"You don't look a day over twenty," Greg answered immediately with a charming smile. Of course, Greg knew that she had to be older than that. In his previous life back on Earth, however, his mother had always told him that if a woman asks him to guess their age, he should always give a ridiculously low figure. Even if both of you know that the guess was wildly off, she'll still be flattered.
And sure enough, despite rolling her eyes as she turned away from him, her smile had widened a bit at his words. "As of this coming winter, I will be seven hundred and ninety cycles in age," The healer gave out a number that caused the gears in Greg's brain to grind to a halt even as his eyes turned to saucers. Greg knew that some women might be offended by him reacting this way after they'd revealed their age. Greg, however, had no control over it. To hear that this woman who didn't even look thirty was just a decade shy of eight centuries old, left him too stunned to even think let alone speak. Going by the amused look on the healer's face, however, she clearly wasn't bothered by Greg's look of shock.
"Every time you rise a tier as a mage, you increase your lifespan by around two to three hundred cycles in the lower tiers, that is, in the first, second, and third tiers. Once you hit the middle tiers, that is, the fourth, fifth, and sixth, every increase in one's tier increases one's lifespan by anywhere from five hundred to a thousand cycles. At the higher end of the mage hierarchy, the increases are measured in the thousands of cycles. Of course, this isn't a fixed number. Depending on a number of factors some mages might live longer, others shorter than the expected amount. As a seventh-tier mage, and a healer to boot, my lifespan might come to roughly three or four thousand cycles or thereabout. And worst case scenario, even if my injuries halved my lifespan, I should still have another thousand or more cycles left to my life," She revealed. Greg couldn't help but feel a deep sense of disconnect between the casual way in which she spoke and the impossibility of what he was hearing. The woman had just casually revealed that she still had another millennium of life to live. And that was in the worst-case scenario!
"Wait, but that would mean that a ninth-tier mage can live up to..."
"Ten thousand cycles," The woman casually revealed. "Most tend to live longer. Some even hit fifteen thousand. The oldest ninth-tier mage to ever live made it to thirty-nine thousand cycles," She revealed. "Magic is such a hard and treacherous road to walk on, Roka. If not to escape the specter of death, I suspect that more than half the people that walk this path wouldn't," She calmly asserted.
A while back, Olivia had told him that just being the student of a seventh-tier mage was enough to make him the equivalent of a member of the royal family in a large kingdom. Greg hadn't really been able to wrap his mind around this concept until this moment. Mages at the higher tiers weren't just powerful entities, they were long-lived ones as well. Offend one now and even if you somehow manage to overpower and fend them off, they might just come back to take it out on your future generations down the line! When you are dealing with beings that measure their life spans in terms of millennia, one can't help but wonder if you are even dealing with the same species anymore. Most people in this world start having the next generation rather young. But even if the age was to be pushed forward to twenty-five, then by the time Roka's ancestor thirty generations back, was born, she was already forty years old back then! It simply boggled the mind to consider.
***
Giving Roka the time to consider the shocking news she had just dropped on him, Alena turned in the direction of the avatar, ready to negotiate with her. Although the boy would be one of the beneficiaries of the idea if it was brought to fruition sooner, she was perfectly aware that she couldn't use this as a bargaining chip. The benefits simply didn't balance out on both sides. That would be like asking someone to build a school for you simply because their child would be one of the students in the school. Even if there were a hundred Roka's, it still wouldn't be enough to balance it out. Should Olivia provide her with the crucial help that she needed for this endeavor, the familiar would be giving her the ability to make an infinite number of high-tier mages. The higher the tier, the fewer the number of people that ever make it to that point. Out of a million people, perhaps only one or two will ever make it to the seventh tier. The fact that in the long history of this world, and of all the trillions of people that have lived, less than a hundred have ever crossed the threshold into the ninth tier, speaks for itself. To be able to guarantee that a mage will make it to the higher tiers is an ability not even the ninth-tier mages can dream of.
Alena was about to speak when she sensed it. The boy was still standing in place looking flabbergasted, unaware that his own familiar was about to cast a spell on him. Alena couldn't exactly blame the boy, if not for the fact that this was her second time sensing this particular spell, she too wouldn't have been able to pick up on it. The first time Olivia cast this spell, Alena hadn't been able to pick up on it right up until the very last second. She couldn't even begin to imagine what level of control over mana the familiar had to have such that she didn't leak any mana when casting a spell. Even now, Despite her being aware that Olivia was casting a spell and having her senses on full alert, there was only a barely perceptible disturbance in the ambient mana.
"Is there a new secret that you wish to hide from the boy?" Alena asked once Roka was frozen by Olivia's spell.
"Secrets are a part of it," The familiar calmly admitted. "The other part, however, is for protection," She added enigmatically even as she continued to weave another spell. Given her near-perfect control of mana, Alena couldn't even sense what the other spell that she was about to cast was. Like the first spell, all Alena's senses could pick up on was the barest of disturbances of the ambient mana. Still, knowing that the familiar had no reason to attack either one of them, she remained relatively calm. Had it been another mage before her, she would have remained on guard all through, knowing that the idea before them was invaluable. To a being above the nine tiers, however, she didn't think it would matter to quite the same degree.
A thin film of light formed around Roka once Olivia was done with her second spell. Alena was confused for a second before her eyes went wide with both shock and fright. As if to confirm her fears, Olivia turned from the shield to her with a serious look on her face. "I suggest you summon the strongest one that you can manage!" She offered. Alena didn't even hesitate or waste time asking stupid questions. Her hands and fingers started moving in intricate patterns through the air as she used them to aid her casting. Despite the urgency of the situation, Alena didn't go at the fastest speed that she could. Instead, she focused all her efforts on making the shield as strong as possible. Usually, it'd take Alena barely a breath of time to cast the spell. This time, however, it took ten breaths of time before a similar shield went up around the healer.
