- Location
- A single human dimension
- Pronouns
- She/Her
That really sounds like the sort of thing you should see an addiction specialist for. I've heard runes are simply terrible for your teeth.
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Ignition (MTG/Multicross, Planeswalker PC)
- Thread starter Alivaril
- Start date
-
- Tags
- fairy tail magi: the labyrinth of magic magic the gathering magical girl lyrical nanoha (magical girl) puella magi madoka magica rwby alternate universe spoilers unreliable narrator earned your happy middle feedback appreciated life slowly gets better metaknowledge is overrated never too much fire setting knowledge not required this can only end well what could possibly go wrong?
That really sounds like the sort of thing you should see an addiction specialist for. I've heard runes are simply terrible for your teeth.
fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
or carving. Which can be done with teeth, but it would be a better idea to let Agneyastra or some specialized tools she makes do it.
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Well, we can bite through rock.
fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
I am amazed how this thread has 5 users and 3 guests when there has not been a post in it for 8 hours. How many people are rereading this?
- Location
- Germany
Fifth read-through, actually. Twice story-only (reader mode), once all author posts, now on my second time with erratic cross-referencing and skipping some chapters.
Found the correct quote, by the way:
We checked multiple cities, and none rival Uminari in mana concentration. Thus, we have to expect mostly single-mote lands on Nanoha's Earth.
fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
I can't even count how many read-through I have done. Although I tend to skip the salty parts.
35.0: Uncanny Slump
- Location
- A single human dimension
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[X] Just point Nanoha in the right direction, or get Mitra to, and let yourself be pulled along.
-[X] Also, the truth. Looking for new magic to study, items both useful and whimsical, maybe a birthday present for Sidhe or not - you have some other half-formed ideas - any interesting people you meet...
You try, and utterly fail, to keep your gaze focused on Nanoha's nose. The stars are really rather distracting and you're hoping there's a way to duplicate the effect. They are somewhat inhuman, but isn't that a good thing? The more stuff you have to demonstrate your differences from normal mortals, the better.
"Um. Well, wherever? I wanted to find new magic to study, buy some magical items, maybe get part of a present for Sidhe, that sort of thing."
You vaguely wave one hand toward the city proper. Nanoha nods once, snatches your wrist from the air, and begins leading you back out of the hospital.
"Sounds like fun! Tell me why you pick out stuff, OK?"
You look down at the hand dragging you along and try to reimagine it as some sort of metal hook. It doesn't really work; you're still being led around by the girl you might have a teensie crush on.
"Okay," you agree meekly.
You are not looking forward to the next few hours.
You know, this isn't actually so bad.
"Which one is that?" Nanoha asks.
The younger girl points to an overflowing fountain attached to the underside of one of Magnostadt's floating aqueducts. The water falling from it passes through a floating gold ring before hitting a child-infested plaza below.
You peer at the objects in question and frown. For as frugal as Magnostadt's mages are with their personal mana, they are remarkably wasteful when it comes to making artifacts. Suspending a PAUSE/HALT ring just so people can safely drink water from the sky? Why not put the fountain closer to the ground? Operating under a resource budget or with long-term sustainability in mind usually requires extra creativity and is overall more impressive than the alternative.
Upon closer inspection, you do notice that new water keeps flowing down faster than the slowed water can descend. The overall effect lets water crash against itself and flow around impeded areas. You still don't think the effect is worth spending so many motes each day.
"The fountain filters water through magical rocks and the ring resets the speed of falling water. The filter is White and Red, the ring is Blue. I think the Red might be keeping the White from setting?"
Nanoha nods and immediately moves on to the next target. Your attempt to unobtrusively free your wrist from her other hand is, as always, futile. You're not sure you mind, especially since Nanoha deliberately loosens her grip every time you try. You could manage to free yourself if you worked harder, just... not without alerting her. You don't want her to think you'd rather not be here.
"That one?"
Nanoha points to a set of crystal lanterns at the top of a building. Those, you barely need to glance at. The appearance may change from tower to tower, but their underlying functions remain the same.
"Just more ward anchors to let them be hemispherical."
"Oh. Do their spells change, or...?"
You shake your head.
"Same Enchantments, different decorations. I think they're trying to make it harder for invaders or saboteurs to know where they should be aiming."
A few seconds pass while Nanoha searches for her next target. You spend the time glancing around and marveling at how little attention you're actually receiving. After the initial mini-parade, public interest seems to have waned in order of normal daily activities. If anything, people are trying to pretend you don't exist as anything other than a mobile restricted area.
Nanoha points to a row of potted flowers in a nearby shop window. You'd been under the impression that glass would be really quite expensive with their technology level, but you don't think you've seen even one window lacking it.
