13 Chapter 13

It had already been a month on the road. They passed through small villages and Hamlets where they bought the rations and other necessities. If they found a inn at night, it meant better food and lodging for them. Coins were the currency used in this world to pay for everything, they seemed to made of copper and silver. Aaron had never seen any other kind of currency so far. Infact even silver coins were new to him. He had grown up seeing copper coins only.

He had already finished all his books. Apart from reading, he listened to Ryan when he explained a little about science and other things of this world.

It seemed mages were pretty knowledgable in terms of science. They had concrete understanding of the basic laws which were understood even on earth. Ryan took care that he never went in depth because he thought Aaron was a kid and lacked the basic foundation to understand those theories. But he was worried that since he had finished his quota of books he would be disturbing him more and more. But that didnt happen. He saw Aaron had a good disposation. He only talked when Ryan was up for it and he never bothered Ryan unnecessarily. That made Ryan have a pretty good image of Aaron in his mind.

"Are mages the strongest beings on Contura?" Aaron asked his daily quota of question.

"Yes, you can say Mages are in general the strongest being. Or you could rather say, the peak of mages are. But there haven't been a mage recently who could say he is the absolute strongest."

"In this world there is two path to gain strength. One is ofcourse being a mage. The other is to be a warrior."

Warrior? This is the new term he heard.

"Before you ask, warrior is branch which is in a totally different direction than being a mage. As I have explained to you before, mages use mental energy. Physical strength have no effect on how strong a mage is. Warriors on the other hand train bodies. I don't have much Idea regarding how they go about training. I have never met anyone and just heard about them. They are very rare, rarer than mages even ."

"Also on the planet their are some beasts which have natural talent to use magic or aura, they are called magical beasts. They are equally strong as mages or warriors. But no one had seen one in many a years."

"These three groups consists the strongest beings on earth. When I said mages were strongest, it's because there have been mages in the past who had total dominance over the world and could claim to be the strongest. Also, the knowledge about the other two groups is not common. I have read about it from really old books which I was lucky to find and learn a little from people I came across by chance. "

"Most mages would would outright declare that they are the strongest group, but I try to keep an open mind about things. That's very important actually if you want to be a good mage. Having an open mind that is. "

Aaron really liked this about Ryan. Whenever Aaron asked a question, Ryan answered several other questions which would come up in relation to Aaron's question without being asked. And he liked how he talked about having an open mind. In order to learn, it was absolutely necessary.

"Thank you Mage Ryan for your explanation. But I was wondering if you had some more books for me to read."

"No. I dont have any other books for you. I am rather surprised that you finished all those books. And hearing your questions everyday, I feel you have really read them and not just pretended in order to impress me. I have some more books with me, but those are mine. I am afraid they are of much higher level than you can understand at present. "

Only if he knew that I had a higher degree in applied mathematics. But Aaron couldnt say it outloud nor could he say that he would understand those books. It just spelled disaster if he did.

"Dont be too sad." Ryan said seeing Aaron was a bit dissapointed.

"Its just one more month. Then you could read as much you want after that."

"One month? Didnt you say it would take 6 months to reach Indigo province?"

"I said it would take 6 months on road. But we have an different arrangement." Ryan winked at Aaron as he said that.

After spending a month with Ryan, Aaron was sure that he wasnt a bad person by any means. He just spoke directly whatever was in his mind. You could say he was slightly eccentric in nature. He would read his books seriously and hated disturbances. But he would daily take out time to talk with Ryan and teach him things too.

It was a good thing that Aaron really liked looking out of the window, else with so much time on his hands with nothing much to do, he would go crazy. This did remind him of earth. Whenever he travelled, he always loved looking out of the window and would fight for the window seat. Now he stared out of the window and thought a lot about his time back on earth. Did he die while sleeping or something else happened. Did 8 years pass by on earth as well. Were his parents still sad that he was dead or missing?

He also thought how much life was different on earth. He did miss the luxury of the modern civilization. All the different variety of food. But it didnt have magic. Honest for god real magic.