The Dive: Birth of a Wordsmith (4 page)

Denise thought that over
for a minute, and then nodded. “Okay. I can give that a try.
I’ll hire someone to run the inn during the day, and take
lessons at the Fighters’ Hall for archery.” She smiled to
me again. “Guess that makes us partners now, huh?”

I laughed at her
straightforward comment. “I guess so, partner. I’ll stop
by here whenever I need a place to rest. If you can’t find me,
I’ll either be at the college, or back in my world so don’t
worry. I’d say that I’ve got plenty of reasons to come
back here now.”

She blushed as I spoke,
and nodded. “Thanks.. I look forward to working with you, Jin.”
She quickly stood up, collected both bowls, and went to wash the
dishes.

Seems that she is a bit
more shy than she looks. Well, it’ll be fun to have her with
me.

Chapter
2

It was unusual to sleep in
the game, and yet it felt perfectly natural. A few hours later, I
woke up on the couch where she left me.
This
game really is too real. It’s hard to even think of it as a
game anymore.

Giving Denise my thanks, I
turned to leave for the college when she stopped me by tugging on the
back of my tunic. She was blushing when I turned around and was
handed a small lunchbox.

“
Since you don’t
have much money… I made this for you.” She said softly,
making me smile.

“
Thank you very
much. I’m sure I’ll enjoy it. I should be back tonight if
nothing unusual happens.” I gave my goodbyes again, and got
directions to the college. The first thing I noticed was that as soon
as I stepped outside, I turned the direction I needed to go. I didn’t
even have to figure out where north was, I just knew.

Guess that’s the
benefit of Navigation, huh? Built in compass… maybe eventually
it will include a mini-map.

As I thought it over, I
took a bit to admire the surroundings. With how busy I had been last
night, I hardly noticed, but Rosenheim is quite a remarkable city.
The streets are kept clean, the buildings are made of stone,
everything looked like a large fantasy city. As I got closer to the
College at the center of the city, even the outfits of the NPCs
became fancier, marking their status. At that point, it was easy to
identify other players, because there weren’t many people with
outfits similar to mine. Sure, some of them were probably NPCs as
well.

When I saw the Mages’
College, the first thing I could think of was a typical fantasy
tower. Rising up above all the other nearby buildings, the spire
overlooked the entire city. Its base was a large square building that
filled up an entire block by itself, with two guards standing by the
gate.

As I approached the gate,
both guards turned their heads to watch me, and one stepped forward
as they saw I wasn’t stopping. “Halt. Speak your business
here.”

I nodded to the guard
before replying, “I come in search of knowledge. I wish to
enroll in this esteemed institute.”

As the guard glanced over
my attire, it was clear he thought I didn’t have the funds to
do what I asked. “You are aware of the tuition? 200 gild, up
front at the start of each week.” When I nodded to him, he
sighed, looking towards his partner. “Go get one of the
professors. They’ll take his tuition out here, if he really has
it.”

The other guard calmly
walked inside, clearly believing it wasn’t worth rushing.
Nearly ten minutes of waiting later, he walked out with an elderly
gentleman. It wasn’t the ornate blue and black robes that
caught me by surprise, or the satchel of books tucked under his
shoulder. No, those I was expecting. What caught me off-guard was his
almost shining bald head. “...Thurgrim?” I asked,
blinking to the man as he approached.

“
Hmm… have we
met? Ah, right, you were the boy who delivered my lunch last evening.
Thank you for that, again. So, what business do you have here?”
He glanced over me as the other guard had, as if looking to see if
there was another delivery.

Instead, I pulled out a
pair of golden coins from my pocket, each engraved with a 100 on it,
which I had been given by Denise in exchange for smaller coins. “I
wish to enroll, if you will have me.”

Thurgrim took the two
coins and inspected them carefully, pocketing them when he was
satisfied. “Very well.” He nodded to the two guards, who
stepped aside to let me pass. Once Thurgrim began walking back
inside, I followed him.
Never thought that old
fisherman would be someone important.

“
So, tell me what
you currently know of magic. That will make it easier to teach you.”

“
I am afraid, sir,
that I am a novice. I am one of the foreigners, and as such have no
knowledge of your magic.” He nodded, accepting this story.
Looks like it really did spread throughout the
city overnight. Maybe one of the customers overheard and started the
rumor mill?
I wasn’t even thinking of
this in game terms anymore, just how it would happen in reality.

“
I see. Well, then I
should tell you. Your tuition covers access to our library, however
you may not remove any of the books from the college. Doing so will
see you banned from this institute and tossed into the city jail. Am
I clear?” When I indicated he was, he continued. “I’ll
have to teach you the most basic of the basics before you can even be
permitted to attend the classes. For now, you’ll be spending
your time in the library. Know that I don’t expect much from
you. As far as I can tell, you don’t have a bit of magical
talent.”

