Me, My Spirit, And I [Book 1 Complete]

The cube of Shadow Stone was only a few inches wide, but Finastras was surprised at the weight when he picked it up. "Heavy stuff…" he muttered to himself.

"The internal structure is very dense and includes a fair bit of metal," Lusha explained without further prompting.

"It resembles obsidian, but it clearly isn't…" Finastras continued to examine the material for several minutes using senses both magical and mundane.

After a time, he sat the stone on the ground. He raised a hand above the stone and cast a relatively simple Stone Manipulation spell on the Shadow Stone. There was a grunt of surprise when the spell failed to summon the stone to his hand as expected. Instead, the stone merely wobbled, much to the Headmaster's surprise.

"A basic Manipulation spell won't work well on Shadow Stone. It is just too different from natural stone for the magic to recognize it properly," Lusha explained helpfully.

With a look of mild confusion, Finastras switched tactics and used a kinetic spell instead. This time the stone moved to his hand as expected, resulting in a nod of satisfaction. "I don't know if it is a good thing or not that it can't be moved with normal Earth magic."

"Oh, I think it is a bonus! Besides…" Lusha used a modified Stone Manipulation spell that was designed specifically for Shadow Stone. The stone obediently flew from the Headmaster's hand to Lusha's. "If it requires special spells only I know, then others will have a much harder time breaching my defenses even before I enchant them," Lusha said with a smile.

"I can see the benefit of that, yes indeed." Headmaster Finastra nodded as he spoke. "Let's see how it handles a magical assault." Another force spell caused the cube of Shadow Stone to float in the middle of the training area. The Headmaster and Archmage began bombarding the stone with a wide variety of elemental spells. Bolts of earth, air, water, fire, lighting, and force assaulted the stone. "Any natural stone would be dust in the wind by now…let's see if it can handle something a bit more exotic."

This time, the Archmage cast a spell that caused the Shadow Stone to vibrate violently. A loud buzzing noise filled the air as the stone showed the first signs of cracking, which caused Finastra to smile in satisfaction and increase the intensity of his spell. After a minute of this, the stone simply disintegrated into a fine cloud of dust.

"Absolutely delightful! It took a full power Disintegration spell to break it!" Finastras explained in delight.

Lusha looked at the cloud in mild annoyance. They knew Shadow Stone wasn't indestructible, but they honestly expected it to take longer for the Archmage to break it.

The Headmaster turned to Lusha. "I do believe that more than demonstrates your proficiency with magic, but we have one more test to go." An evil smile appeared on the Headmaster's face. "For the next test, the goal will be simple. I will defend myself while you attack."

"You really want me to attack you?" Lusha asked in confusion.

"Oh yes, with everything you have! Impress me enough here, and I think we will skip a few steps and make you my personal Apprentice. It will give you special standing as a student, and far more flexibility," the Headmaster wove a simple, but sturdy mage shield as he continued to speak, "I think it will solve a lot of issues for your stay at the Academy."

With a smile Lusha nodded while using Essence Perception to examine the shield. The shield was really basic, but very powerful. Nothing they could do could break a mage shield cast by an Archmage, so they decided to take a different approach. They picked up a wooden practice dagger and approached the bemused Archmage's shield.

As they moved closer, their body began to glow, and it looked like they were wearing a skin tight mage shield of their own. When they reached the unbreakable barrier, they simply kept walking and passed right through it, while placing the point of the dagger right over the shocked Archmage's heart.

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"What!?" Finastras exclaimed in surprise.

"I matched the exact Essence Resonance of your mage shield, then coated myself in a matching shield, which allowed me to pass through without resistance." Lusha gave Finastras a cheeky smile. "It is like merging soap bubbles."

Finastras sputtered for a few seconds before he got himself under control. "I said to impress me, not turn everything I know upside down!"

With a shrug and another smile Lusha used the same trick to leave the Archmages shield. "That isn't impressive?"

"You damn well know it is! Let's see if you can pull off that trick with this shield!" Finastras chanted and waved his hands as the first shield disappeared and a more complex construct made of flowing wind and dust surrounded him, alongside a more complex mage shield.

Examining the new barrier, Lusha was able to quickly tell that their previous trick wouldn't work. They would have to deflect or defend against the wind and dust while trying to match the shield's resonance, which was a bit of a stretch even with their knowledge and skill.

There was one other way that they could bypass the shield, but they were genuinely unsure about it. There hadn't been much time to practice this, but the Archmage had forgotten there were more ways to attack than direct physical and magical attacks. With a bit of mental flexing, Lusha became Shada and Luca. Unless someone were particularly sensitive to spiritual energy, they wouldn't notice the change.

Luca watched as Shada sunk deeper into the Etheric plane beyond the areas affected by the Archmage's shield, then reemerged inside the shield. With a flourish of his wrist Luca made the wooden dagger disappear into his Inventory. Shada pulled the dagger back out, but inside the shield while manifesting.

Once more the Headmaster was rendered speechless. "This is ridiculous!" He shouted in clear frustration. It had been decades since the Headmaster had engaged in any real combat and they were not taking Lusha seriously at all, but it was down right embarrassing to have a teen, little more than a child, bypassing his shields through trickery. He let the latest iteration collapse and stared the spirit manifestation in the eye. "You know there are spirit wards for this, and if I was truly trying to defend myself against attack, I could blast your spirit to bits?"

Shada nodded politely. "Yes, but you didn't use one and this is technically an exam, not combat." He smiled, then faded away to remerge with Luca.

Lusha gave the Headmaster another cheeky smile. "Do we go again?"

Headmaster Finastras nodded with a grim smile before casting again. This time he spent several minutes creating a complex multi-layered shield.

Lusha couldn't even see the Archmage beneath the thick layers of force, sand, wind, fire, water, and even lightning. A quick check showed the shield included wards against spirits and protections against physical, magical, and spiritual intrusions.

Since Lusha couldn't see the Archmage, they figured that the reverse was true. With a bit of mental flexing, Lusha's true form's sensory organs appeared and they used Essence Perception at its maximum capacity to study the shields. After a minute or two of study, it became obvious that Finastras wasn't really trying too hard; the shields were of the cast and forget variety that didn't require active maintenance. This meant that there were metaphysical anchors that fixed the shields in place, but crucially didn't link directly back to the mage who cast them.

With a smile, Lusha got as close as possible before casting a Essence draining spell over and over near the key anchor points. Slowly, but surely the Essence was drawn from the shields, which visibly thinned as the power left them. It wasn't fast, fancy, or flashy, but it was effective. The shields began to collapse one after the other leaving a bemused Archmage staring at Lusha from across the training area.

"You know that wouldn't work in actual combat?" The Headmaster asked curiously.

Lusha nodded cheerfully before speaking. "Of course not; you could have disrupted my spells at any time, recast your shields, attacked me, or any number of things," they shrugged.

Finastras nodded along to each point. "Exactly, but as a demonstration of skill and cleverness you get top marks for creative approaches to bypassing and dismantling magical shields."

There were a few more tests after that. Minor things like testing casting and channeling speed, but in the end Finastra was more than satisfied with Lusha's performance.

"I think I have everything I need to get a schedule ready for you and your spirit self. Give me a few days to sort everything out."

Lusha nodded along and left shortly thereafter.