After they finished strength training, the gladiators switched to hand-to-hand fighting. Haliard was teaching Mike the proper way to throw a punch without risking breaking his fingers while the rest of the men tossed each other in the sand. Sum continued his work of making a larger and larger ball hover before him.

  There were enough similarities between thrusting with a spear and throwing a punch that Mike picked it up faster than he thought he would. The balance, the stance, the movement they were all somewhat familiar to him. Mike wasn’t too surprised when he threw a punch and a window popped up before him.

  New Quest!

  Your body is a weapon they cannot take away from you. Turn it into a weapon.

  Reward: New Skill

  2/100

  From punches, Haliard led Mike through a series of simple throws and binds. This was more complicated than the punches and involved Mike rolling around in the sand. The faint scrapes from the stone bench beneath him during weightlifting were getting irritated.

  The next several hours continued in much the same way. Mike realized partway through that the rough handling he was getting at Haliard’s hands might actually help him train his Constitution Stat. He asked Haliard to step it up and the trainer obliged. Mike felt himself bruised and battered as they finished up before dinner.

  “I have got to ask Aric about healing magic during I our next class.” Mike was out of breath from getting slammed to the sand as Haliard demonstrated a take down on him, but the old man was skilled enough that there was no real damage. “It would make all this so easy.”

  “There are wizard doctors around, but I don’t think the family knows that kind of magic. They specialize more in the opposite of healing.” As Haliard pulled Mike back up to his feet, he leaned in and whispered “Remember, it is Master Aric. You are still controlled by them.”

  “Got it,” Mike answered. He knew he had slipped up several times with the title. If they found out that he wasn’t bound to their will, they’d kill him on the spot.

  While they were heading in, Mike checked both of the martial quests he had now. There had been no movement on killing undead or alchemy yet, but he had progressed his learning of the spear to ninety-two percent, and the martial arts was at eleven. He had tried to use the upgraded Identify on his spear as he did in the first few days, but there were no more mysteries to reveal that way. The only thing left was hard work and practice.

  Mike took the shower first, since Aric’s drone familiar would show up before the meal was done. He spent the time imagining how the Inventory would work. He made himself laugh by thinking of how fun it would be to grab someone and throw them in a magic satchel until they calmed down. It would be a nice surprise to snatch up Haliard.

  Jamming a quick meal down his throat, Mike was soon being led through the complex by the hovering drone. There were mystical symbols painted on it, some even etched into the frame. He understood most of them now but didn’t fully understand how they all fit together. It was difficult to study them while it floated in front of him.

  He had cast Identify on it before without draining any latent spell on it, but he didn’t want to risk it again. Aric had told him that getting a familiar would occur at a later stage of his training, once he mastered the pictographic language of magic.

  Keeping how far ahead of his training he was a secret was stressing Mike out. If he let the secret slip, there was no way to guess how the wizards would treat him. The fact that his Class description was dismissive of wizards wouldn’t win Mike any favor.

  Thinking of his class, Mike pulled that screen up as well.

  Mage

  Level 2 (16/500)

  Wizards study it. Sorcerers are born with it. Warlocks borrow it. But Mages are magic personified.

  Class Skill: Mage Hunger

  Even with all the work he had done, there had been no change in this screen since he had unlocked Mage Hunger. The percentage to the next level hadn’t changed at all.

  Though I did level up when I was fighting those zombies. If Aric can get me some training fights, maybe I can get further ahead.

  Mike resolved to ask about the fights when Aric arrived, but the young man was already there when Mike walked through the door. The usual small crate of supplies was replaced by a large chest, one almost three feet wide. As Mike approached and bowed, he saw that the metal bands on the chest were covered in more spell symbols.

  That cluster there represents space, and maybe distance? He tried to figure it out, but Aric acknowledged his bow and started speaking before he could get lost in the work.

  “Rise. You are right that you need to practice what we have been learning and the more dangerous of your spells. To that end, I have procured some items to help.”

  Aric opened the chest. Mike tried to study more of the enchantment worked into it, but with the lid flipped back they were obscured. He approached closer, looking inside. The interior was a mass of shadows, completely opaque to Mike’s sight.

