Ian first felt the change the moment he woke from sleep.
“……I’m not tired?”
Since he was in charge of the convenience store’s dawn shift, his daily rhythm was a full 180 degrees out of sync with everyone else’s.
He slept in the morning, woke up at noon, killed time for a while, and then went to his part-time job.
Thanks to that, his exhaustion never went away. His body always felt as heavy as lead, and dark circles sat beneath his eyes.
But today was different.
It was exactly one week since he had started eating dirt.
The moment Ian sat up in bed, he felt that his body was lighter than he had expected.
His mind was strangely clear as well, and his eyelids, which had always felt heavy, were perfectly fine.
The reason was obvious.
‘So the introductory process for becoming a magician was real.’
It seemed the methods written in the grimoire had been true after all.
At first, he had been half in doubt and had simply forced himself through it with sheer stubbornness, but this changed things. Now that he had felt the results in his own body, he could no longer dismiss everything written in the grimoire as a complete lie.
Ian burst into laughter, sat down on the living room floor, and gulped down a cup of water. Then he briefly stopped by a nearby convenience store and bought a lunch box.
After eating nothing but dirt for a week, he was starving for real food. He heated the lunch box in the microwave, ate it, cleaned up neatly, and then flopped down into a chair.
“Summon.”
Ian muttered as he stretched his empty hand into the air. At that moment, a burst of pure white light erupted, and the grimoire appeared in his grasp.
It was a function he had discovered by chance. Even if he was not yet a magician, as long as he was the grimoire’s owner, he could use this summoning ability. Thanks to that, he did not have to worry about losing the book or it falling into someone else’s hands.
That much, at least, was a relief.
“……Hmm.”
With an unlit cigarette between his lips, he slowly opened the grimoire. The book opened smoothly and, following its master’s will, flipped on its own to the page he wanted.
Page 785. The section explaining how to take the first steps into magic.
Ian had just finished the part corresponding to earth, one of the four elements.
Now it was air. In other words, it was time to begin the wind section.
Fortunately, wind was far easier than earth. All he had to do was meditate morning and evening for a week in a place with plenty of wind.
After stuffing himself with nothing but dirt for three meals a day, the word meditation was truly soothing to see.
“No need to put it off.”
The first stage was already over, but Ian had no intention of dragging his feet. The sooner he became a magician, the better.
Without taking any particular break, as soon as the sun set, he went up to the rooftop of the villa where he lived alone and sat down cross-legged.
As it happened, the season was winter. The wind blew hard, and though it was cold, with heat packs it was not unbearable.
The problem was meditation.
The only meditation Ian had ever done in his life was spacing out in the shower. Even if someone suddenly told him to meditate, he had no idea how to go about it.
Still, he somehow managed. He clenched his teeth and desperately tried to empty his mind.
And so time passed.
As the number of sunrises and moonrises increased, the amount of time he could continue meditating increased in proportion.
Finally, exactly one week later.
Ian had gained enough mental strength to meditate all day and still have some left over.
And that was not all.
‘Merlin’s flesh.’
In other words, aether.
It had once been one of the five elements proposed by philosophers of the past, though in the present day, the concept had been replaced by a different meaning. However, Ian was able to realize that the element they had claimed existed was by no means false.
‘The air is full of aether.’
To put it in fantasy terms, it was the same as mana filling the world.
The most fundamental and primordial energy forming the foundation of this world—above all, orderly, yet close to chaos.
According to the grimoire, aether was the flesh scattered by Merlin, the first magician and the greatest archmage to have ever existed in this world, when he died.
Here, “Merlin” did not refer to the Merlin from the legend of King Arthur, but to some unknown being that had existed since before the common era.
Leaving behind no records, no grimoire, and no family, he had scattered only the substance called aether into the world and burned away in a brilliant oxidation. Thanks to that, other magicians besides him were able to be born.
‘In the past, I would’ve dismissed it as an interesting bit of lore, but I can’t do that anymore.’
Ian gave a bitter smile and quietly watched the aether filling the world.
He could not touch it directly yet. He could not store it in his body, nor could he use magic through aether.
But he could see it with his eyes and feel it on his skin.
For now, that was enough.
Looking at the beautiful radiance embroidered across the sky, Ian let out a small laugh.
*
Though he had succeeded in sensing aether, he had not become a magician. There were still two elements remaining.
There was no time to delay.
So as soon as Ian finished the air section of the four elements, he immediately moved on to the next part.
This time, he had to consume only water for three meals a day. Fortunately, it was more manageable than eating dirt. He was hungry, but perhaps because his body had changed to some extent, it was not unbearable.
Another week passed like that. The moment Ian opened his eyes in bed, he frowned at the filth dirtying his bedsheets.
‘Waste that had built up inside my body.’
He already knew about it, so he was not flustered. However, the smell was more horrendous than he had expected, and he used every means available to clean it up somehow.
But the smell did not come out. In the end, he stuffed the soiled sheets and blanket into a bag and threw them away at once.
It was a waste of money, but he did not want to sleep wrapped in stinking bedding.
Perhaps because he had expelled the waste, his body felt even healthier than before. In addition, just as the grimoire had said, he had become able to move aether directly.
Storing it in his body was impossible. That was something he could only do after passing through the final stage.
“Phew……”
Before he knew it, three weeks had passed since he had begun the process of becoming a magician. Now only the final stage remained. Once he finished this, it would essentially be the same as transforming his body into that of a magician.
If he became a magician, he probably would not be able to live quietly as he did now, going back and forth between his room and the convenience store. He would surely get caught up in some incident or dreadful affair.
