Dimensions Collide: Destiny Bond Chapter 101: Sunny Days

Chapter 101: Sunny Days

With his theories confird, John explained what he’d found out to Destiny. Interestingly enough, the hero didn’t take it as eagerly as he’d expected.

“...so you’re saying that every part of our body can use mana reinforcent?” Destiny frowned.

“Well, yeah. Prota used it, and it seed to work pretty well. I think,” John shrugged.

“Prota?!”

“Well, it was a theoretical-”

Fate grabbed John’s collar. “You used her as a guinea pig?!”

“No, no, it was just a suggestion-”

“What the hell were you thinking?!”

“Look, if you’re gonna be such a bitch about it, why don’t you just get Kit to teach you, huh? Surely she knows sothing about this!”

“Kit… isn’t very comfortable here. There are too many people who could recognize her as a Mystic.”

“But-”

“Just drop it.”

Days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into months. Progress was slow but steady, and everyone but John was pleased with how things were turning out. Everyone was pleased, though, since he was fine with watching everyone else progress.

Destiny was achieving his goal of learning swordsmanship that he could call his own. While his parents and ntors were excellent warriors in their own right, none of them were really teachers. None of them were people who could guide Destiny down the right path. Albert, too, was a formidable warrior, but even his advice was just the surface of what Destiny was ant to find.

The teachers at Scholaris, then, were perfect for him. The swordsmanship that had been lacking compared to his talent in magic was beginning to show. Of course, it hadn’t been all smooth sailing. He’d been forced to forget his old habits, his old way of fighting, and had been set to learn the basics all over again, but Destiny was dedicated if nothing else.

Swing after swing, stroke after stroke, and he was slowly getting there.

Danjo was learning a lot, too. In fact, of everyone present, he was learning the most. After all, he’d been going on nothing but raw intuition and talent. A proper education was boosting his skills by an incredible amount. It was like having a fantastic car but no adequate fuel to run it. If Danjo were the car, Scholaris was the fuel to propel him forward. He might not be used to it yet, but soon, he’d take off at new speeds never seen before.

Of course, it’d be a bit before he could truly shine. Certain aspects of Magical Engineering still required physics and mathematics, even if they were at a lower level than the engineering of Earth. After all, magic circumvented so laws of physics that normally would’ve been a problem, but in the end, it seed engineering would always be engineering. Thankfully, it seed Danjo had a good head for that kind of stuff, so it wouldn’t be an issue.

Celeste, too, was learning. John wasn’t sure how to judge her progress since he wasn’t familiar with the concept of healing, but she seed pretty pleased while talking with Destiny and Danjo, so she must’ve been doing well.

The one John was paying the most attention to, though, was Prota.

Every day, she’d talk about her classes. What stood out the most was her understanding of magic.

Prota had always been able to see and understand the flow of mana. After all, it was essential to her usage of magic, as she had never learned how to use chants to cast spells. The students had been learning abbreviated spells, sothing she had no use for. Students were also guided in improving their already existing magics, sothing Prota once again had no use for, but finally, a lesson ca that was incredibly useful for her.

“Students. While it is well known that the mana core is sothing we are capable of growing, there will co a ti when it will grow no longer, no matter how much one may try. So of you may be limited to a re A rank core, or perhaps even lower.”

Leora Dawn’s words sent the class into a panic. What kind of teaching was this? Was she deliberately trying to discourage them?

“However, even a B-rank can outdo an S-rank. More mana does not necessarily an one is stronger. Yes?”

A student spoke up nervously.

“I’m sorry, but… how is that possible? Unless one neglects their education, a larger core will result in more powerful spells being cast, or even simply a larger number of spells.”

“That would be correct,” Leora nodded. “That is, to the average mage.”

The class went silent as the phoenix went up to a blackboard, the white chalk scraping along as she drew sothing.

“There are two factors in what we call 'strength' in casting. One would be the circle in which our spells belong to. Now, we all know that the higher the circle of magic, the more powerful it is.”

A pillar of fla erupted from the ground while a small fireball hovered in Leora’s other hand.

“This pillar of fla will obviously hurt more than this small fireball. However, it uses up more mana, which ans our cores will be exhausted faster.”

Moving to the side, the teacher revealed a rough but clear drawing of two pipes leading into two buckets. One fit perfectly, while the other was giant, bigger than the opening of the bucket by far.

“Which pipe is better?” she said, revealing the illustration to the class.

A student raised her hand. “The smaller one.”

“Correct. However, all of you are like this pipe. The big one.”

This was sothing Prota already knew. The idea of wasting mana when casting a spell, and maximizing efficiency when casting. Kit had taught it to her, drilled it into her head. Leora reviewed the basics of the concept, but didn’t do any more than that. This ant that Prota was stuck learning sothing she was already familiar with.

