Training Addict Magician in a Growth-Focused Story

Training Addict Magician in a Growth-Focused Story

EP.3 Tasks in the Magical City

The man, after checking the crystal ball, hurriedly took out another orb from his robe and shouted something urgently.

“Send Professor Mabel to the main gate immediately. It’s an urgent matter!”

“No, I’m telling you, someone with a celestial attribute has appeared! Do you think I’d be acting like this for no reason?”

His excited shouting soon came to an end after he conveyed the news about the celestial attribute. According to what Leon had read in the “Introduction to Mana,” constitutions with light and dark attributes were referred to as celestial attributes. They were considered to have greater talent than those with all six elemental attributes.

Attribute constitutions didn’t just indicate the ability to harness certain elements; they represented one’s innate talent for mana itself, making them highly significant. It was already well-documented through numerous studies that dual attribute constitutions were superior in awakening mana and advancing in magical prowess compared to single attribute constitutions.

Given this, possessing a light attribute, known as a celestial attribute, was almost equivalent to being born with the highest level of talent. Soon, a mage hurriedly descended from the sky.

“Who is it? Who has the celestial attribute?”

“This child… no, this young lady.”

The bald man approached Ria, checked the crystal ball, and gasped.

“It’s true! What a joyous occasion! Haha, to think someone with a celestial attribute would appear in our school.”

The bald man said something to her and then took her into the air, disappearing into the distance. The last image Leon had of her was Ria’s wistful expression as she looked back from the sky.

Leon was dumbfounded. Too many things had happened in such a short time. Although he was momentarily worried about Ria being taken away, he honestly didn’t think they would treat her poorly based on their reactions. Ria didn’t seem entirely disinterested in magic either.

He suddenly recalled the impassioned speech he had given about magic in front of her.

‘I might have been showing off in front of someone who will become a great mage in the future…’

The man, now alone again, checked the attributes of the remaining five children, including Leon. The anticipation on his face quickly faded back to its original state. They were all single attribute constitutions.

“Don’t be too disappointed. You all will have plenty of opportunities to become mages by accumulating merit points or waiting just one year.”

He took the remaining children into the city, introducing them to various places and leaving them in the care of the people in charge of those places before departing. Leon was left alone in a library. He was told it was a magical archive for organizing lower-level magic books.

The person in charge of the archive was an elderly man with graying hair. The elderly man, with a gentle expression, didn’t show much interest in Leon. He explained Leon’s tasks in a soft but monotonous tone.

“This is the Old Magic Archive. The latest magic books are managed elsewhere; this place manages outdated magic books that were too valuable to discard.”

He outlined Leon’s duties.

“Your tasks are to clean the first floor, organize the loan records, and occasionally tidy up the archive. Visitors here usually find the books they need and return them to their places. Oh, and don’t go up to the second floor. Managing the first floor is sufficient.”

Leon thought the tasks assigned to him weren’t bad. His overall impression of the place changed. Although he didn’t like being forcibly brought here, it wasn’t as bad as he had feared, such as being subjected to human experiments. It was actually a very good environment for getting acquainted with magic.

In fact, he felt he could focus more on his training here than at the orphanage. He was particularly pleased that his tasks weren’t too demanding. His quest was to study the “Introduction to Basic Mana.” All he had to do was sit and read, which fit well with his library duties. It didn’t seem like many people would visit this archive of outdated magic books.

After quickly learning his tasks, Leon went to the dormitory he had been shown earlier. The dormitory had better living conditions than the orphanage, although the communal sleeping arrangement remained the same.

At the dormitory, Leon reunited with the children from the orphanage, except for Ria. The children all seemed to have bright faces, indicating that their tasks weren’t too difficult. More than anything, their childlike wonder seemed to be stimulated by the opportunity to experience magic up close, something they had only imagined before.

The children began to chatter noisily among themselves.

‘Working in the library might be better,’ Leon thought, considering whether he could use merit points to get a private room.

***

Several days passed. As the old man had said, there wasn’t much to do if Leon just sat at the entrance of the library. Occasionally, mages would visit, search for something using an artifact at the entrance, quickly find and read a book, then return it to its place before leaving. Rarely, someone would want to borrow a book or have something transcribed. For borrowing, he just had to take money and write down the details in the loan record. Transcribing required more money, and he used an artifact to copy the text, which didn’t even need mana. The transcription artifact had a built-in magic core.

