Taylor Hebert wants nothing more than to prepare for her cape debut in peace. Unfortunately, her new neighbor from across the street has other plans.
[Worm x Fate] Journeywoman & Apprentice
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Index
fallacies
Puyo Mage
Journeywoman
&
Apprentice
&
Apprentice
Or, the Adventure of the Witch House
Or, I Started My Career as a Costumed Superheroine,
but For Some Reason, My Mentor was a Tsundere Witch
From Another World
but For Some Reason, My Mentor was a Tsundere Witch
From Another World
a Worm x Fate crossover
by fallacies
by fallacies
Taylor Hebert wants nothing more than to prepare for her cape debut in peace. Unfortunately, her new neighbor from across the street has other plans.
001 : Inquiry at the No. 24
002 : Accepting Candy From a Stranger
003 : Sense is Something Made
004 : Breakfast of the Champions
005 : The Cup, Half-Empty
006 : Jerusalem's Lot
007 : A Taste For Slaughter
008 : Chrysalis
009 : Fantasia in F minor
010 : Camelback Riding
011 : Bear These Not When Acting of Benevolence
012 : ???
Notes: Because third time's the charm, right? Note that the target genre for this fic intended to be akin to that in the Atelier game series.
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001 : Inquiry at the No. 24
fallacies
Puyo Mage
I noticed it on the way home after finally being discharged from the hospital, several blocks away from our street. It was kinda difficult not to, all things considered.
Since the moment I awoke, the sphere of insects that my power automatically connected with had become as something of a constant companion — an ever-present awareness of the environment around me, even that it was the middle of winter.
It was rather disconcerting to suddenly run across a dead zone in my field of perception — especially as it was just across the street from where I lived.
More accurately, I'd been able to sense the interior for a couple of seconds before everything within abruptly blanked out.
The No. 24 had been boarded up when I last saw it, several weeks earlier during winter break. I wasn't actually certain as to when precisely we previously had a neighbor there. Maybe back when I was in my second or third year of elementary school?
But right at dusk as we pulled into Arbor Street, I took note that there were lights on in the two-story residence; that somebody had apparently gone through the trouble of refurbishing the exterior and cleaning up the yard and driveway. The pristine coat of paint and the replacement of the various rusted fixtures made the place stand out, given the state of the other houses in the neighborhood.
In the driveway, there was an older-model Volkswagen Beetle.
"Somebody's moved in to the Twenty-Four," I remarked.
"Yeah," Dad replied. "Happened after — well, you know." He paused for a moment. "Really don't know what they were thinking, renovating the place and doing all that yardwork so close to the snowy season. It's gonna be ruined before the spring."
"Have you met them yet?" I asked.
He nodded, bringing the car to a halt in front of our house.
"A woman," he said, pulling the brake and withdrawing the key before unbuckling his belt. "A girl, really — a couple of years older than you. I think she might be attending Brockton U. Seems to have the house all to herself."
"In a place like this?," I asked, wincing as I exited the car. "Why not just dorm or something?"
Our neighborhood was relatively safe, but didn't feel like the sort of place a single female college student would want to live on her own. If Dad were right, and she indeed attended Brockton U, the commute to school was a twenty to thirty minute drive. Not terribly convenient.
Accounting for the interference with my power, it was more than a little suspicious. What were the chances that shortly after I became a parahuman, somebody with the exact ability as to counteract my own would just so happen to move into the neighborhood?
It could be a coincidence, of course — or that I was simply being paranoid and excessively self-conscious; but I couldn't shake the thought that maybe the girl across the street was aware of my status. Weren't there stories about the E88 gang-pressing parahumans into their service?
In response to the question I'd voiced aloud, Dad shrugged — lifting my carry-on of clothing from the back of the car and setting it on to the brick of our driveway.
"Hard to say, really," he said. "Everyone's got their own circumstances. It isn't really our position to pry."
Shutting the trunk, he turned, pulling my luggage toward the entrance of our house. Giving the 24 another glance, I followed after him.
Tomorrow was a Sunday, but Dad had work as usual. I'd have time enough to investigate, assuming that nothing happened tonight.
It was a tin of Danish butter cookies that Dad had received for Christmas from somebody at work.
Being as he and I weren't all too big on pastries, he'd apparently just tossed it into a kitchen cupboard and forgotten its existence entirely.
It was probably some flavor of rude for me to re-gift the thing to a neighbor, but I wasn't too hung up on that. A quick check of the expiration date revealed that the contents wouldn't be bad for half a year yet. Good enough for a cape who had potentially positioned herself to blackmail me into joining a criminal organization.
At half past one, wearing gloves and a light jacket, I opened the front door and stepped out into the yard — steeling myself as I ventured across the street. Likely, I would've been a bundle of nerves if not for the trick I'd picked up by necessity during my stay in the psychiatric ward — offloading my assorted misgivings into the insects behind me.
I'd spent the night reasoning through my options.
Maybe this girl had no idea I was a parahuman. Maybe she didn't belong with a gang. If her presence here truly was a coincidence, this would just be a greeting from a neighbor, and everything would be fine.
If not — well, she'd had the entire night and morning to engage in hostilities, and hadn't yet done so, despite her apparent ability to Trump my power. Probably, she could be reasoned with.
I hoped.
Inexplicably, the house and its white picket fence were a lot more foreboding up close, now that I was standing on the sidewalk before the lawn — just at the boundary of the dead zone. Exhaling a breath of mist and upping the extent of my offloading, I opened the gate and let myself in —
My insects abruptly vanished from my senses, and everything came crashing down.
When I was next aware of myself — maybe seconds later — I was kneeling on the cement of the walkway, overcome with vertigo. The yard — not much larger than our own — felt far too expansive; far too empty.
Not a Trump. A Master? Was this a trap? Some sort of test?
My gut instinct was to retreat, but that made little sense. This girl — whoever she was — had an absolute advantage against my power. Even if I retreated, there wouldn't be a resolution to whatever threat she posed.
Gritting my teeth, I climbed to my feet — unsteadily walking the few meters to the front door.
The door opened before I could ring the bell. The Master; the Trump — whatever she was — wasn't the blonde, blue-eyed girl I'd pictured. Her eyes were indeed a pale blue, but her straight black hair and the cast of her features suggested that she was at least partially Asian.
Not from the Empire, then. It occurred to me a little too late that I should've asked Dad for a few more details before jumping to weird conclusions.
"So, you were the one poking about at my Bounded Field, hm?" she asked — unexpectedly, with a British accent. "The old man sent you to check up on me, I suppose?"
"What?"
"Don't play me for a fool," she said, eyes narrowed. "As a student of the Second, I know a pathway to an Adjacent Reality when I sense one — especially when so many are opened all at once."
"What are you talking about?"
"Yesterday evening, you attempted to subsume the insects on my property as familiars, did you not?"
Familiars? Like in witchcraft or something?
"Look," I said, wincing. "I'm sorry about the bugs, but could you please ease up on whatever it is you're doing to me right now? It's really uncomfortable."
