5 Chapter 5: Three Years

It was a beautiful morning in December 2006.

*Thump!* *Thump* *Bang!*

On a training ground, two people were fighting against each other. The first one was a dark skin man and the second one was a boy of around eleven years old. On the side, observing them was a bald middle-aged woman in a monk's garb.

Back to the fight, the black-haired boy had unleashed a round-house kick directed toward the black man's temple. Quickly reacting, he blocked the kick using his arm before reaching out to grab said boy when he saw that he was in the air. Seeing the hand reach out to him, the latter launched his foot towards the man's chest and used it as a springboard before performing a backflip and landing away from him. The man's breath was cut off as he felt the kick on his chest resulting in him taking a few steps back. He gave the boy a wry smile at his maneuver.

"That was a risky move Isaiah, but I must commend your reflexes."

Isaiah smiled at his teacher's compliment,

"Thanks, Mr. Mordo. I didn't have the time to think when you tried to grab me therefore I had to wing it," he replied.

Mordo sighed,

"Isaiah, how many times have I told you to call me Master Mordo." he lightly scolded the boy.

Isaiah kept his smile,

"Too many times Mr. Mordo, but come one. I've lived here for three years and it's the only memory I have. You guys are like my family. Do I really have to keep calling you that?" he whined a little.

The man smiled at the boy's question. He had indeed grown fond of the boy. He was the youngest recruit they have ever had and the Disaster of Kathmandu was a tragedy for the whole country even the world. That was not counting the attack on the Twin Towers in New York the year after. Although they still haven't found why multiple locations were bombed in Kathmandu.

"Still, you must uphold the etiquette even if you don't like it." Master Mordo replied the boy.

"Fine, Master Mordo."

"Good, now come. We haven't finished our sparring session yet. You may now use magic." the man said with one hand behind his back and the other motioning the child to come.

The child's smile grew when he heard the man finally allowing magic. He took a deep breath,

"Root, Shine."

As soon as Isaiah said those words, glowing turquoise circuit-like lines appeared all over the boy's body as he reinforced himself. The spells he use were called (Reinforcement). Two years ago, he was sleeping when he suddenly had a vision about a tan man with white hair wearing a long red overcoat using this particular spell to increase the effectiveness of whatever objects he used his spell. The next day, he went to train when he tried to recall the instructions of the man. In fact, he had gotten four spells that he could use with mana: (Reinforcement), (Structural Analysis), (Projection) and (Alteration) at that time. He didn't get those spells all at once. More visions pertained to the man using these spells during that year. It was also at that time, that he realized that these sorts of visions would keep on coming which led him to conclude that he wasn't as separated as he thought from the Root. The Ancient One also shared the same thoughts when he talked about his visions and showed the spells to her.

Mordo, seeing the circuits appearing all over the boy, prepared himself for him. He was very surprised at the fact that the boy possessed mana and was intrigued by the spells he brought forth. The boy kept smiling before placing his right foot behind him. He pushed down before launching himself forward toward the man leaving a footprint an inch deep in the floor. Mordo seeing the boy speeding towards him flooded his arms and legs with Universal energy before materializing tao mandalas in both of his hands and placing his hand in front of him. Isaiah had his fist ready as it impacted the tao mandalas creating crackling sounds. He grinned at the sight of his fist being blocked. He then started to perform a series of punches to break the man's guard, but the latter held up by either blocking or parrying said punches. He then used Eldritch magic to summon a whip before launching it toward Mordo's feet to trip him. Seeing his intentions, Mordo smirked and his boots glowed. He quickly jumped in the air and took a step forward. Instead of falling, a small magic circle appeared beneath the boot and created a platform for Mordo to step on. He then ran behind the boy.

"That's not fair! You're not allowed to use relics!" the boy cried seeing his opponent use the relic.

The man chuckled before replying,

"All is fair in Love and War, Isaiah."

"Then, when am I getting my relic?"

"When you're ready."

"And, I'm not ready?"

"It's not about when YOU are ready." Mordo said as he emphasized the word "you", "it's about when the relic decides that you are ready."

"Fine," Isaiah said before creating dagger constructs in each hand and running to the man once more. As they exchanged blows, the Ancient One continued to observe the fight with a slight smile. To be honest, she was shocked at the growth rate of the young child. He was only eleven years old and he has already surpassed many Masters in Kamar-Taj. She remembered the first time, the boy had unlocked his mana and it truly took her by surprise.

