The World of Magic II

The next day Yoruhi went to the mana room early to see Mizuki and Nene waiting there patiently. They had wanted to test the boy to see if he would navigate his way there by himself, and because he had, Mizuki had concluded that the boy was a willing participant in her experiment, and that she wasn’t just forcing him to do something he didn’t want.

With Yoruhi having arrived, Nene left the room to perform her cleaning duties and to oversee the tasks of the other maids to make sure that everything was ready before the training day in the dojo started.

“So, how was your trip to the library?” Mizuki asked.

“It was good,” Yoruhi said, walking up to her, “I met a girl and her father who helped me pick out the right books.”

“I see… Did you happen to catch his name?”

“No, but I think the girl’s name was Altair.”

“Altair… ah, so you’ve met the Weiss family,” she said.

“Weiss family?”

“Yes, they’re a family of renowned doctors. That man was a colleague of mine. It’s a shame what happened to his wife and daughter, but well, that’s besides the point. What did you learn from the books he gave you?”

A shame? Yoruhi wondered, becoming more curious about the strange girl, but he knew Mizuki would probably not give him the answers he wanted.

Instead, he began explaining to her his findings and after he finished, she nodded her head silently.

“So based on what you found, what do you think Nene was doing yesterday? What kind of magic was she using?”

Nene told her about that? Yoruhi wondered. I suppose as the lady of the house, she would have to.

He thought back to what Nene did; how she took an existing flower and molded it into something else that had additional properties.

The manipulation of cells… he thought, she manipulated the magicules that exist inside the flower and caused them to transform to her will. So therefore it must be…

“Life Magic!” he shouted.

“That would be correct,” Mizuki said, giving him a pat on the head. “Now, what style of magic do you think she used?”

“Style?” he asked, and remembered the title of the third book which he had not read the night before: Magical Finesse: An Introduction to the Styles of Magic. “I haven’t read that far,” he admitted.

“That’s okay,” Mizuki said, “all you need to know for now is that styles differ from elements in that styles are how you control the elements and where you get the magicules from, while elements are more of the ‘what magicules am I controlling, and what will I do with them?’ When the two concepts are combined you will be able to control magic freely.

After you read that book, I will quiz you again about what Nene did and we can progress from there. For now though, do you have any questions from your reading?”

Yoruhi thought for a moment and recalled a few things that did end up puzzling him.

“In the book, it said that most people can only wield up to three elements,” he said, “that implies that there exists people who can wield more.”

“That’s a smart observation,” she said. “And you are correct in believing so. There are indeed two exceptions to this rule, and while they don’t just appear at random very often, they do happen.

The first exception is when someone is born able to wield one extra element with no downside. The second is when someone is born able to wield all of them, though with slightly less control over each one than someone who has the standard three.

The Albiads Noble Family are the ones who are known for producing people with these exceptions, but there have been times that people outside that family are born with them, albeit it’s very rare. These exceptions weren’t something I was initially planning on telling you because of that; I don’t want you to get your hopes up over something that might not happen.”

Yoruhi knew she was right. It wasn’t like he was anyone special other than the fact that his mind was slightly older than what his body reflected in this world, but even then it wasn’t something that influenced the way he was born. He wasn’t too disappointed in this revelation, and so he brought up his next topic of interest.

“Okay…” he said, “Speaking of which, I also heard that there was something called an Attunement Crystal that lets me figure out what elements I have.”

Mizuki smiled, for the boy had finally brought up the topic she wanted to discuss.

“Yes, and we have one right here,” Mizuki said, pulling out a clear glass orb.

It had a plastic base underneath it which she held onto, carefully avoiding the glass portion at the top.

“But you are not ready for it yet.” she said.

“I’m not?”

