Magic Circles

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"I don't get it…"

Honestly, I've never heard of such strange tier-based systems before.

"I know it's hard to understand, so come with us."

With that, my mother quickly carried me in her arms like a baby, even though I was already four years old, into another room in our house. In that room was a large board, where she began to draw several things on it.

She then drew a circle on the board with a few designs on it, resembling a magic circle. I've barely seen those things because all my "magic" came from the System. In other words, I have no use for magic circles in the first place.

However, I have seen them when Aquarina conjured more powerful spells than Aqua Bullet. The spells were in the form of beautiful magic circles that emerged out of thin air after making a small incantation. They would rotate around the user's hands and show runes of strange letters that I don't understand.

When the incantation was ready, the magic circle would then open up and transmute the mana into a specific element as the spell is made. Well, my parents are advanced magicians, so they rarely use incantations or magic circles.

I suppose when you get strong enough you don't need to do it anymore… I think? I'm not sure really. Maybe this is why they think I'm a genius, because I'm doing what they can do after having trained a lot… but even then, it still takes effort, and it's still not as strong as theirs.

"When a magician reaches the age of four, they can already begin to create what's called a Magic Circle inside their souls. This Magic Circle can be designed by someone of a higher tier, such as me or your daddy," mother started to explain.

I nodded.

"This Magic Circle is different from the ones you see in magic spells. Unlike those ones, this one is permanent and will become the core of your magic power, magic potency and magic talent," she continued.

I nodded once more.

"By creating a basic one inside your soul, concurrently forming its runes, you can see the entirety of your Magic Circle as a history of your magic. Every spell you'll be able to create will emerge from it, which will make it easier for you to conjure them in the long run…"

"I see…"

"As you can see, a Magic Circle has 10 Tiers, with each Tier having 10 Ranks within them. Each Rank consists of a massive group of runes that you must slowly build up through training, refinement, spell creation, and spell enhancement. There are several ways to improve your Magic Circle to grow more runes so you can break through the next Rank. In fact, some of those methods are the ones I just mentioned."

"Ohh…"

Mother then showed a small magic circle, which slowly formed more and more runes. To break through every Rank inside a Magic Circle Tier, one would need magic runes to form in the Magic Circle. In actuality, these runes naturally formed by refining the magic circle through meditation, but she told me this would take dozens of years. With that, she told me there were many ways to enhance the speed of this process, such as using the help of familiars, magic artifacts, potions, and more.

Plus, there was also another way, which was to learn and perfect spells within the magic tier. Through that, the Magic Circle would receive a quantity of runes based on the newly learned spell, giving it a greater chance of breaking through. But of course, creating and learning spells isn't an easy task so it would still take time.

After that, she mentioned another extreme method… which was to forcefully learn a higher-tier magic spell before infusing the runes acquired from mastering it into one's current magic circle tier, forcefully breaking through all the ranks and reaching the next tier… however, she warned me that doing so might risk destroying my magic circle and end up dying in the process, so it wasn't recommended.

I think I kind of get it now…

"Magic Circles, when created, are connected to your soul. If something ends up damaging it, you might risk damaging your soul in the process, which is a very bad thing, of course. It might even kill you if you ignore it for too long… so be careful… Well, you won't find many capable of directly damaging the soul, and I also won't let anyone that can get closer to you either, but still," mother concluded.

"I think I get it… will you help me create one?" I wondered.

"Yes, the earlier it's made, the better for your magical growth. You're already very talented at magic, so making a magic circle shouldn't be hard… let's begin," mother said.

"I still think it's a bit too early… I made my own when I was twelve. What's the hurry?" father said in response, letting out a sigh.

"The earlier it's done, the more talent and magical power she'll be able to amass over time. This world is dangerous, Allan. Our girl requires strength above all else," mother replied, wanting to continue with the formation of my magic circle.

My father sighed once more after hearing that. He seemed against the idea for some reason.

"But she's so young to go through such a painful experience…"

Ah. So that's why.

"Painful?" I asked.

"W-Well… haah. Creating a Magic Circle inside your soul requires a lot of effort from your soul. In short, the soul itself is slightly torn apart to make space for the magic circle. Because of this… you'll experience a bit of pain," mother explained.

"I see. Well, that's fine," I replied nonchalantly.

"Eh?!" Of course, my nonchalance left my father shocked.

In any case, I've experienced all the soul pain I could take against Ignatius, so I don't think this will affect me.

"See? Our girl is braver than her own father!" my mother could not help but say in response to my words.

"A-Are you sure, Sylphy?!" my father asked once more, wanting to make sure.

"Yeah, I can handle it," I said with a nod.

"O-Oh…"

"Hehe! Very well then. Let's begin."

With that, my mother unleashed several incantations as magic circles continuously appeared around my body. These magic circles then converged together in what I would call a "magic circle formation." After she infused mana into them, all five of these circles then fired a ray of mana into my body.

It didn't really hit my body per se, but instead, it aimed directly for my soul.

FLASH!

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