Clarisse ran through the guild hall’s entrance arch, eagerly rushing into the main hall and walking up to the front desk. “Good morning, Rika! Is Nikolas already here?” she asked, taking a moment to catch her breath.

  “He hasn’t been waiting for long.” The guild receptionist was cheery as always, nodding and gesturing to her side at Nikolas sitting at one of the many desks set up for parties to convene at in the guild.

  “Hey! Good to see you all bright-eyed, rookie.” Nikolas called out, getting up and walking up to them with his backpack slung on his shoulder.

  “Yup! We’re practicing magic today, right?” Clarisse replied, flourishing her hands to make a tiny spark appear between them.

  “You are, yes,” he confirmed with a slight edit to her statement, walking down the aisle back towards the front gate. “Come on, I know a good place for us to begin.”

  “We’re headed to the training grounds at the academy, right?” Clarisse tagged along close behind him, curious as to what he was referring to. “I’ve heard they have great facilities there, but I’ve never actually been inside myself!”

  Nikolas simply shook his head as they left the guild, walking through the city square. “Too high profile. I have another place in mind.”

  “Alright… ” Clarisse was confused but decided not to dispute his decision just yet.

  The two of them kept walking through the streets much to the redhead’s uneasiness, though she kept her peace until they were at the city gates.

  “Why are we leaving the city? There are plenty of good places inside where we can train,” she said, her brow furrowing as the eager expression turned into a frown.

  “I’m not particularly comfortable taking a rookie there,” Nikolas shrugged. “Besides, there’s a lot more we can do outdoors. Less rules, less constraints and no need to worry about onlookers.” He spared an upwards glance at the guards stationed on top of the gates before continuing, walking down the cobbled road leading to the plains outside the city limits. “Do you really want to give up that easily?”

  “No- of course not!” Clarisse rebutted, jogging to catch up to him. “You could have told me about this beforehand, though,” she grumbled.

  “I have my own reasons for this too,” he admitted, waving her concerns away. “Now, what exactly can you do – magic-wise? I know you have a fire arcana, but fill me in on the details.”

  “Umm… ” she thought about it, looking down at her hands before answering. “I’m not sure of all the details myself, but I think I can create flames around me. I can also set my hair on fire like that, and it doesn’t burn it up at all.”

  “Hmm… doesn’t sound very different from basic pyromancy. It’s pretty normal for mages with elemental arcana to possess natural resistance to their element.” Nikolas observed. “Can you manipulate your flames?”

  Clarisse shook her head. “I haven’t been able to make them go any further than a few inches from myself without losing control, but I can make them a little stronger if I focus hard!” she replied, getting an inclination that he was already finding her disappointing from the tone of his voice.

  He glanced at her, nodding. “That’s an avenue of progress then. We can stop here,” he said, veering off the stone road and walking into the plains. “Keep your bag somewhere close by.”

  Clarisse did as she was told, quickly finding a good spot to stand and focusing on herself. Within a few seconds, there was a small flame growing in between her hands. “See? It’s like this.”

  Nikolas reached into his bag, pulling out Sera and simply waiting for something to happen. “Sera? Are you there?” he tried to shake the doll back and forth and flicked her head with a finger before looking back at Clarisse. Regardless, Sera didn’t look like she was moving in response to his actions.

  “Is something wrong?” Clarisse asked, she had been too absorbed in creating the flame to pick up on what had happened. To her, it seemed strange to see the motionless doll after meeting Sera before.

  “Sera’s still asleep. Well, either that or she’s busy right now,” Nikolas sighed, returning the doll to his bag and walking up to Clarisse. “She’s much better at this, but I can give you a quick run-down of the basics anyway for now,” he said begrudgingly.

  “That- that would be okay,” the redhead replied, confused about how exactly a magic doll would be asleep. “I know a little bit about the three laws surrounding arcana already if that’s what you mean by the basics.”

  “Zhevana’s laws – yeah.” Nikolas held up three fingers, counting down with each law. “Arcana are the lifeblood of all beings in existence, Arcanas are tied to souls. Most spells cost mana proportionate to their strength to cast,” the way he spoke seemed fast and loose, approximations rather than fact.

  “I thought they were a little different,” Clarisse seemed a little bothered by his description of the laws. “Souls are made of arcana, everyone has one unique magic determined by their arcana, and all spells cost mana proportional to their casting strength,” she recited a slightly different set of rules, noting that her version lacked the added ambiguity of his in all cases.

