The Next Day.
The South Dome was a massive structure reserved for high-level experimental spellcraft.
Its interior, shaped like a half-globe, was laced with reflective mana filaments and a reactive floor capable of simulating any terrain or environment.
The structure itself was one of the Academy's marvels a massive, half-spherical chamber made of spell-woven glass, mithril veins, and layered with ancient mana runes that pulsed with quiet, mystical rhythms.
Its walls shimmered faintly with reactive enchantments, designed to adjust to spell usage, terrain illusions, and environmental simulations.
Here, ordinary laws bent around the will of magic.
Inside, it was cooler than outside, the temperature carefully regulated to prevent even slight fluctuations that might interfere with delicate spellcraft.
The floor was a smooth, pale stone, but even that was illusory, it could ripple into forest terrain, molten rock, or battlefield rubble with a single spell input.
Students poured in by the dozens, then by the hundreds.
Some took seats on the elevated side benches, others sat cross-legged directly on the floor. No one laughed. No one postured.
For once, even the prideful sons and daughters of ancient bloodlines looked quiet, reverent and anxious.
Tashi stood alone in the center of the dome. He wore a long coat threaded with runes that shimmered in and out of visibility, and a dark, lacquered staff rested in his right hand. L
His silver-white hair was pulled back into a loose braid, and his calm face gave away nothing.
He didn't speak at first. He didn't need to. His presence alone commanded attention.
A gentle pulse of mana radiated from him , not oppressive, but steady, ancient, like the deep roots of a tree that had seen empires rise and fall.
When he finally began, he didn't raise his voice. And yet, every breath, every word cut clean through the cavernous space.
"Welcome," he said, "to the most important class about healing you will ever attend."
He raised a hand. Mana gathered and shimmered into light. A translucent whiteboard appeared beside him, hovering in the air.
Then another flick of his fingers, a glowing, semi-transparent figure formed beside it, a detailed anatomical model of a human, complete with golden mana lines threading through limbs, chest, and head.
"This is the human mana system," he said. "And this" he tapped the staff once against his chest, producing a resonant thrum, "is what I've spent all my life learning how to manipulate."
He paused and surveyed the room. The silence deepened.
"Healing is not about just regrowing flesh. Not about closing wounds or purging poisons. Healing," he said, "is the act of intervening directly in the layers of existence mana, spirit, and cell. When you heal, you do not just restore. You rewrite life itself."
There was a faint, collective intake of breath.
A hand raised hesitantly it was one of the veteran students from the Noble Track.
"Isn't healing mostly chant-based spells, Professor Tashi?"
Tashi turned his head slowly.
"That's like saying music is just notes," he replied. "It's not wrong, but it's painfully shallow."
Another pause. Then a sharp clap of his hands.
A wave of mana washed through the Dome like a ripple in still water.
Students shivered as their own internal mana trembled in response.
"I will teach you three layers of healing," Tashi continued,
"each more complex and more dangerous than the last, surface restoration, internal regeneration, and mana-based reconstruction. By the time you reach the third, you will understand why most healers stop at the first."
A murmur of excitement and nervousness passed through the crowd.
"But first," he said, "we begin with control. Healing starts with understanding mana as a thread, thin, precise, and sensitive."
He turned toward the glowing board, and an elegant line of mana extended from his fingertip so fine that it was nearly invisible.
It looped gracefully through the air and curled around his index finger like silk thread.
"Your first task is to form a thread of mana as thin as a hair and loop it around your finger. Do not snap it. Do not let it break. Until you can do this, you cannot proceed."
All around the dome, students exhaled and began trying.
The first half-hour was chaos.
Mana hissed and sputtered. Threads sparked, curled, then snapped.
Some managed a loop only for it to dissolve midway. Others couldn't even get a stable stream.
Neal sat quietly near the back with Jered and Kaelen.
His hands moved slowly, patiently, and within seconds, he had shaped a smooth, near-invisible mana loop that hovered like a wire around his finger.
Tashi's gaze lingered on him for the briefest of seconds, his expression unreadable.
Others around Neal noticed it and grew visibly frustrated.
Jered, muttering curses, tried again and again until his mana finally formed a crude loop rough, but stable.
Kaelen scoffs.
"What's too hard about it, I have done it multiple times" then with a flick of his finger make a mana thread nearly invisible coiling around his finger very sturdy and stable.
All the nearby students cast him an envious gaze.
One by one, students either failed or barely scraped by.
But none were scolded.
Tashi walked among them with long strides, correcting hand positions, suggesting breathing rhythms, and sometimes, simply demonstrating without saying a word.
And it worked slowly, the energy in the dome shifted from frustration to grit.
After over an hour, he moved on.
"Next," he said, "you will learn to feel the mana pulse of another being. Every living thing has a rhythm like a heartbeat, but made of spirit and mana combined. If you cannot feel this pulse, you cannot heal. You will only be damage."
The room tensed.
"I want each of you to sit across from a partner,"
Tashi instructed.
"No touching. Eyes closed. Try to feel their mana beat from where you are."
A rustle of movement followed as students partnered off.
Kaelen and Jered faced each other. Neal reluctantly paired with a Gold-ranked noble girl who looked equally annoyed to be matched with him.
Eyes closed. Silence stretched.
Kaelen reached out not with his hands, but with something deeper.
He extended his senses like he'd done before in battle.
Within moments, he felt Jered's pulses rapid, fiery, like a heartbeat echoing through magma.
"Got it," Kaelen whispered.
Jered blinked. "Already?"
Kaelen just smirked and said nothing.
Neal, on the other hand, growled. "She's either dead or has the mana signature of a slug."
The girl huffed. "Maybe you're the slug."
Around them, students struggled. Some broke concentration and had to start over.
Tashi moved like a quiet shadow, offering no praise or criticism, only guidance.
By late afternoon, many were drenched in sweat, emotionally and mentally exhausted. But progress had been made.
One boy passed out from overextension. A girl threw up quietly in the corner. Another accidentally triggered a mana backlash and singed her own hair.
But Tashi said nothing. He simply covered the unconscious with a flick of his staff, healed the injured without a chant, and continued.
As sunset turned the dome's ceiling into a warm gradient of orange and gold, Tashi finally raised his staff vertically and struck the floor.
A quiet gong sound rang out.
"That's enough for today," he said. "Come tomorrow if you wish to keep going but be warned it will almost be the same thing. Healing is not a trick. Not a list of spells. It is a craft. I will not rush you."
He turned and began walking away.
Students began filing out slowly, murmuring quietly, eyes tired but wide with wonder.
Today had felt less like a lesson and more like stepping into a torture room.
Kaelen, Jered and Neal remained.
Tashi didn't need to ask why.
He turned fully to face them.
"Tomorrow," he said, "we begin real healing. Not magic. Not theory. The kind that keeps people alive when gods try to kill them."
Kaelen frowned slightly. "What do you mean?"
Tashi gave him a long look.
"There is a reason clerics are the first to die in wars," he said quietly. "Because they save lives that fate had already claimed. And fate does not like being cheated."
He began to walk away.
"Oh," he added without turning, "bring something living with a wound tomorrow. Anything. Animals, monsters, people I don't care."
Jered blinked. "You're not going to provide something?"
Tashi's voice echoed faintly as he vanished into a corridor of light.
"You want to be healers? Then start caring where the wounds come from."
Kaelen scratched his head. "What the fuck is he saying? Is it even related"
Jered nonchalantly answered. "Who cares just be present that's all"
"Boring!".