章 13: 13- ACCIO
"Haha, you would have to do better than this if you want to ever match me. This isn't even making me sweat".
"Grr, I'm trying. We'll land at least one hit next time."
"Keep trying. Maybe you will be able to touch more than my clothes by the next year if you keep training hard."
"Oh we are improving are we not? We've been through Uncle Nico's oblivion-grade training this past year."
"Proficiency in sword play is a thing you cultivate over decades not months. Your hard work will bear fruit, but only if you persevere and persist in training hard your skills," Zin very righteously lectured the three knights-in-training, teaching them the virtues of persistence and hard work, completely oblivious of the fact how ridiculous it all sounded coming from his mouth, someone who had attained high achievements in swordsmanship before the age of eight.
And sure enough, "Hah, my lord, as if you of all people can lecture us on hard work, when you were able to rival the sword skills of a full-fledged knight by the age of seven. Additionally, it is not us that are bad at our skills, but that you are much lower in height and nimbler, wearing lighter armor and moving around the field, allowing you to control the pace of battle. Sir Pico has been teaching us sword fighting, but he's much older, and thus never taught us the nimble style. We will master this style also soon enough, and then face you. Until then, my lord," Caiden replied, turning around to leave with Angus and Bjorn, barely suppressing his annoyance at Zin's pretension.
"But Caiden, you must be more respectful to his lordship," Angus nagged in a low voice, worriedly looking over his shoulder to see if Zin had taken any great effect from Caiden's outburst.
"He's right, Angus! His lordship is too conceited. He needs to know that there are a lot of common people out there, and he needs to consider their feelings as well. He could have at least given us some encouragement, seeing that we have worked so hard," the youngest Bjorn complained.
"Yeah we're not sparring with him until we're proficient enough in different sword styles, and then we'll show him what we are made of. Although maybe not as good as him, but still not ones that can be taunted at will…." Caiden trailed off grumbling as he led the other two to train, leaving behind a bewildered Zin and a smirking duo of Selene and Elaine.
"Pardon me, but it somehow escaped me when I was cocky and self-conceited. I just was teaching them, all right?" Zin rolled his eyes, hard kicking a pebble in frustration as he walked towards the hall for breakfast.
"But you were," Selene answered, calming her face. "And put away that stupid smirk, Elaine"
"Hey, you were also smirking just now."
"Yeah I was, and now I'm not. This is a serious matter, and not to be joked. Zin must taught why he isn't able to connect with people his age." Selene retorted forcefully, shutting up Elaine.
"And pray tell me why, your majesty the high empath?" Zin joked.
"This is no joking matter. They are children ranging from ten to twelve years of age, and are learning to be knights. Their families have been serving the Larus family since generations, and two of their fathers have been killed in service of the house Larus, along with your grandfather, while the third's grandfather has grown old in the service of your house. They have the utmost loyalty to your house and yet they can't stand a spar with you without getting angry." Selene began, explaining the problem, in an unusually strict manner.
"I lost you when that was my problem? Maybe they aren't just mature enough to talk to me?"
"That's totally your problem." Her eyes narrowed dangerously. "A good leader does not expect from others to grow to his level to understand him or to try to make others see things from his perspective. A good leader, puts himself in others' boots, sees things from others perspective, and tries to explain all his intentions and will adapting it to the people's perspective. This is where you are lacking. This is where you lose followers, and make enemies."
"Ohh come on, he's trying. He's still a child. You can teach this to him once he grows up."
"He is grown up. He was knighted two months ago."
"Oh, you mean that farce? That was just for show. He is still a child of seven, let him as he pleases."
"He needs to learn before he grows up so that he can be brought upright, and additionally, you can only teach when he is young; once he grows up, he can't be corrected..." Selene was arguing.
Zin, however, made his made his way to the dining room for breakfast. Once there, he discovered that he was early for breakfast, since his usual training time was about two hours, and because of him early completing the spar, he was back in nearly half the time. So instead of asking for a quick breakfast, he settled to pass time by training what he had been trying to do in his free time over the past two weeks.
Zin closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and then looked intently at a copper coin lying across him on a side table. "Accio coin."
Zin waited. The coin didn't move. He concentrated on it more. Again: "ACCIO coin."
Again no movement. Then again. And again.
By the umpteenth time, Zin felt the coin move, but when he had started getting happy, he noticed that it was in fact his eyes creating a false illusion due to his high concentration and anticipation.
He relaxed, taking a deep breath. He had been getting these false illusions of success a lot since he had started trying to use magic.
Again he started, "Accio coin". Again nothing happened. Again tried. Nothing.
Yet Zin was a stubborn kind. He did mean his words when he talked about persistence and hard work, when he was talking with Caiden and company, although not many knew about his work.
