You were deeply thankful that you'd had the presence of mind to properly disguise your tent, since the person seemed to move away very quickly when they actually entered the clearing itself, hopefully they were scared off by the appearance of a den.
Hmm, is it really just a person, all alone, in the middle of the forest? That's pretty suspicious.
So I guess the question is whether or not we check out the lake or not. I mean forest bro has pulled off some pretty amazing things is it farfetched to believe he had a hand it transporting us so far?
Predictably, your surroundings degraded as you expected. Somehow surprising you, you feel that the heat in the air is also slowly being... destroyed? You aren't quite sure how to describe what is happening to the heat inside your barrier, the temperature inside is dropping much faster than the temperature outside, even stranger is that the heat from the outside isn't reaching the edges of your barrier to try and equalise it.
Guys, we made a sphere of Absolute Zero.
If we can throw things into this sphere after it had some charge-up time, we can basically pull it over someone's head to just freeze them to death.
But... we were at least a two hundred miles south of the lakes! There was no way they'd managed to make it that far on foot in the three days they'd been travelling for. What the hell? You didn't have long to speculate though, the sun was getting low in the sky.
Well, Best Forest must have done some things to help us out.
By the way, I actually meant for that little flame to be active during the whole day to get Cerys used to multitasking or working her magic without conciously thinking about it; or was it active all the time and I just misunderstood?
That sounds like a good start. Let me see...
Maybe we should actually read the survival guide, considering that the vote was cut off before we could.
[X] Set up camp
-[X] In the forest, a few dozen metres before the treeline ends
-[X] Disguise the tent as before, then have dinner
-[X] Afterwards, read the Survival Guide with Una and go to bed
[X] In the morning, after getting up:
-[X] Investigate Lake?!?
--[X] Ask the spirit what the heck happened? (If you can reach it. Try)
--[X] Try to sense fish in the water; if any are near the shore, try to catch them (first with your hands and, if this does not work, by freezing the water around them into a cube of ice)
-[X] If Una has yet to get up, practice some more magic
--[X] You still lack a good/reliable means of defending yourself and, more importantly, Una. Try to turn your fire solid this time; if this does not work, form your regular fire into a blade. Try to wield the result like a sword and see if you can make use of it.
--[X] See if you can detach Alpha and Omega from yourself and have it float around; make it fist-sized for that experiment
--[X] Try to form your fire and also the ice into spears you can throw, the latter manually instead of with your magic; having means to keep enemies away from you is probably important and your aura will not cut it with Una nearby
--[X] You also need a better means of transportation... and there were no limits before, so why should there be now? You are fire, so maybe you can make yourself wings of pure flame, like a phoenix; see if you can make working wings for yourself. (Make sure you are nowhere near anything flammable)
---[X] Magic is also bullshit, so you could also try to take to the air with magic alone.
[X] Once Una is awake and had breakfast
-[X] Go for a swim and take Una along; make sure not to go too far inside or away from where you enter
--[X] You both probably smell a lot by now; see if you can at least get her somewhat clean and into a change of clothes
--[X] See if enhancement lets you hold your breath longer.
-[X] Also, see about washing the clothes you wore up to this point
This basically sees us through the evening, night and next morning; I expect a new vote to be called somewhere in the afternoon.
Basically, I want the two to rest for a bit longer; such a trek is brutal on a pair of children.
Changes have to wait a few hours, though. I am off to bed.
By the way, I actually meant for that little flame to be active during the whole day to get Cerys used to multitasking or working her magic without conciously thinking about it; or was it active all the time and I just misunderstood?
Guys, we made a sphere of Absolute Zero.
If we can throw things into this sphere after it had some charge-up time, we can basically pull it over someone's head to just freeze them to death.
Well, first off, you don't need Absolute Zero to freeze something to death.
Second, that wouldn't kill them, it would trap them eternally for all time.
Absolute Zero is when all motion stops past even the molecular level. Time is, more than anything, a measurement of motion. So, Absolute Zero is actually a time-stop. Just one you can't turn back on... except maybe we can because Alpha and Omega.
Our barrier appears to be blocking heat energy from entering the area. Which is Swanky. Absolute zero would require them to cease absorbing ALL energy and expel what they do contain. Then again magic.
Actually if the barrier keeping the heat OUT didn't let any in... Well then the barrier is what we should be interested in. A complete non conductor would be an invaluable defense.
They are absorbing some light energy at least. It didn't turn into a mirror.
