Trotting along beside Adam, Leander sent little bursts of mana spiraling out into the ether. The practice was so ingrained at this point he didn't even have to concentrate. It started almost a year after he had taken on an air aspect in his mana. After months and months of practicing, he noticed something around Laurel one day during their morning workout.

Another few weeks of trying to figure it out, and one chagrined question-and-answer session later, he learned that Laurel was constantly in contact with the air around her. It fed her information when anyone moved around and let her eavesdrop on conversations if she wanted to. Which in turn answered a lot of other questions about how she was impossible to surprise.

Knowing something was a far cry from being able to do it himself. If he concentrated with everything he had, he could send a tendril of mana out and, if he was lucky, listen to something he wouldn't otherwise hear. But he had to know exactly where to concentrate, build a bridge of mana, and maintain it the entire time. If his concentration wavered at all during the process, the effort was wasted.

He kept at it. Every time he wasn't otherwise occupied, he sent strands of mana off into the air. Laurel said he'd eventually get to a point where he could keep a full sphere of awareness without conscious effort. The connection to the element and the hidden parts of his own mind would take care of it.

Which gave him something to do during Adam's rant as they approached the University.

"You have to show up early, but not too early. These guys like to feel self-important, but you can't ever let them think you value their time over your own. Understand?"

Leander nodded, not that Adam really needed his participation. It didn't matter, it was more about existing nearby. He knew how lucky he'd gotten when he first reached out to Adam for help. That the older man hadn't turned him away was his own personal miracle. That he was then brought into the sect and got to learn and do more than he could ever have imagined? Sometimes he had to remind himself it wasn't a dream.

So whenever Adam needed help at these things, Leander tried to tag along. The others felt it was like chores, but Leander knew better. It was Adam's way of teaching him about the world. He would absorb those lessons the same way he listened to Laurel when she talked about cultivating, or Martin when they sparred.

They came to a stop outside of the gates, carved lions staring them down as they approached. Leander shifted so the large pack he was carrying would sit easier on his back. The growth spurt was coming, he could feel it.

"It all comes down to clout. Every single one of the professors in there thinks their research is the most important field of study there is. They should get all the funding and all the best students. It doesn't matter how ridiculously niche the topic is, or if their theories are wrong, they are fully convinced of the fact.

"They jockey amongst themselves for everything. Offices, publications, and of course, funding. The University gets funding from the palace, but only a few items are specified. The rest is discretionary.

"Make no mistake. If they see an opportunity to get one over on a rival, they'll pounce. We're walking into a fistfight, lad. And the opponents are career toughs."

Having reached the conclusion of the day's life lesson, he turned to Leander for confirmation he understood. Instead he looked first over his shoulder at the pack, then pointedly at Adam, then the gates.

Adam huffed. "The difference is my research actually is the most important. And we don't need their funding."

The colloquium room was not very impressive after living and learning in their sect house for years. Seven rows of desks filled the classroom, the walls lined with additional seating, lit by oil lamps and whatever sunlight valiantly battled through the vines and shrubbery outside the window. Half full of old men and women in a rainbow of robes, sitting in clumps and talking to one another. A few students were mixed in as well, but they seemed unsure of what to do with themselves. They sat quietly, focusing on the cookies and tea that had been set out in one corner.

Leander knew for a fact that when Laurel came up she spoke in the outdoor amphitheater. According to her, that was because she was a bigger draw. According to Adam, because she set a fire the first time she visited and they were afraid of needing to do repairs.

He attempted to detour to the snacks but Adam grabbed the strap of his backpack and dragged him up to the podium instead. Notes set out, diagrams and other props carefully ordered. Adam had drilled him on all of the cues until he had them memorized, not that it was difficult. But a cultivator never shirked their duty.

At sixteenth bell, an older man ran inside, his gold-embroidered robe mussed like he had just tossed it on before running here. He patted down his long beard as he came up towards the front. Leander heard Adam's "wannabe wizard" and smiled at the thought. Their host did look like he was dressed as a fairy tale wizard, only missing a staff and a hat. Or an awesome sidekick.

The man waved to get everyones' attention, and launched into a speech. "Yes, thanks for coming everyone. Today we have Adam de Ranier, Loremaster of the Eternal Archive, and the title of his talk is 'An Argument for Increasing Rates of Cultivation Amongst the General Populace'."

The wizard man nabbed a few of the cookies Leander wasn't allowed to try, and slumped into a seat. Adam took that as his cue to begin.

"Thank you for having me. I'll start with an overview of how mana interacts with the physical world."

That was Leander's first cue. He held up the thin board, painted with a flow diagram. It was one of the basic ones they used for lessons, Leander could have recreated it in his sleep.

What followed was a complicated version of the lessons they usually gave to the new recruits. The words were fancier but they meant the same thing. Mana was everywhere, and it let magic happen. What else would they need to know?

A lot, as it turned out. The professors, who had looked so kindly and nonthreatening to start, had evolved into feral dogs, snapping at any opening.

