Chapter 5

Once Hector arrived, he quickly found his way into a large circular room that had a raised platform in the center. Around it there were small desks, some of which were already occupied. Looking around Hector noticed that most of the people looked to be around 15 or 16 years old, but there was one exception who looked to be around 30.

Deciding that even though his age was closer to the younger people in the room, Hector walked over to the older person.

"Hello, is this seat taken?" Hector asked

Surprised, the person looked at Hector before saying,"Umm, no. Feel free to sit there."

Only then did Hector realize that something felt different about the person. When he realized it, he thought he knew why. He'd been told that he would instinctively know if someone was from earth or not, and the feeling he had might be it.

"Excuse me if this sounds odd, but are you a player?" Hector asked.

"I am. Kinda was hoping I'd be the only magician from Earth, but I guess it was a futile dream."

"Yeah, would think that there would be more people here. but I am happy that I'm not the oldest here."

"Not really that surprising. Most people don't have the time to go in a fantasy school on a Monday. And most people who entered the afterlife are spending time with their families, or enjoying Earth"

"Huh, didn't think of that. So, how do you have time then?"

"I died" the person answered in a very matter of fact tone, which resulted in Hector staring at him for a short while.

"That... I am sorry to hear that." Hector stammered

After an awkward silence the person continued talking,"it happens, not your fault. And besides, I can enjoy this entirely new world. It is kinda weird to wake up a few years after you die though."

"hah, tell me about it. I died like 50 years ago, and then I wake up to hear people talking about brainchips, personal quantum computers and all that. My name is Hector by the way, what's yours?"

"It's Shawn, but what do you mean 50 years. The whole thing was announced just..." Shawn was interrupted by a woman in her late 60s entering the room and loudly announced herself.

"Good morning class, I am Journeyman Kyrie, and am going to be teaching you the basic theory of magic and how to use it to you during this week." She said as she walked to stand on the central platform in the room.

"To start off, how many people know what magic is?"

Almost everyone raised their hands, and glancing at Hector and Shawn, she decided to continue. "Well, magic is the manipulation of living energy known as mana, and using it to replicate different types of essence. I trust that everyone has already been taught what essence is." Giving another glance at the Hector and Shawn, she sighed and continued. "Essence is one of the basic building blocks of everything, apart from souls and spirits. It is the meaning and purpose in the elements, objects and even concepts. As an example, take fire. The purpose of fire is to burn, to make heat and light while devouring what it touches. Those things are part of the essence of fire, and when you're able to control mana, you'll be able to give it the same properties effectively changing it into fire essence, with the exception that it's under your own control."

Hector raised his hand,"what did you mean with the meaning of objects and concepts?" he asked.

"well, there is essence in everything, meaning that it is in stuff like swords, shields and buckets. The purpose or essence of a sword is to cut, a shield protects and a bucket holds stuff in it. There is essence in some concepts, like emptiness. It isn't a physical thing, but it still is something real. Same thing with time or fear." Kyrie replied. "Any other questions so far?"

There weren't any, but Hector was already deep in thought, thinking about everything that could be done. He knew for a fact that the world was simulated down to subatomic particles, so how would essence work with them, or was essence the subatomic particles. And could you mix different parts of essence together to get something new, like take heat from fire and protection from a shield, to protect something from heat?

His thoughts were interrupted by Kyrie continuing her teachings when nobody else had questions.

"Now for the most important part. Mana is connected to the soul or spirit, and thus is connected to it's wielders thoughts. This is why learning to manipulate mana similar to learning how to move your ears. It can be difficult to learn, but once you have learned how to do it, it'll be as simple as moving your hand. However, for that same reason, your own knowledge and understand skill of different aspects of somethings essence affects how well your mana can replicate it." She took a short break to make sure nobody had questions so far before continuing. "Now, we will spend the rest of the day learning how to feel and manipulate your own mana. Then tomorrow we'll go through the methods to replicate essence with your mana, and how to do it, and the rest of the week you'll learn the theory on the essence of muscles and water.

The next two and a half hours were spent learning about the theory of mana manipulating and how to sense it in your body and soul. After just a few questions, Hector felt like he had a good understanding of it. Sensing the mana you have stored in the soul was similar to knowing when you're hungry. When the soul had low amounts of mana, you'd feel it and instinctively know where the feeling came from, and once you feel where it is, you'll always be able to feel how full it is. Normally it could take years of meditation and knowledge of ones body to feel it, but the school had devices that forcibly draw mana from the soul. That way the students would be able to feel where it is, without having to meditate a second. Feeling and manipulating ones mana was more difficult, but still simple enough. When the mana would be pulled out of the soul, through the body, you'd have to try and feel it moving, and then try and do it yourself with the feeling of it moving as a guide.