(Flashback)

"Root, Shine!" the boy had said triggering his magic circuits

At that moment, multiple turquoise circuit-like lines appeared all over the boy's body and blue energy surrounded the boy. A shockwave appeared when the mana surfaced as the wind appeared surrounding the boy in a vortex. The ground also cracked from how dense the mana was. The Ancient One who was observing was forced to step back due to the force of the mana.

'Incredible! Such an amount of mana! He has the most mana out of every one possessing said energy. Granted, I haven't seen many, but I can still estimate.' she thought as she looked at the cracks on the ground increasing.

The force of the mana was so strong that it was creating a crater where the boy sat. The woman conjured a barrier around the boy to avoid further damage to the surrounding. At that moment, the door to the rooms was slammed open and Mordo exclaimed.

"Master! I sensed a large amount of energy being released! What's happening!?" he shouted.

"Step back!" she ordered, "It's simply young Isaiah unlocking his mana."

Mordo looked at the boy, who still had his eyes closed, in shock at the tremendous amount of mana emanating from Isaiah.

"By the Vishanti! Is that the mana you were talking about Master?" he asked.

"Yes and it seems like he has a tremendous amount of it."

Soon the rampaging mana died down and the boy slumped forward in exhaustion. He had released all of his mana when he triggered his magic circuits for the first time. His teacher went to catch him as the little boy mumbled,

"So...tired."

The woman smiled,

"Rest little one. You did well," she whispered and the boy finally lost consciousness.

(End of flashback)

She observed as the boy created a shield to block the man's whip. Unfortunately, Mordo's target was the wrist. The whip attached itself to Isaiah's wrist and the latter eye's widened before he was pulled forward and towards his opponent. With a pulse of mana, he dispelled the whip attached to his wrist, but he found himself still flying toward the man. Isaiah raised his hand and pointed his finger toward the incoming man. A dark red crackling energy ball appeared in front of him before it shot forward toward the man. Seeing that he didn't expect that, the energy ball hit the man square in the stomach like he was hit by a speeding dodgeball. A very dangerous dodgeball. Because of the force of the energy bullet, he had to take a few steps back and Isaiah fell back to the floor.

"What was that? I have never seen something like this." Mordo asked bewildered by the spell.

Isaiah simply smirked and replied,

"You'll see."

As soon as he said those words, Mordo started to feel tired which confused him. He wasn't supposed to feel tired like this. It was like he had run sprint and was trying to catch his breath.

"Did you... curse me?"

The boy grinned,

"Yeah, it's a spell called Gandr. It's a small curse that's supposed to decrease the physical health of a person. It's very useful peaceful takedowns." the boy replied.

He learned this useful spell when he was studying mana through the little number of books his teacher had gotten him. His head had started to ache and his eyes fazed when a vision hit him. It was about an Asian girl with black hair. She had a red shirt and a black skirt. She also sported black high-knee socks and shoes. The vision was about her shooting at a red-headed boy in a classroom while the latter tried to protect himself behind a desk. The desk had glowing circuit-like lines on it as Isaiah recognized (Reinforcement) being used. There was also another vision where she used it against a little girl who had transmuted her hair to fight. He reproduced the spell after hearing what it was and the incantation that is used by the girl.

The Ancient One saw the new spell used in action and smiled. Ever since the boy started learning magic, she would always learn something new with him. Even if she was the Sorcerer Supreme and had mastered many fields of magic, there is always something new to learn, especially from someone who was connected to the Akasha Records. It was always refreshing to see something new. The knowledge he came forth with was stuff that even she couldn't find. It was like they came from another world which is not far-fetched since the Akashic Records has the knowledge of everything in the multiverse.

The woman also thought about his learning speed. At first, she thought that he was simply a genius in magic, but his speed was also used in his studies. At eleven years old, he had already finished college-level materials. She had started to suspect that something else was going on. It was last year that her suspicions had cemented.

(Flashback)

The Ancient One was walking with young Isaiah following right behind her. They were going to one of their practical training classes when the boy suddenly stopped. The Ancient One had noticed and also stopped.

"Hm? What's wrong, Isaiah?" she asked.

She then turned around to see the boy and saw the latter had a blank space as he stared at something. She turned her gaze to what the boy was starting and saw that it was a clock. Confused, she asked,

"Isaiah? What's wrong? "

*Tik* *Tok* *Tik* *Tok*

The blank expression disappeared and the bit pointed at the clock,

"That clock is broken," he stated.

Raising an eyebrow, the sorceress looked at the clock that was working perfectly fine.

