Seph massaged her throbbing temples as she glanced down at the Ignis Ales once again. The words seemed to blur together, honestly. She leaned back in her seat on the bar of the Guild, glancing at the ceiling, before forcing her gaze back down to the book. She stifled a yawn and rubbed at her bleary eyes, having gotten little to no sleep the night before because she was so confused over everything and no one seemed very afflicted by the fact that she was some… "Universal Mage" or whatever it was. She felt like reading the book might become much like being slapped with a wet kipper-shocking, attention-grabbing, but not entirely pleasant. The book had a vice-like grip on her mind already; twisting reality and challenging the once mundane facts of her existence… it brought her into a new turbulent realm where even her sense of self was up for grabs.
Maybe Master Makarov would know something about it, since she certainly did not.
She could feel the fear in her chest waiting to take over. Perhaps it only wanted to protect her, but there really wasn't any danger, and it just sat there like an angry ball propelling her towards an anxiety she didn't need. The air was sweet, the weather was fine, there were birds in the sky and she could hear the ecstatic chatter of her friends around her, but she still let out a slow, controlled breath as she attempted to loosen her tense body. She felt like some sort of clockwork soldier and honestly, that was no way to be. Despite it all, her hands remained clenched around the book by subconscious demand as she continued to stare down at it; eventually just letting her head drop and smack against the slightly hard leather cover. This was ridiculous. She could hear her Father's words ringing in the back of her head and somehow, that just made this all of the worse, perhaps because she could never be sure if he meant what he would say.
'Dear Josephine,' He would say, 'never be like a flag, dependant on the capricious breeze for its direction. Be the captain of your own ship; chart a course and navigate with determination in choppy waters and fine. You alone are the master of your own destiny and responsible for the keeping of your humanity in the harshness of life. Do that and, no matter what happens, you will be proud of who you are.'
She sure as Hell didn't feel very proud of herself right now, but she was also still learning… about herself, about others, about this damned world she lived in. It had been so long since she was just a little girl with her family and since then, she hadn't had the chance to just… breathe.
Crossing her legs and intertwining her fingers, she let her clasped hands rest in her lap, on top of the book that would possibly tell her whatever she needed to know about her magic or origin or whatever, and she inhaled a deep breath. Flexibility was important, trust just as much to settle down, and kindness would lead her to being as calm as necessary in any situation. Once she exhaled, she didn't wait any longer, grabbing the cover of the Ignis Ales and pulling it open, listening to the first page flap a bit from probably getting stuck to the cover since it happened been opened in a long time. The pages were old and dusty, but the words that were scribbled down in black ink remained, most of it in a language that Seph could understand, but some of it in a language that she struggled with. Of course, this wasn't just any old book—this one was magic, and it only wanted Seph to read what she could currently understand. When it flipped to a section and kept all other pages stuck together, she couldn't believe how exasperated she was with an object. Nonetheless, she did as it wanted.
'The sweet smell of decaying plant matter and rain mingled with the cool and gentle breeze, which swayed the upper branches of century-old oaks. It was here, on one of these very streets, that I found myself standing about, taking in the fresh air, when this book came to me. Most Mages nowadays are always trying to glean more power and wisdom from the magic we have already tamed and stifled for the last ten-thousand years, so when this book came to me, I knew that no one else except those with the same magic as I could get their hands on it. It is here, in the midst of an industrialized civilization, that magic still flows rampant and wild through the world. Magic can be held in any sanctuary, being contained within the sights, sound and smells of a world. "Contained" seems like the wrong word for magic in the future, I think, unlike our own now where such power has been dammed up and caged. I think that there, in the future, magic is in symbiosis with reality. At home, where magic always had fixed routes to guide me, and a hint of deeper magic will call from a distance away. It is my life's work to record in this book, here in the x300's, and to have sworn allegiance to the people to keep the world fair and correct. One mark in the wrong place and we might lose a country, including millions of people. Not all Universal Mages will be weighed with the responsibility of keeping the world intact, as I intend to meld myself into the Earth when my time is up in order to keep that from happening, but we will drop in number. We will split. We won't have as much responsibility, but we will have just as much power—as long as we use it correctly.
