Something that always strikes me as particularly fucked up when I think of all the shit Al Tharmin put Judal through is how they stifled any chance for him to learn. Judal is not dumb. (His wisdom score however, is, uh… kind of unfortunate.) But they managed to keep him ignorant in both life skills and magical education (and probably at least a little bit in non magical education.)
One of the first times we see Judal, Sinbad comments on how his using a couple different types of magic at once is a new thing.
(ch 47 pg 6 Sense-Scans)
This most definitely isn’t a new thing in the magi universe. I mean if Sinbad wanted to see multiple types of magic combined into a single spell (even more complicated than just using two types at the same time) he could just pop down the hall and visit Yamraiha. So what was surprising to him wasn’t what Judal was doing but that it was Judal doing it.
So why was he so far behind the rest of the magical world? Al Tharmin isn’t lacking in magical knowledge. They know things from all the way back in Alma Torran and are lead by hugely powerful magicians. They were the ones selling knowledge to Magnostadt, the cutting edge magicians of their time. Hell, in the same compound that Judal lived in, Kou had their magical zombie basement!
They were keeping him dumb so he would be an easier tool to use.
Not knowing how to bathe or cook anything on his own?
(vol 28 omake http://arashidono.tumblr.com/post/138547110920/magi-volume-28-omake-the-beginning-of-a-beautiful )
Spoiled and lazy are one thing but that stinks more of we’ve made you so that you can never leave for more than a few hours because you will die on your own.
In this extra (I have like no fucking clue where this was published, sorry guys? http://amaterasu-ookami.tumblr.com/post/136953307626/judals-typical-day ) it says he has to sneak off to practice magic. And yeah, you probably don’t want a trigger happy magi blowing up stuff inside the palace. But his job is literally doing really big magic shit?? It’s ridiculous that he has to hide in order to do it. Even his signature spell, Thalg Al-Salos, seems self taught. It’s an incredibly inefficient and time consuming move. He has to gather water, freeze it, float it in the air, splinter it, and then finally fling it at people. There are many other ways that he could kill people in just as showy a fashion that take much less effort. But think of young Judal, learning very little himself, but surrounded by the other Kou kids whose education featured an awful lot of having swords and killing. Then making his own sharp weapon with the simple spells he knew and fighting in a way similar to how his friends were makes sense.
In fact we see Judal doing no complicated spells until he gobbles up the black rukh with Mogamett’s memories inside it. But as soon as he does he learns incredibly quickly. He goes from ‘I’m gonna make some really pointy ice and then I’m gonna throw it at people really hard’ to teleportation, magic damping barriers, and composite magic in about a month.
‘Oh, but since he had all the memories that would be easy!” you say? Hahaha ha haha no.
^The face of a man having a fun and easy time (ch 245 pg 18 Sense-Scans)
This was the equivalent of him getting through algebra and then picking up the disorganized research notes of a college professor and teaching himself with that.
Judal is really fucking smart and talented and Al Tharmin kept him at a fraction of his potential so that he would be easier to use as their political trading card, dungeon maker, and weapon of mass destruction.
