I read out loud the magic words that were written on the page that I flipped to

“Inanimate objects heed my call and follow my demands”

I felt something happen

I felt some mana floating outside from my body, and try to take a hold of the book

But as it went near the book it immediately start to fizzle out, and I started to feel tired due to the mana lost due to my reckless action

Damnit, I really should have read the book well before trying this out

Since I did not have a full image of how this spell worked, my mana could not stabilize and instead fizzle out as it was carrying out its duty

Furthermore, since I did not properly learn about how much mana I needed to use this spell, I was not able to extend the least amount of mana required and instead cause the loss of a majority of my mana

I really made the simple mistake of an amateur of magic would make due to my eagerness of learning how this magic would work out

And I am reaping what I sowed in such a short amount of time

Man, my eyelids are starting to feel heavy

Symptoms of mana deficiency

It is going to be so awkward to fall asleep in front of her but I literally have no energy to even tell her that I am low on mana

Woah, I think I blackout for a moment

Is it just me or is the table getting kind of close

Oh, I see what's going on

I braced as hard as my mana deficient could as I prepared to the cold hard table

But the impact never came

And instead, I think I felt something soft that soften my blow against the table

I heard something being said as I felt someone holding my hand and a warm feeling entered my hand

I am getting mana from an outside source

As more mana entered my body it felt like I got a cup of coffee and immediately start to freshen up and slowly looked up to see Yuuna face right in front of me

I pulled back out of shock and embarrassment and saw that she had stood up and softened the fall of my head with her right hand

While she used her left hand to supply mana for me to stay awake

“Sorry for the trouble”

I said as I rubbed my head in shame

She smiled and said

“It's fine, luckily I was able to notice in time

But next time make sure not to overdo it alright?

I bet you did not read the instructions fully before you tried it out, did you?”

She was right

And I put my head down in embarrassment

“Sorry and you are correct, I will be less excitable next time”

“Just let me know if you need any help

Oh and”

“Yeah?”

She looked at our hands which were holding each other and said

“Have you fully recovered your mana, I was not sure if you did so I did not stop supplying mana and was waiting for you to tell me if you had recovered enough mana”

Oh

OH

I let go of her hand and said

“Oops my bad, and yeah I will ask for your help from now on, I have low amounts of mana so I was able to recover my reserves very easily thanks

I just forgot to let go of your hands”

“If that’s the case then let's just go back to what we were doing, and don’t forget to ask me for any mana recovery or spell questions if you need”

I nodded

“Roger”

I opened the book that presented me the opportunity to hold her hand and flipped to the first page of the spell

Manipulation Magic Origins

“There are many types of magic that allows one to control inanimate objects, and although there have been many theories where the first-ever type of such magic was created and popularized

The most famous theory was that the creator of this magic was lazy and wanted this magic to be used just so it can make their life easier

And as the creator of this magic, I will have to say that they are half right”

Wait did I read the sentence wrong?

I reread the sentence again

And as the creator of this magic

Huh so I was not seeing things, but I guess it makes sense for the author who was a legendary archmage to be the creator of this magic

But yet again, it's surprising that he is so unknown among the communities and this being the first time I am hearing of him creating this magic

I hope what I am feeling is wrong but I think there is a large conspiracy that’s going on regarding his erasure from history, maybe erasure is too harsh of a word since his books are still here

I think the best way to describe this situation is that they made him unknown enough for the average person not to know about him, but also did not fully erase his name since you can still know about him if you search for him or his books

Which is very weird the more I think about it

But I guess that’s not something I can find out the answer about this easily

I pushed that thought to the back of my mind and continued to read the page

“So, if you want to hear about the full story about the creation of the magic then I will begin my story from the next paragraph, but if you have no interest then just flip to the next page”

Although I really want to learn the magic as soon as possible, I am going to read the story since my curiosity about this incident is much stronger than my desire to learn the magic

I continued onwards to the next paragraph

So, I shall now begin, but it is a very dumb story so please don’t throw the book if the story doesn’t live up to your expectation

I then lowered my expectation when I read the sentence

“On a bright sunny day, many years ago before I became a prestigious archmage, I was looking for various elementless magics that existed during the time, and how I could improve upon them and also to improve my proficiency in those magics

And at that time, I never would have thought that my dream to become an arch mage would really happen but I still tried my best to absorb all the pieces of knowledge that I could utilize

And that day was when I was on my third day cram of my elementless magic cramming session, and I was surrounding by towers of books but I was also very hungry at that time so I really wanted to go outside before I collapse of hunger

Which I ultimately failed in doing so since I collapse in hunger before being able to find my way out

Luckily, I did not die of hunger since my friend who was proficient in white magic was able to save my life after digging me out of the mountain of book I was in

But before I passed out and even during my passed-out state, the main thought that came into my mind was

What if we could use magic to manipulate inanimate objects which could prove to be very convenient in various cases such as the situation where I either had to move the books away by using such a magic or by using it to bring food and water to my side

