Even ordinary people could feel the mana, so those with a talent for it could feel it all the more.
Even they were seeing the magic elements move across their fingertips with such clarity for the first time, summoned at a moment's notice. They were experiencing the world as truly gifted mages saw it.
But a few mages felt that something was off.
Payson was one of them.
Payson was the Minister of the Department of Education in the Eastern Territory, a White Robe and an Intermediate Mage. But he wasn't a local mage from Cecilia City. He came from the Royal Mage Tower in Seyekin City, the Royal Capital, and had the most orthodox of Royal Mage backgrounds in the Central Empire's magical world.
Yet Payson lacked the arrogance common among Royal Mages.
He had a kindly, round face and the look of a good-natured old man who was always smiling. It seemed nothing could ever make him angry.
This time was no different.
The schools fell under the Department of Education's jurisdiction, but Mayor Owen and the Magic Association had only notified a junior officer at the department. They hadn't even bothered to inform Payson, the minister. Still, he had no complaints and had even taken the initiative to attend the Foundation Ceremony, which left the Magic Association feeling rather awkward.
But when a rainbow descended from the sky and the magic elements joyfully spread out in every direction, Payson's smile finally cracked.
This concentration of magic elements—could it be—
A Mana Well?!
Payson's eyes widened in disbelief.
As an orthodox Royal Mage, Payson had experienced a Mana Well. In fact, the Royal Mage Tower still housed the best-preserved Mana Well facilities.
The Crimson Well.
The well had been built at the height of the Magic Era by humans, Elves, and Dwarves. Supposedly, even its design had been the work of a Deity. At full output, it could cover the entire Royal Capital. Its Mana Barrier could withstand a direct impact from another Plane, making it a greater and more impregnable creation than Cecilia's Immortal Wall.
But historically, the well had never been run at full output.
Even when the Demon Race's armies invaded, its Defense Barrier had only just managed to cover the royal palace.
In modern times, the Crimson Well's output was regulated even more strictly. Only a few Star Glory Towers in the Royal Capital were authorized to use its energy. Payson had first replenished his mana from the Crimson Well when he was posted away from the capital and went to a Star Glory Tower to collect his Scholar's Staff.
Yet the mana activity Payson sensed now was similar to what he had felt near the Crimson Well.
He stared in disbelief. "This mana concentration is... a Magic Well?"
"The Black Robe said that's what it is in principle," Agent John replied.
"But a facility like this, provided for a bunch of talentless commoner brats—isn't that a terrible waste?"
"Huh?!"
Agent John stared at him in disbelief. Had he just heard their minister make a discriminatory remark that an educator should never make?
Minister Payson didn't spare a thought for his subordinate's reaction.
Gripping his Scholar's Staff, he murmured a few spells, hoping to draw on the rich mana in the air. That was the proper way to make sure it wasn't "wasted."
But the magic elements didn't respond to his spell as he'd hoped.
Instead, a "beep—" sounded, and bright red text appeared before him:
[Your data allowance is insufficient. Unable to connect to the network.]
[Would you like to top up your data by taking a magic course now?]
"What is this?!" Payson exclaimed.
"Your mana allowance must be too low, right?" Agent John said. Though he eyed his superior skeptically, he still recalled the Mana Network Transmission Protocol Version 1.04 that Angell had given them.
He explained, "The Black Robe said this Mana Well isn't a pure Mana Well, but a Mana Pool. It only contains a finite amount of mana, not enough to support a mage's consumption. It can only supply what the students need for lessons. To prevent mana from being wasted and encourage the students to use magic, every child has to earn their mana allowance by taking magic courses."
"Oh. That's a very sensible arrangement," Payson said stiffly.
So that was how it worked. He'd wondered why anyone would be foolish enough to open a Mana Well for people to use for free!
Even so, this was far too extravagant!
Absurdly extravagant!
If he'd had these conditions when he entered the Mage Tower...
"Are you sure that Black Robe has good intentions?" Payson couldn't help asking. "He's providing facilities like this. Is he really not experimenting on the children?"
Don't worry. That Black Robe had been sent by the Masterless Tower to carry out the Magic Revival Project.
How else could an Intermediate Mage afford such impressive equipment?
Agent John nearly answered aloud.
Fortunately, he remembered that this was a theory Owen and Hume had come up with, and the fewer people who knew, the better.
Payson was a decent man, but plenty of people in the Department of Education opposed Compulsory Magic Education. If one of his friends happened to be among them, news could leak out by accident.
John chose his words carefully. "It does seem to be his research project. But there's no need to worry. We drafted the user safety section of the Mana Network Transmission Protocol to ensure the safety of every user's life, soul, and property."
Payson recalled, "I think you did mention that."
John had even submitted a copy of the protocol earlier.
"Minister, are you discussing the Mana Base Station?" someone suddenly interjected.