"What proof do you have of those currents, is that diagram a faithful representation?"

"How can these things be measured? Has anyone reviewed the findings outside of your organization?"

"Why should this matter when we have natural, observable phenomena to work on understanding?"

Every time Leander held up a diagram or shot out an airblast in demonstration, someone would interrupt with a question. The last one was the worst. Only Adam's preparation kept Leander from confronting the man. He was lolling across a chair in the dead center of the room, like a self-appointed throne. And he treated them like they were interlopers to his kingdom.

"What good is a model of the natural world that leaves out a fundamental, observable force?" Adam wasn't thrown off by the questions at all. He parried them all back without blinking.

"Is it observable?" The mean one said.

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Leander scoffed, anyone who practiced enough could learn to see mana. Adam batted the question down and continued with the presentation. Halfway through, they switched from the teaching aids for the sect to the boards Adam had printed for this talk. It was pretty cool. He could make the ink on the sheet of paper glued to the front say anything he could think of. Even if it dried he could take it out or change the letters. If he tried hard, he could even make the ink out of magic. That had collapsed the older man when he first tried it. Laurel had turned that afternoon into an impromptu lecture on mana transmutation and how different types of materials were more- or less-difficult to create.

Now Adam was going on between vortex and tidal cultivators, and the differences. This was Leander's favorite part. He gathered his mana, connecting to the air around him. On his mark, a massive gust burst out in all directions. Hair flew back and robes flapped in the wind. Two chairs fell over. Not bad, but he could do better next time.

To contrast, Adam pulled out some ink from the flask he always carried, and formed a series of cool shapes in the air, then imprinted it onto a clean board they'd brought for this point. The letters marched across the page, spelling out the beginnings of a poem Leander had been forced to memorize by his tutor.

No one in the audience was impressed enough at the display. The students had perked up, enjoying the magic, but every one of the professors was pretending like it wasn't the best thing they'd seen that day.

Adam cleared his throat and sipped from the cup of tea he'd gotten, somehow. Apparently it was only Leander who was denied the snacks. "I"m sure you're all glad we didn't bring any of our students with fire aspects."

That at least got a laugh. Probably because they didn't know how real of a threat that was. Gabrielle had been the second person to volunteer for this trip. She liked attention and notoriety, and if she had a chance to start a reputation up the hill like the one that was already spreading in the lower districts, she would take it.

"This first graph shows a breakdown of population in the City of Verilia, as of this morning. This next is the same information, broken down by district and age."

"This next chart shows average strength, life expectancy, and mental acumen of cultivators and non-cultivators. Here we define cultivator as anyone that can intentionally connect to their own mana. As you can see, cultivators score higher in all categories by a significant margin. Even if we remove outliers, those that have gone to extreme levels of their cultivation, we see notable improvements.

"Thus I argue that we should focus on teaching this baseline ability to as many people as possible. While the resources required to achieve at the highest levels will always be limited, a more robust, more productive, and stronger populace will benefit Merista in the long run."

"I'll pause here for questions."

What followed could only be described as a bloodbath. On both sides. For every point in Adam's presentation, one of the audience members had a way to pick it apart. Where were the numbers from, how did he know they would be accurate? That wasn't feasible, who would do the teaching, why would it matter, isn't this just attempted overreach?

Each time, Adam had an answer prepared. The mean one, who'd already interrupted more than once, even got into an argument about if having a healthier population was a good thing. Even Leander knew that was stupid.

An eternity later, it was over. A halfhearted round of applause was all the thanks they got as most people filed out of the room.

"We'll be doing lunch at The Marionette," the wizard called out after their retreating backs.

Leander helped by putting everything back together, while a few of the professors lingered.

"Thanks for coming up here lad, great talk." It was the mean one. Who had been holding court and attacking them any way he could. Now he was shaking Adam's hand like they were best friends. And Adam was letting him. No comments or anything. In the Flats, that guy would have gotten a punch to the face for acting like that.

Leander had a moment to feel grateful he hadn't had a formal education.

He traipsed after the crowd of professors, Adam now in their midst, all the way to an expensive pub around the corner from the University gates. A creepy puppet stared at him all through lunch, which he forced down. It would take more than that to put him off a free meal at a decent restaurant. When the gathering broke up, the professors, now tipsy, went back to the university, while Adam and Leander turned the opposite direction.

"Thanks for the help today," Adam said when they were alone.

Leander gave him a thumbs up. It was fun for him, so why would he mind?

"Not sure how many I convinced. A few of the younger ones maybe, but none of the committee members. Maybe if I was more than a glorified printing press."

He angled his steps to bump his shoulder into Adam's. His cultivation was impressive, he had to stop acting like it wasn't. A cultivator's might came down to willpower and confidence. If they believed failure was imminent, then they would never succeed.

"I know. I know." Adam threw his hands in the air. "Martin told me they were banning my complaints in the sect house. I just need to get it out every once in a while."

The Loremaster visibly shook himself, resetting for their next errand. Leander might have had an ulterior motive when he volunteered to come.

