Felix stepped over the threshold and entered the Ways. The only thing that kept him from plummeting into the night’s sky was the unassuming cobblestone path. Somehow, the path failed to realise it wasn’t supported by the ground anymore.

  It felt like Felix’s heart was beating a thousand times a minute. It drowned out any other noise. Standing on his path, the night sky began to move, constellations turned, galaxies twisted, and nebulae shifted form. The stars danced like fireflies in the night.

  As he looked around at the awe-inspiring site, he noticed that he was alone. Only the path stretched out in front of him. No matter how he turned, he could only move forward amidst the shifting sky.

  With nowhere to go except forward, he started his journey.

  The beautiful lights of the night sky soon became overwhelming as he walked. He tried closing his eyes, but the light beamed through his closed eyes. He could hear the shifting celestial bodies and feel their movement around him. They were impossibly far away. The stars were hot, unfathomably hot, even over the vast distance; he could feel them searing his skin.

  It was not just stars dancing, planets spun around them, even the smallest of them weighing countless holds. Some frigid and cold, straining to draw the stars’ heat from his skin, others so used to baking in the light that their indifference washed through his nerves, numbing them to the overwhelming heat. Some filled with so much water that the air around him tasted of rain. Some swept with storms violent enough to sunder moons, their great winds trying to blow him off his feet.

  Beyond the stars, planets, and nebulae, he could feel something greater, a mass so large it dwarfed all the planets and stars combined, as old as creation and teaming with life. Life in its most primal form.

  On it roamed beings so great they could blink stars from existence or destroy galaxies with a single breath. Others were so small that in a single step, he would pass over thousands.

  He felt the countless plants growing on the continent, their roots burrowing through its ancient soil, each one fighting for life amongst its brethren and the creatures around it.

  He felt birth and death, each fueling the other in an endless cycle that echoed through time as far back as time could go. He felt the wild growth of fire and stone, life and nature, chaos unbound, clawing at the edge of the massive continent, slowly growing, nurtured by the waters of a river his mind couldn’t begin to fathom.

  His mind was so overwhelmed with the cacophony of sensations that he almost didn’t notice the itching of his skin, the wringing sensation in his organs, and the colours that had drifted in from the edges of his vision until he could barely see what was in front of him. The colours grew muted and dark, threatening to sink his consciousness with them. His shaking legs begged him to stop, his mind begged him to faint.

  The path he was on called to him— no, not the path, his path. He could feel it tugging at the last remnants of his awareness, urging him to continue.

  In moments, he’d gone from nervously stepping on his path to fighting for his life. His pride would not let him fall. His confidence moved his feet. One little step at a time, he moved forward.

  It felt like he walked for hours, though the entire trip probably only lasted a few minutes. Through the dancing dark spots in his vision, he could just make out a gate that loomed ahead of him. So large that the whole parade of ferries could move through it at once, and beyond it, the Crossroads. Rest.

  He tried focusing on it, tried ignoring the blood that seeped through his skin and flowed from his nose, eyes, and ears. Felix tried to roar his determination, but his voice cracked, coming out in a quiet hiss. Still, he forced his legs to move, his feet to take one more step. Even carrying the weight of creation on his back, he did not relent.

  He would be a knight, and nothing would stop him.

  His tired feet carried him on through the gate as his legs gave way. A sturdy paw covered in fur quickly reached out to catch him. It was the only thing stopping him from falling on his face.

  “Oh, well, this is a surprise. To think you finished this early, little one.” Felix’s mind was barely holding on, but somehow the deep grumbling voice grounded him in the moment, letting him stay conscious. After looking at him for a moment, the man’s eyes looked elsewhere. He couldn’t see through his blood-caked eyes, but he could feel the moment the man shifted his attention.

  “Alvara, why don’t you take him? There’s plenty of time before the others should come out. He might benefit from a bit of your guidance.”

  A melodic voice that promised warm afternoons playing in a cold stream and the smell of freshly cut grass responded.

  “Oh, how interesting. Come, child, let’s go have some tea. It will help you recover.”

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  The rest was a fog of memories that his mind failed to hold on to, a smear of events too blurry to make sense of until a small cup made its way to his mouth. The smell brought back memories of the massive continent and the towering trees that fought for every inch of growth, in an eon’s long war to pierce the sky. The tea tasted of spring and the laughter of new life. A part of his fatigue washed away, not completely, but enough for his mind to start working again.

  “How’s that child, feeling better now?” The melodic voice disrupted his reverie.

  The voice brought his mind back to his body. He was still tired, but he was no longer covered in blood, or maybe he never was; he couldn’t be sure. The tea gave him enough clarity to focus on the source of the soothing voice.

