At the end of class, Professor Cyr asked if anyone had any questions.
Isaac raised his hand. “How long does it take to level up enough to use health-stealing magic?”
Professor Cyr frowned. “The ability to take health and mana is something that requires a level-two healer with a significant amount of mana. Most of you will never achieve that goal. I suggest you focus on learning life-saving skills here and look for attack spells elsewhere.”
Jack scratched his head.
“Do you have a question, Jack? Or are you just itchy?” Professor Cyr asked.
“I don’t understand what it means to level up.”
“Ah, I see. There are two ways of leveling up. First, there is leveling your individual skills in your class. Now that you’ve all started doing healing spells, you have become level 1 healers. This unlocks an entire category of magical spells that you can use if you have enough mana. Achieving level 2 of any skillset makes you an intermediate user, and level 3 and beyond means you’ve reached advanced or better. Many magic users never unlock level 3. I’ve only ever seen a few students achieve level 5 in a skill during their stay at the Academy. That is more of a lifetime goal that comes with dedication and experience.”
“But what about mana?” another student asked.
Professor Cyr smiled. “Yes, I was just getting there. The second way of leveling is simply by increasing your supply of mana. Basic spells require very little mana, and can be done by any first year with access to a spell book. Others must be unlocked by increasing your mana. By practicing and through gaining experience you can increase your own mana. However, you can also increase your mana with the use of magical equipment. Take Master Dixon, for example.”
Isaac grinned and stood up, welcoming the opportunity to be the focal point of the class.
“Master Dixon comes from a powerful family of mages, an—”
“The most powerful,” Isaac said.
Professor Cyr gave Isaac a look and he shut up. “As I was saying, a powerful family of mages, and someone in his family has gifted him several powerful items. A ring, a necklace and dagger. Each of these items increase his health and mana by six points. For the purpose of this class, that gives him enough mana to unlock the group healing spell. A very useful spell for warriors and questers. You may sit down now, Isaac.”
Isaac bowed theatrically and sat down.
“How do you get better magical items?” another student asked.
“You buy them or find them. The Ancient Lands are filled with magical items. That is why most of the powerful mages you meet either come from money or spent time as questers. That is all the time we have for today. See you next class,” Professor Cyr said.
22
Lord Scratches flew over Jack’s head and then twisted before snatching the ball out of the air. He then flew to the far end of the field and dropped the ball into a bucket. Jack then pointed to a second bucket off to the side. The dragon flew over to it and grabbed a ball out of that bucket and flew back to Jack, dropping the ball into his hand.
Jack pumped his fist. Finally, he and Lord were working together as a team. The first few weeks of Advanced Dragon Studies had been terrible. Lord Scratches was easily distracted, and Jack was terrible at nonverbal communication. Once Lord started to realize Jack’s waving of his hands actually had meaning the dragon started to pay more attention to him. The rest of the classes were going OK, but working with Lord Scratches for Dragon Studies made it more interesting. Every week they were getting better and better, and they needed to. The first round of exams was coming up soon. It was hard to imagine that the school year was almost half over. In some ways it seemed like he’d just gotten there, in others it felt like he’d been at the Academy for years.
As Lord dropped down onto his shoulder, a voice came from behind him.
“That was impressive.”
Jack turned to see Lana. “Hey. What are you doing here?”
“Training with you, or did you forget?”
Jack frowned. “I thought we were meeting here after supper?”
“It is after supper. How long have you and Lord been training?”
Jack looked up at the sky; the sun was setting. He’d been so focused on his work with Lord Scratches that he’d lost track of time. Now that he realized it, his tummy started to rumble. “Oh, I lost track of time.”
“I gathered. Let’s go to the cafeteria and get you some food before it closes for the night.”
“But what about our practice time?”
Lana shrugged. “Meh, I don’t need it, and I can quiz you on stuff while you eat.”
“Sounds like a good idea.” The first round of testing was coming up in two days and Jack couldn’t afford to fail any of his classes. While Combat Basics didn’t have a written test, there was an oral test. Colin had told them all about it. They would be going through tests of their form and Instructor Brazee would ask them questions about military tactics and other things they learned in the class. While he was still behind the rest of the class when it came to sparring, Jack had a good grasp of the techniques. Spending more time on the potential questions sounded like a solid plan. That, and he was getting hungry—Lana’s plan took care of that.
“It’s too bad you can’t include Lord in your combat exam. You two are really working well together now.”
“Hmm, that would be interesting. Has that ever happened before?”
“I don’t know about Combat Basics, but it does in other combat classes. I’ve heard of people with familiars like hawks who were able to include the animal in the class. A familiar can be a powerful ally in a battle.”
Jack nodded. He could see it. For as much of a pain Lord Scratches could be at times, Jack still marveled over how quickly he flew and could dart around, grabbing balls out of the air. He could imagine how much damage the little dragon could do if he attacked with his claws or if he bit you. And he saw the potential of Lord as a spy or advanced scout… if he could get to a point where he could communicate with Jack what he saw. There was still so much Jack needed to learn about dragons and Lord Scratches, but the potential seemed limitless. From the books he’d found on sellkirk dragons, Jack knew there was probably a lot more about Lord Scratches that he simply hadn’t found out yet.
