Chapter 98 – Highly Difficult Incantations

“There’s no class this afternoon, so I can set you up on what to work on next.” Marin said as he pulled a couple of books out of the bookcase behind his desk and laid them out on the table.

“Do you have any ideas yourself? Any spells you’d like to learn or anything like that that you’ve heard of before. We generally believe that interest is the best teacher, and a lot of new mages come to Transfiguration to become mages, those little kids love the spell. Even though shapeshifting is the spell in Azeroth that is most prone to catastrophic accidents, it’s easy to learn and hard to master, and practicing shapeshifting is really helpful in a new mage’s growth.”

“What about you, do you want to learn shapeshifting too? Or …… flash magic? Another extremely popular but also very prone to serious mistakes magic.”

Jace wasn’t too keen on shapeshifting, he relied on fear spells to control his enemies now, it would be a bit redundant to pick another control spell, and an arcane one at that.

As for the flash spell …… Jace admitted that this magic was quite tempting to him, after all, he particularly enjoyed using it in the game alone, let alone actually learning it in reality.

And in the abandoned fishing village on the north coast, he also saw the power of the siren using the flash technique …… from his back suddenly popped up to the front position, which is really extremely intimidating.

“Unfortunately, flash magic is currently not open for apprentices to learn at the Sorcerer’s Sanctuary.” Marin’s words immediately poured cold water, “There was once a case where a thirteen year old apprentice used flash magic and ended up melting his own chest cavity with a chest in the harbor, and it took two days just to separate the body. After this horrific accident, the Sorcerer’s Sanctuary is now very cautious in the teaching of flash magic, and the display of flash magic spell books in the library has also made relevant restrictions.”

Is that so? It was just a pity that Jace was too far away to hear the spell when he was being chased by Naga, or else he might have been able to feel it out for himself.

Hearing Marin say that, though, it was more dangerous to fumble around with flashback magic on your own than it was to try out shadow magic on your own.

“Master, I have heard of a spell.” Jace said, “I heard about it from Lordaeron, it’s called Mage Armor.”

Marin nodded and asked, “Why do you want to learn this spell?”

“When I was at the top of the stone castle ……” said Jace, “I was hurt by shadow magic, and the scar on my hand still hasn’t faded away, that time it was really quite dangerous to think about it, and I heard that mage armor can fight against shadow magic. So I want to learn that.”

Marin says, “Mage Armor doesn’t just counter Shadow Magic, Mage Armor counters pretty much all magical damage, which could be considered one of the top spells in protective magic, Mr. Sesso. Except for light, of course, but you’d probably get arrested and beaten up by the priests in Stormwind if you referred to holy light as an energy. Anyway, I suggest you take the class from Master Andromas first, and if you intend to aim for mage armor, signing up for the School of Protection’s canon to learn about the relevant magical principles and such will go a long way towards your success in learning mage armor.”

“So there’s no way I can learn now, is there?” Jess asked tentatively.

“Unless you’re Madivan.” Marin said, “When he was an apprentice in his early teens, his level of magic was already such that he could casually crush a mage like me like a bug, and thankfully he was just a naive and kind child then, so he left tens of thousands of living people in the entire city untouched and ended up just killing his father by mistake.”

“That’s why natural magical ability, a strong magical talent is and its danger, Mr. Sesso. Learning magic that doesn’t match your abilities …… is even more dangerous of dangerous, and while at one time the Tirisfal Council placed great restrictions on magical learning due to arcane abuse, which now seems overly radical, it has to be said that their original intentions were absolutely reasonable.”

“But if I have to participate in your research in the future, such as going deep into the wetlands.” Jace said, “Then when encountering dragon-throated orcs, black iron dwarves or even red dragons, I have to have protection against both shadow and fire, don’t I?”

“Is that a condition you’re making?” Marin said helplessly, “In case you haven’t understood, I’m not letting you learn mage armor for your own good, especially with this kind of magic that’s going to work on itself, be more careful.”

Jess asked, “So what could possibly go wrong?”

Marin said, “Mage armor works similarly to the art of frost armor, which ice magicians are adept at using, in that both use arcane cohesive elemental shells to partially assimilate the same type of external magical aggression …… And the dangers are similar; frost armor can easily frostbite the casters themselves, especially those who aren’t skilled enough to cast it . Incantation errors, gesture errors, and so on, can cause such consequences.”

“And the mage armor is much more complicated, it has a long casting process, as it has to weave a dazzling outer layer containing multiple magical protective effects against the caster, and every color error will cause a cascade of reactions, and in case of a mistake, you may have to face the common backlash of five or six different elemental magics at the same time. The need for energy is secondary in comparison.”

“I want to try, Master.” Jace said firmly.

Instead of refusing again, as Jace thought he would, Marin just sat behind the table and looked at Jace for a long moment before asking, “You made your decision a long time ago, didn’t you?”

“Not too early.” Jace said, “Almost a day or two, after I feel like I’m pretty much done learning my light spells. So, Master, is there any prohibition against apprentices learning mage armor?”

“There’s no hard and fast rule like the flash spell.” Marin said.

“Great.” Jace said, “So, the next spell I want to learn is Mage Armor.”

Looking at Jess so determined, Marin was once again in a state of hesitation.

Perhaps thinking about the matter about the red dragon, perhaps thinking about the look of concentration when Jace cast the light spell just now, perhaps considering whether this big boy in front of him would become another poor person who died tragically on the path of madly chasing supreme power in the future.

And for Jace, it was simple for him to think.

If one’s affinity with arcane energy was not as close as one might think, then the amount of arcane magic he could choose from would be limited.

Specialize in a sufficiently pervasive protection spell, and a sufficiently useful irreplaceable support spell …… practice them to the point of perfection, rather than wasting energy memorizing a large number of miscellaneous spells that can replace each other’s functions.

Mage Armor is, without a doubt, the best choice in this protective magic.

Marin’s words also confirmed this, a lasting resistance bonus was more universal and could protect you from fatal injuries in a wide variety of complex situations, in contrast to the various elemental protection boundaries that required far more skill and energy to cast.

“Here’s the deal, two conditions.” Marin concluded, “One, first learn the spell of Arcane Wisdom, you must practice this spell under the blessing of Arcane Wisdom, which can greatly strengthen the accuracy of your spell recitation, as well as your energy ceiling, which will reduce the level of danger. Two, I’m not allowed to practice secretly on my own when I’m not present, I have to watch you, so as to avoid accidents that you can’t control on your own, or even hurt others.”

“I’m all for it.” Jess said decisively.