The bone-biting cold receded, and the spring of new sprouts came striding in.
This winter had been a little colder than usual, so it was fortunate that the weather warmed sooner than expected.
The snow piled along the roads melted away, and early grasses began to grow little by little.
On the vines hanging by the window, yellow flowers bloomed, announcing the arrival of a new season.
If I still reached a hand out the window, a cold wind blew against it, but if I went out to the central street, I could clearly feel the sunlight growing warmer with each passing day.
Perhaps because our household had suddenly doubled in size, this winter felt as though it had passed even faster than usual.
And the end of winter, in other words, meant that the day we would leave this rented house was not far off.
We had signed a four-month contract at the end of the fifteenth month last year, and now that we were past the middle of the third month, there were only about ten days left at most.
Though it had been a short time, I couldn’t help growing attached to the place, so if I said I felt regret, then I did feel regret.
◇
Before our journey, I decided it was about time to teach Illiana magic from the very basics.
I had thought about waiting until she had completely regained her stability, but if I waited that long, I felt I might miss the right time.
Even if she seemed much better now, the wounds carved into Illiana’s heart were quite deep. Most likely, even now, if I left her side for so much as a day, she would fall into a panic.
And, in a way, that was precisely why.
If by some chance a dangerous situation arose, she needed to be able to protect herself.
I took Cassian and Illiana out to the hill where I always put Cassian through his paces.
Since it would cause a commotion if people caught sight of her, I also brought Rutina along inside a bag.
Any other animal would have made a fuss, but dragons had an instinctive liking for dark, enclosed places, so she remained quiet without complaint.
Even this hill had still had snow piled here and there just a few days ago, but now it had melted away as if it had never been there, and short grasses had grown in its place.
However, because the snow had melted, the ground was muddy, so I dried it with magic and seated the two of them. Since Illiana still seemed uncomfortable around Cassian, I set them a little apart.
“Now, then. For Illiana, this will be your first lesson. Cassian, listen as if you’re reviewing.”
I sat in front of the two of them and lightly raised my right hand, extending only my index finger. Especially so Illiana could see it clearly.
“First, what is magic? Magic is the method of using mana to bring about the phenomenon you desire.”
When I stirred my finger in a small circle, a tiny droplet of water floated above it. The droplet remained suspended in midair, reflecting the sunlight.
Then, when I rotated my finger in place once more, the droplet changed shape and took on the appearance of a transparent jewel carved with exquisite precision.
To be specific, it was a brilliant-cut diamond.
“Wow……!”
Perhaps because I rarely used magic in this sort of way, Illiana’s eyes filled with wonder.
When I flicked my raised hand upward and scattered the droplet into the air, Illiana looked at the empty space with a hint of regret.
“Then next, I’ll show you step by step how it’s actually used. Watch carefully.”
I temporarily overlaid Illiana’s eyes with a filter that allowed her to see mana. Now she should be able to see mana with her eyes, the way I did when using mana sight.
Then I brought the middle finger and thumb of my right hand together, forming a small ring. It wasn’t a necessary movement, but it had become a habit.
“First step. Gather mana.”
Through mana sight, violet-blue mana glowing around us could be seen gathering in a circle around my hand, swirling like a vortex.
In my case, I drew in the mana present in nature to use magic, but most ordinary mages did not go to such trouble and instead used the mana accumulated within their bodies.
Illiana stared intently at my hand, so absorbed by the sight she was seeing for the first time that she even forgot to blink.
“Second step. Concentrate the mana you’ve gathered.”
This time, the mana circling around my hand gathered between my middle finger and thumb before converging into a single point, looking like a star shining brightly in the night sky.
However, mana sight only made it possible to perceive mana, so it was not dazzling to the eyes.
This time, even Cassian came closer and silently watched the mana concentrated in my hand.
“Third step. Transform it into the desired phenomenon and manifest it.”
I snapped the fingers I had brought together out of habit, producing a crisp click.
At the same time, the gathered mana changed into blue light in an instant and rose into the air as a snowflake. It was a three-dimensional image that could be seen, though not touched.
The snowflake glowing blue rotated several times around an axis running from bottom to top, then soon melted into the light and vanished.
I could clearly hear Cassian gulp.
“……That’s completely ridiculous. How do you even use mana that smoothly?”
