Offense, Incantations, Support
The day after Lime became human-shaped. Magic cla.s.s was held in the field. This place, it’s used quite a lot huh. As for the training grounds, it’s because not everyone can fit in there.
“Alright then, we’ll start the lesson. From today, I’ll be usin’ real magic. All, have ye learned how tah control yer mana?”
n.o.body denied it, so Gauche-sensei continues.
“Well then, I’ll try tah explain about magic. Magic is, tellin’ the spirits want ye want them tah do, and havin’ ’em incite various phenomenons.”
Spirits? He’s saying more things I have no clue about…
“Spirits, what kinds of things are those?”
A serious looking boy asks a question.
“Spirits eh, they’re the essence of the world. Mountains, rivers, forests, and the ilk, they dwell in everythin’. Since elves can converse with spirits, they can just tell the spirits what they want ’em tah do.”
Guess that’s the so-called ‘spirit magic’, huh.
“That true?”
“Nn, I can hear it. I can even talk to them.”
Guess you could say it’s as expected of Lucas the elf.
“How ye can use it too, it comes down tah images and words. Spirits know what a body is thinkin’, so because of that ye tell them what’ye want ’em tah do.”
‘Image is important’ eh. Well then, what about the words?
“However, ’tis hard to tell them with only images. Therefore, ye use words to compensate fer ye images.”
Conversely, you could say that if your image is strong then you don’t need words. If it’s delusions then it’s my specialty, could it be my time has come!?
“Now then, I’ll show ye an example. O’ Spirits, Strike my enemy with wind, Wind Bullet.”
A small ball of wind appears. Ooh, so that’s magic…Exactly as I imagined.
“This be the basic wind magic, Wind Bullet. By adjusting yer mana, from something this small.”
This time a considerably large Wind Bullet appears. When Gauche-sensei shoots it at a tree, it flies at high speed, and makes a large ‘Bang!’explosive sound upon impact.
“Tah something this large, can be made possible. Well, I don’t have the Wind Magic skill, so the power doesn’t increase that much.”
Even without the skill, to be able to fire magic of that degree…Well, my mana capacity is small,so I have to start with increasing it.
“Now, first yer all goin’ tah practice this magic. Line yerselves up over here.”
Everyone is lined up in a row. Yeah, it’d be dangerous if you hit someone, so of course you’d be made to shoot in a fixed direction.
“I’m sure there are those who don’t have the skill, but fer the time bein’ try usin’ it. The incantation is, if ye start with ‘O’ Spirits’ and end with’Wind Bullet’, the words in the middle can be anything ye want. Elves, ye can probably just use ‘Wind Bullet’.”
Think for ourselves, huh…That’s a little, no quite embarra.s.sing huh…For now, I guess I’ll try copying the teacher.
“Mkay, try it.”
When Gauche-sensei says that, all students begin to chant in unison. Alright then, shall I try it too.
First, decide on the size. Generally speaking, a tennis ball-size should do. And, I imagine that wind is becoming that shape, and expand it.
“O’ Spirits, Strike my enemy with wind, Wind Bullet.”
In my hand, a golf ball-sized ball of wind appears. Ugh, it’s smaller than thought. The mana used was…about 2%? Seriously, it sucks to have little mana…
“Wind Bullet!…Yup, well that’s about right.”
“O’ Spirits, Strike my enemy with wind, Wind Bullet! … Uuuu, it doesn’t come outtt-dearimasu…”
Lucas summons a wind bullet the size of a handball, while Triss’ doesn’t seem to have cast. As for me, I wonder if it was good just to have cast it.
“Yours is huge Lucas…as expected of an elf huh.”
“Tsuchio-kun too, you cast it properly even without a skill, that’s pretty amazing!”
Oh really? Well, I guess I had a strong image in mind.”
“Image is it-dearimasuka….It’s hard-dearimasu~.”
As though it ran out of mana, the wind bullet disperses. Pheww, it’s pretty difficult to sustain it.
“Regardless of whether or not ye were able tah do it, y’all seem tah have triedmagic.Those unable teh do et, raise yer hands.”
More than half of the students raise their hands. Since skill holders would be able to do it, these are the non-skill holders huh.
