@ManoftheNorth-Magic: Properties of magic are ambiguous. Enchanted items blessed by sages and battle mages can create spells. Wizardry through verbal incantation and spell script exists, though rare - mainly used to enchant items. Origin of magic is unknown, but discoverers are believed to have been people of science before converting their titleship to Sages of The Path.
I imagine through this bit we can start this conversation. If we are going on the idea that magic is rare and there are Battle mages in the Swordseekers, of which there don't seem to be many either way, I'd imagine that the study of magic is a difficult one. Those who can perform magic likely spent an long time studying it in order to understand how it functions. In this case, it'd mean that most who perform magic had a mentor of a sorts to learn from and only have a very few spells. This means that those who can't perform true magic likely pass off alchemical tricks as magic instead, something that'd be rather common such as making a smoke cloud or a burst of light. In the interest check, Whiskey gave a rough estimate of about 500 Swordseekers. I'd guess that, since there seems to be an order of Battle Priests, there are only about 20 or so of them. Maybe a few more but not many.
There isn't much to go off really. At most, I'd expect the average person to be unable to learn spells at all due to a lack of understanding. A person who does understand on their own would take years to learn it. Even then, they probably won't have more than 10 spells or so after they die. A person with a mentor and an understanding, on the other hand, might be able to manage a good ten spells at an age of around 20-30 years old simply due to the accumulation and sharing of knowledge. But that would be assuming the wizard started training young.
@AngelofOctoberIt would also not make sense that there are a free amount of Chimera level hunters to take on the task. The organization itself is corrupt, it seems, and it is likely that even if there are enough Chimera level hunters to take the task they may have been assigned to something else simply so the Swordseekers can readily gain money. Once again, it is also possible that it is a "Accept the Contract" basis rather than Assigned Contracts or direct hire contracts. That quite simply isn't how any sell-sword company would work.
Edit; And by that logic, you'd never hire someone of Sphinx level and never create more Chimera level Swordseekers. Even if they fight monsters, there is the need to send them out on a contract that actually has one for them to become the next rank.
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