5. Roxy
In came the loli.
It’s been a few months since I did some intermediate magic. For a moment I was worried if I somehow missed the window of opportunity, or if a Merlin like character was gonna show up in Roxy’s stead.
Turns out mages are rarer than I thought they were. With the ease I was able to cast I’d have thought that the mage population would be a bit higher, think Magi in Aladdin, but it seems being a Mage in this world is rare. It could be the fact that illiteracy is a real problem, or maybe nobles monopolize magic behind the scenes, but-
Well, you get the idea.
The mage population is quite low, and combine that with the fact that we live in a village in the outskirts, then the prospect of teaching a young child isn’t especially glorious.
Now that I think about it, even if the pay is higher than you’d think for a teaching job, a mage could easily get a higher paying job somewhere else.
I wonder what Roxy was thinking at the time to accept this job?
Anyways, after months of waiting the Loli Sensei finally came in.
Wait a minute, she’s like 40 right? Does that make her a loli-baba, or should I wait 10 more years? These are the questions that matter. Teach me Sensei!
“I am Roxy Migurdia. Pleased to meet you,” she introduced herself.
Petite, young looking(loli-baba?), pale skin and blue hair. She has sleepy half-opened eyes, and a sweet sounding voice.
“...”
“...”
As we stood by the doorway, Paul and Zenith were dumbsmacked for a moment. Guess they were expecting Dumbledore. To be honest, so was I for a while now.
“Ah-ah, you’re the home tutor?” Paul questioned.
“You’re awfully… ah, well…” Zenith leaves the sentence open ended.
“...”
Madam, please don’t start a sentence unless you know how to finish it. The silence is awkward.
“You’re not an Old man with a beard,” I offered.
Praise me!
“Is there any reason why I should be an Old man with a beard?” She frowned.
“Nope, this is better,” I answered honestly.
Hmm?
Paul for some reason has started patting me and showing me a thumbs up. That exist in this world too? Also, get your head out the gutter, old man, I’m just making conversation.
“Hah,” she sighs defeatedly. “Which ones the student I’m supposed to teach?” She looked around as she asked.
“Ah, it’s this child,” Zenith said, placing two hands on either shoulder, as she kneels down to show me.
“Yosh!” I raised my hand in greeting.
She widens her eyes for a moment.
"Haahh..."
...before letting out an even longer sigh a moment later.
Oy, are you trying to pick a fight?
“...I guess it happens from time to time,” she mutters to herself, oh not so quietly, as she's lost in her own little world, looking to the side, and playing with a plank of wood. Scratching at it in a rhythmic pattern as she continues. “That there are idiot parents who think their child has talent after growing slightly…” she grumbled.
Hmm. Maybe she really is trying to pick a fight… with Zenith…
Oy, you fool, you're courting death. We can hear you, you know? Shut up before you unleash the wild dragon.
“What was that?” The drago-mother, questioned.
“N-nothing,” she whisked herself from her fancy.
Just how long have you been traveling alone that you're inner monologue leaks out threw your mouth. Are you spiderman?
“However, I think that child of yours doesn’t understand the concept of magic, right?”
Is that so…
“Water ball,” I threw a water ball at her face.
Splash.
A now wet Loli stood before me.
“...”
She just stared at me gobsmacked for a moment. Her half sleepy eyes now open.
Is there something on my face? Oh wait that’s yours!
“Ooops, I’m sorry, I don’t understand the concept of what I was doing, tee-hee,” I said knocking on my head, performing a tee-hee pero.
Yosh, I can finally mark that off my bucket list. Now if you excuse me, I’m off to repress this memory, and pretend it never happened. I feel I might just die of embarrassment otherwise.
Sharp glare.
After she kills me.
Oowah, what's with those eyes. What happened to the kuudere beauty? Aren't you supposed to be an immovable fortress? Is this what you call an ice beauty?
Careful you’ll freeze the water on your face and catch a cold.
“I’m sorry for my Impertinence. For I could not see all the talent radiating from the young boy. My Eyes are CLEAR now,” she wipes water from her brow, her frown still apparent. “I will do my best, and start teaching him immediately,” she grabbed my shoulder tightly.
