[X] Explore your abilities.
-[X] Play your flute. Open yourself up to the rhythm. After all, music and magic are related according to some schools of thought...
[X] Meditate on your past life.
-[X] How blood magic works and the consequences of it.
[X] Do something else
-[X] Go to the library and study parahumans and how the cape scene works
(QMN: I decided to add in a third action so as to speed up the plot a little.)
Your day starts just like it has the rest of the week—with an awkward breakfast shared with your dad. Danny had offered to let you sleep in this week, but you had stubbornly decided to wake up at your normal time in order to keep in practice for school.
You wish you had just said you were going to sleep in. Your dad obviously feels like he failed you, and his presence just works to remind you that in just four days, you have to return to school. You glower into your eggs, the silence growing even more imposing.
"Got anything planned for today, Taylor?" Your dad suddenly asks you.
"Might go to the library. Do some research for homework," you say.
"Want a note? Just in case anyone asks why you're not in school..." Your dad trails off.
You feel torn between laughing and frowning at how uncomfortable he is, and compromise by grunting out a, "sure."
Your dad makes a couple more attempts at conversation, but you manage to stave them off with terse answers until he has to leave for work. Once he's gone, you go up to your bedroom. You have a full day planned out, so it's time to get to work.
First on your agenda is some basic experimentation with your newly-created implement. You pull the flute out from under your bed, and instantly feel lighter. When you turned it into an implement, you crystallized your past joy, present endurance, and future hopes and made them all a part of the flute. The best parts of you, all in one instrument.
Momentarily distracted, you think back to breakfast. Maybe you've been a little harsh on your dad. You wish he was a more attentive father, but maybe he needs your help as much as you wish you had his.
That is a thought for later, though. You bring the flute to your lips, and begin to play. Almost instantly, you fall into the melody you played during the ritual yesterday. This time, though, you listen intently to the song.
There are no patterns in the song you play. No chorus or verse, no theme or refrain. Just an endless flood of notes, each leading to the next. The song starts sprightly and light, with the occasional deeper note guiding the cheerful babbling of the upper register. When the lower notes suddenly disappear, the melody slows, and falls into what almost sounds like a funeral march. Finally, the speed picks back up, and the song grows ever stronger and stronger.
When you finally stop playing, you smile. The song is more than a recording of your history, or a representation of who you are. It is also a promise of who you will try to become. You recognize each part from the speech you made in the ritual in the song.
Somehow, you have a deeper understanding of the flute. It represents the growth of your character, and will put its full strength behind any enchantment which inspires similar growth, whether in you or in others. While it can't perform any magic in and of itself, anyone who listens to you play it will understand you on a level beyond a casual relationship.
You smile, and put the flute away. While maybe not what you were looking for, you now have a better idea of what your flute is capable of. As long as you dream for a better future, it will serve you well as an implement.
You next sit cross-legged on your bed, and begin to meditate. Not on rituals, as you can figure those out for yourself. Nor on the state of your soul, as since it has lasted this long, it must not be in terrible shape. You feel that your focus is better spent on blood, and its relationship with magic. You dive into your soul, and see what you can remember.
Several hours later, you shake out your stiff limbs. Instead of a specific memory, all your meditation returned was bits and pieces of knowledge. As you go over what you remember, you have to admit that the information is useful.
Blood is the means by which a soul transforms ethereal magic into a physical material. Living blood is a mix of the four primal elements (water, earth, fire, and air) and the fifth element of magic. It is a conduit by which a magic-user may impose their story upon the world's story. As part of the world, it isn't strong enough to completely go against the world, which is the reason why a ritual includes stories that match. The blood gives an overarching purpose to disparate pieces, forming an unified enchantment.
The downside of blood is, like all living reagents, it wishes to tell its own story. When the blood comes from the caster of the enchantment, the story the blood wishes to tell will often match the story the caster wants to tell. Sometimes, though, hidden parts of the caster's mind might come through the blood, causing chaotic side effects. The most standard effect is that a blood-bonded artifact won't work as well for other users, unless the caster is literally willing to shed their blood for the user.