My dear Universal Mage, whenever you read this, my name is Azyle Dium. I am the first Universal Mage to ever exist and gotten their hands on such an important book, because our magic is already fading quickly, but you are something extraordinary. You are one with the world, not as it will do your bidding, but you can call upon it to help you in troubled times. You should be born with it, born with something, and it is alright if you don't understand what is happening or who you truly are because that is just it—you are you. Universal Mage or not, magic runs freely through 90% of the population in the future, I've seen it. Although faced with awful trials, this world is Yin and Yang. I've always felt an attraction to the yin yang symbol. To me, it's always meant caution and hope. Caution because even in the purest of hearts, there is a seed that can become greed and vanity, which can use fear to gain power. Hope that even in the darkest of hearts, there is still a seed of purity that can grow if nurtured in the right way. I'm not sure what you are, who you are, or what your situation is, but I know that you can make the right decisions with your magic.'
"She's been reading like a maniac over there!" Happy sighed after at least half an hour had passed, upon seeing that Seph was still fully emerged in the book she had gotten merely yesterday. If he was going to be honest, he was getting a little worried about her considering how focused and yet how confused her expression seemed to be.
"How many pages in is she?" Natsu asked care-freely, making Happy whine a bit as he squinted to see. He didn't even know. He just knew that she looked conflicted and kept flipping through the pages back and forth, seemingly endlessly.
"She's pouring herself into those pages…" Lucy sighed, feeling quite bad for the small Exceed because is she was utterly confused over everything, than she could only imagine how confused Seph was. "She's scouring that book, skim-reading… she kinda looks like she's about to go cross-eyed, like the words are merging into nonsense."
"She's living every page, Lucy." Erza stated with her eyes closed and her hands clasped together, resting on the table. "It probably has important information on her magic and all, which is something any one of us would read into if we could."
She had a very good point. If there was a book on any of their magic or even a movie, they would be studying that strongly to figure out anything they possibly might've not already known. Seph didn't seem to even know what her magic was, so reading the book was probably a very important for her—it was probably the only teaching she would get. No one knew anything about this "Universal Magic". Erza's hands clenched as she thought back on asking the Master about it, in which he seemed to tense ever so slightly before responding quite truthfully that he didn't know what it was. He had a hunch, but he was unsure, and she didn't dare to dig into him for information. If Seph found out something important or life-threatening, she would most likely talk to them about it… well, perhaps to Laxus and the Raijinshuu first, but if it was something very important, they would eventually come to know.
For now, this was no one's business except Seph's. It was her magic and her decision of what to do with what she found out.
Seph's legs were on fire and her arms needed to move. There was a cupboard behind her and she didn't know what was in it. There were beads on the counter, she wanted to flick them. The fire in her legs was building like the energy in a compressed spring and she tried taking a deep breath, but she could only think about running around in a field right about then. Her hands were twitching and her eyes were blinking, and eventually, she just gave in, putting her book aside and trying to stretch as much as she possibly could without attracting attention. She couldn't stop thinking about everything so simple and then everything so confusing.
When she was eight months old, she knew every corner of her house because she had just learnt to walk. By the time she was ten months old, she hadn't left any spot in the sunflower field untraveled. That's how her Mother liked to say it. Her Mother had one told her that when she took her first step in that field, when she saw how balanced those little feet were, she knew that her daughter could run. She was right; the pride that had lit up in her Mom's eyes were like fireworks after the storm that took out half the village, after she had helped some of the kids get to safety even at the cost of her own life. She remembered wrapping her little fingers around the medal hanging from her neck, then letting her Mom hug her so tight, almost suffocating as always. Then, she frowned a bit, remembering how one moment, she was important, and then the next minute, she was in the background at the best. She couldn't say which one she preferred, what was making her head spin were the transitions. She knew everything was 'need-to-know' and 'last minute' for a reason, but there were days that it felt like her brain cells had been randomized.
She hadn't been herself since she had gotten that back. That morning, she had been so lost and confused, and she could barely work out how to pour the milk into her bowl of cereal. She had a job to do, something important, but it would only make itself known when necessary. For now, she would simply continue to read Azyle's pages with as much childlike wonder as possible. The more she knew about her magic, the better she could use it and in turn—the better she could protect those she cared about dearly. No matter how long it took, no matter how much reading she had to do, she would eventually figure everything out.
… Wow. When had she become so optimistic? For some reason, she found herself smiling.
This was okay.