It’s not hurting, but she’s definitely squeezing.
WHOOSH.
After that, she hooked my shirt by the collar and started dragging me away like the suitcase she dragged in.
Can take that off the bucket list as well I guess...
///
Misgivings aside, Roxy is actually a serious teacher. Shocker I know. Once we were alone she lost that angered look, and started teaching seriously.
“In general, there are three types of magic. Attack, healing, and summoning. Each further divided into seven ranks; beginner, intermediate, advanced, saint, king, and god…”
A bit too by the book for my taste, but still.
This is literally the intro to magic.
Well, I am a child in her eyes.
“...um teach… I already know all this, can we learn something practical?”
She glared at me.
Is this because of the interruption or the waterball?
“Do you? Let’s see…” She walks forward a few steps, and aims her staff at a tree. “Bestow the protection of water to the place where thou demands, let the crystal clear steam appear here, WATER BALL!”
It flew towards the tree at a speed as if it was just pitched by a professional pitcher, and…
Crash. The poor tree never stood a chance, and was promptly snapped in half.
“How's that?” A slight smug smile tugs at the corners of her mouth.
She’s definitely gloating. And definitely faster than mine, but…
“I think Mama is going to be really sad, when she finds out the tree she’s been caring for 4 years was just cut down.”
“Eh? Ah… really?”
“Really.” Outside of her clinic, this garden is her treasure. It’s a hobby that she’s put a lot of pain and effort into, coming from a noble background something small like this garden that she worked with her own hands has a special place in her heart.
Let's not tell her that.
She’s already fumbling around trying to fix it.
“...stand up once again, HEALING.”
Ah, she did it.
Hmm, it’s even blossoming. As I thought Healing magic is the best!
“Cough. Ahem, well with dedicated training you too can cast Healing magic like this,” she boasted with a smug smile.
What a shameless woman. I kinda love it.
“All right, your turn.”
Alright, here I go... What was the chant again?
...forget it.
“Water ball,” forgetting the chant, I just shortened it instead, and casted my waterball at a wall, naturally, and pitched it. I don’t have the speed Roxy sensei has, but it’s still pretty fast in my opinion. The idea of making it fast enough to break a young tree never occurred to me, so I never trained in that, and simply moved on to physical training and other esoteric techniques.
Specifically my own.
...well trying to.
There's a reason I need a teacher.
“Hmm, not bad, we can improve the speed a bit, you can focus a bit while-'' she cuts herself off, freezing in place, her hand still resting under her chin. “wait a minute… Rudeus… Did you just… can you… please do that again?”
Sure, why not.
“Water ball,” I casted again.
“Single line casting… single line… wait a second, when we met you also, ah- Ah… Ahh!”
It seems Roxy sensei is suffering a bit of a breakdown.
“Rudeus do y-you always shorten the chant to just the invocation?” She stuttered a bit.
“Only when I’m conserving mana. For water balls I usually just skip the incantation,” I answer honestly. It would be pretty embarrassing if I had to say such a speech just to throw a water ball. At that point, I might as well just start throwing water balloons.
“Skip?! Ha… haha, looks like an unexpected find almost slipped out my fingers.”
Sensei, I’m not a fan of that look on your face. You won’t dissect me will you?
///
…
Several minutes later we’re still going at it.
“So you think silent casting is easy?”
“No, not at all. In fact it’s impossibly hard, but it’s easier once you get the hang of it.”
“...you’re not making any sense…”
“Haha, ah... Yeah, a teacher I am not. Ok, here goes,” I stood up and decided to start casting some silent magic. Putting my hands out, as if making a sand castle, I made a small staircase. “Soooo, here goes; silent magic-no, all magic, is like a staircase. The more advanced the spell, the more steps it has, and the simpler the spell the less steps."
I make a 2nd set of staircases. One 3 steps high, the other 5.
“You can take it one step at a time,” I jogged up the 3 step one, one step at a time, and then go back down, “or you could even skip a step or two, to get there,” I hop from the ground to the top to emphasize my point. “In this example skipping steps would be omission,” I stretch my leg from the bottom step to the top. “Not difficult, so long as you know the steps to get there, buuut…” I go to the 5 step staircase, “the more noticeably harder it is the more steps it has, and the harder that stretch could be.”