  Aric withdrew from that shadow, holding a folded piece of paper. He started unfolding it as he put it on the desk. Once fully open, it was a sheet twice as large as normal covered in spell symbols.

  “Do you understand any of this?” Aric asked Mike as he smoothed the paper out. Mike leaned over, studying the symbols. He recognized some of them, but not all their interactions. It wasn’t until he noticed a pattern in the top right, one that occurred in both Conjure Arrow and Conjure Ally.

  “It is for summoning something master.” Mike leaned over and traced from the group of symbols he recognized to the larger mass of symbols in the center. “This draws mana into make… something.”

  “Well done,” Aric said as his eyebrows raised. There was a note of surprise in his voice and, Mike realized to his own surprise, pride. “You are picking up your lessons well.

  If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

  “This is a spell for summoning a minor monster. I have yet to fully learn it and scribe it in my grimoire, so I must cast it from this sheet. I had to trade several of my own spells to get it, but I believe this will help accelerate your training.”

  “Yes master, it absolutely will.”

  “And speaking of grimoires…” Aric leaned over, dipping into the chest once again. As he did, Mike stepped up as if he was smoothing out the spell sheet to study it and cast Identify as soon as he touched it.

  Conjure Lesser Monster Level 1

  Spell, 8 Mana Cast, 5 Mana Maintenance, 10-minute duration

  Summon a weak monster to a location within your sight. Only one monster at a time.

  42/100

  There were a few minor affinity bonuses from learning the spell, but not enough to push any of his other spells up a level. Mike was startled to see how much he had learned from Identify, with only a minor headache.

  Studying is growing my mind.

  Aric pulled a book out of the chest. It was thing, roughly a hundred pages, but with covers and bindings of solid metal. There was a chain wrapped around it. Aric unwound it and Mike saw that it wasn’t holding the book closed but was rather the same attachment system Aric used to keep his spell book attached to his belt.

  “It is time for you to start filling your own grimoire.” He sat it on the table and flipped the clasp holding it closed. Within the interior were clean, smooth pages of paper, with a small inkwell and stylus. They were tucked within the metal framework, completely sealed when the book was closed.

  “It is crucial that you get your spells down as accurately as you can. You know them now, remember them now, but they fade from the mind with use. You should spend several minutes a day studying them to make sure they are fresh in your mind. Longer, when you have more of them.”

  Pulling the book towards himself, Mike tried to remember if there had been any weakening of the spells he knew. With Identify cast hundreds of times and Conjure Ally approaching it, there hadn’t been any changes in them.

  Aside from them getting more powerful.

  Was that the benefit of being a Mage? Mike was magic, while wizards just studied it, or at least that is what the power he had said. He had to hide a smug grin as he leaned over to flip through the papers, feeling their texture.

  “Thank you master.”

  “This is a combat model; the metal casing protects the pages within from fire, water, and most other forms of damage. We can get a bigger one if we need to.” Aric smiled, a greedy one to Mike’s hidden smugness. “We would both be very fortunate if you filled that up.”

  “Indeed, master.”

  “Go ahead and start writing out your spells. I will finish up my study of this one. Both of us should be ready within ten minutes.”

  Mike sat at the desk while Aric held the large paper up. The stylus was familiar to him after several days of classes and he took to using it like any ball point pen.

  Know that this would eventually be asked of him, Mike had thought about how to hide what he could actually do. Both Identify and Force Dart had increased in power beyond what he should be able to handle, and he had devised a way to obscure their true power.

  Force Dart was easy; he was able to eliminate the components of the spell diagram that involved the homing function. Without that, it became a much simpler spell he could easily fit on one page. He even had room to formalize the gesture that launched it, firing it off a pointed index finger.

  It was harder for him to work out how to simplify Identify. Even discarding the upgrade it had, the spell was too powerful for him to want to share. It took hours of thought for him to grasp the parts that delivered information directly to his mind. There was some creative work bridging the symbols that were left behind, but Mike was confident that it would work.