"What do you mean? The clock is working perfectly fine," she asked confused as to why the boy said it was broken when it was working.

"It's running five seconds late and, each month, it increases by one second." the bit said.

Isaiah's words had taken her by surprise. Since he was here, the Ancient One never saw him working with a clock. And now he states that it was five seconds late and it would increase by a second every month was very confusing.

"I have never seen you work with a clock before, how do you know?"

"I just... know? I mean, I have been hearing it every day and it started to feel wrong." the boy replied as if he himself didn't know how he knew.

The woman stared at the boy before motioning her hand toward the clock. It started to levitate before flying in the boy's hands. The latter looked at his teacher confused,

"Why don't you try to fix it?" she said before adding,

"Without magic."

"Huh... I'll try" Isaiah replied unsurely.

The teacher-student duo then went back to their theoretical lesson room. The Ancient One had conjured many tools that the boy may need. Isaiah then set to work. He had grabbed a small screwdriver to open up the back of the clock. The woman observed that her student had opened the back of the clock revealing its inner workings. She then saw the boy simply observing the mechanism. Nothing else. For five straight minutes, she saw the boy simply looking at the clock's internal mechanism. She was about to call out to the boy when the boy sprung into action. He grabbed different tools before separating the different pieces of the clock. He then took out a small piece that looked a little bent and presented it to his teacher,

"Teacher, can you fix this?"

"Sure," she replied and waved her hand.

The piece had returned back to normal before the boy expertly put all the pieces back in place and observed the mechanism working once more. Seeing that it was now working properly, he closed the back of the clock and gave it to the teacher.

"It's fixed, teacher."

"Truly? How did you do it?"

The boy scratched his cheek before giving a wry smile,

"I don't know. Like I was looking at the mechanism and I, suddenly, knew how it worked. It was like it made sense to me,"

"Just like that?"

The boy nodded,

"Just like that."

"And you had no prior knowledge of how the clock worked?"

"Yeah. I don't know how to explain it. It's the same thing with my studies, especially science. I look at the problem and it's like everything clicks into place in my mind."

"I see."

(End of flashback)

After that event, the woman brought him many objects such as a microwave, a pocket watch, a TV, and many more. They were all broken and they were tossed out by citizens even if they looked perfectly fine. She then told him to fix them and if he couldn't tell her what the problem was and why it couldn't be fixed. The boy had looked at the inner workings of the machines for a maximum of fifteen minutes before coming up with a solution for each of them and greatly surprising her.

After that, the Ancient One had come up with two theories for this ability. Either the Akashic Records or the Root, as Isaiah calls it, had granted him this ability. Or it was a mutant ability granted him by the X-gene in his DNA. There are all sorts of mutant abilities in this world. One that gives the user to intuitively understand anything is not impossible.

'The power to instantly learn and understand the complexity and exactness of organisms, objects, etc. without the need for long-term or special education. If this ability is used in the right way, it could be a frightening one. If I were to compare our brains with computers, then Isaiah's brain would be a supercomputer,' She thought.

She continued to look at the boy and frowned a little. A year after he had started training, she saw an improvement in the boy's mood and expression. She saw him smiling more and interacting with the other disciples. All of them were older than him and some of them had gotten fond of him. But when she looked at the boy, she saw the broken child who suffered a tragedy that no one should suffer. Even when the boy smiled, his eyes sometimes didn't quite match it. He had told her that he had to give up on feeling fear, anger, and sadness to obtain the knowledge he now has. Therefore the only the boy could do was smile and nothing more. When he was supposed to feel anger, he smiled. When he was supposed to feel fear, he smiled. When he was supposed to feel sadness and grief, he smiled. Although each smile had a different form. It's like these forms were an echo of their real emotions.

The Ancient One, suddenly, snapped out of his thoughts when she saw the man had finally pinned the boy down and called the match. She sighed, although Isaiah's ability to instantly understand almost anything, the power didn't allow him to instantly learn anything, it didn't work on physical stuff. He would understand what he needed to do, but because the power is a mental one, physical aspects were harder to learn.

"Good fight, Isaiah. You have improved a lot from when you first started learning." Mordo said as he removed himself from the boy that was pinned underneath him.

Isaiah groaned before lifting himself up.

"Thanks, Mordo. I thought I had you with that spell though." the boy replied.

"Master Mordo. And you're going to have to bring more than just one simple curse to bring me down Isaiah."

Suddenly, they heard footsteps and they saw the Ancient One approaching them.

"Master/Hey Teacher!" Mordo and Isaiah said when they saw the woman come near them.