She frowned — and then her expression shifted to realization; maybe a tinge of horror, if I wasn't imagining things.
"You're not a magus, are you?" she asked.
"I have no idea what that is."
She closed eyes and sighed.
"My apologies," she said. "Seems that I've once again made a mess of things. Kündigen."
I wasn't certain what the word meant, but at her utterance, my vertigo instantly cleared — vanishing away as I reconnected with my insects. As I tried to collect myself, she put forth her hand, as if offering to shake on a truce.
"We got off on the wrong foot," she said. "My name is Rin — Rin Zenjou. Pleased to make your acquaintance, neighbor."
This was, I realized, something of a mere formality. By the very fact that I'd forced this encounter, I'd demonstrated a grasp of who she was and where she lived — and so she'd decided to be upfront about her identity. On the opposite end, my face and address were known to her, and it wouldn't take a lot of research for her to learn my name. There wasn't any running away from this.
"Taylor Hebert," I replied, tentatively clasping her hand and shaking it.
She seemed to study me for a moment before withdrawing.
"It's perhaps a little inappropriate for me to mention it at this juncture," she remarked, "but in the future, you should pay mind not to so easily disclose your personal information to a perfect stranger. That said —"
She shot me a vaguely predatory smile.
"I'm in the market for a part-time assistant," she said. "Fair wages. Reasonable hours. Are you interested at all, Ms. Hebert?"
Since the moment I awoke, the sphere of insects that my power automatically connected with had become as something of a constant companion — an ever-present awareness of the environment around me, even that it was the middle of winter.
It was rather disconcerting to suddenly run across a dead zone in my field of perception — especially as it was just across the street from where I lived.
More accurately, I'd been able to sense the interior for a couple of seconds before everything within abruptly blanked out.
The No. 24 had been boarded up when I last saw it, several weeks earlier during winter break. I wasn't actually certain as to when precisely we previously had a neighbor there. Maybe back when I was in my second or third year of elementary school?
But right at dusk as we pulled into Arbor Street, I took note that there were lights on in the two-story residence; that somebody had apparently gone through the trouble of refurbishing the exterior and cleaning up the yard and driveway. The pristine coat of paint and the replacement of the various rusted fixtures made the place stand out, given the state of the other houses in the neighborhood.
In the driveway, there was an older-model Volkswagen Beetle.
"Somebody's moved in to the Twenty-Four," I remarked.
"Yeah," Dad replied. "Happened after — well, you know." He paused for a moment. "Really don't know what they were thinking, renovating the place and doing all that yardwork so close to the snowy season. It's gonna be ruined before the spring."
"Have you met them yet?" I asked.
He nodded, bringing the car to a halt in front of our house.
"A woman," he said, pulling the brake and withdrawing the key before unbuckling his belt. "A girl, really — a couple of years older than you. I think she might be attending Brockton U. Seems to have the house all to herself."
"In a place like this?," I asked, wincing as I exited the car. "Why not just dorm or something?"
Our neighborhood was relatively safe, but didn't feel like the sort of place a single female college student would want to live on her own. If Dad were right, and she indeed attended Brockton U, the commute to school was a twenty to thirty minute drive. Not terribly convenient.
Accounting for the interference with my power, it was more than a little suspicious. What were the chances that shortly after I became a parahuman, somebody with the exact ability as to counteract my own would just so happen to move into the neighborhood?
It could be a coincidence, of course — or that I was simply being paranoid and excessively self-conscious; but I couldn't shake the thought that maybe the girl across the street was aware of my status. Weren't there stories about the E88 gang-pressing parahumans into their service?
In response to the question I'd voiced aloud, Dad shrugged — lifting my carry-on of clothing from the back of the car and setting it on to the brick of our driveway.
"Hard to say, really," he said. "Everyone's got their own circumstances. It isn't really our position to pry."
Shutting the trunk, he turned, pulling my luggage toward the entrance of our house. Giving the 24 another glance, I followed after him.
Tomorrow was a Sunday, but Dad had work as usual. I'd have time enough to investigate, assuming that nothing happened tonight.
It was a tin of Danish butter cookies that Dad had received for Christmas from somebody at work.
Being as he and I weren't all too big on pastries, he'd apparently just tossed it into a kitchen cupboard and forgotten its existence entirely.
It was probably some flavor of rude for me to re-gift the thing to a neighbor, but I wasn't too hung up on that. A quick check of the expiration date revealed that the contents wouldn't be bad for half a year yet. Good enough for a cape who had potentially positioned herself to blackmail me into joining a criminal organization.
At half past one, wearing gloves and a light jacket, I opened the front door and stepped out into the yard — steeling myself as I ventured across the street. Likely, I would've been a bundle of nerves if not for the trick I'd picked up by necessity during my stay in the psychiatric ward — offloading my assorted misgivings into the insects behind me.
I'd spent the night reasoning through my options.
Maybe this girl had no idea I was a parahuman. Maybe she didn't belong with a gang. If her presence here truly was a coincidence, this would just be a greeting from a neighbor, and everything would be fine.
If not — well, she'd had the entire night and morning to engage in hostilities, and hadn't yet done so, despite her apparent ability to Trump my power. Probably, she could be reasoned with.
I hoped.
Inexplicably, the house and its white picket fence were a lot more foreboding up close, now that I was standing on the sidewalk before the lawn — just at the boundary of the dead zone. Exhaling a breath of mist and upping the extent of my offloading, I opened the gate and let myself in —
My insects abruptly vanished from my senses, and everything came crashing down.
When I was next aware of myself — maybe seconds later — I was kneeling on the cement of the walkway, overcome with vertigo. The yard — not much larger than our own — felt far too expansive; far too empty.
Not a Trump. A Master? Was this a trap? Some sort of test?
My gut instinct was to retreat, but that made little sense. This girl — whoever she was — had an absolute advantage against my power. Even if I retreated, there wouldn't be a resolution to whatever threat she posed.
Gritting my teeth, I climbed to my feet — unsteadily walking the few meters to the front door.
The door opened before I could ring the bell. The Master; the Trump — whatever she was — wasn't the blonde, blue-eyed girl I'd pictured. Her eyes were indeed a pale blue, but her straight black hair and the cast of her features suggested that she was at least partially Asian.
Not from the Empire, then. It occurred to me a little too late that I should've asked Dad for a few more details before jumping to weird conclusions.
"So, you were the one poking about at my Bounded Field, hm?" she asked — unexpectedly, with a British accent. "The old man sent you to check up on me, I suppose?"
"What?"
"Don't play me for a fool," she said, eyes narrowed. "As a student of the Second, I know a pathway to an Adjacent Reality when I sense one — especially when so many are opened all at once."
"What are you talking about?"
"Yesterday evening, you attempted to subsume the insects on my property as familiars, did you not?"
Familiars? Like in witchcraft or something?
