16 weeks after birth. During the past few weeks Master has stopped by twice a week. Some days he would teach me while others he just let me sit there. I think he was also content in the blissful silence. Sometimes during his teaching I would have him put up a privacy ward and work out in ways a baby shouldn’t work out. You know basic calisthenics. I have also noticed that I am not the size a four month old should be. If I were to give it a guess my body is around the developmental age of somewhere between eight and twelve months. I don’t know I have never had a child and the last time I was a baby I remember being about this big when I was about a year old. Although I don’t know if being an elf or a girl has any affects. All I do know is that my spell is affecting my growth rate. My teeth are pretty much all there I can walk and run. I understand the langue well enough I can even read and write. All in all I am all over the place.

  My day to day hasn’t changed much I am still bored most of the time but with Master coming over it isn’t as overbearing as before. He has also brought me books and toys to entertain and educate myself thing one and two I mean Gale and Tara have started playing with me more and I have been able to interact more. My mom still won’t let me go outside without Master being around which is annoying but oh well. However, Master has managed to convince my mom to take me with her to the market, he has to join us but still I get to leave the property and see the town.

  Speaking of the town let’s talk about the world. From what I am able to tell it is in the industrial revolution era. They have developed production plants, a form of electricity. It is more like a massive mana gathering array that transfers powered through conductive material like copper, coincidentally they also use copper. Okay it’s a copper compound that uses magic to make. I haven’t read about it yet but the idea of using magic to bind certain elements together seems very interesting. Anyway that is what powers the light in my room which is technically just an enchantment on a piece of glass and is powered by the power that runs through the town instead of having its own battery. It is really interesting stuff Master and I are going to pick up some books on it when we go out. So yeah industrial revolution is an interesting time to be living in. Also it turns out I live on a floating island. Now if that isn’t magical I don’t know what is. For a moment I wondered about logistics until I was told about air ships. Again if that’s not magical what is? That’s enough rambling for now. Today I get to see the town.

  Right now I am in my room with my mom playing dress up. She pulled out a plain purple dress with long sleeves and a black belt. She put the dress on me and synched the belt around my lower chest. I also had some hair which reached my shoulders and was a raven black color. It contrasted well with my ivory toned skin. My mom braided my hair into two little pig tails. She then went to her room and returned with a mirror. All I had to say was damn I was cute little ankle bitter. I still had the baby fat on my face surprisingly enough but I could tell it had the same heart shaped face my mother and sister had along with light amethyst colored eyes that almost seemed to glow. It wasn’t they actually glowed but hue gave off the illusion of glowing. I also had dark freckles underlining my eyes and crossed over the bridge of my nose. I had always thought freckles were adorable and now I had the adorable little marks on my face. The freckles would make a great weapon. Instead of looking intimidating with the scar that ran across my cheek as the Dark God I would look disarming allowing my enemies to underestimate me. I ran a hand over them and watched as my mom gave me a smile.

  “I am adorable.” I said and my mom let out a chuckle.

  “Yes you are sweetie. You should have seen your sister when I first brought the mirror out. She was upset that she didn’t have the same eyes as her brother.” Oh great my sister already has body confidence issues.

  After our little exchange we heard the front door to our house open and some voices. They were the voices of my father and master along with my brother and sister. This outing of mine became a family trip with Master tagging along. My father dressed the twins up while my mom got me ready for my debut to the world.

  “Sounds like your teacher is here.” My mom said, “Let’s get your shoes on.” I didn’t realize this before but now it was hitting me. I was blinded by the excitement but now I was going to go outside with tons of people. To say the nervousness hit me would be an understatement. Once my mom got my shoes on me I started to really started to over think. Crowds of people, would these people hurt me? Would they see through me? Would they know who I used to be? Would they try to kill me? Where were my axes I needed them. My hands began to twitch and the room started to darken as wisps of Black energy in the form of two axes started to form in my hands. I was startled out of my spiral when Master swung open the door and shouted my name. I looked at him with a blank expression.

  “Mrs. Valentine could I have a moment alone with your daughter?” He asked but it was less of a question and more of an order. That’s when I noticed my mom’s face. Horror and confusion was written all over her face. She quickly left the room. Master approached me as I was sitting in the voyeur chair. “What’s wrong Sophia?”

  “Fear.” I started, “I started to panic a bit. I realized I haven’t been in a crowd in over seven hundred years. In my last life I wasn’t viewed well amongst many. Logically I know this is a different world but. There is a little voice telling me that people will know the truth and try and hurt me or those I love. I let it get out of control, I’m sorry.”

  “I see, I’ve known people with similar feelings and crowds can be hard for them. Do you wish to stay instead?” he asked.

