When they arrived at Non's house, the carriage came to a smooth stop in front of the mairance.

  The household staff, attentive and diligent, was already waiting for their master and his panion.

  The servants bowed respectfully as soon as Non and Emily began to step down from the luxurious carriage.

  The an, a middle-aged man with a calm expression, got down from the fro and approached Non with respect.

  “Sir, were you satisfied with the journey?” he asked, slightly bowing his head as he extended a small card towards him.

  For a moment, Non uzzled.

  ‘The journey? From the chury house?’ he thought, bewildered by the question.

  It had only been a short ride, almost insignifit for someone like him. However, not wanting to seem rude, he aowledged the an’s courtesy.

  “It was fihank you,” he replied briefly.

  “I’m at your service, sir,” the an said with a bow before a member of Non’s staff quickly stepped forward to take the card from the driver’s hand.

  Non and Emily walked towards the mairance of the house.

  Non led her directly to his study, a private room where he had ducted most of his magical research.

  Upon reag the room, Non closed the door behind them and, without wasting time, walked towards a bookshelf filled with old books.

  He searched briefly before finding the book he had been reading in the library.

  Without saying anything, he took it and ha to Emily.

  “Here you go. I want you to study this,” he said in a ral tone.

  Emily looked at the book in surprise, almost as if she couldn’t believe she was holding it.

  It was a heavy volume that looked quite valuable.

  Lifting her gaze, she looked at Non with a mix of doubt and respect.

  “What do you expect me to do with this?” she asked, still bewildered by the magnitude of the book she had received.

  Non raised an eyebrow, not fully uanding her surprise.

  “Study it, of course,” he said, as if it were the most obvious thing.

  Emily frowned, fused.

  “Aren’t we going to practice magic today?”

  Non shook his head, crossing his arms.

  “No, today we’re fog on what’s in that book. You o uand the theory before you use magic effitly.”

  Emily hough she wasirely vinced.

  She slowly opehe book, starting to flip through it, and soon found herself immersed in dense magical theory.

  As she read, various terms and cepts began to emerge, some familiar, others pletely new.

  The mana core teique was the first thing she reized.

  It was the most on teique, the one almost every mage learned first.

  The mana core allowed mages to tralize and tain their magical energy in a single point within their bodies, usually he heart.

  It was effit aile but had obvious limitations, such as the risk of overloading and slow recovery in case of damage.

  As she tinued reading, Emily discovered the teique of mana rings, created by the Kingdom of Bravka.

  The text detailed how mages could create energy rings around their core to amplify and stabilize the flow of mana.

  Emily looked up at Non, surprised by the plexity of this teique.

  “Mana rings…?” she asked, curious. “Is this the teique you use?”

  Non shook his head.

  “No. I use the core teique.”

  Non thought for a moment, recalling the limitations he had faced with his mana core.

  “And from what I’ve read about mana rings, they are more stable in the long term, but they take a lot of time to master. Also, I don’t have teachers or enough time to learn something so plex…”

  Emily nodded slowly, processing the information.

  However, the more she read about the rings, the more intrigued she became.

  “They seem to be much more effective for trolling rge amounts of mana…” she ented. “If you mao master more than three rings, you could overe the limitations of the core…”

  Non sighed.

  “Yes, but creating a ring is a slow process…”

  Emily tinued reading and found a third teique.

  Mana tattoos, associated with the Kingdom of Astralia. This method articurly iing to her, as it was pletely different from the others.

  Magical tattoos, engraved on the skin with pure mana stones, offered aernal way to manipute magical energy without relying on the core s.

  “And what about this teique?” Emily asked, pointing to the se on tattoos.

  Non approached, what she ointing at.

  “Mana tattoos… they look powerful, but extremely dangerous. If done incorrectly or if the tattoo gets damaged, it could cause an untrolble mana leak. I have very little information about it, so I’m not sidering that path, at least for now.”

  “Then… what are you pnning to do?”

  Non leaned against the desk, looking at the floor as if weighing all his options once more.

  “For now, I o keep w on my core, stabilizing and strengthening it. The rings could be an option in the long term, but I don’t know if I have the time o develop them. And the tattoos…” he paused, letting his thought trail off. “I don’t think they’re for me.”

  Emily pondered for a moment, digesting Non’s words.

  Her gaze shifted to the book she was holding, feeling its weight both in her hands and in her mind.

  A question slowly formed in her head, and she couldn’t help but ask it.

  “Why didn’t you go for the ring teique?” she asked, curious about Non’s choice.

  Non looked at her, somewhat surprised by the question, but his expression rexed before he answered.

  “Because that teique did back then.”

  Emily blinked in surprise.

  What she had thought was an old, well-known teique turned out to be somethiively ret.

  She looked again at the book in her hands, realizing the magnitude of what she was holding.

  “That means this book… is more up-to-date than I thought,” she ented, amazed. Then, she looked up at Non. “Thank you fiving me access to something so valuable.”

  Non nodded slightly, not giving the gesture much importance.

  “You need all the information possible if you’re really going to learn. There’s no point in giving you outdated knowledge.”

  Still impressed by what she was reading, Emily then asked with geerest:

  “Which of these teiques is you the most?”

  Non looked at her thoughtfully, and after a few seds of silence, he answered:

  “I’m not sure, but what I know about the core is that it’s more direct… very versatile. But tely, due to… my dition, I’ve been thinking about other alternatives. Still, the core is quite fortable.”

  Emily nodded, refleg on his words.

  However, a new doubt filled her mind.

  “How do you feel about your core now?”

  As soon as she finished asking, she realized how obvious and painful the question was.

  Immediately, regret fshed across her face.

  Non gave a small, tired smile as he noticed her rea, uanding that there was no ill i in the question.

  “My core is failing, yes, but it’s not irreversible. F a core is easy. The tricky part is keeping it stable, especially when you overexert it like I did during the war. As for the rings…” he paused, looking at her holy, “I ’t tell you much because I’m just learning about their existenow. I had never heard of them until today.”

  Emily looked at him, surprised.

  The idea that someone as advanced as Non didn’t know about mana rings shocked her.

  But there was something more, something that uled her.

  After everything she had heard and learned, an impulse grew within her.

  “I want to follow the same path as you,” she decred, with a mix of determination aation in her voice.

  Non, hearing her, gave a small ugh, though there was a shadow of mencholy in his expression.

  “I wouldn’t reend it. My path…” he paused, remembering all the moments of pain, humiliation, the times he had felt powerless aed until he was finally reized as a hero. “It’s not easy. My magi’t… what you’d expect from an ordinary person.”

  Emily looked at him, intrigued.

  She had never sidered what y behind Non’s power; she had only seen the results, but at that moment, she realized she had no idea what the true nature of his magic was.

  “Don’t you use wind magic?” she asked, astonished.

  “No, I don’t use wind magic or any other elemental magic.”

  Emily remained silent, trying to process that revetion.

  Indeed, she had never seen him use aal spell like es.

  People spoke of him with admiration, but always with a veil of mystery surrounding his abilities.

  She couldn’t help but think of the rumors about his prowess in war.

  ‘What kind of magic does he really use?’ she wondered.

  Finally, she decided to ask directly.

  “What kind of magic are you ied in, then? Because everyone seems curious about what you do… even I am,” Emily admitted.

  Non looked her directly in the eyes, and for a moment, he seemed to be debating whether or not to tell her the truth.