(6) The Path to Becoming Stronger

Chapter 6: The Path to Becoming Stronger

Under Elfman's guidance, Silver and Elfman successfully bought all the supplies they needed.

As they returned to the guild entrance, they noticed a loud commotion coming from inside.

"What's going on?" Silver pushed open the guild doors, and the two walked in.

The first thing he saw was Mira in a heated standoff with a red-haired girl clad in armor.

Seeing the two girls in the middle of their face-off, Silver didn't even need to ask before Elfman, acting like a commentator, began to explain quietly, "The one fighting my sister is Erza. She's as strong as Mira."

"Oh, so that's Erza," Silver muttered, observing her closely. She matched his impression: a fierce and commanding presence, truly embodying the spirit of a strong woman.

"You know Erza?" Elfman asked, confused at how familiar Silver seemed.

"Well, it's pretty obvious—there's a Mira faction and an Erza faction, right?" Silver shrugged, pulling Elfman along as they skirted around Mira and Erza's battlefield to head further into the guild.

Elfman finally understood what Silver meant, scratching the back of his head with an embarrassed smile.

Just as they bypassed Mira and Erza's duel, they stumbled upon another showdown.

A pink-haired boy with a scarf was in a face-off against a boy wearing nothing but shorts.

"The one with the scarf is Natsu, and the one in just shorts is Gray," Elfman whispered an introduction. "These two are just like my sister and Erza—constantly at odds with each other."

At that moment, Natsu noticed Silver and Elfman. He abandoned his quarrel and leaped over to greet Silver enthusiastically. "Hey! I'm Natsu. Lisanna mentioned you're a new member of our guild."

"Nice to meet you, I'm Silver," he replied, a bit taken aback by Natsu's energetic approach.

"Silver, huh? Let's have a duel! It'll be fun!" Natsu immediately got into a fighting stance.

Silver quickly waved his hands in refusal. "I'm not really good at fighting."

The idea of dueling seemed ridiculous to Silver.

Mira and Erza were already at a B-Class mage level, and even Natsu and Gray were probably at least C-Class.

Given that Silver had just learned magic and hadn't even fully grasped his abilities yet, a duel would be more like a one-sided beatdown.

"Don't mind this idiot," Gray interjected, coming over to defuse the situation. "He's always like this. I'm Gray."

"What did you say, you droopy-eyed freak? Who are you calling an idiot?" Natsu immediately turned to argue, head-butting Gray as the two began squabbling again.

"I was talking about you, you slant-eyed moron! Who challenges someone to a duel the moment they meet?" Gray shot back, completely forgetting his earlier attempt to find his missing clothes.

"Silver! Elfman! You're back! What did you get?" In the middle of Natsu and Gray's bickering, Lisanna came over from the guild's counter, curious about their shopping haul.

Hearing Lisanna's question, Natsu and Gray instantly paused their argument and turned to look.

"Nothing much, just some art supplies," Silver answered casually, raising the items in his hand to show her.

"Oh? Do you use pict magic?" asked Cana, who had followed Lisanna over. At this point, she was still a well-behaved girl and looked at Silver's supplies with interest.

"Yes, that's right," Silver nodded.

"Ah, isn't that just like Reedus?" Natsu remarked, losing interest. He was familiar with Reedus's magic and knew it wasn't particularly suited for combat.

While Natsu seemed uninterested, the others found it intriguing, and soon Silver was getting acquainted with them all.

In the Fairy Tail guild, young mages under the age of fifteen were provided with free food and lodging.

For the next period, Silver focused on familiarizing himself with the guild and practicing his magic, seeking ways to enhance its power.

He always kept in mind the saying: "There are no useless abilities, only people who fail to use them properly."

Aside from occasionally teaming up with Elfman to take on simple, low-risk D-rank missions within Magnolia, Silver mostly spent his time in a corner of the guild, experimenting with his magic and learning painting techniques from Reedus.

However, because Silver's pict magic differed entirely from Reedus's, he couldn't directly apply Reedus's experience and had to figure things out on his own over the past six months.

Despite the challenges, this half-year wasn't wasted.

Silver eventually found a path to strengthen his abilities.

But when he discovered this path, everyone witnessed him collapsing weakly onto a table, tears streaming down his face as he muttered, "I came all the way here, yet I still can't escape from this…"

Why was that? It's simple.

Reedus's magic relies on his creative imagination and the amount of magic power he can channel to bring his drawings to life.

However, Silver's pict magic requires him to know detailed information about whatever he wants to manifest.

The more precise and comprehensive his knowledge, the more realistic the object he creates will be.

Take a kitchen knife as an example: Reedus's magic involves drawing the knife on his body and then imagining how it would look once materialized.

The more magic he infuses into the drawing, the closer it resembles the imagined knife until it becomes an exact replica.

Silver's magic works differently.

If he just wants to animate a drawing or connect it to reality, that's manageable.

But if he wishes to materialize an object like a kitchen knife, he needs detailed information about its dimensions—its length, width, height, the thickness of the handle, the curvature, etc.

Even with this data, he would only be able to create a visually accurate but non-functional knife.

To make a usable knife, he would need even more detailed information, such as the materials of the blade and handle, the molecular and atomic structure, and so on.

The more detailed his knowledge, the more realistic the object becomes.

There's a clear distinction between the two types of magic.

Reedus's pict magic is simpler to use but requires substantial magic power.

Silver's magic, on the other hand, demands a solid foundation of knowledge.

Without sufficient understanding, it's impossible to manifest anything.

However, with the right knowledge, even minimal magic power can bring his creations to life.

Fortunately, his "cheat" provides him with vast amounts of knowledge. Without it, his journey to become stronger might have seemed impossible.

This realization confirmed that he was on the right path to strengthening his abilities.

At this point, it's easy to understand why Silver was in tears.

Even after arriving in a world of magic, he couldn't escape the fate of studying physics, chemistry, and mathematics.

Yes, Silver finally realized a fundamental truth: magic and science are essentially two sides of the same coin—they are both methods of exploring and understanding the natural universe.

The universe itself remains unchanged, whether you use science or magic to investigate it.

Moreover, the foundational principles of magic and science overlap.

Whether you are using magic or scientific methods to understand the universe, you still need to study data, the transmission of force, and the composition of matter.

This is exactly why Silver found himself needing to continue learning physics, chemistry, and math.