"Those?"
Besides boring?
"Not magical anymore, but there are still hints of Green. I'm pretty sure Green is all about nature n stuff, but there's some Green girl on my homeworld with a literal metal death forest boasting an absurd amount of Green mana production, so I dunno. It might be good health or adaptation? That kinda occurs passively as plants and animals grow."
You crane your neck to search for the rooftop gardens you're certain exist. Finding them doesn't take very long, but not for the reasons you'd prefer. A gust of Blue-tinged wind dumps a large cloud of dirt and dust right in your face. Coughing can be heard from nearby spectators, but not Nanoha or even yourself.
After your reflexive blinks, you find a severe lack of debris in your eyes. Intrigued, you deliberately keep one eye open and let a little more dirt settle on its surface. The little brown specks reach the floor of your field of view far faster than expected. More importantly, they provoke no pain or irritation whatsoever, only the peculiar feeling of having something sitting in your eye. Blinking removes every trace of the tiny invaders.
You suppose it makes sense. The ancient Agni didn't seem like the sort of people to leave weaknesses for foes to exploit. If your eyes weren't upgraded, they'd be the most vulnerable part of your entire body by far.
Simple self-preservation stops you from outright poking yourself in the eye. It does not prevent you from closing your eyes and experimentally rubbing at their lids. You begin normally, then slowly start to apply more and more pressure. It's hard to tell how much of the resistance encountered is due to armored eyelids and how much is from your eyes refusing to go squish.
"Please stop trying to test the durability of your eyes, Daughter," Mother sighs. "Suffice to say you should not 'tank' the blows of a Belkan Saint without active shields and a Barrier Jacket. Your eyes remain perhaps the most fragile component of your vessel and can still be damaged through your own efforts."
You sheepishly lower your hands and open your eyes. The dust cloud has started to settle, leaving the dirt to slide off the surface of your clothing and vessel without many issues. Your jewelry is not quite so lucky, their surfaces visibly tarnished.
"Right. Sorry."
"It is perfectly fine. I believe acting on curiosity should be encouraged in the vast majority of situations; if caution would be wise, your servants and retainers may raise such topics."
You briefly consider bringing up Calypso, then realize that the evil goddess was probably why Mom included the bit about caution. Being unnecessarily reckless still seems dumb, though.
So says the girl avoiding telling someone about a mutual attraction.
You force yourself to avoid brushing off Nanoha and simply focus on dusting your own jewelry. Your hair and clothes only need a little prodding to dislodge collections of dirt trapped in folded creases. The jewelry takes a little longer, but not especially so.
"You know, I just realized we've never gotten bugs in our eyes," you remark aloud. "Not for long, anyway. Vessels really are convenient."
Nanoha nods automatically. After the first second or so, the nodding slows as she appears to give it some more thought. Your not-a-date eventually sighs.
"It's too bad the rest of us only get four swaps. I did want to try out being a male eventually."
You try to imagine a male Nanoha. Although it's easy enough to transfer over some of her habits and behaviors, such as the bashfulness and tendency to overwork herself, many of the others refuse to be mapped properly. You admit you might be catering to gender stereotypes just a little bit, but... okay, you can't find a good reason. You don't like looking at male clothing and fashions nearly as much, so that might be part of it?
You frown and try to imagine the current Nanoha in a black business suit. Apparently, you still think she'd look good in it, so you probably can't blame everything on gender-specific fashions. Glasses would look weird on her, so maybe it's something like that? It would be fine once you got used to it, but would seem really weird initially? All that still leaves the biggest question to be addressed, though.
"Why? Everyone with more than three brain cells likes you as you are."
If it's simple curiosity, you could understand and might try it yourself. If she feels as though her preferences are forcing her out of being female, though, you'd prefer to have Mom hit Nanoha's Earth with informational broadcasts until they stop acting like idiots.
Nanoha shakes her head, smiling, and sets out to address your worries.
"I just want to see what it's like. We've got all these options as far as vessel mods go, and by those standards, gender is just another tweak. Don't you think it'd be a little dull to spend our whole lives without trying out everything? It'd be like eating one food forever just because you like it."
You shrug. While you think it might be neat to try, you're pretty sure you'd have to start from scratch when it comes to an awful lot of behaviors. For example, the steps designed to avoid disturbing layered female regalia would look weird in the male versions. Female Agni styles might tend toward concealing skin under layers of clothing, but males only wore one or two. Even then, their version of formal attire was often ceremonial armor. You like your Barrier Jacket well enough, but it doesn't cover up fidgeting very well at all, among numerous other complaints. Like, for example, always looking like they're ready to fight someone.
