Market

After finding his cabin, a ten minute walk away. He immediately started learning the new skills. The first spell was called light armor, the second spell was called light ray, and the third spell was mage vision. Ray set up a comfortable stop to sit on, and began his comprehension into the spells without any time to waste.

One and a half months passed by quickly, as Ray learnt all the new spells. It took him longer to learn the armor spell and mage vision since they were inherently more complex, however he still learnt them at a fairly fast rate. He was quite surprised, and happy with his gains. On paper they were powerful, but real life was different than on paper, so it had to be tested out in a real battle.

According to the papyrus for the spell light armor, dense light energy would create an armor that outlined the entire figure, like a tight body suit. Using this armor would also give the ability to reflect some of the attack back to the attacker, although it took some energy to reflect the attack. The only downside was that its defense was a little weak. It is great for absorbing or reflecting smaller attacks, but not large ones. Right after learning the light armor Ray immediately cast it on himself. It would stay there with minimal energy upkeep until he purposefully turned it off. Most mages did this incase they got ambushed by someone, because why use your body to block an attack that their shield could do for them?

The second skill, light ray, is pretty similar to zap. However instead of having an electrical effect, it was more like a laser beam. Before Ray couldn't properly use the electrical effect since he didn't know how to use it, but the light ray was much more easy to use. Using the electrical effect on zap involved a technique in which you controlled the electricity even while it left your body, and made it target the brain so as to stun the recipient. Overall light ray was more useful for a beginner, but zap could have more potential in combat if the user knew how to properly use it.

The last skill, mage vision, was simply an upgraded version of his aura. It allows you to sense all energy activity within your aura. Although it would reduce the size of your aura unless you wanted to use extra energy to increase the range, it would essentially allow him to predict spells before they happen. After learning this skill his aura was at a size of 50 meters. Even though the armor and light ray were flashy and powerful, Ray understood the most important skill was mage vision. Being able to predict what the opponent would do is simply too powerful. If he put himself into his previous opponents shoes, he could sense when the zap was being channeled and dodge the zap by predicting where it would go. Of course it was easier said than done. But with enough battle experience, why can't he do it?

'During the duels and the battle against the beast, I learnt how weak I truly was. Yes, I had the zap spell. But in a fight against another mage who knows what he's doing, it won't do much. But now that I have a set of spells that cover most glaring weaknesses, I feel fairly confident to go out.' He thought. Ray understood he couldn't simply train in his house the whole day. He needed real battle experience. He also needed to go out anyway to check out the school market. He had planned to do that before, but he figured he would prepare himself with the spells before going out.

For the first time in a month, Ray sat up from his spot on the ground. Dust fell off of him, and the wooden planks made a creaking noise, as if complaining he was leaving. He walked to his front door and noticed there was a letter on the ground, which he somehow hadn't seen before. He picked it up and read out loud, "Your personal Merit Point card, use it to buy items from the market, and receive merits for completing quests." 'So this must be the school's currency'. He put it in his pocket and continued along the path to the market.

Before long he reached the market, which was located near the center of Mythri school. Once he entered the market, he was a little surprised at the scene that greeted him. It was like a ghost town apart from one or two mages in hoodies looking at stalls. It was completely silent, which made sense after Ray thought about it. After all most mages would spend the majority of their time training or doing something outside the school.

After a quick scan of the market he saw several stalls. Some selling alchemy potions, and a few selling artifacts. There were many other stalls selling miscellaneous items like herbs, or stones needed for forging, although they were quite small and didn't have a lot of things to sell. Ray walked up to the biggest stall, the alchemy stall. Although it was probably wrong to think of it as a stall, as it was big enough to be a small shop.

There was one person at the door to the shop who sat there without moving. When Ray came close to him he spoke, "Welcome to Emera, the level 12 official mage's alchemy store." He emphasized the 'level 12 mage' part as if to warn Ray not to try anything funny.

"Do you accept souls as payment?" Ray asked.

The guard had a slightly surprised look on his face, as he could tell from Ray's aura that he was level 2. 'He must be a new recruit for this year who got part of a soul from a teacher. Lucky guy.' "Of course we do, souls and merit points are interchangeable." The guard then remembered that he was a level 2 apprentice, and probably didn't know how much it was worth. He added, "Soul's value is measured in soul points. A level 5 beast soul is worth 1000, a level 6 beast soul is 2000,7 4000, 8, 8000, and a level 9 beast soul is worth 16000. The human soul equivalent is worth double at each level."

