The Echoes of Rivalry & Ruin (The Acamancy Series I)

Chapter 30: The Last Week of the First Quarter

After nearly a week of looking over my shoulder and just waiting for Ember and Damon to sneak up and bother me, I have finally accepted that they aren't coming. At least during the week, weekends are another story. Paxx was on edge, worse than I was Monday and Tuesday, but he settled in by Tuesday evening when we had a "date" at his Oasis. Mitchell has been playing hero, behaving almost as Calum did trying to protect me. And now he has been clinging to my side all week. Calum seems to have taken my words to heart and laid off, or he just officially hates me now. Either way, I have barely seen him all week. Granted I did move seats a few weeks ago, to sit near Paxx or Mitch or the girls during class and eased up on my competitive streak a bit. I have been more focused on my friends, so I haven't seen Calum as much lately anyways. But today, as I sit in Manipulation Genetics at 8:45 am on a Thursday morning, I am admittedly concerned that Calum isn't here. I also cannot recall if he was in Genetics on Tuesday either, or any class at all earlier this week. But I don't plan to dwell on it, why would I?

"As you all should know by now, a Manipulator's Element Classification does not fully depend on the Element Class of their parentage, but it is heavily influenced by it. In order to obtain a specific Element Class Skill Set, a Mani must have acquired that Element Classification from a parent, grandparent, or in very rare cases a great grandparent. So ladies and gentleman, if you are an Ice Mani and have no Ice Mani's in your family as far as your mom, dad, granny, pops, great grandpa, or great granny goes... Well I hate to be the one to break it to you, but you're either adopted and no one told you, or some one cheated and lied about who the daddy is." Professor Diggs lectures. 

As Always he immediately is able to draw my focus in, as always. Diggs may not be the most entertaining professor, but not for lack of trying. If anything Professor Diggs tries too hard. He tries to be humorous and relate to the youth and for us to relate to his lectures, but he fails at it most of the time. Luckily for me, the interest in Genetics is not lacking. I love this class because I love the subject matter. So while Professor Diggs is far from my favorite professor, he keeps my attention very well. And this is easily one of my favorite classes.

"Also it should go without saying by now, but if mommy and daddy are both Normies and you or someone you know seemed to magically develop Signs of Skills to manipulate Stone, or any other Element, it's just an example after all people. So if at age 14 or so you can now move rocks without touching them and throw stones three times your body weight, well open your eyes and realize it's actually because mommy and daddy aren't both Normies. It's not magic, it doesn't just happen out of thin air. But what does happen more often than we realize is the fact that Mani's will not realize that they are Mani's and have Skills. In turn, those skills will not be trained and honed, they will not fully manifest, and though you cannot fully lose your skills if you don't use them, they do fade. Sometimes they fade to the point of not being able to notice them at all. Many Normani's brush off Signs of Skills as a coincidence, a trick of the eyes, and they never train and learn and develop their skills. So while they could technically reverse the fade by training and learning to control their skills so they fully manifest, most either never learn they have skills or they decide they're happy without and they purposely ignore them. Then all of the sudden BOOM a child is born with strong Sign of Skills, they want to train and learn, they have dreams of attending a Manipulator school, but they have no idea where to begin. So, as each of you sit in this classroom I have full confidence that you will encourage your children to attend Acamancy, or another Mani school, to keep our kind alive and well. This is extremely important, the numbers of Manipulators dip all of the time. Now, please do not twist my words, I am not saying we need to stop Mani and Normie relationships and breeding. I have no issues with Normani generations or even Mani's who choose to live a Normal life. The only thing I have an issue with is Mani children not being told about their skills and given the chance to hone them because their parents chose not to. Or worse, children being shunned or rejected for developing skills when their parents hoped that they wouldn't."