I then got to researching how to make this magic a reality as soon as it was possible, my creation process was also made much easier since there was already something similar to the spell I was trying to create

The major difference between my spell and the spell that already existed was the definition of the term inanimate object

Since both spells involved manipulating inanimate objects, I had to try my best and use certain theories of the existing spell and turn it into my original spell by narrowing down the definition of inanimate objects

If you the one who is reading don’t know what spell I am talking about, let me give you the answer”

I stopped myself before I read on since I had a hunch that the spell that already existed when the author was trying to create his personal spell could likely be the same spell that I am thinking about now

Since he was putting emphasis on the difference that is the difference of definition regarding inanimate objects but also constantly talked about how it is similar in the fact that both involve manipulation

I think the author was talking about

As I continued onwards with my reading

“NECROMANCY”

I was correct

I said yes in my mind as my thought process and answer was not wrong and continued onwards with the story

“There was already the existence of the dark arts known as necromancy which involved the process of controlled corpses and making them work for the caster as warriors or servants

And my spell was going to be similar to that and how the magic worked

But first I had to learn how did necromancy worked, so I went to borrow different books regarding necromancy and see how the whole process went

And after days of reading and forgetting to take care of myself, I was able to understand how the spells worked

And it seems I was correct in thinking that they were similar since the main gist of necromancy arts involved the caster injecting mana onto the inanimate object which is the corpse and either restoring it into something that is similar to the original look or by making it into what the caster is imagining

And by doing so the caster can also fully control how the servant is moving since they have injected their mana into the reanimated creature

I guess the main problems I had to solve is to make sure that the spell will not be the same as necromancy and also to make sure that even elementless people like me can use the spell

And so, I just went for it and tried to use the same process behind the necromancy to create the magic and obviously, I failed a lot of times

And as I did more tests, I had to rearrange different variables for this magic

First, I obviously had to tone down the mana required for the magic

I found this out pretty early since the first few times I tried to use the spell on different objects they exploded due to the amount of mana I poured into them

Then that’s when I realized the amount of mana obviously had to be lowered since the amount of mana required to reanimate corpses and control them is much less than controlling some inanimate as the process for my spell lacks the mana required for reanimation

And so, I cut the mana cost slowly as it reached a point where the mana was not overpowering the object and causing it to explode

The next thing I was trying to do was trying to truly control the object for longer periods of time and also to make sure the control is sharp and do not lag behind my thoughts

This took me much longer than the first process

I think it was nearly two years when I was able to find the best way to manipulate so that it could reach the goal I wanted

And that depended on the imagination of the caster and also highly differed with necromancy that I was trying to imitate at first

With necromancy, the mana seemed to be turned into a core for the reanimated core for the creature after being injected in the corpse, but this did not work out or the magic I was trying to creature since the core could not properly allow me control of the object I was trying to control

And so, I instead turned to using the mana and fully covering it with mana, and this proved to be the correct choice

By fully covering the object with mana I was able to fully control the movements I needed from the object of my choice and allowed me to enter the final phase of this project

And this type of manipulation also ensured that the spell I was trying to create will not be used as a spell similar to necromancy since this coasting of mana will not work on reanimating anything

This final phase was also equally tiring but also was one that I had the most direction about

I had to make sure that this magic did not have to be heavy on mana reserves so that people using this magic could use it even if they are not full of mana

And so, I got the mana counter from one of my colleagues and spent time casting this spell over and over until I was able to find the least amount of mana that I need for this spell to work

And to my surprise, the mana required for this was actually pretty low depending on the caster if they could efficiently coat the object with the required mana

But the other thing I found out was the mana required for the spell also depends on the type and size of the object they are trying to manipulate, which is an easy conclusion to come to since the main mechanism of this magic requires the coating of the object

And after doing all this I submitted this spell to the required department and I also asked for people will all the elemental affinities to try using this spell

And after a few weeks of test from the department, the spell was officially recognized as both a legal spell and also a spell that can be used by all people with any or no elemental affinities

And that was just the beginning of my journey in magic

But as I write this book, I think my biggest regret would probably be the fact that I could not create any spell for people without any mana

So, my wish for the future is that I hope there is someone who can make it so that even people without mana can stand on equal grounds as people with mana

Just as how we people with no mana affinity were able to stand equally with people with elemental affinities

Oh, now that we are at the end of our story, do you remember me saying about how the people’s theory was only half right

The thing they were wrong about was the fact that I was doing this to make my life easier when I was actually doing this for all of us, especially the ones similar to me with no elements and hoped that our lives could be much better

And after 200 years of my journey, I can clearly say that I succeeded in doing so and I hope the one reading this is also living in a world where people with no mana or no elemental affinity are not being discriminated

I am done rambling; I will write about the spell on the next page and thanks for reading an old man ramble”

While I was shocked about his age, I was glad that the world he envisioned existed, at least in this country

Where whether or not people have mana or elemental affinities they are still seen equally