Hm we should make a fire laser contained and directed with fire mirrors. If we can control thermal energy in our radius anyway it shouldn't be hard.
We need to make a campfire and see if we can direct its heat. We need to step up our magic scale testing.
Guys, we made a sphere of Absolute Zero.
If we can throw things into this sphere after it had some charge-up time, we can basically pull it over someone's head to just freeze them to death.
Well, Best Forest must have done some things to help us out.
By the way, I actually meant for that little flame to be active during the whole day to get Cerys used to multitasking or working her magic without conciously thinking about it; or was it active all the time and I just misunderstood?
That sounds like a good start. Let me see...
Maybe we should actually read the survival guide, considering that the vote was cut off before we could.
[X] Set up camp
-[X] In the forest, a few dozen metres before the treeline ends
-[X] Disguise the tent as before, then have dinner
-[X] Afterwards, read the Survival Guide with Una and go to bed
[X] In the morning, after getting up:
-[X] Investigate Lake?!?
--[X] Ask the spirit what the heck happened? (If you can reach it. Try)
--[X] Try to sense fish in the water; if any are near the shore, try to catch them (first with your hands and, if this does not work, by freezing the water around them into a cube of ice)
-[X] If Una has yet to get up, practice some more magic
--[X] Try to turn your fire solid this time; if this does not work, form your regular fire into a blade and try to wield it like a sword
--[X] See if you can detach Alpha and Omega from yourself and have it float around; make it fist-sized for that experiment
--[X] Try to form your fire and also the ice into spears you can throw, the latter manually instead of with your magic
--[X] Fire is just a form of energy; turn it into energy and then into electricity
[X] Once Una is awake and had breakfast
-[X] Go for a swim and take Una along; make sure not to go too far inside or away from where you enter
--[X] You both probably smell a lot by now; see if you can at least get her somewhat clean and into a change of clothes
--[X] See if enhancement lets you hold your breath longer.
-[X] Also, see about washing the clothes you wore up to this point
This basically sees us through the evening, night and next morning; I expect a new vote to be called somewhere in the afternoon.
Basically, I want the two to rest for a bit longer; such a trek is brutal on a pair of children.
Changes have to wait a few hours, though. I am off to bed.
Ah no seeing if we can sustain fire while underwater? It would be damn good to know if we can burn without oxygen. It will also help us train against someone who tries to "put us out"
Ah no seeing if we can sustain fire while underwater? It would be damn good to know if we can burn without oxygen. It will also help us train against someone who tries to "put us out"
Right now does not sound like a good idea; that would produce a lot of steam and someone might see, then wonder what is going on and come looking.
If we just found a small lake or river in the forest, I would not mind... but this smells like a risk to me.
As a suggestion: a cool idea I thought of is that we could probably use thermokinesis to make a boat made out of ice
While it probably can't really get to moving all that fast yet, with us having only barely begun to use pure magic as a force (which we should probably also practice again), and there is probably no way that we'd be able to actually cross the great lakes with it because they are too big and we'd probably fall asleep before being able to do so, it would be good for small jaunts across water, and rowing (we'd probably have to start with making it a rowboat instead of anything more fancy that doesn't require rowing) would probably build up some strength over time.
Also good for practicing control, and as soon as we are done using an ice boat it would be trivial to use thermokinesis to transfer it all back into water again quickly, so, unlike say alpha and omega, or other skills that might leave marks upon the land, it is inconspicuous after the fact (though of course, a boat made out of ice is very conspicuous if actually seen in the middle of use, though a lot of our magic is), and since we'd be using thermokinesis, we can keep it from reaching a temperature where it would start melting. Until we get flight it would be a good way to cross small (or larger once we get it moving forward magically at a good speed without us having to row) bodies of water.
edit: also I am personally opposed to trying to play with electricity yet. I kind of want to build up more control first, since it is something that we probably don't have as much resistance against as we do fire and it backfiring could go really badly.
edit: also I am personally opposed to trying to play with electricity yet. I kind of want to build up more control first, since it is something that we probably don't have as much resistance against as we do fire and it backfiring could go really badly.
Good point; I mostly just wanted to fill more space in because we ran out of things to do with time to spare before.
Let me cannibalise other things from our nifty idea-page on the character sheet.
Edit: Okay, I exchanged electricity with the beginnings of flight.
