After discovering a way to protect himself with the system’s ability, Nick could finally release a sigh of relief. Feeling confident and happier than ever, he rested on his bed.
Now that he knew that he had the potential and ability to change his life, he felt much safer with the power and capability of resisting to threats.
He wanted to become stronger to protect his own hide.
Which means that he wanted to protect his life against to the threats in the world.
In his old life, Nick couldn’t carry out full-blown scientific research due to his circumstances.
However, now that it was a system requirement, he planned on exploiting this feature for all its worth.
It is given to him by the system why would he not be using it for his own good.
As he was resting, a man entered the room and put red soup and black bread on the table.
Nick noticed that he was the same man as before.
He got up from his bed, drank the red soup, and slowly ate the black bread.
“According to the system, if I want to increase my proficiency in a particular spell, I’ve to gather information about that particular spell. Also, I have to learn about this world’s magic and how to harness it.”
As he ate his rations, thoughts and ideas popped in his head non-stop.
Because of effect of food, he can think better and be more creative.
He wanted to learn about magic, but he could find no books about that.
All he could do was make his own assumptions and hypothesis about it.
“I can try mashing together the scientific knowledge from Earth with my hypothesis about magic…”
To Nick, this seemed like one heck of a good idea. After clearing his mind, he tried to recall the spell Elena used and relive that painful experience.
“Before pointing her finger at me, Elena first concentrated her dark magical energy on her fingertips. This means she has to gather magical energy on her fingertips before casting the spell again.”
Nick took a deep breath and used all his available brainpower to remember every detail about that attack. If he looked at that attack from a boffin’s perspective, how would he explain it?
Seconds later, Nick shook his head and whispered,
“I guess I can’t explain it with science. I’ll just have to visualize the spell in my mind and then work out the specifics.”
Nick liked this idea and closed his eyes, trying to visualize the Life Siphon spell and work out the specifics.
It was not a easy thing to do for himself but he believed that with his intelligence it should be not problem.
He began with the basics—the spell’s name. If one thought about the name “Life Siphon,” they would feel that it had something to do with taking the target’s energy to replenish your own.
Nick tried visualizing a pipe between Elena’s fingertip and his body.
He then imagined that pipe sucking his life energy and delivering it to Elena, who then used it to cast the spell.
The reason why Nick imagined that the life energy taken from himself is used to cast the spell “Life Siphon” pretty much just a wild guess.
He believes that a spell like this must have it is uses which most of the times means that it does not use “magical energy” and tire the caster.
After Nick did this visual training for about four to five minutes, he opened his eyes and checked the spell list.
Before trying to see the status, he first tried to feel the spell. He wanted to know if his current knowledge of the spell allowed him to feel the magical energy in the air or not. If it is not enough he still needs more practice.
[Name]: Nick
[Status]: Level 1 (Imper Level Mage)
[Strength]: 1.0
[Intelligence]: 1.1
[Magical Abilities]
Life Siphon (Proficiency: 5%)
Nick shook his head after noticing the increase. This proved that he could improve the spell’s proficiency by using visualization and theory-crafting.
At the same time, he also believed that the “pipe visualization” technique wouldn’t work for long.
“I have nothing but time, so I can afford the delay. The improvement speed of the “Life Siphon” spell is slow because I am completely clueless about magic and magical energy. Moreover, this spell must be more advanced than any other basic spells.”
Nick sat down on his bed and started thinking about how he could add more spells to his listing.
If he could add a basic spell to the listing, his conjecture that the Life Siphon spell was more advanced than a basic spell would be proven.
How? Because the basic spell’s rate of improvement would be greater than the Life Siphon spell.
At the same, it was common sense to start from the basics.
“If a person tries to run before learning to walk, they will fail.”
While Nick was deep in his thoughts, a mage guard entered his room.
“Go to the courtyard, clean it with other slaves!”
After barking out the order, he left without even sparing Nick a second glance.
At first, Nick was quite unwilling, but he suddenly thought that the trip could actually be worthwhile. So, he got up from his bed and started walking towards the school courtyard.
He wasn’t willing because he loved to clean the dirt and grime that filled the school courtyard.
If he was outside, he could observe many things, even students casting spells.
If he can inspect some spell enough times, he could list it in the system and gain proficiency in that spell. At the same time watching other people casting spells will give him insights and basically let himself be more knowledgeable in the matter of magic which will help himself in the future studies.
After arriving at the courtyard, Nick revealed a smile. Other slaves like him were already there and were busy with their work.
Nick, too, started cleaning the courtyard with others. He was happy because compared to yesterday, there were way more students today. Some were chatting while others were casting spells and practicing their newly learned spells.
While Nick was trying to eavesdrop on the students and cleaning the yard, but as he is trying to eavesdrop on the studentshe noticed something on the ground.
It resembled something like floating dust, just that it had glowing energy. Nick touched it, and while no one was looking at him, he picked it up.
It wasn’t like anyone was going to suspect a slave anyway.
To them, slaves were ordinary people who couldn’t see magical remains or have any use for it.
What were magical remains? Well, it was the stuff left behind after a mage cast a spell. Ordinary slaves couldn’t see it, but no one knew that Nick was a mage too. For ordinary people “magical remains” just glowing dust without any kind of special purposes.
After picking up the magical specks of dust, he acted all casual and normal. While cleaning the ground, he even tried to get close to the other students.
He was trying to be careful. If even one student got irritated because of him, they could kill him on the spot; that would be a pathetic end. The student killed himself would not be punished by the management and even could be given a prize for use of his spell and killing a human being.