“Nope. It’s too dangerous for you to use it because of how Attunement Crystals work.” she explained. “They forcibly take a portion of your mana and inject it inside the orb which is filled with a lot of magicules. It hurts your hand if you try it, because the purpose is to make you react in a way that is most natural to you, so that when your mana touches the magicules, it transforms them into the elements that you have, even if you don’t know how to cast magic yet.”

Yoruhi bit his lip.

“I can take the pain,” he declared.

“Of course you can, but you don’t know what it feels to have mana running through you or what to do if it runs out,” she said. “In fact, that’s going to be your homework for tonight. You know about the dangers of running out of mana, but you don’t know how to prevent yourself from running out of it. You also don’t know how to increase your mana capacity, so that it doesn’t run out with just the simple act of touching the orb. Until you’ve figured out these things, I won’t let you touch the Attunement Crystal.”

Yoruhi began to sulk a bit. Of course prioritizing safety first was important, but he was impatient. He was bummed out that once again, he was making no progress in the acquisition of magic.

As a gifted child, he wasn’t used to taking this long to learn anything, and he felt that with the amount of effort he had put in so far, he should at least feel like he’s progressing. Seeing no effort despite everything, was discouraging, even though realistically the child had spent only two days at most learning magic.

“Okay…” he sighed out, before making his way out of the room.

When he left, Mizuki stared at the closed door in silence. She knew he was a brilliant child—she even found herself speaking more naturally to him, unlike with Tatsuko, around whom she had to be careful to avoid big words—but she saw him falling into the same pitfalls she had when she was younger.

When she found that Tatsuko’s intelligence took after more of her father’s rather than hers, she was relieved, for she knew that having great intelligence was not always a gift. But now with the addition of Yoruhi to the family, the worry of having one of her children repeat her past returned, and for a moment she considered stopping her experiment.

Her rarely seen, unconditionally empathetic side was beginning to show, but nevertheless she held on to the belief that Yoruhi would turn out alright.

⋆✦-∞-⟡-∞-✦⋆

After he left the mana room, Yoruhi bolted straight to the library. It was nearby, and since he remembered the way, he felt he didn’t need Nene to guide him.

It wasn’t until he reached the second floor that he realized he didn’t have a library card on him, and therefore couldn’t check out any books. He silently cursed his forgetfulness and was about to make his way back before the sound of a familiar voice caught his attention.

“Y-Yoruhi!” Altair’s voice called out from behind him.

He slowly turned around to see her carrying a stack of manga in her hands.

“Y-you’re name is Yoruhi right?” she said before quietly mumbling under her breath, “did I get that right? His name is a bit weird, no?”

But Yoruhi heard her, and having grown sensitive about his name over the past few days, because he came to realize it was indeed a weird name, in his bitter mood he said, “well what about Altair? Isn’t that a boy’s name?”

It wasn’t until he said that out loud that he began to regret his words. He couldn’t take them back however, because the girl in front of him had already started crying.

“W-wait, I’m sorry!” he apologized, “I didn’t mean that really! I was just—”

But her crying, although soft, had attracted the attention of her father who was nearby and he came rushing to her aid. When he saw that it was Yoruhi who made her cry however, he was confused, for he had taken Yoruhi to be a good kid.

In his better judgement, he gave Yoruhi time to explain his situation before he punted him to the next universe, but after hearing it, he just let out a disappointed sigh.

“You really need to learn to control your emotions young man,” he said, “but since you did apologize, I suppose as long as Altair forgives you, I shall help you out.”

He turned to his daughter who nodded with her still-teary eyes, and he patted her on her head, avoiding the grotesque flower that sprouted out on the right side.

“Well then young man,” he said, “I can’t help you check out a book because the maximum number of books I can check out at once on my card has been reached. I do happen to own a copy of the books you’re looking for at home however. In fact, we were just about to head there, so if you don’t mind following us, I can let you borrow it.”

Yoruhi knew better than to follow a stranger home, but against his better judgement he decided to go. After all, he figured that because the man had a child of his own and was a renowned doctor, he had to be safe.

Right?