First Day in the Library

The sunlight drifted in through the small window that was part of Sebastian's dorm room lightly touching upon his face when he was woken up by a knock on his door. "Coming!," he shouted and shuffled his way slowly towards the wooden door. After having opened the latch he was greeted by a male servant.

"I've come for your chamber pot sir.," the servant stated

"Thanks, but I haven't used it." Sebastian replied before closing the door again.

Sebastian looked out the window of his room and noticed that it was still early morning and that he was still in his clothes from yesterday. "Looks like I fell asleep without noticing last night.," he grumbled to himself.

"Shouldn't they've provided me with clothes? I remember hearing about that.," he said to himself before he searched the room for a fresh outfit.

The only container in the room seemed to be the small rickety desk which had a few drawers. He began to open them one by one before finding a cloak with some linen pants and a shirt that all seemed to be a part of the academy uniform in the bottom drawer. After changing his clothes Sebastian realized there was no mirror in the room to see how looked. Though he felt kind of awkward in the attire as it wasn't sized right and hung loosely on his body. He regretted sending that servant away but by this point it was too late to call him back. He sighed before he exited the room and walked down the hallways until he left the building. By this point he was glad that his work and the dorm were so close together. Despite there being few mutant mages in existence the campus was quite large, because it served to teach an entire nation of mages. This was no small feat and Sebastian began to wonder why the king hadn't founded more Academies to facilitate all of them. The amount of funding alone to support one academy was astronomical with the amount of servants, food, and other utilities that needed to be provided. It was strange to Sebastian as he grew up as a commoner. Though he was identified as a mutant at birth due to his eyes he wasn't treated any better because of this with the exception of being taught to read. In fact Sebastian was no stranger to how mutant mages were treated outside of this academy because of his status. Though mages often went to war for the kingdom of Seronao some of the commoner class still view them as distasteful because they believed that mages were the cause of the cataclysms that affected the world. Being treated with some modicum of respect from servants and the like was very strange indeed.

As Sebastian neared the library he put his thoughts on hold and staring at the large columns of the building he dreaded the idea of being the only librarian for this huge building. However he noticed something strange, and that was because he saw very few people coming and going from the building. He had figured that there would be more students coming to read the tomes located inside to further their knowledge. He did see some instructors occasionally come and go but that was about it.

After heading inside Sebastian noticed the rows upon rows of books containing the knowledge that mages had spent 100 years studying. The library seemed to be built upon two floors with a grand staircase at the back. Red carpet spanned the entire main aisle and up the stairs onto the second floor. Columns like the ones outside were used to support the second floor on the sides of the aisle past the bookcases. This left a clear view of the ceiling which had a large painting of the night sky. Before reaching the grand staircase Sebastian noticed a large open area where the early morning sunlight poured through the large pane windows of the building onto several long tables each supporting several candle sticks evenly spread out to allow for night reading. Sitting in the middle of that on the large red carpet was a desk where a man sat in a chair with his legs propped up and a book covering his face. Coming up to the desk Sebastian knocked on its hard wood to get the man's attention. Noticing the man was asleep Sebastian pounded harder on to the desk which woke the man with a start.

"Hah, no baby come back! I didn't mean it -", he yelled before he stopped half-way and noticed the book in his field of view. Having moved the book away Sebastian came into his field of view and he sighed.

"Could you not have waited longer? I was just getting to the good part!," he stated in exasperation.

Paying no attention to his whining, Sebastian said, "I was told to report here as the new librarian yesterday."

The man at the desk looked a little peeved when he heard this, "You should've come earlier. Would've saved me a lot of dusting.," he said in annoyance before putting the book down on the desk.

Seeing that Sebastian was unapologetic the man decided that he would just get this over with quickly, "The rules are simple. If someone comes in to check-out a tome, write their name down along with the title of the tome. If they request a specific tome it is your job to go fetch it. Your duties are to dust the library, place tomes in their proper places, and note that they are organized in alphabetical order. With that said, good luck!," to which the man practically raced out of the library like there was a hell hound nipping at his heels. A loud shout was heard once the man exited the doorway, "Freedom! Beauties watch out Lance is coming!"

"I guess I am the only librarian after all.," Sebastian breathed out before sitting at the now vacant desk.