"You can go right ahead if you want to. Me, I'm happy with just staying a girl. Etiquette is difficult enough without trying to change categories."
"Four swaps," Nanoha reminds you. "Mitra thinks she could make some simulations with enough upgrades and a few lifted restrictions, but she says they'd still be guesses. And I should really hold on to those in case something happens."
And what then? Your soul still occupies your body. If the vessel dies, isn't that it? And should Nanoha die, you're not sure you wouldn't obsess over somehow bringing her back. If history and folklore has taught you anything, it's that such goals never end well.
You keep a smile plastered on your face even as you look for a solution. You're pretty sure Mom's original claim of "no Agni has ever fallen on the field of battle" was complete nonsense. Still, even if you do shift Nanoha's soul over to an Agni "True Self," what then? You're fairly confident their versions of Soul Gems weren't even close to invulnerable. The Agni would still be alive if they were. For that matter, you're not even sure their version is usable by non-Agni. Ice and fire don't really get along, so you'll have a hard time turning Sidhe into a demigod, which might mean no Agni Soul Gem for her.
Now that Kyubey is basically dead, you might be able to find out how he made your soul indestructible. You're not comfortable letting even an enslaved monster do the same to your friends, so maybe Mom could recreate the necessary hardware?
Pressure around on your wrist drags you back to reality. Your glance at Nanoha is met with a reassuring smile.
"I don't even have to do the sims if you're uncomfortable with it."
You shake your head violently. You're pretty sure you'd still be fine with Nanoha as a guy, even if it's not quite what you'd prefer. And you might feel like a walking gender stereotype sometimes, but doesn't that make it more important for you to avoid reinforcing roles?
"Not that. Just brooding on mortality and other gloomy stuff. And, um, I just realized I could actually take you home now? I mean, to my home plane. There's a really nice cake shop we could—"
Your brain catches up with your mouth, which promptly clicks shut. Unfortunately, your attempt at damage control definitely leans toward the damage part. Nanoha looks puzzled for a second or two, then seems to realize the implications of the proposal. Her mouth briefly forms a little round o before she glances down.
There are several seconds of awkward silence before the situation gets that much worse. Nanoha looks back up, her eyes beginning to sparkle and her expression determined. You brace yourself for something stressful.
"So, um..." Nanoha begins, then hesitates for a few seconds. She shakes her head and charges onward soon enough.
"I know you're still not comfortable with romantic things, and I'm clueless too, but..."
You look down and cling to Neph's earlier reassurance. She claimed your relationship with Nanoha wouldn't really change, didn't she? Agneyastra's dehumanizing attempts to handle Nanoha's crush have absolutely no bearing on this situation. Which is... it's good since you're barely comfortable with hugging, let alone kissing and stuff.
And just to make that whole mess even creepier, you just realized Indira probably still harbors the belief such things are OK. She might change her tuneonce if you change Nanoha into a demigod, but — wait. How on earth did the whole "heresy" overreactions fit in with Agneyastra's original method of handling Nanoha's crush? You can't remember how or even if Mom justified it.
"She wants to know if you can agree to calling mutual dibs," Mitra says bluntly, startling you out of your off-topic confusion. "You know, no chasing someone else until you give the other a fair chance at some future time? If you ask me, it's pretty obvious you two will be doing that anyway. You're practically giving me sugar poisoning and I don't even have a tongue."
Relief drowns your anxiety, hunts down its cousins, and kills those as well. You'd already practically agreed to such on your end, but maybe Nanoha hadn't quite realized that part? She's kind, hardworking, intelligent, attractive, and dragged you out of darkness. It'd be hard for someone else to compete with that at any point in the next few years.
You look up to see Nanoha give you an uncertain smile. It's hard to interpret her eyes and eyebrows when the former is filled with bright lights, but you think they might be hopeful? They're pretty, you know that much.
"Definitely," you say firmly, then try to come up with something better.
You'd really be fine even with full dating at this point. We're more afraid of not knowing what to do or say when dating her than anything else and that can only be fixed with experience. Mom and Mitra would say our attempts to fix that are "adorkable" and Nanoha is happy no matter what we do. Except literal heart-shaped fields of fire, anyway. That project smelled terrible.
You blink several times and try to remember what you were doing. Something better than a bland agreement, you think? You think you can even somewhat remember that incident, the product of channeling Red to think of something that could be seen from high above. You're not sure if you should worry about the bleedthrough, honestly.
Hush. I'm trying to think.
Dun wanna.
[] It's not like you'd be willing to share your soulfire with anyone. Which is to say, turn her into an Agni-style demigod.
