindscape processing the magic energy so quickly and at such a high capacity. I had already investigated him, he does not have a background that includes a Magician and the only way for him to have gotten his hands on a set of foundation laws was to get the Laws of Syracuse from the magical archives office. The Laws of Syracuse is mediocre at best, only letting you process 40 magical units per second; that is far less than the average foundation laws on the market that let you process at least 120 magical units per second. Nick is processing at least 700 magical units per second. Did he modify the Laws of Syracuse? If so, that''s nothing special but to modify it to such an extent...that''s not normal.) (It looks like he may not have been in as much danger as we might have thought. He clearly has a large capacity for storing and processing magic energy, maybe just as much as a rank four Apprentice Magician. This boy is full of surprises, should I remove my soul tag? No, it''s too soon, as long as his understanding of soul magic doesn''t progress too much, there should be no danger in him noticing it for a long time. I''ll keep monitoring him until I have a full understanding of his potential.) "First, I should do something about the whirlpool of magic energy that is forming. Hmmm...the safest way would be to get him to stop his meditation." The dean raised his right index finger with it glowing with a purple light and waved it towards Nick. (Soul message.) Soul message is a spell that injects information into the soul. The soul and the mind are very closely connected so the information will also be transmitted into the conscious mind. Dean Gecko wanted Nick to end his meditation on his own. ( It seems that the reason for so much magic energy gathering around him in the cafeteria was that his mindscape was using his foundation laws to passively process magic energy and with the strange characteristic of his own magic power, the more that was processed the more magic energy he attracted to himself. His magic power seems very ''special''.) ................................................................................... Within Nick''s mindscape. "Huh? The dean wants me to stop the meditation." The dean''s magic sent instructions into Nick''s soul which alerted his consciousness. The soul message also contained scenes of what was happening in reality so Nick partly understood the situation. "Alright, it''s time to stop." Nick looked at his blue sea of magic energy and felt proud. He willed and his consciousness returned to reality. Nick''s eyes opened, seeing the dean sitting behind his desk with a plain expression; the room was quiet as the whirling magic energy had dispersed as soon as Nick stopped his meditation. Nick didn''t want to waste any of his time since he just had a taste of the results from all his hard work; before the dean said anything else he decided to speak about his visions. "Dean Gecko, I wanted to ask you about something that has been bothering me for a while. The last time I came here you did something to my soul that made me have a strange experience. Was that effect supposed to linger, causing me to have similar experiences like the one I had when I first came here?" Dean Gecko''s eyes slightly widened at hearing that Nick was still experiencing soul states without his intervention. (Nick Capitol...you are a very interesting specimen.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 38: Lions Strength Xavier Gecko was very surprised to hear that Nick was still having soul states. The soul state, practically speaking, was simply an interaction between the person and the various laws carved into their soul. Every human is born with laws carved into their souls and these laws tend to determine the person''s affinity for different types of magical energy. The soul state can be used to interact with these affinities, meaning, that a person can have a meaningful ''discussion'' with basically the source of their magical potential in a form that they can understand. These soul states are usually nothing special, only helping Magicians to figure out what their highest affinities are but sometimes there are reports that Magicians receive inspiration regarding the use of magic from soul states. Soul states tend to be different from person to person so their overall benefits vary. One thing is for sure though, soul states must be triggered by the requisite spell cast by a Magician or through the use of a magical tool. The academy has many such tools to help their students but Nick is saying that he entered soul states without any help and the dean knew that was strange. Dean Gecko thought: (It must have something to do with the soul tag that I placed on him.) Nick was sitting in front of the dean waiting for an answer so dean Gecko felt inclined to answer his question as honestly as possible minus his suspicions about his soul tag having something to do with it. The dean spoke to Nick, telling him information and even his own experiences regarding soul states. "...So that''s all there is to it. I don''t know the cause of your soul states but they should be harmless to you. They may even bring you inspiration and benefits every once in a while." Nick felt enlightened and relieved that these soul states would not put him in danger and just as the dean said he did receive inspiration from them but he was definitely not going to tell the dean about that. Something still felt amiss but he couldn''t tell what exactly so he was not going to say more than he had to to the dean. (My intuition is telling me that the dean is suspicious. It could be that I just have trust issues but I''d rather bet that the dean is playing tricks, more than that I''m just bugging out.) Dean Gecko continued speaking: "Now, moving on to the matter of you being brought here. I am satisfied that the ruckus in your dorm''s cafeteria was caused by the fact that you just carved your foundation laws into your mindscape and you were ignorant of how to properly control your power. I will settle matters with the enforcement office. By the way, this goes without saying but I''ll say it anyway for your benefit. Do not tell anyone the details of your meditation or the power of your mindscape or foundation laws, do not even speak of your own speculations regarding them. That is all, you may leave. Tell Thomas to come in here when you see him." Nick nodded his head and said: "Thank you for your teachings dean Gecko." The dean nodded and Nick turned around and left. When he entered the waiting room he told Thomas that the dean wanted to speak with him and so Thomas entered the dean''s room while Nick sat in a chair, waiting for him to return. The only people currently in the room were Nick and the receptionist. Nick wanted to get back to his room to experiment with his new found powers but obviously couldn''t do that until Thomas returned and let him go. Nick turned his attention to the receptionist and thought: (I want her.) Nick had never actively tried to interact with women but that doesn''t mean that he didn''t have the desire, he just didn''t want to waste his time enduring the social games that they played, as well as, his own circumstances were never the best. Nick walked up to the receptionist''s desk and nervously asked: "Excuse me miss, may I know your name for future reference?" The receptionist looked at Nick with a gentle smile and spoke: "My name is Samantha Bell. Young man, you know, I''ve worked in this office for quite some time and I''ve received the attention of many men and women but I''ve got to say, your stare makes me the most uncomfortable and I mean that in a positive way. Behind all that nervousness you seem to have a fairly formidable character. You see, I practice wisdom magic so I have an intuition for these things." Nick was a little caught off guard, he didn''t think that he would be complemented by this woman for staring at her, he thought at most he might get slapped on the head or something. "Thank you Samantha..." Before Nick could say any more, Samantha interrupted him. "And because I''m a Wisdom Magician, I can intuit your intentions quite clearly. Because the dean seems to think well enough of you, I will say this. I am a Regular Magician with more power than any nation''s non-magical military. If you want to fuck me, your chances are very slim indeed. Hmmm...If you could somehow defeat the dean in combat, I might consider it but as you are right now I can crush you with a wave of my hair. Behave yourself and sit down, do not approach me with your lust in mind again unless you have the same capability a lion has to hold down his lioness." Nick was shocked at hearing all that, he felt like there was a stone lodged in his throat. No matter how he tried to speak, when he opened his mouth, no words came out. He opened and closed his mouth for almost thirty seconds and ended up saying nothing. Finally, as he took one last look at Samantha''s calm smile, he turned around and went back to his chair in defeat. He silently clenched his right fist. Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.(Fuck, that was embarrassing but she is right. I didn''t know that she was a Regular Magician, I can''t even feel any magic energy coming from her. Since coming to this academy, that interaction with her ended up being my first real defeat. That''s so lame. Sigh...I''ll work harder and some day I''ll definitely make a woman like Samantha submit to me. I just have to be patient.) Nick waited quietly for another thirty minutes before Thomas returned. Thomas spoke to Nick in a more carefree tone than before: "Based on the dean''s recommendation, you have been cleared of all suspicions. You may leave of your own accord now." When Thomas finished speaking, he disappeared in front of Nick''s eyes. Nick felt relieved to be free of Thomas''s supervision. Before Nick left, he steeled himself and walked up to Samantha''s desk again, speaking with a slight bow: "Thank you for your admonishment and correction as I did act presumptuously towards you but know that I have not given up and I won''t stop until I possess that lion strength that you mentioned. That being said, I hope you''ll be ready to be my lioness when the time comes." Samantha''s eyes widened slightly, reacting to this boy''s guts. (Is this young man brave or stupid?) Suddenly, Samantha raised her right hand that was emanating a pinkish light and the scene in front of Nick changed; he now found himself in a space devoid of anything but a large shining object far below him. As the object got closer, he realized that he was apparently free falling towards what seemed like a huge ball of fire. (Is that the sun?) Nick could not speak and he felt like he was suffocating as he felt the heat coming from the supposed sun. When he was about to come in direct contact with the ball of fire, the scene changed back to reflect reality with him slightly bowing in front of Samantha. Sweat dripped off of his face like he had just taken a shower. Samantha spoke softly: "We''ll see." At that, Nick turned around and left, proud of himself for his declaration but internally kicking himself for how stupid it was to say that to a Regular Magician. (Sigh, I''m an idiot...No! If I don''t even have the guts to say something like that to a woman, then I''m basically showing that I don''t have the chops to successfully chase down the things that I want. I don''t have to be strong now, but I''ll get there...over time.) ....................................................................... The dean looked at a holographic screen in front of him, witnessing the scene between Samantha and Nick. "Ha, ha, ha. This young man sure has some guts, making such a declaration. There are no real consequences preventing faculty from exchanging blows with each other and If I had made such a declaration to Samantha, she would definitely have given me a small scar before I could take her down. I remember when I was young, I made even more ridiculous declarations than him. Ha, ha." "Hmmm...I wonder. Should I give Samantha over to him for a night in exchange for the details regarding the magic scrolls that he used in the exam as well as information about his mindscape. My suspicion is that this young man has a special mindscape, just thinking about his apparent storage capacity for magic gives me goosebumps. There''s also the unknown nature of the magic contained in his scrolls..." The dean mulled it over for a while but ultimately decided against it. "No way, that Nick Capitol doesn''t seem so naive as to give up his benefits because of his sexual desires. Forget it, I''ll find a handle on him sooner or later." ..... When Nick got back to his dorm, it was already around 4 pm. Nick went back to the cafeteria to buy some food and then returned to his room to eat it there. After he finished eating he started thinking about his next moves. (I should start by trying to alter the three spells that I already made to make them suitable for casting without scrolls. Then I should work on a spell that I can use as a trump card; I already have some inspiration from my last soul state so that will likely help a lot. Oh, and I have to make a magic scroll from the translation that I got from Marsha, I still have to fulfill my end of the agreement with her.) Nick knew that he had a lot of work to do in less than two months but he was excited for what the future might hold. Nick sat at his desk and started chanting his meditation. The magic energy in his room appeared stimulated and started whirling around his head. Within his mindscape, Nick tried to move a large mass of his ''magic water'' according to his will, all the while saying some of the words of his meditation: "I am the rules." "Within both heaven and earth, my path is limitless." "This world is only grass for me to tread on to reach the mountain of my dreams." "The rules have no limit." The bluish water of Nick''s mindscape became turbulent and its level started to raise. Nick could not visibly see it because of its apparent vastness but he could intuitively feel it. Nick smiled. "The future will be interesting." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 39: Big Two months later. ..................................................................................... Nick was standing in his room at 4 am on a Monday morning sweating and panting after doing a few reps of pushups. Nick turned to a mirror that he had on the door of his closet and looked at the progress he had made with his physique. He had been doing reps of pushups for about two years now and even though he did not start with a good foundation, being barely able to get decent food to feed himself when he was living with his grandaunt, his arm muscles were now fairly developed. So were his chest and shoulder muscles and based on how easy it was becoming to do his daily exercises, his upper body strength had increased by at at least 30 percent. Nick knew how big of a deal that was, assuming that he had average strength for a male his age, that means that his physical strength was now 30 percent above the average male; that''s a significant improvement. Nick looked at his toned upper body and felt satisfied. He went to the bathroom to take a shower and when he was finished he got dressed and sat at his desk to think about his progress in the last two months. (The last two months sure have been difficult. I''ve only managed to complete half of my goals and I have only made slight progress in becoming a rank two Apprentice Magician. I heard from Marsha that every one else in the top ranks of our year has become a rank 2 Apprentice Magician including herself while I''m the odd one out, still being stuck at rank one.) In the past two months, Nick tried to modify his first three spells so that he could cast them himself instead of having to use scrolls but he failed in that regard. Apparently the complexity involved in creating a spell meant to be cast by an actual Magician was many times more difficult than creating a spell used via a scroll for various reasons that Nick did not yet fully understand. Since his understanding of rule magic had increased, he was also better able to appraise those spells and the results disappointed him. The laws used to create the spells were so full of ''holes'' that it was embarrassing, he could see them and he was only a rank one Apprentice Magician with limited training. Although his spells looked great when they were activated with a scroll, they were actually not that powerful; if not for the fact that Don Bartholomew did not have a way to protect against rule magic and was most likely ignorant of it, Nick would have definitely lost during the last exam. Using the scrolls against an experienced Apprentice Magician would definitely lead to him losing. To modify the spells into better versions that he could cast himself would be the same as creating different spells so Nick abandoned that project and decided to work on creating a spell based on the inspiration that he got during his soul state after interacting with Big. Two weeks ago he was successful in creating an initial version of his new spell using the inspiration he had gotten from his soul state. It was like he had someone subtly guiding him as to what to do at the really important parts where he needed to theorize how the spell would work in order to establish realistic conclusions. Nick had written the spell''s last laws last night after two weeks of continuous improvements and modifications. He would go out to test it in a few hours. He named his new spell ''Big''. The other thing that he had to be concerned about was the agreement that he had with Marsha. Creating a magic scroll using the translation was easier than Nick thought it would be, probably because he had so much practice with using Valteese in the past year. Nick took up a magic scroll at the side of his desk and moved towards a covered up cage in a corner of his room. The cage was small, probably less than four feet in height and about two feet in width. Nick took the cloth off from over the cage which revealed a small bird standing on a perch inside the cage. Nick didn''t bother opening the cage because the magic scroll he was holding worked based on space magic. Nick unfurled the scroll and willed, the laws on the scroll started moving around until they formed a small cage on the page. The bird inside Nick''s cage then disappeared and the image of a bird drawn in ink appeared inside the cage on the scroll. "Success?" Nick willed again and this time the scroll crumbled. The bird appeared in midair flapping its wings and moving around the room. Nick looked at it and scratched his head. (How am I supposed to catch it now? Releasing the bird inside my room was really stupid...sigh.) Nick was glad that at least the scroll worked. That was not the only benefit that Nick got from creating it; Nick could feel the magic energy that radiated from the scroll. "So that was space magic. When we were teleported during the mid-year exam, I did not feel any magic energy during the whole process, probably because I did not have a mindscape yet. Space magic is pretty interesting. Ideally one could cast spells hitting targets no matter the distance or objects between them. Too bad that persons with a high enough affinity with it are rare. Come, to think of it, do you even need a high affinity with a type of magic energy to use it? Probably not, but doing so without the right affinity would probably be difficult." (Hmmm...I should give learning a type of magic that people have a rare affinity for but is still known a chance? I have to admit that the difficulty in doing so is what makes it enticing.) Nick considered it for a while and decided to put those thoughts to the back of his mind for now. Nick picked up his phone and called Marsha Cassidy. The phone rung for a while and then the call went through. "Hello Marsha, this is Nick. I''ve completed the scrolls for the storage spell. I guarantee their quality and I can sell you two for ¡ê20,000 each. So what do you think?" Marsha could be heard cheering after Nick spoke. "I new you could do it Nick, also you don''t have to say your name every time you call me. You do know that I have caller ID, right? Anyway, I agree on the price but I''m busy doing something right now since the end of year exam is just two days away so could you bring the scrolls to my dorm room please?" Normally Nick wouldn''t want to go to Marsha''s dorm room but the allure of ¡ê40,000 cancelled out his common sense. (I''ve never even seen so much money before and she''s just going to spend that much on two scrolls. Sure enough, comparisons between persons are odious.) "Fine, I''ll bring the scrolls to your dorm room. Just give me the name of the building and the room number. I have other things to do as well so we should make this a quick transaction." Marsha sounded pleased at Nick''s agreement. "It''s the Merry Weather dorm, room 6. The dorm is near the entrance to the academy so you shouldn''t have much trouble finding it. Oh, and since I''m busy, I''ll leave the door unlocked for you. Just enter when you get there and close the door behind you." Nick felt a little weird about that arrangement but ignored his feelings because he just wanted to get the money. "Alright." Nick assented and hung up the phone. Nick didn''t want to waste any more time since he still had to test out his new spell and like Marsha said, the exam was only two days away. Nick got dressed and left his room to go to the cafeteria. He bought a chocolate covered donut, eating it while walking and headed to the Merry Weather dorm. He arrived there twenty minutes later and after asking around he found out the location of the elevator which he took to the first floor. The hallway of the first floor was quiet and Nick did not see anyone so he simply walked up to the door that had a big ''6'' engraved on it and that was painted in purple. Nick knocked on the door but received no answer; there seemed to be music playing inside. Nick remembered what Marsha said and decided to enter on his own. The door was unlocked so he turned the knob and it opened; he went inside and closed the door behind him thinking: This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.(This is all for the sake of the ¡ê40,000. Let''s get this over with.) Nick walked into the living room/bedroom that all the dorm rooms had and instantly regretted it. On the bed he saw Marsha and another girl in a compromising position. The other woman had long red hair, white skin and was naked; she was bent over moaning on the bed in a way that allowed Nick to see her from behind. Marsha was naked along with the other woman and was bent over behind the woman with her head between the woman''s legs licking her vagina from behind. Nick looked on for about ten seconds before shouting: "What the fuck Marsha!" Marsha and the other woman was alerted and both jumped up. The other woman seemed surprised and quickly tried to get dressed. "Hold it!" Exclaimed Marsha motioning the other woman to stop what she was doing. "I''m not done yet so you should just go into the bathroom to wash up for round two." The other woman complied with Marsha''s words and went into the bathroom, closing the door. Marsha turned the music off and looked at Nick, still naked and spoke: "Not bad, right? That woman is one of the bottom rankers and has been trying to gain my favor, trying to get protection for the upcoming exam. She came over to do some chores for me and I made an offer she couldn''t refuse. That''s all there is to this." Nick looked at Marsha in the eye, feeling awkward because she was naked and spoke grudgingly: "This is what you meant by being busy? That''s messed up Marsha. You left the door unlocked so that I would walk in on you guys didn''t you? Are you a pervert?" Marsha laughed at Nick while putting on a robe she took up from the floor. "Ha, Ha, man you are so uptight. I didn''t think that I''d bother doing this but I''ve been stressed recently and needed a release so I took the initiative. Anyway, You have the scrolls right, just place them on the table; text me your banking info and I''ll make the transfer." Nick couldn''t be bothered to argue with Marsha. Nick thought that she was such an earnest and clumsy woman before even though she was a little calculating but looks are clearly deceiving. Nick placed two scrolls on the table in the corner of the room and sent his banking information to Marsha via text. Marsha took only a few seconds to make the transfer. When Nick saw the money in his account, he couldn''t help but internally rejoice despite the weirdness of his current situation. Marsha looked at Nick and spoke: "I''ll use the scrolls later. Since I know you wouldn''t lie to me about their quality, I won''t bother asking you to demonstrate them and also I can easily feel the space magic coming from them anyway. Just like I said the last time we met, in the future when my grandfather sends me scrolls, I''ll let you examine them if you are willing to recreate them and sell me a few copies of the new scrolls." Nick nodded in agreement. Marsha gave a bright smile and spoke: "Now that business is out of the way, why don''t you help yourself to that girl in the bathroom as a favor from me? Don''t worry, we already have an agreement in place so she''ll comply with whatever you want, just don''t play too much with her butt and she''s fine with anything. Ha, ha." Nick looked at Marsha chuckling after what she just said and sighed internally. (Sigh...apparently people that come from wealthy families seem to have varying perverseness about them. Well, that''s none of my business. I just have to remember to be careful when interacting with other students and no more meeting with other students inside their dorm rooms or I might end up like that girl in the bathroom. As for Marsha''s suggestion of using that girl...I''ll pass. I''ve got to say, to a virgin like me it''s really tempting but I''m definitely not going to go along with what Marsha wants.) "I''ll pass. Call me when you have other scrolls." Nick turned around to leave and Marsha waved him goodbye. "See you later, my new best friend." When Nick left the room, Marsha locked the door and punched it. There was a loud thud. "That faggot refused my offer. Hmph, putting on airs because he has some skills. If he had done what I wanted him to, I could have used the opportunity to fuck him myself and use my new enchanting tool to make him a ''little'' more compliant. I won''t rush things again. I''ll definitely make that guy into one of my useful little tools." Marsha looked at the bathroom door and shouted: "Get out here bitch. I''m stressed out again, I''ll be making use of all your holes this time." ....................................................................................... Nick had left the Merry Weather dorm and headed to one of the academy''s magical combat buildings. These were buildings where magic was used to simulate combat situations such as monster attacks and human conflicts. Apprentice Magicians occasionally used them to practice their spell casting. Nick got to the arena like building and went inside. There were apparently many rooms for use to accommodate the academy''s large population of Magicians. Nick went up to the male clerk and spoke: "I would like a room outfitted with a large monster and rocky terrain, please." The clerk did something on his computer and responded: "No problem sir, please go to room 21 for the simulation. You have to scan your ID card at the door to unlock it." Nick nodded his head and went to room 21. He scanned his student ID at the door and entered the room at which point the door closed behind him. The scene in front of Nick appeared to be that of a large valley with rocks all around. Nick walked around for a few minutes before he heard a loud noise approaching from above. Nick looked up to see a large hairy body falling from the sky onto the hard valley floor at which point a lot of dust was raised into the air. Nick used the opportunity to find an elevated position where he could see the supposed monster clearly. There were paths carved into the valley wall leading to platforms protruding from the walls that Nick could use to stand on so he ran up one of those paths and found his way onto a high platform. Looking down, Nick saw the largest rat he had ever seen in his life. It had to weigh several tonnes, it had sharp looking yellow teeth and all of its four long limbs were outfitted with razor sharp claws that cut the stone ground when it moved. Nick''s heart skipped a beat when the giant rat looked up towards him. (Good thing that this is just a simulation, huh?) Nick picked up a small pebble and jumped off the platform, going down towards the rat. The giant rat looked at Nick falling, staying still waiting for Nick to come to it. Nick held the pebble out in front of him and whispered: "Big." A set of laws glowing with brick red light appeared in midair within Nick''s mindscape and his blue sea of magic became turbulent decreasing at a visible rate. Nick clearly intended to use a massive amount of magic energy on this spell. Nick let go of the pebble in his hand and as he was about a ten meters from the rat, the pebble started growing to an enormous size, within a second the small pebble had become the size of one quarter of the valley, falling quickly and heavily on the rat. The large stone fell with a heavy thud and there was a splat, popping sound that could be heard shortly after that. SIMULATION ENDED Were the large neon colored letters that appeared in front of Nick as he continued his descent. (Oh, shit. I forgot to think about how I was going to land.) As Nick was going to fall harshly on the stone that he had enlarged, the space inside the valley warped causing him to appear standing on the ground within a normal white walled room. (Oh, space magic again. I never get tired of experiencing it.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 40: Simulation Nick was pleased with the result of his spell. The spell, Big, has the effect of increasing the size of whatever he touches and how big the target becomes depends on how much magic energy he uses to activate the spell. The principles of the spell are based on the mathematical theory of dilation, particularly, making objects bigger. Creating this spell was no easy task but thanks to the inspiration that Nick received from one of his soul states, he was able to be productive during the hardest parts. The greatest advantage that he had was the fact that he had a large amount of magic energy made possible by the capacity and processing power of his mindscape. During the last two months he had borrowed a magical tool from the academy''s magical devices office in order to determine how much magic energy he could store and recover. This was basically done by everyone when they became an Apprentice Magician or advanced a rank. Magician''s used these tools to ascertain their limits because the amount of magic energy they had determined how many spells that they could use within a certain period of time. Nick had read that rank 1 Apprentice Magicians typically had a magic holding capacity of about 5000 magical units. Magical units were the universal unit of measure for magic energy. Typically, a normal spell required about 1500 magical units so most rank 1 Apprentice Magicians would only be able to use a spell three times before needing to recover their magic energy through meditation; one could also recover their magic energy passively but that usually took three times as long as meditation. The results of using the magic tool to test his mindscape''s capacity confirmed in his own opinion that he had a special mindscape; his capacity for storing magic was a whopping 25,000 magical units, five times the average. That wasn''t the only surprise though, Nick had released all of his magic energy so that he could also test his magic energy recovery when he meditated and the number was almost unbelievable: 980 magical units per second. Nick suspected that his foundation laws, Big Improvement, would significantly outpace the effects of the original Laws of Syracuse but he had never anticipated an over 2000% increase in effectiveness in processing raw magic energy. If the average time for a Magician to recover their magic energy fully when depleted was 42 seconds, considering that the average foundation laws that affluent persons could get recovered magic at 120 magical units per second, Nick could recover his large reserve within 21 seconds, half the time - that''s a huge advantage, and Nick intended to use it fully. From reading books Nick knew that a few seconds difference in magic recovery could mean life or death, victory or defeat so he was grateful for his advantage. Nick also realized the peculiar characteristic that his mindscape gave his magic power and it was that the more magic energy that was stored within his mindscape''s ''sea'', the more magic energy would gather towards him when he meditated and with increasing concentration of rule magic that was included, increasing his recovery ability so much so that his passive recovery was about just as good as other Apprentice Magician''s active recovery. In other words: (I''m a fucking beast.) The biggest hurdle now was his own lack of combat experience which might be important in this end of year exam. Nick left the room and went to the clerk again. "I would like a different scenario this time, I want to be within an enclosed space with multiple small enemies." The clerk responded affirmatively. "Okay, will a cavern with several goblins do?" Nick had seen goblins in video games and movies but had never seen them in real life. Having the chance to face some in a simulation was very exciting. "Yes, that will be fine." Nick turned around to enter the room again. "My advantages are irrelevant if I can''t survive battles in the real world, after all, a dead genius is no genius at all so from now on I have to purposely hone my combat capabilities. Oh..." Nick looked around the cavern that he now found himself in. It was a decent size, about the size of the dorm''s cafeteria, enough to hold about 100 people. At the opposite end of the cavern he saw eight short green figures running towards him, each holding daggers. "So these are goblins." Nick didn''t waste any time, he picked up four pebbles on the cavern floor with his left hand and then started running towards the approaching goblins. He was going to take full advantage of the fact that this was a simulation so that he could learn basic combat as soon as possible since he only had one more day to practice his spell before the exam started. When Nick was about 10 meters from the group of goblins, he put one of the pebbles in his right hand and used Big and then threw the pebble. The spell allowed him to decide the timing of the transformation after he used it within 10 seconds, beyond that the spell would carry out its effect on its own. When the pebble reached slightly overhead of the goblins, suddenly, the pebble that probably weighed no more that a gram originally became what seemed like a two tonne boulder. The goblins, not expecting the change did not react in unison and simply scattered when they realized that a heavy object was falling from above. The boulder fell in quick succession. Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.THUD SPLAT SPLAT Two of the goblins were not lucky enough to escape because they were at the center of the group and so were a step too late in getting from under the boulder. Their red blood oozed from beneath the boulder. "Six left." Two goblins had jumped to the left of the boulder and since they had jumped out of the way so wildly and without caution, they were now picking themselves up off of the ground. Nick rushed over and the goblin nearest to him, sensing his presence, hastily picked up his dagger and lunged at Nick. Nick side stepped the goblin and grabbed its right arm holding the dagger with his right hand; although these goblins were child sized, they had the strength of grown men but Nick was stronger. (This is where all the mornings of doing pushups pay off.) (Big.) Nick let go of the goblin and retreated a few steps. The goblin''s entire arm had instantly became ten times its width and length. The goblin''s arm fell down with a thud; it tried to move it but was not able to do so. (No creature could move a limb that just had a suddenly large increase in size. Big seems to have the advantage that I can control how far the magic penetrates within a living being. I held onto the goblin long enough to just affect its arm muscles. Seeing how grotesque its right arm is now, my spell may not have had a uniform effect on its arm bones...I can live with that.) AAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH The goblin started to scream out in pain seemingly from its arm suddenly transforming, it could no longer grasp its dagger and its arm felt like a mass of useless mush. The other goblin saw its friend''s predicament and also lunged towards Nick with its dagger. Nick responded by throwing a pebble at the goblins face. (Big.) Nick had thrown the pebble with a lot of force and by the time it reached the goblins face the pebble expanded into a basin wide rock. The transformation did not slow the rock down even a little and with a disastrous force the rock hit the goblins face tearing its head off of its body. (Force is equal to mass multiplied by acceleration. A sudden increase in mass from my spell did not seem to immediately affect the rock''s acceleration so the force that I threw the rock with increased by over twenty times in response to the same increase in the rock''s size. The flying rock produced enough force to tear the goblin''s head off. So cool.) Nick rush over to the goblin''s now lifeless body lying on the ground and picked up its dagger and ran over to the goblin whose arm he had enlarged. Nick held the dagger firmly and drove it into the goblin''s throat. It could hardly defend itself because of its deformed right arm and Nick was too strong to defend against with only the use of one arm. This goblin now lied on the ground grasping its punctured neck drowning in its own blood. Nick looked at the scene with indifference. "It''s just a simulation." Nick heard the sound of running and saw that the other four goblins had gathered themselves and were now quickly approaching his position. Nick ran over to the body of the decapitated goblin and used a significant amount of magic energy to activate his spell. His magic sea could be seen decreasing at a visible rate. "It seems that in order to use Big on living beings the cost is far more than on inanimate objects. Hmmm...." Nick wondered why that was but since he was in battle, he pushed the thought to the back of his mind. Nick threw the goblin''s body at the four approaching goblins using his developed arms; it wasn''t difficult to throw the corpse as the goblins were child sized. As the goblin''s corpse reached the others, it suddenly increased in size by about twenty times in midair and fell on them. (Now the easy part begins.) As the goblins tried to crawl out from under the corpse, just as each one was almost free, Nick walked over and gabbed its head activating his spell. (Big) (Big) (Big) (Big) All the heads of the goblins increased in size by about eight times and they silently died. Nick looked on with satisfaction. (I was wondering what would happen if a creature''s brain was suddenly increased in size. I guess it''s not that they get smarter. Ha.) This is the most excitement Nick had had in a year so he was getting a little carried away in his celebration of his spell''s effectiveness by making inappropriate jokes. Nick quickly realized that none of the events that just occurred were funny and calmed himself down. SIMULATION ENDED Neon colored letters appeared and the room warped, returning to its boring white walled, bedroom like state. Nick smiled as he declared: "I win." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 41: Simulated Defeat Nick was satisfied with how he handled the last simulation. (Everything seemed so real, even when I stabbed that goblin in the neck.) Nick thought back to the moment he stabbed one of the goblins, leaving it on the ground drowning in blood. Nick had never killed a living being before but considering that it was a simulation, he still hadn''t but although the scenario was a simulation, it felt extremely real. The feel of the dagger, the heat from the goblins body, the goreish scene of the goblin struggling for breath with blood flowing from its mouth and neck. All of that felt real but Nick didn''t feel much from the event of killing the goblin, he felt excitement from using his spell but all in all, what he felt from killing those goblins felt the opposite. "Indifference." Nick knew no other way to describe the feeling. (Is it because I knew that it was a simulation?) Nick shook his head and removed those questions from his mind. (Whether it was a simulation or not doesn''t matter. I had an objective and I did what it took to accomplish it. Nothing else matters other than that.) Nick didn''t realize, but as he internalized that thought, there was an eerie glow in his eyes. Nick left the simulation room and spoke to the clerk again. "This time, I would like multiple adult sized targets in an open area. Could the targets be Apprentice Magicians?" The clerk looked at Nick with a weird expression but still spoke politely: "Yes, the targets can be made to be other Apprentice Magicians but..." Nick felt annoyed with the way the clerk''s expression was, as if the clerk was silently judging him. "But what?" The clerk changed his expression quickly into a plain one and spoke: "This is the first time since I was placed in this building that someone has asked to fight other Apprentice Magicians instead of monsters, well, considering that only first years and second years use this building. Your request is understood, please reenter your room to begin the simulation." Nick turned around to walk back to his room, thinking about what the clerk said. (Hmmm...I''m not surprised with what the clerk said. I''ve read in some books that Apprentice Magicians are trained by mostly fighting monsters in various realms controlled by their schools and other than school spars that don''t usually end up in fatalities, Apprentice Magicians in Europe and most western countries do not have the opportunity to battle other humans seriously until after graduation like how police officers being trained in the academy would never have the opportunity to man handle criminals. Most of the first and second years probably don''t have the mentality of wanting to fight humans, at least not when the simulation can produce monsters like in video games.) Nick honestly didn''t care what the reason was for the preference of the students, he and the clerk were probably overthinking things anyway. "Who cares about their reasons?" Nick entered the simulation room, closing the door behind him and looked around. He was now standing in a grassy field that spread into the distance in each direction. "This is a grassy plain, not a bad terrain for a magical battle, not that it suits me very well, but where are my enemies?" Suddenly, a bright white light shone from the left of Nick''s vision. Nick couldn''t see what the source of the white light was but he could feel magic energy flowing to that spot. "Are the enemies here?" Nick stood at his position waiting to see what would happen next. In the next second a blinding ray of white light covered his vision. "Huh?" Nick felt his body being hit but the pain from the impact didn''t set in until he was thrown into the air and fell back to the ground, moving about eight meters from his original position. He did not receive a wound from the attack so there was no blood but Nick was now in a tremendous amount of pain. He slowly picked himself up off of the ground from the small pit that was created from his body''s impact against the ground when he was thrown over here by the ray of light. Nick stood shakily, looking at four other people that stood in the position that the ray of light originated from. They all stood side by side wearing dark red robes. (These guys are clearly responsible for the earlier attack. They didn''t show themselves before they began preparing their attack. I said that I wanted Apprentice Magicians and I got them. These scheming bastards.) Seeing Nick stand up, none of them spoke but they all raised their hands in unison causing a set of laws glowing in white light to appear above their position. The laws then morphed into a ball of light, shining so brightly that Nick had to squint his eyes when looking at it. In the next moment the ray of light appeared, reaching Nick''s position in a few seconds but Nick had already prepared to jump out of the way and when he did so he fell on the ground harshly pulling up dirt and grass. Nick lied on his belly amidst all the dirt thinking about how pathetic he must look at this moment. Nick turned his head to look at the spot that was hit by the ray of light and saw a meter deep pit that was formed from the impact of the attack. (Fuck!) While Nick was internally cursing, the four Magicians cast their spell again and more quickly than before. Nick didn''t even have time to stand up so in order to dodge the attack he rolled to the side until he felt the impact of the spell hitting the ground. Nick became fed up with this state of events and quickly got to his feet charging at the group in a zigzag pattern. Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.(Oh man, I don''t have anything that I can use to throw at them that I can activate my spell on. That just leaves getting in close and trying to deform their bodies with my magic.) Nick was now about twenty meters from the group of Magicians and to get to them he had to run over a lot of almost slippery grass trying to dodge a fast and accurate spell without any sort of cover to hide behind. The situation seemed dismal but instead of feeling dejected, Nick''s blood felt like it was boiling. (Now this is exciting. This is ten times better than sitting in my room all day. I just have to get in close and deal with at least one of them since it looks like all four of them are needed to cast their spell.) The Magicians cast the spell again and the ray of light missed Nick by only a small margin as he zigged and the next moment he zagged. Nick did those kinds of movements for ten minutes straight, sometimes having to jump to the ground in order to dodge the ray of light but he eventually managed to get to the male Magician farthest to the left. The Magician did not seem to panic at Nick''s close proximity but instead clenched his right fist and threw a heavy punch aiming at Nick''s face. Due to Nick''s constant dodging and haphazard movements, he was already exhausted when he reached the Magician and so could barely move his head aside to dodge the fist. The wind he felt on his cheek from the Magician''s punch sent a chill down his spine. (So these guys aren''t physically weak. I have to finish this quickly in order to win.) Nick dodged another attempt by the male Magician to punch him by side stepping him and then Nick used all his strength to rush him in order to tackle the Magician to the ground, disorienting the Magician. Nick took the chance to use his developed upper body strength to keep the Magician on the ground and grabbed the sides of his head with both arms and activated his spell. (Big.) The Magician did not lie on the ground quietly while Nick used his magic; he punched Nick''s chest with both arms trying to get Nick off of him but he was ultimately unable to. With bated breath Nick poured an excessive amount of magic into his spell''s activation and in the next moment the Magician''s head enlarged by about five times, killing him. (Yes, I did it!) The interaction between Nick and the Magician took twenty seconds at most and seeing as how the three other Magician''s did not react in order to help their companion, Nick thought that they might have been shocked by his tenacity and did not want to get involved. (Wait...can simulated enemies feel panic or shock?) This question popped into Nick''s mind like a bolt of lightning and in the next moment he got his answer. As soon as Nick lifted himself up from the ground, a dagger was plunged into his chest, the area of impact felt like it was burning as if bathed with fire. Nick slowly looked up at the smiling face of the male Magician that did him in and thought: (They didn''t give a damn about their companion. This fucker was just waiting until I finished making my move in order to strike the winning blow...not bad.) SIMULATION ENDED. YOU''VE RECEIVED WHAT WOULD HAVE BEEN A FATAL INJURY. Those neon words appeared in front of Nick as the simulation ended and space warped, sending him back to the white walled room. Nick looked at his chest and saw that the dagger was no longer there and felt relieved. "So Magician enemies have better attack patterns and can strategize just like real people but unlike real people they don''t seem to be inhibited by negative emotions or fatigue." "I should assume that all my enemies are of this standard and act in a more strategic and controlled manner, making proper use of my energy seeing as how I was pretty much drained when I got stabbed. Even If I didn''t get stabbed, with my depleted energy I would never have been able to defeat all three of those other Magicians." "Before, I thought that the Magician''s needed each other in order to attack but now I think that kind of thinking was naive and it figuratively cost me my life. Also, because of the grassy terrain I had nothing to use my spell on that I could launch at my enemies. I need weapons that I can use strategically with my magic spell to both surprise and cripple my enemies when given the chance to. I need more practice too." Nick left the room, exiting the building and heading to the nearby convenience store and he bought several snacks and and an orange juice. Nick sat on the side walk for twenty minutes eating and thinking about weapons that would suit his purposes. After thinking a little Nick took out his phone and started up the academy''s mobile app which had a map function. (There it is, a weapons store.) Using the map, Nick spent thirty minutes finding the academy''s weapons store. he went inside and looked around. The store was clean and well stocked containing items from sling shots to swords. Nick walked around eventually going to the blade section where he stopped at a rack that caught his eye. The rack was labeled, "Throwing Knives". Nick looked at the knives displayed with an uncharacteristically wide smile and whispered: "These should be my weapons." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 42: Looking For Success Nick scratched his head with an almost childish smile when looking at these knives. He didn''t have much of a practical reason for wanting to choose them other than their lightness and the fact that he could store many of them on his person considering his upper body strength. Also: (I remember watching that old movie, ''The Expendables''. Jason Statham was such a beast in that film with these knives. That''s a silly reason for wanting to use them but I can live with that. These knives aren''t normally the most practical or effective weapons but with magic, I think I can see some possibilities in using them that may even be cooler than in the movies.) "Ha, ha." Nick chuckled, reminiscing about watching The Expendables franchise of movies. Nick didn''t have any friends or much of a family growing up so he found entertainment and pleasure in watching films and the like. One of the reasons that he wanted to become a Magician so much was that he wanted to do some of the things that he saw in the films. Throwing knives are light-weight, expendable and extremely sharp. Although buying many of the high quality ones would be relatively expensive, since Nick had just received a ¡ê40,000 payout, that was not much of a problem right now. Nick looked at the best quality Knife available and looked at its price. "Only ¡ê100 each. I can buy one hundred of them without feeling a sting." Nick picked up the knife and went to the store''s counter clerk and spoke eagerly, handing over the throwing knife that he picked up from the shelf: "I want 100 of these knives." The clerk looked at the knife and nodded his head, saying: "Understood. Is there anything else that you would like to buy?" Nick thought for a few seconds and then asked: "Do you sell vests that I can use to conceal the knives?" The clerk shook his head. "We do not keep such vests in stock but we can have one specially made by the academy''s armory department and you can pick it up tomorrow. Special orders for a vest like that will cost about ¡ê5,000. Is that okay?" Nick was shocked at the price. (One day ago, I barely had ¡ê100 to my name but now I have to spend ¡ê5,000 on a vest. Being a Magician burns money like crazy. I should find a way to make more money going forward or I''m probably going to end up bankrupt.) "I''ll take the knives and the vest. I''ll pick them up tomorrow morning." The clerk nodded and spoke: "Hand me your ID card and you can pay with bank card or with the academy''s mobile app." Nick knew that already from other purchases he had made so he took out his phone and started up the academy''s app and went to the payment section. His bank account was already linked to the app so he simply made a payment of 15,000 pounds sterling to the weapons store. after showing the clerk the electronic receipt, the clerk confirmed his order by taking his ID and making a few records with his computer. "You can pick up your items tomorrow at around 9 am. The armory office operates 24 hours a day so your vest is being made as we speak." Nick nodded his head and thanked the clerk for his help. Nick left the store and made his way to the library where he borrowed a book on magical scrolls. The librarian looked at Nick and spoke: "The book I''ve recommended, Advanced Scroll Arts, is very old and therefore delicate so be careful. Scroll writing is a pretty old discipline and although it is still used today, that''s only in fairly special circumstances because scrolls just don''t have the same effectiveness as a Magician''s spell casting or other magical tools or even potions. Are you sure that you want to spend your time learning it further? Why not learn how to create other magical tools?" Nick shook his head. "I''ve noticed that, from my own experience, writing scrolls and creating spells cast by Magicians have a significant difference in the complexity required, the latter requiring far more effort to create and I think that probably accounts for the lack of effectiveness in scroll writing. I''m still a novice but I find scroll writing interesting so I''m going to continue walking down that road." Jack, the librarian, looked at Nick for a moment and then smiled. "Go ahead then, young people are the future after all." Nick thanked the librarian for his help and headed to his dorm room. It was now 6:55 pm so after taking a shower and eating a few snacks that he bought from the convenience store Nick started reading Advanced Scroll Arts and did not stop until around 11 pm. Nick raised his head from the book and rubbed his tired and blood shot eyes. (Next, I have to practice math problems.) Without any rest between sessions Nick started practicing math problems. He was so tired that he was basically doing it on auto pilot, only putting in significant focus when a math problem was especially difficult. (I''m going to grind my very bones using the process of learning. I have to be able to use magic, study or train by sheer instinct. To do that I have to stress myself out to the limits. Only after I heal from all the stress will there be growth.) Nick affirmed and internalized his beliefs and continued solving math problems until 12:30 am at which point he jumped into bed and fell into a deep sleep. RRRRRRIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGG Nick''s alarm went off at 3 am. Nick woke up and left his bed, his limbs feeling heavy like lead. Nick washed his face and ate a snack before doing his pushups. Nick began his meditation, nurturing his mindscape. Nick''s consciousness looked on from within his mindscape as his magic sea swirled in some places and waves moved violently in other places. The golden figure of light was still endlessly walking along his road as if it had no other purpose but to walk on that road. Nick''s consciousness felt sluggish. "I already feel tired plus the strain from meditation is making my mind slow. Sigh, my mindscape is supposed to have increased my mental strength but I''m still being drained like this. Will this ever get easier?" At the moment Nick asked that question, his consciousness looked up towards the hundreds of stars in his mindscape''s ''sky''. He looked at them for seemingly a long time until an indescribable feeling penetrated his mind like a migraine but without the pain. Nick felt: "Lonely." He had basically been alone all his life even being around his schoolmates, teachers and even his own relatives. He had always been alone because he had no one that could understand him. Nick never cared about being alone or being understood since all he wanted to do was achieve his dreams of becoming a Magician but right now he was actually feeling lonely. "Why am I feeling this way?" Nick continued looking at the stars in the sky, not paying attention to how much time he was spending in his mindscape. At some point, Nick''s consciousness was ejected from his mindscape and his vision turned to black. When he regained his sight he was standing among a group of trees in an unfamiliar environment. "Where am I?" Nick received no response, not that he was expecting one. All he could see were trees and grass and all that he could hear was the wind moving about this place. "Huh? Is that sound really the wind?" Nick felt that the supposed wind sounded strange so he tried to move towards the direction where the sound was the loudest and after walking around having no sense of direction he began to hear the ''wind'' more clearly. The sound wasn''t the wind at all, it was the sound of whispering. Listening closely, Nick heard two voices speaking amidst many others: "When are we going to get out of this damn valley, it doesn''t ever seem to end?" "Friend, this is the valley of death, rarely does anyone make it out of here alive. See those footprints on the ground, those were left by the people who came before us. They all end suddenly because that is where our predecessors fell dead from their journeys, turning into corpses and eventually becoming nourishment for these trees." "What! If this really is such a place then why did you encourage me to come here with you. You''ve doomed both of us." Unauthorized use: this story is on Amazon without permission from the author. Report any sightings."My friend, I did not force you to come, we both decided that we wanted an adventure and chose to enter this valley in order to chase down Success." "Yes, I wanted to meet Success but I did not want all of this suffering. I especially did not want to be stuck in this dark valley that is filled with the remains of the deceased. This place is filthy, it smells and no one else can be seen." "My friend, you and I started this journey together, how can there be others? Success is never found among a crowd and it certainly is never found in places without suffering and sacrifice. That''s why Success lives in this valley" "Hmph, you talk like you know it all but where did you get this information from? Have you ever seen Success?" "No, but take a look at the footprints on the ground. See the ones that are the biggest and the deepest, they have clearly been here for a long time but have not faded away. Those are they footprints of Success and I know that success always leaves clues. Do you see how the footprints of Success can mostly be found near the biggest and tallest group of trees? That''s definitely where the most people have died providing enough nourishment for the trees to grow so big and tall, that must also be where the most suffering has taken place. Success seems to be attracted to such places." "Oh, now I understand. Success is attracted to sacrifice." Nick overheard the conversation but was too concerned about his current circumstances to think about its significance. He ran towards the two voices until he found their origin. He ran past a group of trees, coming face to face with two creatures. One was covered in white feathers from head to toe, having the features of a grown man but wearing no clothes, the other was wearing a fine pink robe with his appearance hidden, only revealing his face that seemed similar to a grizzly bear''s. Nick asked: "Who are you two?" The two creatures looked surprised to see Nick. The creature covered in feathers stepped forward and introduced himself. "Hello friend, my name is Peace and this is my traveling companion, Love. What is your name." Nick felt weird when hearing that those were their names but answered anyway: "My name is Nick Capitol and I''ve suddenly found myself in this place. Where are we?" The creature in the robe called Love spoke with his rough voice, saying: "This place is called the valley of death. We came here in order to pursue Success but have not been able to find him. Do you want to accompany us on our journey? The only way to get out of this valley seems to be to meet with Success." Nick was calmed by that statement. "Alright, I''ll follow you guys to meet success. I want to get out of this horrid place." Peace spoke in an uplifting tone and said: "Ha, ha. With one more brother, our journey will definitely be easier. Come, we have some clues as to Success''s whereabouts. Those are his freshest footprints. We''ll follow them until we find him." The three of them began walking together, following Success''s footprints. Success''s footprints could be traced moving towards and among the biggest and tallest groups of trees where the three found copious amounts of remains; the stench was almost unbearable but they all continued going further, gritting their teeth. On their journey they also came upon holes and pits which they each would fall into from time to time because the valley had dim lighting, resulting in many superficial injuries. At one point a large black striped bee flew along and stung Love, saying: "Ha, ha, my name is Gossip. How dare you think that you can find Success? I''ve already told everyone in this valley how crazy you all are and that you think that you three are better than them. Listen to how strong the whispering has become." Nick listened and the whispering that he had been hearing since he got here and had confused with the wind had indeed grown louder and more frequent. "Each time I sting you, the louder the whispering will become. Let''s see how far you can go with me around." Gossip was quick to fly away when Love tried to take hold of him so seeing that it was futile to stop Gossip from following them, the three carried on with their journey. Gossip stung Love another fifty times and the whispering had turned to almost shouts of slander. "Who do you think you are?" "You think you can find Success before us, comical?" "You bastards. Success can hear you approaching and that''s why we have not found it. You are clearly sabotaging us." After enduring all the stings and listening to all the gossip, Love could not take it anymore. "I feel like I''m going to go crazy at this rate. Success is no where to be found after all of this. I''m going to find another way out of this valley. You two should just give up too, this is hopeless." After declaring his intentions, Love turned around and left. Nick and Peace became worried but both decided to continue following the footprints. Since Love had went away, Gossip started targeting Peace, stinging him continuously. Soon, trees started falling suddenly in there paths and stones would occasionally be thrown at them. Nick and Peace gritted their teeth and carried on. After what seemed like a long time, Peace could no longer endure the abuse. "I''m sorry friend but all this has become too much for me to bare, you will have to carry on without me. Finding Success isn''t worth all of this pain." Peace turned around and ran away quickly, leaving Nick alone. Gossip took the chance to target Nick, stinging him continuously but Nick continued following the footprints. The stings became harsher, the voices of negativity became louder, trees started to fall on the path more frequently and the stones that were thrown at Nick became bigger and came more frequently. Nick gritted his teeth. "I have to find Success and get out of this valley." Nick continued walking for what seemed to be a long time until he got to a clearing where there were no trees. Gossip quickly flew away, the voices Nick was hearing before could no longer be heard and no more stones were being thrown. "What''s going on?" Nick looked in front of him to see a human shaped mass of stones standing in front of him. This creature was about his height and was completely made of grey stones. "Who are you?" The creature answered confidently: "Who else could I be? My name is Success." Nick was overjoyed. "You are Success, how comes you look so ordinary and plain, you are only made of stones?" Success shrugged his shoulders, saying: "People have been misled into believing that I am more glamorous than I am. I am only an accumulation of ordinary things so how can I look any other way. My power is what is extraordinary, not my appearance." Nick felt enlightened. I have been looking for you for so long. My companions, Love and Peace were with me but because of all the hardship, they left. I felt so lonely on the way." Success sighed and spoke: "Sigh, many times when looking for me, a person will not only lose the love around them but also the corresponding peace; this will probably keep happening as long as you are pursuing success and that is why you felt lonely. The road to success is like a valley of death with the remains of persons who came before you and failed lying all around. Listen, now that you have found me, things will change. See how Gossip fled at my presence, how all the voices quietened down and how stones were no longer thrown at you? That is my, Success''s, power. I love this valley because of all the effort made here, after all, I only remain in proximity to purposeful effort. Yes, although I love this valley, I love the determined who find me more. Come, let''s leave this valley to find even more success." Nick followed Success out of the valley of death. ....... Nick opened his eyes and checked his phone. It was now 6 am and for some reason his mind felt more rested than before. "It looks like I endured another soul state" Nick thought back to the events of his soul state and tried to reason them out. "...So finding success is a lonely journey. I understand." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 43: Apprentice Magician Rematch Nick took a shower, got dressed and made his way to the dorm''s cafeteria. Nick bought a breakfast of eggs, sausages and pancakes with maple syrup and sat on one of the tables in the corner of the room. Nick lost himself in his thoughts while he was eating. (That last soul state was really something. Does chasing success really involve losing love and peace? Although I''ve never really had either, I would of liked to continue thinking that I could get them someday.) Nick''s emotions were in slight turmoil and his breathing quickened a little. (I''ve been working hard my entire life and although I''ve had my successes, most of what I''ve gotten from others is contempt and jealousy. No love, no peace. What''s funny is that if I was a couch potato, they would probably treat me better because I wouldn''t make them feel self-conscious about themselves but that ''better'' would probably amount to some sort of neutral indifference. And the people who I do associate with only want to use me and even try to scheme against me; Nick thought back to what he experienced with Marsha yesterday and gritted his teeth. Is this how working towards your goals should be?) Nick thought back to all the films and animes that he had watched in the past, the main characters had the support of either their friends, family and/or associates but that clearly was not the case for himself. (There are liars and betrayers at every step and no one is just going to come and help me.) "..." The feeling of loneliness within Nick''s mind intensified at this moment. (No, that''s not true.) Nick thought back to his high school teacher, Theo Williams, that gave him a laptop and wished him well and then he thought of librarian Jack that would encourage and help him most of the times when they met in the library. (Although life is full of hardships, I definitely don''t have to give up on finding love and peace as well as success. I have a feeling that if I continue chasing success, I might find the former two.) Nick''s eyes seemed to have gained a spark in them as he strengthened his determination. (I won''t give up hope. Things will get better.) "It''s time." Nick finished his meal and made his way to the academy''s weapons store. Nick entered the store and saw the same male clerk from yesterday sitting at his desk. It was now 9:10 am so Nick walked up to the clerk''s desk and spoke: "Good morning, I''m here to collect the throwing knives and vest that I ordered yesterday." The clerk looked away from his computer and upon seeing that it was Nick, the clerk asked for his student ID card and after making changes to his records, the clerk spoke: "Wait here, I''m going to get your items, they were already delivered to the store this morning." The clerk went through a door located a few feet behind his desk. Nick waited for ten minutes before seeing the clerk again. "Here are your items." The clerk put two black, plastic transport briefcases on his desk and opened them. One briefcase contained many brand new throwing knives and the other contained a black hybrid tactical vest. The clerk introduced the items to Nick: "These throwing knives are lightweight, suited for being thrown at close targets, made from strengthened steel and are sharper that your average non-magical military grade knife." "This vest was made with the assumption that your intention is to store the knives on it, so for your convenience it was made with very rudimentary spacial laws engraved in it. There are ten visible pockets on the vest but each pocket can hold ten knives. All you have to do is insert a knife into the pocket and continue trying to place knives in there until the pocket is full. Each time you take the visible knife from the pocket, another knife inside the pocket takes its place." The clerk demonstrated the use of the vest by place in two throwing knives into one of its pockets. The first knife seemed to disappear as the second knife was being placed into the pocket. The clerk removed the second knife and the first knife became visible again. Nick thought: (Space magic really is the coolest. It''s too bad I don''t seem to have much affinity with it. Hmmm....you know, because of my soul states, I know that I have an affinity for rule magic but I never really tried to find out what are the other affinities that I might have. I should check on that later.) The clerk put the throwing knives and vest back into their briefcases, locked both cases and handed them over to Nick. Nick thanked the clerk and left the weapons store, making his way to the battle simulation building. Nick walked into the reception area and spoke to the male clerk that was present: "I want a room outfitted with the last simulation that I had experienced yesterday. Also, I want you to give me thirty minutes in the room before you begin the simulation so that I can prepare." The clerk unconsciously looked at Nick''s two black briefcases and then asked for his ID card. The clerk was different from the one yesterday so after accessing Nick''s simulation records, he spoke: "The simulation will begin in thirty minutes after you enter room 21. You can go ahead to your room". The clerk handed back the ID to Nick and Nick went to room 21 with his briefcases. As soon as Nick entered the room, he proceeded to fill each of the pockets with throwing knives. Each knife felt like it had the weight of a common screwdriver and was about 11 cm. After Nick put all 100 knives into the vest pockets, he put on the vest and waited for the simulation to start. "I won''t lose again." Words in neon floated in front of Nick, giving him a count down for when the simulation would start. Three minutes till the simulation begins... Two minutes... One minute... The simulation will now begin... (Fuck yeah.) The space within the room warped and Nick found himself in the same grassy plain as yesterday. Nick waited for the Apprentice Magicians to make their move. Nick looked around while he waited. (Yesterday, they caught me by surprise but this time, that won''t happen again.) Five minutes later a blinding white light appeared. Nick squinted his eyes and prepared his body to move by taking a low runner''s stance. The moment that the ray of light appeared, Nick ran to the left of its trajectory. After running for about four meters at a downward angle relative to his original position, moving closer towards the Magicians, Nick looked back at the place of impact and saw a deep, narrow pit in the ground. (Same plan as yesterday, since I don''t have any long range attacks, I have to run towards the Magicians and deal with them directly. I should not reveal my cards until the last moment.) The four Magicians appeared in Nick''s vision after the bright white light abated. They were all wearing red robes and each was standing about a meter apart from the other Magician. Nick started running in a steady manner towards their position. The Apprentice Magicians kept their eyes on Nick and launched the spell once again. All the Magicians raised their right arm and began moving their lips, supposedly chanting their spell but Nick couldn''t hear what they were chanting. A set of laws represented in Valteese appeared about two meters above their heads and after shining brightly with white light for five seconds, those laws morphed into a ball of white light and launched a ray of light in Nick''s direction. Stolen novel; please report."Oh, shit." The ray of light had a trajectory aimed right where Nick was about to step. Nick had to clumsily use his own momentum to jump at an angle that allowed him to dodge the ray of light. He fell on the ground and purposely rolled in a direction that would get him closer to the Magicians. As he rolled, grass and dirt were raised off of the ground and Nick felt the same discomfort that he did yesterday but with less intensity because of his new vest which cushioned some of the impact. (Their spell has accuracy and intensity but can only shoot that ray of light in a straight line and there needs to be some interval between shots.) Nick got to his feet again from his rolling position and continued running towards the Magicians. The moment Nick got up from the ground, the ray of light was launched at the position directly in front of him with greater speed that before. Nick once again just barely dodged the light by jumping to the side but this time he remained standing instead of falling on the ground and continued running towards the Magicians. Nick was now about two meters from the nearest Magician. (I didn''t notice yesterday but the intervals between shots of their magic decreases as time goes on. I should end this quickly.) As Nick got within one meter of the nearest Magician the ray of light was shot towards him again. Nick didn''t want to lose his momentum since he was so close to one of the Magicians so he took a knife from one of his vest''s pockets and made a hurried jump to the side, barely dodging the ray of light, dirt that was sent flying from the pit that was created hit him. Nick gritted his teeth and made another jump towards the nearest Magician the moment his feet touched the ground. In midair Nick raised his knife above his head with his right arm and made a slow slashing motion. Nick''s jump would only get him within a few feet of the Magician, the Magician clearly knew that as he looked at the small knife in Nick''s hand and wore an amused and smug expression, looking at Nick as if he was obviously an idiot, probably thinking: "How are you going to cut me with your knife from so far away." While Nick''s feet still had not reached the ground, he contracted his arm''s muscles and slashed down. (Big.) Laws glowing in a dull red light and written in Nickel appeared in Nick''s mindscape and its magic sea became turbulent. The laws floating in the air transformed into a mist and flowed with great speed towards the mindscape''s sky, disappearing. Within an instant the knife in Nick''s hand became two inches wider, a meter longer and its edge became broader but still maintained its sharpness. The blade that before would never reach the Magician was now lowering as its tip suddenly stretched a few inches past the Magician''s head. The Magician still had a smug look on his face when the now long-sword sized throwing knife cleaved through his head going through his body, cutting through flesh and bone, and finally hitting the ground between the Magicians legs. The Magician died with his eyes wide open; his body splitting into two halves, his organs and blood spilling away from his body. Nick smiled and thought. (Force is equal to mass times acceleration. My spell doesn''t affect my body''s immediate acceleration so when I put all of my arm''s strength into swinging the then relatively light throwing knife downwards, as soon as I made it grow bigger, the added mass made the force I struck with disastrous for that Magician. Hmph, that''s what he gets for being arrogant) Nick looked at the gruesome sight of the Magician''s bisected corpse with its organs and blood splattered on the ground with indifference. Nick quickly collected himself and dropped his enlarged throwing knife and ran towards the next Magician. This Magician took out his dagger from his sleeve with an angry expression and ran to meet Nick directly. "Hmph, looking for death." Nick took another throwing knife from his vest''s pocket and pointed it towards the approaching Magician. (Big.) In an instant the throwing knife''s tip and blade extended into the Magician''s neck, exiting through his neck''s nape. (My spell allows me to control what dimensions of the object that I actually increase, which could be either its length, width or depth or a combination of any of them. That feature is really useful.) The Magician''s body stood still for a moment and after all life within its eyes was depleted, the body went limp and fell to the ground. Nick let go of his throwing knife, letting it fall with the Magician. Nick proceeded to run towards the other two Magicians who were now running towards him in tandem. Both Magician''s raised both their hands and a ball of light appeared in front of them, the same ball of light that Nick had been annoyed by since the beginning of the simulation. (So two Magicians can activate the spell as long as they raise both of their hands. Fuck, they got me. The ray of light is fast and I''m already so close to them. I don''t have a way to defend myself...unless...) Nick thought quickly and stuck one of his knives into the ground. (Big) The Magicians'' ball of light launched its ray of white light towards Nick but instead of hitting Nick, it hit against a steel structure, leaving a large dent on its surface. Nick stood behind the structure, panting. (That was a close call. I stuck one of my knives into the ground and used Big to extend it in all directions creating a structure tall enough, rooted enough and wide enough to block their attack. Now its my turn to go on the offensive.) By the time the Magicians'' spell had hit the now enlarged knife, they stood almost directly in front the steel structure. (Big.) Nick threw one of his knives past his steel structure, to the right of the Magicians, having it enlarge as it fell to the ground. As the Magicians'' attention was directed to the knife on the ground, Nick appeared from behind the steel structure that he was using as defense, approaching their left side. Nick and the Magicians were less than a meter apart so before the Magicians could launch another spell or run away, Nick tackled both of them to the ground and activated his spell while holding both of their chests. (Big.) (Big.) The magic sea in Nick''s mindscape decreased in volume at a visible rate as Nick poured his magic power into the Magicians. Their torsos instantly began to enlarge leading to their torsos'' surrounding skin starting to burst with popping sounds being heard. Nick used so much of his magic energy that both person''s torsos enlarged to ten times their original size, tearing the rest of their body apart; it was a gruesome and bloody sight. Nick looked at the Magicians as he stood uncomfortably between them, their chests'' flesh, bones and muscles protruding towards the sky and watched as all the life left their eyes. Nick held his own chest with his right hand as he panted and whispered weakly: "I win." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 44: A New Pet? THE SIMULATION HAS ENDED. Neon colored words appeared in front of Nick as the space warped, revealing a room with four white colored walls. Nick dropped to the floor, lying on his back while panting. (That battle was absolutely thrilling. If I hadn''t thought to use one of my knives in a defensive manner, I probably would have lost. Speaking of my knives where are the ones that I dropped?) Nick looked around but only saw his two briefcases in one of the corners of the room along with his backpack that he usually carried everywhere with him. Nick rested for ten minutes then left the room to speak with the clerk. "During my simulation, I used some throwing knives to win the battle. I didn''t see them in my room after the simulation ended, so where are they?" The clerk looked at Nick and spoke: "Give me a moment, let me check our records." The clerk spent a minute on his computer looking through the building''s electronic records and then addressed Nick''s concerns: "It seems that your knives were magically altered during your simulation and the overseers decided to not have them remain in the room once the simulation ended because they did not recognize the spell that you used to alter the knives. The knives are currently being stored in the building''s storage area but considering how they''ve been altered, they will be scrapped if you do not request them back. Do you want them back?" Nick thought for a moment: (I used Big on those knives and since I have no way currently of reducing their size back to their original, I should just let them be scrapped and buy some more knives when I leave this building.) "No need, scrap them. I want my next simulation to have a different terrain, also, if you could give me Apprentice Magicians with different attack patterns and combat formations, I would like that to be done." The clerk nodded his head and spent about a minute to input Nick''s request into his computer. "Your request was approved. Please re-enter room 21 to start the simulation." Nick smiled lightly and turned around, walking towards room 21. When he entered and closed the door behind him, the space warped and he found himself within a well lit cavern lined with sharp mud colored rocks. Nick held the shoulder straps of his vest, looking at the scenery. (This place looks pretty nice. I don''t see any enemies but there are clearly many places to hide. I count thirteen columns made of rock in this cavern, stretching from the floor to the ceiling. There is also a pool of water at the upper left corner of the cavern. I should take the initiative to actively check my surroundings.) Nick walked towards one of the thirteen columns trying to get a better understanding of his surroundings. When he reached within ten meters of the column, a pillar of rock was launched at high speed towards Nick''s position. Nick dodged by jumping to the side; because of his experience in the last simulation, Nick was becoming accustomed to dodging without falling onto the ground. As soon as Nick''s feet touched the ground, he ran fifteen meters away from the columns and collected himself. He looked at the pillar that had jutted out toward him and swallowed his own saliva. The pillar of stone pierce the ground at a point that would have definitely resulted in Nick being impaled if he had not dodge the attack. (Who launched that attack?) Nick couldn''t see the Magicians that launched the attack but he knew that he should stay away from the columns unless he wanted to be skewered. Suddenly, from behind Nick there was a rumbling sound. Nick looked on with horror as crescent shaped portions of the ground violently jutted out two meters into the air in sequence while coming towards him. The effect of this spell was so wide that there was no way that Nick could dodge this attack by running to the side without the risk of getting caught up in its aftermath so he was forced to run forward towards the thirteen columns again. When he reached within eight meters of a column, his position was such that he could see each column''s rocky surface clearly; the earth that was jutting out from the ground ferociously a moment ago suddenly ceased moving and the area became quiet but as soon as Nick felt relieved and took a step forward, all thirteen columns launched a spiked pillar made of stone towards his position. All thirteen pillars of stone approached Nick at high speed. "What the fuck?" Nick acted quickly and stuck one of his knives into the ground. (Big.) The knife expanded in all directions becoming a thick steel structure firmly rooted into the ground. TING TING TING TING... As the spike pillars hit the now enlarged knife, the impact created sounds that intimidated Nick but each pillar was blocked, preventing them from reaching his position. Nick looked at his enlarged knife and could see cracks spreading through it. (Hmmm...I didn''t notice before but when my knife extends through the ground, it''s like it does so with almost no resistance. I think I understand the phenomenon, from my experiences thus far I can tell that must be a characteristic of rule magic. It alters physical laws to ensure that its own laws take effect as if the new circumstances are exactly as they should be. That explains why when I move with my knives and use Big on them, my momentum and acceleration isn''t slowed even though the weight and the mass of the knives change; that''s probably because if those physical quantities suddenly had an effect on the circumstances, they might inhibit the growth of my knife as I''ve directed.) Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.As Nick used his spell, he was gaining a better understanding of rule magic. Nick quickly ran away from his position to a position farthest at the left side of the room, making it awkward for half of the columns to attack him again with pillars of stone if they wanted to. Nick stopped as he reached the rocky cavern wall and looked at the rocky, stone columns. Nick wore a cold expression as he saw life like human figures made of stone jut out from the rocky columns looking at him, smiling at his pathetic state. Nick felt a chill go down his spine as he looked at those figures. The next moment Nick felt a quaking on the wall; suddenly, the rock wall jutted out at several places, forming an enclosed space around Nick. Nick wasn''t able to see what happened clearly before his vision turned dark but from the perspective of the stone figures attached to the rocky columns, a stone face emerged from the cavern wall, using its mouth to capture Nick; the stone face smiled as it moved the insides of its mouth to grind the person inside. SIMULATION ENDED. A FATAL EVENT HAS OCCURRED. When Nick''s vision returned, he found himself sitting on the floor of the white walled room staring at the ceiling with a blank expression. Nick stayed in that position for about a minute before he clenched his fist and shouted: "I''ll fight them again until I beat those fuckers!" .......... At around 5:30 pm Nick emerged from room 21 with a listless expression on his face. He had spent hours fighting in the same simulation but he had been killed over and over again. He did the same simulation about nine times before he ran out of throwing knives. Nick left the simulation building and made his way towards the weapons store. (I lost in my last simulated battles because I don''t yet have a versatile arsenal of spells. There is only so much that I can do with only one spell, Big, that I have not even had that much experience using. Sigh, that will have to be all the practice that I do for today. After the exam is over tomorrow, I should begin working on other spells to make my self stronger.) Nick entered the weapon''s store with his two brief cases and spoke to the clerk: "I would like to buy another set of 100 throwing knives like the ones that I picked up this morning." The clerk nodded and asked Nick for his student ID. Nick made a payment to the store using the academy''s mobile app. The clerk made some changes to the store''s records and after seeing Nick''s electronic receipt, took one of Nick''s transport briefcases and went through the door located a few meters behind his desk. While the clerk was gone, Nick took the opportunity to take off his vest and placed it into his other briefcase. The clerk returned five minutes later with his transport briefcase filled with 100 new throwing knives. With this purchase, Nick only had ¡ê15,000 left in his bank account. (I need more money.) Nick had that thought but wasn''t sure how to earn more without Marsha yet so he threw the thought to the back of his mind. Nick thanked the clerk and then used the academy''s app''s map function to search for the directions to the animal store. That store was where he had gotten the bird that he had used to test his beast capture scroll on. Speaking of that bird, Nick had left it flying around in his room yesterday but when he returned home that evening, he found it dead in a corner of the room; it probably starved to death because Nick had forgotten to feed it. Nick threw its carcass out of his window, thinking: (My bad birdy, but out of sight, out of mind.) Nick made his way towards the animal store and when he entered he went directly to one of the three clerks at the counter and spoke: "Good evening, I want to have a look at the dangerous animals that you sell in this store." The clerk nodded his head and guided Nick through the door at the side of the room. They both walked through a tiled hallway until they got to a warehouse like room that was filled with cages and animals. The cages had various animals, from raccoons to honey badgers. Amidst all the growling, Nick walked to a cage and pointed at a sleeping animal, saying: "This is the one that I want." The clerk indifferently looked at the animal, then at Nick. A tablet computer suddenly appeared in his hands and after he checked the store''s records, he spoke: "This animal''s price is ¡ê13,000. Let me remind you that all of our animals have spells cast on them and if they try to harm other students or staff within the academy grounds during a non-authorized battle, the animal will immediately die. Also, to have the animal transported, there will be an extra cost." Nick paid the ¡ê13,000 to the store using the academy''s app and showed the electronic receipt to the clerk. Nick said confidently: "No need for your store to transport the animal." Nick took out a scroll from his backpack; it was a copy of the same scroll that he used on the bird to store it yesterday. Nick unfurled the scroll and willed its activation. The laws on the scroll moved around on the page, forming a cage made of laws and in the next moment the large, burly animal inside the steel cage in front of Nick appeared in the scroll''s cage looking like a drawing made of ink. Nick looked at the trapped animal on his scroll and whispered. "Gotta catch em all, Pokemon. Ha, ha." The clerk looked at the spectacle with slightly wide opened eyes and asked: "Sir, where did you get that scroll?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 45: Demand for Magic Scrolls Nick looked at the clerk and responded: "Why do you want to know?" The clerk did not hide his reasons. "You see, we usually transport large and/or dangerous animals using a special magic formation. The cost of using that formation is around ¡ê40,000 and up depending on how far the delivery site is from the store. I would like to know how much you might be willing to sell that magic scroll for? If it could lessen the cost of transportation to our customers, that might boost our sales and increase our profits. Sir, you might not know but there is a large demand for animals to use as test subjects, targets for attacks and otherwise within the academy. Depending on how much it costs to make that scroll, my boss would definitely be willing to make a deal." (The clerk is interested in this scroll? What''s so special about it, Marsha''s grandfather picked it up in some remote part of the world? Are you telling me that this store does not have the ability create a similar tool. Is this like how Japanese smart toilets are awesome but for some reason you can''t find them commonly in the west?) Nick silently looked at the clerk for a moment and then asked: "What is a magic formation?" The clerk was slightly stumped at Nick''s question. (Isn''t he a Magician? Why doesn''t he know?) "Well sir, I''m not a Magician so I don''t have the exact details but I know that a magic formation is an arrangement of laws carved out in an area that brings about a certain effect. That''s all I know." (I''ve never heard of magic formations before. Even a non-Magician knows about them...so this must be the downside of not going to formal classes. It seems that my magic related common sense needs some work. Magic formations, I''ll remember to look them up later.) The clerk continued to press Nick: "What do you say sir. Are you interested in selling your scrolls to us in bulk?" Nick purposely wore an unsure expression and asked: "Before I decide anything. Why is this so called magic formation so expensive to use?" The clerk did not hesitate to answer. "Oh, that''s because apparently, at least three rank 3 Apprentice Magicians are needed to activate the magic formation and they need to be paid for each activation." Nick nodded his head. (That makes sense. Even an Apprentice Magician''s services cost a lot. The clerk wants to know if I can produce these scrolls in bulk but that might be a little challenging for just me, after all, that would involve copying my scroll hundreds of times to meet this store''s demands. Writing laws isn''t exactly easy and there is a chance that I may make a mistake or overlook something in the process of copying a scroll. Hmmm...copying...copy.) At that thought, Nick''s eyes shone discretely with inspiration. His intuition based on his experience with rule magic and creating his spell, Big, was telling him that there might be an opportunity to create a spell that may aid him to mass produce the scrolls. "Another question. If transporting those animals via a magic formation is so expensive, then why not use trucks and trailers to do it?" The clerk looked as if he was ready and waiting to answer that question so he spoke quickly: "The academy has a strict policy that does not allow businesses to transport live animals or magic beasts along campus roads. It would be disastrous if one of them escaped and mauled someone, assuming that for some reason the spell that keeps them in check was not working." After remaining silent for a while, Nick finally answered: "I''ll need to speak with your boss before I can agree to anything." The clerk nodded his head and replied: "I''ll lead the way." Nick followed the clerk back through the hallway that they had walked through before. They arrived into the reception area again and Nick and the clerk made their way to the store''s first floor, above the ground floor, by walking up the stairs. On the first floor, there were three offices, each having a name on the door. The clerk brought Nick to the office door with the name, "Carla Jenner", on it. The clerk knocked the door and he and Nick waited for about a minute before someone opened the door. A woman that looked like she was in her forties emerged from the room looking displeased at the interruption. She looked at the clerk and then at Nick and then directly asked the clerk: "What do you want Marshall? You know that I use this time to look over our books and now I have to stop to talk with you about what? Also, who is the man behind you?" The clerk cleared his throat and made an introduction: "Boss Carla, this man''s name is Nick Capitol and he is a rank 1 Apprentice Magician of this academy..." As soon as the clerk said, "rank 1 Apprentice Magician", Carla visibly lost interest in what the clerk, Marshall, was saying but Marshall endured the disinterest and continued. "...and he might possibly be able to sell us scrolls that could lessen our cost of transporting animals to customers'' residences." Carla''s eyes brightened. Although she usually gave Marshall a hard time, she new that he was a sensible and competent clerk and would not waste her time with nonsense. Carla looked at Nick and asked: "Is that true?" Nick stepped forward and said in a slightly nervous tone: "Yes, it''s true. I''ve created scrolls that can store animals within them. When the user wants to release the animal, they just have to will it and the scroll will be destroyed, releasing the animal." Carla looked at Nick intensely and requested: "Give me a demonstration." Nick felt bothered, he only had one more beast capture scroll and he did not want to just waste it. (What if she saw its effect but did not want to buy the scrolls?) Nick thought about it for a while and realized that he had no use for the scroll after he left this store anyway so he might as well use it to try and earn some money. Nick looked Carla in the eye and spoke: The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation."Sure, do you have an animal that I can test it on?" Carla had an amused smile on her face as Nick asked that question; Marshall face-palmed himself. Nick scratched his head in embarrassment. (Oh right, this is an animal shop. I guess that was a stupid question.) Carla answered anyway: "I have a salamander caged in my office. Come inside." Carla led Marshall and Nick inside of her office. She showed Nick the salamander lying inside a cage on her desk and then sat in her office chair behind the desk to watch the show. Nick took his last beast capture scroll from his backpack and held it in front of the salamander''s cage. Nick unfurled the scroll and willed its activation; the salamander disappeared from its cage and appeared on the scroll within a cage made of laws, looking like an inked drawing. Carla sat up in her chair and spoke: "Okay, that''s some decent space magic but can you really release the animal you captured, it still being alive." Nick wasn''t surprised that Carla recognized the nature of the magic that was used because he could sense the magic coming from her body. He couldn''t tell what her rank as a Magician was but he could sense that she was way more powerful than him. Nick willed the scroll''s activation once again and the scroll disintegrated and the salamander appeared on Carla''s desk, slowly crawling about. Carla looked at the salamander for a moment and clapped. CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP "That''s a nice toy you''ve got there. I don''t know anything about making magical scrolls or much about creating spells but you''ve obviously got something special there. Let''s hear it. How much are you selling those items for?" Nick answered quickly: "I can sell them to you for ¡ê12,000 each but I''ll only be able to deliver them to you eight months from now." Marshall''s eyes opened wide in surprise, saying: "Six months from now, Mr. Capitol, surely you can give us a better time line than that? What''s your issue that is resulting in such a long waiting time, manpower, materials, or other orders to fill?..." Carla raise her hand, signalling Marshall to stop questioning Nick and so Marshall stopped talking mid-speech. Carla wasn''t a spell maker and did not even personally know one but she could guess that it would take a lot of effort for a student to mass produce such scrolls and so expecting them within a short period of time was laughable; Marshall did not know that because he was not even a Magician while she was a rank 4 Apprentice Magician. Nick looked on as Carla thought about his offer. (Honestly, I don''t have much expectation for her to accept those terms but I don''t have a choice. I have too many things to do and me successfully fulfilling orders long term is dependent on me creating the spell that I now have in mind.) After five minutes Carla spoke with a determined look in her eye: "Nick, is it? As long as you agree that you can deliver 20,000 of those magic scrolls to me within seven months at ¡ê11,000 a pop, I''ll give you a contract for the deal the day after tomorrow. This is a busy store, after all." Nick was so surprised that his jaw dropped when Carla finished speaking. Carla quickly got up from her chair and tapped Nick''s chin, motioning for him to close his widened mouth. Nick quickly collected himself and thought: (20,000 scrolls multiplied by ¡ê11,000 is ¡ê220,000,000. She''s just going to hand over that much money to me?) Nick looked at Carla, confused and doubtful. Carla noticed Nick''s doubtful expression and addressed him: "Nick, you''ve probably only been a Magician for a short time so you don''t know yet but ¡ê220,000,000 is only a drop in the bucket in terms of the cost of our cultivation. I was born into a Magician''s family and I can safely say that it took over a thousand times that amount to get me to my current rank 4 Apprentice Magician status. Money is only a tool, don''t be so intimidated by the largeness of the amount. So what do you say, do we have a deal?" Nick was sure that this was a good deal as long as he could deliver. "Yes, we have a deal." Carla smiled. "I''ll have a contract ready by the day after tomorrow. Just come by the store at anytime after 10 am and Marshall over there will bring you up here." Nick nodded his head and spoke: "I''ll be here." Carla, with a satisfied expression replied: "Alright, you two can leave now, I have work that still needs to be completed." Nick and Marshall walked out of Carla''s office both feeling like they gained something. Marshall had the biggest grin between them because he new that if this deal went through, it might result in him being promoted. Marshall did not know much about magic scrolls or the cost of being a Magician but one thing for certain is that Carla would never have given such good terms if she did not value Nick and his magic scrolls. Marshall led Nick to the door and Nick left the store. It was now 7:30 pm but Nick was not ready to go back to his dorm yet. He placed his transport briefcases on the ground before using his smart phone to use the academy''s app''s map function. He searched and found the directions to the place he was looking for, the academy''s "Magical Anatomy Office". This was the office on campus that dealt with all things magical that had some relationship to the human body. It was also where Nick would go to officially check on his magical affinities. "This has been a long time coming, I can''t believe that I waited this long to check on my affinities but then again, I''ve been so busy just learning what magic and laws even are so I guess I shouldn''t be too hard on myself. Now that I''m trying to become a rank 2 Apprentice Magician and will be doing more magic related activities, I should take my own magical affinities seriously." Nick put a serious expression on his face, picked up his transport briefcases and walked forward towards the magical anatomy office. (Things will get better...) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 46: End Of Year Exam Nick arrived in front of a building with an all white exterior and four grand columns positioned to hold up the part of the roof that jutted out to provide shade to the entrance. Since it was night time, the lights surrounding the building were turned on with many facing the building''s walls, making the magical anatomy office look more fantastic than it would in the day time. Most of the academy''s administrative offices and stores remained open for 24 hours to accommodate the large population of students, faculty and civilian staff that lived on campus. Nick walked into the building going past its automatic sliding glass front door. In the reception area, a woman sat at a desk working on her computer and occasionally looked through documents; she had silver hair and a fair, white complexion. Nick walked up to her desk and inquired: "Good night ma''am, I would like to have my magical affinities tested, where would I go to have that done?" The woman looked away from her computer to give Nick some attention, saying: "The magical anatomy office has 6 floors, this being the ground floor, the affinity testing rooms are located on the second floor. In one of those small rooms you will find a machine that you will have to pour your magic energy into. The machine will analyze what kind of magical natures are most compatible with your magical energy. As you should know, based on our affinities, all things being equal, the type of magic we are most suited for are naturally attracted to our mindscapes, the more suited we are for a type of magic the larger the quantity of a certain type of magic energy that is stored within our mindscape. A more accurate test exists but that involves having a Regular Magician skilled in soul magic inspecting your soul''s laws. While we do offer that service, it is expensive and I do not recommend it." Nick became curious. "Huh? Why do you not recommend the latter test?" The woman wore a plain expression as she explained: "That is because although testing the soul is a more accurate test, generally that greater accuracy makes very little difference, practically speaking. Also, the test that involves the machines are confidential while if you have a Magician stronger than you check your soul''s laws, who knows what they will do with the information that they obtain, after all, it is very difficult to police Regular Magicians. Not to mention, a Regular Magician with some understanding of soul magic could easily tamper with an Apprentice Magician''s soul without that Apprentice Magician or this office noticing." The woman finished her explanation and waited for Nick to make his decision but rather than the test, Nick was now thinking about the fact that the dean of this academy is a Regular Magician that specializes in soul magic and Nick had willingly let him interact with his soul. (Oh shit, although the dean said that he only stimulated my soul into having a soul state and didn''t inspect it, how can I be certain that he did not tamper with my soul?) Nick felt distressed, having the realization that he gave the dean the initiative to take advantage of his ignorance. (Sigh, advantages often come with disadvantages. If it wasn''t for my soul states, I might not have gotten this far so even if the dean did something to my soul, its up to me to become strong enough to defend myself.) Nick had already learned from a previous soul state that accountability mitigates failure, in this case his failure to have been more cautious with the dean. Nick spoke with confidence: "I will use one of the machines to test my affinities." The woman looked unsurprised, as if she knew that Nick would make that choice. "Using the affinity testing rooms are free so just go to the second floor and enter an unoccupied testing room." The woman pointed at the elevator that could take Nick to the other floors; it was located at the far right of the room. Nick thanked the woman and made his way to the elevator, using it to get to the second floor. What Nick saw once he stepped onto the floor was a large hallway with may doors on both of its sides. On each door, Nick saw a digital sign that indicated whether the room was occupied or not. Nick saw that most of the signs displayed, "Unoccupied", so Nick chose to enter the door closest to him on the right. When Nick entered the room, he saw nothing but a stool and a device that looked like an ATM embedded into the wall. There was a poster on the wall that had instructions for using the machine. Nick read the poster carefully and summarized its contents in his head. (Apparently all I have to do is activate the machine with my student ID card and place both of my hands on the designated pad while pouring my magic energy into it. The machine will siphon my magic energy in order to analyze it and I should have the results within three minutes. That''s pretty easy to understand.) Nick didn''t waste any time, he placed his two transport briefcases and his backpack on the ground in the corner near the door and sat on the stool in front of the testing machine. Nick placed his student ID into the designated slot and words appeared on the machine''s screen: "Place both of your hands on the pad below and concentrate your magic energy into your palms." Nick followed the instructions and placed both his hands on the semi-glass pad jutting out from the machine, concentrating his magic energy within his palms. The screen showed new words: "Please keep your hands on the pad while your magic energy is analyzed.". Nick waited in the same position for three minutes before the screen showed the results of the test. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Unknown magical affinity: 59% Soul magic affinity: 22% Blade magic affinity: 11% Other assorted but insignificant affinities: 8% --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "So these are my magical affinities. This unknown affinity has to be for rule magic. From what I''ve read, an affinity for soul magic is fairly common and most Regular Magicians have magic related to training their souls but for someone to actually specialize in it is rare because of the rumored pain involved in cultivating soul magic. I read in a book that recounted the events involving of a certain World Class Magician that specialized in soul magic that killed people as a method of strengthening his magic; the book stated that in those turbulent times, there were many Soul Magicians but now soul magic is mostly used to cultivate defensive methods within one''s own soul. What''s surprising to me is this affinity for blade magic..." Nick thought for a moment. (Why blade magic? Why couldn''t it have been space magic or something more cool sounding and rare like time magic. Well, at least now I know where my talents lie. Hmmm... is my affinity for soul magic related to my less than frequent soul states?) Nick didn''t have an answer but he would definitely look into the cause of his soul states in the future. Nick picked up his transport briefcases and backpack and left the magical anatomy office, heading towards his dorm. When Nick entered his dorm room he placed his belongings on his desk and went to have a shower. After he was finished showering, he ate a snack, changed the time that his alarm was to activate to 5 am and went to bed, the current time being 9:43 pm. The exam starts at 9 am tomorrow morning so he was going to skip his regular training routine until the exam ended. This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it..... RING RING RING RING Nick woke up to his alarm at 5 am; he jumped up out of bed and ran to take a shower and brush his teeth. After he was finished, he got dressed in his usual attire consisting of a pair of blue jeans pants and a light colored polo shirt. Nick opened his two travel briefcases that were on his desk and began placing his throwing knives into his vest''s pockets. He spent thirty minutes doing that and so after putting on his vest and picking up his backpack containing a few snacks, a bottle of water and his last beast capture scroll holding the animal he had bought yesterday, Nick left his dorm room heading to the cafeteria to have breakfast. Nick waited in line to purchase a serving of eggs and sausages with french toast. Nick then sat at a table in the far left corner of the cafeteria to enjoy his breakfast. (This place has the best food...I mostly grew up eating whatever I got from my grandaunt and I did not usually have enough money to buy food when I went to school so I actually don''t have much experience with getting food elsewhere so I guess I''m not the best judge of quality. I should eat out at one of the academy''s restaurants after the exam, I still have ¡ê2,000 after all.) While Nick was eating his breakfast, two persons clothed in black combat attire walked up to his table, sitting down with their trays in hand. Nick looked up at the two persons and spoke with a hint of annoyance: "Oh, its you. It''s been a long time Don Bartholomew and miss...Marcia, right? I''m sorry but I never got your last name. What can I do for you?" Nick obviously recognized these two as the scene of their moment of passion from his first day at the academy was seared into his brain. Don and Marcia looked at Nick with serious but friendly expressions; Don spoke first: "Hello Nick, it''s been a long time since we were face to face since the mid-year exams so I''m hoping that we can put that whole event behind us. I''ll get straight to the point since we are both busy men; I want to invite you to join our group in order to complete this year''s survival challenge with top ranks. Even though you are still clearly a rank 1 Apprentice Magician, we recognize your talents and want you with us." Nick raised his eyebrows and replied: "Us?" This time, Marcia spoke to Nick: "Yes, us. Us two along with six of our other rank 2 Apprentice Magicians. It makes sense that in a survival challenge that we should work together to get through the difficulties. As you know, as Apprentice Magicians we only have limited experience as well as magic skills to use so we should try to make up for what each other lacks with our individual skills. Don''t you agree? By the way, My full name is Marcia Dunn." Nick nodded as if he understood what Marcia was saying and spoke clearly: "I understand what your saying but why exactly would I need to team up with you to get a top score in this exam?" Don spoke with squinted eyes: "You definitely received the same email as us, this exam will take place within one of the academy''s private realms which are home to poisonous plants and magical beasts. Although we don''t yet know the overall criteria for getting top scores in this exam, we know that we have to overcome all these natural hurdles while we are within the realm. Not even I have confidence in doing well by myself, how much more would you, who is one rank lower than me?..." Marcia interrupted Don before he said something that would make their efforts to recruit Nick futile: "The point is that unity is strength and we would like for you, as rank four within our year''s ranking to contribute your strength to our overall success. We would be willing to pay you for whatever expenditure you incur during the exam. We will also give you tips on how to become a rank 2 Apprentice Magician. How about it?" Nick looked at Don and Marcia sitting across from him with an indifferent expression and thought for a moment: (I don''t give a damn about your money or your tips. You people give me the creeps and I don''t trust you. You say that the difficulties within the realm require a group''s effort but that''s just your own guesswork. I hate the herd mentality more than anything and you two actually came here trying to lure me into working for you? Hmph, maybe I would agree to your invitation in another life but not in this one.) Nick thought all of that within a moment but knew that he should not say such things out loud. (What did King Akhtoi of Egypt counsel his son? - "Be diplomatic. It will help you gain your point.") "Thank you for the invite but I''m just getting the hang of my magic and would like to use this exam to test my skills. The presence of other people would just get in the way, so I will have to reject your invite." Marcia was about to speak further but Nick raised his hand in order to stop her. "I''ve already made up my mind so there''s no need to continue speaking about this, so if you''ll excuse me, I have to get to the exam venue." With that, Nick got up from the table and left the cafeteria, not looking back at the two people that he rejected. Don sat in place with a vain visibly bulging on his forehead and an angry expression. "Marcia, I told you that trying to invite that guy would lead us to disgrace but you insisted. I was feeling happy with you because of how we ''rekindled'' our relationship yesterday so I at least tried things your way but now that I''ve been rejected, I will do things my way. We will use the people we already have and pass this exam and afterwards you are going to let me inside of you as much as I please. Do you understand?" Marcia internally sighed. (Although Don has gotten more powerful since the mid-year exam, his temperament is still that of an entitled prince; he doesn''t understand that that will get him killed in this academy full of human monsters. I was intimate with him yesterday so that he would comply more easily but it looks like this episode will result in me giving him more of my time when the exam ends; I''m so sick of him but without a special background, my hands are tied. I''ll agree for now and see how things play out.) Marcia nodded her head. "Sure Don. Nick is only one person and he is still just a rank 1 Apprentice Magician, he is only putting on airs. I only thought well of him because his magic power seems a little interesting but it''s his loss. Let''s get the others and go to the exam venue." ... Nick arrived at the exam venue, following the directions given in an email that he received a few days ago. The venue was located within a clearing located within the woodlands at the very edge of the campus''s southern region. The clearing was large enough that the over 800 first years could freely move without getting in each others way. Nick stood at the edge of the group of students, waiting for what was to come. Nick looked above him to see a platform positioned at the very center of the venue, floating about fifteen meters above the ground with three Magicians standing on it, their presence being felt even from such a distance, there being two males and one female. Nick recognized the female. When it became 9 am, the female Magician stepped forward and spoke authoritatively: "My name is Rebecca Jones and I will be the overseer for this exam. I will now explain the rules and objectives for this exam." As Rebecca spoke, a bright glowing circular diagram made up entirely of laws written in Valteese appeared above the students and the floating platform, its light blocking out the sight of the morning sun. Nick looked on with excitement. "It''s finally starting." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 47: Wary Dog The diagram of laws above the students and faculty radiated a pressure that was spine tingling. Some students with weaker magical powers sat on the ground in order to cope with the turbulent magic energy that was now concentrating within the area they were in. Nick felt a little discomfort but it faded as time went on. (That diagram is drawing in a lot of the surrounding magical energy. Whatever spell that is going to be used will be big; also, those laws are definitely used to draw in and control mostly spacial magic.) Nick could feel how the magic energy being radiated from the diagram felt in part, very similar to the magic energy radiated by his beast capture scroll. Rebecca Jones continued speaking with a magically amplified voice: "This exam will take place within one of our academy''s private realms. As you all should know, a realm is a world that is distinct from and independent of the world that we are currently in. The realm that we are using for this exam is relatively small and contains both natural flora and fauna. Your objective in this exam is to survive a five day period within the realm; time in the realm flows faster than it does in this world so five days within the realm should be about 10 hours on Grand Earth. That is also one of the reasons that this particular realm was chosen to be used for this exam. The rules are simple: 1. You are not allowed to leave the realm once you arrive there until the exam ends. 2. You are not allowed to directly kill or cripple other students or have other students commit those crimes for you; doing so will result in your execution. 3. As long as you are alive at the end of the exam, you will receive a passing grade and will be allowed to take one free apprentice grade spell from the academy''s magical archives office." Nick found one of the rules strange. (Students are not allowed to kill or cripple each other? This is a survival exam so I thought that students would naturally be allowed to kill each other but it seems that is not the case. Then that means that rather than survive the actions of the other students, I''m supposed to survive whatever is contained naturally within that realm. Rebecca said that the realm contains natural flora and fauna; they must be dangerous. I have to keep that in mind.) After Rebecca announced three of the rules, she paused for several seconds to let the students think them over and then spoke again: "Now, as for how your student ranking will be determined. There is a certain criteria that will contribute to how we assess your performance that involves things such as: initiative, critical thinking, adaptability, magical power, magical knowledge, etcetera. Although the before mentioned assessment is important, the main thing that will contribute to your individual ranking is this..." Rebecca pointed towards the diagram of laws and a ray of golden light shot down from it, landing within an empty area below the platform surrounded on all sides by the group of students, revealing a creature standing on four legs. The creature looked similar to a dog, it had a line of thick bluish fur growing along its spinal column, glowing red eyes, bone spikes protruding from its meter long tail, dark grey fur and noticeably large spike like fangs that protruded from its mouth, similar to that of a saber-toothed tiger. GRRRRRRRRAAAAAWWWW! The creature shrieked loudly and looked as if it was about to lunge towards the the nearest students but before it could position itself to do so, Rebecca waved her hand and a cross of orange light emerged from the creature''s neck in four places, decapitating it. The creature''s head floated up to Rebecca while its body lied on the ground convulsing, red, blackish blood continuously flowing from the neck of the creature''s carcass, creating a small pool. "Aaaaaahhhhhhhhhh" Many students, mostly women, started to scream at the sight of the dead and decapitated creature but Nick looked at the creature''s carcass with disinterest. He turned his attention to the floating platform with Rebecca now holding the creature''s head in her right palm. Rebecca seemingly cast a spell and the head of the creature started radiating orange light. Once the light dissipated, only the creatures skull could be seen in Rebecca''s palm; the skull''s flesh and blood had been completely stripped away. Rebecca ignored the screams of the students and explained: "The creature that I just killed is called a ''wary dog'' and they are the pests of our academy''s realm; they are literally everywhere within the realm and they are fast, have very keen perception, an exceptionally strong sense of smell, a tendency to hunt both day and night and are extremely hostile to creatures that are not apart of their species. The one I just killed was a baby and there are far larger and more powerful wary dogs within the realm. Your main objective is basically pest control. You must eliminate as many wary dogs as possible and your individual ranking will mostly be determined by the mass of the wary dog skulls that that you present to us at the end of the exam. Yes, and I do mean the mass of the skulls and not the number of skulls. You see, as wary dogs age, they not only gain stronger magical resistance, they also grow in size at a startling rate; An adult wary dog can be the size and mass of an armored military truck with its head having a mass of around 800 kilograms while a baby weary dog''s head might have a mass of around 20 kilograms and so the stronger and older the wary dogs that you execute, the better you will be ranked. Of course we don''t care if you had help in killing the wary dogs, we only care about the mass of the heads that you present to us at the end of the exam. The only rules during this exam are what I mentioned before. Also, the academy''s realm has been allowed to flourish naturally without too much human intervention and is largely unexplored so whatever natural resources you find in there can be kept by you as long as you declare it at the end of the exam." Rebecca paused again, this time for about two minutes so that the students could digest all the information that she had just given them. She then motioned for one of the male faculty members that was standing behind her to step forward and as he did so, he held out a wristwatch like device and spoke: "This device is called a ''space band'' and it is engraved with many laws related to spacial magic. You will use this device to hold the heads and/or carcasses of the wary dogs that you kill. Each person will be assigned and given a device as soon as they enter the realm. If you lose the device, your score and ranking for the exam will be adversely affected and if you were wandering, it is completely legal for other students to steal your space band so it is in your best interest to act prudently at all times during this exam." The seemingly thirty year old man wearing an all black robe and black rimmed glasses warned the students with a solemn tone and stepped back. The students broke out in all sorts of discussions after the man finished speaking. Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon."So we are allowed to steal the results of others hard work, that will give an advantage to the stronger students." "That wary dog was seriously ugly, you are telling me that there are even bigger sons of bitches than the one that teacher Rebecca killed. We''re fucked." "What are you guys afraid of? With so few rules, we can easily form groups in order to get good rankings during this exam. They only brought that creature out to scare us; this exam doesn''t seem that hard." "Ciara and Jenny, since you two are still rank 1 Apprentice Magicians, you should roll with me. I''ll protect you." ......................................... While most of the students were conversing, Nick was wrapped up in his own thoughts. (So the main objective of this exam is the kill wary dogs and obtain the highest mass of their skulls possible. That seems fairly simple but with all these students and our unfamiliarity with the realm, things are bound to get complicated. My plan should involve exploring the realm while being as invisible as possible to the others. Although, we can''t kill or cripple each other, we can definitely mess each other up enough to cause indirect deaths.) Nick would be lying if he said that he wasn''t somewhat scared of what was to come but he knew that he had no choice but to dive on into whatever the situation would be within that realm. Rebecca began speaking again: "It''s time for the exam to begin, the magic formation above us will transport you to the realm within the next thirty seconds. Do not resist it!" After saying that, within several seconds, golden light shone down from the diagram of laws which then receded, seemingly carrying the students that the light touched away. Nick stood in his position watching the spectacle in awe and reverence. (One day, I''ll definitely be strong enough to do something like that. I just have to work harder and learn even more.) Nick steeled his resolve as he was bathed in golden light and taken away from his position. Rebecca looked on as each student was taken away from Grand Earth and transported into the academy''s realm. She looked back at the two faculty members behind her and said: "The two of you have been itching to find new disciples, right? Maybe this is your opportunity to find good seeds. Let''s go to the observation building and watch the show." The two men standing behind Rebecca shrugged their shoulders in unison and within an instant the three Regular Magicians vanished from the platform, Rebecca doing so amidst a column of blue light, one of the male Magicians, amidst a collection of fog and the last Magician seemed to break apart into flower petals and was carried off with the wind. .......................................... When the golden light dissipated, Nick could see again, he was standing on the bank of a stream. Nick''s right arm now had a shiny black device wrapped around it that looked like a wristwatch. "This is the space band? It doesn''t seem very special, I can''t even feel any magic energy coming from it. I guess I''ll find an opportunity to test it out later." Nick looked around with curiosity, seeing that he was now standing within a clearing where there were many trees at its edge.The clearing was filled with green slippery grass growing within soft wet soil; the stream flowed from within a path that originated from the woodland that appeared to surround Nick''s current position. Nick noticed that the end of the stream seemed to slope downwards as it approached a rock wall that rose over twenty meters into the air and so Nick walked a few meters to discover a large opening in the ground that extended into the rock wall; it was large enough that Nick would definitely be able to jump down and walk around alongside the stream. (Should I go down there or wander around the surrounding woodlands? My plan is to kill as many wary dogs as I can while avoiding direct confrontations with other students; walking around the woodlands would probably more likely result in me coming into contact with other students which I want to avoid so early in the exam. I''ll check out this underground space and if anything seems suspicious, I will immediately leave.) Nick jumped into the opening and landed within the shallow stream of water. Nick''s leather boots were covered with water so he quickly moved to the bank of the underground stream. When Nick got to the stream bank he looked around to see a dimly lit space with moss covered rock formations all around. The air was damp and smelt moldy but Nick could easily cope with it. (This place isn''t very well lit so I should use the flashlight on my phone to see my way around.) Nick took out his old smart phone and turned on its flashlight. He could explore his surroundings with much more clarity now. Nick walked for a few meters until he reached a group of rock formations. These rocks had a mix of blue and green moss all over them but did not seem special in any way. As Nick was ready to go deeper down and explore the underground area, he heard what seemed like rapid footsteps approaching his position; it was dark so he couldn''t see what exactly was causing those sounds but as the sounds got louder Nick remembered what Rebecca said: "The creature that I just killed is called a ''wary dog'' and they are the pests of our academy''s realm; they are literally everywhere within the realm..." (Oh shit, I messed up! I actually nonchalantly walked into a poorly lit space when I know about the existence of those wary dogs.) Nick didn''t hesitate to turn around and run back to the entrance of the underground space but before he got to the entrance he could hear the footsteps from before being made only a few feet behind him. (Sigh, I''ve got no choice.) Nick had already gotten near to the well lit entrance so he could see fairly well; he took out one of his throwing knives from his vest with his right hand and turned around while swinging it as the footsteps behind him quickened its pace. (Big.) Nick''s throwing knife became the size of a machete and as the wary dog lunged at Nick, Nick held the knife firmly and swung it at the wary dog''s approaching head. PAAAACCCCKKKK! Nick''s enlarged knife landed hard on the wary dog''s face, splitting its skull and going deeper by about two inches. The wary dog''s body became lifeless and it fell to the ground with Nick''s knife stuck in its head. "Man, that was close." STEP STEP STEP STEP As Nick was feeling relieved, a set of footsteps became audible in the distance and from the darkness emerged a wary dog that was three times that size of the one that Nick had just killed. Nick looked at the grey furred, menacing beast with glowing red eyes and for just a moment, he regretted not pretending to be sick in order to skip this exam. (Sigh, why does my life suck so much?) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 48: Magical Creatures Nick watched as the tiger sized wary dog eyed him with its ruby red eyes. Right now, a tingling sensation went down Nick''s spine as the wary dog drew near, slowly, step by step. (Do I turn and run? No, that would be exactly what this thing wants. With its dog like physique, it definitely has greater speed than me; running would just expose my back to it which is probably equivalent to suicide. Looking at it now, its clearly observing me to determine my threat level. I guess that''s why its called a ''wary'' dog.) Nick took out one of his throwing knives from his vest with his right hand and held it firmly and then took five steps forward. The wary dog reacted by also moving forward, seemingly keeping its eyes on the blade in Nick''s right hand. (What''s going on, it still hasn''t attacked even though I''m approaching it; that''s clearly not something a vicious animal would hesitate to do? This thing is so tame compared to the other wary dog that just ran towards me earlier. Its been looking at the knife in my hand since I took it out; these creatures seem to also get smarter as they age and not just bigger. Who knows how many wary dogs might be in the vicinity; I can''t maintain a stand-off with this wary dog anymore. Since you won''t take the initiative, I will.) Nick decided that he could not wait anymore and ran towards the wary dog. As soon as the wary dog saw Nick''s movements, it opened its terrifying maw and made a loud growl. GRRRRRAAAAWWWW! The sound was ear-piercing and it echoed within the surrounding space. Nick steeled himself and continued to run forward while the wary dog also took large strides towards Nick; they were four meters apart from each other within five seconds. (Big.) Nick pointed his knife at the approaching wary dog and activated his spell; the tip and blade of the knife broadened and extended forward at an incredible speed that the wary dog failed to keep track of. By the time the wary dog noticed something amiss, the blade of Nick''s knife had already completely pieced its left front leg near its shoulder region. GRAW GRAW GRAW GRAW The wary dog was visibly suffering from the pain of being impaled and no longer moved forward as it had before because the blade of Nick''s knife had pierced its leg, partially damaging its leg bone and then exiting its leg and piercing into the semi-hard rock ground. The wary dog was only three meters away when this happened and so Nick, knowing that the creature''s movements would be hampered by its injury let go of the knife in his right hand and ran at a curved angle towards the war dog''s left side. Nick took out another throwing knife from his vest and when he was less than a meter from his target, while the wary dog was biting at its disabled leg trying to get the blade out and moving erratically, Nick held his knife firmly and raised it above his head and swung it down with all his strength. (Big.) The blade and hilt of Nick''s knife widened by about an inch and extended by over 1 meter. SSSHHHHIIINNNGGGGGGG SSSSPPPPPLLLLAAATTTT As the knife was slammed down on the wary dog, the middle if its spinal column was cleaved into, the enlarged knife not stopping until it reached the center of the wary dog''s midsection. Blood poured from the creature''s wound and hit the ground with a harrowing sound. The wary dog''s body fell on the ground, motionless. (Success!) Nick didn''t waste any time, he quickly used his knife to cut off the heads of both wary dog carcasses and tapped them with his space band; each head disappeared, Nick hoping that they were now stored within the space band but since he was worried about other wary dogs appearing because of the scent of blood, he ran to the entrance of the underground space, throwing his enlarged knife away and left the area by pulling himself up by holding on to the edge of the opening in the ground. Nick''s clothes were wet with stream water and blood but there was a sort of comfort that he felt in knowing that the two wary dogs that he had met were now dead. (Those wary dogs were really ugly and the second one was huge compared to the first. The first one was similar in size to the one that Rebecca killed so it must have been a baby; it was still really fast though. The second wary dog didn''t run towards me as eagerly as the first but that''s probably a sign of increased intelligence. With those experiences under my belt, I now know that I should avoid dark, enclosed spaces.) Nick ran some distance from the entrance of the underground space along the bank of the stream and then threw his backpack to the ground and jumped into the stream attempting to wash off some of the blood that was on his skin and clothes. (Rebecca said that the wary dogs have an excellent sense of smell. If there are more down in that hole I should get rid of the scent of blood on me as much as possible; it would be a bitch if they followed me because of the smell.) Nick spent a minute bathing himself with the stream water and then left the stream, picking up his backpack and running towards the nearby woodlands. Once Nick found himself among the trees, he stopped running and started to move cautiously through the collections of trees. This woodland was filled with green, shrub like grass that reached up to Nick''s knees. Nick continued moving past the trees while stepping on grass for a seemingly long time and only stopped when he felt tired. Nick found a large tree that was separated from the others on all sides by a couple meters and sat at the foot of it. Nick opened his backpack to make sure that his beast capture scroll was okay and closed it again. (I have my beast capture scroll, my knives and my spell as my offensive capabilities. I have to admit that that doesn''t seem like much and I can''t even make proper use of my large reserves of magic energy because I only know one spell but I''ve got no choice but to make the most of what I have.) GGGGRRRRRRRR Nick''s stomach rumbled with a distressing sound and with it came a hunger that he had not noticed before. (Now that I think about it, I never thought about what I was going to eat during this exam because I thought that it wouldn''t last that long and the information that we were given in the email about the exam did not expressly state that we needed to carry our own food and water. So...am I supposed to find those things myself? That seems a little harsh considering that most students would have never been in this situation before.) As Nick thought about food, his space band released a green light and a container suddenly appeared in front of him. "Huh?" Nick picked up the container and opened it. Within the container, there was dried meat, bread and raisins. Nick looked at the food with joy and began eating without even thinking about what had taken place with his space band; normally Nick didn''t even like raisins but in this situation, he wasn''t going to look down on food that suddenly appeared in front of him. After he was finished eating, he inspected his space band and willed and the two heads of the wary dogs that he had previously killed appeared in front of him, most of the blood that had been oozing out from them before had already came out and the rest that was still present had already dried. (Hmmm...let me try this.) For a moment, Nick thought about food and water while focusing his attention on the space band and within the next moment fourteen containers similar to the one that had first appeared from the ring appeared in front of Nick along with fifteen bottles of water. This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.(Fifteen containers of meals and fifteen 2 liter bottles of water, that''s 3 servings of food and water each day for five days which is the entire duration of the exam. It looks like those teachers of ours aren''t complete assholes. They didn''t send us to this place without food and water.) Nick tapped on the containers of food, the bottles of water and the heads of the wary dogs with his space band and they all disappeared from sight, being transported into the space band again. (What a nifty magical tool. No wonder Marsha is so obsessed with them. Alright, it''s time to continue exploring this place...) Before Nick could finish his thought, a fireball the size of a soccer ball flew over to his position. (Oh, shit!) Nick reacted by quickly getting on all fours and jumping away from the tree. His previous position at the foot of the tree was now a charred mess, smoke still rising from it. Nick looked towards the direction that the fireball came from only to see a bipedal lizard the size of a 10 year old child standing a few meters away from him. Seeing that its attack had failed, the lizard quickly ran away, using the trees behind it to cover its movements. (Sigh, it looks like the wary dogs are not the only deadly creatures in this place, there are also other magic beasts within this realm.) Nick wasn''t naive enough to believe that that bipedal lizard had actually left so he backed away towards the direction opposite to where the lizard ran to until he got to a group of trees that he could use as cover and he ran as fast as he could, trying to find somewhere that he could use as a base of operations. Nick ran seemingly for a long time until he came upon an old tree with very thick branches. Since It seemed that it would soon be sunset as the daylight became dimmer, Nick wanted to take up residence on one of the tree''s branches. Nick ran up to the tree and using the ball of his right foot, planted his foot on the tree and pushed upward towards a low hanging branch, making an extra jump with his right leg. Nick held on to the branch and pulled himself up; he then reached for other branches until he found himself a comfortable spot on a branch about 8 meters from the ground. The branch was large and sturdy so Nick chose to rest there for the moment. Nick willed and retrieved another meal from his space band as well as a bottle of water and spent the next fifteen minutes eating and drinking. As soon as his meal was over, Nick put the trash back into his space band and thought about the events leading up to his current situation. (I''ve encountered three magic beasts since coming here, none of them really all that strong but If I had made an error in judgement, they all could have killed me. My weakness of only having one decent spell has become apparent. Maybe I should have brought some of the scrolls with my first three spells along with me. Hmmm...I didn''t bring them along because I did not want the extra load as well as I thought of them as insufficient to use against experienced Apprentice Magicians. Thinking about my current circumstances, my magic scrolls might have been very effective against those magic beasts though. Note to self, next time I should prepare as much as possible for an event that I know nothing about, using whatever means I possess to bring about the best possible outcome. It''s clearly life and death in this place and I didn''t bring my magic scrolls because I didn''t want the extra load. Am I an idiot? Sigh, I just hope that one of those magic beasts doesn''t send me off before the exam is over.) Suddenly, Nick heard chatter from below. "Mary, hold it off with your ice spike spell while I prepare my thunder cannon!" (Huh?) Nick looked down to the ground at an area near his tree where two students, a man and a woman were currently having a battle with a wary dog that was twice the size of the second wary dog that Nick had killed. The two students were clearly struggling. "Moose, hurry up and cast your spell, this thing is fast and tanky, If you don''t come through, we''re both dead." The woman spent her efforts conjuring ice spikes in midair that flew over to the wary dog with a twisted motion. The wary dog didn''t bother dodging the ice spike and let it stab into its body. The ice spike create a large bleeding wound and then turned into a cloud of vapor and faded. The wary dog seemed to be unaffected by its wound that was visibly being healed. Nick raised his brows in silence. (That wary dog can heal its own wounds! Sigh, those two are in trouble, should I help now? No, wait for an opportune moment to strike.) Nick sat tight, not wanting to hurt himself by helping those two students. As the female Apprentice Magician, Mary, kept on launching her ice spike attack at the wary dog, the wary dog kept pushing forward while its wounds healed, slowly pushing the two students toward Nick''s tree. Suddenly, the male Apprentice Magician, Moose spoke as they were now directly below Nick''s position: "I need thirty more seconds to launch my thunder cannon, keep it busy until then Mary." The magic energy in the surroundings became turbulent as the young man was preparing his spell; his body started giving off blue electric sparks. Mary smiled from in front of Moose and cast another ice spike. The wary dog noticed the change in the flow of magical energy and ignoring the ice spike that stabbed into its body and burst out with speed not inferior to a moving car. "What?" With that, the beast loomed over Mary with its maw wide open, its breath penetrating her nostrils; the beast was about to bite off Mary''s head when suddenly something landed on its back. ................................................................................ Nick saw the speed at which the wary dog moved towards Mary and was slightly shocked. (With speed like that, those wary dogs must not have a hard time hunting down prey but they clearly have a cautious nature when dealing with unknown enemies so they only move forward violently when they understand the situation better or are left with no choice, the exception being the baby wary dogs that recklessly lunge at their prey. Okay, it''s time for me to do something; those two might have some useful information so it would be a pity if they died prematurely.) Nick placed his backpack at the corner of the branch, not wanting to risk damaging his beast capture scroll and jumped down towards the wary dog. ........................................................................................ Nick landed on the wary dog''s back, its fur providing a suitable cushion for his fall. (This wary dog''s knees didn''t even buckle at the impact...it has an impressively strong frame.) Nick immediately corrected his posture after the impact and reached out with both hands, grabbing the back of the wary dog''s head. (Big.) The volume of the magic sea within Nick''s mindscape decreased at a visible rate as he activated his spell. Within a few moments the growling wary dog''s head grew to twice its original size and it fell lifelessly onto the ground. "Huh?" "Huh?" Both Mary and Moose were at a loss for words, witnessing what just took place. They looked at Nick with some fear and gratefulness. Nick ignored the two other Apprentice Magicians for the moment and looked at the enlarged head of the now dead wary dog and thought: (I think I''m going to get a really high student ranking during this exam.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 49: Moose and Mary Moose Dempsey was glad that the wary dog was dead even if it wasn''t him that killed it. Moose stopped preparing his smell and the blue electric sparks on his body faded away. Moose walked towards Nick and signaled Mary to do the same. Moose spoke while Nick was looking at the wary dog''s corpse: "So, hey man. Thanks for the help in killing this wary dog. Since you were the one that killed it, we naturally won''t ask for the carcass. My name is Moose Dempsey and this is my classmate, Mary Watkins. What is your name, if you don''t mind me asking?" Nick, still focusing on the wary dog''s body absentmindedly replied: "Nick Capitol." (Oh right, those two are still here.) After answering their question, Nick remembered that there were two other Apprentice Magicians on the scene. He turned around to have a good look at both of them. They were both wearing a t-shirt and a pair of jeans pants and were white. The man seemed to be in his mid twenties, had black, messy hair and a smile on his face. Nick noticed that the woman, Mary, was probably closer to his age, fairly pretty, looked somewhat athletic and she had a stern expression on her face. Nick spoke to them both: "Right, I''ll keep the carcass since I killed the wary dog. Now, since we know each others names, like good old friends, mind telling me what your experience has been since being transported into this realm?" Mary and Moose looked at each other with uncertain eyes which changed in a few moments to eyes filled with determination. Mary looked at Nick and spoke in a matter of fact tone: "When I arrived in this realm, I found myself in a woodland surrounded by trees and I wandered around for a while, trying to find other people or at least a few magic beasts like the wary dogs. Along the way, I saw a magic beast that looked like a giant bear, a menacing looking deer and a fast moving boar. I avoided all of them because fighting them didn''t seem worth it since only killing the wary dogs contribute to our overall score. I wandered around for most of the day until I found Moose. We''re actually classmates of the same introduction to magical tools class so we decided to team up for the time being. Things were going fine, that is, until that wary dog found us while we were eating some of the food we got from our space bands." Moose nodded in response to Mary''s narration of events and then spoke about his own experience: "I found myself near a cliff overlooking this woodland when I came to this realm and so I used one of my earth related spells to climb down to the woodland below and explored for a while until I found Mary. I actually didn''t see any magic beasts before meeting that wary dog so I don''t have anything useful to say about the fauna in this place." Nick nodded his head in understanding and said: "Okay, since that''s all I wanted to ask you about, I''ll take the carcass and go back to minding my own business. Be careful while traveling around this place. I''ve met three wary dogs including this one and a fire breathing lizard since I came to this realm. I killed the wary dogs but the lizard ran away before I could do anything to it. Good luck." Nick tapped the carcass of the wary dog, storing it within his space band and was going to climb up his tree again when Moose stopped him, saying: "Wait Nick, we should stick together and help each other during the exam. I''m a rank 2 Apprentice Magician and I know quite a few spells. Mary doesn''t know as many spells as I do but she is also a rank 2 Apprentice Magician. Judging by the magic energy that you''re exuding, you are a rank 1 Apprentice Magician, you can follow us as we try to find other students and kill some more wary dogs along the way." Nick stopped in his tracks, his back facing both Mary and Moose, feeling annoyed beyond belief. (Why the hell would I need to ''follow'' you? I saved you, not the other way around. Sigh, why do I keep attracting the attention of egotistical, ignorant people?) Still with his back turned to them, Nick spoke clearly: "No thank you, I''m not interested in being in a team so you should continue your search for the other students and wary dogs without me." Moose was surprised at Nick''s refusal. (Who would want to be alone in a place like this. Is this Nick stupid or crazy? Well either way, he has some useful strength just looking at how skillfully he killed that wary dog while still being a rank 1 Apprentice Magician. Hmph, he''s probably just worried that we might slow him down. I''ll just have to make a show of power to make him respect me.) Moose activated one of his spells. (Basic Thunder Bolt.) Moose made a fist pump motion towards the sky and a bolt of lightning dropped at Nick''s feet charring the space in front of him black. Mary looked at Moose with incredulity. (Why would you do that to someone we just met? Do you really think that a difference of 1 rank at our level means much, you idiot.) Nick was pissed...very pissed. This moron returned his kindness with enmity because he felt a little rejection. Nick wouldn''t show any mercy to this fool going forward. Nick took out one of his throwing knives from his vest and swung around his body with the muscles within his right arm holding his knife contracted. (Big.) The blade of Nick''s knife broadened by a few centimeters and its length extended by several meters. By the time Nick was facing the other two students again, the blade of his knife was resting on Moose''s shoulder, being dangerously close to his carotid artery. "Huh?" Moose was shocked by the sudden turn of events as Nick took out another knife from his vest with his left hand, pointing it at him. (Oh fuck, what spell did he use? Never mind that, I should say something before he decides to break the exam rules.) "Hold on, I was just making a point. C''mon, see how I could have injured you if I wanted. That is the disadvantage in having no companions as you have no one to watch your back." Nick scoffed at Moose''s words. "With a companion like you, why the fuck would I even need enemies; I would already have someone willing to attack me while my back is turned." The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.Moose was at a loss for words because what Nick said was justified considering that he just attacked him while Nick wasn''t even looking. At this moment Mary stepped in before things went too far. "Mr. Nick, I apologize for my friend''s stupidity in attacking you, he''s just a little immature, that''s all. How about this, we promise to leave right after you put your weapons down, we''ll even give you some of our food as an apology." Nick looked at the two with blatant disgust. "You two should just get the fuck up out of here, I don''t want your food. I swear, this kind of shit is the reason that I don''t want other Apprentice Magicians around me." Nick took his knife from Moose''s shoulder and eyed the two with displeasure. Mary took Moose by the hand and dragged him away as fast as he could. Moose looked back at Nick with the same displeasure but held his tongue since he knew that he was in the wrong and Nick was not defenseless. In a few moments, both Mary and Moose disappeared behind some trees and Nick watched that area for about a minute to see if there would be any more movements from that direction. After a minute, Nick let out a sigh, feeling troubled. (With those two within such close proximity to me, I can''t stay here anymore. I know better than anyone that compared to wild beasts, humans are far more terrifying. I should get my backpack and keep moving.) Nick climbed up into the tree again and retrieved his backpack and then climbed down. He ran into the forest opposite the direction that Moose and Mary went and kept on moving. ...................................................................... Back at the tree where Nick had met Mary and Moose, there was movement within the tall grass opposite the tree and in a few moments, two people emerged from the grass. "See Moose, I told you that he wouldn''t stay here after your little threat. What you did was really stupid and it probably cost us a valuable ally. Next time, use your words instead of launching meaningless attacks." Moose silently clenched his fist while Mary scolded him. He knew that he had acted rashly but it was too late for him to regret his decision. Moose looked at Mary and spoke: "Since he left so decisively, we should not chase after him. Instead, we should try to find other students willing to be our teammates and we should actively look for wary dogs to kill along the way. When we were fighting the last wary dog, none of our basic spells worked very well against it because of its healing ability but that Nick''s spell killed the wary dog in almost an instant. That was fairly impressive. Sigh, let''s find a place to rest our heads before it becomes dark and continue our search tomorrow." Both Moose and Mary moved in tandem towards a random direction and just kept walking. ........................................................................... (Oh shit, It''s almost sundown and I haven''t found a suitable place to camp for the night. I really don''t want to remain in the open during the night time in this place, that seems like asking to die.) Nick rushed forward as he tried to find a resting spot but no where seemed suitable for him. As he entered a region where the trees were now spaced father apart, he suddenly heard the sound of wailing. "Huh, what is that sound? Is something crying out?" Nick looked around but found nothing but trees and grass within his immediate vicinity. He remembered a trick that he saw on the History channel once, used to hear subtle sounds in the wild. Nick put his ear to the ground and listened intently. (Hold on, this trick was for hearing enemies tunneling into your camp, does the same principle apply in this situation?) Nick now felt kind of stupid having the side of his face in the dirt while trying to listen out for some indistinct cry. When Nick was about to give up, a sound penetrated the ground which he could hear more clearly than before: "Rawwwwwwwr Rawwwwwwwr Rawwwwwwwwr" It sounded like the growling of something that was in pain. Nick moved his head and body along the ground, trying to get a better understanding of where the sound was originating from. Nick crawled over a dozen meters in the direction where the sound seemed to penetrate the ground the loudest. (Why am I doing this. If something''s roar is strong enough to penetrate the ground like this and be heard for meters all around, it must be fairly strong, right? Am I looking for trouble? Sigh, to be a Magician is to be curious about the world around you. If I''m not even willing to go through this much trouble then I can forget about becoming anything special.) Nick continued to move towards the epicenter of the sound, passing trees, boulders and all kinds of shrubs and grass. By the time Nick raised his head for a break, he was in a completely different area than before. The area that he was now in was more of a savanna than a woodland and the grass had become noticeably thicker and lighter in color. (How comes I haven''t encountered any magic beasts so far? That''s strange isn''t it, there are far less trees to cover my position now so I should be more visible to wary dogs at this point. Well...whatever.) Nick continued to crawl along the savanna, listening to the cry of the creature. (The beauty about what I''m doing is that I should be able to hear enemies approaching from the ground as I crawl like this.) Nick continued searching for the source of the sound until suddenly, the ground around him became soft and collapsed around him and Nick slid along a sloping pathway toward the bottom of an underground chamber. PPPPFFFFTTTTTT Nick fell to the ground and under a heavy wind he picked himself up from his position. Nick looked in front of him and realized that the air pressure he was feeling was not the wind. A large, burly creature was actually breathing on him at this very moment, its abyss like black eyes staring at him. Nick was visibly shocked at the size of the creature and then internally sighed. (Sigh, I really messed up this time.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 50: Slade Terrence The magic beast in front of Nick was as big as a one storey house. It had the body and appearance of a lion with a live snake for a tail; it had glowing green eyes, brown fur and a reddish mane. It looked at Nick with its eyes that seemed full of intelligence, breathing heavily. Nick was so frightened by the magic beast''s presence that he continuously backed away from it without thinking until he was stopped by a semi-hard rock wall. Nick stood with his back against the wall looking at the creature in trepidation, the creature was also silently looking at him (This thing is huge and terrifying. The wary dogs and the fire breathing lizard that I met previously had the magical strength about the equivalent of a rank 1 Apprentice Magician. I can''t feel any magical energy coming from that ''lion'' but it has to be something more powerful, right? What were the academy administrators thinking, sending us students to wander around with something like that living within this realm?) The magic beast did not immediately move in response to Nick''s arrival so Nick took the time to look at his surroundings for a possible escape route. The underground space that he was currently in seemed like a naturally formed cavern with stalactites jutting out from the ceiling and a sparse amount of stone formations positioned seemingly at random on the cavern floor. Nick also tried to find the place where he fell from but when he saw that it was only a few meters away from the lion, he was doubtful about using it as an escape route, not to mention that he had slid down at a sloped angle so climbing back up using that passage seemed unlikely as he did not have a magic spell to help him in that regard. (This situation seems hopeless but I''m definitely not going to go down without a fight. I''ll shove all my knives up this beast''s ass if I have to in order to kill it.) [I don''t think that that would be a wise course of action for you young man.] (Huh?) Nick looked at the lion in surprise, the lion was looking back at him with a plain expression, not uttering a sound, contrary to the circumstances that lured Nick here but Nick had just heard someone''s voice. "Who was that? Was it you mister lion?" [Hah, mister lion? Kid, do you have a few screws loose or something? Ha, ha...] The voice appeared again but this time it jeered at Nick. Since Nick was paying attention this time, he realized that the voice was not an audible one, but one that seemed to be coming from his own thoughts. [This is my spell, will as thoughts, how do you like it? I used to use it as a method to speak with my mistresses back in the day so as not to alert their husbands; I have finally found a proper use for it.] Nick grew concerned about this voice invading his mind. (Who are you, what are you doing in my mind?) [I''m not ''in'' your mind kid, I''m just subtly injecting some of my will into your body and converting it into your thoughts. Oh, and I''m also reading your thoughts while I''m at it.] Nick didn''t like the voice''s carefree attitude. (You didn''t answer my first question.) [Hmph, why should I, the great soul hunter Mage, answer your trifling question?] (Soul hunter Mage? Do you mean Magician? Well...maybe you should answer my question because you''re the one that''s playing around with other peoples thoughts, communicating with me. I assume that you wouldn''t do that if you didn''t have some kind of purpose behind it, right?) [Oh, it seems that you''re not a dolt, kid. Congratulations.] Nick became pissed, he didn''t like the voice''s attitude. That kind of talk sounded all too familiar to Nick and he did not like it one bit. (I''ll ask again. Who the fuck are you and what the fuck do you want? If you''re going to kill me then do so. If not, then fuck off.) [Hmmm...you''re a troubled one aren''t you, it seems that you have some traumas that are plaguing you? Well, that might make you even more suitable for my inheritance.] Nick didn''t know what to say so he simply repeated the voice''s last word. (Inheritance?) [Yes, inheritance. Let me properly introduce myself to you, kid. This daddy here is called...or rather was called Slade Terrence, the soul hunter Mage. You seem to be used to the term Magician; that could be because you are from a different realm that mine or by now, ''Mage'' might be an old designation. Anyway, when I was alive I was a Mage that specialized in soul and wisdom magic and I eventually became a rank 8 World Class Mage. In my last days, I had a falling out with a certain group of World Class Mages and we fought until I was near death; in my last moments I created a sentient will and entrusted my remaining magic energy as well as much of my magical knowledge to it and teleported it to a random realm. I suppose that my body died but even I''m not too sure about that.] (What does all that have to do with me?) [You see, kid, when I got to this realm, there were a bunch of soul eating lions like this one roaming around so I possessed one of them and because soul eating lions were filled with laws related to soul magic, I ate as much as I could with my new body to make sure that my new host would last long enough for me to find a human host. I don''t know how long you have been in this realm but I''m sure that you have seen no other soul eating lions. I believe the predator that competed with the soul eating lions were the impish jackals.] (Impish jackals? Do you mean the wary dogs.) Slade Terrence read Nick''s thoughts and affirmed: [Yes, I mean the ''wary dogs''; what a stupid name, mine is way better. Those creatures are fairly weak and have limited potential but the older ones would still pose a significant threat to someone of your strength. Listen, when you arrived here, I noticed that you seemed to have a satisfactory affinity for soul magic so I was going to possess your body in order to recreate my own soul but it seems that your soul has been tampered with so that is not ideal for me.] (My soul has been tampered with? Fuck, the dean; I knew that bastard might have pulled something. Hey, can you help me deal with whatever was done to my soul? Wait...did you say that you were going to possess me, what the fuck?) [Calm down, I also implied that that''s no longer the plan. As for what I can do for you, I''m getting to that, kid. With your soul being tampered with, it''s too troublesome for me to possess you so to save myself another hundreds of years of waiting, I''m going to give you my soul magic inheritance as well as I will accompany you for a while and guide you, taking you on as my disciple. This beast''s body is dying and it''s feeling so much pain that even with my possession, it wails all day long if I don''t actively restrain it; it''s strength has also fallen to rock bottom despite its size. Even you could probably beat it if you tried really hard.] Slade stopped talking so that Nick could process what he had just said. Nick stood in place for a while, thinking. He didn''t know whether he could completely trust Slade''s words or not but clearly he did not have the strength to refuse this ''opportunity'' so he decided to play along for now. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it(I thought that you said that you specialized in soul and wisdom magic, why are you only giving me a soul magic inheritance?) [Kid, I''ve already examined your soul so I know that you have nearly no affinity for wisdom magic. While you could probably still practice it if you worked really, really, really hard, with your foundation in rule magic, adding soul magic on top of that should be about all you can handle for now. More knowledge at your level may not be such a good thing. Thoroughly learning just one type of magic requires extreme focus, only badasses like me can specialize in two types of magic. If you seem to be able to handle the extra work, in the future I''ll pass along the wisdom magic inheritance but not now.] (You know about rule magic? How do you know that I practice it?) [Huh, why wouldn''t I know about rule magic? It''s one of the oldest areas of specialization in the magical arts. As for how I know that you practice it...ignoring your clear affinity for it, I can somewhat sense the kind of magic power that''s contained within your mindscape, a skill that World Class Mages tend to have. You definitely have a special grade mindscape that is most suitable for the use of rule magic.] Nick was glad to finally confirm that he had a special grade mindscape but he still had concerns. (You still haven''t stated your terms for giving me this inheritance and how you will help me fix my tampered with soul.) [You should know how Mages operate, nothing is for free, it''s good that is the case. As long as you promise to help me find out what happened to my real body and help me deal with the Mages that caused my unfortunate circumstance or their descendants, I''ll give you my inheritance and help you along your journey. I can tell that whatever was done to your soul should be harmless to you but with magic, you never know for sure how things will work out in the future. The best way to deal with it is by relying on yourself. I''ll teach you how to properly command soul magic and you''ll be able to deal with the problem yourself eventually.] (That''s it huh? I can live with that, yes, I''ll help you with your quest for revenge but let me be clear, my learning magic takes priority over anything else so it will probably take me a long time to become strong enough to deal with your enemies and maybe even longer to travel to wherever you came from. Is that okay with you?) [Just your word will suffice for now. Brace yourself.] The pressure in the underground cavern intensified and the soul eating lion began to wail again, seeming as if it was in extreme pain. RAAAAAAAAWR RAAAAAAAWR RAAAAAAAAWR RAAAAAAAAAAWR Nick held his hands over his ears in order to cope with the magic beast''s outburst. A few minutes into the creature''s wailing, an almost blinding purple light emerged from its body. Nick squinted his eyes and watched the light carefully; soon, the visage of an aged man appeared amidst the light and he smiled half-wickedly at Nick. (God, I hope I don''t regret this.) The purple light concentrated itself at a central point above the soul eating lion and soon the soul eating lion withered into a pile of silver and grey ash. Those events took about twenty minutes to complete. After the soul eating lion was completely turned to ash, the light condensed into a lightly glowing purple ball and moved toward Nick, stopping right in front of him. [I''m going to house why will in your mind, moving freely among your thoughts. Just so you know, I will be reading your thoughts of my own accord so be prepared for that] (Sigh, let''s just get this over with.) [Ha, ha. That''s the spirit, kid.] The light approached Nick''s forehead and passed through his skull, remaining inside his head. [I would have requested to enter your mindscape but I''ll have to get to know you first before I go in there.] (Hmph, who told you that I wanted you in there, don''t even think about it. The mindscape is a Magician''s most important resource point, why would I let an external force inside, stop your dreaming!) [He, he. I knew you were a sharp one, kid. Fine, now that I''m all settled, let''s get down to the business of leaving this place. The presence of my will within that lion was keeping the other magic beasts away from this area. Now that I''m concealing myself within your body, the surrounding magic beasts will come flooding in, fighting for territory. You don''t want to be in this area when that happens. Oh, that little device on your arm, it''s a spacial storage device right? Well, it seconds as a monitoring device. I deactivated it the minute you entered this cavern but I will reactivate it as soon as you leave here. Do not tell anyone about me or I will renege on our agreement! Loose lips sink ships and if you have the propensity to talk too much, I won''t bother helping you.] (Yeah...I get it. I don''t like chatterboxes either.) [Now, this cavern has a magic formation that conceals its main entrance at the edge of this particular region, you can''t sense it at your level so don''t even bother trying. I''m going to use some of my strength to have the formation teleport you to that entrance. Just start walking and after a few meters you''ll find yourself where you need to be.] Nick did as Slade wanted and began walking to the other side of the cavern. After a while, a feeling of nausea came over him and the scene in front of him changed from that of a rocky cavern to a woodland filled with well separated pine trees and short green grass that was facing a sloping cliff wall. Nick had his back to the cliff wall and looked back for a moment. (This is the entrance, it''s a cliff wall, what''s up with that? Also, you can use magic while inside my body, that doesn''t make me feel comfortable?) [Kid, why would I have the entrance to my lair look like an actual entrance, that would be asking for trouble; any dumb-ass could just wander in and cause problems if that was the case. A skilled Mage would be able to see through the trick though and that''s what I was counting on in order to find someone worthy of possessing. Instead, I ended up with you, who happened to fall through the roof of the cavern because the surrounding earth had weakened. Sigh.] (What are you grumbling about? You''re the one who asked me to help you with your damn revenge. Show some respect.) [He, he. Kid, you have a long way to go before earning my respect. Let''s focus on your circumstances for now. I used magic to get you out of the cavern but that''s because this place was my home for many years and I had the time to carve the necessary laws into the surroundings using the soul eating lion''s body. I can''t use magic to interfere with the physical world otherwise. Keep that in mind.] Nick nodded his head in understanding. "It''s time to go." Slade went silent and Nick walked towards the new area with a heightened level of confidence. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 51: Shortcoming Nick was now running through an area filled with pine trees, trying to find a place to rest before night came as it was now approaching sundown. (Slade, do you know a safe area where I can take shelter for the night?) Slade spoke in a carefree manner. [Your name is Nick Capitol, huh boy? Most of your thoughts are pretty bland, is all that you think about related to magic? That''s not necessarily a bad thing for an aspiring Mage but I doubt that you are very popular with other people.] A vein bulged on Nick''s forehead; he spoke through gritted teeth: "Stop messing around, If I die then you won''t get what you want, right? It''s in your best interest to help me. If I can''t find shelter by nightfall, my circumstances will get dangerous if I encounter a magic beast." [You''re right about that kid. Hold on, I''m trying to familiarize myself with you before I start feeding you instructions. So...your now currently attending some sort of magic academy and you are within this realm because your academy is now conducting an exam. Hmmm..Some time ago, I did notice that there was a team of Mages that were surveying the realm but since none of them appeared to have good aptitudes for soul or wisdom magic, I left them alone. They only did a superficial exploration of this realm so I doubt that they know very much about the few precious resources within this realm. Exam, huh? That''s laughable, your academy is probably using that as a pretense to have you green horns explore the realm extensively. That monitoring device on your wrist...a space band...will probably alert them if you find precious resources. They use you weaklings because your level of strength prevents you from making use of the most precious natural resources that these kind of realms usually contain and so they will be able to find them without having to worry about you young ones consuming them.] Nick squinted his eyes. (That makes sense, I wasn''t trying to be cynical about the academy''s intentions but considering that I now confirmed that the dean tampered with my soul, I probably should start appreciating cynicism more. What do you think, what''s the best course of action?) Slade went silent for a while and then replied: [There is a graveyard of sorts for soul eating lions that I created some time ago in order to make use of the carcasses of the soul eating lions that I couldn''t eat for various reasons such as them having diseases or some sort of corruption that would have harmed my soul eating lion host. That place is filled with soul magic and the innate laws of those dead soul eating lions that spread into the surroundings over time, creating certain phenomena. I have a magic formation in mind that you can use to absorb the soul magic related laws within those surroundings into your own soul minus any corruption that affects soul eating lions. Absorbing those laws will increase your affinity for soul magic and even make your soul a little stronger but let me warn you, it''s going to hurt...very much. Are you willing?] Nick was internally rejoicing at the possibility of making his magic potential stronger but asked with some concern: (Is there a risk that the pain will kill me?) [Hmmm...no, you probably won''t die from the pain. Although soul magic cultivation can be said to be the most painful among the paths you can walk, you''re not at a level where the methods that I give you will outright kill you. That comes later when you are at least a rank 4 Apprentice Magician. Anyway, I will guide you to that area starting tomorrow morning; it will take about half a day to get to the graveyard if there are no interruptions. For now, I''ll guide you to an area that should provide some safety for the night.] Suddenly, thoughts that Nick were unfamiliar with appeared in his mind, giving him detailed directions to an area not far from his current location. Nick trusted that Slade wanted to make use of him so it wasn''t very likely that he would knowingly harm him, at least not obviously, so Nick followed the directions that Slade put in his mind. Nick change directions slightly and ran towards the north east direction; the number of pine trees that Nick was seeing started to decrease and soon there were hardly any in sight. When sundown had arrived and Nick was very close to his destination, a large bird like magic beast appeared on his path. This magic beast had a body similar to an Australian emu with long legs, very tiny wings, a noticeably sharp beak and brown feathers but unlike emus, the magic beast had visibly sharp fangs. [Kid, you sure are unlucky, that''s a luring bird and I don''t call it that for kicks. That creature operates by making a magical cry that attracts wary dogs when they encounter prey that they cannot defeat themselves. They let the wary dogs kill the prey and they pick up the scraps. Kill it quickly!] With Slade''s warning, Nick quickened his pace while the luring bird took a hostile stance and glared at Nick and so Nick took out a throwing knife from his vest with his right hand and pointed it at the luring bird. (Big.) Before the bird could realize the danger that it was in, Nick''s knife broadened by half an inch and its blade extended by over twelve meters in an instant, piercing the luring bird''s body and exiting behind it. By the time his knife pierced the bird''s body, Nick already took out a second knife from his vest with his left hand and pointed it a little higher than his other knife. Before the luring bird could cry out, Nick''s second knife pierced its throat, causing the bird to cough up blood. Nick released his knives and the luring bird''s body fell to the ground, lifeless. This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.Slade praised: [Not bad kid, your spell is based on rule magic, right? In my eyes, it''s pathetic but the way that you used it to kill the luring bird was satisfactory, but...you''ve made a mistake.] "Huh? What mistake." SSSSSSSSKKKKKKKKKKKKEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! Just as Nick asked the question, an ear piercing screech came from behind a large rock formation that was a few meters away from Nick. Nick then saw a smaller luring bird than the one that he killed run away from behind the rock formation towards a large collection of trees in the distance. RAAAAAAWR RAAAAAAAAWR RAAAAAAAWR RAAAAAAAAAWR... A succession of loud growls came from the woodlands to the west of Nick''s position. As Nick listened to the growls, a chill went down his spine. (Those are not coming from one wary dog.) Slade spoke: [You should run to our destination quickly.] Nick ran quickly along the route that Slade had given him, internally grumbling: (Slade, if you knew that there was a luring bird behind that rock formation, why didn''t you say anything about it?) Slade scoffed at Nick''s question. [Hmph, listen kid, I said that I would help you and make you my disciple but that doesn''t mean that I''m interested in becoming your nanny. Are you telling me that in such an open space, you could not sense the magic energy coming from that luring bird? Most weak magical creatures don''t have the ability to control their magic energy precisely so they bleed it as they go about their lives; if you could not sense it, that means that you''re lacking some fundamental training. Instead of asking me why I didn''t help you, you should be asking me how you can become better so that you don''t make such foolish oversights again.] Nick opened his mouth as if to speak but then he closed it. (Sigh, he''s right. I need to get better, not just in studying magic, but in using magic related skills in the field.) After realizing his shortcomings, Nick no longer grumbled and simply ran forward. Soon, Nick heard many footsteps coming from behind him and so he turned slightly to see what the situation was behind him. Nick was shocked as he saw ten wary dogs chasing him. Most of them seemed to be tiger sized and there was one that seemed as large as a rhino. [I''ve already read your thoughts so I know that the spell that you used earlier is the only one that you know so I don''t have to tell you that trying to fight so many wary dogs at the same time would be a very risky decision. It will take them about two minutes to catch up; you''re already fairly close to the destination that I have in mind. Keep running, if you get severely injured by those wary dogs, there will be no one to save you. Your academy sent you here without any magical tools related to healing, they must also be trying to weed out some of you people while using you to search through this realm. Efficient, right? Ha, ha.] Nick clenched his fist and continued running. After over a minute, the wary dogs were only a few meters away from Nick and their growls filled him with discomfort. The rhino sized wary dog growled and was about to burst out with increased running speed when it suddenly sniffed the air and slowed down, eventually stopping its pursuit; the other wary dogs followed its lead and also stopped their pursuit. Nick looked behind himself with some confusion. (Why did they stop?) [We''re here. Keep your eyes in front of you kid. Those pups aren''t a concern for now.] Nick looked into the distance. He was now within a woodland filled with old, short trees that seemed similar to oak trees. Beyond the trees there was a clearing in which a small lake was situated. Nick walked past the trees towards the clearing and got near the lake. [Stop! Don''t get any closer to that lake.] (Huh, why?) When Nick was about ten meters from the lake, a large bluish scaled snake lifted itself out of the water and looked at Nick with its glowing crystal like blue eyes. The snake hissed and stared at Nick for a minute; Nick stood in place looking at the magic beast, his mind overflowing with fear. The snake had raised itself by about twelve meters above the lake and its head was as large as a public bus and menacing. After a minute, the snake seemed to have lost interest in Nick and placed its head back into the lake. When Nick saw that, his knees collapsed and he fell to the ground, lying on his back. (Slade, you better have a good reason for leading me here.) Slade chuckled. [He, he, he. Kid, this is the ''safe'' place you wanted. You''ll be spending the night here.] Nick squinted his eyes in suspicion. (Oh, really...) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 52: Material Benefits Nick hated the fact that Slade was willfully withholding information from him, especially now when he was so close to a giant, menacing snake. (What is going on Slade, why did you lead me to this place when there''s a vicious monster living in that lake?) [Vicious? Do you see the aqua serpent trying to attack you? That creature has strength equivalent to a rank 4 Apprentice Magician but it won''t necessarily attack creatures that aren''t even as strong as a rank 3 Apprentice Magician unless you get too close to the lake. The magic energy coming from this magic beast, though probably imperceptible to you, acts as a sort of repellent for other magic beasts just like the soul eating lion that I possessed before so you should be safe for tonight, that is, from magic beasts.] Nick was relieved upon hearing Slade''s explanation. He walked a couple of meters away from the lake and found a low standing tree; Nick sat on the ground with his backpack, leaning on the tree and closed his eyes in order to try and get some rest but he was so uncomfortable that it took him over an hour to fall asleep despite his tiredness. By the time Nick fell asleep, the area had already gone completely dark, the only thing that could be heard being low howls in the distance and the slight movement of the lake water. Hours passed by and soon the darkness eventually faded as the sun rose from the east. Nick woke up and got to his feet, letting out a mild groan. (Sleeping in that awkward position messed up my back, this sucks. Sigh, I don''t even have a place to take a shower.) Nick thought about the stream that he had seen when he first got to the realm but shook his head. There was no way he was going to try to find that stream again just to wash himself in it. Nick took a bottle of water from his space band and used some of it to wash his face. He then took a meal container from the space band and spent the next twenty minutes sitting by the tree where he had slept all night, eating. When he was finished eating, Nick got up from his sitting position, stored his meal container and water and picked up his backpack. "I''m ready to move out." Slade chimed in: [Then lets get to the soul eating lion graveyard, I''m about to place the directions in your thoughts. Let''s be quick about it.] Nick nodded in understanding. A few moments later, after the directions appeared in his mind, Nick started his journey through the woodlands again about one hour after sunrise and kept moving through the trees, shrubs, bushes and occasional tall grass until he came upon a familiar scenario. When Nick had momentarily stopped by a large tree, a soccer ball sized fireball was shot towards his position. Nick jumped out of its path with a sense of calm and landed a few feet away from his original position, searching for his attacker; Nick found a toddler sized bipedal lizard closing its mouth, emanating magic energy from the distance. (I''m starting to get the hang of sensing the magic energy of these beasts. Much of what I''m sensing should be fire magic, right? This creature tried to surprise attack me instead of making its presence known. The last time that I met one, as soon as its attack failed, it ran away. This magical beast is most likely physically weak, just judging from its size and behavior.) Slade chimed in: [Not bad, kid. Your analysis is fairly on point. I call that magic beast a sneaking lizard; generally, they are only as strong as a rank 1 or 2 Apprentice Magician. You are not very likely to run into a magic beast that is as strong as a rank 3 Apprentice Magician because the few that exist in this realm are in hiding, slowly growing their strength. That is because there are a few magic beasts that have strength equivalent to rank 4 Apprentice Magicians that kill anything they find with strength rivaling rank 3 but you don''t have to worry about them even if you run into them because you are so weak and they won''t waste their time killing you; once a magic beast gets to about rank 4 strength, it will develop human like intelligence. As for the wary dogs, despite their tendency to grow to large sizes, their magic power never gets stronger than rank 2 but there are many of them and they breed like common rabbits.] Slade''s explanation only took Nick about a few seconds to process before he struck out with two of his throwing knives in hand, one in his left, the other in his right. (Big.) (Big.) Nick''s spell, Big, can only be activated on one individual target at a time since activating it requires a fair amount of concentration on his part and so Nick pointed the knife in his left hand directly at the sneaking lizard and its blade extended towards the magic beast in an instant. As if sensing the danger, the sneaking lizard moved out of the way with a supernatural quickness so characteristic of lizards but as soon as it got to its new position, the blade of Nick''s second knife was already only an inch away from it. SQQQQUEEEEEEEL! The sneaking lizard made a shrill sound just as it was stabbed in the abdomen by the throwing knife; the lizard bled profusely for several seconds before it died. (I won the bet; it really did have a fragile body. When I extended my knife the first time, I knew that the situation would go one of two ways: the sneaking lizard would either dodge to the left or to the right. Lucky for me, it dodged to the right where I was already planning to extend my second knife towards. The worst case scenario would be if the lizard dodged to the left and got enough time to run away but that didn''t happen, its loss is my win.) Unauthorized content usage: if you discover this narrative on Amazon, report the violation.Slade was clearly pleased with Nick''s display. [Your lack of other spells to use is a clear problem but since this realm is not so dangerous and you were sent here for an exam, you should be fine for now unless you do something really stupid. Decently done, kid, however I''m only saying that because you manged to kill it. If you had allowed it to escape despite using your spell, I would have called you trash; half baked plans like the one that you just pulled off are a waste of time and magic energy. You should have just kept moving towards your goal if you did not have a more effective way to kill it.] (Huh? So you are saying that I should have just let that thing off after it tried to attack me. What if it followed me when I ignored it and tried to attack me again?) [Then that would have been its funeral but I know that you were attacked by one of these beasts before and saw their nature. The probability that that beast would have followed you is almost nil and if it did, that would have given you a more realistic chance of killing it, using the terrain and your own wits. Instead, you chose to gamble on whether your attack could kill it, possibly wasting your magic energy and your time and now that you''ve killed it, tell me what have you gained?] Nick wasn''t sure what to say for the moment; he looked at the lizard''s carcass and knew that he could do nothing with it but he did not want to prove Slade''s point. (I gained experience in killing a magic beast.) [Ha, ha. Experience in killing a magic beast? Listen to me kid, a warrior acts and only fools react. Your objective is to get to our destination, that''s it; not to engage in fights with lowly creatures. If it had stood in your path, then so be it but it only sent a measly attack your way and you''ve delayed your objective just to waste time killing it and you''ve gained no real material benefits from killing it. Killing, whether it''s magic beasts or other humans is merely a tool to gain physical benefits, not to stroke your own ego. Don''t waste any more time with the irrelevant and head towards our destination.] Nick could partly understand Slade''s line of thinking but it still felt a little unnatural to him; he continued on his journey thinking about what Slade said to him. [You think what I said is unnatural? Of course it is, most people operate based on the idea of an eye for an eye despite there being all sorts of available wisdom that encourages otherwise. They think: you attack me, I attack you. While that sort of thinking does have its place, that should not be the foundation of your thought process. As a Magician that won many difficult battles, kid, I can say with confidence that the only thing that matters in the end are the material benefits that you gain from the conflict. In other words, if there''s nothing to gain, don''t waste your time with petty conflicts.] Nick thought about all the time back in high school when the other students slandered him and he did nothing about it, only focusing on studying. (Was I right back then? I thought that even if I became violent in that sort of situation, it would somehow make things worse. But in the end I had no one''s respect and I was treated as an outcast and a fool. If I had openly went against the people who were causing me problems...) [What? You think that you would have gained something like respect from your peers? Ha, laughable! Kid, the only kind of respect that matters to a Magician is ''self-respect'' and that comes from doing what is best for you and what you have the stomach for. You say that they did not respect you, but did their disrespect alter your future or make your hard work invalid? No, it did not. Take pride in enduring the problems that they brought to your doorstep and doing what you had to in order to safely and efficiently achieve your goals. There is no shame in that. If I had understood that in my younger years, believe me, I would have gotten to my strongest level many times sooner.] Nick clenched his right fist, some of the doubts that he held for so many years fading away at this time. He slowly unclenched his fist as he moved past the trees and said to Slade: (I understand.) [Good.] Nick moved through the woodlands for another three hours before encountering an area of mostly plain grassland. Nick moved away from the trees and heard the sounds of battle in the distance. All sorts of lights from spells and sounds coming from wary dogs could be seen and heard, the fighting being visible from his position. Slade spoke with a solemn tone: [We are heading into the wary dogs'' main territory and away from the influence of any of the rank 4 magic beasts so you will run into magic beasts more often now. Be careful of both beasts and other humans from now on and keep moving towards our destination.] Nick nodded at Slade''s words but he still wanted to gain experience by taking a look at the battle up ahead; he could see from his current position that it involved more than two dozen students and a large group of wary dogs. (I want to at least watch some of the battle so that I can know what the other students are capable of.) Slade wasn''t surprised at Nick''s insistence on watching the battle; he knew that this young man seemed to have a curious nature. [Fine, just don''t get caught up in the fighting if you can avoid it.] Nick moved slowly towards the battle but since there weren''t that much trees around, Nick was plainly visible to the other students present who were not currently fighting. When he got to about twenty meters away from the fighting, two students came out to meet him, a male and a female. Nick recognized the female. "Marsha!" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 53: Best Friend Nick "Ha, Ha, Ha. Yup, its me babe." Marsha wore a black ball cap, a zipped up brown leather jacket, a pair of black jeans pants and a pair of leather boots. Marsha ran in tandem with a Young man who wore a red dress shirt tucked into his black jeans pants and a pair of black leather boots. Nick quickly noticed that Marsha had two holstered guns attached to her waste. Nick matched their pace and ran to them until they were about a meter apart. Nick spoke in the friendliest tone that he could muster: "What''s going on Marsha? I''ve been moving around this place for hours and haven''t had the chance to do much fighting but you guys seem to be all up in it with those wary dogs. You looking to get top scores, huh?" With no change of her genial expression, Marsha spoke as if Nick was an old friend: "Oh, yeah. I joined up with a fairly large group of people for this exam and we were all given a magical tool that helped us find each other when we arrived in this realm so it was pretty easy for us to meet up. The tool also helped us to map out the terrain so we''ve got a good idea of where the wary dogs are concentrated so we lured a large number of them here, thus this battle." Marsha turned to her male companion and introduced him to Nick. "Nick this is Greg North and he is the leader of our group. Greg, this is Nick Capitol and he was ranked 4th in our year during the mid-year exams. He and I also have some history of doing business together, in fact, I think that we are going to be the best of friends some day." Nick internally cringed at Marsha''s introduction. (Best of friends? The last interaction that you and I had started with me walking in on you while you were eating pussy. You think that sets us up to be best friends?) For a while Nick didn''t know what to say. "..." Greg North noticed the awkward silence and then spoke to Nick in a genial tone: "It''s nice to meet you Nick, I myself was ranked 12th during the mid-year exams. We saw you running towards our battle with the wary dogs and I thought that you might be trying to take advantage of our current situation to get some of our battle spoils so we ran out to ''meet'' you but since you know Marsha, I''ve no doubt that I was mistaken, right?" Nick looked at Greg in the eye; he had bright blue eyes and blonde hair. Nick felt momentarily disgusted but only because he just didn''t like looking other people directly in their eyes. (They say that the eyes are the window to the soul...well since I know that from my own experience, most people''s souls are corrupt and rotten, it makes me real uncomfortable looking through that window.) Slade commented: [That''s actually really deep, but inaccurate. Don''t sweat it kid, you''ll get used to dealing with all sorts of people as time goes on.] Nick wanted to ask what was so inaccurate about his thoughts but he had different priorities right now. "You''re definitely mistaken, I was on my way to somewhere else when I noticed your battle. I only ran towards it to watch and maybe learn some things, that''s it. If you''d rather that I didn''t, I''ll just go my own way..." Marsha interrupted Nick during his speech: "Hold on Nick, you don''t'' have to go anywhere, come and take part in the battle with us. I can''t promise that you''ll get anything out of it since you''re not a part of our group but you can gain some experience from the fight. Am I right?" Nick put on a polite smile and replied: "Sure, I don''t want any reward by the way, I''d just like to experience what it''s like fighting with a group." Marsha looked to Greg for his approval and Greg nodded his head: "Since Nick doesn''t want a reward for helping, who am I to refuse free help. Since you ranked 4th in the last exam, you must be fairly strong. Show us what you can do." Nick shrugged his shoulders nonchalantly and replied: "You shouldn''t expect too much from me." Greg put on a polite smile and turned around in order to run back to the battle; Marsha followed suit while also motioning Nick to follow them. They ran together for five minutes before getting to the outer edge of the battle. Marsha proceeded to explain the situation to Nick: "We have thirty three people that are part of our group, most of them being rank 2 Apprentice Magicians. Although everyone knows a variety of spells, we have people assigned to various roles like in an role playing game. We have the main attackers, the people responsible for healing, the tanks and other defenders. Greg and I are main attackers but since we mostly lead the group we aren''t too physically involved in this battle, we''ve mostly been spitting out orders since this battle started early this morning." Nick listened intently, trying to understand the situation better. He could see the various roles Marsha was talking about set up on the battlefield. The healers were at the back, defenders were concentrated in the middle with a few at the front and the main attackers and tanks were mostly positioned at the front. Marsha said nothing about the wary dogs but Nick could see that there had to be at least 50 of them left; there were also a few dozen wary dog carcasses on the ground. Nick could also see that there was a leader among the pack of wary dogs and it was as big as a rhino, about the same size as the last wary dog that Nick had killed. Nick stood in place watching the battle for about five minutes while Marsha and Greg were directing the members of their group. There was nothing complicated about their tactics; The main attackers launched spells from a distance dealing damage to the wary dogs while the supposed tanks would use their own spells to draw the attention of most of the wary dogs that were in front of them while also using other spells and magical tools to defend themselves. The healers mostly focused on casting healing spells on the tanks but would cast them on the main attackers occasionally when a wary dog broke through their formation and if their formation was broken through, the healers had the defenders who waited in reserve, to keep them safe. Nick looked at the battle and thought: (It all feels very clean.) Slade grew curious. [What do you mean?] Nick thought a little more before answering: Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.(Everyone has their designated roles and they all carry them out, eventually bringing the result of one more dead wary dog but no one really seems to be getting their hands dirty in this whole battle. Even the tanks who are supposed to be drawing attention are just taking hits and waiting for the main attackers to target and kill the wary dog, none of the tanks are really attacking the beasts themselves. The battle seems so orderly and mundane; how does anyone learn how real individual combat works in a situation like this where they don''t have to do the hard part themselves and if they are doing the hard part, they''re either positioned at a distance and/or restrained by commands?) Slade acted like he did not know what Nick was talking about. [He, he. Kid, did you somehow forget that this is an exam? Your fellow students are doing what they think they have to in order to get a good score and pass the exam. Who can blame them?] Nick scoffed without thinking. (Hmph, exam? The rules are that if you survive the five day duration, you''ve passed the exam. As for the score, what''s more important, learning how to handle yourself in the field or a superficial ranking?) [Ha, ha. Kid, you have a really interesting thought process. Now, what will you do?] (I''ve already seen enough. This turned out to be a waste of my time because everyone is acting so robotic, I can''t learn anything here. I''m leaving but before that...) Nick moved from his spot beside Marsha and made his way to the front line. Greg saw Nick''s movements and asked Marsha: "Marsha, what is your friend doing? He''s already gone past the main attackers, going to where the tanks and the front line defenders are, does he have the skills to defend himself against the wary dogs'' bites and scratches? He is still a rank 1 Apprentice Magician and I only treated him with such respect because you vouched for him. If he messes up our formation, it''s on you." Marsha shrugged her shoulders and replied: "Let''s just see what happens." Nick moved to the area with the tanks and defenders where he also picked up a mug sized rock. The Apprentice Magicians saw this new comer but since their leaders said nothing, they thought that he was just another addition to their team. The unofficial leader of the tanks shouted at Nick, thinking that he was a new tank sent to work with them: "Listen up new guy! Just use your spells to draw some attention and keep out of our way. We''ve got some tacit teamwork going on here and I don''t want you to ruin that!" Nick ignored the burly young man screaming at the side and activated his spell while keeping his eyes on the leader of the wary dog pack; the rhino sized wary dog looked menacing and its stature also reflected it status among the wary dogs, the wary dogs surrounded their leader going forward or retreating based on its howls and growls. (Big.) Nick''s activation of his spell caused the magic sea within his mindscape to decrease at a visible rate, his magic power flowing into the rock in his right hand. The leader of the tanks looked at Nick and wandered: (What spell is he casting and why is he casting it on a rock?) Two seconds later Nick threw the rock 12 meters ahead of him towards the rhino sized wary dog which wasn''t difficult considering his well developed arm muscles. The wary dogs have keen eye sight so the rhino sized wary dog saw the rock coming its way the moment it became airborne but ignored it since a flying rock could never even destroy one of its hairs much less harm it. (Slade, you said that these low level magic beasts don''t have very precise control of their magic energy, right? I wonder how good they are at sensing magic energy coming from an inanimate object.) "Hey, tanks and front line defenders, you should all step back unless you want to get caught up in my spell and die!" The other Apprentice Magicians on the front line looked at Nick as if he was crazy. "Who is this nobody talking to. Stay quiet and get out of our way." The next moment as the rock that Nick threw fell from its high point towards the leader of the wary dog pack, the rock expanded in size within an instant. The rock''s length had become roughly twenty meters and its width and depth became roughly the same as it length, making the rock seemed like a misshaped cube. The tanks and defenders saw the change and did not hesitate to run; they were at the edge of where the transformation took place so they did not have to put too much effort into getting out of the way of the falling rock, however, the rhino sized wary dog who was at the center of the transformation and its closest pack members were not so lucky. BOOOOOOOOOM! SPPPPLLLLAAAAAAATTTTTTTT! The wary dogs were crushed under the weight of Nick''s rock without having the time to run or retaliate. The wary dogs that did get out of the way in time saw what had happened to their leader and were enraged, their savage nature taking over and without their leader to direct them, they ran towards the Apprentice Magicians in a disorderly frenzy. The Apprentice Magicians ignored Nick''s actions for the moment and focused on killing the wary dogs which was now easier than before; they took only 10 more minutes to kill the remaining wary dogs. After he had cast his spell, Nick had already retreated to where the healers were stationed so that he would not get caught up in anymore of the group fighting. At the end of the fight, Marsha ran to Nick and screamed while hugging him: "Everybody, this is my best friend, Nick! Since he was the one responsible for our quick victory, it should be me who decides how the spoils are divided." While Marsha was politicking, Nick pushed her off of himself and said: "Marsha, I didn''t do that much. Now, since the battle is over, I''m leaving to go do my own business, goodbye." Nick turned to leave but Marsha grabbed his shoulders from behind, insisting: "Best friend, don''t embarrass me like this. Since we battled together, we should at least share a meal and discuss some things before parting." Greg then walked up to Nick and Marsha and chimed in: "I second Marsha''s suggestion." Nick looked at Greg for a moment. (Who asked you? Sigh, here comes the political bullshit.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 54: Jessica Jones Nick made his stance clear: "I appreciate the invitation but I have some time sensitive objectives that I have to complete so I will have to reject your good intentions." Greg stepped forward and spoke with determination: "Then let me ask anyway, do you want to join our group? You''ve got very interesting magic and if you have some objectives that you need to fulfill, if you join us we would be willing to help you, after all, two heads are better than one so to speak." Marsha also stepped forward after Greg finished speaking and said: "Nick, let me tell you, we have already killed over a few hundred wary dogs already. Can you match our efficiency with just yourself. We are only one group and there are definitely many more groups like us. If you continue traveling by yourself, you may even end up at the bottom of the rankings. Nick, we are friends so I don''t want you to be careless with your own results. Join us." Nick looked at Marsha with a calm smile and spoke: "Once again, no thanks Marsha. I''d rather adventure on my own. This group is nice and all but it''s not the place for me to be." Nick turned around and started to run towards his destination without saying any more. When the other Apprentice Magicians saw Nick''s determination, they moved out of his way, mostly because they were instinctively wary of his magic power; none of them could tell what kind of magic he had used to enlarge that stone but they at least knew that it was not earth magic. The unofficial leader of the tanks moved close to Greg and whispered: "Greg, we can simply use our numbers to coerce him into working with us. Why are you just letting him walk away?" Greg frowned at Nick''s disregard and was about to give a command when Marsha stopped him. "Shut up Earl, if you mess with my friend, you mess with me. Greg don''t act stupidly because you have some authority to use. Remember that this is only an exam and making an enemy out of a possibly powerful Magician can cost you your life later on." Greg became solemn and squinted his eyes but reverted to his usual genial smile after a moment of consideration. "What are you talking about Marsha, I would never try to coerce a fellow student into working with us. Earl here was just making a joke, right Earl?" Greg looked at Earl with a calm smile and Earl took a step back saying: "Yeah...I was only joking." Greg nodded his head and commanded: "Everyone, let''s get back on track. We''ll be resting for the next few hours to prepare for our next battle. Let''s collect the beast carcasses first before doing anything else." Greg walked away from Marsha feeling grudgeful. (Marsha stopped me from ''convincing'' Nick further. I wander what kind of business she has with him that would make her risk offending me for a rank 1 Apprentice Magician. Although he has a strange spell, that Nick doesn''t seem that special to me. Hmph, whatever, I''ve still got three days of this exam left so I should let things be for now. Marsha watched Nick run into the distance and thought to herself: (You better be worth my effort, Nick. If you disappoint me, your time at this school won''t be a peaceful one.) .............................................................................. Nick had left Marsha''s group an hour ago and was now running through a grassland, heading towards more woodland territory. Nick looked all around and saw traces of reddish black blood on the grass and he has been seeing these traces ever since he left Marsha''s group so he could tell that she was being truthful about their activities. (Hey Slade, what did you mean when you said that I was inaccurate about most people having corrupt and rotten souls.) [Oh, you''re still hung up on that. I can explain what I meant but you have to keep in mind that what I will say is only the conclusion that I''ve obtained from my own experiences and that you shouldn''t put too much of it to heart.] (I would like to hear what you have to say.) [So be it. You say that most people have corrupt and rotten souls but that is not really true. In fact, most people are only the product of their environment and the culture that they were raised in; they act in a manner believing that whatever they do is alright without thinking too much about it as long as they see others doing the same. You say that they are corrupt and their actions may just be but they don''t think so. Most people go about their lives thinking that their behavior whether positive or negative is acceptable and normal. It is truly a rare soul that objectively knows the difference between right and wrong, morally speaking. That''s why human conflicts and wars seem never ending. With all this in mind, you should stop taking other peoples negative behavior towards you so personally, the problem is most likely how they view the world and the motivation behind their behavior probably has nothing to really do with you despite its effects on you. I''m not saying that there are not people who are truly destructive with malice engraved within their brain, but those people are relatively rare. Most conflicts and ''friendships'' come down to benefits. If you have enough benefits associated with you, we''ll treat you well, if not, then you''re garbage...a very practical approach. If you look at it like that, you shouldn''t feel too offended by anyone''s actions. If other people can''t see enough of your value to treat you well, that''s their problem, after all, genuinely kind people are actually very rare, at least they were where I came from.] If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.Nick thought about what Slade said for a seemingly long time then said: (If what you said approximates to the truth, then doesn''t that mean that as soon as I lose value to the people that I come in contact with, I''ll find knives in my back constantly.) [Ha, that''s a great way of putting it, kid. Welcome to the reality that most people face on a daily basis. There is no such thing as unconditional love, not for most people, no matter how successful they may seem. Most people just do what they need to in order to survive the best they can or to maintain their lifestyle. Morals and justice have its place, but in everyday living, those concepts mean nothing to most people. Do you understand?] (...I think I do.) [Good.] Both Nick and Slade remained silent after that conversation while Nick moved through the woodland territory that he had entered into a while ago. WHHHHHHOOOOOOSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHH! (That must be the sound of water. Slade''s directions showed that there is a waterfall within this area. I need to wash myself, right now I feel really uncomfortable since It''s been almost two days since the exam started...) Slade interrupted Nick''s thinking: [Forget it. Continue with the objective of getting to the graveyard. You''re already behind schedule and you feeling uncomfortable doesn''t change the fact that there are still magic beasts roaming around this area.] Nick felt exasperated with Slade''s tone. (I get that, but I just want to wash my feet, hands and face, alright. Judging from your directions, it should only take me about twenty minutes to get to the waterfall, wash and then get back on track. Is that really a problem?) [Hmph, do whatever you want, kid.] Nick took a detour towards the waterfall in order to wash himself. When he got there, he saw a forty feet waterfall flowing down the side of a cliff wall emptying into a large pool. Nick got closer but realized that there was someone else at this waterfall. Nick could tell because he could sense the magic energy being exuded by that person. (That person has to at least be a rank 2 Apprentice Magician. Sigh, I''m tired of my low rank.) In a few moments, someone came up from under the water in the pool. This person was clearly female with light blonde hair, white skin and an athletic body; Nick raised both his brows in surprise as she was also completely naked. Nick stood in place staring for a while and did nothing. After a while, a bulge appeared in his pants and the unknown woman spoke with a carefree tone while swimming around in the pool of water: "How long are you going to stand there watching me? I don''t have all day, if you are going to try something, go ahead. It''s been a long time since I killed another person. Here I was thinking that I wouldn''t have the chance to do so for a while." (Oh, she noticed me.) Nick wasn''t surprised, since he noticed her, of course she would notice him, considering that she was a higher ranked Magician. Nick walked closer to the pool while the woman had her back turned and when he was within three meters of her, she turned slightly towards Nick, not embarrassed at all about her current state of undress. Nick and the unknown woman looked into each others eyes for some time before she spoke while turning towards the direction left of her, Nick being at her right: "You can stop eye fucking me for now, we''ve got visitors." Nick came to the same realization the moment she said it and turned his head towards the magic beasts that just came into view some distance away from them, coming from behind the nearby trees. "Three tiger sized wary dogs." Nick quickly took out two of his throwing knives from his vest, waiting for the wary dogs to make a move but the woman made a move first from within the pool. She raised her hand while exuding a large amount of magic energy and the entire pool of water was raised ten meters into the air and the mass of water remained floating in midair in the form of a ball, the woman seemingly waiting for something. The wary dogs panicked at the sight of the phenomenon and rushed at the woman with crazed expressions. By the time the wary dogs were within six meters of the woman, the ball of water fell towards the wary dogs. The wary dogs quickly scattered, moving out of the way of the impact but at the moment of impact, the water splashed, spreading out about four meters in all directions and dragging the wary dogs back to the center of the mass of water. The wary dogs were firmly held in place within the rotating ball of water that stayed in position and in shape despite pressing against the ground constantly. The woman got out of the now almost empty pool and picked up her clothes that she had placed on a large rock beside the waterfall. She proceeded to get dressed while Nick watched from the distance, unsure of what to do. While the woman got dressed, the pool filled up again with water. After putting on her clothes the woman walked up to the ball of water and released her spell. The water fell to the ground, soaking the nearby grass and soil. The dead carcasses of the three wary dogs lied on the ground, motionless - they were clearly drowned by the woman''s spell; the woman tapped on the three carcasses with her space band and they all disappeared, one by one. She then turned to Nick, looking at his amateurish battle stance and the unsure expression on his face and said flatly: "My name is Jessica Jones, by the way." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 55: Hard Fought Battle "Uhhhh...my name is Nick Capitol. It''s nice to meet you Jessica." After the introductions, there was an awkward silence between the two Apprentice Magicians. Nick soon realized that he was wasting too much time so he went to the pool and took off his shoes and socks and placed both his feet inside the pool of water while sitting at the pool''s edge and proceeded to wash his hands and face. Jessica looked on with a strange expression. "Nick, could it be that you are ignoring me?" Nick turned towards Jessica in response to her words and replied: "Well...you weren''t saying anything and I have somewhere to be so I just started doing what I came here to do. Is that a problem?" Jessica spoke with a plain expression: "After seeing me naked, and so intently watching me for so long, shouldn''t you be groveling in apology for being so perverse?" "Perverse? I came to this waterfall to wash myself a bit. How could I know that you would be using it while being completely naked? If you''re looking for someone to blame, blame yourself." Jessica''s face suddenly became solemn. Nick felt a sudden burst of magic power coming from Jessica. Nick saw the water in the pool being raised as droplets into the air and reacted by jumping to his feet and backing away from the pool in the direction opposite to Jessica''s position. Nick took out two throwing knives from his vest and exuded his own magic energy which Nick made to rival the amount that Jessica was releasing. Nick could sense that Jessica''s magic energy had a strong affinity with water; just by standing so close to her in this state, he felt like he was suffocating somehow. "Oh, you seem to have an abundance of magic energy." Jessica said that and stopped releasing her magic energy so Nick stopped releasing his as well. He spoke with an air of suspicion: "Just as much as anyone else." Jessica let out a slight chuckle. "Do you know that individuals with a strong affinity for water magic tend to have the highest amount of magic energy reserved within their mindscapes when compared to Magicians of the same rank?" Nick was caught off guard by Jessica''s sudden question but replied obliviously: "I didn''t know that, is there a point in you telling me?" Jessica''s solemn expression eased. "Just making light conversation." Nick became annoyed with this woman. (First, she lets we watch her while she''s naked and then blames me for it, now she''s claiming to be making light conversation. Is this woman touched?) Slade chimed in at this moment. [You may not know yet, kid, but with female Magician''s you better develop some thick skin because they like to play games. Ha, ha.] Nick ignored Slade and walked over to the pool of water in order to retrieve his shoes and socks. "Well...I''ve got somewhere to be, so see you some other time Jessica." After putting on his socks and shoes, Nick turned to leave but Jessica raised her hand and a wall of water appeared in front of Nick, blocking his path. "Sigh, does she really want to fight?" Nick turned around to look at Jessica; at this time Jessica spoke dominantly: "While I admit that I should have been more prudent in my conduct, the fact still remains that you saw me naked and so as a man you should at least be willing to have a conversation with me after the fact." Nick raised both of his brows in surprise after hearing Jessica''s absurd reasoning. (This woman is really shameless, making her poor choices my responsibility.) "Sigh. What do you want Jessica?" Jessica smiled at Nick''s tolerance and spoke calmly: "I just want to discuss magic with a fellow Magician. The magic energy that you exuded a while ago was interesting. I could not tell what its predominant nature was at all. Also, despite you being a rank 1 Apprentice Magician, 1 rank lower than this Water Magician here, you were able to so easily match my magic output. How exactly do you cultivate your magic?" Nick didn''t want to give Jessica a serious answer since he just met her so Nick wore a solemn expression and gave a flippant response: "Hmph, If you must know then I will tell you. One hundred pushups, one hundred sit-ups, one hundred squats..." Jessica frowned and interrupted Nick by dousing him with her water-wall. Nick was now fully drenched and pissed at the same time: "What the hell is wrong with you?" Jessica replied: "What is wrong with you? I asked you a serious question and you decided to feed me a line from a comic, have you no shame?" Nick looked at her with some incredulity and thought: (Seriously, I''m the shameless one? Does this woman have no self awareness at all?) "It''s called a manga, not a comic, there''s a god damn difference. And what were you expecting, I don''t even know you yet you want to know how I cultivate my magic? Do you have any idea how inappropriate your question was?" Jessica looked at Nick as if she did not understand what he was saying. "Inappropriate, how so? In my family, we talk about our experiences with cultivating magic without any restraint, after all, mere talking won''t disadvantage any of us if we''re strong enough. Hmmm...I get it, I should have led with my own information first." "As I''ve already said, I''m a Water Magician, meaning that I mostly specialize in using water related spells and as you could probably tell from my magic energy, my greatest affinity is for water magic. How about you?" Nick could hardly believe that this woman was talking so freely to him about herself. In high school, he couldn''t even get a girl to spit in his direction much less tell him personal details but that didn''t mean that he would just do what Jessica wanted. (I think that she''s just curious about my magic power. Hmmm...she''s actually fairly beautiful, maybe I should talk to her for a while...) Nick then sensed laughter coming from his mind in response to his thoughts; Slade spoke mockingly: [Kid, if you like her why don''t you go marry her? You saw her naked before, go take responsibility.] Nick internally frowned at Slade''s mockery. The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.[Sigh. You''re going to meet all sorts of people while learning magic and some of them like to discuss cultivation experiences with just about any Magician that comes their way. Don''t mistake her interest in your magic for an interest in you. Grow a spine and stop wasting our time; quickly leave before you start revealing information. People like this usually have the tendency to share details about their power because they are already strong and don''t see you as a threat, so be cautious.] (I understand.) Slade''s analysis made sense to Nick so he decided to be unyielding with Jessica. "Jessica, I''m not going to discuss my personal details with you no matter what you do so unless you want to fight it out of me, I suggest you do not stop me from leaving again." Jessica squinted her eyes and replied: "Oh, so you want to be stubborn, huh? Fine, I was only a little curious about your magic power anyway so I won''t waste any more time with you." Jessica turned around and walked away from Nick without sparing him another glance. For some reason, Nick felt a little disappointed with how quickly she disregarded him when she didn''t get what she wanted. (That hurt a little.) [Remember what I said about developing thick skin, kid. Let''s move on from this place. This should be a lesson to you. Magician''s have no problem wasting your time because of their own curiosities so you shouldn''t handicap yourself by getting distracted from your own goals.] Nick nodded in understanding and turned around to continue moving towards the soul eating lion graveyard. During the next three hours Nick met and killed three baby wary dogs and one tiger sized wary dog and eventually when he reached the edge of the woodland, he came upon a desert like environment with sand seemingly stretching into the distance, Nick found a shady tree and sat down to have a meal along with some water. Nick spent forty minutes eating and resting. (I''m so sick of dried meat and raisins. When this exam is over, I''m definitely going to eat out at one of the restaurants on campus.) Nick got up from his position under the shady tree and continued moving forward, this time walking on sand instead of hard ground. It was now about 3 pm and since Nick knew how cold deserts were at night, he now wanted to get to the graveyard without too much delay. (Slade, why did you choose this place to situate your supposed graveyard?) [Take a look around, kid. This desert may look silent right now but this harsh environment is a land of death with creatures dying every second so laws relating to soul magic flourish here and soul magic can be found in large concentration. This is the largest area within this realm and has the least amount of wary dogs within it but there are many other magic beasts here that would be troublesome for you so don''t deviate from my directions. I specifically guided you here with the most optimal path in mind considering your rank so you probably won''t meet too many magic beasts. The graveyard''s entrance is protected by a magic formation but as long as you do what I say, you will be able to enter.] Nick walked along the desert floor for the next hour when he suddenly heard howls and growls in the distance which was exactly where Nick had to go to reach the graveyard. "Sigh, trouble is up ahead. Should I continue this way?" As soon as he asked this question, the memory of Jessica turning away from him and just walking away as if he didn''t exist came to his mind. Nick clenched his fist and kept moving forward. After walking cautiously for about 30 meters, Nick finally found the source of all the noise. Nick lied flat on his belly at the top of a sand dune overlooking a battle between two rhino sized wary dogs along with their pack of about a dozen tiger sized wary dogs and two very large serpents. These serpents were not as big as the aqua serpent that Nick had encountered at the lake before but they were bigger than all of the wary dogs present and probably longer than ten meters; they had scarlet like scales with black markings on them, glowing purple eyes and when they opened their mouths, large jagged fangs could be seen protruding from their gums. A violent battle raged on between the wary dogs and the serpents until it was almost sundown. Nick didn''t try to move around them because he wanted to see how the battle would end. Most of the wary dogs including one that was rhino sized were already dead, mostly from being bitten by the serpents that seemed to be poisonous, and one of the the serpents had succumbed to its wounds created from the bites of the many wary dogs. Right now, the remaining rhino sized wary dog and serpent were tangled with each other, both trying to end the life of the other. The wary dog bit and the serpent squeezed. The wary dog had yellow purple botches on its skin and fur which gave off a heavy rotting smell, probably from the poison of the serpent while the serpent had lost many of its scales and in those areas bite marks oozing greenish blood were visible; the serpent had also lost its right eye. The fight continued until the wary dog finally scratched out the serpent''s remaining left eye at which point the serpent''s body went limp; it had clearly died. The wary dog gave a loud howl in victory but a few seconds later dropped dead, probably due to the accumulated injuries and poison flowing through its body. Nick looked at the scene, reminiscing the battle with a feeling of awe. Slade commented at his time: [I told you that this place was a land of death. In this harsh environment these magic beasts will fight each other to the death for territory in stark contrast to the beasts within the woodlands, grasslands, hills and plains which do not go to such extremes but will flee if they become heavily injured.] Nick felt his blood boiling, not just because of the awesome battle that just took place but because of the spoils that he was about to pick up. "Fourteen wary dog carcasses for the taking. This battle was truly a hard fought one." Nick shamelessly commented as he slid down his sand dune to the site of the battle. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 56: Soul Magic Formation In Action Nick didn''t bother cutting off the heads of the wary dogs because that would take too much time so he just tapped on each carcass, having them enter his space band. Nick didn''t take the serpent carcasses because he had no use for them so he hurriedly got back on track, heading towards the soul eating lion graveyard. Nick traveled for another two hours until he came upon an old stone well. "Is this the entrance to the graveyard, Slade?" Slade replied: [Indeed, it is. Now, the formation that I set up around this well is a simple one so the blood of someone or something with a high enough affinity for soul magic will activate it, transporting whomever or whatever into the graveyard. Just prick your finger and let the blood fall into the well.] Nick did as Slade instructed, using one of his knives to cut the tip of his index finger and placed his finger over the well so that some of his blood would fall into it. His blood slid off his right index finger and when into the well, after waiting for two minutes, a glowing azure, circular diagram appeared over the sand surrounding the well, radiating magic energy that Nick was both familiar and unfamiliar with. (This is a magic formation, right? It feels so similar to the one that brought me to this realm. What is that unfamiliar magic energy that I''m feeling?) [It''s probably the soul magic, kid. I created this formation mostly from the naturally occurring laws within the surroundings which consists of laws related to soul magic and I also used the corpse of a magic beast that had rank 4 Apprentice Magician level strength that also specialized in using space related magic; that creature''s corpse is buried deep within the sand. This formation uses both soul and space magic to create the effect of transporting something to a different area, it''s more soul magic than space magic though. Brace yourself, what''s about to happen may make you feel nauseous the first time.] Nick suddenly felt overwhelmed by the magic power coming from the magic formation and soon he felt the space warp around him, giving him a feeling of nausea. Soon, the scene in front of him became that of an underground chamber that was the size of a football field with the ground being completely made of sand. Nick looked up and he could see the light blue sky through the well''s entrance; The space was dimly lit but Nick could still see his surroundings. Nick moved his feet slightly upon which his foot touched something hard. "Bones?" Nick took a closer look at his surroundings and realized that this place was filled with bones half covered by the sand. Nick ran around to get a better picture of the environment. "Bones everywhere...this place really is a graveyard. Slade, why did you create that formation to transport things if the well''s entrance is directly above us? Couldn''t you have just thrown the bodies of the magic beasts you killed down the well." Slade replied quickly: [I could have but don''t forget that my previous host was a large soul eating lion - its body was bigger than the well''s entrance. I needed spacial magic added to the formation to get that huge body down here beyond the entrance to make use of this environment. The formation is mostly present for security purposes; for anyone or anything that doesn''t know how to get down here, the well will seem as ordinary as any other.] "Well, now that I''m down here, what''s next? You said that you had a magic formation that could allow me to absorb the soul magic related laws in this place, lets have it." [That''s the right attitude, kid. I''m about to place the laws into your thoughts so that you will remember them as you draw them in the sand; there''s no wind down here to interfere with your drawings so you just have to use one of those bones to do so. After you finish drawing the laws, we''ll get to the good part.] Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.Nick received a diagram made up of laws via his thoughts and tried to identify the meaning in the symbols but he was immediately stumped because he saw that the symbols were not written in Valteese. Slade spoke with a smug tone: [Huh, you thought that the laws would be in Valteese? Who am I? I am the great soul hunter Mage so of course I have a few other mystical languages under my belt apart from Valteese. Don''t bother trying to determine the meaning of the symbols and just copy them exactly.] Nick did as Slade instructed and took a length of leg bone off of the ground and began using it to draw symbols in the sand. The process was slow since Nick was unfamiliar with the symbols so he would take a few minutes on each one making sure that it was drawn correctly. Nick drew the magic formation with a radius of about ten meters which was minuscule compared to the size of the underground space. When Nick was almost finished drawing the symbols, the sky had already turned dark but the space that he was in did not decrease in visibility. Slade read Nick''s thoughts and satisfied his curiosity: [The formation outside keeps the visibility of this underground space constant so you don''t have to worry about it getting dark. Finish the formation so that we can move on.] Nick continued drawing the magic formation and when he had written the last symbol, the entire formation began to shine with a grayish glow. [Good, we''re ready to begin increasing your potential. Sit in the center of the formation and begin chanting the laws that I''m about to give you. They will cause the surround laws related to soul magic to be imprinted on your soul, eventually destroying the magic formation. I''ve translated these laws into Valteese for your benefit but they''ll be effective as soon as you begin to speak.] Nick couldn''t wait for what was about to happen since if Slade was accurate in his description, his affinity for soul magic would increase by a large margin. Nick hurried to the center of the magic formation and sat and began chanting the laws that Slade had placed in his thoughts. He could feel the magic power coming from his voice as he spoke the words in Valteese. The grayish glow of the formation increased in its intensity and Nick began to feel an itchy sensation all over his body. At this moment, Slade encouraged him: [You should be feeling a bit of discomfort but that is natural when cultivating soul magic, that''s why not many people generally specialize in it but if you can endure it, the rewards will be great.] (Okay.) Nick continued to chant the laws and a few hours went by, Nick couldn''t tell how much. By the time the itchy feeling became incredibly unbearable, Nick was so exhausted that he felt like he might die at any moment; Nick closed his eyes in an effort to focus on the words he was chanting and not on the discomfort. Exhaustion and discomfort filled Nick''s entire being but he persevered until he was alerted by Slade: [You can stop now, kid. You have absorbed all the soul related laws in this underground space.] Nick opened his eyes and saw that the glowing magic formation had disappeared and the symbols that he had drawn into the sand were no longer present. Nick got to his feet and looked up to the entrance of the well and he saw that night had turned into day without him even noticing; Nick moved around and the itchy feeling that he had previously been enduring faded away like it was never there. "I don''t feel any different, how do I know that the magic formation worked?" Slade chimed in: "You''ll know after I teach you one of my favorite soul spells from my younger years and use it to kill the magic beasts in this area." Nick became exited and asked sarcastically: "Should I start calling you master Slade?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 57: Soul Pressure Slade ignored Nick''s question and started speaking about the spell that he was going to teach Nick: [I got the initial version of this spell from the records of a very old and infamous Mage when I was about your age. I altered it when I became a Regular Magician because I saw an interesting improvement that I could make. The spell is called ''Soul Pressure'' and It can be used by Apprentice Mages as long as they have a strong enough affinity for soul magic which you should now have. The initial version of the spell worked by using the strength of your soul to suppress your opponents movements but after my enhancement, the spell can also use the strength of your opponent''s soul against them inflicting real damage to their own soul.] Nick became excited at hearing its description and asked: "Wow, that sounds great but will it be suitable for me considering that I haven''t even tried to strengthen my soul and how strong of a soul will the opponents at my level have anyway?" Slade became frustrated: [Kid, what do you think we have been doing since yesterday? Most people don''t have a way to increase their affinity for soul magic even if they increase the strength of their soul. However, most of the rare methods that increase a person''s affinity for soul magic also increases the strength of their soul by a decent margin because of the laws that have been newly added to the soul; think of it like giving a man steroids, the man gets stronger for the moment because of the increased muscle mass but he could have gotten just as strong by lifting weights and eating properly, well, think of what the magic formation did to you as giving you steroids except that you won''t lose the increase in strength over time.] Nick thought about it and what Slade said made sense: "Okay, I''m ready to learn the spell." [That''s good. I will place the laws for the spell within your thoughts so that you''ll be able to memorize it instantly but to form the symbols within your mindscape successfully will be up to you.] Within a few moments Nick received the laws for the spell Soul Pressure in his thoughts. The laws were written in Valteese and seemed fairly complex, at least more complex than Nick''s own spell, Big, when he had first created it in Valteese before translating it to Nickel. (What would happen if I translated Soul Pressure to Nickel?) Slade chuckled at Nick''s naive thinking and answered him: [You would most definitely fail at creating another version of the spell. Your mystical language, Nickel, was borne from your affinity with rule magic, correct? That means that that language is more suited for spells using rule magic. While using your mystical language to create another version of Soul Pressure is not impossible, without a far better understanding of soul magic that will never happen because the spell is based on soul magic in the first place. Just focus on learning to use the spell I gave you so that you can become stronger because right now you are pathetically weak, far from strong enough to help me.] Nick felt a little hurt by the latter part of Slade''s statement but he knew that it was probably the truth. Nick sat in the sand and began chanting his meditation, his consciousness entering his mindscape. Nick looked down at his endless road and saw the golden figure walking energetically on it and then turned his attention to his magic sea that shone with crystal blue water. Nick watched as the water became turbulent as he was preparing to draw the symbols for the spell, Soul Pressure. Symbols made of dull grey light began being formed in midair; Nick focused intensely on how he was forming each symbol and spent the next hour trying to complete the spell but when he was almost done, one of the symbols was malformed and a moment later all of the symbols faded away. Nick''s consciousness was forced out of his mindscape and then he coughed up blood three times; Nick had suffered a backlash from failing to perform the spell successfully. Slade commented: [See, pathetic. Kid, I don''t want you to think that I''m trying to say that you are a pathetic person but your ability to command spells is pathetic. You are a Magician which means that being able to cast spells is what you should mostly be concerned with. I was slightly surprised that you only knew one spell and now the consequence of that has appeared, you''re having a hard time forming spells related to other types of magic. Studying magic isn''t enough, going forward you must practise spell casting religiously or you won''t make it in this cruel world that we Mages have to live in. Wipe that blood off of your mouth and try again.] Nick felt the weight of Slade''s criticism but knew that this was probable Slade''s strict way of encouraging him. Nick didn''t say a word, he started internally chanting his meditation again and his consciousness entered his mindscape. With his magic sea churning, symbols of dull grey light slowly appeared again but this time when Nick got half way into forming the symbols, they faded away; he had failed again. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.COUGH! COUGH! This time Nick coughed up blood twice, [At this rate, you''ll die from blood loss before you can perform the spell but if you weren''t prepared to die like this, you shouldn''t have become a Mage. Do it again!] Nick wiped the blood from his lips with his right hand and took out some water and a piece of bread from his space band; he drank the water and ate the bread and then started internally chanting his meditation again. Nick began forming the symbols for the spell in midair within his mindscape and after about thirty minutes when he was almost done casting the spell, the symbols crumbled once again. COUGH! COUGH! COUGH! Nick wiped the blood off of his lips and gritted his teeth, beginning another round of meditation. Nick''s consciousness entered his mindscape and with his magic sea churning, he formed dull gray symbols of light in midair. After 20 minutes the spell was finally completed and the symbols shone brightly with grey light which filled Nick''s mindscape. Unbeknownst to Nick, his soul began radiating a domineering aura and the color of his eyes turned to a pitch black hue, making Nick look menacing as he opened his eyes. "The spell finally worked but without a target, nothing happened." [The fact that you formed the symbols within your mindscape is enough. The first time casting a spell is always the hardest; since having a mindscape increases you mental capabilities, the more you experience, the more quickly you will adapt to the mental strain of casting the spell and soon you''ll be able to cast in without too much effort. Did you realize that after each time you failed, it took less time to form the symbols?] Now that Slade mentioned it, Nick felt that he had indeed taken less time to progress in forming the symbols after each failure. [No more practising, leave this place by drawing this symbol in the sand and go kill every magic beast in the vicinity with the spell until nightfall.] Nick looked up through the well and saw that the sun was directly above it, probably indicating that the time of day was around noon; Nick didn''t want to use the clock on his cell phone because he had realized that something was causing it to move slower than it usually would. A symbol appeared in Nick''s thoughts that seemed like a reverse E (?) so Nick drew that symbol in the sand and space warped around him again. Nick once again appeared outside the well and looked at the vast expanse of desert. Slade directed him: [Move to the east along the path that I will place in your thoughts. Kill all the monsters in your path until you get to an area outside this desert where you''ll probably be resting for the night.] Slade had not misled Nick thus far so Nick followed his instructions, after receiving the information regarding the path in his thoughts, Nick ran in the eastern direction feeling excited for what was to come. ............................................ Moving past dozens of sand dunes, Nick finally met magic beasts when he spotted a pit full of serpents rolling around in a sand pit; Nick watched them from a high vantage point on top of a sand dune. These serpents were thinner than the ones that Nick saw before but were just as long and were more brightly and ridiculously colored, having a mix of pink, red, orange, purple scales on their body. (Although color isn''t the most accurate indicator but with all those brightly colored scales, I should assume that those snakes are highly venomous and they''re so many of them. Getting in close would definitely be a sure way to die...) Slade chimed in: [It''s good that you noticed. The range of Soul Pressure at your level should be around twelve meters which should cover almost half of those serpents. I don''t have to tell you what to do, right?] Nick focused and without his meditation, he started forming the laws for Soul Pressure within his mindscape. Nick cast the spell after ten minutes and his soul radiated a domineering aura that reached the pit of serpents. After being affected by the spell, almost half of the serpents in the pit were forced to stop moving and then died without a struggle. Slade seemed pleased at the results while Nick was shocked at the effectiveness of the spell. (Why did the serpents die so easily?) [Most of the magic beasts in this desert have many soul magic related laws on their body; those are ''ghastly serpents'' that are able to harm the soul of anyone that they bind, a very nasty bunch. I told you before that the spell can use the strength of your opponent''s soul against them, well, the same applies to the soul magic related laws on their body. These ghastly serpents'' bodies may be filled with those kinds of laws but because of their low rank, their own soul is fairly mediocre so the harm your spell did to them was amplified by the many laws on their body, crippling and destroying their own fragile souls.] Nick''s eyes shone with understanding. "So you''re saying that I can basically bully these little snakes to death, right?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 58: Delicious Meat After Nick had killed almost half of their numbers, the ghastly serpents started to move around in a frenzy, cannibalizing their now dead brethren. Nick watched them biting off and swallowing the dead flesh as he began preparing his spell again; they didn''t even look for the enemy that had killed their companions. (Simple minded creatures, aren''t they?) Nick formed the laws for his spell in about eight minutes but before he cast it, he moved from his position, sliding down the sand dune he had occupied using his back. His vest made his movements down the slope of the sand dune almost comfortable. When Nick got to the foot of the sand dune he was five meters away from the pit of serpents and so they finally noticed his presence and turned their heads towards Nick''s position, hissing at him and looking like they were about to attack. "It''s too late for all that." (Soul Pressure.) From the serpents'' perspective, an irresistible pressure overwhelmed them, stopping their movements and then they became out of touch with their five senses. Nick watched as the rest of the ghastly serpents died with almost no resistance whatsoever. Looking at the dead serpents in the pit and remembering them cannibalizing each other, a thought came to Nick''s mind. (Can I eat these things? I once heard that snake flesh tastes like chicken. There has to be some benefit other than becoming more proficient with my spell involved in killing these things.) Slade replied to Nick with a weird tone: [Well, I''ve never eaten one but I know that generally once you remove their poison producing glands, even venomous magic beasts can be eaten but you already have ample food. Why would you want to eat these beasts, remember that they aren''t actually related to snakes as you know them?] Nick shrugged his shoulders and said: "Just curious about the taste." Nick went to the pit of carcasses and used his space band to store one of the carcasses. The space band somehow seemed to prevent organic materials from going bad so Nick was not in a rush to cook the dead serpent. Nick continued to move along his determined path; over the next six hours Nick came in contact with a fair number of magic beasts. After he had moved one hundred meters from the pit of serpents, he ran into a pack of tiger sized wary dogs that consisted of eight wary dogs feeding on the carcass of a large scorpion like magic beast. Nick used Soul Pressure to immobilize them then used his spell, Big, to turn one of his throwing knives into a machete and proceeded to behead all of the wary dogs one by one. The effects of Soul Pressure seemed to last as long as he had magic energy and would only stop if Nick himself wanted it to stop. The spell consumed about 360 magical units per second while Big''s base consumption was about 590 magical units per second, more if Nick used it on a living being and even more if that living being had magic within their body. By the time Nick had killed all the wary dogs, his magic sea was almost bottomed out resulting in Nick taking about a minute to rest before moving again after storing all the carcasses. Nick then went on to face a six foot tall crab magic beast, then a six meter centipede like beast with razors moving along the perimeter of its carapace; after Slade indicated that the ''blade centipede'' was a magic beast that had laws related to blade magic all over its body, Nick stored the corpse using his space band to be inspected at a later time. Nick had never forgotten that his third highest aptitude was for blade magic. After traveling for three hours, Nick spotted a mountain in the distance and knew that that was where Slade was leading him. Nick then went on to encounter and kill a large burrowing mongoose, then a supersized diseased brown rat that could spew toxic blood, then a large flying vulture that had glowing scarlet eyes that almost beheaded Nick with its beak; Nick was able to defeat the vulture after its surprise attack from above by moving under a large rock formation where the vulture could not enter. Nick used the opportunity to cast Soul Pressure and after the vulture was immobilized while on the ground from trying to get at Nick, he beheaded the vulture. Nick left that battle feeling far more confident and went on to kill a few more groups of wary dogs, most of them consisting of tiger sized wary dogs, then when he reached the desert''s edge at around sundown, he encountered a fox that was three times the size of the ones on Grand Earth; the fox moved along the desert floor with great speed and agility so much so that Nick wanted to avoid facing it so Nick hid himself behind a nearby sand dune until the fox moved far away from his position so that it would not notice him when he entered the neighboring mountain path; the mountain seemed to extend beyond the clouds so Nick could not see its summit. The mountain path consisted of a road that led to multiple other roads along the mountain''s face; Nick couldn''t tell whether these roads were naturally formed or not. Slade sensed Nick''s thoughts and clarified: [These roads are most definitely not naturally formed. They existed before I came to this realm so I have no idea who engineered them. The way they were made seems to prevent the vegetation from growing on them or encroaching on them which has kept them looking so ''pristine'' up until now. For some reason magic beasts don''t seem to come near these roads either; magical engineering and botany are not my specialty so I cannot tell you the reason for the avoidance of these roads by the flora and fauna.] Nick walked along the road while the sun was going down and decided that he would make camp on the road while he could still see the surroundings. Nick approached a nearby tree that was about six meters tall and pointed his knife''s blade at its trunk and used his spell, Big. Because of the nature of his spell, the knife was sharp enough to pierce through the trunk with relative ease and after its width was increased, the tree was cut in half. Nick did the same kind of thing to the fallen tree in many places giving himself a quick source of firewood. Nick carried the pieces of wood onto the road, making sure that he would have enough to make a fire that would last for hours. Nick created a circle of stones and then piled the wood that he had into a pyramid within the circle and then place a mixture of dried leaves and twigs on top of the wood as tinder. Nick took out a small lighter that he had bought from the academy''s convenience store some time ago from his bag and lit the tinder; the pieces of wood became fully lit within seconds and burnt brightly. Nick picked up a rock on the ground and used his spell, Big, to turn it into a large slab and then took out the carcass of the ghastly serpent from his space band and placed it on the enlarged rock. Nick started dissecting the carcass, removing all the internal organs and then removed the skin from the flesh. The scales of the serpent were hard but when Nick''s knives were imbued with the magic power of his spell, cutting through the scales became only slightly difficult. Nick let the pink flesh bleed out the sepent''s red-black blood. By the time the blood had been fully drained, night time had fully set in and the surroundings beyond the fire''s light became dark. Nick cut up some of the serpent''s flesh into chunks and skewered them with small branches from the nearby tree; he stuck them into the ground behind the rocks of the camp fire where they would be roasted by the heat of the flames. Nick waited for a little over an hour while the meat was cooking thinking about the day he had been through. Stolen novel; please report.(I now have a soul magic spell that seems to be very useful to me at my level; I wander how much money Soul Pressure would sell for on Grand Earth considering its effectiveness. Of course I''m not going to actually sell a spell that I use to the public, that would be troublesome for me since people would learn my tricks. I did fairly well against the magic beasts that I faced today, giving me valuable experience. Tomorrow, I''ll cross this mountain using the roads and explore the realm further. I''m more interested in exploring this place than the exam; exploring realms is actually pretty fun. Maybe I should try to look for more wary dogs to kill...) Slade chimed in at this moment: [Kid, from reading your thoughts, I already know that you have plans that will give you a good score without having to kill more wary dogs. Don''t waste time focusing on that. There are two areas each with a precious resource that I want you to get to before this exam ends. I did not retrieve these resources before because they were of no benefit to my previous soul eating lion host. Eat your meat first before I start explaining. I want you focused when I explain things.] (Sure thing.) Nick reached out his hands to retrieve the five pieces of the skewered meat from the fire but since they were hot, Nick used a trick that he had read about in a book to handle them. By concentrating his magic energy within his hands, he could actually protect them from being harmed by the high temperature; the same went for any other part of his body. Of course, if he threw himself into the fire, no mater how much he saturated his body parts with magic energy, at his level, he would be burnt alive. Nick started eating the meat and opened his eyes wide in shock. (How comes this meat tastes so good? I thought that the taste might be strange because the serpent''s blood had a blackish hue to it but this is literally the best tasting piece of meat that I have ever eaten.) Slade answered Nick''s question: [Magic energy nourishes blood and flesh so most low level magic beasts will have a pleasant taste but at higher levels, because their magic energy gain more potent characteristics you''ll find that you will have to use special methods to cook them for them to taste pleasant.] Nick nodded his head in satisfaction. Nick was enjoying the meat in his mouth with the other pieces of meat resting on a clean portion of the rock that Nick was using as a table when he heard a voice close to his position. "Mind if I partake in some of that meat?" Nick looked towards the direction from where the voice came and watched as a young man whom he had never met before walked into the light of his fire. The young man had short blonde hair and green eyes, wearing a pair of light blue jeans pants and a zipped up leather jacket; the young man also had a backpack on his back. Nick saw that the young man had blood on his clothes and despite his attempts to seem calm and collected, his breathing was subtly labored and his movements were sluggish. (This guy probably had to go through hell to get here. Thank god for old boy Slade guiding me to this place without having to run around like I was crazy, facing unknown magic beasts.) [Ha, don''t thank your god for me just yet. The future difficulties I will give you to train you will surely give you enough traumas for ten life times.] Nick felt a little downcast at Slade''s words but decided to focus on the man near him. Nick picked up a piece of skewered meat and raised it towards the young man. "Why don''t you take a seat beside the fire and have some meat. I can tell that you must be exhausted, just give me a bottle of water as compensation for my hospitality. Oh, and I can assure you that magic beasts will not approach this road so you don''t have to be so wary." The young man nodded silently: "Thank you." He walked towards Nick and took the piece of meat that Nick was giving him and released a bottle of water from his space band, giving it to Nick. Nick didn''t actually want the bottle of water but from his experience there were many people that acted like ungrateful fools when you gave them benefits for free so he mentioned the ''compensation'' to ease the young man''s wariness and dispel his possibly flawed thinking. The young man looked at Nick before eating the meat and introduced himself: "My name is Bart Johnson. May I know yours?" Nick swallowed his meat and replied: "Nick Capitol." After hearing Nick''s response Bart began to eat the meat and after he swallowed it his eyes opened wide in amazement. "This is the tastiest thing I''ve ever eaten." Bart proceeded to wolf down the rest of the meat and then looked at the rest of Nick''s meat covetously. Nick laughed internally and said: "Don''t even think about it, this is my meat." Bart visibly became a little downcast but then got over it in a few moments. He asked with a grateful look in his eyes: "So...Nick, where are you heading?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 59: Ichor Root Nick turned his attention to Bart when he asked the question. He swallowed his meat and spoke: "Bart, that is none of your business. While I appreciate that you want to converse, I do not. You are welcomed to stay by my fire but please do not mistake my hospitality and the appreciation for our shared circumstances for friendliness. I just want to get through the night as peacefully as possible." Bart heard that and didn''t know what to say: "..." "...Okay" Bart became silent and simply put his backpack onto the ground and lied back using the backpack as a pillow, trying to get some sleep. (Is he really sleeping with me here? For all he knows, I could be a psycho.) Slade commented: [He is young so he may not be all that wary of other people, after all, not everyone has traumas similar to yours. The way you destroyed the possibility of having a meaningful conversation was expertly done...very cold of you, and that''s not criticism by the way.] Nick shrugged his shoulders. (I''ve already learnt from my past experiences. Getting chummy with people that you have just met is foolish because you never know what intentions they have in their hearts. It is painfully clear to me that most people, not even considering whether they care about morals or not will act badly in stressful situations. Character is what I''m searching for in my associates and that can only be seen over time so until I see it, I will never freely converse with strangers that have no obligation to be decent.) [Hah, I''m a little impressed by your conviction, kid; if that''s so then you probably don''t plan to sleep tonight despite all that you did today, right? Well that shouldn''t be too much of a problem for an Apprentice Magician but don''t skip too much sleep or it will mess up your rationality.] (Right.) Of course Nick wasn''t going to go to sleep with a stranger around but running Bart away wouldn''t do either. (Having him here let''s me keep an eye on him so that I am assured that he is not scheming against me.) [Shrewd. Now, let''s discuss tomorrow''s plans. Using this road, it will take about four hours to get to the western exit of the mountain path. From there, we will be going to an area with tall trees; within that area is an old, dead tree that seems ordinary but has a thousand year old ichor root buried among its dead roots. An ichor root when prepared properly and consumed will nourish your mindscape enough to increase its quality greatly. You already have a special mindscape so I don''t have to tell you the benefits that increasing the quality of your mindscape will have.] Nick grew excited but he had questions: (Since my mindscape is already special grade, what would an increase in quality even look like? Also, since the ichor root is buried, how do you even know about it?) Slade became frustrated: [Do I have to keep reminding you of my greatness? When I first came to this realm and obtained a host, I explored the entirety of this realm and using my magic sense I found all sorts of resources. The magic sense of a World Class Magician is not something that you could even fathom. I''ve explored the entirety of realms and worlds thousands of times bigger than this one or your Grand Earth. Finding a few useful items among some dirt is a simple task for me if I put in the effort. As for your other question, what the increase in quality will look like depends on you, I can''t give you a useful description.] Nick was satisfied with that answer. (Okay, what is the other resource?) [After we get the ichor root, we will head twenty kilometers south to a swamp where within a certain pool of foul smelling water, there is the mummified corpse of a Regular Magician, a rank six Hero Magician to be exact. I know for a fact that that Magician specialized in soul magic because it''s body is filled with soul laws, probably originating from its destroyed mindscape but those laws are peculiar and weren''t suited for my soul eating lion host. We will use that corpse to nourish your mindscape and help you push towards rank 2 Apprentice Magician. Since you are not going to sleep, what will you do until morning? I suggest that you meditate in order to nourish your mindscape; you should get into the habit of meditating for hours because the only way to actually get to rank 2 Apprentice Magician is to have the right accumulation of laws and to improve your meditation. Those requirements are not that high when you have sufficient methods to nurture your mindscape which I do and you are familiar enough with your meditation to improve it.] Nick was pleased to have Slade so wholeheartedly trying to help him but this generosity made him wander: (How much does he hate his enemies that he would help a stranger like me so earnestly?) Slade gave an answer with a menacing tone: [I despise them more than you could imagine so get yourself in gear. I will keep an eye on your little visitor so you can focus, figuratively speaking of course.] Nick relocated to the side of the fire opposite to Bart and began meditating. Slowly, the magic sea within his mindscape began churning and the magic energy in the surroundings began forming a whirlpool above Nick''s head, slowly entering his body. This was what most Magicians spent their free time doing; to increase their rank, a Magician had to nourish their mindscape by meditating. Meditation resulted in magic energy being attracted to the mindscape which resulted in naturally derived laws being accumulated within the mindscape. What kind of magic that these laws would be associated with was determined mostly by the Magician''s affinities. After a certain amount of accumulation, the Magician would then be able to increase their rank by chanting an adequately improved version of their meditation. Nick was quite a distance from rank 2 because of the magic holding capacity of his mindscape. He realized some months ago that he required far more meditation that the normal person to make any progress in accumulating natural laws within his mindscape. Bart noticed the change in the flow of magic energy and was shocked by the intensity of the movement. He could see the magic energy whirlpool above Nick''s head and thought: (Is this guy for real? How can he even meditate in this situation? Sigh, since he thinks it is safe enough to do so, I should probably meditate too, after all, I''m far from getting to rank 3.) Bart sat up and crossed his legs, beginning his meditation. ........................................................ When the sun rose, the magic energy whirlpool that was above Nick''s head dispersed and he opened his now blood shot eyes. The fire had died a few hours before and only a mass of gray ashes remained. Bart was still lying on the ground, sleeping; Nick took out a meal container from his space band along with a bottle of water and had his breakfast of raisins, bread and dried meat. (Man, compared to the serpent meat, this might as well be lard but I''m still grateful for it. I remember those days when I had disagreements with my grandaunt and I had to go hungry for the rest of the day as punishment...glad those days are over.) Bart woke up while Nick was having his meal and decided to also have his breakfast. Nick stored his trash within his space band and got up to head to the next area but he spoke to Bart before leaving: The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident."It was nice to meet you mister Bart, I hope you don''t get caught up in any bullshit during the exam. See you another time." Bart quickly replied, trying to convince Nick: "Wait...Nick, why don''t we travel together. This realm is fairly dangerous so why don''t we help each other out. I wasn''t sure last night but now I''m certain that you''re only a rank 1 Apprentice Magician. I can help you pass the exam safely." Nick heard that and sighed internally. The truth was that the difference in power between rank 1 and rank 2 was not that great and with Nick''s special mindscape and his new spell, he could definitely kill rank 2 Apprentice Magicians like cutting grass. (This shit again...) "No thanks mister Bart. I will see you another time." Nick walked away from Bart, leaving Bart staring at his back in disbelief. (Why wouldn''t he want to team up, at least until we left the mountain? Does he somehow know how to leave this place safely? He did know that this road would not be approached by magic beasts and he even had the spare energy to roast beast meat, he must know something that I don''t. I should follow him.) Bart started tailing Nick, staying ten meters behind him as Nicked walked on the road. Nick noticed Bart''s actions and became annoyed. (Maybe he is just walking along the road and it doesn''t have anything to do with me.) Slade chimed in: [He is making sure to keep a certain distance from you at all time and his eyes have never strayed from your position. He is definitely following you. Deal with him accordingly. If you need justification, we are approaching a fork, see if he still follows you so boldly.] Nick walked a bit further and did come upon a fork with four diverging roads appeared; the road farthest to the right would lead to the western exit so Nick planned to use this road but before walking down it he started preparing Soul Pressure and quickened his pace. When Nick walked far enough along the road and turned to see Bart still following him, he immediately turned around and walked towards Bart. Bart saw Nick walking towards him but was not worried because he thought that he should be stronger than Nick or at worst they are of equal strength; he would just pretend that it was a coincidence that he was walking on the same road. When they were two meters apart, Bart decided to greet Nick: "Hey Nick, it looks..." (Soul Pressure.) Before Bart could finish his sentence Nick activated his spell and Bart''s movements immediately froze having become almost defenseless. Most rank 2 Apprentice Magicians in Nick''s year would not have had the time to strengthen the defense of their soul so they were easy prey for Nick''s spell. Bart stood still with a line of blood falling from his right nostril. Nick walked up to him and spoke with a wide, hypocritical smile: "Mister Bart, don''t be ungrateful. Don''t make the mistake of returning my kindness with enmity. If you follow me one more step, I will brake your legs then throw you off of the road for the magic beasts to come find you. If you died in that way, I doubt that I would face execution. Don''t you agree?" Bart couldn''t speak but from the frightened look in his eyes, he clearly understood the implications of continuing his foolishness. Nick was satisfied and turned around to continue his journey. When Nick and Bart were separated by five meters of distance, the effects of Soul Pressure were cancelled by Nick. Bart was able to move again and so he turned to run in the opposite direction. Why? Bart turned his head slightly to see Nick walking down the road and thought: (There''s a monster on this road!) ............................................................. After walking for about four and a half hours, Nick finally reached the western exit of the mountain path. Nick stopped to eat some food and then started running towards his destination. After about twenty meters, he became winded and stopped. (Ah man, I really need to start doing cardio exercises. The spot that Slade described should be less than a kilometer in this direction.) Nick started walking again and reached the dead tree two hours later. On the way Nick encountered two wary dog packs filled with baby wary dogs and killed them fairly easily using a combination of Soul Pressure and Big, freezing them in place and beheading them with his knives; he also encountered a rhino sized wary dog but since Nick had time to prepare Soul Pressure, it had the same experience as the other dead wary dogs. Nick took out one of his knives and used it in combination with his spell, Big, to chop down the tree, even removing its truck completely,leaving only its roots in the ground. Nick created a lot of noise in the process; at this point Slade warned him: [Be careful going forward, the ichor root shouldn''t be too far from the surface so make sure that you don''t damage it when digging it up, move slowly.] Nick listened to Slade''s instructions and enlarged one of his knives to the appropriate size, slowly digging at the ground. Two hours later, Nick pulled a foot long bronze colored root from the ground that had a strong ginger like smell. [Smell that kid, that''s your future, smells good right?] Nick smiled and replied: (Yeah, it sure does.) Nick stored the ichor root in his space band and asked: (This thing is supposed to increase the quality of my mindscape, right? How is it even formed?) Slade spoke with some uncertainty: [I''m not a magic botanist so I''m not sure about the details but when I was still in my world, rumors were that the ichor root was randomly formed in a realm when a certain rank 9 magic beast shed its blood but I''m not sure how accurate those rumors are.] Nick raised his eyebrows in surprise. (A rank 9 magic beast? If that rumor is true, then this realm used to be its home. It would be long gone by now, right, since there are clearly no signs of it. The academy would never have sent students here if there were such signs.) [Your guess is as good as mine, kid. Let''s move on to our second objective.] When Nick was about to leave his position, he heard loud noises of a battle in the distance. "Another group battle?" Nick moved towards the sound of the battle using the surrounding trees as cover and came upon a large group of students battling with an army of wary dogs led by a huge wary dog that seemed to be the size of a small house; it had a length of thirteen meters and a height of three meters. It was literally barking orders from the rear of the pack to the other wary dogs while the group of students were desperately resisting but they were obviously about to be overwhelmed. To Nick''s surprise, he actually recognized a few of the people in the group of students. (Hmmm...that''s Cindy Reece and that''s...Daryl Smith, the student that was ranked number 1 in the mid year exam. Should I help them?) Nick looked at the huge wary dog and became determined. (While I''m in this area, there is no way that I can let that wary dog remain alive or I might end up as one of its victims.) Nick focused on the leader wary dog''s position and ran in a curved path towards it. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 60: Sliced Up Wary Dog The area that Nick was currently in mostly consisted of tall cedar like trees that were greatly spaced apart and the ground was lined with short Bermuda grass. The pack of wary dogs were focused fully on the group of students so Nick planned to head to the leader of the pack from the side; the number of wary dogs amounted to about sixty, most of them being babies and a small portion being tiger-sized. Nick ran about 30 meters to the right away from where the two groups were engaged in battle, the battlefield having a radius of about twenty five meters. The leader of the wary dog pack was all the way at the back with the other wary dogs in front of it fighting against the students. The students attacked ferociously unlike the group that Marsha had been in where each Magician had a clearly defined role; every Magician in this group was there to kill their enemies. Fireballs, ice arrows, snowballs, fire pillars, green acid, poisonous fog and killer vines, Nick saw all of these attacks being thrown at the wary dogs but they lacked a sense of coordination so the situation looked like a mess. Daryl Smith was mixed in among the front liners using his magic power to launch steel spikes at the closest wary dogs but his hit rate was only about 50%; the same went for all the other students. Cindy Reece was at the back of the group and had a steel bow in her hands which she would occasionally draw back, an arrow made of orange-red fire appearing and being launched by the string as she let it go, impaling and incinerating any wary dog that came in contact with it. The group of students seemed to number about twenty five and were barely holding on, not because their attacks weren''t effective but because their hit rates were only about one half and they noticeable paused for at least 15 seconds between about every five casts of their spells, everyone attacking at intervals in order to consistently hold the wary dogs off. Nick looked on as he ran and thought: (Their disadvantage lies in their inexperience with real battles and that''s probably why their hit rate is so low. Not to mention that they are only rank 2 Apprentice Magicians which means that their mindscapes should have a capacity of around 10,000 magical units and assuming that the average one time attack spell consumes about 1500 magical units, after they cast five spells some students wait to recover their magic energy so that they aren''t completely depleted of it while other students start attacking in earnest to cover the others who are recovering; they do this in intervals to keep the attacks fairly heavy but constant so that the wary dogs don''t rush in at them.) Spells had the same ranks as Magicians and as the rank of a spell increased, theoretically the higher the power it had; there were generally two types of spells, ones that had a one time, instant effect and others that produced an effect over time. The former kind had a higher base of consumption at around 1500-2000 magical units while the latter kind had a lower base consumption at around an average of 150-250 magical units per second. The consumption of the spells did not necessarily change as the Magicians or the spell increased in rank but the power of the spell would certainly be greater if it was a higher rank attack spell; the power of a rank 1 spell would certainly be greater when cast by a rank 2 Apprentice Magician as opposed to a rank 1 Apprentice Magician because the former had more condensed and generally better quality magic energy than the latter. A spell''s overall rank was determined by the nature and complexity of the laws used to make it and generally not by its consumption, however, even if the description for a rank 3 spell stated that it required 1500 magical units, that was referring to magical units from a rank 3 Apprentice Magician; a rank 1 Apprentice Magician trying to cast such a spell may not be able to activate it or if they can active it the consumption would be significantly greater, depleting their magic energy and the spell would have much lower power than if it was cast by a rank 3 Magician. Nick created his spell, Big, so it did not necessarily have a rank yet but its base consumption was a good indicator of its power, it being almost 600 magical units per second. Soul Pressure was different, with its consumption being only a little above the average at 360 magical units per second but Nick thinks that''s probably a testament to the skill of its creator in how exquisitely it was crafted, having low cost but high power. In contrast Nick''s, Big, has high power but a relatively high cost and the cost per second shoots up greatly depending on how large Nick wants to make an object. Nick positioned himself at a 180 degree angle to the rear of the pack without too much trouble after ten minutes of running; he was winded and still had about twenty five meters to run in a straight line to reach the position of the leader of the pack but he didn''t need to cross the whole distance to accomplish his goal. Along the way here, there were many wary dogs that clearly noticed him but under their leader''s commands, they could not stray from the battlefield and their leader only momentarily looked towards Nick''s direction before ignoring him, probably feeling that the power of a lone human couldn''t amount to much in this situation. The narrative has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.(Dumb beast, I''ll make you regret ignoring me.) Nick started preparing his spell, Soul Pressure, and after five minutes, he ran in a straight line towards the pack leader''s position. Amidst all the shouting of the students and the growling of the wary dogs, Nick ran towards the rear of the pack, not trying to hide the magic power exuding from his body. The pack leader soon looked towards Nick, and let out a ferocious growl, ordering some of the closest wary dogs to attack the foolish human running towards it and it returned its attention to the group of humans in front of it. By the time Nick was eighteen meters away from the pack leader, he took out two of his throwing knives, holding one in each had. As the wary dogs were about to reach Nick''s position, Nick acted: (Soul Pressure.) The wary dogs froze on the spot with varying amounts of blood coming from their mouth and nostrils; Nick had put their souls under immense pressure, keeping them in place. Nick continued to run and soon having reached within twelve meters of the pack leader, its movements also slowed, having enough strength to turn its head angrily to look at Nick. Slade commented: [It seems that this large wary dog has some resistance to soul magic but not that much so it shouldn''t be too difficult to remove its pitiful life from this realm. Get it over with so that we can continue our journey.] (Understood.) Nick nodded, the pack leader had completely frozen in place after it turned its head, looking at Nick grudgingly; the wary dogs closest to it had also frozen in place. The wary dogs outside of the range of Nick''s spell grew confused at their leader''s lack of communication and diverted their attention to see what was happening, creating an opportunity for the students to kill a large number of them with little resistance. Nick held out both of his throwing knives and pointed at the house sized leader of the pack, the blades positioned vertically. (Big!) The magic sea within Nick''s mindscape started visibly decreasing until it was completely bottomed out in two seconds; over 15,000 magical units were used up in the activation of the spell. The blade of the knives in Nick''s hands extended towards the wary dog and increased in size, burrowing deep into the ground and rising two and a half meters into the air. Because of the nature of the spell, Big, the knives moved unimpeded by the ground or wind pressure, with Nick not even feeling the weight of the transformation until the blades had ran through the pack leader''s body, splitting it into three gruesome pieces. Just before the blades had pierced the pack leader, the effects of soul pressure had dissipated because Nick had ran out of magic energy to keep the spell going but it was already too late for the huge wary dog. As the pieces of its body fell onto the ground, its eyes were wide opened as it died silently; a pool of hot steaming blood was created where it died. SILENCE The whole battlefield went quiet. The students momentarily stopped their assault as they saw the huge, menacing wary dog cut into pieces, shock filling them at this moment and the tiger sized wary dogs no longer paid attention to the students, now looking at their dead leader they lost their courage to fight this death match and wanted to flee. The tiger sized wary dogs had human like intelligence and were now the ones in charge so it wasn''t long before they growled loudly and ordered all the baby wary dogs in the vicinity to scatter and flee. The students screamed ecstatically, Daryl smith commanded: "Don''t let even one of these fuckers escape!" As the wary dogs began to flee the students chased them down, killing many of them from behind. The wary dogs weren''t the only ones that were fleeing at this time as Nick had already let go of his knives that were still firmly rooted in the ground, no hope of them being budged from their high raised positions and was running towards the direction of the swamp. (No way am I going to stay here while my magic energy is still recovering, it''s a good thing that these wary dogs decided to flee outright when I killed their leader or things might have gotten difficult for me. Next time, I should control my expenditure better so as not to become defenseless after I cast a spell so intensely from running out of magic energy.) Nick learned from his apparent mistake in this moment and ran towards his destination, him ignoring the fleeing wary dogs and them ignoring him. Out of all of the students on the battlefield, there was one who was not interested in chasing the wary dogs and killing them; she was Cindy Reece, Nick''s old acquaintance. As she looked at the back of the familiar man fleeing in the distance, she muttered to herself, unsure: "Nick, is that you?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 61: Sahashi Miyamoto By the time Nick got to the swamp, it was almost sundown. Nick saw nothing but pools of murky water, mangroves and trees that looked like they were diseased all over, being bent to varying degrees and spotted; there was also an almost unbearable stench flowing through the air. (Okay Slade, this place doesn''t feel very welcoming and its almost sundown. What information do you have on this place?) Slade spoke plainly: [This place is mostly filled with laws related to poison magic so it''s fairly dangerous if you don''t know where you''re going or the habits of the magic beasts here. Lucky for you, I know both. The magic beasts here are nocturnal, meaning that they hunt at night and sleep during the day, resting in the various pools and the water of the mangroves so you still have plenty of time to get to the murky pool I told you about before they become active; also, there are many poisonous insects that hide themselves in the tree branches but they won''t bother you unless you interact with the trees. To traverse this swamp safely, you just have to walk through the mud without getting too close to any bodies of water because the magic beasts sleep in groups at the bottom of them; the pool we''re looking for is close by, being only a few minutes from our current location. The magic beasts stay out of it because the corpse is harmful to them and the pool has somehow managed to preserve the corpse''s dead flesh for a long time. While you find the pool, you are to pick up a reed from the surroundings, I''ll explain everything when you find our pool. I''m going to send the directions to your thoughts now.] A moment later, Nick became aware of where the pool was located and traversed the swamp through mud that went up to his knees trying to avoid touching the trees or falling into any body of water; Nick picked up a swamp reed''s two meter long, hollow stem along the way but Slade still had not mentioned why he needed it. Nick got to a pool of murky brown water in thirty minutes, just as it was about to get dark. "Now what, Slade?" Slade spoke with a sense of urgency: [Jump into the pool to save your life.] "What?" [I already told you that the magic beasts here are nocturnal creatures and it''s about to get dark. Trust me, when they start hunting, their numbers will seem like a swarm and most of them are extremely poisonous. The only way to save yourself is to jump into this pool and stay there until morning.] When Nick heard how dangerous the magic beasts were, he no longer spoke out loud. (Are you crazy? This water stinks and may have all sorts of diseases and parasites in it. So are you telling me that to save myself from the magic beasts, I have to risk disease killing me?) Slade was amused by Nick''s reaction: [Ha, don''t worry. Despite how the water looks, the corpse of a rank 6 Hero Magician would have definitely purified this body of water of diseases and pests considering how long it has been in here but you might be affected by the laws on its body in an unpredictable manner. Are you willing to take the risk? If not, then just go die! As a Magician, you''ll have to brave even greater risks than this to get to a high rank; now if you''re done finding excuses, put that reed in your mouth and dive quickly.] Nick began to hear many screeching and growling noises all around him in the dimness of the evening. He no longer hesitated and jumped into the pool, sinking to the bottom while a portion of the reed stayed above ground delivering life giving oxygen to Nick''s lungs and also allowing him to exhale the bad air out of his lungs. The water was so murky that Nick had to close his eyes while remaining underwater. Trying not to breathe through his nose was difficult but he did it with only a little strain. Slade instructed at this moment: [The corpse is only a few feet to your left so just slowly move towards it and stay beside it so that you can easily drag it out when morning comes. I will alert you when that time arrives.] Nick followed Slade''s instructions and a few minutes later, as he was feeling his way around he apparently touched the leg of the corpse but something unexpected happened. While Nick''s eyes were still closed, the scenery in front of him actually became a wide expanse of grassy plain with the sun raised high in the clear blue sky. (What''s going on?) Nick was confused as this was a very strange and unexpected circumstance; he was just in a murky pool of water located in a swamp at night and now he has found himself in a grassy plain during the daytime. Nick looked around trying to understand his situation better when he spotted something very strange a few meters away from him; a man in his early thirties sitting on a blanket, pouring tea into a ceramic mug was looking at him, seemingly waiting for him to come to him. This man seemed to to look Asian with tall black hair reaching down to the middle of his back, he had glowing red squinted eyes and he was wearing what looked like a gold yukata. Nick walked up to the man and asked: "Hello, who exactly are you?" The man smiled at Nick and said: "Why don''t you have a seat. We have much to discuss." Nick was suspicious but he did not seem to have any alternatives so he complied and took a seat on the blanket facing the strange man. (Slade, why are you being silent at this time?) Nick received no response. The man looked at Nick, took a sip of tea and then spoke: "If you are trying to communicate with that foreign will in your mind, don''t bother. He and I just agreed that he would give me a few minutes to speak to you. Don''t worry, our interaction will surely benefit you." Nick squinted his eyes as his suspicions grew bigger; it felt like Slade had sold him out. The man began to speak again: "My name is Sahashi Miyamoto and I was a rank six Regular Magician that had once lived in the Agron realm. After a battle with a very cunning magic beast, I was inflicted with an incurable curse and found myself dying slowly. Knowing that I was going to die, I decided to explore a few distant realms before the inevitable happened and so when I came to this realm, my time was finally up and I decided to die in this swamp, leaving my will and inheritance for a fortunate Magician to find." "Huh, another inheritance? Is it normal for a dying Magician to leave an inheritance?" The man answered plainly: "Yes it is, for various reasons, most powerful Magicians almost always leave an inheritance when they feel themselves dying so that their unfulfilled ambitions may be accomplished by a later generation. Mine is no different. Will you hear me out?" Nick nodded his head indicating his approval. "Yes, I will hear you out but if you are asking me to sell my soul or something like that, you can just forget it." Sahashi laughed: "Ha, ha. No, it''s nothing like that. During my lifetime, I had a dream of becoming a rank 10 Soul Magician but unfortunately my life was cut short. I would like you to accomplish my dream in my place. I can''t control what you will do as after our discussion, this will of mine will dissipate so all I need is your word that you will push toward that goal and I will give you my inheritance. Do I have your word?" Unauthorized usage: this tale is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.Nick had a weird expression on his face. (That''s it, he only wants me to become a rank 10 Magician down the road. That was already my plan so this seems like a good deal, I''ve been getting a lot of those lately.) "I have no problem agreeing to your demands but I have to know what kind of inheritance will I be getting." Sahashi''s smile widened. "The inheritance includes my corpse as a high class magical material and my soul magic true meaning. Oh, and If you don''t agree, don''t even bother trying to move my corpse. It will surely only bring you misery if you do as I will infect you with the same curse that I was plagued with, using the last ounce of my strength." Nick didn''t like being threatened but he could understand Sahashi''s attitude considering that he would still want someone else to gain his inheritance? "No threats required, I agree to accept your inheritance and in exchange, I guarantee that I will become the strongest rank 10 Soul Magician that ever live. But I have a question...what the hell is a true meaning?" Sahashi was not surprised by Nick''s ignorance because Magicians that can produce true meanings were in fact extremely rare, probably rarer than the number of the living World Class Magicians. Sahashi explained: "A true meaning is the accumulation of a Magician''s knowledge and expertise that can be transferred to another person. A Magician''s expertise is usually divided into several levels that include: ordinary, master, scholar, archmage and scourgemage. The last classification is what it is because most of the Magicians that had reached such a level in the past caused tremendous disasters to the realms that they visited for all sorts of reason, some just for a bit of entertainment. I was a scholar specialized in soul magic during my lifetime, admittedly far from ever reaching archmage. I gained this attainment after 600 long years of slow accumulation because my talent wasn''t all that good." Nick was satisfied with that answer and he was excited that he had a chance of obtaining so much mastery in soul magic. This situation was almost unbelievable. (I must have some serious dog shit luck to get an opportunity like this.) Nick didn''t want to waste any more time. "I''ve already agreed, let me have my inheritance." Sahashi Miyamoto did not feel the need to explain anymore either. He just spoke once more before Nick''s vision was shrouded in darkness again: "Good luck to you, young man." Once again feeling the pressure of the water around him and the discomfort of breathing through a reed, Nick''s mind was overwhelmed with knowledge as if he had known about soul magic his entire life and it was all that he had thought about; the feeling of recalling information about soul magic felt like magic itself, he was now shocked by his own comprehension. Slade spoke at this moment: [It looks like that junior gave you a great benefit. Not even I could produce a true meaning when I was alive despite being an archmage, only a few steps away from becoming a scourgemage. Well, congratulations, kid, I did not expect this. The universe truly works in mysterious ways, maybe you were destined for this. I had not known about the curse on this corpse until I read your thoughts, it must be a pernicious one indeed. Since even I cannot sense it, it''s probably produced from shadow or phantom magic; those types of magic can be used to create imperceptible curses but generally only affect the inflicted while they are alive. That junior''s threat was probably a bluff.] Nick wasn''t so sure about that, he felt something familiar about Sahashi, a kind a hidden but menacing conviction. (Maybe I just imagined it.) [There is still time before the sun comes up, you might as well learn a new soul spell while your down hear. I wasn''t going to teach you anymore spells until your understanding of soul related laws and magic increased to avoid you killing yourself from the backlashes from failing to perform them but with your new expertise, that is no longer a concern. This spell is called ''Soul Vision''. It allows you to share the vision of the living things around you within a fifty meter radius by sending out and receiving magic signals from your soul; think of it like a video feed. This spell will adjust itself according to your rank just like Soul Pressure and will only work if the target has a weaker soul than you which will likely be the case unless you encounter a rank 3 magic beast. The laws for this spell are fairly complex, I''m about to send the symbols translated to Valteese to your thoughts.] A moment later, Nick knew the laws for the spell, Soul Vision, like he knew the back of his hand. Nick smiled, with his new comprehension, the ins and outs of this spell were as clear to him as distilled water. He would very easily be able to perform this spell after becoming familiar with the laws. ................................................... At the moment of sunrise, Nick raised himself out of the pool of water carrying the mummified corpse out along with him and after getting to the muddy ground, Nick took a good look at the corpse and cringed at how degraded and ugly it was. "Even a glorious rank 6 Magician becomes nothing but a mass of rot and crap after he dies. Sigh." Slade chimed in at this moment: [Don''t get poetic on me kid. This is your last day within this realm so let''s make the most of it. About one kilometer north west of here is a cliff overlooking an expanse of rocky treeless terrain. That place is also a land of death like the desert we had previously been in. Carnivorous buffaloes live in that area. I want you to kill some of them and cut out their bladders to obtain their urine. You can use it as a drink to increase your concentration for a few hours. A few liters of the stuff may be useful in the coming days.] Nick was horrified. "You want me to drink beast piss?" Slade laughed manically: [Ha, ha, ha...you''ll be doing stranger things than that in the future so get over yourself and move forward.] Nick sighed at Slade''s ruthlessness and used his space band to store the corpse; he couldn''t store it while in the pool because he needed to see it for the space band to store it. Nick took a look at his clothes and was disgusted at the muck that he found now covering him, he also sniffed himself and realized that he smelled like sulfur for some reason; his state was truly repulsive but Nick would not let the temporary circumstance get him down. After checking himself, Nick used his new spell to check on his surrounding before moving from his spot. (Soul Vision.) All sorts of scenes appeared in Nicks mind showing him the circumstances of many magic beasts in his vicinity. With this advantage in scouting the surroundings he could tell that none of them had their eyes on him giving him some peace of mind. Nick followed Slade''s directions and headed in the north west direction, his face beaming with a hopeful smile. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 62: Warp Bat Nick soon left the swamp as his position at the murky pool was already near its edge. Moving forward while using Soul Vision gave Nick the upper hand in avoiding magic beasts because he was able to piece together a map of their positions from the information that he received as he was able to intuit the distance of his target from himself. Nick did not plan to battle any more magic beasts until encountering the carnivorous buffaloes. Nick spent an hour getting to the cliff that Slade spoke of; the cliff overlooked a wide expanse of rocky terrain with little to no vegetation except some clumps of grass here and there. With no cover, it didn''t take long before Nick noticed the several groups of students that were battling the magic beasts in the area. They were not only battling wary dogs but also battling the carnivorous buffaloes and other magic beasts. Nick used Soul Vision to thoroughly analyze the events going on below. All sorts of magic beasts were running to the area where the battles were most concentrated, some dug their way out of the ground, some flew down from the skies and some even came out of naturally formed crevices and caves in the ground and rock walls. The students apparently belonged to different groups but were fighting with a tacit understanding that they needed to kill as much magic beasts as possible before things got out of hand but the number of magic beasts just kept on increasing. "This place really is a land of death, the magic beasts here act so ferociously and they are gathered in great numbers and varieties. So many groups of students being here is like adding fuel to a fire." Slade spoke: [It looks like those children somehow caused a beast tide to form.] Because of the abundance of magic beasts, Nick no longer wanted to speak out loud to avoid them placing their attention on his location. (What is a beast tide?) [Just like how it sounds, kid. A beast tide happens when a large number of magic beasts decide to wreak havoc in an area in unison but it is usually the case where that involves one species of magic beasts. So many species forming a beast tide means that someone used a special method to attract all of their fury. This place was already a killing field and now its going to become a bloody hell. Their are about 200 students down there; want to make a bet as to how long they are going to last, my magic sense tells me that more magic beasts are on the way, one of them even being a rank 4 magic beast?] (Rank 4 magic beast? How did something like that get attracted to this battle, this is crazy? I guess I''ll have to forget about retrieving the buffalo urine then.) Nick tried to say that as regretfully as possible but he was actually relieved knowing that he would not have to drink the urine later. (Since things are so crazy down there and there is only a few hours until the exam ends, I''m just going to stay up here and watch. I''ve already received plenty of benefits from this exam, I don''t need to join the fighting and I don''t want to do anymore needless exploring because I am starting to feel fatigued.) Slade easily agreed with Nick''s decision: [I agree but keep a watchful eye on the sky, if any of those flying magic beasts come your way, be prepared to fight or flee.] ............................... Marcus Delvey could not believe what was happening in these badlands. Several groups of students had decided to camp in this area yesterday because of the apparent high concentration of wary dogs and except the annoying attacks from other kinds of magical beasts, everything had been going well until the leaders of the groups had met up and a plan to get the most out of this area in a way that they would all supposedly benefit was proposed. Marcus was there at the time of the meeting because he was close to the leader of his group, Jerry Taylor who had gotten rank 3 in the student rankings. when they had arrived at the meeting, the other leaders were, Don Bartholomew, Vance Allen, Joan Adams, Gregory Smith, Harry Bailes and Jeff Cadman. All of these group leaders were famous in their year and had outstanding magic powers. Vance Allen convinced the other group leaders that he had a way of gathering many wary dogs but the probable number was not something that one group could manage so he proposed a temporary alliance that would involve all of the groups fighting together to kill the magic beasts that would appear. Vance had a very good reputation among the students for being strong and reliable so the other group leaders agreed that as long as he informed them of his method they would participate in an all out battle, each group being able to keep the carcasses of the wary dogs that they killed as long as he informed them of the method. Vance held out a small glass bottle of oil, saying that it was magic beast essence oil and once poured in the surroundings, it would make the magic beasts within an ten kilometer radius come towards them with battle lust, destroying their rationality which would make them easy to defeat. He further convinced them that with so many rank 2 Apprentice Magicians concentrated in one place, it was impossible that they would fail. The group leaders agreed wholeheartedly despite Vance not even telling them where he got the magic beast essence oil from. That was probably because every one of the group leaders was focused on getting a good score for themselves rather than the safety of the other students and so now we have this situation where a seemingly endless wave of different kinds of magic beasts were coming at them. Marcus was feeling enraged at this moment. Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences."That bastard was either ignorant of the effectiveness of that oil or he downplayed it when he was kissing the group leaders'' ass." Marcus opened his mouth and let of a deafening scream at four approaching wary dogs; the wary dogs bled from their ears and fell down dead the next moment. "The magic beasts are only rank 2 and are mostly wary dogs but if they keep coming like this, we''ll all be overwhelmed. Damn it, there''s only a few hours left until the exam is over, why should I die in a place like this?" Jerry Taylor, Marcus''s group leader came to his side after killing a few carnivorous buffaloes and shadow vultures with blades of wind constantly flying around him, shooting out at the right time, decapitating any magic beast that came too close. He shouted to Marcus: "Marcus, help me gather up our people, we are going to try to break out of this mess. All this trouble is clearly not worth the wary dog carcasses. Most of the other group leaders have the same idea so we won''t be getting in each others'' way." Marcus was relieved that they weren''t going to continue this futile battle but before he could help rally the students in his group, a large bat like magic beast flew down from the sky, pouncing on Vance Allen''s group; It was huge with a wingspan of about twelve meters. Marcus and Jerry looked on in horror because the magic power coming from that magic beast suggested that it was definitely above rank 3. Jerry spoke cautiously to Marcus: "That''s the area where Vance had spilled the magic beast essence oil, if it''s not coincidence, that huge bat must be attracted to the oil. When it flew down, it actually killed dozens of the students that were fighting over there. We need to hurry and get the fuck out of here." Marcus nodded and started rallying his group-mates. ............................ Nick looked on in trepidation. "So that''s a rank 4 magic beast. Without a rank 4 Apprentice Magician down there, most of those students are probably going to die, am I right?" Slade replied: [Not necessarily. Did you know that it is not typical for a lone rank 4 Apprentice Magician to be able to kill a rank 4 magic beast?] (Huh? Why is that?) [That''s because at rank 4 magic beasts go through a qualitative change that includes their intellect and physique. They become as smart as a human adult and typically their skin and flesh becomes incredibly thick. Typically, a qualitative change does not occur for humans until they get to one of the Regular Magician ranks where their magic power becomes capable of slicing apart mountains and sinking entire countries. I was an exception though, back when I was a rank 4 Apprentice Magician due to my training methods, spells and my divergent mindscape, granted that I had trained for nearly 100 years before I reached that level.] (Well then, those students are definitely screwed. By the way you said before that those rank 4 magic beasts weren''t interested in killing anything below rank 3 so why is it here now?) [It looks like whatever method that these people used to cause this beast tide has also aggravated the warp bat. Although it has the equivalent of a human intellect, a beast is still just a beast, there are certain methods that can be used to get it to act irrationally. Whichever one it is, it''s currently causing the warp bat to act aggressively just like the other magic beasts. The warp bat has laws on its body related to space magic and anything it swallows has a chance of ending up in random locations, literally anywhere, so its fairly dangerous.] (Alright, I''ve heard enough. It''s time for me to leave this place before I get caught up in this. The exam will be over soon so all of this is of no concern to me.) When Nick was about to leave, he noticed something horrifying. The warp bat was actually looking towards his direction as it stood on the corpses of some students and the carcasses of various magic beasts. (Am I mistaken, it can''t actually be looking at me right?) [No, according to my magic sense, it is definitely looking at you. Something about you has attracted its attention.] (What? I don''t have anything that that bat beast would want.) [Not exactly. You do have the ichor root within your space band and the warp bat is a magic beast that wields spacial magic so it might be able to sense the ichor root. It is a well sought after supplement, especially among magic beasts but they can''t sense it until it has been removed from the ground. How unexpected, this warp bat might have powers that allow it to peer into spacial objects.] (Oh fuck!) Nick turned around in order to run away but by the time he had run two meters from the cliff''s edge, the warp bat had already flown over the cliff, heading towards him. Seeing that he could not out run the flying magic beast, Nick took two throwing knives from his vest and prepared to fight, using his spell, Big, while pointing at the approaching wary bat. In a few seconds, Nick''s magic energy reserves were bottomed out and the blades of his knives extended over fifteen meters and broadened vertically by one meter. As the knives were about to pierce the huge warp bat, as soon as they touched its skin, they actually broke apart like a glass ball that was thrown at a hard rock wall. The warp bat pounced on Nick and swallowed him. Nick felt like he was going through a raging river, space warping violently around him as he went into the warp bat''s throat. "Am I going to die like this?" Under the pressure of the warp bat''s power, Nick could no longer move freely and slid down the warp bat''s throat. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 63: Space Magic Affinity For an unknown amount of time, Nick felt that he was covered in darkness, having nowhere to go, feeling nothing and knowing almost nothing about his circumstances. He, at the very least knew that he had been swallowed by a rank 4 warp bat which should have sent him to who knows where but for right now, he was just in darkness, unable to move. (Sigh, how could this have happened? I thought that my luck was good but it turned out that it''s not so good after all.) When Nick felt that he had enough of his own self pity, he remembered that he had the will of a rank 8 World Class Magician housed in his mind so he attempted to speak to Slade? (Slade, Slade. Are you there? Now is not the time for silence, I could be in some real trouble here.) Nick received no response from Slade. (Sigh, I guess I''ll just wait for something to change.) Nick waited seemingly for a very long time without any change in his circumstances until light finally came to his eyes. When his eyes adjusted to the light, Nick was looking at what appeared to be a ceiling, like one for the room of a house; he felt that he was able to move now so he sat up and took a look around. Nick was actually in what appeared to be a very large library with books organized on bookshelves all around him arranged in neat rows and columns. "Where is this place? Is anyone here?" Nick was so mentally exhausted and sick of all of this uncertainty that he at this time didn''t mind if no one answered him but a moment later, someone actually did. "Young man, walk further in front of you and come to meet me. I''ve got some freshly made juice and biscuits ready here. You''ll probably like them." Nick was so stunned by the voice because it was as if someone was speaking right beside his ear but he saw no one. Nick asked: "Who are you?" This time, Nick received no response so he had no alternative but to follow the voice''s instructions. (Slade, are you there?) Nick received no response from Slade, like he had never inhabited his mind. (Fuck.) Nick walked past over thirty bookshelves before he came to a table with a smiling young man sitting at it, eating biscuits and drinking some kind of beverage. The young man looked to be in his early twenties, had long silver hair, gem like blue eyes, he had a white complexion and he was wearing a white robe reaching down to his ankles. He had a genial smile on his face and motioned Nick to have a seat in front of him. Nick took a seat but ignored the food, getting straight to the point: "Who are you sir?" The young man swallowed some biscuits and answered Nick in a calm, friendly tone: "My name is Andre Reigns and who might you be?" Nick answered back with some anxiousness: "My name is Nick Capitol. Do you know exactly why I am here or even, how did I get here? You don''t seem all that disturbed by my presence even though we have never met before." Andre took a sip of his juice and answered nonchalantly: "You were sent to me by one of my pets so to speak. You were swallowed by a young warp bat, were you not?" Nick was visibly shocked: "Your pet?" "Yes, that''s correct. You see a few hundred years ago or maybe more than a few hundred, I can''t remember, I launched a little experiment. The idea was to send baby warp bats to a multitude of unknown realms so that they could grow and over time deliver me interesting plants, animals or treasures. They are magic beasts with the ability to use space magic to search even the most forbidden and/or tightly guarded areas so I thought that they would be perfect for the job. One of them seems to have sent me you but you don''t look much like a treasure." "Of course I''m not a treasure, your warp bat made a mistake and ate me. As the owner of the beast, are you going to give me some compensation, maybe a lift back to where I came from?" Andre started laughing at Nick''s boldness, almost choking on his biscuit; after drinking some more of his juice that he poured from a glass pitcher into his clear glass cup, he held his hands in the air and a black device appeared in it. Nick looked at the object, then looked at his right wrist and saw that his space band was missing from it and was now in the hands of Andre. "Hey, what are you doing with my space band?" Andre spoke while keeping his eyes on the space band: "Space band huh? I suppose many lower realms have variations of these kinds of devices. Don''t be so anxious, I am just looking at its contents to see why my pet would have sent you here." Andre focused on Nick''s space band intensely. "Beast carcasses, a slightly interesting corpse, some food and water, trash and..." Andre''s eyes finally seemed to shine with some interest while Nick looked on with bewilderment. (How is he able to just inspect the contents of my space band. Is he a Magician? I can''t feel any magic power coming from him at all but he took my space band so easily. Something tells me that If I try to take my space band back, I won''t like his response.) Andre''s face became visibly heated like he had just found his long lost love and then he looked at Nick and spoke: "It seems that you happened upon an ichor root, are you aware of its value?" (The ichor root? Why would he be so interested in that?) Nick answered with some uncertainty in his tone: "Well, vaguely. I was planning to use it to nourish my mindscape to help me push towards becoming a rank 2 Apprentice Magician." It was now Andre''s turn to open his eyes wide in shock. "You were going to use an ichor root to help you push towards rank 2? Do you also use ox cleavers to kill chickens? An ichor root can be used to make life saving potions for rank 8 and 9 Magicians so it is incredibly valuable considering how much time we spend exploring and the risks we take during occasional battles with magic beasts and enemy Magicians." Nick did not miss the meaning behind Andre''s wording. "You are a World Class Magician?" Andre nodded his head in affirmation: "Of course I am and I have been for the past 1000 years. Oh right, I haven''t been around a Magician of your level for a long time so I forgot that you would only be able to sense my power if I put in some effort. Seeing as how that would probably kill you, why don''t you just take my word for it." Nick silently shook his head and wore a bitter expression. (I''ve landed in the hands of a World Class Magician, I''m done for if he is as ruthless as the rumors say that they are. Man, I didn''t even get to hold receptionist Samantha''s hand once even though she''d probably kill me right after if I did something like that.) Andre saw his expression and reassured him: "Don''t be so glum Nick, I''m not going to hurt you, in fact, my faith does not permit me to harm the weak for my own benefit. Now if you were at my level, that would be another story entirely...but I won''t get into that. Are you willing to trade this ichor root with me for something more appropriate for you?" Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.Nick gave a wry smile and replied: "Do I have a choice?" Andre returned a smile of his own and asked: "What do you think?" "Sigh, then can I ask a question? Do you specialize in space magic?" Andre wasn''t sure why that would be important to Nick but he decided to humor him. "Actually, that is only one of my specialties. Why do you ask?" Nick steeled his determination at this moment. If he was going to lose the ichor root anyway and Andre did seem to value it highly, he might as well get a good enough benefit for all the trouble that he was going through. He looked at Andre in the eye and spoke clearly: "My highest affinities are for rule magic, soul magic and blade magic. Is it possible that you could somehow give me a high affinity for space magic?" Andre looked amused. "Oh, so you are interested in space magic but don''t have a high affinity for it, huh? Increasing your affinity is possible but I''ll have to take away one of your other major affinities as well as damage your soul a bit to facilitate the increase in affinity. Would that be acceptable to you?" Nick was a little let down by the requirements. "Will I lose anything important after you damage my soul?" "Hmmm...I suppose that you will. The damage I''m referring to involves removing the laws on your soul related to your other miscellaneous affinities which means that you would be able to directly manipulate only three types of magic energy all your life. If you are okay with that, then we can make a deal right now." Nick thought about the cost of altering his affinity for space magic for a seemingly long time: (I would lose the ability to use other types of magic. Is getting a better affinity for space magic worth it?) Nick looked at Andre, wanting to seek his advice: "If you were me, what would you do?" Andre was put on the spot by the question, he just wanted the ichor root and didn''t want to just rob this child so he was willing to just go along with what the boy wanted whether it really helped him or not but he was also inclined to answer the question honestly: "Honestly, I would not do such an extreme thing but I am not you. If you want to become a strong Magician, you have to decide what you want and make the necessary sacrifices. That''s it." Nick returned to thinking deeply again and then a few minutes later, his eyes shone with determination. "Okay, I''ll go through with it but also, is it possible that I could also obtain a space magic inheritance that suits my rank and be returned from where I came from?" Andre thought for a few moments then answered: "I can give you some cultivation knowledge and spells that would be helpful for someone wanting to become a rank 4 Space Magician and I will return you to the realm that you came from. All that is fairly easy since that sort of knowledge is not difficult to obtain on Utopior and the realm that you seem to have come from is far inferior to the one we are in now." Nick grew curious. "Utopior, is that where this is?" Andre shook his head and spoke: "Alright, that''s enough questions, I won''t answer anymore since you have already agreed to the trade and set the terms but I will say this to you because I find you a little odd and I do like odd things. My intuition is telling me that you have very strong but strange luck; you should be careful going forward. While luck can certainly contribute to a person''s strength, it can also be the noose that hangs them, so become stronger so that you are not so greatly affected by your own luck." After saying that, Andre handed the space band back to Nick. "I have already taken the ichor root so I will be making good on our deal now. One final thing, my intuition is now telling me that we will probably meet again so don''t disappoint me when that time comes." Andre pointed his dainty right index finger at Nick and Nick''s vision was filled with a white light, then came abject darkness; Nick had lost consciousness. ......................... When Nick had regained his consciousness, he found himself a dozen meters away from the cliff where he had been eaten by the warp bat. Nick quickly checked his space band and saw that the ichor root was indeed gone but his mind had knowledge seared into it that had never been there before. (This is cultivation knowledge on space magic with spells and magic formations included. Andre kept his word.) While Nick was feeling excited, Slade spoke with an unhappy tone: [You really gave up your ability to use most other magic to increase your affinity for space magic? Kid, whatever you do with your body is your own business but what if you had lost your affinity for soul magic or rule magic, do you even understand the consequences. Let me remind you that your own mindscape is suited for rule magic and my inheritance and methods are suited for soul magic. You are lucky that that fellow seems to only have removed your affinity for blade magic but with your damaged soul and the loss of so many affinities, you have basically become a half-invalid. Was it worth it?] Nick smiled. (Yes it was. By the way, where the hell have you been, you left me hanging while I was talking to a World Class Magician, what was that about?) Slade sighed. [You''ve got to understand kid, the person who you made that deal with was definitely not an ordinary World Class Magician and he said that we were in Utopior which is a world that is many times more powerful than yours or mine for that matter. If he had discovered the will of another rank 8 Magician, he would have definitely not been so cordial and might have even forcibly extracted me from your mind so I stayed silent and hid to avoid detection.] Nick could understand Slade''s reasoning so he let it go. (Alright, so now that my soul is damaged, you have a way of healing it, right?) [Hmph, is that what you were hoping for. Yes, I have methods to heal it, you practically wasted all the efforts that I made to strengthen it with the soul formation so don''t try to use the spells that I taught you for now or you might just invite trouble to yourself. The bad news is that we will have to use the corpse of the rank six hero Magician to mend your soul instead of nourishing your mindscape but the good news is that damaging the soul and then mending it is the essence of soul cultivation so it''s not too much of a bother. Your exam should be over in a few minutes. Remember, don''t tell anyone about me.] (That''s a given.) Nick went to the edge of the cliff once more and looked down at the badlands to see the outcome of the beast tide. There was blood, corpses and carcasses everywhere but Nick also saw traces that suggested that some students fought their way out of the beast tide and escaped so he wasn''t inclined to be too sympathetic. Nick waited for about twenty five minutes until a ray of light shone down from the clouds and embraced him, pulling him away. "Finally, it''s over." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 64: Worth The Discomfort? After the ray of light performed its function, leaving Nick within the clearing of the academy''s southern woodlands that he had been in when the exam started, it dispersed. Nick stood among many students, who like him had survived and passed the exams. Nick couldn''t tell how many students died from just looking at the crowd alone so he simply stopped thinking about it. Rebecca Jones and two other Magicians stood on the same platform above them where they had been when the students had been sent to the realm. Rebecca spoke plainly: "Congratulations on successfully completing your end of year exam. During the exam, most of you would have been monitored using the space bands that we gave you so those students will receive personalized advice based on what we observed during the exam at a later time. Now, on to the matter of your student ranking. Each student will have to hand in their space band with the wary dog carcasses that they obtained and the ranking will be issued tomorrow at 10 pm. If there are any items that you would like to remove from the space band and declare, do it now." There weren''t many students that took items from their space band to declare them because most of them had already been preoccupied with trying to kill magic beasts rather than procuring items from the realm. Those who did take out items took out pieces of plant material, magic beast carcasses or funny enough, rocks. Nick went to a spot that was a good distance from the other students and also took out a few things. He took out the rest of the ghastly serpent meat that he had, the head of a wary dog, and the mummified corpse of the rank 6 Hero Magician. Before anyone could take notice of the corpse, Nick used his spell, Big, on the wary dog head. (Big.) Nick almost bottomed out his magic sea in activating the spell. Most of the other students as well as the Regular Magician instructors noticed the surge in magic power coming from Nick and looked towards his direction. "What does that guy think he is doing?" "It looks like he is casting a spell on a wary dog head." "Look beside him, is that a human corpse?" "No way, killing each other in the exam is forbidden. It must be the carcass of a strange looking magic beast." "Oh wait, that wary dog head looks like it''s getting bigger." Nick decided to enlarge the head relatively slowly so as not to deform it. This was his plan since he first got to the realm. The rules stated by Rebecca at the start of the exam said that to get a top score, one had to have the highest mass of wary dog heads. Assuming those words can be taken at face value, him using his magic to enlarge the head should not be against the rules. Nick didn''t do this inside the academy''s realm because he wanted to observe the Regular Magicians'' reactions to his plan; he looked up at the platform and saw no reaction from them so he continued channeling his magic power into the wary dog head and it grew bigger and bigger; Nick had to constantly reposition himself to make room for the growing head. In the next thirty seconds Nick had grown the wary dog head into something of gigantic proportions; it had a height of twenty meters, an width of sixteen meters and a length of twenty eight meters. Every student present looked on in shock and suspicion. "Hey, what is this bastard trying to do?" "Remember the rules man, our score is mainly determined by the mass of the wary dog heads that we obtain from the realm, it was never mentioned that we could not alter the heads with our own magic." "So you''re saying that he is using an oversight in the rules to get a good score." "Hmph, why do you say that it is an oversight? We all use magic for our own advantage, why should what he is doing be any different?" The students had varying opinions about what Nick did to the wary dog head. Some were confused, some were enraged but most were jealous of his magic power at this particular moment. Some even said things like: "Maybe I should ask him to do the same thing for my wary dog carcasses." Nick didn''t care about what others thought or what they would say so he ignored them and stored the giant head within his space band, then he waited for the Regular Magicians to inspect the items that he did not intend to hand over to them. It did not take long before the Regular Magicians made their move and started checking the students'' items. Nick stood away from the other students and just watched warily as they moved about, everyone seemingly too nervous, tired and/or suspicious to go anywhere near him. Soon, Rebecca found her way to Nick''s position. First, she looked at the ghastly serpent beast meat and then the corpse on the ground. When her eyes focused on the corpse, her expression became weird and then it seemed as if she became full of shock. "Answer me truthfully. Is this the corpse of a Regular Magician?" Nick had no reason to say anything but the truth and the evidence was already right there anyway. Nick replied plainly: "Yes it is, miss Rebecca." Rebecca calmed herself, remembering that she had a job to do. "Where did you find it?" Nick didn''t mind answering a few questions to get rid of some suspicions: "I found it in a murky pool located in a swamp within the realm." Rebecca followed up: "How did you find it?" Nick replied plainly again: "Luck." Rebecca squinted her eyes and spoke with incredulity: "You must have the strangest luck I have ever seen, just finding the intact corpse of a Regular Magician. What do you intend to do with it? If you are planning to sell it, I might be interested in buying it." Nick shook his head resolutely and said: "I have no intention of selling this corpse because I have use for it." This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.Rebecca did not believe Nick. (Use for it? This is Nick Capitol. This young man has no magical background before coming to this academy and has only been here for a year. He shouldn''t have any idea of how to use this corpse unless...) "Did you perhaps receive a Magician''s inheritance when you found this corpse?" Nick could hear the gasps from the students when Rebecca asked that question and Nick could only sigh knowing full well that Rebecca was probably trying to use the attention from the other students to pressure him into handing over the corpse. Nick however answered resolutely, even at the risk of offending Rebecca: "Miss Rebecca, I believe that your question is inappropriate and has nothing to do with the inspection. Please do not ask me that again." Nick wasn''t going to lie, not that he wasn''t inclined to do so but who knows if she had some way to magically determine whether he was speaking the truth or not. His reply would ensure that she remained uncertain of the answer and there should be nothing that she can do about it if he didn''t want to give an answer. Rebecca pursed her lips in frustration: (This boy is a hard stone, not softening a little in my presence. Fine, there is nothing that I can do If he doesn''t want to divulge anymore details about the corpse. I''ll pay special attention to the information that we get from his space band though.) "You are free to leave with the corpse and the meat. Would you like to borrow a space band to carry them away." Nick smiled. "Yes I would, please." Rebecca thought that although this kid was smelly and covered in muck, at the very least he knew how to be polite. Nick handed over his space band with all of his wary dog carcasses to Rebecca and Rebecca handed Nick an empty space band. After telling Nick to return the space band to the magical tools office in a few days, Rebecca moved on to the next student who needed an inspection and Nick stored the corpse and the beast meat within his empty space band and prepared to go somewhere else. As he was about to leave the clearing with many students watching his movements, a woman with short blonde hair walked into his path. "Well, it has been a long time since me last met Cindy Reece, how have you been?" Cindy Reece stood in front of Nick with a friendly smile but Nick wasn''t fooled. (I''ve seen that smile plenty of times in my life. That''s a hater''s smile.) Cindy spoke genially: "Hello Nick, it has been a long time. I saw your display earlier and was wondering if you had anything to do with cutting a very large Wary dog in three pieces with two large blades during the exam while my group was battling its pack?" Nick pretended to think about it then answered: "Now that you mention it, I did kill such a wary dog in that way. That was your group? Well, sorry for butting in like that but having that wary dog living in the same area that I was exploring made me uncomfortable so I killed it. That''s all there is to it." Cindy was visibly shook for a moment but spoke calmly: "So that''s it, no need for an apology because your actions actually helped us, the leader of my group, Daryl Smith figured it was you and wants to have a talk with you. Do you have free time?" Nick was filthy and exhausted, he did not want to converse with strangers for no reason so he replied: "Maybe next time, I''ve got somewhere to be." Cindy seemed disappointed by Nick''s reply but decided to try something else. She took out her phone and asked: "Is it possible that I could have your phone number in order to meet up later?" Nick was puzzled by her request. "Meet up for what?" Cindy seemed a little shifty when Nick asked that question but a moment later, her eyes shone with determination. She moved closer to Nick''s front so that with Nick''s back turned to the students, they could not see her clearly. Cindy grabbed Nick''s right hand to his surprise and displeasure and placed it on her left breast. "Meet up for this." Nick''s eyes opened wide in shock. (What the hell is happening right now? I''m smelly and covered in filth and she is actually trying to tempt me. Hmph, she dares? I''ve got a will of steel.) Nick''s mind said one thing but his body did another. Nick lightly squeezed her left breast and took out his phone for them to exchange numbers. With a flushed face, Cindy gave Nick her number and Nick gave Cindy his and then she took Nick''s hand off of her breast and ran back to the group of students behind him. (Okay, that was weird.) Slade chimed in at this moment: [kid, I have no problem with you wanting to make use of women, god knows I did in the past but you have to be careful as to their intentions. Not all that glitters is gold, especially when it comes to women.] (Sigh, You don''t have to remind me, Slade? I just had a moment of weakness just now, I''m still a virgin after all. It probably won''t happen again, at least not until I''m in complete control of the situation.) [Good.] Nick walked away from the academy woodlands and headed towards the academy''s magical anatomy office. He took the elevator to the second floor after greeting the receptionist in the lobby and entered an unoccupied affinity testing room. Nick put his student ID into a slot on the machine and placed his palms on the semi-glass panel, waiting for the results of the test. Three minutes later, Nick obtained the results. --------------------------------------------------------- Unknown magical affinity: 59% Soul magic affinity: 22% Space magic affinity: 19% ---------------------------------------------------------- Nick smiled from ear to ear. "That exam was truly worth every bit of the discomfort." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 65: Contract Secured After checking his affinities, Nick went to his dorm room and took a shower to get the dirt and stink from the five days of exploration off of him. After that, Nick didn''t waste any time and set his cell phone''s alarm before going to bed eagerly since he hadn''t gotten a good night''s sleep since the exam started. Before Nick fell asleep, he had a few thoughts lingering in his weary brain: (Now that I think about it, although I hadn''t had a good night''s sleep in a while, I wasn''t really slowed down by that during the exam. That must be a side effect of nurturing my mindscape. When I get to higher ranks, will I even need to sleep?) Nick thought about it but couldn''t come up with an answer. (Well, anyway, tomorrow I have a meeting with the people from the animal store. That should be interesting...) Nick finally fell asleep. ......................... RING RING RING RING Nick''s alarm went off at 5 am and he got out of bed with his body feeling sore in several places. Nick gritted his teeth and took a shower before getting dressed and leaving his room, heading to the cafeteria. When Nick got to the cafeteria, there weren''t many students to be seen. Most of them were probably still recovering from from the psychological and/or physical stress of the end of year exam. Before ordering breakfast Nick politely asked the cashier: "Good morning, do you cook certain foods upon request?" The male cashier wasn''t too bothered by the question and replied: "Actually, we don''t to special requests but It wouldn''t be too hard to find restaurants on campus that do or if you have some skills, you could always visit the academy''s culinary building and get some space to cook your own food." Nick nodded his head in understanding. (I''m not giving up on the ghastly serpent meat that I have left.) "I''d like two egg and cheese sandwiches with an orange juice, please." Nick made his order, collected his food and sat at a table in the corner of the cafeteria to enjoy it. While he was eating, Nick''s phone rang to indicate that he was getting a call; looking at the phone, Nick saw that it was Marsha calling him. Nick wanted to let the call hang but taking into consideration that Marsha was the first customer for his scrolls, he decided against that and answered the phone. "Good morning, Marsha. What''s up?" "Nothing much babe. I want to meet up with you to discuss the exam, is that possible for today?" Nick wasn''t surprised at the request because when he was in high school, the students would always be itching to discuss how they performed after every major exam with each other. It seemed to Nick that the same mentality applied here but in order to mess with Marsha a little bit, he decided to play oblivious. "Huh, discuss the exam? What for and stop calling me babe, it''s creepy?" Marsha didn''t seem too pleased with Nick''s resistance but tried to sound polite anyway: "Don''t play dumb with me, Nick. You obtained some benefits from the realm right, like that corpse that you brought out for inspection and don''t you dare try to bullshit me? There is no way that was an ordinary corpse if you went through the trouble of bringing it outside of the realm." "My dear Marsha, I think that you are pondering too much on other people''s business but since we''re apparently ''best friends'', I''ll tell you what, do something for me and I''ll meet up with you tomorrow to discuss the exam as well as some other things that I have in mind..." Marsha''s interest was slightly piqued, not expecting Nick to want her to do something for him. (What could little Nick want from me, more money?) "What do you want?" Nick has been feeling a strong urge ever since his interaction with Cindy last night and thought of a way that he could easily solve it without getting into too much trouble. "That girl that I saw you with in your room the last time that we met before the exam, could you send her to my room tonight, making a similar deal with her again but for dealing with me instead of you?" Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.Marsha stared blankly for a moment after Nick finished speaking and then came to a realization; she smiled and spoke with a pseudo-sweet tone: "Oh, I get it now, so that''s what you want. Well...I can arrange a meeting with you and my little pixie but what''s in it for me? Do you think that just a meeting with you is worth so much effort? Don''t get cocky Nick." Nick squinted his eyes and spoke: "Inheritance." "What?" Marsha was confused at what Nick meant by that until she remembered what Rebecca had suggested last night in front of all of the students. It was that Nick might have gotten a Magician''s inheritance from the corpse. "You mean to say..." Nick interrupted her and pretended like he was busy. "Sorry Marsha, something important just came up, I''ve got to go. Send the young woman over tonight to the River-Run dorm, room 32 and make sure that she knows what she''s getting into." After saying that, Nick hung up the phone and finished his breakfast. Slade asked with an uninterested tone: [What are you planning? I can read your thoughts but I want to hear your intentions spoken directly.] (It''s nothing that you need to worry about. I just need to scratch an itch and I saw a way of getting it done. Oh, and don''t worry, I''m not going to actually tell Marsha anything about the benefits that I gained within the realm.) [Then I can be at ease.] Nick threw away his trash and headed to the General Beast Store where he was set to have a meeting with the operator of the store. After thirty minutes, Nick got to the store and walked in. As soon as he walked in, he was spotted by Marshall, the clerk that had introduced him to his boss Carla the last time that Nick was here. Marshall came from behind his desk and walked up to Nick with a smile. "Nick, I hope you''ve been well since the last time that we met. I won''t waste any of your time with chit-chat, let''s go to boss Carla''s office and get things started." Nick nodded and Marshall silently led him up the stairs to Carla''s office where he knocked the door and waited about thirty seconds before someone opened the door. Nick looked on as Marshall greeted his boss, Carla Jenner. She was a lady that looked to be in her early thirties, she had dark brown hair that reached all the way down to her lower back, she had a white complexion, a slim build and she was wearing a pants suit. She greeted Marshall and then looked at Nick with a plain expression and said: "Good morning, Nick Capitol. Come into my office so we can sort things out. Marshall you come too, you''ll mostly be the one interacting with Nick for future transactions." Marshall looked ecstatic as he and Nick were led into the office where a man that seemed to be in his fifties was sitting at a table sifting through documents. There were three seats at the table, one for the middle aged man, one where Carla sat beside him and one where Carla motioned Nick to sit opposite them; Marshall was told to stand at the side. Carla spoke strictly: "Nick, this gentleman beside me is Howard Marks and he is my lawyer. Now, we have already drawn up a basic contract where in seven and a half months, you are to deliver 20,000 of your animal holding scrolls to my business where we will pay ¡ê11,000 for each one assuming that they are the same quality as the previous one that I was shown. Here, read through the contract and then if you are satisfied, please sign the document." Carla motioned and Howard handed Nick a set of documents that were about ten pages long. Nick felt a slight headache looking a the legal jargon but took his time reading through each page carefully. Nick spent about the next two hours reading and re-reading the documents before he was satisfied but no one rushed him the entire time because they could understand what signing a contract of that size must have meant to a man as young as Nick. In fact, Carla internally commended him for being so careful; cautious business partners were more useful to her than reckless ones. After two hours of reading and not finding any problems, Nick was ready to sign the contract. (I know that you must have been paying attention, Slade, any thoughts.) Slade scoffed: [This is a business arrangement and has nothing to do with my goal. I will not interfere.] (That''s cold, man. Sigh, I didn''t expect much help from you anyway.) Nick signed the document and its copy which he kept. Carla smiled and stood up, saying: "Although there are no penalties for you failing to complete the contract, be sure not to let me down Nick Capitol. If you have anymore questions, please feel free to come by and ask Marshall and if I need to get involved, he will find me. You can go now." Nick held his contract with slightly shaky hands and then placed it into his backpack. Speaking of his backpack, it still contained his beast capture scroll with the animal that Nick had bought from the store a couple of days ago. Nick had bought the wild animal assuming that he may have needed a little ''help'' during the exam dealing with magic beasts but with Slade''s appearance, that became unnecessary. Marshall led Nick out of Carla''s office and to the front door of the store. Nick left the store and at that time Slade decided to speak. [Listen to me kid, it seems that you have an interesting hobby. Scroll writing...there was a fair bit of that where I came from but it was thought of as an archaic art form but still loved by many Magicians. It just might be what you need to address your current lack of ability to use most types of magic energy. I want you to show me one of your scrolls in action.] Nick was surprised by Slade''s interest at first but soon understood. Slade knew that Nick''s current state made him weaker than other Magicians in an important aspect and so he would need to compensate for that if he wanted any chance of completing Slade''s ultimate mission. (Sure thing...) When Nick was about to speak more with Slade, his phone started ringing, indicating that he was getting a call. Nick looked at the holographic screen and saw that the number was unknown to him. He answered the phone so that he could move on with his day: "Hello, who is this?" The person on the other end sounded serious. "Good day, is this Nick Capitol?" "Yes it is." "This is Gregory Justeen of the enforcement office. You are being instructed to report to our offices immediately for questioning regarding some data that we have processed from the space band that you used in the exam." Nick instantly felt annoyed, knowing that he might have to explain some of the crazy stuff that the space band might have recorded. "Sigh, I will go there immediately." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 66: Interview and the Enforcement Office Nick took out his cell phone and looked up the directions to the enforcement office using the academy''s app. After deciding on a route, Nick proceeded to walk to the enforcement office. On the way, he asked Slade: (What do you think that the space band would have recorded?) Slade seemed to think for a while and then replied: [It shouldn''t have recorded anything that cannot be explained away. When you and I first met, I sensed the active monitoring by the space band and disrupted it until you left the underground space using the power of the formation that I had set up in the area and assuming that the space band cannot monitor your thoughts, there should be no danger of them knowing about me or the events that transpired between you and me. As for all of the times that you spoke to me out loud, that shouldn''t ring any alarms as there are plenty of Magicians with psychological issues, even at your age, because of the varying results of forming mindscapes. As for what happened with the warp bat, you can just say that the warp bat spit you out after it swallowed you, who can predict the behavior of every magic beast? As for Andre Reigns, that rank 8 Magician...it is very unlikely that a World Class Magician would let themselves be spied on and even more so by a tool related to their specialty so you shouldn''t worry about them finding out about him.] (Oh, okay.) Nick felt relieved that most of what happened would probably appear innocuous and that the suspicious parts could probably be explained away but he felt kind of awkward letting people think that he might have some psychological issues. Thirty minutes later, Nick arrived in front of the enforcement office. It was a building complex that covered a large area, about the same as an American football field; its exterior was painted black and white and it seemed to have a flat concrete roof. Nick walked into the lobby through its glass doors and went up to a man sitting at the reception desk. This man was wearing a black suit with a white dress shirt and seemed to be in his early thirties; Nick spoke to him with a neutral tone: "Good morning sir, I was told to come here by a Gregory Justeen who said that he worked for this office, could you please inform him of my arrival?" The man spoke without a change in his plain expression while pointing behind Nick: "No need, he is already here." Nick wore a weird expression and turned to where the man''s finger was pointing and behind him, only a few feet away, Nick saw a burly, seemingly forty year old man wearing a black suit walking towards his position. The lobby was filled with people moving about, carrying on their own business but even with that, the man still stood out. When he was right in front of Nick, the man spoke authoritatively: "Nick Capitol, my name is Gregory Justeen, the man that you spoke with on the phone earlier. I have some questions to ask you regarding your exam experience so please follow me to one of our interview rooms." Nick replied simply: "Lead the way, sir." Gregory turned around and lead Nick down the hall, past a door which required Gregory to use some kind of identification card to get through and after walking for a few more minutes, they arrived in front of a room with a large glass window that allowed you to see the table and four chairs contained within the room. Nick commented: "I think that I saw a room like this in one of the detective shows that I used to watch on TV." Gregory gave a light smirk and motioned for Nick to follow him into the room. Both Nick and Gregory went into the room and took a seat. Gregory started speaking: "Just so you know, our conversation is being monitored for investigative purposes." Nick replied: "I wouldn''t expect anything less." After getting that out of the way, Gregory got straight to the point: "During the end of year exams for the first-years, the space band was intended to act as a monitoring device in addition to a storage device that we could use to better assess your abilities and determine your ranking." Nick thought: (Also to observe our exploration of the realm in order to find possible existing resources, don''t forget that.) Gregory continued: "The space band captured video and sounds of your trials during the exam, obviously private or intimate moments being ignored and/or redacted. The problem we have with your recordings are that there are large periods where the space band seems to stop recording for no apparent reason. Do you have an explanation for that?" Nick replied innocently: "I don''t know much about magic tools so I am ignorant of why the device would stop recording apart from the instances that you mentioned earlier that would be redacted." Gregory''s eyes became sharp and he spoke just as sharply:The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. "Oh, then can you explain what happened after you fell through the ground, trying to track down the source of some sound that you were listening to?" Nick replied with an even tone: "I fell into a cavern and found my way out through a passage that led elsewhere. I don''t know why that wasn''t recorded." Gregory squinted his eyes and asked another question: "Fine. What happened when you were swallowed by the warp bat? Your space band only started recording again a few hours afterwards." Nick replied with some uncertainty: "Honestly, I don''t really know what happened, when I was swallowed, I felt completely helpless, then under some kind of pressure, I lost consciousness. When I woke up, I was lying on the ground near where I had been swallowed. As for why my space band stopped recording, again, I don''t know much about magic tools." Gregory relaxed his expression and said: "Well, whatever happened, that realm will eventually be fully explored by the academy so hopefully some of these mysteries may be solved. Those questions I asked about were the main reason why you were called in but there is one more thing that the academy is curious about but we will not force you to divulge any information." Nick shrugged his shoulders. "Ask away." Gregory squinted his eyes again and spoke: "The corpse of a rank 6 Hero Magician, it''s pretty interesting that you found it, right? To save your life, you jumped into a filthy pool of water and happened upon it. How did you know the corpse''s value?" Nick was about to open his mouth when Slade intercepted him: [Kid, don''t lie. These people are not fools and since they are asking you directly in this setting, telling the truth about receiving an inheritance may save us some trouble down the line. In any case, it seems to me that trying to recklessly mislead them here has more disadvantages than advantages so just tell them that you received an inheritance but do not speak about its details.] (I think you''re right.) Nick has also been having an intuitive feeling that lying to Gregory about the corpse was not going to benefit him and instead might just cause trouble in the future. "When I was in the pool , I was feeling around and just happened to touch the corpse. When I touched it, the sentient will of the dead Magician appeared in my mind and told me about himself and the corpse and then gave me an inheritance that included the corpse. Of course, I will not tell you the details of the inheritance so if that is what you are after, you will have to torture it out of me." The expression on Gregory''s face eased and he replied: "This academy would never do that to one of its students over an inheritance, we were just a little curious about how a green horn like yourself with no magical background knew the significance of the corpse, that''s all. You know that Regular Magicians are divided into Hero, Lord and Conqueror Magicians, right?" Nick replied: "Yes, I''ve read about those designations in books." Gregory nodded and spoke: "Well, anything having to do with Regular Magicians is usually guarded by the various Magician families and magic organizations because Regular Magicians are their main fighting force. There are many people that are also interested in that corpse of yours so if you are interested in selling it, the academy would like to make an offer of ¡ê1,000,000,000. How about it, will you accept the offer?" Nick''s breathing became ragged after hearing that offer; a few seconds later, he calmed himself down and thought about it: (That''s so much money, with that much money I would be able to flex on my grandaunt and my former classmates for nine generations. The boy with no sense made it big, ha, ha...) After about a minute or so of those thoughts, Nick''s mind sobered and he thought seriously about his intentions: (...but I need the corpse to progress as a Magician and nothing else should get in the way of that. I can always make money but that corpse has a priceless value to me right now. Besides, I don''t really give a damn about flexing on those losers from my past. My path should lead me to becoming the best at whatever I do; revenge and status are not my goals, there can be no compromise.) Nick looked at Gregory with determined eyes and spoke: "No thank you, sir. I have use for the corpse and I don''t think that such a small amount of money can act as a substitute for its real value." Gregory smiled. "A small amount of money, huh? Fine, we''re done here. I''ll escort you from the building now." Nick and Gregory left the interview room and walked to the lobby of the enforcement office. Gregory walked Nick to the exit of the building and said: "Take care young Magician. Between you and me, I think that you made the right choice when I offered you the money. When I was your age, I never could resist offers like that at the expense of my own development and it cost me much. I don''t know your goal, but don''t stop for anything or men like me will eventually get the jump on you." Gregory said that with a cryptic smile and walked away. Nick looked at Gregory''s receding back for a while and the proceeded through the glass doors. (Now that that''s over, I have something important that I need to attend to.) Nick took out his smart phone and looked up some directions on the academy''s app and then made his way to a certain location. ................... "Here it is." Nick stood in front of a building with a brightly painted exterior that had a sign board at the front that read: "Lucky Choice Restaurant" Nick walked inside and made his way to the order counter but before the clerk could ask anything, Nick spoke clearly while releasing the still fresh ghastly serpent meat from his space band: "How much does it cost to barbecue this meat for me?" The clerk looked at Nick weirdly and then and the mass of meat now laying on the counter, still slightly oozing red-black blood; the clerk replied: "Assuming that this is meat from a magic beast, we will require ¡ê3,000 to cook this much meat for you." Nick was shocked. "So expensive." The male clerk shrugged his shoulders and replied: "Anything magic related is usually expensive and these things are not so easy to cook for non-Magicians so a Magician will be doing the cooking. What kind of beast did this meat come from?" Nick replied: "It came from a serpent magic beast with a strong affinity for soul magic. I want it cooked as soon as possible and served with some good sauce." The clerk wrote what Nick said down on a piece of paper and left the counter to go to the kitchen. Two minutes later, the clerk returned with two young men that took the beast meat into the kitchen and the clerk spoke to Nick plainly: "The chef said that the meat will probably take anywhere from one to three hours to cook depending on the quality of the meat so please have a seat and wait. Oh, I will also need to see your payment receipt if you are paying with the academy''s app." Nick paid the restaurant via the the app and showed the clerk the receipt. Satisfied, the clerk pointed Nick to one of their window seats, so Nick sat there and looked and the crowd of students walking outside on the street, wondering about his own future. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 67: Katherine Dell Nick sat in his seat for a seemingly long time, going through the events of the end of year exam in his mind and thinking about how far he had come: (I''ve actually survived my first year in Richter Order Academy, I''ve become a rank 1 Apprentice Magician and I''m on the verge of making a living for myself. I''ve come a long way from not being able to afford food and having to deal with the constant criticisms of others. Things have gotten better in a way and it was extremely hard getting to this point but since I survived, I''m very satisfied with myself. There should be a two month break before my second year semester begins so I should use that time to get ahead, pushing towards rank 2 Apprentice Magician. I also have new spells to learn and create and a business opportunity to work on...) Nick''s mind started to become muddled when he thought of the growing complexity of the tasks that he had to complete but his mind became focused again when he thought of his advantages that he could use to complete those tasks: (I have my own mystical language, Nickel, for manipulating rule magic, I am now a scholar in soul magic and I have a mountain of information on space magic along with knowledge of corresponding spells and formations. Let''s not forget about my ability to create scrolls; with all these little advantages, I really am a beast...) Nick continued to think about his possible next moves for almost two and a half hours. He only stopped when the restaurant''s server came to his table, laying out dishes of meat and sauce made from the ghastly serpent carcass. "It''s finally ready." The server nodded and said: "Let us know if you would like anything else." The server left and Nick started eating the meat and was shocked at how good it tasted. (I didn''t have any seasoning with me during the exam so I didn''t get to fully enjoy the meat but I didn''t think that its potential for flavor would be so great. Whatever sauce that the chef used on it is giving it a sweet yet rich, meaty taste; the texture is also great, kind of like fried chicken with no sort of sponginess from chewing on fat. Yup, this is the best thing that I''ve ever eaten; I think I''ve found my new favorite past time.) Nick spent the rest of the afternoon eating and savoring his meal and by the time he was done and satisfied, the time was about 6:30 pm. With a full stomach, Nick threw away his trash in a nearby trash bin and left the restaurant to head back to his dorm room. When Nick stepped into his dorm room, the time was 7 pm and so he went to the bathroom and took a shower and afterwards sat at his desk to look at his new contract with General Beast Store. (I still have about two and a half hours until the results of this year''s exam are sent to my email so I''ll just review this contract until then.) Thirty minutes into reviewing his contract, a soft, continuous knock was heard at his door. Nick was confused. (Who would be knocking at my door and at this time of day?) The next moment, Nick remembered the conversation that he had with Marsha that morning and he became serious. Nick placed the contract into his backpack and hid it under his bed. Nick walked to his door thinking: (It''s time to see whether I can really rely on that Marsha character.) Nick opened the door and he saw a red haired woman with a white complexion, pearly white teeth and a slim body standing stoically at his door; she was wearing a fitted yellow blouse and an orange, fitted skirt that reached to her knees. Nick remembered the time when Lana also appeared at his door but he knew that this time was different; he was not the same person as he was back then. Nick spoke with a slightly nervous voice: "Marsha sent you, right? Please come in." The woman stepped inside and Nick locked the door and turned to her, asking her a question: "What did Marsha tell you, oh and my bad, I forgot to ask for your name?" The woman spoke without much liveliness in her voice: "My name is Katherine Dell and before I talk about Marsha, can I ask you something?" Nick replied: "Shoot." "Why did you ask Marsha for me?" Nick took a second to think and answered while shrugging his shoulders: "You''re a pretty woman and I saw you naked, that''s all that there is to it." The woman closed her eyes, let out a breath and opened them again and spoke: "Let me make this clear, the only reason that I am continuing to deal with that monster Marsha is because of arrangements we had made before and during the end of year exam and what this is, is just carrying out a business arrangement. After we''re done, don''t talk to me casually when you see me and If I hear any rumors, I''ll know it was you." Nick squinted his eyes and replied: "A business arrangement, huh? That''s how I see this too. Now, can you answer my initial question?" Katherine nodded and replied: "Marsha and I made a deal that involves her selling me a certain magical tool in exchange for our meeting tonight in addition to that I no longer owe her for some events that took place during the exam. As for what will happen tonight, since I know that monster will ask you what happened, let''s just get on with what you want." Katherine proceeded to take her blouse off and throw it on the floor, revealing to Nick her yellow bra and her flat stomach. Nick didn''t know what to do for a few seconds and thought: (Am I really going to go through with this; this arrangement feels weird even though I am the one that asked for it? Sigh, even my body is shaking a little right now, this is pathetic. Whether I like it or not, this is also a part of my growth, I need to remove hesitation in times like these.) Nick''s eyes became determined and he held Katherine by the hand firmly and led her to his bed without saying much and picked her up slightly and placed her on the bed. Katherine lied on the bed watching Nick to see what he would do next. Nick took off his t-shirt, shorts and underwear, feeling slightly embarrassed about being naked in front of a woman he didn''t even know. Nick was about to join Katherine in the bed when a thought came to his mind.Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. (Oh wait, I forgot to buy a condom, do they even sell those on campus?) Nick felt like face palming himself at this moment. There was no way that he was going to risk getting this girl pregnant but he had already gotten this far and it would be ridiculous to stop his own momentum. Nick remembered a few videos he saw during his time in high school when some of his male classmates where showing illicit videos that they had downloaded off of the internet when the girls weren''t around. Nick didn''t really want to watch the videos but he found them pretty hard to ignore at the time when he heard the sounds that they made. Nick decided to do what he saw in one of those videos. Nick reached for Katherine and took off her skirt and underwear with no resistance from her then he placed her in a bent over position like what he saw when he had walked in on her and Marsha before. Nick licked his right palm and rubbed his saliva on his engorged private part; the next moment, he spread Katherine''s butt cheeks and guided it towards his groin, thinking: (I''m a certified goblin.) Katherine wasn''t expecting much because she was fairly experienced with men her age. When it came to rich families on Grand Earth, most children had some sort of sex education by the time they were in high school and with many willing participants, most young people were very promiscuous and the better your background, the more opportunities available for this kind of activity. While Nick was guiding her lower body towards his groin, she thought: (This will probably be over quick, he was so nervous, even though he tried to act calm.) Katherine was in a neutral mood until her eyes opened wide in shock as a jolt of pain could be felt from her bottom. (What the hell, he put it in there?) Nick spoke with an authoritative voice at this moment while he gave a deep stroke: "Don''t resist too much; you said before, let''s get on with whatever I want, right? Well, you asked for it." Katherine gritted her teeth and hid her face in the bed sheets as Nick delivered stroke after stroke. ......................... An hour and a half later, Katherine got off of Nick''s bed and picked up her underwear, skirt and blouse and put them on before she left without saying another word to Nick. Nick lied on the bed and looked at the closed door for some time without saying anything. After a few minutes, he got up and took another shower. While showering, he thought: (That was...satisfying in a base sort of way but still did not match up to the pleasure of me forming my mindscape or creating my first spell. Glad to know that I wasn''t missing out on much.) After his shower, Nick got back to his desk and turned on his laptop and logged into his email account. The email from the academy was there waiting for him. Nick opened it and saw his grade as well as the new rankings for the first years;his grade was still ''S'' but his rank was pushed back all the way to number 9, but he was apparently still regarded highly by the academy according to the remarks in the email except that they said that he was mostly a one trick pony and he lacked some fundamental magical training but the quality of his magic power was extremely high and his spell which they assumed to be original was very well crafted for someone of his age and rank, also, they said that he had some talent for fighting against magic beasts and exploration of the unknown. "One trick pony? Did they not notice that I used soul pressure or soul vision during the exam." Slade commented: [Probably not, at least it is not likely with just the monitoring of the space band alone. that''s one of the advantages of soul magic, the spells are very discreet unless you want them to be loud so the magical tool was probably unable to pick up on your use of soul magic in the latter days. The results might have been different if someone that specializes in soul magic watched the recording though, this evaluation seems very subjective so it is probably based on the bias of a particular Magician.] "Well, I guess that is to be expected." Nick looked at the rankings with more attention and saw that Marsha was now ranked 16th while her associate, Greg North was ranked 13th. Nick also saw some other familiar names: Daryl Smith, rank 7 Don Bartholomew, rank 35 Marcia Dunn, rank 115 Cindy Reece, rank 52 Jean Raymond, rank 27 Jerry Taylor, rank 11 Nick did not really know any of these people personally, but it is probably a good thing to keep track of the standing of familiar names to gauge their improvement. When Nick looked at the name in the rank 1 position, he was slightly surprised, then when he thought back to the events of the exam, he realized that it wasn''t so strange. The person in first place was: Jessica Jones, the female Apprentice Magician that Nick had met at the waterfall. (I did feel that there was something weird about her. It''s good to know that that feeling had some substance behind it, even if it was just intuitive.) The email stated that the new school year would start in September, two months away and that students had to formally apply to spend this time away from the academy. In any case, the email declared that for those students wishing to leave the academy for a short period, the day after tomorrow, all students would be allowed to leave the campus from 6 am and return at 6 pm. Nick had a few thousand dollars in his bank account and wanted to do something in person anyway so he would definitely be leaving the academy grounds on that day. Nick turned off his laptop and went to bed. (I won''t be doing any more physical exercises until the day after I leave the academy grounds in order for my body to rest properly. Tomorrow''s a new day, I can''t wait.) Nick meditated for about an hour and then went to bed and slept until the next morning. ....................... RING RING RING RING Nick woke up at 5 am to the sound of his alarm and he got out of bed to take a shower, brush his teeth and get dressed. An hour later, Nick picked up his backpack and went to the cafeteria for breakfast. There was a few dozen other students in the cafeteria besides Nick and some even watched him as he bought his breakfast of eggs, pancakes and orange juice. Slade commented: [You seem to have gained some attention.] Nick noticed but didn''t care because these people didn''t, in fact, care about him, they were just curious about his ranking. (Story of my life.) Nick sat down to have his meal and a woman sat down across from him two minutes later. Nick took his eyes off of his food to look at who it was and so he saw Marcia Dunn, Don''s servant, sitting opposite of him. She spoke using her small, pink lips: "Greetings Nick Capitol. Let me congratulate you on your ranking. Achieving rank 9 in the exam must not have been an easy feat. I was thinking that the food in this cafeteria is pretty good. Is it possible that I could sit with you to have a meal when we encounter each other in the cafeteria like this again?" Nick raised his right eyebrow in awkwardness and replied: "I don''t own the tables or chairs, do what you want, although, I don''t know why you would want to sit next to a less than." Marcia awkwardly nodded, knowing full well what Nick was referring to but she ignored the implication and replied while getting up: "Well, let''s have a meal together next time then." Marcia left with a slightly embarrassed but determined expression. Nick''s forehead skin creased as he openly frowned. (These people are becoming like flies.) Slade chimed in: [It''s natural for people to want to associate with the strong even if they know that they offended you in the past. Remember what I said, right or wrong does not play that much of a role in most people''s thinking. It''s all about benefits. You''ll get used to it.] (No, I won''t.) [Well...if you don''t accept and acknowledge their efforts to get to know you, they will start to hate you and throw proverbial stones your way.] (If that happens, I''ll ignore them like always.) [Have it your way, kid, but the stronger you get, the less you''ll be able to simply ignore your enemies.] Nick understood what Slade was saying but he didn''t want to think about that for now. Nick took out his smart phone and made a call to Marsha. Nick waited for a few seconds until she finally answered the call. "Good morning babe." "Marsha, I told you to stop calling me that. Anyway, in honor of our deal, let''s meet up at the library in the next hour, how about that?" "Hmmm...since, I already completed my end of the deal, I''ll be deciding where we meet up. I haven''t had breakfast yet so meet me at the High Spirits Restaurant around that time, we''ve got much to discuss. Speaking of our deal, did you actually fuck Katherine''s ass last night for over an hour, ha, ha? I didn''t know that you were that rough, color me surprised. I''ll see you in an hour." Nick''s face flushed with embarrassment as Marsha ended the call. Nick looked at the phone for a while and thought: (Sigh, I really hate loose lips.