The Dive: Birth of a Wordsmith (50 page)

Some of the houses had
scorch marks along their side, others having holes in the roofs.
Either demon powers going haywire, or a demon gang war. Either way, I
nodded to Levy and the three of us made our way inside the spire,
where we found several well equipped classrooms. Each one had scrolls
and textbooks lining entire shelves, likely even more than the
library of the Rosenheim college!

“
So, Levy? Would you
mind having a seat please?” I asked with a smile, and he moved
to one of the desks appropriately sized for an imp. There were many
that size, while others were too big for even a full grown human to
sit in. “How much do you know about magic?”

I figured I knew the
answer already, but I had to ask first to be polite. “W-well..
not much. It can do some amazing things… and apparently I have
a talent for it?”

In a literal way, you
have three. I should work on getting Mana Pool and Mana Recovery
talents…
“That’s right,
you do. I noticed it earlier when you agreed to let me teach you. But
first, let me begin with the basics.” I closed my eyes,
dispelling my normal mage robes and equipping myself with more of a
scholar’s outfit, including a squared hat, a vest, and well
made pants. Part of this was for the aesthetic look, but the other
part was to pour all but a hundred of my mana into it.
Maybe
I can get one of them by training my mana like a muscle. I haven’t
really done that much.

Levy just stared in awe at
my transformation, before I continued casually. “Magic is a
manifestation of your willpower. Once you learn to control it, then
you
can do amazing
things with it. By itself, magic doesn’t do anything. It as to
be focused in order to work. But that’s not the only thing
needed in magic. Sure, having the will to use it is important, but
there is an ancient language of magic called runes. With these runes,
you can change the essence of the magic into a spell.”

Levy nodded to me
patiently as I searched through the books to find a beginner textbook
on runes. Once I had it, I took it over to him. “This book
contains the basic runes that are used in most general spells. Take a
moment to look it over, and properly study a few of the runes. After
today, I’ll regularly quiz you on their meaning so I expect you
to take it seriously.”

He hesitantly grabbed the
book from me and nodded. “I understand… I’ll do my
best, sir..” As soon as he opened the book, I received a pop
up. Thankfully, by now Lilith’s spell had worn off. It was
weird watching her run away from her perspective.

The fact that he learned
that talent after such a short speech and barely opening the book
surprised me. I had to study a ‘magic for beginners’ book
for over an hour to get both that and Magical Talent. Maybe he will
get pretty far with his training after all.

As he read through the
book, I received another message indicating his knowledge level had
increased. Once I got that message, I noticed he was suddenly reading
faster, flipping through each page after less than a minute of
studying. If it weren’t for the fact that his level was rising
I would think he was only skimming.

Less than half an hour
later, and two more levels, he closed the book and nodded to me. “I
think I understand sir. I’ll study it more later.”

“
That’s
alright. This much is fine. It’s already late, so head home.”
I went to where I grabbed the book from, and picked out the next
advanced rune book. “Take this one too. Once you have the first
set of runes memorized, move on to this. Tomorrow, we’ll cover
creating and casting spells.”

He nodded again, taking
the books and walking to the door.
Did he get
taller? No, it’s probably just that he isn’t as shy now.
I nodded to myself as I went out to meet Denise.

“
So, how’d it
go being a teacher~?” She was grinning as she asked me, waiting
just outside the spire.

“
Oh hush you. I
could have let them stick you with the job.”

“
I know, I know. I’m
thankful you took the responsibility yourself, I really am. I can
still tease you about it though.”

“
Anyways, that guy’s
learning speed is insane. In about a half hour, he got the same
results I received in a full day at the College. And even I had an
accelerate growth as a foreigner.”

“
Wow, nice. So,
what’s with the clothes?” She looked to my uniform. “Not
really complaining, but I swear you were wearing a robe before.”

“
Ah, sorry. Yeah.”
I switched back to my robe, and paused.
That’s
why it won’t give me those talents. Manifesting items don’t
actually spend mana unless I get rid of them like an arrow. I’d
have to make a super-mana intensive projectile to actually give me
mana a work out.
“When I saw Levy’s
abilities earlier, I noticed that she had talents that increased her
mana limit and mana recovery. I had an idea to try to get something
similar, but went about it all wrong.”

“
What do you mean?”
She tilted her head, not really understanding the whole magic thing.

“
When I materialize
an object like this, I’m not really spending any magic. I’m
just borrowing it. That’s why my magic doesn’t recover
while I’m using it. The only exception is something like an
arrow, where I remove the object from my person. So basically, I have
to use magic to such a degree that I exhaust my mana and keep it low
for a while... This would have been so much easier when I was still
new to this.”

“
So… like
with that summoning from a while ago, you want to make yourself pass
out from using too much magic..? That doesn’t sound at all bad
to you?”

“
Well, if I do it in
a controlled environment like Hell, then there’s no worry about
being attacked. And there are plenty of people nearby that can help
me if something goes wrong.”

“
How about we talk
with Lilith about this first..? Demons use a lot of magic, right? So
maybe they have a training area made for something like this. It’d
have to be better than just firing your magic off at random at
least.”

I thought about her
proposal for a moment as we walked towards the court. “Alright.
I’ll ask her in the morning. It’s been a long day, and
right now I just want to rest.” As if to prove my point, I let
out a long yawn.