-[] Well, you might do so for your other friends if you can, but Nanoha would get the untested version. As in, before you're 100% sure it's entirely safe, but are still willing to do it anyway.
--[] You're 99% you'll be fine, no worries. Neph said soulfires grow back.
[] Channel Red as an excuse to kiss her. You're explicitly not officially dating yet, just not chasing after anyone else until you do later.
[] Repeat what you just thought: She's kind, intelligent, attractive, hardworking, and literally kept you from turning into an eldritch abomination born from overwhelming despair. With all that, she doesn't exactly have real competition.
-[] You were more worried about her finding someone else first.
[] Try to keep things from getting worse before you're ready; simply tell her she didn't have to worry about that and continue your not-a-date.
[] Write-in
-[X] Also, the truth. Looking for new magic to study, items both useful and whimsical, maybe a birthday present for Sidhe or not - you have some other half-formed ideas - any interesting people you meet...
You try, and utterly fail, to keep your gaze focused on Nanoha's nose. The stars are really rather distracting and you're hoping there's a way to duplicate the effect. They are somewhat inhuman, but isn't that a good thing? The more stuff you have to demonstrate your differences from normal mortals, the better.
"Um. Well, wherever? I wanted to find new magic to study, buy some magical items, maybe get part of a present for Sidhe, that sort of thing."
You vaguely wave one hand toward the city proper. Nanoha nods once, snatches your wrist from the air, and begins leading you back out of the hospital.
"Sounds like fun! Tell me why you pick out stuff, OK?"
You look down at the hand dragging you along and try to reimagine it as some sort of metal hook. It doesn't really work; you're still being led around by the girl you might have a teensie crush on.
"Okay," you agree meekly.
You are not looking forward to the next few hours.
You know, this isn't actually so bad.
"Which one is that?" Nanoha asks.
The younger girl points to an overflowing fountain attached to the underside of one of Magnostadt's floating aqueducts. The water falling from it passes through a floating gold ring before hitting a child-infested plaza below.
You peer at the objects in question and frown. For as frugal as Magnostadt's mages are with their personal mana, they are remarkably wasteful when it comes to making artifacts. Suspending a PAUSE/HALT ring just so people can safely drink water from the sky? Why not put the fountain closer to the ground? Operating under a resource budget or with long-term sustainability in mind usually requires extra creativity and is overall more impressive than the alternative.
Upon closer inspection, you do notice that new water keeps flowing down faster than the slowed water can descend. The overall effect lets water crash against itself and flow around impeded areas. You still don't think the effect is worth spending so many motes each day.
"The fountain filters water through magical rocks and the ring resets the speed of falling water. The filter is White and Red, the ring is Blue. I think the Red might be keeping the White from setting?"
Nanoha nods and immediately moves on to the next target. Your attempt to unobtrusively free your wrist from her other hand is, as always, futile. You're not sure you mind, especially since Nanoha deliberately loosens her grip every time you try. You could manage to free yourself if you worked harder, just... not without alerting her. You don't want her to think you'd rather not be here.
"That one?"
Nanoha points to a set of crystal lanterns at the top of a building. Those, you barely need to glance at. The appearance may change from tower to tower, but their underlying functions remain the same.
"Just more ward anchors to let them be hemispherical."
"Oh. Do their spells change, or...?"
You shake your head.
"Same Enchantments, different decorations. I think they're trying to make it harder for invaders or saboteurs to know where they should be aiming."
A few seconds pass while Nanoha searches for her next target. You spend the time glancing around and marveling at how little attention you're actually receiving. After the initial mini-parade, public interest seems to have waned in order of normal daily activities. If anything, people are trying to pretend you don't exist as anything other than a mobile restricted area.
Nanoha points to a row of potted flowers in a nearby shop window. You'd been under the impression that glass would be really quite expensive with their technology level, but you don't think you've seen even one window lacking it.
"Those?"
Besides boring?
"Not magical anymore, but there are still hints of Green. I'm pretty sure Green is all about nature n stuff, but there's some Green girl on my homeworld with a literal metal death forest boasting an absurd amount of Green mana production, so I dunno. It might be good health or adaptation? That kinda occurs passively as plants and animals grow."
You crane your neck to search for the rooftop gardens you're certain exist. Finding them doesn't take very long, but not for the reasons you'd prefer. A gust of Blue-tinged wind dumps a large cloud of dirt and dust right in your face. Coughing can be heard from nearby spectators, but not Nanoha or even yourself.
After your reflexive blinks, you find a severe lack of debris in your eyes. Intrigued, you deliberately keep one eye open and let a little more dirt settle on its surface. The little brown specks reach the floor of your field of view far faster than expected. More importantly, they provoke no pain or irritation whatsoever, only the peculiar feeling of having something sitting in your eye. Blinking removes every trace of the tiny invaders.
