114 First Classes

"Alright class! Welcome to your first lesson on Pyromancy! I am Teacher Deida, your Pyromancy teacher!" The man in front of us chirped while writing his name on the board.

[Name: Deida

Title: Pyromancy Teacher, Hothead, Firepants

Race: Mahun

Gender: Male

Current Mood: Anticipation

Stats:

23 Strength

14 Dexterity

17 Endurance

162 Magic

Skills:

Cooking (Tier 1), Teaching (Tier 2)

Magic Skills:

Pyromancy (Tier 3), Hydromancy (Tier 1)]

I wonder what he did to get those two titles of his?

Just by looking at his skills, I'm going to guess it has something to do with his cooking.

Since I was pretty much free to join any classes I saw fit, I decided I would take the seat at the back of the classes I choose to join so that I wouldn't disrupt the other students. That's just in case I decide that the class isn't worth my time and bail on it.

What? It's possible, ok? I'm not delusional enough to believe that all the teachers here are completely competent.

The classroom had enough seats for about forty people but I see only about half the seats are taken up and that's including me.

Well, considering that there's about a hundred to two hundred students per year, that's quite a number of students considering the number of classes there are inside this school. Do we have that many pyromaniacs?

Our teacher finished writing his name and turned back to face us with a grin on his face, "So! All of you are aspiring fire mages that have come to learn the art of pyromancy! Could I have a show of hands who have already succeeded in learning a fire spell?"

Less than half of the students in the class raised their hands.

Lucas isn't here since there's intermediate classes and seeing that he's a tier two in Pyromancy, he wouldn't have learned anything in this beginner class anyway.

Teacher Deida's grin grew wider, "Oh! Lots of first timers I see! Don't worry! Soon enough,I'll have all of you casting fire magic in no time!"

You know… All this sounds well and good, until you remember that you're basically teaching a bunch of twelve year olds how to throw fire around. I'm seriously wondering how houses aren't being burned down on a daily basis.

I mean come on, you give a kid a flamethrower, they're definitely going to try it out somewhere. Actually, even if you give an adult a flamethrower, they'll definitely want to try it somewhere as well.

So just how aren't we experiencing arson and the like within the city on a daily basis?

Meh, I guess I can ask the teacher this question later.

"Alright! For the first lesson, can anyone who is already capable of casting fire magic tell the rest of the class how you learned it?"

Oh, that takes me back when I first learned magic! I had to focus on my mana and change it to what I want to cast those magic spells. But since it's mostly because I have that kind of imagination from another World that allowed me to do it, I wonder how the locals start their magic training?

One of the kids in the front row raised their hand, "We practice chanting!"

"Correct! That's why we shall be doing the most basic spell today! [Ember]!" The teacher praised, writing the chant for it on the board.

Heh?

Wait, what?

"Now, everyone can try chanting the spell I wrote on the board until you cast the spell!"

Ok, hold on, putting aside the method of learning this magic, I have another concern as well.

I raised my hand to get his attention and he nodded at me, "Ah! Student Aster! What is it?"

"Umm… Shouldn't we worry about burning the class?"

He chuckled, "Oh not to worry! As a standard for all the buildings inside cities, this room is enchanted to be fire resistant! So you don't need to worry about setting stuff on fire. Ah! But do refrain from casting the higher tier magics if you know them, those could still start one."

Oh… Oh… Oh, I see…

Ok, I get it.

Every building is enchanted to be difficult to burn so the likelihood of someone accidentally setting something on fire would be quite low. You have to really want to burn down something by casting the higher tiered spells to burn them down.

Thus the only thing we need to worry about are the kids burning themselves or each other…

Wait, that's not a good thing either?

Ah, I guess with healing magic being a thing, being burned would actually serve as a good lesson for the kids to be careful with the magic I guess?

That's also probably why our pyromancy teacher also has hydromancy magic to help out in case any fire in his class gets out of hand.

"Does anyone else have any questions?"

Another girl raised her hand, "Umm… What if I already know the spell?"

"Ah of course, those of you who already know this spell, I want you to try and maintain the flame for as long as possible. I know that your flame would usually disappear after a few seconds so let's try to extend the time you can keep it burning for! Let's try for five seconds first!"

Huh… Doesn't that mean continuing to supply mana to it? That's quite simple. As long as you have the mana, you'll be able to just keep the flame alight.

I guess it's a matter of training our concentration? But five seconds? Isn't that… Ah… Kids… Short attention span, got it.

Teacher Deida then let us start chanting the spell and I took a moment to see how the other students were doing.

All of them started to chant the spell that the teacher had written on the board and those who had raised their hands just now managed to cast the spell successfully. I did notice one or two of them stumble on their chants and needed to repeat the chant again to cast it.

Not even three seconds passed and their flames quickly snuffed out which made them try to cast the spell again.

At least they could cast the magic since the rest of the class were still struggling on the chanting stage.

That's to be expected I guess, considering that these twelve year olds spent more time looking at the chant on the board than concentrating on casting the magic itself.

The teacher went around to each student to help them with the problems they were facing, especially the ones who were trying to use this magic for the first time.

I then realised that a few of my classmates were trying to look at me discreetly. It took me a moment to realise that they wanted to see how I would cast the spell as a special student.

Welp, since I'm already here, let's just see how difficult it is to maintain the spell.

"I command the flame to form under my direction. [Ember]."

A small bit of flame appeared above my finger and I held it there, maintaining the flame by feeding it with my mana.

I heard a few of them let out gasps of surprise when they saw my flame continued to burn even after several seconds had passed.

"She's doing it so easily!"

"That's a special class student for you!"

"Big sister is so cool!"

"I want her to teach me!"

I know I may look older in this body but seriously, we're all the same age though.

"Oh! Well done, student Aster! I see you already have experience in maintaining spells over an extended period of time! Well done indeed!"

I mean… This would be easier if one knows how to manipulate your mana and just feed it… Wait…

No way… No damn way…

I checked his stats again and I saw it.

I recalled back to the time I checked the stats of a few other people and I realised this was also consistent with theirs as well…

Why do they not have the Mana Management skill? Isn't that skill a given when you are learning magic? Are you telling me it's not?!

I did a quick check of all the students in this room and indeed, those with tier one Pyromancy don't have Mana Management in their skill list.

Oh damn… Now things make more sense…

They learn by directly chanting the magic to materialise the spell instead of learning how to control their mana to materialise the spell instead. The others who learn Mana Management only learn to do it as a skill of its own, not as a supplement to the magic they cast.

They're basically brute forcing their way through learning magic aren't they? Is that also part of the reason it's so difficult for most people to advance their magic?

And… Is this why I can cast my magic without chanting?

No… That Andrew Wrunch also had Mana Management in his skill list but he also needed to chant didn't he?

Oh wait… I never actually got to see him cast any magic since I knocked him out before he could…

Guess I'll just need to go and find another Off-Worlder to find out?