Again, "Accio coin" no movement. "Accio coin" dead as anything.
A deep breath to keep calm and concentrate, "Accio coin" and the coin JUMPED INTO HIS FACE.
"Whoa, yes!" Zin exclaimed, only to look up to see the smirking face of Elaine. He narrowed his eyes, barely suppressing his rage, "why?"
"Stupid, use the basic spell mage's hand or summon using a spell. What were you doing summoning the coin by just concentrating narrowing eyes and exhaling cold sighs?"
"I…."
"I what? Did the three's attitude got to your brains and you're acting all weird so sane people can start keeping distance from you? Or something else? Even a child knows that you need to cast a spell to use magic. And then there's you, someone who has been bombarding my brains with high-level magic theory over the past two months and now is committing such childish mistakes. Tsk, the genius couldn't even bear a single social beating," Elaine tsked in mock disdain, looking at Zin with a look hiding many things including worry.
"I know you are worried that what happened in the morning has had an effect on me, but please, I do not concern myself with dwelling on such things. You may be trying to cheer me up, but I'm not sad or worried at all.
As for what I'm trying to do, I'll explain it to you later, once I have succeeded to some extent, so please, wait until I can tell you. Please believe me, it's something very important." Zin assured, as he felt a warm current in his heart, because he knew that Elaine usually showed her concern by mock-scolding him or making fun of everything about him….
'Hah, effects of wars, losing loved ones and living in constant danger are scary. See, what they make of talented and warm people. One hiding her emotions and worries behind a hard shell as a rough tough person, practically becoming a tsundere and the other sinking into herself, becoming a quiet empath. Well, they took relatively less effect, if you know they actually lost their parents as 8 year old girls and were forced to leave home and were hunted out of their home town when they were only around 14. Alas, but we must all live with our own sorrows.'
"And what's with those eyes of yours, boy? Selene, we're not giving in to any of his demands, whatever eyes he shows," Elaine hurriedly became vigilante noticing the warmth mixed with love in Zin's eyes, as the cook started bringing in the first edible for breakfast.
Zin again rolled his eyes at her lame joke, while starting to pick up his all-time favorite Skyrim delicacy 'SWEETROLLS'.
章 14: 14- You never asked
"Well we have all eaten, and now that we have returned to the laboratory, you can start explaining why you were shouting in Imperial while sitting at the dining table; all the while staring fixedly at that vase carrying that constipated expression on your face," returning to the basement, Elaine immediately shifted her attention to Zin, inquiring about what they had found him doing in the room before breakfast. "Yeah, and how can that be related to magic, when it is against the very concept of magic we have been taught?"
"I've told you, it's just one of my speculations, and I will tell you once I get facts to support it."
"But you must tell us. Remember, you said we are your team, and we have to carry out research and experimentation together?" She nagged. "Besides I am very much afraid that it isn't even a valid hypothesis and you'll just end up frustrating yourself or falling into madness, as almost all research based mages and scholars are. Heck, the imperial circles of scholars and colleges of magic always have a few very famous madmen who are a very big pain in the ass to be around…." Elaine grumbled, her dissatisfaction with Zin's silence all too evident from her face.
"Hey, why are you two fighting like little kids? Don't you have any better things to do than bicker like little kids? At least Zin, you can be the bigger person, as you know Elaine has not yet grown up except in body sizes and years" Cynthia mocked Elaine, as she and Iris were forced to divert their attention to the three from their attempts at enchantment. "You say Selene, why are they bickering again after the morning spar?"
"Hey if my rack is larger than your flatness, it can't be used to taunt me. It should be you trying to grow your size or worrying to arrange male clothes for yourself, not that the mage's robe is anything gender specific, but still, it's equally lose throughout all over your body, if you get it…" Elaine trailed out as she retorted with a big slap to Cynthia's taunt, again starting their taunt game.
"You dare!" Cynthia growled, as her grey hair began rippling under effect of her mobilizing her magic power. A chill spread as Elaine also raised her left hand, snowflakes dancing on her palm, as another ice sword condensed in her other hand.
"Yes, let's see what a tomboy can do," Elaine smiled, as she flashed, magically enhancing her speed to instantly reach Cynthia, only to hit and fall down meeting an invisible wall in the way.
"I have constantly told you two, no fighting inside the laboratory. There are a lot of delicate apparatus inside here that you will destroy. And yet" Zin stopped the two, as he looked around noticing the havoc caused by the two's magic power being exposed in the overcrowded place.
"At least I was better than the cow," Cynthia hummed. "I only let loose a fraction of my power, while protecting the surroundings and didn't even attack."
