After their training ended, Arthur went back to class. It was now their free time, usually used for clubs.

“Hey, Arthur! Need help with choosing a club?” Markus walked over and leaned on Arthur’s seat. As the latter was just mulling over it, he welcomed an introduction.

“I’m not even sure I’ll be attending a club though…”

“You should if you want to get into Jerano. There’s extra credit for people with extracurricular activities. Especially for famous clubs like Virtual Fighting, Abilities Evolution, and Dungeons Science. These are the ones that are selling like hotcakes. There are also Martial Arts Club, Mana Research Club, and Skills Club.”

Although Markus was a bit too chatty, unlike his friend Amelia, he was still a great help. Arthur quietly listened as he flipped through the introductions of these clubs in the guideline he found in the classroom. There were so many clubs out there that Arthur didn’t know how many hobbies people had.

As he was considering what club to join, he came across a small introduction of a club that caught his eye. It was called The Ancient Runes Club. As he started reading the introduction and activities more avidly, Markus peeked his head to see what he was reading.

“Oh, that club. I heard it was the lowest of the seven clubs.”

“Seven clubs?”

“Yeah, clubs that were first founded when the school started. Six I already told you about, and this one here is the seventh. These clubs are accredited by Jerano so joining them gives you credit if you applied for their related scholarship.” Arthur’s eyes gleamed as he heard this. 

Every year, Jerano would host an examination for students from all over the Yalveran Union. This examination would mostly be about testing the student’s abilities, and fighting capabilities as that was the most sought-after examination. 

However, special scholarships gave you an advantage over other students if you took this exam. This was their way of recruiting talented students that weren’t so good at fighting.

“I think I’ll check this one out.”

“What?” Markus was speechless. It sounded obvious that Arthur should join one of the more popular clubs as that would give him more advantages in applying.

***

As Arthur decided on his club, he went toward the clubroom on the third floor. As he looked through them, he found out that this club was further to the back, unlike the rest. He walked through the hallways until he reached a classroom at the corner of the floor before he knocked. After three knocks, a lazy voice told him to come in.

“Welcome, how may I help you?” The person inside was a male student who had huge black bags under his eyes. He sounded tired but remained his polite attitude.

“I’m here to join the club. Is it closed for today?”

“Oh… OH? Do you want to join? Come in! Come in! How come you’re only joining now?” The student suddenly grew enthusiastic as he introduced Arthur to a seat and started pouring tea. 

Arthur wasn’t a particular fan of tea, but he felt like he couldn’t say no. As he drank the tea, he felt relaxed as the aroma spread in his mouth.

“I see that you like it. We grew these tea leaves using runes.”

“What?” Arthur was suddenly amazed. It felt as if his bubble just burst as he heard that he was not the only one using runes.

“We drew the rune path on the container and made these tea leaves enriched with mana. It’s an old technique but we struggled to make it work. Cost us most of our budget for the materials.” As the student saw Arthur’s interest in his words, he felt proud and kept explaining. He felt their new member was an excellent addition to their club.

“Drew the rune path? Does that give similar effects to the original runes?” Arthur asked, confused.

“What? Of course not!” The student was stunned. He then continued, “Since ancient times, runes were considered the language of creation and magic. Even now, people thought of skills as the products of runes. They’re a series of complex runes that would activate once supplied with mana. 

However, to be able to use ancient runes, the person has to connect to the origin of the world. That’s what many ancient scriptures said. The method to establish such a connection is said to be lost.” The student entered a full-lecture mode as he grabbed a pen and a whiteboard to demonstrate.

“For example, if a person was to draw a rune without connecting to the origin, it would be called a mana path. Most artificial artifacts are made using mana paths. These paths show effects similar to runes but at a higher cost of mana but much lower efficiency. 

If an artifact had a rune that controlled the sea, then the same rune would only create a pool if made artificially. If artificial runes were the same as the original, then artifacts would be worthless.”

“That makes sense. Then what about runes that are one-time use? Would they disappear if they are used? What happens to the weapon afterward?” Arthur asked. He always knew that artifacts had a version of permanent runes. However, he didn’t know enough about this field to know what temporary runes did.

“Well,” The student then paused and grinned. “That, my friend, is why Runes Cards were created.”

***

“Is Ori already in the clubroom?” Jia asked the petite girl next to him. The two walked together in the hallway, making a stark contrast. He was tall, athletic with flamboyant blonde hair, and the girl was meek, quiet, and doll-like. To his question, the girl nodded and kept reading her book. 

Jia had to move the girl left and right to get her out of other students’ way. She was so absorbed with her book that she didn’t pay attention to anything else, except Jia occasionally.

The two reached their clubroom where a sign said Ancient Runes Club, a place not many people came to. Their usually quiet clubroom was noisy for some reason, and Arthur saw the confusion on Jia’s face. If he had to describe the atmosphere in his club, it would be the word ‘dead.’

“Why can’t we use the air as a medium to imprint runes?” This question was thrown as soon as the two opened the door. The two came to a halt as this was the question bugging the Runes Research society.

“We just can’t. To imprint runes, we need a medium and a material for the mana path. Air can’t be the medium for the runes as you couldn’t draw a mana path, to begin with.” Jia and Ellen walked in as they saw Ori explaining things to another student. 

They could see Ori’s red face of excitement as he discussed possibilities upon possibilities. The weird part was that the student threw a question after the other without pause, and each one of them attacked a fundamental aspect of artificial runes.

“Ori? Who’s this?” Jia asked as the two took a seat at the table. It was only then that Ori finally calmed down and introduced Arthur to the two.

“He’s our newest member, Arthur Silvera. He’s an A-Class student, so Ellen should have already met him.” The three turned toward the petite girl who kept reading without reacting.

“She probably didn’t even notice they had a transfer student,” Jia said to which the rest of them laughed. After getting over with the introduction, another heated discussion began where Arthur learned a lot about his new profession. In the end, they agreed to meet at the weekend.

“We’ll be going to Green Golems Dungeon. It’s a neo rank dungeon but we’ll only hunt on the outer layer. The goal of this to decipher the runes moving the Golems there. We’ll try to replicate the runes there to make our own Golem.”

This was this year’s project. It was making a Golem that would fight with you. They would also use a tool to imprint runes resonating with the Golem’s runes to create a remote control device. As they discussed the time and place, Arthur left the place more excited than ever.