I gulped a bit, inwardly
hoping that magic was indeed a Talent, and not something that you had
to be born with. If the latter was true, then the concept of choosing
your own path would be a lie. “I understand, sir. I’ll do
my best to learn while I am in your care.”

“
You said your name
was Jin, right?” When I nodded, he handed me a silver disk, a
bit larger than a 10 gild coin, with an emblem of an eye on it and
two curved lines descending from the eye. “This is your pass.
Have it with you at all times, or you will be evicted from the
college and forced to pay your tuition again.”

We went down several stone
hallways, the ceilings curved inwards before coming to a vast
library, which had to occupy most of the floor. “This, if you
didn’t notice, is our library. Now, follow me…” He
led me through to one of the nearest bookshelves. Pulling a book from
the shelf, he handed it to me. It was a dusty tome, obviously unused
for some time, the letters almost faded against the cover. ‘The
Magical Arts for the Mundane reader’.

As I brushed the dust off
of the book, I accidentally breathed some in and was sent into a
temporary coughing fit. Thurgrim waited patiently for my outburst to
end. “This book will teach you the most basic rules about
magic. If after reading it, you are still as.. mundane as you are
now, then I am afraid your time here is wasted.” He pointed me
towards a table along the wall so that I could read in private while
he attended other matters.

When I sat down, I opened
the book, having to blow the dust off of a few pages as I read
intently.
From what I have noticed, this game
works as much on thought as it does action. I got Navigation because
I knew the directions by looking at the sky, not because I guessed.
That means that simply skimming won’t give me anything. I have
to earnestly read, and commit this to memory as fact.

As I proceeded to read
through the book, absorbing the information, I was growing
increasingly worried that all this was for nothing, and that magical
talent is indeed something a character is born with. I got so
distracted that I ended up reading through the book three times
before a series of messages flashed before my eyes.

I smiled wide to myself,
mentally pulling up my character window to review the new
information.

Nice. With this, I pass
the first test.
I put four of my points into
Intelligence, bringing my mana up to 90, and the last one into
Wisdom. Even though I already read through the book, it would be a
little bit before Thurgrim returned to check on me, so I read it
through one last time to make sure I got everything I could from it.

A short while later, the
old professor returned, raising an eyebrow as he saw me. “I’m
not sure how you did it, but it seems that you possess the ability to
use magic now. Very well, I’ll take you to the beginner
lessons.” He moved to put the book back where it came from, and
got a pair of textbooks from near it to give to me. “You’ll
be needing these. Also, tomorrow I expect you to bring your own
journal to use to keep notes.”

And with that, he led me
off to a classroom, where students were just piling in and taking
their places. I’m ashamed to say it, but I was the oldest in
the class by a considerable margin. Enough so that the others, most
barely teenagers, were asking if I was going to be the instructor. It
seems that magic is taught young for those who can use it.
Okay,
maybe I’ll learn a spell or two to get me started.

At least, that’s
what I was hoping for. When the teacher, a petite woman who couldn’t
have been older than me, walked in the door, she began going over the
beginner’s basics. Incidentally, those were a step above what I
had learned. The book I had read merely explained to me the barest
nature of magic and easy to remember techniques for manipulating it.
Now we were diving into the meaning of runes and significance of a
circle in a ritual. Still, I paid attention to a degree where a few
of the kids started giggling near me, and even got a few confused
looks from the teacher when I asked her to explain something.
Nonetheless, by the end of the day my Intelligence had risen another
three points. I also got a new talent just before the end of class.

When I unlocked Magical
Knowledge, I instinctively put three more points in Intelligence, and
two more in Wisdom, bringing them up to 25 and 15 respectively. I
also noticed that when I looked at the runes on the board or in the
book, their meanings flowed into me as if I were reading perfect
English. Not all the runes, though… Many were still clouded as
strange arcane symbols.

Class let out after that,
and I was confused because there apparently wasn’t another
class scheduled, but none of the students seemed ready to leave yet.
When they left, they moved in a crowd, so I naturally followed along.
Maybe there is another class and nobody told
me?

The room that most of the
students led to was a large open area, where many separated to move
off by themselves and sit down on the cold floor. Others stood,
closing their eyes in focus. That’s when the meaning of the
room came to me. This was a practice room! So, study hall. Taking the
books I had with me, I moved over to an unoccupied corner, thinking
back to what I’ve learned so far, starting with how to channel
magic. Around me, several students were creating balls of fire or
water, or shooting the walls with weak bolts of magic.

“
Hey, mister.”
I heard a high pitched voice calling to me as I was concentrating.
Looking for its source, I noticed a small boy, no older than 15. “I’m
Devlyn, what’s your name?”

I smiled to him. He was a
fellow student, so I should try to get along with him right? “I’m
Jin. Nice to meet you.”

“
You’re old.”
He said it frankly, as if just stating a fact.

“
Heh, I suppose I
am. I guess I’m what you would call a late bloomer?”
Devlyn nodded as if that explained everything.