The old man never spoke to Leon or gave him any tasks. He always carried a book and disappeared somewhere, not to be seen again for the rest of the day. Leon found this arrangement wonderful. It felt like the old man’s lifestyle was exactly what Leon had dreamed of.

As a result, Leon’s pure study time increased dramatically. The library hours were from 7 AM to 3 PM, with a lunch break in between. Excluding the morning cleaning and organizing time, the lunch break, and the afternoon organizing time, Leon had about five hours to devote solely to studying the “Introduction to Basic Mana.”

After his library duties ended, he would return to the dormitory and spend another two hours studying alone. By then, the other children would return from their tasks. Leon would then wash up, lay out his bedding, and sleep alone. He slept during the time when the children were most active.

sLeon woke up at 9 PM, quickly ate a simple meal of bread, and then resumed reading the “Introduction to Basic Mana” from around 10 PM, when the other children went to sleep, until 1 AM. This allowed him to achieve a total of 10 hours of pure study time each day.

‘Maybe I should call this the Leon Sleep Method instead of the Napoleon Sleep Method?’

Excluding the initial adjustment period, he completed three quests in five days. During that time, the quest content didn’t change, nor did the rewards, which remained single attribute constitutions. It seemed that higher attribute constitutions had low probabilities, much like in gacha games.

Of course, what was important to Leon was the knowledge about magic he gained from reading the “Introduction to Basic Mana.” Specifically, the middle part of the book he was currently reading focused on the origin of mana and basic knowledge about magic. It covered fundamental concepts necessary for learning magic, such as the quality of magical power, attribute constitutions, levels of magical prowess, academic explanations of mana, and methods for awakening mana.

After reading diligently for five days, Leon had retained a considerable amount of this information in his mind. The remaining part of the book provided basic explanations about elemental magic.

And then.

General Quest

▶ Mana Perception Training (0/10)

The quest content had changed.

‘This is bad.’

Leon scratched his head in frustration as he confirmed the new quest content. The reason he had postponed mana perception training was not only because the quest content had been fixed on studying the “Introduction to Basic Mana,” but also because mana perception training required a place rich in mana.

The current range of places he frequented was limited to the dormitory and the magical archive. The dormitory? It was unlikely to be rich in mana. The magical archive was the same.

If the place had been rich in mana, it would already have been a training ground used by mages, not a place for ordinary people doing chores. For the first time, Leon headed to the merit points exchange center.

Entering a building as large as the magical archive where he worked, he saw a few people already occupying seats. They were all ordinary people like Leon. He examined the exchange list that covered the entire wall behind the receptionist. He was looking for a place where he could train in mana.

He soon found what he was looking for.

[Mana Concentration Room (24h) – 50 Merit Points]

“Ah….”

Leon couldn’t suppress the sigh of regret that escaped his lips. The merit points he could earn in a month amounted to 10. He would need to work for five months to use the Mana Concentration Room.

Having spent a few days adapting to this place, Leon had already realized how difficult it was for an ordinary person with a single attribute constitution to become a mage. Otherwise, there wouldn’t be so many people doing chores in the buildings around the entrance of the city, unable to enter the central part of the city.

Opportunities were given, but the door to those opportunities was as narrow as a needle’s eye. It was believed that talent had already determined their limits. This wasn’t surprising. Numerous studies had already revealed that talent was everything for a mage.

Disheartened, Leon returned to the dormitory. Since his roommates would soon arrive, he couldn’t proceed with the quest any further. He took out the black orb he had hidden. The number displayed on the surface of the orb was 40.

The number increased every time he completed a quest, but he couldn’t figure out how to use it. He had once thought it required mana because it looked like an artifact. However, after confirming that the artifacts in the library operated without mana, he had tried various other methods.

He had attempted all sorts of outlandish methods. He had even considered swallowing the large orb. Leon sat in contemplation with the orb in front of him.

‘If it doesn’t operate by injecting mana…’

Suddenly, an idea flashed through Leon’s mind.

‘Why haven’t I tried this?’

Leon bit his thumb with his teeth. After a sharp pain, a drop of blood began to form on his thumb. He let the drop of blood fall onto the orb. The orb started to hum.

Seeing something happening, Leon quickly grabbed the orb. He stared at it for several minutes. The vibration transmitted through his palm stopped, and then Leon’s consciousness seemed to be drawn somewhere, becoming distant.