Fair enough, while I'd still prefer having magical force blasts and the ice boat to be practiced as well, probably experimenting on too many things at once would lead to not having spent as much time on each experiment, and am willing to wait for them. If the magical flight pays off enough the ice boat might not be needed yet anyway (assuming of course that we would be able to pick up Una, all the stuff she has, and all the stuff that we have and still remain flying if we manage to roll a 100 and actually get flight this turn )
Fair enough, while I'd still prefer having magical force blasts and the ice boat to be practiced as well, probably experimenting on too many things at once would lead to not having spent as much time on each experiment, and am willing to wait for them. If the magical flight pays off enough the ice boat might not be needed yet anyway (assuming of course that we would be able to pick up Una, all the stuff she has, and all the stuff that we have and still remain flying if we manage to roll a 100 and actually get flight this turn )
I... I am not really convinced on the boat of ice.
As for the forceblasts, we can throw those in for the next vote; right now, I would like to have more means of attack just in case we have to fight.
I... I am not really convinced on the boat of ice.
As for the forceblasts, we can throw those in for the next vote; right now, I would like to have more means of attack just in case we have to fight.
One: Mythbusters did once make a boat out of ice and newspaper(to form the mold of the boat with we wouldn't need to do), could hold two bigger men then us and a 500 pound motor without sinking. It held up fine for thirty minutes, but couldn't really stay out for much longer because its melting caused a leak. A problem we wouldn't have. Hence it is viable without sinking on us.
Two: I am not convinced that we'd get flight in one or even two updates practicing it without the weight of a critical success.
three: I am not convinced that we'd be able to pick up Una and everything we currently own while flying, while the boat (as seen by the mythbusters attempt) definitely could.
Four: Even if we can manage to pick up Una and everything we own while in flight, I wouldn't imagine that it would be safe early level, and I imagine that until flight feels natural to Cerys that she wouldn't want to bring Una with her as she could lose concentration and fall.
Five: a person flying through the sky raises much more suspicion than a person on a boat, especially since we don't have a way to deal with the lose of oxygen from going to a high altitude so we can't even really manage to be "dots in the sky" or high up enough to be unseen.
six: I just really like an image of using a boat of ice to cross bodies of water .
To put it simply, I have no confidence in flight being a reliable, or inconspicuous method of moving Una around any time soon, while a boat would be and if we do learn to effectively use magical force, making it move without rowing or relying on the tide would also be a good way to try to build up to true telekinesis.
As for the force blast argument… I really don't get your point at all?
You want more means to attack doesn't make much sense as an argument against it because it is a new means to attack. To hit an enemy hard with magical force. One that unlike the ice and fire suggestions isn't weakened in effectiveness by someone immune or resistant to hot or cold? Once it is mastered it can probably branch off into more penetrative strikes like your idea of the fire and ice lances. Is also a method that is invisible to normals, and to anyone who can't actually sense another's person build up of magical powers. One that could be used as the basis of an ability to eventually put more force into our movements in a different way than reinforcement. Also part of my "work with magical force to eventually build up to telekinesis" which besides a lot of utility is also once again a major method of attack, as well a way to grind up control which would be needed to make other attacks viable down the line?
Ultimately I just don't get the idea of rejecting an idea in a vote because you wanted more avenues of attack when it is an avenue of attack itself and can build up into more of them?
It is a magical attack that acts as a staging ground of more types of magical attacks, utility, and enhancement so, and isn't "more of the same theme" such as fire or ice, doesn't have the same weaknesses as ice and fire.
It is absolutely a new means of attack so saying it isn't is eyebrow raising?
Ultimately I just don't get the idea of rejecting an idea in a vote because you wanted more avenues of attack when it is an avenue of attack itself and can build up into more of them?
It is a magical attack that acts as a staging ground of more types of magical attacks, utility, and enhancement so, and isn't "more of the same theme" such as fire or ice, doesn't have the same weaknesses as ice and fire.
It is absolutely a new means of attack so saying it isn't is eyebrow raising?
Fair enough.
However, the means of attack we currently have in our character sheet are a ball of plasma, an unusable ball of ice, our fists and temperature manipulation. What I meant was that I want to consolidate the avenues we already have into something usable first before going off exploring other opportunities. That is why I went with those first.
Also, I forgot about the energy blast when making my vote and now I doubt it will still fit in.
As for the boat, that does make sense... but I am not yet sure we have to cross the lake to begin with.
Edit: We can throw it in once we learn that crossing is significantly faster than just going left or right around it; my main problem is just that I am not sure we even have to.
As for the boat, that does make sense... but I am not yet sure we have to cross the lake to begin with.