  “No, I want to go. Could you just stay close to me. Maybe use an air shield on me. Actually disregard that last part.” I said sheepishly.

  “Oh escorting a cutie like you. Your going to make this old man blush.” He said with a chuckle. I rolled my eyes and held a hand out in a regal way towards him.

  “Oh please master mage please protect this frail one from the dangers of the uncivilized world.” He took my hand and pulled me up.

  “I’m pretty sure I would be protecting the world from you. The mana billowing off of you early felt like there was a god of war in the house.” He said and I blushed a bit.

  We walked downstairs my hand wrapped around masters index finger.. When we reached the bottom I turned towards my mom and said sorry. Her face still held a hint of fear but that helped. When my dad spotted me cooed and went to pick me up. I stopped him with a hand.

  “You will ruffle the dress dad.” I said stopping him he instead grabbed my face and kissed my forehead.

  “You’re very cute sweetie.” He said after.

  “What about me dad.” Tara whined.

  “Oh you are very cute too Tara darlin. You know the Doctor is holding Sophia's hand maybe I should hold yours.” Tara’s face lit up with that and she launched herself at him. Grabbed one of his fingers and was ready for the day. Gale walked over to mom and grabbed one of her fingers. Then put on a determined face. Hand over finger we left the house.

  Once we stepped outside I took in a deep breath. It wasn’t quite freedom but it was damn close. My mom and dad lead the way with my siblings the residential area barely had any people. The houses around here were not crowded and reminded me slightly of an American or Canadian suburb, although not all of the houses were the same. Some had trees in their front yard while others had well manicured grass. Another thing that separated it all was the lack of driveways but it made some sort of sense, no cars equals no driveways.

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  We continued walking following a path that my parents and Master knew but was lost to both me and the twins. At some point on the trip more people started to appear. I couldn’t help myself but, with each person I used mana sight and analyzed their bodies and posture. It was out of habit but also paranoia. Master noticed and curled his finger so he could give my hand a reassuring squeeze. I wouldn’t say it helped relax me but it reassured me that their was someone there.

  After another few minute we were surrounded by three story buildings crowded together with store fronts on the bottom floor with many more people. The increase of people caused my anxiety to spike. A dark aura started to shroud me, comfort and hide me from others. I was snapped out of it quickly as Master picked me up and started to hold me by his waist. He shot me a little smile and I flushed. He kept a hold of my as we walked. Then I heard something. Something I thought I would never hear again and it brought a cold sweat down my spine. It was the Browen common language.

  My head snapped in the direction of the voices and that’s when I saw it. Priest of that bitch. Master followed my line of sight he scoffed then spoke.

  “Priest of the light goddess. They showed up about ten years ago, they are… off putting.” He said.

  “I’ll say.” I said.

  “Oh?” he asked inquisitively.

  “My last life was on Browen.” I simply stated.

  “That’s a pretty big coincidence.” He said. ‘’ I thought to myself and continued to glare. After a moment I scoffed.

  “They just called us all idiots.” I said.

  Master just let out a sigh in response to that.

  We continued walking through the shopping district entering some produce stores and a bakery. I convinced Master that I needed a cookie for help in my growth and that it would help my weary mind. Thus almost caused an issue with the twins because they wanted one too, Master almost said no till I smacked him with my little baby hand. He gave me a “What the fuck,” look and I just returned a glare and a bit of shadowy wisps. Yeah we all got cookies and my god was it orgasmic. I had not had a good cookie in for ever. I took a long time just savoring that cookie. I took so long enjoying that cookie that I didn’t even realize that we entered a book store.

  “Sophia. You may pick out three educational books and one book for entertainment. As for you two.” Master said turning too the twins. “Your mom and dad can help you pick out one book each.” He set me down and let me peruse he followed me through the store as I looked. The organization wasn’t half bad it only took me a bit to figure it out and wouldn’t you know it, they used the Dewey Decimal System. It probably had a different name but it was neat to see some ideas transcended realities. I browsed the history area and looked for wars. Their was a thick book labeled “The War Between the Tholia Empire and the Poiwin Serfdom.” What caught my attention wasn’t just that it was thick but it was a named serfdom. I picked it up, and flipped it to the first page. The introduction sold me on it.

  ‘’

  That had me wanting to read it. The thoughts of how hooked me. Did they have some sort of great tactician or did they have someone with huge latent magic potential? I turned to Master holding up to book for him to hold onto. When he saw the title he just nodded. I then went to the science area to learn about the magic’s and technologies of this world. There was actually three sections dedicated to magic and it was probably only the ones closest to me. Theoretical magical theory, General magic theory and fussed magic theory. Each section was full of books. I went down the general magic theory section and found the biggest one about the theory. When I flipped to the first page I realized that the read was going to be a slog. We then moved onto a general science area and I picked up a general science theory book. Again it was also going to be slog but it was interesting to see parallels of earth’s science and the science here. Like fore example instead of electricity they use mana instead.

