The words on the page told Damion something he had never considered. A person was limited in how many spells they could learn. Being limited to learning only twenty magic seals in his entire life was something he had never considered. In a panic, Damion opened up the Magic System and checked the skills page. To his disbelief he had twenty skills recorded under unusable.
Realizing he had just used up every magic seal learning opportunity in his life, Damion wanted to cry. Tears began to well up and as Damion began to try to stop himself, he saw the system menu still open in his mind's eye and he realized something. He had only counted the unusable skills, he still had the usable section which contained one spell.
This meant he knew a total of twenty-one magic seals. What this meant Damion was not sure, but it was somewhat obvious that the rule of only twenty magic seals did not entirely apply to him. There was a possibility that the limit only applied to spells he could use, but Damion wanted to believe the Magic System would not be limited by this sort of rule. After all the Magic System let him learn magic seals that were not related to his affinity.
'System, what is my limit for learning magic seals'
{By default Host can learn five active magic seals per tier of mage.}
The answer did not help Damion that much, as he was not sure what it meant at all. 'System, provide an example of the previous question and answer.'
{When host is an F Rank mage, host can learn five magic seals. When host advances and becomes an E Rank mage, host will expand that limit by five. This will continue until host has reached maximum rank.}
'System, what is the maximum rank a mage can achieve?'
{Error. Unable to answer due to system restrictions. Please unlock the system for further information.}
'Well, I guess that answers some of my questions.' Damion thought to himself. 'If its five spells per mage rank, then I will have to get to C Rank to reach the twenty spell limit, that is really going to restrict my magic, especially since I already know one spell. Wait!'
Damion suddenly realized his spell restriction and his learned magic seals still did not match.
'System, if I can only learn five spells per mage rank, why do I know more than twenty spells already?'
{The Magic System has no limit on retaining knowledge and can record all magic seals host comes into contact with. Non-usable magic seals and passive spells do not count towards magic seal limits.}
'So that's it.' Damion finally understood.
All the magic seals he learned did not count against him since they were not usable. This was a huge weight off his shoulders as Damion had briefly thought he had once again crippled his ability to do magic by having the system record all the seals in the book. Now that he knew he had a hard limit that he needed to respect, Damion would be more careful, especially once he found out his magic affinity. It would really cripple him if he learned weak or useless spells and couldn't learn more because of his limit.
'Wait a minute!' Damion screamed mentally. The words of the system finally sinking in. The system had specified a limit to active spells and that passive spells were not counted towards the magic seal limit. His Mana Absorption spell was a passive spell, so that should mean he still had five free magic seal slots. Now he needed to understand the difference between an active and a passive skill.
'System, what is the difference between active and passive spells, please provide examples.'
{Active spells are single use spells that require a mage to intentionally cast the spell. Example: When Fireball is cast the spell is shot out and to be used again the spell must be cast again.}
{Passive spells are continuous use spells that when activated continue to function until the spell is deactivated or the caster runs out of mana. Example: Mana Absorption will continue to absorb mana until host deactivates the spell or explodes from excess mana.}
The idea of exploding from absorbing too much mana sent shivers down Damion's spine. He had already come far too close to that happening for comfort.
'System, Fire Breath is an active skill, but requires mana to keep active, why is it not a passive spell?'
{Fire Breath relies on activation and while can be kept up for long periods of time at a high mastery level, there is a limit to how long a mage can maintain the spell even without exhausting their mana supply.}
Once again Damion was happy to learn something new. While Mana Absorption was not a spell he would like to keep active all the time, except maybe if he was casting a lot of spells and needed to recover, that might not be the case with other passive spells. Damion did not know what other passive spells were out there, but he hoped there existed passive spells like game buffs from Earth that he could keep up all the time and basically become invincible.
"Alright young man, time to go home," Ms. Teft said to Damion snapping him out of his thoughts about spells.
"Already," Damion whined in complaint. He had completely lost track of time in his reading and interacting with the Magic System.
"Yes. It won't do for you to skip lunch and be late getting home. Your mother will worry. Don't worry, you can come back and read my book tomorrow as long as you are finished with your classwork."
Damion perked up when he heard what the librarian said. After scooting off the chair he left the book to its owner and headed out of the library to meet his mother so they could walk home together.
At the entrance to the school, Damion saw his mother waiting for him. He walked to class everyday by himself, but she insisted on walking him to and from the schoolyard, after all, he was only six years old.
"So, what did you learn in school today," Sharon Wells asked Damion as they walked home.
"We worked on mathematics today," Damion answered his mother while mentally wondering if he should continue his search for magic seals or just wait until he turned eighteen.
"That is nice. I know school can be hard and it is important to study well so you can get a good job in the future, but don't forget to have fun. You only get to be a kid once you know."
His mother's words hit Damion hard. He was actually granted a second childhood because of his rebirth into this new world. However, he had spent the majority of his childhood studying and learning as much about this world and the Magic System as he could.
The thought of just enjoying himself had not occurred to him before. Any other child born would slowly learn about the world as they grew, the idea that he had to know everything as soon as possible was driving him to neglect his all-important childhood lack of responsibilities.
"I understand mother," Damion said as he hugged his mother from the side to reassure her. "I will try and have more fun and make friends. You don't have to worry about me."