The class began with an introduction to magic. As they were now, the players’ basic understanding of magic was influenced a lot by games and was totally different from what this world possessed. They couldn’t just go ahead and shoot magic without understanding it like in a lot of RPG games. So, it was time for Victor to burst their magical bubble and show them the real deal!
With that in mind, Victor began explaining: “To become a Magus, you must first have a suitable meditation technique. This meditation technique enables you to perform ‘mana inversion,’ a process where you harness mana by inverting it within your body. The reason why Magi’s constitutions become stronger and more resilient as they progress higher is because the inverted mana becomes their life force and the source of their magical abilities, hence the term ‘inverted mana.’”
Then, he conjured his inverted mana on his fingertip and drew two circles on the magic-enchanted board behind him, continuing further, “The source of mana is the ‘Primordial Nexus’ — an ethereal realm brimming with ancient and raw magical energy. It is basically a plane that exists parallel to the physical world, accessible only to Magi.”
In layman’s terms, meditation techniques were used to gather mana and invert it into the body. It might seem like mana existed in the air, but that was more like an illusion as the Primordial Nexus existed parallel to the physical world — just like the infamous Schrodinger’s cat, it was there and not there at the same time, hidden from regular perception.
“In essence, meditation techniques are your magical roadmap, and the Primordial Nexus is your treasure trove of power.”
He looked at the players, ensuring they were following along. “Understanding this fundamental aspect of magic is crucial to your journey to become a Magus. Furthermore, there’s one more important thing you have to remember: A Magus’s meditation is a continuous journey, and only with daily devotion and perseverance could one invert enough mana to become a being that could control mysterious powers. All right, if you have any questions, you may ask them now.”
The room fell silent as the players tried hard to digest the mind-boggling information that Victor had dumped on their heads. They exchanged glances, their minds racing to grasp the concepts they had just been introduced to.
Finally, the player named Storm bravely raised his hand and asked, “Sir Astralium, are you going to teach us a meditation technique?”
“Naturally,” Victor replied with a small smile, “The academy has given the five of you a free meditation technique, and you can access it through your Shadowlink Marks. Feel free to review it once the class ends.”
Victor had, of course, converted the meditation technique into its e-book form to make it easily accessible to the players. This was convenient; there was no need to pass the book to each of them one by one.
By the way, the free meditation technique was called the “Myriad Elements Method,” and it could be meditated upon until the third-stage Initiate Attunement. Victor had yet to try the meditation technique himself, but from a brief introduction he had read, it was significantly better than even the basic meditation technique of the Arcane Radiant College. On top of that, the content had various sub-parts where acolytes could choose to focus based on their specific elemental affinities, making it extremely versatile.
“Now, let’s delve deeper into the prerequisites to become a Magus,” Victor continued, addressing the enthusiastic players. “Remember, becoming a Magus requires a specific kind of gift, and among tens of thousands of people, it’s possible that there isn’t even one with such potential.”
“Gulp.”
The players’ expressions immediately shifted, surprised by the harsh reality they were facing. In almost every game, the characters the players controlled were always so conveniently “the chosen one.” This was not a game, however, but a reality. Though they appeared taken aback by this, curiosity seemed to outweigh their concern.
Grinning, Victor assured them, “However, I believe that each of you has the necessary aptitude for you to be accepted into this academy. Since you acolytes are curious to find out about your aptitudes, I just so happen to have a magic tool here to do just that.” He then took out a crystal ball from his interspatial ring and placed it on the front table.
Among the items given freely in the starting pack was a crystal ball used to grade people’s aptitude for magic. Normally, acquiring such a magic tool would not have been easy, even with enough mana crystals. However, it appeared that his predecessor had planned things through.
“I will call your name one at a time. When your name is mentioned, come here and place both of your hands on the crystal ball; I will tell you the result afterward,” Victor instructed.
He had obviously memorized the usernames of the first batch of players. Yet, It dawned on him that once the number of players exceeded one thousand or more, not even he could memorize them all. As the headmaster of a Magus academy, there was no need for him to memorize every single one of them. It was better to act like a typical NPC and “not know someone until they met that person.”