Payson turned and saw several people dressed like reporters watching him.
One look was enough to tell: they were all from the Royal Capital.
But in the current situation, insisting that games were a waste of time would be distorting the truth. The other side had brought out a Mana Well, after all.
If Mayor Owen had built the Mana Well, they could still accuse him of wasting tax money on a vanity project.
But it had been donated by a privately owned Alchemy Workshop, and the workshop belonged to the Cecilia Family, who would always be commoners. No one would believe an accusation of corruption.
The only angle they could pursue, perhaps, was Angell's identity as a Black Robe.
But Owen had the Magic Agreement to back him up, and an outright attack would offend the many Black Robes. Who knew what those madmen might do if provoked? Making enemies of them would be a terrible trade.
Minister Payson weighed the possibilities rapidly.
Then he gave his usual smile. "This Magic Education Pilot Project is an impressive undertaking! The mana concentration is so high that even the Royal Academy in the capital doesn't have conditions like these. I can't wait to see the results!"
As he spoke, Payson pushed John into the spotlight.
"This is Agent John from our Department of Education. He's one of the leading figures behind this pilot project! He's a talented educator who always puts the students first. With him overseeing the project, our Eastern Territory Department of Education has complete confidence in it! I'm sure we'll see some unexpected results during this winter's Mana Appraisal!"
"You're too kind, Minister!" John said in surprise.
So Minister Payson really was optimistic about the pilot project? I must have misheard him just now.
That was what John thought. Soon, the camera flashes dazzled him. He tried to put on his most handsome smile for the cameras, and the reporters eagerly snapped away.
Minister Payson watched from the side with a beaming smile, seemingly not bothered at all by being outshone.
He also noticed several reporters looking relieved, as if they were glad they wouldn't have to write an insincere article.
Minister Payson's smile deepened:
Fools. Learning magic wasn't that easy!
Even if people without talent were thrown right into the center of a Mana Well, they'd still accomplish nothing!
He didn't know what foolish experiment that Black Robe was trying to carry out, but he'd soon learn that talent determined everything. There was no point in expecting anything from people without talent. In the end, they were only fit to become fuel for factories.
The higher people praised the project now, the more "impressive" the results would look when the Mana Appraisal came around!
With a smile, Payson slipped away from the bustling crowd.
*
The other person who slipped away from the crowd was someone who should have been the center of attention:
Angell Cecilia.
Angell avoided the crowd and went to the small pond beside the school's teaching building. He scooped up some water and patted his face.
He'd been standing in front of the crowd too long, and his head was spinning.
So many irrelevant people, so much meaningless noise, so many time-wasting speeches.
That was why Angell hated ceremonies, celebrations, and meetings. Whether he was onstage or off, they always made him uncomfortable! If it weren't for his research project, he'd never have attended this ridiculous publicity stunt!
But it had all been worth it!
The first Mana Base Station was finally built! How far off could the second and third be?
If things developed quickly enough, perhaps by this time next year, he'd have a citywide local network.
That meant that after crossing over a century ago, Angell finally had internet access! Sob!
Angell was overwhelmed with emotion.
As someone from the Information Age, he had a serious internet addiction.
In his previous life, he'd felt intensely uneasy whenever he went somewhere without Wi-Fi. Whenever he had to travel and lost his internet connection for a day, he felt like he was about to die.
And now he'd lived for over a century in this godforsaken place with no internet!
People really were tougher than he'd thought!
Thinking back to two months ago, when he'd been kicked out of the Masterless Tower, he'd wondered whether he'd chosen the wrong research topic. If he'd chosen "Interplanar Travel Through Space" instead, perhaps he'd already returned to the Plane of his previous life—though, with the fragile soul of an Intermediate Mage, there was a 99.999...% chance he'd have gotten lost in the spatial turbulence and been mashed into mince.
Who would've thought that a twist of fate would give him the chance to complete his project outside the Mage Tower?
Angell felt as though he could laugh himself awake from a dream.
He didn't necessarily need the internet for anything in particular. But the security of being able to learn about the outside world without having to interact with people was enough to make him feel happy.
Just then, a sinister voice suddenly asked:
"Isn't this a Magic Well, meow?"
Angell glanced at his shadow and saw a huge, odd-colored cat's eye open on its black surface, staring at him.
"Don't pop out like that. You'll scare me to death," Angell protested.
Mithril ignored his complaint and continued, "This is a Sky Spring!"
"...What's the difference?" Angell asked.
"A huge difference!" Mithril ground out. "A Mana Well is just a man-made device! But a Sky Spring is a living thing! I can't say whether it's a plant or an animal or something else, but it's alive!"
That was right. The thing hanging upside down in the sky, shaped like a fountain, was alive!
And the area that now looked like a rainbow touching down was actually its feeding channel!