You suppose it makes sense. The ancient Agni didn't seem like the sort of people to leave weaknesses for foes to exploit. If your eyes weren't upgraded, they'd be the most vulnerable part of your entire body by far.
Simple self-preservation stops you from outright poking yourself in the eye. It does not prevent you from closing your eyes and experimentally rubbing at their lids. You begin normally, then slowly start to apply more and more pressure. It's hard to tell how much of the resistance encountered is due to armored eyelids and how much is from your eyes refusing to go squish.
"Please stop trying to test the durability of your eyes, Daughter," Mother sighs. "Suffice to say you should not 'tank' the blows of a Belkan Saint without active shields and a Barrier Jacket. Your eyes remain perhaps the most fragile component of your vessel and can still be damaged through your own efforts."
You sheepishly lower your hands and open your eyes. The dust cloud has started to settle, leaving the dirt to slide off the surface of your clothing and vessel without many issues. Your jewelry is not quite so lucky, their surfaces visibly tarnished.
"Right. Sorry."
"It is perfectly fine. I believe acting on curiosity should be encouraged in the vast majority of situations; if caution would be wise, your servants and retainers may raise such topics."
You briefly consider bringing up Calypso, then realize that the evil goddess was probably why Mom included the bit about caution. Being unnecessarily reckless still seems dumb, though.
So says the girl avoiding telling someone about a mutual attraction.
You force yourself to avoid brushing off Nanoha and simply focus on dusting your own jewelry. Your hair and clothes only need a little prodding to dislodge collections of dirt trapped in folded creases. The jewelry takes a little longer, but not especially so.
"You know, I just realized we've never gotten bugs in our eyes," you remark aloud. "Not for long, anyway. Vessels really are convenient."
Nanoha nods automatically. After the first second or so, the nodding slows as she appears to give it some more thought. Your not-a-date eventually sighs.
"It's too bad the rest of us only get four swaps. I did want to try out being a male eventually."
You try to imagine a male Nanoha. Although it's easy enough to transfer over some of her habits and behaviors, such as the bashfulness and tendency to overwork herself, many of the others refuse to be mapped properly. You admit you might be catering to gender stereotypes just a little bit, but... okay, you can't find a good reason. You don't like looking at male clothing and fashions nearly as much, so that might be part of it?
You frown and try to imagine the current Nanoha in a black business suit. Apparently, you still think she'd look good in it, so you probably can't blame everything on gender-specific fashions. Glasses would look weird on her, so maybe it's something like that? It would be fine once you got used to it, but would seem really weird initially? All that still leaves the biggest question to be addressed, though.
"Why? Everyone with more than three brain cells likes you as you are."
If it's simple curiosity, you could understand and might try it yourself. If she feels as though her preferences are forcing her out of being female, though, you'd prefer to have Mom hit Nanoha's Earth with informational broadcasts until they stop acting like idiots.
Nanoha shakes her head, smiling, and sets out to address your worries.
"I just want to see what it's like. We've got all these options as far as vessel mods go, and by those standards, gender is just another tweak. Don't you think it'd be a little dull to spend our whole lives without trying out everything? It'd be like eating one food forever just because you like it."
You shrug. While you think it might be neat to try, you're pretty sure you'd have to start from scratch when it comes to an awful lot of behaviors. For example, the steps designed to avoid disturbing layered female regalia would look weird in the male versions. Female Agni styles might tend toward concealing skin under layers of clothing, but males only wore one or two. Even then, their version of formal attire was often ceremonial armor. You like your Barrier Jacket well enough, but it doesn't cover up fidgeting very well at all, among numerous other complaints. Like, for example, always looking like they're ready to fight someone.
"You can go right ahead if you want to. Me, I'm happy with just staying a girl. Etiquette is difficult enough without trying to change categories."
"Four swaps," Nanoha reminds you. "Mitra thinks she could make some simulations with enough upgrades and a few lifted restrictions, but she says they'd still be guesses. And I should really hold on to those in case something happens."
And what then? Your soul still occupies your body. If the vessel dies, isn't that it? And should Nanoha die, you're not sure you wouldn't obsess over somehow bringing her back. If history and folklore has taught you anything, it's that such goals never end well.
You keep a smile plastered on your face even as you look for a solution. You're pretty sure Mom's original claim of "no Agni has ever fallen on the field of battle" was complete nonsense. Still, even if you do shift Nanoha's soul over to an Agni "True Self," what then? You're fairly confident their versions of Soul Gems weren't even close to invulnerable. The Agni would still be alive if they were. For that matter, you're not even sure their version is usable by non-Agni. Ice and fire don't really get along, so you'll have a hard time turning Sidhe into a demigod, which might mean no Agni Soul Gem for her.