Edit: We can throw it in once we learn that crossing is significantly faster than just going left or right around it; my main problem is just that I am not sure we even have to.
Aye that is fair enough, depending on which great lake we are at and where we are at on it, crossing the water might not even really be necessary at all, though for the future, in case it is necessary:
What you are trying is a somewhat more important factor, as if why you are doing it. If you try to learn how to create a wall of flame to destroy people who attack you, it would be harder than if you were learning it so that you could protect your sister behind it.
Since intent helps lower the dc for experimentation, and I dare say that if making a boat of ice is useful in the near future, we could word trying to use magical force as having it with the intent of being able to apply it to the boat later: Aka rather than have it being learnt as a "method to attack enemies" have it be learned as "a way to move the thing that will be carrying Una and us to safety" or "thing that will help us transverse this area better
something like:
[]experiment with magic
-[] Seeing how you are now next to the great lakes, the ability to transverse across water for yourself and Una in case of emergency, or as a means of travel is now much higher priority.
--[] Start with practicing the magical force blast you had tried earlier.
---[] Use thermo-Kinesis to make a boat out of ice using the water of the lake
----[] If you had succeeded with magical force earlier now try to apply it to the boat in a way that causes it to move without putting enough force into it to damage it.
-----[] If that fails use magic to create oars and practice rowing for a bit.
------[] When done with practice make the boat into water again using thermokinesis.
This way we could actually use it in a way to make learning magical force easier (lower dc) by shaping the motivation this way.
Actually, I think we really need to begin wording our votes in ways that would lower the dc for experimentation by providing a "why" that fits within Cerys motivations rather than leave the reasons more nebulous.
Also @Rukia could you perhaps put that post of yours I just quoted a part of on how location, mood, and intent affects magical experimentation, under the informational threadmarks or put that information on the character sheet post (probably under the magic tab) so that it is easier for new readers to find and old readers to reference in the future?
Actually, I think we really need to begin wording our votes in ways that would lower the dc for experimentation by providing a "why" that fits within Cerys motivations rather than leave the reasons more nebulous.
You disregard your sudden jump of what has to be at least at least hundred and fifty miles and peer around. There aren't really any great places to hide out by the water. There is isn't any roads nearby as best as you can tell, though there is a worn path that leads from the woods to the water then off to the right. When you stretch your thermal sense, you don't feel anyone, though there are lots of little heat signatures that you presume are fish in the water.
Still, you suppose that your best chance would be to move back into the forest and set up camp there. With a bit of effort, you should be able to properly disguise your tent again, though you doubt that you'll find any trees with branches the right size over here. All of the trees are massive and have no side branches, only ones near the top, and those are much higher than you are willing to climb to reach them. A minutes walking later and you are out of view of the path, another quick scan tells you that you are alone and you get to setting up your tent.
You clear out a small area and flatten it as best you can, then pitch the tent there. The floor here is mostly dirt with the odd leaf that's fallen from the trees above, to be honest you don't really see any way to disguise your tent as it is.
(Cerys: 75 + 30 Hiding = 105 Critical Success!)
When you are peering around, you see a section of dirt that is slightly different that it's surroundings. When you carefully poke it with your foot, an entire patch of ground crumbles away into a large opening. Curiosity raised, you start glowing and poke your head through the hole. It's a little dark, so you glow brighter, but the insides surprise you. There is a fairly large burrow down here, easily large enough for you to stand up, though not to stretch. Your finding makes you grin, it is completely empty, nothing is lurking in any of the corners and the roof is held up by the roots of the massive trees above you. You were seriously lucky to notice that patch of uneven dirt, this was literally the perfect hidey-hole.
A happy grin on your face, you excitedly called Una over to look at your find. She poked her head into the hole and started bouncing around, she honestly looked like she'd found a dozen gold bars. You couldn't quite tell, but you were fairly sure that she was muttering something about a secret hideout with a silly grin on her face. While she was prancing about, you quickly climbed back up and grabbed the tent, collapsing it and brining it underneath. There was only a tiny bit of light being let into the cave at this point, the sun was almost gone, but your own light was sufficient for you and Una to pitch your tent. The lack of dirt on the floor made it hard to find somewhere to put the pegs, but in the end you found some large stones that you could put the rope under.
When the two of you entered your lopsided tent, you decided to break out some of the chocolate bars, the fruits would last until tomorrow but even you were affected by the prospect of a secret cave. It was one of the childhood dreams you had shared with your sister, that the two of you would run away and go live in a cave like some sort of stone age batman. The thought was ridiculous, but to be honest the fact that you kind of were was something that tickled your sense of humour like nothing else had in months.