  Felix would have liked to say he answered her question calmly, or perhaps that he coolly thought back upon his first time travelling before responding with the wisdom gained on the journey. After all, having set foot upon the ways, he was in many ways now considered an adult. Instead of having a dignified response, for his first sentence as a grown-up, he half-yelled. “Wheels and spokes! An elf!”

  As soon as his brain caught up with his mouth, he immediately felt the heat rise to his cheeks. Absolutely mortified, he quickly looked away. Only now did he notice that they were sitting in a beautiful garden. The sun gently filtered through the leaves of the tree they were sitting under, while small white flowers dappled the green grass.

  They sat on the ground with only a low table and a strange set of cups before them. Before the beautiful garden could make him forget his embarrassment, her laughter forced him to focus.

  “I forget how excited human children can be when they first meet other races. No need to be embarrassed, child. My name is Alvara, I am a guide at this crossroads. There is no need to rush; the first time on the Ways can be disconcerting for anyone. Center yourself before we speak.”

  After Felix had time to calm down and drink more of the tea, Alvara continued.

  “Please, hand me your token so I can activate it, now that you’ve taken your first journey.”

  Felix fished the smooth white slate he’d barely thought of out of his pocket and sheepishly handed it to her.

  “This thing?”

  She nodded and pressed it to her forehead, closing her eyes for a moment.

  “Ah, Felix, is it. Here you go, keep your token safe, you’ll be using it a lot during your time here. I’ve updated it with your mana affinities and given you access to the basic resources. Including a spell matching your affinity that you can use when you get to your dorm. In your case, it’s important that you practice it well.”

  Felix’s eyes opened wide with shock. He actually got a spell already? He couldn’t believe that it was that easy. He wouldn’t waste too much time working on spells when he starts training to be a knight, but how cool would it be to cast magic?!

  “Thank you! I can’t wait to look at it!”

  Alvara gave him a smile that somehow made her young face look even older than Grandma's.

  “Now, Felix, you’ve managed to finish your first journey in record-breaking time. In large part, this is due to your unique affinities. That means I have a little more time to answer your questions than I’d normally be able to spend.”

  Felix’s chest immediately swelled with pride. He forgot all his embarrassment and concern. He’d finished in record time, and his affinities were ‘unique’. He had a hard time just sitting still in his chair. Clearly, he was right, and he was destined for great things. He couldn’t wait to share the news with Lara. She probably finished right after him.

  ‘Guess that’s a win for me, a shame we can’t mark it on the tree.’ He thought with a little smug smile.

  “So let's clear up a few misapprehensions you may be suffering under before we begin. First off, you currently believe that when you walked the Ways, you came in contact with mana for the first time and that you’ve now ‘awakened’, is that correct?”

  Frowning, Felix nodded.

  “You believe homeworlds are places without mana where children are raised, but you don’t really understand why human children are sometimes raised on homeworlds, correct?”

  Felix wasn’t sure where she was going with this. Everyone knew homeworlds were places without mana. How could he, who’d grown up on one, not know something so basic? So he nodded again.

  “Well, the first thing you should know is that homeworlds do have mana. In fact, we’ve never found a place in all of creation and even beyond it that has no mana. Mana isn’t some mysterious force. Mana is the fundamental building block from which our world is created.

  “Everything you see, everything you touch, taste, and smell, all of it is mana. It’s impossible for a homeworld to exist without mana because it is mana. It's impossible for you to never touch mana because you are made of mana.”

  Alvara was kind enough to allow Felix some time for the words to sink in. After all, it wasn’t every day you had your entire understanding of how the universe worked upturned.

  For a moment, Felix looked at her like she was crazy.

  ‘Are some of the other guides hiding behind the bushes waiting to see if I’ll fall for it?’

  He stared at Alvara, waiting for her to laugh at his confusion. He waited, and waited. Eventually, while looking at her steady gaze as she sipped her tea, he realised that she was serious.

  His eyes widened, and he quickly looked around at all the trees, flowers, shrubs, and paths again as if they might have changed now that he knew what they were. He looked at his hands, turning them over while squinting as if they’d suddenly reveal… something. As if they’ve been waiting for him to figure it out all twelve years of his life, and now that he knew, they’d suddenly show their true colours.

  Alas, they remained unchanged. He looked at the table with the tea and noticed that at some point his cup had been refilled.

  Remembering the strange effect of the tea, he slowly picked it up, carefully examining it, even smelling it. It just looked like crystal clear water tinged slightly green by the tea leaves, and while it smelled amazing, he didn’t think he’d call it magical. Yet the smell brought back bits and pieces of what he’d seen in the Ways. He remembered the trees and life on the Continent. He felt like he was on the verge of seeing something in the tea.

  He carefully sipped the tea once again, feeling how clear his mind was. He felt like he could remember things in much greater detail, like his thoughts were somehow faster. His body felt slightly tingly as if every part of it was bursting with energy. But with clarity came questions, and with a guide right in front of him, he had no reason not to voice them.