That said, Victor called the first player — “ZeroXScyth.”
Zero stood up and walked nervously toward the front table, then placed both of his hands on the crystal ball. His face twitched as soon as he touched the icy cold surface, and a faint glow was emitted from the ball.
“Good. Don’t let go. Hold your stance as long as possible.”
However, as the crystal ball grew brighter, an expression of pain appeared on Zero’s face. “Sir Headmaster…! I can’t! I can’t hold on any longer!” He gritted his teeth, struggling to endure the pain and looking like he could pass out at any moment.
This was strange. Lizbeth had previously mentioned that the players had a pain limiter, which should have such extreme discomfort. Victor wondered if there were exceptions to this rule and decided to discuss it with her later.
“Okay. Release your hands.” Victor nodded and glanced at the glowing crystal ball. Whoa! This is…
“…Not bad,” he slowly said. “The aptitude of the acolytes is called ‘mana aptitude’ and is categorized into seven grades: mundane, faint, ordinary, glimmering, bright, shining, and radiant. Basically no one has had a radiant-grade aptitude for tens of thousands of years. As for your aptitude… it’s not bad. You have an intermediate glimmering-grade aptitude, a middle among middle-ranked grade.”
Victor’s tone might have sounded like it wasn’t anything extraordinary, but even his own mana aptitude was not much better than his, being a superior glimmering-grade aptitude. At the time, he had regarded himself as a genius among many, which was a given considering that it was well above average.
One should be aware that a Magus academy that essentially controlled a whole kingdom, like the Arcane Radiance College, accepted individuals with an inferior ordinary-grade aptitude at the very minimum. Those with lower aptitudes could never hope to join the academy unless they had a powerful background or settled for smaller and more obscure academies but doomed to be the lowest of the rung, nevertheless.
“Esteemed Headmaster, how good is my aptitude?” Zero asked carefully.
“You have a high chance of becoming an official Magus, and rather swiftly at that. But don’t be complacent; your aptitude won’t decide everything,” explained Victor. “Now return to your seat.”
“Yes, Headmaster!” Zero replied rather excitedly.
“Next… You.” Victor pointed at Prominence, who looked to be the most eager to try as he almost jumped out of his seat the instant he was called on.
“Yes!” He rushed to the front and did exactly the same thing as Zero.
This time, the crystal ball glowed even brighter, making Victor’s facial expression twitch. Prominence’s countenance, on the flip side, looked slightly worse than even Zero’s.
“Very good. It’s an inferior bright-grade aptitude. You can consider yourself fairly gifted.” The words at the end of his sentence were really hard for Victor to utter.
“Yeess!!” The player in question was barely holding back from bursting into hearty laughter. In fact, his excessively smug face was practically screaming, “Don’t you hear that?! I’m the chosen one!” Even Victor, who was confident in his acting skills, was struggling to maintain his poker face and had to tell him to shut up and go back to his seat.
“Next.”
The same process continued with the rest of the players. Each of them showed at least inferior glimmering-grade mana aptitude, causing Victor to doubt himself if his own aptitude was anything special inwardly. He had known that the bodies created by the Nexus Tower wouldn’t be normal, but he never thought that each of them would be so exceptionally talented that they could easily pass any Magus academy’s admission test with flying colors.
With these… Won’t the dream of creating the best Magus academy out there be feasible? It’s no longer a pipe dream! As long as Victor was able to come up with the necessary resources, qualified mentors, and suitable environments, he could make a force that could rival — no, trample — the Arcane Radiance College and proclaim hegemony in this kingdom and its surroundings!
Victor quickly calmed himself down by silently taking a deep breath and said, “Your results are all quite satisfactory. But without diligence, forget about becoming an official Magus, even reaching Initiate Attunement acolyte would be impossible. With that said, we’ll move on to test your elemental affinities.”
Storing the crystal ball, Victor took out a silver standing mirror from his interspatial ring. The mirror was not too big and only had a diameter of about half a meter, yet it had an entrancing quality to it that made anyone who stared intensely at it feel dazed. After all, this was no ordinary mirror; it had the power to reveal one’s elemental affinity.
“All right. You five, get to the front in the same order as before.”