“
Now that’s an
idea I can accept. Onwards, to the bed!” Denise smiled and we
picked up the pace, going to our usual sleeping chambers when staying
in Hell. Of course, those were Lilith’s quarters. Since she
hadn’t mentioned arranging anywhere else for us to stay it
should be alright. Much closer than heading all the way back to the
port, anyways.

On our way, we passed
through the heart of the District of Wrath. Every now and again, we’d
see a fight going on behind a house, or even in the middle of a
street. There were times that we considered stepping in to help, or
using my authority to order them to stop. However, it turns out that
none of these fights were serious, and they just performed sparring
as a way to relieve stress. The loser would typically be seen handing
over a few coins to the winner, but only when there was property
damage involved.

So, the loser pays for
repairs? I guess that’s one way to do it, though I think it’d
be better to make the winner pay so that they aren’t encouraged
to do unnecessary damage.

When we passed through the
District of Gluttony, there were food stands lining the road at every
opportunity, and large restaurants advertising exquisite food at low
prices. A lot of the establishments had outdoor seating so that
passing viewers could see the quality of food being served.

At the sight of this, my
stomach rumbled loudly, causing Denise to laugh and pull us into one
of the fancier restaurants. It’s not like we really had a
budget to worry about, and I had never been to any of the places here
before. The last time we were in Hell, the food I ate was typically
brought to me by Lilith while I was working for the first few days,
and then Denise would get me something to eat the rest of the time. I
guess she went to places like this during our stay, though.

“
Come on, Jin, I’ve
heard this place is great!” Denise smiled as we entered the
large greeting room. It was clearly designed to be suitable for even
the larger demons, with the ceiling a full seven meters high. The red
velvet carpeting looked extremely extravagant, but somehow seemed to
fit with the red walls. Likewise, at the four corners of the room
there were black columns with a single strand of gold spiraling up
them like a vine. Through an arch to the side of a wooden counter at
the far end of the room, the sight of multiple demons happily
enjoying their meals could be seen.

A smiling female demon
with four arms and dark blue skin stood behind the counter. Atop her
head were three small horns that shot straight up a few inches as if
to decorate her long purple hair. She was wearing a long red dress
with golden flower designs along it. “Ah, well this is quite
the surprise. Our two human guests came to pay us a visit.” Her
smile broadened as she saw us. “I take it that it will just be
the two of you dining tonight?”

“
That’s
right.” Denise answered for us, nodding happily.

“
Excellent. I hope
you enjoy our service and come again. It’s an honor to have
such distinguished patrons as yourselves.”

“
If the food is half
as good as Krath told me, I’m sure we’ll be back!”
Denise laughed again, and the hostess nodded.

“
Well, that is
certainly high praise to have one of the generals recommend us. I do
hope that we live up to your expectations.” She grabbed a pair
of menus from behind the counter and then stepped out, revealing her
long legs that could be seen through the high cut of her dress as
well as her taloned feet. “Please, follow me. I hope you don’t
mind, but we’ll be placing you in our VIP section this
evening.”

I shook my head, not
really understanding her concern. “I don’t know why we’d
object to that. It should be fine, right?”

Denise nodded next to me,
and the hostess led us up a pair of stairs at the back of the
restaurant, giving us plenty of time to look at the surroundings.
Even if the entrance had seemed overdone, the style of the building
matched throughout. Again in the dining area was red carpeting and
walls, with a hanging chandelier that appeared to be decorated with
glowing jewels in the center of the room.

In one corner at the back
was a stage, with a pair of succubi performing a duet. Their looks
may not be up to Lilith’s level, but either of them could
easily play the part of a pop star in my world, one having long black
hair and a matching dress that accentuated her curves while the other
had white hair and a matching dress. Her curves weren’t as
pronounced as her partner’s. Even though they weren’t
speaking the human language, the normally guttural tongue they sang
in still sounded beautiful. Enough so that I was tempted to cast my
translation spell to understand their lyrics.

In the VIP section, there
were several closed off rooms, each allowing the guests to maintain
their privacy. I guessed that it would become an issue if we sat in
the general area, since we’d draw enough attention to be
labeled a disturbance. The blue demon guiding us led us past a few
doors, grasping the golden handle of the one she stopped at. “Please
be seated. One of our servers will be with you shortly.” As she
says this, she sets the menus on a large round table with elegantly
carved chairs, each one having a soft red velvet seat.

“
Thank you very
much.” I smiled to the hostess before she left, silently
closing the door behind her. The interior of the room was well
decorated, with mounted candles along the wall burning a deep red. At
the wall to our left after we sat down there was a painting hanging
from the wall that seemed to display a different famous demon every
time I looked at it. Well, I assumed they were famous. Among the
assorted glances I noticed that Lilith and Krath were in the painting
at some point.

Denise opened up the menu
and stared at it for a second before smiling and flipping through it.
I followed her action, picking it up and immediately noticing that
none of it was written in a language I could understand! She must
have noticed my apparent distress, because Denise giggled softly.
“Just give it a second.”

I figured I might as well
trust her, and looked at the menu again. Slowly, the words were
shifting on the page to become what looked like english to me. Now
that I could read the menu, I saw that there were quite a number of
delicious sounding dishes offered. And the price really wasn’t
all that bad. If I didn’t know this was hell, I’d have
thoughtt I died and went to cuisine heaven!

“
Figure out what you
want yet?” Denise smiled to me as she closed her menu, setting
it down in front of herself.

“
Not in the
slightest.” I continued skimming through the various dishes.
The problem wasn’t trying to figure out what sounded good. The
problem was trying to decided between everything on the menu, because
it all sounded good!