  In a move that he was really proud of, Mike was also able to work in that it required a magic word. He didn’t want anyone to suspect his silent castings.

  Mike and Aric finished up their project at almost the same moment. The wizard set down the sheet of paper and sighed.

  “More complex than it has to be, I think. Still, I should have it for several days.”

  “That is good master. My own spells are complete if you want to look them over.”

  “Yes, let me check them.” He pulled Mike’s spell book over to him and started to trace the patterns and symbols, muttering to himself. While he did, Mike surreptitiously cast Identify on the Conjure Monster spell, bringing it up to eighty-five percent known.

  It only took Aric three minutes to become confident he understood the spells. Mike was surprised since Identify was fairly complex for a single page, but he reminded himself that Aric was born to this.

  He probably had a mobile with magic missiles and spell symbol wall art. Mike had to stifle a laugh at the image his thought brought up, but it also occurred to him that the training Aric went through as a kid might not have been all that gentle. Eric didn’t seem like a very kind teacher.

  “Should I write out the Torch spell you taught me master?” Mike asked once Aric pushed his spell book away.

  Grimoire, he called them a grimoire. That word is much better, Mike thought to himself as he pulled the book closer to him. The pain in his head from his last contact with the Conjure Monster scroll hadn’t passed, so he didn’t take the chance to cast Identify on it again.

  “Yes, a good idea.” Aric looked distant, lost in thought. “The combat spell is fairly basic; I can teach you a better one in a few days. But the other spell…” With that, Aric laid his hand on top of the chest. Staring down at it, he spoke aloud.

  “Identify.”

  The English word almost startled Mike, but not as much as what happened to Aric. Mike had to swallow another laugh as he stepped back, waving in the air in front of his face. The chair behind him became tangled in his legs and he fell back across it. Mike had to swallow a laugh as the wizard caught himself on the edge of the table.

  Aric’s eyes were flicking back and forth as he raised his hand again. He was steady once he stood back up, but Mike could see he was busy.

  Is that what I look like when I am messing with the windows?

  “Master, are you well?” he said out loud.

  “Cast your spell on the chest and tell me what happens for you.” Aric didn’t look at Mike as he gave the order. So, he didn’t catch Mike’s face turning white.

  “Yes master,” he replied as he walked over. Now I just have to absorb the enchantment on the thing, somehow.

  Steeling his nerves, Mike placed his hand on the chest and pulled up his internal grimoire. When he moved to cast Identify, he was startled to see a spell next to it with the same symbol, but with red coloring. He glanced at it and saw that it was named Lesser Identify. Feeling more confident, he pulled the spell up.

  Lesser Identify Level 1

  Spell, 1 Mana, 30 second cool down.

  Display information about an object or person you touch.

  The change from “learn information” in his normal spell to “display information” in the Lesser variant interested him. He closed the window and saw that he also had a Lesser Force Dart spell that matched the original fully.

  Though it has an actual mana cost instead of just a generic placeholder word. I am getting better!

  “Identify,” Mike said as he cast the new spell. A window appeared, but there was no accompanying pain. He was delighted to see that the enchantment on the chest wasn’t absorbed.

  Dimensionally Expanded Chest

  A chest that has 368.3 cubic feet of space available. Weight reduction of contents is 0.4 times normal weight.

  Mike was glad that the language function of his power handled conversions of units of measure. He felt like he was saying the units he was familiar with, but it was automatically translated to the language he was speaking. Since Chilt used a measurement that was seventeen inches with a base five system for distance, Mike didn’t want to do the math.

  He told Aric what he saw and the wizard nodded.

  “The floating words are a bit unusual but the information it displays is…” Aric shook his head. “How do I get rid of it?”

  “Just concentrate on it vanishing and it will.” Since it wasn’t the same spell generated by the system in Mike’s head, it took more effort to control. Mike had almost instinctive knowledge of what to do now that he had gotten more familiar with it, but the spell he had created had been reduced too much for it to function that way.

  Aric’s eyes cleared and he focused on Mike. Maintaining eye contact with him, Aric spoke.

  “Father. Get down here now. My gladiator has something to show you.”