Berthalia looked at me with a strange expression on her face.
I looked back at her, making eye contact, wondering why she was looking at me like that.
It was the fourteenth day since I had met her, and she had been training me in spells and the usage of my Own every day since then, improving my proficiency with them.
A minute ago I had just managed to properly use a spell that she had taught me, and I thought that it had worked, but she hadn't congratulated me like she did every time I managed to cast a spell for the first time, so it felt like something had gone wrong with my spell. On the other hand, she wasn't speaking about any fault, just looking at me with gritted teeth and furrowed eyebrows.
So I was quite confused at the moment.
Another minute passed, and I decided to break the silence with a question.
"Did I do something wrong?"
This question would make her tell me what I did wrong if there was anything of that sort.
Her face frowned even more as she let out a growl and turned around to let her back face me.
Now I was quite befuddled.
"That's all for today."
She said that and disappeared.
It was only halfway into our session, so I pulled out my phone and called Plot to find out what could have happened.
He picked up on the third ring.
"Good afternoon Alias! Is something the problem?"
I told him about what had happened and what Berthalia had done.
"Gritted teeth and furrowed brows... What spell was it?"
"Nemean fury."
"Nemean... fury. That's... Haha!"
Plot let out a chuckle.
"It seems like she got jealous of your talent in learning spells."
"Why would that happen?"
"It took her two weeks to cast it properly, and she was quite proud of that achievement too. Normally, it takes a little more than three months for an average spell caster to learn it from scratch, so you doing it in less than... How long?"
"Three hours."
"Three hours, you learned it dozens of times faster than she did, and how many times did you fail?"
"Twice."
"She failed more than fifty times... You really are something else."
Plot's voice dropped near the end.
"Why would that make her jealous?"
"Hm?"
"Shouldn't she be happy that her student is good?"
Plot clicked his tongue.
"How do I explain this..."
Plot went silent for a moment.
"If you had been slightly better than her, then it would have been fine, but you showed such a great ability that it completely outclassed her and overshadowed her greatest achievement, which gave rise to jealousy, but don't worry, she won't be that way for long, at most she'll be a little harsh for a few days."
"I see..."
I understood a little bit of it.
"So what you mean is that she feels inferior to me? Which makes her not want to teach me?"
"I suppose you could put it that way."
"Thank you for your time."
"No problem, I have a suggestion... if you are willing to listen?"
"Hm?"
"During your free time, I suggest you walk around the city, look at the people and how they interact with others in their surroundings, do things you see then doing, this will help you understand people further."
"I see, I shall do that. Goodbye."
With that finished, I closed the call.
I had some time before my melee combat session with Arquero, so I decided to go and do what Plot suggested.
I walked through the streets looking at the people walking, before I came across a gate.
It had a big sign on it that read 'Eastern main park'.
Many groups of people were entering, and I could see multiple families inside as well. I decided to enter the park as well.
I paid the entrance fee and started walking along the paths, looking at the greenery around me, as well as the many small picnicking groups spread across the fields.
I saw a bench and walked over to it.
It was unoccupied and provided a good view of the park.
I sat down on it and started to watch the people.
I looked at the children who were playing with a ball.
From what Numoral had told me, creating a child in this world was quite a difficult and lengthy process, so most children were adopted.
One of them, a boy wearing a plain blue shirt got hit in the face by the ball and fell on his butt.
Immediately an adult ran towards him and knelt in the grass beside him as he started to cry.
The man picked him up and walked back to the group where he had come from.
The other adults spoke a few words with him as he carried the child and tried to soothe him.
I looked back at the children, whose play had paused.
It looked like they were arguing about something, likely about whose fault it was that the child had been injured.
Then one of the bigger ones spoke up, and the others quietened down, and a moment later, the play had restarted.
I changed my sight to another group.
I sat there for half an hour, then I got up and left.
I had about twenty minutes before I had to depart for my melee training session.
I walked through a market, stopping to listen to the bargaining around me, observing their faces and their tones
This place was good, there was a lot of emotion shown clearly here, joy, anger, frustration.
People happy because they got a good item for a good price.
Customers angry because they think that something should not be at such a price, or that some item is not in stock.
Shopkeepers frustrated at people who just look and question, but do not purchase anything, wasting their time.
But unfortunately, I had to leave because it was nearing the agreed time for my lesson.
I reached a relatively open space, unfurled my Skypage and took off.