"Look," I said, wincing. "I'm sorry about the bugs, but could you please ease up on whatever it is you're doing to me right now? It's really uncomfortable."
She frowned — and then her expression shifted to realization; maybe a tinge of horror, if I wasn't imagining things.
"You're not a magus, are you?" she asked.
"I have no idea what that is."
She closed eyes and sighed.
"My apologies," she said. "Seems that I've once again made a mess of things. Kündigen."
I wasn't certain what the word meant, but at her utterance, my vertigo instantly cleared — vanishing away as I reconnected with my insects. As I tried to collect myself, she put forth her hand, as if offering to shake on a truce.
"We got off on the wrong foot," she said. "My name is Rin — Rin Zenjou. Pleased to make your acquaintance, neighbor."
This was, I realized, something of a mere formality. By the very fact that I'd forced this encounter, I'd demonstrated a grasp of who she was and where she lived — and so she'd decided to be upfront about her identity. On the opposite end, my face and address were known to her, and it wouldn't take a lot of research for her to learn my name. There wasn't any running away from this.
"Taylor Hebert," I replied, tentatively clasping her hand and shaking it.
She seemed to study me for a moment before withdrawing.
"It's perhaps a little inappropriate for me to mention it at this juncture," she remarked, "but in the future, you should pay mind not to so easily disclose your personal information to a perfect stranger. That said —"
She shot me a vaguely predatory smile.
"I'm in the market for a part-time assistant," she said. "Fair wages. Reasonable hours. Are you interested at all, Ms. Hebert?"
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002 : Accepting Candy From a Stranger
fallacies
Puyo Mage
Noting the tin of pastries that I'd somehow managed not to drop, she invited me inside to speak about her offer over tea.
Unsurprisingly, the layout of the first floor looked to be approximately identical to most of the other houses in the neighborhood; though at some point, a garage had been added — replacing what would've been the brick driveway that led into the backyard at my house.
She must've spent a bit on renovations. The hardwood floors and the Prussian blue of the walls looked fresh, and the interior was done up in a sort of minimalist French country chic — sparsely furnished, but tasteful. It was surprising that she'd managed to get the work completed in the few weeks I'd been hospitalized. There wasn't even the scent of fresh paint in the air.
There also weren't any insects — not that I could sense, at least, even that my connection without the bounds of her property had been fully restored. Whatever adjustments she'd just now made, it was doing a darn good job of denying me any ability to pose a threat.
"As you can probably tell from my accent, I'm not from around here," said Zenjou, pouring me a cup of tea. "Likewise, I'm not associated with any of the organizations in this area. You're the first parahuman that I've so far encountered face-to-face."
Seated on a couch at right angle to her armchair, I carefully accepted the cup and dish.
"Normally, there would be protocol against revealing myself," she continued, "but being as you're somebody on this side, I trust that you're capable of keeping a secret?"
"I'm not really seeing much of a choice," I said, taking a sip, and noting the vaguely floral scent. This wasn't drugged, was it?
"I think you misunderstand," she said, sipping her own tea. "This isn't on my part anything so crude as blackmail. I earnestly hope to engage you in a partnership of mutual benefit — no strings attached. If you refuse, I ask for nothing more than an agreement of secrecy before we go our separate ways."
Mutual secrecy, backed by the potential of mutually assured destruction — or maybe not so mutual. She was almost certainly aware that I lived with Dad — and so, barring the circumstance that I could get at something dear to her, she could pose a far more immediate danger to me than I could her.
No matter what she said, she held a definite upper hand.
That being the case, I didn't see any downside to playing ball for the time being.
"What sort of benefit are we talking about?" I asked.
Taking a sip of her tea, she set her cup upon her dish.
"For a start, $7.25 an hour," she said. "That's the legal wage per hour here in the state of New Hampshire, no?"
Legal minimum wage, maybe — and of all the things she could've said, I wasn't expecting that.
"That's not much of a benefit," I said.
"I'd also be providing you with useful work experience and training," she said.
"Training in what, exactly?"
"The use of your abilities, of course," she said.
Skeptical that she could help, I frowned. I had more or less an inherent grasp of my power; and as far as I could tell based on the limited information I'd gathered from the internet, parahumans didn't really 'improve' with experience. What little improvement the big name heroes had exhibited over the years was more akin to figuring out clever applications of their powers than any change in their underlying capabilities.
"I don't think there's a lot of room for improvement," I replied. "My power's fine as is."
"I'm not referring to your powers as a parahuman," she said, leaning back into her armchair and crossing her legs. "It's a little complicated to explain right off the cuff, but — tell me, do you practice any martial arts?"
"No?"
She considered me with a raised brow.
"And you intend to go out superheroing, or whatever it is you Americans get up to?"
I was fairly certain that superheroes weren't a phenomenon restricted to the United States. Obviously, it was likely sarcasm on her part, but it felt as if she were making light of the efforts of heroic capes.
"Is there a problem with that?" I asked, slightly glaring.
"If you're fine with it, I suppose it isn't my place to criticize," she said, taking a sip of her tea. "But I would think it rather risky for a young woman to venture out into the night without a proper means of defending herself. What if you were to run into somebody able to nullify your power?"
Aside from Zenjou herself and the creepy axe murderer with the Slaughterhouse Nine, I wasn't aware of any Trumps capable of outright shutting down another parahuman. Granted, I didn't obsessively hang out on PHO — but I imagined that if power nullifiers were so commonplace, I would've been aware of it.
She did have a point, though. I'd been planning anyhow to get myself into shape before making my debut on the cape scene — picking up parkour along the way for purposes of mobility, maybe. So as to deal with the threats that my insects couldn't handle; that I couldn't evade or run away from, I'd been planning to carry around a canister of Mace.
Martial arts wouldn't be of much use against actual Brutes, but a bit of skill in unarmed combat was otherwise a reasonable addition to my repertoire.
"You're offering to teach me self-defense then?" I asked.
"Something like that," Zenjou replied. "In the immediate future, I'd want to further assess your use of power; but once that's through, certainly. You're what, 17? 18?"
"15," I said.
"Rather tall for a 15-year-old," she remarked. "But moving on, I'd have you here primarily in the afternoons — after classes, and before your father is home from work. You get off around three, I assume?"
"3:30," I said. "And my father is home around 8:30, normally. But I've just gotten out of the hospital, and I'm planning on taking a short break from school."
She frowned at that.
"An ongoing health condition?"
"They got Panacea to see me, so I'm fine, physically," I said. "Just don't feel like dealing with school for awhile."
"Panacea ..." she muttered to herself, as if the name were unfamiliar. "Ah, right. The healer. This won't present an issue, then?"
Even with the offloading to my insects, I didn't think I'd be fully functional anytime soon — but I wasn't about to tell her that. No need to give her more of a grasp of my vulnerabilities than she already possessed.
If I were committing myself to the long game, this wasn't the place to falter.
"Like I said, I'll be fine," I replied. "And I'll take you up on your offer."
"Wonderful," she said. "You can start immediately, if you like."
