Mother of Learning: ARC 1

by Domagoj Kurmaić

“Mother, I’m fifteen,” he protested.

“Don’t be so flustered,” Zach told him happily. “I don’t think there’s a single boy in class who doesn’t occasionally daydream about our resident red-headed goddess.”

“She’s tricky,” Zach agreed. “But I’ve got all the time in the world.”

magic missile

“Hey Zorian,” Benisek whispered to him not so quietly. “I never noticed it until now, but our teacher is kind of hot!”

it’s like cooking. Hell, we’re making glue, of all things. You should leave that to girls.”

“It’s true!” he protested. “Even our teacher is a girl. A hot girl, but still.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, all teenage girls liked older guys. Dating a guy that was two or three years her senior seemed to be a status symbol for a girl, and a majority of them loudly disparaged the male population their own age as crass and immature. When they were in their first year, all the girls wanted to date third-years. Now that they were in their third year, all the girls wanted to date apprenticed graduates.

I’m a nobody. A third son of a minor merchant family from the middle of nowhere.

small town sure but the family is "a pillar of the town" ?

especially for a civilian-born student who wasn't exposed to magic your entire life.

a morlock.

a what

expert on girl trouble.” Now it was Zorian’s turn to make a strangled noise. “Girl trouble!?” “Oh, come on.” Benisek laughed. “Constantly distracted? Spacing out in the middle of the class? Making plans for sending anonymous letters? It’s obvious, man! Who’s the lucky girl?” “There is no ‘lucky girl’,”

the question of why Zorian was thrown back in time, too.

he blacked out and woke up, once again, with Kiri on top of him, wishing him a good morning.

and he had lived through it eight times already.

“There is also mind magic to worry about. Aside from the obvious possibility of ending up as a mind thrall, you could also end up with more than a few gaps in your memory—you could have your whole mind blanked out. Then there’s the possibility of having a geas forced upon you if you’re too careless, which also binds to the soul as far as I know. Some creatures eat souls—like wraiths. That’s another thing to worry about. And there are a couple of methods of sealing away a mage’s ability to do magic, which might very well stay with you when you… ‘revert’.”

“My education was… unconventional,” said Kael. “I was a sort of unofficial apprentice to a village mage. One that wasn’t a member of the guild. Her skills were somewhat specialized, so much of my proficiency with magic is a product of my own personal efforts. In other words, I’m largely self-taught.”

Which would make Zorian soul-bonded to Zach.

duh

first circle spell than a zero circle one.

“You are the lamest time traveler ever,” Kirielle opinionated.

no but seriously tho this time travel story /sucks/

“Soul Meld,” Zorian read aloud. “Requires at least two targets. Causes target souls to merge and blend into one. Typically used as a component in more complicated rituals, which in turn heavily modify the effects. If the spell is used in isolation, the resulting entity is virtually always rendered insane or otherwise defective from the stress of the merger. Commonly used in the creation of familiar bonds and soul bonds in general…”

“It’s because empathy is usually portrayed as a feminine ability, one reserved for girls and girly men,” admitted Zorian. “Ahhh,” nodded Imaya. “Of course a boy would be bothered by something like that.” “I’m not sexist or anything,” Zorian hastily added. “But I already receive a lot of comments about my supposed lack of masculinity, and they’re annoying enough as it is. I really don’t want to see how bad they would get if they had this sort of ‘proof’.”

“Spear of Resolve Striking Straight at the Heart of the Matter?”

but are you sure you can’t talk to Zach without triggering it? Who knows what useful things the boy knows about this whole thing? Surely if you inform him of your fears, he will agree to keep his distance.]

thank you

Why was he insisting on learning combat magic alone, without an instructor, when he was friends with someone who specialized in that very field of magic?

because you're a dumbass

“How big are your mana reserves?” Taiven immediately asked, not at all perturbed by the request. “Magnitude twelve,” Zorian said.

THE MAGIC MAKES NO SENSE

ur-examples

??????????

Zorian would be the first to admit he wasn’t the easiest person to get along with. He was unsociable, irritable, and tended to assume the worst of people.