Chapter 222: Aurelius’s suspicion
The more Aurelius thought on Caius’s words, with the ~Heindyll~ symbol above his palm, the more sense they made to him and the more he realized their potential truth.
Looking at Aurelius, Caius couldn’t help but think his life was a bit ironic;
The more Aurelius advanced in Magic Circles, the more of his last life he would remember and understand which would naturally grant him this obscure but essential information about Light Magic.
However, to advance in Magic Circles, he needed those important informations which he could only get by advancing. It’s very cyclical and seems designed to keep him trapped and locked forever in a Bottleneck. A paradox of sorts.
Caius wondered if he’d have to recreate more situations in the original story that led to Aurelius’s breakthrough epiphanies. After all, he may have just set a precedent by doing this.
"I’ll meditate on this," Aurelius said as the ~Heindyll~ symbol fizzled out from atop his palm.
"Yes, you should do that," Caius said with a nod.
This moment besides not being as it had been in the original story (I.e involving Kaya directly) had also happened a bit late and Caius hoped it would not derail the schedule of trials to come.
Aurelius was eyeing Caius just as Caius eyed him. The suspicious expression he had had when this conversation first started, was back now.
"And you said you came up with this through your study of Dark Magic?" Aurelius asked.
"Yeah," Caius lied easily, "It’s as I said earlier, they’re really two sides of the same coin."
"Ah, of course. Of course," Aurelius said with a somewhat agreeing nod but his expression was still suspicious even if he said nothing more.
You see, while Aurelius would not say he detested Dark Magic, he knew it was against his nature. He assumed this was because of his complete lack of affinity with the Dark Element even though this wasn’t the case for other elements—unique elements—that he didn’t have affinity with such as Ice or Nature.
Aurelius had accepted that the reason why his reaction to Dark Magic was different and so... negative was because the two Elements were so opposite one another.
Now, of course, Aurelius had nothing against Dark Mages or the concept of Dark Magic itself. He wouldn’t have been as friendly as he was with Caius if he were.
His Dark Magic intolerance was about him wielding the Element himself and not about others wielding it. As it turns out, it wasn’t enough that he didn’t have an affinity with the Element as something within him—likely his Light Magic Affinity—didn’t want the Dark Element inside him in any capacity. It made the very thought of mediating on Dark Magic Arcane Symbols irritate him.
In any other human, affinity with both Elements will be present albeit on varying levels. The most common is usually low in either of the two because Light and Dark Magic are quite... special.
In any case, Aurelius believed that their having affinity to both Light and Dark Elements—regardless of levels of affinity with either—was the reason the average human/humanoid doesn’t react to either Light or Dark with the level of intolerance as he had with Dark Magic.
This was proven, at least as far as he knew, by Light Mages adepts who dedicate themselves wholly to the Element and aim to purge their entire selves of any inkling of Dark Magic which they consider to be an impurity. These Light Mages are often initiates in the Church of Light dedicated to the Goddess of Divine Light and are a bit fanatical about their faith.
Aurelius was not quite the same of course. He was not quite to that extreme. However, they were proof that the feeling of intolerance he had for Dark Magic wasn’t unique.
So Aurelius had expected it to also be the case—in reverse—for Caius who had an affinity with Dark Magic and none with Light Magic. He expected the very thought of researching Light Magic Arcane Symbols to irritate Caius to no end so the idea that Caius had applied his knowledge in Magical breakthrough in Dark Magic to Light Magic was... interesting to say the least.
Also, looking through the Arcane Codex is very difficult and straining on the mind. So what could have possessed Caius to endure such mind-breaking strain and the potentially irritating factor of Light Magic Arcane Symbols to help Aurelius achieve a breakthrough?
Especially when they both barely even qualified as friends.
They hardly ever said anything to each other and Aurelius had never voiced his struggle. Hell, he had never said anything to his actual friends about it so why...
Why would Caius just intuitively realize his struggle and so quickly relate it to something he had apparently gone through recently himself and then go the extra mile to find just the right Arcane symbol (The ~Heindyll~ symbol) that would help with the bottleneck?
It just seemed like far too much work to do for an acquaintance and warranted suspicion.
It also furthered a feeling Aurelius had had since he and Caius were paired to face Professor Cynthia Kragsten on their first week at Lochxen which was that Caius seemed to know him more than should be possible. Only this time, Aurelius wasn’t sure he should be looking at such a thing favorably.
Not when he had been having a feeling of being watched for a few weeks now.
"What is it?" Caius asked when Aurelius just kept looking at him, his brows pulling closer and closer together.
"Hmm? Oh, it’s nothing," Aurelius said and his expression brightened, going from suspicious to appreciative in a second. He even accompanied that with a smile.
"Thank you for this," Aurelius said as he cast the ~Heindyll~ symbol again, "I think I’ll keep looking into this before I head to class."
"Yeah, you do that," Caius said and turned around to walk ahead to the Alchemy classroom.
Aurelius watched him walk. His appreciative expression shifted back to suspicion as he stared at Caius’s back until he turned a corner to the classroom door and was gone from sight, at which point, Aurelius directed his blue eyes down to stare at the ~Heindyll~ symbol again.
Whatever he might suspect of Caius, this symbol truly might be his breakthrough. He was already determined to go poring through the Arcane Codex for more symbols like ~Heindyll~ that could help him understand what Light Magic truly meant.
•••
Caius wasn’t dumb and his sensitivity worked well enough for him to know Aurelius’s expression had become one of suspicion once he turned around and headed to class first.
That was likely problematic but it didn’t really matter. Not right now anyway. What mattered, as far as Caius was concerned, was that Aurelius take the hint he had been given and use it as he should.
Arlette was already in class teaching when Caius arrived and after a respectful exchange with little clue to what they were to one another outside the classroom, Caius went to sit by Doran’s side as he usually did.
Only it wasn’t Doran who was there.
It was Aylin.
"What took you so long?" She asked with a smile on her impossibly beautiful face.
"What are you-?" Caius started to ask and then took his seat before he completed the question,
"What are you doing here?"
"I’m sitting with you today," Aylin said still with a smile.
"Why?" Caius asked.
"Because I want to," Aylin said with a shrug, "And I’ll be a better seat partner than the peasant boy anyway."
"His name’s Doran," Caius said, "He confessed his love to you, the least you could do is know his name."
Aylin frowned.
"Don’t remind me of that."
Caius looked around the classroom then as he asked.
"What did you do with him, anyway?"
"Oh come on Caius, that makes me sound like a villain who did him in," Aylin said and despite the tiny gasp she let out, she seemed to like the idea of being evil actually, as she waved her hand and continued nonchalantly,
"I merely relocated him."
As she said that, Caius found Doran where he really should have looked at first. Doran was sitting where Aylin usually did beside Aylin’s supposed best friend, Marianne. Both of them were looking very awkward about this impromptu seating arrangement.
Doran caught Caius’s eyes and his brown eyes bugged a bit like he was imploring Caius to help him out. Caius just smiled and looked away.
"Yeah, I don’t think that’s all that bad actually," he said mostly to himself.
The class continued and a few minutes later, Aylin was leaning closer to Caius to whisper,
"She’s so cool?"
"Who?" Caius asked.
There was only one direction Aylin was looking at and considering how high and mighty she was, there was no way she was talking about a student. Still, that caught Caius by surprise and he just had to be sure.
"Professor Louvene, of course," Aylin said and her icy blue eyes actually seemed to sparkle,
"Since when?" Caius asked.
It wasn’t that he doubted Arlette’s ’coolness’. This admiration of hers from Aylin was just new to him from the knowledge he had of the original story.