“Hmmm…. With magic of this level even without a skill ye should be able to cast et, so et must be yer image and chant. You there, what’d ye chant?”
Gauche-sensei pointed at an energetic-looking boy who had his hand raised.
“Eh!? Um, I chanted the same thing as sensei.”
“Ye ken do that. Ye got tah properly think ah ye own, best fitting chant, or ye kennae use magic well. Fer now, those who didn’t cast et work on yer chant tah be able to cast et. Those able tah cast et, work on makin yer cast shorter, and that’s et fer today.”
I wanted him to teach support magic though…oh well. For the time being, let’s do our best to reduce the mana consumed.
“Tsuchio-dono, how do you do it-dearimasuka?”
“Err, didn’t he tell you to think about it yourself.”
“But it’s hard to think from scratch-dearimasuyo. How about Lucas-dono?”
“Mmmm, I never did it so I don’t know~. Y’know, I’m an elf, so we don’t really chant right.”
“Is that so-dearimasuka…. Mmmm, what should I do-dearimasu…”
Anyway, I also want to be able to cast with one phrase. As long as I have a clear image, I don’t even think I need words though…Let’s try it.
Imagine the Wind Bullet cast a moment ago clearly in your mind. And just like that,
“Wind Bullet”
I utter a phrase. Then, a bullet slightly larger then before appeared. So the fact that it became larger, means mana is planted in your words huh?
“Tsuchio-dono you just cast with only one phrase-dearimasuyo!?”
“Tsuchio-kun, are you really sure you don’t have the skill?”
“I don’t have it already….Also, I can’t do this without concentrating really hard. Lucas can do this without trying right?”
“That’s right but….Still, it’s really cool to do it in one phrase without a skill. You must have a really clear image.”
Well, for an otaku, delusions are what we do to kill time after all. Our imaginations are naturally trained.
“Uuu, I don’t get it-dearimasuyo.”
It’d be sad if we don’t have Triss fire one off soon. I guess I’ll try thinking aloud a bit.
“Lessee-…O’ Spirits, conjure a bullet of wind to strike my enemies, Wind Bullet, or something?”
“O’ spirits, conjure a bullet of wind to strike my enemies, Wind Bullet!”
“Don’t repeat it verbatim.”
A small ball appears in Triss’ hand. Eh, she did it with just that? I just fiddled with it a bit…
“I did it, Tsuchio-dono-dearimasuyo! I did it-dearimasu!”
“Good job, Triss.Alright, now do your best to make it shorter.”
“Yup-dearimasu!”
Since the noon bell rang, the day’s magic lesson was completed. Though Tris had been working hard the whole time, she wasn’t able to shorten her chant any further.
“This sucks-dearimasuyo…”
“Well Triss, you’re taking magic cla.s.s in order to practice magic control, aren’t you? Work hard on that part.”
“Yeah! You should just concentrate on training body strengthening and stuff!”
“That’s true-dearimasu…but even if just a little, I want to be able to use magic-dearimasu. ”
“Well, I want to be able to use magic somewhat too though, so I get the feeling…. Lunch is getting cold, so let’s eat.”
Guess I’ll go to the library later, and look up support magic or something. The one I looked at last time only had basics after all. Think I’ll go after I feed Ruu.
After feeding Lime swords, gra.s.s, and water I head to the library. Its appet.i.te strong today, so it eats a bunch of swords. Maybe it likes it? It drinks a bunch of solution too, so its body has gotten bigger.
“h.e.l.lo, what kind of book are you looking for today?”
The librarian, upon seeing me, comes to talk to me. I like it, this kinda service.
“I’m looking for a book about support magic. I had magic cla.s.s today, so I’m a bit interested.”
“Is that so. Please wait a moment.”
The male librarian goes to retrieve a book. (TLN: Don’t know why the author decided to specify here). If he had just gone to where it is, I could’ve gotten it myself though…
“I recommend this one; it’s got a variety of things written in it.”
Saying so he brings out a book as thick as a dictionary….Geez it’s thick.
“There’s that much support magic?”
“Support magic isn’t quite separated into categories, you see. When you collect it into a book, it becomes as large as such. As a result, difficult magics are lumped together and placed in this book as well.”