Curious as to what the mage had been reading Sebastian read the cover reading out, "Ka-ma Su-tra," pondering for a moment he read it out again more clearly this time, "Kama Sutra, is this some sort of ancient cultivation method? Let's take a look." opening the book at first Sebastian didn't understand how this was a cultivation method and upon flipping a few pages where there were pictures to go along with what was written his entire head heated up and he slammed the book shut before he let out a phrase that many female acolytes had said upon meeting that same man, "Damn, perverted mage!"

After visiting the K section of the library and returning the tome to its rightful place Sebastian thought that an alphabetical system was terrible and caused his head to spin reading all the titles to determine its spot. Sebastian then began to explore the library slowly but surely when he noticed a tome titled, "Mages a Brief History". Despite saying the word "Brief" the tome itself was quite large causing Sebastian to notice it initially. Upon opening it it read:

[Mages came into being through the mutation of humans during the first cataclysm. Those who survived their mutations were referred to by the term 'Mage' derived from an ancient word that meant someone who could use magic or at least someone with knowledge. Though the term is used to identify those with a mutation after experimentation with the earliest of mages it was determined that as a mage cultivated their mutations would grow in power and could be split up into different stages namely: Acolyte, Novice, Apprentice, Adept, Expert, and finally an official mage. Though it is theorized that there may be realms beyond that there has been no conclusive evidence.]

Sebastian already knew most of this information so he skipped a few pages before reading further.

[When the first cataclysm occurred those who didn't mutate to become mages mutated instead to become monsters. Monsters are an amalgamation of different species and humans only became a subset of the humanoid variety. Though most monsters today have clear distinctive features they are not yet in their final form and can continue to mutate changing their appearance wildly.]

Sebastian himself had met a few monsters though usually of the harmless variety what really drew his attention though was the sentence that stated

[Due to monster mutation and Mage mutation occurring at the same time people began to view them as the cause or as monsters themselves.]

Sebastian had always wondered why people viewed mages as undesirable but now he could sort of understand where the association came from and how over generations that view could become even more skewed. Most of the rest of the tome was about who did what and when. Seeing that the information wasn't helpful he returned the book back to its spot on the shelf.

When he returned to the desk he noticed that there seemed to be a student waiting. After having heard Sebastian approach the acolyte turned and Sebastian recognized him immediately.

"Sebastian, it is so wonderful to see you!" the boy exclaimed, but of course his expression said otherwise.

"Abarin, what brings you to the library? Are you looking for anything?," Sebastian questioned with a strained smile.

Abarin had been one of the younger sons of the lord of Sebastian's home. When Sebastian had been born he was immediately given the right to learn to read and write because he would be attending Rixora. This caused Abarin to despise the lad for he believed that the art of writing should only belong to the nobles. This belief came from the fact that Abarin's father was already a minor noble and there were no titles for Abarin to inherit being the youngest son. Though Abarin enjoyed the privileges of being of noble birth he wouldn't get much else and Sebastian, though a commoner, was given some of his rights without any effort. Though this line of thinking was hypocritical it didn't stop Abarin from treating Sebastian poorly in order to feel a sense of superiority and gratification.

"Well actually I'm here for you! I heard that you had been placed in the library after not being able to determine your specialty.," Abarin stated with a smug grin on his face.

This caused Sebastian's already strained smile to falter slightly. Until the next sentence that came out of his mouth caused Sebastian to break out into laughter.

"I found out that my own specialty is the air element!," Arabin stated proudly, but became unsure of himself once Sebastian started laughing so hard that tears came out.

Remembering the event from yesterday where the bear had attacked the group of acolytes on their first day of training he couldn't help himself.

"What is so funny?!," Arabin questioned with an authoritative tone as though Sebastian was some sort of servant.

In between laughter Sebastian heaved out the words, "How pfft…How is your ass?"

Arabin's eyes grew wide with shock and stuttered to ask, "How'd you know!?"

Though this caused Sebastian to laugh even harder. To which Arabin turned and stomped out of the library like the spoiled child he was, but not before throwing one last tantrum by throwing the tomes off the nearby shelf.

After he left Sebastian questioned his behavior, " Well that was completely unnecessary and he just made a fool of himself coming here."

Sebastian began to slowly pick up the books that were thrown but noticed one that was out of place. The size of the book was much smaller than the other thick tomes that were on the shelves.

"What are you doing here? Let's see, 'Theory of Souls by Odor,' sounds interesting. Maybe I'll give it a read until someone else shows up.," having said that Sebastian picked up the rest of the heavy tomes and placed them back on the shelf before sitting down at the Librarian's desk. Flipping through the book Sebastian read the preface.