  As for entertainment is tried to find a big compilation of fairytale and things like that. As I searched through the fiction section I let out a sigh. I have come to a horrible realization four books wasn’t enough.

  “Master. Can I have more then four books?”

  “Eventually.”

  “How soon is eventually?”

  “When you can answer all of my questions on the educational books you grabbed.”

  “Oh. Are you going to read them to?”

  “Sense you like being honest I will be honest with you to. I own this shop. I have read every book in here.”

  “That’s impressive. Just one thing though. How?”

  “It’s a spell I have developed it is great for reading books.” He answered. I gave him a deadpan stare. I have a similar spell but, he said he can’t use dark mana. I have had the theory of how to use that spell with light mana but, well light mana has a hard time affecting the mind and I didn’t have access to light mana to test. Then it came to me.

  Each element has a subsection and cross combination. With dark there is dark slash shadow what ever you want to call it, mind, and void. Dark allows some one to create solid or semi solid things with the Dark energy like my tendrils, shields, weapons, and any other shape you want it’s simple. Mind is self explanatory kind of, it is the manipulation of the mind, accelerating thought, changing memories, perceptions of the mind, and one I refuse to every use control of the body. Void, would be closest to what some would call space magic. Creating a void pocket to store things, teleportation, gravity kind of, summoning, removal slash dislocation of anything. That last one and gravity manipulation is related in a way. Void can make an anti gravity field and also remove particles of anything, making this colder. With summoning you can also make things hotter. I had a lot of time to mess around.

  Light magic, has light, illusion, and soul. Light much like dark allows someone to create solid or semi solid things like, glowing orbs, glowing tendrils, glowing shield, and glowing weapons, yes I added glowing to all of those for a reason because without the glow it is invisible. Speaking of invisibility. Illusions I don’t know if I have to explain illusions, but I will give it a go, blend with your background, allow light to pass through you and become invisible, make people see things that are not real. Anyway soul, I don’t know how much someone can mess around with it outside of being a god.

  Water magic, has water. Alright yes it is simple but unlike light and dark the main elements are more about creation and manipulation, the other two have creation and manipulation too but, these elements shine when combined with other elements. Personally I doubt all of the combinations have been discovered. Fire is similar to water where they shine when combined. Air and earth are different though.

  Air magic is air and lightning. Earth magic is earth and metal. So, what I am guessing is that master used lightning on himself to accelerate his neurons or however the brain works. All I know is that electricity and the human body does some funny things like muscle twitches when zapped. So, with all of that into think if figured it out.

  “You used lightning magic.” I guessed.

  “Lightning?” he asked in response.

  “The compound element of air.”

  “Oh, we call that storm magic. It is one of the most versatile elements.” Master explained, “in response to your implied question, yes I used storm magic.”

  And that’s where this world’s knowledge and Browens differ. It is actually fire and water that are the most versatile. With water you have, ice, healing, clay, rain storm, and steam. With fire you have, Radiant flame, black flame, magma, inferno, and steam. While the others only have four combinations. I guess it isn’t completely true because you can adjust the ratios and get different spells out if all of them, in that vane air is definitely pretty versatile. I take back my opinion I guess he is sort of correct.

  “Oh, well I am ready.” I said and started off to fund the others.

  *-*-*

  We returned home with little fan fare, I took the books and retreated to my room. In there I started to think about the presence of the goddess here. Either the gods of this world don’t know or they do. Master did say that they have been around for ten years. That lead to more questions but for now I need to focus on the main issue. The gods here may know about her presence and are being deceived by her, or they know of her past and are readying in secret. With either one of those situations it means I need to accelerate my training. I can’t do anything either way without any power. With that thought I started the grueling part.

  Some people are born with mana like me. Some aren’t, either way in order to increase their power they need to gather more mana. More mana means more staying power or harder hitting spells. So with that I started to gather. My body was already pretty full of mana but there was still room for more. While the mana did spread through my entire body it was like an oxygen tank. The pressure was low. What I needed to do was move the mana and make way for more. In my body I shoved mana around and made wholes. Some people tried to shove all of their mana down to create room for more, I found it easier to only shove a bit of my mana around. Once I created those wholes I started gathering. Just like that time when I first went outside I started taking in great big breaths while also drawing in mana. I had to split my attention to hold open those wholes and direct the new mana into them. I haven’t gathered like this in a while so it took constant concentration.