The class began with an introduction to magic. As they were now, the players’ basic understanding of magic was influenced a lot by games and was totally different from what this world possessed. They couldn’t just go ahead and shoot magic without understanding it like in a lot of RPG games. So, it was time for Victor to burst their magical bubble and show them the real deal!
With that in mind, Victor began explaining: “To become a Magus, you must first have a suitable meditation technique. This meditation technique enables you to perform ‘mana inversion,’ a process where you harness mana by inverting it within your body. The reason why Magi’s constitutions become stronger and more resilient as they progress higher is because the inverted mana becomes their life force and the source of their magical abilities, hence the term ‘inverted mana.’”
Then, he conjured his inverted mana on his fingertip and drew two circles on the magic-enchanted board behind him, continuing further, “The source of mana is the ‘Primordial Nexus’ — an ethereal realm brimming with ancient and raw magical energy. It is basically a plane that exists parallel to the physical world, accessible only to Magi.”
In layman’s terms, meditation techniques were used to gather mana and invert it into the body. It might seem like mana existed in the air, but that was more like an illusion as the Primordial Nexus existed parallel to the physical world — just like the infamous Schrodinger’s cat, it was there and not there at the same time, hidden from regular perception.
“In essence, meditation techniques are your magical roadmap, and the Primordial Nexus is your treasure trove of power.”
He looked at the players, ensuring they were following along. “Understanding this fundamental aspect of magic is crucial to your journey to become a Magus. Furthermore, there’s one more important thing you have to remember: A Magus’s meditation is a continuous journey, and only with daily devotion and perseverance could one invert enough mana to become a being that could control mysterious powers. All right, if you have any questions, you may ask them now.”
The room fell silent as the players tried hard to digest the mind-boggling information that Victor had dumped on their heads. They exchanged glances, their minds racing to grasp the concepts they had just been introduced to.
Finally, the player named Storm bravely raised his hand and asked, “Sir Astralium, are you going to teach us a meditation technique?”
“Naturally,” Victor replied with a small smile, “The academy has given the five of you a free meditation technique, and you can access it through your Shadowlink Marks. Feel free to review it once the class ends.”
Victor had, of course, converted the meditation technique into its e-book form to make it easily accessible to the players. This was convenient; there was no need to pass the book to each of them one by one.
By the way, the free meditation technique was called the “Myriad Elements Method,” and it could be meditated upon until the third-stage Initiate Attunement. Victor had yet to try the meditation technique himself, but from a brief introduction he had read, it was significantly better than even the basic meditation technique of the Arcane Radiant College. On top of that, the content had various sub-parts where acolytes could choose to focus based on their specific elemental affinities, making it extremely versatile.
“Now, let’s delve deeper into the prerequisites to become a Magus,” Victor continued, addressing the enthusiastic players. “Remember, becoming a Magus requires a specific kind of gift, and among tens of thousands of people, it’s possible that there isn’t even one with such potential.”
“Gulp.”
The players’ expressions immediately shifted, surprised by the harsh reality they were facing. In almost every game, the characters the players controlled were always so conveniently “the chosen one.” This was not a game, however, but a reality. Though they appeared taken aback by this, curiosity seemed to outweigh their concern.
Grinning, Victor assured them, “However, I believe that each of you has the necessary aptitude for you to be accepted into this academy. Since you acolytes are curious to find out about your aptitudes, I just so happen to have a magic tool here to do just that.” He then took out a crystal ball from his interspatial ring and placed it on the front table.
Among the items given freely in the starting pack was a crystal ball used to grade people’s aptitude for magic. Normally, acquiring such a magic tool would not have been easy, even with enough mana crystals. However, it appeared that his predecessor had planned things through.
“I will call your name one at a time. When your name is mentioned, come here and place both of your hands on the crystal ball; I will tell you the result afterward,” Victor instructed.
He had obviously memorized the usernames of the first batch of players. Yet, It dawned on him that once the number of players exceeded one thousand or more, not even he could memorize them all. As the headmaster of a Magus academy, there was no need for him to memorize every single one of them. It was better to act like a typical NPC and “not know someone until they met that person.”