Still, dinner served with entertainment, you decided to finally get around to reading that survival book you had. You'd honestly meant to read it days ago, but one thing or another kept interrupting you. Now you had both snacks and an attentive little sister to read it with. You read well into the night, the two of your pouring over it's contents carefully. What it contained was a goldmine of useful information on survival in the wild. You don't manage to make it all the way through the book, but now you are far more comfortable with the idea of staying in the wilds for extended lengths of time, you might even be able to make a few creature comforts if you had the time.
(Skill Learned: Wilderness Survival)
Una learns more from it than you do, she is better at learning and honestly smarter than you. You give her a head-rub for her help and settle down to sleep, slowly dimming the light you extrude as you do so.
You are woken in the night by a massive collection of heat in the distance, you carefully lay still to let your sister stay asleep as you follow the mass of heat as it travels. When you focus further, you can feel that it is easily a dozen humans and what you think is a truck or transport of some sort. It is mostly cold, but there is an extremely hot part near the front and all of the people are inside of the transport. You remain carefully still as they grow closer, not deviating from their path as they approach you, pass where you had exited the forest and then continue onwards past you.
When they finally pass, you let out a massive sigh of relief as you feel all of your tense muscles relax from where they had tightly wound. You kept a weary eye on them until they passed out of your range. Obviously you had missed a road of some sort in your previous explorations. There should be no way that a vehicle of that size would fit in the forest, the trees grew very close and the path by the water was human sized. Still, you settle back down from where you were half sitting up and try your best to fall back into a light slumber.
Once morning comes around, you are fairly well rested. You were only woken twice last night, the first by the large group and the second by what was apparently a very large fish. You hadn't known there were fish big enough to trip your thermal sense in the lake, but now you know better. A quick round of stretching later and you are up and about, though for the first time in days your sister actually woke up when you did. You suppose that the multiple breaks you had taken yesterday hadn't worn her out so much, she looks a lot better today that she did yesterday. Much more energetic, if that was even possible.
The two of you clamber out of your tent and into the gloomy cave, it has a little light shining in from the opening, but you still light up your glow to help you move around. A quick check later and you clamber out of the hole and up to the surface once more. You suppose that you are somewhat stuck right now, so you'll leave the tent where it is until you find a direction to go. You're not sure if this is the edge of the forest the spirit wanted you to exit, but seeing as there are more trees ahead of you around the lake, you suppose not.
You send a quick pulse of your magic down your arm as you touch the largest tree there, trying to form a connection with the spirit. It is certainly there, you can feel it, but the connection is really fuzzy. Well, not fuzzy, but it would be like trying to speak while you have a foam ball in your mouth. Everything is just kind of distant and comes out wrong, or it gets lost half way. You suppose that is why the spirit had guided you towards a specific area to communicate with you, it was possible, but really hard to do it anywhere else.
You retract your magic with a quiet sigh, no help on that front, though you do think that it was the spirit that had made your passage through the forest as fast as it had been.
You peer around at your surroundings considering. You still have a lot of ideas as to how to practice your magic, a lot of them to be honest, but they were all so visible. You had a lot of ideas but seeing as this was pretty close to a tourist area, kind of, you were a little wary. You suppose you could practice some of your smaller ideas though. You and Una had already eaten and you were full of energy, so you suppose that it couldn't hurt to try some of your smaller, easier to conceal ideas.
You decide to start off with the safest idea first as usual. You create your flame armour, you suppose you could call it that. It feels a little wrong to do so, whenever you thought of armour, the first thing that came to mind was that skintight black material that had appeared upon you when you'd transformed? That seemed both right and not, there was a transformation you suppose, but you hadn't felt any different after you had dissolved the armour later. Something to think on you, maybe you could try transforming? The words were readily at hand, the rush of magic ready at your command, but you aren't sure if your Aura would surge as it had when you first released it.
Actually, considering your binding of the flame, maybe you were already transformed? That.. didn't seem right. You felt like you weren't, but parts of it seemed to be? Gah, you'll think about this later. Once you have an hour or two to sit down.
You focus back to your original idea and create the small buffer of flames around you. You impose it into the semi-solid state you had managed to reach before, the flames now running along your body like water. Then you try and solidify them even further.
