>>5777406The next week of classes, the ‘golden child’ of the Tower was quieter than usual, withdrawn. It didn’t stop her from beating your exam scores in every damn class, of course (ugh), but in the practical demonstrations and in-class lectures, yours were once more the loudest, most confident, and most often and most wholly CORRECT. You felt like the star again and, for all her ill-earned popularity, Izirina Henzler’s hangers-on did not come to comfort her, but take their lunch and study breaks with you in her emotional absence.
And then, of course, came Living Alchemy. Your mousy, fussy-moustached proctor organized the qualifying students into teams of two, for a partner is necessary to quickly organize and add the ingredients for the healing potions you are making—special herbs and alchemical compounds of rare and distilled metals, passed over runes and into a pot maintained at a careful temperature, so that a <Cure> spell can be retained in a solution, its magical effects preserved to be used later. Any error in timing, in temperature, in quantity or quality in ingredients, in the words or motions and magical application will weaken the potion or render it otherwise inferior.
You were the undisputed master of this class, of course, and you were thus the favourite pick for a partner. Every boy and girl was quick to cozy up to you… Except Izirina Henzler, who fussed with her disorganized ingredients in a corner, looking helpless.
What did you do?
>Chose the most cement and capable student (next to yourself) and made a potion worthy of a true Mage Apprentice, earning you the fast track to advanced classes in Life Magic[Learn a second spell in the field, gain acclaim and respect]
>Picked Izirina Henzler as your partner, hampering your own performance slightly but beginning a relationship of tutelage and (eventually) friendship[Henzler learns <Cure> as well, and you improve your relationship with her]
[Either choice will also affect your options moving forward, how other characters view them, and how I characterize the MC in dialogue and internal monologue.]