"What do you want me to do?"
Zenjou set her cup and dish on the coffee table, and picked up the can that she'd brought out with her tea set. Opening the lid, she took out something that looked to be a piece of rock candy — bright red with its artificial coloring.
"Here," she said, holding it before me.
I reached forward and let her drop it into my hand.
"Put it in your mouth, and swallow it whole," she said. "Don't attempt to chew."
I regarded the candy suspiciously.
"This isn't something addictive, is it?" I asked.
"It isn't any sort of drug, if that's what you're asking," she said. "And if I were looking to harm you, I'd have already done so."
Alternatively, she could just be the sort of sadist who toyed with her victims before moving in for the kill.
I didn't voice that aloud. Deciding to trust her for now, I popped the candy into my mouth.
It didn't really taste like anything.
Cool; smooth; hard — more like a piece of glass than any kind of confection. Following her instructions, I didn't bother chewing, and simply swallowed — washing it down with the remainder of my tea. Despite the lubrication, the edges of the thing scraped the insides of my esophagus.
"What was that?" I asked, coughing slightly as I placed my cup and dish on the table.
"Your signing bonus — worth about $8,000," Zenjou replied. "A three-carat pigeon's blood ruby."
What.
"But don't worry," she continued. "It won't tear its way through your digestive tract, or anything so horrendous. Once it activates, it should harmlessly melt away. I do recommend that you make yourself comfortable on the couch, though, as the process that follows might hurt a bit."
"What are you —"
— a terrible heat, burning my body from the inside out as I collapsed into the soft cushions of the couch. The fire spread throughout my organs; upwards along my spinal cord — into the flesh of my brain.
"I imagine you feel as if you're dying at present," said Zenjou, "but that should pass soon enough. The burning, on the other hand — in a reduced state, it'll persist for several weeks yet, until your body fully adjusts."
"Wh- what is this ..." I managed to croak out, despite the pain.
Zenjou placed a finger against her lower lip.
"How is it that they put it again?" she asked. "Ah, yes."
She leaned toward me. grinning.
"Yer a wizard, Hebert," she said. "And this would be a crash course into the discipline of Magic."
Unsurprisingly, the layout of the first floor looked to be approximately identical to most of the other houses in the neighborhood; though at some point, a garage had been added — replacing what would've been the brick driveway that led into the backyard at my house.
She must've spent a bit on renovations. The hardwood floors and the Prussian blue of the walls looked fresh, and the interior was done up in a sort of minimalist French country chic — sparsely furnished, but tasteful. It was surprising that she'd managed to get the work completed in the few weeks I'd been hospitalized. There wasn't even the scent of fresh paint in the air.
There also weren't any insects — not that I could sense, at least, even that my connection without the bounds of her property had been fully restored. Whatever adjustments she'd just now made, it was doing a darn good job of denying me any ability to pose a threat.
"As you can probably tell from my accent, I'm not from around here," said Zenjou, pouring me a cup of tea. "Likewise, I'm not associated with any of the organizations in this area. You're the first parahuman that I've so far encountered face-to-face."
Seated on a couch at right angle to her armchair, I carefully accepted the cup and dish.
"Normally, there would be protocol against revealing myself," she continued, "but being as you're somebody on this side, I trust that you're capable of keeping a secret?"
"I'm not really seeing much of a choice," I said, taking a sip, and noting the vaguely floral scent. This wasn't drugged, was it?
"I think you misunderstand," she said, sipping her own tea. "This isn't on my part anything so crude as blackmail. I earnestly hope to engage you in a partnership of mutual benefit — no strings attached. If you refuse, I ask for nothing more than an agreement of secrecy before we go our separate ways."
Mutual secrecy, backed by the potential of mutually assured destruction — or maybe not so mutual. She was almost certainly aware that I lived with Dad — and so, barring the circumstance that I could get at something dear to her, she could pose a far more immediate danger to me than I could her.
No matter what she said, she held a definite upper hand.
That being the case, I didn't see any downside to playing ball for the time being.
"What sort of benefit are we talking about?" I asked.
Taking a sip of her tea, she set her cup upon her dish.
"For a start, $7.25 an hour," she said. "That's the legal wage per hour here in the state of New Hampshire, no?"
Legal minimum wage, maybe — and of all the things she could've said, I wasn't expecting that.
"That's not much of a benefit," I said.
"I'd also be providing you with useful work experience and training," she said.
"Training in what, exactly?"
"The use of your abilities, of course," she said.
Skeptical that she could help, I frowned. I had more or less an inherent grasp of my power; and as far as I could tell based on the limited information I'd gathered from the internet, parahumans didn't really 'improve' with experience. What little improvement the big name heroes had exhibited over the years was more akin to figuring out clever applications of their powers than any change in their underlying capabilities.
"I don't think there's a lot of room for improvement," I replied. "My power's fine as is."
"I'm not referring to your powers as a parahuman," she said, leaning back into her armchair and crossing her legs. "It's a little complicated to explain right off the cuff, but — tell me, do you practice any martial arts?"
"No?"
She considered me with a raised brow.
"And you intend to go out superheroing, or whatever it is you Americans get up to?"
I was fairly certain that superheroes weren't a phenomenon restricted to the United States. Obviously, it was likely sarcasm on her part, but it felt as if she were making light of the efforts of heroic capes.
"Is there a problem with that?" I asked, slightly glaring.
"If you're fine with it, I suppose it isn't my place to criticize," she said, taking a sip of her tea. "But I would think it rather risky for a young woman to venture out into the night without a proper means of defending herself. What if you were to run into somebody able to nullify your power?"
Aside from Zenjou herself and the creepy axe murderer with the Slaughterhouse Nine, I wasn't aware of any Trumps capable of outright shutting down another parahuman. Granted, I didn't obsessively hang out on PHO — but I imagined that if power nullifiers were so commonplace, I would've been aware of it.
She did have a point, though. I'd been planning anyhow to get myself into shape before making my debut on the cape scene — picking up parkour along the way for purposes of mobility, maybe. So as to deal with the threats that my insects couldn't handle; that I couldn't evade or run away from, I'd been planning to carry around a canister of Mace.
Martial arts wouldn't be of much use against actual Brutes, but a bit of skill in unarmed combat was otherwise a reasonable addition to my repertoire.
"You're offering to teach me self-defense then?" I asked.
"Something like that," Zenjou replied. "In the immediate future, I'd want to further assess your use of power; but once that's through, certainly. You're what, 17? 18?"
"15," I said.
"Rather tall for a 15-year-old," she remarked. "But moving on, I'd have you here primarily in the afternoons — after classes, and before your father is home from work. You get off around three, I assume?"
"3:30," I said. "And my father is home around 8:30, normally. But I've just gotten out of the hospital, and I'm planning on taking a short break from school."
She frowned at that.
"An ongoing health condition?"
"They got Panacea to see me, so I'm fine, physically," I said. "Just don't feel like dealing with school for awhile."