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 68: Through The Gates Nick finished his breakfast, threw away the trash and left the cafeteria. Based on the directions that he got from his smartphone, High Spirits Restaurant should be a twenty minute walk from his dorm so Nick made his way over, standing at the restaurant doors about twenty five minutes later. Nick looked around and saw that the streets were filled with students, most going into stores and others going into restaurants and cafes; most everybody was with a friend or group of friends in contrast to Nick''s situation where he has been at the academy for one year but did not have a single friend. (That''s probably a good thing, not that most people would agree with that.) Slade chimed in with a mischievous tone: [Is the woman you''re meeting now not your ''friend''?] Nick replied: (Not everyone who helps you is your friend, right? That''s the situation with Marsha; honestly, something about that woman gives me the creeps.) [Ha, ha, ha. Well, at least you have some discernment. I may just be a will but I''ve still retained some of my capabilities with wisdom magic and when you were having your conversation with this Marsha character, my intuition was signaling that we should be wary of her.] (What''s that warning based off of?) [It could be the information I''ve gathered from your thoughts or it could be based on something that I am not consciously aware of, intuition from wisdom magic can be obtained from the smallest and most innocuous stimuli. Anyway, do what you will with my small warning.] Nick walked into High Spirits Restaurant and saw that there weren''t much customers in the restaurant at this time, not even Marsha who mentioned before that she liked to be early for events was here yet. Nick went to the female cashier and ordered a chocolate covered doughnut and after receiving the doughnut, he took a seat at the far left corner of the dining area, waiting for Marsha to arrive. Nick wasn''t much interested in the doughnut, he only bought it so that the restaurant supervisor wouldn''t say that he was loitering and so he mostly thought about what he was going to discuss with Marsha. Nick had a certain intention behind meeting Marsha, it was to get some financial support in order to complete the contract that he got from Carla Jenner. Producing 20,000 high quality magic scrolls was no easy task and assuming that he wasn''t going to create each one perfectly, he needed ample supplies in terms of ink, paper and storage devices. All this required money which he did not have but he knew for sure that Marsha was wealthy or at least her family was; it was a long shot, but he wanted to form a profit sharing partnership between himself and Marsha. Nick kept going over how the conversation might go in his mind and just like that, over thirty minutes had passed and Marsha still had not arrived, although it was well past their agreed upon meeting time. (Am I being stood up?) Nick silently shook his head. (She suggested the restaurant and even helped me with Katherine last night, there''s no way that she would put in all that effort and then not show up. I should give her a call to see what''s taking so long.) When Nick took out his smartphone and was about to make the call, Marsha finally walked into the restaurant but she was not alone. Nick squinted his eyes as he looked at the person Marsha had brought along. "That''s...Greg North." Nick remembered the blue eyed, blonde haired young man whom he had met during the end of year exam. (This is unexpected, I wonder what excuse Marsha is going to use for bringing him along.) Nick didn''t even have to make himself known as Marsha spotted him not long after she entered the restaurant. Marsha smiled brightly and motioned for Greg to follow her to Nick''s table. "Hello Nick, good to see you, I''m sorry I''m late but I ran into my associate, you remember Greg North from the exam, right?" Marsha made an excuse and pointed to Greg as if to break the ice. She then walked up to Nick and pat him on the shoulder. Marsha came so close that Nick could smell the fragrance that Marsha was emitting, Nick didn''t like Marsha''s chumminess but endured it for the sake of his intentions. "Well, I''m going to order some food and I''ll be right back." Marsha ran to the cashier without even explaining why Greg was even here which angered Nick a great deal but he did not let it show on his face. Greg sat down opposite to Nick and spoke: "I bet you were not expecting me, right? Sorry to interrupt your date like this but since Marsha told me this morning that she was going to meet the rank 9 student in our year to talk about the exam and magic, I just couldn''t resist and tagged along. It''s nice to see you again." Greg reached out to shake Nick''s hand and as he was about to tell Greg that he did not want to shake his hand, Nick caught a whiff of the scent that Greg was emanating. A sudden realization came into Nick''s mind and so he grabbed his backpack from beside his chair, got up and left the restaurant without giving Greg a reason or telling Marsha why he was leaving. Nick walked quickly towards his dorm. Slade was confused by his actions. [Why did you leave so suddenly and without an explanation?] (Their scent?) Slade grew even more confused. [What about their scent?] The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.(Both Marsha and that playboy had the same scent coming off of them. What those people do together are their own business but the fact that he came along with her and that they shared a similar scent is too coincidental, they are likely in cahoots.) [So what? Alliances between Magicians is nothing new and even intimate ones are common place. Why alter your plans because of this revelation?] Nick said with a vein bulging from his forehead: (Look, you''ve read my thoughts so what I''m about to say should not come as a surprise but anyone who plots against me deserves to die, I don''t care who they are or what their reasoning. I warned Marsha once and she decided to pull some bullshit again. She seemed useful but now I think that she''s more trouble than she is worth. Those two having some kind of alliance is none of my business but when she starts forcing me to deal with people I hardly know, to me, that is no different than treachery. From now on, I will not be personally involved with Marsha Cassidy.) Slade was a little caught off guard by Nick''s extremeness in this matter. [You know, kid, I only vaguely sensed it before as you went through the exam but I can definitely confirm it now.] (Confirm what?) [That you and I are very similar people. You''ve got the devil inside of you.] (Huh?) Slade went silent. ............... Greg North sat in his chair, a little shocked by Nick''s sudden departure after he tried to shake his hand. "What could that have been about?" Greg heard running foot steps approaching him and turned his head to see Marsha coming closer to him, her normally cute face clearly radiating anger. "What the hell happened?" Greg shrugged his shoulders and replied: "I have no idea, I stretched my hand out to shake his and then he just left." Marsha felt troubled, she had planned to use this opportunity to form some sort of coalition between the three of them but instead Nick who she thought would definitely be an asset left before she could make any serious moves. (I''m not surprised that he didn''t shake Greg''s hand, he''s not the friendly type...oh. He must have become suspicious after he saw that I brought Greg. When we talked in the library in the past, he told me to be straight forward with him but I did not think that my little power play would illicit this kind of reaction, that''s not normal but then again Nick is a Magician, is he supposed to act normal? Sigh, I messed up.) Marsha rubbed her forehead in frustration and said to Greg: "My plan failed and I''ve probably pissed off a possibly very troublesome guy so at least for now, let''s leave Nick Capitol out of our arrangement." Greg shrugged his shoulders again and replied: "That''s fine with me." ................ Nick got back to his dorm room and Slade asked him: [Now what?] "Now...I have to move forward without Marsha in mind." Nick looked at his smartphone and saw three missed calls from Marsha, all in the last thirty minutes. "Hmph, I won''t willingly be the target of anyone''s schemes. Slade, when can I start using the corpse to repair my soul?" [At any time really. The process involves drawing a formation that involves a certain mystical language and it will definitely not be pleasant. You will probably need a day or so to recover from the physical and mental strain of the process.] "In that case, I''ll start tomorrow after I come back from my outing." Tomorrow the academy would be giving all of its students permission to be off campus grounds for about twelve hours so Nick wanted to use the opportunity to initiate his plans for fulfilling the contract that he had with the General Beast Store. "The contract will be more difficult to complete without outright financial support like I was planning to get from Marsha but I can think of a few ways to get the ball rolling. When I get back to my room tomorrow, I''ll need to repair my soul because I can intuit that my magical capabilities are impaired right now." Slade chimed in: [And you''d be exactly correct. I was waiting on you to try to use your magic before explaining things but you haven''t up to this point so I hadn''t gotten the chance. With your soul damaged as it is, you''ll probably find it very difficult to perform a spell. Go ahead and try.] "Sigh." Nick tore a piece of paper from his notebook that was on his desk and attempted to use Big. The laws started to form in his mindscape, then half way through, they collapsed. A line of blood emerged from Nick''s mouth, going down his face; the spell had failed and he received a small backlash. "I can''t focus when creating the symbols for the laws." [The mind and soul are tightly linked and at your level, any damage to the soul will significantly impact your ability to perform spells and manipulate magic in other ways so take note and be wary of making deals with strange Magicians.] Nick could hear the smugness in Slade''s tone but he ignored it since Slade was right. "I''ll spend the rest of today meditating and then get some sleep at around midnight." Nick sat at his desk and started his meditation; the magic energy within his room became turbulent as a rotating whirlpool of magic energy formed over Nick''s head. Some eight hours later... Nick opened his eyes and the whirlpool of magic energy dispersed. Nick got up from his chair and was immediately hit with a wave of exhaustion. This was supposedly the consequence of meditating with a damaged soul, his mind was put under twice the stress. Nick waddled over to his bed and fell into it, going into a deep sleep. ................ RING RING RING RING Nick''s alarm rang at 5 am and he shakily got up out of bed. Nick ran to take a shower and after that he got dressed. Nick went to the cafeteria to get a breakfast of two servings of eggs, sausages and toast with an orange juice. Nick took thirty minutes to eat his breakfast and then headed towards the academy gates. Twenty minutes later, Nick stood in front of the same gates that he stood at almost one year ago, feeling nostalgic. Nick looked around. (Why isn''t there a stream of students itching to leave the academy grounds.) Nick walked to the guard post near the gate which he had to report to before leaving the campus. The male guard stationed there sat at a desk in a well made steel booth and looked on as Nick approached him. "Good morning, sir. I would like to leave the campus today and return a few hours from now. By the way, why are there no students rushing to leave at this time, it seems strange?" The guard answered Nick nonchalantly: "That''s because most students who intend to leave will do so in a few days, staying with their families for the two months that classes aren''t being held. Third years mostly never leave campus unless for a mission and generally only a few second and first years bother leaving the campus today." Nick nodded in understanding. "Well, can I just leave now?" The guard reached for a plastic covered card on his desk that had the academy''s logo of a lion eating its own paw and that had the words: ''Student'', on it. The guard spoke: "This card should be worn visibly at all times so the that local authorities know who you are. If you commit any crimes while off campus, the academy will be responsible for administering your punishment and depending on the severity of the crime, that could include execution. This card also has protection properties to keep you from injury as you are not allowed to use your magic against non-Magicians until you are in your third year. This card will also act as a tracking device and if you ever need help just speak the word ''help'' with serious intention or tap the card three times continuously and the academy will find and help you within seconds. Be aware that if you do this while not being in danger, you will be charged a fine." Nick nodded his head and took the card from the guard and pinned it on his left chest pocket, making it clearly visible. Nick then walked through the academy gates. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 69: Whats In My Heart Nick walked to the nearest bus stop where he waited fifteen minutes for a bus that would go to London''s central district. Nick sat in the bus with his empty backpack, having left his contract in his dorm room. The bus ride to the central district was only thirty minutes at this time of the day, accounting for morning traffic. The central district was where many buildings that offered public services could be found. One such building was where Nick was heading to, the Companies Office, where he would form a limited liability company with him as the sole shareholder. These days, entrepreneurship was a wide spread practice and so the government made it easy for individuals to form LLC''s for their own legal protection and to stimulate the economy, mind you, for every successful entrepreneur, there were one hundred unsuccessful ones. Nick thought that forming an LLC should be the first step towards completing his contract, well, that''s what entrepreneurs in the movies he watched in the past did. Nick got off of the bus and made his way to the Companies Office. State run agencies these days commonly operated from 6 am to 8 pm so Nick saw a fairy long line when he stepped into the building. (Maybe I should have done this online?) That was an option but since this was the first company that Nick was forming, he wanted to do it in person to gain some worthwhile experience. Nick waited in line for forty minutes before he was able to speak to the female clerk: "Good morning, I would like to form a limited liability company with me as the only shareholder." The clerk looked at Nick with an unimpressed gaze then took out a stack of documents and explained: "Fill out these documents and present us with your government ID and we will have your company legally formed in short order." Nick took the documents from the clerk and found a table to sit at in one of the far corners of the room; Nick spent the next three hours carefully reading and filling out the document. Nick had left the very first question on the form for last because he did not immediately have an answer: ''What will be the name of your company?''. Nick thought for some time and finally wrote down a name that he thought was fitting. (The Magic Scroll Company.) Nick felt that the name was boring for sure but it got straight to the point. Nick smiled as he handed in the documents for the formation of his company. The female clerk looked through the documents and nodded before saying: "Come back to me in one hour and I should have your company certificate and all the other documents ready." Nick nodded his head and turned to leave the building. Once he was on the street, Nick tried to find somewhere that he could have an early lunch while he waited for the documents to be ready. Nick spotted a fast food restaurant near the end of the street and made his way there. (Hmmm...this should be very close to Caterbury University where that ''sister'' of mine attends. It''s been a whole year since I''ve seen my grandaunt and sisters. Sigh, it hasn''t been long enough.) Nick walked into a restaurant called, QuickChick. Nick looked at the menu and mostly saw fried chicken based meals so he ordered one with two pieces of fried chicken, fries, a biscuit and a soda. Nick picked up his order at the pick-up counter and walked towards a window booth to enjoy his meal but when he got near to the window booth, he saw a person that he knew staring right in his face. (Sigh, I really do have some kind of weird luck.) The young woman who was looking Nick in the eyes was his own older sister that he had not seen in a year, Narissa Capitol, eating a meal similar to the one that he had just ordered. Nick wore an indifferent expression as Narissa momentarily looked at the card that was attached to his left breast pocket. Nick wasn''t surprised that she took notice of it because there was practically no one who did not look at London''s two magic academies with some sort of reverence despite their unwillingness to enroll in them themselves. As Narissa was about to say something, Nick walked past her booth and sat at the booth two booths away from her, facing the opposite direction. (Out of sight, out of mind.) Unfortunately for him, Narissa did not seem to want to leave him be; she walked over to his booth and said with a smile, while standing beside the booth''s table: "Brother Nick, how could you just walk past your own sister without saying anything? I know we weren''t exactly close while you were living with us but that''s no reason for us to be estranged, right? Can I sit with you?" Nick wasn''t even going to entertain her so he gave a simple reply. "No." The smile on her face became a little bitter at Nick''s response and she spoke: "Fine, you don''t want to talk to me because of how you were treated while living with our grandaunt but I was just playing a part in Irene''s play. You know how she is, going along with her bullshit was the only way that I could shift her malice away from me. Can''t you understand that? We are siblings and you also have a younger sister; you are the only brother we have, are you really going to have nothing to do with us?"Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author. Nick pretended to think for a while then replied: "Yeah, that''s right. Now, can I get back to my meal?" Narissa''s eyes became visibly watery after hearing those indifferent words but she decided to take out a piece of paper and write down something on it, placing it in front of Nick when she was done. "This is Tracy''s phone number, she also wants to be a Magician despite how dangerous I told her attending one of the academies would be. I know that we were not much of sisters to you, but blood is thicker than water and she is your blood. Tracy will be entering her final year of high school in the upcoming semester; she was only doing the same thing that she saw Irene and I doing, you shouldn''t blame her. Please give her a call, I know becoming a Magician is dangerous and I don''t want to hear about my sister suddenly dying for no good reason, your help would be appreciated." Narissa left the paper on the table and walked out of the restaurant. Nick looked at the piece of paper with a phone number on it for quite a while and the picked it up, tore it in two and let it fall to the ground. (Out of sight, out of mind.) Slade was seemingly amused: [Don''t you care about what happens to your family?] Nick replied coldly: (Those people are not my family. I was born and lived among them but they persisted in harming me for no good reason. The fact that I''m not planning to butcher them is a show of my ''care''. Sigh, many of these people just don''t understand the consequences of their actions. They scarred me for life and now that my situation is better, she thinks a cheap apology and crocodile tears can remedy the hurt. That''s laughable. I''m not naive and this isn''t a television drama; anyone who chooses to harm me of their own volition deserves to die, I don''t care about their reasons. I will help whomever I see it fit to help but I will damn whoever goes against me or returns my kindness with enmity.) Slade laughed manically at Nick''s rant: [Ha, ha, ha...] Nick was confused. (Why are you laughing?) [Remember when I said that you had the devil inside of you, kid?] (Yeah, but I still don''t get that. I don''t know if I''m necessarily a good person but I''m definitely not evil.) [Kid, what I said has nothing to do with being evil. Where I come from, a ''devil'' is simply a Magician who has extreme ideologies and religiously lives by those ideologies; the hypocritical Magicians who abhor such ideologies call those Magicians who embrace them demons or devils. These so called demons are unrestrained and merciless in their actions and are often at the center of turmoil and tragedy, in the name of some goal. While I was alive, I was such a Magician and that is ultimately what led me to my death.] (Oh, so are you going to convince me against being extreme in my thoughts?) [Hah! Of course not, I was born with nothing, given nothing for free and was mistreated by the entire world while I was powerless just like you so I can understand your feelings. Because I was alone and could only rely on myself, I focused on my goal of becoming one of the strongest Magicians with absolute obsession and my life up until my death became a very satisfying journey despite the pain. I''m not trying to tell you how to live, you can only become a truly phenomenal Magician deciding that for yourself. I''m just making you aware, you probably won''t be able to get along with anyone else, not really, if you continue with your extremeness and you''ll probably be alone for a very long time but in exchange you may reach greater heights than everyone else. Are you willing to make such a personal sacrifice for goals that may well result in your death?] Nick looked at his meal and thought about Slade''s question: (Am I willing? A friend would probably be nice, maybe a girlfriend, a family. Becoming the strongest Magician isn''t very likely but having some loved ones is very possible if I put in some effort. With my status as a Magician alone, I can probably get a girlfriend right now; that seems better than moving endlessly towards an unreachable goal.) As Nick was having these thoughts, he remembered the lone figure made of golden light that walked on a never ending road in his mindscape and his intuition poked at him. Nick immediately started internally chanting his meditation and entered his mindscape, being careful not to cause a commotion. Nick''s consciousness appeared next to the walking figure of light as it stepped forward on the never ending road. As the figure walked along, Nick couldn''t help but ask, not expecting a reply: "Why continue to walk?" Unexpectedly, the figure of golden light stopped walking and turned to look towards Nick''s consciousness as if reacting to his question. The figure pointed to the left side of its chest as if to indicate something and somehow Nick understood its meaning: "Because this is what''s in my heart." The figure turned away from Nick and continued walking. Nick''s consciousness left his mindscape and he ceased chanting and slowly whispered the answer he received from the figure: "Because this is what''s in my heart." Nick felt a trace of inspiration and rushed to the order counter to ask if he could borrow a few pieces of blank A4 paper and a pen. Nick got back to his seat, ignored his food, and wrote down, in Nickel, possible additions to his existing meditation: "My lonely road." "The rules of it are determined by me and only me." "Not even death can restrict this devil''s heart." ....................... For the next two hours, Nick wrote down additions to his own meditation and when he finally lifted his head from the papers that were glowing a dull red light, Nick felt satisfied with himself. (I can''t wait to properly merge this with my existing meditation.) Suddenly, Nick felt something amiss, he looked around and there was a whole restaurant of people looking at him as if he was a crazy person as he had been speaking to a glowing piece of paper for the past two hours. As Nick put the papers into his backpack and got up, the other customers saw the ID card attached to his left breast pocket and their eyes filled with realization. Some of them seemed to want to speak to Nick but he quickly exited the restaurant and made his way to the Companies Office. He went inside, walked up to the same female clerk that he had interacted with before, presented his government ID and received his company documents, stuffing them into his backpack. (The Magic Scroll Company has been born!) Nick thanked the clerk and left the building, going to the bus stop where he boarded a bus heading to the academy. Nick thought back to the inspiration for the additions to his meditation throughout the thirty minute bus ride. Nick got off of the bus and walked to the academy gate. He stepped through it, feeling a similar pressure come over him then disperse, like the first day that he had arrived at the academy. He walked to the guard post and handed in their student ID card to the male guard stationed there. The guard looked at Nick and said almost sarcastically: "Welcome back." Nick replied with an earnestness that the guard had never seen before coming from a student: "It''s damn sure good to be back." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 70: Repaired Soul Nick went to the academy bookstore and purchased a pack of multicolored chalks and then proceeded to his dorm, stopping at the cafeteria to have a meal of fried chicken, gravy, mash potatoes and vegetables. After his uneventful meal, Nick went straight to his room where he threw his backpack on his bed and spoke to Slade: "Let''s get my soul fixed as soon as possible, I still have to return the space band that I am using to store Sahashi''s corpse." Slade replied: [I will be placing the outline for the formation that you are going to be using among your thoughts. Ensure that you draw the symbols correctly as there can be no deviation if the repairing process is to work. The mystical language used in the formation is a rather complex and dangerous one so don''t bother trying to decipher it or you will hurt yourself, literally. Any questions?] Nick thought for a moment. "Since I''m now a scholar in soul magic, should I be able to use a similar formation to deal with the tampering that was done to my soul?" [Theoretically, yes, but you don''t have such a formation, you don''t know how to invent one as creating formations is a vast field in its own right and you may have some understanding of soul magic but without enough experience, trying to undo the workings of a Regular Magician at your rank is a dream.] "Ha, ha. I was only speaking in terms of possibilities, you''re right. I''ll start drawing the formation now." Nick spent the next three hours carefully drawing the formation that would supposedly repair his soul. The mystical language that the formation was based on was indeed completely unknown to Nick and the arrangement of the symbols did appear complex so there were many times that Nick had to erase them and then draw them over again. After three hours, he finally had a circular formation made of symbols that seemed right. "Why do these formations look like the magic circles that I saw in TV shows that I used to watch, even the formation used during the end of year exam looked like a magic circle? Do all formations look like this?" [Not necessarily. I don''t know anything about ''TV shows'' but formations are usually created to the tastes and biases of the inventor so any similarities are probably a coincidence.] [Alright, kid, now that you''re done drawing the laws, we can get to the next step. Most formations need some sort of magical base in order to work such as items filled with magic or magical laws or an environment or living mass with those laws and/or magic. The formation is like a catalyst but we need elements for some kind of reaction. One of the elements we are going to use is you and the other will be the corpse of the Rank 6 Hero Magician that is filled with laws related to soul magic. Take out the corpse from your soul band and place it in the center of the formation.] Nick did as Slade said, taking out Sahashi Miyamoto''s corpse and placing it at the center of the formation. The formation had a radius of about two meters and was situated in Nick''s living/bedroom but since the only furniture that Nick had to speak of was a bed and a desk, the formation was drawn without obstruction. [Now sit beside the corpse and start chanting the words that I''m about to place in your thoughts. As I mentioned before, the process of repairing your soul is going to hurt but you cannot stop during the process because failure would likely have dire consequences for you. Do you understand?] Nick swallowed some saliva and replied: "Yes, I understand." Nick took a seat beside the corpse and crossed his legs for comfort; he started chanting a passage in the same mystical language that made up the formation, Slade having translated the symbols into English letters and placing them into Nick''s thoughts. The moment Nick started chanting, the formation lit up all around him; after a few minutes, small bluish lights in the shape of spheres started emerging from the skin and flesh of the corpse beside Nick and flowing into Nick through his own skin. At first, Nick didn''t feel any change then gradually, a feeling of discomfort developed as more spheres of light flowed into his body; the scene looked like a gathering of fireflies. After about one hour, Nick started to feel real pain, like the kind that you would get from a sore muscle but he felt it all over his body; Nick gritted his teeth and started chanting in his mind which still kept the formation going. This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.After three more hours, Nick''s entire body felt sore, in addition to that, his abdomen felt like it was hovering over a medium flame, being slowly roasted. Nick didn''t know how much more he could take but he gritted his teeth and continued chanting internally. At some point, unbeknownst to Nick, because he was so distracted by the pain, a black substance began oozing from his pores as a foul, sulfur like smell filled his dorm room. Nick endured the pain and the stench for another two hours before the pain receded and the spheres of light were now fully absorbed into his body. The light of the formation faded and Nick was left in darkness as it was already night time. "I did it." Nick whispered these words weakly as he fell backwards onto the floor, becoming unconscious covered in a blackish filth. Nick lied on the floor, unconscious for all of the next day until he woke up in the middle of the night. He got up off of the floor and checked his phone for the time. "I slept for more than eighteen hours and my mind still feels weak. What the hell is that smell?" After his mind cleared a little, Nick realized that there was an unbearable stench all over his room, distinct from the smell of the black filth that his body was covered with. Nick looked over at the corpse in his room and felt suspicious. "Is that thing rotting?" Slade answered his question: [Yes it is. It was preserved mostly by the power of its own laws but since those laws were transferred to you, it became just another quickly rotting corpse. You should get rid of it quickly before it attracts pests.] Nick tapped on the corpse with his space band and it disappeared. He proceeded to open a window to let the stench out and then went to the bathroom to take a shower. Nick didn''t worry about the black filth that may have fell on the floor as the room had a self cleaning function. Nick got out of the shower and tried to get a feel for his situation but did not notice any obvious change. He tore a piece of paper from his note book and used his spell, Big, on it and the paper grew double its size. "At the very least, I can perform spells again." Nick said that with a smile and then got dressed and left his room for the cafeteria since he had not eaten in one whole day. The cafeteria was almost empty at night but that was alright with Nick. He ordered a meal of baked chicken and pasta and after getting a hold of his food, he moved towards the corner of the cafeteria where he was planning to eat his meal. Some ten meters from his destination, Nick had a thought: (I actually know a spell that can get me to my destination in an instant.) When Nick had made his deal with Andre Reigns, he not only received an aptitude for space magic but also basically an encyclopedia on space magic and over two dozen spells seared into his mind that he could recall when he wanted. Nick thought for some time and realized that there was a rank 2 spell recorded in his mind that would have the effect of teleporting him over a short distance called ''Blink''. Nick placed his tray of food on a nearby table and remained standing while thinking about the laws of the spell that were in Valteese. (Hmmm...this shouldn''t be all that complicated to cast. The spell''s description does indicate that it has a high consumption rate at 4500 magical units per cast for a rank 2 Apprentice Magician and it could only transport the Magician a maximum of fifteen meters.) Nick spent ten minutes thinking about the spell and then decided to make an attempt at casting it. Nick picked up his tray of food and then started forming the laws for Blink in his mindscape, however, when he was two thirds finished, he made a mistake in forming one of the symbols and the laws collapsed, resulting in him having a coughing fit and a line of blood slowly coming from his mouth. The few other people in the cafeteria took notice of Nick''s circumstance and recognizing the signs of magic energy being exuded from him and Nick''s coughing fit, they assumed that he had failed to cast a spell and simply ignored him. (One more time.) Nick started forming the laws for Blink within his mindscape once again and this time after careful attention to detail, he completely formed the laws of the spell and cast it. In an instant, Nick moved eight meters from his position to near the place that he was aiming for but at a cost of most of his magic energy; Nick sensed that he did not have much magic energy in his magic sea left. (What consumption? Even if this is a rank 2 spell, I was only able to barely cast it and teleport a decent distance because of the advantage of my special mindscape having an extremely high magic holding capacity. Does space magic generally take this much magic energy to use successfully?) Slade answered his question: [Some types of spells require more magic energy to cast than others and spells that result in some kind of teleportation generally require much more magic energy than other spells of the same rank. The type of magic doesn''t necessarily have to be space magic for that to apply.] Nick silently nodded his head in understanding and as he was about to finally move to his table, he could feel eyes burning holes in the back of his head. Nick turned around to see that the few other students that were in the cafeteria were staring at him. Nick understood why, an aptitude for space magic was one of those rare affinities on Grand Earth and so not many people practiced it freely and the ones that did were almost always backed by some organization or large Magician family. Space Magicians were rare and based on the magic energy that Nick exuded while casting the spell, the spell was definitely of high quality. Only a Space Magician would use high quality space spells; not many people personally knew such Magicians so when the students witnessed Blink in action, they were surprised and became curious as to who Nick was and that was why they were staring at him. Nick decided to ignore the stares and took a seat in order to enjoy his now lukewarm meal. While he was eating, a tall young man with a wide smile and curly red hair came over to Nick''s table and spoke loudly with a carefree tone: "Hey man, why don''t you and I have a spar!" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 71: Eat Soul Nick looked up away from his meal to see a red haired, white young man standing opposite of him on the other side of his table: "Huh, why would I spar with you?" The red haired young man looked excited despite Nick''s reply and said confidently: "My name is Merick Asher from the Asher family. You''ve heard of us, right?" Nick replied flatly: "No, I haven''t heard of your family and you still haven''t answered my question." Nick had only become associated with Magicians a year ago and there are hundreds of famous Magician families so he would not know of every one of them. Merick replied fervently: "Well, we are the family with two of the top ranked Magicians in the country. Besides that, we are always looking for great talent and after seeing you use that spell, I assumed that you have an affinity for space magic. Am I correct?" Nick had no need to hide it since he had already performed a spell in front of so many people, he would have to reveal it eventually anyways so answering honestly now is akin to ripping a band-aid off. "Yeah, sure." Merick looked pleased that he guessed correctly. "In that case, let''s have a spar so that I can see your skills. If they are up to par, I''ll give my family a call right away and have you recruited. How does that sound?" Nick scoffed: "Hmph. I don''t want to be recruited. Now leave so that I can finish my meal." Nick ignored Merick and started eating his meal. Merrick looked as if a bug was caught in his throat. (Why wouldn''t he want to be recruited by my family. Is he stupid? A future licensed Space Magician is a powerhouse that some companies would pay billions to support. Although this person looks a little rough, there''s no mistaking the quality of the apprentice grade spell that he just used. No one without a powerful inheritance just uses teleportation spells like that.) Merick composed himself and took a seat at Nick''s table. "Hey, I think that we got off on the wrong foot. Come to think of it, I never asked what your name was. My bad. Mind letting me know what it is?" Nick was annoyed but answered just to be polite: "It''s Nick Capitol." Merick''s eyes shone with uncertainty when he heard Nick''s answer. "Nick Capitol...that name. Wait, aren''t you ranked 9th in our first year. Well, I heard that you were in this dorm but I never really checked because I''m usually busy during the day. It looks like I have even more reason to try to recruit you." Nick''s right eye twitched. (Can''t this guy just shut up.) Merick continued speaking: "You know, for a future Space Magician, the Asher family would be willing to pay you a few million in allowances and might even engage you to one of my sisters. Arranged marriages sound old fashion but who would not want to be engaged to a wealthy heiress..." Merick went on with his futile attempt to convince Nick until Nick had had enough. "What exactly do you get out of convincing me that you are going through this must trouble so late at night?" Merick stared blankly for a second as if the answer was supposed to be obvious and then replied: "Well, I''m competing with my siblings over the highest positions in the family and recruiting capable people into the family would be a big help to me." Nick nodded his head in understanding. "Well then, that does make sense but I''m not interested so you should stop right now or else you and I might have a real problem." Merick noticed that the look in Nick''s eye became sharp and knew that if he continued trying to convince Nick, it would only backfire so he stopped, saying: "Fine for now, I''ll leave you alone to eat your meal but we will speak again Nick Capitol." Merick got up and left the cafeteria. The other students were curious about Nick and Merick''s conversation as some of them were able to recognize the identity of the two but as soon as Merick left the cafeteria and Nick started eating again, they turned their attention towards their own meals and conversations. Nick continued eating for the next twenty minutes, at the same time, thinking: Unauthorized duplication: this narrative has been taken without consent. Report sightings.(Being recruited by some family sounds like becoming their employee. Whatever resources they give me would definitely not be without requirements. I don''t need that right now when I''ve just started my path; I need freedom to develop my own methodologies and ways of doing things so joining a Magicians'' family is not ideal.) Nick finished his food and left the cafeteria. By the time he got back to his dorm room, the stench that was lingering in his room had already been filtered out. Nick closed his window and started making plans. (In the next two months before my second year starts, I need to sort through all of the space magic related information that I have gained, increase my proficiency with soul magic, push toward rank 2 Apprentice Magician and create a new rule spell that I have in mind.) Nick smiled. (This grind is going to be fun.) Nick sat at his desk and meditated for three hours before going to bed. ............................................. The next morning, Nick woke up at 6 am and did a few reps of pushups which he hadn''t done in a while due to all of the strenuous activities that he participated in recently. After showering, getting some food at the cafeteria and returning to his dorm room, Nick spent the next four hours going through math questions in one of his textbooks stored on his laptop. When he was done studying math, he started going through the information on space magic that was stored in his mind. (Space magic involves the manipulating of the dimensions of reality, including the first dimension, second dimension, third dimension and so on. It is one of the oldest and most obscure areas of specialty in magic and is feared for its ability to allow its skilled users to cross distances effortlessly and to make attacks discreetly as well as other amazing feats...) As Nick went through the information, he couldn''t help but lick his lips as he started to realize all the advantages of space magic. He began to feel that his sacrifice of his other insignificant affinities was worth it. He may not be able to use magic besides rule, soul and space magic but he felt assured that as long as he worked hard, that fact should not be much of a handicap. Nick stopped going through the information at around six and went to the cafeteria for a meal. When he returned to his dorm room, he asked Slade: (Uncle Slade, since I''m a soul magic scholar, my understanding is good but my real experience is lacking. You promised me a soul path inheritance, I need to have it now to make use of my attainment.) [You sure are greedy, kid, not being satisfied with your space magic gains. Ha, ha, but if that weren''t the case you would not be worthy of my, Slade Terrence''s, methods. A deals a deal, I will give you the entire inheritance now. I did not give it to you during the exam so as not to tempt you into doing anything wild within that realm and to keep you focused on my instructions.] [Give me a moment, I''ll imprint the inheritance in your mind so that you won''t ever forget it using a wisdom path method.] Nick frowned. (I thought you said that you couldn''t use magic to affect things easily. You''re now saying that you can cast magic on my mind?) [Don''t get the wrong idea, kid, my will has many laws infused in it to allow me to use various methods by making use of the natural magic energy around us but it is difficult without a good set up like some kind of formation or the current bond that I have with you. With that in mind, I will need your cooperation to imprint my inheritance in your mind, if you resist at all, I won''t be able to perform my method, do you understand?] Nick squinted his eyes in suspicion but quickly got over it since Slade had not hurt him thus far. (Do your best Uncle Slade.) Slade spoke with a flat tone. [Remember, don''t resist.] Within the next minute, Nick felt a large volume of information flooding into his mind and in a few moments he knew that he had obtained a wealth of information that he had not known a minute earlier. The process felt similar to what he went through when Andre Reigns passed on the space magic ''inheritance'' to him, but different somehow. Slade chimed in after reading Nick''s thoughts. [It feels slightly different to you because my method is pure wisdom magic while that rank 8 magician''s method was not pure wisdom magic. It was probably magic that had the effect of imitating wisdom magic.] (That''s possible?) [Not only is it possible, it is extremely common among high level Magicians. It is something that you will be able to do once you have a high enough attainment with a certain type of magic. Since you are a scholar in soul magic, it shouldn''t be that difficult so long as you get enough experience and practice.] Nick nodded his head in understanding. Nick spent some time sorting through the inheritance that he had just received and eventually, Nick thought: (Soul magic methods are really effective in combat situations and work best with a strong soul, I need a method to strengthen my soul.) Soon after having this thought, Nick came upon such a method in his mind. (''Eat Soul''. This method would allow me to strengthen my soul by consuming the souls of other living beings. Hmmm...it seems that this method would work best on non-human targets because it does not have the capability to filter out the extreme emotions that human souls would possess.) Nick understood that because he was a soul magic scholar. "Interesting." Nick spent some time practicing forming the laws for Eat Soul in his mind and after an hour, he felt that he knew enough about the spell to use it. Nick went into his backpack and took out his beast capture scroll, intending to use it. (What I''m about to do could end very badly but no risk, no reward.) Nick unfurled the scroll and willed its activation. The magic in the air around Nick flowed into the scroll and the markings written on it vanished. In a moment, five meters from Nick appeared a vicious looking adult leopard standing in his bedroom/living room. This was the dangerous animal that he had bought from the General Beast Store right before the exam. Nick had intended to use it as some kind of distraction or aid if he fought a tough magic beast but he never actually needed to use the leopard. The leopard looked at Nick menacingly and seemed like it was about to lunge at him. (Soul Pressure.) The leopard froze in place because of Nick''s spell. Nick smiled and thought: (Soul Pressure is really useful. Eat soul needs a live target to be effective and since that leopard will die if it attacks me because of the General Beast Store''s methods, I needed to use Soul Pressure to immobilize it while I cast the spell.) Nick didn''t waste any time, he opened his mouth and cast the spell with his finger pointed at the leopard. (Eat Soul.) In a moment, an almost translucent miasma was exuded by the leopard''s body and flew straight into Nick''s mouth. After that happened, the leopard fell to the ground, lifeless. Nick closed his mouth and wiped it with the back of his right hand. (That wasn''t so bad but know I feel a little agitated.) Slade clarified at this moment: [That is natural. When the soul becomes stronger suddenly, there will be some agitation depending on the method used. Since Eat Soul is an apprentice level spell, that is the case. You need to deal with the agitation or it will subtly affect your mental state. You can most effectively do this by going to sleep.] Nick nodded in agreement; he was a soul magic scholar so he already understood this. He couldn''t sense the improvement but he knew that the spell worked and improved his soul by a little. Nick looked at the lifeless leopard carcass and had an idea. (I think I can strengthen my soul greatly in a short amount of time.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 72: Calming The Soul Slade asked even though he knew what Nick was thinking: [How so?] Looking into the methods that Slade had given him, Nick explained his plan to Slade. ... After listening to Nick''s explanation, Slade responded with an amused tone: [Well, you are certainly thinking like a Magician. Your plan will work at your level but at higher levels, doing the same effectively would be incredibly difficult.] Nick responded: "I know. I''ll start my plans tomorrow." Nick stored the leopard''s carcass into his space band and went to bed. ......... The next morning, Nick walked into the General Beast Store looking for the clerk, Marshall, who was supposed to be his point of contact with the store. In a few moments Nick found him at the counter. Marshall saw Nick as soon as he walked in and with a wide smile, Marshall walked from behind the counter to greet Nick fervently: "Hello there, Mr. Nick. What brings you here today. Are you going to discuss your contract with us or perhaps buy some animals." Nick motioned Marshall to the corner of the room where they could put some distance between them and the other customers; Nick spoke: "I would like to obtain a large amount of animals from you today. Their species does not matter, nor their age, nor their health, I just want a large number of them and keeping in mind the deal that we have already, I would like to purchase them on credit." Nick said the last part with some nervousness as he knew that it was a big ask but he did not think that it would be impossible for the store to agree to his request. His biggest reason for believing this was that the contract that he had with them had a relatively large value, much more than a few hundred animals and trying to deepen their cooperation with him was in their best interest because if Nick delivered, the store could reap an immense profit. Marshall''s smile became slightly forced as he heard Nick''s request. (What is this young man thinking. He has not even fulfilled his contract yet and he wants to buy animals from us on credit and what''s even stranger, he doesn''t even care about the type or quality. While we do have many animals to be put down because of their inability to be sold because of disease, temperament , ecetera, that does not mean I should just give them to him.) As if reading Marshall''s thoughts, Nick took out a business card that he had printed this morning and spoke: "You would not be giving credit to Nick Capitol but to The Magic Scroll Company." Marshall listened to Nick''s words and looked at the business card that had ''Nick Capitol - CEO of The Magic Scroll Company'' on it and almost felt like laughing in Nick''s face but he resisted the urge. (Sigh, this young man must be crazy. Considering the contract that we have with him, I shouldn''t turn him down outright. I''ll inform Carla of the situation first and have her turn him down so as not to sour my relationship with him.) "Mr. Nick, I''ll have to ask boss Carla if you are eligible to receive store credit. Please give me a moment..." Nick watched as Marshall went back to his counter and made a phone call. ......... "What? He wants to buy a large quantity of random animals on credit. What for?" "Boss Carla, I did not ask that since I had no intention of complying in the first place. I just wanted to inform you before I reject his request." Carla sat in her office chair, smiling with an amused expression as she held her office phone to her ear. (Marshall is a decent store clerk and I do plan to promote him to supervisor since he works so diligently but, in regards to the ways of Magicians, he is almost clueless even though he interacts with them often. Nick Capitol, my sources tell me that he was ranked 9th in the first year and there are even whispers about him having an affinity with space magic. Making alliances with promising Magicians is always a priority but Marshall doesn''t seem to understand that. Considering this kid''s ability with creating magic scrolls as well as his ranking in his academic year, there is no harm in deepening our relationship with him; if he becomes a powerful Magician and we helped him, the benefits that I would reap would be great. In that case I would be willing to give him a million useless animals on credit not to mention a few hundred.) "Give his company the animals on credit, we should have a little over one hundred useless animals in stock right now. What did you say the name of his company was, The Magic Scroll Company? That''s so boring." Marshall was shocked that Carla would so easily give the animals away to a kid with no business experience. "Boss Carla, is this really okay? How is he going to pay us back for the animals when he is only a student in school?" Carla replied, annoyed: "Just do as I say. Besides, if his status as a student was really a concern, you shouldn''t have introduced me to him in the first place." Marshall awkwardly scratched his head because he knew that Carla was right. Carla went on to say: "I have a good feeling about this kid, call it a Magician''s intuition. Give him the animals on credit and give him two months to pay us back or we will triple the price and subtract it from what we will owe him when he fulfills his contract." The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.Marshall had no choice but to go along with Carla''s decision. "I''ll do as you say boss." Carla ended the call and Marshall went to Nick to relay what Carla had said to him. "...Do those terms sound fair Mr. Nick?" Nick was excited, he believed that he could get something out of them but did not think that Carla would agree to give him all the animals that he wanted and with such reasonable terms of credit. (This woman is not simple. She definitely has some schemes in mind but then again, so do I.) "I accept those terms. How long until you can gather the animals?" Marshall thought for a moment and then replied: "We can have the animals gathered for transport in about thirty minutes but it will take about two hours to have the Apprentice Magicians on our payroll use the magic formation to teleport the animals to a location on campus." Nick shook his head, saying: "No need for transport, just gather the animals, I''ll make use of them here." Marshall had a puzzled look on his face, not knowing what Nick was trying to do. "Well, I''ll go give the instructions and then take you to the place where the animals will be brought." Marshall went back to the counter and made a few calls and when he was done, he came back to Nick, leading him towards one of the store''s underground chambers. Nick and Marshall walked down a long stair case to get to a very large room, about the size of a soccer field that had several entrances similar to the one that Nick and Marshall walked through. Nick could see the store''s employees bringing the animals that he requested through the entrances. The animals were of many varieties, some clearly dangerous, some not but most commonly, the animals brought all had visible flaws such as being sickly, old, missing a limb, blind, etcetera. Nick didn''t care about the condition of their body, he just wanted their souls. Nick was going to devour all of these animals'' souls this very day. While the animals were still being gathered Nick put some distance between him and Marshall and took out a few pieces of chalk. In a few moments, Nick started to draw a magic formation on the stone floor. Marshall was puzzled at Nick''s actions; never mind that he started drawing on the floor but the part that puzzled him the most were the symbols that Nick was drawing, he had never seen them before. ........... Carla sat in her office watching Nick''s actions on her computer. Marshall had called again telling her that Nick wanted to make use of the animals while still in the store so she gained access to the area''s security cameras to observe out of sheer curiosity. "You really never know what''s going to happen when the circumstances involve Magicians." "Nick is clearly drawing a magic formation and one that is definitely not at the apprentice level. That area is self-contained and magically reinforced so that formation shouldn''t do any damage to the rest of the store if it is harmful and this Nick shouldn''t be crazy enough to try to harm my place, not with me here." Carla watched intently as Nick drew out his magic formation. ............ (It''s almost done. This soul calming formation is at the regular level but since it makes use of the natural magic energy in the atmosphere, that is not a real concern for me. I just need to chant the words of a mystical language to use it.) Nick had learnt this formation from Slade''s inheritance and it stood out because despite it being a regular level magic formation, it could be used by even non-Magicians so long as they knew of the mystical language that manipulates it; the mystical language was one of a few that was recorded in Slade''s inheritance, Nick did not understand it but that wasn''t necessary to activate the formation. This is a formation that uses laws related to soul magic to calm an agitated soul, the stronger the soul the weaker the effect that the formation would have but since Nick just started cultivating his soul, this formation was perfect for what he wanted to do. As for why he was doing this in the store, It was simply because there was no other place that he could discreetly use to contain all of these animals, not to mention that using a formation to transport them would attract a substantial cost that Nick could not afford. It was one thing to ask for the animals on credit but the Apprentice Magicians that operated the store''s formation had to be paid and Nick did not think that Carla would help him in that regard so he decided to devour the animals'' souls here. Nick did not care about people finding out about his method because Slade assured him that the only way someone else could use this formation is if the knew its mystical language which according to him was impossible. Also, the academy protected their students and their students'' creations fiercely in order to nurture them so Nick had not need to be concerned about anyone targeting him. With all this in mind, he decided to take a risk and reveal this method. Marshall came close to the magic formation and asked: "Mr. Nick, what exactly do you plan to do?" Nick smiled and replied: "Just watch." Most of the animals were already in place and there was a little over one hundred of them and so Nick sat in the center of the formation and cast his spell. (Eat Soul.) An old black bear in one of the cages started to move shakily as an almost translucent miasma rose from its body and flew ten meters to enter Nick''s mouth and be swallowed by him; the black bear then fell to the cage''s floor, lifeless. Nick could feel the agitation of his soul from consuming that animal''s soul. Nick began to chant some words of the formation''s mystical language and the formation began to glow with a bright crimson light. In a few moments, his agitated soul was calm and the formation stopped glowing once Nick stopped chanting. Marshall stood at the side with his mouth agape. (What the hell did I just witness?) As Marshall looked at the young man sitting down in the middle of the magic formation, he felt a chill run down his spine. Nick looked on with cold eyes. (One down.) ............ By the time Nick had finished consuming souls, it was already 10 pm. He had taken over twelve hours to finish because he frequently needed to stop to let his magic energy reserves recover to an acceptable level as Eat Soul consumed about one quarter of his magic sea every time it was used and he also needed time to recover mentally after consuming a certain amount of souls despite the effects of the soul calming formation. Nick got up from the ground and dusted himself off. He currently had a feeling similar to when he ate too much, a kind of discomfort. Slade read his thoughts and spoke: [Your soul has been strengthened to a point that If you continue to strengthen it without refining it, you will die. That is why you are feeling discomfort.] Nick nodded. (That sounds about right. Refining the soul involves removing impurities and excessive magic from it, basically shredding parts of it which is not a very pleasant process, even more so if you do not have methods to quickly heal your soul; it''s a good thing that Slade''s inheritance has those methods. However, I should avoid doing that for now, until I become a rank 2 Magician so that I can reap greater benefits.) Marshall was still standing near the formation looking at the carcasses one 123 dead animals in the distance, all affected by whatever magic that Nick had cast. He turned to Nick and asked: "Mr. Nick, are you done?" Nick scratched the back of his head and replied: "Sure am. You didn''t have to wait here the whole time, you now. I could have found my way back to the main hall." Marshall shook his head, saying: "I would not leave until I finished attending to the customer." Nick shrugged his shoulders and said: "How very professional of you. Well, about the carcasses..." Marshall quickly interrupted: "We''ll get rid of them for you, no problem." Nick smiled because he did not want to stuff all of the into his space band one by one. "Alright, since my business here is complete. I will be going now." Marshall nodded and led Nick to the main hall where unexpectedly, Carla Jenner was there waiting on them. Nick looked at her with confusion. (Why would she be here this late? It couldn''t be because of...) Before Nick could finish his thought, Carla spoke with a tone that did not permit a refusal to her request: "Mr. Nick Capitol. Why don''t you come to my office. We seem to have more to discuss than I had initially thought." Nick smiled bitterly. "Sigh, lead the way Miss Carla." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 73: Floating Ice Nick sat awkwardly in front of Carla''s office desk as Carla herself looked at him silently with a gentle smile. Nick wasn''t sure why but that smile made him feel uncomfortable, like he was a mouse within the line of sight of the cat. Nick noticed that Marshall did not follow them into Carla''s office and thought: (This is probably supposed to be a conversation between Magicians.) Carla wasn''t saying anything and Nick suspected that this was a tactic to fill him with unease and force him to speak first, revealing more than he should. Nick internally sighed, although he understood this, since Carla was much stronger than him, he had to play along with her and spoke with a tired expression: "Miss Carla, it is really late and I have other business to attend to. What is this about?" Carla frowned slightly at Nick''s lack of eagerness to speak with her; as a rank 4 Apprentice Magician, even military generals had to treat her with respect but thinking back on the day that Nick had been through and his obvious youth, Carla decided to not ''discipline'' the young man. "Well Nick, the formation that you used within my store interested me very much. It was clearly not an apprentice level formation like the one we use to transport our beasts but you were able to use it. Do you mind telling me where you got it?" Nick smiled bitterly and replied: "Miss Carla, you should know better than to ask a Magician about their methods, even if I was skinned alive I would definitely not reveal where I got my magic formation from." Carla expected such an answer as most Magicians were selfish when it came to their methods. "Okay, fair enough. I am asking questions because I think highly of you. I noticed that your formation used soul magic; since you are ranked 9th within the first year, you are fairly famous on campus among your peers but they know very little about you because you do not interact with them. Since you and I have business, I did some digging and it was brought to my attention that you''ve used magic of an unknown nature publicly as well as space magic; this is all public information. Now you have shown some capability with soul magic. Nick, as a favor to me for giving you so much store credit, I would like to know: what kind of Magician are you?" Nick was a little caught off guard by that question because Carla seemed to have a deep intention for asking it. Nick awkwardly scratched his head and replied: "Miss Carla, I hope that you can appreciate that I am still trying to answer that question myself so I don''t really have an answer to give you." Carla looked at Nick for a few seconds and nodded. "Fine, I''ll accept that answer for now but since that answer was really vague, I would like to ask a favor of you to as a kind of compensation." Nick sighed internally. (The strong have the right to be unreasonable. I should have expected this when I asked for credit and then revealed my magic formation.) "What is it Miss Carla?" Carla smiled sweetly and replied: "Oh, it''s nothing much. A month from now, my family is having a little tournament where we ''seniors'' choose juniors to be our champions in order to compete and decide on the distribution of certain benefits. Only persons under the age of 25 are allowed to compete in the tournament and I have not yet chosen a champion. I want you to be my champion in this tournament and win me some benefits." Nick did not expect Carla to ask this of him. "Why choose me?" Carla replied simply: "Magician''s intuition." Nick squinted his eyes a little. "You know that I am not allowed to leave the campus, right?" "That''s not a problem, I can get you permission to leave the academy for a period of time with me as your ''supervisor''. I am a proud graduate and sponsor of Richter Order Academy after all." Nick''s eyes squinted a little more. "What exactly do I get out of this arrangement?" Carla replied: "You get my friendship." Nick smiled, knowing that Carla was bullshitting him. In this world there were only benefits, friends and enemies were just fancy labels that people used to deceive each other to obtain the greatest benefits. "Miss Carla, if that''s all then I''ll have to refuse your request." Carla sighed, feeling that this young man was a little difficult to deal with but with the academy rules in place, she could not use a heavy hand against him so she had to convince him. This tournament was important to her as it would contribute to her standing within her family and she needed a good champion to win and Nick seemed like a good choice based on her own intuition that had been refined after years of business. (I should just ask him what he wants in return.) "What would you like as a reward for competing Nick?" Nick smiled in fake appreciation in response to the question and replied: "Hmmm...I would like an opportunity to explore another realm if that is possible." Carla did not expect such a request. Exploring realms was a common thing for licensed Magicians but was not for Magicians in training because it exposed them to a fair amount of dangers including other Magicians but exploring realms was also a way for Magicians to train themselves and find opportunities. With Carla''s connections, it would not be difficult to get Nick permission to enter one of her families private realms, most of them being drained of their natural resources except magic beasts anyway. Carla said: This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author''s consent. Report any appearances on Amazon. "That''s easy but if you die in one of my family''s realms, I will not be held responsible. Do you accept that?" Nick''s smile broadened. "I can accept that." Carla nodded. "Good, in exactly one month, I will take you to the tournament venue and you are to do your best. You can leave now." Nick said goodbye to Carla and left the General beast Store. On his way out, Slade asked: [Of all the rewards that you could have suggested, why choose exploring an unfamiliar realm?] (I did so because the end of year exam brought me so much benefits that I am eager to explore another realm to test myself. I realized that I need more combat training and real world experience if I am going to survive this place.) [If that is your reasoning, then I won''t object. So what''s next?] Nick took out his smart phone to looked up some directions and then made his way to the academy''s magical tools office to return his space band. The process was easy since Nick only had to present his ID along with the space band to the clerk in the reception hall; he didn''t even need to get rid of the contents as the clerk would do it for him. Nick returned to his dorm room at about midnight and went straight to bed. (Tomorrow, I''m going to start integrating the new parts of my meditation into the old version.) With that thought, Nick fell asleep. .................... Nick woke up at 6 am and did his usual reps of pushups, showered and had a meal in the cafeteria. When he returned to his dorm room, he retrieved his notes with the new parts of his meditation from his backpack and went through them at his desk. (Hmmm...I thought that adding these new passages to my existing meditation would be easy but now I think that doing so might be a little difficult. Mystical languages attract magical power based on the will of the Magician and these words are my encoded will. I had a certain intention when I first created my meditation and based on my understanding, adding to it will either enhance the meditation or change the nature of it or ruin it entirely. My experience with Nickel is limited so I should be careful.) Nick spent the entire morning rewriting his meditation with the new passages included but each new version seemed flawed for some reason but he could not decern that reason. Slade eventually instructed: [Don''t rush it, kid. Refining your own meditation takes time and experience so its normal to fail at the start.] Nick knew that Slade was right and decided to stop rewriting his meditation for today. (It''s time to do some actual meditating.) Nick sat down at his desk, closed his eyes and started internally chanting his meditation, nourishing his mindscape. The process of becoming a rank 2 Apprentice Magician was simple but not easy. One simply had to nourish their mindscape with magic energy until a qualitative change occurred with the amount and quality of the laws contained within the mindscape and the Magician had to have a properly advanced version of their existing meditation. Nick did not satisfy both of the requirements as yet so he had a lot of work to do compared to his year-mates because of his special mindscape which needed more nourishment than was normally required. Nick finished meditating at around 7 pm and since he felt hungry, he went to the cafeteria for a meal. Nick ate in the cafeteria and returned to his dorm room when he received a text from Marsha Cassidy which read: "Nick, I know that you and I had a little falling out, not that you gave me a chance to speak my peace but I wanted you to know that I will be spending time with my grandfather until our second year begins. I will see you again in two months. Your best friend Marsha." Nick looked at the message and and didn''t even want to reply. (I swear to only focus on the study of magic. I don''t want friends who are only interested in using me for their own gain.) Nick put down his phone, sat at his desk and took out his notebook. "Now, I have a concept for a new spell that I am going to call ''Copy''. I mostly need such a spell in order efficiently produce copies of magic scrolls so I can complete my contract with the General Beast Store." "Laws, particularly the laws that I make with my mystical language, Nickel, consist of symbols that attract and manipulate magic power. For a magic scroll to work properly, the laws written on them have to be absolutely correct and ideally speaking, two scrolls with the same spell should have identical laws written on them. My spell should be like the magical version of an inkjet printer, making identical copies of magical laws." "From my study of math, particularly mathematical transformation, I know that a way to get that kind of result is to use the theories of symmetry and rotation so those areas are what I need to focus on..." Nick began writing notes and did not stop until midnight, at which point, he went to sleep and woke up at around 4 am. He did his usual reps of pushups, showered and had a meal at the cafeteria. Nick followed this routine for the next two weeks in addition to reviewing the information and spells he had in relation to space magic and soul magic, he practiced math questions and looked through theories on mathematical transformation, he meditated, worked on the new version of his mediation and continued developing what would be his new rule magic spell. Nick felt tired all the time but all of the work gave him an undying sense of fulfillment. At the end of the two weeks Nick had finally rewritten his original meditation into what seemed like a successful improvement. "I''ve finally advanced my meditation. Hmmm, I had some really good progress when working on my new spell recently so it could be that my increased understanding of rule magic helped me in ironing out the flaws in the new version of my meditation. I don''t have an inheritance for rule magic so I have to progress step by step with it but I don''t think that''s such a bad thing. Now, I should test the new version of my meditation out." Nick sat at his desk, closed his eyes and started chanting. His consciousness entered his mindscape and observed it for a long time. His magic sea of crystal blue water churned rhythmically and a few meters above was a figure of golden light that continued to walk on an unending concrete road that had cracks all over it. The stars in the mindscape''s sky shone brightly with one standing out with a bluish-red glow. "There doesn''t seem to be any changes. Sigh, it looks like I have much more meditating to do." "Huh, what''s that?" Nick noticed something he had never seen before floating on the surface of his magic sea. Nick moved his consciousness to take a closer look and was surprised at what he saw. "Is this...ice?" Nick was now looking at a soccer ball sized chunk of ice floating on the surface of the water and felt a little suspicious. "The temperature hasn''t seemed to change in my mindscape so where did this ice come from?" Nick thought for a long time about this sudden change. "Let''s think about this logically. Currently most of the magic energy processed and stored by my mindscape is in a water like form and now an insignificant portion of it has turned to what seems like ice. Well...ice is a denser form of water so does that mean that my stored magic energy is starting to take on a denser, more compact form? That seems close to the truth; this should be the qualitative change that I should be observing as I nourish my mindscape." Nick felt satisfied with the signs of progress that he was seeing and after observing the piece of floating ice for a few more hours, he stopped meditating. "I''m close to a break through, I know it. Slade, with my current progress, how long do you think it will take me to become a rank 2 Apprentice Magician?" Slade answered Nick flatly: [Probably two or three months, its hard to say. I did not have a special mindscape during my lifetime so I am not sure how to judge the changes that take place in yours but I can say for sure that the quality of the magic energy that you are exuding is getting better as the days go by.] Nick smiled silently and decided to work on ''Copy'' before getting some sleep so as to be well rested for what he had planned tomorrow. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 74: I Am The Greatest "That should be enough." Nick spent a few hours meditating after he woke up and did a few reps of pushups. He was now feeling hungry but before going to the cafeteria, he started assessing his progress. "Within the last two weeks, I not only made progress on my meditation and spell creating, I have also developed a better understanding of space magic and soul magic." "To increase my combat capabilities which should be a priority of mine, I''ve decided to focus on increasing my understanding of both types of magic by selecting and using a few select apprentice grade spells from both the inheritances that I possess. I''ve decided to practice four spells from my space magic inheritance, one each for movement, defense, attack and hiding. From my soul magic inheritance, I''m focusing on four apprentice grade spells, one each for scouting and restriction and two for attacking, soul magic is very suitable for combat after all." "In total I have about sixty five spells and formations from both inheritances but I am not qualified to use the majority of them and out of the nineteen that I am qualified to use I only chose to use half of them because of my limited experience and magic energy reserves which does not allow me to use a large number of spells effectively." "My space spells are Blink for movement, Half A Kilometer for defense, Rumbling Pillar for attack and Clear Space for hiding. My soul spells are Soul Vision for scouting, Soul Pressure for restriction and Ghost Eyes and Spirit Quake for attack. With these spells, and the fact that I''ve already memorized their laws, in addition to Big, I should be a more formidable combat Magician." Nick went under his bed and brought out one of his transport briefcases which he opened and took out his battle vest which currently held about fifty of his throwing knives. (My old friend.) Nick smiled thinking of all he had been through with this vest. He hadn''t worn it since the end of year exam and it still had a little smell to it because Nick had never remembered to wash it but he didn''t mind. Nick put on the vest and left his dorm room and after having a quiet meal in the cafeteria, he headed to the battle simulation building where he was planning to spend most of the day. Nick walked into the battle simulation building like he owned the place, swaggering while wearing his smelly vest. Nick walked to the clerk''s counter and asked: "Good morning, is it possible for you to recreate the last simulation that I had encountered when I was here last?" The clerk scrunched his face because of the strange smell that was coming from Nick and replied respectfully despite his unease: "Yes, that is possible, just give me your student ID and I will have that particular simulation recreated." Nick was pleased. He remembered the many defeats that he had experienced in that simulation and would surely avenge himself this time. "I have a question. Do the enemies in the simulation have souls?" The clerk gave a very professional response: "This building uses magic the produce simulations that mirror reality in an absolutely realistic sense so while the simulated enemies don''t have real souls, what they have is very similar in that it behaves the same and can be manipulated the same as if it was a real soul." Nick nodded his head in satisfaction. He was planning to practice his soul spells which would be pointless if his enemies did not have souls. Nick handed over his student ID and after the clerk did something with his computer, he told Nick: "Go to room 4 over there to begin you simulation." Nick took back his student ID and went to room 4 and entered. As soon as he closed the door behind him, the room''s appearance became clear as a cavern with thirteen pillars of solid rock in the distance. Nick smiled, took out two of his knives, one in each hand and ran to the rock pillars. When he was about twelve meters from the pillar farthest to the right, a rock spike jutted out towards him with great speed; as it was close to impaling him, Nick acted. (Blink.) Nick used his space magic movement spell to dodge the pillar, appearing ten inches away from its direct path. Nick successfully used the spell but wore a bitter expression. (The consumption of the spell really is two much. Teleporting ten inches actually consumed over 2000 magical units of my magic energy. I have to use blink sparingly.) After dodging the rock spike, Nick focused on where he felt a source of magic energy existed but was hiding somewhere on the rock pillar and used his next spell. (Soul Vision.) Within Nick''s mind he could now see himself running towards the pillar from a frontal perspective which means his enemy was looking right at him. Soul Vision worked by using magic to form a connection with another being''s soul in order to share their vision. The only requirements of the spell was that the spell''s target had to have a weaker soul and Nick had to be able to sense their magic energy. Devouring all those beast souls two weeks ago had strengthened Nick''s soul beyond the level of a normal Apprentice Magician and at the apprentice level, hardly anyone could stop their exuded magic energy from being sensed once they used a spell so using Soul Vision effectively was no problem. As Nick moved closer to the rock pillar, another stone spike was sent out after him, but instead of dodging, Nick smiled. (Got you. Spirit Quake.) The stone spike that was jutting out towards Nick suddenly crumbled apart and fell to the ground as dust while a fit of coughing could be heard from the rock pillar''s direction. Now, using Soul Vision, Nick saw his enemy''s hand after he had wiped blood from his mouth and now the hand was covered with blood; Nick''s target had coughed up blood as backlash for the failure of his spell after Nick had cast Spirit Quake. Spirit Quake worked by using a magical connection to another person''s soul to cause a quake like disturbance. The soul was closely connected to the mind so causing the soul to quake would violently disturb the mind which would result in any Magician failing while casting a spell, the spell also had a high chance of damaging the soul which would impair the target''s mental faculties. Since Nick and his enemy were already connected through Soul Vision, Nick just had to use the spell at the right time to reap the most rewards. Since he caught his enemy unaware, Nick wasn''t going to waste anymore time. While his enemy was still suffering from the effect Spirit Quake, when Nick got to two meters of the rock pillar, he put his knives into his vest''s pockets and clasped his hands, using another spell. (Rumbling Pillar.) The moment Nick use this spell, 5000 magical units from his magic sea were consumed. The space surrounding the rock pillar in front of Nick seemed to shake violently and cracking, crumbling, breaking sounds could then be heard as the pillar started to fall apart. Rock after rock fell to the ground and eventually a bleeding corpse also fell from among the rocks of the shattered pillar; it was the corpse of a white man wearing a bright red robe that was bleeding from his mouth, nose and ears. Rumbling Pillar was a space spell that caused a section of space to shake, twist and turn violently resulting in what seemed like a loud rumble. The description within the inheritance stated that the spell could shatter solid rock if a high amount of magic energy was used in its activation. Nick was now seeing that the description was true; the corpse of the Magician fell so listlessly that Nick believed that all of his bones must have been broken by the spell. The spell was effective but at the cost of one fifth of Nick''s magic energy. If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. (If my mindscape did not have its special advantage, I would not dare to use this spell so wildly. Most rank 1 Apprentice Magicians only had a 5,000-7,000 magical unit capacity while I have a 25,000 magical unit capacity) Nick noticed some movement from the other pillars as human shaped figures of stone appeared, jutting out from the other twelve rock pillars. They each looked at the dead Magician, then at Nick and with expressions filled with hatred, they hid within their pillars once again. (To end the simulation, I have to kill all of these bastards so there is no point waiting here, I have to take the initiative to end this.) Nick back tracked by about ten meters to position himself as well as to passively recover some of his magic energy. It did not take long before the ground behind him started jutting out with such high speed and harshness, in a crescent shape, that assured Nick that if he was hit, he would die a quick death. Nick ran towards the pillars with a rapid pace in order to out run the approaching attack from behind. Nick had positioned himself purposely so that he was running towards the center of the pillar formation and when he was about eight meters from each pillar, the enemy Magicians finally acted; twelve stone spikes came rushing towards Nick, as if to skewer him from the front and sides but Nick was prepared for this. (Half A Kilometer.) Nick cast his space magic defensive spell and as the stone spikes came within a meter of him, their movements seemed to have slowed drastically. (Half A Kilometer affects a radius of one meter around me and forces all ranged attacks to travel 500 meters to reach me within the affected space so it gives the impression that the attacks have slowed but they just have to travel a really long distance to get to me.) Nick looked all round him at the twelve pillars and smiled, sensing his enemy''s magic power as it was exuded from their bodies. (Spirit Quake.) All twelve pillars crumbled as each Magician experienced a degree of spell casting failure and backlash. (Casting that spell on twelve people simultaneously cost me about 6000 magical units. Some of the spells can actually be used as area of effect attacks and not just on a single target, they are really top quality goods.) (Soul Vision.) With all of his enemies'' visual information at his disposal, Nick took out two of his knives, one in each hand, turning there blade to a horizontal position pointing at the rock pillars to the farthest left and right. (Big.) (Big.) After casting Big twice Nick''s magic energy storage dropped to about two fifths of its capacity and the blades of his knives grew thicker, widened by a meter each and extended, cutting through two pillars, one on Nick''s right and the other on Nick''s left. Nick was forced to drop his knives after the pillars were cut through because of their new weight but his goal had been achieved as two of the pillars fell to the ground and the Magicians that were hiding emerged from their fallen hiding places with menacing expressions. Nick used another spell: (Clear Space.) The two enemy Magicians that came out of their hiding places were puzzled as Nick seemed to just vanish in front of them. They looked around but could no longer see him. This continued until the Magician that was to the left of Nick noticed a blade extending through his heart. "Huh?" That was the Magician''s last utterance as he fell to the ground, lifeless, Nick suddenly appearing in front of the lifeless corpse. The other Magician standing on the ground saw this and was enraged as he clasped his hands and cast a spell. The Ground under Nick''s feet turned into a face and Nick was standing on its mouth; as the face tried to open its mouth in order to swallow Nick, he used his spell: (Blink.) Nick appeared five feet from the mouth''s opening and cast another spell. (Clear Space.) Clear Space was a spell that made a certain area of space seem void of a certain object or objects as if they were not there and it was practically making Nick invisible to his enemies wherever he went while it was active. This spell had very little consumption at 120 magical units per second. When Nick next appeared, he stood right in front the Magician and cast a spell. (Ghost Eyes.) Nick stared with his now glowing purple eyes into the Magician''s eyes and within a moment, the enemy Magician started to drool and lost all the focus in his eyes; soon after the Magician fell lifeless to the ground. (Ghost Eyes uses a visual connection to force our souls into conflict, damage being done based on the strength of our own souls and since my soul is apparently far stronger, my victory was overwhelming. This spell is no doubt deadly, the downside being that if my opponent happened to have a stronger soul, I would be the one to end up as a corpse.) The moment that the second Magician died, four stone spikes rushed towards Nick''s position from four of the ten remaining pillars. "Not so fast." (Soul Quake.) The four stone spikes crumbled as the enemy Magicians experienced backlashes. Nick cast Clear Space and when he reappeared he was already twelve meters from the nearest pillar. (I need time to recover my magic energy. Passively, that should take about three minutes in this situation, I just have to keep my distance and be wary of their spells.) Nick waited for over a minute, continuously moving around because he was wary of his enemy''s spell that could cause the ground to jut out violently but they did not cast it until another minute and thirty seconds had passed. (That should be as a result of the effects of Soul Quake, the Magician''s are having trouble coordinating their attacks.) Nick''s magic energy had recovered to a little over 21,000 magical units so he was not afraid. Nick ran towards the ten remaining pillars until the ground behind him became still and all ten pillars sent a stone spike each toward him. Nick cast Half A Kilometer and ran past the stone spikes without much trouble; he could hear the spikes hit the ground of his former position with a sickening thud but Nick just kept running toward the group of pillars on his right. (Clear Space.) Nick disappeared from the sight of his enemies once again but they could hear his running footsteps so one of the Magicians jumped from his pillar to the ground, landing with a heavy stomp that shattered much of the cavern''s stone floor. During the upheaval, Nick reappeared about two meters from one of the rock pillars and as soon as he could be seen, the Magician hiding within that pillar sent a stone spike toward him. (Spirit Quake.) (Clear Space.) Nick cast two spells in succession and the stone spike sent by the Magician crumbled. This time that Nick cast Soul Quake was different though, in that the Magician that was affected by it was ejected from the rock pillar and fell lifelessly to the ground, blood oozing from his nose, mouth and ears. Nick looked on indifferently. (The backlash probably killed him this time. Being a Magician is dangerous, failing to cast a spell can even lead to your death or it could be that he actually died from the damage of Soul Quake. Soul Quake''s damage isn''t supposed to be high but since Apprentice Magicians aren''t known for having strong soul defenses, my spell might be more effective than it should be and his soul shattered as a result.) Nick didn''t care which one it was, he was just glad that another Magician was dead. Nick quickly found his way to the nearest rock pillar and reappeared but before the Magician within this pillar could attack him, Nick acted first. (Rumbling Pillar.) The space around the pillar shook violently, causing it to crumble completely and from the wreck, the corpse of another dead Magician wearing a bright red robe could be seen. (I''ve got 11,000 magical units left after that attack and eight enemies, this battle really has my blood boiling. Clear Space.) Nick disappeared once again so the Magician on the ground decided to return to his own pillar for a better chance at defending against Nick but before he could, Nick cast his spell. (Soul Pressure.) The Magician froze in place as blood oozed from his nose, mouth and ears. Nick appeared in front of him and used his Ghost Eyes, the Magician only lasted two seconds before falling to the ground lifelessly. (Another one down.) After another Magician died, Nick heard the sound of feet hitting the ground as he turned around and saw seven Magicians standing in unison some eleven meters away from him. (They gathered really quickly, they must have something big planned but they made a mistake. I had always cast Rumbling Pillar at a close distance on purpose to give them the wrong impression and it seems to have worked, they''ve made my job easier.) Rumbling Pillar was a powerful apprentice grade space spell that could, in fact, be cast from fifteen meters away at the cost of a fair amount of magic energy and a decrease in power but its effects were still not something that the bare human body could cope with. Nick''s enemies seemed to be gathering magic energy to cast a powerful spell as the magic energy within the cavern became turbulent quickly but Nick remained calm and clasped his hands. (Rumbling Pillar.) Eleven meters away from Nick, the space around the Magicians shook madly, with far less power than before but the fracturing of bones could still be heard. The Magicians were force to stop their spell casting in order to avoid suffering a backlash but the damage from Rumbling Pillar sent most of them sprawling on the ground. Nick did not waste any time in running towards his enemies to finish them off. (4,000 magical units left.) The seven Magicians were still conscious and seeing that Nick was quickly approaching them, four of the Magicians slowly raised themselves from the ground and each began to prepare a spell to counter Nick, each spell being cast in quick succession. A wave of mud moved towards Nick, one Magician launched a javelin of stone at Nick, another clasped his hands and created a face made of stone under Nick''s feet and the fourth Magician summoned a rock golem and ordered it to attack Nick. Nick felt shivers run down his spine at this moment but tried to remain as calm as possible, putting on an air of indifference. "Pointless." (Soul Quake.) Nick''s spell hit all seven Magicians, bottoming out his store of magic energy; the four Magicians that had cast their spells had their minds disrupted which caused their spells to fail and break apart and they each suffered varying backlashes and died where they stood. The other three got off easier but were too beaten up to move a muscle so Nick easily ran up to them a slit each of their throats with his knives. SIMULATION ENDED Those Neon colored words appeared as the space around Nick warped and he now stood inside a white walled room. Nick looked at the ceiling for some time before doing a fist pump towards it, saying: "I am the greatest." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 75: Plunder Grasp Nick left room 4 with a feeling of satisfaction and decided to head to his dorm for a meal. When Nick got to his dorm''s cafeteria, there was not much activity to be seen as many first year students had decided to spend their two month break away from the academy. Nick would of liked to try out the restaurants on campus but their food was relatively expensive and he was running out of money so the cafeteria was his best choice. Nick ordered a meal of fried chicken, brown rice and chicken soup; he chose a table and ate quietly in the cafeteria, thinking about the battle he had experienced: (My spells are really good but I still require practice using them. The most powerful of them cost a lot of magic energy to use and I even ran out of magic energy twice during the battle even with my large store of magic energy. If that was a real battle, such a circumstance might prove fatal so I should learn how to pace my use of magic energy better.) (Usually, spells that can be purchased on Grand Earth are graded in the same manner as Magicians, starting at apprentice grade 1, 2, 3 and so on but many of the spells in my inheritance are generally graded as either apprentice, regular or world class, which should mean that the quality of their power adjusts according to the quality of magic energy that I use to activate them up to a certain rank. I am not so sure, however, that Big is that kind of spell; I don''t have any proof of that but I have an intuitive feeling that that is the case...) Nick finished his meal in twenty minutes and got up from his table and went to his dorm room. He took off his vest and went to the bathroom to take a shower. When Nick finished showering, he sat at his desk, planning out his daily routine for the next two weeks. "Each morning, I should head to the battle simulation building to have at least one battle and most of the time afterwards I''ll spend working on my spell and studying space and soul magic." Nick nodded in affirmation and turned on his laptop to practice math questions, then he began a four hour session of meditation; when he was finished, it was already night and despite his tiredness, Nick spent the next few hours working on his new spell before going to bed. ................... One week later, Nick exited room 13 of the battle simulation building, feeling exhausted. Nick had spent the last week doing a few battle simulations everyday in order to become accustomed to casting his new spells in battle situations. "I''ve won more than I''ve lost but the fact that these are simulations means that I''m still uncertain as to how I''d do against real, skilled human beings. Sigh, Carla''s tournament is next week and I''m not so sure that I can cancel on her at this point..." Nick exited the the battle simulation building while talking to himself. The clerk who had been interacting with Nick for the last week looked up from his counter towards Nick''s direction, thinking: (Thank god that weird guy is gone, he''s always talking to himself and he smells really strange...) Nick went back to his dorm room at which point he threw his vest onto his bed and rubbed his shoulders. "My throwing knives are finished and I don''t have the cash to buy another large set so this vest has pretty much lost its value. Well...its no big deal since I''m getting the feeling that I''m not cut out for using throwing knives anyway. Come to think of it, I''ve pretty much been using them like swords up until now." Nick shook his head. "I should get some proper weapons training later since I''m so prone to running out of magic energy." The irony was not lost on Nick that somehow, although he had almost five times the magic energy holding capacity of a Magician at his level, he always found himself running out of magic energy during the battle simulations. "I still need to work on pacing my magic energy consumption." Nick took one of his transport briefcases and placed his combat vest inside, locking it away. "The vest actually smells really bad but the tag on it warns not to wash it so I didn''t try to clean it. Now that I think about it, there are probably cleaning spells that could have cleaned the vest so I didn''t have to walk around the simulation building smelling like a spoiled fruit. Hmmm...a note for next time." Nick sat at his desk looking at the version of his new spell, Copy, that he had managed to create up to this point. In his eyes the spell was far from complete and many of the laws that he had already written seemed a little incoherent but Nick wasn''t frustrated at how long it was taking to create the spell since he had learnt much since he started trying to create it. Nick spent the next few hours working on the spell without much progress. At 7 pm Nick went to the cafeteria to obtain a meal as well as to give his mind some rest. As Nick was eating, he thought: (Getting to rank 2 Apprentice Magician is taking a long time despite my efforts. Slade do you have any shortcuts to get to rank 2?) Slade replied as if he was annoyed: [You should know better than that, kid. There are hardly any shortcuts when it comes to cultivating Magic and any shortcut would definitely require a disastrous price to be paid so just continue meditating silently and you''ll eventually get there.] (Yeah, you''re right.) When Nick got back to his room, he sat at his desk and reviewed a portion of his space magic inheritance, thinking: (There are a four magic formations in this space magic inheritance. Two having to do with passing through solid defenses, one having to do with defending against large scale attacks and an incomplete one that has to do with teleporting to another realm.) Since the end of year exam, Nick had become very interested in the exploration of different realms, so much so that he requested entry to a another realm as a reward from Carla. Nick looked closely at the formation design of ''Lost Star Formation'' which had a description that stated: Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions. ''This magic formation was obtained from the records of Thanos The Great, a rank 9 World Class Magician and has been spread widely in this incomplete form which has been proven to be modifiable and can be completed to result in a partly original space magic formation. Depending on how this formation is modified, a Magician can be transported to an unknown realm at a suitable cost of magic energy.'' Nick looked at this description for a while and shook his head. "There is no way that I could complete this formation with my current knowledge and even if I could, would I even dare to use it? What if I was transported to a realm with nothing but lava in it or a realm where I could not freely use magic. Wouldn''t I just be asking for trouble?" Nick pondered for a while more and decided. "I can''t attempt to complete this formation yet but learning about them is probably a wise thing to do since they seem so useful." Nick remembered the formation that he had used to calm his soul while he was devouring beast souls at the General Beast Store and knew that they had high value. "Tomorrow, I will go to the library to pick up a book on magic formations." .................... Jack Macy, the academy''s librarian, placed an introductory book on magic formations on the counter and said to Nick: "Your interested in formations now, huh? I''ve been hearing a fair amount of rumors about a first year who does nothing but study, doesn''t interact with his peers and hardly goes to class and that that person is ranked 9th within the year." Nick replied disinterestedly while looking at the book on the counter: "Oh yeah, people like to talk. I don''t care about rumors" Jacked looked at Nick silently for a few seconds before saying: "Good to know. Well, you have your book so take it and go. Oh, remember that when you officially become a second year, you will be able to borrow more than one book each time so keep that in mind." Nick nodded his head, took the book on magic formations from the counter and left the library. Nick was planning to go back to his dorm room and look over an space magic spell that he had come across in his inheritance recently. As soon as Nick entered his room and closed the door, he threw his backpack onto his bed and sat at his desk with his note book opened in case he needed to make notes. "Plunder Grasp. The inheritance states that this is a space spell but also says that it is a theft magic spell. What the hell is theft magic?" Slade chimed in at this moment: [I''m not surprised that you are unaware of it, kid. Even I only know of this type of magic because I traveled to a few worlds where there were Magicians who practiced it. This type of magic is very obscure in that not many Magicians practice its spells or even have a high affinity for it, even among the many realms that exist.] [The story is that in a certain world, there existed a rank 10 Cursed Magician that pioneered this type of magic and he was also a space Magician. Theft magic, just like its name suggests, is mainly used to steal things in a sense and although that sounds plain, it is actually a very practical and troublesome type of magic. I once dealt with a Magician that stole almost all of my magic energy and used it for his own purposes, he almost killed me but it was fortunate for me that I was still a rank above him and had superior magic energy recovery.] "Okay, its just another obscure kind of magic, right, like rule magic? How comes this description says that the spell is both a space spell and a theft spell?" [No, not like rule magic, rule magic is actually very common outside of Grand Earth. The spell has two classifications because it probably uses both space and theft magic. It looks like you''ve never experienced a dual natured spell before but there are spells that use more than one type of magic. Although, they are difficult to create for someone who is not a scholar in a certain field, those kinds of spells are common place among high level Magicians.] Nick felt excited at the possibilities that this new information opened up. "That''s really interesting, the theory behind combining more than one type of magic must be complex. That just proves how right I was to make a habit out of studying so much. Things will definitely not get easier going forward." "Now, this Plunder Grasp spell is supposed to be able to allow me to take a random item off of a target''s body from up to fifteen meters away so long as the target does not have adequate defenses. Its description also says that it is a rank 2 apprentice level spell so it is an entire rank above mine. It seems interesting so I am going to practice it in addition to the other spells that I plan to use in my arsenal." Slade seemed uninterested. [Learn whatever spell that you like but remember that your second highest affinity is with soul magic and that is what my inheritance is based on. You better not overdo it with the space magic!] Nick gave a mischievous grin and replied: "Understood, uncle Slade." [Hmph.] Nick spent the next few hours looking over the spell and surprisingly had an easy time understanding many of it laws. (With my increased meditation for the past few weeks, my mind has gotten stronger which allows me to learn spells faster. It''s good to know that even though I''m still some distance away from becoming rank 2, there is some benefit to the meditation and I guess my affinity with space magic also helps too.) At around 10 pm, Nick decided that he had studied the spell enough and wanted to try it out. He got up from his desk and walked to the edge of his bedroom and took a grasping stance. As he held out his hand as if holding something, Nick concentrated on forming the laws for Plunder Grasp within his mindscape. Nick''s consciousness looked on as laws made of dull grey light were being formed above his magic sea; Nick carefully created the laws and after twelve minutes, they were complete and giving a ghost white glow. Nick''s magic sea decreased by about 3000 magical units as the notebook that had been on his desk appeared within his grasp. "3000 magical units to grab a notebook from six meters across the room. That''s not very impressive." [I told you before that space magic has generally high magic energy consumption so you should not be surprised. In addition, you are using a rank 2 spell while you are a rank 1 Apprentice Magician so the fact that it cost so little is a testament to the spell''s quality.] "If you say so." Nick looked at the notebook in his hand, feeling that he did not test the spell sufficiently. Nick looked out of his window and saw the darkness of the night and wondered: (Do I need to have a specific target in mind to use this spell?) Nick walked up to the glass window and slid it open to look onto the well lit street that had no pedestrians on it at this time of night; there were, however, a group of trees lining the base of Nick''s dorm. He placed his hand out of the window and made a grasping motion at the trees but without a specific target in mind. Nick spend the next ten minutes forming the laws for plunder grasp and it activated, surprisingly requiring 13,000 magical units before the spell gave a result. (Why did casting the spell cost so much this time.) Nick eased his grasp to reveal a piece of pink colored fabric nestled in his palm. AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH Nick suddenly heard a loud, girly scream come from below him, originating from among the group of trees that lined the base of his dorm building. A few seconds later, a woman with blonde short hair ran onto the street away from the cover of the trees and looked up at Nick''s window with an angry expression, staring at Nick''s right hand that was grasping the piece of fabric. (What is she yelling about, this piece of cloth? I get that I took it unexpectedly but her reaction is a bit much.) Nick decided to throw it back to the enraged woman so he loosened his grip slightly and let the fabric unfurl. What Nick saw was not just a piece of fabric but a pair of thong panties held in his palm. "..." (Oh...so that''s why she was screaming.) Nick quickly threw the panties towards the woman and yelled: "Sorry for the trouble." He locked his window and turned of the light before going to bed. (Out of sight, out of mind.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 76: Alicia Jenner The rest of the week involved Nick doing his usual routine of pushups, going to the battle simulation building, studying space and soul magic and working on his new rule magic spell. Nick''s progress on the latter was slow but he could feel his understanding of rule magic increase with every mistake and correction. The Monday morning that Nick was to accompany Carla to her family''s tournament had finally arrived. Nick got dressed in his usual attire of a polo shirt and a pair of jeans pants and not long after he received a call from Carla Jenner. "Are you ready?" Nick replied without much enthusiasm in his tone: "Sure I am miss Carla. Where should I meet you?" "Drop the miss, you can just call me Carla, I''m not your teacher Nick. Anyway, I''ll pick you up at the academy gate, I already received permission from the academy to supervise you while you and I go on a ''field exercise''. You just have to get an exit permission card form the guard stationed at the gate." "Field exercise? Is that really what we are calling this, isn''t it more accurate to say that I''m your mercenary." Carla let out a chuckle: "Don''t be so dramatic, Nick. So long as you do well, I will grant you your reward." Nick sighed internally. (I have a bad habit of making deals with powerful Magicians. I hope I won''t regret this one.) "I''ll be at the academy gates within the hour." "Good." Carla hung up the phone and Nick grabbed his backpack and made his way over to the academy gates, having already ate earlier that morning. It was around 11 am as Nick stood in front of the guard post situated near the academy gates. He walked up to the reception counter of the guard post and said to the security guard on duty: "Good morning, my name is Nick Capitol and I am supposed to be getting an exit permission card from you." The old guard looked at Nick with an almost empty gaze that made Nick alert. Nick sensed a feint magic energy coming from the guard''s body; although this guard did not feel as powerful as Carla, Nick was almost sure that the guard could kill him easily. The guard spoke flatly: "Nick Capitol...I have an exit permit card for you right here. This card allows you to leave the academy and return during the seventh day after you go beyond those gates. If you do not return by then, you will be considered truant and you and your supervisor will face punishment. Do you understand?" Nick nodded his head in response. "Sure do." The guard took a glossy plastic card from somewhere below the counter that had a red colored ''E'' on the front and handed it to Nick. "Once you leave the academy, that card will be bound to you no matter where you go so you don''t have to worry about losing it. It will act as a tracking device and a health meter so that we can monitor your condition. You can leave now." Nick left through the academy gates after receiving the exit permit card ; as soon as he walked beyond the gates, the ''E'' on the card glowed a bright red and the card merged with Nick''s right palm, becoming a scarlet E on his palm. (A tracking device and a health meter, huh? Almost makes me feel like cattle.) Nick was the recipient of a very valuable scholarship from the British government as well as someone who had absorbed many of the academy''s literary resources so they would not let him freely roam the country until he was in his third year and could be considered a well enough instructed apprentice. A black and silver town car drove beside Nick as he waited for Carla to pick him up and when the window rolled down, a clear feminine voice could be heard: "Get in Nick, I want to get there early to scout out our competition." Nick looked through the window to see Carla wearing a purple short sleeved dress with her brown, long hair tied into a bundle. Carla had a white complexion and a glowing disposition despite her age. Nick didn''t say anything in reply and quickly entered the town car. Nick sat opposite to Carla and remained quiet as the car drove along the road, waiting for his so called supervisor to say something. "So Nick, how''s the scroll making coming along?" Nick felt embarrassed upon being asked this question as he had not made even one scroll to fulfill his contract but he did not let his embarrassment show on his face. Nick calmly replied: "It''s going great Carla, I should be able to fulfill the contract on time and the quality of the scrolls won''t disappoint you." "Ha, ha, that''s good. We are going to one of my family''s estates in a relatively rural part of the region which should take about an hour and thirty minutes for us to get there. Once we are there, there will be some meet and greets, a little speech by my uncle and then the tournament will begin and probably won''t be concluded until the next day so you are in for an eventful trip. Take this time to think on your spells and battle tactics if you want." "Honestly, I''m a little surprised that you are still at rank 1 considering your results within the academy. Are you purposefully not promoting yourself to rank 2?" Nick shook his head in response to Carla''s question. The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. "No, I''ve spent most of my time in the academy studying so I still have more active meditation to do before being able to promote to rank 2." Nick replied with a half truth and Carla nodded her head in understanding. "Studying is good young man but remember that the basis of your survival is actual strength. All your competitors will be rank 2 Apprentice Magicians but that shouldn''t be too great of a hurdle since the difference between rank 1 and rank 2 is not big. If your opponents were rank 3, you and a mop would probably have the same probability of winning the tournament." Nick smiled awkwardly in response to Carla''s critique but knew that she was probably correct. Nick needed to do much more hours of meditation than his peers to get to rank 2 because of the characteristics of his mindscape but the benefits of his special mindscape already made up for that inconvenience. After talking a little with Nick about mundane things like what he had eaten that morning and why he chose to wear jeans and a polo shirt of all things, Carla sat back silently and waited for the car to reach their destination. Nick also sat back silently and looked through the window as it passed different buildings, trees, etcetera and became lost in thought. (All of my opponents are rank 2 and have probably been under the influence of Magicians far longer than me. When I fight them, I shouldn''t hold back, if I am planning to explore a realm like Carla promised, I have to get good results.) Nick was hell bent on exploring realms, he wanted to experience the same feeling of adventure that he had during the end of year exam. While Nick''s mind continued to wonder, his eyes eventually ended up on Carla as she also seemed lost in thought. She had her legs folded with one on top of the other and the appeal of one of them was enhanced by the fact that her dress was split at one side allowing Nick to see a section of her thigh. (Carla''s actually very attractive for her age. Not that it''s any of my business but I wonder whether female Magicians like her ever get married?) As Nick continued to eye Carla''s leg, he suddenly heard her speak: "Be careful Nick, don''t you know that curiosity once killed the cat?" "Huh?" Nick snapped out of his daze and looked away from Carla''s legs to look directly at her face; his cheeks flushed a bit in embarrassment at being caught. "He, he." Carla chuckled and asked without any shame: "Nick, do you want to have sex with me?" Nick''s expression became awkward, not knowing what to say. Carla continued: "It''s fine if you do, after all, Magicians are generally a promiscuous bunch but I am not most Magicians. Don''t let your eyes wonder." Nick replied nervously: "Yes maam." Carla chuckled again and turned to look out of the window. Nick sat awkwardly in the car and waited for them to reach the Jenner family estate. ................ At around 2 pm, the town car drove up a cobbled road to get to a pair of large steel gates. The gates opened at the car''s approach and the car traveled another two hundred meters to get to a large mansion. When Carla''s town car had arrived, there were already a line of vehicles in front of the mansion so the town car parked behind the last one and Carla and Nick exited. As soon as Carla stepped out, a loud greeting shout could be heard: "Big sis Carla, how comes it took you so long to get here?" A woman one head shorter than Carla ran out from the gathering of people at the entrance of the mansion and gave her a very intimate hug. Carla replied while hugging the woman: "I was busy with the store''s business this morning and I also had to pick up my champion before coming here." The woman replied with a tone of exasperation: "I don''t know why you even bother with that store, with your talents you could definitely get a high position within the ministry of magic and they would definitely give you all the cultivation resources you need." Carla shook her head and replied: "I like being independent, anyway, let''s not talk about that right here. Alicia, let me introduce you to Nick Capitol, my champion for this tournament. Nick, this is Alicia Jenner, head secretary within our family and my little sister." The women''s hug loosened and Carla introduced Nick to Alicia. Alicia turned her attention to Nick and after spending a few moments looking him over, she seemed visibly unimpressed and turned to Carla, asking: "This is your champion, you realize that he is a rank 1 Magician right?" Carla''s right eye twitched a little and she replied while pinching Alicia''s right cheek with her left hand: "Of course I realize that little girl but he is stronger than he seems. I have no doubt that he will win me some benefits." Alicia knocked Carla''s hand away and said with squinted eyes: "Oh, let me see if that is the case then." Nick who had been idly watching the women''s interaction at the side with no intention of saying anything suddenly felt a sense of imminent danger. Without thinking too much about the implications, Nick activated one of his spells. (Blink.) Within an instant, Nick appeared one meter away from his previous position; Nick had been practicing his spells for weeks so now he was able to cast them at a moments notice. Near the spot that Nick had just been, a large creature that seemed like a praying mantis became visible with its sythe like claw stuck in the ground where Nick had just been standing. Nick pointed his right index finger at Alicia and was about to cast another spell. (Rumbling...) However, before Nick could finish forming the laws of the spell, he suddenly felt a suppressive force come over him, halting his actions and his magic sea became completely still. (What the hell is this.) At this moment, Slade said to Nick: [''This'' is the difference between a rank 4 and a rank 1 Apprentice Magician.] Nick looked to the side to see Carla looking at him with a glance that gave no room for complaints. In a few moments, Nick felt the suppressive force disperse and he was free to move again. Nick looked at Alicia with a menacing glare but she ignored him and spoke to Carla: "Interesting, you actually got an Apprentice Magician who knows such a good space path spell to be your champion. Where did you find him?" Carla replied: "He is one of my customers." Alicia looked at Carla blankly for a while and then burst into laughter: "Of course he is. Well, I have to go greet our other relatives so I will see you later big sis." With that Alicia waved her hand and the praying mantis like creature disappeared and she walked back to the large group of people who were too busy talking among themselves to pay their scuffle any attention. Nick was looking at Alicia''s back with pure malice when he heard Carla speak: "Calm your mind Nick, it''s actually a good thing that I stopped you from casting your spell at Alicia, she doesn''t look it but she is a rank 3 Apprentice Magician and one strong enough to kill you with a flick of her finger. She was just testing you a little so let it go." Nick wasn''t appeased but he put on an indifferent expression to mask his anger. Carla knew how he felt so she consoled: "Sorry about that, rich kids can be a little playful, that''s all. The good news is that your use of your spell impressed her a bit. Not many rank 1 Magicians have a movement spell as good as yours or even have the qualifications to cast one of such quality. I also sensed spacial magic energy gathering around you when you were about to cast your other spell before I interrupted you, so you really are a space Magician, huh?" Nick shrugged his shoulders. "I''m just a magic fanatic." Carla looked at Nick with an amused expression. "He, he, of course you are. Let''s not waste any more time and go inside." Carla turned around and walked to the entrance of the building to greet her relatives and Nick was expected to follow her. Nick walked one meter behind Carla, looking back at the spot on the concrete ground that had been sliced by Alicia''s creature; the gash was 10 inches deep, meaning if that had connected to his body, Nick would have definitely died. (Testing me, huh? What a joke.) Nick clenched his right hand with silent rage and continued to walk forward. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 77: Soul Path Carla spent the next hour greeting her various relatives, both old and young with a friendly, familiar tone; from Nick''s perspective, she was like a different person compared to when she spoke with him or her employees. Nick had been standing at the side quietly the whole time as if he were her shadow. After she had mingled sufficiently she led him into the main hall and the other guests flooded in as well. Everyone continued to discuss matters such as financial news, the new regulations of the Ministry of Magic, political infighting of the Magician Association and the like. Soon an old man stood at the top of the staircase leading to the 1st floor above the main hall. He had long silver hair flowing from his head and a full silver beard. He spoke with a magically amplified voice in an authoritative and dominating tone: "Another one of our Jenner family tournaments has come along . It is always a pleasure to have most of my relatives, seniors and juniors under one roof even if the purpose is the distribution of resources. First things first, since there are outsiders here, I would like them to be introduced before we talk about how things will proceed. Alicia, you direct the flow of things." Alicia who walked to the side of the old man, full of smiles, spoke with some level of authority in her voice as well: "Everyone, please be ready to introduce your champions. We will start with the Falkner faction, cousin Andrew." A man that seemed to be in his early thirties stepped forward along with two young men that seemed to be in their early twenties. The man spoke plainly: "Andrew Jenner reporting, my two champions are Kevin Nelly and Tom Parkinson of Raylam Priest Academy. I believe that they are both promising young men that I plan to recruit into our family gradually. They will be my champions to compete for our Falkner faction''s benefits." Following that introduction, many of Carla''s other relatives stepped forward to introduce their champions. From what was being said, Nick slowly pieced together the circumstances surrounding the Jenner family tournament. Apparently, each person was a part of a certain faction that was aligned with a Jenner family elder and they were competing as a whole for the distribution of some resources and responsibility to their respective factions for the next year. Soon, it was Carla''s turn; she stepped forward and spoke, holding Nick''s wrist gently as she brought him forward: "I am Carla Jenner and a proud member of the Victor faction. My champion will be Nick Capitol of the Richter Order Academy and with him here, I have no doubt that my faction will prosper." Nick silently cringed a little at Carla''s declaration. (It''s either she really believes in me or she''s just very good at bullshitting. It''s probably the latter but man, she almost had me believing that she meant the former.) Nick awkwardly waved his left hand at the surrounding family members and some chuckled at his apparent discomfort. Carla stepped back along with Nick and a few other people and their champions made introductions. Carla leaned close to Nick and whispered: "You know that I meant what I said, right?" Nick discreetly rolled his eyes at Carla''s shamelessness and replied: "Yeah, sure." Carla chuckled and then became silent. When all of the introductions were over, the old man spoke once again: "For the outsiders here, my name is Vaughn Jenner and I am the acting head of the Jenner Family in place of my brother Victor Jenner who is currently too ill to greet you today." When Vaughn said the latter part, Nick could see a slight quake in Carla''s eyes but he ignored it. (None of my business.) Vaughn continued: "We will not waste any of your time as the tournament has been scheduled to end tomorrow night, the day after which, we will discuss the results during a banquet. The first stage of the tournament will involve a comprehension test where each champion will be asked to choose the type of magic that they are most knowledgeable about and they will be given an advanced apprentice grade spell from our treasury to learn within a certain time period. They will then be tested on their comprehension of the spell and then if they are able to successfully cast it, they will also be graded on that. As you know, each champion''s grade will contribute to a faction''s overall score. You are welcomed to wait here until the test is about to start but all candidates must be in the arena in exactly one hour. That is all." Nick didn''t know what to expect but he didn''t think the first stage of the tournament would be so academic. "A comprehension test, huh?" Carla spoke to Nick softly: "This is also an opportunity for you since you get to learn an advanced spell from our treasury, that is, if you can understand and grasp its laws. What area of specialization will you choose?" Nick pretended to think for a while and then replied: "Soul magic." Carla had a weird expression when she heard his answer. "Why not space magic. If you are decently skilled in that area, we are likely to get a better grade considering the relative rarity of space path Magicians." Nick answered while shrugging his shoulders: "I''m not a space Magician and I happen to know more about soul magic than space magic, I only happen to know a few space spells. By the way, I heard Alicia refer to space ''path'' before and now you are also saying ''path'', what exactly are you referring to?" Carla scratched her head at Nick''s question. "Oh, right, the rumors are that you do not go to classes so you are probably missing out on some common information. For rank 3 and above Magicians, choosing an area of specialization is a must and so we usually say that we are walking a certain ''path'' and so we describe ourselves and our magic with a certain ''path'' in mind. At rank 1 and rank 2, most Magicians don''t have a path yet but the apprentices here are different, their paths would have been chosen for them since young based on their talents so they ought to have some area of specialization. As for other apprentices, focusing on one path so early on makes their methods less versatile during everyday tasks so they refrain from focusing on one or a few areas." Nick nodded in understanding and reaffirmed: "Then my choice has to be the soul path." Carla sighed and spoke: "Okay, since you''re so confident in that path." Of course Nick was confident, he was a soul path scholar so he should do fine if all he had to do was comprehend an advanced apprentice grade spell. Spells were not only classified by ranks, they also had more general classifications for spells that did not have a specific rank such as basic, intermediate and advanced; these classifications were usually given to a spell based on how it was designed. A spell graded based on the latter three classifications usually could be used suitably by any rank of Magician up to a certain rank but their power would be depend on the rank of the caster. Many of Nick''s current spells were like that but the ones that he used could not be considered advanced and were intermediate because he did not want to jump the gun and bite off more than he could chew, after all, advanced spells were not simple to cast as they usually required some preparation. Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences. "Do you mind if I go to the arena now?" Carla motioned. "Go ahead through the passage way to the right of the staircase and you''ll get to the estate''s indoor arena. You''ll likely see other competitors there so play nice while you are there, you are not allowed to wound anyone until the fighting part of the tournament begins." Nick nodded in understanding and walked towards and into the passageway that Carla had mentioned. Nick walked for 10 minutes to get to an arena like setting where there were groups of seats at the outer edge reserve for spectators. While Nick stood at the entrance, other young persons flooded into the arena as well; about 30 champions were present for this tournament, each one looking polished and well dressed, Nick being the odd one out, wearing blue jeans and a slight color faded red polo shirt. The other competitors seemed to actively avoid him. (Whatever.) Nick walked up to a middle aged man standing in the middle of two columns of desks within the arena and asked: "Excuse me sir, when do I get to choose my area of specialization?" The middle aged man looked at Nick and answered: "Well young man, you may do so now but you will not be able to start examining the spell we are going to give you until the tournament begins and your choice will be final. Have you already chosen?" Nick replied flatly: "Yes, Nick Capitol chooses soul path." The middle aged man nodded in acceptance. "So be it, I am the invigilator by the way, call me Wong. Go and take a seat and a manual for an advanced apprentice grade soul path spell will be brought to you. Remember, do not open it until I say so." Nick took a seat in a row farthest back in one of the two columns and waited. Twenty minutes later, a thin book was brought to him and the title on the cover read: ''Retrieve Soul''. (Retrieve Soul, the name sounds so benign. Do you have any idea on what kind of spell this might be, Slade?) [Kid, do you actually expect me to deduce the spell''s effect from just the name. Your language is not even my native tongue so that name could refer to all kinds of methods from my perspective.] (Yeah, that was a stupid question, my bad. In any case, I''m going to try to go for the best score early on. Everyone else here should be too young to be a scholar like me, right.) [It is as you say.] Forty minutes later, all of the competitors were seated and had chosen their specialty. The Jenners were also all seated in the stands at the edge of the arena looking on at the young people. Nick looked towards the crowd of people to spot Carla speaking with Alicia with rapt attention, he then turned his attention towards his spell''s manual. At the right time, invigilator Wong commanded: "Open your manuals, you have two hours to review them." Nick quickly opened his manual and began going through the laws for Retrieve Soul. After a few minutes, Nick had an idea of the spell''s overall effect: (Hmmm...this seems to be a spell that would allow me to take an entity''s soul out of their body by force, plainly speaking. It won''t work however if I cannot restrain their magic as well as the innate will within their soul which is not very likely for a rank 1 Apprentice Magician like me so this spell is practically useless to me in normal circumstances. Looking at the laws as a whole though, the theory behind this spell is fairly complex and before I became a scholar, I would definitely not have been able to successfully cast it...) Nick spent the next hour looking over the spell three times and then got up and said to invigilator Wong: "I''m ready to see the judges invigilator Wong." Invigilator Wong looked at Nick with some suspicion as all of the other competitors were far from finished with examining their manuals. "Young man, being eager is good but haste makes waste. Are you sure you do not want to continue reviewing whatever spell that you got?" Nick answered flatly: "I don''t need anymore time, I''ve already reviewed the entire manual." Invigilator Wong felt annoyed at Nick because he thought that should be impossible and that Nick was only making a joke out of the competition. The annoyance seeped into his tone: "Fine, go into that tent and the judges will assess you." Nick could hear the mockery and disgust in invigilator Wong''s voice but he didn''t care. (I''ve heard worse.) A tent had been set up long ago to house the judges so as not to distract other competitors when one of them was being assessed so Nick walked into the tent to see five people seated side by side at a wooden table, in the middle being Vaughn Jenner. He looked at Nick and spoke without much expectation in his tone: "Well young man, since you are here, tell us about the spell that you received." Nick spoke as if he was giving a lecture, there was a little nervousness in his voice at first: "The spell that I was given was Retrieve Soul and it is advanced based on these principles..." Nick spoke for almost thirty minutes explaining the principles of how the spell worked and even gave a mini lecture on soul magic. The judges present except Vaughn seemed impressed at his performance but Vaughn thought otherwise: (Based on what this young man is wearing, he probably is not from a Magician family but he does know much about soul magic. At his age, with no Magician supporting him, being this knowledgeable means that he must be spending all of his time studying instead of actually practicing magic. Although his lecture was informative, it was ordinary and his disposition was shaky all the way through. This family supports heroes, dragons among men, not school boys. Carla surely could have brought a better champion, perhaps one that was rank 2. Sigh, I should hurry and get this over with so I can see the real talents.) Vaughn spoke at this time: "Finely done, young man, I assume that you will not be trying to cast the spell, right? There is no shame in that, you have done well already." Nick replied with a weird expression. (Why would he assume that, well, it doesn''t matter?) "Yes, I will attempt to cast the spell." The judges all seemed surprised at Nick''s decision, after all, the backlash for failing to complete an advanced spell was not light. Vaughn waved his hand decisively and a tied up goat with a blank stare appeared on the ground; Vaughn spoke: "This goat has had its soul''s will erased, so do what you will." Nick nodded and focused on his mindscape. Nick started drawing laws that appeared as dull silver light within his mindscape; he drew them slowly so as not to increase the risk of failure. He understood the laws and was able to memorize them thanks to his developed mindscape but theorizing a spell and executing it were often two different monsters. Nick finished forming the laws after thirty five minutes of silent work and they began to shine in a bright silver light, Nick''s magic sea decreasing by about 2000 magical units as he aimed it at the defenseless goat. Nick placed his palm on the goat''s midsection and then withdrew it aggressively. Nick held up his right hand in front of the judges as it appeared to grip a translucent grayish phantom; the goat on the ground lost all of the life in its eyes at that moment and became limp. One of the judges uttered without thinking: "He actually cast the spell successfully..." Vaughn quickly sent a glance of disapproval at the judge and the judge corrected his expression and disposition quickly but an air of disbelief still filled the tent. Advanced spells were difficult to cast and often needed preparation and a deep understanding of the path involved to cast successfully so the fact that Nick cast the spell after examining the manual for an hour was very impressive in the eyes of all the judges. Vaughn nodded in approval. (It seems that this ordinary boy has some potential. I''ll ask Carla about him later.) "You''ve completed the spell, you can go now." Nick released his grip and the translucent phantom that he held dispersed like it was never there; he exited the tent with all of the judges watching him leave. Nick walked towards his seat with over a dozen stares of contempt and ridicule being sent his way. Invigilator Wong asked sarcastically: "How did you do, Nick Capitol? You are going to get the highest score, right?" Nick understood Wong''s intention to mock him from his tone but Nick replied politely anyway: "Sigh, I just hope that I won''t make the rest of these chaps look too bad." When Nick said that, the glares of contempt and ridicule from the other competitors intensified. Invigilator Wong looked at Nick wide eyed and then said: "Good, good, good. You are too good." Nick replied: "Thank you." Invigilator Wong squinted his eyes and decided to ignore Nick. Nick walked back to his seat and gave a thumbs up aimed at Carla in the stands. Carla saw his gesture and nodded in reply. Nick then turned inwards to his thoughts: (The feeling I got when I used retrieve soul was interesting, like it gave me some kind of inspiration.) Slade commented: [As a scholar of the soul path, using different kinds of soul spells are likely to give you inspiration for things related to soul magic. You''ll get used to the feeling soon] Twenty minutes later, the other students were told to close their manuals and line up to be assessed by the judges while Nick sat quietly in his seat thinking about Retrieve Soul. The assessments took another three hours to complete and then Vaughn stepped forward to announce the results to everyone. Nick was still lost in his thought at the time. (Wait, come to think of it, how come no one else here is from Richter Order Academy?) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 78: Not Good Enough Nick definitely did not hear of anyone else being a student of Richter Order Academy when the introductions were being made. The other competitors were either from Raylam Priest Academy, an academy outside of London or had no affiliation with a magical school. Nick didn''t think much of it at the time but his intuition was telling him that he should ask Carla about it later. Vaughn Jenner spoke with an authoritative tone, announcing the winner of the first stage as well as having a display projected using magic for everyone to see the competitors'' individual scores: "The winner of the first stage is Nick Capitol after scoring a 45/50 during our assessment." The people seated in the stands started whispering immediately: "Nick Capitol. Who is that?" "I think he was the one that Carla boasted so shamelessly about during the introductions." "Look at what he is wearing, he is definitely a poor commoner." "Does it matter if he is a commoner? He won the first stage regardless. To get such a high score means that he must have cast the spell that he was given. What spell was?" "I saw him use a space path spell at the entrance earlier today. Maybe it was such a spell." .... While her relatives talked, Carla smiled from ear to ear. While she expected Nick to do well, she did not expect him to get such a high score; honestly, she had been worried since Nick had finished examining his manual after only one hour but now she saw that he really did have potential. (Nick wasn''t lying when he said that his specialty was soul magic, so weird. He does not have an upbringing that would suggest that he had been taught about soul magic, did he really gain such attainment in it after one year at the academy?) While Carla pondered, Nick sat in his seat and nodded his head in acceptance. (I didn''t know if I would get first place but my score is acceptable. Looking at that projection, the closest score to mine is 29/50 which means that probably no one else was able to successfully cast their spell.) The other competitors took a look at the projection and nodded, some gritted their teeth and many looked over at Nick as he was lost in his thoughts. During all of this, Vaughn continued to speak: "Now that the first stage is over, we will take a six hour break before the next stage which will be a test of each competitor''s attack power by casting an attack spell on one of our magic power gauge devices. Of course magic tools can be used to enhance a competitor''s power but the attack spell cannot originate from the magic tool." Vaughn motioned and invigilator Wong brought out a floating orb that seemed to be made of some kind of silver liquid; the orb had various laws written all over it in Valteese. Vaughn snapped his fingers and the silhouette of a twenty meter tall dragon appeared within the arena, the dragon was purely made out of crimson flames. Many of the young persons close to Nick were terrified for a moment before realizing that it was probably one of Vaughn''s spells. The dragon looked at the liquid orb for a moment then dived at it, bathing it and a part of the surrounding in flames that did not seem to affect anything but the orb. After the flames cleared, a blue and white colored score could be seen hovering over the now silver glowing orb: ''20/20''. Vaughn nodded and spoke: "The test is simply a measure of the power with which one can cast a certain level of spell, the highest being a rank 2 or advanced grade apprentice spell. All competitors are to return to the arena six hours from now. You are dismissed." Nick got up from his seat and was about to go meet up with Carla when a young man came over to him, saying: "Hey you, Nick Capitol, right? My name is Drew Gordon and I''m from Raylam Priest Academy. It''s good to know that Richter Order Academy has at least one decent pupil among its ranks. Why don''t we go and get some food and talk about the spells that we got from the Jenners'' treasury." Nick looked at the freckled redhead speaking to him and thought: (Drew Gordon...oh, he was the guy that scored the 29/50 in the first stage. What was that comment about Richter Order Academy supposed to mean? Whatever, I don''t really care, as for spending time with this guy, I''ll pass, these prim and proper soy boys make me feel uncomfortable.) "No thanks Drew but I appreciate the invitation. Maybe we will get the chance to have a meal when the tournament is over." Drew''s expression froze like someone had just paralyzed his facial nerves. "You actually rejected my invitation?" Nick replied with a weird tone: "...Yes, I did. Is there a problem?" Drew''s face became scrunched in anger, he quickly stepped back by a few feet and he raised his right hand, gathering electricity in it, forming what seemed like a bolt and then bending his elbow as if he was about to throw out an attack. Nick saw through Drew''s intentions and did not hesitate to act: (Soul Pressure.) Drew''s movements immediately froze and he stood a few feet away from Nick, stuck in place with blood flowing from his mouth, nose and ears. "Why are so many of you people so stupid?" Nick was angry but he knew that if he acted reckless here, he way well lose his opportunity to explore a realm later so he turned around and walked away from the frozen Drew. A few seconds later, Soul Pressure was released and the electricity in Drew''s hand dissipated; as Drew wiped his orifices of blood, he stared at Nick''s receding figure with hatred while the other competitors watched at the side with amused or indifferent expressions. Nick walked to the section of the stands where he could speak with Carla and asked: "Where to next, Carla?" Carla smiled at the promising young man and said: "We are going to go to my room to eat supper. Meet me at the ground floor hall and I''ll take you there." Nick nodded his head and then proceeded to walk towards and through the passageway to get to the hall at the entrance of the mansion. A few minutes later, Carla arrived with Alicia in tow. "Alicia, I''ve got to go take care of my champion''s needs so goodbye for now, I''ll see you in the next six hours." Alicia kept her eyes on Nick, staring with an ambivalent, curious expression and said: "Okay, I will see you then." Carla led Nick to the 1st floor by going up the staircase while Alicia went to speak with other relatives that arrived into the hall. Nick and Carla walked silently for a few minutes until they got to a section of the 1st floor that had multiple rooms residing there. Carla opened one door and motioned Nick to follow her inside. When Nick entered the room, Carla locked the door behind him and Nick spent a few moments looking around. The room looked similar to those of five star hotels that he saw on television a few times. There was a king sized bed with clean, cream and white colored sheets, two sofas, a holographic television, a large bathroom and a glass table with four beautifully decorated chairs resting beside it. Nick said without thinking: "Not bad." Carla stared at Nick for a few moments then asked a question with a stern expression: "Nick, answer me honestly. Who is the person that is mentoring you?" Nick turned to Carla and looked at her weirdly, replying: "What are you talking about, I don''t have a mentor?" Carla squinted her eyes and spoke: "Hmph, that''s nonsense. Do you think that I don''t know your background? You are a poor boy from a less than normal family and have only been in the academy for a year but you seem to have some fairly decent spells and a very good comprehension of magic, maybe better than your peers. Only a fool would believe that you did not have some kind of backer teaching you behind the scenes." This tale has been unlawfully lifted from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere. Carla had hit the nail on the head, Nick had a backer in the form of Slade Terrence whose inheritance he had obtained along with the soul path attainment of Sahashi Miyamoto, a former Hero Magician who had given him the task of becoming the strongest Soul Magician but he could say none of that so Nick simply shrugged his shoulders and replied: "I told you that I was a magic fanatic. It looks like you don''t believe me." Carla looked at Nick seriously for a few more seconds then burst into laughter. "Ha, ha. Fine, don''t tell me. I just wanted to know if I had to worry about some Magician coming to me later to account for using you during this little tournament." Nick shook his head: "I can assure you that no one gives a damn about me so you do not have to worry." Carla''s laughing became slightly awkward after hearing that and she stopped; after a minute or so of awkward silence she said: "You should take a seat on one of those sofas, The food will be here in a few minutes. You can eat and then get some rest before the next stage or whatever else you''d like to do, Oh, what kind of spell are you planning to cast at the gauging device?" Nick sat on one of the sofas and replied: "I plan to use a space path spell on that weird device. I think I should get a fairly decent score with it, it is an intermediate apprentice grade spell." Carla nodded. "Do you mind showing it to me." Nick''s eyes widened. "Do you want me to destroy this nice room of yours?" Carla chuckled at Nick''s concern. "Don''t worry, I can neutralize the attack of a rank 1 Magician fairly easily so you don''t have to worry about doing too much damage." Nick looked at Carla blankly for a moment and then got up from the sofa and said: "Fine." Nick took a firm stance with his feet apart and pointed his right index and middle finger at Carla who was five meters away from him and cast his spell. (Rumbling Pillar.) Nick''s magic sea immediately decreased by 15,000 magical units and the ambient space around Carla started distorting violently and the room started to shake as if an earthquake was occurring. Carla stood in place with a slightly surprised expression. "Wow, this is a pretty powerful spell but not good enough." Carla lightly stretched out her right hand and moved it in a horizontal straight line and the space inside their room immediately stopped moving. Nick looked with wide opened eyes as the effects of his spell were cancelled out in front of his very eyes. He looked at Carla and said: "Sigh, are you purposefully trying to diminish my motivation." Carla shook her head. "Most of the competitors here are seeds that members of this family plan to recruit and to gain the most benefits they would definitely have been taught powerful spells equivalent to advanced grade for the possibility of the next test being a part of the tournament. I know that it''s a lot to ask but I would prefer if you let me lend you an advanced grade spell and learn in within the next few hours. I don''t have any soul or space path spells but other paths should be enough to compete even if you do not have a high affinity with the spell." Nick understood what Carla was saying as advanced grade spells were powerful because they required some preparation to cast and magic tools that enhanced the competitors'' magic power were allowed so her concerns about Nick''s ability to place high in this stage were valid but Nick also had his own concerns. (I can only use, space, soul and rule magic. Assuming that she doesn''t have a rule path spell, I cannot borrow a spell from her so I need to learn one that I have in one of my inheritances.) Nick had avoided learning one of those spells because it was unnecessary for his current needs and they were complex while he had only seriously started using soul and space path spells a few weeks ago. Nick said to Carla: "I have an advanced grade spell that I can use but I need time to get accustomed to it. Is it possible for you to leave the room while I prepare?" Carla''s right eyelid twitched. Nick did not even bother telling her what kind of spell it was but he wanted her to leave her own room to practice it but she relented because that was not necessarily an unreasonable request as most Magician''s were secretive about their methods. "The room is reinforced so even if you use the spell in here, you will not do much damage to the rest of the mansion. I will go deal with some business while you get things straight." Carla opened the door to leave and spotted a servant bringing their meals so she took the meals from the servant and placed them on the glass table for Nick to have at them when he was ready and then left the room, closing the door behind her. (I definitely would not have Carla watch me practise my magic, after all, I don''t trust her.) Slade asked curiously: [What spell do you intend to use?] Nick pondered for sometime, looking through his inheritances to find an acceptable one. (Most of my advanced grade apprentice soul path spells have special requirements such as a living sacrifice(s) or alteration of my own soul but I simply don''t meet those requirements.) [Indeed, soul path is so powerful in combat because it has such high requirements for its Magicians] Nick sighed. (Then that leaves my space path inheritance. One spell has caught my attention and that is this "Cursed Domain". The description says that it is a powerful spell that can be used up to rank 6 but requires me to not only bleed every time I cast it but the domain will take on a form and power that is unpredictable and dependent on my own talents and nature. What the hell should I expect from that?) [You received this accumulation of methods from a seemingly powerful rank 8 Magician so it is not surprising that he may have placed some strange methods within this so called inheritance. The best way to find out is to test the spell yourself.] Nick nodded his head in agreement. (You''re right, but considering the requirements, I should memorize and practice writing the laws on paper before casting this spell. I think I can expect the backlash for failure to draw the laws properly within my mindscape to be nasty.) [I agree. Also I want you to be wary of any description that involves the word ''cursed''. From where I come from, that usually suggests that demonic Magicians are involved and methods that we create can range from troublesome to down right pernicious. I don''t want you to cast those kinds of spells freely going forward until your attainments in soul and space path increase but since you currently have a special need to use this spell, you''ll have to take a risk.] (Right.) Nick found pages of loose paper and a pen within the room and spent over five hours memorizing and practicing the drawing of the symbols for the spell, he even forgot to eat the meals left on the glass table. At some point, Carla walked through the door and Nick lifted his red, blood shot eyes to look at her. She spoke expectantly while looking at the young man hunched over a pile of papers with Valteesian symbols written on them: "Are you ready, Nick? We have to return to the arena within the next ten minutes for when the 2nd stage begins." Carla looked over at the cold plates of food that were still on the table where she had left it and and then at Nick who had chapped lips and an expression that screamed: ''Mental Exhaustion''. "Did you seriously not rest the whole time that you were in here?" Nick laughed bitterly; "What''s the saying, to be the best, you have to work overtime." Carla stared at Nick blankly for a moment and then said: "We have to go now." Nick threw the papers that he had already written on into the nearby fireplace inside of the room and walked through the door before Carla. Carla looked the room over, surprised that there was no damage from practicing a spell and walked out after Nick. Looking at Nick''s tired condition, Carla decided to remain quiet while they walked to the arena. When they got there, Carla took her seat among her relatives while Nick joined the other competitors who eyed him as he walked among them. Some whispered about his clearly tired expression and hunched posture while others were just gossiping slander, saying that Nick was just a poor upstart looking for attention. Nick ignored them all. Soon Vaughn and the four other previous judges appeared within a booth that loomed over the arena; invigilator Wong stood next to the silver orb that was to be used as a magic power gauge and waited for instructions. Vaughn stepped forward in the booth and spoke loudly: "The competitors will cast their spell one by one on the gauging device while all of us observe so as to prevent any cheating. Wong, you may begin the 2nd stage." Invigilator Wong nodded and spoke: "I will allow you to compete in the order that you arrived here. Jerry Fowler, step forward and show us your power!" A white young man with short, curly black hair walked within six feet of the device and entered a praying stance. Magic energy gathered madly towards him as everyone else looked on. The temperature soon decreased drastically and after ten minutes when a fair amount of frost started gathering on the ground, a spell was cast. A rush of four streams of white snow appeared from four directions moving towards the silver orb and made contact, soon turning the orb into a block of clear jagged ice. The young man the clapped his hands twice and the block of ice shattered, the remnant snow on the ground clearing up. The gauging device seemed relatively unharmed, the only change being that the laws on its surface were now glowing with a navy blue light. Numbers appeared above it displaying the supposed power of the attack: 11/20. The young man tried to keep a stoic expression but the slight quake in his eyes revealed his disappointment at his own score. Invigilator Wong said: "You''ve done well, step back for the other competitor." The young man stepped back quickly and another young man took his place. Over the next two hours, Nick saw all kinds of magical attacks: steel pins oozing acid, a giant crab monster that was summoned to hit the orb, pink lightning that threatened to blind all of the apprentices present , water that transitioned to becoming lava and more. (Wow, there all all sorts of spells that have been created, huh? I bet each one took their creators a long time to make. No wonder they are sold with such a high price tag.) Nick was the last competitor to arrive so he was the last to be be called up to participate by invigilator Wong: "Nick Capitol, do your best." Nick stepped forward and asked Wong: "Ummm...could I borrow a sharp pin or a knife please?" Invigilator Wong scratched his head and took out a small blade that he had in his side pants pocket, not knowing why Nick wanted it. (I should have asked Carla for a blade before I came here but I forgot.) Nick ignored his tiredness and standing about eight feet from the silver orb, he cut his right palm with the blade. Feeling the sting from the wound, Nick scrunched his face in pain but persevered in dropping the knife and folding his right and left hands into each other. Nick spent the next twenty five minutes drawing the laws for Cursed Domain within his mindscape, they glowed with a light that changed from dull black to dull red and vice versa periodically. At the end of the twenty five minutes, the spell was ready and Nick finally cast it, ignoring his fatigue and hunger. (Cursed Domain.) Vaughn Jenner stood up on his feet the moment the spell was cast. The entire arena was bathed in a blackish void but everyone was still able to see. The surroundings were now filled with white humanoid bones and an old tattered building stood erect among the bones looming over the magic power gauge. Nick looked around in bewilderment as the blood that was still within his palms started to steam and dry up. (What the hell is this situation?) If the environment wasn''t strange enough, there was actually a figure with ruby red eyes sitting on top of the tattered building looking down at the competitors and Wong menacingly and said: "You fools actually dare to enter my shrine?" The figure then focused his glare at Nick and said with clear malice: "So it''s you that brought me here, well now that you''ve done so, you and I will probably be seeing each other again very soon." The figure looked at the silver orb with contempt then slid his blackish index finger down diagonally. The orb was immediately cut in half and the scene went back to how it was before Nick cast his spell. Nick stood on the spot in confusion, staring at the silver orb that was now a puddle of liquid on the ground as well as he paid attention to the magic sea within his mindscape. (From 25,000 magical units, I now only have 100 magical units left!) SILENCE Abject silence reigned over the arena. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 79: Bloodline Altered Vaughn stood in the booth, not quite sure what to say so he looked at the magic power gauge to check what kind of score was given but the device laid on the ground as a pool of silver liquid; it had clearly been destroyed. (How could an apprentice grade spell, even if it was advanced grade, break a magic tool reinforced with rank 5 materials? That''s impossible...yet it just happened. That scene earlier was so bizarre, especially the appearance of that lone figure, those eyes of his gave even me a few shivers.) Vaughn was internally a little shook but on the surface he had to show a confident, in control front. COUGH COUGH "Everyone, it seems that one of our competitors had a very interesting spell in his arsenal but you can rest assured that there was no cheating involved; the spell he cast was definitely of the apprentice grade." Nick looked up at Vaughn and thought: (He clearly wants everyone to think that he is in control of the situation but these people are definitely not idiots. I don''t even know what happened, do you Slade?) Slade spoke uncertainly: [I told you that anything described as ''cursed'' could possibly be trouble. I am not sure why things turned out this way but with magic, anything could happen when all sorts of different factors are mixed in. For example, that strange spell, your special mindscape, your three lone affinities, etcetera. What just happened could be the result of a number of factors playing a role.] Nick continued to ponder as Carla stood up and spoke: "Uncle Vaughn, seeing as how Nick''s spell resulted in the gauge device being broken, that clearly means that the magic tool''s durability was overpowered and in that case even if it did not give a score, Nick should receive a 20/20 score. Aren''t I correct?" The rest of the Jenners internally cursed Carla for being shameless but her request was not unreasonable despite the strangeness of the young man''s spell, after all, they were all witnesses and the young man had indeed cast an apprentice grade spell. Vaughn looked at Carla for a few moments, then at Nick and announced: "Nick Capitol has hereby received a score of 20/20 for breaking the magic tool. He is therefore the undisputed winner of this stage." The other candidates went into a short lived uproar but under the watchful eye of a Regular Magician, they did not dare to act wildly. Vaughn announced: "The rest of the tournament will continue after another three hours and will consist of one-on-one elimination battles where the ultimate winner will be the one who does not get eliminated. Everyone is dismissed." Nick didn''t waste any time in moving because he felt a sudden wave of exhaustion come over him and so he quickly left the arena with many gazes focused on him and went back to Carla''s room. The door had been kept unlocked by Carla so Nicked entered without a problem. He flung himself onto the sofa and was so tired and his eyes so heavy that he immediately fell into a deep sleep. ..................... Nick suddenly found himself in the same space he had been in when he cast Cursed Domain. Bones lined the ground and a run down building was situated in their midst and a lone figure sat on its roof looking down on Nick, seemingly covered in darkness, the only thing being clearly visible was his ruby red eyes filled with malice. Nick looked up at him and asked: "Who are you?" The figure replied: "That is not your concern" Nick''s right eyelid twitched and then he asked: "Okay, then what do you want?" The figure replied: "That is also not your concern." Nick sighed and after thinking for a while, asked another question: "So then, what is my concern?" The figure spoke slowly and with clear malice: "You seemed to have gained some relation to my malevolent shrine and I am not sure why that is even possible. So tell me, how did a runt like you gain access to a road leading to the pinnacle of blade magic." Nick was confused. "Blade magic? I cannot use blade magic." The figure looked at Nick silently for some time after hearing his reply and then spoke with lost interest: "You, who does not know your own talent has actually stumbled onto my path. It is certainly true that pigs sometimes do find jewels. You and I will speak again but only when you are not so clueless." .................. After the figure was done speaking, Nick woke up from his sleep. With hazy eyes he looked around the room to see Carla sitting at the table, looking at him. She spoke with some amount of concern: "What happened out there, Nick?" Nick sat up while slowly rubbing his eyes and replied: "To be honest, I am not sure myself so I would appreciate it if you didn''t pry. It is something that is currently under control." Carla sighed and said: "I will respect your wishes this time but my uncle has become very interested in you and is asking me to introduce you to him later so just be prepared. The battle part of the tournament will begin in one hour, I will leave you alone to prepare. Just so you know, you have already exceeded my expectations so no matter how you do in the battles to come, I will get you access to one of our private realms when the tournament ends." Nick replied: "Thank you." Carla nodded her head and left silently. When Nick was about to talk to Slade, he felt a searing pain envelop his right palm. Nick looked at where he had cut earlier and was surprised to see that the cut had now healed but there was now a strange black symbol drawn onto the middle of his right palm. (Slade, what the hell is this?) Slade replied with some incredulity in his tone: If you encounter this tale on Amazon, note that it''s taken without the author''s consent. Report it. [Kid, quick, check your mindscape.] (Huh, why?) [Just do it.] Nick closed his eyes and internally chanted his meditation; his consciousness appeared within his mindscape. Everything looked the same, including the sea, sky and the road where the golden figure walked. "Why did Slade tell me to look in here?" Nick was about to eject his consciousness when he noticed something strange about the stars in the sky. With the large bluish red star at the center, the stars seemed to form some kind of formation. "No, that is definitely different from a magic formation. That actually seems more like the laws for an advanced grade spell being represent by the stars. This is strange." Nick''s consciousness exited his mindscape and he asked Slade: "Did you see it?" Slade read Nick''s thoughts and affirmed: [Unbelievable kid, somehow that Cursed Domain has resulted in you becoming the host for a bloodline spell.] (A bloodline spell, what is that?) [A bloodline spell is exactly what it sounds like. It is a magic power borne from the bloodline of a powerful Magician. People with bloodline spells are able to cast it as soon as they form their mindscape and establish their foundation laws. They are often related to a person''s affinities and will be passed on to their children and usually only members of the bloodline can use that spell.] (Okay, but how the hell did I get it?) [That Cursed Domain spell that you used required you to cut yourself and that is where the mark that represents that bloodline has appeared. The description of the spell did say that based on your own talent and affinities, something unpredictable would happen. It seems to me that you were transported to a space that forced you to inherit a bloodline. Whoever that figure that you interacted with was probably did that to you purposefully. That space did seem strange, you probably were transported there because of the large reserves of magic energy that you have in addition to some other factors, that''s why your magic energy reserves were so depleted before and seeing how things ended up, Cursed Domain probably worked by making use of that space''s power to make the attack via that mysterious Magician but the Magician seemed to have also cursed you with his bloodline while he was at it.] (What does cursing me with his bloodline mean?) [It means that his blood and power is being stored within your body.] (Well, what the hell do I do?) [First things first, we should attempt to use the bloodline spell to find out how powerful it is and how it relates to you. Take another look at it and cast it.] (Okay.) Nick''s consciousness appeared within his mindscape once again and he took a look at the patterns that were made up by the stars. "Hmmm...whatever this spell is seems very complex but somehow I feel a sort of closeness with it like I''ve known about it since I was born. Slade said that I have to cast it and with the familiarity that I seem to have with it, that shouldn''t be very difficult." Nick focused and it was like he did have a certain connection with the laws formed by the stars within his mindscape, like he could cast the spell at a moments notice. Nick was ready to begin. "Oh, what is the name of this spell. I think that figure mentioned a term that struck me when I heard it. It was..." As Nick''s consciousness left his mindscape, he whispered the name of the spell in the real world: "Malevolent Shrine." The level of the magic sea withing his mindscape dropped rapidly and all of his surroundings turned into a black void filled with bones and an old wooden building loomed over him from behind. Within two seconds, the space returned to normal and the bones and the building were gone but everything that was in the room other than the fours walls and the door had been cut to pieces, being barely recognizable. "So this is the spell''s effect, kind of cool." Slade said sternly: [Kid, this is the seed of a very powerful blade path spell. You might be in very serious danger. I suspect that the Magician who cursed you plans to use you as some sort of host later on. We have to deal with the bloodline curse.] (Could you be wrong? Remember that I gave up my affinity with blade path when I got my affinity with space path.) Slade replied: [With that foreign bloodline inside of you anything could be possible. Go and ask Carla for these items that I am about to send to your thoughts. They should be relatively common.] Nick took out his smart phone and called Carla. "What is it Nick, you still have forty minutes until the next stage, you should be resting?" "Carla, to make sure that I come out on top in the next stage, I actually need a few items to help me with a method that I am planning to use." "Oh, If it is to help us get a better score, I will see what I can do. What are the items?" Nick new that this half truth would get Carla to help him, after all, self interest was the lever that could move anyone. "The items are..." Nick listed the items that Slade had instructed him to get and Carla replied that they were easy to get and that she would have them gathered and bring them to him in ten minutes. Slade then explained what Nick was supposed to do when he received the items. Ten minutes later, Carla entered the room and she looked around at all of the furniture and fixtures that had been cut to shreds and asked Nick: "What have you been doing in here?" "Carla, I''ll explain later but right now, I need to prepare for the next stage alone." Carla looked at Nick expressionlessly for half a minute and then said: "Carry on, I won''t pry, for now." Carla handed over the items and then left. (It''s a good thing that her desire to win has overwhelmed her curiosity about me. Women never found me that interesting anyway.) Nick locked the door and looked at the items. "One basin, one magically enhanced surgical knife, one basic level healing potion, one pack of drawing chalk." Nick cleared an area in the room and the began to draw a formation that Slade had placed in his mind. [This is an enhanced blood infusion formation that I picked up from a defeated enemy at one point during my rank 7 years. The only way to effectively combat the bloodline curse is to ironically become truly a part of that bloodline so we are going to use you as the power source for this formation to replace your current bone marrow with tissue that self produces a mixture of your original blood plus the cursed blood that is now within your right hand. Let''s begin.] Nick finished drawing the magic formation and placed himself at the center; Nick remember that he had also used himself as the power source for the soul calming formation so the process was not entirely new to him. Nick then took the magically enhanced surgical knife and made a deep cut into his palm; he gritted his teeth and let the blood from his palm flow into the basin. ("Why is the blood black?") [Because it is cursed blood and even if we bleed you like this, with that mark on your palm, more would eventually be generated and continue to mix with your actual blood until it influenced you physiology to a certain degree.] Nick sighed. (I really do have some weird luck, Andre was right. What were the chances that this would happen to me at this time?) [That doesn''t mater right now, let''s deal with the situation at hand.] Nick nodded and let his palm bleed until he could see red blood. Slade instructed further: [Alright, activate the formation while chanting these words. You might want to lie down for this procedure, It will be painful.] Nick heeded Slade''s warning and lied down while chanting the words of a mystical language that he was unfamiliar with in order to activate the formation and there soon developed a buzzing noise within the room as the symbols of the formation started rotating rapidly on the floor. The black blood within the basin soon began to boil and Nick could feel the blood within his body begin to move rapidly. After a certain amount of boiling, the black blood within the bucket was lifted into the air and it flowed into Nick''s nostrils, ears and mouth; he constantly felt like he was drowning. As if there was a battle going on, Nick''s original blood and the black blood started mixing and reacting violently. The pain was almost unbearable as Nick felt that his bones were being broken apart and put back together and his body felt like hot coals were being placed all over it. Nick still gritted his teeth and endured the pain while struggling to chant the words that kept the formation going for the next ten minutes. At the end of that time, the pain receded and his right palm started bleeding red blood again. Slade instructed: [Go ahead and drink that healing potion before you bleed out.] Nick got up despite his current discomfort and drank the healing potion that was placed beside the formation which had stopped rotating already. The incision on his right palm was mended within a few seconds but there was still a burning pain at the area that the incision was made and the mark left by the curse was still present. [We will not be able to remove that mark for now but at least it should not produce anymore black blood after you infused your bloodline with the cursed blood.] (What does obtaining a cursed bloodline mean for me?) [It could mean many things, many of which are not so good but under the circumstances, I really had no other solutions to the imminent danger. The good news though, is that considering the power of the first bloodline spell, this bloodline may be powerful enough to grant other bloodline abilities or change your physiology and other aspects of you later on.] (...Great.) Nick was not excited in the least because he was forced to do a choppy procedure on his own body, practically altering his DNA with hardly any time to consider. Nick sat on the floor for a while and considered his next steps. (The last stage of the tournament starts in fifteen minutes. I''ll go to the arena now. Oh, before that...) Nick took out his smart phone and called Carla again; she picked up at the first ring. "What do you want now, Nick?" "I am kind of ready to go to the arena but before that, do you have a place in this estate where can test my magic affinities?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 80: Less Than "Why do you need to test your affinities?" Nick replied, not wanting to give Carla much information: "I just want to make sure of something. I can''t explain it even if you ask me." Carla gave a heavy sigh over the phone. "Can''t or won''t? Anyway, it doesn''t matter. Meet me at the first floor''s hall and I will hand you a hand held testing device and then we will go to the arena for the final stage." Nick noticed the stern tone in Carla''s voice so he gave no objections: "I''ll be there in five minutes." (She must really be annoyed by my secrecy considering her status and mine are worlds apart but she still needs me to compete so she isn''t willing to be forceful right now.) The more Nick interacted with Carla, the more he realized how shrewd she was. Nick left the room and arrived at the first floor''s hall within a few minutes; Carla was sitting at the corner of the hall on one of the sofas, seemingly waiting for Nick. As soon as he walked up to her, Carla handed him a smart phone sized device that consisted of a screen and what seemed like a finger print scanner. Nick looked at the device for a few moments with some uncertainty so Carla clarified: "That is a recent model of a portable affinity tester, you''re looking like you''ve never seen one before. Well, I suppose that they are very expensive and you need to be a licensed Magician to purchase one so considering your circumstances, this might be the first time that you''re using one since the academy doesn''t use these, am I correct?" Nick silently nodded his head to affirm Carla''s guess. "Well then, you just have to place your thumb on the pad, funneling your magic energy into it and wait a couple of minutes for the results. The tournament is about to start so don''t waste any time." Nick got right to it, he placed his thumb on the device''s pad and made his magic energy flow into it; a loading screen appeared and at the end of two minutes, the results from the device''s analysis was displayed on the screen: ----------------------------------------- Unknown magic affinity: 42% Soul magic affinity: 22% Space magic affinity: 19% Blade magic affinity: 17% ------------------------------------------ Nick looked at the results with wide opened eyes. (My affinity for rule magic was diluted and somehow my affinity for blade magic has returned. Slade, what the hell is this situation?) Slade spoke with uncertainty: [This affinity must have originated from your now cursed bloodline and that is why you are now able to use blade magic. Usually, affinities originate from the laws engraved on the soul at birth but for some extremely powerful Magicians, the laws that dictate their affinities are etched into various parts of their body. That being said, the Magician that cursed you must be very powerful so it''s a good thing that we acted when we did to resist the curse but my wisdom path intuition is telling me that the only way to truly resolve the danger of your curse is for you to get stronger, enough to resist that mysterious Magician.] Nick''s mood became terrible, to him this was like misfortune falling from the sky while he remained in his own house. (Note to self, beware of using strange spells just because they seem powerful. Sigh, I can only move forward from here. It''s either I get stronger or eventually die as meat on someone else''s chopping block.) Carla noticed the change in Nick''s mood and asked: "Is something the matter, did the device not work as expected?" Nick internally kicked himself for not keeping a straight face in front of this powerful Magician and quickly deleted the results on the device and handed it back to her with a now indifferent expression. "The device is fine, I just remembered something unpleasant." Carla got up from her sitting position and instructed: "Since you are done, let''s go to the arena." Nick nodded his head in agreement and began to walk to the arena with Carla leading the way. When they arrived in the arena, Carla went to sit among her relatives while Nick went into the arena where a battle stage had now been erected. Nick stood among the competitors but he paid them no attention as he was wrapped up with his own thoughts: (I can''t only think about the negatives of my situation. The good part is that now with my change in affinities, I can use blade magic. How strange, I initially had an affinity for blade magic and now because of a ''curse'', I''ve regained it, my luck really is weird.) Nick was snapped out of his thoughts by Vaughn Jenner''s booming voice. "Thirty competitors are set to compete in today''s matches and each pair of fighters will be chosen at random and each fight will take place one after the other. Invigilator Wong will act as the referee for each match." "The winner will be decided by knock out or elimination if one of the competitors fall off of the battle stage; Wong also has the right to stop the match and declare a winner if one of the competitors falls into a clear and possibly fatal disadvantage. In the spirit of real combat and considering that not all competitors attend a Magician school, I''ve already spoken with the academies of the students involved in this tournament and the various deans have already decided not to pursue the matter if any of their student''s die in this competition after participating willingly, so do your best." Nick''s right eyebrow raised in surprise. (The academy actually waived responsibility just like that without even notifying me?) Slade chimed in: [What are you so surprised about? It is normal for organizations to break their own rules for influential members of society, don''t get hung up over it.] Nick felt slightly annoyed but calmed himself down because Slade was right when he said that it was a normal thing for organizations to do. Suddenly, Nick felt someone staring at him from the side so he turned to look and saw the young man that he had ''dealt'' with previously looking at him menacingly. (I think his name was Drew Gordon. It looks like he did not learn his lesson.) Nick was in no mood to be the target of other people''s bullshit so he ignored Drew. Drew Gordon watched Nick turn away from him and snickered internally. (Do you think that it''s going to be that easy to ignore me after you embarrassed me before. Hmph, you should be more careful about who you offend!) Drew looked at invigilator Wong who caught Drew''s stare and Wong discretely made a winking motion with his eye, thinking: (This dumb kid actually paid me ¡ê25,000,000 just to set up a match. I''ve heard stories of students from Raylam Priest Academy being vengeful but they don''t do them justice, this boy is extremely petty.) Invigilator Wong spoke with decisiveness: "The first match will be between Nick Capitol and Drew Gordon. Both competitors should go to the battle stage immediately." Nick squinted his eyes in suspicion after hearing that. (A coincidence? No, coincidences like this don''t happen. It looks like I''m going to really have to deal with this Drew Gordon.) Nick thought that with obvious malice contained within his eyes; he fixed his expression to an indifferent one soon after and made his way to the battle stage. Drew Gordon also walked onto the stage with a confident grin, saying: "You got one on me before but do you really think that a rank 1 Magician could ever be superior to a rank 2? Let me give you the answer, No, and you are about to witness why." Nick replied: "You talk too much." A vain bulged on Drew''s forehead when he heard that but then he relaxed his expression, saying: "You should have been more respectful." Invigilator Wong walked to the side of the stage to keep a watchful eye and to give instructions, observing both participants for a while and then shouted: Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there. "Begin the match!" That shout was like a gunshot to Nick and so he didn''t waste any time, Drew was within ten feet of him so he cast his spell to quickly immobilize him. (Soul Pressure.) Drew was about to move but suddenly, he became stuck in place like what he had experienced during his first interaction with Nick. Drew spoke through gritted teeth: "That won''t work this time." The next moment, a bright green light could be seen emerging from behind Drew''s long sleeved shirt; he became able to move again and so he put his hand into his shirt''s neck opening and drew out what seemed to be a glowing necklace. Nick squinted his eyes. (A magic tool? He''s resisting Soul Pressure and seeing how that thing is radiating some kind of magic, it must be the source of his resistance.) Drew reached into his pocket and took out two metal, brass colored objects and placed one on his left hand''s knuckles and the other on his right hand''s knuckles. Nick raised both of his eyelids this time. (Those are brass knuckles and I''m definitely sensing a weak trace of magic energy from them.) Drew bent his right elbow and shot his right fist into the ground, thoroughly cracking the surface of the battle stage a few inches deep as the crack expanded as it moved towards Nick. Nick sensed the danger so as the crack approached him he activated his spell. (Blink.) Nick disappeared and reappeared two meters from his last position and he witnessed a stone spike that was nine meters tall and twenty inches thick rise from the ground exactly where he had been standing. Nick knew that if he hadn''t dodged, that attack would have at the very least skewered him. Among the spectators, Carla looked at the scene and frowned, directing a reprimand at one of her relatives: "Miles, you actually gave an outsider the earth breaker knuckles. Are we in the business of arming children with dangerous weapons? That is a magic tool with the power to perform peak rank 2 attacks." A middle aged man wearing a yellow robe and sandals countered: "Carla, you are actually reprimanding me after you brought a student from Richter Order Academy here despite the grievance between that academy and many of our family members. Don''t you dare accuse me, I''ve already recruited that young man and even intend to marry him to my daughter so he is practically family, besides, there is nothing wrong with using magic tools in this tournament. It''s not my fault that you brought a rank 1 Apprentice Magician here; he may have done well in the other stages but this is combat and no amount of skill can overcome raw, overwhelming power. I know it''s early but let me just say, I am sorry for your loss. Ha, ha, ha..." Miles Jenner laughed outrageously as Carla scowled at him but Carla could do nothing as it was indeed legal to used magic tools but she herself had never intended to give Nick magic tools to use because she did not need him to win these battles as he had already done well in the last two stages in addition to the fact that she found him to be a little arrogant and wanted to humble him but this situation could result in his death which would not be good for the relationship between her and Richter Order Academy which was already strained. (Wong should stop the match if things get out of hand. Damn this bastard, not only did he give this child the earth breaker knuckles, he also gave this Drew the soul repelling chain to wear around his neck. Were they targeting Nick from the start, knowing that he used soul path spells?) As Carla became concerned, Drew Gordon continued to speak: "I''ll give you the chance to surrender, less than. Don''t take too long." Nick''s expression became one of extreme rage and his thoughts were filled with malice at this moment. (Less than. Why do I keep being called that. I''m was chosen to compete just like you and I''ve even done better than you and yet you are targeting me because you think that you are some elite and I am not. I''m so sick of these people and their bullshit.) Nick remembered how Alicia had attacked him at the entrance of the mansion and did not even glance at him or even say that she was sorry, like he wasn''t even human, deserving of even a little decency. (I''ve had enough.) As Drew bent his right elbow, about to launch another attack, Nick stared at him with extreme malice and folded both of his hands into each other, magic energy flowing to him in a frenzy; Nick was also exuding a great amount of magic energy. "Huh?" Drew noticed the change and stopped his actions to observe what Nick was doing. A sinister aura started to fill the stage and Drew observed that the look on Nick''s face revealed his turbulent emotions. Nick spoke to Drew with hatred in his tone: "You actually stopped attacking just to stare at me? You are an idiot and have no business being a Magician." At this moment, Nick cast his spell. (Malevolent Shrine.) The whole arena, including the spectator stands became filled with a darkness that each person could still see through. In the middle of the arena, piles of bones appeared scattered all around and an old run down temple stood erect behind Nick as Drew looked at the scene in fear, paralyzed by the aura that he was feeling. (This has to be at least a rank two advanced grade spell, how is he casting it? What kind of spell is this anyway, the whole arena has been affected?...) Before Drew could finish analyzing the situation, his whole world became dark, different from the darkness around him, his vision filled with darkness that he could not see through no matter what. The spectators watched silently as Drew was cut vertically into three pieces that fell to the floor in a bloody mess with Nick standing a few meters away watching the scene with a rage filled gaze. After Drew''s blood had formed a pool, the darkness enveloping the arena and the stands dispersed and the bones and temple also faded away as if they were never there. Miles Jenner stood up without thinking, looking at the scene angrily and then cursing at Nick like he had lost his mind: "You little bastard. How could you kill that young man so ruthlessly during a friendly tournament!" "Miles, where is your composure!" Vaughn retorted with a louder reproach that sent shivers down Miles'' spine. He quickly bowed towards Vaughn, saying: "I was wrong, uncle. I should have instructed Drew in defending himself better." Miles said this and then took a seat, clearly upset; Carla smiled lightly at his misfortune. Nick looked at the situation with indifference and simply walked off of the stage. Wong who was at the side and still processing what just happened snapped out of his stupor as soon as Nick walked off of the stage and then declared: "Nick Capitol is the winner of the match." Nick stood among the other competitors but they all distanced themselves from him, whispering: "He killed Drew just like that. Although Drew was unreasonable and annoying, this guy is even more unreasonable and absurd." "Drew was the adopted son of one of the administrators of the Raylam Priest Academy, I wonder how they will react to his death." "That Nick Capitol has some serious issues, why is he taking this so seriously? What was that spell that he used, was it really rank 2?" .... All sorts of chatter emerged but Nick paid no attention to it, he just stood in his spot, feeling somewhat satisfied while Slade spoke: [Actually, your spell was the equivalent of rank one advanced grade but it just looked more terrifying than it actually is. Although its overall power is nothing to write home about because you are still rank 1, the spell''s complexity and killing precision make it formidable. An inexperienced junior like the one that you killed would never be able to defend against it despite his higher rank.] Nick said nothing as he waited for the tournament to continue. Invigilator Wong had Drew''s corpse cleaned up and called up the other participants in pairs and everyone competed without an incident as gruesome as what happened in the first match taking place. When Nick''s next match came around, his opponent this time was a dignified looking youth who wore an all white tunic and had a head of golden blonde hair; they stood and faced each other on the battle stage. As soon as Wong announced that the match was to begin, the young man raised both of his hands in surrender, saying: "I don''t really intend to die today so I admit my defeat." The young man said this and walked off of the stage; Nick was a little surprised that his opponent did not even try to fight him but he thought for a moment and understood the decision. (Malevolent Shrine does look scary. It seems that I''ve frightened these people.) Nick stepped off of the stage and waited for his next match. The tournament went on with the only oddity being Nick who had killed his first opponent and every other opponent that he had, surrendered with no actual battle occurring. Eventually, after many battles, the ultimate winner was declared by invigilator Wong to be Nick because all of his opponents surrendered without a fight. At the end of the tournament, Vaughn instructed everyone to leave and that they would hold a banquet in honor of the winner tomorrow morning. Carla walked into the arena and pat Nick on the shoulder saying: "You sure gave me a surprise, that spell that you used seemed to be similar to the one that you used on the magic power gauge device in the second stage but different somehow. What kind of spell was that?" Nick thought it was unnecessary that hide that information from Carla at this point so he answered: "It was a blade path spell." Carla nodded as she had already suspected that. "Soul path, space path, an unknown path and now blade path. You weren''t joking when you said that you were a magic fanatic but now I''m even more confident that you have a mentor. Don''t worry, I won''t pry but since I don''t want to make enemies out of another Magician with such methods, I''ll have to ask that you choose to explore one of the less dangerous of my family''s private realms as your reward. We can access two such small realms from this estate. I''ll have a gate opened for you to enter after the banquet." Nick shook his head with a firm resolve rooted into his eyes. "I would like to start exploring the realm now. I have many other things to do and so I cannot afford to waste time on a banquet." Carla looked at Nick for a few moments, feeling that this junior of hers was very interesting despite his bland personality. "Hmmm...my uncle wanted to meet you but I guess he''ll have to be disappointed. Go take a shower and rest a little. I''ll come get you after I''ve made some preparations so that you can enter one of our realms." Nick nodded his head silently with tired eyes and returned to Carla''s room. Surprisingly, all of the furniture and fixtures had been replaced with new ones and you could not tell that the room was used as the testing ground for a powerful spell before. Nick went into the room''s bathroom and got into the shower; he stood in there for a while thinking about his circumstances: (Sigh, it looks like I have a little anger within me.) Slade laughed: [A little? You murdered that boy with intent.] Nick''s eyes quaked at Slade''s comment. [Don''t get the wrong idea, kid. I''m not criticizing you as I have killed millions more for far more insignificant reasons. All I''m saying is that feeling bad about what you did is pointless because your opponent would have had no problem doing the same to you.] Nick nodded his head. (I''ll get over it.) [That''s good. Now, I seriously don''t recommend that you use that spell or similar spells in front of people while you are attending your academy. Civilized society tends to frown on rampant murder and whoever created that spell seemed to design it for that specific purpose. The rules of darkness is darkness and the rules of light is light. Let''s not give the authorities any reason to watch us warily. Understood?] Nick thought for a moment then replied: "I get it, spells that reek of blood lust should not be used openly." Nick spent the next thirty minutes showering and slept for an hour. When he woke up, it was already dark outside from it being the middle of the night. At this time Carla came into the room and spoke to him: "I''ve made the preparations, follow me to your reward." Nick got up from his sitting position and left the room with Carla leading him. (Finally, another realm to explore.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 81: Growth Carla and Nick walked out of the mansion and headed to the west side of the estate where there were very little trees and a wide expanse of freshly cut grass. Nick asked Carla: "So what are my choices of realms?" As if waiting for Nick to ask, Carla answered readily: "As I mentioned earlier, despite our deal, I am only giving you an option of our two least dangerous realms; they are fairly small and all of their natural resources excluding local fauna have already been harvested for this period. One realm includes a large forest plagued with curse path beasts, the strongest of which are rank 2 and the other realm consists of a small island surrounded by nothing but sea, it is filled with swamps that are the home to many poison path beasts and poisonous insects." Nick pondered on the choices. (Curse path magic beasts, huh? Sounds a little interesting. Thinking back on the last swamp I was in, I don''t really want to visit another one.) "I thought you said that you were sending me to a not so dangerous realm, why would you send me to a poisonous swamp?" Carla replied: "The magic beasts and insects are only mildly poisonous and the strongest among them are rank 2. The most that their poison can do is give you a stomach ache if you stupidly touch one or let one bite you. All you have to do to explore it is avoid getting ambushed by a large group of beasts or insects and you should be fine, especially considering the capabilities that you have already shown..." Carla said the last part with deep meaning but Nick ignored it and said: "I''ll explore the realm with the curse path magic beasts. Oh and the last realm that I visited had a different flow of time than Grand Earth. Is it the same with that realm?" Carla was a little disappointed that Nick ignored her attempt to steer the conversation in a certain direction but she answered his question nonetheless: "Yes, there is a difference in the flow of time in the realm. One day in that particular realm should be about four days on Grand Earth." Nick felt ecstatic. (Since I have five days left before I have to go back to the academy, I can actually spend twenty days exploring that realm, that''s great.) Nick smiled lightly and continued to follow Carla to a spot where a man dressed in a scarlet colored robe that had a hoodie which covered his head was standing holding a small travel bag. Carla spoke first: "This is one of my servants within the estate and I had him pack you some food that should last you about two days within the realm. How long were you planning on exploring?" Nick replied: "The rest of the five days that I am allowed to be away from the academy." Carla raised two of her eyebrows in surprise. "You want to be in there for that long, that is almost a month within the realm. Are you sure that you want to do that?" Nick replied: "Yes I am." Carla sighed. "Then in that case, you will have to find additional food and water yourself after these supplies are finished." Carla motioned and her servant handed Nick the travel bag at which point Nick looked inside and there was indeed loaves of bread and packets of dried meat and water inside. Nick closed the bag and asked: "Can you open the passage now?" Carla nodded and revealed a wrist watch in her hand. "This is basically a magic timing device and it will bring you back here once it is time for me to return you to the academy, if you want to return here before then, all you have to do is select the ''alert'' option on the device." Nick took the device from Carla and wrapped it around his wrist. To him, it looked like an old model smart watch with a touch display, not that he could ever afford one. Carla''s servant took out a glowing blue crystal and placed it on the ground. He clasped his hands, seeming to perform a spell and the crystal broke into pieces from which a blue mist spread from. Carla spoke at this time: "That was a marking crystal with the coordinates of the realm I''m sending you set in it, once you walk through that mist, you will find your way there. Be careful Nick and don''t bite off more than you can chew. If you do not return here in five days, I will send out a search party. Goodbye" Nick nodded silently and walked up to the mist; it has an almost fragrant scent to it and had the consistency of fire smoke. Nick quickly walked through it, continuing forward even though he could not see where he was going. After some time, he finally walked out of the mist after which it dissipated and Nick found himself among many trees with a forest canopy preventing him from seeing the sky so the lighting of the forest floor was fairly dim. Suddenly, Nick heard the sound of ''hooting'' above him and he looked up to see a meter tall owl staring down at him, watching him. Nick looked squarely in its eyes and the owl like creature returned his stare. (What is that magic beast, something about its stare is causing me to feel some unease?) Slade warned: [Nick, quickly get away from that magic beast, it is casting some sort of curse on you.] Slade''s warning, however came too late. As Nick looked into the magic beast''s eyes, his eyes became unfocused and his vision became dark. ....................... When Nick''s vision returned to him, he was no longer in a forest, instead he was inside of a boat floating on a body of water that was covered all around in fog. Nick looked around and saw nothing but grey fog in every direction and so he asked, not expecting a reply: If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. "Where am I?" Surprisingly, there was a reply to Nick''s question. "Even if you knew where you were, would it make a difference?" Nick immediately looked for the source of the voice and eventually spotted a stork as it flew down to rest on the edge of his boat. This stork was the size of a ten year old child and had a twenty inch long beak and glistening white feathers. Nick asked: "Who are you?" "My name is Years and I was just flying along my usual route when I spotted your boat and answered your stupid question." Nick became visibly annoyed when he heard Years call his question stupid and retorted: "What was so stupid about my question?" "Even if you knew where you were, with this fog all about you, you would not be able to direct yourself so does it matter where you are?" "It''s the obvious thing to ask when you are in an unknown situation." "You say that but wouldn''t a better question have been: ''How do I steer through this fog?''. You have no control over the surrounding circumstances which are unknown to you but you can find a way to steer this boat." Nick went silent for a second and looked around soon finding an oar on the other side of the boat. Nick picked it up and tried to use it to direct the boat. While he was rowing, he asked the stork: "You said that you were flying on this route, how long do you think before I can row this boat out of the fog?" The stork replied: "Years." "What?" "You don''t know where you are or the exact direction to take to get out of this fog, you have to expect that it will take years." Nick swallowed his own saliva. "I can''t think like that, won''t I go thirsty if the journey takes that long?" After Nick asked this question, a small brown pigeon flew down to rest on the side off the boat opposite to Years and replied: "Not necessarily, you can survive for quite a while by drinking your own urine and seeing how foggy this place is, there might be occasional rain." Nick asked: "Who are you?" The pigeon answered: "My name is Endurance and I was flying on this route when I heard you ask Years your question and I had to intervene. If you want to escape troublesome circumstances you must have endurance, for who knows how long it will take." Nick listened to Endurance intently and nodded his head in agreement, continuing to row the boat. Nick rowed for a seemingly long time; occasionally he would have to stop when he was thirsty to urinate on his own shirt then wring the shirt to release the urine into his mouth. he did this a few times over a long period and after each time he would row the boat another great distance. Soon, rain fell from the sky and Nick drank much of it until his thirst could no longer be felt but now his stomach rumbled frequently because of hunger so he asked Years and Endurance: "Even if I quench my thirst and keep rowing, how do I cope with this hunger?" At this moment, a large vulture flew down from the sky and landed on Nick''s shoulder and answered his question with a whisper: "Are you stupid? Years and Endurance are right there, If you can catch them, they will certainly make for a good meal?" Nick asked the newcomer: "Who are you?" The vulture replied: "My name is Growth. I''ve already told you how to satisfy your hunger so do what I said." Nick was reluctant to do as Growth demanded but he soon realized that he was starving to death so he went into action. "Years, Endurance, I think I found a way to resolve my hunger, could you come closer and listen to my plan?" Years and Endurance were wary of the newcomer, Growth, because he had a bad reputation but they both approached Nick anyway to hear his plan; Years asked: "Nick, what plan did that rascal Growth give you, be careful of him, he has a bad reputation among us birds?" Endurance also had something to say: "That''s right, Growth is known for being unreasonable and ill-mannered." As they were warning him, Nick grabbed both birds fiercely, immobilizing them and Growth proceeded to bite off the heads of both birds; it was a gruesome sight. With some disgust, Nick asked: "Why did you bite off their heads?" Growth replied: "Don''t you know? It is natural for growth to consume both years of time and one''s endurance. Those two said that I had a bad reputation and that I was unreasonable but those who desire nothing valuable and remain stagnant always see someone else''s growth as offensive to themselves so they spread falsehoods to make themselves feel better. You should eat too if you want to grow." Nick felt enlightened. He bit into the flesh of both Years and Endurance and said: "They are both bitter tasting but they fill my stomach and produce a feeling of satisfaction." Nick finished eating the flesh of Years and Endurance until only their bones and intestines were left. He then got back to rowing the boat with more vigor than before. After an unknown amount of time, Nick had finally rowed the boat out of the fog; he looked back to celebrate with Growth but was surprised to see that Growth had somehow become five times his original size without him noticing. "Growth, how did you get so big?" Growth replied with a satisfied expression: "Years of time and endurance amidst persistent effort produces even greater growth. Do you understand Nick?" Growth''s eyes glowed with a reddish hue as he declared this, staring into Nick''s eyes. Nick''s eyes also glowed with a reddish hue and he replied: "Yeah...I understand." ..................... Nick suddenly snapped out of his daze and jumped to the side, dodging the owl like magic beast as it tried to swoop down on him. (Soul Pressure.) The magic beast''s movements became sluggish but it did not stop moving entirely so Nick quickly pointed is right index and middle finger at the creature and cast his offensive spell. (Rumbling Pillar.) The magic beast was flying about a meter off of the ground when the space around it twisted and shook madly. In the next ten seconds, the magic beast fell to the ground with all of its bones broken and blood oozing out from its orifices. Nick stood over his victim as he assessed it and himself. (Rumbling Pillar consumed 2,000 magical units this time just to kill one magic beast. My advantage of having high magic energy reserves won''t matter if I have to use so much of it to perform one attack. I need a way to resolve the high expenditure of my spells.) Nick reflected on his shortcomings and then asked Slade: "Hey, Slade, is it possible that I can eat this thing without cooking it?" Slade answered with a weird tone: [I''m glad that you were able to somehow overcome the curse that this magic beast placed on you, putting you into a daze, but why would you want to eat it while you already have food and water?] Nick replied: "To test out a hunch." Nick opened his backpack and retrieved a knife that he had gotten from invigilator Wong but forgot to return; Nick used his spell, Big, to make it slightly bigger and to strengthen it. He started dissecting the magic beast, creating a bloody mess and after cutting out its liver, Nick bit into it and swallowed a mouthful. Slade was alarmed. [What the hell are you doing? Magic beasts also have diseases and parasites. In addition, this magic beast is of the curse path. Its body may naturally have laws related to all sorts of curses. Stop eating its flesh.] Nick ignored Slade and continued to eat until he felt full. At that point, Nick felt his blood boil and magic energy started to flow towards him in a frenzy. Nick sat down and began to meditate; a whirlpool of magic energy appeared above his head and gradually filled his mindscape with magic energy. After an hour, the whirlpool of magic dissipated and Nick stood up with loads of energy to burn. Slade remarked with surprise: [I realized what you did, kid. You ate that magic beast''s flesh and somehow the laws that were on its flesh temporarily remained in your body and attracted a torrent of magic energy to you. This place is filled with curse path magic energy but is also mixed with other paths like the rule path magic energy that you need to nurture your mindscape, filling it with rule path laws. How did you discover this method?] Nick told Slade about the vision he had that involved Years, Endurance and Growth and how he frequently had such visions. [You are a really strange young man with even stranger luck. No, this sort of feels like something more than luck. Hmmm...never mind, I''m probably just letting my mind wonder.] [Although your method is reckless and I''m not even sure why it works the way it does, it is beneficial to you so I won''t interfere.] Nick smiled with the blood of the magic beast still around his mouth. "I''m not leaving this place until I get to rank 2." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 82: Sever Five days later... Ten vile jaguars were running in a group after a target that had decreased their numbers over the last two hours from twenty nine to a mere ten. These were rank two magic beasts that looked similar to the jaguars on Grand Earth but had black colored magic laws visible all over their bodies and they had the speed of cheetahs so they were about to catch up to their target. This target who was running with all that he had was none other than Nick Capitol who had been hunting magic beasts of the curse path within this realm for almost a week. (It looks like I cannot outrun them after all. I didn''t want to continue fighting because the sun was going down but I have no choice.) Nick quickly stopped running, turned around and cast his spell. (Soul Pressure.) The vile jaguars were slowed by the spell but they continued running at a normal human''s running pace. (Sigh, Soul Pressure is becoming less and less effective with these magic beasts. Apparently curse path beasts have a fair degree of resistance to soul path methods and the strength of my own soul is not strong enough to overcome the resistance.) Nick planted his feet firmly on the ground and folded his hands into each other, casting another spell. (Malevolent Shrine.) The area within a fifteen meter radius was covered in a feint darkness with large numbers of bones piled up on the ground and an old rundown temple stood erect behind Nick. The vile jaguars running towards him felt something amiss and so they tried to turn around and flee. (Too late for that.) All ten magic beasts were cut in half from the midsection through to the spinal column. When Malevolent Shrine concluded, all ten vile jaguars were as dead as could be. Nick quickly went into action and started dissecting the upper half of one of his victims, stripping away its fur coat and going for its internal organs. Nick took hold of the magic beast''s heart that was still pumping lightly and bit into it, spending the next five minutes completely devouring it. After Nick was finished eating, he started to run again towards the north direction where twenty minutes later he found his base of operations. It was a cave that was situated inside of a cliff wall; although it was small and smelt of iron, it was warm and avoided by the magic beasts that resided within this realm. "Man, I really can''t get over how bitter raw beast meat and blood tastes." Nick sat on the ground and began meditating, drawing a torrent of magic energy towards him. Over the last few days, after multiple sessions like this, Nick had figured out why his meditation was so much more effective when he came here. The first reason being that his mindscape had more than just the quality of having a high capacity for holding magic energy, it also attracted a large amount of magic energy to him based on the saturation of rule magic energy within his surroundings, increasing his rate of magic energy recovery and increasing the rate at which his mindscape was nurtured. Nick could tell after spending a few days within this realm that although the predominant type of magic energy in the atmosphere was curse magic, this place had a far higher concentration of rule magic in the atmosphere than Grand Earth. Slade had suggested to Nick after using his wisdom path methods that this was so because curse magic was actually closely related to rule magic. The second reason was that ever since his bloodline was altered, he became more easily affected by and more sensitive to magical laws and so when he ate the flesh of these magic beasts a portion of their laws remained within his body and this temporarily caused an increase in the magic energy that he attracted from the surroundings and even promoted the development of rule magic laws within his mindscape. Of course he wasn''t exactly sure how accurate the latter conclusion was but he felt certain that it was close to the truth and Slade agreed with him. Nick had been hunting magic beasts for days on end trying to progress in his mediation and he could feel his mind becoming stronger and the quality of his magic energy becoming greater. Nick finished up his meditation in a few hours and within the darkness, he focused on his thoughts. (...and that should be it. During my last ''vision'', I received some inspiration from Growth and I have been working on an interesting spell for the past five days after my hunts. It''s actually very easy now to use my own mind as a notebook because of my improving mindscape and my understanding of rule magic is getting better everyday.) (This new spell is called Growth and theoretically, it should help me experience some kind of growth every time that I consume beast meat, although I don''t know by how much as yet and what form that this growth would take. The spell''s laws are not very complex from my perspective so it should be easy to cast, I just have to wait for daytime to go hunting.) Nick created this spell from inspiration so he was not entirely sure about the spell''s specific effects, he just knew that it would result in ''growth''. Nick would always stay within the cave at night because curse magic seemed to be even more effective in dark settings which resulted in the magic beasts being stronger at night so he did not want to take the risk of encountering a strong curse path magic beast during this time. (I''ve also noticed from using Malevolent Shrine that when it came to killing, blade path is far more effective than space path or soul path.) Slade chimed in at this time: [You are right about that, blade path and sword path practically specialize in killing and have very little use in doing anything else. Your malevolent shrine is very useful to you at this stage but how much magic energy did it consume in order to use the spell?] (It cost 11,000 magical units to kill all ten vile jaguars.) This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there. [Kid, that''s too much consumption just to kill ten lowly pups; if you were a normal rank 2 Apprentice Magician, you would never be able to use this spell. You have powerful spells but the fact that you have a large amount of magic energy reserves is ruining your sense of proportion. A good Magician should not waste a drop of magic energy and so you should stop using ox cleavers to kill chickens. I know that the inheritance that I gave you requires you to begin training and altering your soul to use almost all of its attack methods but you still have a few less costly attacking methods within your space path inheritance. You should use them.] (The reason why I did not learn them before was that I thought that they lacked lethality.) [So? An attacking spell does not have to be lethal for it to be effective on an opponent, why are you so concerned about that?] (I''m not sure but if a spell doesn''t have a sort of lethality to it, it doesn''t seem worth using to me. From my experiences, I think that every blow to my opponent should have the chance of killing them, I''m not trying to tickle people into submission.) Slade was quiet for a while before speaking again: [He, he. Nick, those are actually some extreme and demonic thoughts. If you really want to walk down that road, things won''t be easy for you.] (I''m not looking for my circumstances to be easy.) Nick waited until sunrise came and the darkness lifted by a large margin. Because of the forest canopy, the forest floor was still fairly dim but Nick''s vision was not hampered by much. Nick went out of his cave looking for his next meal; he actually never kept the travel bag of food that Carla had given him since he thought that it would weaken his resolve. (That sounds like some samurai type thing but I needed to push myself in order to continue eating beast meat and drinking beast blood to grow stronger so I ended up throwing the bag away.) Throughout the next six hours, Nick ran into vile jaguars, petty owls, meager dogs and quarrel rats but he killed them all fairly easily with his overpowered spells. Nick needed about one minutes to recover his magic energy reserves in this realm so he was never in a situation where he was completely tapped out. Nick soon discovered a clearing after going a distance in the eastern direction that he had never traveled before. This part of the forest was well lit because of the lack of trees and existed over a large radius. CLANG BASH RIP Nick soon heard a mixture of sounds as he entered the clearing and it was not long before he discovered the source. About thirty meters in the distance, there were two magic beasts battling each other with their lives on the line. One looked like a two meter tall crane with an incredibly sharp beak and silver feathers and the other was a just as tall gorilla like beast covered in black fur. The gorilla punched and the crane pecked and clawed. Nick lowered his posture and moved closer, making sure not to alert the fighting beasts. The two rank 2 magic beats continuing fighting for over an hour until the crane like magic beast finally used its sharp beak to slice off the gorilla''s arm then used its unbroken leg to pierce into the gorilla''s abdomen and cut it in half at the midsection. The gorilla like magic beast died with obvious grievance expressed on its face.The crane''s body fell to the ground after the victory; it had a broken leg, a damaged left eye and its beak was on the verge of breaking. A few minutes later, it tried to muster the strength to fly away but the space around it started to twist, and shake madly and soon it found itself being beaten into brokenness by the phenomenon. The crane fell to the ground with all of its bones broken and clear internal bleeding as blood pooled at its now distended abdomen. Nick walked up to the carcass and took a look at the crane. He had used Rumbling Pillar to defeat the crane that was unaware of his presence. (This magic beast seems different from the rest that I''ve faced. Do you also feel the difference, Slade?) [Indeed. This bird beast is actually of the sword path, not the curse path like that gorilla over there or the other magic beasts that you had killed.] Nick nodded in affirmation. (I wonder how its meat tastes...) Nick took out his knife and started dismembering the crane after which he devoured its heart and brain. (Now is the time to use my new spell.) Nick had not used Growth before in the forest because the areas he had been traveling in were home to many magic beasts and he did not want to stop running to dismember the carcasses which would attract other magic beasts. Nick focused on his mindscape where he started to form the laws for his spell and within the next ten minutes, they were fully formed. (Growth.) Immediately Nick was bombarded with all sorts of memories that were not his own that consisted of flying through the sky, perching on trees and fighting magic beasts. These fights mostly consisted of severing limbs, pecking out eyeballs, cutting throats and scenes like this played in Nick''s mind over and over again for a seemingly long time. (Severing, cutting...severing, cutting...) "Interesting...is this the effect of growth?" Slade was quick to comment: [Kid, although you seem really plain, you do have some talent. The spell that you created is using rule path to mimic wisdom path, providing you with the experiences and memories of that magic beast. Have you gained anything else from its effects?] Nick smiled. "I think that I have." Nick ignored the corpse of the other magic beast and spent the next few hours finding his way back to his cave. Once he returned to the cave, he took a sitting position and began meditating; while the magic energy around him flowed into him and was processed by his mindscape, Nick''s consciousness looked at the stars in his mindscape''s sky that patterned the laws for his bloodline spell, Malevolent Shrine. "Severing, cutting. Malevolent Shrine also involves these principles and if I can just take them and reapply them in a different way, I should be able to mimic at least a portion of its effects." Nick got to work immediately with working on a new spell based on the inspiration that he received from the use of Growth. (The effect Growth had was to take the memories and experiences of that crane magic beast and give me inspiration. Now that I think about it, I did eat the beast''s brain.) Nick wasn''t sure if that was exactly how growth achieved its effect but he was sure that he would figure it out later. Nick spent the next five days in the cave meditating and working on a new spell, not even going out to hunt for food and water. (Magic seems to nourish my body in a way that extends the period that I can survive without food and water, that''s good to know.) On the fifth day, Nick emerged from the cave with a smile on his face and a kind of sharpness in his eyes. Nick ran into the forest with no clear destination in mind and eventually found himself face to face with a wicked bear, a type of magic beast that he had encountered before, a few days after he entered the realm. They walked on all fours but could stand on their hind legs to appear eight feet tall; they looked very much like European black bears and they had the ability to sound out a growl that weakened one''s legs for a certain amount of time. This wicked bear stood on its hind legs as it faced Nick, looking like a towering menace and was about to make use of its signature growl but Nick intervened before that could happen. Remembering the motion that the mysterious Magician made when he first experienced Malevolent Shrine, Nick used his right index finger to trace a horizontal straight line away from his body; laws were formed within his mindscape and some of his magic energy was consumed in using the spell. (Sever.) The wicked bear suddenly realized that its vision had turned upside down and that it seemed like it was falling to the ground but actually only its head was falling to the ground; the wicked bear had been decapitated by Nick''s spell. The wicked bear died with an almost human like expression of surprise on its face. Nick stood in his spot watching the rest of the wicked bear''s body fall to the ground with blood oozing from the opening in its neck. (A rank 2 spell that requires only 1,500 magical units of rank 1 magic energy. With such lethality, I''ve finally solved the problem of my main attack methods costing too much.) World of Laws and Magic Chapter 83: 45,000 Magical Units Nick proceeded to dissect the wicked bear''s corpse wile thinking about his new spell: (Spell making is really more of an art than a science. I was able to create Sever from the inspiration that I received from the effects of Growth giving me that sword path magic beast''s experiences and by making use of some of the structure of my bloodline spell, Malevolent Shrine. The latter part was easy to do since I have an extreme familiarity with Malevolent Shrine due to the bloodline curse.) Nick took out the wicked bear''s heart, liver and brain and started eating them, as well as drinking the magic beast''s blood. (This wicked bear''s organs have a sort of sweet taste to them. Speaking of the wicked bear, I named all of these magic beasts myself but I don''t even have a reason to call this bear ''wicked'', it just sounds cool.) Nick chuckled to himself as he finished his meal. The magical laws that were engraved onto the wicked bear''s organs were temporarily stored inside of Nick and were now attracting a great deal of magic energy to Nick in a similar way as meditation and with the characteristic of his mindscape that caused even more magic energy to come his way due to the high saturation, all of these factors made him radiate with magic energy. The wicked bear''s laws within his body would soon fade away, though, so the effect was only temporary. Nick activated his spell, Growth, and observed its effects. (Huh? There is no change. Hmmm...I remember that in my vision, Growth said that years of time, endurance and persistent effort resulted in greater growth so I guess that I should continue using the spell even if I do not see immediate effects.) Nick could not meditate here because of the danger so he continued hunting magic beasts throughout the rest of the day, practising Sever in order to get familiar with it and every time he ate the flesh of a beast, he would cast Growth. When it was nearing nightfall, Nick returned to his cave and thought back on his experiences: (Sever is a rule path spell that makes use of the concept of separating one thing from another and this is done in a fashion similar to a clean slice so I''ve practically used rule path to mimic the effects of sword path, similar to how Slade said that Growth seemed to mimic the effect of wisdom path before, giving me inspiration.) Slade chimed in on Nick''s analysis: [You have a very real talent for making spells, kid. Although Growth and Sever are only rank two spells, they are able to mimic other paths using rule path which is a big deal because most Magicians are not able to create such spells until they at least enter the Regular levels. I''ve assessed both Growth and Sever to be rank 2 intermediate grade spells and you created them while being rank 1 so you should feel proud, especially considering that their consumption of magic energy is so little.] Nick felt a little pleased at Slade''s compliment since he rarely heard those from him but the feeling soon went away, replaced with cold rationality. (Slade what do you think the exact effect of Growth is, I have not noticed any changes since the second time that I used it?) Slade replied with uncertainty: [I don''t know yet either but I can sense that there is some change occurring with how your body is processing magic energy. It''s starting to feel similar to how a magic beast develops...] (Huh, what does that mean?) [I won''t be able to explain it better until we have more information, just keep hunting and meditating and we''ll probably see more results eventually. A Magician''s growth is often akin to an experiment where you do not know all of the probable outcomes so don''t try to explain everything in one go.] Nick nodded his head in the darkness and then began his meditation. Nick''s consciousness entered his mindscape and looked down at his magic sea. The results of his meditation over the last two weeks had become obvious as Nick''s magic ''sea'' had now frozen over by a large portion, going from having a few chucks of ice to a portion of it becoming a frozen tundra. (I can''t wait to see how this change progresses...) ................. Over the next two weeks, Nick did nothing but hunt magic beasts and meditate all the while practising Sever until he could use it as if it was second nature. Nick used his spell, Growth, many times but still did not notice an obvious effect. "This is the last day that I can explore the realm, come to think of it, I haven''t taken a shower in a while, I kind of miss it." Nick was running through the forest and had been doing so for close to an hour but did not find a single magic beast. Slade commented: [They seem to be avoiding you when you approach. Have you noticed that their footprints seem to frequently point away from you?] Nick was confused. (Why would they purposely avoid me, shouldn''t I be prey to them?) [I''m not sure yet.] After searching for another two hours, Nick finally found his next target, a magic beast that he had never seen before. It looked like a very large komodo dragon with razor sharp fangs, a tail that had a sharp looking blade at the end of it and colorless, cold looking eyes. The magic beast was crawling out of a hole in the ground which was probably its nest when Nick spotted it; Nick hid himself behind a tree and stalked it. (That doesn''t look like a curse path magic beast, I''m getting a similar feeling from it that I got from that sword path crane that I killed a few weeks ago.) Slade commented: [Indeed, that is either a sword path or a blade path magic beast but just like the others, it is still just at the basic stage of rank 2.] Although Nick had been here for a month already, he was only one person and could only move around in the day time so he had only been able to explore within a few kilometers of his cave so he was still unfamiliar with many of this realm''s fauna which consisted of mostly curse path magic beasts but their were clearly magic beasts of other paths living here as well. (I''ll take it by surprise.) Nick had this in mind but as soon as the magic beast crawled a few meters from its nest, it hissed at Nick''s position, taking a fighting stance. (It found me already? No matter.) Nick jumped out and pointing his right index and middle finger at the magic beast, he cast his spell. (I don''t have time to waste today so I''ll finish this quickly. Rumbling Pillar.) The space around the reptile like magic beast started to twist madly but using an ungodly amount of speed, it ran away from the position that the spell affected before it was immobilized and crushed by it. After that, it ran straight towards Nick. Nick tried to back away and eventually cast another spell: (Soul Pressure.) The magic beast was slowed but still kept moving but Nick had already achieved his goal of dealing with some of its speed. Nick stopped backing away and instead took a firm stance and traced a horizontal straight line in front of his body. Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road. (Sever.) The magic beast halted its movement as some of its scales on its neck going all the way to its lower abdomen were ripped off, but within a few moments it continued to pursue Nick. "Damn, this magic beast is actually so tough." The magic beast had been quick to begin with so even with Soul Pressure slowing it down, it soon reached Nick''s position and then lunged at him, trying to bite into his abdomen. (Blink.) Nick instantly appeared four meters behind the magic beast at a cost of 9,000 magical units, reducing his magic reserves to about half of its capacity. (This can''t go on. Why am I having so much trouble now?) Slade chuckled: [That''s because, some magic beasts at the same level have greater defenses and combat capabilities than others; their rank is dependent upon the quality of their magic energy, not combat ability and this magic beast seems to be proficient in combat. To be honest, considering your rank, it is a miracle that you could even survive in this forest, even rank 2 Apprentice Magicians would not try to hunt magic beasts so recklessly as you have because they simply don''t have the magic energy capacity to outlast a strong rank 2 magic beast who will use its body to attack them. In addition, magic beasts up to rank 4 do not commonly use spells and instead rely on the toughness of their body granted by the laws engraved into their flesh to fight. The curse path magic beasts that you have been fighting were not proficient in combat and the only reason that you killed the sword path crane so easily was because it was already injured and Malevolent Shrine has a strong killing potential.] Nick''s mood took a turn when he realized that he was not as strong as he thought but he quickly normalized his mental state. (It doesn''t matter if this thing is tough, I still have to kill it or it will kill me.) Nick ran towards the magic beast as it turned around to face him and used a spell. (Soul Quake.) The large reptile''s stance became shaky and it shook its head three times before looking straight at Nick again but Nick had already prepared his next move, he only wanted to slow down the magic beast''s reaction by a little. Nick looked squarely in the magic beast''s eyes from two meters way and cast his spell: (Ghost Eyes.) The magic beast and Nick both stopped moving and stared into each other''s eyes. A battle between their souls was now taking place and within a minute the results were clear. Nick coughed up a mouthful of blood and the magic beast oozed blood from its mouth and eyes; they both suffered damage from the effects of Ghost Eyes. Nick cursed inwardly. (Damn it, even this thing''s soul has about the same quality as mine. I only have around 5,000 magical units left. My last attack has to finish this.) Nick and the magic beast were still two meters apart but the magic beast had not collected itself as yet and was still standing in the same spot shaking its head, trying to cope with the damage done to its mind due to Nick''s soul path methods. Nick quickly folded his hands into each other and cast the spell he was hoping to end this conflict with: (Malevolent Shrine.) The radius of fifteen meters around Nick was now covered with a feint darkness and piles of bones appeared all over the ground, in addition, an old rundown temple stood erect behind Nick as he remained standing firmly, facing his enemy. The magic beast noticed the change and hissed at Nick menacingly but it was too late for it to do anything about the circumstances. Within the next moment, the magic beast was spit in half from its midsection through to its spinal column, both halves falling to the ground with the organs contained in each spilling out slightly. Malevolent Shrine faded at that moment and normalcy returned. Nick patted his chest and breathed in deeply. (I was actually able to finish this magic beast off before things got desperate. With its speed, I don''t know whether I could have out run it if I was not able to kill it.) Suddenly, Nick heard the sound of movement from the magic beast; it was actually still weakly hissing at Nick even though it organs had spilled out of its body and it was losing a large amount of blood each second. Slade commented at this time: [Magic beasts can be extraordinarily tough, and this is why Magicians of your rank don''t normally spend their time exploring realms.] "Hmph." Nick traced a horizontal line in front of him and cast a spell: (Sever.) In a moment , half of the head of the magic beast starting from its upper mouth to its crown flew into the air and landed beside the rest of its body which poured out blood like a fountain from its upper end. "Finally over." Nick walked to a nearby tree and took a seat at its base, watching the magic beast''s carcass as it bled out. Five minutes later, after recovering his magic energy reserves, Nick went up to the carcass and retrieved its heart and liver, devouring both quickly and casting his spell, Growth. Nick felt a rush of energy and his body felt oddly warmer than usual. Nick disregarded the feeling because he was not done with his hunt. He made his way towards the Magic beast''s nest and took a look inside the hole which was big enough for Nick to crawl through. After crawling through the hole for six meters, Nick encountered an area covered in leaves and dried grass that was home to four grapefruit sized eggs, one of which was different from the others as it had green circular spots all over it while the others had a completely plain white egg shell. "Why is this one different?" Slade offered a guess: [Sometimes some magical beasts are born with different potential and abilities than their kin and these magic beast are usually able to ascend a higher rank that normal once they mature. This ''mutancy'' usually presents at birth when they are born with extra limbs, different complexions, better senses or in this case for a reptile like magic beast, it is being incubated within a strangely patterned egg.] Nick didn''t care much about those details now since he was starting to feel fatigued and so he picked up each egg and broke its shell, sucking out the contents and casting Growth. (These eggs taste disgusting but they are filling me with warmth.) Nick saved the weirdly patterned egg for last and as soon as he swallowed its contents, a rush of magic energy came to him and his blood felt like it was boiling at this moment. He quickly cast Growth. "Its time to meditate." Nick remained in a lying position and began chanting his meditation. From outside of the magic beast''s nest, magic energy began to flow into it violently, entering Nick''s body. Nick''s consciousness entered his mindscape and watched as a torrent of magic energy pored into his magic sea, infusing itself with the ''water''. Much of the magic sea had already turned into ice but as if a qualitative change was occurring, the magic sea began to visibly freeze over during Nick''s four hours of meditation after which all of the water had become cold hard ice. A change happened with the stars in the mindscape''s sky as their patterns shifted to form new and more complex laws. "Is Malevolent Shrine evolving?" These were not the only changes. The concrete road that had floated above the magic sea had now merged with the ice and the road no longer had cracks in the surface as the golden figure of light continued to walk on it. Nick took a closer look at the human shaped figure; the light it exuded seemed to have dulled by about half but there was now a word on its forehead written in Nickel, Nick''s own mystical language. Nick looked closer and said the word in English: "Devour?" Nick pondered a little on the possible meaning that this change represented but could not think of an answer but he was too excited to become hung up on it. "This is definitely the qualitative change that I''ve been working towards. I''ve finally become a rank 2 Apprentice Magician." Nick''s consciousness left his mindscape and he crawled out of the hole that he had been in. It was dark outside now as it had become night while Nick was meditating. Nick could feel that he had changed significantly since before his meditation, especially the quality of his magic energy. Nick wasn''t exactly sure how to describe it but if he had to associate the feeling that his magic energy was giving him with a word, the word would be: ''violent''. Nick wasn''t sure why but that was the word that came to mind. Slade spoke at this moment: [I can tell you why, kid, but first let me say that the length of time that you took to become rank 2 wasn''t without justification, your growth has certainly been unpredictable. Go ahead, use your Malevolent Shrine on the surrounding forest.] "Huh, why?" [Just do it.] "Fine." Nick folded both of his hands into each other and focused on the laws of Malevolent Shrine within his mindscape. Before, Malevolent shrine could have only been considered a rank 1 spell since Nick himself was rank one but it had the raw killing power to rival advanced grade rank 2 spells. Now, Malevolent Shrine had transformed into a true blue rank two spell and its complexity clearly increased; Nick focused on the laws of the spell and began to feel a power come over him immediately. Two seconds later, he cast it: (Malevolent Shrine.) The surroundings within a thirty meter radius was now covered in a pitch black miasma but this did not hinder Nick''s vision; bones of varying sizes filled the surroundings and a bigger and more decrepit temple stood erect behind Nick. As the spell resolved a moment later, all of the trees, rocks and magic beasts that were within the spell''s area of effect were cut into pieces, not one thing remaining intact other than Nick himself. Nick assessed and Slade asked: [How would you describe the spell''s increased effectiveness?] Nick spoke flatly: "Violent." Slade asked another question: [What was the magic energy consumption like?] Nick assessed and spoke: "Only 3,000 magical units out of..." Nick paused for a while after noticing the capacity of his own magic energy reserves. "My magic energy reserves actually reached 45,000 magical units. Most rank two Apprentice Magicians only had a capacity of 7,000-12,000 magical units." Before Nick could celebrate, the wristwatch like magic tool on his wrist began to ring and at the next moment, the space around him warped and when things normalized he stood on the Jenners'' estate as two women talked excitedly in front of him but stopped when they noticed Nick''s arrival. Carla Jenner spoke while slowly turning her head to look at Nick: "Welcome back Nick, I''m glad..." When Carla looked at Nick, she paused in surprise. Alicia who was standing beside Carla raised both of her eyebrows, saying: "Well, he must have had an interesting time exploring our realm." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 84: Return To The Academy (What the hell happened to this young man?) Carla asked this question to herself as she looked at Nick, realizing that his appearance had changed significantly since she last saw him. His hair was no longer black but completely white, his skin was a much lighter brown than before, he was about four inches taller and the most startling change was his eyes. Before, they were a dark brown hue but now his irises were pitch black with two dull red rings surrounding his pupil; Nick''s gaze had become piercing and radiated a feeling of complete indifference. Nick noticed the strange looks that he was getting from Carla and Alicia and asked: "Ummm, can I go back to the academy now?" Both women stopped staring when they heard Nick speak and Carla stepped forward, saying: "You''ll have to take a shower first before I can bring you to the academy, you smell of blood and filth." Before Carla could walk up to Nick, however, Alicia acted: (Summons Art: Long Nose Bear) Suddenly, a magic beast that looked like a bear with a long snout who stood over ten feet tall appeared in front of Nick. Carla angrily shouted at Alicia: "What the hell are you doing?" Alicia replied: "Let''s just observe, his change is not normal." The magic beast slammed down its paw at Nick and Nick frowned intensely at which point a thick aura radiated from him filled with a bloody malice that caused the bear to stop its attack out of fear but it was too late to avoid the consequences of its actions. Nick flicked his right index finger and cast his spell: (Sever.) The magic beast was cut in two, horizontally, at its chest region, the upper half falling to the ground while the lower half stood in place erupting a fountain of blood which happened to pour all over Nick. Only after five seconds passed did the lower half fall to the ground, its organs spilling out. Carla and Alicia raised their eyebrows in surprise at Nick''s display. The long nose bear was a basic rank 2 strength path magic beast with very thick skin and strong defensive capabilities but Nick had just cut it in half with only a flick of his finger. Alicia looked on with suspicion: (What spell did he just use? The effect would suggest that it was either sword or blade magic but it doesn''t feel like either of those two.") As Alicia was about to make another move, Nick looked at her with killing intent and folded his hands into one another. Feeling Nick''s clear malice towards Alicia, Carla shouted: "Both of you, stop this foolishness before I get mad." Nick stopped what he was about to do, after all, Carla was still far more powerful than him. He clicked his tongue at Alicia and walked towards the Mansion to go and take a shower. Carla looked at his receding figure and commented: "That boy smells like death and he now has even become a rank 2 Apprentice Magician. I did not expect him to benefit much from his exploration, after all, he should have spent most of his time avoiding the magic beasts that are inside the realm but I guess I was wrong. That spell that he used...rumor has it that he sometimes uses magic of an unknown path. It looks like he has had some progress on that path." Carla looked at Alicia and reprimanded: "Stop attacking that junior without cause, if you do it again, I will take issue. It looked like he was going to cast that strange blade path spell on you. Do you think that you could have come out of the confrontation unscathed?" Alicia scoffed: "I was only playing with him a little bit and he took things so seriously. As for that blade path spell, never in a million years would I be hurt by an attack of that quality. Did you see the spell that he used against the long nose bear, that was definitely not blade path but it had extremely high killing potential for its rank?" Alicia nodded. "The young man is certainly full of surprises." .................. Nick had gone to Alicia''s room where he was now taking a shower; he had a lot of grime and blood to wash off so his shower took an hour before he felt comfortable and clean. As soon as he was done showering, he stood in front of the bathroom mirror, taking a look at himself. (I''ve really changed, the hair on my head is now white for some reason and what''s with my eyes...scary.) (Slade, when that bear attacked me, did you notice the aura that I released. I didn''t imagine that right?) Slade spoke: [No, you didn''t imagine it. That aura was palpable and it is a kind of quality that I''ve witnessed in very ferocious magic beasts and some profoundly strong Magicians. I have a suspicion as to its origin on you but I will need more information to confirm. Could you get access to a magical imaging device?] (What''s that?) [Its a device that can observe magical laws not visible on objects or the body.] (I can probably get access to one at the academy''s magical anatomy office.) [Good, do so as soon as you get to the academy.] Nick put on a robe that was in the room and called Carla and spoke as soon as she picked up the call. "I''m ready to leave, where should I meet you?" "Come out front, I''m already waiting in the car." Nick hung up the phone and made his way to the outside of the mansion. He approached Carla''s town car and proceeded to go inside. ................. Vaughn Jenner looked at the scene through his office''s window as Nick entered the town car and asked Alicia who was sitting beside of him: "You''re saying that we should recruit that young man, is that correct?" The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings. Alicia nodded in affirmation: "Yes uncle, I''ve tested him myself and he seems to have extraordinary potential. He has only become a rank 2 Apprentice Magician but managed to kill my long nose bear so easily. He is certainly worthy of our family to use. The only problem is that he attends Richter Order Academy which we have a minor dispute with." Vaughn clarified: "I am already working to resolve that with the help of Carla I will only officially recruit him once he is in his third year at the academy, those are the unwritten rules so we''ll just observe him for now." ................... Nick sat across from Carla as they were driven back to Richter Order Academy. She sighed and said to Nick: "You know, you could have asked for a new set of clothes instead of just wearing that robe." Nick shrugged his shoulders, saying: "I don''t care what I wear, so long as it suits my purposes." Carla sighed again and said: "Other people will think you are crazy for walking around in a bath robe." Nick replied coldly: "I don''t care what other people think." Carla remained silent for a while before continuing to speak: "Your next school year doesn''t begin until about three weeks from now, what are your plans mister rank 2 Magician?" Nick didn''t want to say too much so he replied: "I''m mostly going to work on completing our contract and study. That''s all." "...Right." Inside of the car became silent as Nick and Carla stopped speaking. Carla thought: (This Nick has become more difficult to talk to and his tone and body language has become even more distant and cold. The changes involved with his increase in rank are definitely not simple but he is not giving me a chance to ask...sigh, I should just let it go for now.) Nick and Carla therefore spent the rest of the two hour ride in silence and Nick got out of the car as soon as it approached the academy''s gate. Carla said to him: "I suppose this is farewell for a while, I still have business outside of the academy so I won''t be going in. You did well in this tournament and helped my faction gain a fair amount of benefits so you have my gratitude." Nick nodded his head and Carla told her driver to head to their next destination. Nick walked through the gate at which point his exit permission card emerged from the back of his right hand which it had moved to when Nick''s palm had developed the mark representing his cursed bloodline. It turned into a physical object again and Nick quickly handed it over to the guard stationed at the guard booth. Nick walked away from the entrance to the academy already knowing where he was heading to next. (Next stop, the magic anatomy office.) Nick took only fifteen minutes to walk to the academy''s anatomy office and when he entered the building he saw only a quiet lobby with hardly any visitors. The receptionist stationed in the lobby sat at her desk looking at documents when Nick walked up to her and asked: "Excuse me miss, is it possible that I can use a magic imaging device?" Without looking up, the receptionist asked: "For what purpose?" Nick replied: "I need to take a look at possible laws that have been carved onto my body." The receptionist slowly looked up while speaking: "Well, I suppose that..." She paused for a few seconds after taking a look at the brown complexioned young man wearing a bath robe with a head full of white hair and strange looking eyes that stood in front of her and then continued: "...we can have someone do a full body scan but only the first time is free. The next time that you make such a request you will have to pay a fee." Nick replied while handing over his student ID: "That won''t be a problem." The receptionist received the ID card and picked up her office phone to make a call; she spent the next minute talking to someone over the phone and when she was done, she returned to Nick his ID card and said: "A physician will see you on the 3rd floor, room 2." Nick nodded and took the elevator to find his way to room 2 of the 3rd floor. When Nick got there, a young man that looked to be in his late twenties said flatly: "Nick Capitol, right? Place your phone on the desk and lie down on the imaging machine that is behind the glass wall." Nick looked around the room, seeing a glass wall that separated the area with the computers that controlled the imaging machine and the actual imaging machine. (That imaging machine looks like a hospital''s MRI machine.) Nick did as the physician instructed, placing his phone on the desk with the computers and walking through a door that was cut into the glass wall to lie down on the bed like portion of the magic imaging machine. Soon, that portion of the machine drew Nick into the scanning apparatus and after five minutes of knocking noises, the scan was complete. Nick quickly left the machine and went to the physician who said: "The imaging machine scanned all over your body including doing a kind of x-ray to see your bones and this is what appeared. I''m very impressed, do you specialize in body enhancement?" Nick happened to know what body enhancement was and it involved a Magician carving magical laws into their body to produce an effect that enhanced their body''s natural characteristics indefinitely. Body enhancement was an entire field on its own just like spell making but Nick knew next to nothing about the former so he had no idea what the physician was talking about. "Why would you think that?" The physician had a weird look on his face as he showed Nick the scans. "Aren''t these laws that have been carved onto your bones. How did you manage to carve them onto so many at your age?" Nick looked at the scan and realized that the physician wasn''t lying. The scan revealed that most of his bones from his skull to his feet had laws sparsely carved into them. (What the hell, how did that happen?) ....................... Nick returned to his dorm room at about 6 pm thinking about nothing except the results of his full body scan. "Where did the laws carved into my bones come from?" Nick took out copies of his scan from his backpack and examined them carefully. "These are definitely laws of the rule path drawn in Valteese. They are drawn on most of my large bones and they seem closely related." Slade commented at this moment: [They are definitely related and my intuition tells me that they are the source of the aura that you released when you killed that enslaved bear like magic beast.] "Okay, but how did I acquire them?" [Guess.] "Hmmm...could it be because of my spell, Growth?" [Exactly. Take a closer look at the laws and tell me what you can understand from them. I have no attainment in rule magic so you''ll have to do it on your own.] "Okay." Nick spent the next five hours reviewing and translating the laws that he could read from the scan even though he was tired since he was excited to learn more about what he was capable of. Soon, he came up with a basic summary of his translations and assessed it. "Most of the laws are related and they are definitely mostly of the rule path but they seem to be incomplete as a whole. Now, what can be coherently made out involves phrases and words like: ''Devour to grow.'', ''Devour'' and ''Growth''." "Since becoming rank 2, the golden figure within my mindscape has developed a law etched into its forehead that reads: ''devour'' and the laws representing ''growth'' must have something to do with my spell, Growth." "What do you think Slade." Slade remained quiet for a while and then answered: "Give me a moment, kid, I will use one of my wisdom path methods to deduce a possibility." Slade became completely quiet for the next ten minutes while Nick waited for a response. He did not like the idea of Slade using his ''methods'' but he needed answers. Slade soon spoke: [I''ve deduced that your spell, Growth, actually mimics food path and not wisdom path like I had wrongly guessed before.] (Food path? What do you know about it?) [I know that it involves a Magician consuming laws to alter them, destroy them or absorb them, making the laws their own. I had thought that Growth had a wisdom path effect that had given you the memories of the crane magic beast that you killed before but actually, you had probably gotten its memories and experiences from the various laws that you consumed and absorbed when you ate its brain and other internal organs, making them partly your own. Look at the scans again, there should be some laws that you cannot interpret.] Nick looked at the scans again, affirming Slade''s conclusion: "You''re right. there are laws other than those of rule path on this scan." [Exactly. The rule path laws carved into your bones are probably from the effects of Growth after you ate those curse path magic beasts, after all, curse path is a branch of rule path so their laws are fundamentally the same. As for how the laws ended up manifesting a bloody aura, your guess is as good as mine. Can you summon the aura at will?] "No, I''ve already tried." [Then forget about it, the real benefit of those laws is that the more you have that are related to your affinities, the stronger your magic and body will become so just find a way to keep using your spell.] "Yeah, I''ll try to find opportunities in the future." Nick decided that he would mostly focus on working on his spell, Copy, during the next few months so that he could complete his contract with the General Beast Store so he would not be exploring more realms any time soon. Nick got up from his desk and crawled into bed, getting ready to go to sleep. "I''m only going to get stronger from here on out. I can''t wait." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 85: I Dont Want Friends Nick sat at his desk, reading through his notes and and making changes. He returned to the academy from the Jenner estate a day ago and after getting some well needed sleep, Nick immediately started working on ''Copy''. The spell was intended to be used to perfectly copy magical laws and reproduce them, similar to how a printer could perfectly duplicate a document. Since he became rank 2, Nick''s mental acuity and the processing power of his brain had increased tremendously and he could almost perfectly recall information that had seemed hazy before. Looking at his notes, Nick was able to pick up on many of his mistakes and oversights that were not obvious to him before as well as see possible ways of moving forward that he had not thought of before. Of course his successes in creating spells while he was exploring the last realm gave him valuable experiences and insights, for example, he became able to tell what grade a spell was from looking at its laws. Because of this, Nick discovered that his spell, Big, is in fact a rank 1 spell. (Even though it is rank 1, I still remember killing that huge wary dog by enhancing my knives with it and that wary dog should have been rank 2. Hmmm...just like Slade mentioned, not all magic beats are made equal. Some have extremely strong defenses and combat capabilities at rank 2 while others are only at a that rank because of the quality of the magic energy that the laws on their body process, but that does not necessarily mean that they are ''strong''.) "I can definitely make some serious progress in designing Copy, I just have to focus. I already emptied my savings to buy a large number of snacks from the convenient store so I am not leaving this room until I at least have something akin to an initial version of the spell." Nick knew that he was putting a lot of pressure on himself but he had no choice, the next semester started in three weeks and he still had other things to do besides completing the contract with the General Beast Store, after all, developing his magic powers were his main priority but he also realized that if he wanted to progress efficiently, he would also need resources to help him. Nick slapped both of his cheeks simultaneous to psyche himself up and began his work. ........................... Three weeks later, Nick lifted himself up off of the ground slowly. He had once again spent another day doing nothing but working on his spell and had been doing that for the past three weeks with at most two hours of sleep every two nights. He was exhausted to say the least and last night, he finally collapsed onto the floor and remained unconscious for hours. Nick went to the bathroom and washed his face, taking a look at his striking white hair and his eyes that had eerie pitch black irises with two reddish rings surrounding each of his pupils. Nick didn''t know whether he was usually handsome or not but looking at himself, he could describe how he looked right now with two words: "Like shite." He clearly needed more rest but Nick just shook his head and went back to his desk, looking through his pile of documents. "Sigh, spell making is really difficult, I was able to create Sever and Growth in such a short period of time because of inspiration while creating Copy from scratch is like what I''d imagine writing an original encyclopedia would be like." "I have the basic concept for the spell already sorted out and I have the structure it should take in mind but putting all the laws I''ve written in Nickle together coherently is proving to be difficult and time consuming so I''ll need another few weeks to complete it. During my second year, I am free to go to scheduled classes or not so at least I will not have to waste my time with the unnecessary ones." "My understanding of rule magic has progressed significantly since I became a rank 2 Magician but my studying of space magic has slowed to a crawl. While I am a soul path scholar, I have not had the time or energy to begin training my soul according to Slade''s inheritance so I''m lacking in that area too." Nick thought back to what Growth had said to him during his vision and consoled himself. (Years of endurance and effort is needed for greater growth. I just have to keep going step by step.) Nick continued working on the spell until 6 pm, at which point, he went to the bathroom, took a shower and then got dressed, afterwards leaving for the cafeteria which he had not visited in three weeks. When Nick got to the cafeteria, There was a large number of students present with most sitting in groups talking excitedly about their time away from the academy. "Bro, I leveled up, I was able to learn this new spell that allows me to move at four times my normal speed." "Oh, yeah, my family secured me some magic tools that have greatly increased my combat capabilities. I was even able to learn a little about enchanting normal objects." ........ "My parents were a little disappointed with my rank last semester so I was studying the entire break and my girlfriend broke up with me because of it. She''s a real bitch!" ...... "Have you heard, Greg North and Daryl Smith are apparently in conflict because of an incident that happened while they were outside of the academy? Who do you think would win in a fight?" "Does it matter? Rumors are that those two are probably the strongest Magicians within our year so there will probably be a good bit of drama but they are not allowed to actually fight each other on campus without special circumstances." "They are the strongest? Last semester, I was hearing some things about...Nick Capitol, that guy. He''s in our dorm and he ranked 9th at the end of the year." "Hmph, that hermit. I heard that he remained on campus during the break but hasn''t spoken to anyone but the librarian for two months. How could a guy like that amount to anything. Plus, in the last exam, he was only rank 1, how much progress could he have possibly made while in hiding. Just forget about that guy." ........ Nick heard bits and pieces of conversations and gossiping but was too tired and hungry to care about any of it. Nick bought two servings of fried chicken, fried rice, pork gravy and vegetables and sat alone at a table in the corner of the cafeteria, only paying attention to his food. Five minutes in, he heard someone call his name: "...You are Nick Capitol, right?" Nick stopped eating and looked up in annoyance at the person who decided to interrupt him. He vaguely recognized the culprit. (Her name is...Marcia Dunn. What does she want?) Marcia looked at Nick with uncertainty. (This should be Nick Capitol but he looks very different. This person is a rank 2 Apprentice Magician so if this is Nick, his increased rank might explain the change.) Nick nodded his head and said: "Yeah, I''m Nick Capitol. You''re asking as if we''ve never met before." Carla waved both of her hands, trying to look embarrassed: "Uh, well, it''s because you look so different now that I barely recognize you." The author''s tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon. "Okay. Do you need something?" "I don''t need anything exactly. I was wondering if I could sit with you and maybe have a conversation?" Nick raised his right eyebrow. (She wants to have a conversation. Weird.) "A conversation about what?" Marcia discreetly clenched both of her fists, gathering her courage. (If I want to get closer to him, I have to take a leap. Even if I insulted him before, he doesn''t seem like the type to hold a grudge.) Marcia took a seat without Nick saying that it was okay and began speaking: "The school will not ask us to change dorms until our third year and I think that you are a fine Magician. Do you think that we could become friends?" Nick had taken a bite of his chicken already but when he heard Marcia''s question, he spit out his food in surprise at the ridiculousness of it. COUGH COUGH COUGH (What the hell is this woman asking, why would I want to be her friend? Isn''t she Don Bartholomew''s servant, what would she gain by associating with me?) "Uhhh, why are you asking this?" Marcia breathed in deeply and answered: "Ever since I was young, I have always been able to accurately read people and although I don''t know you, your discipline in your studies and your commitment to them, even at the cost of being a loner tells me that you are a person with ambition and determination and I admire that. I also have my own ambitions but I lack talent and maybe other things but I have not given up on finding my way to a respectable position. Since you seem like a serious man, I do not want to waste your time with insincere niceties so I decided to be straightforward. I would like to become associated with you so that some of your good qualities can rub off on me." Nick wore a weird expression as he listened to Marcia''s plea and replied: "What about Don, isn''t he some kind of big shot?" Marcia bit her lip but decided to take a risk and speak: "Don treats me badly and is not a very decent man. I do not want to be around him too much." "Does that mean that you think that I am a decent man?" Marcia shrugged her shoulders and replied: "I don''t know but I''m willing to bet that you are." Nick looked at Marcia for quite a while as he continued to eat some of his food. Marcia stayed quiet, assuming that Nick was trying to make up his mind. (He should be open to it, right? I am a fairly pretty woman and I''m offering, almost begging to be his friend. He received good ranks in both of last year''s exams and seems to be serious about becoming a great Magician. Most importantly, I have never seen him treat other people badly just because, even me, after I insulted him. If he is even half way decent, it is worth getting to know him.) Nick stopped eating his food and spoke plainly: "No, I don''t want friends..." Marcia''s hopeful expression deflated as she felt an intense sense of embarrassment and self-loathing. "...but, do you like reading books?" "Huh?" Nick rubbed his nose and asked again: "I said, do you like reading books?" Marcia was confused as to why Nick was asking that question but she replied anyway: "I wouldn''t say that I like reading books but I do study often and I read enough to learn what I need to learn." With a serious face, Nick said: "Well, that won''t cut it. Look, I got no problem discussing magic and related topics with you or even helping you get better just as long as you''re worth talking to and helping. If you don''t read books for the purpose of improving your knowledge, then I don''t have any business talking to you." Marcia pursed her lips then asked softly: "What book would you recommend?" "What is your highest affinity?" "Oh, my highest affinity is with enslavement magic." Nick rubbed his chin. "I personally know nothing about enslavement magic but if you read a book on it and explained to me some of the basics, that would be well appreciated." Marcia''s eyes opened wide, understanding what Nick was getting at. (He said he doesn''t want a friend but he is not closed off to us getting to know each other as long as I can show him that I am not a waste of his time.) "I''ll go to the library and read up and discuss it with you at another time." Nick nodded: "Sounds good to me, how''s the morning after tomorrow sound." "That works for me." "Alright then, do you mind if I continue eating my meal alone?" Marcia nodded and excused herself, wearing an excited expression as she left the cafeteria. Slade asked Nick in a weird tone: [What are you doing?] Nick continued to eat as he internally spoke to Slade: (There is no harm in humoring her, especially if she can actually provide me with some useful information. I may like to be alone but I understand that other people have value if I force them to show it. Plus, she was so earnest, I like that.) (If she becomes a problem, I''ll get rid of her but if she has some value, I''ll help her along so that she can offer me more value in the future. That''s how human beings built the society that we live in today.) Slade remained quiet for a while before saying: [You have surprised me, kid. You are more mature than I thought.] Nick shook his head. (I''m not so mature, my dreams are just too important for me to be inflexible and intolerant.) [Well said.] Nick finished his meal and went back to his room where he took a three hour nap and woke up to continue working on his spell. Nick did not stop working on his spell until more than a day had passed, even missing the orientation for the second years. "They''ll send the information that I need in an email...probably." Nick picked up his weary body from his desk and went to the cafeteria for some breakfast and while he was eating, Marcia found him and sat at his table. "Good morning Nick." Nick looked up from his meal and replied: "Morning." Marcia smiled and spoke: "I..." Before she could say any more, Nick interrupted her: "What is enslavement magic?" Marcia pursed her lips knowing that this was Nick getting down to business but then opened them to speak: "Enslavement magic is the use of magical laws to control other living beings, most commonly magic beasts, by carving the Magician''s laws into their body." Nick asked another question: "What is the main advantage in using enslavement magic?" Marcia answered without faltering: "Enslavement magic allows one person to face an entire army with their own power and has a relatively low cost in magic energy as long as the enslaved already have the Magician''s laws carved into their body. In addition..." Marcia spoke on the enslavement path for twenty more minutes which meant that she had come fully prepared after Nick instructed her to go and read a book on the subject. (So she does have some value.) Nick spoke expressionlessly: "That was a pretty good mini lecture. Do you have anything that you want to ask me?" Marcia smiled and nodded in affirmation: "What type of magic do you specialize in, there are all sorts of rumors involving multiple kinds of magic but a serious guy like you must have a specialization, right?" Nick remained silent as he thought of how to answer the question. (I never gave much thought to what kind of magic that I should show in front of other people as I am not comfortable with revealing all of my methods around strangers like I did with the Jenners and eventually I will have to work with teams to complete academy missions. So what path should I walk down publicly so as not to appear too flashy?) Slade commented: [It''s good that you are asking this question now. Only using a select number of methods in public will probably save you a lot of trouble down the road.] Nick pondered: (I have four paths that I walk in order of proficiency, namely, soul path, rule path, space path and blade path. Soul path and blade path are both great if I want to appear as a combat specialist but space path and rule path have more utility. Then again since rule path is not commonly practised on Grand Earth, I should avoid using it publicly so as not to draw attention; I also have very little use for combat within the academy...so space path it is.) "I specialize in space magic." Marcia''s eyes beamed with interest. "Oh really, I hear that such Magicians are relatively rare, what kind of spells do you use." Nick visibly frowned at that question. Marcia saw his expression and knew that she had stepped on a landmine as most Magicians did not like being asked that question directly. "My bad...I lost my head for a second." Nick''s frown became a plain expression again. "I''m glad that you found it." Nick asked another question: "How proficient are you in combat?" Marcia shook her head: "Not very, although my highest affinity is with enslavement magic, being an enslavement Magician is expensive and my family cannot support the cost so I have mostly been using fire spells that I received from the Bartholomews." (Fire spells, huh?) "Next week is the start of normal scheduled classes and I wanted to do a little sparring in the combat class scheduled for the first day. If you don''t mind, could you register for the class and spar with me?" Marcia went silent for a while to think about it and a few seconds later she answered: "Sure, I''ll spar with you during combat class but why not just ask someone stronger when you get to the class?" "That''s because if they refuse, I would have wasted my time going to the class and that would be unfortunate." Marcia raised her right eyebrow, thinking: (This Nick is a little unreasonable but still better than Don.) "Well, I have some studying to do so I''m going to leave now, see you another time." Nick nodded: "Sure." A few minutes after Marcia left, Nick went back to his room and began going through his space path inheritance. "Alright, I have to learn these spells by next week to put up a facade that I am a space path Magician." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 86: Second Combat Class Nick already had four space path spells that he was familiar with which were intermediate apprentice grade spells that adjusted their power based on his rank and they included: Blink, Half A Kilometer, Rumbling Pillar and Clear Space. Nick spent the next two hours finding three additional space path spells that he would use when he was in public and they were rank 2 intermediate grade spells, namely: Exchange Space, Expand Space and Reverse Space. Exchange Space allowed Nick to switch his location with an object or a living being that was within ten meters of him, however the heavier the target and the more magic that was imbued into the target, the greater the magic energy that was required to use this spell. Expand Space was able to temporarily alter the space around him within a ten meter radius by doubling the distance needed to traverse a certain length of space (distance) before the spell was activated. This spell cost 1,000 magical units per activation and only lasted 30 seconds, its downside being that he was also affected by the spell. Reverse Space allowed Nick to reverse the direction that an object or person was facing within five meters of himself. This spell required 1,500 magical units per activation but would fail if its target was in anyway physically in contact or connected to Nick. (These spells seem pretty cool but they don''t have the effect of causing damage directly which doesn''t surprise me. No one in their right mind would just hand out combat space path spells so easily and Andre mentioned that the methods in this inheritance were easily obtainable by the people within his realm. It seems that Rumbling Pillar is the only spell in this inheritance that does direct damage but that is enough for now.) Space path was no doubt powerful and versatile but spells and methods related to this path were not freely available and were usually only accessible through large organizations and clans despite the rarity of individuals who had a high affinity for space path on Grand Earth. Nick decided that he would practice his space path spells everyday to get accustomed to them in addition to working on Copy and so cultivating his soul would have to wait. Nick remained at his desk for the rest of the day working on Copy and when it became night time he spent about two hours practising his space path spells before doing two hours of meditation. After which he went to bed exhausted. Nick did this everyday up to the morning that his new school year began. ...................... "My name is Thompson Varrow and I''m sure that most of you would have met or heard about me in your first year..." Nick stood in the crowd of students as Thompson Varrow, one of Richter Order Academy''s combat specialists introduced himself. He was a tall, burly man who was a Regular Magician; Nick had seen him in action once during his first combat class and was impressed with how he easily ''broke'' a student''s spell. Nick looked around and spotted Marcia standing at the far left end of the crowd, paying rapt attention to Varrow''s words. (She came after all. I''ve got to say, having someone do what I tell them so easily feels sort of weird, like I should be suspicious about it.) Slade commented: [If you weren''t suspicious, I''d consider you an idiot. At the very least that woman clearly wants to have some association with you, so she is putting in the effort. Just make sure that she does not become close enough to you to do us harm and you can make as much use of her as you want.] (Sigh, that was the plan.) Nick did not like the thought of just using someone but he was not naive and knew that making use of other people''s efforts was necessary in some aspects of life which he was still inexperienced with so his goal in interacting with Marcia was to gain some experience in that regard. (It''s not like she''s not getting anything out of it, she''ll definitely benefit from discussing about magic with me .) Nick stopped looking around and paid attention to what Varrow was saying. "...I don''t want to waste any time so just pick a partner and begin sparring with each other so that I can get an idea of where each of you are at in terms of fighting proficiency." Nick nodded his head in understanding. (Clearly, teaching random stuff to Magicians who have different temperaments, powers and potential would be a waste of time so he is trying to use a targeted approach, learning what our individual potential is so that he can teach accordingly.) Nick walked through the crowd and made himself known to Marcia. "Are you ready to spar, Marcia?" "Oh, hey Nick, I still think that you would benefit more from sparring with someone else that is stronger." Nick raised his right eyebrow and said: "Even so, won''t you benefit from sparring with me If I am stronger than you so what''s the use in turning me down? You said that you wanted to be a decent Magician, right? Well, being a Magician will probably involve a lot of fighting so we should just put in the effort and not think too much about anything else." Marcia felt that Nick was right but she was not particularly confident in her combat capabilities because during the last end of year exam, most of her wary dog kills came from the efforts of her team-mates and she rarely fought by herself. Although she wanted to get stronger, she did not want to embarrass herself. Nick looked at Marcia''s hesitation and visibly sighed. "Fine, if you don''t want to spar, I''ll find someone else with some guts." Nick turned around curtly and pretended as if he was leaving to find a sparring partner. Marcia bit her lip and then said with her voice slightly raised: "I have guts." Nick turned around immediately and replied: "Then stop wasting time and let''s spar already. Show me those fire spells of yours." Marcia nodded her head and moved towards an area at a decent distance from the other students; Nick followed her and eventually, they both stood five meters apart, facing each other. The other students noticed their situation as they were all slow in forming pairs to spar, wanting the others to reveal their methods first, so they turned to look at Nick and Marcia, hoping to see a good show. The combat classes were held in a large, well maintained, grassy field located beside a gymnasium used for special training. The sun was high in the sky and shining brightly as flocks of birds flew above the academy campus. The students whispered among themselves to get a better understanding of the situation: "Who are those two people?" "I think I know. One of them is Marcia Dunn, I''ve seen her hanging around Don Bartholomew a few times. The other guy...I think his name is Nick Capitol, he placed ninth during the end of year exam." Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel. "Really, that high, that probably means that he has some decent skills, right? This might be a good show." ... The other students waited for Nick and Marcia to start their spar with slight expectations based on Nick''s apparent rank. Marcia spoke: "It looks like you''re famous." Nick shook his head. "More like infamous. I''ve heard people refer to me as a hermit more than once. Anyway, ignore the spectators and begin." Marcia nodded and raised her hand, positioning it in front of her chest at which point she summoned a soccer ball sized fireball. She then bent her elbow and threw the fireball forward with relatively quick speed, the same speed as a baseball pitcher would use to throw a baseball. Someone from the crowd spoke and because everyone was quietly watching the spar, they all heard him: "That''s the rank 2 Fire Pitch spell, since that Nick guy is so close to her, he''ll no doubt get hit with it if he doesn''t have a defensive spell or a good movement spell." Everyone in the crowd silently agreed and watched on. The fireball came quick but as soon as it reached within a meter of Nick it appeared to stall at that distance and then moved at a snail''s pace. (Half A Kilometer.) Nick used his space path spell to separate himself and the fireball by 500 meters so from the perspective of everyone else, the fireball speared to have slowed its movement drastically. Nick nodded his head when seeing his spell''s effectiveness. (That fireball is just not quick enough. Half A Kilometer might not have been effective if Marcia had used a light path or a sound path spell but unfortunately, she didn''t. My spell consumes 800 magical units per second so lets'' see how long that fireball lasts.) Nick stood in place and watched the spell slowly move towards him for six seconds while Marcia also watched with a frown on her face. (Nick wasn''t lying, he really does use space magic, how do I counter this exactly?) While thinking of a counter, at the end of the six seconds, Marcia''s spell fizzled out as the fireball shrunk to a spark and disappeared. Nick, still standing in his spot looked at Marcia tauntingly and said: "You''ll have to do better than that if you want to make it here." The students at the side went into a small uproar when the saw the scene unfold. "Nick Capitol uses space magic? Does anyone know what spell he used?" "How would we know that? Everyone knows that a high space magic affinity is rare and no one bothers learning space spells because they are far more expensive than other types of magic spells. I don''t even personally know one other person in our year who even uses space magic." "Nick Capitol...If I''m remembering correctly, my family gave me a list of the new students at the start of the first year and I looked through it. Nick Capitol was definitely included in the section for people who had no magical background or private financial support. How did he get that spell?" ... Nick ignored the chatter and waited for Marcia''s next move. Marcia became nervous, although Nick''s execution of his spell was simple and plain, it''s effect that made her spell worthless gave her a significant psychological blow. (I can''t give up, even if he is strong, that doesn''t mean that I can''t hurt him.) Marcia clapped her hands together and then drew them apart at a length of 0.8 meters, revealing a sword completely made of flames and then she grasped it and ran towards Nick. Nick stood firmly in his spot with his feet apart, ready to counter the approaching Marsha. (Half A Kilometer is only effective against ranged attacks, did she deduce that or is her reaction to my spell just pure luck?) Nick thought for a moment before deciding: (It does not matter.) Marcia arrived in front of Nick and slashed down with her flame sword. (Why is he just waiting to be hit by my Flame Blade?...) As she thought this, her sword slashed down hard, hitting the ground and leaving a two meter stretch of land charred black from the heat and impact of her attack but Nick was no where to be seen. (Huh? Aren''t I looking at the spot that I ran here from. Why am I facing it now, where is Nick?) Nick stood a few inches behind Marcia after using his spell, Reverse Space, to change her facing position to the opposite of what it was supposed to be, causing her to completely miss the target of her strike, him. Nick quickly placed his right index and middle finger on Marcia''s lower back and cast his spell: (Rumbling Pillar.) Before she could turn around, Marcia felt a painful jolt at her lower back and unconsciously released her Flame Blade spell and fell to the ground in shock. She was now in so much pain that she could hardly move or speak so she lied in front of Nick''s feet appearing to gasp for air. Nick looked down while scratching the back of his head. (Wasn''t that a bit too easy? I made sure to use the minimum of 200 magical units to cast the spell and I only activated it for one second, how comes she seems so hurt?) Slade spoke with an amused tone: [This child is laughably weak in terms of her understanding and control of magic. If this is your academy''s standards, then this place might as well be a breeding ground for cannon fodder.] Nick did not reply to Slade because he would not be able to refute him based on Marcia''s performance. Nick was about to help her up when the thought that he might of seriously hurt her popped into his mind so he called to Thompson Varrow who had been watching the spar from afar. "Sir Varrow, can you do something for Marcia here, like some kind of healing, I don''t know if my spell did any real damage to her bones?" Varrow walked over quickly and stooped to examine Marcia who was on the ground but after a minute, he stood up and shook his head. "There is nothing physically wrong with her except some pain, she''s just in shock after you jolted her spinal chord. just let her lie here for a while, she''ll be fine." Nick nodded his head. "That''s good." The other students watched the exchange, not knowing how to react to what they saw. "What did he do that caused Marcia to be on the ground in such a pathetic state." "I think that he poked her back." "Does back poking count as magic?" "Ha, ha. I guess on this occasion it does. That was a very lame match up, that Marcia has no chops." "Are you sure, she scored within the top three hundred within our year? That Nick Capitol might just be too strong." "Hmph, if I could use space magic, I''d be that strong too." While the students were guessing on how Nick took Marcia down, Thompson Varrow spoke to Nick with a rare smile: "You controlled your strength very nicely. You seem fairly capable in combat, why have I only seen you in one of my classes once before?" Nick shrugged his shoulders and answered: "I''ve been busy learning about magic, Sir Varrow. Combat training wasn''t a priority in my first year." Varrow asked: "What about now?" "I''m very interested to learn more about it, I especially would like to train with some kind of weapon because I don''t have many attack methods to make use of." Varrow nodded in understanding. "In my experience, except for blood path and sword path, people with rare affinities always had problems getting a hold of good attack methods due to the spells being expensive or inaccessible to them so learning to use a weapon would be very useful to you. Stay after class and I will give you some advice if you''d like." Nick replied without much of a change in his expression: "That would be very much appreciated, Sir Varrow." Varrow nodded his head and turned to the rest of the class, speaking harshly: "You people have been staring for an awfully long time at other people''s business, start forming pairs and begin sparring or get the hell out of my class!" A reprimand from a Regular Magician was very intimidating for the youths and so they did as instructed and were soon focused on their own spars. Varrow stooped to look at Marcia again and whispered some words to her before going to observe the other students. Nick stepped close to Marcia and asked: "How long are you going to lie on the ground for?" Marcia replied: "Long enough for this embarrassment to go away." Nick rolled his eyes at Marcia, she was clearly fine. He then turned his attention to the other students and tried to take note of the methods that they used. Nick saw many kinds of spells being used which included: lightning, fire, ice, metal, and light spells. Although there were all of these varieties, Nick had a general opinion of the student''s combat abilities after watching twenty minutes worth of sparring. (Their combat capabilities are so weak, how could this be? I hadn''t started taking combat seriously until about three months ago and even I''m not this bad. What''s going on?) [Why are you surprised. From what I''ve observed, your society focuses on raising its children without the influence of magic so it shouldn''t be surprising that their combat ability is so poor. They lack killer instincts that people in my world would get from hunting magic beasts and training their magic powers at a young age. You gained much experience from your exploration of that last realm so that explains the difference between you and them.] (You''re right.) Nick watched from the sidelines for the rest of the class and waited until it was over and all the students including Marcia had left. Nick then took the initiative to speak with Thompson Varrow about combat training: "You mentioned that you wanted to train with a weapon, young man, which is a whole different beast than practising magic alone. What kind of weapon are you interested in?" Nick stood in his spot silently for a while, thinking about the times that he used knives during combat like they were swords and then he thought of his own affinity with blade magic and concluded that using some kind of sword was the right thing to do. "I would like to train with the sword, Sir Varrow." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 87: Your Own Worthless Skills Thompson Varrow asked the obvious question: "Have you ever trained with a sword before?" Nick replied: "I used a spell of mine to enlarge knives and kind of used them like swords, Do you think that counts as experience?" Varrow shook his head and said: "You have no experience training with a sword. Swordplay is more than just swinging a blade around so what you''re referring to simply does not count." Nick shrugged his shoulders, not surprised at all by Varrow''s assessment, after all, frying an egg doesn''t mean that you are a trained chef. Varrow looked at Nick sternly and said: "You seem to have some potential for combat so I''ll tell you what, if you agree to come to all of my classes, I will allow you to use that time to practise swordplay." Nick raised his eyebrow, asking: "Is that really okay? You would have me focus on something completely different than what the other students are going to be doing." Varrow nodded in affirmation: "This academy exists to nurture Magicians, not indoctrinate them and so if you have an interest in a particular field, I will help guide you down that path as long as you are willing to do the work." "I have a two hour class everyday for the second years so all you have to do is attend all of them. If you are not willing to do that, then just get lost." Nick thought about it: (Two hours per day is a reasonable amount of time for me to practise using a sword without it getting in the way of my main priorities, in addition, this guy is supposed to be a combat expert and I do see a need for the training.) Nick bowed by bending his waist slightly and spoke earnestly: "I gratefully accept your offer." Varrow looked at Nick weirdly, then asked: "What are you doing?" Nick awkwardly scratched his head and replied: "This is a traditional bow of gratitude." Varrow couldn''t help bet let a chuckle escape from his mouth. "Traditional for whom, you''re a weird one, huh? That''s not me criticizing you because most decent Magicians are weird but I''d rather that you didn''t employ such formalities with me. As long as you continue to refer to me as sir Varrow, just talk to me normally." Nick nodded his head and said: "Okay, sir Varrow, if that''s all, I''ll come back tomorrow for the lesson." Varrow replied: "Be prepared to work hard during my classes." After saying this, Varrow snapped his fingers and he transformed into a gust of wind that flew away into the distance, becoming imperceptible to Nick. (What a cool exit.) Nick left the field and went to the spell creation club which he hadn''t visited in months. ............... When Nick opened the door, Norman Francis was having a discussion with Derek Drake and Lana Parsely, Nick''s club mates. All three of them turned around to pay attention to whoever just walked in and as soon as Norman saw Nick, he said: "It''s been a long time Nick, glad to see you during this new school year. I hope that you have improved your skills while you were not coming to the club." Nick greeted: "It''s good to see you professor Norman, same to you Derek and Lana." Derek spoke with a genial smile: "It''s good to see you as well, Nick." Lana didn''t speak and just nodded her head in greeting. Nick continued: "I actually didn''t expect to see you guys here, I heard somewhere that third years were very busy people." When Nick said this, both Derek''s and Lana''s expression became awkward which made Nick slightly confused. Norman spoke flatly to clear up the confusion: "Your two club mates are not third years yet and will remain within the second year for this school year." Nick raised both his eyebrows in surprise: "Huh, such a thing is possible? Why haven''t you two become third years?" Norman remained quiet at the question and Derek decided to clear the air: "At the end of the second year, you can choose to advance to the third year, if your performance was satisfactory, or drop out of the academy or remain a second year. While Lana and I did have satisfactory performances, we each decided that we were not ready for the third year." With a questioning look, Nick asked: "Why?" Lana shrugged her shoulders and answered: "Third years are sometimes required to leave the academy to do mandatory missions and if you''re abilities are lacking, there is a real chance of dying, Derek and I would rather work on our fundamentals more before going to the third year." Nick thought: (I see. So the different years within the academy are not just some superficial separation based on age. They represent each person''s supposed standard of skills. I guess these two don''t have faith in themselves.) With no change in his expression, Nick said: "Well, it''s good to know that there are such options." Derek replied: "...Yeah." The atmosphere became slightly awkward so Norman spoke to Nick in order to dispel it: "Since you are in your second year, I would like for you to do some tasks for me such as looking over notes that I give you and sometimes doing research, at least for now." Nick nodded his head in affirmation: "I will do my best professor. Oh, I came here also to ask for some special scroll papers, could I have a certain number of them?" Norman squinted his eyes, saying: "Scroll papers? Are you still interested in writing scrolls even after becoming a rank 2 Magician?" This book''s true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience. Derek and Lana looked at Nick after hearing Norman speak and assessed him. Derek and Lana were also rank 2 Magicians and so without Nick actively exuding magic power, it was hard for them to decern his change in rank but Norman was a Regular Magician and to him Nick''s current rank was as clear as day just from the feint magic power that he was sensing on Nick''s body. Nick replied: "It''s an interesting field and so I would like to continue researching it." Norman was a little bothered by Nick''s interest in scroll writing since it was technically a field that wasn''t very useful to himself and so he would not benefit much from Nick''s work but he continued to act like a proper instructor: "How much scroll writing papers do you need?" Nick replied immediately: "Fifty thousand." Norman''s eyes opened wide as he looked at Nick suspiciously. "Why do you need so much?" Nick rubbed his nose and replied with a shifty smirk: "I do a lot of research professor and I''ve already used up the ones that I had. I''m currently working on something that requires me to do many tests so is it possible for me to get the papers?" Norman looked at Nick''s half shameless expression for a few seconds and then sighed. "That''s one hundred packets of papers and I do have that many in stock and since the academy provides them for free and the rest of us don''t use them, you can have the amount that you''re requesting with the condition that after a period of time, you have to give me a report on what the papers were used for. I would be considered reckless if I did not ask you for this much." Nick nodded and said: "That''s reasonable, when can I get them?" Norman replied: "I''ll have them delivered to your dorm room by the end of the week." Nick''s face went back to being expressionless and he thanked Norman for his help. "Don''t mention it. I have some notes that I want you to look through to make sure that the Valteese written is appropriate. I want you to check it and return them to me by the end of next week." Norman handed Nick a stack of documents which Nick subsequently placed into his backpack. Nick said his goodbyes and left the spell creation club and made his way back to his dorm room. Nick sat at his desk with a pleased disposition, saying: "I found a source for the scroll writing papers I need to manufacture the scrolls and I''m even getting them for free. My biggest hurdle is still getting Copy to work." Nick looked at the notes for his spell that he had on the desk and uttered a long heavy sigh, knowing that he had to keep working despite the slow progress. (Don''t give up, Nick.) Nick began working on the spell and did not stop until midnight at which point he decided to do two hours of meditation before going to bed, however, during his meditation, Nick lost consciousness from mental exhaustion and did not wake up until his phone alarm rang at around 6 am. Nick picked his head up from his desk and got out of his chair. (Ahhhh, my back.) Nick felt a numbing pain in his back from sleeping at his desk for so long. He did his usual reps of pushups and got ready to go to his combat class. Nick arrived at the field where the class would be held at around 8 am and made use of the one hour period before class would start at 9 am so he chose a random spot in the grass and sat with his legs crossed, reading from his laptop''s screen. By the time it became 8:50 am, the other students began arriving at the field and when they saw Nick, the students whispered among themselves but no one approached him. At 9 am, the students felt a strong gust of wind blow over them and before they knew it, Thompson Varrow was standing in front of the group of students holding onto what looked like two wooden swords. He spoke sternly: "Alright, yesterday I saw what you were capable of and on average I have to say that I am disappointed with your standards and so I will start by teaching you tactics related to magical combat and the analyses involved in using said tactics. Prepare yourselves and I will begin my demonstration in ten minutes." Varrow looked to find Nick in the crowd but soon spotted him on his laptop, lost in whatever he was paying attention to. A vein visibly bulged on Varrow''s forehead, with him thinking: (So my presence is not worthy enough for you to start paying attention, huh?) Varrow squinted his eyes and threw one of the wooden swords into the air and swirled his right index finger. The sword flew through the air while spinning rapidly; most of the students were confused about what Varrow was doing until they realized that the target of his maneuver was Nick Capitol. Some smiled at Nick''s misfortune and others shook their heads at Varrow''s ''heavy handedness''. While the wooden sword was making its way towards Nick, Nick himself felt something amiss with the flow of magic energy in the surroundings. (Something''s drastically changed and it''s making me uncomfortable.) (Blink.) As the wooden sword quickly struck into the ground one inch from Nick''s position, Nick appeared two meters away in an instant and unconsciously looked at the crowd in front of him with malice, releasing a strange aura. The aura pervaded the surroundings and sent a shiver down the spine of the students present. Nick spoke slowly with a half menacing tone: "Who threw this at me?" No student answered Nick''s question, unsure of what spell Nick was using against them that caused this strange fear inducing aura. Thompson Varrow quickly walked beyond the group of students to face Nick and replied: "I did. You should pay more attention to your surroundings while you are in my class. Now, conceal that nasty aura and pick up that wooden sword." When Nick realized that Varrow, his instructor, was the one that threw the sword, his mind relaxed and the aura that he was releasing was unknowingly dissipated. (What aura is he talking about?) Nick ran to his previous resting spot and placed his laptop into his backpack, placed his backpack onto the ground and picked up the wooden sword whose tip had been lodged into the ground. Nick waved the sword around, thinking: (Its made out of wood but it has a decent weight to it. What is Varrow planning?) Varrow walked up to Nick and said: "I''ll choose to ignore whatever that sickening aura was just now so just focus on that sword. I want you to spend the next two hours waving it like this." Varrow took a stance with both hands holding the sword''s handle while his right leg was positioned in front of his left leg; he raised the sword vertically above his head and then swung down, his arm muscles almost rippling. Varrow came out of his stance and said: "You said that you wanted to train with the sword, you will start by doing what I just did, no exceptions." Nick nodded and tried to emulate Varrow''s previous stance, placing his right leg in front of his left leg and holding his wooden sword''s handle with both hands, he raised it above his head. Nick swung the sword down three seconds later and brought his arms to a resting position. (Varrow really wants me to do this for two hours?) Nick looked at Varrow with a questioning gaze and Varrow responded: "You seem to already have fairly developed arms but you need to condition them to hold and swing a sword for a long time for you to use one in combat so keep practising." Varrow left Nick alone after saying those words and began speaking with the other students. The other students whispered amongst themselves about the interaction between Varrow and Nick: "What is Nick Capitol up to?" "It looks like sir Varrow has given him some special instructions to swing that sword. It seems that Nick is interested in sword play." "My would a Space Magician be interested in using a sword? Hmph, if he wants to waste his talent, he should just give it to me." "Are you an idiot, bro, everyone has their own preferences. Just focus on your own talent." ... The chatter went on until Varrow told them all to shut up and listen to him; he did a mini-lecture on battle tactics between opposing magicians and the other students spent the rest of the class paired up, putting into practise what Varrow lectured to them. Nick spent the next two hours swinging his sword in exactly the same fashion that Varrow had done without stopping. By the time class had ended, Nick''s arms were sore despite being developed from his years of doing pushups. Nick smiled bitterly, saying to himself: "No matter how much you improve, there is always more room for improvement." The other students left the field and Varrow walked up to Nick who was resting on the ground beside his backpack and asked: "Are you going to come again tomorrow?" Nick looked at the wooden sword that he had laid on the ground in front of himself then looked back at Varrow, replying with determination in his eyes: "Yes sir, I will!" Varrow nodded, saying: "Then you can keep that wooden sword, if you want to become adept at using a weapon, then it has to become part of you and so you should carry that wherever you go, try swinging it around constantly. Alright, you can go now." Varrow snapped his fingers and once again left the field as a gust of wind. Nick picked up his backpack and the wooden sword and walked to his dorm and returned to his room. Nick took a shower, ate a few snacks and sat at his desk to look through the notes that Norman had given him, fixing whatever errors that he came across. Valteese was a more complex language than English so grammatical errors were very difficult to decern and even errors in the form of the misshaped Valteesian symbols were a concern. After spending a few hours on that, Nick spent the rest of the day working on Copy and at Midnight, he meditated until he fell asleep from exhaustion. ................. The next morning... Nick had been in combat class for one hour already with his shirt off, swinging his wooden sword. The other students took glances at him while Varrow did another mini lecture on how to properly move against an advancing enemy; they whispered amongst themselves: "Is that Nick Capitol crazy, he even took his shirt off?" "Hmph, he''s just showing off. What does it matter that he has some muscles, if we fought, one ice spear is all I would need to take him down?" Someone shook their head, saying in rebuttal: "I doubt that, but I am really curious. What is the point of that kind of physical training when casting most spells hardly require much movement?" Someone else said mockingly: "Maybe the muscle head is just trying to make us look bad. Only an idiot would put that much effort into something with relatively so little reward." Another person agreed: "...Yeah. He must be an idiot. He hasn''t spoken to anyone except Marcia since the first class, maybe he is too stupid and doesn''t know how to have a conversation?" Marcia stood among the crowd and listened to the negative remarks of the others and wondered: (Is he stupid?) Suddenly, a fierce wind blew towards one of the gossiping students and pushed him one meter into the air and then dissipated, resulting in the student falling harshly to the ground. Thompson Varrow spoke with a thick tone of disgust: "If you have time to gossip about another student, than you have time to reflect on your own worthless skills!" Everyone became silent, not daring to provoke the Regular Magician. Varrow looked at Nick in the distance and thought. (I hope that you have thick skin, Nick. All this chattering won''t go away anytime soon.) Varrow returned his gaze to the students in front of him and continued to lecture them. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 88: Social Nonsense Four weeks after Nick''s second combat class... Kevin raised his hand to cast his spell directly in front of him: (Electric Purge) A ray of dazzling blue energy moved in a straight line towards a young woman, who, seeing the danger quickly activated her defensive method: (Crimson Shroud) A twisting collection of crimson flames appeared to cover the young woman like a shroud and the ray of electricity was consumed as it hit the shroud, eventually being cancelled out. Seeing this, the woman dispelled her defensive flames and raised her hand, conjuring a soccer ball sized fireball and throwing it at Kevin who managed to transform into a ray of light, moving three meters ahead, past the quick moving fireball which eventually fell to the ground two meters away from where Kevin was initially positioned, scorching the ground an ugly black hue. Kevin approached the woman at the speed of a moving car while preparing his next spell. Seeing that she could not outrun Kevin, the woman used an area of effect spell that she had recently learned to overcome her disadvantage: (Flame Joker) Suddenly, the five meter radius surrounding the woman became unbearably hot and Kevin who was still approaching the woman as a ray of light suddenly burst into flames, falling to the ground with a suspiciously quiet crash with the fire burning his body as he rolled in the dirt.The woman internally rejoiced: (Flame Joker is a rare rank 2 intermediate grade spell that my family sacrificed for me to obtain. Its effect sets all magically imbued living beings on fire within a five meter radius of myself. There was no way that Kevin could of avoided that.) "I won." As soon as the woman said that, a snarky laugh came directly from behind her. (Scene of Glory.) The burning figure in front of Marcia as well as the scene caused by its crash to the ground suddenly dissipated like an illusion, as if her spell had never had any effect, revealing pristinely cut grass in its place. Kevin appeared one meter behind Marcia and used another spell while crossing both of his arms in front of his chest: (Bolt of Light.) Using himself as a bolt, Kevin was covered in light and moved at blinding speed to knock into the woman''s back which sent her flying three meters across the field. Kevin uttered with a smug grin: "I win." He ran towards the fallen woman who was shakily getting up and said: "You''ve improved by quite a lot, Marcia, so much so that sparring with you is also helping me to improve." Kevin held out his hand and helped Marcia up from the ground, with Marcia replying: "You''re too polite, Kevin. Your spells and tactics are superb, you must have been working hard this whole time." Kevin and Marcia smiled at each other while most of the students surrounded them after their spar, saying: "You guys were great, especially you Kevin. Your use of lightning and light spells together is ingenious." "Yeah Kevin, you are a genius. Out of all of us you have probably improved the most since the start of the school year." "Hey Kevin, why don''t we all get some lunch together after class at the Chinese Buffet restaurant on campus to discuss our progress, my treat." Kevin replied: "Yeah sure, we work hard so a little treat won''t hurt, ha, ha." Marcia looked at Kevin with stars in her eyes, thinking: (This Kevin Stalwart is really something. Not only is he polite, confident and good with magic, he also knows the value of maintaining relationships...) Marcia glanced to the distant left side of the field as she thought this, looking at Nick Capitol as he rhythmically swung his sword, shirtless in the hot sun. (Sigh, Nick seemed like a good investment but he spends most of his time alone and I only get to talk to him occasionally when I see him at breakfast and those talks never even amount to real conversations because he just asks me questions about magic and he will only answer my questions if its also about magic. He is so unfriendly; he does not care about relationships, he does not care about his appearance and he doesn''t even care about his reputation. What use is he as a man if he doesn''t consider those things?) Marcia had started to feel a kind of loathing towards Nick and his indifference to those things that she placed a high value on. (Kevin is a part of the Stalwart family and while they are not nearly as influential as the Bartholomew family, they have some influence. I don''t mind getting close to him.) While the students were making plans for their lunch after class, Thompson Varrow, their instructor, stood at the side shaking his head in disappointment: (What a sorry lot. At first, they slowly started taking my class seriously until this young man, Kevin Stalwart, started becoming increasingly social within the class which has led to a clique and some kind of social hierarchy being formed when the students were supposed to be using their time to practise combat techniques. Magicians are not socialites and we do not cater to or concern ourselves with any particular group without material benefits in hand. This false warmth is sickening.) Varrow looked at the far left corner at Nick who was dutifully swinging his wooden sword and nodded in approval. (I did not make a mistake in setting that young man apart. I was hoping that his seriousness would rub off on the others but that has failed spectacularly. They are even actively shunning him. I wonder how things will unfold going forward.) Nick did what would be his final swing of his sword for the day and breathed in deeply. "That''s two thousand swings today." Swinging the sword was not as easy as it seemed as time went on becomes of the fatigue that could accumulate in the muscles and it took Nick a few weeks, from being able to do a few hundred good swings to being able to do a couple thousand good swings within two hours. Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel. Nick decided to take a breather before leaving class and caught sight of the group of twenty five students as they were making plans for after class and paid particular attention to the two at the center of the gathering. (Marcia seems to have found herself a lively host in...Kevin Stal something I think. I don''t care about what Marcia wants to do since I only wanted information from her but looking at her now, it seems that she hasn''t learnt her lesson.) Nick shook his head in disapproval. (If you want to belong somewhere, you should earn that right with your capabilities and not some ridiculous feeling of closeness with people who do not care whether you live another day.) Nick put on his shirt, indicated to Varrow that he was going to leave and was about to head to the spell creation club when Kevin emerged from the crowd and said jokingly: "Wait, Nick. We made plans to go out to eat after this and was wondering if you wanted to join us. We know that it must be hard for you to swing that sword for so long. I definitely don''t want you to be left out." After Kevin made this declaration, there were all sorts of grumbling from the surrounding students, saying: "Why are you inviting him Kevin, he''ll only bring down the mood." "Yeah, why bother inviting that crazy guy?" Kevin put on a thoughtful expression after hearing the comments and asked: "You know him right, Marcia, what do you think?" Marcia was caught by surprise after hearing that question from Kevin. Although something about the situation felt distasteful, she did not want to disrespect Kevin in front of everyone so she looked at Nick, then with a half embarrassed expression, she looked away from Nick and replied: "I don''t think that Nick would want to come, he doesn''t like people after all, so you should not have invited him." With a regretful expression, Kevin said to Nick: "Sorry friend, no one wants you at the buffet so I''ll have to rescind my invitation. I guess we''ll see you in class tomorrow." Nick stood in his spot and looked at the scene with an indifferent expression, not surprised by Kevin''s performance or Marcia''s betrayal. He shrugged his shoulders in response and simply left. Slade soon spoke to Nick like a devil on his shoulders: [Not going to do anything after that disrespect?] Nick replied: (Why would I? I''ve been disrespected dozens of times before and not one time did it really matter, it''s no different this time. Those people and their bad behavior is not my problem.) Slade asked cheekily: [What about your reputation?] (The people who take gossip and social nonsense seriously are not worth considering much less what they think about me or my situation. I don''t care about my reputation among pigs.) Slade said with unconcealed approval: [I am liking you more and more, kid. Anyway, why do you waste time going to that club of yours, we could use the time to cultivate your soul but here you are going to hand in work that you accepted from that mediocre potion maker.] (You know that the club serves a purpose. Besides, looking through Norman''s notes is helping me to sharpen my translation skills so I don''t mind the tasks.) When Nick arrived in the spell creation club with his wooden sword in hand, Lana was the only one present and Nick asked: "Where''s Norman?" Lana shook her head, saying: "I don''t know, I just know that he''s not here." An awkward silence followed between Lana and Nick but Nick eventually took out the documents that he was to give to Norman that had his corrections and said to Lana while placing them in front of her: "Well, please see to it that he gets these documents." Lana silently nodded. Nick was about to leave but Lana stopped him: "Wait, Nick. I never asked before but why are you still interested in scroll writing? You know that there are many Magicians that look at it as the magical equivalent of children''s finger painting, right?" Nick turned around and looked at Lana with a weird expression and replied: "If your studying magic with the opinions of everyone else in mind, you might as well give up now cause you just aren''t going to make it." Lana quivered a little when Nick said that and fell silent, pretending to focus on her documents. Nick sighed and left the spell creation club and made his way back to his dorm room. Nick sat at his desk and looked at the progress that he had made on Copy and felt pleased with himself. A few weeks ago, while he was meditating, he managed to figure out how to solve a major hurdle in creating his spell and has made rapid progress since then. The initial version of the spell was almost complete and all he needed to do to finish it was to figure out how to structure the final parts of the spell that would allow it to execute seamlessly with little chance of failure. Nick had tried for the past few days but had failed after many attempts. "It has been three months since I signed the contract with the General Beast Store and I''ve only got a few months left, I''m running out of time." Nick felt subtly pressured and it was getting in the way of his recent attempts at meditation. Nick picked up his pen and stared and the last parts of the spell for hours, trying to figure out the solution. At around midnight, Nick sighed and put his pen down. "I''m still unsure." Nick decided to do some meditation before going to bed so he started chanting his meditation technique and mediated for the next two hours.When he was finished, he stopped meditating and caught sight of the whirlpool of magic energy that was dissipating. (Why does the magic energy that gathers take the form of a whirlpool before it enters my body? It seems a little strange that that is always the shape that the magic energy takes on as it slowly saturates my mindscape...) "Huh?" Nick felt a stroke of inspiration. "From reading math books, I know that natural phenomenon often takes on certain patterns to produce the most optimal results, given the circumstances. What if the magic gathering in a whirlpool is the most optimal way to saturate my mindscape with magic energy while the magic energy already within is being processed and the magic energy outside is kept in a state of constant motion to prevent it from dissipating or even becoming unstable..." Nick opened his eyes wide as he grabbed his pen and started writing notes for his spell, Copy. Despite his tiredness, he persevered and four hours later, he finally found a solution for the final part of his spell that would allow it to efficiently produce its effect without stalling or failing after activation. "Let''s test it out..." Before Nick could muster the strength to test the spell, his head suddenly fell on the desk and his now heavy eyelids closed; Nick had fallen unconscious once again from mental exhaustion. ..................... When Nick woke up, he checked his phone and discovered that it was already 8:00 am. "I missed my alarm!" Nick quickly got into the shower without thinking of anything else and then got dressed and left for combat class with his wooden sword in hand. Unlike usual, he arrived at class exactly as it began instead of being there one hour earlier, time he would have used to review the math books on his laptop. Thompson Varrow took note of Nick''s arrival and told the rest of the class to wait a moment for him to lecture them; he walked over to Nick with a wooden sword, saying: "You''ve been swinging that sword up and down for over a month now so It''s time for you to learn how to swing it using more complex motions." Varrow proceeded to show Nick a set of sword play techniques where he swung the sword aggressively in a sequence of strange patterns. "This sword technique is called the Waiting Viper because its movements allow you to stall the enemy and strike ferociously when the time is right. I want you to practise the movements that I just showed you until further notice." Because Nick had a rank 2 mindscape, his memory was already close to perfect so remembering how Slade moved was no problem for him. Nick began practising the movements, but for the entire two hours of class his sword play was sloppy at best. (My pacing and control of the amount of strength that I use are not good enough.) Nick sat in the grass, resting before he made his next move. (I finally finished the initial version of Copy but I woke up so late this morning that I didn''t get a chance to test it. I''ll have to return to my dorm room quickly after visiting the spell creation club.) After seeing the other students leave, some of who looked at him scornfully before they left, Nick got up, picked up his sword and backpack and left for the spell creation club. ....................... When Nick arrived, Derek, Lana and Norman were all present and after greeting them, Nick asked Norman: "Do you have anymore tasks for me professor?" Norman seemed to think for a while before saying: "Not today, I''m busy helping these two so I haven''t arranged any tasks for you, come back tomorrow." Nick nodded his head and as he was about to leave, from a side glance, he noticed that Lana was looking at him with an unsightly expression. (Sigh, why do all of these people want to hate on me? Is it my fault that they are mediocre or worse?) Nick shook his head and left the spell creation club, soon returning to his dorm room. Nick sat at his desk and after looking over the laws that he had written down for Copy which seemed to now be glowing in a feint red hue, Nick decided that it was finally time to test out the spell. "This has been months in the making." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 89: The Nail That Stands Out Nick took out a packet of scroll writing papers that he kept in a neat pile in one of the corners of his room and returned to his desk, spending the next thirty minutes writing a copy of the beast capture scroll. When he was done, the scroll emitted a feint magical aura that made it evident that it was not defective. Nick took out another scroll writing paper from the packet and this time he placed it beside his already produced magic scroll. Nick closed his eyes and his consciousness entered his mindscape where he began to form the laws for Copy, the symbols appearing as dull red light; Nick slowly formed the symbols in order to make sure that he did not make a mistake that could result in a backlash. "Forming the laws of a spell the first time is always the hardest but becomes much easier afterwards. I wonder why that is?" A few minutes later, all of the laws had been formed and the spell was ready to be cast. Nick willed and watched as the field of ice that replaced his magic sea cracked in various places and released small crystals of magic energy into the air which flowed towards the spell''s laws that suddenly burst out in blinding light when fed with the magic energy. Nick''s consciousness left his mindscape and after examining his magic scroll once again, Nick placed his right index finger on the scroll and uttered: "Make Copy." Then he placed his right index finger on the blank scroll writing paper and uttered: "Produce Copy." Copy was a two part spell that had sub-spells, which was a term that Nick arbitrarily called them, one to copy the magical laws and one to project the laws onto a medium. Theoretically, the concept of the spell should work fine but without a test, Nick would not know how effective his concept was. The blank scroll writing paper lit up with a dull red light and when the light dissipated, the formerly blank paper now had symbols drawn with a red hue. Nick became momentarily excited before calming himself down and carefully comparing both magic scrolls. "The symbols are identical and the magical aura they are releasing are nearly the same but why only nearly?" There was a slight difference in the magical aura released by the scroll that Nick produced by hand and the scroll produced by the spell. Nick did not understand why there was such a subtle difference but he ignored it for now. Nick picked up the two scrolls and went to the outside of his dorm where by this time of the day there would be pigeons perching on the tree branches and pecking on the ground, looking for food. Nick first used his hand written magic scroll to capture a pigeon with unsurprising success and then used his magic scroll that was produced by his spell. Nick willed and the symbols on the page moved around to form a cage and a moment later, a fat pigeon sitting on a branch disappeared and reappeared as a red inked drawing on the scroll page. (Success! It actually works.) Nick knew that it likely would but to see his hard work finally pay off gave him an indescribably good feeling. Slade commented: [Hmmm, kid, do you realize that your spell mimics information path which is the retrieval and manipulation of information.] Nick replied in agreement: (I''m starting to notice a trend, the concepts involved in rule magic are so rudimentary and vague that when applied to spells, they end up producing results that mimic other magical paths, like how my spell, Big, produces the effect of transformation path, Growth produces the effect of food path and transformation path, Sever produces the effect of blade path and sword path and now Copy produces the effect of information path. Rule path seems to be very versatile and practical as long as you can apply its principles correctly.) Nick felt like his understanding of rule path made a big leap and he immersed himself in the intoxicating feeling of improvement. Slade spoke: [You sure catch on quick when things involve rule path which probably has to do with your high affinity for it.] Nick was about to head back to his dorm when he heard someone say: "Those are some neat little tools that you have. Where did you get them from, did you create them?" Nick turned around and squinted his yes when he saw the person who spoke. "Don Bartholomew." Don smiled and said: "Glad to know that you still remember me neighbor, it has been a while. I''ve heard that you''ve been eating with little Marcia lately but she''s started talking shit about you the moment she got involved with Kevin Stalwart. You sure have a way with the ladies." Don said that last part with a sarcastic tone and continued: "So, like I was asking before, where did you get those scrolls?" Nick spoke dismissively in reply: "That''s none of your business, Don." After saying that Nick began making his way back to his dorm room while Don spoke with a grudging tone: "Fine, don''t tell me but don''t forget that one day I will be in charge of the Bartholomew family and I will remember your disrespect." Nick replied: "If you say so." Nick was not worried about Don''s threat because he knew that Magicians could generally rise above the strength of a group as well as the fact that Magician families rise into prominence and fall into obscurity almost every day so the Bartholomew family may or may not be relevant by the time Don graduated anyway. When Nick got back to his room, he spent the next six hours copying the beast capture scrolls in order to familiarize himself with the spell and to begin fulfilling his contract with the General Beast Store. "Copy is a rank 2 basic grade spell with the ability to copy magical laws and reproduce them on a medium. Its consumption should be based on the power of the laws that it is copying, for example, each scroll that I copy requires 1200 magical units and with my magic energy holding capacity of 45,000 magical units, that''s 37 scrolls per session. Hmmm, I am not exactly sure why the spell is only basic grade but I''ll try to figure out the reason later." At around 8 pm, Nick was finished producing over two hundred and fifty magic scrolls and he stored them in a corner of his room. "I''ll have to get boxes for them tomorrow." Nick meditated until midnight and after setting his alarm for 6:00 am, he went to bed. ....................... During his next combat class, Nick practised the Waiting Viper for two hours and became noticeably better at performing its movements. Varrow even commented on Nick''s improvement: "You really do seem to have some talent with learning sword play. Do you have a high affinity with sword path or blade path?" Varrow referred to ''path'' instead of ''magic'' because after speaking to Nick a few times, he realized that the young man was well learnt and could discuss magical topics at a high level, at least far beyond the level of his peers. Nick thought a little about how to answer and decided that it was in his best interest to be a little truthful if this man was going to instruct him properly: "I actually do have a high affinity with blade path." Varrow nodded in understanding. "Now I understand your preference with a sword as a weapon but you do know that unlike sword path, blade path has the advantage that it makes it easier to use all sorts of bladed weapons that aren''t necessarily swords." Nick wore a thoughtful expression and then replied: "I figured that but swords are such classic weapons. I remember watching films with guys using them to chop off the heads of dragons and the like. I want to be that cool too." Varrow looked at Nick with wide eyes, not expecting such a childish response but he could also understand. When he was younger, he also wanted to become something akin to a hero using magic. "Fine, we''ll continue focusing on the sword for now, you can go. Oh, by the way, aren''t you a bit bothered by the gossiping and foolishness of your classmates; it was hard to ignore their little performance the other day?" Nick replied indifferently: "I wouldn''t say that I''m unbothered by it but acting against them over it seems like a foolish endevour, one where I don''t gain anything of value." Varrow nodded in approval: "Well, I like the maturity in your analysis." Varrow said that and left as a gust of wind. Nick headed to the spell creation club to receive his tasks from Norman. When he got there, he noticed that Derek and Lana were the only ones in the room and so he greeted them respectfully: "Greetings club mates, is Norman around?" Derek turned away from the white board that he was writing Valteesian symbols on and answered Nick: "He isn''t around but he left those notes for you to work through; he said to bring them back by the end of next week." Derek pointed to a large stack of documents on the desk that was beside of Lana''s and so Nick picked them up and placed them into his backpack and said his goodbyes, leaving the club room and heading to the convenience store near to his dorm where he picked up three basin sized cardboard boxes and then returned to his dorm room. This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it As soon as he but down his backpack, Nick used his spell, Big, on the three cardboard boxes, enlarging them to a size that could still fit through his room door. He proceeded to pack all of the scrolls that he had already produced into the boxes, filling up one box and only half of another. After that, Nick started producing more scrolls and this went on until midnight at which point he had produced nearly four hundred more beast capture scrolls. Nick meditated before going to bed. ...................... Over the next three weeks, Nick continued to attend combat classes where he practised that Waiting Viper sword technique, then he would visit the spell creation club to hand in or receive tasks or just to show his face. During the afternoons, he would produce magic scrolls and meditate, falling asleep well after midnight; Nick did the same thing everyday except on some days where he would review his mathematics texts before combat class and on weekends when there was no class, he would practise his space path spells and review his soul path inheritance; he would also study his rule path spells and Malevolent shrine to gain a better understanding of how they worked. Nick''s life was very busy but he enjoyed improving himself everyday, even if sometimes he made a fool of himself or was confused or didn''t know what to do. Every challenge gave him the opportunity to find a solution which he thought made him better, even if many of the things he had to do was painful. ...................... On the combat field, Nick moved swiftly using the first seven moments of the Waiting Viper sword technique before his opponent used one swing of his wooden sword to disrupt Nick''s momentum and send him sprawling on the ground. Thompson Varrow nodded his head in approval and said: "Although your movements are still a little rough, you have been making steady progress and before long, you should be able to learn more basic sword techniques." Nick picked himself up with and exhausted expression and dusted off his bare chest since he usually practised sword play shirtless, feeling that this opponent of his was unfathomable. "Thank you for the assessment, I can feel my muscles getting more and more use to these kinds of movements, making my practising much easier." Suddenly, there was an uproar from the other students who were supposed to be sparring as Kevin Stalwart unveiled a new spell. Kevin stood surrounded by three, three meter tall human figures of blue light which basically trampled his opponent into submission. After losing miserably, his opponent forced a smile and stood up while, saying: "That rank 2 advanced grade spell of yours is really something Kevin, what did you say its name was again?" Kevin replied with a satisfied but humble expression: "Oh, this. It''s name is Light of the Three Muskateers. It is a rare advanced grade spell that not only uses light magic, but also enslavement magic. My family spent millions to get their hands on it for me." Everyone gasped at the cost. Although most of their families were well off, hardly anyone of them would spend millions of pounds on one rank 2 spell. Marcia spoke at this time, trying to please Kevin: "The price of the spell is not the most impressive thing; that would be your skills in using it just now. In the next special exam, you will receive a high rank for sure. I bet that you are the strongest Magician in this class." Everyone shouted cheers in agreement, that is, until someone threw a fly into their soup: "What about Nick Capitol?" Everyone stopped cheering when they heard that, most just looking at each other with a wondering expression. The person that had spoken continued: "Well...he was ranked 9th within the entire year last semester." Kevin''s expression became unsightly for a moment but it quickly became humble again. He spoke, not wanting to confirm or deny who was the strongest: "Since we can''t determine that right now, I guess we''ll have to wait for the next special exam." When he finished speaking, a voice sounded from an fair distance away, it was clearly magically amplified: "Who said that you can''t determine that right now? Nick Capitol is right here, why don''t you and him have a little spar?" Nick looked at Varrow with raised eyebrows when he heard the words coming out of his mouth, not understanding what he was trying to do. Varrow discretely winked at him and continued: "You can determine who is the strongest with just a little spar, besides, Nick here hasn''t sparred with another student and I don''t want him getting rusty. Since you are one of the best in the class Kevin, why don''t you critique Nick''s skills for me?" Kevin now wore and awkward expression and said humbly: "Sir Varrow, Nick has not been sparring with us for a whole two months, I don''t want to hurt him, you should let him spar with someone else." Varrow visibly frowned and replied: "Young man, if I say that I want you to spar with another student, that is what you will do. It wasn''t a request." After hearing Varrow''s tone, Kevin quickly changed his attitude, saying: "I misunderstood your meaning, sir Varrow, my bad. I''ll spar with Nick but if he gets hurt badly, I don''t want to accept the responsibility." Varrow replied: "Hmph, I will accept all the responsibility, now prepare yourself." Kevin stood in his spot recovering his magic energy while the other students were clamoring: "Who do you think will win, Nick or Kevin?" "I don''t know but Nick hasn''t been sparring with us for so long so his skills must have become rusty. It should be a close match" "You''re wrong, Kevin has an advanced grade dual typed spell while we have never seen Nick use one of his own. He''ll definitely lose this match." Nick looked at Varrow with a questioning gaze but said nothing. Varrow simply said: "Go on Nick, I need you to disrupt that boy''s influence over the class so that the other students will focus more on improving themselves rather than kissing Kevin''s ass, just treat this as payment for my special instructions to you. Oh, and make sure not to kill or cripple him or we will both be in trouble." Varrow was sure that Nick was proficient in combat based on the fear inducing aura that he released in the second class; Varrow knew that one had to be either an extremely powerful Magician or possess powerful combat traits to produce such an aura. Nick didn''t say anything and just moved towards where Kevin was standing. (Sigh, I did not want this to happen but this idiot just had to make himself an eyesore. Under the circumstances, I can''t refuse to spar but I do not want to spend much time on this either because today is the day that I produce the last of the beast capture scrolls that I owe the General Beast Store.) Nick stopped walking when he got to six meters of Kevin who was standing directly opposite of himself; the other students were standing at a fifteen meter radius to Nick''s and Kevin''s right and left sides. Marcia looked and Kevin and then looked at Nick, her stare remaining on him for a few seconds before she turned away and kept her eyes on Kevin; her movements did not escape Nick''s peripheral vision. He spoke to Kevin while shaking his head: "The nail that sticks out gets hammered down first." Kevin sneered and used his most powerful spell right away: (Light of the Three Muskateers) Three human figures made of blue light appeared standing in front of Kevin; they were three meters tall and while they were made out of light, they could obviously affect their surroundings and had weight as they trampled the grass beneath their feet. Before Kevin could give his commands for them to attack Nick, however, Nick traced a horizontal straight line in front of himself and cast his spell: (Sever.) A moment later, the skin from Kevin''s left pectoral to his left pectoral as well as his shirt was cut open, spraying blood like a fountain and Kevin fell to the ground, rolling in the grass, covered with his own blood and screaming like a small child. Everyone present except Nick were shocked at the scene. "What happened?" "I think that Nick cast a spell on Kevin." "How comes I did not see the spell." "Are you an idiot? There are many spells that don''t have a flashy display but are effective but I could not tell the nature of the spell that Nick used, I only know that before Kevin went down, Nick exuded some magic energy." Varrow quickly reacted and suddenly appeared at Kevin''s position and began to perform a healing spell on him. (That was a very interesting attack that Nick just used. It seemed like a sword path spell but the magic employed definitely did not feel that way. Hmmm...it is not convenient to assess this boy''s wounds right now to figure out what kind of spell was used so I guess I''ll have to wait for an opportunity to ask Nick.) While Varrow was healing Kevin, Nick walked up to the three figures of light that were produced by Kevin''s spell. (Light path and enslavement path...it seems that they cannot act without instructions from Kevin and they are in a state of rest.) Nick touched one but his hand moved right through it. (No wonder that it was so hard for the other students to deal with this spell today, these things are made of light so physical attacks can pass through them but they can attack with a certain amount of hardness. This is a nice spell, hmmm...when I touch them, I can feel the magic power used to create them because they still require Kevin''s magic power to keep them going since he has not dispelled them yet. I wonder...) Nick once again placed his hand on one of the figures of blue light and when his hand went through it, he immersed himself into getting a good feel for the magic power involved in the spell and then cast his own: (Make Copy.) (Produce Copy.) Nick cast both sub-spells one after the other, using his own mindscape as the medium for which a copy of the laws of Light of the Three Muskateers was produced. The laws glowed with a dull blue light within Nick''s Mindscape. (Well...this is a surprise, I can actually copy the laws for spells that I come in contact with using my own spell, Copy. How...convenient) Nick smiled and took a note of the laws involved in casting the Light of the three Muskateers and dispelled them from his mindscape since he would not be able to cast a light and enslavement path spell anyway. When Varrow was done healing Kevin, they both stood up and Kevin looked and Nick with intense displeasure while canceling his spell; Varrow looked at Nick with approval while the other students looked at Nick with suspicion. Nick did not care about anyone''s approval or disapproval so he just waited for Varrow to dismiss them. Slade asked: [Why did you use Sever instead of your space path methods, see how you''ve made everyone suspicious?] (My space path methods are not suitable for attacking, you know that and I wanted to finish the spar quickly while Rumbling Pillar might not have gotten the job done with the same efficiency. Sever is great for killing an enemy but also great for causing a deep wound if I hold back, even more important in this situation, I could cast it quickly before that idiot realized what was going on. Besides, for all anyone here knows, that was a space path spell, considering that they probably can''t identify that it was rule path or any other path. The rest of the details, I can just explain away.) Slade replied with a half impressed tone: [Shrewd...] Varrow spoke loudly: "That''s all the time that we have for class so you can all leave now." Varrow motioned Nick to move to the side with him and said: "Tomorrow, I have a kind of gift that I would like to give you in recognition of your hard work so be here on time." Nick was confused about why Varrow wanted to give him a gift since he had done nothing special but he nodded his head and left. While he was leaving, Nick saw Varrow speaking to Kevin who had his head lowered. Nick put the events of today''s combat class out of his mind for now and returned to his room. He sat at his desk and produced magic scrolls with his spell, Copy, until midnight, finally completing the General Beast Store''s order. Although he was tired, he spent the next two hours writing the laws for Light of the Three Muskateers down on paper with the intention to find out how much this spell was really valued at. Nick went to bed soon thereafter, excited about the events that would unfold tomorrow. ................. "¡ê6,000,000. That''s how much I will pay for the complete version of this spell." Nick stood in front of the clerk of the Rip Rudy Spell Store, who after assessing the initial portion of the Light of the Three Muskateers spell that Nick had given him, valued the complete version at ¡ê6,000,000. Nick excitedly asked: "Can we complete the transaction today?" The clerk responded: "Sure, but why are you selling this spell, this is definitely a rare one? Won''t your family be upset when they find out that you sold it, after all, every spell that is bought by a store like ours has to be reported to the Magician''s association and you should know the saying, the walls have eyes and ears." Nick replied with a cool expression: "Don''t worry, I received this spell as a gift to do with as I please, there will be no repercussions for me." The clerk did not really care and was only warning the young man as a courtesy because most families deeply treasured the powerful spells that they possessed and if one of their relatives sold it to a private buyer, that relative might be disowned. (I wonder what face this clerk would make if he knew that I was practically an orphan?) Nick internally chuckled and handed the clerk the documents with the completed spell on it. The clerk looked it over and spent the next hour verifying its authenticity and after discovering that it was authentic, made Nick another offer: "I will add ¡ê1,000,000 more on my buying price if you do not sell the spell to other stores." Nick quickly accepted: "You''ve got yourself a deal, sir." Nick understood that intellectual property was truly valuable if very few people owned the rights to it so he had no intention of selling it to more stores for now. The clerk went ahead with processing the sale and half an hour later, Nick had ¡ê7,000,000 sitting in his bank account. "Becoming a millionaire is so easy..." Nick said this and chuckled. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 90: Commercial Property Nick went combat class with a subtle spring in his step. He went straight there from the Rip Rudy Spell Store and arrived by 9 am. The atmosphere of the class obviously changed as Kevin Stalwart remained quiet, waiting for class to begin in contrast to his usually sociable demeanor. Everyone around him was quietly waiting for class to begin, even Marcia just stood next to Kevin, not saying anything. All of the students noticed Nick''s arrival but quickly turned away when a gust of wind blew unto the field, revealing Thompson Varrow, their combat instructor. Varrow held a sheathed sword in his hand and spoke to the other students sternly: "Everyone, same program as usual, find a partner and start sparring." After leaving them with those instructions, Varrow went to Nick and handed him the sheathed sword. "This is a basic apprentice grade magic sword that I used in my early days. It is made from a Morning Wyvern''s bones that are steel like so it is fairly durable and has still remained sharp after all the passing years. You should practise using a real sword from now on." Nick accepted the sword with a strange expression, not knowing what to say, so he said the only appropriate thing that he could think of: "Th...th...thank you." Varrow could hear the subtle emotion in Nick''s voice and was not surprised at the young man''s reaction. (To be able to withstand all the gossip and shunning happening around him with such poise. This young man must have had a hard life up until now. He reminds me a lot of myself when I was younger, I hope that he makes good use of that sword.) Varrow spoke to Nick in a more fatherly tone than with the other students: "Continue practising the Waiting Viper, I want to see major improvement by the end of the next month." Nick nodded and took off his shirt, practising his sword technique with his new sword until class ended two hours later. The other students left while looking at Nick''s new sword with a bit of jealousy as gaining the favor of a Regular Magician was a big deal in their eyes. While Nick was getting ready to leave, Marcia came over to him and asked softly: "How..." Before she could say anymore, Nick curtly interrupted her: "Get lost." Marcia stood there embarrassed, not saying anything more after Nick''s dismissal and could only watch his back as he walked away. (Sigh, I made the wrong choice.) ....................... Nick arrived at the General Beast Store at around midday and looked for Marshall, the clerk that Nick was supposed to stay in contact with for matters relating to his contract. As soon as Marshall saw Nick, he came over with a smiling expression, almost fawning over him. (Carla warned me to treat this young man with extreme courtesy or I will pay dearly. I wonder why her attitude towards him changed so much?) "What will it be today, mister Nick, do you want more beasts on credit?" Nick shook his head and replied: "I''ve produced all of the magic scrolls that I''ve promised but they are still in my dorm room packed in big, heavy boxes. Do you mind lending me some work men and recommending a moving truck rental service so I can bring them here?" Marshall opened his eyes wide, not believing that he had heard correctly. "You mean, all twenty thousand magic scrolls are ready?" Nick nodded his head and took out a magic scroll from his backpack and handed it to Marshall. "Sure they are, that is a magic scroll from this batch, you can test it if you want to or just hand it to Carla as a gift." Since Carla had told him to treat Nick with extreme courtesy, he would not test the scroll until Nick was gone. "Of course you can borrow some of our work men but they will need to be paid extra for their service, as for the moving truck, I''ll call a friend of mine who works at such a business on campus, he''ll go to your dorm room quickly after you give me the address." Nick responded: "Paying your workers won''t be a problem, just give me a figure and this is my address..." After discussing further details with Marshall, Nick transferred the workers'' additional wages to the stores bank account and he also transferred money to the moving truck company''s bank account as well to have things moved along as quickly as possible. The work men and Nick used one of the store''s vehicles to drive to his dorm where the workmen retrieved the boxes of magic scrolls from his room and placed them onto the hired truck that would bring them to the store. (Hard work really pays off...) Nick revealed a rare unrestrained smile, showing some of his slightly crooked teeth. ....................... A fat, hairy African boar stood within a large, spacious cage, grunting at the two people that stood in front of it, dragging its hind legs across the cage floor, like it was going to charge at them. In the next moment, the boar disappeared and reappeared on a beast capture scroll as a red inked drawing. Carla looked at the image, pleased with the product that Marshall had handed her to test out. She asked Marshall: "Where is Nick now?" Marshall who was standing beside her replied: "He should be bringing the rest of the scrolls over to the store right now. Are you going to look through the boxes of scrolls to make sure that the quality is the same as this scroll?" Carla shook her head. "Nick is not stupid enough to try and deceive me. He actually fulfilled the contract ahead of schedule. I like that, when he arrives with the scrolls, you have my permission to unload them into the supplies area and count them. Tell Nick that I will make a payment by 5 pm today." Marshall responded: "Yes maam." .......................... Nick arrived at the General Beast Store, riding in the hired truck and then watched as the workmen unloaded the truck and brought the boxes of scrolls into the store. Marshall went out to meet Nick, saying: "Thank you for your hard work, mister Nick. Boss Carla was pleased with the quality of the magic scroll that you gave me earlier and said that you will receive payment to your bank account by 5 pm today." Nick nodded his head and said: "It''s been great doing business with you guys, I hope that our relationship will continue into the foreseeable future." Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings. Marshall responded: "Definitely." Marshall went back inside of the General Beast Store and Nick looked for the location of nearby restaurants on his smart phone. After finding one that seemed interesting, Nick made his way there. A soon as Nick entered the Many Soups restaurant, he ordered two servings of red peas soup with pig''s tail and took a window seat where he spent the next hour eating his soup and reminiscing about his progress thus far. (Now that I''ve completed my contract and will have many millions to burn, my progress will sky rocket from here on out as long as I keep working towards my goals. Next, I have to start cultivating my soul using the methods in Slade''s inheritance. Now that I have money, that isn''t so difficult. I also have to continue studying space path; there''s also the need to continue studying rule path on my own and I guess I do that by creating more rule path spells. Since I made money by creating magic scrolls, I''ll continue to make more magic scrolls that have practical uses for the people on campus and I''ll see how well I do. Oh, and lets not forget about this...) Nick picked up the sword that Varrow gave him and unsheathed it. The blade kind of looked glassy but Nick felt that it was definitely hard and sharp. (I wonder how many people Varrow has killed with this thing?) Nick touched the blade of the sword and something strange happened. The surroundings changed into a pitch black void and Nick stood in a space littered with bones with an old rundown temple looming over him. A figure shrouded in Darkness sat on the edge of the temple''s roof and looked at Nick with scary, ruby red, lifeless eyes. (Those eyes...they seem similar to mine since I became rank 2 so my change in appearance must have something to do with this guy.) "Who are you?" The figure replied: "That is not your concern" Nick felt exasperated at hearing that. (Not this shit again.) "Okay then, what kind of curse did you put on me, why is it altering my body?" The figure spoke with a gravely voice: "You ask many questions boy but are still unworthy of any answers. However, I will say this, the blade in your hand must wipe away thousands from this world before I will be give you any answers. Do not think that my power was given to you for free, if you do not create blood shed and develop yourself well, I will surely destroy you." Before Nick could ask any questions, the surroundings returned to that of the quiet restaurant before the change. Nick asked Slade: (Did you see all of that?) Slade replied: [How could I have missed it. Whoever that Magician is, he is a demon for sure but that is not the real concern here, he has threatened to destroy you if you do not become stronger and he seems to want you do do so through killing.] (I realize all of that but come to think of it, those aren''t such bad terms, all things considered. At least we know for sure that Malevolent Shrine and my physical changes have some connection with him. As for killing to make myself stronger, honestly, that was already in the cards for me since finding out that devouring magic beasts made myself stronger.) [You seem intent on becoming a demon, are you sure that you want that when it is probably easier to live peacefully within this cushy little society?] (Hmph, this place is a poor land, in the books that I got from the library, worlds ten times larger than this one with far more abundance of magic were described. Why would I settle for this place? This world is only a stepping stone.) [Ha, ha, ha. Good, when the blood shed begins, I hope that you won''t balk. A demon does not compromise.] (So be it.) Nick finished his now lukewarm soup and when it finally became 5 pm, he took out his phone and looked at his bank account to see nearly ¡ê230,000,000 in it. Nick immediately left the restaurant and went to the academy''s real estate office where all purchases of land and rental of space on the academy campus had to take place. Nick walked to the desk of one of the officers present and said to him: "I want to purchase an office space on campus, preferably outfitted with furniture. How much will that cost?" The male real estate officer looked at Nick and seeing that he was young, almost the same age as him, did not have much hope of making a sale. (He''s probably here because he is curious.) "Well...we have four such units available for sale that are situated within the academy''s commercial district." The real estate officer took out a tablet computer and showed Nick the properties, captured on its holographic screen. Nick looked at all four and told the real estate officer that he chose the one across from a restaurant that he knew sold fried chicken and fried rice everyday. Coincidentally, that happened to be the most expensive property. The real estate officer discretely rolled his eyes at Nick and quoted a figure: "If you want it to be set up with furniture and a magic security system. The price will be ¡ê90,000,000." Nick nodded his head. (The price is high but that should be expected on this campus. I need this building, not only to get away from the prying eyes of other students but to do business as well. I also need the space for researching magic; my dorm room is just too small and I have to waste a lot of time walking to other academy and commercial buildings when I stay at the dorm so...) "I will buy the property, provided that all the basic amenities, including the ones that you mentioned are set up." The real estate officer wore a suspicious expression when he heard Nick say that he would buy the property. "Really?" Nick replied: "When can I get the paperwork done and pay the selling price?" The real estate officer replied excitedly: "Right away, sir." (A 1% commission on this property is ¡ê900,000. I''m about to get up outta the hood.) Nick watched as the real estate officer prepared the paperwork with surprising vigor and two hours later, after paying the selling price, Nick now owned a commercial property within the academy commercial district. Nick went to his dorm room and packed up his belongings which was easy since he did not own much and all of his clothes and personal effects could fit inside a travel bag and his backpack. Nick meditated until he fell asleep at his desk and early the next morning, he officially moved out of the River Run Dorm When Nick arrived at his new home, he opened the door with a few tears in his eyes. (A few years ago, I could barely find food for myself and now I own my own place of business. I almost can''t believe it.) Nick went inside and explored all three storeys of the building. The ground floor consisted of a hall with sofas , a television and an eating space. The first floor had five offices that were already outfitted with carpets, desks, computers and telephones and the second floor consisted of a large carpeted room with a large oak desk, a refrigerator and a restroom area that had a few toilets and a shower. "No bed?" (Oh right, this is a commercial building, I''ll have to buy one later.) After checking his building out Nick carried his sword and backpack with him to combat class where he practised the Waiting Viper shirtless for two hours and then left to go to the spell creation club. When he arrived, Nick greeted everyone present and received his new task from Norman which was still just looking through documents filled with Valteese and making corrections. (He must be doing heavy research, since he has so many documents that need to be looked through.) Nick left the spell creation club and went back to his building where a box of supplies was placed at his door. Nick had ordered supplies that he would use to practise magic. Nick went into the building and stayed on the first floor where he begun to draw a magic formation on the floor, filled with symbols from a mystical language that he did not recognize. Nick sat in the center of the formation and activated it. Nick''s soul immediately began shaking which caused him a great deal of pain. Thirty minutes later, Nick''s soul crumbled to a size 1/6th of the original, the sudden damage to his soul making him feel hazy. The process had been so painful that Nick had tears flowing from his eyes throughout; he picked himself up, washed his face and left his building, making his way to the General Beast Store. Nick had used the Soul Breaking Formation to remove the impurities in his soul which naturally caused much of it to break away. When Nick entered the store, Marshall greeted him happily. After the contract was completed, Carla promoted him to store manager and now he had authority over the stores non-magical operations and was making four times the money that he was making before. "What will it be today, mister Nick?" Nick replied wearily: "I need a large volume of your most decrepit animals, how much will that cost?" Marshall thought for a while and quoted a price: "We have in stock right now, about two hundred animals that we were planning to put down for various reasons, you can have them for a discounted price of ¡ê40,000." Nick accepted and paid the price, telling Marshall to place them in the underground chamber that he was in the last time he wanted decrepit animals. Marshall wore a suspicious expression as he thought: (Is he going to...) Nick made his way to the underground chamber with Marshall following behind him and started using chalk to draw the soul calming formation on the ground. With cages of sickly, ill-tempered animals in front of him, Nick cast his spell: (Eat Soul.) Marshall looked on in horror as the souls of the animals flew into Nick''s ''maw'' one by one. (I knew it, he''s doing this again.) Nick spent the next few hours eating the souls of the animals to repair his own soul and using the soul calming formation to sooth any disturbances caused by the side effects of the spell. ''Breaking'' the soul, healing the soul and calming the soul, these were the three general methods of soul cultivation. There were of course better methods to cultivate the soul in Slade''s inheritance but Nick did not have the qualifications to use them. Nick said goodbye to the fear stricken Marshall and returned to his building where he meditated and then slept on one of the ground floor''s sofas, looking forward to the next day. For the next two months, Nick religiously followed a daily routine of going to combat class, visiting the spell creation club, cultivating his soul, studying space magic and practising the spells within his arsenal. ....................... One sunny morning, Nick walked away from his desk, leaving a pile of documents on it and looked out of the second floor window of his commercial building, looking tired but satisfied. "After two months, I''ve finally created another useful magic scroll." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 91: Soul Healing Scroll For the past two months, in addition to sword practice, cultivating his soul and and studying space and rule magic, Nick had been trying to develop another product to sell under his company''s name. He wants to put effort into making the Magic Scroll Company an identifiable organization as that would also help him in developing himself. Nick had thought of many kinds of spells that might be useful but most of them were eventually rejected because Nick lacked knowledge of the requisite paths. Nick ended up running with an idea that he had come up with while cultivating his soul: "How about a magic scroll that can heal damaged souls?" Soul magic was fairly common and injuries to the soul happened all the time through backlash from failing to cast spells, magic beast attacks, attacks from Magicians and from soul cultivation itself. Most of these injuries would be allowed to heal naturally over time through sleep or some unorthodox methods at the cost of some discomfort on the part of the Magician. Two months ago Nick thought that if he could create such a spell, there would be a large Market for it. Nick was a soul path scholar so he had an intuition that his plan would work. After taking apart the spell, Eat Soul, to see how it achieved its effects and doing tests with various beast souls, Nick was able to conceptualize a magic scroll that healed superficial damage to the soul almost instantly, leaving the affected Magician without discomfort. Nick finished conceptualizing the final portions of the spell just now and was about to create his first ''Soul Healing'' scroll. Nick retrieved a scroll writing paper and started filling it with Valteesian symbols and an hour later, he had a magic scroll filled with dimly glowing grey symbols. The magic energy coming from the scroll assured one of its quality but Nick knew that the scroll was not yet complete. Nick retrieved a flat bed trolley with ten small cages loaded on it that each contained one sloth. Sloths were sedentary creatures that spent much of their time sleeping so there was special quality to their soul that produced a soothing effect when Nick used Eat Soul on them. Their souls were an important ingredient in the production of the Soul Healing scroll, without which the scroll could leave a Magician''s mind in slight turmoil for a few hours after his soul was healed. Nick used a spell that was aimed at five of the ten sloths: (Retrieve Soul.) Nick used the advanced apprentice grade spell that he had learnt when he was at the Jenner estate to drag the sloths'' souls from their bodies and released them into the scroll that went from emitting a dull gray light to emitting a bright gray light. Nick then took out another scroll writing paper and used another spell of his while touching his completed scroll. (Make Copy.) Nick then placed his right index finger on the blank scroll writing paper. (Produce Copy.) The laws for the Soul Healing spell appeared on the paper in a bright silver ink but the magic energy that it was releasing felt off compared to Nick''s already finished product. (Sigh, just like I expected, I still need to use five sloths for each copy that I make, the spell apparently cannot copy the laws contained in the souls that were used to produce a complete scroll; hmmm...this inability probably relates to why Copy is currently just a basic grade rank 2 spell.) Nick continued to focus on finishing the scroll and used Retrieve Soul to capture the last five sloths'' souls and released them into the unfinished scroll which began to emit a magic energy very similar to the original. "Now I need to rest its effects." Nick went to the ground floor and sat in the middle of his Breaking Soul formation and activated it. The formation took a relatively long time to damage Nick''s soul because during the past two, months Nick had refined his soul to a very high degree, having used this formation, then healed and calmed his soul at the general beast store about fifty three times; each time Nick spent around ¡ê40,000 to buy decrepit animals that he would use to heal his soul so Nick had spent over ¡ê2,000,000 already refining his soul. The result is now that Nick''s soul was extremely resilient and strong and the Break Soul formation was only a rank 2 basic grade magic formation. "Carla was right, the money that I earned is only a drop in the bucket compared to what I need to get to a high rank." After nearly an hour, the Break Soul formation damaged Nick''s soul sufficiently and so Nick stopped its activation and took out the copy of his Soul Healing magic scroll. Nick willed its activation and in the next moment, the scroll crumbled and he felt a wave of warmth come over him and the slight disturbance to his mind from the damage to his soul went away. Nick clenched his fist in excitement. "I succeeded." Slade commented at this moment: [Your magic soul is no doubt useful. Even in my former home, I could see such a magic tool being highly sought after, even if it is merely rank 1 basic grade.] Slade was correct, the spell written on the Soul Healing scroll was only a rank 1 basic grade spell but its effect on the soul was amplified because of all the soul path laws that the soul naturally contained and its low rank made it extremely easy to activate. "Since today is a Saturday and I don''t have combat class, I will make a visit to my favorite beast store." Nick placed his original version of the Soul Healing scroll into his backpack and made his way to the General Beast Store. When Nick arrived through the door, Marshall treated Nick with extreme warmth because not only was he a supplier of an item that made them a fair amount of profit, he even bought animals from them regularly in recent times. Where as the store used to use the transportation array for the convenience of the customer and barely made any profit from it at all, selling the Beast Capture scroll to customers looking for an uncomplicated exchange had earned the store over ¡ê120,000,000 in profit during the past two months and demand for the scrolls has only increased but the store was beginning to run out of them. Nick spoke plainly to Marshall: "I have a business proposition for your store and so I would like to speak to Carla." Marshall smiled and happily asked for more information: "Oh, what kind of business proposition is it?" "I would like to secure sloths from this store in regular volume going into the foreseeable future to obtain from them a raw material that I will be using in my newly invented magic scrolls." Nick took out his furled magic scroll and showed it to Marshall but to Marshall, it looked rather unimpressive. Marshall replied: "Boss Carla is out at the moment so I will have to ask her for instructions over the phone." Nick nodded. "Go ahead." Marshall went to the lobby counter and mad a telephone call to Carla, explaining the situation to her. Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere. She spoke eagerly: "Take Nick into my office and tell him to wait there and I will arrive at the store in twenty minutes." Marshall did as Carla instructed and took him into her office and had him wait there alone while Carla made her way to the store. Nick sat in the office, thinking about his two months of progress. (In terms of sword techniques, I have learnt the Waiting Viper thoroughly even though I have not mastered it, I can pretty much use the current spells in my arsenal on instinct and I even have ideas for new rule path spells from my study of space path and my experience with the sword. My biggest source of progress, however, is the cultivation of my soul which has went on relatively great although I had to burn a lot of cash to do it efficiently. I haven''t used my soul path spells on a living target in quite a while so I''m unsure of their current strength; I also have soul path methods that I would like to place into my arsenal of spells as soon as possible.) The door of Carla''s office soon opened, revealing Carla, wearing a tight denim skirt and a sleeveless green blouse, she greeted Nick as politely as a rank 4 Magician would anyone else and sat behind her desk. She then said: "Before we speak about anything else, I need to place an order for more magic scrolls with your company." Nick nodded. "Okay, how much?" Carla replied: "Another twenty thousand by the end of the month." Nick replied with certainty even though he knew that producing that many scrolls within a month''s time with just him alone would be difficult. Carla was pleased to see Nick accept. She knew that Nick''s company only had one employee which was himself but she just wanted as many scrolls as she could get her hands on since her customers were demanding them instead of using the transportation array to transport the animals that they bought from her. At first she thought that the scrolls would be an added convenience to her customers but now that selling them was making her a large profit, she had to have more. "Okay, did Marshall report to me correctly? You said that you wanted a regular source of sloths to obtain a raw material for some new scroll that you invented? What kind of scroll is it?" Nick replied: "Before I answer that, I would like to know if I can have the sloths?" Carla thought for a moment and then said: "The sloths are not regularly bred by us because of their low demand but if you can convince me that you will be purchasing a large volume of them going into the foreseeable future, I do not mind sourcing them for you at a premium until our facilities can breed a large amount of them." Nick nodded his head in approval: "Fine..." Nick took out his scroll and explained its use to Carla who seemed very interested in it. "If that scroll works as you say it does, then I can guarantee that I can give you a regular amount of sloths starting every month." Nick handed Carla the magic scroll and said: "You can test that out for yourself later and give my a reply, I would also want to rent one of your underground spaces to keep the sloths until I get my own warehouse, I''ll buy them at an additional premium if you are willing to feed them while they are being stored here." Carla counter offered: "I''ll make you an even better offer, I will manage the storage, feeding and logistics related to the sloths in exchange for 10% of the profit that you make from selling these scrolls during the next year. I''ll even help you market them, how does that sound?" Nick thought for a moment and then said: "Deal." Nick knew nothing about logistics or marketing so if Carla could take those worries off of his mind, he welcomed it. (The help of a rank 4 Apprentice Magician is worth the 10%. I am surprised that she did not ask for more, like shares in my company.) Nick asked: "When can you have a batch of sloths ready?" Carla replied: "By the time we sign a contract for both deals. Come back tomorrow to sign the contracts, I will test your Soul Healing scroll myself later today." Nick thanked Carla for her time and left the General Beast Store, heading back to his building to start the production of the next batch of Beast Capture scrolls and to continue studying but after he walked for a few minutes, he received a phone call from Marsha Cassidy. Nick was going to ignore it but remembered that he was a business man now and needed to be professional. Nick answered the phone: "Hello, this is Nick." Marsha answered with an angry tone: "Nick, you bastard, are you actually selling the Beast Capture scrolls to the General Beast Store and making an enormous amount of money without me." "Huh? What are you talking about?" "Don''t play dumb with me, my associate bought an animal from that store and showed me the scroll that he was using to store it. Don''t forget that you got the means to make those scrolls from me. The least you could do is cut me in on some of the action." "Sigh, Marsha, I don''t owe you anything, especially after you tried to ambush me with Greg North. I warned you about playing games with me and you did not listen. If you want to purchase the scrolls, I''m all ears but otherwise, you''ll have to excuse me while I make this cash." Marsha became enraged when Nick said that last part. "Where are you, Nick? I''m being told that you moved out of your dorm. Let''s talk about this in a civilized manner, face to face. Don''t let a misunderstanding get in the way of old friends." Nick shook his head, saying: "Goodbye Marsha." "...Nick, wait, you son of a..." Nick hung up the phone before Marsha could finish her insult and proceeded to his building. Nick spent the rest of the day producing magic scrolls and studying magic. At around 9 pm, Carla called him on his smart phone, saying: "Nick, my sweet. Why didn''t you say that you were going to be selling top quality goods. I''ll have your contracts ready by tomorrow. Oh, what''s your address, I need to give you a magically encrypted phone if we are going to talk business over the phone from now on, I''ll send one of my assistants over to give it to you." Nick was confused as to why Carla wanted to give him the phone tonight if he was going to meet her tomorrow but he figured that she must have her reasons. (Powerful Magicians are so unreasonable.) Nick told Carla his address and in twenty minutes, someone rang his door bell. Nick opened the door to see a young woman clothed in a tight purple dress, saying: "You are Nick Capitol, correct? Carla sent me. Where do I put the cellphone?" Nick invited her in and told her to leave the phone on one of the ground floor''s sofas. The woman walked inside and Nick closed the door behind her, thinking: (Wow, this girl is beautiful, she has a nice ass too. Its kind of weird that she just walked into a stranger''s residence like that but the academy is relatively safe I guess, so that''s probably the reason that she walked in with no worries.) The woman placed the phone on the sofa and took a seat, looking at Nick and then asked: "So mister Capitol. I hear that you are planning to make a big deal with Carla? Mind telling me about it?" Nick frowned. (Why is this assistant so nosy, if Carla wanted her to know about it then Carla would have told her?) The woman reached into her cleavage to take something out but Nick''s mind went into high alert the moment she did so. (Soul Pressure.) The woman''s movements froze and blood oozed from her nose but she was able to move again within the next few seconds, albeit slightly. "I''m just showing you my ID." She took out an ID card that read: ''Board Member of the General Beast Store''. Nick canceled Soul Pressure and the woman wiped her face of blood. Nick asked: "Carla sent you didn''t she, why don''t you ask her?" "She is being tight lipped about it and I want to know why. Considering the profit that we have made off of your previous magic scrolls, I want to know what you have cooking." Nick replied coldly: "Not happening." "Whatever she offered you, I can have it increased if you are willing to work with the Jenner family as opposed to just Carla." "Not interested, now leave." Nick wore a stern expression and showed no room for compromise. The woman sighed and got up from the sofa and walked to the door, saying: "I left my business card with the cell phone, If you change your mind or there is something that you need, just let me know." When the woman got to the door, however, Nick spoke: "Wait." With her back turned to Nick, the woman thought: (I knew it, no one can resist the influence of the Jenner name.) The woman, however, did not expect what happened next. With her back still turned to him, Nick nervously put his hand on the woman''s round bottom and said: "There is actually something that I need." The young woman blushed with surprise but remained still as Nick rubbed her bottom with his right hand. The woman internally sighed: (It looks like this dress worked too well but this result is fine too. Carla has too much influence in our faction and I need and advantage over her while I am trying to become a stronger Magician.) The woman steeled herself and turned around, placing Nick''s right hand into her crotch. When Nick felt the warmth there, he realized that his gamble had worked and this woman would let him do what he wanted. (Self interest is the lever that moves everyone.) Nick used his developed physique to pick the woman up with both arms and carry her to one of the sofas where he turned her onto her stomach and lifted her dress above her waist. He then moved her panties aside and took out his penis with no resistance whatsoever from the woman. He quickly felt her vagina again and feeling that it was moist, he guided his penis inside of it. "Ahhhhhh!" The woman moaned continuously and tried to hold Nick''s hand but Nick brushed her hand off of his and held down her back roughly and swung his hips onto her bottom continuously for the next twenty minutes. When he was done, he got up from the sofa and said: "You can go now." The woman, with a half grudging expression went towards the door and opened it but before she left, Nick asked: "What was your name again?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 92: May I Also Attend? The next day... Nick sat in an office chair within Carla''s office looking through two contracts with Carla and her lawyer present. Nick had the thought of bringing his own lawyer but with his rank 2 mindscape, reading and understanding these simple contracts was no problem as they were in the format of: do this by this date and you will be paid this amount. While Nick was reading the contracts, Carla asked him: "Did you get the phone that I sent to you, Nick?" Nick stopped reading the contract in his hand and looked at Carla before answering her: "Yeah, I received the smart phone, I just didn''t expect that a supposed board member was the one who would deliver it." Carla made an expression as if she was pondering something, then asked: "Oh, so Britney told you who she was. Did she say anything else?" Now, it was Nick''s turn to ponder: (I suspect that there is some political in-fighting going on with these people and I definitely do not want to get involved, so...) "Britney Jenner not only told me who she was but, she made me an offer to work with the Jenner family and not just you." Carla smiled, amused: "What reply did you give her?" Nick shrugged his shoulders and responded: "I said I wasn''t interested and after I had sex with her, I told her to leave." The lawyer beside Carla opened his eyes wide in surprise in response to what Nick said and looked at Carla to see how she would respond. Carla turned to the lawyer and asked: "Mr. Marks, can Nick and I have the room for a few minutes?" Howard Marks, the lawyer, got up from his chair and silently left the room. Carla then focused on Nick and chuckled a bit before saying: "You had sex with her? Who just comes out and says that in the middle of a contract signing?" Nick shrugged his shoulders: "I don''t want to be involved in your family drama, so I wanted to be as transparent as possible." Carla squinted her eyes and asked: "Oh, if that''s the case, did you enjoy fucking her?" With an almost indifferent expression, Nick replied: "Yeah, I did, but that''s neither here nor there. Why exactly did you send her to my place? Couldn''t you have used Marshall or some other worker?" Carla shook her head in reply. "Britney is the daughter of an important family member and has been acting in that family member''s capacity as a board member of this store to gain business experience in addition to her magical training at another academy. She had already been notified about our profits from selling your scrolls and has been paying close attention to whatever we do that involves you. I happened to be with her when I called you yesterday and she volunteered to deliver the phone to you." Nick raised his right eyebrow and asked: "Weren''t you concerned that she would make me such an offer?" Carla shrugged her shoulders. "And so what if she did, you rejected her, right? Nick, in business and as a Magician, you should expect those around you to attempt to screw you over and undermine you when they get the chance. If they are not trying to undermine you, it probably means that you aren''t doing anything worthy." Carla smiled as she said this, remembering her early years and how she came up. Were there many people that tried to undermine her? Yes. Were there many people that tried to ruin her? Of course. How many of those people are still left standing? Close to zero. "The games of petty children are not part of my, Carla Jenner''s, major concerns. Since she is family and has a troublesome status, even if she is much weaker than me, probably even weaker than you, I will still keep her around as long as she doesn''t do something too stupid. Going forward, I would prefer that you not reveal your sexual escapades so easily in front of company, okay." Nick replied: "Fine with me." (I am not really interested in what is going on with you Jenners and I won''t tolerate being dragged into a political whirlpool. That being said, I probably shouldn''t have had sex with Britney but I just had the urge.) Nick sighed internally, he was not a robot and sometimes he felt the urge for sexual gratification. Last night, he saw an opportunity to satisfy that urge and took advantage of it. (I don''t think it should amount to a big problem but I should learn to control myself when dealing with business contacts at least.) Carla called the lawyer back into the room and Nick spent an additional two hours reading through the contracts and then signing them. Nick''s first contract gave him a deadline of a month to deliver an additional twenty thousand Beast Capture scrolls at ¡ê11,000 a piece. His other contract stipulated that the sloths would be delivered to and stored within the General Beast Store regularly and Nick had the right to determine when and where he would use them to produce his scrolls, with the store responsible for providing transport and disposal; Nick also had the right to sell the Soul Healing scrolls to whomever he wanted but the General Beast Store had a right to ten percent of the profits from those sales. Nick returned home and produced a batch of a few hundred Beast Capture scrolls and after he did that, he looked over the spells within his soul path inheritance and incorporated a few more into his combat arsenal. Nick also did a few hours of meditation before going to bed. ................ During combat class, Thompson Varrow and Nick squared off against each other while the other students were sparring. Nick had become very proficient with performing the movements of the Waiting Viper and Varrow has decided to put that proficiency to the test. Varrow''s movements with the sword were swift and precise, not missing any opportunity to deflect Nick''s attacks and use Nick''s lost momentum to his advantage to press forward. Nick slashed and sliced at Varrow, paying special attention to his footwork and breathing like he had been instructed. Nick tried his hardest to match up to Varrow''s speed but was slowly unable to cope with the many slices that Varrow sent his way using the same Waiting Viper technique. Varrow''s sword seemed to move like an agile snake that bit into Nick every chance it got so by the time that Nick was sent sprawling onto the ground, he had several superficial wounds on his chest and arms. Varrow walked over to him and performed his healing spell which only took a few moments to mend Nick''s wounds. Nick complained: "Why do we have to use our real swords during these spars." Varrow spoke with a tone that suggested that what he was going to say was obvious: "Growth only comes through pain. If you want to learn swordsmanship at a decent pace, you should get used to being cut and you better figure out the reasons that you received each cut." Varrow finished healing Nick and said: "You''ve gained a decent proficiency with the Waiting Viper technique. Now I''m going to teach you an additional one, the Menacing Crane." Nick internally sighed: (Why do these sword techniques have such weird names?) Varrow began to perform the movements of the Menacing Crane and Nick immediately noticed the difference between this sword technique and the Waiting Viper. The Waiting Viper was best performed in retaliation to an opponent''s attacks, building up momentum until a deciding blow could be struck while the Menacing Crane was an all out offensive that did not give the enemy room for pause or rest, that is, it was designed to go for your opponent''s throat from beginning till end. The Menacing Crane technique was definitely more complex than the Waiting Viper, having 25 different movements in total. Varrow spent forty minutes showing Nick the technique and explaining each movement. Afterwards he went back to lecturing the students after they had finished their sparring. There were twenty minutes left until class would end and although Nick lost badly to Varrow in their spar, that loss did not demotivate him. Nick rested his right hand on his bare chest and tried to regulate his breathing and when he felt that he was ready, Nick practised the movements of the Menacing Crane until class was over. Nick left combat class as soon as it ended and went straight to his commercial building. Usually, he would go to the spell creation club after class, but now that he had ample funds to buy supplies and do other things, he found the club less and less useful so instead of spending time helping Norman with his work, he intended to focus on developing his business and studying magic. This novel is published on a different platform. Support the original author by finding the official source. Nick took out his magically encrypted smart phone and called Marshall, from the General Beast Store. Marshall answered quickly: "Hello, General Beast Store." "Marshall, this is Nick Capitol. Have the sloths related to my contract been stored yet?" "Yes mister Nick, they have." "Well, can you have them delivered and loaded into the ground floor of my building by 7 pm tonight, I''ll leave the door unlocked since I don''t want to be disturbed. I also want you to pick up the cages and carcasses tomorrow morning as early as 6 am." "I can have the sloths delivered at 7 pm via our transportation array. I will have the men in place to load them into your building and they will come back in the morning to retrieve the cages and carcasses of the animals via box truck." "I''m satisfied with that." Nick hung up the phone and went to the 2nd floor to produce another batch of the Beast Capture scrolls. When he had produced a little over two hundred scrolls, he stopped and turned his attention to the soul path spells that he planned to learn and use going forward. (These are great but they require me to magically make adjustments to the laws on my soul to use them or else I''ll only fail in casting them.) Some spells were like that, where a part of the body or multiple parts had to be conditioned before the spell could activate properly, assuming that the laws were formed correctly within the mindscape. Nick needed to go through another period of cultivation similar to his use of the Break Soul Formation to make subtle changes to his soul to properly use his chosen soul path spells; it would certainly be painful. Soul path was one of the strongest paths in terms of attack power but it was also one of the most painful and difficult paths to cultivate because the soul was generally not very malleable and each permanent change to it came with noticeable effects. If one did not cultivate the soul correctly, best case is that they would develop lasting mental issues, the worst case is that they would become a hollow shell of themselves that could do nothing but drool. Nick spent a few hours studying the spells and when he received a notification via his smartphone that the sloths had been loaded into the ground floor of his building, he stopped his studying and carried all of his materials, including his scroll writing papers to the first floor to begin creating his first batch of Soul Healing scrolls. Nick looked at the over one hundred small cages filled with sloths arranged neatly throughout a section of the first floor and bitterly smiled for the sloths: "Well...its either your guys'' lives or my development. I choose the latter." Nick spent the next few hours using every sloth to manufacture Soul Healing scrolls. ....................... One month later... Nick carried a box to the first floor and placed it among a stacked collection of many other boxes. Nick looked at the dozens of boxes all around him and felt proud. "It wasn''t easy but I''ve not only fulfilled my contract for a second batch of Beast Capture scrolls but I''ve also produced a stock pile of Soul Healing scrolls." During the past month, Nick spent much of it studying and practising his own spells outside of the time that he spent in combat class, however most of his time was actually spent producing Beast Capture and Soul Healing scrolls. Nick thought about all of the sloths that had died in his hands, their souls being used to produce scrolls and although he felt some feeling of remorse about it, he understood that this was just how running a business worked. (You have to break eggs to make omelettes. I doubt that the CEO of Jerry''s Fried Chicken loses sleep about all the chickens they have to slaughter to produce their meals.) "This past month, I have produced twenty thousand Beast Capture scrolls and ninety thousand Soul Healing scrolls." Nick had produced so much Soul Healing scrolls because the scrolls used a rank 1 basic grade spell and he required minimal magic energy to make copies of them, about 150 magical units per copy. The most expenditure of magic energy that came from producing the soul healing scrolls was using his spell, Retrieve Soul, on the sloths but Nick figured out that the spell could be used on up to fifty sloths at a time and since they were weak, non-magical creatures, the spell only required about 3,000 magical units to retrieve the souls of those fifty sloths. The quality of Retrieve Soul as a spell was very commendable, having such reasonable magic energy requirements despite being an advanced grade spell, although it was a fairly complex spell. Nick took out his magically encrypted smart phone and called Marshall who answered the call quickly: "Hello mister Nick. What can I do for you today?" "I have another batch of beast Capture Scrolls that I want your people to come pick up." "Oh, certainly. I''ll have the workers and delivery truck at your office in about an hour." Nick hung up the call. He had worked out a deal with the General Beast Store so that as long as he paid the workers additional wages and a fee, he could make use of their manpower and trucks to deliver his Beast Capture scrolls to their store. Nick didn''t mind since he did not want to deal with the logistics personally and he did not want to currently spend the time hiring people either. Nick then called Carla, who answered the phone after some time: "What is it, Nick?" "The Soul Healing scrolls are ready, Carla. I have ninety thousand of them that I am willing to sell for ¡ê50,000 a piece. You said that you were marketing them, right? Well, do we have any interested customers?" "It''s been hard to get people on board since you did not give me any of those scrolls for people to sample but with my relationships, I have secured a few commitments but ¡ê50,000 seems like a high price. Do you have a reason for it?" "Carla, you know that I have some experience with soul magic. Well, that experience has shown me how awful and problematic damage to the soul can be and I know that soul cultivation and backlashes for failing to cast spells and the like are very common. We have a unique product with potentially high demand and relatively low supply, it is natural to price it so high. I might even have to increase the price later." Carla did not know much about soul magic and had limited experience with cultivating her own soul so she did not fully understand the value of the Soul Healing scrolls but Nick did. He knew that he was going to make a fortune with his creation. Carla responded: "Fine, since you don''t have any staff yet, I''ll take the initiative to collect the orders and forward them to you. I''ll even handle the logistics involved in delivering the scrolls for an additional 2% of the profits. Do you agree?" Nick thought for a while and replied: "I agree." "You''ll have the orders by the end of the business day." Carla hung up the phone and Nick left his building to go to combat class with the sword that he received from Varrow at his side. ..................... Nick swung his sword in a vicious manner against Varrow who was doing the same but Nick''s strikes lacked the power and precision that Varrow''s strikes had. The difference in their skill level was obvious at a glance and as the spar went on for another ten minutes, Nick found himself covered with superficial cuts, even one being on his forehead which bled profusely, hampering his vision. Nick plopped onto the ground, tired and in pain, not wanting to spar anymore. Varrow stooped beside him and cast a healing spell that would mend all of his cuts in a few moments. The other students who were supposed to be sparring themselves had stopped some time ago to watch the exchange between Nick and Varrow and they were stupefied. Nick had only been practising swordsmanship with Varrow for about five months yet his movements with the sword seemed profound from their perspective, far from the same level as Varrow but that was to be expected considering that Varrow was a Regular Magician who had definitely been living for a long time. "Should I be practising swordsmanship too or train with another weapon?" "No way...casting spells is what Magicians are supposed to do, right, we don''t need to be using cold weapons or the like." "That''s not right. There are plenty of Magicians that use magic tools to fight, even in our year. Have you ever heard of Marsha Cassidy who uses two guns during combat or Brudus Flinn who often uses a spear when fighting?" "Hmmm...you''re right but those guys have probably been practising since young, how the hell are we supposed to compete?" Kevin Stalwart interrupted the people speaking and said with an unusually stern tone: "You''re supposed to compete by figuring out your own style and working hard to develop it, isn''t that obvious?" Kevin had somewhat grown up since he had suffered a defeat at Nick''s hands. He no longer talked as much and took his classes more seriously, he even stopped hanging out with his friends as frequently as he did in the past and spent much of his time working on his spell casting skills. Marcia looked at Kevin and thought: (Kevin has changed a little, just like Don did after he lost to Nick. Things are almost the same again where the group that I planned to get involved with has basically dissolved because of Kevin''s lost interest in nurturing it. Should I change too?...) Marcia felt that she needed to change, even just a little considering the repeat experiences she''s had as well as witnessing Nick''s progress first hand. She definitely did not think that Nick was some kind of genius and even thought that he was a little simple since he didn''t talk about anything else other than magic but he was definitely working hard and making greater progress than her in becoming a Magician. She also knew from the information that the Bartholomews gathered that his starting point might have even been worse than hers; at that thought, she felt embarrassed for how she had called him a less than when they first interacted. Just as Varrow had finished healing Nick, a sudden bright light appeared close to their position that revealed a woman''s figure after it dispersed. Nick recognized the woman as Rebecca Jones, one of Richter Order Academy''s instructors. She walked over to Varrow, saying: "Thompson, I need to have a word with you, let''s speak in private." Varrow, with a disinterested expression replied: "It''s not anything that needs to be kept secret, right? You can just talk right here." Jessica looked at Nick and recognized him as the young man that had obtained the corpse of a rank 6 Magician before but soon turned her attention back to Varrow, saying: "There will be an emergency auction tonight hosted by the Madrid family who have apparently suffered heavy damage after many of the most powerful Magicians in their family were seriously injured while exploring a high class realm. They need money to pay for the treatment of those Magicians so they are opening their vaults and selling some treasures. Are you interested?" The other students were a fair distance away but Rebecca spoke loud enough for them to hear. They started chattering amongst themselves immediately. "The Madrid family? Aren''t they in the top one hundred of the Forbe''s List for being one of the richest Magician families in London? They actually need to hold an emergency auction to afford medical fees?" "Why would that be surprising? Exploring high class realms is dangerous and you could encounter anything in them. There have been many prominent Magician families in the past that were brought down because of losing powerful Magicians to a high class realm." "I know more than you guys. Word is that the head of the clan was injured during this exploration and his wounds are so severe that he might die. If that guy bites the dust, then the Madrid family will lose a lot of standing with the other powerful families." ... While the other students gossiped, Varrow rubbed his chin and said to Rebecca: "Sure, I''ll go, I know for a fact that the Madrid family has an item that I would be interested in." Nick listened to the conversation from the side and wondered: (A high class realm? I''ve never heard that designation before.) Slade went ahead to inform Nick: [A high class realm is a large magical world that is filled with natural resources, including unique plants and/or magic beasts. They are different than low class realms in that they are much larger, some being one hundred times the size of the universe that you live in with all sorts of different planets. Low class realms do not have advanced civilizations living within them and possess limited resources but high class realms usually have such civilizations and the amount of resource that they contain are usually in massive amounts. Grand Earth that we are currently in is located within a high class realm.] (Oh, I get it now, so high class realms are places that other magic civilization inhabit. It would probably be great to visit one.) [...Yeah sure.] Slade did not speak anymore. Nick felt that attending an auction would be a good thing for him and just as he had that thought, he received a text message from Marshall saying that they had picked up the Beast Capture scrolls and that Carla had transferred his payment to his bank account. Nick went to view his bank account balance and after seeing over ¡ê350,000,000, he knew that nothing was holding him back from participating in that auction. While Jessica and Varrow were still speaking about their plans, Nick interrupted them humbly with a question: "May I also attend this auction?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 93: Strength Magician Thompson Varrow and Rebecca Jones looked at Nick weirdly for a few moments before Varrow replied: "Nick, to get into auctions like this one, the hosts have to be assured that you have the ability to at least purchase the items that they are going to sell, that''s just the way that things are done to avoid unnecessary drama and to keep out irrelevant people. You are..." Nick interrupted Varrow by showing him the bank account balance on his smart phone. Varrow immediately paused, at a loss for how this youth with no magical or financial background suddenly ended up with millions of pounds to spend. Varrow quickly changed his attitude. "Well, that makes things easier, if you''d like, you can always sit in my private room with me and view the auction from there." Most Regular Magicians would be assigned a private room at auctions while representatives from important companies and others would sit together and participate in the auction. Rebecca stood at the side wondering what Nick had showed Varrow that resulted in him changing his attitude like this but she decided not to give it too much thought. Rebecca told Varrow: "We''ll talk more later tonight when I see you at the auction." Rebecca transformed into a pillar of blue light and disappeared from the combat field. Varrow went close to Nick, before saying: "Meet me in front of the academy''s Convention Hall tonight and I will vouch for you so that you can get in without having to reveal your bank balance. You probably don''t want a lot of people knowing about it, right?" Nick silently nodded his head. Varrow continued: "Well then, the auction starts at 8 pm sharp, don''t be late." After saying that, Varrow left Nick alone and went to lecture the other students. Nick thought: (That was a bit of a risky move, showing Varrow my ''wealth'' like that but I figured that since he helped me this much so far that he might be somewhat tolerant of my success and I guess I was right.) Nick continued to practise his sword technique until class ended, following which he went to the battle simulation building where he decided to test out the skills that he had been honing for almost half a year. (Come to think of it, my next midyear exam should be taking place in one month. I wonder what it will be this time.) Nick walked into the battle simulation building and asked the clerk that was present: "Can I have a simulation with a single strong enemy of rank 2 strength with powerful magic. Oh, and I would like the surroundings to be flat, normal terrain." The clerk nodded and after receiving Nick''s student ID and manipulating his computer, he said: "Go ahead to room number 6. Your simulation is waiting." Nick took back his ID and entered room 6; when he close the door behind him, the space became that of a clean cut, flat grassy field with mountain ranges in the far distance. Twenty meters ahead of him, Nick could see someone walking towards him. This person was a black man wearing brown leather pants and shoes but was not wearing anything on his upper body. The man looked to be in his mid twenties and was looking at Nick menacingly as he approached. Nick smiled. "Let''s go, son." Nick walked towards his opponent with an average pace, taking his sword from its sheath and keeping the sheath at his side. His stony faced opponent did not make any strange movements while waking towards Nick but as soon as he and Nick came within ten meters of each other, the man balled his right fist and raised it in the air following which he slammed it down. (Ranged Strength: 1 Arm) Nick sensed something amiss and looked above him to see the yellowish, almost translucent phantom of a fist coming down towards him with extreme force. Nick was certain that if this attack hit him in real life, he would turn into meat paste. (This is...strength path? Awesome.) Nick began casting a spell and a moment later, his already scary black-red irises completely disappeared as his eyes became a complete pitch black. (Soul Pulse.) Immediately, a strong force with an all-encompassing aura was released from Nick''s soul that covered the ten meter radius around him, not only destroying the phantom fist like a shattered mirror but also resulting in Nick''s opponent taking two steps back while he coughed up a mouthful of blood. Soul Pulse is a rank 2 intermediate grade spell that releases an aura carrying a physical force that can also harm the soul, the strength of the spell varying based on the strength of Nick''s own soul. (This guy is a Strength Magician so his bare body should have a certain amount of physical resistance to my spell and that''s why he only took two steps back but the attack on his soul caused him to cough up blood.) Nick smiled even wider, feeling his blood boiling and unbeknownst to him, an entirely different aura emerged from his body at that moment. Nick pressed forward while his enemy was still trying to cope with the effects of his attack. (Soul Pressure.) Nick tried to restrict his enemy''s movement when a violent force suddenly bathed over him sending him flying three meters backward. (Formless Strength) Nick held the handle of his sword tightly as he hit the ground and then cast: (Blink.) Nick disappeared and reappeared four meters from his original position where the yellowish phantom of a leg stomped down onto the ground creating a meter deep crater. (Ranged Strength: 1 Leg) Nick started running to his opponent again and with his eyes still pitch black, he cast another spell after getting within six meters of him, Nick focused on the magic energy that he felt coming from his opponent and cast: (Soul Vision.) Nick could now see in his mind what his opponent was seeing. The man in front of Nick frowned, feeling something amiss and cast his spell in retaliation, running towards Nick: (Boar Strength) The man''s pace suddenly quickened and the force generated by his momentum now appeared deadly as if a ferocious boar was about to charge right into Nick. Using the connection established by Soul Vision Nick cast his spell: (Soul Quake.) The man felt his soul shake and he frowned intensely but kept charging forward, reaching Nick within a matter of seconds. As Nick was about to be run over by his opponent, he cast: If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it. (Blink.) Appearing a few inches out of of his opponent''s way. (That guy was charging so wildly in a straight line which means that he would have a problem suddenly turning so all I needed to do was dodge the attack but man, that was close. From what I know about strength path, Soul Quake was ineffective because strength path usually requires minimal magical and mental exertion to be used so my opponent practically suffered no backlash from the effects of my Spell even if I caused some damage.) Nick did not let up, the next moment he chased his opponent down and cast: (Soul Attraction.) As Nick''s opponent stopped and turned around, an irresistible force washed over him and quickly drew him toward Nick, resulting in only his toes being on the ground as he moved along. As they were about to meet, Nick waved his sword in a horizontal line. (Sever.) Feeling a ''shadow'' of death approaching him, the man countered with his own spell: (Strength Cauldron) The phantom of a metal cauldron appeared surrounding Nick''s opponent and when Nick''s attack met with it, the cauldron was cut open with a horizontal slice at the front but Nick''s attack dissipated right after and the cauldron fell to the ground as Nick dispelled Soul Attraction. They were two meters apart when the shirtless man activated another spell from within the cauldron as he raised both his arms and slammed them down: (Ranged Strength: 2 Arms) Two huge balled up fists slammed down towards Nick''s position as if Nick were an ant that they needed to crush. Nick acted quickly: (Exchange Space.) Suddenly Nick and his enemy exchanged positions, remaining two meters apart but his enemy had no time to cancel his spell before he realized what had happened. The two phantom fists landed heavily on the strength cauldron and broke it apart but Nick''s opponent had enough time to break out at a section of the cauldron and escape the aftermath of the fists'' destruction which resulted in a large crater being formed. Nick''s opponent quickly gathered himself and while moving closer towards Nick, cast: (Formless Strength.) Nick felt a wave of violent force wash over him which made him cough up two mouthfuls of blood and he was swatted five meters backward. Nick hit the ground with a harsh thump: (What is wrong with this guy? He is a strength path Magician but keeps using ranged attacks and when he gets the chance, he uses his spells to push me away. Why isn''t he trying to brawl it out in close combat?) Slade chimed in at this moment: [That might something to do with the sword that you are carrying. Also, you still have too little experience, kid. Forget the conventional stuff that you''ve read in books, Magicians of all paths eventually find all sorts of ways to use their magic in a way that doesn''t fit a conventional mold. You have to adapt to your enemy''s way of doing things in order to win. That is why there is the saying: ''There is no strongest magic, only strongest Magician.''] Nick repeated that saying in his mind: (There is no strongest magic, only strongest Magician.) Nick picked himself up and once again cast: (Soul Attraction.) Nick''s opponent practically came flying towards him as a mystical connection between his and Nick''s soul acted as a one-sided magnet. Nick ran towards his opponent with pitch black eyes with sword in hand; Nick''s eyes were like this as a result of his soul cultivation, whenever he used some soul path spells, his eyes became this way and Slade told him that this was a unique trait of many spells within his inheritance. Nick waved his sword horizontally and cast: (Sever.) Nick''s opponent once again formed a phantom cauldron around himself and Sever sliced into only a portion of the cauldron, dissipating afterwards, however, Nick did not cancel Soul Attraction. Nick ran forward while pointing his sword towards his opponent and cast: (Reinforced With Soul.) A translucent miasma bathed over Nick''s sword as the cauldron came towards him. Reinforced With Soul was a spell that used the strength of Nick''s own soul to toughen, sharpen and/or harden whatever Nick used the spell on with a portion of his soul practically covering the object. Just before the cauldron slammed into him, Nick dispelled Soul Attraction and the cauldron fell heavily onto the ground in an upright position. Nick continued running and with his sword in front of him, pierced into the cauldron. Nick''s sword was about 0.8 meters long and the phantom cauldron did not have a large internal space so Nick was able to stab his opponent who dispelled the cauldron afterwards and attempted to grab Nick''s throat with his right hand while grabbing hold of Nick''s sword with the left. Nick smiled at his opponent''s foolishness. (Got you. Sever!) Nick flicked his left index finger and his opponent''s right arm was completely cut off at the shoulder region and a fountain of blood flowed from it. Nick''s opponent used the raw strength of his left arm to pull Nick''s sword out of his abdomen, take it away from Nick and throw it ten meters into the distance. Nick backed away, stupefied that his sword was taken from him. Slade said with an amused tone: [That''s a strength path Magician for you. Your experience with the sword was too little to overcome your opponent''s raw strength.] Nick sneered and said: "I don''t need the sword." Nick cast his spells one after the other: (Expand Space.) (Rumbling Pillar.) When Nick''s opponent felt his surroundings warping, he started to run while putting pressure on his abdomen wound and while bleeding profusely from his right shoulder, casting: (Boar Strength) But he was too late as the effect of Expand Space doubled the efforts required to move any distance so he couldn''t escape from the one meter area of space that was warping around him before his body began to feel like it was suddenly caught up in a blender and running away became impossible. Space twisted, turned and shook around the man; he desperately cast his spell: (Strength From The Inside Out.) A formless strength enveloped him and protected him from most of the effects of Rumbling Pillar but the left side of his body had been slightly crushed from his shoulder to his ankle and he fell down. PLOP! The man struggled to breathe as Nick walked up to him slowly. Nick looked at the man indifferently then frowned as he felt the man gathering magic energy around him, preparing to cast another spell. "Hmph!" (Sever.) A moment later, the Strength Magician''s head was sliced off from the Neck and blood sprayed onto the grass dying it in a deep red as the head rolled away by half a meter and then stopped. Nick looked at the corpse indifferently for a few moments and then neon colored words appeared in front of him that read: SIMULATION ENDED The space around him warped and Nick appeared in a white walled room and upon seeing his sword on the floor some distance away from him, he picked it up and put it inside the sheath at his side. Nick''s eyes changed from being a complete pitch black to again having a white sclera with pitch black irises that had two dull red rings contained in both of them. (Soul Pulse, Soul Attraction and Reinforced With Soul. These three spells are excellent and very useful, all being rank 2 intermediate grade spells but having slightly greater power than other spells of the same grade. To cast them successfully, I had to use a special magic formation contained within Slade''s inheritance to carve a part of each spell''s laws into my soul and when I activate one of the spells I just have to form certain laws within my mindscape that act as the trigger for them, resulting in a quicker cast time and allowing me to cast these spells in high pressure situations with minimal chance of backlash from failure to form their laws. If the spells'' laws that are carved into my soul can be viewed as a door with munitions behind it, the laws that I form within my mindscape act as the key to open the door so I can get to and use the munitions.) Nick left the combat building feeling proud of his progress. Since it was just around 5:30 pm, Nick visited the restaurant across the street from his building and had a meal of fried chicken, whole wheat bread, fries and rice. He then returned to his building, rested for a while, took a shower and got ready for the auction that was to take place. Nick left his building and got to the academy''s Convention Hall by 7:50 pm; it was a large cuboid shaped building with a few guards at the door. Almost as soon as he got there, a gust of wind came over him and Thompson Varrow appeared beside him dressed in a black and white suit. Varrow looked at Nick who was wearing his usual attire of a pair of jeans and a polo shirt and asked: "With the amount of money that you have, you should be able to afford better clothes, why do you only wear clothes like these?" Nick shrugged his shoulders and replied: "Old habits die hard." Varrow silently shook his head with a half smile and motioned Nick to follow him into the building. "I''ve already taken the liberty of registering you with the hosts so no need to worry about having to show them your assets." Nick and Varrow walked into the building where there were many wooden, polished seats set up in neat rows on the ground floor with hundreds of people filling them, most wearing suits, robes or dresses. Nick could see the windows of the private rooms above the ground floor that were positioned to have a great view of the stage where the items for sale would be presented. Nick and Varrow walked up a flight of stairs to get to a private room that had several seats in it positioned in front of a large bay window that had an almost perfect view of the stage below. Nick and Varrow waited until 8 pm when the announcer arrived on the stage, saying: "Welcome to the Madrid family auction, we''ve got some great goodies for you folks so I hope that you came with filled bank accounts..." While the announcer tried to banter with the audience, the door to their private room opened as two persons walked in. Nick grabbed hold of his sheathed sword, ready for an attack but Varrow placed his hand on Nick''s shoulder and explained: "Relax, a friend and her relative will be watching the auction with us, my bad for not telling you but you should be less jumpy with that sword when we are not in class." Nick placed his sword in his lap and attempted to relax as two women that Nick recognized appeared in front of them. (Oh, It''s Rebecca Jones and....wait, Jessica Jones.) Nick raised both his eyebrows, not expecting to see the young woman that once made a fool out of him, here, at this auction. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 94: Blade Path Inheritance Nick looked at Jessica Jones and asked without thinking: "Why are you here?" Jessica looked at him and tilted her head, replying: "Who are you?" Nick raised his right eyebrow and replied: "I''m Nick Capitol, we met in the end of year exam at the waterfall." After thinking for a moment, Jessica responded: "Oh, you''re the guy that watched me while I was naked at the waterfall." Rebecca raised both of her brows at Jessica''s words and then looked at Nick who sighed: "Again, It'' not my fault that you were naked and I just happened to be at the waterfall." Jessica replied indifferently: "I''ve already lost interest in speaking with you." Jessica said that and took her seat at the far right corner of the bay window, the farthest seat away from Nick. Nick frowned slightly but then changed his expression to one of indifference and turned his attention to the stage once again. Varrow was looking at Nick and caught all of his changes in expression so he understood how he felt and looked at Rebecca with clear displeasure, as if saying: "Why did you bring this girl with you?" Jessica raised both her hands in exasperation as if she was blameless. (It''s not my fault, blame our parents for not raising her better.) Rebecca decided to make an introduction so as to lesson the awkwardness in the room. "Nick, as you should know already, my name is Rebecca Jones, one of the instructors and this is my younger sister and also a student of this academy, Jessica Jones. I and Thompson are old friends so I decided to sit with him during the auction and I brought Jessica along so that she can gain some experience." Nick turned around and did a slight bow in greeting and then turned again to pay attention to the announcer. Varrow sighed at Nick''s current attitude, his feelings had clearly been hurt by Jessica but Varrow could do nothing about it. Nick was a relatively quiet young man who minded his own business and although he was famous among the students, since he did not interact with them, many were resentful and jealous of him. Varrow knew that most women, in particular, did not like quiet young men, even if they were hardworking and would often freely disrespect them; it''s just the way it would be until they get to know the young man but with Nick''s reluctance to interact with other people, that will likely not happen. Rebecca took her seat beside Varrow and said: "Lets just focus on the auction." Varrow replied: "Indeed." The announcer introduced the first item for sale as an old horn was brought out to the stage. "This is the intermediate apprentice grade Insect Calling Horn. It is an enslavement path magical tool that has the chance of enslaving insect type magic beasts that hear the blowing of the horn, the magic beast of course has to be of an apprentice rank. The starting bid is ¡ê800,000." The audience on the ground floor bid in a frenzy: "¡ê800,000" "¡ê850,000" "¡ê930,000" "¡ê1,100,000" ... The bidding went on for a while. Rebecca remarked: "Many companies want to nurture enslavement path Magicians because they make exploring realms easier even though they are usually physically fragile themselves." Varrow followed up with: "The horn is a high quality good for sure but I''m not competing with these wolves over some crumbs." Eventually, an executive of a large organization won the bid at ¡ê1,500,000 and the announcer moved on to the next item. "We have in our collection a beautiful book with notes from the late, great Magician, Jeffrey Hardow. Everyone should now that he was a rank 7 Conqueror Magician of the water path and we can at least say that this book is filled with many apprentice and a few regular grade spells. The opening bid is ¡ê19,300,000." Many people on the ground floor made bids: "¡ê19,300,000" "¡ê19,600,000" "¡ê19,800,000" ... After a few bids from the ground floor, persons from the private rooms started to bid as well: "¡ê21,000,000" "¡ê22,000,000" Jessica looked over to her sister and asked with an eager expression: "Big sister, I need that book. Can you get it for me?" Rebecca smiled dotingly on her problematic sister and replied: "Sure, Jess." Rebecca said through one of the room''s microphones: "¡ê26,000,000" Rebecca quoted such a high price right off the bat to deter her competitors but one of them from a private room was not going to give up so easily. "You think that you can outbid, me, Lewis Flannory, with such a meager bid, dream on. ¡ê30,000,000." Lewis increased the bid by the same amount that Rebecca had. Rebecca pursed her lips and frowned then quoted another bid: "¡ê32,000,000" Lewis responded with: "Such petty tricks. ¡ê36,000,000." Rebecca shook her head, saying: "Whoever is bidding with me is clearly a mad man, Sorry Jess but I have items that I want to buy tonight so I can''t waste too much funds." Varrow chimed in: "If you did not stop, I was going to remind you." Jessica sighed and looked away. Rebecca took that to mean that she understood and did not bid anymore so Lewis Flannory won the book. Jessica frowned for a seemingly long time over the loss. During the next three hours, many items were auctioned off with most being bought by the people on the ground floor. Nick couldn''t believe that millions of pounds were being expended before his eyes when a few months ago he could barely afford to eat at a restaurant without feeling a sting. Many items also went to persons within the private rooms including Varrow and Rebecca. Varrow had bought a supposedly cursed ring for ¡ê103,000,000, a rank 5 wind path spell for ¡ê316,000,000 and a broken advanced regular grade sword for ¡ê194,000,000. Jessica had bought two rank 5 light path spells for ¡ê120,000,000 each and three incomplete magic formations at prices of: ¡ê110,000,000, ¡ê200,000,000 and ¡ê79,000,000. Rebecca wore a bitter smile, saying: "Whenever these auctions come around, I end up facing the possibility of going bankrupt." Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon. Varrow did not pay Rebecca any mind and was rubbing the blade of his new broken sword, holding it like a child. Jessica had a less pronounced frown than she had at the end of the first bid because Rebecca had bought an advanced apprentice grade water path spell for her at ¡ê30,000,000. Nick looked at Jessica then asked Varrow: "The book that the announcer declared to have regular grade water spells in it was won at almost the same price as one apprentice grade spell, why is that?" Varrow almost forgot that this was probably Nick''s first auction and explained: "Well, it''s simple, the announcer did not reveal what the spells in the book were and without that knowledge no one would spend big bucks on it because not all spells are made equal. There are plenty of spells that have requirements that disqualify most Magicians from casting them and there are even some regular grade spells that have power equivalent to apprentice grade spells if you can believe that; the reasons are similar for the apprentice grade spells. The hosts knew that revealing the spells might get them a higher price but they did not and so that means that the spells are probably not that good thus the relatively low bidding price for the book." Nick felt enlightened and continued paying attention to the announcer. "Alright folks, we only have a few items left. Our next item is a formation path inheritance that is written in a mystical language that our hosts cannot identify. The starting bid is ¡ê3,000,000." Nick''s eyes brightened and he reached for a microphone to ask a question: "If the inheritance is codified in a mystical language that the hosts can''t identify, then how do they know it is a formation path inheritance?" The announcer looked like she had a bug stuck in her throat as she seemed not to know the answer. She made a quick call using her smart phone and then answered the question: "They know that it is a formation path inheritance because they obtained it through an oath made with a prince of Denmark and if the inheritance was not of the formation path, the prince would have died. That prince is a Regular Magician still living today." Nick asked Varrow: "Should I believe them." Varrow nodded: "Trust me, the hosts know better than to lie in an auction house filled with Regular Magicians, that is the same as asking for death and the Madrid family is already at death''s door, they wouldn''t risk it." Nick chose to believe in Varrow''s words and placed a bid: "¡ê3,000,000." Other bids came from the first floor: "¡ê3,100,000" "¡ê3,150,000" "¡ê3,175,000" "¡ê3,210,000" Nick decided that he might as well try to use the same tactic as Rebecca did: "¡ê4,000,000" After Nick said that, the hall went silent and he ended up winning with his bid. Varrow shook his head saying: "Young man, you are too rash. You could have possibly won the bid at ¡ê3,500,000." Nick shrugged his shoulders. "...Yeah. I was too rash." A servant of the Madrid family soon after visited the room and gave Nick a pill encased inside of a plastic container. Nick looked at it with confusion. Varrow clarified: "That is a basic apprentice grade memory pill. It has information path laws in it that will imprint the contents of the inheritance into your mind permanently the second that you swallow it." Nick raised his right eyebrow and said: "Oh." Nick took the pill out of its case and swallowed it. A large amount of information appeared in his mind as if he had known it all along. (Hmmm...I can''t understand any of this, can you Slade?) [No. This mystical language, however, seems similar to one that I know but not exactly. I''ll teach you that mystical language later and you can try to use it to translate this one.] (Fine by me.) Nick was used to working for his rewards, he did not expect them to come to him easily so it was no surprise to him that he had to do additional grunt work. Nick returned to his seat and watched the announcer as he displayed the other items for sale; from the corner of her eye, Jessica looked at Nick with a little surprise, not expecting him to be able to afford anything at this auction. She was from the Jones family that also had an information network so it was easy for her to use her smart phone to look up Nick''s background which she did after he identified her. (Oh, so he''s not poor after all.) She went back to minding her own business soon after that thought. The next few items were bid for fiercely by the people within the private rooms and they included an intermediate regular grade magic war hammer that was bought for ¡ê780,000,000, an ice path inheritance that was bought for ¡ê250,000,000 and a rank 5 sound path spell that was bought for ¡ê430,000,000. The auction was almost over with the last item about to be displayed. Nick felt that he had gained much in experience from being at this auction and was not looking to buy anything else but his mind changed when the announcer finished speaking her next words. "Next, we have a blade path inheritance up for sale. It has the notes and experiences of an unknown rank 4 Apprentice Magician and also includes a few apprentice grade spells from rank 1 to rank 3. The starting bid is ¡ê50,000,000." "¡ê50,000,000" "¡ê60,000,000" "¡ê85,000,000" ... Nick couldn''t believe it. He had regained his affinity for blade path but he lacked an inheritance which would make his attempts to learn about blade path much easier. He could read books of course but when it came to magic, widely available books were never as good as the explanations and experience of a magician that struggled on that path. Although Nick had Malevolent shrine, if he was being honest, he did not really understand it and the only reason that he was able to develop his spell, Sever, which mimicked blade path was because of the inspiration that he got as a result of the effects of his spell, Growth, and by reinterpreting some sections of Malevolent Shrine randomly. Nick could have tried to buy an inheritance but on Grand Earth, inheritances were not just sold to the public and would usually be kept locked up in someone''s treasury. Only on occasions like this would someone of Nick''s status be able to get their hands on an inheritance that was worth something. Nick needed this inheritance, not only so that he could become stronger, but maybe to better understand the mysterious Magician that had appeared to him before who was probably a Blade Magician; dealing with that Magician''s curse was probably a life and death matter. Nick quoted a number: "¡ê200,000,000" Varrow immediately frowned when he heard Nick speak . (This young man is really too rash. I know that he has an affinity for blade path but does he really think the inheritance of a rank 4 Apprentice Magician is worth that much. He doesn''t even know who the Magician is. That inheritance could be filled with nothing but nonsense.) As Varrow was about to warn Nick, someone else from another private room quoted a number: "¡ê220,000,000" Nick slammed his fist onto the microphone stand, revealing his eagerness to get this inheritance to the other three Magicians present. After seeing that, Varrow did not bother to warn Nick. (He must need the inheritance for a special reason.) Nick quoted another number: "¡ê300,000,000" Nick''s competitor remained quiet until the last moment before the bid was accepted and then quoted: "¡ê310,000,000" Nick immediately quoted: "¡ê330,000,000" Nick decided that if this amount was not enough to purchase the inheritance then he would stop, he did not want to spend all of his money because that might leave him incapable of cultivating his soul or maintaining his business which would be unacceptable. Nick waited for a seemingly long time until the announcer yelled: "Sold!" Nick clenched his fist in excitement, knowing that he had won over his competitor. (Damn, winning feels good!) After transferring the money, a few minutes later, a Madrid family servant brought another basic apprentice grade memory pill to the room and Nick swallowed it joyfully. (So this is how ¡ê330,000,000 tastes.) Nick returned to his seat and Rebecca and Jessica each took a short glance at Nick, reassessing him. Rebecca thought: (How comes this young man is so rich. Was I so loaded at his age? Not in the slightest, so how is he?) Jessica just turned her head towards the stage again while Rebecca pulled Varrow''s sleeve and gave him a look that asked: "What''s this young man''s story?" Varrow returned a look to Rebecca that implied: "I don''t fucking know." The announcer declared the end of the auction and everyone proceeded to leave the Convention Hall. Nick and the rest went outside and Nick thanked Varrow for his help and was about to leave when Jessica asked him a question out of the blue with a serious expression: "Hey you, are you strong?" Nick looked at Jessica for a moment, then shook his head and turned to leave when a powerful downpour of water appeared out of nowhere from above Nick. Nick kept calm, knowing that this woman was clearly crazy and turned his attention back to her, casting a spell: (Exchange Space.) Jessica''s and Nick''s positions were quickly exchanged and now Jessica was about to face the onslaught of her own spell. Before she could dispel it, Nick cast: (Soul Quake.) Jessica''s soul shook violently, disrupting her thoughts and causing her to spew a mouthful of blood. She had also missed the chance to dispel her spell and was about to be hit by it. Rebecca sighed and waved her hand while Varrow yawned: (Extreme Light) In a moment, a blinding light appeared which enveloped the water, turning it into nothing but steam. Rebecca looked at Nick and said: "This was my sister''s fault for attacking you in the first place so I will take responsibility and deal with the push back from the academy''s enforcement office, after all, you made Jessica here spew blood which is generally a no no on campus in this situation." Varrow shook his head, speaking disinterestedly: "You need to reign in that little girl. With me here, there is no way that Nick would be punished for defending himself. Hmph, when I was his age, if she had attacked me like that, I would have cut off one of her arms at the very least and accepted my execution with a smile." Rebecca rolled her eyes at Varrow, knowing that the last part of what he said was bullshit and spoke to Nick: "You can go now young man, once again, I am sorry." Nick left the area in a half disgruntled state while Jessica watched him leave silently with blood still running down her chin. Her eyes now contained a slight spark as she looked at Nick. Rebecca recognized that spark and internally sighed at her troublesome sister; she would definitely reprimand her later but first... A man dressed in an all black suit walked up to Rebecca and Varrow and asked: "My name is Terry Morrison of the enforcement office. What exactly happened here?" Varrow yawned and replied: "Oh, my friend''s sister just bit her lip, that''s all." Terry smiled bitterly at Varrow''s unreasonable response and asked Jessica: "Is that true?" Jessica silently nodded her head in affirmation and Rebecca said nothing which Terry chose to interpret as confirmation. (I''m not going to mix it up with two other Regular Magicians over a ''bit lip''.) "I guess our monitoring devices were mistaken then." Terry turned around and left. In many cases the enforcement office could ignore the matter if there was no complaining party so long as no one died or was crippled, then there was no issue to deal with. It also helped that everyone else in the area seemed to be pretending as if nothing happened, under the silent pressure of the two Regular Magicians. ...................... Nick sat at his desk and turned on his new desktop computer to look at his remaining bank balance. "I can''t believe that I spent ¡ê334,000,000 in one night. Sigh, I suppose it was worth it though." Nick logged into his email and saw a list of orders from Carla for the Soul Healing scrolls, all ninety thousand of them. Nick smiled brightly: "?Mi used to bruk dawg, but mi neva give up dawg?. Ha, ha..." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 95: No Negotiations Nick was so excited that he shoved the thought of getting some sleep out of his mind and proceeded to unpack and repack the boxes of Soul Healing scrolls according to the orders that he received. Most of the orders seemed to come from medical companies that used magic in their research as well as a few private individuals. Nick didn''t care, he just new that he was about to earn a ¡ê4,500,000,000 pay day. Nick repackaged the scrolls until 6 in the morning and labeled them according to buyer. Nick called Carla immediately afterwards and she answered quickly: "Are the scrolls read for transport, Nick?" "Yes, they are, you just have to come pick them up now and deliver them, they''re packed on the ground floor, I won''t be here so I''ll leave the door unlocked. Oh, and I want all the payments forwarded to me first and I will give you your 12% afterwards." Carla chuckled at Nick''s cautiousness, like she would bother trying to steal money from him when he was clearly a golden goose. She responded sweetly: "That''s fine by me Nick, I will have the trucks arrive at your building in one hour and be reminded that payment will take a while, after all, the customers will want to ensure that they are paying for something of quality first." Nick expected that he would have to deliver the goods and have the customers test them out first since no one knew if his product actually worked. "Yeah, that''s expected. I''ll talk to you later." Carla hung up the phone and Nick prepared himself to go to combat class. Nick arrived at the combat field at around 8 am and was so tired that he just sprawled himself onto the grassy field. While he was lying down, he took the chance to look through his new blade path inheritance which he had not done before. Nick observed that it had very lengthy explanations that went in depth into the journey of the Magician that authored this inheritance. There were indeed rank 1 to 3 spells but from what Nick observed, he knew too little about blade path to critique any of them. Nick started reading: (Blade magic is the use of magic energy to transform, cultivate, mimic and use blades. It is a path that is generally only useful for combat and has very little value outside of combat, however, blade magic has the potential to give one Magician the power to slaughter an entire realm.) Nick raised his right eyebrow at that bit of information. (...That''s a rather extreme assertion but then again, this path seems to be extreme in a sense.) Nick continued to read the information contained in the inheritance, not even realizing that the other students had arrived and was completely clueless when Varrow made his entrance. Varrow sternly greeted his students before turning to look at Nick in the distance who was sprawled on the ground and lost in thought. Varrow''s right eyelid twitched and he raised his right index finger and flicked it at Nick, sending a greenish colored ''wind blade'' at Nick that was almost crescent shaped. The wind blade flew through the air quickly but only a little faster than running speed. Nick suddenly sensed that there was a mass of magic energy coming towards him and he quickly jumped to his feet with his sword in hand, unsheathing it. Nick saw the greenish wind blade coming towards him and his expression became fierce. He held the handle of his sword with both hands and cast his spell: (Reinforce With Soul.) An almost translucent miasma covered his sword as the wind blade drew nearer. As the wind blade was about to reach him, he positioned himself firmly with both feet spread apart and lunged towards it with the 7th movement of the Menacing Crane sword technique; both of Nick''s arms twisted to trace a half-moon curve and when the wind blade hit his sword, Nick simultaneously cast: (Sever.) The impact was loud and magic energy from both attacks radiated into the surroundings; waves of air washed over the students who were standing at least twelve meters away. Nick gritted his teeth as the wind blade refused to give in to his blow and slowly pushed him back. Nick''s arms were about to buckle when he decided that he needed more power. Nick''s eyes became an eerie pitch black and he cast: (Soul Pulse.) Since the wind blade had already been nearly stopped and impacted by the effects of Reinforced With Soul and Sever, it was very fragile at the moment even though it continued to press on against Nick''s sword due to its own sharpness. However, Soul Pulse created an explosive physical force that hit against the wind blade and that was the straw that broke the camel''s back. Most of the wind blade shattered and Nick was able to cut through the mid-section of it that was directly pressing against his sword before it completely shattered. The students looked on as Nick appeared to them to look like an expert swordsman that was overcoming an impossible hurdle. Nick dropped his sword after the wind blade was destroyed and panted heavily. The students stayed quiet as they looked at him in deep shock while Varrow indifferently eyed Nick''s callused and bleeding hands and said coldly: "Pay attention during class!" ................................. As punishment for his ''day dreaming'', Varrow did not heal Nick''s bleeding hands but still made Nick practise the Menacing Crane until class ended. The handle of Nick''s sword was covered in blood but he did not mind it one bit. (This little bit of pain is nothing.) Varrow came over to speak to Nick and asked: "Have you learnt the lesson I was trying to teach you?" Nick replied: "That depends. What was the lesson exactly?" Varrow sighed. "You shouldn''t be so disengaged with your surroundings out in public. That could result in all sorts of trouble coming your way." Nick thought about it: (I guess he''s right, but since when did my combat instructor become my guidance counselor?) Nick politely said: "Thank you for the advice, Sir Varrow." Hearing Nick''s overly formal reply, Varrow sighed heavily and then went on to switch the topic: "I did not expect you to actually retaliate directly against my wind blade like you did. Although I barely put any power or effort into it, most persons at your level would think it best to avoid the attack of a Regular Magician." Nick shook his head, saying: "What would be the point of all of this training if I was just going to dodge powerful attacks. Besides, I doubt that you would use killing force against me so I took the risk of facing your attack to gain some experience." "Well, you certainly impressed many of your classmates with your little display. You''ve been doing well so far, keep it up." After saying, that Varrow cast a healing spell on Nick, repairing his bloody hands in an instant and then turned into a gust of wind and left. Nick shook both of his hands vigorously to ease the stinging sensation that he still felt in his palms. Nick quickly hurried home to continue reading through his blade path inheritance and since tomorrow was Saturday, he would use it and Sunday to focus on the inheritance, undisturbed. When Nick got to the second floor of his building, he turned off all of the lights and sat at his desk while closing his eyes to focus purely on the inheritance. Nick was so immersed in reading the inheritance that he did not pay attention to how much time was passing him by while he studied and he did not even eat on Saturday or Sunday, only leaving his desk to occasionally use the bathroom. By the time Monday morning had arrived, Nick had gained a whole knew understanding of blade magic although his understanding was still ordinary at best; Nick had even reviewed a few of the blade path spells contained in the inheritance. He was a rank 2 Magician so he had almost no interest in the rank 1 spells and was able learn the laws of two rank 2 basic grade blade path spells. Nick picked his head up from his desk and rubbed his blood shot eyes. Nick looked at his smart phone and realized that the time was currently 6 am. Nick went to take a shower and get dressed; he decided to get some food from the restaurant across the street before going to combat class. Nick walked into the restaurant and ordered two servings of eggs and pancakes with a black forest cake. While Nick was eating, he received a call from Carla; he had not spoken to her since he had told her to pick up the Soul Healing scrolls from his building for delivery. Nick answered the call, asking: "Good morning Carla, what''s the matter?" "Nick, I have received nothing but positive feedback regarding the Soul Healing scrolls, have you checked your bank account to see the payments." Nick had been focused on his new inheritance the whole weekend so he had no idea whether he received any payments or not; he put his phone on loud speaker and checked his bank balance. Sure enough, he was now the proud owner of a bank account with over ¡ê4,516,000,000 in it. Nick dropped his fork when he saw the figures but continued chewing his food which somehow now tasted a bit better. Nick swallowed his food and said to Carla: "I''ve received the payments for the scrolls. I''ll send you your store''s 12% immediately." Carla replied: "Good, but I have another matter that I wanted to discuss. One of the companies that bought your scrolls has reached out to me saying that they want to meet with the manufacturer for lunch today, here, within the academy. Are you available? No, forget that, you''ll make the time." Nick smiled bitterly at Carla''s unreasonableness. He had been dealing with her in business and had almost forgotten that she was a Magician that was far more powerful than him so he had to acquiesce her requests as long as she did not stomp on his bottom line. "Just name the place and time and I will be there." Carla smiled at Nick''s cooperativeness and said: "Of course, I will also be at this meeting since it is my contact that you will be speaking with. You will meet up with us in the lobby of the Heaven Hotel within the commercial district at 12 pm sharp." Nick smiled even more bitterly; Carla was even intruding in on the meeting between him and his buyer, using a flimsy excuse. "That''s fine, see you then." You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. Carla hung up the phone and Nick finished his breakfast and ordered another serving of eggs and pancakes in celebration of his new found success. Now that he had such a large store of funds, there were many things that he could do now that would have been difficult before; he would have to think about his plans for the next few months later today. Nick finished his meal and transferred ¡ê540,000,000 to the General Beast Store''s bank account and made a call to someone. After a few rings, the person finally picked up. "This is Britney Jenner, who is this?" During their last encounter Nick had obtained Britney''s phone number and made a deal with her that as long as she helped him purchase a few things in the future, he would definitely consider working with her and the Jenner family. "This is Nick Capitol. How have you been doing Britney?" Britney sneered: "Hmph, better before you called." Britney had been in a perpetual bad mood since she met Nick and had sex with him. Although her family had ''trained'' her for those kinds of situations since making deals with powerful people was a matter of course in their world but to Britney, Nick was just an upstart but to secure a foot hold with him, she had let him use her body and he wasn''t even gentle with her. Nick laughed off Britney''s bitterness and spoke: "Don''t be like that Britney, it was my bad for not treating you better the last time that we met. You still want to work together, right? You know how Carla and I made a few big sales in recent times don''t you?" Britney''s bitterness was alleviated a bit when she remembered the details of the store''s deal with Nick. That deal had basically gained them over ¡ê500,000,000 in pure profit from very minimal efforts. Carla was right when she had told her that Nick was a possible gold mine. Her tone became more friendly. "What do you want?" Nick smiled. "I would like to get my hands on an assortment of rank 2 spells in blade path and space path. Is that possible for you?" "Using my authority as a member of the board of director of this store as well as my father''s influence, sure. But why aren''t you asking Carla for help since she is a rank 4 Magician, she could get what you want far more easily than me." That was true but Nick knew that Carla was only being civil because of the profits that he represented and could become quite unreasonable depending on the circumstances so he did not want to deal with her for everything. Britney on the other hand was a rank 2 Magician just like him so she would be easier to talk to and negotiate with. "Why would I want to miss the opportunity to talk to and possibly spend time with you?" Britney audibly sneered and replied: "Just speak plainly before I get mad." "Sigh, alright. Carla''s too strong, I want to limit the influence of her heavy hand." Britney chuckled at Nick''s caution but knew that he was smart for having it. "Alright I will get you your spells and you can reimburse me the amount that I spend." "That''s fine, make sure to send me proper receipts though." "Hmph, you''re so petty for a newly rich man. I can''t believe that I let you touch me." Nick laughed. "Now, who''s the one that''s being petty." Britney frowned and asked: "Are we done?" "I wanted to ask one more question..." Britney exasperatedly asked: "What is it?" Nick asked with a straight face and flat tone: "Can we have sex again?" Britney audibly sneered and hung up the phone. Nick looked at the phone''s screen that was now showing how long the call had lasted with an indifferent expression and shrugged his shoulders. "It was worth a try." ....................................... Nick went to combat class and practised the Menacing Crane like usual while the other students were sparring or being lectured by Varrow. Nick was shirtless and swinging his sword around, feeling excited for what his future would be like. (Once Britney buys me those spells, I would have a greater opportunity to research space and blade path. I didn''t ask for soul path spells because I am already a soul path scholar in addition to the fact that Slade''s inheritance is complete and uniform unlike my space path inheritance that now seems to me to be a random mix of methods. For rule path, I have to experiment with creating spells and the like on my own to learn more about it.) "NICK CAPITOL!" Suddenly, a relatively short woman with curly brown hair marched onto the field and shouted Nick''s name angrily. Nick quickly turned to look at the source of the commotion. "Which blind fool..." Nick paused when he saw that it was Marsha Cassidy, his ex-associate who he had not seen in a while. Nick already had very little interaction with the other students and when he moved into his commercial building, that interaction became nonexistent outside of combat class, he hadn''t even gone to the spell creation club in a long while. (Sigh, this is what happens when your past catches up to you.) Marsha held two magic tools that seemed to be similar to revolver pistols except for their glowing purple tips, one in each hand. Marsha walked up to Nick fiercely and spoke with much anger: "I''ve finally found you, best friend. You didn''t explain to me the other day how you could be running a business selling the thing that I had you create for me without even involving me. Say it, how much are you making selling those scrolls?" The other students noticed to commotion and started paying attention to Nick and Marsha. "What is she talking about? Nick is running a business, does anyone know what kind of business it is?" "No idea but does she even have that right? Nick practically wears the same sets of clothes when he comes to class every weak. Does a guy like that really own a business?" "Idiot. You can''t just judge a book by its cover, hasn''t Nick been performing like a beast since combat class began." ... While the students were chattering, Nick looked at the two pistols in Marsha''s hands and frowned. "Put those guns away before you talk to me and I don''t owe you any explanations. The scrolls were my creation and I am free to do with them as I wish." Marsha gritted her teeth with anger but knew that Nick was correct. She was just upset that she had lost the chance to be part of an interesting venture that she was now hearing about through her network, after all, the General Beast Store was a fairly busy and popular business establishment. Marsha still had copies of the Beast Capture scrolls that she got from Nick and could probably get someone to copy them and try and sell them too now that there seemed to be a demand for them but she didn''t dare to do that. Richter Order Academy had many unwritten rules, one of which was that no one was to try and steal the intellectual property and inventions of their students and anyone who tried would face the onslaught of the many Magicians that graduated from here after being protected by the same rules. The academy did this to nurture its Magicians who occasionally brought fame and wealth to the academy through their creations. Nick knew of this rule and that is why he was not afraid of dealing with Carla or the other Jenners when selling his scrolls. Marsha still wanted to threaten Nick into telling him how he ended up selling his scrolls to the store though. She raised one of her pistols and shook it at him as if she was going to use it and said: "You better start talking or else..." Before she could finish her sentence, Nick did a quick wave of his sword, casting one of the blade path spells whose laws he had become familiar with over the weekend: (Vision Of The Blade.) Marsha stopped shaking her right pistol as she saw a sword suddenly come out of nowhere and slice into her, cutting into her midsection and slicing her in half horizontally. Marsha felt her upper body fall to the ground as she watched her lower body spew blood like a fountain as it remained standing; her breathing became absolutely ragged. The next moment, however, the scene before Marsha seemed to return to the one before the sword had appeared and sliced into her. Marsha sweated profusely and fell down on one knee. Nick looked at Marsha''s condition with indifference; Vision Of The Blade was actually a rank 2 basic grade blade path and wisdom path spell that forced the target to experience an imaginary scene of being cut apart by whatever blade that Nick held while casting the spell. The spell''s effectiveness was based on a number of factors such as the quality of the blade, the magical resistance of the target, the mental resistance of the target and the magic power within Nick''s own mindscape. This was the first time Nick had cast the spell, not even having practised casting it before but blade magic had the advantage of very quick cast times. Marsha looked at Nick with blood shot eyes, clearly suffering from the after effects of the spell that resulted in extreme mental strain. (Since when did Nick become such a hard stone?) "Alright, that''s enough." Varrow walked over and spoke overbearingly. "Young lady, leave before you piss me off, and if you ever interrupt one of my classes again, you will face severe consequences." Under the pressure of the Regular Magician, Marsha got up from her half kneeling position and limped away until she was out of sight of the class. Varrow looked at Nick and shook his head with an amused expression: "You sure have a way with the ladies." Nick shrugged his shoulders and said: "Yeah...I guess I do." Varrow went back to lecturing the other students and Nick continued to practise the Menacing Crane until class ended after which he quickly made his way to the Heaven Hotel that was surprisingly close to his commercial building. (Carla must have chosen this place in consideration of me. It almost makes me feel bad for calling her unreasonable.) Nick walked into the hotel lobby and just as he was going to look for Carla, he saw a few portraits on the wall of the supposed owners of the hotel. In the third position to the right of two other portraits, Nick saw Carla''s portrait, she looked dazzling with her makeup on and her hair done up with all kinds of accessories. (...Oh...that''s why she chose this place.) Nick sighed and looked for Carla. Before he had even noticed her, she called to him: "Nick, come over here." Carla and two other persons were sitting on two sofas that were facing each other, Carla sitting on one and a middle aged man in a suit and a young man wearing jeans and a t-shirt sitting on the other. Nick came over and greeted everyone at which point Carla made introductions: "Nick, this is Glenn Clarke from the Moonshine Medical Company and his associate Seth Teller. Glenn, Seth, this is the owner of The Magic Scroll Company, Nick Capitol." Glenn and Seth looked at Nick''s nearly disheveled appearance and his shirt that had sweat stains on it and raised their eyebrows. Carla noticed their expressions and made an excuse for Nick''s poor deportment. "Nick is a student of this academy and must have rushed over here from a class." Glenn''s expression eased and he spoke to Nick with politeness: "It''s nice to meet you, Nick. Let''s not waste time since you must be a busy man. I am here today because my employer has found your scrolls to be very useful and unique and I''m not kidding about that last part. Although we wouldn''t dare to steal the work of a student from this academy and sell it ourselves, we do admit to trying to recreate your scrolls and ended up failing in doing so, they are very strange." Nick did not change his expression but was internally surprised. (I never even considered whether someone would try to recreate my scrolls. They weren''t able to do it, I wonder why?) Then Nick remembered how the copies of his hand written scrolls had a slightly different magical aura than the originals and his intuition suggested to him that the reason for the Moonshine Medical Company''s failure to recreate his scrolls might be due to that difference. Glenn continued: "In light of those circumstances, my company would like to make an offer to buy your scrolls in bulk going into the foreseeable future, each at ¡ê30,000 a piece." Nick frowned, he hadn''t even had the time to get comfortable yet but this guy in front of him was trying to short change him. Nick said flatly: "No." The faces of Glenn and Seth became slightly dull upon hearing Nick''s response and Glenn asked: "Can I have a reason for your response? While your scrolls are useful, they are priced very highly and for us to gain a certain amount of profits we would like to buy them at a discount, considering that we are willing to commit to buying them in bulk indefinitely." Nick shook his head, saying: "I know the value of my scrolls, even if you don''t. I will not only be giving no discounts, I plan to raise the price of each scroll to ¡ê55,000 effective immediately. You can either take it or leave it, no negotiations." Carla smiled at Nick''s heavy handedness; she also realized the value of Nick''s scrolls and came here today to make sure that Nick did not stupidly get led by the nose by this goon. Glenn looked at Nick''s indifferent expression, seeing that Nick was serious and responded slowly with a sour expression: "We''ll...take...it." Nick''s indifference turned to a light smile and he was about to ask if they could go and get some food to celebrate their agreement when Seth, who had been sitting quietly beside Glenn all along said: "Hold on, this is a matter regarding magic tools and where I come from, those kinds of agreements are settled with a ''friendly'' exchange first." Nick frowned, asking: "What kind of exchange?" Seth smiled smugly and replied: "Your academy has combat fields, right?" .................................... Thirty minutes later... Nick and Seth stood twelve meters apart in a grassy field that was quite a distance away from the commercial district, both wearing blue jeans and standing firm. Glenn who was a fair distance from the two young men and standing beside Carla said to her with an excited grin: "This should be an exciting match up. Want to make a bet?" Carla looked and Glenn and replied: "Go ahead." Glenn''s eyes became sharp: "Whoever wins gets to dictate the price that the scrolls will be sold to us for, within reason, say, ¡ê55,000 if Nick wins or ¡ê42,000 if Seth wins. Do you think that you can get Nick to agree to that?" Carla thought for a moment and sighed internally: (Nick your company is knew and does not really have much foundation and in cases like that, might often makes right. If you want to avoid making unnecessary enemies before you''ve established yourself, you''ll have to give in somewhere. For the sake of your own development and this venture, I won''t protect you from that.) Carla replied: "I will get him to agree to your terms only if your man wins." Glenn responded: "Excellent." Seth flexed his shoulders and spoke to Nick in a carefree manner: "I hope you''re ready for this. I''m not like the cherry boys in this place. The Moonshine Medical Company trained me so that I could explore realms for resources, you better not be a pushover." Nick said nothing and only unsheathed his sword and held it with two hands in front of himself. Seth was also a rank two Magician so Nick was not worried. Seeing Nick take his stance, Seth grinned with a sharp look in his eyes and spoke while pointing his right index finger to the sky, the midday sun being overhead: "Let''s begin." In the next moment, Set''s body radiated an intense magical aura and the light coming from the sun became dazzling, forcing Nick to squint his eyes but before he could react more, Nick felt a burning sensation within his chest. Nick used his left hand to rub his chest but what followed was him having a fit of coughing. Nick covered his mouth with his left hand and coughed several times. When he released his mouth and looked at his hand, there was an unnerving amount of blood on it and much blood was still flowing from his mouth. Nick''s eyes opened wide at the sight. "What the hell?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 96: No Winner Nick was not sure what was happening. He did not sense an attack come his way, although he new that Seth had released a fair amount of magic energy just now. Nick wiped as much of the blood from his mouth as he could with his sleeves and pressed forward towards Seth. (He''s doing something but since I don''t know what it is exactly, I have to go on the offensive.) Nick ran for two meters and swung his sword in a horizontal line. (Sever.) Seth seem to have noticed the formless power that radiated from Nick''s swing and before Sever''s formless cutting power could affect him, he raised his hand in front of himself and opened his hand fully while keeping his fingers straight and locked together; he guided his hand downwards with a vertical motion at which point an intensely glowing orange-red vertical line was left where his hand had traced. When the power of Sever came into contact with this orange-red line, a violent clash occurred that sent ripples of magic energy and almost blinding light in every direction and when the light dispersed, Seth remained in his position unharmed and pointed above him once again with his index finger, releasing quite a bit of magic energy. Nick was now closer to Seth, about seven meters away; as Seth pointed towards the sky, the sun shone with an unusual brightness and Nick''s movements slowed as his body''s temperature rose gradually, causing him to sweat profusely and become light headed. (Is this heat stroke?) Nick shook his head and gritted his teeth and continued running forward, trying to get to Seth to bring the fight right at him. Once Nick was within six meters of Seth, his eyes became completely pitch black as he cast: (Soul Pulse.) Nick''s soul radiated an imposing, formless force outwards towards Seth who sensed the attack and snapped his fingers, after which, the sun shone dazzlingly once again and pellets of glowing orange light began to rain down all around Seth from seemingly out of nowhere. As Soul Pulse washed over Seth''s position, the pellets of orange light glowed intensely and the imposing force from Nick''s attack was dispersed and the brightly glowing pellets were destroyed. Seth remained standing in his position but visibly shook as blood oozed from his mouth, nose and ears. Nick saw this and was internally elated: (He somehow dispelled Soul Pulse''s physical force but his soul still suffered from the attack by a fair degree. Now, I at least know that my soul''s development is superior to his.) Nick had not used his other soul path methods yet because he was unaware of the strength of his opponent''s soul and Nick wanted to first get a feel for what Seth was capable of. Nick got within five meters of Seth and swung his sword horizontally. (Sever.) Seth somehow sensed the attack and countered by once again tracing his straightened hand down in a vertical motion which left a brightly glowing orange-red line in place. The impact between Sever and the glowing line caused magic energy and light to radiate into the surroundings and amidst all of the commotion, Nick cast: (Soul Attraction.) Seth felt an irresistible force begin to pull him towards Nick but he did not try to resist. The next moment, Seth radiated a large amount of magic energy and became a glowing man, radiating an intense orange-red light as he moved towards Nick. The closer Seth came to Nick, the more Nick felt the temperature in the surroundings increase, soon becoming as hot as a sauna. Nick acted quickly, dispelling Soul Attraction and pointed his right index and middle finger at the brightly glowing Seth who landed on the ground three meters in front of him. (Rumbling Pillar.) The space around Seth began to warp, twist and shake and feeling the change, Seth tried to cast his own spell but Nick had already cast his: (Spirit Quake.) Seth felt his soul shake and his mind was disrupted as he coughed out a mouthful of blood, but Seth did not fail in casting his spell. A cylindrical pillar of light appeared around Seth which rose eight meters into the air, and then turned horizontally, making its way five meters to the left of Seth''s original position before falling to the ground vertically. The light immediately faded and Seth appeared at the new position half kneeling, clearly suffering from some of the effects of Rumbling Pillar which dispersed after it lost its target; the temperature in the surroundings went back to normal as Seth dispelled the bright glow emerging from his body. Before Seth could collect himself, however, Nick decided to move quickly to press his current advantage: (Blink.) Nick momentarily disappeared from Seth''s vision and then reappeared a few inches in front of Seth, swinging his sword down ferociously. Seth got up from his half kneeling position quickly and straightened his hand, drawing with it a bright orange-red horizontal line in the path of Nick''s sword but Nick was ready to counter: (Five Blades.) Four other sword blades that looked identical to Nick''s appeared seemingly out of nowhere and moved quickly, aiming for Seth''s sides and legs. Nick''s sword passed through the orange red line like it was not a solid object and something illusory; in the next moment, Nick''s body made a strange movement with Nick''s sword suddenly taking the place of the blade going towards Seth''s right side. Seth''s body began to gradually glow with a bright orange-red light once again but Nick ignored the increase in temperature and cast: (Soul Pressure.) All of Seth''s movements momentarily froze like gravity was keeping him locked in place and Nick continued the swing of his sword with a practised viciousness. Nick''s sword bit into Seth''s glowing body and despite Nick feeling some resistance, his sword''s blade ultimately created a gash in Seth''s side and bright red blood spilled onto the ground; after the sword went in by an inch, Nick felt like he had hit a steel wall and was forced to retract the sword''s blade. Seth coughed out a mouthful of blood, some of it landing on Nick''s face. (Blink.) Nick used Blink to appear three meters away in front of Seth in order to get away from the high temperatures that came with the young man''s strange glow. Seth dispelled his glow and rubbed his wounded right side with his left hand, taking a few moments to look at the blood that appeared on his hand as a result. He licked his bloody lips and spoke to Nick with a sickening grin: "You''ve got some spunk. The real fight begins now." The light from the sun above their heads became dazzling and Seth''s right side radiated a bright orange light. Nick looked on in half distress as he witnessed that as the orange light faded, Seth''s side appeared to be completely healed of his open wound. Seth continued to grin and clasped his hands at which point hundreds of thin brightly rippling, glowing orange-red lines appeared all around him and Nick''s surroundings in midair; all of these strange lines were situated within an meter radius beginning between Nick and Seth. (Gift From The Sun: Many Bright Lines) Nick was stupefied internally at seeing all of the brightly glowing lines around him whose rippling gave him an ironic chill. (Fuck!) In the next moment, the ten glowing lines nearest to him each shone a ray of orange-red light onto his body, some around his chest and abdomen and and the rest onto his thighs and legs. Nick felt his body heat up all over and slightly spasm; he coughed up two mouthfuls of blood as the lights on his body receded back into the floating lines. Nick''s legs buckled from whatever damage those rays of light did to him. Nick''s mind was spinning fast: (This guy has some strange spells, even having one that allows him to heal damage done to himself. This...is a tough fight. Whatever he did to my upper and lower body has me in a lot of pain; it feels like parts of my body were roasted by his attack.) Slade sighed and spoke at this time: [Kid, you''re in a tough spot. That fellow is using the sun path against you and not only is he more experienced than your classmates but I think that he still hasn''t shown you all that he can do judging by that smirk on his face.] If you spot this story on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation. (Sun path?) Nick vaguely remembers reading a book that mentioned it. [Sun path is an obscure branch of fire path, not many in my world practised it but those that did had the advantage of swift and relatively stealthy attacks. This type of magic is also fairly good at healing although it is related to fire path.] (Hmph, it doesn''t matter if he''s using some peculiar kind of magic, I still have an advantage that he definitely cannot keep up with.) Slade had to agree with Nick. The biggest disadvantage that rank 1 and 2 Magicians faced was their low magic energy storing capacity, however, with Nick''s special mindscape, he did not have that disadvantage. (Seth has used very powerful spells multiple times so he should be more than half empty in terms of magic energy and should be pacing himself from now on. That''s why he hasn''t continued to attack despite my fall. He''s trying to recover his magic energy.) Nick''s expression became cold, displaying his firm resolve to defeat Seth and his still pitch black eyes became extremely sharp. He took a moment to calm his breathing and looked at Seth with absolute menace. Unbeknownst to Nick, an intimidating and dark aura radiated from his body and flowed into the nearby surroundings. Seth, Glenn and Carla frowned. Carla thought: (This aura is incredibly sickening; I think its the same one he radiated at my family''s estate and its gotten worse.) Seth just looked at Nick in return and shook his head, saying simply: "Just give up, ¡ê30,000 a piece for each scroll is good enough already..." While Seth was speaking, Nick gradually raised himself off of the ground and swung his sword horizontally once again. A look of annoyance dominated Seth''s face. "Not this shit again." As he was about to trace another glowing orange-red line to counter Nick''s attack, suddenly, a sword that seemingly came out of nowhere sliced into his neck and severed it from the middle. Seth felt his head falling down to the ground as he observed the rest of his body still standing with the stump of his neck spraying out blood like a fountain. Seth''s eyes opened wide in disbelief. (What the fuck? This was supposed to be a ''friendly'' match!) After that thought, however, Seth snapped back to reality where he was standing among a space filled with many bright, glowing orange-red lines with his neck intact. Seth touched his neck and wondered: (An illusion? Illusion path...no, that felt too visceral for a rank two illusion path spell. That was definitely a wisdom path method.) Seth had been trying to get his eyes on Nick the moment that his senses had normalized but could not find him. Feeling a sense of imminent danger, Seth cast a spell while holding up his right arm. (Solar Flare) A ball of orange light was quickly ejected from Seth''s hand and went up eight meters into the air and then flashed with an intense, all-encompassing light. Nick who had used his spell, Clear Space, to hide his presence from Seth''s vision was revealed to have creeped up less than a meter behind of Seth. Seth who had slightly turned his head in order to check his surroundings was alarmed that Nick had gotten so close to him. (Nick clearly has blade path methods, I cannot let him get close to me. Although he probably won''t strike a fatal blow considering the circumstances, I don''t want to risk losing a limb over one business deal. I have to finish this quickly.) Seth''s expression became stern and he cast his Many Bright Lines spell once again while turning around but during the activation, his soul shook and his mind was disrupted, however, he gritted his teeth and the spell still took effect. Ten bright, orange rays of light landed on Nick''s body simultaneously as half of Seth''s magic energy was consumed in order to maintain his spell. Nick was already paying special attention to the glowing lines around him, ready for their next attack as he had assumed that since they were still present, Seth could somehow keep this spell perpetually in effect. Nick cast Blink and appeared right in front of Seth, dodging most of his attack and stared squarely into Seth''s eyes while his own radiated a pitch black luster. (Ghost Eyes.) Seth''s face showed a weird expression as he and Nick''s souls competed in terms of strength. A few moments later, the results were obvious when Seth began to bleed heavily from his eyes and nose. Nick cast Blink again and appeared behind Seth, swinging down his sword ruthlessly but before his sword made contact, Seth acted. (Gift From The Sun: Sunshine) Nick was immediately blinded by an intense light and his vision became filled with nothing but orange-red light. Nick stopped his sword''s descent and closed his eyes while feeling an intense sense of danger; Nick used Blink again to immediately move six meters away from Seth, his magic energy reserves decreasing by a large amount. When Nick opened his eyes again, Seth stood valiantly, facing Nick with flames seeming to dance all over his body and intense sunlight shining down on him and radiating into the surroundings. This, in addition to the blood that covered his face made Seth seem like some kind of battling god; he spoke imposingly: "Let''s finish this." Slade spoke at this time: [This fellow must be using a great amount of magic energy to maintain his two spells so he won''t last long. All you have to do to win is withstand the next few exchanges.] Nick pointed at Seth and activated his spell: (Reverse Space.) The space around Seth suddenly warped which resulted in him facing the direction opposite from Nick. Nick swung his sword horizontally and cast: (Sever.) The moment he cast Sever, however, ten of the nearest glowing orange lines floating around him radiated intense rays of light that each shone on his torso. Blood flowed heavily from Nick''s mouth and burn marks appeared all over his torso and muscles. Six meters away, Seth grit his teeth as the power of Nick''s Sever was able to bypass Sunshine''s relatively meager defense and create a gaping wound in his upper back. He quickly turned around and breathed in deeply, stepping forward and with a flurry of flames dancing around him, he ran forward at the speed of car, getting to Nick''s position in a matter of moments, radiating an intense and scorching light that burned the grass everywhere that he went. Nick had already dropped his sword after he was hit by Many Bright Lines and seeing events unfold this way, he sighed knowing that he was about to lose. (My body is actually so heavily damaged and my magic energy is running low but this guy only made a few successful attacks. I''ve made many more successful attacks in comparison but this guy is not only still standing despite the injuries, his magic energy hasn''t bottomed out yet; he''s definitely been quietly using a healing method on himself and I suspect that he has some method to increase his rate of magic recovery. The difference between us is clear but that doesn''t mean I''ll just give up.) The dark and imposing aura flowing from Nick became even more intense causing everyone to frown at sensing it. (It''s either I win or I''ll die trying.) As the missile of flames and light called Seth Teller was about to hit him with a disastrous attack, Nick folded his slightly burned hands into each other and the space within a thirty meter radius became thickly covered with a black miasma except at the spot where the flaming Seth was about to crash into Nick and many piles of bones littered the ground as a decrepit temple stood behind Nick. (Malevolent Shrine.) Malevolent Shrine was actually activated within an instant of real time and an incredibly sharp and domineering aura went ahead to confront Seth amidst an ever increasing torrent of flames and light that had by then transformed into a miniature sun; at this moment, however, both Nick and Seth heard a plain but feminine voice say: "Alright, that''s enough. You two aren''t supposed to be trying to kill each other." Carla who was quite a distance away from the battle waved her right index finger at the two and it shone with a dark light. (Mighty Shadow) Immediately, a mass of black material covered the entirety of Nick and Seth''s battle area and everything went quiet. Nick felt himself lose control of Malevolent Shrine and Seth felt all of his spells being nullified and canceled; they were also both frozen in place and covered in an impenetrable darkness that was far more imposing and solid that the darkness created using Malevolent Shrine. Nick wondered out loud: "So this is the power of a rank 4 Apprentice Magician." After two seconds, the darkness faded and Nick and Seth found themselves lying on the ground next to each other, battered, cut, burned and/or bruised; they both just looked at the sky, trying to catch their breath. Carla and Glenn walked over and looked at both young men who were in sorry states. Seth was bleeding profusely from a large wound in his back and had a vacant stare which suggested heavy damage to his soul and Nick was covered in superficial burns and blood was still flowing from his mouth. Carla sighed and spent the next twenty minutes healing the two young men with her shadow magic; she healed Nick, then Seth. Nick had not known Carla''s specialty before but never would have guessed that it was darkness or shadow magic, he couldn''t tell which because the two presented similarly. After the two young men were healed, Carla said to the both of them: "You two are lucky that healing spells work so well on rank 2 Magicians. Alright, since we don''t have a winner or a loser in this match let''s just say that the Soul Healing scrolls will continue to be sold at ¡ê50,000 a piece for now." Nick was going to say something but under Carla''s stare that implied: "Nick, don''t press the issue.", he remained quiet. Seth did not seem to have much interest in the scrolls anymore and just stood at the side with an unsatisfied expression. Glenn clapped his hands and said: "In light of Nick''s valiant performance, I will not press the issue of a discount. Carla has already provided me with your email address so our purchasing department will send my employer''s order directly to you within the coming days." Glenn motioned to Seth that they were going to leave but before Seth walked away, he said to Nick: "We will finish our match another time." Seth left with Glenn in a quick haste. Nick looked at Seth''s receding figure and thought: (That guy was the better Magician in this match without doubt. He paced the use of his magic power better, coordinated his spells better and had spells that covered aspects that mine didn''t. The only reason I kept up with him was because I could launch more attacks because of my large magic energy reserves and I had the benefit of using spells from multiple paths which no doubt confused him a bit.) Rarely did Magicians use spells of purely different paths during combat because becoming specialized on one path was already difficult, becoming proficient at more than one path was a hurdle that most Magicians would not attempt to undertake because of the improbable rewards. Nick was special in that he had a relatively huge store of magic energy for his rank and guidance in the form of Slade Terrence as well as a few good inheritances. Slade chimed in: [You''re right, he was the better Magician this time around but you better make sure that this is the last time.] (Understood.) Nick looked at the sky and breathed in deeply, his scary black-red irises rippling as the aura that he was unknowingly releasing dissipated. "Hey Carla, did you know? Today was the first time that I lost out since coming to this academy." Carla looked at Nick and raised both of her eyebrows in surprise; she was expecting him to be muddle headed or dispirited after the fight: (This young man''s pace of growth in terms of his mindset is astounding and even outpaces his magical growth. He really does have a lot of potential.) Carla patted Nick on the shoulder, ignoring his obvious discomfort and replied: "Let''s go get something to eat." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 97: Upcoming Exam After having a free lunch at the Heaven Hotel, Carla told Nick that she would be happy to take on all of his logistics, legal, accounting and security concerns using the General Beast Store indefinitely for a total of fifteen percent of the profits made from selling the Soul Healing scrolls and Nick agreed to it since he would be too busy himself to handle all of those concerns. Therefore, he decided that The Magic Scroll Company would outsource all aspects of its operations except manufacturing. Carla said that she would email him the relevant contract in the coming days and that they would talk often, his initial point of contact becoming her instead of Marshall. Nick said that he was fine with that and the afternoon was going well until Carla said: "Oh, and I would appreciate it if you told me the details every time that you make a deal with Britney, that is, if we are going to continue to work together." Nick put on a confused expression and responded: "Britney who?" Carla chuckled and squinted her eyes: "Don''t play dumb, Nick. You and Britney made a deal that she would buy you an assortment of space path and blade path spells in exchange for the possibility of your future business, isn''t that correct?" Nick shrugged his shoulders with a plain expression: "How did you find out?" "Did you really think that I wasn''t keeping track of that girl''s every action? Don''t worry, I am not mad and I don''t care how you use her but we need to set some ground rules for the benefit of our relationship, okay." Nick remained quiet, waiting for Carla to speak, which she did in a moment: "First, do not have sex with any of my relatives, second, do not make backdoor deals with my relatives, that should have gone without saying but since you are young, I will ignore it this time and finally, if you want help with something magic related, I want you to come to me first and I will try to the best of my ability within reason to help you and the only thing that I am asking for in return is honesty during our interactions." Nick subtly squinted his eyes when Carla said the last part; although it seemed like a sweet notion on the surface, Nick felt that this was her way of exercising a subtle control over him and he did not like that. (Sigh, she is being unreasonable again but what can I do. Since she''s already wrapped up in my business, It would be difficult to cut her out without serious repercussions. This is because I am still too weak.) Nick quietly clenched his right fist under the table but replied with politeness: "Sure thing Carla, is there anything else?" Carla held up her hand and a small mass of darkness emerged from it and faded away leaving behind what seemed to be a memory pill like the one that Nick had used at the auction venue. "This contains the space and blade path spells that you were seeking. They are mostly rank 2 basic grade spells, nothing of real note but you don''t find top tier spells like you would cabbage at a market. They cost me ¡ê1,000,000,000 in all and I''ll email you a receipt from the Ministry of Magic later." Nick looked pleased that he had gotten what he wanted so quickly and replied: "I''ll reimburse you the money when I get the receipt." Carla smiled at seeing Nick''s overly cautious nature on display and nodded her head. "Forward me the details whenever you need sloths delivered to your building or you need scrolls delivered to customers. I will be giving the rest of my contacts your email and phone number so they can communicate with you directly. Also, after word spreads, expect an increase in the volume of orders." Nick nodded and both him and Carla proceeded to leave the Heaven Hotel after which Carla gave Nick a ride to his building and they said their goodbyes. Nick looked at Carla''s car as it drove into the distance and remarked with semi-cold eyes: "That woman sure is something..." Slade asked eerily: [Are you going to deal with her in the future?] Nick stayed quiet for a while and then responded: "...That''s a must." Nick entered his building. ........................... One month later... Nick sat and waited on the combat field where his usual combat class was to take place with his sword in hand and a transport briefcase at his side; class would begin in ten minutes and all of the other students had not arrived yet. Nick had spent the past month doing what he usually did which included going to combat class, meditating, producing his Beast Capture and Soul Healing scrolls and studying magic. After his battle against Seth Teller, Nick realized that he needed to take learning combat more seriously which included not only becoming more dedicated to his sword training but also reviewing the line up of spells that he often used in battle. Up until now he had just been using whatever spells he had found to be cool and strong without considering how well they complemented each other or if he was covering all of his bases with the spells. For example, Seth made him realize that having a proper healing spell was important as well as a good movement spell. Nick did have Blink for movement but he realized that it consumed too much magic energy to be used consecutively which left holes in his battle strategies. He also realized that he lacked advanced grade spells that could change the course of the battle when he found himself in a tight spot. Although he had Retrieve Soul and Malevolent Shrine, the former was not suitable for combat and Nick did not want to use the latter openly because of its suspicious origin and overly dark nature. While Slade''s inheritance had advanced grade spells, Nick had spent too little time cultivating his soul and he therefore could not use them. He also realized that he was subtly holding himself back by trying as much as possible to use only his space path methods in public which was hampering his growth. With all of this in mind, Nick had decided that not only would he not limit himself to using only his space path spells in public but he would try as much as possible to increase the quality of the spells he learnt and used going forward, making sure that they complemented each other within reason and did not result in faults in his defense or movement. Class finally began at 9 am with the rest of the students finally arriving and Varrow also arrived at that time appearing with a strong wind as his body turned from formless to solid, revealing himself wearing his usual brown leather combat attire. He spoke with authority: "Two days from now will be the start of your mid year exams and this will be your final combat class until it is over. As you would of already been notified, the details of your exam will be revealed tomorrow in one of the academy''s assembly halls. You have been in my class for half a year and now I want to see the fruits of my labor and so today every one will spar pair by pair and show me that I have not been wasting my time, that includes you too Nick. Who will be going first?" Nick walked to the front of the group with his sword and transport briefcase and said: "Sir Varrow, I have a better idea." Varrow frowned at Nick''s words but let him continue with what he was doing. Nick threw his transport briefcase onto the ground and opened it, revealing a large sum of money. Varrow raised both of his eyebrows at the sight and all of the other students went into a commotion, however, Nick raised his voice above theirs: "This briefcase contains ¡ê50,000,000. I want to battle with each and every one of you one by one and whoever is able to defeat me first will obtain this money. How about that?" The students whispered: "Has Nick gone crazy? He wants to battle all of us, hmph, just because he has some decent spells and some sword skills, he is trying to bite off more than he can chew." "That''s exactly what he is doing. Were did he get so much money, anyway? I heard that he was just a poor nobody." "Weren''t you here when Marsha Cassidy made that commotion a month ago? Apparently Nick has some sort of business." "If he wants to gift me his money, then I will gladly take it." ... Varrow laughed at the scene that was going on in front of him. (To think that this young man is willing to use such methods to incite these students. Fine, I won''t interfere.) Varrow stood at the side and after he finished laughing, he quietly waited for the show to unfold. Everyone took his silence as assent to Nick''s actions. Nick looked at Varrow, then at the other students and then asked: "Who is first?" Kevin Stalwart stepped forward and declared: "Nick, your actions are too outrageous and your method too unsightly. I will do our class justice by teaching you some decorum and respect for trying to bribe us with money." Although Kevin said this, he eyed the money in the briefcase with undeniable interest. Although most of the students of Richter Order Academy came from fairly well off families, that did not mean that they had endless resources at their disposal and in many cases, progress with their magic cultivation required a certain amount of money and so to the students, having ¡ê50,000,000 to spend was just too attractive an opportunity to pass up. You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story. Nick said in response: "Then let''s not waste any time." (Blink.) Nick disappeared and reappeared twelve meters away from the rest of the students and waited for Kevin to come at him. Kevin ran to the area within ten meters of Nick and cast his advanced grade spell immediately: (Light of the Three Musketeers) Three, three meter tall figures of blue light resembling humans in medieval style battle amour appeared and stood at Kevin''s sides and front. Nick raised his right eyebrow in response: (Oh, he has improved. Those figures of light didn''t have battle armor when I fought him before.) Kevin then used another spell: (Glory Wall) A cylindrical pillar of intense yellow light surrounded only Kevin''s body and shot up into the skies, beyond the clouds. All of the other students except Nick gasped at the wondrous sight; it was like a scene from a movie where the hero was about to make an epic final attack against the villain. Nick shook his head in disappointment. He could tell that the second light path spell was a rank 2 basic grade spell from the intensity of the magic energy that gathered around it; in recent times after reviewing dozens of the spells that Carla had given him, Nick gained a better understanding of the differences between basic, intermediate and advanced grade spells. That spell, although it looked amazing, just looked amazing and wasn''t anything special. (Spell creation is so interesting, depending on how the laws for the spell are designed, even a rank one basic grade spell could be made to look as destructive as an atomic bomb without having any real effect. That light barrier is probably a defensive measure but if Kevin thinks that will protect him, he is sorely mistaken.) (Blink.) Nick disappeared and reappeared two meters in front of the three figures of blue light and they reacted immediately by lunging at Nick, looking like they were ready to tear him apart. Nick gripped his sword tightly with his right hand and cast his spell: (Reinforce With Soul.) A translucent miasma covered his sword''s blade, increasing its sharpness and hardness by at least a large degree. Nick took a firm stance with feet apart and as the warriors of light were about to pounce on him, he positioned the tip of his sword near to his left shoulder and then swung the sword quickly in a horizontal line, casting a spell: (Cleave.) In an instant, all three figures of light were cut in half from their midsections and they dissipated; Kevin''s spell was literally cut apart. Kevin who was standing within the light pillar looked on with a shocked expression. (What the fuck just happened?) Nick held his right shoulder with his left hand and proceeded to flex his right sword holding arm. (Well, that worked better than I thought it would. I created Cleave after reviewing a lot of basic grade blade path spells and a few intermediate ones. It''s really not much different from Sever except that I created it using Valteese but it works based on the same principles and has almost the same effect except that Cleave is a true blue blade path spell and its base strength is determined by the qualities of the blade used to cast it. The sword that I have is good but for it to achieve such a great effect, I used Reinforce With Soul on it before I cast Cleave. It''s a good thing that blade path and soul path don''t conflict much.) (If I were to compare them, I''d say that Sever is a more flexible method because I don''t need a blade to cast it but Cleave can be cast with more power and destructive force depending on the blade that I wield. The former is of the rule path and the latter is of the blade path so there are more pros and cons to consider.) Nick stood in front of Kevin''s great pillar of light but Kevin did not react even after Nick had cut through his light and enslavement path spell. Kevin just stood in one spot inside the pillar seeming to be waiting for something to happen. Nick wasn''t interested in waiting so he went ahead to create a pillar of his own; Nick pointed his left index and middle finger at Kevin''s light pillar and cast: (Rumbling Pillar.) A large amount of magic ice crystals floated up from the icy ground within Nick''s mindscape and were consumed by the laws of Rumbling Pillar. The space around the light pillar warped, shook and twisted and eventually under the effects of Rumbling Pillar, Kevin''s light pillar broke apart and Nick cancelled Rumbling Pillar before it crushed Kevin, however, as soon as the light pillar was destroyed, Kevin spewed out a few mouthfuls of blood and fell to the ground, obviously suffering from some kind of backlash. Varrow shook his head slowly and transformed into a gust of wind, moving next to Kevin within a moment and casting a healing spell on him. He spoke out loud for the benefit of the class: "The spell that Kevin used to create that pillar of light is called Glory Wall which is a common rank two basic grade defensive spell. It has fairly good defense but requires the caster to actively maintain it for a fixed period of time before it can be safely dispelled and therefore its forceful destruction means that the caster will suffer a heavy backlash." Nick went into deep thought for a moment: (Did this idiot think that he could protect himself behind that light wall while those three figures of light dealt with me. Kevin lost because he overestimated his first spell and underestimated me.) Varrow only took a few seconds to heal Kevin who got up off of the ground and walked to the back of the crowd with an embarrassed expression. Nick did not pay anymore attention to him and asked openly: "Who is next?" ..................................... At the end of combat class, everyone except Varrow and Nick left with a defeated and dispirited expression. Nick picked up his travel briefcase with the ¡ê50,000,000 and faced Varrow, asking: "Are you satisfied with your students?" Varrow sighed. (The quality of this year''s new second year students is really lacking. Nick managed to defeat many of them with one or two spells and most of them he defeated using the Waiting Viper or Menacing Crane sword techniques and not actual magic.) "Hmph, don''t get cocky. Those students still have much to learn and so do you." Nick nodded and replied: "I know." Varrow raised his right eyebrow at Nick''s forthright admittance: (He at least has some self-awareness that he is still lacking in some areas, that''s good.) "Are you ready for another special exam?" Nick half smiled and replied: "Yeah...ready as I''ll ever be. By any chance, do you know what form this special exam will take?" Varrow rubbed his chin and thought for a moment: (I''ll do this kid a favor and see what happens.) "You didn''t hear this from me but all second years will be sent to a public realm for this test: the never ending battlefield." Nick replied: "A public realm, not private?" Varrow replied: "Private realms are owned by companies or individuals but public realms are the property of the country who gives access rights to it. That''s all I''ll say so the next time we meet you better have an interesting story to tell." After saying that, Varrow transformed into a gust of wind and left the combat field. "The never ending battlefield..." Nick took out his smart phone and did an online search on that phrase and the results shocked him. "A realm where visitors are basically immortal!" .............................................. The next day, inside one of Richter Order Academy''s assembly halls... Xavier Gecko, the dean of Richter Order Academy, stood on the central stage in front of over a thousand second year students and spoke with authority: "The second year mid-year exam will begin tomorrow and will take place within the British Government''s never ending battlefield." There were gasps among the normal students who did not yet know of the venue of the exam. They knew that the British Government had discovered many peculiar realms that they did not allow any private interest to claim because of the realm''s special effects and/or strategic resources. The never ending battlefield was one such realm. Xavier continued: "This year, your exams will be conducted jointly with Raylam Priest Academy as an effort to mend the strained relationship between that academy and ours and the exam will be monitored by both academies as far as we are able. For those of you that do not know, the never ending battlefield is a high class realm that the British government has been trying to research for many years and has only explored within a few thousand kilometers of the entry point and has yet to come into contact with an advanced civilization. So how do we know that it is a high class realm?" The students remained quiet in order to listen to Xavier''s explanation because although everyone knew what the never ending battlefield was, only students from very influential families knew its details exactly. "The first reason is because the British Government has discovered many signs that intelligent life-forms besides us from Grand Earth had gathered and settled within the never ending battlefield at one point and the second reason is the abundance of renewable resources that the never ending battlefield contains. The never ending battlefield has only been explored to a certain extent because of the dangers that appear after a particular distance is traveled within the battlefield which include regular magic beasts." Nick nodded his head in understanding, he had already read up about magic beasts and knew that regular magic beasts were on a whole different level than apprentice magic beasts. So much so that a random rank 5 Traveler Magician will probably not be able to defeat a rank 5 magic beast by himself because of their magical defenses, powers and/or size which can be immense in comparison to one human''s. "With all of this in mind, you are to head to the entrance of the academy tomorrow morning for transport to the site of the gateway that leads to the realm. That is all." Xavier dismissed the students and they all left the assembly hall, including Nick. Nick went back to his commercial building and sat in one of the large offices of the second floor, reading his emails on the computer. The academy had sent the details of the exam and Nick was reading through it thoroughly. "The second year exam will be jointly conducted with Raylam Priest Academy and therefore the students of both schools will interact closely. Within the realm, there will be no direct monitoring of the students but any crimes committed will be investigated. The students will enter the realm at a starting point within a town settlement developed by the British government which will act as a rest point while within the realm. The students'' objective during this exam will be to defeat as many other students and magical beasts as possible by the end of the exam. Each student will start off with a score of zero and will gain one point for each student that they ''kill'' that does not already have a score, ten points for each rank 1 magic beast and thirty points for each rank 2 magic beasts that they kill. When a student kills another student with a score, half of that score will go to the killer." Nick thought about these rules for a moment before saying: "It looks like the academies are trying to nurture the students'' combat abilities with this exam. The email says that helping to kill someone will not get you any points and that anyone killed will somehow be teleported back to the town in a revived state upon which they can continue the exam, thus the name of the realm: the never ending battlefield. The British government sometimes uses this realm to train soldiers and its own Magicians so the surroundings that have already been explored are relatively safe in terms of magic beasts for which the strongest should only be rank 2." Nick read the last part of the email and was surprised to say the least. "Five days on Grand Earth will be equivalent to five years within the realm and the exam will be hosted for ten days, Grand Earth time...." "So the exam will last ten years. The more I think about it, the more it makes sense. Magicians aren''t just scholars, they are supposed to be fighters and from what I''ve seen, the other students are greatly inept at fighting which means that this exam is meant to toughen them up. What a great way to do it. Ten years in a never ending battlefield..." Soon, a knock came from Nick''s door and he responded: "Come in." Following his response, a middle aged man dressed in dress pants and a long sleeved, buttoned up white shirt came in with a cart filled with dishes of meals, saying: "Your supper is here, sir." This was Nick''s newly hired steward/chef/butler that he now gave the responsibility of making sure that the building was cleaned and maintained and that Nick was served meals when he was here; his name is Dewy Johnson and hiring him was easy, Nick just had to have an agency within the academy grounds find a decent person for the job and they sent him over for Nick to interview and hire him. Dewy had been on the job for two weeks already and had done well so far. "Thanks Dewy, you can leave the tray here and go. Oh, and I''ll be away from this place for about two weeks so see to it that everything is okay while I''m gone." Dewy nodded his head and left. Nick smiled and began to eat the meals while watching a few motivational videos on his computer. Nick had much success in selling his scrolls which had made him over ¡ê6,000,000,000 in the past month. Nick had finally entered the ranks of billionaire by the age of twenty. Although the process was tough, it was worth it. After he ate, Nick called Carla and told her about his exam and how he would not be able to manufacture anymore scrolls for the next two weeks. She said in understanding: "Do well on your exam and we will talk when you get back." Nick spent the rest of the day meditating and then went to sleep so that he would be well rested for tomorrow. World of Laws and Magic Chapter 98: Shelter Town Near the academy entrance on the day of the exam... All of the second year students formed groups and spoke to each other, many with clear excitement and some with melancholy: "Can you believe that we get to experience going to a realm where we can''t be killed, that''s awesome." "...Yeah but we''ll be stuck in that realm for ten years, I have a boyfriend that does not attend the academy, by the time that we get out, I''ll look like his mother." "We are Magicians in training so we have to make some sacrifices to become better for our future profession." "That''s easy for you to say, this exam favors the students skilled in combat." "Are you dense? The academy is probably having this special exam so that everyone can gain some proficiency in combat so you should use this opportunity to get stronger, no matter your skill level." ... While the students were chattering, a black town car drove up near the entrance from which Nick emerged with his sheathed sword in hand and told Dewy who was acting as his driver: "Thanks Dewy, you can leave now. When I come back, I want a celebratory meal with fried chicken and all sorts of rice." Dewy responded: "No problem, sir." Nick closed the car door and Dewy drove off. Nick had bought that car when he hired Dewy to make getting around the academy easier and although he didn''t mind walking: (Turns out that being driven around feels great when you own the car.) Nick walked further ahead and stayed at the edge of the group of students, waiting for events to unfold. Nick unsheathed his sword to look at its blade and after seeing that it was fine, he sheathed it once again and tapped on it with a wristwatch like magical tool which caused his sword to disappear suddenly but Nick showed no signs of panic. The wristwatch like magical tool was actually an intermediate apprentice grade space band that Nick had purchased from the academy''s magical tools office for ¡ê1,500,000,000. Since Nick knew that the exam would last ten years, he was not going to waste his time huddling up with the other students inside a town and was going to explore the realm with all of his might. To that end, he bought many sets of clothes, bottled water, packaged food, tools and equipment to help him survive in the wilderness of the realm for a whole year at the very least. Nick had only one weapon though because any weapon that he could just buy would not be as good as the sword given to him by his combat instructor, Thompson Varrow. Nick had asked Carla if she could buy him more swords made of magic materials but she said that buying such weapons for an unlicensed Magician required a lengthy process with the Ministry of Magic so Nick gave up on doing that for now. At around 10 am, a middle aged man wearing a navy blue robe appeared hovering above the students, saying: "I''m about to open a spacial gate to another location and you are all to walk inside." The middle aged man clasped his hands, seemingly casting a spell since a torrent of magic energy began to gather at the location. In a few moments, a large space in front of the students warped and a sort of gateway appeared whose entrance looked like a half opaque mirror; it was twenty meters wide and eighteen meters high in the shape of a semi-circle. The middle aged man repeated his previous words: "Walk inside!" The students followed the instructions and flooded into the gateway, moving through its mirror like entrance without any resistance. Nick stopped in front of the entrance to observe the gateway up close and muttered: "This is a space path spell...regular grade probably." Nick then walked through the entrance and what appeared in front of him next was an area lined with concrete that had laws drawn all over the floor. Nick was surrounded by other students, many of whom he did not recognize. There was a stage that floated a few meters above them where about a dozen people sat in seats and waited until all of the students had arrived through the opened warp-gate. When the last student had arrived and the warp-gate closed, One man wearing a dark gray robe stepped forward and spoke with authority: "My name is Victor Durant of Raylam Priest Academy and I will be the head invigilator for this exam which will be overseen by the twelve of us that you see here. When the exam begins you will be teleported to a town settlement within the never ending battlefield where lodging and other establishments have already been prepared to see to your basic needs while you are within the realm; you will also be greeted by the staff stationed there. You have already been sent the details of the exam but let me summarize it for you anyway: kill as much as you can outside of the town, kill your peers, kill your neighbors and kill the magic beasts that you see. The ones who successfully kill the most will likely end up with the highest scores. Oh, and you are free to explore the realm while you are at it and you can keep whatever useful resources that you find or trade it with one of us twelve or other students for items that you may need." Durant waved his hand and the laws drawn onto the concrete floor lit up, at which point a glowing zero appeared in the right palms of every student. "You should be able to see your score on your body now which you will be able to reveal or conceal at will from now on. Although you probably haven''t noticed, a spell has been cast on you to link the flow of time around your body to Grand Earth''s flow of time so despite the fact that the duration of the exam will be ten years within the never ending battlefield, you will only be ten days older when you return here." Many students uttered sighs of relief at hearing that. Durant continued: "Students cannot be permanently killed as a result of battle within the never ending battlefield and your point of revival will always be within the town which you are not allowed to do combat in unless it is against an encroaching magic beast. Good luck to you." After he said that, the space that the students stood in glowed with a bright white light that emerged from the laws that were drawn on the ground and soon, all that Nick saw was white until a few seconds passed and the light receded. Nick was now standing within some kind of reception area where people dressed in suits stood behind counters greeting the students that were present which numbered at about fifty. A middle aged woman wearing an all black pants suit that had a scar on her face stood at the largest counter in the lobby and shouted: "This is Shelter Town inn number 1. Please speak to one of the staff and a room will be assigned to you. If you do not want a room at this inn, that is fine too, you can try to find a room at another inn." The other students scurried about, either speaking to the staff or immediately leaving the inn by themselves or with companions. Nick decided to have a room assigned to himself. He spoke to one of the staff members who assigned him a room using a computer and instructed another staff member to guide Nick to his new room. The room was on the second floor of the inn with only one window, one bathroom and a small kitchen within the bedroom. The only furniture in the room was a bed that was already spread with white cotton sheets. Nick took off his shoes and lied in the bed for a while, thinking about his next move. (I''ll explore this town first and then go out into the supposed wilderness. During this exam, we will be mixed with students from Raylam Priest Academy, not that it matters to me.) Nick rested for one hour then proceeded to leave the inn in order to have a look around town. Nick randomly walked from street to street and saw various buildings such as inns, restaurants, bars, and administrative offices, weapons depots, magic tools stores and even a fifteen storey tower where the invigilators for this exam and important government officials spent their time while within this realm. The streets were busy with students, most wearing some kind of casual attire and many wearing traditional Magician''s robes. Nick eventually encountered two familiar persons in the form of Derek Drake and Lana Parsely. The two, like Nick were currently wearing blue jeans and a casual top. Nick had not seen them in a few months since he stopped going to the spell creation club in order to focus on creating magic scrolls and studying; habitually, Nick thought that he might as well ignore them, but he ultimately decided to say something. Since Lana and Derek had not noticed him yet, Nick called out: "Lana, Derek, how are you?" Both Lana and Derek who were seemingly walking to a destination turned around upon being called to and when they saw Nick, Derek walked over to meet him immediately while Lana seemed to hesitate before following closely behind Derek. Derek spoke when he walked up to Nick: "Hey Nick, how''s it going? How comes we haven''t been seeing you at the club recently?" Nick shrugged his shoulders and replied: "I''ve been busy doing many things and I just didn''t have the time. Is Norman upset about it." Derek shook his head. "Most Magicians will have times where they become so focused on something that they disregard other things completely so Norman said that It''s not strange that you haven''t gone to the club recently but after this exam is over, he will definitely demand an explanation." The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement. Nick chuckled internally, although Norman was a Regular Magician, Nick was not planning to give him any sort of explanation as the spell creation club had already outlived its usefulness and he would not be going back. Nick stopped talking about the club and asked: "What are you two planning to do?" Derek replied: "Well, we plan to spend the next ten years here studying spell creation; it''s actually the second time that Lana and I have been within the never ending battlefield since they have this exam for second years every year, in fact, Lana and I stayed within the second year instead of moving on just to come here again." Nick pondered for a moment, then asked: "Is it because of the time difference between here and Grand Earth?" Derek smiled and replied: "You''re quick. Yes, we want to benefit from spending ten years here with only ten days passing by on Grand Earth." Nick acted clueless and asked: "Is it really that big of a deal?" Lana, seeming like she wanted to badly join in on the conversation, answered: "You may not know Nick since you may not have had the opportunity to interact with the third years but the third years are on a whole different level in terms of magic power and skill when compared to us second years. While most of them are still rank 2, the rank 3''s are all basically monsters that we might have to compete with when we get to the third year. These ten years will give us an edge, an opportunity to close the gap between us and them and also prepare us for what the academy will ask of us during the third year." Nick nodded in understanding, confirming their intentions and thought processes, at least partially. "Aren''t you going to leave the town to gather up points and increase your score?" Derek shook his head slowly: "That is a waste of our time, at least during the start. Only the battle crazy students will do that but the rest of the students will focus mostly on studying since that will determine the ceiling that our skills can reach." Nick did not agree, the purpose of knowledge was action and this exam was the perfect opportunity to put all of their current knowledge to the test by exploring the realm and battling other students and magic beasts. He did not think that this time should be spent holed up in a room studying. (No wonder they had to remain within the second year. They just don''t get what being a Magician is all about. We aren''t just scholars, we are also supposed to be explorers and fighters.) Slade chimed in at this time: [Let them be, they will eventually learn the hard way of what comes from inaction when opportunity presents itself.] Derek asked Nick: "What do you intend to do, do you want to form a study group with me, Lana and some other second years?" Nick replied simply while shaking his head: "I''m going to spend most of my time exploring the realm so you won''t be seeing me much." Lana and Derek nodded their heads, they thought that since Nick had just come to this realm, he needed time to face reality and change his mindset. Derek thought: (Playing games with the other students outside of town is a waste of time; I want to become somebody through my knowledge and genius, not slogging away fighting over crumbs with the other students.) Lana thought: (This guy is such a loner but I''m surprised that he isn''t going to spend his time studying. The other students in our year call him a hermit because he basically only stays in his room and study. Well, I guess he just wants to experience the new environment for now but he''ll change his mind when he sees how things really are out there.) Nick looked at Derek''s and Lana''s subtle expressions of pity towards him and felt disgusted although he did not show his feelings outwardly. (There will always be people like this, standing on a high horse, judging you because you have the courage to do what they won''t, telling themselves that you will fail because they can''t do what you are trying to do. They look at you with pity, trying to make you feel small while making themselves feel smart and wise for choosing their course of action. These two can go to hell; I, Nick Capitol, do knot need anyone''s pity.) Nick spoke indifferently: "Well, since you both have your plans, I won''t get in the way. See you another time." As Nick walked off, Derek also said goodbye: "Yeah, I''ll see you soon." Lana just looked at Nick''s receding figure with an expression of half disgust, thinking: (That hermit will come begging us later to join our study group. Being ranked 9th during your first year doesn''t mean much in this exam.) Nick walked around for the next thirty minutes trying to find the town''s exit. (I should have gotten that information from Derek or Lana before I walked away from them.) Shelter Town, as this settlement was called was not a very large town and had only a few dozen large buildings to house and support the students, other staff and Magicians. Raised high above the town were gray, rough looking walls that seemed to be made out of both steel and concrete. As Nick walked along the edge of the town with the fifty meter high wall above him, he observed that there were guarded entrances at sections of the walls as well as openings that seemed like windows more than anything else. (Are there people living inside of the walls?) Nick walked up to a nearby guard at one of the entrances who was wearing a military styled uniform with the logo for the British Ministry of Magic embedded on it. Nick spoke plainly: "Excuse me, sir, I have been trying to find an exit to this town but it has been difficult. Is the exit somewhere beyond this entrance that you''re guarding." The guard blinked twice and answered Nick after assessing him a bit and spoke politely: "No, this entrance leads to the apartments for us soldiers and to the top of the wall where the others take their posts to keep watch of the nearby wilderness." "Oh, so the soldiers live inside the wall." "That''s correct, it makes it easy to get to our posts if we just live here, not to mention, with you students here, all the inns have basically been occupied. If you want to get to the entrance/exit of the town, I will call one of my peers to assist you." Nick nodded his head in affirmation, saying: "That would be well appreciated." "No need to call anyone, Jackson, I will take the young man to the exit." A gruff voice suddenly interjected from behind Nick; the soldier in front of Nick immediately stood at attention and saluted, saying: "Commander Wallace, good morning, sir!" Nick turned around and saw a middle aged man standing a few inches behind him that wore a genial smile, dressed in the same greenish combat uniform as the other soldier but there were obvious stripes and gold stars attached to the left chest and shoulder areas of the middle aged man''s uniform. The man spoke to the other soldier: "At ease Jackson, no need for such a formal solute now." Wallace looked at the young man in front of him and said genially despite his rough tone: "Well, son, my name is Jeffrey Wallace and I am one of the fifteen junior commanders stationed in this town by the Ministry of Magic. I was going to the entrance to the town anyway so why don''t you tag along?" Nick didn''t know why but this man was giving him dangerous vibes. (How did he get behind we without me noticing? Now that I am aware of him, I can actually feel the feint magic energy that he is exuding if I try; this man is clearly stronger than a rank 2 Apprentice Magician.) Nick responded politely: "Thank you for the offer commander Wallace." Wallace nodded his head and motioned for Nick to follow him. Nick walked alongside Wallace, continuing to observe the wall; Wallace soon asked him: "Judging by the fact that you don''t know where the entrance is, this should be your first time here, correct?" Nick was not bothered by Wallace''s questioning and answered: "Yes, it''s my first time here. I''m guessing that you would already know about Richter Order Academy''s mid-year exam." Wallace nodded and replied: "The exam is hosted every year and every year I see many battle crazed students leave this town and make a mess in the wilderness. Although because of the nature of this realm, we as its visitors cannot be killed here, you should still be careful because we don''t know what is the cause of the phenomenon." Nick raised his right eyebrow, asking: "The Ministry of Magic really doesn''t know?" Wallace shook his head, saying: "Even Magicians don''t know everything, it just so happens that this town started as a place to research the phenomenon but because of the lack of progress, the Ministry decided to use it as a training ground for soldiers and earns revenue from renting space to magic academies like yours and the occasional large company." Nick didn''t usually bother having conversations with strangers but he liked people who had useful things to say. Nick asked: "Do you know anything about the magic beast in the wilderness?" Wallace rubbed his bearded chin and replied: "Hmmm...the magic beasts within the area that we recommend you civilians to venture into are at most rank two, many of them having magic powers of varying paths but the most common are fire path and earth path. You should know, young man, that some of these rank 2 magic beasts are extraordinarily ferocious, so much so that many of our lower ranks cannot handle them by themselves so do not underestimate the magic beasts here." Nick nodded in understanding and responded: "What about the magic beasts beyond the area that we are recommended to stay within?" Wallace stared blankly for a few moments, then answered Nick with a low chuckle: "Ha, ha, you know, I can feel the ambition in your tone...uhh. I never asked you your name, what is it?" Nick replied: "It''s Nick, sir." "Well Nick, beyond the ''safe'' area are many areas with rank 3 and even rank 4 magic beasts. To tell you the truth, even I was taken down by two of the rank 3 magical beasts in the past each on separate occasions and they weren''t pleasant experiences to say the least. One of the rank 4 magic beasts actually wiped out an entire 40-man platoon led by one of our rank 4 senior commanders on one occasion so my defeat paled in comparison." Nick frowned and responded: "A rank 4 Magician could not defeat a rank 4 magic beast even with the help of 39 other Magicians?" "That''s correct, you probably haven''t experienced one yet but from rank 3 onward, magic beasts have near human like intelligence and their bodies far exceeds us humans in terms of strength, endurance, stamina and durability. Not only that, they can also cast spells too based on their bloodline talents; although some lower ranked magic beasts can also cast spells too, the spells cast by rank 3 and higher magic beasts are absolutely devastating to humans. Also, magic beasts have been fighting for survival basically since they were born so they are more used to combat than many of us humans." Nick nodded his head, saying: "That makes sense." Varrow liked that Nick paid attention to his ramblings so wholeheartedly, so he continued: "With all of that being said, don''t be afraid to push your limits out their, many students don''t get it but proficiency in combat is a boon for any Magician so don''t hesitate to get involved in a few brawls out there to train yourself." Wallace said that as he and Nick finally arrived at the town''s entrance/exit. Two guards stood at each corner of the exit that was a rectangular opening in the wall that had a width of about five meters and a height of about six meters; a wave like translucent miasma spread from one end of the exit to the other. The guards saluted Wallace when they realized he had arrived and Wallace signaled for them to be at ease in return. Wallace turned his head to Nick and said: "I was just going to take a look at the situation over here and leave but I might as well take you through the gate since you bothered to listen to this old man for as long as you did." Wallace motioned and he and Nick walked through the entrance which felt to Nick like a wave of formless power had washed over him as he made his way through. As Nick left the entrance, finally walking out of Shelter Town and seeing the dry ground in front of him and the woodlands and mountains in the distance, Nick heard a loud screech and something large and heavy fell from the sky. BANG! The object created a deep crater as it fell to the ground in front of the entrance and Nick gasped without thinking in response. The object was actually a black bird that was the size of an elephant. It had scary red eyes and lustrous, pitch black feathers. Within its mouth, beyond its beak were sharp looking fangs that were stained with the remains of a fresh kill. The bird seemed lifeless within the crater as a large metal bolt stuck out of its chest area; the carcass bled profusely and soon the four meter radius crater became a pool and Nick watched on, a little disturbed. Nick swallowed his saliva and looked at Wallace who smiled at him in return and asked Nick: "Are you ready to experience what real combat Magicians have to deal with, day in, day out?" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 99: Magicians Use Wands? Nick turned to the magic beast carcass in response to Wallace''s question and answered him while walking slowly towards the carcass: "Yes, I am." The crash site of the carcass was about twelve meters away from the town entrance and Nick walked silently towards it with a fixed stare, as if he was looking at something interesting. Wallace looked at Nick weirdly and thought: (What''s wrong with this young man, why is he going towards the carcass? Hmmm...he might be interested in magic beast anatomy; that''s a brave bird, a relatively common magic beast that is at the strong end of rank two in terms of lethality. They are a problem for the city because they can get over the wall and some are brave enough to try to fly through our defenses in order to attack the people stationed here.) Nick soon got to the crater where the magic beast''s carcass was situated and willed for a clear glass pitcher to appear from within his space band. The crater that was created by the magic beast had already become a pool of red blood and more blood oozed out continuously from the brave bird''s wound. From the edge of the crater, Nick bent down and used his pitcher to scoop up a serving of the dead magic beast''s blood; what Nick did next caused Wallace to raise both of his eyebrows in surprise. Nick brought the pitcher that was now filled with blood to his mouth and began to drink its contents as if the blood was a sweet drink; Wallace frowned slightly, not expecting this turn of events, he was expecting that Nick would become a little flustered and afraid after seeing the large magic beast fall from the sky. Wallace of course had known about the presence of the brave bird when he was leading Nick to the entrance and he accompanied him beyond the entrance to witness Nick''s reaction to this course of events that would certainly have taken place so that if Nick was fear-stricken by the experience, Wallace could give words of encouragement, not because he particularly liked Nick but because he was the kind of person that liked to speak to others from a superior position. Wallace thought: (What is this situation? Is this boy''s head damaged, no sane person would just start drinking a magic beast''s blood like this?...) While Wallace was trying to reason out the motives behind Nick''s actions, Nick himself had finished drinking the dead brave bird''s blood and silently cast his spell: (Growth.) Nick suddenly felt energized as a rush of magic energy flowed into his body but he resisted the urge to meditate because of Wallace''s presence, in addition to the fact that he was now beyond the entrance of the town where his safety was not necessarily guaranteed. Wallace felt the change in the flow of magic energy around Nick''s body from his position and assumed that Nick''s body had some sort of reaction from drinking the blood. (It''s not my concern what another Magician that is not a part of my unit does. This young man is strange, though. That being said, there are actually much stranger Magicians within the Ministry so this bit of weirdness shouldn''t surprise me.) Wallace returned his facial expression to a friendly one and genially waved Nick goodbye before turning around and walking back through the entrance. Nick stared at Wallace''s receding figure as the commander went through the entrance but when Wallace moved out of sight, he then turned his attention to the brave bird''s carcass once again. Nick''s eyes shone with greed and he moved to secure another serving of blood when he heard a stern voice suddenly come from behind him: "Stop what you are doing, that magic beast carcass is the property of the Ministry of Magic! Move aside." Nick turned around to see a middle aged man in one of the greenish combat uniforms that had the Ministry of Magic''s logo embroidered on the left breast area. The man had a head full of gray hair and stubble all over his chin; he was only a meter away from Nick when he appeared and Nick, not wanting to create trouble for himself stepped away from the carcass and stored his glass pitcher within his space band. The soldier''s stern expression eased upon seeing Nick''s compliance with his instructions and proceeded to walk up to the crater at which point he tapped a magic tool attached to his wrist that looked to Nick like a space band but was clearly different in terms of the materials that it was made of compared to the ones that Nick had seen before. The large brave bird''s carcass suddenly vanished and the soldier tapped onto the magic tool once again, at which point a palm sized flask appeared in his hand. The unknown soldier placed the mouth of the flask into the pool of blood left behind by the carcass and all of the blood proceeded to flow into the flask, somehow all being taken into the flask until not one drop was left within the crater. The soldier looked at Nick for a few moments while storing the flask within his space band, then said: "All magic beasts killed by our combat unit from the Ministry are to be left alone by you civilians, otherwise things could become unpleasant." The soldier squinted his eyes, giving Nick a sharp look but within the next moment, the soldier suddenly vanished, as if he was never there to begin with. Nick turned his attention to the now empty crater and internally sighed: (Just picking up rewards won''t be so easy with all of these strong Magicians around. I need to get away from this town.) Nick then focused his attention on the distant woodland and began to run towards it. *********************** An ape like magic beast suddenly pounced on Nick from an over hanging tree branch and sensing its presence that was bathed in magic energy, Nick made his move; the magic beast''s expression was filled with hunger and malice radiated from its deep green eyes but that expression frozen in the next moment when it sensed the magic power that was thrown towards it. (Sever.) RIIIIIIIPPPPPPPP! The small ape was vertically cut in half as Nick flicked his finger while casting his spell. The magic beast''s carcass fell onto the ground in two halves and its internal organs spilled out with a disgusting sound. Nick looked at the carcass indifferently and thought: (I shouldn''t consume these magic beasts recklessly before I have a better understanding of them.) Although consuming magic beasts and then casting Growth gave Nick an interesting feeling, he decided that his current priority should be exploration; he did not receive a map or any related information from the town settlement and so he had to rely on himself to gain a better understanding of his surroundings. Nick had been traversing this woodland for a little over thirty minutes but the ape like magic beast was the only one that he had encountered. (My current goal should be to cross a few kilometers before nightfall descends after which I would have to stop moving around.) Nick walked deeper into the woodland that mostly consisted of oak like trees that were only a few meters tall; these trees had a mix of green and dull orange leaves which fluttered occasionally because of a slight wind. Nick went on for a few more meters before he caught sight of foot prints made by something bipedal but was clearly barefooted as imprints of its toes were a pronounced part of the footprints. (A bipedal magic beast? Well, whatever it is, it''s going to get a visit from this daddy here.) Nick followed the footprints as he carefully moved past the trees, hoping to find another magic beast that he could battle; the footprints would often be seen going in different directions but Nick did not mind it since he did not have a definite destination in mind in the first place. Nick followed the footprints for about two hours before they suddenly ended at a point in the soft brown soil that only had patches of brown grass growing at seemingly random places. (Huh, why did the footprints stop?) BOOOF Suddenly, a pair of hands forced their way up through the ground near Nick''s legs and were about to grab hold of him but Nick reacted in time: (Blink.) Nick disappeared and reappeared a few inches away from the reach of the mysterious hands that seemed to be covered in dark brown fur and sported long, sharp fingernails. Nick willed and his sword appeared from within his space band; Nick quickly unsheathed it, placing the sheath at his right side and held his sword with two hands, striking at the now flailing two hands with a movent from the Menacing Crane sword technique. Nick swung his sword with a swift fierceness, severing one of the arms at the mid-forearm and leaving a heavily bleeding wound on the other. SCREEECH A shrill scream came from under the ground and a five foot figure was ejected from the ground and landed on its two feet less than a meter in front of Nick. What Nick saw was a magic beast that looked similar to an African baboon with a body almost completely covered in dark brown fur except at its bright red buttocks. It continued to scream shrilly as it bled from its injuries; its eye were blood red in color and saliva was being oozed from the side of its mouth. Nick quickly grew annoyed with his noisy opponent and lunged at the magic beast, using another movement from the Menacing Crane sword technique. The magic beast foolishly tried to grab Nick''s sword with its one functioning but injured arm, but Nick altered his stance mid-movement and cast: (Five Blades.) Four other blades almost identical to Nick''s sword''s suddenly appeared seemingly out of nowhere heading for the magic beast''s sides and legs; the magic beast panicked slightly but still tried to defend itself against the sword that Nick was holding. Nick suddenly moved strangely and when the magic beast''s hand came in contact with the sword''s blade, its hand passed through the blade as if the blade was not even there. The magic beast was surprised but before it could do anything else, one of the blades on its left side increased its moving pace and bit into its midsection, cutting into it from side to side. This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there. A moment later, Nick backed away from the large baboon and witnessed as its bloody, pink intestines fell from the open wound now in its midsection. The magic beast looked at Nick hatefully before its eyes turned lifeless and it fell to the ground, dead. Nick breathed in deeply and thought: (The chain of events leading to the battle seems strange, like that magic beast had been waiting to ambush me. Did it somehow notice me tracking its footprints?) Slade chimed in at this time: [Is that strange? These magic beasts live in the wilderness and would have to survive by hunting prey, it''s only natural for one of them to figure out that it is being followed and try to ambush its pursuer. It probably didn''t expect that its pursuer would be such a hard stone, though. Ha, ha...] Nick agreed with Slade''s reasoning and decided to store the magic beasts carcass in his space ring to study it later. (Now that I think about it, I forgot to store that ape magic beast''s carcass.) Nick shook his head and decided to forget about it. He quickly moved away from the sight of his battle after returning his sword and its sheath to his space band and continued further in the same direction he was moving towards before. After an hour of event-less travel, Nick found a tree with a relatively large trunk and sat at its base to have a meal. Nick willed and a bag with a large piece of bread and a bottle of water appeared in his hands. The bread was packaged in a clear plastic bag but its fragrant, buttery smell escaped the packaging; this was a ''butter bread'' that Nick had bought dozens of from a bakery on campus. The first time, that he had visited the bakery and tried one, he fell in love with the bread and had been eating at least two everyday for the past few days; the bread weighed about 450 grams and when Nick bit into it, he could taste the margarine that lined its interior. Nick spent twenty minutes eating and drinking before he got up to continue his journey but before he could make a move, Nick heard a scream that was clearly made by a male human. AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH Nick quickly cast his spell, Clear Space, becoming visually imperceptible to his surroundings and moved cautiously towards the scream at a running pace. Five minutes later, Nick found a clearing within the woodland that was the site of some sort of battle between a group of eight humans, and a slightly larger group of twelve magic beasts that looked like the baboon like magic beasts that Nick had killed before. Nick noticed immediately that the humans were young people, around his age, and all wore an emblem with Raylam Priest Academy''s logo pinned to their chest. Nick thought: (Oh, some students are fighting a group of magic beasts, I wasn''t expecting to encounter this so soon.) There were two dead baboon magic beasts on the ground already and one of the male students held his limp right arm as if it had been broken. The two groups were face to face with each other and seemed to be at a standstill, that is, until one of the large baboons wearing a sort of cloth hood over its head waved what seemed to be a partly glowing wooden rod in its right hand from which a bluish bolt of electricity shot out towards the group of students. One of the male students moved to the front, in the path of the magic attack and shouted: "Durable Wall!" The burly young man''s skin glowed a bronze color as he received the attack. The young man was pushed five steps backward as the attack struck him and he grimaced in pain; the baboon magic beasts except the hood wearing one cheered by beating their chests and slapping their buttocks as they felt that they had the upper hand. One of the female students shouted to the rest of the group: "Everyone, get ready for a fight, we''ve got to kill these magic beasts, especially the one with the glowing wand." Nick was confused at hearing the term that woman used: (Wand? Like the ones used in Harry Potter, real Magicians use wands?) Nick ignored the students and looked at the hooded, wand carrying baboon and wondered: (What''s up with this magic beast, it''s most definitely rank 2 but it cast a spell with a magic tool like a human?) Slade informed: [As I mentioned in the past, kid, not all magic beasts are made equal. some of them have weird talents and unusual growth patterns mentally, magically and/or physically. Those special ones tend to lead groups of their own kind even while being at the same rank. This one seems to have somehow formed a mindscape, learnt how to cast spells and even has a magic tool; in other words, its strong.] Nick nodded in understanding and rubbed his chin while still staying hidden with the effects of Clear Space. Nick looked at the wand that the magic beast had in his hand and grew curious about it. (I wonder...) After thinking for a minute, as the two groups seemed like they were finally going to clash and the hooded baboon looked like it was going to cast another spell, Nick acted by stretching out his grasping right hand in front of him and cast: (Plunder Grasp.) Plunder Grasp was a space and theft path spell that Nick had learnt months ago but never used outside of his former dorm room. Now he was going to take the chance to test it out in the field. The effects of Clear Space were cancelled at this moment due to the power of Plunder Grasp and Nick became visible to the two groups that noticed the magic energy being exuded by him. The female student that had rallied her friends before looked at Nick weirdly and asked out loud: "Who the hell is this guy?" The baboon magic beasts were enraged that a newcomer suddenly appeared so close to them and were about to attack Nick when the effects of Plunder Grasp became apparent. The icy round within Nick''s mindscape cracked at various places and thousands of small magic ice crystals floated into the air towards the laws of Plunder Grasp that lit up as it was fed with magic energy. Within a moment, 6,300 magical units were consumed as Nick focused on the wand being held by the hooded magic beast. A moment later, the wand disappeared from the magic beast''s right hand and appeared within Nick''s grasp. (Success!) While a few of the baboon magic beasts ran towards Nick, the hooded baboon went crazy and snarled in Nick''s direction, pointing and screeching at Nick, seemingly upset at something that Nick had done. The students became confused at this time; one of the males asked: "What just happened?" Another male student replied: "That guy just provided us with a good distraction, that''s what happened. Let''s take these monkeys down." The students, feeling encouraged by Nick''s move, ran towards the group of magic beats, preparing to cast their own spells. Nick looked at the approaching magic beasts and sneered: (Soul Pulse.) Nick''s eyes became completely pitch black in color and a formless force was exuded violently from his soul and five of the twelve baboon magic beasts were thrown backwards as they coughed out a few mouthfuls of blood and hit the ground, sprawling out where they lied with slightly unfocused eyes. The students stopped running towards the battle when they saw what happened and the hooded magic beast looked at Nick warily with squinted eyes. The rest of the large baboons ignored the students and focused on Nick who now appeared to be a greater threat. Nick stored the stolen wand within his space band and brought out his sword which he unsheathed and stored the sheath within the space band once again. Nick and the group of magic beasts stared at each other for a few moments without making any movements, the hooded magic beast having stopped its screaming in order to observe the thief that stole its property. Nick thought: (The leader of this group sure has great intelligence. It immediately stopped caring about the wand and became cool headed the moment I showed my power. If it won''t take the initiative to move this standoff along, then I will.) By the time Nick had this thought, the magic beasts that had been struck down by Soul Pulse had risen to their feet again and were ready to attack. Seeing that all of its companions had readied themselves, the leader of the magic beasts screeched and pointed at Nick, signaling for its group to attack him. The group of magic beats ran towards Nick in tandem and with their speed it would only take them a few seconds to reach Nick. Nick held his sword firmly with his right hand and swung it from his left side to his right with fierceness while casting his blade path spell: (Cleave.) While the eleven baboon magic beasts were running towards him, Nick radiated a strong magic power and a sharp, imposing force was launched at the magic beasts. A moment later, all eleven magic beasts were cut in half horizontally at their midsections and their carcasses fell horrifyingly onto the ground. The leader of the group of magic beasts opened his eyes wide and showed an almost human like expression of fear as its screeching stopped; instead of further retaliation, the magic beast immediately tried to escape by running way. Since Nick was at its right side and the students from Raylam Priest Academy at its left, it decided to run towards the expanse of woodland in front of it. The magic beast was surprisingly fast and could run with both of its arms in addition to its legs, however, before it could get among the trees, one of the students suddenly cast a spell and within a few moments moved towards the magic beast amidst a gust of greenish wind, catching up to it and casting another spell: (Wind Swirl) A greenish mass of swirling wind shot out from around the male student towards the magic beast but sensing this, the magic beast countered by turning towards the attack and spitting out a blob of purple liquid from its mouth that turned into a bright purple gas when it collided with the wind. The gas spread and separated the magic beast and the student. One of the females from the group of students shouted: "Sean, get away from that gas, that''s definitely poison magic at work." The young man whose name was apparently Sean wrapped himself with greenish wind and retreated back to his group, frowning as he witnessed the large hooded baboon escape into the woodlands. The burly student from before that had received the hooded baboon''s attack looked over at Nick and shouted: "Hey you, are you not going to chase that thing down and kill it?" Nick looked and the group of students and internally sneered: (This was your fight to begin with and even with my assistance, you let one of them escape and now you are asking me to chase the magic beast. Shameless!) One of the female students patted the burly man''s shoulder and said: "Don''t push it Clide, he already helped us out. Let that magic beast go, chasing it won''t get us anything of value and might even be problematic if it has more poison path spells in its arsenal." The burly man nodded after being reminded but kept a stern expression. Nick wasn''t interested in these people and was about to leave when the group of students ran over to him. Nick stood his ground and flexed his right sword wielding arm as a warning to the group. The group stopped moving towards him when they got within a few feet of him; there were eight of them in total. The burly man stepped forward and introduced himself: "My name is Clide Wilson of Raylam Priest Academy''s second year and these are my friends and classmates. May we know your name so that we can communicate better?" Nick thought for a moment, then replied: "It''s Nick capitol." Clide nodded and continued: "Well then Nick, thanks for the assist. The leader of those monkeys would have certainly been problematic to deal with if it had its wand in hand. Before you showed up, it had already struck Dave over there with its lightning path spell and crippled his arm." Clide pointed to the young man that was holding his limp right arm and continued speaking: "We''ll have to return to Shelter Town to have him healed up so I was wondering if you wanted to return with us?" Nick shook his head and replied: "I won''t be returning to Shelter Town for a while, don''t let me get in your way." A blonde haired woman stepped forward at this time and spoke: "Well Nick, I''m actually interested in the wand that the magic beast was using and I noticed that you somehow stole it so do you mind if I traded with you for it. My name is Lissan Doyle of the Doyle family and we specialize in magic weapons like that wand." Nick thought for a moment and brought out the wand from his space band. (Honestly, this ''wand'' just looks like a thin, partly glowing tree branch. Does it really have any use?) Nick had that thought then remembered how the magic beast used it to cast a spell before and decided not to overlook its possible value. Nick looked at Lissan and asked: "What do you want to exchange for it? Do you have any swords made from magic materials?" Lissan shook her head in response to Nick''s latter question and replied: "No, I don''t have such a sword but I have many magic potions within our group''s space band. I want to exchange the wand for some of those." Nick shook his head in refusal. (Like I would purposely drink magic potions that I received from a group of strangers. Do I have ''dunce'' written on my forehead?) Nick responded while storing the wand again: "No thank you, if there''s nothing else, I''ll be going." Nick turned to leave and Lissan''s face became gloomy. Clide saw her expression and felt downcast himself since he had feelings for Lissan so he steeled himself and spoke with his chest out, his words directed at Nick: "Hey, are you forgetting that we out number you, don''t be so quick to leave. We have not given you permission yet." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 100: A Raid Nick frowned at Clide''s remark and quickly responded: "I hope you''re not about to do something stupid Mr. Clide." Clide thought for a moment: (Although his display against those monkeys was impressive, those were just magic beasts while we have eight rank 2 Apprentice Magicians on our side. He can''t possibly think that he can overcome all of us.) Clide spoke sternly: "Don''t spout nonsense. My friend here would like that magic wand and since you interfered in our fight to begin with, you should be happy to trade it with us, even if you don''t want the potions. If you don''t agree with my words, I''ll have no choice but to ''convince'' you." Lissan looked at the scene ambivalently, knowing that Clide''s words were wrong but since she really did want the wand, she chose to say nothing and see how things would play out. Nick turned to Clide and replied to him in the simplest way possible: (Soul Pressure.) All eight students felt a formless pressure wash over them, inhibiting their movements and ruining their concentration. Clide could barely move his mouth to say a few words as blood oozed from his nose: "Th..think...carefully...about...what...you''re...doing." Nick sneered and flicked his right index finger. (Sever.) Clide''s vision suddenly turned to black as his head was separated from his body and flew into the air but strangely enough, as soon as that happened, Clide''s entire being turned into specks of white light and disappeared. Nick raised his right eyebrow in slight surprise. (Is that the effect of the never ending battlefield?) Slade answered: [Most likely. It seems that the moment someone is struck with a fatal blow, they are transported somewhere else.] Nick was glad to confirm the consequences of killing someone even though he did not intend for this to happen. He cancelled Soul Pressure and walked away from the group. The other students felt relieved that the pressure on them had been lifted but looked at Nick with some fear and hatred. Sean spoke to Lissan quickly while wiping blood from his nostrils and lips: "He just killed Clide, are we going to let him go?" Lissan spoke with a bitter expression while turning towards the opposite direction of Nick: "Go seek your own death if you want to, I am returning to Shelter Town to regroup with Clide." Sean frowned at Lissan''s response and turned his attention to his other companions, looking for support. They shook their heads and followed behind Lissan; Sean gritted his teeth and also left for Shelter Town after giving Nick''s receding figure a hate-filled glance. Nick ran deeper into the woodland with a clear mind, he had already firmed up his resolve. (If anyone shows me malice, I will return it in kind while I am in the wilderness. This is not a place to be lenient with others.) Slade spoke at this time: [It''s good that you realize that, but then, why did you not slaughter the entire group?] Nick was momentarily stumped by the question. (Why didn''t I?...I guess I just didn''t think of doing that because only Clide aggravated me and the rest of them seemed weak to me.) Slade responded in disappointment: [That half measure that you just performed was weak. Listen, if you''re going to do something, go all the way; you are not allowed to be half-hearted during this exam. If you can kill one, kill one, if you can kill two, kill two. Don''t let future problems walk around freely; when dealing with adversaries, destroy them totally or you are breeding your own destruction. The moment that that fool made his final remark, they had all become your adversaries; there are no mere spectators out here.] Nick felt that Slade was right and adjusted his mindset so that he would not make the same mistake in the future. Nick soon came upon another group of baboon like magic beasts and cast Soul Pressure and made use of Sever multiple times to kill them quickly, collecting their carcasses afterwards. For the next few hours up until sundown, Nick encountered the same ape and baboon like magic beasts and killed as much as he could, sometimes using Clear Space to flee when their numbers were too great. When it became sundown, Nick found a small clearing in the woods and tapped his space band and willed for a steel container that was 6 x 12 x 6 meters in dimensions to appear within the clearing. The container had a silver, chrome colored exterior with one entrance and a few concealed vents; Its walls were reinforced with magically treated steel and had cameras and motion sensors on the exterior. Nick had considered that he would be spending some time in the wilderness after Varrow told him about the realm and quickly bought one of these portable safe-houses for ¡ê100,000,000 with the help of Carla''s connections; this small container actually cost more than his commercial building which was probably to be expected since it was made out of highly resistant magically treated metals. With this, he would not have to sleep out in the open and this safe-house also emitted smells and subtle sounds into the surroundings that deterred magic beasts like how a skunk''s stink spray deterred other animals. Nick had fully realized the value of having money to burn while he was attending Richter Order Academy. Nick entered the safe house and immediately went to take a shower, after which, he had a meal of roasted chicken and fried dumplings. Nick had ordered a lot of food in preparation for the exam and stored them within the space band; high-end space bands could keep food and other organic materials from going bad indefinitely so food and water would not be a problem for a while. Nick summoned his new high-end laptop and read a math text that he had stored on it as well as a book on magic beasts that he had copied from the library. When he was finished reading those books, Nick studied his soul, space, and blade path inheritances for an hour each before finally meditating and then going to sleep on a small bed in the corner of the safe-house. Nick had an alarm near the bed and set it to wake him up in a few hours. ******************************** RING RING RING Nick woke up and brushed his teeth and took a shower, after which, he had a breakfast of cinnamon porridge and scrambled eggs with orange juice. When he was done, Nick left the safe-house and stored it within his space band once again. (Being rich really makes things convenient.) Slade remarked: [Sigh, kid, when I was your age, I was homeless and lived out in fields where I had nothing but weeds to eat while I practised magic. Comparisons are really odious.] Nick shrugged his shoulders and moved in a random direction since he was unfamiliar with the area. The time was just before sunrise which left the woodland a little dim but the feint dimness did not hamper Nick''s vision. Soon, Nick came upon the foot of a cliff that was the beginning of a rock wall that was at least forty meters high. Nick thought for a moment on whether he should turn back but after looking at a nearby tree, he thought of a plan quickly. Nick climbed the tree that was only about four meters high and sat on one of its thick branches; he placed his left palm onto the tree''s trunk and cast his spell: (Big.) The effects of Big allowed Nick to increase the dimensions of an object depending on the magic energy that he invested in casting the spell. Nick poured 9,000 magical units into activating and maintaining the spell while the tree that he was resting on rose into the air until Nick''s position was slightly above the edge of the cliff. Nick cast Big on the thick branch that he was sitting on to create a bridge towards the cliff and jumped down to the ground once he was within a safe distance above the ground. Nick then turned towards the tree and and traced a horizontal line with his right index finger, casting: (Sever.) The tree was suddenly cut apart at about twenty meters above the ground and its upper half fell to the ground with a loud crash. Nick had learnt from the mistake of the first baboon magic beast that he killed. (Wouldn''t want someone or something following me up here via that tree.) Nick looked at the terrain leading away from the cliff and saw nothing but an expanse of grassland with very few trees. Nick breathed in deeply and started running away from the cliff''s edge towards the expanse. (This is the most free I''ve felt in a long time.) Nick was on the move for about two hours when he finally met the next magic beast while it was devouring the carcass of a horse like magic beast. The magic beast looked like an adult grizzly bear but had long iron like claws and teeth and its eyes also radiated a silver glow. Since there were no trees to provide cover, the bear magic beast quickly noticed Nick and stopped eating its meal. It snarled menacingly and ran towards Nick on all fours; Nick quickly took out his sword from his space band and unsheathed it, storing the sheath afterwards. Nick ran towards the magic beast and swung his sword from his left side to his right and cast: This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it. (Cleave.) A sharp, formless power emerged from Nick''s sword and bit into the bear but the attack only created a shallow cut on the bear''s left shoulder and side which visibly healed within a few seconds. Slade spoke: [The is a metal path magic beast that has decent defense and regenerative abilities, be careful.] Nick nodded and cast two more spells: (Reinforce With Soul.) (Soul Pressure.) The magic beast''s movements slowed and it bled from its nose but still continued charging towards Nick. Nick lunged at the bear while holding his reinforced sword with both hands and attacked with movements from the Menacing Crane sword technique. Nick soon realized that the magic beast''s defense was incredible and it was also quick, so much so that it almost impaled Nick with its claws a few times but Nick had always cast Blink just in time to dodge a fatal blow. As the battle went on for ten minutes, Nick found himself covered with a few superficial cuts and bruises. Nick got behind the bear and swung his sword: (Sever.) The attack cut into the magic beast''s right hind leg and Nick noticed that this wound was taking an unusual amount of time to heal. Slade remarked: [Since this magic beast is covered with metal path laws, it has some resistance to blade path attacks but rule path appears to be another story, hurry up and finish this.] Nick''s eyes became a complete pitch black as he cast two spells in quick succession: (Sou Pulse.) (Sever.) Nick swung his blade onto the bear''s side and with the power of Sever as well as the impactful and disorienting effect of Soul Pulse, Nick was able to injure the magic beast heavily, slowing its movements temporarily to a crawl and leaving a deep wound on its left side. Nick got in close and grabbed the magic beast''s midsection, near to the wound with his left hand and poured his magic power into the bear: (Big.) Before the bear could retaliate, its midsection begun to bloat and it spit out a few mouthfuls of blood before it fell to the ground, lifeless; the magic beast had died from the internal bleeding that resulted from Nick enlarging some of its internal organs. Nick thought: (This bear was strong, I think that it would make a great meal.) Nick summoned a magically strengthened cleaving knife from his space band and started hacking at the magic beast''s paws. Nick was planning to cook the magic beast''s four paws and wanted to avoid eating its internal organs since many of them would have been affected by Big. After cutting off the beast''s four paws, Nick summoned a basin and a large jug of water as well as a few spices and after cleaning his hands, Nick started cleaning the paws and seasoning them with salt and other spices as well as specially prepared flour. He then summoned a battery powered fryer and threw the bear''s paws into it upon which the sound of frying flesh could be heard. Twenty minutes later, Nick turned off the fryer, stored the fried paws within a bowl and returned the fryer to his space band. Nick continued walking on while chewing on the fried magic beast paws which filled him with a rush of energy after he cast Growth; they were tender and succulent. (I know that I''m not a great cook but these came out awesome.) Nick walked slowly while having his meal, and used the time to carefully observe the surroundings. There wasn''t much magic beasts around for some reason but that could be explained by the presence of the bear magic beast. (It might have been the apex predator in this area, thus other magic beasts might be avoiding my current location. I have to go further.) Nick threw away the left over bones from his meal and ran forward until he saw some smoke in the distance. Nick stopped and looked at the rising gray smoke and thought: (Where there''s fire, there''s smoke. Should I go towards it?) Nick quickly shook off his hesitation and headed towards the direction where the smoke was coming from. Moving towards the smoke, Nick realized that there were a fair amount of magic beast carcasses to be found on the ground, some of which looked like dogs, wolves, horses, lizards and pumas. Nick ignored the carcasses and continued moving. Soon, he came upon a group of tents that were surrounding a large fire where meat was being cooked by a group of people. There was no cover in the grassland so what was going on in the settlement could be easily seen, but in turn, the people there soon noticed Nick. A group of four Magicians ran out to meet him, at which point Nick saw the Raylam Priest Academy''s emblems pinned to their chests. (More students from Raylam Priest Academy. I hope that these people have better sense than Clide did.) One of the four people that ran out to meet Nick was a thin young man wearing a pair of blue jeans and a zipped up leather jacket; the young man had a white complexion and spoke to Nick mildly: "Friend, my name is Nate Barlow and I am a student of Raylam Priest Academy. Do you mind introducing yourself?" Nick felt no need to be standoffish and replied: "I am Nick Capitol of Richter Order Academy. What are you all doing here?" Nate looked at his companions and they nodded their heads at each other, seeming to signal that telling Nick their intentions would be fine. Nate spoke warmly: "We are a group of twenty six rank 2 Magicians and some of our scouts found an underground passage filled with peppermint crystals and we are planning to raid it tonight, would you like to join us?" Nick raised both of his eyebrows upon hearing their reply. Nick knew what peppermint crystals were from reading books and knew that they could be used in creating high level healing potions so they were well sought after and valuable. (Why are they inviting me? If there are benefits to be gained, they should want to keep it for themselves.) Nick frowned and asked: "What''s the catch?" Nate smiled bitterly and replied: "Well Nick, the cave also happens to be filled with goblins of rank 1 and rank 2 strength and there is even a mutant rank 2 goblin that can cast spells so we need as much help as possible to raid the underground passage." Nick thought: (Now I see, goblins. Normally, an individual goblin is not even worth considering but when in a large group, they are a terrifying threat because of their innate human like intelligence. They want we to go into an enclosed space with those things running around? Hell no.) Nick shook his head and responded: "No thanks, that seems like more trouble than it''s worth." Nate''s smile turned even more bitter and he said: "You see...a few of our people were actually captured by those goblins when they were exploring the passage and we would like to get them back so we are willing to pay you for your assistance." Nick thought for a moment before asking: "Do you have any swords made of magic materials?" Nate scratched his head as he thought and realizing something, he replied: "Our group''s leader should have some of those. Are you saying that you want one as payment?" Nick answered: "Yes, that is what I am saying." Nick has grown very interested in swords since he began using his in real combat and would like to obtain additional ones for the purpose of study but the exam arrived too soon and he was not able to purchase any because of the lengthy process in buying one, regulated by the Ministry of Magic. Nate nodded and said: "Come with me to our camp and meet our leader, only he can agree to your request." Nate and his three companions turned and moved hastily towards their camp and Nick followed closely behind them, keeping up with their pace. Soon, they came to a large fire where nearly two dozen students were conversing with each other and eating. At a wooden round table, near the fire, a young man was standing as he spoke to a group of six other people sitting around the table. The young man noticed Nate''s arrival with an unfamiliar guest and stared indifferently while directing a question at Nate: "Nate, who is this?" Before Nate could answer, the young man looked Nick squarely in the eyes which caused Nick to feel a sense of alarm. Slade said quickly: [Kid, this young man is using a wisdom path method on you. While I am helping you to resist it since it is a fairly simple method you need to strike back to get him to stop.] Nick internally sneered and cast a spell and his already scary looking black-red eyes shone with an ominous silver light; Nate noticed the weird interaction going on between Nick and the group leader and chose to stay quiet. (Ghost Eyes.) Nick''s and the young man''s soul suddenly wound up in a mystical confrontation and after a few moments, the result of the confrontation became clear. The young man''s expression transformed from indifferent to bitter as he coughed out a mouthful of blood and bled from his nostrils. Nick spoke with unhidden displeasure: "I am Nick Capitol of Richter Order Academy!" Everyone in the camp paused what they were doing and watched the scene warily, their mood becoming grim. Nate sighed, not expecting such a bad start to the meeting but he ignored the awkwardness and quickly introduced Nick before the other students got up in arms. "Mike, this is Nick Capitol and I am trying to convince him to join us in the raid tonight but he says that he wants a sword made of magic materials in return..." Nick suddenly interrupted, holding up three fingers: "Based on that idiocy just a moment ago, now I actually want three of such swords or you can all go screw yourselves." Nate smiled bitterly and looked at their leader, Mike, asking: "What do you think?" Mike looked at Nick while wiping blood from his lips with his right hand and then spoke with a slightly less indifferent tone: "Three swords made of magic materials, right? Yeah, I have those and are keeping them in our communal space band. Nick, was it? If you join us and actively contribute to a successful raid, you can have the swords." Nick nodded his head, signalling that they had a deal. He then said: "Show me the location of the passage then." Nate motioned one of his female companions to show Nick the way and after they both walked into the distance, Nate said to Mike grudgingly: "What the hell Mike, why would you suddenly attack someone that I led here?" Mike shrugged his shoulders and rubbed is black, slick styled hair, replying: "I assumed that you brought him here as help but if he was a useless bum, I didn''t even want to talk to him since he was not from our academy." Nate opened his eyes wide as he looked at Mike and asked: "Are you serious?" A fit of laughter then sounded from one of the women at the table. She had a white complexion, blue eyes and long, curly, blonde hair; she answered for Mike: "Yup, he is serious and I''d have to agree with his tactics. At least we now know that we have gained an interesting team member." Nate shook his head and responded: "Mike, Erica, you''re both crazy." Mike responded indifferently: "Hmph, he just has a few skills. When he comes back, we will discuss things." ***************************** Nick walked behind the blonde young woman that was showing him the way to the entrance to the underground passage. The young woman was a head shorter than Nick and wore a pair of dark blue jeans, combat boots, a grey t-shirt and a denim jacket. Nick thought that she seemed fairly athletic and pretty but he quickly got rid of those thoughts and took note of the route to the passage. (We''ve walked about fourteen meters away from the camp so far and I''ve seen no other humans or magic beasts? I think that''s a little weird but maybe I''m just paranoid...) The young woman suddenly spoke lively, disrupting Nick''s thoughts: "My name is Clarissa, by the way. That standoff that you had with Mike was so cool. I bet he didn''t expect you to counter him so well. What kind of spell did you use against his Penetrating Wisdom." Nick thought for a moment before answering the young woman: "A soul path spell." The young woman nodded in understanding and turned around to face Nick while walking backwards, responding: "That make sense, soul path is a great counter to wisdom path. Wisdom path Magicians are kind of rare so the other students treat Mike with a lot of respect but in my opinion, he''s a little reckless." Nick stayed quiet and Clarissa turned around to walk forward once again, both of them remaining silent. Five minutes later, Nick and Clarissa arrived at the site of a bricked opening in the ground that appeared to be the beginning of a stair case. Nick thought: (How convenient.) Clarissa pointed to the underground entrance and said with firm resolve in her eyes: "We have to save our academy-mates from those goblins." World of Laws and Magic Chapter 101: Goblins Nick thought: (Good for you.) Nick only wanted the swords that he was promised as well as a little combat experience, after all, he only ever fought goblins in a simulation at the academy and he now wondered how real goblins would measure up. Nick focused on the entrance and tried to sense if any magic energy was coming out of it but after two minutes, he sensed nothing. (It seems that the only way to know what''s going on down there is to enter myself.) Nick sighed and said to Clarissa: "Let''s go back to the camp, this hole is creepy." Clarissa replied: "Yeah, that''s true." Clarissa led Nick back to the camp at which point Nick once again met Mike, Nate and the rest at the wooden round table and said with practised indifference: "I want the swords before the raid begins. Who knows how nasty things will get down there and if you all get killed, I don''t want to waste time having to look for you." Mike frowned at Nick''s attitude but thought for a moment: (He is unlikely to go against his word because we will all have to eventually return to the same town, not to mention that he would have to face the constant pursuit of all of us if he did. Fine, I''ll give him the swords before hand to show him our sincerity as well as a subtle apology for attacking him earlier.) Nick was not surprised at Mike''s sudden pause to think of a reply as wisdom path Magicians were said to be most adept at scheming. (He''s still to green, though. I can already tell that he is scheming against me.) Mike replied with a snap of his fingers and a few words: "Erica, give him the three swords." The blonde young woman with long, curly hair sitting at the table spoke with a mischievous grin: "Right, no problem." Erica tapped the space band on her right wrist and three sheathed swords appeared on the table. Their designs looked much fancier than the sword that Varrow gave Nick but Nick knew that did not necessarily mean that they were better. Nick unsheathed each sword one by one and examined them closely. (I don''t know much about weapons so its hard to tell what kind of materials these swords are made from.) Nick looked at Mike and asked: (What are the specifications of these sword?) Mike said indifferently: "Don''t worry, they are the real deal. A man from the Tate family never goes back on his words. The sword with the silver sheath is called Blind Crest and its blade is made from basic apprentice grade alloys, the sword with the blue sheath is called Sky Piercer and is made from the steel like bones of a flying giant magic beast and the final sword with the yellow sheath is called Wicked Thorn and its blade was made from the spine of a rank 2 metal path magic beast. They are all basic apprentice grade swords." Nick thought for a moment: (All the swords have names? That''s so cliche. I guessed I should have expected all of them to be basic apprentice grade. I''ll test them out later, I don''t think that these guys will let me out of their sight now that I''ve accepted these rewards.) Nick rubbed each of the swords a bit then stored them in his space band and then asked Mike: "Why do you have these swords with you, do you use them in combat?" Nate who was sitting at the table grinned because he knew the answer. (Mike is a wisdom path Magician in training and hardly has much combat ability but he likes to carry around swords to make himself seem tough.) Mike slapped the round table and replied with obvious pride: "Because they accentuate my greatness." Nick looked at Mike for a moment with a blank stare, then responded: "...Okay." Erica and the rest seemed like they were trying their best to hold back their laughter. Slade told Nick: [He probably doesn''t use them in combat since, generally, sword path and wisdom path greatly conflict with each other.] Nick already thought that was the case and said: "Well, I''ll just mind my own business until the raid starts. Come get me then." Nick tapped his space band and his steel container safe-house appeared within the camp. Nick went inside and locked the door behind him. Many of the students gasped at Nick''s clear affluence. Erica''s grin seemed to sombre a little bit; she spoke openly: "That''s a Genex safe-house from The Maximillian company and it''s their newest model. It looks like we have a rich loner in our midst." Everyone at the table including Mike and Nate nodded. They could tell that Nick was a loner because despite having a high end space band, he did not have any companions with him. Their group had twenty plus members and they had to pool all of their allowances to purchase an inferior space band compared to Nick''s and now after seeing this safe-house that cost a large sum of money, even in their eyes, their opinion of Nick solidified to that of a rich loner. Nate asked hurriedly: "Shouldn''t we include him in our discussions about the raid tonight." Mike shook his head slowly, saying: "If he wanted to be part of our discussions, he would not have brought out that safe-house and entered it. We don''t need to discuss anything more with him anyway, his job is just to kill all the goblins that he sees." Everyone at the table agreed but the other students around the campfire were a little pissed at the newcomer for not taking the time to get familiar with them. Erica saw this and took the initiative to walk up to Nick''s safe-house and ring the door bell. After a few moments, the steel door slid open and Nick appeared, asking: "What?" Erica smiled and said: "We are about to do some spars to prepare for the raid, mind if you and I exchange a few moves?" Everyone looked at the interaction, waiting for Nick''s response which made Nick feel uncomfortable. (What? Do they want to see a show of my strength. It looks like my confrontation with Mike wasn''t enough to impress them.) Nick sighed and replied: "Fine, lead the way." After Nick stored his safe-house within his space band, Erica led Nick to an area that was a few meters outside of camp; the other students all followed them to see the show since Erica was the third strongest member of their group. The other students wanted to see her humble the arrogant Nick a bit. Nick stood six meters away from and in front of Erica; he summoned his trusty morning wyvern bone sword and waited for Erica to begin the match. A few seconds later, she shouted: "Ready!" Erica clasped her hands and a torrent of magic energy was exuded by her. (Glacial Surface) Beginning at Erica''s feet, a layer of ice spread out on the ground towards Nick at a speed that he could not keep up with; the ice spread towards him in a wide area which made it difficult for him to even dodge by using Blink because the ice would probably cross a few meters within moments. Without much surprise, the layer of ice spread to Nick''s feet and kept him in place. Nick felt a bone chilling cold penetrate his legs and retaliated by making a slashing motion with his sword towards Erica, exuding a fair amount of magic energy. (Vision of the Blade.) While Erica still had her hands clasped in concentration, she suddenly felt her head droop down and fall to the ground, the rest of her body still standing upright. (What happened?) The next moment, however, the scene changed back to that of her fierce offensive before she lost her head. Erica became confused. (Was that an illusion?) Nick didn''t care what Erica was thinking since he just wanted to disrupt her concentration for a bit and he was successful since the ice layer on the ground mostly cracked apart the moment that Erica was affected by his blade and wisdom path method. Nick stretched out his left hand towards Erica and cast: (Soul Attraction.) Erica''s feet slightly left the ground, separated from the partly shattered ice that had also kept her in place and her body was pulled at running speed towards Nick who was waiting to strike again. Erica shouted: If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the violation. "Not so fast, hun!" Erica pointed her right index finger at Nick and cast: (Ice Spears.) Two meter long poles of ice were suddenly generated by Erica and the sharply pointed ends were directed at and flung towards Nick using magic energy. Nick sneered and retaliated by casting Reinforce With Soul on his sword and swung it in the direction of the approaching spears. (Cleave.) The ice spears were simultaneously cut in half from their tips to the opposite end and shattered. By the time that happened, Erica was already only a meter away from Nick and coming in fast. Assuming that she would be crashing into Nick very soon, she cast one of her strongest spells: (Myself As A Blizzard.) A torrent of ice and snow suddenly generated around Erica and swirled at an incredible speed, creating a small blizzard within the area and its epicenter was about to collide with Nick, probably freezing him solid. Nick felt the cold air approaching him and sighed. (This was only supposed to be a spar but she is using such a method, most of my strongest attacks are geared towards inflicting heavy damage and I do not want to injure her in consideration of tonight but I can''t be lax in the face of this attack.) Nick cancelled Soul Attraction and the small blizzard fell to the ground only a few feet away from him but the cold wind and ice was still moving towards him. Nick''s black-red eyes became a complete pitch black as he activated his spells one after the other: (Half A Kilometer.) (Spirit Quake.) (Soul Pulse.) The movement of the spreading cold wind and ice seemed to have slowed to a crawl because under the effect of Half A Kilometer, it had to now cross five hundred meters of distorted space to reach Nick. Erica who had transformed herself into a miniature mass of ice, snow and wind felt her soul shake as a result of Spirit Quake which greatly decreased her concentration. (Lucky for me that Myself As A Blizzard is a transformation path and ice path spell so it requires minimal concentration to maintain. Hmph, you''re counter failed!) That''s what she thought until she was hit with the full brunt of Soul Pulse at which point her concentration was completely shattered and her spell broke apart. Since she was only a few feet away from Nick, the explosive force of Soul Pulse sent her flying like a rag doll and the damage to her soul from Nick''s attack as well as the backlash from the forced cancellation of her spell caused her to spit out several mouthfuls of blood. There was a trail of red blotches along the path that Erica flew over as she fell to the ground harshly almost two meters away from Nick. Erica lied on the ground, her face covered in the blood that oozed out from her eyes, mouth and ears; it was a pathetic sight to say the least. Nate opened his eyes wide as he witnessed the seen, not believing that Erica was beaten so badly; the other students looked on with just as much astonishment and a little pity for Erica. Mike hurriedly ran towards Erica and stooped down to feed her a bright red liquid from a flask sized glass bottle. Nick thought: (Oh, they have healing potions on hand, that''s good.) After drinking the entire bottle of red liquid, Erica still grimaced from the massive headache that she was experiencing but the potion had mostly healed her physical injuries. Mike looked up at Nick and said with a tone that was a little more respectful than before: "That''s enough, you won." Nick shrugged his shoulders and returned his sword to his space band; he then proceeded to walk back to the camp with an indifferent expression, leaving behind a few words: "Notify me when it is time for the raid." ******************************** Nick sat at a desk in his safe-house that he had summoned once again when he got back to the camp. After having a meal of butter bread and sausages, he began reading his electronic copy of a book on common magic beasts, paying special attention the the section on goblins. After spending an hour and a half reading about them, Nick turned off his laptop and said: "This raid will probably be a little tough..." Nick sighed and began studying his inheritances until it became night time and his door bell rang. Nick opened the door and came face to face with Clarissa who spoke with nervousness in her tone: "It''s time to go out to raid that goblin den." Nick nodded, left the safe-house and stored it within his space band and then followed Clarissa to group up with the others who had already stored their tents and other items within the communal space band that Erica wore. Nick walked among the group, soon coming face to face with Nate, Mike, Erica and a young man that Nick had not seen before; the young man had a mixture of gray and black short hair on his head and had a white complexion. He looked at Nick with a gleam in his eyes and asked Erica. "My sweet, is he the one that tuned you up so badly?" Erica avoided looking into Nick''s eyes and replied: "Yes, Saul." The young man who was apparently named Saul walked up to Nick at which point Nick became tense, feeling a strange magic power coming from the young man but surprisingly, the young man did not try to get into a conflict with Nick and simply patted him on the left shoulder: "I hope we can kill many goblins tonight, my brother in arms." Nick brushed Saul''s hand off of his shoulder and responded: "Sure, I hope so too." Everyone else except Erica breathed out a sigh of relief after seeing the calm interaction between Nick and Saul. All of them knew that Saul was very popular among the second year women within their academy and Erica was one of his favorites so they half expected a brawl because Nick had caused Erica so much pain but it turns out that Saul was more reasonable that they had previously thought. Saul turned away from Nick and started leading the group towards the underground passage; Nate walked beside Nick and tried to get him to relax: "Don''t worry about earlier, it was only a spar and Erica asked for it. We''re all good." Nick replied with disinterest: "Sure..." Slade remarked with a grim tone: [You felt it when that boy touched you, right?] Nick didn''t have to guess at what Slade was referring to and replied: (Oh, you mean the disguised malice, like prostate exam.) [Then I don''t have to remind you what to do if things get funny, do I?] Nick smiled lightly. (Send them to their graves laughing.) ****************************** Shelter Town, inn number 4... A table in the small dining area was over thrown by a burly man with a Raylam Priest Academy insignia pinned to his chest. One of the students sitting at the table frowned and asked in anger: "Who the hell are you? Why did you suddenly flip over our table?" The burly man replied with blood shot eyes: "I am Clide Wilson of Raylam Priest Academy and I want to know where your associate Nick Capitol is!" The people at the table frowned even deeper when they heard that; one of them stood up and responded: "Nick Capitol, are you stupid? He is not our associate. Do you think that because we go the the same academy that we must know him or his whereabouts?" Clide knew that they were correct in what they were saying but he was so angry that he did not care. (That bastard humiliated me in front of the group, even more so, in front of Lissan. I won''t stop until I teach him a lesson.) As Clide was about to make more trouble for the other students, a woman sitting at a distant table with a man asked Clide sweetly: "Hey babes, I know Nick Capitol and you could even say that we are best friends but he''s been real mean to me lately. What''s your gripe with him?" The man next to the woman frowned and said to the woman: "Marsha, don''t get us stupidly involved in some conflict because you have an old grudge." Marsha frowned at hearing that and gave a sharp look at her companion before responding: "It''s not an ''old'' grudge Greg and if nothing else, that Nick still owes me an explanation." Greg sighed, he had no problems with Nick and suspected that the man was formidable since he tended to attract attention wherever he went but Marsha has been obsessed with getting revenge on Nick for quite some time and he has found himself being dragged into it since he and Marsha had already made a pact to help each other during exams no matter what. (It also doesn''t help that I''ve been fucking her recently.) Greg shook his head and smiled bitterly. Marsha focused on Clide once again and spoke sweetly: "Now babes, just tell me all that you know about my bestie, Nick Capitol." ***************************** Nick frowned as he and the rest of the group of students had almost reached the underground passage. As they got closer to their destination, Nick''s frown became deeper. He turned to Nate who was walking beside him and asked: "How long have you people been in this area?" Nate didn''t know why Nick wanted to know the answer but he replied anyway: "We actually rushed to this area this morning to flee from a pack of hyena like magic beasts. We were a little surprised that they did not follow us here but we assumed that they did not like to leave their territory." Nick asked another question: "How many magic beasts did you encounter while being in this area since this morning?" Nate thought for a while, then said: "About a dozen, why?" Nick''s frown persisted and he replied: "Don''t you find the lack of magic beasts roaming around a little strange? In addition, goblins are said to have human like tendencies, meaning that they hunt in the day time and rest at night, which is why you guys waited to raid tonight, right?" Nate looked confused and asked: "What are you getting at, Nick?" Nick squinted his eyes and asked: "Why haven''t the goblins come above ground to hunt and where are the other magic beasts? This is the second time I have walked on this route today and I see no signs or traces that anything else but us are currently inhabiting this area." Nate shrugged and asked: "Why ask questions that you nor I can answer, Nick?" Nick sighed and shook his head, saying: "Forget I brought it up." Nate responded simply before going back to minding his own business: "Okay." Nick asked Slade: (Are you also getting a bad feeling, uncle Slade?) Slade replied: [You might be on to something , kid, but I have too little information to make a deduction.] Nick sighed again and became silent, continuing to move towards the underground passage. The group arrived at their destination ten minutes later. Saul spoke with authority at this time: "You know the rules, the strongest people will take the lead during any battles and they will also get first pick of the rewards. Is anyone in disagreement?" No one objected and Mike, Saul, Erica Nate and Nick were positioned closest to the front of the group as they descended the staircase to the underground passage. Nick thought: (How comes Saul did not say anything about rescuing the captured students and only talked about rewards?) Slade guessed: [The students can''t be permanently killed, right? So he must consider the retrieval of the peppermint crystals a bigger priority] (Hmmm...I guess.) This is why Nick was never interested in groups; the leaders often saw the group members as tools and cared little about their well being no matter what they said. The students that had been captured by the goblins had been missing for more than twelve hours and Saul only mentioned rewards when he came down here. Nick looked to his side and could see a frown on Clarissa''s face. (She must have noticed the indifference too. Sigh.) When the group finally came to the end of the stone staircase, they were met with a flat, dry floor made of rough limestone. There was only one direction that they could move in, where the passage was wide enough to fit a group eight times the size of theirs but it was dark. Saul commanded: "Erica, take out the LED lights from the space band, it doesn''t matter if the goblins see us coming. That''s better than us being caught unawares in the dark." Erica tapped the communal space band that she was wearing and ten high powered, battery powered LED lamps were released from the space band. Five students were given the responsibility of carrying the lamps and lighting the way, two to a man. The group walked a couple dozen meters forward in silence with nothing suspicious happening. One of the young men carrying a LED lamp suddenly alerted the group with a shout and everyone turned to him to see what was the matter. He scratched the back of his head and said. "Uhhh, I actually just wanted someone to hold these lights while I go take a piss." Saul frowned and asked someone else to take hold of the lights while that young man went to a section of the wall a few meters behind them and relieved himself. The young man walked about two meters away from the group and unzipped his pants, beginning to urinate at the base of the wall. He lightly whistled and moved his head around while he carried on his business. Suddenly, he kept his head straight as he noticed something strange about the wall in front of him, this section of the wall was dimly lit since the lights were mostly positioned towards the front of the group. The young man spoke uncertainly. "Why is this section of the wall so wrinkled?" As if responding to the young man''s words, two glowing, blood shot green eyes suddenly opened in front of him. The young man was so shocked that he let go of his penis and some of the urine sprayed unto his shoes. Before the young man could even scream, a wrinkled, light brown complexioned figure emerged from the shadow cast on the wall and stabbed into his throat with a stone dagger. The young man held his throat that was now bleeding profusely; some females within the group began to scream, at which point dozens of shadows cast on the walls began to squirm, child sized, brown goblins emerging from them. The goblins had wrinkled skin and sharp, yellow teeth with almost no hair on their heads. The unfortunate young man soon went limp and fell to the ground, becoming specs of light and disappearing. By the time that happened, Nick''s group was already surrounded by goblins who were smiling fiendishly at them. Nick summoned his morning wyvern bone sword and readied himself, remembering what Slade had previously said to him: ''If you can kill one, kill one, if you can kill two, kill two.'' Nick shouted from among the group: "Kill them all!" World of Laws and Magic Chapter 102: I Promise The goblins quickly ran towards the group of students from all sides when a torrent of magic energy seemed to gather around Saul and was then released; Saul shouted: "Slow Time!" All of the goblins suddenly had their movements slowed down in an awkward way, as if they were purposely moving in slow motion. Nick raised his right eyebrow in surprise. (Was that time magic?) As if to answer Nick''s question, Saul cast another spell on the surrounding goblins: "Rewind Time!" The goblins seemed to move backwards like the reverse recording of a television video and moved back to the previous moment when they just emerged from the shadows. Nick was amazed and envious. (God dammit, I should have asked Andre for time path affinity!) Saul released his spell, at which point, the goblins came out of the shadows one again; Saul commanded: "Kill them, they are shadow goblins so they can easily blend in with the shadows and stalk us, we cannot let a single one escape." The group members did not hesitate to cast their spells: ice spears, snow balls, fire arrows, mud slaps; many of such spells were cast but they paled in effectiveness compared to Nick''s blade path method. Nick swung his sword in one direction. (Cleave.) Three goblins lost their heads. Nick swung his sword in another direction. (Cleave.) Five goblins were grotesquely sliced apart. Nick went on to kill many more goblins, cutting them down as if they were grass and he was the landscaper. By the time the battle ended, the ground was covered with craters, blood, organs and the intact carcasses of goblins, the good news being that Nick''s group only had one casualty which was the young man that was surprise attacked while urinating. Nick looked at the goblin carcasses indifferently when Saul came over and spoke to him: "You were pretty good out there. You specialize in blade magic ,right? From what I heard from the others, I thought that you might have been more partial to soul magic?" Nick replied indifferently: "I''m just a magic fanatic." Saul chuckled and said: "Aren''t we all?" At this time, Mike came over and said: "I made a few deductions and I think that these goblins were waiting for us in ambush as if they were expecting us to come here." At this time, Nate and Erica also came over and agreed with Mike''s opinion. Saul responded: "Even if they thought that we would come here, we still need to clean this place out to get the peppermint crystals...and to save our two companions." Nate nodded his head and said: "Then let''s get going." The group reorganized and continued moving down the passageway; the group did not come across another goblin and they moved unhindered through the passage. They eventually came to a large chamber one hour later. Saul was the first to enter the chamber and his mouth suddenly gaped as he looked on and uttered without thinking: "We''re rich!" The other students who walked in after Saul saw the scene in front of them and were just as astonished. The scout that had escaped capture and reported seeing traces of peppermint crystals failed to determine just how much was down here. Nick looked on and saw large, bright red crystals embedded into that walls and floor of the chamber. (This amount is definitely enough to produce thousands of bottles of high end healing potions. Hmmm...but where are the goblins?) Nick looked around and saw that there were two entrances to this chamber, one at the opposite end of the room and the one that the group was currently standing at. The group suddenly heard someone''s muffled speech from among a group of large, erect peppermint crystals. The group moved closer and actually found a young woman that was naked and tied to a piece of peppermint crystal with chains. "Renee!" Clarissa shouted in joy as she ran to the bound naked woman and Nick, Nate, Mike, Erica and Saul happened to follow along. (Something is not right here.) When the group moved closer to the naked woman who had a piece of cloth stuffed in her mouth, they frowned. Nick thought: (That smell...) The woman''s naked body radiated a musty smell that slapped everyone present in the face. Almost everyone in the group had some ''experience'' and knew what that smell was. Even Nick felt pity for the woman: (Those goblins must have used her like a sex toy.) Nick did read that goblins had a tendency to mate with the women that they captured alive but he did not expect to witness the aftermath personally. Clarissa activated her poison path spell and corroded the iron chain that bound the young woman at which point she fell to the ground but Clarissa helped her to her feet and removed the cloth from her mouth. The naked woman cried uncontrollably as Nick summoned a robe from his space band and gave Clarissa to wrap around the crying woman. Saul put on an expression of sorrow and asked the woman in the midst of her crying as Clarissa tried to comfort her: "Renee, where is James?" Before Renee could answer, a member of their group screamed: "Guys, over here." The group ran towards their teammate, leaving Clarissa and Renee behind and what they saw disturbed them. A young man was bound with ropes behind a large crystal and bent over a stone platform in a compromising position, naked. Dried blood had stained his thighs and legs, showing that he had taken heavy damage to the area near his exposed buttocks. Someone shouted out: "What the fuck!" Nick''s expression grew grim. (The goblins don''t only attempt to mate with females, but also males. They really are beasts, no, they are worse than that.) Some members of the group moved to untie the young man who now wore a vacant expression, not willing to speak as tears fell from his face. Nick summoned a robe to cover him as well. Saul had a deep frown on his face. (This is a bit...troublesome. At worst, I thought that the goblins might have roughed them up or at least killed them, sending them back to Shelter Town but this...forget the peppermint crystals, if we don''t kill those goblins, our reputation and that of the academy''s will be ruined!) Nick looked at Saul''s troubled expression and shook his head. (The captured students have been rescued and the goblins are nowhere to be seen. I want to get out of this place now, I don''t care about the peppermint crystals and I care even less about what is going through Saul''s head.) Just as Nick had this thought, thirty sharp stalactites grew out from the ceiling and were launched quickly down towards the group. Nick noticed in time and cast his spell: (Half A Kilometer.) Nick''s spell covered a one meter radius sphere around him and gave him and some other students the time needed to move out of the way of the falling stalactites. Saul also cast his spell, Slow Time, to assist the other students who were in danger and they were all able to escape from a messy demise. Many of the students looked at Nick with gratefulness but Nick paid them no attention and focused on the two entrances to the chamber and spoke loudly: "The goblins are here." Standing at both entrances were groups of shadow goblins that wielded wooden clubs, stone and steel daggers and some even had leather slings. At the right entrance that Nick and the others had emerged from, one goblin stood out; it had a wooden staff and blue eyes instead of green; magic energy radiated strongly from its body. It smiled at the students with an undisguised malice that sent shivers down many of their spines. Nate, as the second strongest group member, looked on and shouted while Saul and Mike tried to formulate a plan to overcome this situation: "Everyone, get ready for a fight. Whatever you do, don''t let these bastards capture you alive." The latter part echoed in the minds of the group members and their faces turned grim. The staff wielding shadow goblin spoke in human tongue with a shrill voice that was audible to everyone in the chamber: "Surrender now!" This book is hosted on another platform. Read the official version and support the author''s work. Nick acted quickly upon hearing that and stuck his sword into the ground and raised both of his hand in front of his body towards the goblins blocking the right entrance. (That thing can speak our language somehow, that''s definitely a bad sign and I''m not waiting for it to surprise me any further. Rumbling Pillar!) The space covering a three meter radius around the shadow goblins began to warp, twist and shake. Within Nick''s mindscape, 14,000 magical units worth of magic ice crystals were fed into the spell''s laws as they took effect. A few moments later, dozens of shrill screams and slushing noises could be heard coming from the group of goblins as they were torn apart by the warping space, as if they were shoved into a meat grinder. Nick was radiating a massive amount of magic energy at this time and all of the students, including Saul looked at him with incredulity; Saul asked out loud without thinking: "How can he expend that much magic power with one spell at rank 2?" By the time Rumbling Pillar ended, only one goblin still stood in one piece at the right entrance. The staff wielding goblin glowed as a gold liquid covered its whole body and its staff glowed a dull orange light. Nick looked at the staff and thought: (That magic tool seems similar to the wand that I stole from that baboon magic beast. A coincidence?) Nick shook his head and pushed those thoughts aside, now was not the time to wonder. Nick ran towards the gold soaked goblin and tried to make an escape. The other students followed Nick''s lead and ran towards the right entrance as well. The mutant shadow goblin sneered at its adversaries and tapped the ground with the butt of its staff and three iron walls rose up from the ground, concealing the entrance and the mutant goblin. Nick frowned, knowing that he could not destroy these three metal walls in quick succession. The goblins from the opposite entrance had already started to flood into the chamber, heading towards their group of twenty plus students. Nick could not cast Soul Pressure or Soul Pulse because the spells would affect the other students; Nick thought for a moment about acting without concern for the other students and memories suddenly appeared within his mind of earlier years: ############################# Nick who was about ten years old was crying in the corner of a classroom when the door suddenly opened and a chubby middle aged man walked into the classroom with a worried expression, asking: "Nick, some students said that you were in here bawling your eyes out. What''s the matter?" Nick looked at the teacher with tear filled eyes and replied: "Some bullies were beating on someone from our class and I tried to push them away but when I did that, all of the bullies turned on me and started hitting me." The teacher said: "Well, it''s normal to feel sad when other people hurt you, just tell me who the bullies were and this daddy here will deal with them." Nick cried even harder and shook his head, saying: "That''s not why I am crying. When the bullies started hitting me, the classmate that I tried to save got up and after one of the bullies told him to join in, he didn''t hesitate to kick me multiple times until I vomited out my lunch and then he ran off with the bullies when a staff member showed up." The middle aged man frowned and sighed: "Nick, some kids are just that foolish..." Nick screamed out, interrupting the man: "No, I am never helping anyone ever again!" The middle aged man''s frown deepened and he moved in close and gave Nick a tight hug; Nick was so surprised that he momentarily stopped crying. The middle aged man said with a somber tone while hugging Nick: "Now you listen to me young man, you may be too young to understand this but sometimes the world can be cruel and those who just try to help often face the brunt of unfair treatment because of that cruelty but without those kind of people, neither you nor I may have had the opportunity to have even been born. Don''t let anyone take that kind heart of yours away from you, if they do, the bullies win!" The middle aged man continued after releasing Nick from his embrace as he looked into the boy''s tear-filled eyes: "Never be ashamed of or hesitant to help those around you even if they prove to be ungrateful. The real winners are those that can maintain their strong heart even in stressful and inconvenient times. Promise me that you will keep this in mind." Young Nick who was slightly confused stuttered: "I...I..." ############################### Nick snapped back to reality and uttered uncontrollably as a tear flowed down his right eye: "I promise." Nick''s expression grew stern and focused, he activated his spell: (Reinforce with Soul.) His sword became enveloped in a translucent miasma and Nick swung it with one hand from his left to right side. (Cleave.) Over a dozen goblins that were charging in from the front were sliced apart by the power of Nick''s spell; there were over one hundred more goblins to deal with, however. The other students followed Nick''s example and cast their own spells at the incoming goblins which caused the goblins to stop moving forward as they attempted to dodge the attacks. The scene became messy. Nick asked Nate who was next to him: "What is your strongest attack?" Nate replied: "Why do you ask?" "Just say it!" Under the circumstances, Nate became unusually compliant: "I have a spell that emits a sound wave that can cause all of someone''s blood vessels to burst but I need a few minutes to prepare it." Nick nodded and said: "That will do. Prepare the spell and cast it at me when I give the order." Nate became confused. "What are you planning, Nick?" Nick replied: "No time to explain, just do it if you want to get out of this without dying." Nate didn''t like the idea of dying even if he knew that he would be revived within Shelter Town so he started preparing his sound path spell. Saul, Mike and Erica noticed Nick and Nate''s conversation and Saul asked Nick: "What''s going on?" Nick replied: "I need the rest of you guys to hold those other goblins back while Nate and I deal with the mutant shadow goblin." Saul wondered how Nick was planing to do that and was about to ask when Mike grabbed his shoulder and said: "Let''s just do as Nick says for now." Mike was the brains of the group as a wisdom path Magician and was the leader in name so more often than not, Saul followed his suggestions and this time would be no different. Saul replied with an affirmative nod and he, Mike and Erica went to help the other students in fighting the goblins. Nick stored his morning wyvern bone sword within his space band and summoned the sword named Sky Piercer that he received from Mike earlier that day. He held the sword with both hands and cast his spells on the sword: (Reinforce With Soul.) (Big.) Sky Piercer was immediately covered with a translucent miasma and then its blade was extended five meters and broadened by half a meter. Nick swung the sword at the first metal wall blocking the entrance and the mutant goblin, using a movement from the Menacing Crane sword technique and casting his blade path spell with all of his might: (Cleave.) SSSHHHHHIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGG The first wall was horizontally cut in half and fell, pressing against the next wall, then Nick swing his sword again in quick succession. (Cleave.) SSSHHHHHIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGG The second wall fell and the pieces of the first two walls leaned against the area near the third wall''s base. Nick was beginning to feel the increased weight of his enlarged sword so he quickly made a final swing. (Cleave.) SSSHHHHHIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNNGGGGGGGGGG The third wall was sliced in half horizontally from the middle and crashed down revealing the entrance to the chamber and the mutant goblin; the members of Nick''s group cheered at the display and Nick finally dropped his sword that became too heavy for him to hold. Nick was not done yet, while the mutant goblin panicked at seeing its metal wall sliced apart as it was no longer covered with the same gold liquid from before that acted as a sort of defensive measure. Nick shouted at Nate: "Cast your spell at me now!" Nate suddenly opened his mouth that was radiating an intense magic energy and screamed at Nick. (Booming Voice) Nick immediately cast his own spell: (Exchange Space.) Suddenly, Nick disappeared from his position and the mutant goblin took his place and was immediately hit by Nate''s Booming Voice. The mutant goblin instinctively tried to activate a defensive spell but it had already consumed most of its magic energy in defending against Rumbling Pillar and erecting the three metal walls from before so it couldn''t cast its spells. It was hit with Nate''s spell at almost point blank range and many of its blood vessels did indeed burst, causing massive internal bleeding. The mutant goblin fell to the ground, vomiting out a large volume of blood. (Blink.) Nick appeared beside the mutant goblin and traced a horizontal line with his right index finger. (Sever.) The mutant goblin''s head was immediately separated from its body which confirmed its death. Seeing that, the students cheered loudly and the other goblins panicked. Nick summoned his morning wyvern bone sword once again and turned his attention to the other goblins, saying to the other students with a tired but still audible voice: "Let''s kill ''em." The students intensified their attacks as Nick started swinging his sword and casting Cleave wildly at the shadow goblins. Within the next twenty minutes, all the shadow goblins were dead and only the students remained, most of them being completely drained of magic energy. Saul, who was covered in goblin blood at the moment looked at the scene with satisfaction but also a little fear and wondered: (Is this what Magicians who explore realms have to deal with? Scary.) Saul looked gratefully at Nick who was now sprawled onto the ground. (He could have definitely ran away by himself when he cut apart the metal walls and helped to kill the mutant goblin but he stayed. Is he a fool?) Saul smiled at this thought and spoke to everyone: "I know that we are all tired and that we have to return Renee and James to Shelter Town but as long as we are here we might as well mine some of the peppermint crystals to supplement our losses." The students were tired but they all agreed with Saul. Nick was about to refuse and leave when he suddenly felt an incredible magic power coming from the distant entrance to the chamber. (Oh shit, there is still a goblin left.) At the next moment, everyone else felt the powerful magic as well and turned their attention to the distant entrance. A three meter tall, muscular shadow goblin entered the chamber and looked at the carcasses of the other shadow goblins on the ground and snarled with its sharp, yellow teeth. It looked directly at Saul and the rest with absolute menace. Saul opened his yes wide in fear and was about to give the command to retreat when the goblin made a slapping motion and a phantom, yellowish hand appeared out of nowhere and slammed down on Saul, turning him into specs of white light. "Run!" Nick shouted that and immediately got up, running to the first entrance, thinking: (I recognize that power, that''s strength path and that goblin is radiating a crazy amount of magic energy. It''s probably stronger than any of us.) The other students noticed Nick''s movements and followed his lead, however, the goblin somehow out ran Nick and the other students to reach the entrance first, blocking them. Nick reacted quickly: (Blink.) Nick consumed more than half of his remaining magic energy to teleport fifteen meters through the passage - Blink''s maximum distance of effect, past the muscular goblin. Nick did not look behind him as he ran and the screams of the other students became audible from behind him; Nick continued running for as long as he could. Thirty minutes past like that and Nick thought that he was in the clear, however, he soon sensed that something that was radiating powerful magic energy was closing in on him, fast. Nick didn''t have to guess what it was. Nick cast Blink multiple times, each time crossing fifteen meters until he had emptied out his magic energy reserves and he had reached the staircase leading out of the underground passage, which he ascended without stop. Nick soon sensed the intense magic power once again when he got to the entrance of the underground passage and that is was ascending the staircase quickly. Nick made a huge jump and landed outside of the underground passage, rolling some distance away before he sprawled out on the ground completely exhausted and unable to move. The muscular goblin soon appeared at the entrance to the underground passageway and looked at Nick hatefully but did not leave the entrance to pursue him. The goblin sniffed the air, frowned and then walked back down the staircase. Nick stood up in an almost victory stance and cheered: "Fuck you, goblin. I really am the greatest..." As Nick cheered, he felt a sharp pain at his right side as if something had bit him. Nick looked to his side to see a large black scaled lizard with jaws similar to an alligator''s and eyes similar to a cat''s biting into his abdomen. Nick''s eyes opened wide in surprise and after hearing a series of slithering and crawling noises near him, Nick looked up to see what to him appeared to be an ocean of the same creatures moving around as far as the eye could see, under the moon lit sky; they crawled and slithered on top of each other and their glowing green eyes made the scene look incredibly creepy in the dimness of the night. Nick smiled bitterly as he said out loud: "Oh, so these guys are why there are hardly any other magic beasts within the area and why those goblins insist on staying underground." Two more of the lizard like magic beasts lunged at Nick, one biting his head off and the other, tearing his right arm off. Nick''s body suddenly turned into specs of white light and disappeared from the area. The three magic beasts became enraged that their meal had suddenly vanished and started biting at each other until only one was left alive. The winner dragged its scarred and bleeding body into the ocean of its own kind and slithered around like the rest.