After the explanations were finished and questions were answered, Kyrie started talking with some finality in her voice,"That was all the theory for today. Those who want to use two skill points to transfer the knowledge into a skill, can do so now and go home. For everyone else, you can go have a lunch break, and come back in an hour. Well start the practical part of the lesson then, and hopefully you'll be able to manipulate magic at the end of the day."

Hector and Shawn followed the other students out of the class, and out of the building. Hector had expected that there would've been a cafeteria where they could eat, but seeing the other students take food out of pouches and bags, they realized they'd need to go buy lunch somewhere else.

"know anywhere where we can eat?" Shawn asked.

"There's a small inn where I slept last night, it had decent food there. But I don't have a lot of money to spend." Hector replied.

"What do you mean no money, did you already spent all your money in the bank already?"

"Bank, why would I have money there?"

"You really should have read what you were getting. All players get 10 gold upon death, and you also could have bought money at $10 per gold coin. I got myself 100 gold before I died."

"That... that's good to know. I've got 7 and a half silver with me, so we don't have to find a bank yet. But we will have to go buy some better stuff later on."

They continued walking towards the inn, where they had a nice lunch for one silver. They got to know each other better, and went happily back to the school after eating. When they got back to the school, only half the amount people from previously were there. Apparently many were willing to use skill points to skip over a few hours of school. It didn't take long for the teacher to come back, eating something that looked similar to a burrito, and the lesson continued.

Learning magic was... not as painful as Hector expected. The feeling that came with the mana drain was comparable to having his energy taken away, and after about half of his mana had been slowly drained, he felt like he'd been awake for a week, and wanted to do nothing but sleep. It did slowly fade away though. The only pain he felt was the mana being forced through his unused channels, but it was only about as painful as a paper cut. Kyrie had explained that the body had small channels that allowed mana to travel through the body easier, and that they'd need to get used to mana traveling through them, so the first time using them would hurt.

But even though Hector was feeling very tired, and slight pain, he managed to feel where the mana was stored, and where the mana was moving. It was odd, they felt like parts of his body, and after a while he instinctively knew where they were, but they were still separate from his body. As he talked with Shawn about it, he compared it to phantom pain, or being able go feel and move a severed finger. After an hour, Hector was able to willfully move the mana along his channels, after a little while more, he learned to move it to other parts of his body, and after another two hours, he learned to move it out of his body, but it required intense concentration. In the half an hour he had left before the lesson would've ended, he learned that moving mana through solid objects was a lot easier than through air.

Hector was even very satisfied with his progress, untill Shawn bragged about being able to do it first. As a response, Hector splashed Shawn with a bit of mana, which resulted in something Hector hadn't expected. The mana was... wet, and as Hector realized that, his whole body was washed in a short wave of relaxation and pleasure, and the now slight feeling of tiredness went completely away.

"What happened, did you do something?" Hector asked in slight shock.

"No, I think you just got to level one. Check you character sheet"

Hector did as Shawn said, and he had indeed leveled up. His XP had gone from 0 to 107, but that wasn't the only thing that had changed. Hector decided to put three stat points into both wisdom and intelligence, leaving the last for perception, and as he was doing it, he noticed that his stat multipliers had changed. His dexterity, constitution and perception multipliers had gone down to 0.998, while his strength had stayed the same, and his intelligence, wisdom and charisma had risen to 1.006.

Deciding to check what else had changed, he found that he'd gained new skills and knowledge. Checking the skills first, he was disappointed at first seeing the first few skills, bit seeing the last three, he was overjoyed.

Skills:

- Walking (Proficient)

- Vocal communication (Proficient)

- Mathematics (Beginner)

- Mana manipulation (Novice)

- Mana sense (Novice)

- Mental mana transformation (Novice)

Note: the brackets after each skill are their level of advancement. From worst to best they are: Novice, Beginner, Competent, Proficient, Journeyman, Expert, Master, Grandmaster and Sage

Hector yelped as he noticed Shawn staring at his character sheet from behind his shoulder.

"Wow, math at a beginner level. Amazing" Shawn said slightly teasing Hector.

"And what does that actually mean?" Hector asked

"I don't know, try pressing it."

Hector pressed the button reading 'Mathematics (Beginner)', and it expanded to fit a brief explanation. 'Mathematics (Beginner): You are capable of instinctively doing addition and subtraction, and basic multiplication and division.'

"That's good, I think. But I'm more curious about this" Hector said before pressing the button that had mental mana transformation written on it. 'Mental mana transformation (Novice): You are capable of mentally transforming the basic properties of your mana. Warning: making mistake when using this skill may cause malfunction of the brain.'

"Is that why your mana was wet?" Shawn asked.

"Probably, but the brain malfunction is something I'm worried about. I'll ask the teacher about it tomorrow." Hector answered with slight terror, before they continued walking towards the bank.