She wasn’t complaining, however, as this was a chance to learn more about it.

As long as the teachers didn’t ask her to respond to their comnts or get close enough to touch her, she was perfectly fine with receiving instruction. Perhaps Kit had gotten her used to this type of instruction. Or maybe she was simply improving in her ability to deal with other people. Regardless, she was healing.

It was a few weeks later when sothing she’d never learned ca up.

“While I don’t expect anyone here to have perfected the technique of making things more efficient, there is one more thing to go over.”

Once again, drawings of pipes and buckets were put on the blackboard, but this ti, they were the sa size. However, one was riddled with holes and cracks, and it was clear water would spill everywhere. The other was properly made, the only opening leading into the bucket.

“Many of you are like this. Even if you’ve managed to use the right amount of mana for a spell, you leak out mana.”

“Leak… mana?”

Confused murmurs spread through the crowd. If they weren’t wasting mana, how was that possible?

“Listen. Mana flows from your core, spreading out and commanding reality to rewrite itself according to your command. However, if you aren’t able to contain that mana and manage it properly, it will leak. And that leakage is wasting a lot of mana.”

Leora paused, looking up at the class.

“Does anyone know why I saved this issue for last?”

The class went quiet. No one wanted to answer, fearing they would look foolish. After all, this was a foreign subject, sothing that was far beyond anything they’d ever imagined. They’d been taught a different syllabus their entire lives. Leaking mana? That wasn’t even sothing they dread about, let alone theorized about. Even chantless spells were reserved for the incredibly talented, and such a technique applied only to first and second-circle spells.

Well, there was one student who was familiar with the topic.

Prota’s mind was running furiously. There was a connection to be made. She just wasn’t sure if she was right. Leaking mana from her body was sothing she’d never really thought about, but it made sense. She just didn’t know how it connected to anything else.

Chantless casting. Efficiency. Stronger.

For so reason, the pointers John gave the twins were coming back to mind. Accuracy. Speed. Chantless casting…

Hold on. If one were able to maximize the flow of mana to the spell directly, then wouldn’t it co out faster? If one were to use the pipes as an analogy, then the speed at which a spell could be cast depended on how quickly the mana to be used was expelled. Obviously, a larger pipe would allow all the water needed to flow out quickly, but a smaller pipe would exert more pressure. Then, the problem was finding the best ratio of pressure to the amount expelled.

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And in order for that to be done, the pipe needed to have no flaws. No holes, no cracks, a perfectly smooth and clean pipe. If there were flaws, the pressure would be reduced. The speed at which the water flowed out would be reduced, and it would also lower the accuracy. Prota had never had these issues since she’d practiced her aim and speed through extre ans, but it made sense that this was an issue people would have.

“You. You look like you have a clue as to what that connection might be.”

Prota had been so lost in thought that she hadn’t realized the class had yet to answer. Leora was genuinely waiting for soone to answer. With everyone averting their gaze, Prota was the only one who looked like she was trying to solve the problem.

The issue was that she was absolutely terrified of speaking up in front of the class. Any child would get anxiety at being called upon, but added with the pressure of Scholaris, combined with Prota’s absolute trauma with dealing with strangers, she completely froze up. She hadn’t had a mont this bad since she’d first t John.

“You got this,” she heard Lilith whisper.

She actually almost jumped, since she hadn’t realized Lilith was even within whispering range of her, but sohow, that shock was just enough to jumpstart her into talking.

“Um… speed. Speed and accuracy,” Prota mumbled, her thoughts stumbling over each other as they tried to make their way out of her mouth first. “Efficient mana usage. Clean pipe, better pressure, better spell, less mana…”

There were more than a few snickers among the other children. Not only did the answer make no sense, but Prota’s awful way of explanation was comical on its own.

The only one who had a thoughtful expression was the teacher herself.

“Interesting.”

At that one word, the class went dead silent.

“Could you explain a bit more?”

Prota shook her head violently. She didn’t look scared or anything, but that was rely due to the fact that her facial expressions never changed. Inwardly, she was absolutely terrified.

“Hm… regardless, I didn’t expect a student to get so close to the real answer. Well, the explanation is sothing reserved for the second year. After all, I am explaining topics well beyond practice. Well, that will be all.”

The students dispersed, chatting loudly, but Prota remained frozen at her seat.

“You good?”

Prota nodded, slowly turning around to see Lilith looking at her with a concerned expression. Ryan stood behind her, trying to wear an uncaring expression, but mostly just looking incredibly awkward.

“Sorry about that. You just… looked like you needed a little push,” Lilith said awkwardly.