I then went to the instruction pages which was exactly as written in his story

So, I tried it out

I should probably start small

Hmm

Is there something small around here

I looked around but couldn’t find anything

Then I saw Yuuna was writing something in a notebook and also saw her stationery case next to her

“Yuuna, can I borrow one of your stationery

I want to try this magic out with something small first before I move on to larger objects”

She nodded and searched for something in her stationery case

“Here you go, is this alright”

She handed me a red pen

“Thanks”

I then started by slowly injecting mana into the pen

This process took a pretty short time since the pen was quite small, but I was also careful to make sure that I did not inject too much mana into the pen and cause it to shatter

After confirming that the pen had been fully coated, I tried to make it move the I wanted it too

…

Nothing

I guess my image was not clear enough

Then I tried harder and was more through with my imagination

Then I open my eyes as I heard a small sound

Then I saw the pen floating slightly but still shaky

Then I continued to input my commands into the pen by thinking and it was able to do it slightly before it dropped down due to me not continuing to input commands

And during this process, it seems Yuuna was looking at me using the magic, and she gave me a smile and raised up her hand

“You did it, and that was so fast as well”

I responded to her and gave her a high five

“Thanks, and this is just the first step, but I am glad I was at least able to learnt the basics first before moving on to bigger objects”

I was planning on continuing to improve my proficiency with the magic when I looked at the clock and saw that there was not much time left in this period so I closed the first book and moved on to the next ones

The second book's title was

“Niche magic that could prove useful to you”

I had my expectations up when I saw the title

But after flipping through, I was not able to find new magic to learn

And instead, I found the same magic that was taught to me in the first book

So, I put down the book and in disappointment and picked up the last book of the pile, which also interested me quite a bit due to its design

I took a look at its cover and made out the title of the book

“Magic that is useful to you”

Uh...

This is such a vague title and the title is also something that did not match with the book's design 

If I were to guess I thought this would be something related to dark magics but the title does not indicate that

Ouch

I said under my breath as I touched the cover of the book to open it

That was a weird sensation, it was almost like being shocked slightly 

But I ignored that sensation and flipped the book open

I took a look at the index since I was not able to find anything regarding the author

And after taking a quick look, I was able to find the section I was looking for and skipped ahead

Manipulation magic (Hands of the False God)

The words that were written in the bracket were not shown in the index, which is understandable since they probably didn't want people to get put off by the name

It's a creepy name

But also, an interesting name

I continued to read on, but I could not find anything that looked similar to a spell instruction

All I could see was a symbol in the middle of the page

The symbol looked like a diamond, which is not the weird part

The weird part was that there were hands that were coming out of the diamond, or at least I think those are hands but I am not sure

The more I looked at the symbol, the eerier it looked and also caused me to feel more anxious as if something is going to suddenly happen

And that was all that was on the page, I looked on the other page and it was all empty

When I flipped to the other page, it was already a section about another spell but the weirdest thing was that there were full instructions about the spells

And the spells in those pages were all also common spells

I was about to continue flipping the pages when I heard the school bell ring signalling the end of the school day, and I closed up the book as I heard the chime

I don’t know if it was out of fear but the only thing that was on my mind was that I wanted to put this book away and get it out of my mind

So, I stacked it with the other two books and looked for their areas to put them away as I waited for Yuuna to stand from her seated position

“Shall we go?”

She asked me

I nodded as I also helped her carry her stack of books

“Let's go, I will carry the books and you show me where should I put them”

She nodded and we took some time to return all the books in their original positions

And finally, it was time to return the last book of the stack

The one that made me very anxious

Yuuna looked at the book and said

“I actually don’t know where this book’s original place is”

Huh?

“So, you did not get the book yourself?”

She shook her head

“No, I did but I did not get it from the shelves where the books are usually placed, follow me”

She said as she led me to an area where there were multiple books were located

I looked at the sign where the books were placed, it read

“Please put the books here if you don’t remember their original locations”

Ah, that’s what she meant

“I understand what you mean now, then I guess let's just put it here and let the librarians take care of the book?”

She nodded and I put down the book in the pile

This action of putting down the book made me feel quite relieved

Huh?

“I am curious, what made you think there would be something I would need in this pile?”

She pondered for a while and answered

“I don’t know why but I had a gut feeling, and even me choosing that book was a gut feeling”

Huh, that's strange

“Did you read through it at all?”

I asked her

She shook her head

“No, I did not, so was it useful?

That’s good

“I think it was a weird book, but I did not really have time to read it, maybe I will get it next time”

“Or you could just borrow it now?”

Nah

“Probably not this time, I will read it in the library since I like the environment here, and I feel like I would forget about the book if I borrow it”

Which was a lie with some truth sprinkled in

“Let's go before the librarians kick us out"

I slightly hold her shoulders and pushed her in the direction of the exit

No one’s POV

The book that was just placed in the pile slowly turned into black vapour and disappeared as the duo who put it down walked away