บท 335: House of bricks and cement

The exam was less of a test and more of a demonstration—a performance, even. At this level, it was on the mage to demonstrate knowledge and capabilities worthy of the rank.

Cael needed to awe the two kings. The Archbishop, who acted as the third judge, was already on Cael's side. The kings, though, appeared skeptical for now.

Maybe Cael was too short for their tastes. Next to most of the northerners, he felt like a kid sometimes—even humans were on average half a head taller than him.

What Cael knew was that merely a big, flashy spell won't be enough to convince these people. It would show that he had the mana for it, but not necessarily the knowledge. Empowering a weaker spell was a relatively simple task.

Cael wanted to show something more intricate.

He spent a lot of time in the last several months in Dante's library. Besides treatises on modifications of flesh and stone, the late mage wrote plenty about spellcraft.