"It's normal to not feel anything, it's not like you can start hearing and sensing your entire body in just a few minutes. It takes time, time to start sensing yourself and time to start sensing your surroundings before you can start feeling and sensing mana. It takes the average four-year-old a year. It takes bright kids about 9 months and it took geniuses like your Father, your older brother George and the captain of the Flameworth's Mages, Sin Morderego about 5 months."
He's still a bit groggy from waking up, he's yawning and scratching his eyes as he talks to me.
"Alright. That's enough for the day, go back home. Remember, every day after class two trainings, come to this training grounds. And I want you to keep focusing on feeling yourself first. Report any significant progress to me once we meet. Goodbye, Young Master Charles."
He stood up and adjusted his black uniform before walking out.
I went back to my room too.
***
I lie down on my bed. Deep in thought.
Damn. This isn't easy at all. I just want to learn magic and see my wife. But now I gotta hear and feel my body cells, it sounds so stupid.
"This isn't how Harry learned magic in Hogwarts."
I roll on my bed, frustration creeping on my skin.
"Isn't there a way to learn this stuff faster? Like a shortcut? There must be. After all... Every long thing has a shortcut."
I nod my head in agreement with my words, I'm satisfied with my wisdom.
But wait...
I jerk up from my bed.
"Haven't I felt mana before?" I start walking to and fro in my room.
"Yes, I have. I'm sure of it. But when?"
My hands are on my chin as I keep walking to and fro.
"Aha!" I slam my folded hands on my palm, my face lit up with a smile.
"Yes, I remember! I felt it all the time when Jennette used to play with me and lift me with her Magic! That sensation... Wasn't it mana? I mean... Hmm, I'm not sure.."
My head droops and I begin to rummage my brain again.
"Yes! When the Firebird. Phoenix I mean, was transferring the flames of eternity to me. I even forgot that I had that. But that fire that felt like it was burning my soul itself, I'm sure of it, it's the mana from the flame of eternity."
I caress my jaw as I ponder, still forgetting that I have no goatee.
"If I remember how It felt at that time, won't my brain register the feeling, and subsequently, alert me if I ever feel mana?"
I nod solemnly.
"Yes yes, that sounds about right. So all I have to do is remember how it felt. Since mana is everywhere in the atmosphere, I can even start feeling it as soon as my body remembers how it felt. Then I can start learning mana breathing."
Good plan.
I immediately sit on the cold, ceramic-tiled floor in a lotus position.
I close my eyes and take deep breaths, forgetting everything around me.
I clear my thoughts, focusing on the moment when I was transfused with the flame of eternity.
I can feel goosebumps on my body as I try to remember the feeling.
***
It's been a while since I started meditating. I'm pretty sure that it's nighttime. I'm supposed to be resting, but...
How can I rest when I'm feeling this way?
A soothing, calm and gentle breeze penetrates through the window of my room and blows, caressing my body, and fueling the peace that I feel. My body welcomes the touch of the breeze, my shoulders relax and my tense muscles soften into this moment.
I can hear my heart beat louder and louder, it's as if my heart is beating directly in my ears.
I can feel my blood flow. How it's running through my veins and arteries from my heart smoothly, how the blood flows to my tissues, I can feel even the blood in my pulmonary arteries, as it cascades through the arteries, approaching my lungs.
I can feel something else now. I don't know how to explain how I can feel this. I know how it's shaped, how it feels, how it smells, but I've never seen it before. I see what my tissues are made up of– cells. I can feel even the red and white blood cells in my blood. I can feel the molecules of oxygen flowing through my blood.
I can feel– Everything in my body. It feels like I can see them. When I close my eyes, I can imagine an accurate picture of everything I feel in my body.
I feel everything that touches my body now, the microbes in the air that touch my body. I can even feel the atoms and molecules of the oxygen and the other chemical elements that make up the air I breathe. I can even feel the air that goes through my lungs.
Ah, this is it. This is the feeling he was talking about. It feels natural like it's part of everything, but it also feels foreign.
I have finally remembered how mana felt, but I didn't feel it when I was receiving the flame of eternity. What I felt from the Flame of Eternity wasn't mana, that heat was... Something else that I don't know.
The Mana that I remember was from the times when Jennette used her magic on me.
I can feel the Mana everywhere. It's even in my body, weak and pure mana are flowing in my Mana pathway. I can feel this mana flowing in me.
I open my eyes.
Fwoosh!
The air coming from outside the window in the room starts twirling around me.
My hair keeps dangling and blocking my eyesight as the air keeps twirling like a tornado but much less violent.
The air stops twirling and the pieces of paper that were twirling around me with the air fall down.
I stand up from the ground.
I walk towards the window and I look outside.
The full, cleaved moon is up... It's night.
I still see the white, non-elemental mana in the air.
I outstretch my hand to touch it.
My hand still passes through like it's a hologram but I can feel it now. It feels empty, like a bland, spiceless bowl of soup that doesn't even have salt.
I smile broadly and clench my fists.
"Five months my ass."
I turn to look at my body.
The darkness is still revolving around me. But apart from the darkness, I can see something else now, I can feel it and I can see it.
It's different from everyone else's. The circle revolving around me is an interlaced light formed from red, blue, yellow and red light. The light is bright, but not so bright that I can't ignore and continue my daily activities.
"Well, that's enough for today. I need to sleep, and tomorrow... I'll learn how to gather Mana in my Mana pathway."
I head to my bed to sleep.