3.3 -Magic test: Night Four

Fourth night arrived,

I felt a mix of excitement and nervousness as Sensei Grignard asked if I was ready for the magic test. Grignard was the magic instructor. I met him on the first night as Silica broke his back door and demonstrated how to do magic. It was the day of the magic test.

"Yes, sensei," I replied confidently.

"Welcome to your mage test, For the first challenge, you must cast an attack spell with a magic circle within three seconds without the wand. You must also hit the target with enough damage to knock it over. You may begin!"

I faced the wooden target, positioned 20 feet away. Taking a deep breath, I raised my arm and opened my hand. A red liquid began to form: a circle and lines, starting from the inside and spreading outward. It only took a second to complete the outline. The red circle grew darker and thicker as I infused more mana into it. "Fireball," I whispered, just loud enough for the four of us to hear. A red flame emerged and absorbed the circle from the center, shooting out and striking the upper third of the target, breaking, shattering it in half. As master Grignard counted down stopping between two and three. About two and half seconds had passed.

"Well done, you pass," Sensei acknowledged.

"Now, for the next challenge. Kendra, come here, dear," Sensei called Kendra. The old man positioned Kendra three feet in front of the target and one foot to the right, with her back facing me. "For this challenge, you must shoot an attack spell at the target without hitting Kendra in the back. It is important to trust your comrades not to hit you from behind when you are fighting foes. The vanguard must have to trust the rear guard to cover."

I stepped forward, drew my hand up, and felt sweat dripping down my face. I was nervous since I had never shot a spell at anyone before, and now I was supposed to hit the target on the other side while avoiding Kendra. I aimed another inch to the left to ensure I missed Kendra and focused on the target.

"Mackenzie, shoot!" Sensei commanded.

I released the spell and hit the side of the target with enough force to knock it down.

"That's a pass. Congratulations on getting it on your first try, unlike Miss Silica over here, who hit poor Luke in the back of the head. Impressive," Sensei remarked.

"Don't bring that up! It's a bad memory. I only hit Luke in the back because he moved," Silica responded, blushing bright red with embarrassment.

"I can't believe it only took you four days to master magic drawing and attacking. It took Silica seven days just to hit the target. Here is your bronze badge. You may now go to the adventure hall and choose any bronze quest. Congratulations again, Mackenzie," Sensei said, handing me a bronze metal tag with a crest of the adventure guild logo. The bronze medal was no bigger than my thumb and had a shield-shaped design with the emblem of the adventure hall's logo.

"I had a great teacher and senpai who made it fun and sped up the process. It was a team effort. Thank you, Sensei, and Silica, for teaching me," I expressed my gratitude as I bowed to each of them.

The night was still young as we watched as Kendra continued her training, engaging in 1v1 duels against other members of the class. She was ferocious and unleashed all her anger, overpowering her opponents with speed.

As a reward for passing the test, Silica and I went to the armor shop to buy suitable armor for adventuring. Inside the shop, we found both Rino and Sara.

“Welcome to TT quality wears”

"Hi, Rino-San and Sara-San. What are you two doing here?" I asked.

"We have become Miss TT apprentices in making armor and clothing," Rino Proclaimed herself.

It seemed that fashion held a significant place in this world, just as it did in the classic world. They set me up with a new set of leather armor and clothes, making sure I tried on all the latest and most expensive gear in the store. It cost me a hefty price of another 85 silver. The gray robe and leather padding added up.

Next, we visited the weapon smith and examined the staff. There were two main types, distinguished by the gems embedded within them: power and control. The power gem, like a red stone, increased fire damage, while the clear gem, similar to the wand training, reduced the time, and better control required to draw the magic circle. In the end, I chose the Firestone staff, believing that having more power would be more effective in taking down monsters. This put me 160 silvers and another 40 silvers for an iron sword in debt to Silica.

***

It was raining heavily. Kendra went to the warrior training area with the guys, while Silica and I sat in the grand hall, playing tic-tac-toe and talking.

“Hey, Silica, do you happen to know which god I'm descended from?"