  “I’m not going to try and change your views on them, but do know that the distinctions can come up in some cases,” Nikolas conceded with a shrug. “The important thing here is that whatever your magic is, it’ll be mostly constant regardless of your familiarity with it. Does maintaining the flame’s size drain you of mana continuously?”

  Clarisse nodded, making the flame between her hands larger so that it was the size of her fist and floated right above her palm. “I can maintain the small flames for around an hour but I’ve never been able to make them much larger than this. It’s also much easier to maintain when it's directly connected to me or on my hair,” she recalled.

  “Right,” Nikolas stared at the flame for a few seconds, before an idea occurred to him. Walking about twenty feet back, he called out to her. “Make the largest fireball you can and throw it at me,” he instructed her.

  Clarisse seemed skeptical about his idea, but was already making the flame floating in hands larger as she spoke. “Are you sure you won’t get burned if it hits you?”

  “I’ll be fine,” Nikolas was quick to answer, extending an arm forward. “Aim for my hand and throw whenever you’re comfortable with the size.”

  “Okay…” Clarisse cupped the flame between her hands to let it focus into a sphere and wound her arm back, before arcing it at him.

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  The fireball was fast at release, flying towards Nikolas but quickly lost momentum and size. By the time it reached him, the fireball had turned into a narrow plume of fire which was dissipated by the tailwinds from a swing of his hand..

  “Hmm… either your arcana isn’t suited for long range, or you just need to work on it more,” Nikolas muttered to himself, waving away the leftover smoke from the fireball. “Throw another! Try to condense the flames into a smaller ball this time,” he called out to Clarisse.

  Clarisse felt disheartened from how her initial fireball had faded away, but on his prompt she began to make another in her hands, willing herself to make it stronger this time. “Okay! Here goes…” with another wind up, she threw the fireball at him.

  The second projectile flew in a similar trajectory as the first one, although it hadn’t lost as much momentum by the time it made it within Nikolas’s reach. He batted it away with the back of his hand, expecting it to dissipate just like the first one.

  As soon as his gloved hand made contact with the flaming orb, it exploded into a small wave of fire around itself, which lingered for a moment before dissipating. Clarisse’s eyes lit up as soon as the event registered, surprised by her own capabilities.

  “I’m guessing that hasn’t happened before?” Nikolas asked rhetorically, dusting off a layer of soot from his glove. “When you’re starting out, arcana can be tough to figure out due to not knowing anything about it. Often, concentrating it into a denser form can reveal hidden qualities.”

  Clarisse smiled, running up to him. “This is new! I’ve never seen it explode like that!” she exclaimed. “Does that mean my arcana is less pure pyromancy and more towards explosions?”

  “It’s… not as simple as that,” Nikolas explained, trying to curtail her premature excitement. “It could be possible that you simply have an affinity for spreading flames around yourself - I wanted you to make projectiles so that I could isolate how your fire behaves when separated from you.”

  Clarisse nodded, absorbing the first new tidbit of information among many more that she expected were to come. “I want to try it again then – I’ll make it even denser than before.”

  “Sure,” Nikolas replied, relieved that she didn’t want him to demonstrate anything himself. “Go farther back- your throws could use some practice too.” he called out as she took her position again.

  The adventurer duo kept up their fiery game of catch until the sun’s shrouded heat had crossed its peak in the sky, now completely obscured by the Veil as it made its descent into the horizon.

  “By Svaha… I think… I’m done for.” Clarisse heaved, catching her breath as she supported herself by holding onto her knees. She was sweating profusely and her arms were sore, exhausted from throwing fireballs at Nikolas all day.

  “I suppose this is a good time to call it a day then.” Nikolas said, walking up to her. He seemed completely okay despite being a walking target and parrying fireballs all day. Besides a few layers of soot spread on his armor and clothes, nothing seemed to have changed about the fox.

  “That was more fireballs than I’ve made before… ever.” Clarisse drew in a deep breath, before letting herself fall back and lay flat on the ground.

  “I’d say you made good progress.” Nikolas commented, standing next to her and looking down to meet her gaze. “Especially for your first time actually training. I was expecting you to tap out by the afternoon.”