Having lived an ordinary life and then suddenly become a magician, it was impossible not to feel fear. To be honest, he was a little scared.
But more than that, he was filled with anticipation and curiosity.
He wanted to know what the society of magicians looked like, and what kinds of mysteries and wonders filled the world.
Had he never known, he would have lived forever in ignorance, but now that he had already dipped his foot in, he could no longer return to the days when he knew nothing.
More knowledge.
The desire to dig up even more of the world’s secrets and find out what the pinnacle of magic was began to creep up inside him.
‘Was I always this kind of person?’
It was true that once something caught his interest, he tended to dig into it to a rather relentless degree, but this time, it seemed a little excessive.
Still, it was not as though he could not understand it.
Until now, the things he had liked were games, instruments, and novels.
None of them were particularly mysterious.
But magic was more mysterious than anything, and this world was filled with even more unknowns.
It was inevitable that the extent to which he fell into it would be different.
Thinking that, Ian lit a candle on the living room floor and sat beside it.
His thoughts had gone on long enough.
Now was the time to climb steadily from the very lowest step. First, he had to master all four elements, and only then move on to the next stage.
“Phew……”
Together with his exhaled breath, he expelled every stray thought in his mind.
He sat cross-legged where he was, emptied his mind, and began meditating.
Like that, Ian began meditating every day at noon and continued meditating beside the flame until just before he had to leave for his part-time job.
And after a week passed.
“It’s over.”
At last, he had passed through every stage of the four elements. His body had changed into that of a magician.
Compared to the previous stages, there was no immediate, visceral sensation, but he could clearly tell that something had changed.
Now, even if he used magic, he no longer needed to worry about his body exploding or collapsing because it could not endure it.
With a faint smile, Ian opened the grimoire and checked the next step after the four elements.
[If one has comprehended the four elements and awakened to the existence of aether, then for all practical purposes, one has already become a magician.]
[However, if one wishes to become a proper magician in every sense and use true magic, it is necessary to contain aether within the body once.]
[Through this, one expands and sustains one’s own existence, changing not only the body but also the soul into a form suited to a magician.]
[It is not a very difficult process, but if one fails to maintain concentration, the soul may crumble and result in death, so caution is required.]
[The soul is a delicate material. It is not included among the three elements of magic for nothing. Therefore, whether it is your own or someone else’s, precise control is required when handling it.]
“……”
At the words “may result in death,” Ian gulped. But his hesitation was brief, and his action swift.
He immediately sat down on the living room floor, closed his eyes, and slowly drew the aether drifting around him into his body.
There was no particular sense of resistance or rejection in the process. It seemed the statement that it was not a difficult process had not been a lie. As long as his concentration did not waver, he likely did not need to worry too much.
“Phew……”
He exhaled and stored the moving aether inside his body. The aether traveled through his respiratory tract, took root in his blood vessels, and gathered in his heart along with the flow of blood.
It condensed. It spread apart. It split.
As though undergoing weathering, the aether crumbled in time with his beating heart, scattered throughout it, and melted away.
At the moment all the aether finally melted and was absorbed, Ian felt as if his soul had become firmer.
It was probably not an illusion. Just as the grimoire had said, his soul, too, had been transformed into that of a magician, like his body.
There was no difference in his ability to think. Humans did not suddenly seem insignificant to him, nor did he feel himself to be great, nor did he lose his humanity.
Ian’s condition was exceedingly ordinary, and also calm.
‘Is that it?’
Just in case, Ian searched through the grimoire further, but there was nothing more written regarding the introduction to magic.
It really was over.
A plain ending, without any mana storm or flashy effects like those that occurred when changing classes into a magician in a game.
It seemed he did not create circles or mana circuits in his body like a fantasy magician. If that was disappointing, then it was disappointing, but he was not particularly let down.
In any case, the fact that he could use magic was far more important.
Ian rose from his seat, drank a cup of water, and slowly checked the spells written in the grimoire.
There was quite a variety of recorded spells.
From simple magic to clean a room, to magic that turned water into wine, to magic that copied the shape of clothing.
Not only were there spells that seemed usable in daily life, but also a number of rather bizarre and offensive spells, such as magic that compressed corpses, magic that extracted eyeballs without touching them, and magic that used another person’s body as a ritual sacrifice.
Most spells required offerings or a preparation process to use. Things like formulas or magic circles were only used in large-scale magic.
‘Alchemy is…… even more vast than magic.’
The Hand of Re-Creation placed greater emphasis on alchemy than on magic. It seemed to be more focused on alchemy after all.
Ian let out a low hum and slowly skimmed through the alchemy section.
The items that could be made through alchemy were extremely diverse. From potions, which generally came to mind when one thought of alchemy, to ores with strange powers, swords or fetishes with specific effects, and more. Mysterious and bizarre objects captured Ian’s gaze.
However, most of the items required extremely complicated materials.
He could at least understand minerals like gold, silver, and lead, but things like the hair of an aberration, the scales of the sea, and the tooth of a condemned prisoner harboring a curse—he had no idea how to obtain those. He was not even sure if they could be obtained in the first place.
‘I guess I should start with something easy.’
Ian passed over the “medicine that kills by planting parasites in the heart,” which he had been watching with great interest, and examined alchemical items with simple materials.
In the midst of that, a certain dagger caught his eye.
[Knife That Kills Primates]
The required materials were a single bladed object, salt, silver, the hair of a primate, aether, and the corpse of an insect.
They were all things he could easily obtain.
Ian decided to try crafting this first.