"Yeah you're much better than a battle hungry spell sword, who has always been taught to attack first against mages, to try to reducethe distance and get into melee to gain advantage. You OnLy showed an IntEnT to AtTaCk and didn't AtTaCK," Zin ended in a sing-song voice rolling his eyes.
"Well, we were talking about serious matters. What was this we heard about you staring at things and ordering them to move in Imperial, instead of using magic? What of the claims of Zin losing his sanity?" the serious minded Iris interrupted their bickering. "Is this another one of Zin's brilliant ideas for research? Like we haven't already got enough proof of his power of genius speculation, conjecture and postulation?" Iris waved her hands around to draw attention to the magic laboratory.
Where the basement two months ago used to be clean, tidy and very elegant, portraying a scene of a typical magic laboratory, completely equipped with an alchemy table, an enchanting table, rows upon rows of bookshelves containing scrolls and books of magic and cabinets containing all kinds of precious and rare magical items and ingredients, it had now been converted into a messy congested bio-lab cum greenhouse, with all sorts of different plants growing in pots and chunks of different animals submerged in different solutions and cultured as experiments. The air carried a rancid, pungent odor of strong concoctions and strange rituals being conducted.
"Well…." Zin scratched his nose in embarrassment. "I tried, but I couldn't find a breakthrough…"
"It's no problem trying, but the way you explained it, and how you said that crops can be genetically mutated to increase produce and lower their ripening time is alright theoretically, but if you wish to accomplish it on your own and in such little time, it's impossible. I thought so at the very time you proposed it, that it's going to be a very difficult feat; as although maybe you could describe cells and plant structures very minutely, if it all could be modified this easily, many mages would have done it already, when the empire was already very keen at increased productivity over the years. And genetically tempering animals, well, you can produce monsters, but apart from the established spell models and body strengthening tactics already recorded its nigh impossible. By oblivion, mages have already been tempering with undead and necromancy, let alone your amateurish attempts at attaining immortality through magic modification of the body." Iris continued her demolition of Zin's conjectures.
"Yeah, but it is all so possible. So real. If I had the power over magic to only temper some stats and not all, to make it according to my will, while maintaining the other existent configurations. But, when I do it, it all falls apart. Everything is tied as if a single thread, if you move a single thing, it all collapses, as if it all is being maintained at the best balance, and any disturbance causes it all to just fall apart," Zin vigorously gestured with his hands as if trying to explain something that he couldn't find the words for, as if his verbal skills couldn't quite keep up with his thinking.
And so it was. He couldn't explain how he felt. Over these past two months, he had been frustrated over the lack of results from his research as time after time he had met with failure. The scholar level spells that he had mastered up till now had been unable to meet his needs. He had even tried peering into the arch-mage level spells that his father had kept for future study, but had been unable to find a satisfactory model.
The reason was simple. Mages stored magika from the surroundings inside them as mana. They even gained the power to, overtime although, manipulate the ambient magika in the surroundings, but they all did it through employing calculations and casting spells. The spells model enabled them to manipulate the magika energy, and thus they were limited to manipulate magika according to how good and powerful the spell model was. The deeper the understanding of the spell model making, and the elements, the better the result, and the more efficient the spell would be, even mana cost wise. This made it too mind boggling for him when he considered how deep the calculations needed were to develop an advanced spell.
'Like algebra having multivariable non-linear equations, with millions of variables,' Zin sighed.
"Tell me Zin, what perturbs you?" Iris came closer to him looking deep into his eyes, she noticed how he turned his eyes away as if trying to hide something. "I also noticed that you have something on your mind, but you were always hiding it. I thought I would give you time, but now listening to Elaine it seems that it is something serious. I'm always here to help, when you're ready to talk."
"Well I'm working at it, and as soon as I find a breakthrough I will consult you people on this manner and share my findings." Zin said, as he continued walking to a corner of the rather congested room. "I will stay here trying to check out my new theory and conduct experiments…"
All four of them frowned, flinching as if in fear, wary of what new absurdities Zin would be introducing in the lab. At long last Iris gathered her courage to ask, although maintaining her serious façade: "Wait does this mean that you will be introducing more strange things into this room?"
"Nope. Although I think I will be meditating a lot…" his voice was drowned out in the cheers of Elaine and Cynthia while Selene just had a beautiful smile on her face. Iris also breathed a sigh of relief, and then asked, "Can we clean the room and throw away these then?"
"You can always clean the room and at least somehow clean the air quality. Seriously, I thought you senior mages must at least know a spell or two for air odor refreshment?"
The four gasped, only for Cynthia to flare up and say "we thought it was essential to your stupid experimentation. You could have at least told us to clean up."
"Oh I thought you liked living in all the filth and smell, you know mages and all," Zin rolled his eyes spreading his arms to prove his innocence. "Anyways, you never asked…"
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