39 What are the Magic Circles?

After that very friendly interaction between the two shortest girls of the group, the door was finally opened on a familiar face. How did that old man found out that everyone had finally arrived was a mystery for the moment but they could finally enter the room. It was highly similar to the one on the ground floor, by being an amphitheater with a lot of desks. It was therefore logical that this room was placed above the previous one, albeit two floors above. Otherwise, the last row would have been too high and it probably meant that there was nothing on the first and third floor to accommodate the space required.

Taking the exact same places, they left, the children were a lot calmer than after their breakfast. The cold and cruel woman taught them to stay still and don't even say a single word. Seeing them quite traumatized, Oscar Moo harbored his gentlest smile. Unfortunately, instead of reassuring the little kids, that scared them even more. Shaking his head, he began his speech.

"Welcome back, I hope that the last class was enjoyable. She can be a little severe but Ella Romba is extremely good at inculcating important notions into the brains of young students. As for her methods, if you think that they are overboard, you can always complain about them to Alexander Arastil."

After saying this, nearly everyone looked at the son of the magus but instead of seeing a proud face, they saw his visibly scared attitude. Realizing that if even the son of that man was scared of complaining about her with his father, they wouldn't even dare to do it. At the same time, it made sense that complains and critics without fundaments would be badly received, at best.

"Since we are past this, you will have to suffer the company of the wonderful magician Romba for a little while. She probably hasn't said it yet, but you can take a certain test whenever you want. If you manage to succeed, you won't have to see her ever again. But if you fail HoHoHo."

His sadistic laugh at the end sent more shivers into the hopeful children. Linking the terrible comportment of the old lady and the fact that they tried to escape her grasp, it didn't take long for even the dumbest kid to understand that whoever failed the test will have a really bad time. For the commoners, it was like the sun had pierced for a second through the clouds but the sky turned black right away and a storm was coming. As for the nobles and son of mages, they were counting the days before they will try their luck. Especially the group of Jorien, Owen and Leodagan. They already knew about that test and by the end of the week, they will do it.

"But let's not talk about that horrible harpy, I mean generous colleague. Forget also history, writing, reading and those boring stuff. No, let's talk about what everyone is seeking here. Magic. Which is also linked with power, wealth, nobility and respect. For those that will not be able to reach the 4th Circle, your future will be a little bit limited. But for the rest, you will be able to speak with some of the most important people of this country, even the Sword Saint or the king. Because you have something that they won't ever be able to have. [Fireball]"

A huge fireball appeared in the hand of the old man. Compared to the tiny flame Leilade created back in the countryside, there was no comparison. The fire was levitating ten centimeters above the hand of the mage and the ball was at least a meter tall. Leilade couldn't feel the heat since she was very far from it, but she was quite certain that the first row of desks was feeling a little bit hot. As expected, she saw the group of three casting some minor spells to reduce the heat. However, since she was able to notice that, Oscar Moo also did.

He approached the son of Alexander and extended his hand near the face of the arrogant boy. Instead of submitting as he did in front of the terrifying Ella, he stood in front of the old man, defying him to do more. The duel kept going for a few more seconds until Jorien grabbed the shoulder of Leodagan and hide him behind her. His face was extremely red and he was sweating a lot, visibly affected by the intense flame. Seeing the state of the young boy, Oscar extinguished his spell and returned to his initial position. That was until he heard a snicker behind him.

"[Wind blade]."

A tuft of red hair fell on the ground near an astonished boy. Ronald made too much noise and neither he or Istuienn saw the very quick movement of the old man. Even if Oscar had a huge disagreement with Alexander and that he dislikes the arrogant sons of nobles and magicians, he would only scare them. But what he hated the most was the people cursing in the back of others or attacking from behind. Leaving a deep impression on the rest of the kids, they swore to themselves to never make their crazy teachers angry. Whether it was the angry crazy old woman or the friendly crazy old man.

"As I said, you have the power to create something from nothing. Well, not exactly nothing, but something at the same time invisible and visible, immaterial and material. Even after thousands of years where all the races studied that energy, no one managed to truly understand it. All we managed to do is using some tricks to acquire its power and use it as we wished and when we wanted. You might have noticed your young peers or even true magicians like myself say something when we casted our spells. That is one of the tricks I talked about. Before I talk more profoundly about that, does anyone have a question? I know you are all very curious about magic, so that's why it is better than I answer your most basic interrogations now, to not let you deviate from the right path."

