Bibliomancer ~ 8!

~ Eight ~

Sam dropped into a wooden chair, already feeling exhausted from the day even though he’d hadn’t really done anything. Dealing with all the administrative stuff had been both mentally taxing and emotional draining, even if physically he was feeling fine.

Apparently, Octavius Igenitor—Stone Mage, Peak Student, and the human equivalent of a rancid milk—wasn’t kidding when he said Sam would ‘pay’. That wasn’t just in the figurative, evil villain sort of way, the guy had meant it quite literally. Not only did Sam get slapped with a twenty-five-gold fine for the ‘property damage’—which seemed like a bit of stretch for trimming a tree branch—but he had to pay for about a thousand other things. Everything in the college cost an arm and a leg; Sam had no idea how regular players were supposed to deal with the heavy fees associated with a Mage class.

He was starting to suspect the reason magic was so incredibly rare in Eternium was because the Mage’s College had a virtual chokehold on the industry and were pricing out the competition. Heck, just the bare bones step of becoming a ‘Licensed Mage’ cost one hundred gold, the equivalent of a thousand dollars, and there was simply no option to be an ‘Unlicensed’ Mage. Refuse to pay their fee and sign their Accords, and they would slap the Rogue Mage label on your head and let bounty hunters kill you on repeat until you caved. Worse, membership didn’t actually get you any tangible benefits. Just the opposite. The College took a steep percentage of all quest rewards, and members didn’t even get so much as a discount on classes or items. According to the ‘all-knowing’ Octavius, initiates were paying for the privilege of association.

So worth. Much magic. Very association. Wow.

That was just the tip of the arcane iceberg.

The classes were even more outrageously priced than the entry fee. Many of the basic courses ran at fifty gold a pop, a hefty five-hundred dollars, while some of the rare, high-level courses could cost anywhere between one thousand and ten thousand gold. It seemed Mages College was an apt name, since this placed charged actual College prices for their services—though graduates didn’t even walk away with a slip of paper for their trouble. On its face, it was an ugly, mean-spirited system and Sam was surprised a game company would have the gall to design a Guild which would no-doubt be universally hated by players everywhere.

Hopefully, they’d fix things in future patches, but until then, this was the only way to go. Sam really didn’t want to start over as some run-of-the-mill tank or fighter, and he did have the money to spend. So, reluctantly, he paid the registration fee and signed up for his classes; many of them were ‘suggestions’, though they were very forceful suggestions. On the outset he picked up Mana Manipulation and Mana Coalescence—with a guided meditation module, of course—Mage Shields and You: The Art of Defensive Magic; and Here Comes the Boom: Basics of Offensive Spell Casters.

Those were the required courses for someone who hoped to grind their way up the ranks. Truth-be-told, they all sounded like practical classes that had some good common-sense applications. But, because Sam was actually interested in playing the game—i.e. Dungeon Crawls, adventuring, and not just sitting around the stuffy College—he also opted into an elective called Field Monster Manual, which was one of the cheaper courses available. The current session was covering the Wolfmen, their language culture, and practices, which sounded both interesting and potentially useful, since the Wolfmen seemed to be the primary baddies in the game.   

Sam pushed all those thoughts from his head as one of his new teachers took to the podium at the front of the small classroom. There were only a double fistful of students and all of them were newbs just like him—though there was only one other traveler present. Most of these ‘players’ were actually NPCs, all of them from noble families with a lot of money to toss around. They would need a lot of money, since this was one of the most expensive classes around at a mind-boggling one thousand gold—one fifth of his total three-month budget—but according to Octavius, this was the single most important class he would take while at the College. It was the foundation for all magic, the cornerstone upon which everything else would be built around.

Mana Manipulation and Mana Coalescence.

The teacher was a petite woman named Mage Akora, who looked like she might he in her late forties or early fifties, though rumor was she was actually much older. She had a mousy face, a rather large nose, and streaks of silver lining her brown hair. She couldn’t have stood much taller than five-feet or weighed more than a hundred pounds soaking wet, yet in her deeply purple robes, she radiated power and authority. A teacher who knew her business and would accept no nonsense from bright-eyed youngsters learning magic for the first time. Being fresh out of College, Sam knew her type well, and expected her to be a good teacher, though probably not a kind, or especially patient, one.