But this creature didn't eat people, nor did it need to feed on any other living things. All it ate was mana.
By absorbing mana to sustain itself, the fountain in the sky would keep growing until it became something like a Sky Kingdom.
In an age even earlier than the Magic Era, people had believed that the cloud kingdom it formed was the realm of the Deities. They'd left behind countless myths and legends about the Sky Kingdom.
Even during the Magic Era, plenty of mages had tried to raise a Sky Spring to create a Heavenly Kingdom of their own.
In that sense, the Sky Spring could be considered a mythical creature.
"Mithril, you know a lot!" Angell said. "A lot of mages have never even heard of it!"
"When you've lived long enough, you naturally learn a lot," Mithril said crossly.
It was worried Angell didn't know enough. "What I want to know is, where did you find this thing's spring? It might look like a Mana Well, and the area around it might have plenty of mana, but that mana is just what it spills over. It actually needs to eat much more! In fact, there have only been two people in history who successfully raised a Sky Spring! One was Bloody Tyrant Inna, in ancient times. She used the magical creatures of an entire country as feed to raise her Sky Spring! The other was Lady of Charm Cecilia... Ah, another Cecilia... But that woman had a charm that captivated all living beings! Her Sky Spring was funded by followers of every race pooling their resources for her! Do you think you have that kind of charm?!"
"I know. That's why I thought my project was bound to fail," Angell said.
"What do you mean?"
Angell explained, "Over the past century, I've tried every possible approach to building the Magic Net. The hardest problem was transmitting mana. Its elements aren't physical; they're more like emotions, like concepts. There's simply no way to produce and transmit them through physical means."
"I realized I'd been limiting myself. If physical equipment couldn't solve the problem, perhaps a magical creature would work better. The result was the Sky Spring. Though it's a living thing, it can produce and store mana, and it has powerful computing abilities. It's perfect as the core of my network."
"The only drawback is... it eats too much. It needs an enormous amount of mana," Angell finished with a sigh.
Mithril's gaze turned cold. "So they finally fired you from the Mage Tower?"
"Yeah. They were so short-sighted, weren't they?"
"No. I think supporting your nonsense for over a century was already pretty incredible!" Mithril thought of the people Angell referred to and felt exhausted on their behalf.
What kind of generous spirit did it take to keep paying for someone like Angell?
A Heavenly Kingdom!
Tch!
Mithril, at least, wasn't willing to. "Do you think you have enough mana to feed this monster?!"
"I don't. Neither do the mages at the Mage Tower," Angell said. "But people without talent might be able to! They've already proved with the Game Tables that they aren't without mana, haven't they?"
Otherwise, Angell wouldn't have forced his project into operation.
He'd "built" his first Base Station only after calculating the number of Magic Cores used by the Game Tables during the first month.
"Besides, this Sky Spring isn't a wild one. I synthesized it using Alchemy," Angell said. "I can precisely control its size and how much it eats. It's a 'creature' entirely under my control!"
As he spoke, Angell raised one hand.
The concentrated mana around them reshaped itself into a rainbow and rubbed against his hand like a cat.
Angell gently stroked it too. "I'll raise it well."
Mithril, Angell's shadow, instantly bristled. "You Alchemists are all insane!"
"I'm not an Alchemist. I'm a Black Robe Mage."
"Meow! An Alchemist and a Black Robe Mage—what combination could be more terrifying, meow!" Mithril cried.
It disappeared from Angell's shadow, as if disgusted.
Angell wasn't surprised. He waved away the small rainbow as it nuzzled against him, then looked toward the corner. Half a minute later, a fashionable middle-aged man with a carefully groomed, extravagant handlebar mustache came over.
"Excuse me, are you Mr. Angell? I've finally found you!" he asked, though he already knew the answer. He gave Angell an exaggerated smile. "I'm Mandela, from Xiesse. I run a small Entertainment Company, and I'd be honored to speak with you!"
As he spoke, he handed over his business card.
*
What Angell and Mandela discussed was a story for another time.
For now, let's turn our attention away from these filthy adults with their heads full of distracting thoughts and return to the Mana Base Station!
People had spent so long arguing about the Education Pilot Project, the Black Robe's motives, and the Alchemy Workshop's Game Tables, yet hardly anyone had paid attention to what kind of school the Charity School chosen as the "Education Pilot Project site" actually was.
Cecilia City's Third Compulsory School was just such a school, one that barely anyone noticed.
It stood on the edge of the city. It had once been an ordinary, overlooked Compulsory School, and Cecilia City had five others just like it.
—Mayor Owen had originally wanted to choose the school Enlise attended, but Angell had considered the possible repercussions and didn't want anyone making an issue of it. He rejected the suggestion and chose an ordinary school with no problems and nothing special about it.
Bolo, who was just as unremarkable, was a first-year student at the Third Compulsory School.
