[City of Magnolia]
"You think the old man is a dictator?"
"Huh, what's dic-ta-tor mean?" Gildart's asked
Ivan rolled his eyes "Someone who uses their power to choose what people to ."
Gildarts looked at him with a raised eyebrow "No not really, why do you?"
"Sometimes, like what if he just made it so that he got first dibs on all the good food or good ale. What if he even made us clean up all his messes.'
Gildarts paused to think and then turned to Ivan, he had a surprised face "I guess now that you mention it kinda. He does get first dibs on food, I never see him do any cleaning, and he orders around everyone in the guild, maybe your right."
Ivan shrugged "You should tell him that when we see him, maybe we could make a stand against tyranny."
Gildart's nodded while Ivan tried to hide his smile.
The two were currently making their way down the early morning streets of the Magnolia. Not many people were out at this time. It was very early in the morning after all and not many jobs in Magnolia worked on such early schedules. The city was after all a party city.
The two had been given instructions to meet Makarov at the training ground. Fairy Tail owned only one training field within the city so it wasn't hard to find out where they were going.
Ivan hadn't remembered the last time he'd heard about the training grounds being used, the guild didn't have much use for it; only during the summer did they use it for games, while other times the grounds were used by younger mages to actually train.
Ivan wondered if Makarov had even checked to see if the grounds had been reserved or had he old man just taken them for himself, he was the guild master after all. He supposed the geezer could do anything he wanted too.
As the two kept walking Gildart's reached into his pocket to start eating. He threw pieces of stale bread into his mouth; the sound seemed to echo through the streets as Ivan turned to give him a sour look.
"wHaT?" he asked while chewing
"Can you be any louder?"
Gildarts paused then nodded "YeA!"
He started to chew right in front of Ivan's face, making the sound as loud as can be.
Ivan resisted the urge to punch him.
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Makarov cleared his throat, "Yesterday I gave you two a brief lecture about the basics of magic, now I want to see what you remember."
Ivan and Gildart's were both sitting down on the grass of the training field, Makarov sat on a rock only a foot away his arms crossed and eyes locked onto the two.
"Ethernano is a term used to describe the particles that make up magical power." Ivan said
Gildart's spoke next, "And magical power is the energy mages use to cast spells."
Makarov nodded a smile on his face, "Good, that's all you too need to know for today. Though I have question for you too, how does a mage become a mage?" his question was not so much aimed at Gildarts who looked lost but Ivan
Ivan thought and to be honest he didn't really have an answer for Makarov. He knew it must've mentioned in the anime, but he couldn't remember it for the life of him. Was it like Nen from hunter? Would Makarov have to inject magical power into them? Perhaps, but he kept thinking, maybe it was more like Naruto, and some people were just born with it. No! That just didn't make sense, he had the potential to be a mage and Gildarts too, but they weren't born with magic at their fingertips, so what was it!
His face scrunched up and Makarov seemed to notice.
His voice was calm and gentle when he spoke, "It's ok if you don't know Ivan."
Ivan locked eyes with Makarov, "I don't know, what about you Gildarts?"
Gildarts glanced at him before Makarov, "Na, beats me."
Makarov nodded, "That's fine and honestly what I expected, the thing is most mages simply awaken to magic through traumatic events, they are considered natural born mages, anomalies almost." he chuckled at the world, "As I mentioned to you yesterday Ivan magic doesn't make sense all the time, sometimes it can be...fickle."
Ivan nodded remembering the words 'Jeez, why am I acting like kid right now? Getting worked up over a simple question that I was never supposed to know, even Gildarts knew when to give up and I'm almost thrice his senior.' a sigh escaped his lips 'I'm assuming Makarov wants to teach me some sort of lesson, that its ok to be wrong or something along those lines, ahh look at me falling right into his trap like a cliche protagonist.'
"But that's not the only way, right?"
Makarov's eyes turned to Gildarts his face showing the barest hint of surprised at Gildarts statement, "You would be correct Gildarts, it is not the only way, once upon a time it may have seemed so, but now a days another more civil method has been found and used by senior mages when teaching their students." he paused as he began to stand
"If I was your master long ago, I may have well put you two in a life-or-death situation to awaken your magic." he chuckled darkly, "However, lucky for you two we are in a much different time, instead I will have you both enter a mediative position where you can concentrate the best. That is how we will awaken your magic."
Ivan thought about his words 'Really? We're going to mediate and awaken to magic? There's no way it's that simple.'
Makarov raised one finger, "Though I do want to point out one thing to you both, when you are mediating you should focus on connecting. Connecting to the world around you. Your magical power will form as a result to your spirit connecting to natures flow, to the ethernano around you. It's believed by many scholars now and even one's dating back to older times, such as Mildian, that to channel magic the best emotions or one's passion can play a vital role."
Ivan raised an eyebrow "Old Mildian?"
Makarov looked at him "Ah, I've never mentioned that name to you two before have I?"
"Nope"
"Never"
Makarov chuckled, "My old master, the second guild master, had quite the curiosity in magical history. He may have passed that down to me." Makarov seemed to stare off into the distance thinking back, "Mildian was an old city founded by magical scholars who wanted to learn as much as they could about magic, they developed many theories and even magics. Most of which have been lost, though pieces of their research have been recovered and studied by the scholars of the magic council, it's the main reason why we have so much knowledge on magic now a days."
Ivan looked at Makarov for a moment, "What happened to the city? If it had so much magical knowledge, how come you're talking about it with an air of...sadness."
Makarov looked to Ivan, "That, that is a question for another day Ivan. It's safe to say that while magic can be a wonderful thing in some hands, it can also be an awful in others."
Ivan paused as he thought for a moment 'Is he talking about Zeref? Likely, I do recall Zeref being something of a magical scholar before his curse. Did he destroy the city by accident or on purpose?'
Ivan would look into it later, for now he needed to learn magic and stop thinking about it. Him and Gildarts both got into mediative positions, Ivan wondered if he looked like some sort of monk.
Makarov stood before them "Take a deep breath in and remember to think about your passion for magic. Why you want to learn and most importantly.... who you are right now."
Ivan took a deep breath in, and he could hear Gildarts do the same. 'Why do I want to learn magic? Well, I guess cause it fucking cool?'
He opened one eye to see if anything had changed, something had changed.
Makarov stood before him with a stick in his hand, eyes staring directly at Ivan. "Keep your eyes shut!" The stick came down and smacked Ivan on the head
The pain was minimal but the meaning from Makarov was simple, don't lose focus and don't mess around. He regained his focus and closed his eyes. 'Why do I want to learn magic? What's my passion?'
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