The Flames of Passion (Quest)

[Fyrra Na'Limndra]

Basic Offensive Magic Starter Quest
8 years ago, 192 ATD
-The Academy on Ne'Turak Balika

Fyrra was almost done her apprenticeship at the young age of fourteen and would soon be a master Kalimbra by academy and guild standards. During her final year of training she took another magical elective to eat up hours in her day. She had gained many friends in her coursework and decided to take a class with some of her mage scholar friends to even out her time at school.

Most of her friends were fellow Kalimbra, yet they were older than her and ready to get their licenses any day now. They were busy practicing and preparing for their first official standings. They had all spent years perfecting their art and had only a razor sharp focus for it. Fyrra was more curious being younger than them.

She made her way to the offensive magic classroom, a room like all others, and sat on a pillow near the back. Other students filtered into the room over a period of ten minutes. The others greeted her cheerfully, many of them had taken shielding with her, or had seen her in the basics of thaumaturgy or glamours. Though many had a double take when they saw her, as she had changed her skin hair and eye colors since then.

A bubbly full blooded Drokagr came into the room and tool her place in the center. She was last to arrive. She had dyed her hair black and had several tattoos of spiders on her skin. She gave Fyrra shivers at first.

"Welcome aspiring mages! I shall be your instructor this evening! If I remember correctly most of you are scholars and one, you miss blue?, is a Kalimbra. How interesting! This is offensive magic basics, fire affinity. We will be discussing fire in nature first. Then how it behaves under magical influence, and finally how to wield it like a true combat mage!"

Fyrra's second thought was that the instructor was too perky about everything. How can someone be this excited about killing?

"Fire is a very important element to our world. It is surmised that without fire this world we call home would be a lifeless rock like some of our moons. Heat is energy! And the flow of that energy is what allows our world to spin. Our kind have seen the bottom of the rock layer and have come upon oceans of magma deep below in exploratory missions. This sea warms our world and spins us on our axis allow each part of our world to receive light from our star. A world that does not spin is a dead world!"

Fyrra thought this was interesting. An interesting theory at least. She had never heard it before and wasn't sure what to make of it beyond how it piqued her enough to pay attention.

"Natural fire comes from heat. Either generated chemically or through radiation. A lense can focus light from the sun to start a fire. This fire will consume material and locked energy in all flammable things near it, putting out heat. It will travel along this path, seeking more fuel to consume so it can grow. This is how fire lives, by expanding to new areas and consuming more resources. Much like many sentient races."

Now that was an interesting thought. But Fyrra couldn't dwell on it. There was no time! Arachnid lady was still continuing on about the subject!

"Quenching fire or killing it is done through a few ways. Water will quench it by depriving it of the heat it needs to sustain it's consumption. Dirt will quench it by suffocating it. Fire needs both fuel and air to burn! Water deprives it of fuel by making the fuel too hard to heat up and consume. Dirt smothers it so it can't breath! Not all fire is bad though. Without fire our winters would be too cold to survive through, our food would never get cooked and we would die of poisoning, and our industry would not thrive. Think about these things for next class!"

Fyrra was confused. The lesson was over already? But why? Had it really been the allotted time? She wanted to know more. This instructor was far more captivating than her previous magic instructors. She shuffled out of class a little melancholy over the shortness of the class.

[Fyrra Na'Limndra]

The following class Fyrra intended on sitting closer, yet all the center ring pillows were already taken. Instead she sat on the next closest pillow she coulsaid find, upsetting the seating arrangements for much of the class. She apologized to everyone who was set off balance by her choice to disrupt the seating of the entire class. Her intention wasn't to upset.

The instructor arrived after everyone and was again just as perky and happy to see everyone as the time before.

"Hello class! Today we will cover magical fire and it's behaviors! Magical fire behaves like normal and natural fire as well as under direct control of a mage. A mage can direct the fire to leap into the air or condense into an exploding ball. At the same time that fire will need fuel to stay alive and air to breathe. In magical application the fuel can be both natural fuel or wellspring energy from the mage! A mage that is unpracticed at fire manipulation may accidentally cause a catastrophe. What was meant to impress friends could become a conflagration by over manipulating the flames with wellspring energy and will. As we know, fire will consume anything it can get close to that is made of a material that can burn. But that is not the limit! Fire magic can also be used to heat metals for forging, or melting. Similarly with enough energy rock can be reduced to magma in the same fashion."

That was interesting. And here she thought the applications stopped at burning people alive with your thoughts. She didn't know you could take a whole stone building down with it.

"This begs the question of where the limit is with fire magic. The limit is that line of absolute destruction. Fire can be a terrible and powerful force. Should it ever be out of control it can burn a swatch across the world, annihilating and consuming all in its path. It is your responsibility that if you use fire magic to contain it and control it. Never make a fire too big for you to control. Check every space you plan to use fire magic in for flammable materials than you don't want to burn. That is all for now, we are dismissed. Complete your exercises and meet for class next week!"

[Fyrra Na'Limndra]

The final day of classes was both exciting and depressing for Fyrra. She had spent so long studying that she wasn't sure she was truly ready to leave the academy yet. There was something about the atmosphere that allowed her to feel like it was a second home. Perhaps it was the safety she felt now, or the camaraderie. She went to the classroom where she was studying fire magic and took her seat. The others had eventually accepted that is where she belonged. They got over the feelings of being shoved out of spots they had come to accept as their own into a new order of things.

Once the rest of the class had become settled the instructor entered the classroom and looked around.

"Welcome class! This is our final lesson in fire magic. The living flame is both a useful tool and a deadly weapon as we've come to understand. There are many practical applications to this wonderous element. Some of which are useful around the household, such as lighting candles, cooking meals, and bringing warmth to the home through a hearth. Others are more industrious such as using fire magic to aid in the forging of metals for various purposes such as creating weapons and armor, as well as tools and other instruments for specific purposes! For combat the basic firebolt is merely an imagined arrow of flame directed at a foe, as is the fireball but in a more explosive fashion! Remember that a dragon may breath flames, and so can a mage with enough practice and dedication to the art form!"

Breathe fire like a dragon? That was a thought she had yet to have. She had considered the fireball with its explosive capabilities, but to use the breath of a dragon as a weapon? That gave her ideas. Mostly about how to easily control the flames with one's own breath. And snuff them out in the same manner. Perhaps that was how the dragons did it.

"I have graded your exercises and posted them on the board outside in the hallway. Now that these lessons have finished, I wish you all a happy life! Perhaps you will be my students again! Remember that fire can be used to both create and destroy! Now, please, be responsible!"

Fyrra left class feeling more informed on the subject. She looked at her posted grades and let out a squee of happiness. She had passed with glorious marks! Then she noticed just about everyone passed with glorious marks. Then she double checked... everyone had passed with glorious marks. Was it just the teacher that passed everyone regardless of performance?

Strange. She left the academy that day not feeling too sure about herself.

[Azuloth]

Quest Completed:
Rewards:

Fire III
+3 Stat points