Now that Kyubey is basically dead, you might be able to find out how he made your soul indestructible. You're not comfortable letting even an enslaved monster do the same to your friends, so maybe Mom could recreate the necessary hardware?
Pressure around on your wrist drags you back to reality. Your glance at Nanoha is met with a reassuring smile.
"I don't even have to do the sims if you're uncomfortable with it."
You shake your head violently. You're pretty sure you'd still be fine with Nanoha as a guy, even if it's not quite what you'd prefer. And you might feel like a walking gender stereotype sometimes, but doesn't that make it more important for you to avoid reinforcing roles?
"Not that. Just brooding on mortality and other gloomy stuff. And, um, I just realized I could actually take you home now? I mean, to my home plane. There's a really nice cake shop we could—"
Your brain catches up with your mouth, which promptly clicks shut. Unfortunately, your attempt at damage control definitely leans toward the damage part. Nanoha looks puzzled for a second or two, then seems to realize the implications of the proposal. Her mouth briefly forms a little round o before she glances down.
There are several seconds of awkward silence before the situation gets that much worse. Nanoha looks back up, her eyes beginning to sparkle and her expression determined. You brace yourself for something stressful.
"So, um..." Nanoha begins, then hesitates for a few seconds. She shakes her head and charges onward soon enough.
"I know you're still not comfortable with romantic things, and I'm clueless too, but..."
You look down and cling to Neph's earlier reassurance. She claimed your relationship with Nanoha wouldn't really change, didn't she? Agneyastra's dehumanizing attempts to handle Nanoha's crush have absolutely no bearing on this situation. Which is... it's good since you're barely comfortable with hugging, let alone kissing and stuff.
And just to make that whole mess even creepier, you just realized Indira probably still harbors the belief such things are OK. She might change her tune
"She wants to know if you can agree to calling mutual dibs," Mitra says bluntly, startling you out of your off-topic confusion. "You know, no chasing someone else until you give the other a fair chance at some future time? If you ask me, it's pretty obvious you two will be doing that anyway. You're practically giving me sugar poisoning and I don't even have a tongue."
Relief drowns your anxiety, hunts down its cousins, and kills those as well. You'd already practically agreed to such on your end, but maybe Nanoha hadn't quite realized that part? She's kind, hardworking, intelligent, attractive, and dragged you out of darkness. It'd be hard for someone else to compete with that at any point in the next few years.
You look up to see Nanoha give you an uncertain smile. It's hard to interpret her eyes and eyebrows when the former is filled with bright lights, but you think they might be hopeful? They're pretty, you know that much.
"Definitely," you say firmly, then try to come up with something better.
You'd really be fine even with full dating at this point. We're more afraid of not knowing what to do or say when dating her than anything else and that can only be fixed with experience. Mom and Mitra would say our attempts to fix that are "adorkable" and Nanoha is happy no matter what we do. Except literal heart-shaped fields of fire, anyway. That project smelled terrible.
You blink several times and try to remember what you were doing. Something better than a bland agreement, you think? You think you can even somewhat remember that incident, the product of channeling Red to think of something that could be seen from high above. You're not sure if you should worry about the bleedthrough, honestly.
Hush. I'm trying to think.
Dun wanna.
[] It's not like you'd be willing to share your soulfire with anyone. Which is to say, turn her into an Agni-style demigod.
-[] Well, you might do so for your other friends if you can, but Nanoha would get the untested version. As in, before you're 100% sure it's entirely safe, but are still willing to do it anyway.
--[] You're 99% you'll be fine, no worries. Neph said soulfires grow back.
[] Repeat what you just thought: She's kind, intelligent, attractive, hardworking, and literally kept you from turning into an eldritch abomination born from overwhelming despair. With all that, she doesn't exactly have real competition.
-[] You were more worried about her finding someone else first.
[] Try to keep things from getting worse before you're ready; simply tell her she didn't have to worry about that and continue your not-a-date.
[] Write-in
Voting will be locked for 120 minutes after this first goes up.
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Spectral Waltz
Scatterbrained Writer
- Location
- Walking the Endless Corridors
I-impossible...
The votes... They're all amazing... How am I supposed to choose just one!?
HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO CHOOSE!?
globalwarmth
ruining the weather.
- Location
- Polar ice caps
gah! the wholesome is too strong!
want all but
[] Repeat what you just thought: She's kind, intelligent, attractive, hardworking, and literally kept you from turning into an eldritch abomination born from overwhelming despair. With all that, she doesn't exactly have real competition.
