The Academy

by Colin Daumen

  He had a pretty toned body due to the relentless working out that the former owner used to put himself through. Yet, his body was malnourished and sickly. His owner would never know, but he died by overexerting himself during training, as he, similar to the Favian, wanted more power. The poor boy had attempted to perform a hundred situps in one go, but his fragile body collapsed under the pressure, and a heart attack robbed him of his life.

  Favian knew that he couldn't make the same mistakes, and luckily for him, Favian had a living cheat code for himself. If he wasn't able to use this for his own benefit, then he wasn't fit to be alive anyway, he thought.

  'Interface open up and show me my current stats.'

  [Ding! Name: Favian. Race: Human. Gender: Male. Constitution: 0.6, Strength: 0.8, Intelligence 2.4, Agility 0.6, Arcana 1. Mana pool 90 (100) points remaining.]

  A blue screen popped up in front of Favian's eyes, and he could see all the stats related to his body, along with an in-depth anatomical view of his own body and explanations of every stat. Here he could see that his body urgently needed an increased gain of nutrition, as a constitution of only 0.6 relayed that his body was 40% less able to combat against disease and fatigue than a regular human, who would be at a stat of 1. Similarly, his strength and agility were low, as a weak constitution would shackle how strong or agile a person could get, regardless of how much they trained.

  Yet, his intelligence was at 2.4, and he was, therefore, more than two times smarter than any regular individual. This may partly have been due to his reincarnation, which allowed him to keep all of his previous memories on anatomy and the medical practice.

  The arcana stat was the most confusing one there. It seemed that this stat was what controlled his total mana points, with a conversion of 1 arcana to 100 mana. Arcana could be permanently used up to learn certain spells or to convert into one of his other stats, however when Favian asked the system how to gain arcana it simply replied with an error.

  [Error, host's knowledge is not high enough to access this information. Host needs to level up arcana knowledge (50 experience required). Would the host like to level up arcana knowledge?]

  'What? I should have expected this when I realised you were from the World of Exile system, using up all my hard-earned experience.' Favian furrowed his eyebrows as he came to this realisation. 'Well, I mean I didn't actually do anything but call for help and was rewarded with 50 experience points earlier so it's not exactly a loss now that I think about it.'

  Looking at the blue screen, Favian forced himself to press onto the 'level up arcana knowledge +' button.

  Chapter 3 – Proposition

  [Ding! Arcana Knowledge Level 1 acquired. Current Exp 0.

  Arcana is the broad overview of the different magical particles in the atmosphere. These different magical particles are composed of their different elements, namely air, water, fire, earth, light, and dark particles. Information on intermediate and advanced particles is currently unavailable. Affinity to different particles is based on innate body composition. Arcana can be drawn into your body via meditation techniques.]

  'That was insightful and all, but I don't know any meditation techniques right now, so how am I going to draw in arcana?' Favian replied helplessly.

  [Ding! The user can activate automatic arcana assembly via the system, which will gather elemental particles passively. Would the user like to activate this function now?]

  'YES DO IT.' Favian screamed at the system in his mind. He was so interested in magic that this chance felt like it would disappear if he didn't act quickly. He wanted to soak up all this information like a sponge, and couldn't wait to enter an academy to learn everything from scratch. Why have this system if he wasn't going to use it?

  A numbing sensation slowly took over Favian's body and mind, making him momentarily lose all the feeling in his legs, which resulted in him falling onto the bedroll in the middle of the tent. Wide-eyed, he looked around the room as he could now see a plethora of different coloured particles in the vicinity. Mainly there were black, brown and blue particles.

  'Hmm, if I would take a guess, I'd say that there are more black particles here as it is night-time, and blue particles would probably represent the water element; since I am near a waterfall there would obviously be lots of that element here.'

  Suddenly, a swirl of these different elements rushed into his body. It felt as if he was being force-fed food after having already been full, and left his body feeling ice cold. His whole body was now too desensitized to move about, and his mind slowly started to fade into black.

  All of the troubles from the past couple of hours were completely wiped away, and he was finally at peace, even if only for a short while, as he drifted away into a much-needed slumber.

  ...

  Favian woke up to the sounds of birds chirping away in the trees. These high-pitched chirps were relentless and extremely annoying, making Favian seriously consider ripping out his eardrums. His sleep had been complete euphoria; having his dream of eating pizza and doughnuts back on Earth end abruptly because of the birds left him feeling livid.

  Opening the game system, Favian's eyes instantly opened wide, as he could not believe what he was seeing. His arcana had risen by a whole 0.2 points and was now at a 1.2 total. A 20 percent increase overnight seemed too crazy for him to believe. It was no wonder that his whole body still felt numb, as it must have gone through a relatively large change.

  'Wait, I don't even know what my arcana level is relative to other mages, so this might not even be as impressive as I think. I'll have to try and gather data on some other trainees first to see where I stand,' he thought to himself. 'Is that possible system?'

  [Ding! Affirmative, the user can scan other people but is currently only able to scan those of an equal or lower power level than himself. To upgrade scan function host needs to upgrade the game system - Version 1 (10,000 experience required).]