I turn my head to Roxy sensei, which she just nods at me.
“Ok, then. Now silent casting is well, this…” rather than talk first I rather make an action for this example. It’s hard to put into words after all. I close my eyes, and go up the three steps. “I guess silent casting is like running up those steps with your eyes closed. Just like the other two, silent casting, and omission you’re still going through the process, but you’re not thinking about it as hard. You simply know what the process is, step by step, and can do it effortlessly. That said...”
I go back down, looking obviously then get ready to go up the 5 step staircase. Step, step, step… trip, step, step.
“...yup, something like that happens too,” I brushed some dirt off of me. “Sooo, silent casting, is like knowing where these steps are, and going up them. It’s a lot harder than skipping, but not impossible, and,” I turn to the 7 step staircase, and, step, step, step, step, trip, step, step, and “....woah,” almost stumbled of the edge at the last one, “and the more steps there are the more, and more difficult is, seeing as I almost fell. Aaaand… that’s all I got, or at least that’s all I got so far.”
“…”
“Ah, Roxy sensei?”
“...how old are you again?”
“Three and a half.”
“...he’s three…” she whispered, doubling over.
“And a half,” I corrected.
“...so this is how it feels like.”
“Sensei?”
“Nothing. Anyways, silent casting aside, I didn’t see your Water ball go that fast before, so I take it that your ‘steps’ aren’t complete yet?”
I nod.
“I’m still working on my skip, I guess you could say.”
Yeah, I’m pretty much taking shortcuts through my training.
Although, is it a shortcut if the shortcut is more excruciating than the original? It’s like I'm cutting through a thorny path, yeah I got there faster, but I'm getting plenty of scars.
“All right, we’ll start with a review for now, and see how many steps you know, and then we’ll work our way up the... steps.”
“Hai!”
The lessons continued from where they need to, the basics, there was a thing or two I knew about, but I mostly didn’t interrupt.
Mostly.
“What are you even talking about you idiot disciple?!”
“I mean there's nothing disproving it right? Why couldn’t there be more elements?”
“I could accept sand, perhaps as an extension of earth. Similar to Ice being an extension of water, but how the hell is a sword an element. You mean metal?”
“No, I mean sword.”
We started arguing.
It seems my image of magic doesn’t quite fit with hers.
“What does that even mean?!”
“I mean magic is magic. Why should it be tied down to earth, water, fire, and earth. Couldn’t it be anything?”
“Magic is the manipulation of the world's energies. The manipulation of our everyday surroundings. Swords are refined metal. Is your body made of swords”
It could be.
“Who decided that?”
“Sigh, you can’t just force magic to be what you-”
“Teleportation,” I cut her off. “Teleportation magic is not the manipulation of the world around us, at least not on that level.”
“…”
Made her a bit speechless.
“...spatial magic is manipulating the space we live in,” she meekly says.
“Toki-”
“Toki is different.” This time I’m the one getting cut off. “Toki is a person’s battle spirit, ‘SPIRIT,’ it is YOU, it cannot be applied…”
“Roxy~ Rudy~ I brought snacks,” A smiling Zenith breaks us from our discussion.
Oh, wow it’s late.
We started in the afternoon, but the sun is starting to set. We lost track of time. I missed my sword training. Well, at least I get to rest my achy-bones.
“Thank you,” Roxy thanked Zenith, enjoying her snack.
Unexpectedly, this has been a fun day.
Roxy and Zenith, enjoy some pleasant conversation for a short while, before-
“Hey, hurry up!” Paul happily, if a bit drunkenly, waved at us from the door. Zenith returns back to the home, and tells us to finish up for the day.
“Alright, we got a little… off topic, we will begin your ‘proper,’ education tomorrow, but before we end today, one lesson before we end,” she kneeled down. “Research, hypothesis, Practice, analyze, if you wish to convince me, show me. Alright, now let me teach you what these mean…”
…isn’t this the scientific method?
And so my scientific approach to magic in another world began.
Oh, that’s not half bad. I think I just invented an Isekai.