  “Me too-” the redhead said in between deep breaths, her voice betraying a tinge of disbelief. “It felt like I ran out of mana a couple of hours ago. Somehow, I was still able to use magic.”

  “Really?” Nikolas inquired, suddenly curious. He hadn’t thought much of his own mana pool being lower than usual despite not using magic before, but this piqued his interest. “Did it feel like you kept getting back mana after feeling empty?”

  “I… I don’t know,” Clarisse brushed it off, slowly sitting up using her elbows for support. “Just felt like I could keep casting as long as I wanted to.”

  “Interesting…” Nikolas made a mental note of it for later, extending an arm towards her. “Let’s head back.”

  “Thanks,” she replied, accepting his hand to help her get up and regain her balance. “Do you want to get some dinner on the way back?”

  “I don’t think I have an appetite right now, but I’ll come with,” he shrugged, slinging his backpack and waiting for her to do the same before heading for the cobbled road.

  “I was thinking about getting dinner at the guild hall,” Clarisse suggested, to which her stomach grumbled in agreement. “I can’t wait to show Rika my progress!”

  Nikolas chuckled at her enthusiasm. “Rika’s probably going to be swamped with work like always… unless there’s still that shortage of quests,” he glanced up at the orange-ish sky, pondering silently.

  “Oh, yeah,” Clarisse realized, her mood dampening a little bit. She didn’t really know anyone else at the guild to talk about her training. “She’s a hard worker.”

  “You’ve improved quite a bit too,” Nikolas said, noting the change in her expression from the corner of his eye. “You’ll be slinging fireballs effortlessly soon if you keep up the work. Plus, their explosions are useful to catch opponents off guard and create distractions.”

  Clarisse smiled modestly at his acknowledgement. “Thanks. Although, I don’t think I learnt much else about arcana in general. I still have a long way to go,”

  “Arcana is a complicated topic,” Nikolas said with the cadence of someone who learnt it the hard way. “Some use their entire lives to master it, while others are gifted with complete control of theirs from birth. Still, there are others who don’t possess the capacity for magic and even they have a semblance of arcana in them.”

  Clarisse didn’t feel reassured after hearing that, given that she certainly didn’t feel gifted with her arcana. “You sound like you know a lot about arcana… where did you learn it all from?”

  “. . .” Nikolas simply glanced ahead, not wanting to give anything away. “I was curious about it when I was young. Sera taught me most of what I know in that regard.”

  “What’s your arcana then?” Clarisse pressed on with another question, brimming with curiosity despite her tiredness.

  “Some arcana are best not used.” Nikolas replied, glancing at her with a slight tilt before looking ahead again.

  Clarisse frowned at his refusal to elaborate. “But how can you ignore your arcana? It’s a part of who you are- ” she began, but stopped when she caught him glaring at her out of the corner of his eye.

  “I don’t like talking about mine.” Nikolas said again to make it clear he wouldn’t be entertaining her questions. He increased his pace slightly, walking ahead of her.

  Clarisse decided not to pursue the topic further, feeling unnerved by his glare. “Fine, I won’t ask about it anymore,” she said, annoyed by his increase in pace and jogging a few steps to catch up to him. “But you have to teach me more about arcana!”

  “I’m confident Sera would be better suited for that…” he sighed. “But while she’s busy, I can teach you some more stuff. Maybe you’ll impress her when she comes back.”

  Clarisse smiled, satisfied with their arrangement. “Have you ever done this before? Teaching someone else, I mean.”

  “No,” Nikolas replied, though he seemed lost in thought. “Another adventurer is a first for me. Either way, you’ll do well.”

  “That sounded ominous,” she commented with a huff. “Are you sure you know what you’re doing?”

  “Says the girl who went into the forests alone and got ambushed,” Nikolas countered with sarcasm dripping from his voice. “You won’t be in danger like that if you stick back and learn.”

  “Hey- That’s not fair!” Clarisse protested, punching his arm with as much force she could muster through her tiredness, but only ended up hurting her fist. “Ow…”

  Nikolas seemed to take her punch as a joke, letting out a chuckle as she rubbed her knuckles. “That’s really not a good idea – you’re lucky I didn’t have a dagger stashed there.”

  “How many weapons do you even have?” she asked, both curious and annoyed by his demeanor.

  “As many as I need.” came a curt reply, leaving her to roll her eyes as they made their way back to the guild hall.

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