Chapter 1497: First Lesson with Chancellor
She stayed mostly silent while I recounted what I found back in Nomed Metropolis and the Tree of Death.
At first, I thought about keeping the demon town a secret but I thought it would be a better idea for her to know everything instead, lest she decides to leak out information and cause people to come across that town instead.
And no, I wasn’t worried about the demons, I was more worried about clueless Adventurers and Mercenaries getting affected by that aura around the Tree of Death and turned into one of those creatures instead.
Thus, I even told the Chancellor that I had been recognised as the leader of the demon town and that they were not a threat.
She asked a few clarifying questions like what kind of demons there were and whether I knew for sure they were friendly and not just using me during my recount.
When I was finally done, she did not respond to me straight away and seemed to be in deep contemplation for a moment before she finally looked up at me.
"So the demons are planning to open a portal for their demon king to take over this world... And this is one of their plans to achieve that... In fact, it might even be close to being achieved at this moment too..."
I nodded, "That’s what we believe, yes. I initially wanted to keep things quiet since I thought I might be able to find the person myself but... No luck so far."
She nodded, "I understand. That’s why you came to me since I would be able to use the Academy’s resources to hunt this person down. Although... If I may be allowed to point something out... The person you are looking for might not be a first year student to begin with..."
I tilted my head, "Umm... When we checked the pendant, it was on its way to the Academy so... I assumed that only the first year students would be travelling towards the school at this period of time..."
"There could be staff members and also other students who had taken some time off from the Academy and were returning before the semester started... So for all we know, it might even be a member of the faculty and not even a student. It might even just be a citizen who is working inside the city and not even a student or an instructor... Or it could even just be a visitor too and they are no longer here."
That’s... A good point. I didn’t actually think about that.
I guess I should have told her about this earlier.
Hey, you can’t blame me! You’ve seen what she’s like when Isre is involved! There was no telling if she might actually just start a crusade within the school just for this!
I’m just glad she didn’t go that route for this.
I let out a hum, "Hmm... I suppose that could be possible... But if that’s the case, what should we do?"
Chancellor Vastraea looked back down at the drawing of the pendant on the table again before gesturing to it, "May I have this?"
I nodded, "Go ahead. Two of my girls are skilled artists and they can draw it again if they have to. Do you need more copies of this?"
"No need. I will get Director Cecilia to make the copies if I need to. But for now, I will check the staff to make sure it’s not one of them before we move on to the students and then the other citizens living on the island. I would like to tell you to just focus on your own studies, Aster, but I would not mind if you help us by checking your classmates as well if you can."
"That’s what I intend to do."
"That’s more than what I can ask for. Thank you, Aster."
"Well... With that done, I guess I should ask if there were any plans for a lesson this time?"
The Chancellor perked up almost immediately, "Oh yes! There is! I figured that I might as well give you the chance to help you control your chantless magic better!"
She clapped her hands together and I felt the flare of magic well up around her before the runes around the room lit up.
I watched as the bookshelves sank into the ground one by one and the size of the room expanded itself until we were standing in a big open space.
I stood up from my chair and the chair also joined the rest to sink into the ground as well, leaving just me and the Chancellor standing in this empty space.
That’s cool.
"So... What are we doing?" I asked, looking at Chancellor Vastraea with anticipation.
"First things first..." She extended her hands and her wings stretched out from behind her back while she stretched her arms over her head. "Mmmm!! That feels much better~"
I almost forgot she’s a Comissar...
She then turned to me with her hands clasped together, "Alright! So... I know you already know about the basics of chantless magic and you’re able to cast your spells without chanting... Seeing your schedule, you must have already received the introduction to intermediate magic these two days right?"
I nodded, "That’s right. I heard that we will need to be able to craft our own original magic in order to advance to the next tier of proficiency."
"That’s great! Then we can work on that with your chantless magic too! I see you had Pyromancy as your first class yesterday so why don’t we start with that? Let’s first review the spells you know~ Can you cast [Fire Blast]?"
I did as she asked and raised up my hand while concentrating on the magic she asked for, watching as flames gathered in front of my palm before shooting out as a gout of flames that engulfed the space in front of me.
The Chancellor watched while nodding her head, "Good, good~ I see that you have no problems with the speed and the power of the spell itself. But here’s the interesting part... You seem to be restricting your mana by quite a bit when you cast it?"
I tilted my head, "I don’t want to cast too big of a spell since I’m not sure what’s the limit... I’m surprised you could even tell..."
Her eyes seemed to glow for a moment, "Any mage who is sensitive to mana will be able to tell. In fact, I believe you are also able to sense it to a certain degree. You felt the mana flow out from me just now when I activated the magic circles, right?"
I nodded, wondering where she was going with this.
She hummed, "Mmm... I suppose you are able to sense it but you’re not familiar with the mana fluctuations to be able to tell what the spells are just from the mana you sense. We can work on that here~"
She then spread out her arms and I felt a mass of mana well up in her hands, specifically in between her fingertips, right before flames blaster out from them.
The way that it was blasted out made it look like she had wings made of fire as well, turning her into an angel with wings of flame.
As if to show that off, the flaming wings flapped once and she shot into the air like a rocket, circling around in the air for a moment before she dove back down towards me.
She angled herself towards the ground that was a short distance away from me before she landed in a column of flames, the column exploding upwards to form a fire tornado before it dispersed just as suddenly as it had appeared.
She then did a spin to dispel the flames before she turned to me, "Did you feel that?"
I tilted my head at her, "Are you talking about the mana when you gathered them at your finger tips? If it’s that then yes."
She smiled at me, "So you managed to feel that. What about while I was in the air?"
"Eh? Umm... I wasn’t really paying attention at that point... So I’m not sure. Was there mana fluctuations there?"
She grinned, "There certainly was. Shall I do it again?"
"Umm... Before that... I just want to know how this would help me with chantless magic though?"
"A very sensible question. Part of the reason why you are able to cast magic without chanting is because you are aware of the mana the spell requires in order to activate that spell. Which is why that skill is tied very closely to the Mana Management skill."
Ah... I see why my Mana Management skill is my highest tiered skill now.
"Does that mean... If I’m able to sense the mana from these spells... I could potentially cast spells of a higher tier than what I am originally capable of?"
She smiled at me, "That is one of the questions about magic that has not been answered yet. And that is what I want you to find out."
Oh~ So that’s what she’s going to try and teach me~
That means I get to see really big spells from her, right?
That’s cool~