"Umm," Marie vocalised while twiddling her fingers embarrassedly. "I-I didn't..."historical

"It's fine," Guy said with a light cough. "I understand. You were just excited - no harm done."

"No, I mean-" Marie tried. "I wasn't..."

"Look, Marie, there are at least five years between us. I'm as old as Grace. It's fine," Guy continued his explanation with a warm smile.

Marie eyed Guy's expressions carefully and sighed in relief upon realising that her hasty and impulsive actions weren't misconstrued. She too was quite surprised at her emotional outburst, which took place for the first time in her life. It wasn't an action brought on by attraction; her opinion of Teacher Larks wasn't skewed in that sense. She didn't know what possessed her to do it, but the emotions she felt after doing it, albeit for barely a short second, washed her with a sense of comfort and gratitude.

Marie then snapped her head and glared forcefully at Markus, who was struggling to hide a mischievous smile. The two had lived together long enough to understand the hidden implication in each other's gazes, and right now it looked like Markus was just eagerly awaiting the next opportunity to spill everything he had seen to the others in the orphanage. With a tactful scowl, Marie transmitted, 'If you tell anyone, I will chop you into a million pieces,' which caused Markus to shrink into his body in fear.

"You need to prepare yourself," Guy instructed, shifting the stagnant conversation forward. "Let's start meditating."

With that, the Teacher and Student started the process. Guy had already tailored a fitting sequence of poses for Marie to follow when practising Yoga. With familiarity, the duo commenced with a simple cross-legged posture to centre their breathing. There was sufficient space within the room to accommodate the duo as well as Markus who was, at this point, squashed into a corner with his head lowered in his book.

Gradually, the ambience within the room started to enter a pleasant standstill.

Eventually, Marie managed to enter a steady meditative state, at which point Guy added, "Extend your mana sense to one per cent of its maximum range."

Marie's experience with mana control was very limited. It took her nearly an hour of steady mana manipulation to achieve the one per cent limit Teacher Larks had set for her. After she managed to hold the mana sense stably, Teacher Larks said, "Now, open up your mana sense to its maximum capacity. Become receptive to everything that the sensor captures. Hold it for no more than half a second!"

She followed as instructed, however, she immediately faced difficulty as she attempted to open up her receptivity. Although it sounded simple in instruction, the process was extremely complicated because its basis was beyond mortal understanding. For comparison, a human is limited to their five basic senses. They know what the senses are open to, and how to interpret this information. Since humans do not know what exists beyond the limits of these five senses, it is often difficult for mages to absorb information through mana sense that is foreign to their mortal senses. This was the barrier Marie was currently colliding against.

"Do not think of the mana sense as a part of you. The more you think of it as such, the less you will perceive. Hence, do not actively focus on what the mana sense captures," Guy pointed out.

Marie processed this new set of instructions and gradually loosened her vigilance. Incrementally, the extended sensory data she kept receiving started to blend into an incomprehensible mush. Then, out of nowhere, an inhuman quantity of what can only be classified as illogical gibberish assaulted Marie's mind causing her to reel over in pain and get thrown out of her meditative state.

"AAAAH!" Marie evoked while grasping her head tightly.

Markus immediately rushed forward with concern showing on his face but was immediately stopped by a monotone and firm command from his Master, "Don't agitate her. She needs to recuperate by herself."

Marie rolled on the ground like a salted slug, pulling at her hair from its scalps. Just a fraction of a second's worth of exposure to everything that radiated around her had put her in such a sorry state. She shuddered internally as she pondered over what would happen if she were to allow double this pressure to bear down on her. For a moment, a part of her subconsciously urged her to give up immediately, yet the doubt was immediately doused by the force of her unbending will. She had to go through with it, to the bitter end.

Guy exited his meditative state and helped Marie up after the pain had passed. Within the short moment, she had become as dishevelled as someone who had undergone days' worth of torture. With an apologetic and dejected tone, Guy said, "Take the day off. Since you've set your mind to it, try to start building up resistance to this process. Do not be foolhardy and push yourself beyond your limits. Look at what happened to you now!"