That said, Victor called the first player — “ZeroXScyth.”
Zero stood up and walked nervously toward the front table, then placed both of his hands on the crystal ball. His face twitched as soon as he touched the icy cold surface, and a faint glow was emitted from the ball.
“Good. Don’t let go. Hold your stance as long as possible.”
However, as the crystal ball grew brighter, an expression of pain appeared on Zero’s face. “Sir Headmaster…! I can’t! I can’t hold on any longer!” He gritted his teeth, struggling to endure the pain and looking like he could pass out at any moment.
This was strange. Lizbeth had previously mentioned that the players had a pain limiter, which should have such extreme discomfort. Victor wondered if there were exceptions to this rule and decided to discuss it with her later.
“Okay. Release your hands.” Victor nodded and glanced at the glowing crystal ball. Whoa! This is…
“…Not bad,” he slowly said. “The aptitude of the acolytes is called ‘mana aptitude’ and is categorized into seven grades: mundane, faint, ordinary, glimmering, bright, shining, and radiant. Basically no one has had a radiant-grade aptitude for tens of thousands of years. As for your aptitude… it’s not bad. You have an intermediate glimmering-grade aptitude, a middle among middle-ranked grade.”
Victor’s tone might have sounded like it wasn’t anything extraordinary, but even his own mana aptitude was not much better than his, being a superior glimmering-grade aptitude. At the time, he had regarded himself as a genius among many, which was a given considering that it was well above average.
One should be aware that a Magus academy that essentially controlled a whole kingdom, like the Arcane Radiance College, accepted individuals with an inferior ordinary-grade aptitude at the very minimum. Those with lower aptitudes could never hope to join the academy unless they had a powerful background or settled for smaller and more obscure academies but doomed to be the lowest of the rung, nevertheless.
“Esteemed Headmaster, how good is my aptitude?” Zero asked carefully.
“You have a high chance of becoming an official Magus, and rather swiftly at that. But don’t be complacent; your aptitude won’t decide everything,” explained Victor. “Now return to your seat.”
“Yes, Headmaster!” Zero replied rather excitedly.
“Next… You.” Victor pointed at Prominence, who looked to be the most eager to try as he almost jumped out of his seat the instant he was called on.
“Yes!” He rushed to the front and did exactly the same thing as Zero.
This time, the crystal ball glowed even brighter, making Victor’s facial expression twitch. Prominence’s countenance, on the flip side, looked slightly worse than even Zero’s.
“Very good. It’s an inferior bright-grade aptitude. You can consider yourself fairly gifted.” The words at the end of his sentence were really hard for Victor to utter.
“Yeess!!” The player in question was barely holding back from bursting into hearty laughter. In fact, his excessively smug face was practically screaming, “Don’t you hear that?! I’m the chosen one!” Even Victor, who was confident in his acting skills, was struggling to maintain his poker face and had to tell him to shut up and go back to his seat.
“Next.”
The same process continued with the rest of the players. Each of them showed at least inferior glimmering-grade mana aptitude, causing Victor to doubt himself if his own aptitude was anything special inwardly. He had known that the bodies created by the Nexus Tower wouldn’t be normal, but he never thought that each of them would be so exceptionally talented that they could easily pass any Magus academy’s admission test with flying colors.
With these… Won’t the dream of creating the best Magus academy out there be feasible? It’s no longer a pipe dream! As long as Victor was able to come up with the necessary resources, qualified mentors, and suitable environments, he could make a force that could rival — no, trample — the Arcane Radiance College and proclaim hegemony in this kingdom and its surroundings!
Victor quickly calmed himself down by silently taking a deep breath and said, “Your results are all quite satisfactory. But without diligence, forget about becoming an official Magus, even reaching Initiate Attunement acolyte would be impossible. With that said, we’ll move on to test your elemental affinities.”
Storing the crystal ball, Victor took out a silver standing mirror from his interspatial ring. The mirror was not too big and only had a diameter of about half a meter, yet it had an entrancing quality to it that made anyone who stared intensely at it feel dazed. After all, this was no ordinary mirror; it had the power to reveal one’s elemental affinity.
“All right. You five, get to the front in the same order as before.”
