When I entered the tent where my elemental affinity would be checked, there were orbs in the middle of the tent, just like in the tent before this. There were men and women behind those orbs, and one of the women addressed me, "Come on, Jack. Let's see if you have something special or not."
Something special, she asked.
Well, having a single elemental affinity was great, but that was the only case for those that had a short life span. For example, in a short life of a hundred years, only those with talent and great effort could reach the pinnacle of one elemental magic realm.
In other words, life was too short to focus on all elements, so there were rarely any magicians who excelled in all elements. It wasn't like they couldn't cast other elemental spells, but their mastery in them was only basic; they had only mastered spells of a specific element.
I approached her and placed my hand on the orb once again. This time, notifications from the system were around the same topic, and once I took hold of the orb, I let it be as it was, transparent.
"Hmm..." The woman waited for a while before giving her verdict, "It looks like you have no affinity, Jack. I'm sorry."
"It's okay," I replied.
"Well, you still received a brown in awakening, so no one will mind. Do you want to check your aura affinity?" The woman asked with a smile. I had thought about this, but decided to shake my head. This much was enough. And my decided path was going to be a mage anyway.
"I see." The woman nodded before she added, "Then don't bother going anywhere. Why don't you go stand in a corner until everyone is done?"
I nodded and simply went to sit cross-legged in a corner. As she said, in about an hour and a half, all seventy or some kids were done with their tests. All of them had awakened, but no one was at my level. Some checked their aura affinity and decided to switch to aura, while most of them remained in the magic line.
I was chatting with a girl my age, who I was surprised to find out was my cousin, my aunt's daughter, who had come to visit me yesterday. We were still chatting when a familiar figure, none other than the mother of the girl next to me, my aunt, entered the room and said after clapping her hands, "Okay. Since you have all passed, congratulations."
She then waved her hand, and men and women carrying robes, armors, staffs, and weapons of various kinds entered the tent.
"Jack. Come forward." My aunt said, and I stepped forward because, as I said, I received the highest rank.
"Congratulations on becoming a C-ranked mage. You will have a bright future ahead of you." Saying so, she handed me a robe enchanted with some basic arrays such as mana amplification, cost reduction, and mana recovery.
I nodded with a smile and took the robe. While I wore it, she gave me a staff with a basic tiered mana orb embedded on top of it with attack and range increase arrays carved on it.
"Mia." She called the next candidate, who was none other than her daughter. She also received the same things as I, but she had even lower-level arrays cast on it. And just like that, everyone received something.
After that was done, she began to hand out books to everyone. They were spells, and once I was given one, a set of notifications appeared before me.
[A basic tier fire spell book had been detected]
[Three spells discovered]
[Would you like to learn them?]
'No.' I replied. If I were to learn like that, the book in my hand would disappear. I didn't know if I had to return it or not, but I wasn't taking any risks. Besides, there were better spells in the shop, so why would I waste my energy on these basic-level spells?
Once we were done, she told us to follow her. As I came out of the tent, it was already bright but still early, like seven in the morning. She then led us to a square platform of sorts, around which were the wooden seats of the audience. I spotted my family among the audience, and they were all curious about my rank announcement.
My aunt began to announce our ranks, and the first announcement was none other than mine, and when it was revealed I was a C rank mage, the audience couldn't help but be astonished.
It was only today that I found that the lord of this city was a B rank knight, or an aura master in other words, so being a C rank was actually a good accomplishment.
The happiness on my family's faces was immeasurable, even Lucas seemed happy. I wondered why? Wasn't this just a weak rank? Or was it because it was great in this city?
Anyway, they were all happy, and Rayla was even crying due to her immense happiness. I would have to talk to them about it later, though, because once the ranks were announced, we were all led away while the audience was excused.
We were taken to a training field that was very vast. There were two sections, one for the mages and the other for the knights.
"Learn the skills in the book and practice them the best you can. You can ask the instructors to help you with that." My aunt said as she pointed at the various people at the training grounds.
"Lunch will be at noon, then a brief rest, and then dinner will be at sundown, after which you will be taken to your sleeping area, so try as hard as you can if you want to catch the lord's eye tomorrow." Aunt explained to us the schedule, but I was confused about the last part. However, as soon as the lord was mentioned, everyone was suddenly very motivated.
I guessed it was a big deal to these guys. Anyway, after that, everyone was left to their own devices. I read the book, but only found a basic flame ball spell, flame steps spell, and flame shield spell in the book.
They were all basic-level spells, and even among the first circle spells, they weren't too highly regarded. Yet, everyone was so absorbed in the books as if their lives depended on it.
Some asked the teachers or instructors on the ground, and everyone was making good progress, but for some reason, everyone had only chosen to master a single spell, Flame Ball.
Well, it was at least more practical than the rest of the flame spells. Anyway, the day went on, and the lunch was served.
After which, there was a break for an hour, but no one took the break except me, and they all practiced, so I had no choice but to do the same. Of course, I only put up a facade while I purchased a spell from the system with the same look.
[Effect: Creates a pure ball of fire which can be varied in size depending on the mana supplied]
[Minimum size: 1 inch (10 MP)]
[Maximum size: 10 inches (100 MP)]
The size of a bead and the size of a tennis ball.
I couldn't help but sigh. Such a small ranked spell was also worth 10,000 shop coins, so I couldn't help but imagine what the price of an S rank spell was. Still, I had enough coins and mana for such a spell, and it was quite good in battle against D to C rank monsters. Of course, against C-rank monsters, the effectiveness would drastically decrease, but it would still be good depending on how one used it.
And just like that, sundown arrived at and everyone was served dinner. After dinner, we were still allowed to practice, but the instructors wouldn't be present then.
But before that, we were led to the tents where we would be spending the night, which were very close to the training area. No one chose to go to sleep that night, while I slept like a log.
At dawn, when I woke up, I could still hear kids practicing and couldn't help but shake my head.
I did some exercise as I always did, and it soon got bright while we had breakfast. Most of the kids were tired, but they opted to sleep after today was over and give their all in front of the lord.
Finally, the time for the demonstration came, and we were led to the same platform. Only this time, along with the audience stand, there was another stand that was perched higher than the others. On it, there were five seats available, and there were already people sitting on them.
At a single glance, I could tell.
Same drill as always.