(Cerys: 48 + 5 Control = 53)
You manage to turn small parts of the flame covering you solid, though you suddenly realise that you hadn't so much created armour as you had created a solid cage around you. A little bit of effort lets you loose those solid parts until they were attached to you rather than floating around you, solidly in place. That was a little embarrassing. Still, what small parts you manage to solidify are strange. You dismiss most of the liquid flame while you look at these parts.
You can touch them with your bare band, feel the waviness of the material you had made. It was still very hot, despite not moving now. When you tried putting pressure on it, it bent with the force slightly though you couldn't just push through with a gentle push. You carefully control the heat away from your clothes as you draw back a fist and punch it. It promptly cracks into a dozen pieces like a dropped plate. The pieces don't move far and they join back together into one piece without difficulty, but it really hadn't taken much effort to shatter it into pieces. You suppose that if you wanted to use it as armour you'd have to work at it for a while.
You dismiss what remains as you think about your next idea. You don't really have a ranged method of attack beyond your Aura, and that still kind of indiscriminately set everything on fire, not particularly useful at the moment. You suppose you could throw walls of fire about or something, but the need for a more... controlled method is there. You quickly look over to where your sister is sitting against a tree and reading and poke her for ideas. She helpfully throws you the idea of a spear or sword of some sort.
You'd had the idea for a sword before, though it didn't work out then you think that with your 'success' with the flame armour that it might work out better now. You form long but thin pole of fire and carefully try and etch a spearhead onto the top. It's halfway through this that you question why the hell you were bothering. The fire was mostly intangible, so having an actual 'head' to the spear that you were going to throw wasn't really needed, there would be no more damage it could cause by having the head of the spear wriggle in the wound. If you were actually going to hold it, then you would bother, but it was actually much easier to make a floating javelin of fire.
(Cerys: 8 + 5 Control = 13)
Your first attempt at throwing it is honestly pitiful. Once it starts going more than ten miles an hour your control over it starts to waver and the fire just bursts out into the air and disperses without something to burn. The next several attempts are much more successful, once you figure out how to track and control something moving quickly with your control over heat. It took a while of adjusting and a quick duck back into the shelter when you felt a couple wander up and past you on the waterside.
Still, you eventually managed to figure out how to make and throw the javelins of heat, though you suppose that calling them spears is a little cooler. This time, you spend a while carefully making a solid spear, one that you could actually hold. It was just as difficult as creating the solid parts of your armour, though you did manage to slowly create the entire thing, spearhead included. You wave it around in your hands a little, discovering that it only actually weighed anything if you tried to make it weigh anything. That made sense, fire didn't actually have any mass, you think. You aren't sure about that one and Una says that the encyclopedia doesn't say either. A mystery for another day.
You chose a tree of choice and carefully wind your arm back, before stabbing straight forwards. The spear shatters on the bark of the tree, though it does leave a burn mark where it had struck. Ah, yeah, fragile. You really needed to figure out some way to make these harder. Right now they held a shape but were useless at actually hitting something, they just broke, easy as they were to re-form.
You dismiss the spear, carefully leaching it's heat as you think about your next idea. While your fire javelins had also lost cohesion whenever they hit something, the spear shattered into physical-ish pieces. It makes you wonder if actually having something physical to work from would help. You drain a fairly large area of heat and compress the cold into a rough spear shape. It takes a lot of work, but you manage to squeeze it down until it was mostly uniform. There was an odd bump here or there but it was mostly spear shaped. New spear in hand, you try and strike this at the tree.
This works somewhat better. The tip actually dug into the tree a small distance before it stopped, though it sent a wave of force up the spear that jarred your arm and sent cracks racing down the spear. You spent a little while trying to force the ice back together, but it wasn't incorporeal like your fire was, it had an actual physical form and it didn't really want to just merge back together. You could drop the temperature inside the spear as much as you wanted, the cracks were still there, there was no new material to fill them and you couldn't actually control the ice directly like you could fire. You just moved the heat with fire, but the ice was nice and stationary, it needed water to freeze to form.
You sigh in frustration. Well, it worked. For one meaning of the word. You create a quick sword of solid fire and ice, though you don't use it, it would just shatter like the spears.
You just decide to move on to your next idea, trying to control your degradation barrier. You really need a better name for it, you'll think about it. This time you try and form the barrier itself just underneath your skin, instead of out of it.