-[] You were more worried about her finding someone else first.
seems like an okay 1st step
want all but
[] Repeat what you just thought: She's kind, intelligent, attractive, hardworking, and literally kept you from turning into an eldritch abomination born from overwhelming despair. With all that, she doesn't exactly have real competition.
-[] You were more worried about her finding someone else first.
seems like an okay 1st step
Breadnaugt
Even in Death, I'm still Tasty
- Location
- Britland
Ahh, little baby Planeswalker. Still thinks death means anything.
Sweetie, give it a few centuries, you'll be able to kill entire worlds, resurrect them, then repeat, just for shits and giggles.
Replicating the Kyubey method isn't half bad. The main weakness is that range limit, and I'm pretty sure the "invulnerability" isn't absolute. But the range limit is what makes it impractical as a kind of "revive when body dead" thing since you have to carry it to the thing that killed you.
Oh honey. Just wait until you run into Fate.
The more I think of this the more I like this update:
- Jade is trying (not necessarily romance, but relationships in general)
- Nanoha great maturity overall*. First and foremost of the emotional kind: after her crying she took to heart the "I'm not ready yet" from Jade, both because she realizes she still has a chance (I'm not ready...) and because she's giving Jade enough space so she grows comfortable with it (...yet).
- Nanoha's love of magic isn't left unaddressed: just because she can't detect mana doesn't mean she isn't interested in artifacts (and she'll get a mage gift soon anyways)
- Curious about gender change, but why not if you have the chance?
-- And immediately she says the "why not"
- And I can see Jade being obsessed with reviving Nanoha is she truly dies.
- The interchange between Jade and Agneyastra was sweet too: sure this could be dangerous, but please don't stop experimenting.
- The whole mutual dibs is a culmination of all of that: Nanoha finally realized she didn't have to give up on her crush, that the best way to have a "date" of sorts is not making it a date with all the expectatives of it... yet knowing when and just how much to push.
I like Nanoha as a series (well, up to StrikerS) and Nanoha as a character in spite of disliking-to-hating** the focus in the shipping and yuri (heresy, I know) yet I love this because it's a realization of Nanoha and Jade as characters.
* honestly, I shouldn't have been surprised by this. Yet here I am.
** where in that spectum I am on any given day depends on how annoying shippers are being
- Jade is trying (not necessarily romance, but relationships in general)
- Nanoha great maturity overall*. First and foremost of the emotional kind: after her crying she took to heart the "I'm not ready yet" from Jade, both because she realizes she still has a chance (I'm not ready...) and because she's giving Jade enough space so she grows comfortable with it (...yet).
- Nanoha's love of magic isn't left unaddressed: just because she can't detect mana doesn't mean she isn't interested in artifacts (and she'll get a mage gift soon anyways)
- Curious about gender change, but why not if you have the chance?
-- And immediately she says the "why not"
- And I can see Jade being obsessed with reviving Nanoha is she truly dies.
- The interchange between Jade and Agneyastra was sweet too: sure this could be dangerous, but please don't stop experimenting.
- The whole mutual dibs is a culmination of all of that: Nanoha finally realized she didn't have to give up on her crush, that the best way to have a "date" of sorts is not making it a date with all the expectatives of it... yet knowing when and just how much to push.
I like Nanoha as a series (well, up to StrikerS) and Nanoha as a character in spite of disliking-to-hating** the focus in the shipping and yuri (heresy, I know) yet I love this because it's a realization of Nanoha and Jade as characters.
* honestly, I shouldn't have been surprised by this. Yet here I am.
** where in that spectum I am on any given day depends on how annoying shippers are being
You know if Nanoha is so interested in mana everything we can share input mana sense to her I guess? Should have thought of it earlier but we can start now.
Nixeu
Lord of Madness, Harbinger of Llamas
- Location
- Your nightmares.
She's also a deity-the-making. On any world with a god of the underworld, she has a decent chance of being able to either bargain with them, or just straight up free the soul of that person from there by force, once she's strong enough. On worlds without established afterlives, intercepting and repairing the souls of the recently deceased shouldn't be too hard. She may be able to use her Summoning bonds to "catch" souls before they dissipate, too. Overall, yeah, death isn't really much of a stumbling block for Jade, especially in the long-term.
It seems fairly conceptual. Short of chucking ourselves into a black hole, or an encounter with some conceptual death or destruction magic user, or something equally crazy, I think we're fine. Maybe some deities would be able to do it, but I'm not sure.
However, that sort of immortality isn't necessarily without flaws, either. Extra-dimensional banishment, sealing, time-stopping/time-looping magic, and a variety of other methods can still effectively kill us, at least for a period of time. Black holes would be bad to fall into, even if we could survive one, just because of the time-dilation. Even if we escape by Planeswalking out, that still has an effect.