“Attention,” she called out, her voice clipped, her words precise. “Welcome to Mana Manipulation and Mana Coalescence. As most of you know, this is perhaps the single most important class you will ever take, and that is because it will teach you the fundamentals and core philosophy behind controlling your magical potential. You see, the truth is, everyone in the room—even those who have never cast a single spell in their lives—have access to what we call a mana pool and mana channels. The mana pool is the seat of your power, the well of energy that drives the very forces of creation.

“Think of your mana pool as a vast reservoir, while your mana channels are the minor tributaries which branch off from that reservoir. Those tributaries carry the power out and away from your center so that it may be used in practical ways—a farmer irrigating her crops, someone washing dishes in a house far away, a child fetching water for a bath. So it is with you. But this vast reservoir of power can be dangerous to those who do not understand its proper use. If one of you”—her gaze seemed to linger on Sam—“were to cast a spell without directing that rush of power through the appropriate channels, it could cause great damage. Everything from exhaustion to pain to fits of severe nausea. In some ways, it would be like the reservoir flooding its banks, all of that water rushing around without anywhere to go, destroying anything in its path indiscriminately.   

“Fortunately for you lot, I can teach you the proper way to both access your mana pool and how to safely direct that energy, which will broaden your mana channels over time, allowing you to do far more with magic than most of the unwashed masses could ever dream possible. I could walk you through more of the history and theory revolving around mana manipulation, but frankly I have found the single best way to learn is through a hands-on guided meditation, of which I am a Master. First, I want all of you to close your eyes, and locate your mana pool deep within your center.”

Sam did as he was instructed, pressing his eyes shut tightly, and delving deeply inside himself, searching out the rolling mass of power which burned and shifted like a kaleidoscope inside him. As he drew closer to that energy, the shifting colors and blurring lines began to take form, resolving into a chaotic bundle of blues and whites which churned like a hurricane about to make landfall. Sam just stared at the image in his mind’s eye, awed by the power of this magic. Somewhere, a voice cut through his focus, though it sounded muffled and hazy, as though he were hearing it through hundreds of feet of water.

“Good.” Mage Akora. “I see a handful of you have found it, but the rest are having some difficulty. Please, all of you, open yourself and allow me to guide you.”

As she finished speaking, a prompt appeared, which Sam accepted with only half a thought, still fixated on the sight of all that power burbling and swirling inside his chest.

Mage Akora used skill ‘guided meditation’ on you! Accept? Yes / No

Time seemed to slid by at half speed, but finally, Mage Akora spoke again. “Excellent, there now. All of you have managed to locate your Mana Pool, but that is only the first step. What you will need to do now—and what you must practice every single day—is condensing your mana pool while cycling it through your spell channels. As you watch your energy, I want each of you to envision that ball of arcane energy shrinking, condensing, forcing it down and back in onto itself. Forge it into an orb that spins like a top, twirling, twirling, twirling. You need only to envision it… impose your will… and it will be so.”

Sam licked his lips, a fine sheen of perspiration building on his forehead, then followed her instructions. Slowly and diligently, Sam reached his thoughts toward the ball of gale force winds. Immediately, the bundle of chaotic, formless energy responded, the edges smoothing, the sides rounding into something that more closely resembled a sphere. Oh my god it’s working, he thought with a surge of pride and excitement. Spurred on by his minute success, he pushed even harder, working the energy like a lump of clay, rolling, pushing, and pressing it between the palms of mental-hands until it was a perfectly round ball, like a marble containing a blizzard within.

With that done, he began to rotate the ball, urging it to spin even as he bore down, pressing the energy back into on itself so the ball shrank in size. After what felt like years of concerted effort, the ball finally stopped compressing. It was roughly half the size it’d been before, and now, no matter how much pressure Sam applied, the energy wouldn’t budge so much as a millimeter. A thunderous headache began into throb in his brain, hot agony curling around the sides of his skull like ram’s horns.

Being trained by a Master of a craft has greatly increased your speed of comprehension!

Skill gained: Coalescence (Beginner 0). You have taken the first steps on the path of the mind! By collecting your mana in an orderly form, you will be able to pack more mana into a single usage, with far greater effect. +1% spell efficiency and +2% mana regeneration per skill level. Wisdom +1. Increase your wisdom to coalesce your mana to a higher degree. (Maximum 50% spell efficiency.)

As this is your first time gaining spell efficiency, here is a short explanation. Spell Efficiency allows you to lessen the amount of mana cost of any action that requires mana, by packing mana into the spell more densely. Spell efficiency, therefore, is a different way to say ‘decreased mana cost’.

