School life suited me quite well, though that was likely because I was able to choose the majority of my classes and much of what I was learning felt enjoyable. There were of course classes I didn't enjoy, such as calligraphy and dance, but until I became an adult, Alcrem and Marian had some sway over the classes I was to take, and they obviously preferred that I learn the Skills of a housewife over Skills meant for more dangerous professions.
That said, they still expected me to be able to defend myself so I was still able to train my combat and magic Skills. However, since I was still a first year student most of the advanced classes were unavailable to me, so I was stuck with classes that were not extremely helpful. There were a few classes that actually retained my full attention, one of them being Magical Theory. It was a class I'd picked on a whim and one that I had though would be a boring lecture of things I already knew. While the class was indeed a lecture conducted by a old and wizardly old man and covered or reiterated things I'd already learned there was plenty of new content that delved deeper into the workings of magic and ways to apply it.
For instance, the most common way to use magic was through formations, of which there were three types. Chants, the easiest and most used formation type, by speaking a string of ancient words together one guided their mana to take the desired effect. The downside of chanting was that it always output the same result, regardless of Affinity. This meant that if two mages were to use the same chant they'd create an effect that was identical, the sole difference would be the mana used by each depending on their Affinity.
Magic Circles were the second most used formation and had a wide range of applications. Most permanent magical effects were the work of this kind of formation and they were used frequently in both alchemy and enchanting along with most forms of magical research. The reason magic circles were not as widespread is that they were expensive, even the most simple of them were beyond the price range of even lesser nobles, let alone common citizens.
The final and least understood formation were Magic Arts. The professor didn't go into too much detail, but there was a method of using one's body movements as a form of mana manipulation allowing you to cast spells by performing a set of movements. There were several kinds of Magic Arts but each was a closely guarded secret, and while they did occasionally appear in auctions there price quickly became exorbitant meaning no researcher was that willing to purchase them for study.
It was with great surprise that I learned that formations were not the only way to use magic, primordial magic was one such method. It involved controlling your mana manually and shaping it to cause your desired effect. This was extremely difficult for most people as even if they managed to assert control over their mana, they lacked the knowledge and imagination required to bring the effects out. Many historical Heroes had been proficient with primordial style magic due to their advanced knowledge of science. This was a frustrating fact for me to learn since while I also had advanced scientific knowledge, most of my Affinities were likely too low to properly bring about any effect.
Thankfully the two S-rank Affinities I had were also the ones with the least amount of formation magic available. Most people with Life Affinity and therefore the affiliated formation belong to the churches, making learning them difficult unless you were apart of them. Besides the commonly available Life Formations and whatever Elaine taught me I was going to have to experiment to find out what I could and couldn't do, thankfully I could raise Superhuman Regeneration's level at the same time.
Vibro was even worse off and was actually considered an interesting but mostly useless Affinity. In addition to a lack of formations people didn't understand how to apply vibration to cause effects. While I didn't know exactly how certain effects worked I at least had a solid idea of what was possible.
There were a few other interesting tidbits I learned about the Affinities and magic in general, such as that ice wasn't part of Water Affinity, but lava was, or that everyone had a certain space around them commonly referred to as a Territory. Essentially an area where other mages couldn't manifest their magic, so it wasn't possible to just create water in their lungs or other similar attacks.
In response to the comments from last chapter, yes futa will be included. There are at least two that will appear, whether or not there is more depends entirely on if I feel it makes sense for a character.
As for Vell, I'm still tossing up about her status, though I'm leaning towards her either not being, or having it require special circumstances, such as her wanting to impregnate someone.
Don't complain too much, the tags are there. That said, I plan for it mostly to be straight up girl on girl, and don't really plan on going into great detail about the dangly meat bits. If you can't imagine them as dildos with nerve endings, sorry I guess?
Also got a discord if anyone is interested https://discord.gg/M3U7quRufk
nah mate! dont be sorry! id be okay with a few futa characters. but ideally not vell please! i dont mind if she could summon a magic PP but as long as most if of is just yuri
Vell's Gender is none, but does she has the bits? Like Vagina, anus, etc. I know she has her small spinneret, don't know if she wants something up there, maybe stimulated by other means. But nothing has been said of her other bits... the Idea to grow a pp only when she wants to impregnate sounds nice. Two futas on her harem sounds really nice.... or you meant two futas on your whole story?
@Ruiso She's got the girl parts. Probably going down the growing when wanted route, but that could change.
As for futas, two for sure. Others exist but I don't know if it matters too much as it depends of if Vell gets them naked or not.
@Tyboneous yeah a bit weird to say XXXXX is a futa and never show the goods, then that is irrelevant. Same as giving the girls in a hentai a big juicy d*ck that she never uses.... the grow when needing to impregnate approach would work on her as her Gender is none, maybe make it n/a since she has her bits bellow, not that it matters much since it doesn't say female so a possible option in the future is viable. In another novel a character used her Life attribute to manipulate her body, wink, wink.
@Ruiso The none is more because, while she acknowledges she is female physically, she still thinks she is masculine. So perhaps at some point in the future that entry will change, who knows?
@Tyboneous interesting, so the Gender tag in the status screen is more mental than physical? As she thinks she is masculine intead of an actual man because her body is female?
@Ruiso Correct, some of the Status is influenced by one's mental perception of themselves, Gender being one such entry.
@Tyboneous interesting
So if a boy was raised by his parents as girl and he also believes that he is a girl then his status will show that he is a 'girl'?
I get your point but idk this somehow hard to digest. System feels faulty
@ReiZero97 In that situation the system would identify as None, similar to how Vell is. To have a gender listed one must both identify and physically be said gender.
The reason behind the system and why it is the way it is will come up eventually.
@Tyboneous I am not criticizing ... It just '' feels" odd because its slightly different than norm. Usually systems shows 'facts' and your system don't show gender as a fact. That's all...
@ReiZero97 Wasn't particularly taking it as criticism, if it feels odd then I'm doing it right.
As for the standard system showing facts, if they do include gender, usually it's defined as a being's biological sex, whereas this system is more, 'progressive' I guess, since for its gender entry it uses both biological s*x and one's gender identity.
Its a small detail that hopefully, when combined with information from later chapters will hint at certain truths, whether I did so good enough or not is something I'll find out when the time comes.
@Tyboneous Ah, so Vell isn't a futa then... Damn, looking for one with a futa mc was part of why I started this...