"Panacea ..." she muttered to herself, as if the name were unfamiliar. "Ah, right. The healer. This won't present an issue, then?"
Even with the offloading to my insects, I didn't think I'd be fully functional anytime soon — but I wasn't about to tell her that. No need to give her more of a grasp of my vulnerabilities than she already possessed.
If I were committing myself to the long game, this wasn't the place to falter.
"Like I said, I'll be fine," I replied. "And I'll take you up on your offer."
"Wonderful," she said. "You can start immediately, if you like."
"What do you want me to do?"
Zenjou set her cup and dish on the coffee table, and picked up the can that she'd brought out with her tea set. Opening the lid, she took out something that looked to be a piece of rock candy — bright red with its artificial coloring.
"Here," she said, holding it before me.
I reached forward and let her drop it into my hand.
"Put it in your mouth, and swallow it whole," she said. "Don't attempt to chew."
I regarded the candy suspiciously.
"This isn't something addictive, is it?" I asked.
"It isn't any sort of drug, if that's what you're asking," she said. "And if I were looking to harm you, I'd have already done so."
Alternatively, she could just be the sort of sadist who toyed with her victims before moving in for the kill.
I didn't voice that aloud. Deciding to trust her for now, I popped the candy into my mouth.
It didn't really taste like anything.
Cool; smooth; hard — more like a piece of glass than any kind of confection. Following her instructions, I didn't bother chewing, and simply swallowed — washing it down with the remainder of my tea. Despite the lubrication, the edges of the thing scraped the insides of my esophagus.
"What was that?" I asked, coughing slightly as I placed my cup and dish on the table.
"Your signing bonus — worth about $8,000," Zenjou replied. "A three-carat pigeon's blood ruby."
What.
"But don't worry," she continued. "It won't tear its way through your digestive tract, or anything so horrendous. Once it activates, it should harmlessly melt away. I do recommend that you make yourself comfortable on the couch, though, as the process that follows might hurt a bit."
"What are you —"
— a terrible heat, burning my body from the inside out as I collapsed into the soft cushions of the couch. The fire spread throughout my organs; upwards along my spinal cord — into the flesh of my brain.
"I imagine you feel as if you're dying at present," said Zenjou, "but that should pass soon enough. The burning, on the other hand — in a reduced state, it'll persist for several weeks yet, until your body fully adjusts."
"Wh- what is this ..." I managed to croak out, despite the pain.
Zenjou placed a finger against her lower lip.
"How is it that they put it again?" she asked. "Ah, yes."
She leaned toward me. grinning.
"Yer a wizard, Hebert," she said. "And this would be a crash course into the discipline of Magic."
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003 : Sense is Something Made
fallacies
Puyo Mage
'Soon enough' arrived after more than two hours of excruciating, deathly pain.
There was, it turned out, a trick to shutting it off — something like a motor skill that abstractly apprehended the full throttle of my so-called 'Circuits' as a kind of limb; an extension of my body. It wasn't altogether different from my powers as a parahuman.
It did hurt a whole lot, though. In the aftermath, I was out of breath and mildly feverish — drenched in a cold sweat that completely permeated my clothes.
The 'reduced state' of the burning was akin to a full-body acid reflux.
Hunched over on Zenjou's couch with my elbows propped upon my knees, it struck me that there wasn't any way I could independently confirm that all of this wasn't just a product of Zenjou's Master power.
Certainly, I could feel a kind of energy thrumming through my 'Circuits' — but Othala from the E88 was famously the holder of a Striker power that temporarily granted abilities alike to a parahuman. Wasn't there also the one supervillain with the power to grant addictive Thinker abilities that gradually deteriorated?
"So, an affinity for Water," said Zenjou, gathering the spread of Tarot cards across the coffee table into a deck. "I thought there might've been something else, but it's likely an artifact of your status as a parahuman."
She'd lit up a bit of aromatic incense as I was recovering — asked me a battery of questions from what sounded like a personality test, and then performed a tarot reading.
Initially, I thought she was one of those capes who put up a front about their powers being 'magic' — but, really, the more she spoke, the more I got the impression that she used the word in the same sense that a stage magician might.
"You can tell that from a bunch of cards?" I asked. "How does that work?"
"The Tarot itself reveals nothing of incredible relevance," Zenjou replied, slipping the cards into a velvet pouch and pulling taut the strings. "It's merely a matter of confirmation — to ascertain that the answers you provided in the first stage of my assessment were a reasonable indicator of a general orientation. Broadly, there are only five common results in any case — and so, this isn't a terribly complicated process."
"I mean, I saw you shuffle the deck. If you draw a bunch of cards, wouldn't the outcome just be random?"
She met my gaze with a grin.
"A skeptic, are we?" she asked. "Good to see that you've got a head on your shoulders. But to answer your question, 'random' is nothing more than a descriptor we assign to phenomena evaluated to be absent of meaning. Being that meaning is entirely subjective, things are in reality as random or non-random as we're inclined to judge them. Carl Jung would call this Synchronicity."
"Sophistry is what it is," I said. "So long as your deck is well and truly shuffled, the cards you draw are necessarily random and meaningless. No exceptions."
Would a person with the presence of mind to invoke Jung in an argument on the nature of meaning really put any weight into the mystical power of the Tarot?
If not, what was all this superstitious nonsense?
"By your very upbringing," she replied — palpably smug, "you're inclined to interpret new information in the context of the worldview you've so far assembled — doubting the bits that seem improbable. Thus, I won't even attempt to convince you to the contrary. As a student of the sciences, you should cherish that doubt of yours, and carefully dissect the claims that I make. It's a good attitude that you don't trust in my word merely in deference to seniority."
If you're going for the long con, tell the person you're attempting to swindle not to believe you. Paradoxically, it builds rapport, and gives you a veneer of honesty.
I'm not gonna fall for that.
"What did you find out about my Circuits, then?" I asked.
"You have 18 in total," she replied. "A decent Quantity and Quality for somebody absent the bloodline descent of an established thaumaturgical lineage. The Composition, though — it's rather aberrant."
The jargon didn't mean anything to me — but it also didn't sound as if she were making up the words on the spot. If indeed this was all an act, it was skillfully performed.
"What does that mean in practice?" I asked.
"Are you well enough to walk?" she asked, standing up.
I sighed, and with a grimace, pulled myself from her couch.
"Looks like it," I said, ignoring the aching of my muscles.
"Good," she said. "Follow me."
With heavy, halting steps, I trailed after her into the rear of the house. The kitchen — a bit more modern than ours — had an island in the center with a second sink. Walking up, she turned on the tap.
"Hold the faucet and pour your mana into it," she said.
Rolling up the sleeve of my sweater, I grabbed ahold of the metal — willing my Circuits open, and instinctively directing the energy within to flow forth through the flesh of my hand.
The laminar flow of the tap turned into a high pressure spray, splattering all over the counter. Not wanting any more dampness on my sweater, I let go of the faucet — and instantly, the surging water calmed.
