There was a moment of silence in the entire crowd as they stared up at the mage. She was a gorgeous young woman, about early or mid twenties, with beautiful features and silvery hair. She was toned but not muscular, rather tall and her oversized robe could do nothing to hide her curves.
There was drool coming out of the male audience, Ry included, when his thoughted suddenly snapped back to her clothing.
'Oversized robe? Why would the mage corpe send out a mage with oversized clothes? From what I've heard the uniforms are enchanted and are custom tailored to the mage to a certain extent.'
Before he could question it further, Daneel dropped to his knees."I am deeply sorry miss mage, but this young man insulted my family and my honour, forcing me to take action of the pride of my family" His acting was so good that Ry almost fell for it himself.
Before he could open his mouth again, the mage appeared right next to his oversized head and gave it a good slap. "Don't give me your lies, and certainly don't give me your fake apologies, give them to the young man you insulted then tried to blow up!" Everything happened so fast that no one in the audience had time to process anything.
Daneel, now with a purple handprint across his cheek, and a ringing in his ears turned to Ry before apologizing with a glare in his eye that promised a world of pain. The beautiful mage looked into Ry's eyes and winked before appearing on stage again. She wasn't teleporting, just running so fast that no one could see her move.
'What the hell was that?'
Ry was still dumbfounded that an actual mage from the mage corps would stand up for him, and even slap the son of the local town mayor. The very same mayor was actually on stage, trying to hide the anger in his eyes while introducing the mage as Lieutenant Avilia Furcifer, a beginner T4 ice mage.
Everyone in the crowd was absolutely shocked. Even the strongest person in the town was a beginner T3 mage, and he didn't have advanced magic like Avilia. Everyone was ecstatic, it seemed like an angel blessed them to have such a strong mage protecting them.
Everyone except Ry.
'A beginner TIER 4 mage?! Why the hell would the mage corps send out such a powerful mage to a shithole like frostford. And why in the world would she blatantly attack a nobels son, even if he is a very minor noble. I've never heard of a mage doing that. Something's not right here.'
Ry wanted to believe he was just being overly paranoid, but he had learned to trust his instincts over his years of being on his own, and right now, they were extremely suspicious.
Before the crowd could get any noisier, Avilia stepped forward. "Now I know you all know how this works, but all of the testers listen up. When your name is called, you will step onto the stage and hold out your hands palm-up. I will place my hands on yours"-some of the male testers got very excited at this thought-"and I will send a tiny pulse of my mana into your body. Whatever element your body's mana instinctively protects you with is your elemental affinity. This process will only sting if the amount of mana in your body is too little to protect you. I will grade you on your element and by how much your bodies mana blocks my attack."
'That's an ingenious way to test!! None of the other mages explained that much, they just told the tester to put out their hands and gave them their result.'
Even though he had no family to cheer on, Ry still attended the ceremony every year in hopes that he would somehow unlock his magic by watching. Just thinking about that made Ry's stomach roil and his palms sweat.
'Here is the moment I have been waiting for all my life. I will have strength, and I will become so powerful that no one could ever hurt me again!'
"Theron Lawson, please step forward."
The aforementioned boy stepped-or more accurately, tripped- up the stage, visibly nervous. He was a lanky red-head that was so pale Ry thought he might actually be able to see his veins. He placed his hands out and Avilia did the same. She concentrated for a second and Theron's body glowed lightly. She took off her hands and turned to the crowd.
"Theron Lawson, Fire affinity, mana blocked 70% of my attack!"
He smiled brightly amongst cheers as he made his way towards his family. Fire was considered a good attacking element and if his mana blocked that much of the 'attack' that means that he has more mana in his body to start with, which makes it easier to advance in the early levels.
Ry sighed and leaned back into his chair, looking at the candy-blue sky and the pale early morning sun. 'I hope today is the day.' Ry decided to try and look for mana in his body for the 1000th time while he waited for the other kids to be tested.
He had bought a book meant for children on how to locate and condense their bodies mana. The First three advancements, T1, beginner T1, and Intermediate T1, are the only advancements that do not require any trial, so children could usually get to beginner T1 if they understood their magic and used it alot.
The first step was to close your eyes and breath in a constant rhythm, to calm your body and mind. Then you would look inward at yourself to find the mana. It was supposed to look like a colored cloud spread through your body, but just like always, Ry saw nothing but black.
He was about to give up and look back to the testing when he saw a small flash
Of pale blue in the direction of the stage, then a cloud of brown in the wague shape of a human momentarily becoming solid before being dispersed by the pale blue flash. Ry was so shocked that his eyes jolted open.
'What was that!? That cloud and mana flash is what the book described, but you're only supposed to be able to see your own body's mana when you use that technique! So what was I looking at?'
'That looked like what the mage described as what she was doing to find out the elemental affinity, but I shouldn't be able to see that. Well there is only one way to find out. I'm guessing by the brown color the person has earth affinity and by the fact that their mana was blocked so easily they probably only block a low amount of the attack.'
'If mage Avalia announces those two things, then I know what I saw meant.'
He looked up at the stage just as Mage Avalia announced
"Miranda Shaffer, Earth affinity, mana blocked 20% of my attack!"
The cheering of Miranda's family was drowned out by Ry's thoughts. 'Well I guess that's that. Now I know that I am somehow able to see the mana all around me when I use that technique, even though that should be impossible. Maybe I should test it out on the people in the crowd and see if they are using any m-'
"Ry Tempest, please come up."