“…What kind of things are cla.s.sified as ‘support magic’?”
It’s support, so isn’t it something like raising your allies abilities, or a.s.sisting their actions? Like buffs.
“Err, things such as raising abilities or a.s.sisting actions. Then there’s interfering with your enemies’ action or blocking their attacks, and even curses and things difficult to categorize are lumped into ‘support magic’.”
“Curses!? Wait, those are completely different aren’t they…”
Even if obstructing your opponents are considered safe, are curses different? Well, if I had to say I guess I could think of it as something like a debuff though.
“The subject of magic is divided into Attack, Recovery, and Support. Although ‘Attack’ and ‘Recovery’ have made great strides in research, the subject of ‘Support’ is not studied very much, you see.”
“Why though. If you can raise your allies’ abilities, doesn’t it make it easier to fight?”
“Well, there are the various reasons….The reason for the Attack Magic’s preferential treatment is clear.”
“What is it?”
“It’s flashy isn’t it, Attack Magic. Compared to that, Support Magic is plain after all.”
…Yeah, he has a point. When you hear the word ‘magic’, you think of ‘Attack Magic’. If you’re gonna do it anyways, you’d want to make it flashy and cool, huh…
“Recovery magic absolutely essential, and so it is researched. However, support is to its end support. It will never be considered essential.”
“True, I see your point.But, just because it’s plain doesn’t mean it’s good to take it lightly right…”
“Well, there is another reason. The crux of Support Magic is, there are few spells for use in group settings.In particular, spells for increasing abilities. There are also area-of-effect type magic within Attack Magic, so effort is being put exclusively into researching it.”
“Can’t efforts from researching area-of-effect attacks be diverted into researching support magic?”
“It is, however it appears it will take time before results are produced. And the Kingdom wants results as quickly as possible.”
“What’s with the hurry?”
“Isn’t it obvious, if it can’t be used for war then it has no use.”
Ahh, I see. I got it. Certainly if you were at war, rather than strengthen your troops, it’d be faster to kill your enemies. No matter what world you’re in, when war breaks out technology progresses eh.
“In that case, do adventurers use support magic?”
“I’ve heard they use it quite often. Against several or strong opponents, you live through by strengthening yourself after all. Since even the largest party is at most a dozen or so people, to, it isn’t that hard to cast it on everyone. Amongst them, I believe there are those who create their own magic as well.”
“Is that so, makes me want to ask them a few things. Thank you for this book. I’ll try reading it for now.”
“No, not at all, this is my work after all. Good luck with your studies.”
I place the book on the desk and look at its table of contents. Relatively speaking, it seems to have been roughly divided by type of effect. Let’s skim through it, and look for more detail on only things that catch our eye.
There was a lot to read, so even just by skimming through and reading only points of interest, I took quite a bit of time. When I closed the book, the sun had already begun to slant and tinge slightly orange. It’s about time for Ruu to come back, so let’s move to the bestiary.
I take a notes on a few magics and return the book before I leave the library.
Just as I reached the front of the bestiary, Ruu came flying down from the sky. Looks like she went to sea today too; she’s brought two big fish.
“Thanks for the hard work today too. You went out to sea today too huh.”
“Guru”
“Your scales are sticky with salt y’know. I’ll wash you later mkay-.”
“Guru~u!”
I bring out Lime, and feed it the fish. As I thought, it’s getting stronger, so its dissolving speed is getting faster. I want you to get even stronger at this pace. I want to make Ruu stronger too, but she’s already strong from the beginning and I can’t really leave the academy. For now, I have no choice but to have her keep hunting.
“Roux, next time could you bring human-like monsters? I want to try feeding them to Lime.”
“Guru? Gururu~u…”
‘Human-like monsters don’t have that much meat, so they’re not very good prey’, huh. Meh, I’m not really asking for it for foodstuffs, so there’s no need to worry about that.
“So, next time bring back human-like ones please. Only if you see them okay? No need to go out of your way to find them.”
“Guru”
“Lime too, make sure you properly thank Ruu now.”
“…” Purupuru nod nod
Lime nods. Now by all means I want them to get closer to their human forms.