Tsaimath
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Chapter 1069
🕑 Added 2024-10-16 16:00:14 +0000 UTC“Jade?” Maggy’s voice interrupted my musings as I sat in the middle of the shrine, contemplating the progress my students had made since they started their work. It was quite impressive, all of them had made some progress, though the exact amount varied greatly. Maggy and Leonard, the most powerful of them all, had amusingly made the least amount of progress. In Maggy’s case, it was because her class wasn’t focused on magic, it used magic as a supplemental art, allowing her to accomplish a variety of normally impossible effects. Calling her primarily a rogue focused on social and societal manipulation would most likely be the best way to describe her, which made me somewhat curious about the things she had managed on Mundus, where she would have been able to take advantage of an already existing society. Now, after the change, Terra simply didn’t have enough people to accomplish a whole lot of manipulation and theft would be far too obvious, at least theft from the community you were a part of.
Leonard, on the other hand, was an entirely different problem. His class was focused on magic alright, but he had started down his own path, working with verbal invocations and focusing his magic through rhyme, verse and rhythm. It was an entirely different method and while we might arrive at similar effects, the paths we were taking to get there were utterly different. Not that his magic was weak, it was quite formidable within the limitations he was working under, but that didn’t mean it was something I could readily help him with. Even understanding what he was doing could be fairly challenging to the point that I considered it only possible thanks to my high attributes and my magical senses. Otherwise, I’d be quite lost without a real point of comparison. This was the biggest problem he was labouring under when trying to comprehend my lessons, he was working from an entirely different base, though I had noticed that there were occasional flashes and flares of power from the shrine, likely coming from Lady Hecate to offer some subtle guidance, maybe in his dreams. Or through Luna, at times, she was slipping into the role of a teacher, much to my amusement.
On the other end of the advancement spectrum were the two kids, Liam and Sandy, both of whom had taken to magic like ducklings to the water and were constantly pushing their boundaries. Curiously, the pair had a certain level of compatibility in their magic, with Liam favouring Fire Magic, while Sandy had an innate affinity for Wind Magic. Together, they had managed something I hadn’t expected, namely, they had managed to combine a few simple exercises on elemental manipulation into an actual lightning spell, allowing them to wield power far beyond their level. It was fairly impressive what they could do and I had a feeling they would continue to push their skills as they had been forbidden from venturing out to push their level. I had my doubts about the efficiency of that restriction, mostly because the kids would break it as soon as they found a good way, but that wasn’t really my problem.
Similarly, Daniel had taken his advanced level and used it to build a solid foundation, letting him wield magic comfortably far beyond the level he originally had used it on. He wasn’t as powerful as I had been at his level, far from it, but I had a feeling that he would soon reach an impressive level of versatility. If nothing else, he was an excellent example of what a person with a lacking elemental affinity could accomplish, even if his general magical affinity and high innate Intelligence were distorting things a little.
“What is it, Maggy?” I asked, shaking off the thoughts about my various other students and their individual advancement.
“I wanted to ask your advice and opinion,” she admitted, sitting down across from me when I nodded, looking slightly pensive and taking a moment to organise her thoughts, making me think that talking to me had been a spontaneous decision.
“Do you think I’ll make a lot of progress with my magic if I stay here?” she asked, sounding just a little bit despondent.
“You are dissatisfied, aren’t you? The others are generally making a lot more progress or can wield their magic in ways you can’t even imagine, leaving you in the dust, or something along those lines?” I asked in return, getting a slight glare and a nod moments later.
“Would you be okay with telling me about your time on Mundus? What you were doing, where your focus was, things like that?” I prodded, just to see if my previous ideas in regards to her class held water.
Again, she nodded before starting to explain to me that she had focused on gathering information from the shadows, using gossip and rumour to her advantage in finding and cementing her position as a part of a criminal underworld. An information broker and thief, avoiding combat as much as possible. The more I heard, the more I realised just how ill-suited for the current situation her class and legacy were but there was little she could do to fix that in the short term. In the long-term, her best bet, at least in my opinion, was to emulate Lia, at least to some degree, as she had been doing. Both of them had a certain amount of athleticism, though Lia was a fair bit stronger and faster thanks to her vampiric traits, and both had excellent stealth abilities, second only to my own. Sure, she could put all her focus on her Darkness Magic, but I had a feeling it wouldn’t do her much good, partially due to her attributes, partially due to her class and partially due to her innate disposition. Maybe she’d be able to learn some sort of illusion magic, maybe using Mind Magic as a base, though we’d have to test that.
“Maybe,” I admitted, considering how we might be able to test my latest idea, “I doubt you’ll ever be comfortable wielding purely offensive magic, you don’t really have the mindset for them from what I can tell. However, what you might be able to learn and do well are illusions, though we’ll have to be somewhat creative with the lessons there, especially as I’m not really well-versed in them myself,” I explained, readily downplaying just how ignorant of the discipline I was. Sure, I could push a Mind to see or experience something but that was all internal to them, real illusions, capable of affecting multiple people? I wasn’t sure where to start, other than to work my way up from my concealment magic, which was something of an illusion, maybe. I’d have to test things and see but Maggy didn’t have to know that.
Maggy, on the other hand, seemed to be highly interested all of a sudden, making me grin just a little, especially when she began speaking again.
“Not what I had expected, if I’m honest. I had thought I was hopeless when it came to magic, though I also wasn’t sure I really needed to learn. Sure, it’s incredibly useful for a lot of things but when do I need those in my everyday life?” she shrugged, making me realise that she had managed to found her community early on and largely focused on building and leading her people, making me wonder where her levels came from. Maybe from teaching, or there were other ways to gain levels, though I wasn’t sure how.
“Though I’m afraid those lessons will have to wait unless you can give them to me within a day or two. That’s what I originally wanted to talk to you about, I need to get back home, make sure everything’s still going as planned and talk to a few people about the resources I promised in payment,” she admitted, looking somewhat disappointed that she now had an actually good reason to stay but also a certain need to head back.
“Fair, I guess. And no, it’s not something you can learn in a day, I’ll have to figure out the best way to start anyway, what I can currently do is a fairly minor outcropping of a far more complex skill, one that takes a lot of time, effort and special resources to develop. Not something you can dive into without any idea or preparation,” I told her, accepting that I’d have some time to figure out the best way to teach her illusion magic without delving too deep into the far-too-easily abusable Mind Magic. As of yet, I wasn’t comfortable teaching that to her, I didn’t know her well enough, despite the time she had spent here as my student.
“Fair, I guess. I’ll try and see what I can come up with on my own. Hopefully, I’ll be able to get back in a week or two, maybe with a few extra students and the resources I had promised,” she grinned, getting a nod from me in return. But before she could stand up and walk away, I decided to ask her about her relatively high level and how she had managed that, without serious combat skills, especially as her earlier explanation had sounded very much as if she hadn’t been much of a fighter on Mundus either.