"Hello, Master Mordo and Isaiah. That was an excellent sparring match you displayed. I can see that young Isaiah had improved tremendously in magic and martial arts."

Mordo nodded,

"Yes, I can see that in magic he is almost on my level and it is very impressive for someone who only started learning magic three years ago. Not to mention, the spells he comes up with using mana. Although, he still needs to improve his martial arts and he needs to gain experience." he adds.

The boy and his teacher decided to keep his unnatural powers a secret since Isaiah didn't want anyone to learn about them. Therefore, Mordo simply thinks that the boy invents the spells on his own.

"That's good. Thank you, Master Mordo, for your time."

"It was my pleasure, Master," he said before turning to the boy, "I'll see you later, Isaiah." before turning away.

"Bye, Mordo!" the bit replied.

"It's Master Mordo!" the man retorted.

Isaiah simply giggled and the Ancient One smiled. They started to make their way toward their theoretical lesson room while Isaiah had conjured a towel to wipe off the sweat.

"How are you feeling?" she asked.

"I feel like I could've done better. For one, I could've used portals to redirect his attacks," Isaiah replied.

The woman looked at the boy,

"You do know that you need a sling ring to create a portal. And you didn't have one during your sparring match.," she said

"Yeah, I know. But about a month ago, I had another vision."

"Oh? What was it about?"

"It was about a spell on the same level as (Gradation Air)."

"Gradation Air is a spell where you materialize an object using mana, am I right?"

"Yeah."

"A useful spell, if I say so myself. Continue, please."

"So yeah. The spell that I saw was called (Flash Air)."

"And what does it do?"

"It's a spell that substitutes something with another.

" We don't have a spell like that as far as I'm concerned. It sounds like a simple spell."

"I know, right? That's because it is a simple spell. The spell has a conceptual part of substituting. We can replace a fork with a spoon. Or a baseball with a tennis ball. Or even something more."

"I see." she says when they arrived in front of their "classroom".

As they entered, they sat down in front of a table, and the woman conjured two sets of teacups.

"If you say that the spell is a concept of substituting, that means you can use it on almost anything including space."

"Exactly." the boy enthusiastically said.

The Ancient One smiled when he saw the boy give a genuine smile. The boy loved magic and she was happy that he found something like that.

"Have you made progress then?"

"Well, I learned to use the spell to do on visible objects like substituting utensils or balls even clothes." the boy answered before his sorcerer's robe disappeared replaced with a T-shirt and pants.

The Ancient One raised an eyebrow at the spell. There was no visible effect. It was like like an instantaneous change. Unlike using the spells of the Masters of Mystic Arts, this one didn't transmute the clothes to another. Isaiah then wore his robe back before continuing to explaining

" Although doing it on abstract stuff gets a little harder since it's harder to visualize something I can't see. The only examples of space manipulation I have are the sling ring portals and the mirror dimension. But I'm getting there." he said before sipping his tea.

"That's good. You can always ask me for help you know. I may be the Sorcerer Supreme, but I'm also your teacher."

"No problem, teacher."

They sat in silence as they sipped their tea. After a full minute, the woman put her cup down.

*Ting*

She then waved her hand and the walls of the room glowed orange and gold before dissipating.

"Now that I have put a barrier. Have you made progress with those?" she asked.

The boy closed his eyes before removing his glasses. They now had a new feature to stick to his face so that it doesn't fall when moving around. His teacher had noticed that they would always fall when he trained therefore she added a new enchantment. He then opened his eyes revealing the glowing pupils. In the boy's vision, the world cracked as multiple red pulsing lines appeared all around him.

"It doesn't hurt to use them, but I still can't turn them off though."

"Mhmm." the woman hummed in response.

"On the bright side, I think I can keep it up for a few hours."

"That's good," his teacher replied before asking," And the other matter?"

"I practiced using it and I think I got it down. It took me three years of practice, and I think I succeeded in mastering it."

The Ancient One nodded seriously,

"Demonstrate."

Isaiah closed his eyes and took a deep breath. For this particular ability, he didn't need to use his mana. In fact, he didn't need to use any energy. When he was on his way to the Root, he sacrificed many things that made him a normal human. In return, he gained reality-shattering knowledge. He had comprehended the very essence of Nothingness and Creation. In doing so, it granted him a technique that shattered any laws of science and magic. Isaiah connected himself with that knowledge. He focused on what he wanted and denied its nonexistence. He opened his eyes and said three words,

"Denial of Nothingness."