And, most importantly, if we're trapped for any significant amount of time (months-to-years) when we have a time-stop running on a plane, Bad Things happen. Namely, we attract the attention of the Eldrazi. (Thanks to @Torgamous for pointing that out to me a while back.)
The Froggy Ninja
The Blade Will Never Die
I wonder if we'll every run across a D&D, Pathfinder or Final Fantasy setting. D&D or PF for learning how to god, especially with empowering mortal champions, and FF for that sweet sweet White Magic and some powerful summons.
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Spectral Waltz
Scatterbrained Writer
- Location
- Walking the Endless Corridors
[x] Repeat what you just thought: She's kind, intelligent, attractive, hardworking, and literally kept you from turning into an eldritch abomination born from overwhelming despair. With all that, she doesn't exactly have real competition.
-[x] You were more worried about her finding someone else first.
I kinda wish I could insert 'Channel red as an excuse to kiss her' after since it would be extremely apropos...
-[x] You were more worried about her finding someone else first.
I kinda wish I could insert 'Channel red as an excuse to kiss her' after since it would be extremely apropos...
fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
Should be easier if we exercise our God power and make afterlife for her first.
We already have a connection to her soul and are able to create soulless copies of her at will.
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- Location
- Germany
[X] Repeat what you just thought: She's kind, intelligent, attractive, hardworking, and literally kept you from turning into an eldritch abomination born from overwhelming despair. With all that, she doesn't exactly have real competition.
[X] Share Input with Nanoha to give her a preview on mana sense.
[X] Notify Agneyastra and keep your mana sense active. A mage targeted you with that gust, the dirt may be drugged or a distraction.
[X] @Neph: BTW, any shopping recommendations here in Magnostadt?
PAUSE/HALT, crystal lanterns, Blue-tinged are the wrong color: Blue is #3366ff and White is #ffff00.
Might want to fix that when you're back at your PC.
[X] Share Input with Nanoha to give her a preview on mana sense.
[X] Notify Agneyastra and keep your mana sense active. A mage targeted you with that gust, the dirt may be drugged or a distraction.
[X] @Neph: BTW, any shopping recommendations here in Magnostadt?
PAUSE/HALT, crystal lanterns, Blue-tinged are the wrong color: Blue is #3366ff and White is #ffff00.
Might want to fix that when you're back at your PC.
Bad Jade! That's the road to 'puny little mortals'. Being better is great, being different and thinking you're better is a trap.
Is nobody going to react to the fact that some mage created that gust of wind to target us? For all we know, that dirt could be poisoned, drugged, enchanted or most likely a distraction. We just made enemies in Magnostadt by ruining the plot of an apocalypse cult and you're ignoring magic-infused wind?
New experiment!
Conceptual invulnerability against damage, immunity to "a massive number of hostile soul-affecting abilities".
No 'may' here, the souls of those we bonded with will go to us and if we create an afterlife, that expands to our followers.
Very bad idea. There's a reason Jade isn't ready for romance, and we'll either need more time or actual therapy to get over them.
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Spectral Waltz
Scatterbrained Writer
- Location
- Walking the Endless Corridors
I know I know.
Bugs in eyes? What?
Not relevant for anyone we are bonded to, as we can just summon them back to us.
That would require us to exhaust all available settings. By that point we shouldn't need any help with godhood. Or anything at all, I think.
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- Location
- Germany
Oh, and about
Unless you want to mention that she'll be interested in a blonde over the next six months? To me, that seems rather counterproductive in the current situation.
It's just a minor difference, but I'd prefer to leave it out.
If we just state it like that, it sounds rather desperate and may reinforce Jade's lack of self-worth a bit. Nanoha doesn't know about Neph's comment, after all.
Unless you want to mention that she'll be interested in a blonde over the next six months? To me, that seems rather counterproductive in the current situation.
It's just a minor difference, but I'd prefer to leave it out.
Flight training, although Jade's perspective is probably biased by the fact that most of it was in simulations where there are no bugs we could fly into.
fictionfan
Please sir, may I have some Meows?
- Location
- Tempe, AZ
We should have channeled white.
Shouldn't Barrier Jacket protect us from that? Or most of the mages on MGLN would be blind.
[x] Try to keep things from getting worse before you're ready; simply tell her she didn't have to worry about that and continue your not-a-date.
[x] Share Input with Nanoha to give her a preview on mana sense.
[x] Notify Agneyastra and keep your mana sense active. A mage targeted you with that gust, the dirt may be drugged or a distraction.
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