Chapter 4

I woke up to the sound of the maids walking about my room and the moment I opened my eyes I saw the head maid and an unfamiliar old man at the foot of my bed. The maid began relaying instructions, "Young master, the mistress has ordered that since you are weak and lacking etiquette, you should begin to sharpen your mind. She has brought you various tutors to begin your teachings. Starting with learning how to read and write. This is your new tutor, he is famous for teaching the younger generation of the various noble clans."

'Lies.' I thought. The head maid was filled with waves of contempt for the teacher. It was clear that he wasn't as great as they made him sound. While the bald headed man with a sour expression felt that his task was beneath him. Step-mother was clearly embarrassed by the spectacle yesterday as it probably looked like I was being mistreated. I couldn't grasp her purpose for sending tutors but I doubt it was for anything good.

After forming my first circle, I could suddenly feel the emotions of everyone around me clearly. Each person was surrounded by a particular color which I could interpret as a manifestation of their emotions. My previous-life memories are of no help and the strange things happening in my body were a mystery.

I ignored the people before me and began collecting essence energy while inspecting my body. There was now a dark colored circle around my heart, indicating that I had now become a first circle mage. In this world, awakeners were divided by levels. However in my previous life there was a different standard.

First Circle mages in my previous world were from level 1-15, with the early first circle being level 1-4, mid level being 5-10 and peak being 11-15. The circles went all the way from first to ninth. However, the levels of this world went from 1-100 but there are believed to be existences who broke the level boundaries. It was more difficult to rise in levels after the first five. Many people spend their entire lives attempting to reach level 40 not to talk of peak existences that had reached 50 and above.

With one circle, a mage could begin to interact with the elements and train their affinity. The four main elements are water, fire, earth, and wind. The less common were the variants like lightning, darkness, and light. There were also exceedingly rare non-elemental affinities like space and time. The four elements were fairly common, the variants were possessed by one in a thousand magicians while the non-elemental affinities only appeared once in a thousand years.

I had scoured the library this past year gathering information about this world.

Magicians were usually bound by their elements. They could only perform spells they had affinities with. It was the rule of nature.

No one noticed the changes around me as I trained my body with essence energy as I could train while carrying out everyday activities. Essence energy was a purer form of mana that could only be accessed by entering a state which was called 'one with the world'.

As I trained, I learned that aside from emotions, I could also hear some string of words that came from the thoughts of the people around me. I realized that if I couldn't control this power, I would soon make a blunder big enough to warrant my step-mother gaining enough leverage to send me to a mental institution and kill me off.

…

I followed the head maid and my new teacher to the library. Inside were shelves lining the walls that were filled with a number of books. The shelves went up to the tall ceiling and the books could be accessed by a magical tool that contained the index of each shelf. In the middle of the library were desks filled with numerous members of the clan. My lessons would take place in a corner of the library cordoned off from the rest of the desks and was another magic tool that prevented noise from leaving the area.

I sat down in front of my new teacher and watched as he began his introduction.

As the lesson continued, it was clear that the old man was a charlatan. Not only was his basic knowledge lacking, I had no doubts that If I were to ask a mid-level question that he'd pass out from the stress. I ignored his rambling and trained my new power by attempting to listen to the emotions and thoughts of the people around me.

From what I've gathered so far, my new body is clearly not human or any of the other commonly known races. For starters, I have two hearts and strange powers. However, the most important things on my agenda wasn't to discover the secret of my birth but to grow stronger. The best way was to convince my father to let me go to a Hunters Academy.

"Teacher ?"

"Noah, did you have any questions" he replied

"What is the best school to train to be a hunter ?"

"Of Course it's the Scholar King Hunter's College"

"How do I get in teacher ?"

"There's no requirement other than having the potential to awaken for your age group."

After making sure the rats that were listening in had heard our conversation and gone to report, I rushed over to my father's study to make my move. I knocked on my father's study door and made my very first request to him. I convinced him with stories of how strengthening myself and interacting with others would groom me to be a proper child of the Sun Clan and after making a whole speech on the benefits and putting on my cutest face, my father finally succumbed and decided to send me to the 12-year boarding school program at the Scholar King Hunter's College.