Oscar looked earnestly at his students but for a small period of time, only an embarrassing silence was present. Some didn't need to ask anything while the rest was too scared to do it. Since it was a pure waste of time, Leilade began to think about a good first question. She complained at the Viscount about the total lack of guts and courage that those kids were showing. Discussing a bit, they found an appropriate interrogation.

"What are the Magic Circles?" Her cold voice resonated in the silent room and the eyebrows of Oscar moved a bit at the sound of her voice. He recognized her but he hadn't had the time to talk with her before the class started. When he went to Alexander for the issue of her potential, all he received was rebuttal upon rebuttal. The magus let nothing passed and stick to his original affirmation, even after Oscar explained his first encounter. That left the old man with a bad taste in the mouth and he took revenge on his son, without going too much overboard. So when he heard her talking, he got a little bit happier since she, as a small girl, was even more composed than the rest of the class.

"That's a very good question. For some, it is just a notion. This magician is a 2nd Circle magician, oh, that one, he is from the 3rd Circle. But what do they truly mean? Normally, you should have already talked a bit about the Great Calamities, am I right?"

Un-Un

Some mumblings could be heard but the intonation was closer to a yes than a no. No matter what would have happened, Oscar would have continued nonetheless.

"So, you may have talked about the change of the Magic Circles before and after those dark events?"

Un-Un

A bigger commotion arose and some clear "Yes" could even be heard. One of them was the now smiling Istuienn that from the looks of it, loved that interaction. She had recovered from the shock of the cutting wind, unlike her companion that was still a little bit pale.

"So, since you know those two things, you already realized that it is just a notion created by the humans for the humans. If something even stronger than the dark gods arrived and casted a sortilege more destructive than theirs, the notation will once again change. However, since that's the case, we probably won't be able to do that." The old teacher looked a bit depressed while saying this, prompting the motivated princess to inquire about it.

"But why? Since we managed to do that after the dark gods, why would we be incapable of doing it once again?" Oscar sighed at her pondering face and felt that he was a bit too pessimistic. But that was a truth established after those centuries of studying. If something stronger really appeared, the world would be doomed.

"Because they were capable of manipulating space as they wished. So, if something stronger than that was facing us, how hopeless the situation will be?"

Shock quickly spread among the students and this time, Leilade was also part of it. The Dark Gods were capable of manipulating space but still were taken down? Ignoring the visible advantage that this type of magic brought to the caster, something capable of preventing such magic was the appanage of only a few selected races. All were created by the Ancients but besides the traces of their creators, there was no trace of them. At the same time, this information needed to be given to Malakov as soon as possible, since those races were capable of hunting their small group of unharmed combatants without a problem.

Oscar kept talking about how the numerous conclave of magicians talked and talked about the numerous spells and their might before classing people into different categories. Those that had the knowledge, the affinity and the skill to cast a certain spell would be considered as a magician of that Circle. He was also explaining how a stronger magician could use a lesser spell more efficiently, like his [Fireball] would be stronger than a [Fireball] created by Leodagan. He concluded by explaining how only the way a magician was manipulating the mana around him dictated how strong he was.

While this could have interested greatly Leilade and the Viscount, right now, the two of them were heavily debating whether they should try to communicate right now with a big risk or wait a few hours for the lunch. The debate was won by the bodiless soul when he pointed the fact that to the knowledge of the humans, they won against the Dark Gods only because of the Heroes. And therefore, the spatial magic was visibly countered by either them or the gods watching them.

For a being made of energy like a god, to be able to temporarily prevent the use of the mana surrounding a being is a possibility. At the same time, it was not known if those legends were capable of even harvesting the strange mana created by the Ancients. If that was the case, the most probable outcome would be the fact that in the end, the foreigners of this world run out of mana and couldn't cast a spell. Even if all of this was only speculations from the two of them, the possibility of any of those peculiar races to be present was too dangerous to not be transmitted.

Leilade listened with only one ear the rest of the course and when Oscar dismissed them, he didn't even have the time to call her name that she was already gone. The old man grumbled a bit about the hot-blooded youngster but had no choice to acknowledge the fact that he had no way to catch her. As for Leilade, she didn't care at all and rushed immediately to her room where she fool-proofed her surroundings. Carefully probing one last time the archaic magical detectors to not be detected, she established a mental contact with her servant.