[This work is dedicated to the study of mutation. I've come up with several theories about the nature of mutations and those with undiscovered magic specialties. My theory is that each mutation not only is reflected in the body of the Mage but also within his own soul. I have no means to test this theory unless someone with the ability to perceive souls is made available. I have made numerous requests to the Academy to test for this ability though each one has been denied. Though if one desires to test their mutation for such an ability the method is described in these notes…] Sebastian began to realize the importance of this book the more he read on and decided to take the book from the library without placing a check-out. He did this for two reasons. The first being that the school likely wouldn't notice a single missing book in the large library and that the book had largely gone unnoticed by the academy. If he placed a check-out in the records it was likely to cause some of that attention to be placed on that book, and considering that the academy didn't use the method to test students left him to be a little worried that the method wouldn't work. The second reason was that even if taking the book proved to be a risk it was his only hope of receiving or finding his own specialty.

Sebastian slowly closed the book and, noticing that it was late, decided it was best to head out of the library for the day. Upon leaving he stuffed the book underneath his cloak and thought of ways that he could also make use of himself at the academy. Sebastian was deeply worried that the school would expel him should he produce little to no results. A mage that was abandoned by the state wouldn't have a good fate. The common class viewed them as the antithesis to their salvation and even though Seronao was more accepting to mages there were still a few stories of them being secretly killed by the commoners and without magical knowledge he would be a lamb to the slaughter. So he took a detour across the bridge, and over the river to where the academy of fire and the forge was located.

After watching the smiths work for a while before he approached one with a friendly face and asked, "Would it be alright if I helped out in the forge?"

"And who might you be? I don't recognize you from my academy. Are you one of those new acolytes that was just recruited?, " asked a woman with bronze skin and red hair which were in stark contrast to one another.

"I'm not actually part of the fire academy, or any other academy for that matter.," Sebastian said in a downcast manner.

The bronze woman gave him a look of pity before giving another suggestion, "Working in the forge without fire magic is extremely difficult and time consuming.Doesn't mean ain't some hope in the nearby institute of Alchemy. They are relatively new and have only been around for 5 years some I'm sure they are willing to accept members academy or not."

Upon hearing this Sebastian's green eyes contained a glimmer of hope. After getting directions he sped off towards the direction of the Summoner's academy. Upon reaching there he was very careful around this area as he looked for the Alchemy building. Noticing a smaller building he approached it, and unlike the other buildings this one didn't have a sign carved into the doorway to indicate what it was used for. Sebastian supposed this was because they were a new emerging field amongst mages. As he thought about this a loud boom was heard and the ground began to shake and a man with soot and grime exited the building coughing.

Noticing the crazy haired and dirty mage Sebastian approached him cautiously before saying, "Senior, I was told that this was the Alchemy building is that correct."

The mage held up his hand before coughing a few more times and answering between coughs, "cough... sorry my hearing isn't the best right now...cough cough...could you repeat that?"

So Sebastian asked once again but this time unsure of his choice to come to this place. If explosions like this occurred regularly he could see why the Alchemy department of Rixora was struggling.

"Come back tomorrow! We've appeared to run into difficulties and it will be easier to get you acquainted with the rest of the department once we've cleaned up, " the crazy man beamed once he knew Sebastian was interested in his field of study.

Though Sebastian was worried it seems as though this was the only place on campus without any prerequisites to join and so he readily agreed to visit again on the next day. Making his way back to the dorms carefully so as to avoid the Summoner's Academy. Once he reached his room he laid on the bed again before pulling out the, 'Theory of Souls' book and began to read further: [To be able to perceive the existence of souls first and foremost they need the prerequisite mutation to do so. The second requirement is to practice meditative techniques to increase perception through hearing, followed by sight and touch. Through meditation the mage is able to connect his body and soul together more concretely. Of course most of this is conjecture based on common mage practices with perception.] Upon reading this far Sebastian set upon using the methods listed for meditation and perception outlined in the book. Upon doing so he began to hear voices but they sounded muffled and Sebastian almost suspected that it was coming from the next room over. Slowly the voices became more and more clear.

The more he listened the more he heard something like a shout of joy, " - that brat actually did it. Or at least I think he did. Hello? Can you hear me?" Surprised Sebastian opened his eyes to see a almost translucent man floating just above the floor of his room which scared him greatly causing him to scream, "Ahhhhhh"

To which the translucent man also began to scream surprised by the boy's sudden change in behavior. Suddenly there was a bang on the wall and the voice of a mage from the next room over shouted, "Keep it down in there!"