  Favian almost coughed up blood. He couldn't believe how much experience he needed. It seemed that he would have to come back to this issue in the future, as he currently did not know how his system worked with giving experience, and it would only reply with 'Information restricted' when prompting it for answers.

  After regaining his bearings, he went straight towards Aria's tent, as she had asked him to come talk to her first thing in the morning.

  A table filled with an assortment of food, including what looked like lobster and chicken, stood in the dark red tent within which Aria stayed. The sweet aroma of jasmine green tea mixed with honey lifted Favian's mood completely, and the fragrances soothed both his body and mind.

  Aria looked to be around 24 years of age. She had a relatively slim build with wide hips, and a big bust. Taking some time to get a better look at her, Favian was able to notice that her eyes had a similar purple shade just like his own, however, it was much deeper in colour. The dark purple hue to her brown eyes, along with her jet-black hair complimented her fair skin, and she looked even more beautiful to him in the sunlight. Somehow he couldn't believe that such a small change in scenery could elevate a person's beauty to such heights.

  After noticing that he had been staring at her for a moment too long without saying anything, he quickly shifted his gaze towards the food. 'Damn, it must be the hormones affecting my mind right now. You give me memories from my past and still force me to feel like a prepubescent teenager. That's just perfect!'

  *Grumble* *Grumble* Favian covered his stomach quickly as it noised its opinion.

  "Come sit, let's chat whilst we eat. It sounds like you could use some food Favian, and negotiations are always better on a full stomach. Something my master always used to say to me." Aria motioned for him to come to sit down at the table.

  "Now, I noticed earlier that you were able to cast a protective barrier to defend against my magic. As we have done extensive research on every candidate, I know that you have never learned any magic. Would you mind explaining how you were able to use that spell without
casting?" she asked him, her eyebrows raised in interest because of this young boy. Her gaze looked straight into his eyes, and Favian felt it piercing straight through his soul.

  'Shit! How am I going to explain that I reincarnated and have a game system which is basically a massive cheat, whilst also not becoming a lab rat for some academy's experiments? I should probably lie, but I bet she has some sort of magic that can detect that. Guess I'll have to just twist the truth a little bit,' he thought to himself as the panic that was slowly trickling onto his face subsided after he quickly thought about what to say.

  "Well, I don't completely know how it happened, but my body just automatically did that. I had no control when the spell was cast. I don't know any spells either and am completely new to this world of magic, so it came to a surprise to me as well," Favian replied, weaving in truths that could be interpreted in different ways. He hoped that this would be enough to make her believe him, or at least stop her from questioning him any further.

  Aria pondered to herself for a minute, before finally saying, "That's pretty interesting. I would think then that you have a very high innate talent in magic passed down from your bloodline. It's such a shame that we have no information about who your parents are, maybe that would have given us greater insight."

  She paused for a moment, before asking, "Do you know about how we rank magical talent at the academies here in Ortu Solis?"

  "Nope," Favian replied, shrugging his shoulders.

  Aria went on to explain that testing trainee magicians' ability to draw in elemental particles was how they ranked magical talent grades. The colours red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and grey would correspond to the arcane core present in the body when tested, with red being the lowest and grey the highest talent.

  "Favian, I have a proposition from the Dusk Academy. I am guessing that you have a pretty high innate talent. The fact that you were able to subconsciously use magic whilst casting silently without ever having been taught leads me to believe this. I'd like to invite you to join the Dusk Academy as my student." She smiled at Favian, with a gleam in her eyes.

  Favian cursed in his mind that he had to be reborn in such a young body. This beautiful woman was exactly his type and even wanted to teach him. How the gods must be finding this hilarious, he thought.

  "Ahh, let me not get ahead of everything, why don't you let me test your magical talent grade first. It'll just take a couple of seconds. Don't worry, it won't hurt. Just sit tight and get comfortable for a moment."

  Without being given the time to react, Favian felt pins and needles all over his body, prickling through the surface of his skin. The uncomfortable feeling left as quickly as it came, with tendrils of blackish indigo energy being released from his pores and dispersing into the atmosphere.

  After these tendrils of energy left his body, Favian felt a lot more stable, as if he had unclogged his pores from dirt that had always been stuck in them. The elemental particles from the atmosphere moved freely into his body now, which they had only ever done after he'd asked his system to do so. Now it seemed that they passively entered.

  With her mouth wide open in shock, Aria could not help but feel that she finally hit the jackpot. The only word she could muster out was, "Incredible."

  Chapter 4 - Attention

  Aria could not believe that in this scrawny young man, there was the potential to create a magnificent magician. It was already widely known that only 1 in 1 thousand individuals were capable of practising magic.

  The majority of these individuals would belong to those with almost no talent, only having a red arcane core. It was already extremely rare to find individuals with talent above a green core, and these people would be groomed and treated with care by the academies. They wished to nurture strong and capable magicians, who would, in turn, have some form of vested interest in the academy after they left and became some of the most powerful beings on the continent.