Marie nodded and prepared to leave, but was immediately caught by Guy who then propped her against himself and helped her walk. "I'll take you to your room."

Markus darted up and immediately intercepted them. "Master, let me!" to which Guy readily complied.

"Why are you doing this?" Markus inquired in a low voice as he helped Marie to her room. "Why are you putting yourself through all this?"

Marie lifted her face slowly and muttered with a wavering tone, "Family must be protected. At all costs!"

"Why do you have to be the one? Huh!" Markus challenged angrily. "Let me! Wasn't this the reason you sent me to the Academy?"

"I'm sorry," Marie answered weakly. "I was being too selfish. It should have been me. You've suffered a lot, Markus."

Markus controlled his swelling emotions and pushed down the sudden urge to bawl. "Look. I'm strong now. I can handle it, I promise!"

"I know. I believe you. But I don't want you to be alone," Marie said with finality in her voice. Markus frowned in dismay and didn't continue the conversation.

____

In the following weeks, Marie entered a frenzied state of diligently practising the process of exposing her mana sense to everything around her, much to Grace's dissatisfaction. Observing Marie walk around in shambles discomfited Grace greatly, and she had constantly accosted Guy verbally regarding this. It wasn't like Guy could do anything about it besides bearing with the abuse. Guy was also bothered by the way Krish handled this situation and was equally interested in confronting the man about it. But he was powerless to do anything, lest he angers someone who could extinguish them all with a single snap.

The days passed like this, with a charged atmosphere prevailing during dinner times, until one day, Marie walked in with a satisfied smile on her face. Guy knew straight away that the girl had made some progress

"Are you ready for the next step?" Guy asked.

"As ready as I will ever be, Teacher Larks," Marie answered flatly and then, without wasting any more time, the two tacitly entered a meditative state through Yoga.

Guy followed his usual method of |Introspect| to access his core. The area was exactly the same as before, reminiscent of a bright, isolated room from a mental health institution with an out-of-place elevation leading to a mirror-like, unperturbed liquid pool. Upon entry, Guy quickly dove through the membranous surface and entered The Church.

Here, Guy observed a few glaring differences from his previous extensive visit. For one, the figures of Jean and Marie had gained greater clarity, the former more than the latter. This was primarily because Jean had successfully entered the Middle stage of Mana Condensation realm a while back and was reaching the cusp of breaking through to the Late stage. The rate of her advancement to this stage, which was approximately three months, was starkly faster than Markus'. This was primarily due to the ampler access to resources she enjoyed compared to the boy. Having the force of a renowned and wealthy clan backing her, the girl had access to a nigh endless supply of mana crystals, mana replenishing potions, body rejuvenation and reinforcement potions, internal cleansing potions, and so on, which Markus lacked.

Markus was a little jealous of Jean, which was a natural response. But it was only a fleeting emotion. The boy had matured vastly through the past few years and understood that feeling jealous of the luck and privilege of others was futile. One had to make do with the hand one was dealt, and Markus was satisfied with his efforts as he recognised that he had done his best. Besides, since his Junior Sister was exclusively his Master's student, he was also awarded the same benefits. Nowadays, Markus didn't have to scrounge and save up his mana crystals and potions either.

Marie, on the other hand, had only just reached the peak of the Early stage of Mana Condensation realm. Her journey was much more orthodox compared to Markus and Jean's, and since she was perfectly attuned to her cultivation method, her advancement was smooth and generally faster.

Guy approached her ethereal figure and grasped it, pulling the girl into The Church.

"Wha- Where?" Marie exclaimed as she felt herself within a foreign space all of a sudden. "Ah! So this is the place..." she muttered after relaxing her nerves.

This was Marie's first time in The Church. She had only heard through Markus and Jean how it felt like, and she was excited to witness it herself. Except, she was too embarrassed to ask Teacher Larks to take her into this space as it wasn't a trivial trick that he could pull out anytime someone wanted, and it would also be disrespectful.

"Look over there," Guy said while pointing behind the dais, where a large black screen had descended.