It’s been three weeks since Hermes came to live with us, and I’ve got to say, I’m rather impressed by his progress. He has developed an ego by week two, and when I say Ego, I mean a human one. The only thing he’s missing is the ability to talk, and I’m sure as hell I won’t teach him.

He likes to play a lot with the children outside, and they love him – It had been tedious scheduling petting timers on all of them. Although, that has given me time to advance in my studies. I still have my classes with cute Brother Nicholie, but I really don’t mind them. I want to be able to perfectly understand this language.

Right now, I’m reading the basics of magic. My conclusion is that magic is a crazy thing. There are six types of attunements: the four basic elements, light and darkness. At first, I thought that light was good, and darkness was evil, but it turns out people here don’t discriminate in the attunements. Light and Darkness are, of course, very difficult magic to master but the reason is simple. They are bound to physics. Light represents time and Darkness space. It’s easy to comprehend the functions of those two if you know some physics and math.

Another thing I notice is the rules to perform and create skills. You can cast any spell you want if you know three things: the runes necessary for that action, a circle of channeling and the incantation. The runes shape the magic to a specific element or a pair of elements, the circle sets the amount of mana required as well as the target, finally, the incantation helps to direct the spell to do exactly what you want. The runes and the circles are pretty much preset. What it’s up to the caster is the incantation. Also, once the skill is learnt, you only need to name the skill to cast it.

This kind of magic is quite simple, but at the same time too complicated. There are common runes, without an attunement, and element-specific runes. You can actually cast various spells with the same runes and circle just by changing the incantation… I think it’s better if I practice it instead.

“Still studying hard, I see,” I heard a voice behind me, and I shrieked my guts out. “Oh, I’m sorry Leo, I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“It’s ok, Brother Nicholie. I was just too concentrated here.”

“I see,” he smiled radiantly at me. “I was wondering, Leo. You’ve been studying a lot lately. Are you planning on joining the Guild?”

That’s something I’ve heard before. The Guild is an organization that gathers hunters in order to keep monsters at bay. It also serves as a free army for the ones able to pay. It’s quite popular, and I can’t blame people for wanting to be a hero.

“Is there a merith in joining? I just want to study magic to the fullest.”

“They do have a research faction,” he told me, sitting in the chair in front of me. “I know their library has more books of magic than any other place in this continent, so…”

They do, huh?

I still haven’t found anything about the summons in these books, so it would be wise to prepare myself to join them if I can’t keep advancing.

“Brother Nicholie, I have a question. What is a Summon?”

Nicholie’s neck tensed with the question, and moved uncomfortably in his spot. So I was right in being cautious about what happened to me.

“Don’t people of Flonctus tell the tale of The Red Circle?”

“I think not, never heard of it,” Nicholie sighed.

“The Red Circle was a sect of five Priests of the Flame Church. They… attempted to bring new talents to this world by the art of summoning. They brought some people and made them their slaves. They had some powerful talents, indeed, but also ill intent – They didn’t want to be pets after all. One day, one of the Priests died in an accident. In normal circumstances, the slavery crest in the chest of the summon would have chosen another master. But, for some reason, the crest just deactivated. Of course, this person took revenge and was unmatched in a fight. It wasn’t until one person with the Hero Title stood his ground and defeated him. The destruction left behind was just too much, though. The Congregation of the Six, which rules over magic and the Churches, banned the summon art and declared all the people brought to this world by it as criminals. This is a summary of the story, of course. I’m surprised you haven’t heard about this.”

“Well, I did know to some extent, but this is refreshing.”

The hell with that? There is no way I can find the information I require to get back home… Am I trapped in this world?

“Has there been any summons since that happened?”

“The Calamity of the Red Circle happened like two hundred years ago, so I think that’s possible. Though they most likely had been hunted down and killed for that. There is a rumor that the Continent of the Demi-Human doesn’t mind welcoming them but I heard that they actually like to eat them,” of course.

“I see. That’s quite the scary story.”

“We sometimes use the summons to scare the children, actually,” naturally.

I have to rethink this… I can’t expect the information to be lying about, waiting for me to find it.

“Answering your question, Brother. I do think I’ll join The Guild. Might help me somehow.”

“Sure, Leo. I don’t know much about magic, but Father Thompson used to be an hunter. You should ask him for that if you want.”

I have a new mission now… I knew this wasn’t going to be easy, but things are getting more and more entangled.

For now, I’ll just join The Guild and see what I can find.