  A grey arcane core was impossible to find, it could only be read about in myths and legends. It had been said that any person with a grey core would ascend the shackles of mortality and reach towards the path of godhood.

  “You are one fascinating boy, Favian. I honestly can’t believe that I found such a diamond in the rough. I will do my best to polish you up and make an extraordinary magician out of you,” Aria said, her eyes twinkled at the prospect of being known as the teacher of a purple core student.

  For her job reputation and security as a professor at the Dusk Academy, Favian would serve to be her greatest asset, if she could nurture him properly. Of course Aria didn’t think about this for one moment, instead, her decision to take Favian in had been a spur in the moment decision. This didn’t mean she would have taken a person with a weak talent as her student because of her rash behaviour.

  “Before you even think about gloating to others or rejoicing about having such immense talent in magic, I warn you. This is a path you should never tread on lightly! You will still have to put in blood, sweat and tears in order to become a fully-fledged magician. Talent is only one part of the equation, and hard work is the spine that stabilizes it.” She lectured on, making sure that Favian wouldn't become a procrastinator who only knew to flaunt his talent without being able to back it up.

  Favian replied solemnly to her concern, “I will work hard, I promise. I am no stranger to persevering against adversity, and don’t plan on letting this go to my head.”

  Favian thought back to the memories of his body’s former host struggling to get enough food to eat, and having to beg on the street near his orphanage just to survive. The agony of such an existence acted as a source of power for Favian to strive for greatness. He resolved himself to never beg again in his life.

  “So, will you accept the offer and study under me at the Dusk Academy? We specialize in dark magic and usually, the protocol would be to also test your elemental affinity with dark energy particles, however, it seems that you are pretty welcoming to them,” Aria said.

  After taking in all of this new information, Favian decided that it would be best to get a guaranteed place at an academy with a seemingly nice professor as his master. Of course, he couldn’t be sure whether she had any ulterior motives, but it seemed like the right decision to make, lest he is put on the spot for taking the places from some rich nobles who would just come looking for revenge.

  “I would love to learn under your instruction. Thank you very much, Master Aria,” Favian courteously replied. He felt that his chances of succeeding in life would only go up from here.

  ….

  After breakfast, Favian and Aria went back on the trail to arrive at the meeting point of the various academy representatives. Instead of a horse-drawn carriage, as Favian had woken up in after being reincarnated, Aria had her carriage drawn by a pair of lion-like spirit beasts. These two identical creatures stood 8-feet tall whilst on all fours and had a dark red mane which gave them a menacing look. Their pitch-black skin also added to their fearful aura. Even their speed would lead to onlookers shaking in fear, as they were big, bulky and even nimble. You wouldn’t notice this 300kg monster run up behind you before it had your head lodged in between its sharp fangs.

  It seemed that on the Ortu Solis continent, there were large swathes of beast ranges which housed a plethora of animals that had been bolstered by magical energy. These beasts were even able to gain sentience if they had lived long enough and absorbed enough energy. It was widely known that a spirit beast on the same power level as a human would be a lot stronger physically. The reason behind this was unknown, but some hypothesized that there were simply more dense particles of magical energy surrounding these beast ranges, which resulted in more powerful physiques. The inherent advantage that humans and the other races had was the ability to learn a multitude of spells, whereas the beasts only had innate spells they could use.

  Favian would occasionally stare outside the windows of the carriage and take in all of the scenery. It was simply immeasurable to know
how ecstatic he felt looking at the passing mountains, rivers, trees and lakes. After having sat in the carriage for more than 8 hours, the snowy climate started to fade away and humidity rose in the air. Plains stretched out as far as he could see, and the sun boiled away at the surface.

  The inside of the carriage stayed the same temperature it had this whole time; almost perfect. Not too cold and not too hot. It seemed as if there was some magical form of air conditioning placed here. ‘Magic truly seems to be useful. Conjuring water when you are thirsty. Creating fire at a campsite. Even air conditioning.’

  …

  About an hour away from the plains was yet another change in scenery. The plains slowly turned into a woodland packed with shrubs and high standing trees. The air was very dense in oxygen, and it took a while to get used to breathing in this air.

  A silent voice called out in the clearing, “How much longer until they will pass through here?” Hesitation was apparent in the voice.

  A louder, more authoritative voice boomed out of the foliage, clearly irritated by his fellow companion. “They’ll be here within the hour. All you have to do is sit tight and wait for just a little longer. You can’t be telling me that you want to back out now? Especially after we already took the down payment?”

  “That’s not what I meant, of course I won’t back out.” The reply rang out with an even more silent voice.

  “Good. Don’t forget to signal to the others once they have passed by. We have to make sure with precise timing to only steal what we have come to steal. We don’t want to get chased into death. We are thieves, not idiots!” their conversation ended with the two men sitting back in the foliage, waiting for their prey to enter their trap.

  ….

  Favian woke up from a short nap to the view of his master meditating. Sitting opposite to him, with her legs crossed and her arms relaxed by her sides, she concentrated to gather energy particles into her frame. From the angle that he was looking from, Favian thought to himself that this truly was the most beautiful woman he had ever laid eyes on.