[ WP ] A kid doodling in a math class accidentally creates the world 's first functional magic circle in centuries .

My perfectionism always got the best of me. I flipped my pencil and erased the arc on the outer ring for what must have been the eighth time. 
 
 `` Now, remember class, when you attempt to calculate...,'' Mr. Kaprizy was very smart, I never doubted that. I remember in the Spring quarter he decided, on the spur of the moment, that he was unsatisfied with the textbook's method of proving some theorem or other and derived an alternative proof in the middle of class. I would have been more impressed had I understood how he got from start to finish. He just made everything so dry. 
 
 What use did I have for math anyway? I did not kid myself. My art would not pay my bills when I left this dump of a high school, but math? Even if I were good at it, which I was n't, what would I do with it? Did I believe Mr. Kaprizy when he said math is everywhere, that math is the world? The practical side of me did. That was the only thing my father taught me that when he was around, a happenstance of rarity. Money meant more to him than we did. `` Security'' he said. I did n't believe it. 
 
 *There. Finally, * I thought to myself as I finished the curve and swept away some of the dust. I turned my note sheet about 20 degrees, leaning my head to the side to examine my work. Graceful arcs crossed over each other in almost chaotic entanglement. 
 
 I had been particular about the corners. The top left was blithe in its curves, jagged at its ends to show the destructive playfulness of the flame. The top right looped and spun in such intricate ways. The lines came close, but never crossed; they only deflected off each other, swirling and changing like the winds. The bottom left had no curves, just edges that moved in direction without sense, but always from top the bottom - whimsical much like a thunder god. The bottom right was all grace. Each line held measure in its smooth transition from East to West, the flow like water. 
 
 Beneath the mass of lines - some dark, some light, others thin, each and everyone one still precise - was an unmistakable organization you could only see if you were looking for it. I smiled as I stared at my work. My perfectionist was satisfied. 
 
 Leaning in close, I blew across the surface to clear the rest of the eraser debris. I noticed the glow first. The embers in the graphite warmed the page. I could feel a summer heat rise off the page and seep into my face. 
 
 `` Did anyone-?'' I turned to look my classmates, their eyes glued on the board, their faces locked in some weird mixture between confusion and fear. I leaned in close once more, and blew across the page again. This time the lines glowed blue, where my fingertips touched the paper I felt an icy tingle trickle up my arm and into my shoulders. I exhaled light mist, my lips chilled. 
 
 And then the paper, a focused work that had given me no meaning at first, shook beneath the pressure of my grip. It bucked and pulled as if wanting to be free. So I let go, my eyes watching it rise into the air to defy gravity. I slowly rose to my feet, my hand reaching out to take hold of it once more. 
 
 `` Mr. Kenificks, what in the name-,'' I heard Mr. Kaprizy stutter. I ignored him as my hand inched toward the silly sheet of paper that had raised me from something mundane. Closer and closer my hand crept, spurred on by a hungering curiosity that I could not understand. And as my hand touched the center of my drawing, light erupted, and the veil of the world pulled back from the corners to-
