After the small speech of Miss Elana, the students were all shown where they would reside and where they could find utilities.

  The "utilities" were essentially just multiple large barrels full of water, which, whenever they wanted to bathe themselves, they had to go to, and take a few buckets worth of water with them into the bathing area.

  After the past week in the inn, Kalmia felt uncomfortable thinking about going back to washing herself with a bucket.

  At least for her, it would be less of a problem than most of her classmates. They seemed to shudder and looked disgusted. They probably never before washed themselves with a bucket instead of warm, running water.

  Something suddenly came into Kalmia’s mind. How would they even warm the water? Even for her, taking a cold bath was extremely uncomfortable.

  As if she had read the room, Miss Elana loudly said something.

  "If you don't know how to warm the water up, meet me at my room later. I will teach you some fire magic."

  One of the students spoke up.

  "But didn't you say no fire?"

  "You listened well, good! But fire magic doesn't only include making a fire. If you send it directly into water, the water starts boiling. If you tone it down to the point it doesn't extrude a flame any more, it gives off hot air, and if you increase the output, you can even create something like explosions. Of course there are many other possibilities, especially when mixing the elements, but for now we will focus on these most common use cases."

  While she said that, she showed the students how it can boil water, or give off hot air. On the ship, however, she wouldn't endanger the students by using fire, which could potentially burn the entire ship down.

  It appeared Miss Elana wanted to test the students on their way to SIA and teach them some magic along the way.

  Kalmia didn’t know much about magic. She knew it existed, and that it could potentially do anything, but she didn't know that a single element of magic had this many use cases. Just a 'simple' fire spell, depending on strength, could only be hot air or water... or amplified to explosion.

  In the back of her head, Kalmia asked herself why, in that case, she hadn’t encountered someone who used magic to attack someone yet, but didn't find an answer.

  After this, she showed the students to their rooms. The boys and girls areas were separated by a simple door. Miss Elana told the boys to stay in the area with their rooms. After that, she showed the girls to their rooms and handed out their keys. Engraved in the key was a number which correlated to the numbers written on the doors.

  "If you have any problems, don't worry about knocking on my door. It is right down the hall, the first door on the left side," Miss Elana said, while she pointed towards a door opposite to the boys area.

  "I will show the boys to their rooms now."

  With this, Miss Elana left through the door to the boys area again.

  Kalmia opened the door to her room to put her things away before doing anything else.

  The room wasn't very big, but large enough to fit a normal size bed into it. She didn't see a window anywhere, but there were some weird illuminating balls. When Kalmia tried to touch them, she didn't feel anything. Seeing something she couldn't touch felt weird to Kalmia, but she went and put her stuff on the bed. After that, she looked into a door which was connected to her room.

  It was the showering area... and the toilet. The toilet exit was just hanging out of the edge of the ship and a lead right to the ocean. The hole was not big enough for anyone to fit through, so one could comfortably sit on it. After she used the toilet, Kalmia just laid down on her bed and used the balls of light to read some books, which Dedrik put into her bag as well.

  A few hours later, Kalmia was standing in front of Miss Elana's door. She wasn't the only one, but there hadn't been many others. Among the others, she found Lana and Luis. They seemed to get along pretty well. Kalmia didn't really want to intervene in the conversation, until she was suddenly asked something.

  "And, what do you think?"

  "Huh? Me?"

  "Yeah. What do you think about Miss Elana?"

  "Well..."

  Kalmia was quiet and looked around, ensuring the door wouldn't open while she spoke.

  "She seems a bit nice, but far too strict for my taste."

  The dark haired boy answered loudly.

  "See, I told you!"

  "Well, I just think she is nice!"

  Suddenly, the door opened.

  "What is going on out here?"

  Both went silent for a moment before answering in unison.

  "Nothing ma'am!"

  Miss Elana thought for a second before leaving it like that.

  "How many of you are waiting here? 5?"

  "Yes, ma'am"

  Miss Elana sighed and turned around again.