"What the hell?" I asked, staring at the sink.
Was there a pump to boost the pressure on demand? A switch, hidden away somewhere?
"Congratulations," said Zenjou, smiling. "You've just cast your very first spell — a Reinforcement in the affinity of Water."
Grabbing a towel from a nearby rack, she tossed it at me. I caught it, confused.
"And now," she said, "for your first task as my assistant — wipe up the mess you've made."
Once every two weeks, Coach Powell forced our PE section to run a full mile. Up until now, I hadn't put in the effort to properly perform the recommended warm-up exercises, and the muscular aches that consequently followed usually lasted a day or two before fading away.
The pain from my Circuit activation was several magnitudes worse — even versus the necrotic rot that Panacea had so recently cleared from my system. However, by nine in the evening — stepping into the hot bath that I'd run for myself — I was pleasantly surprised that my limbs and muscles were miraculously free of discomfort.
The burning sensation of course remained; but Zenjou's claims regarding the side effects of an active circulation of mana seemed to ring true.
The 'mana' employed in this 'magecraft' of hers was fundamentally derived of vital energy — from 'Od,' per the pseudoscience of vitalism; from 'Qi,' per the traditions associated with East Asian martial arts. Within the body, its behavior defaulted to a bolstering of the vital processes; the reassertion of an ideal state of health.
Or so Zenjou alleged.
I wasn't at this point entirely convinced she wasn't a con artist. The 'rock candy' I'd been made to consume was for all I knew some hyper-advanced Tinkertech drug designed to grant temporary powers. Even that I could apparently impose 'Reinforcement' on the flow of water, following the example of the powers bestowed by Othala and that Teacher guy, the potency of my 'spells' were likely to degenerate over time — barring continuous contact with Zenjou.
Which, of course, my informal contract with her virtually guaranteed.
"My first action as a cape," I said, speaking at the water gradually filling the tub. "Giving an overly smug Myrddin wannabe an opening to addict me to her power. Nice going, Taylor. You're a goddamn genius."
Still —
Leaning forward, I grasped the faucet of the tub — activating my Circuits and allowing my mana to flow. As before, the gushing of the water accelerated.
— if Zenjou were attempting a repeat of Teacher's schemes, shouldn't she have endowed me with a power a bit more exciting than mild water manipulation? In a fight between capes, 'Reinforcement' amounted to bringing along a super soaker. It was hardly useful at all.
Alternatively, was this maybe just a taste of power? A starter pack of sorts, to ensure that I go back for more?
I sank into the bathwater up to my chin, allowing my skin to soak up the warmth.
"If I'm not careful," I again said aloud, "Zenjou's gonna turn me into a mindless enforcer."
Bright-eyed and utterly filled with optimism, I embarked upon my career as a magus.
There was, it turned out, a trick to shutting it off — something like a motor skill that abstractly apprehended the full throttle of my so-called 'Circuits' as a kind of limb; an extension of my body. It wasn't altogether different from my powers as a parahuman.
It did hurt a whole lot, though. In the aftermath, I was out of breath and mildly feverish — drenched in a cold sweat that completely permeated my clothes.
The 'reduced state' of the burning was akin to a full-body acid reflux.
Hunched over on Zenjou's couch with my elbows propped upon my knees, it struck me that there wasn't any way I could independently confirm that all of this wasn't just a product of Zenjou's Master power.
Certainly, I could feel a kind of energy thrumming through my 'Circuits' — but Othala from the E88 was famously the holder of a Striker power that temporarily granted abilities alike to a parahuman. Wasn't there also the one supervillain with the power to grant addictive Thinker abilities that gradually deteriorated?
"So, an affinity for Water," said Zenjou, gathering the spread of Tarot cards across the coffee table into a deck. "I thought there might've been something else, but it's likely an artifact of your status as a parahuman."
She'd lit up a bit of aromatic incense as I was recovering — asked me a battery of questions from what sounded like a personality test, and then performed a tarot reading.
Initially, I thought she was one of those capes who put up a front about their powers being 'magic' — but, really, the more she spoke, the more I got the impression that she used the word in the same sense that a stage magician might.
"You can tell that from a bunch of cards?" I asked. "How does that work?"
"The Tarot itself reveals nothing of incredible relevance," Zenjou replied, slipping the cards into a velvet pouch and pulling taut the strings. "It's merely a matter of confirmation — to ascertain that the answers you provided in the first stage of my assessment were a reasonable indicator of a general orientation. Broadly, there are only five common results in any case — and so, this isn't a terribly complicated process."
"I mean, I saw you shuffle the deck. If you draw a bunch of cards, wouldn't the outcome just be random?"
She met my gaze with a grin.
"A skeptic, are we?" she asked. "Good to see that you've got a head on your shoulders. But to answer your question, 'random' is nothing more than a descriptor we assign to phenomena evaluated to be absent of meaning. Being that meaning is entirely subjective, things are in reality as random or non-random as we're inclined to judge them. Carl Jung would call this Synchronicity."
"Sophistry is what it is," I said. "So long as your deck is well and truly shuffled, the cards you draw are necessarily random and meaningless. No exceptions."
Would a person with the presence of mind to invoke Jung in an argument on the nature of meaning really put any weight into the mystical power of the Tarot?
If not, what was all this superstitious nonsense?
"By your very upbringing," she replied — palpably smug, "you're inclined to interpret new information in the context of the worldview you've so far assembled — doubting the bits that seem improbable. Thus, I won't even attempt to convince you to the contrary. As a student of the sciences, you should cherish that doubt of yours, and carefully dissect the claims that I make. It's a good attitude that you don't trust in my word merely in deference to seniority."
If you're going for the long con, tell the person you're attempting to swindle not to believe you. Paradoxically, it builds rapport, and gives you a veneer of honesty.
I'm not gonna fall for that.
"What did you find out about my Circuits, then?" I asked.
"You have 18 in total," she replied. "A decent Quantity and Quality for somebody absent the bloodline descent of an established thaumaturgical lineage. The Composition, though — it's rather aberrant."
The jargon didn't mean anything to me — but it also didn't sound as if she were making up the words on the spot. If indeed this was all an act, it was skillfully performed.
"What does that mean in practice?" I asked.
"Are you well enough to walk?" she asked, standing up.
I sighed, and with a grimace, pulled myself from her couch.
"Looks like it," I said, ignoring the aching of my muscles.
"Good," she said. "Follow me."
With heavy, halting steps, I trailed after her into the rear of the house. The kitchen — a bit more modern than ours — had an island in the center with a second sink. Walking up, she turned on the tap.
"Hold the faucet and pour your mana into it," she said.
Rolling up the sleeve of my sweater, I grabbed ahold of the metal — willing my Circuits open, and instinctively directing the energy within to flow forth through the flesh of my hand.
The laminar flow of the tap turned into a high pressure spray, splattering all over the counter. Not wanting any more dampness on my sweater, I let go of the faucet — and instantly, the surging water calmed.