“Do you want to go to your room first and drop off Lord Scratches?”
“No, we’re good.” Last week Dragon Keeper Clifton had suggested it was time that Jack took Lord Scratches with him to some of his classes and to the cafeteria. She thought it would be good for the dragon, and Jack, to get used to being around more people. A few of the cafeteria workers gave them strange looks, and several students came over to check Lord out that first week, but now it seemed the newness of seeing a dragon in the cafeteria had worn off and he was back to being a lowly first-year scholarship student. That wasn’t bad as far as Jack was concerned. Although it seemed Lord liked the attention and would prefer if more students checked him out, especially if they rubbed his head.
The cafeteria was almost empty when they entered. Jack grabbed a plate of food and took extra chunks of meat and carrots for Lord Scratches. The dragon loved carrots for some strange reason. It was the only vegetable he would eat. Lord’s preferred food was spicy chicken chunks. He even preferred them over raw chicken or beef. It amused the cooks to see that Lord Scratches liked the spicy chicken, so they kept it on the menu every night. And on nights where Jack didn’t bring in the dragon the kitchen staff sent a little box of the chicken with Jack for Lord Scratches. Jack was just glad that the dragon didn’t need mice or snakes for supper.
Once they sat down, Jack fed Lord Scratches by throwing chunks of the spicy chicken up above. Lord would snatch them out of the air and then chomp them down.
“The most important watch shift when on patrol?” Lana asked.
“The last one before dawn.”
“Time it takes an archer to reload a crossbow?”
“Three seconds on average, one and a h
alf if they are good.”
“What do you look for when you first enter a fight?”
“You assess the enemy troops, the terrain and any potential blind spots where you can be attacked,” Jack said as threw up another piece of meat for Lord.
Lana kept drilling him. Jack got almost all of the answers right. A few he missed, but they’d been hard questions, likely harder than the ones Instructor Brazee would give them. “You’re doing good, Jack. If you can answer like that while sparring, you’ll pass with ease.”
Jack hoped she was right. He was fairly confident that Combat Basics wasn’t his biggest problem. Lana was a fantastic sparring partner and she’d helped him get much better. The most challenging test was going to be Magic Basics. Professor Logston had promised that his test was the most challenging of all the first-year classes. He seemed to take pride in the fact that every year students failed out of the Academy because they didn’t pass his classes.
Healing didn’t worry Jack as much. At least once a week Jack was meeting with Professor Cyr, and she drilled him on what they’d worked on that week and she’d give him extra work to make sure he was always ready for the next week’s topics. He wasn’t great at it, but he definitely could do everything asked, and as long as there weren’t any surprises, he’d pass the first exam.
“You want to study again tomorrow?” Lana asked.
“No. I’m going to be studying Ethics with Colin, Stannerios and Cara. That is the class I’ve done the least amount of studying on. You’re welcome to join us.”
“Sounds smart.”
Jack smiled. “Ha, ha. We all agreed that it was a good idea to spend more time on our weakest classes and then just one day on Ethics. That’s why I’ve been spending so much time with you working on Combat Basics.”
“Must’ve been Colin’s idea. I think I will. I do find the ethics class a little dry—perhaps a group study session is a good idea. I think you worry too much. You’ve been doing really well the last couple weeks. I’m sure you’ll pass.”
“Thanks. I wish I was as confident as you about that, but we’ll know soon enough.”
“That’s true. OK. I’ll see you tomorrow to study Ethics. When you meeting?”
“After last class tomorrow. We’re meeting in my room. The lounges are going to be packed with students getting last-minute study groups in.”
“Yes, they were pretty busy today, I can imagine tomorrow will be even worse.”
Jack nodded. He was still a little new to this whole school thing, but he’d discovered that there was nothing like a series of midterms to get students motivated. For the scholarship students, it was even worse. Fail a test and you might not be able to come back for a second year. Jack didn’t want to be sent home.
23
“Today is the last class before your midterm exams. Some professors believe in giving you a class to study and prepare for the tests. I believe they are doing you a disservice. In the real world you don’t get a day to prepare for when the swamp ogres start throwing dung at you. You have to be able to react in the moment. You should already know the stuff we’ve been working on.”
A few students groaned under their breaths, but Professor Logston was not swayed.
“Today we are going to learn to focus magic through weapons. For those of you already in possession of a magical wand, staff, blade or other weapon, you may use those. For the rest of you, there are wands and daggers at the front of the class. If your weapon is in your room, I suggest you get moving.”
Cara, who was sitting beside Jack, nudged him. “Quick, go get your sword.”
Jack jumped up and bolted out of the class as fast as he could. This was his opportunity to learn how to use his new dwarven short sword. There was no way he wasn’t going to take the opportunity to learn what he could do with it.
As he ran towards the first-year dorms he was surprised to see that only a few other students were making their way towards the normal dorms. He’d assumed that the rich families would’ve sent their kids to school equipped with the best magical weapons they could. Maybe magical weapons weren’t that readily available.
