What's magic?
Felix thought.
It's a topic most mages would think is useless and forget it the moment they graduate, and yet this knowledge is also the wall that separates good mages from excellent ones.
"Magic is,"
Felix's professor started to say while playing with a chalk in his right hand and the other on his hips.
"The ability to manipulate a special type of energy called mana in and around us, using either artificial means -such as mana circles- or by getting help from a higher evolved species, like spirits."
"There are seven types of magic- elemental magic, spirit manipulation, artefacts, channeling, body tempering, mana circles, and divinity."
"Elemental magic is the basic magic almost everyone in this world can accomplish, and is considered to be magic's main branch. It consists of influencing natural phenomena, in which a mage will usually recite a spell, tune his internal mana to the spell, and then use a chain-like reaction for external mana to respond and turn into the spell recited. One can tune internal mana into seven types of element- fire, water, earth, wind, light, dark, and chaos. Elemental magic is also heavily dependent on talent and affinity, making it one of the more difficult paths to master in magic. However, this also means that for someone talented enough, it is possible to surpass even the demigods."
"Spirit manipulation refers to making a contract with spirits, which are clumps of mana given life naturally and their power to influence one's surroundings. Usually, it is done by defeating a spirit using specialized artefacts and then forcing a contract on it. However, this greatly reduces the spirit's power. Another method is to befriend it, which is nigh impossible for most races other than elves, as they have a natural affinity for it. This process will, instead of reducing the spirit's strength, actually enforce it much more. Once again, spirits can take the form of the seven elements."
"An important thing to note is that the older the spirit is, the stronger it is, and the oldest seven spirits are called spirit kings of their respective elements. One of the four demigods uses spirit manipulation and is an elf."
"Artefacts are fairly easy to understand but difficult in application. It uses ancient technology, which relies on runes -words imbued with mana- to capture external mana, which also means that most of them are perpetually active. These are usually large-scale and are uncommon. However,"
The professor continued looking at Felix,
"There have been recent advancements in this field to the point where one can buy things such as spirit capturers with enough money, like I stated earlier, or even shoes imbued with wind magic to make them fly, albeit their range is not that much."
"The next one on the list is channeling."
He turned around to the board and drew two circles labelled 'A' and 'C'.
"While it is not considered to be a major field in magic, it plays a heavy role in making wands and magic weapons. The runes I stated earlier also use channeling. In this, we imbue inanimate objects with mana to strengthen them, give them properties of one of the seven elements or make them more efficient. The main difference between artefacts and channeling is that artefacts rely on external mana, but channeling relies on internal mana."
He said, shading the inside of the circle labelled 'C' and shading the surrounding of the circle labelled 'A'.
"Channeling, just like elemental magic, is one of the more difficult paths. Not because of the requirement of talent, but due to its inefficiency, as no mortal can keep using it for long periods of time unlike artefacts. However, this is made up for by using minerals that already have mana in them, such as mithril. While wands of mithril are extremely rare, it's not so uncommon for a good warrior to have a sword or spear made of one. And due to the difficulty of handling mithril, the only species that can do so are the dwarves with their immense strength and huge furnaces."
"On that topic, let's get to the next topic. Body tempering. Most people do not consider body tempering 'magic'. Although I'm teaching it because I believe it to be. Unlike other magic paths, where everything happens outside the body, body tempering is a field where you break down your own muscles and build them up again while reinforcing them with mana. This is quite painful, but the rewards are just as good- superhuman strength, inhumane speed and other factors. It only increases the more you repeat the process, but so does the pain. That's why most warriors only do it once or twice in their lives. Some of the strongest warriors in the world have done this process a dozen times, and easily have the power to level mountains and split the seas."
"Then come mana circles. They aren't that important in themselves, but are a huge boon in aiding the other paths. Have a huge elemental spell you want to do and no artefact? Use a one-time mana circle! No spirit to be found? Summon one using an appropriate sacrifice and a good mana circle! That's it with these."
"And finally, the most mysterious and powerful path of magic, divinity. Not much is known about it, but divinity is said to be borrowed power from a higher entity. Well, no one knows this for sure, though. One of the demigods is someone fairly famous- the saintess of the Holy kingdom, who is said to use divinity. Does anyone have any questions?"
"Yes, professor."
A voice came out from the back of the crowd.
"I recall that there are four demigods, yet you only mentioned two. What's with that?"
"Well, Felix, no one knows. We only know about two because one is the queen of the elves and the other is the saintess. Both of them are fairly famous, so it's to be expected that there's adequate information about them both. We don't actually know anything about the other two except that they exist."
"Now then, let's proceed with the most controversial topic of all time- where did mana come from?"
Murmurs immediately began to spread among the students. This was a question almost everyone had asked at least once in their lives, and yet no one knew the answer to it.
"Some people,"
The professor said in a voice loud enough to gather the attention of everyone present there,
"Consider mana to come from the spirit kings, while some think that the higher entity that grants divinity was also the one that bestowed mana. There's no clear answer to this, and hence it is useless to ponder upon it until decisive evidence is found. The reason I brought this up is... because people tend to get radical on this topic, and I don't want any unnecessary arguments between my own students."
"The last topic for this lecture is how to use mana efficiently. This is extremely important because most mages forget this once they graduate, so pay close attention to what I'm about to say."
The crowd became silent. Everyone- including Felix- was interested in this.
"The most efficient way to use mana,"
He spoke in a soft yet firm voice, holding up a single finger in front of his eyes.
"Is to not use it at all."