"What the hell?" I asked, staring at the sink.
Was there a pump to boost the pressure on demand? A switch, hidden away somewhere?
"Congratulations," said Zenjou, smiling. "You've just cast your very first spell — a Reinforcement in the affinity of Water."
Grabbing a towel from a nearby rack, she tossed it at me. I caught it, confused.
"And now," she said, "for your first task as my assistant — wipe up the mess you've made."
Once every two weeks, Coach Powell forced our PE section to run a full mile. Up until now, I hadn't put in the effort to properly perform the recommended warm-up exercises, and the muscular aches that consequently followed usually lasted a day or two before fading away.
The pain from my Circuit activation was several magnitudes worse — even versus the necrotic rot that Panacea had so recently cleared from my system. However, by nine in the evening — stepping into the hot bath that I'd run for myself — I was pleasantly surprised that my limbs and muscles were miraculously free of discomfort.
The burning sensation of course remained; but Zenjou's claims regarding the side effects of an active circulation of mana seemed to ring true.
The 'mana' employed in this 'magecraft' of hers was fundamentally derived of vital energy — from 'Od,' per the pseudoscience of vitalism; from 'Qi,' per the traditions associated with East Asian martial arts. Within the body, its behavior defaulted to a bolstering of the vital processes; the reassertion of an ideal state of health.
Or so Zenjou alleged.
I wasn't at this point entirely convinced she wasn't a con artist. The 'rock candy' I'd been made to consume was for all I knew some hyper-advanced Tinkertech drug designed to grant temporary powers. Even that I could apparently impose 'Reinforcement' on the flow of water, following the example of the powers bestowed by Othala and that Teacher guy, the potency of my 'spells' were likely to degenerate over time — barring continuous contact with Zenjou.
Which, of course, my informal contract with her virtually guaranteed.
"My first action as a cape," I said, speaking at the water gradually filling the tub. "Giving an overly smug Myrddin wannabe an opening to addict me to her power. Nice going, Taylor. You're a goddamn genius."
Still —
Leaning forward, I grasped the faucet of the tub — activating my Circuits and allowing my mana to flow. As before, the gushing of the water accelerated.
— if Zenjou were attempting a repeat of Teacher's schemes, shouldn't she have endowed me with a power a bit more exciting than mild water manipulation? In a fight between capes, 'Reinforcement' amounted to bringing along a super soaker. It was hardly useful at all.
Alternatively, was this maybe just a taste of power? A starter pack of sorts, to ensure that I go back for more?
I sank into the bathwater up to my chin, allowing my skin to soak up the warmth.
"If I'm not careful," I again said aloud, "Zenjou's gonna turn me into a mindless enforcer."
Bright-eyed and utterly filled with optimism, I embarked upon my career as a magus.
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Interesting.
But why is Rin's name different?
But why is Rin's name different?
Because she's not Rin Rin obviously. She's a alternate timeline Rin.
About the story itself, well, i think you'll get complaints about 'Taylor wouldn't do that' from people who take immersion far too seriously, but i'm ok with jumping ahead to the 'good part' in the beginning of a story. They'll probably tell you to rewrite it and just have Rin injecting Od into her and forcefully activating circuits but i kind of understand this is supposed to be a plot point about Earth Bet natives not having them.
If you're persuaded to change it, i suggest just giving Taylor a choice and continuing the story as usual until the Lung fight and instead of taking a shady offer from Tattletale or a shady offer from Armsmaster, taking a shady offer from Rin - that she kept observing and knows she's not up to 'no good' - and swallowing the jewel then in the search for more power or companionship - because she almost died and we all know Taylor makes the best decisions then.
About the story itself, well, i think you'll get complaints about 'Taylor wouldn't do that' from people who take immersion far too seriously, but i'm ok with jumping ahead to the 'good part' in the beginning of a story. They'll probably tell you to rewrite it and just have Rin injecting Od into her and forcefully activating circuits but i kind of understand this is supposed to be a plot point about Earth Bet natives not having them.
If you're persuaded to change it, i suggest just giving Taylor a choice and continuing the story as usual until the Lung fight and instead of taking a shady offer from Tattletale or a shady offer from Armsmaster, taking a shady offer from Rin - that she kept observing and knows she's not up to 'no good' - and swallowing the jewel then in the search for more power or companionship - because she almost died and we all know Taylor makes the best decisions then.
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- Location
- Probably at sea
Interesting - and blessedly different.
Do not change it for anything, and especially don't change it to repeat the same damn Lung fight we've seen a hundred times. I have absolutely no idea where this fic is going to go, and that's rare enough especially for Worm fics that I'm more than happy to see what you've got planned.
I'm also excited to see the two most stubborn and hidebound worldviews in popular ficdom collide. Most Nasu fics couch everything in terms of magecraft, most Worm fics couch everything in terms of parahuman powers (see Taylor's refusal to accept the existence of magic). We the audience know that both are correct, although how they interact is an ongoing question - interesting that Rin can trump QA if she wants to. What we don't know is which one will budge first and admit the existence of the other.
Will be following this with interest.
Do not change it for anything, and especially don't change it to repeat the same damn Lung fight we've seen a hundred times. I have absolutely no idea where this fic is going to go, and that's rare enough especially for Worm fics that I'm more than happy to see what you've got planned.
I'm also excited to see the two most stubborn and hidebound worldviews in popular ficdom collide. Most Nasu fics couch everything in terms of magecraft, most Worm fics couch everything in terms of parahuman powers (see Taylor's refusal to accept the existence of magic). We the audience know that both are correct, although how they interact is an ongoing question - interesting that Rin can trump QA if she wants to. What we don't know is which one will budge first and admit the existence of the other.
Will be following this with interest.
Can just skip over it. I don't get why authors in fandoms don't use timeskip plus small infodump flashback more often if they're bored. It's happening more often with the locker at least.
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Zenjou is the maiden name of Rin's mother.
It does, however, seem unlikely that a random person who walks into Rin's home is going to be someone who Rin wants to teach magic to. Characters don't have little signs over their heads saying "I am the protagonist of the story"; as far as Rin is concerned, Taylor is nothing special. (Unless Taylor is unusual in that she has the potential for magic, in which case that's the part which is unlikely, but it's unlikely either way.)
It does, however, seem unlikely that a random person who walks into Rin's home is going to be someone who Rin wants to teach magic to. Characters don't have little signs over their heads saying "I am the protagonist of the story"; as far as Rin is concerned, Taylor is nothing special. (Unless Taylor is unusual in that she has the potential for magic, in which case that's the part which is unlikely, but it's unlikely either way.)
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- Location
- Massachusetts
I'm liking the setup so far. Rin is probably way more appealing a contact to Taylor as a random neighbor rather than a school idol and a bored Taylor without much direction might be willing to dip a foot into anything parahuman-adjacent that has nothing to do with school.
Taylor's incredible paranoia and stubbornness come off as true to the original. If anything, it's Rin who seems more mature than in canon - sort of a given based on her age. Once Taylor proves herself, Rin might be willing to show off just how spoiled she can really be.