When he got to the room, Lord Scratches wasn’t there. It wasn’t much of a surprise. As they spent more time together, the little dragon seemed to have a good idea of Jack’s schedule and would go back to the dragon castle while he was in class. Lord Scratches liked hanging out in the dragon egg cave.
Reaching under his bed, Jack grabbed his sword. It was still wrapped in a blanket. He really did need to get it a proper sheath, but he’d just not had the time. He then ran back to the classroom.
As he was the only scholarship student in the class with a magical blade, he’d had the longest route as the general dorms were in same building as the Magic Basics classroom.
“So glad you could join us,” Professor Logston said as Jack burst into the classroom. “Now that everyone is back, I will begin.”
Jack took his seat, too excited to learn to be worried about the professor’s remarks. Besides, Professor Logston was snarky with everyone, it wasn’t like he picked on just Jack. He was like that with everyone.
“There are different classes of magical weapons. Some are just conduits to channel your magical energy, others come imbued with magical spells already attached and others can do both. The latter are the most valuable as they offer the greatest range of potential. However, modern magical weapons rarely have this ability. One of the great losses caused by the Great War was the knowledge of magic that was lost to us. Ancient mages could imbue multiple spells into one weapon using combinations of runes and gemstones to contain the magic. Hopefully one day we’ll find tomes or books from a mage or sorcerer that give us this ability, but until then our options are to find ancient weapons or to use modern ones that are still very effective, just not as diverse in the range of what they can do and which don’t contain as powerful spells. That isn’t to say powerful spells can’t be added to a weapon—we do have experts that can add a rune or gemstone—but nothing like what the ancient mages could do.”
Theron, one of the top students in the class raised his hand.
“Yes, Theron?” Professor Logston said.
“How do you know if an ancient weapon contains a certain spell?” Theron asked.
“If the spell was done with runes, you can usually figure out the potential spells based on the combination of runes used. Your Magic Basics handbook has some of the more common runes in the appendix, and there are books in the library that contain many more of the known spells and runes. If the rune is unfamiliar to you, or the combination isn’t known, you have to guess and test. Which can be dangerous. I highly recommend spending a good amount of time studying the weapon or taking it to an expert instead of just willy-nilly experimenting. As you increase your mana you can use identifying spells, which are quite handy.”
“Any other questions?”
“What’s more important? A mage’s skill level or their gear?” Theron asked.
“Another good question. Perhaps you lot aren’t the total idiots that I thought you were. There are actually fairly advanced magical theories on this—if you make it to intermediate and advanced magic classes, we do get into more those equations. For the purpose of this class it can be dumbed down a bit. Imagine the oldest, wisest most powerful mage being a ten. Any of you lot, the youngest, dumbest, ignorant fools that you are, equal a one—if that. For the sake of argument, let’s say that I’m a level-eight mage. With no magical gear the chances of you defeating me are almost zero based solely on that data. However, let’s argue that Theron here is now a level two, and he has a magical ring that enhances his mana. Now instead of him being a simple two, he has a multiplier. Is that going to bring him up to the equivalent of a level eight? No, but let’s say he had a magic ring, magic necklace and a magic wand. That is three multipliers. Depending on the strength of those individual magical items, that might make him the equivalent of a level 3 mage if the items are decent. If they are powerful, t
hat might bring him up to a level 4 or 5. While that might not give Theron here a chance to defeat me, it would give him the ability to defeat a mage with significantly higher skill than he had. You want to level up your skills and your gear to maximize your potential. If you want to learn more about that, you are welcome to look it up in the library, or advance to the next-level classes.”
Theron raised his hand again.
Professor Logston pointed at him.
“Doesn’t it take years to reach level two?”
“Yes. That is why magical gear is so important. There are exceptions, but in general you’ll find it far easier to level up individual skills. You could be a lever 2 mage with the ability to cast level 8 fire magic because you have magical gear.”
Professor Logston grinned. He rarely grinned, but when he did it was usually because one of the students had asked a question that he thought worthy of answering. To Jack that meant Professor Logston obviously thought that gaining magical gear was a vital thing for aspiring mages. Jack raised his hand.
“Yes, Jack?”
“How will we know if we’ve reached a certain level in a skill?”
“There are magic spells that do that. Some spells work better than others, some only give basic information, others can give you far more insight into your own and others capabilities. We don’t teach first year students this spell as there are far more important things to be spending your time on than comparing your stats. Now, those of you with your own magically enhanced weapons, I want you to be able to tell me what they do. Once you figure out what your weapon can do, you can move over to the practice area.”
Jack unwrapped his blade. Other than cleaning and sharpening the blade, he hadn’t spent a lot of time really looking closely at it. He knew that there was a ruby gemstone in the pommel, but he hadn’t known enough about magic to bother trying to figure out what that meant. He examined the blade closely. There were several runes right above the guard.
Menacing Misfits: An Epic Fantasy Adventure (Darkthorn Academy Book 1) Page 18