  "Fine then, follow me."

  Kalmia and the others silently followed Miss Elana. The room they entered didn't look much different from what Kalmia had seen of her own room. Just a bit larger. This made all the students that were there fit into the room.

  Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.

  "Well, I told you about the use of magic already. Now you probably don't know how to apply magic, right?"

  Most students kept quiet. It was just Kalmia that answered.

  "Yes, Miss Elana."

  "Well, considering almost all of you here are of lower birth, I already guessed as much."

  Kalmia didn't know most of the others in this room were also of lower birth.

  "Casting magic is a bit different for everyone. Some say it feels like just pushing it out, then are a few that say they circle the magic around, others need chants. There are many ways to do it.

  I can guide you, but I can not give you a direct tutorial."

  Kalmia nodded.

  The teacher took time for each of the students. Kalmia was the third one, which was all she cared about.

  "You are something special, aren't you? A dragon that age, and can't even apply magic."

  Kalmia silently stood there and looked at the ground.

  "Now look up a bit again. I will try to help you. As a dragon, you should probably feel something weird if you concentrate on your heartbeat. There should be something else too, right?"

  Kalmia focused on her heartbeat for a moment, and was surprised when she heard something a bit lighter beating right after."

  "Magical creatures, such as dragons, have something similar to a heart, which generates and pumps mana through their body. If you use more mana than it can generate, though, you will need a long time to regenerate.

  This organ is also the cause of the immense hunger that dragons have."

  Kalmia was surprised. Dedrik gave her a few books about dragons, but nowhere in what she had read did it mention anything in that direction.

  "If you close your fist and hit with it while concentrating on heat, you might manage to have a flame shoot out.

  For now, I will allow you to practice that skill on the deck. Once you manage to do that, return to me, and I will teach you from there."

  Kalmia did as Miss Elana had told her. She excused herself from the room and went on deck. There, nowhere close to something that was immediately dangerous if it set fire, she tried that fire punch.

  She hit the air again and again, but nothing came out. She tried listening to that organ's beat, but then she was too focused on the rhythm to concentrate on the output. Then she just tried to concentrate on the output, but she didn't know what she was supposed to concentrate on.

  Then she tried to focus on her form and push something out, but it didn't really produce anything except some slightly warmer air.

  The moon was already high up in the sky before Maria came over and brought Kalmia some food, as she didn't appear during mealtime.

  "What are you doing there?"

  "I’m trying to practice magic."

  "You didn't get anywhere yet?"

  "Well... no."

  Kalmia looked at the ground a bit sad.

  "Well, try eating first. You'll need the energy."

  "Thanks."

  As Kalmia sat down to eat, Maria sat next to her.

  "So you’re trying to learn how to use magic..."

  "Yeah."

  Kalmia’s mouth was stuffed with some bread.

  "I may be able to help you a bit. I cannot promise, though."

  "YOU CAN?!"

  "Now calm down a bit. It is easier if you are calm."

  "Sorry."

  "After you finish eating, I will see what I can do for you."

  ---- After the meal ----

  "Well, you know about the organ, right?"

  "Yes."

  "But you don't know how to let that mana flow."

  "Correct."

  "Then let me try to explain it to you..."

  Maria sat there thinking for a bit.

  "Well, you see, it is a bit like a muscle you’ve never used before."

  "...What does that mean?"

  "It means, you can do nothing but try to find out how to use that muscle and where it is.

  The more you use it, the easier it will get."

  "I see."

  "But you shouldn't overdo it. If you overdo it, it will hurt every time you use it for a long time."

  "Okay."

  "What I am trying to tell you is, go sleep for now. You can continue tomorrow. It’s better to take a break and also take some time to think about what I just told you."

  "Fine... If you say so. I trust you."

  "Now, that's what I wanted to hear!"

  After that, they left for their rooms. Kalmia didn't fall asleep instantly, though. She stayed awake thinking about what Maria told her. A few hours later, she finally fell asleep."

  **CHAPTER 15: END**