(Cerys: 93 + 5 Control = 98)
It takes it's usual amount of magic and forms under your skin without issue. The barrier following the contours of your body so perfectly that if you could see it it would probably look like an outline of you. You move about slightly, stretching and flexing slightly as you do so, only for the barrier to follow you perfectly. You spend five minutes or so wandering around with the barrier, but to be honest you feel great, better than you had before. You notice that you are getting a slight stream of magic from something, despite the barrier having nothing to degrade. You think about about it for a while, but the best conclusion you come from is that it's consuming something inside your body.
The though makes you panic a bit, but when you think about it, you do feel amazing. You feel lighter than you have in a while, like there was a weight that was pushing you down and making your limbs drag slightly when you moved.
(Cerys: Demon of Due's Curse of Weakness removed.)
You let out a long and satisfied sigh with a stretch, basking in the feeling, like you'd just had a hot bath. The barrier stops feeding you energy after a little while, it's normal flow speeding up before it reaches a certain point and then you felt a large chunk of magic flow into you at once. Occasionally you feel a slight amount of magic flow to you, but you can feel that it's coming from outside of your barrier, consumed when it touched it. Magic was something that just ambivalently floated in the air and soaked into people? That made sense you guess. It would explain how magical animals or plants, if they existed, were magical.
Still, you crush your barrier down further, to the size of your fist and try moving it around a little. It... really doesn't move properly. You can stretch the barrier in one direction, but you cant actually move it from it's centre, somewhere in your chest. No matter how hard you pushed it remained solidly in place. Ah well, can't have everything.
You were feeling much better now, bouncing slightly on your feel at the energy running through you. You collapse the barrier inside of you and move on to the last idea you had. This one will be a lot more dangerous and flashy, so you suppose that you should start with the safer part of it.
You carefully gather your magic and suffuse it through your entire body. The energy buzzing under your skin is enough that you start glowing slightly, even though you weren't trying to. You mange to stop yourself from glowing, though it is something you actually have to work at constantly. Whatever, for the purpose of this test, it would be better if you could focus entirely on what you were going to do so you let the glow out. Una peers up from her book at your glow, though she doesn't look particularly bothered as she goes back to it.
(Cerys: 3 + 5 = 8)
You gather all of the energy in your body and focus on trying to lift yourself from the ground. You promptly throw yourself a foot upwards and land on your face. Not sure what I was expecting. Ok, so flying won't be that easy. You try forming a platform of magic under your feet as Una snickers at you, but your magic is too flimsy and it just flows around your feet. When you try and make it hard, it just shatters around your feet. No platforms then. You sigh a little as you move back to your other idea.
You carefully push upwards and try and control your rise this time. You feel like your magic is doing something, but your not sure. Still, you do a little hop and are very surprised when you quickly bounce upwards and then slowly fall back downwards. It's not exactly flight or even hovering, but you are using your magic to help you jump higher and fall slower, so you suppose that you are getting there? This is going to take a while.
You play with your new ability a little, you aren't even using reinforcement but you find yourself able to leap metres up and slowly float down. You try jumping onto a tree and bouncing off of it to another and it works. It was fairly similar as to what you did when you were doing parkour, but instead of using your muscles, you were using magic to bounce between trees. Sure, there were some close calls where you nearly missed a tree or hit it with your face. But so long as you were keeping focused on your magic then you just floated down to the ground.
You considered an idea Una had pitched to you, to make wings of flame and use the increased surface area to have an easier time pushing with your magic, but to be honest you still feel distant signs of humans sometimes. The road was a good six hundred metres away, almost at the limit of your range, but you could feel the drastically hotter tarmac compared to the forest around it clearly. Vehicles occasionally past by, and you think that wings of flame would be visible from there. Smaller ones might not, but it's best not to risk it.
You are feeling sweaty and hungry now. You keep the air around you nice and cool but you had still worked up a sweat with all of your jumping. Una is buried into her book as usual, you'd expected her to finish it by now, but it was a very big book. She was probably going over it once or twice to make sure she remembered most things. You wander over and poke her until she looks up. A quick pulse of your sense to it's maximum and back to normal tells you there isn't anyone nearby.
"Want to go swimming?" Una adored swimming, not that you often got to take her. You think that she was part fish in a past life, probably a shark or something cute.
She lets out a quiet high pitched noise before she rushes back to the cave and throws the book down somewhere, probably on her pile of stuff. Then she quickly comes running out and over to you, she grabs you by the arms and starts dragging you to the water. Once you get there she doesn't even bother taking her clothes off, she just jumps straight in, still dragging you right behind her. Despite expecting it, she still managed to drag you straight off of your feet and nearly head-first into the water.