“...nn.”

“That was a really interesting answer, though. I’m really curious as to how you thought of it!”

Lilith’s cheerful smile was distracting enough that Prota found herself forgetting about her previous troubles.

“Co on, we’ve got a bit of ti until our next class. Ryan and I have been learning this ga that’s popular at the academy. Wanna try it out?”

~~~

From that point on, Prota continued to improve on her own from that one bit of advice, paying close attention to how the mana within her own body was flowing. As she worked at it, she found that she was, in fact, leaking mana when using magic.

John, anwhile, was studying sothing completely different. Prota had recently expressed interest in a card ga of sorts, and that was enough to get him mildly interested.

“Magecraft, huh…”

Normally, John would’ve checked it out and dropped it. Unfortunately, it looked like this was sowhat of a popular ga at the school, enough so that it warranted so good research.

Students of all classes and ages played it. You could bet tokens on it. There was an annual tournant for it. If it were that important of a ga, it would likely show up at so point as sothing important.

The rules were pretty simple. The matches were of a one-on-one format. Players started with three stats: health, mana, and coins. The goal of the ga was to reduce the enemy’s health to zero.

The interesting part was that the common strategy of deck building was not an aspect of this card ga. Instead, students pulled cards from a shared deck of thousands of cards. Aside from a few specialty cards, they mainly fell into three categories: attack cards, defence cards, and spells.

Attack cards were straightforward: they had a nurical value that, if undefended, lowered the opponent’s health by that much. However, if an attack card was played, then the opponent had the opportunity to defend themselves. Defence cards also had a nurical value that subtracted from the value of the attack card.

Then, if an attack card of value eight was played, and a defence card of value ten was used, no damage was taken. For every card played, a player was allowed to draw a new one.

Spells were cards that did elental damage, which was a type of damage that could only be blocked by certain elents. However, these used up mana, a limited resource. Health and mana could be replenished with potion cards, but these weren’t always guaranteed, and using one took up a turn.

Finally, there were buy and sell cards, which allowed one to buy a card from an opponent or sell a card from one's own hand. As each card had an in-ga monetary value, the in-ga coins were used for this purpose. However, one cannot refuse a card being sold to them. Then, if a player has no coins, mana is taken instead. And if neither mana nor coins are in a player’s stats, health is taken.

While the ga might then seem to be up to random chance, strategy revolves around one simple rule: while only one attack card can be played, multiple defence cards can be used to defend against one attack. For every card spent, a new one could be drawn. In this way, various strategies could be developed for manipulating one’s luck.

“It’s… a little too similar to a ga I rember playing,” John muttered as he closed the rule book.

Zero snickered. “Well, yeah. It’s probably taking inspiration from that ga.”

“Taking inspiration? Or stealing the idea?”

Zero sighed. “John, do you know how many card gas follow a formula like this? It’s not that unique.”

“But you didn’t say it’s not plagiarism.”

“Well- hm.”

Regardless, John now had sothing to do. However, sothing was on his mind as he studied the cards and considered strategies.

Nothing had happened since the incident with the nobles. He went to class peacefully. He slept during lectures and still managed to ace the tests. Fighting classes were always sothing he’d never find interesting, but that much was to be expected. Obviously, school life wasn’t entirely bland, but there were no monts of great interest. Nothing that stood out.

In short, it felt like this wasn’t ant to be part of the [Story]. This shouldn’t be included in whatever perspective the [Readers] were getting.

Well, at least Prota was making friends. The fact that she was voluntarily hanging around Lilith and Ryan ant that he didn’t have to look after her all the ti; more importantly, she was healing. His concerns as to whether or not she would make friends were for nothing.

She wasn’t exactly a social butterfly, but she wasn’t withdrawing into a shell, either. And that was enough, right?

He shook his head. He was getting lazy, but then again, wasn’t he always? It was fine to let things co as they went. It wasn’t as if things could go all that horribly wrong in a place such as this, right?

“...now that I’ve thought of that, it’s probably going to happen,” John groaned, pulling at his hair. “This stupid fucking Chekov’s gun…”

~~~

The next day, after classes were over, John went to Lupin.

The others were all busy with their own things. Danjo had made a friend, but John had never t this friend, as he always went straight ho. Destiny was probably off sowhere with Celeste. If he wasn’t, John didn’t really care to know what the hero was up to. Prota had joined a club to play Magecraft with others. He was surprised that she’d been willing to do so, but if it was what she wanted, he wouldn’t question it.

He shook his head. He was getting distracted.

Standing in front of the door, John looked up at the golden na plaque reading “Lupin Wolfhound.” What he was doing was stupid, but after the thoughts he’d had last night, he didn’t really have another option.