"I have no clue, I was fortunate enough to stumble upon a book that revealed my ancestry, but I'm afraid I can't help you. I'm still fairly new to this world myself, so my knowledge is limited. I apologize."

I opened the Magic 101 book and flipped through its pages. The book had so much information about elements and other spells. Learning other element schools was similar with different colors and diagrams, but it would take some time to memorize each one. Changing the color of the diagram was difficult at first but I managed to change any color I wanted. The hard part was memorizing the different types of elements diagrams.

"Hey, Silica, what elements can you use?"

"I can only use fire and charm, at the moment" Silica was at an intermediate level fire mage and purely focus on fire magic.

"Can everyone learn white magic?" I inquired further.

"It's a common type of magic. I believe most people can learn it if they can use magic," Silica explained.

White magic as i skimmed through the pages of the book contained many types of spells from: barriers, telekinesis, telepathy, and many more.

"Hey, want to try this spell called telepathy?" I asked Silica, flipping the pages to show her.

Turning the page to Silica and she read: Telepathy: A way to communicate without the use of voice. This magic allows thoughts to be sent and forms a connection between targets. Multiple connections can be made and be connected at the same time. Telepathy is best formed through touch or eye contact, and deeper connections can be established even from miles away. Telepathy is most commonly used in groups to communicate without the other knowing. It was a high rank spell.

"It's a difficult spell to learn. Telepathy doesn't require drawing magic circles.”

“Sounds like an interesting spell, let's do it!” Silica said excitedly.

"To learn this spell, you need to form a deep connection and try to link our mana to each other. The best way to connect is through kissing or maintaining eye contact, but touch is also acceptable. The second method is to link eyes across the room, and lastly, it can be done without any contact or eye contact at all."

"Let me see... Telepathy is a challenging spell, best learned by kissing or touching. You could have just asked to kiss me, you know, even if it would be my first time."

"N-No, touch will be fine," I stammered, as my face turned bright red.

Silica leaned in, tempting me to do the same. I gulped, not expecting to get so close and touch Miss Silica forehead. I leaned in slowly, closed my eyes, and accidentally bumped our noses together instead of our foreheads. Embarrassed, I adjusted and gently pressed our foreheads together this time. I slowly opened my eyes, only to find Silica’s bright green eyes locked onto my blue eyes. Sweat started dripping all over my body to parts I didn’t even know could exist. This was the first time I had been this close to someone, not even coming close to kissing anyone before. Not even Kendra had ever been this close to me. Sweat was coming from places I hadn't even sweated from before. I was nervous and scared. Our foreheads were touching.

Silica’s face turned bright red as well. A few seconds passed, and I felt her warm breath brush against my lips. Without even realizing it, I was holding my breath. We continued breathing, and it felt like a connection was forming between the two of us. I completely forgot about the goal of the spell. It must have been around 30 seconds since our initial contact, and my heart was pounding like crazy. I started channeling mana into Silica’s blushing face and green eyes.

"Hello, hello, hello," the thought ran through my mind. We remained connected, staring into each other's eyes for at least three minutes. We had a connection, but it was weak. From the residence room in the back, Silica’s sister Tina walked in and caught us in that intimate moment. She stared at us for about 30 seconds, probably thinking we were making out. Stepping forward the wooden floor screeched, we broke the connection quickly, both of us bright red and embarrassed. We split fast, pretending nothing had happened," Trying to regain composure.

"What do you need, Tina?" I asked, attempting to change the subject. Tina, still bright red and flustered, apologized for interrupting, and quickly ran out of the room.

“Nothing!” she yelled as she ran out.

The day came to an end rather quickly, but now there was a rumor circulating that Silica and I were making out. Due to Tina and what her big mouth was telling everyone. Kendra supposedly was training and heard the news when fighting Luke and apparently, she broke her wooden sword over his head and knocked him out.

Kendra was very awkward and mad at me during school the next day and didn’t want to talk to me. Seemed extremely mad, probably jealous of the supposed intimacy between Silica and me.