Although the school had been selected as a pilot site and the mayor and other important figures had come to give speeches, none of that had much to do with ordinary students like Bolo.
In fact, the students had been given the day off on the day of the Foundation Ceremony so they wouldn't disrupt it.
Only after the brief commotion had passed were the students allowed back into their familiar classrooms.
Bolo wasn't happy about it at all.
He had no interest in school.
And even less interest in magic.
What was so interesting about magic?
Either you sat around in a daze—meditating—or you studied runes nobody could understand. By the time they finally got to practical lessons, they'd struggle for ages just to squeeze out a fireball smaller than a match flame. Besides, he'd heard that the gentlemen in the Royal Capital didn't even use matches. They used a device called a lighter. All they had to do was press it once to make a flame. It was even more amazing than magic!
Of course, the most powerful weapon was still the musket.
All it took was a single bang, and the prey was dead. No meditation or incantations needed. It was incredibly impressive!
Thinking about it made Bolo wish he could turn twelve as soon as possible.
—He'd heard that once he turned twelve, he could work at the factory in the neighboring town. He could go with his older cousin! The pay was supposedly much lower than an adult's, but he was a kid, so that was only natural, right? Besides, he didn't get paid for helping out at his family's weapons shop, either! Once he had a wage, he'd buy a whole box of matches and strike one just to toss it away, then strike two and toss them both!
But right now, Little Bolo could only sit in the classroom, staring blankly as the teacher droned on from the lectern:
"...The most important thing in meditation is to concentrate and clear your mind of distractions. Use your magical senses to feel the presence of the various elements, absorb them, and turn them into your own power. This takes time and effort; there's no room for slacking off. Only then can you truly set foot on the path of magic. Although today we're going to try a new method of meditation, the principles are the same. You may find it more complicated than the old method, but this was Mayor Owen's decision. Be grateful to him. Even with his busy schedule, he still cares about you..."
The words went in one of Bolo's ears and out the other.
Instead, lulled by the droning voice, Bolo's eyelids grew heavy, and his head began to nod. He leaned closer and closer to his desk—
"Smack!"
The sharp crack of the pointer jolted Bolo awake.
He looked up and saw Mr. Yara, the Meditation Class teacher, glaring fiercely at him.
Bolo hurriedly sat up straight.
Fortunately, Mr. Yara didn't call on him. He merely tapped the blackboard with his pointer.
"All right, let's try it out for ourselves!"
Try what?
Bolo wondered, utterly confused.
But when he saw a large magic rune written in the center of the blackboard and the other students start gesturing with their hands, he quickly realized they were supposed to learn that rune.
But this was Meditation Class, not Rune Class, wasn't it?
And wasn't formal Rune Class only offered in fourth grade?
Bolo wondered about it, but he was afraid of Mr. Yara's cold gaze from the front of the room. He quickly raised his hand, struggled to connect with the mana inside his body, and began writing in the air.
As he moved his hand, the Magic Element gathered, but its color was very faint, like smoke. The rune came out crooked and wobbly, as if it might fall apart at any moment.
A rune like this looked awful—not just to Mr. Yara, but even to Bolo himself.
He was doomed!
Bolo despairingly drew the final stroke.
He hadn't paid attention in class, so he didn't know what the rune did. But whatever its purpose, a rune that twisted out of shape like that could only fail... right?
Bolo could already picture Mr. Yara using his pointer to smack his palm. But just as he finished drawing the rune, a rectangular frame popped up in front of him.
Huh, had it worked?
But what kind of magic was this?
Bolo stared at the strange rectangular frame. Square, straight, L-shaped, and Z-shaped bricks were falling from above and piling up at the bottom.
Bolo wasn't stupid; he just wasn't focused.
After watching for a while, he understood that he had to fit the bricks together without leaving any empty spaces. The completed rows would be converted into mana and stored in the little box in the upper-right corner.
Bolo thought it was incredibly easy. Once he figured out the rules, he filled in the bricks that had already fallen, and even discovered a "trick": the higher he stacked them, the more mana he got.
So it didn't take long for Bolo to fill the little box with mana.
The box burst open. Half the mana flowed into Bolo's body, while the other half turned into tiny fireworks that exploded inside the frame, forming words:
[Meditation successful!] [Your mana has increased!]
Bolo looked at the little frame and grinned foolishly.
He didn't even notice that the mana from the fireworks disappeared once they had finished exploding.
Bolo felt like he hadn't had enough and wanted to play another round.
As if it had sensed his thoughts, new words appeared:
[Begin the next round of meditation?] [Yes/No]
Of course he wanted to!
Without a moment's hesitation, Bolo selected [Yes] and watched as the bricks began falling from the frame again.
By now, Bolo had completely forgotten that Mr. Yara was even there.
And he wasn't the only one; the other children were just the same.