“Yes? I don’t rember having any appointnts,” the gruff voice called out in response to John’s knock.

“Sir. It’s .”

There was a long pause.

“Co in.”

When John entered, he found Lupin sitting at his desk, chained glasses sitting on the edge of his nose as he went over various papers. These were taken off and neatly put aside as he beckoned for John to co forward.

“What is it?” the Mystic asked gruffily.

“Um… hey, look. This is gonna send incredibly bold, but, well…”

“I am listening.”

“Your technique you showed. Um, at the beginning, when you were talking about aura. You coated your cells with aura, didn’t you?”

Lupin studied John’s face carefully.

“Who told you this?”

Lupin’s voice was dangerously quiet. To soone ignorant, it might have seed like he was just asking another question, but those words carried the grim reaper himself. One wrong move, and there would be a scythe at your neck.

“No one. I figured it out myself,” John shrugged.

“That’s not possible. In the first place, cells are sothing known to very few. The composition of organic beings is sothing only Mystics have ti to study. Those who graduate from this academy are not eager to share our secrets. This is a technique that requires hundreds of hours to fully understand. Just because soone explains it to you does not an you can say what you said as easily as you did.”

“Ok, so if this whole mana reinforcent thing is all hush-hush, would I really just tell you that I know about it? No. I ca up with this on my own. Or are you gonna say I’m lying?”

Lupin crossed his arms. “...hmph. Continue.”

John felt a bead of sweat dripping down his neck. Despite all his years of experience, the aura Lupin was emitting was truly nerve-wracking. It wasn’t even his status as a Mythic. It was simply the feeling of being a schoolboy in front of a teacher. He shook his head.

Get over this, John. You’ve dealt with worse.

“You know Destiny?”

Lupin nodded. “Of course. I am aware of all my pupils.”

“Look. I’d appreciate it if you could… well, if you could teach him this technique. Not like, after a month of training or sothing. I an now. In a week, I guess.”

“You would ask this of ?” Lupin said, surprised. “To train not you, who personally figured out such a rare technique, but your friend?”

“I can’t do it.” John clenched his fists, preparing himself for what he’d say next. This was it. All or nothing. “You know those rumours about mana and shit? They’re not just rumours.”

“...so it was true.”

John grimaced. “So… are you gonna expel now?”

“Perhaps. After all, all of our teachings depend on mana. But still. Despite your lack of mana, you continue to perform… adequately. You are no star pupil, but you also do not fall behind. So I will continue to think about this. Now, continue.”

John let out a little sigh. “Look. Destiny is soone special. He has the talent and power to handle this. So, please. Teach him.”

“Again, why? You do not seem like the selfless sort.”

John pressed his lips together. Lupin had made a fair point.

“Yeah. I’m not. But again, I can’t use this technique. And we need it. I… I need it. I need Destiny to know how to do this. Sooner than later.”

Silence once more, broken only by the tapping of Lupin’s fingers on the table. He continued to sit stiffly in his chair, staring intensely into John’s eyes as if trying to get past them and into his brain.

“Do you consider yourself to be strong, boy?”

“No.”

“Do you think you could win against your friend, Destiny?”

“No.”

“Hm. You are too arrogant to lie about that. It seems you are telling the truth.”

John opened his mouth to protest, but Lupin spun around in his chair before he could say anything. Without turning back, he spoke once more.

“So you believe this Destiny boy to be stronger than you. Then any test you pass, he, too, should be able to pass. Is that correct?”

“Uh… yeah?”

John didn’t like where this was going.

“Our duel last ti ended unsatisfactorily. Co. Follow .”

They wound up in the grand stadium, empty now, devoid of students or professors save for the two standing on the dusty grounds.

“This isn’t the illusion world. You can be hurt,” Lupin said quietly.

Just like in the exam, Lupin pulled out a sword and tossed it on the ground, the tip plunging straight down, leaving the handle facing up for John to take.

“You do not have your arsenal of tricks. Co. Take the sword.”

“And fight you?” John said incredulously.

“No. You must simply survive.”

“Hold on, if I can survive, then aura isn’t needed-”

“But a certain level of focus is. And if you can survive, then this Destiny boy can handle the training needed to learn my technique.”

There was a slow scraping sound as Lupin unsheathed his sword. It must’ve been intentional. There was no way soone as professional as Lupin would keep his weapon ill kept. Even while knowing this, the sound sent shivers down John’s spine.

Lupin’s eyes narrowed. “Then. En garde.”

“Hey, what’re you-”

The sun glinted off the rapier’s edge as it shot toward John like a bullet, aid right between his eyes.

“Hey, hey, wait a minute, what the fu-!”