“I told you, if you practice for about five more years, you’ll be able to do this much too.”
“That’s too long…….”
Showing it only once would not mean much, so I demonstrated several times, changing it into various shapes.
A flower, a crown, the shape of the house we lived in, and even a form modeled exactly after Rutina.
Since what she saw through mana sight was the same each time, watching it repeatedly could have become boring, but Illiana kept staring intently at my hand until the very end without taking her eyes off it.
◇
After showing them a little more than ten times, we took a short break.
Since the sun happened to be high overhead, I took out the Mindrat fruit I had brought as a snack. It was a round fruit with a rough, bright yellow peel, and it was large enough that I couldn’t fully wrap both hands around it.
Inside was snow-white flesh, and at the center was a single large, round seed.
I swept my fingers through the air to cut it into four portions, and since the seed contained enough deadly poison to kill a person with ease, I immediately burned it away with magic.
While we were leisurely resting, each eating one piece—me, Cassian, Illiana, and Rutina—
Cassian looked at me as if something had suddenly occurred to him and asked,
“Come to think of it, Master, why don’t you use magic circles? When I see other mages, they all draw magic circles when they use magic.”
Why didn’t I use magic circles? The reason was very simple.
“Those are like a shortcut.”
“A shortcut?”
“It’s a method of pushing the complicated and difficult parts onto someone else because it’s hard to use magic directly.”
“Uh…… pushing them onto someone else? Onto who?”
“If I explain that, it’ll turn into a lesson on the history of magic, so I’ll make it simple.”
In the far, far distant past, there was a mage named Laius Paul Lerkelen.
At that time, the only magic that existed was the method of manipulating mana solely through individual will.
In other words, the same method I was teaching.
However, using magic this way depended heavily on the individual’s talent.
Even effort was only possible when one possessed innate talent.
Yet he, the greatest mage across both past and future, wished for magic to be equal to all.
With that wish in his heart, he finally completed one grand spell and cast it over the entire world.
To put it simply, it was “a spell that recognizes every magic circle in the entire world and uses the mana infused into that circle to cast the magic in its stead.”
And he was also the one who created the rules and basic grammar known as magic circles.
In other words.
“Lerkelen was the founder of magic circles, and of humanity’s magic that uses magic circles.”
“Wow, uh…… so one person created something called magic circles?”
“Yes. If he hadn’t existed, there would be no such thing as magic circles.”
Thanks to that, magic became universal, and as a result, the ancient humanity of that time achieved tremendous development unlike anything that would ever follow.
In the end, they perished, though.
After that, all that remained were fragmentary pieces of magic. In other words, because the basic grammar of magic circles had been lost, people had to build them back up from scratch.
Some mages did manage to restore a considerable amount of that grammar, but it still did not amount to even half.
Because of that, the people of this era used it merely as a tool to calculate magic, without even knowing what it meant.
For that reason, the absolute majority of mages who used magic circles could be called mages who were half fake.
If you can’t create the phenomenon you desire with your own power, how does that make you a mage?
In exchange, because they pushed off the most difficult parts, it was possible for them to easily reach a high level, but their limits were just as clear.
If I had taught Cassian magic circles first, then by now, according to the standards set by the Mage Alliance in the southern part of the continent, he would probably have been considered an upper-rank mage.
In exchange, he would have ended his life as no more than some paltry grand mage, the kind of person of whom there were dozens in the world even among his contemporaries alone.
As expected, magic was not meant to be some rigid academic discipline. It ought to be free.
I finished my explanation while tossing the remaining end of the Mindrat into my mouth.
Chew, chew. Gulp.
“Then that’s the end of break time.”
There was still plenty of time left before sunset. We couldn’t waste precious time.
“Cassian, try practicing exactly what I showed you earlier. Especially at the stage where you concentrate mana—do it a little more smoothly.”
“Tch, boring…….”
“You only improve by repeating things.”
Then I went around behind Illiana, who was sitting down, stroked her head, and said,
“Illiana, let’s start by learning how to handle mana freely. You’ll be able to do it soon.”
“……Yes!”
Sitting behind Illiana as she answered with as much vigor as she could muster, I half-embraced her and taught her the trick.
I found myself looking forward a little to seeing just how far these children might reach in the future.