First circle

A week passed in a blur of repetition — the kind of routine that wore grooves into the soul.

Wake up. Eat. Get poked and prodded by Alric while he muttered to himself and jotted things down in that tattered old journal of his. Short lectures about Florence, the gods, the guilds, the wars of the past and the ones brewing now. Then hours spent in the Circle of Quiet Thought, breathing deep, drawing in mana until my bones felt heavy with it. Then food again. Then sleep.

Every day felt the same. But inside me, something was shifting — slowly, quietly. I couldn't feel it at first. The changes were subtle, like a tide rising so gradually you only noticed it once the shoreline was gone.

Nyx stayed close, ever watchful. Sometimes he curled against me while I meditated. Other times he perched in the rafters, eyes glowing faintly in the shadows. Alric said familiars could sense magical change before we could — and Nyx had started watching me more intently these last few days.

By the seventh day, my body felt different. Not stronger — not yet — but denser. Like the mana I'd been breathing in wasn't just soaking through me anymore. It was collecting. Staying. Waiting.

That morning, during cultivation, I felt it.

It started with a chill.

Not a shiver — not cold — but a clarity. As if my body had slipped into perfect alignment with the air around it. Every breath I took was pure, every muscle still. My thoughts slowed. Focus sharpened. The ambient mana in the room no longer hovered like mist.

It flowed.

And I was the centre of it.

Then came the pull — deep in my skull, behind my eyes, behind thought itself. A pressure building in the core of my brain, like a second heartbeat slowly coming to life.

It wasn't pain — not really. More like something being etched inside me, carved by invisible hands into the very architecture of my being. I gasped, eyes snapping open — but I couldn't move. I wasn't paralyzed. I was anchored.

I felt something forming behind my mind — not an object, but a space. A pocket of impossible stillness. It filled slowly, steadily, with the mana I had gathered, the weeks of breath and discipline coalescing into something permanent.

My vision blurred. I could see the mana now, in flickers of light and colour just outside my perception — threads drifting through the air, spiralling into me, feeding the process.

It was like being born again.

A final pulse of pressure surged through my head — a sharp, crystalline moment of awareness — and then it was done.

The world stilled. My breath evened.

And I knew.

I had evolved.

Somewhere deep inside my mind, in a part of my brain that hadn't existed until now, a mana core had formed — a gleaming point of magic bound to my essence. Not temporary, not borrowed but mine.

I let out a shaky breath and slumped forward slightly, heart pounding.

Nyx padded over silently and rubbed against my arm. I looked down at him, still dazed.

He gave a soft purr of approval.

I didn't need Alric to tell me what had happened.

I was a first-circle mage now.

I sat there for several minutes, trying to calm my breath and steady my thoughts, but the quiet crackle of mana in my body wouldn't fade. It wasn't just inside me now — it was part of me. A slow, steady presence behind my eyes, in my chest, coiled around every nerve like a sleeping serpent.

For the first time since arriving in Florence, I didn't feel like I was pretending.

I felt like a mage.

When I finally stood — carefully, still adjusting to my imbalance — Nyx hopped from the cushion to my shoulder and gave a faint chirp, as if urging me on.

I made my way back into the main hall of the temple, where Alric was bent over his desk, scribbling into his journal while muttering to himself. He didn't look up when I entered, just waved a hand vaguely.

"If you're here to tell me you've collapsed from overexertion, save your breath. I've only got one healing salve left, and I'm using it for my knees."

"I did it."

He paused mid-sentence. "Did what?"

"I evolved," I said simply.

His quill stopped. Then, very slowly, he turned to face me.

"You what?"

"I can feel it," I said, pressing a hand to my temple. "There's a space in me now — a mana core. I can store it. I can sense it. I'm not just cycling it through my breath anymore."

He blinked twice, then stood — a little too fast — and hobbled over to me, cane clacking on the stone floor.

"Let me see."

I let him examine me. He placed his hand just over my chest, murmured a detection incantation, and immediately stiffened. His fingers trembled slightly.

"Well I'll be damned…" he whispered. "You actually did it. And in a week."

I smirked. "Fast learner, remember?"

He stepped back, his expression somewhere between impressed and exasperated.

"Do you have any idea how long it takes most initiates to reach the first circle? Months. Sometimes years. And they don't usually start with missing limbs and a familiar purring on their shoulders."

Nyx blinked, clearly pleased with the compliment.

Alric shook his head. "Alright. If your core is formed, then it's time we teach you how not to explode when you try to use it."

He gestured toward the back chamber, where the spell circle diagrams were etched into the floor.

"Come. We'll start with mana control and cantrips. Don't get excited — tier one spells are barely more than parlor tricks, and even they'll drain you if you overuse them."

I followed him back into the room and sat once again on the meditation cushion as he knelt beside one of the older diagrams.

He pointed at the outer ring of a crude spell circle, inscribed with runes that shimmered faintly in the candlelight.

"Spells," he began, "are structured constructs of will, mana, and language. This here is a Rosharan base circle — common in the Western Calan Empire. The runes are read from the outer ring inward, layered by effect."

I leaned closer, fascinated. The circle was composed of three concentric rings: intent, element, and shape.

"Each spell circle varies depending on where it was created," Alric continued. "Every region has its own runic language — some primitive, others refined. The more complex the runes, the more efficient the spell. But they all rely on the same core idea: translate thought into effect through mana."

He drew a small circle of his own in the air, a faint glow trailing behind his finger.

"Cantrips are the simplest form — tier one spells. Like this."

He flicked the glowing circle forward, and a tiny puff of wind ruffled Nyx's fur.

I raised an eyebrow. "That's it?"

"You expected a fireball?"

"A little."

He rolled his eyes. "You want fire, learn control first. Mana's like breath — you don't blow it all out at once or you'll pass out. Even spells at your own circle can be taxing. Especially if you get sloppy with your shaping or overload the runes."

He handed me a piece of chalk. "Try something simple. Light, maybe."

I knelt beside the diagram, focusing on the basic rune structure he'd shown me.

Intent: Illuminate.Element: Light.Shape: Sphere.

I reached inward, into that strange new space inside me — and felt the mana waiting, coiled and calm. I tugged gently.

The spell circle glowed faintly under my touch.

I traced the runes, visualized the outcome, and pushed mana into the form.

A small, flickering orb of pale blue light shimmered into existence in the air above my palm.

It wasn't bright.

It wasn't stable.

But it was mine.

Alric gave a single approving nod.

"Good. Now do it again. A thousand more times."

I groaned.

And so began the next step in my journey — not dramatic, not flashy. Just a glowing orb and an old man with endless patience.

But in that quiet chamber, beneath stone and candlelight, I finally understood something:

Power isn't earned in moments of greatness.

It's built in hours of repetition.