"You ready?"

"Then let's do this," he said when Leander nodded in confirmation.

The first bookshop was only a few streets over from the university, and catered mostly to students there. He reveled in the dry scent of paper as he walked in. Large shelves full of notebooks, pens, and more esoteric stationary implements dominated a whole wall, while textbooks took up most of the remaining space. Leander ignored all of that and went straight to the fiction section. Or the fiction shelf, as it was in this particular shop.

It was a disappointment but he wasn't worried. This was only the first stop. It took him a handful of minutes to skim the whole shelf. The books were mostly used, sold to the shop from graduating students, and the titles were popular. There was only one option he hadn't read before, the fourth in an adventure series in which a dashing young wizard fought monsters around the world. As he himself was such a dashing young wizard, Leander was a big fan. He brought it up to the counter and carefully placed a few coins on the counter to pay.

Annette's required budgeting left him with a small amount each month. What didn't go to pastries went into his growing collection of books. Soon he would need another shelf for his room at the sect. The thought warmed him to the core. He would never forget his childhood on the streets and the harsh lessons it imparted. It was one of the reasons he was so great today. But every sign that it was over, that he had a place and a family to call his own was something to cherish.

Purchase tucked away, he went to find Adam. The older man was on the hunt, prowling each shelf like a lion stalking its prey. Leander finally caught up to him where he was hunched over, examining the bottom shelf in the natural science section. A stack of tomes was growing beside him, as he periodically plucked something off the shelf and added to it.

Leander grabbed the pile and lugged it to the front desk. Then repeated the process twice more before Adam was satisfied.

"Tell me your best offer," Adam said when he returned to where the horrified clerk was standing.

"Um, well give me a second to add everything."

They waited patiently as the clerk pulled out a paper and started doing sums for how many books Adam was buying. Then the haggling started. If they were buying so many, surely they could get a discount? And delivery down the hill? In the end Adam walked out satisfied, Leander trailing behind clutching his own purchase, and the clerk was left looking like a tornado had come through the shop.

"One down, four to go," Adam said. Any trace of melancholy was gone, replaced by pure glee as they hailed a cab to take them to the next shop.

It was an attitude impossible to resist, and Leander didn't try. He loved bookshops. The next two were close together. One focused on literature, which Adam loaded up on just as much as the textbooks, though Leander wasn't thrilled with their selection. All classics and complicated metaphors, which he didn't mind. But they all referenced things he'd never heard of before, when all he was looking for was a fun story. But there was one about a witch he picked up anyway. It might turn out to be good.

The next was not even worth the stop. Adam combed the entire place and ended up not buying anything. Leander felt terrible and went to purchase something small before Adam dragged him out.

"It happens. Second hand stores are hit or miss, but you still have to check. Don't want to lose out when someone clears out their grandfather's library without realizing what they have."

Their route took them by another store, with Hook's Books written in bold letters above the door. A stylized fishing hood hung down to the side, with a book stabbed onto the end. Leander made for the door before a tug at the back of his neck stopped him.

"We're not going in there."

He quirked a single eyebrow. Learning how to do that had taken months of practice in front of a mirror, but it was worth it.

"Hook's a bastard. He's not getting any coin from us. Next place is a few districts over."

That was all the explanation Leander recieved.

It wasn't until after all the shops, when they'd stopped at a food stand selling fried falafel wrapped in warm pita that anything put a damper in his day.

"We're talking about this," Adam said. He wasn't making eye contact but he squared his shoulders like it was about to be unpleasant. "Why aren't you evolving your aspect."

Noooooo. He'd had this conversation already with Martin and Rebecca. Coming from Adam was worse. If Laurel decided to bring it up too he was not sure he'd stay strong. He shrugged at Adam's question. It was his path, he got to do whatever he wanted. No one could tell him what aspects to cultivate. It was in the sect rules. He'd checked!

They had walked to a park, empty at this time of day when no one was lingering outside longer than they had to.

"I WILL BECOME A STORM CULTIVATOR." He frowned. Every time he used the technique, he tried to make it quiet, and every time it came out as a shout. Laurel told him with enough practice, he would get there, but it was becoming annoying. He had a new mana stone, one he'd made himself after his original gift from Laurel finally dissolved last year. But he avoided using it. If he could make this technique work, he would be able to communicate whenever he wanted, no matter what.

Adam sighed for a full five seconds. Leander counted. "Okay, I'll say this once and then you can do what you want. Having role models, heroes, people to look up to, that's great and important. But admiring someone doesn't mean you have to be them. They had different lives, different struggles, which you'll never recreate. You can be a poor imitation of your heroes, or learn from them and be the best version of you."

"Alright, that's my feelings quota for the day. We have to stop by the guild warehouse and buy some moonflower for Laurel before they close so let's get moving."

Leander trailed behind. He could see Adam's point, but he'd already decided. Hadn't he? He would be a protector for his friends and the sect, and he'd already seen the best way to do that.

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