Chapter 44 - Wesley's Temperament (2)

The next morning, at around seven o'clock, Wesley, dressed in his red school uniform, walked out of his manor. If anyone saw this seemingly still half-asleep youth, with his innocent eyes and simple smile, they would never, in a thousand years, believe that he had killed someone in his own house.

As soon as Wesley set foot outside of the manor, he felt a pair of eyes glued to him, causing him to slightly snicker. The same mechanism the four families had put in place to keep him in check now served as his alibi.

Wesley simply ignored them and walked towards the academy. Normally, Wesley wouldn’t go to the academy this early since the only class he had to attend was swordsmanship, which was around eleven o'clock. However, today Wesley needed to go to the academy earlier to spend some time in the library.

Over the last seven months, Wesley had continued his research into the mysteries of mana. Using Oliver Reme's journal, Wesley was able to rely on the recorded theories to save himself forty years of pointless research.

Oliver Reme's theories were not only well documented and researched, but it also seemed that a lot of time had been spent on retests until each theory was disproved without a shadow of a doubt. Some of these theories even seemed accurate, but they were nonetheless disproved through intense testing by Reme.

Each of Reme's theories caused Wesley to exclaim, thinking that he had found the true essence of mana, but each time, Reme would disprove it so thoroughly that Wesley was left dumbfounded.

After reading all the theories, and after each of them was disproved, Wesley was at a loss. He couldn’t come up with any other theories regarding the nature of mana. After a period of pondering where to go from here, Wesley decided to search for more books regarding mana.

If Wesley had decided to slowly think up possible theories and then test them until they were either disproven or maintained, it wouldn’t have been surprising if he spent eighty years still not finding anything. And this was assuming he was as capable as Reme, which he wasn’t.

So, Wesley decided on an alternate path: to find other research regarding mana and learn from those, just as he did with Reme's work. Wesley convinced himself that standing on the shoulders of giants to reach greater heights was not inappropriate; rather, he was simply doing his part to help those who had died before reaching their goal.

Wesley soon reached the academy and headed straight to the library, which was located in the main building. Over his almost two years at the academy, Wesley had never once gone to the library. It was simply pointless since he had all the books he needed in his study.

Wesley immediately walked into the library. The room was dimly lit, and the musky scent of books and wood filled the air. Wesley headed straight to the main desk, which was facing the entrance.

There was a scraggly, azure-robed old man sitting behind the counter, reading some book. At first glance, this old man seemed extremely fragile, as if halfway to the grave, but his eyes shone with a vigorous light and seemed to contain boundless wisdom.

Seeing the old man, Wesley didn’t dare be disrespectful. An azure robe signified an elder, and Wesley had learned to never underestimate the elders of this school, even the ones who seemed like they could be blown away by a simple gust of wind.

Wesley walked up to the elder, causing him to look up curiously from his book and at Wesley. Wesley simply bowed slightly and spoke with a respectful tone in his voice:

"Elder, I wish to inquire about some books."

The elder looked at Wesley from head to toe, seemingly sizing him up. Wesley felt like he couldn’t hide anything from this elder's gaze that seemed to fathom every truth. However, after a few moments of silence, the elder spoke with a voice so soft that one would wonder if he really spoke at all:

"What books?"

"Anything on mana."

The elder once again looked at Wesley with a deep gaze that contained a hint of surprise. There were many reasons behind his gaze; first, Wesley was clearly a swordsman, so what use does a swordsman have for mana. Also, this academy is predominantly an academy for mages, and the first thing one learns about as a mage is mana control and refining, so no mage reads about it.

Wesley, as if seeing what the elder was thinking, smiled back and spoke once again:

"Elder, I am learning breathing exercises for swordsmen. I want to see if I can understand something about the process."

Hearing this, a somewhat slight sneer formed on his lips;it was clear that mages looked down on swordsmen and their techniques. The elder simply put his book aside and pulled out a thick book from the counter and immediately started going through it. After almost two minutes of back and forth page turning, the elder nodded at a certain page then turned to Wesley and spoke:

"Row ten, column seven, book 432 and 433."

"Thank you Elder."

Wesley immediately headed to the designated area and looked for the two books. He wasn’t surprised that there are only two books regarding mana in this entire library, after all, mana is only but a tool to most mages, and side from few odd ones like Oliver Reme, most mages ignore as such.

After finding the two books, Wesley tried finding a place to sit. Surprisingly, even though it was still early, the library was almost filled to the brim by students. Most of these students were second years studying for specific classes they either failed last year or are failing now, while others, like Wesley, had something to do.

Wesley walked around the library trying to find a place to sit, only to fail. After, sighing resignigly and cursing how studious the other students are, he couldn’t help but go back to the elder and check out the two books to read them somewhere else.

Wesley immediately headed to the courtyard which is a small open space outside of the academy's main building. Most of the students use the courtyard to socialize and just relax.

Reaching the courtyard, Wesley went up to the one of the many trees scattered around the courtyard and sat underneath it. It was still pretty early, so not many students were around the courtyard giving Wesley a nice, quiet, place to read.

After a few hours of reading, Wesley was disappointed at these two books. Whomever wrote these books did so thinking that they deciphered the truth behind mana. Their theories were in fact slightly different than the ones Reme found, but unlike Reme who spent a long time disproving his theories, these two books were just based on initial tests.

One book claimed that mana's source is from the core of the earth. This theory was indeed similar to one of Reme's theories that claimed that mana originates from the center of the earth. However, he noticed that mana levels are the same regardless of where is at, which means that this theory can't be true, because, places that are underground should have higher mana levels.

The other book claimed that mana is a recyclable form of energy that exists in the atmosphere. This was one of the hardest theories for Reme to disapprove because it contained some truth, mana is indeed somewhat unlimited, but not necessarily recyclable. If a mage refines mana and stores it in his mana core, then does then does the space that that portion of mana occupied in the space remain empty. It does not, so there is mana is replaced rather than recycled.

"Oh, what do we have here, some trash under my tree."

Wesley was brought back from his musings by a voice filled with disdain and arrogance. Wesley looked up from the book he had to the source of the voice.

Standing around ten feet from him were five or so students. The foremost students was surprisingly a blue-robed first year while the others were red robed. Wesley had no idea who spoke, but going by how the red robed students were standing respectfully behind the blue robed students, it was most likely the blue robed student.

This blue robed students had blue hair, which unlike Wesley's blue hair, was far deeper. His face was also somewhat tanned with a healthy glow and handsome features. His eyes contained no small amount of arrogance as he looked down on Wesley who was sitting down.

The blue robed students spoke once again with the disdain still present in his tone of speech:

"You, trash. Leave, this is my spot."