You manage not to inhale a lungful of water and slowly peek your head above the water. The water around you is icy cold to you, seeing that your internal temperature is stupidly high, so you quickly heat it up to a more comfortable temperature. Much better. Now, revenge.
Una had already turned around and started playing in the water, so you quietly stalked up behind her before grabbing her in a grab bear hug. She lets out giggling screams as you lift her out of the water and hold her up sideways. You zoom her over the water, close enough that her nose just barely scrapes the water, before at the top of a pass you just let her go. She hovers in the air for a long moment, her eyes drilling into yours, openly displaying the horrific betrayal you had inflicted upon her. Then she plunges into the water, spluttering and gasping as she quickly paddles back up to the surface.
Hmm, the water here must get deep really quickly. You engage in the splash war to end all splash wars, dipping into your reinforcement for just a moment as you drag your arms through the water, making waves much larger than you could otherwise. Your sneaky sister takes advantage of these and 'sneaks' up on you, you politely ignore her heat signature as she stealthily swims just under the water, past your feet. When she grabs your feet and pulls them as hard as she can, you obligingly fall onto you back where she pushes you under water while giggling like mad.
You take the brief time you have to try something. You quickly reinforce your lungs, just to see if you can hold your breath longer. You seem to do so, but then you suddenly realise that you just cant feel the convulsions that your lungs would normally be doing if you were gasping for breath. Your head quickly gets foggier as you sit up as fast as you can and start gasping for breath. Your sister was looking at you worriedly, but then sighs in relief as you pop your head back up.
Once you've gotten your breath, you pulse your sense again. You don't catch any humans, but you do sense that big mass of heat in the water. It seems to be slowly working it's way towards your general area, though you don't know if it's looking for you. You decide that you really don't want to be in the water with something that has as large a heat signature as a human and quickly make your way out of the water, urging Una along as you go. A quick flex of your control later and the two of you were bone dry, clothes included.
You keep careful watch of the thing, seeing it slowly continue coming closer. Once it gets into the shallow areas of the water, it ambles around a little before moving back towards deeper water. You quietly share your findings with Una, making sure that she won't go into the water without you there to keep watch. You honestly don't even know if it's a hostile fish of some sort, but you don't know of any sort of water creature of that size in Lake Superior. Nothing that big should like here, seeing as the lake freezes every year.
Before you leave the lake, you try and see if it has some sort of spirit too. You have no idea if it does, but it can't hurt to try. You quickly send a short length of magic into the water by your foot. Predictably you feel water. Touching things with your magic was strange, but there seems to be some sort of existence inside the lake. You aren't sure if that is the creatures inside the lake or if there is some sort of spirit that you can' connect to properly, like the spirit of the land.
You withdraw your magic when you don't feel anything different, though you quickly pulse your sense to check. The large fish thing was still ambling around three hundred metres away or so, though it was easily a hundred metres underwater at this point, so there wasn't much to be worrying about there.
Camp...
[]Make the cave a little more homely, you'll be here for a little while
[]Abandon the cave, start walking around the edge of the lake, you'll make it into Canada one way or another
[]Write In...
Magic...
[]Una has all of the ideas!
[]Cut it out for now
+ 10 XP Discovered the true nature of your barrier
Spells
Thermal Spear
-Shoot a spear of Fire or Ice.
Level 1
Base Damage: 75 x1.2
Magic Modifier: 10 +10
Affinity: Beginning
Ability: Burn | Freeze
Abilities
Magic Control
Progress...
Thermal Control
Level 8 -> 10
Sensing radius increased to seven hundred metres.
Pre-Flight
Level 1/5
-Once 5/5 flight is unlocked. Can currently jump 4 metres and fall slowly.
Alpha and Omega
Level 1
You've discovered that your barrier can destroy magic the same as everything else, living beings other than you are no longer safe within your barrier. So long as this ability is in effect and is consuming your surroundings, you cannot run out of magic.
Alpha and Omega
Level 3 -> 5
You've discovered that your barrier can destroy magic the same as everything else, living beings other than you are no longer safe within your barrier. Currently deals 5 damage per turn. This effect is additionally applied every turn the enemy is within the barrier with no upper limit. 5dmg -> 10dmg -> 15 dmg. So long as this ability is in effect and is consuming your surroundings, you cannot out of magic.
Once they leave your barrier, the stack dispels after one turn.
Passively consumes magic being used against you. Buffs and Debuffs are applied at 50% strength and only last one turn. Offensive magic's are weakened by 25% per turn they spend inside the barrier.