*Ray was given 1 / 8 of a level 6 beast soul if you forgot.

"What about the souls past that?" Ray curiously asked.

The guard let out a chuckle and said, "You don't need to worry about that, first reach the official magus level then come back and ask me.

Ray walked into the store and saw there were rows and rows of potions taking up the entire space of the store. It was almost like a mini library of just potions. He looked at a bright blue potion with a label that read, "Extra Limb, grows another limb for a day. Price: 50 merits/5soul points." To the right of it was a dark green potion that read, "Enhanced Earth Strength, increases spells of earth type for 10 minutes. Price: 50 merits/5 soul points."

He looked around for some time and saw many interesting potions. Some had obscure effects, like increasing hair growth by 25 times for a day. And some were straight forward, like increasing energy immediately without having to regenerate by a certain amount. There was no numerical value as for how much it would restore, but it could let an apprentice cast a minor spell one extra time. The price however was much higher than other potions, as this could directly cause you to win a battle you otherwise would have lost. It went for a grand 250 merits/25 soul points. It was clearly meant to be used more as something to use when in danger rather than something you casually used in day to day life. After looking around he bought a basic healing potion which could regrow a minor injury, like stab wounds for 10 soul points. He also got the expensive energy potion he saw earlier for 25 soul points. Although he now had 215 soul points left, to make himself feel reassured he needed these potions.

After seeing Ray spend some money on the potions the guard had a warmer attitude towards him. A future customer is someone at least worth having a decent relationship with. "I have a question about the rules in this place." Ray told the guard.

"Go ahead, I've been here for over a hundred years, I know what's going on around here."

"What happens if someone tries to kill me, or I kill someone else."

"Well that's… on paper you're not allowed to kill anybody from your school, but in reality nobody cares if some apprentice dies. Although don't do anything stupid where you will get caught, they won't turn a blind eye if it happens right Infront of them. After all we are affiliated as the top school of the kingdom Valier, we can't be seen as a place where people can kill each other in the open and get away with it!"

'These potions were definitely worth it then. If I ever encounter an apprentice who wants to kill me these will be life saving. I'll also have to be much more careful when stepping into places outside of the school's watch.' Ray made a mental note to himself.

He looked at the artifact shop too, but it was mainly melee weapons with a few bows and other primitive weaponry. He wondered if modern weapon technology would be useful in this world, but he quickly decided against it. It would take too much time in which he could make himself powerful without outside weapons. The idea of the artifacts was to channel energy through the weapon, and discharge the energy when hitting somebody with it. Doing this would let you have a lot more power when you hit something or someone. You would have to learn more skills for whatever weapon you were using to be able to rely on it as your main combat method, but it was always a good backup if you ran out of energy since you could store some energy within the artifacts. The weapons were very expensive, costing over 150 soul points to get the most basic of them. Although getting a weapon from the artifact shop would be a little useful, he still needed to get a body training technique. Just from the few battles he had previously he could feel the wear and tear it did on his body. His body could still handle it for now, but it would eventually wear out within a few years. That of course was assuming he didn't use any more powerful spells.

After that he went to the shop that had spells and body training techniques. Unlike the previous shops that were owned by high ranking mages, this shop was owned by the school itself. From the outside it looked normal, but once you stepped inside it felt like a mystical library. Strangely there was nobody guarding the entrance, but Ray didn't dare to have thoughts of stealing anything. The lack of guards showed that they were confident enough to deal with anybody without even having to be there!

Although buying new spells is always enticing, he barely learnt the current skills he had right now. And his priority was buying something that could strengthen his body, so he wouldn't be a glass tank that would die immediately after his shield was broken. He was also a bit paranoid that someone would ambush him and break through his shield. After his shield was broken, his body was like a regular humans. You wouldn't even need magical powers to kill him, let alone using actual magic powers.

All the techniques centered around a main path (fire, water, light etc). Other than that the differences between techniques were pretty minute. Some were supposedly a bit faster than others, but it didn't seem to be a deal breaker. The price tag also reflected his thoughts, as the prices ranged from 100-110 soul points. After thinking about which one to get, he bought a light path centered body training technique. It was 110 soul points, but he was willing to spend a bit of extra money for a supposedly better technique.

After getting the potions and body training technique, he had 105 soul points left. Ray decided next to complete some basic missions for the school at the mission hall, earning merits to save for an artifact and along the way get some battle experience.