“Very good,” the teacher droned from a million miles away, “but that was only the first step of two. Learning to shape and condense your mana pool, without learning to channel it naturally, is a recipe for disaster. Some of you may have problems with this next part, but never fear—that is the reason this class is a month-long endeavor. More time to build your mana pool and perfect your core. In this next exercise, you are going to carefully grasp some of your mana and pull it, oh-so-gently away from the pool, but be sure to keep it attached. Your mana should be a bit like a string. Once you have a thread of energy, start pulling it along the tunnels. Just walk and pull. Walk and pull. The more mana you bring along on each pass, the better your overall bonus will be in the end.”  

So far, her advice had been sound, so Sam followed suit, reaching out with nimble mental fingers and grasping a hair-fine strand of power, stretching it out like playdoh until he had a strand as thick as his pinky finger. He found the exercise surprisingly easy, even though Mage Akora had indicated that it might be a somewhat difficult process. But then, so far, all of his magical abilities had been easy to use, almost second nature, which he thought probably had something to do with his Instinctual Casting ability. Maybe it didn’t just effect spells, but every aspect related to spellcasting.

If so, that meant he might-well have a significant advantage over some of the other spell-slingers running around Eternium.

With the strand of energy in hand, he set out to stretch that burning energy along his mana channels. He felt as though he were trekking through a dark cave system filled with a thousand twists, turns, and dead ends, but floating before him was a soft ball of white light like an ethereal Will-O-Wisp, guiding him through the dark tangles of an overgrown forest. Somehow, he knew that the little ball of light was actually Mage Akora, and though Sam had no idea where he was going, she seemed to be traversing the passages of his mind with frightening ease and familiarity.  

The whole while, the tether of mana followed after him like a lost puppy. Twist after twist, turn after turn, more than a few switchbacks—which completely threw off his sense of direction—then finally the ball of light rounded a corner and Sam found himself staring at the ball of mana he’d left behind a few minutes ago.

“No, you are not lost,” Mage Akora whispered into his mind, though Sam couldn’t tell if her voice came from outside his body or inside his head. The noise echoed in stereo, making him suspect the answer might’ve been both. “We are back to where we’ve begun, but you’ll notice there is a thin strand of mana jutting off from the far side of your mana pool. We have successfully navigated your prime channel, and it is time to reconnect to the source, completing the loop. Now, finish the process.”

With a thought, Sam slid forward and directed the tether of mana in his hand to connect with the pool. As soon as the glowing blue thread made contact with the sphere, his mana began to pulse and thrum in time with the rock-steady beating of his heart.  

Being trained by a Master of a craft has greatly increased your speed of comprehension!

Skill gained: Mana manipulation (Beginner 0). Where others are content to throw unseemly amounts of power into a spell—swiftly fueling their own destruction—you use a lighter touch. -30% mana. +1% mana and +1% spell efficiency per skill level. (Maximum 25% efficiency). Intelligence +1.  

Sam read and reread the message, confusion quickly mounting as he did some rough math in his head. Yep, the numbers checked out: minus thirty percent mana definitely seemed like a bad thing, not a good thing.

“Wait a minute,” he opened his eyes. He wobbled in his seat for a heartbeat as the world reeled around him. He was light headed, woozy, and exhausted to his core. Pun not intended. He shook away the fog in his brain and pressed on. “This doesn’t make any sense. According to the last update, mana manipulation, I’ve actually lost a bunch of mana. Like… a lot. I thought this was supposed to help make me better at magic and increase my overall mana pool.”

The professor offered him a crooked smile and a shake of her head, a mischievous gleam in her eyes.  “Such is the ignorance of the young and untrained. You must not have taken the recommended Mages College Overview Primer, young man. If you had, you would know full-well that you won’t start increasing your overall mana pool size until you obtain Student Rank, and if you should somehow make it to the Sage level, this skill can actually bolster your pool by seventy percent. You should feel privileged, however. You’ll notice that you’ve jumped all the way past the Novice Stage and directly into the Beginner ranks—just one of the many perks of having a Master such as myself educate you.”

“This class will continue for the next four weeks,” she continued, now speaking to everyone, “where I will be running you through a variety of techniques and exercises, all designed to drain your mana, compressed your mana pool, and simultaneously stretch your channels. Assuming you all show up and pay attention to my instruction, I fully expect all of you to be at least Apprentice Level zero, which is no small feat. That also means you will have two channels open, which should be quite useful as you complete your other courses. Now, if there are no further questions?”

Her hard gaze said in no uncertain terms that there had better not be any more questions. “Then class is dismissed.”