Implements were originally invented as a method of preventing unusual side effects. The mindset of the crafter at the time of creation is imprinted on the implement, so that the exact same frame of mind can be used for any number of enchantments. It was quickly discovered that, as no actually blood was spilled during a ritual performed with an implement, implements also removed the condition that the caster be willing to spill their blood for the eventual user of the created artifact in order to utilize its full strength.
The true danger of blood magic is when the blood used doesn't come from the caster of the ritual. Foreign blood can contain any type of story that was in the owner's mind and soul when it was taken from them. Usually, this story won't be telling what the caster wishes, causing catastrophic failure of the ritual. The easiest way to get around this is to have the permission of the creature you are taking blood from, but ruthless crafters have used any number of methods to force a person to only tell certain stories.
You grimace at the dark tones of the last bit of information, but dutifully note it down as something that could be important. To summarize, use blood for personal artifacts, or when the purpose of the artifact doesn't match any of your implements. You throw together a quick sandwich, and then head out to the library, your dad's note stuffed in your pocket.
It is the first time you've left the house since you got back from the hospital, and everything is ... normal. The world goes on, and cares little for the random sophomore who was shoved into a locker full of garbage. You start to feel worse, but remember the promise you made by creating your flute. If you want to continue using it as an implement, you need to embody the desire for a brighter tomorrow. You straighten your shoulders, lift your head high, and embrace the faint heat of the winter sun.
The library must be having a slow day today, because there are open computers when you arrive. Choosing one in the back corner so no one can see your screen, you open up a web browser and start searching.
First looking up information for new capes, you sift through a large amount of dross. The only useful things you find are recommendations to talk with the Protectorate even if you don't plan on joining, and to never attempt to find out another cape's civilian identity. You also read up on a list of cape lingo, which includes the Parahuman Response Team's threat rating system and a brief description of trigger events.
Other than that, though, you don't find much. There are mentions of the Endbringer truce and something called the Unwritten Rules, but you doubt that an Endbringer will ever hit somewhere as useless as Brockton Bay, and funnily enough, the Unwritten Rules don't seem to be written anywhere that you can find.
Tiring of that topic, you instead turn towards Brockton Bay, and the capes that reside in it. Taking the easy groups first, you go to the official Protectorate website and the site for New Wave. You look at pictures of each hero so you can recognize them, and read brief descriptions of their powers. Next, you look up the gangs.
On a site call Parahuman Online, you find articles for each gang and descriptions of their capes. You raise your eyebrows at the distribution you see. Arguably the most dangerous gang, the Az'n Bad Boys have only two capes, but both are deadly. The Archer's Bridge Merchants have three capes, and the Empire Eighty-Eight has an astounding 15 capes listed under their name, though some haven't been seen in quite some time.
You sit back and stare at the ceiling. While you have to admit that you've had fantasies of going out as a hero, reading the realities of the cape scene in Brockton Bay puts a damper on you. While you may decide to go out at a later date, or possibly become a Rogue selling enchanted gear, either will have to wait until you have enough artifacts to defend yourself with.
Not wanting to leave the job half-finished, you return your attention to the computer screen to see what other capes are in Brockton Bay. You read up on Faultline's Crew, Coil's Organization, Uber and Leet, a couple solitary vigilantes and villains, and the two rogues in the city, a clothier named Parian and a craftsman named Amish, of all things.
Almost exactly one hour after you arrived, you are heading back home with a notebook full of your notes. Whatever you decide to do with yourself, you will make sure you are prepared for what comes.
Choose three!
[] Meditate on your past life.
-[] Write in on a specific topic you wish to focus on.
[] Explore your abilities.
-[] Write in what you wish to attempt.
[] Go shopping (or pillaging) for reagents.
-[] Write in what and where.
[] Do something else.
-[]Write in.
(QMN: Today was Thursday (in quest). We have Friday and the Weekend left of the tutorial, and then things will happen! Today was a little boring, but we got important stuff out of the way. If anyone has problems understanding my lecture on blood, please tell me so I can try and make it clearer. Since the metaphysics makes sense in my head, it is really hard to tell if it makes sense to anyone else when I put it into words. Other than that, enjoy! Next post will probably be late tomorrow.
As a reminder, you can choose to meditate in general, in which case you are given a useful memory. When you meditate on a topic, you only get a memory if I can think of one that fits.)