Rin trusting Taylor to not betray her immediately might be a little out there but the former might just be used to treating people fairly with the expectation of fair treatment in turn - after all, magecraft is a compelling hook and Taylor has some degree of academic curiosity.
Taylor's incredible paranoia and stubbornness come off as true to the original. If anything, it's Rin who seems more mature than in canon - sort of a given based on her age. Once Taylor proves herself, Rin might be willing to show off just how spoiled she can really be.
Rin trusting Taylor to not betray her immediately might be a little out there but the former might just be used to treating people fairly with the expectation of fair treatment in turn - after all, magecraft is a compelling hook and Taylor has some degree of academic curiosity.
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- Location
- Void
Honestly I'm hoping this is a fusion of the Settings rather then inserting one particular element that dominates another. As technically speaking there would be nothing actually preventing Shards from acting akin to Magecraft, other hypothetical Systems picked up over countless Cycles, or other integrations into the Human Order. Though it does being to mind the fact that beings like Abaddon, Zion, and Eden should/could be comparable to Velber. As they both do invade planets, the former kills them while the latter wipes the surface Civilization, but both collect innumerable amounts of Data.
So overall I do hope that some Shards do take advantage of Nasuverse metaphysics, even if it's just the underlying shared parts rather then anything specific. Like True Ether making up all the planets and the like. But I do dread and dream what the Endbringers would be like, Objects of terrible and vast alien Mysteries unable to be approached by the Yolk of Man?
So overall I do hope that some Shards do take advantage of Nasuverse metaphysics, even if it's just the underlying shared parts rather then anything specific. Like True Ether making up all the planets and the like. But I do dread and dream what the Endbringers would be like, Objects of terrible and vast alien Mysteries unable to be approached by the Yolk of Man?
- Location
- Sea of Quanta
If they attack parahumans specifically - and those somehow mess with the planet itself (or lead to death of humanity), they could be Beasts of Gaia. Or Alaya. Who knows. Up to the author. We just gotta sit back and enjoy the ride.
Can't specifically be Beasts, as you have to love humanity in some manner to be a Beast. They can be incredibly similar, but not the same. Endbringers, to the best of our knowledge, do not have emotions.
- Location
- Sea of Quanta
Beasts of Gaia specifically don't care about humanity at all though. Their main goal is preserving the planet itself. If humans are wiped out as a result - so be it. Though I see your point. Still, it's an AU - who knows what could happen.
- Location
- Florida
Little suggestion to the author. Make sure your story is internally consistent first and worry about the source material and complaints there in, second. Worm and fate at two... contentious... Settings and fate is just down right confusing on a byzantine level. So doing your own thing is fine.
Purely in terms of what she is: she's a parahuman, her ability is obviously Second-related (all parahuman powers are, but Rin doesn't know that yet; but Taylor's connections to her bugs is mediated by the Entities' usual cross-dimensional shenanigans, i.e. every time she connects with a bug it's accompanied with a nice flashy Second Magic portal that Rin can sense and study), she furthermore has a power that Rin can easily counter (as she's demonstrated) and is otherwise untrained and without an existing power base.
On top of that, she's the sort of person that notices weird people moving in, investigates mysterious gaps in their awareness, and is willing to press that investigation even when her power gets totally cut off. And she's got the sort of sharp-edged rigorous mind you really want in a researcher of any kind.
All and all, Rin is probably already thinking she's got a nice catch here.
You, ah... are talking to one of the people who translate most of the Fate material we get. And by extension, tend to care most about getting it right. So... probably not a concern lol.
... As a side note.
Given that it's Rin, and that Taylor is already exhibiting Second Magic phenomena... nonzero odds that Rin really means what she said here? That would be fun in its own right. Second Magic Taylor is a new one on me.
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004 : Breakfast of the Champions
fallacies
Puyo Mage
Monday morning, I woke to the realization that my tactile perception now extended into Zenjou's yard — even though the interior of her house was still off-limits. I wasn't entirely certain what to make of this, beyond that she must've adjusted her Master effect again. Was I supposed to take it as a message?
It was only 6:30 — quite a bit earlier than I expected to be awake. Descending the stairs in my pajamas, I found Dad in the kitchen, halfway through a bowl of oatmeal.
"Thought you might've wanted to sleep in again," he said. "The doctors said you should take it easy for the next week or so."
"I'm feeling pretty well-rested," I said, pulling a bottle of milk from the fridge. "Don't think I could go back to sleep even if I wanted to."
"Well, if you're sure."
Pouring myself a glass of milk, I put the bottle back in the fridge, and then seated myself at the dining table.
"I'm thinking of using my time off to get my body into shape," I said. "My paunch makes me look like a frog, and I want to get rid of some of the flab."
Dad frowned at that, setting his spoon against the side of his bowl.
"You aren't fat, Taylor," he said. "You're underweight. Borderline anorexic, the doctors said — especially after Panacea healed you."
I gave Dad a look. I'd known for awhile that his eyesight had been getting worse, but it wasn't like him to say things so far removed from reality. Did he not see how huge I was?
"My BMI being lower than some national average doesn't mean I'm not fat, Dad," I said, a little heatedly. "The people who decide what's underweight do it based on a population mean, and things like that aren't applicable across the board to every body type. That's why professional athletes use personalized BMI tests."
Dad sighed, rubbing the arch of his brow with a finger.
"I'll see if I can't schedule a half-day off, and take you to see a nutritionist," he said. "Get them to give you one of these personalized tests, maybe."
"I guess?"
I didn't really see why I would need something like that, but Dad had always been the obstinate sort. Most likely, he wouldn't concede that I knew my body best unless an expert told him so — and thus, I'd obediently play along. Getting a professional opinion on my level of fitness would be useful anyhow.
On my part, this was a conscious effort not to be overly argumentative.
After Mom passed, Dad had thrown himself into his work with machine-like diligence — apparently trying to lose himself in the never-ending drudgery of a 60-hour week. It had taken nothing short of my hospitalization to snap him out of it; and since then, he'd been visibly making an effort to reconnect with me. I appreciated that immensely.
Problem was, there wasn't a lot of common ground between us anymore. At some point, we'd grown apart — not quite to the extent that we were virtually strangers, but incapable of conversing for extended periods without running into a disagreement.
Without ever broaching the issue aloud, we'd learned to compromise — pulling back from the brink whenever we realized that we'd yet again crossed into disputed territory. This tended to make for halting, unproductive conversations, interspersed with awkward silences.
Mom's knack for verbal communications seemed ever beyond my grasp.
Rinsing out his bowl in the sink and leaving it up to dry, Dad asked, "Do we need anything from the store, by the way?"
"Some eggs," I replied. "And we're almost out of milk again."
Drying his hands on a towel, he pulled on the coat that hung from the back of his chair.
"I'll grab some on the way home, then," he said, opening the door into the back yard. "If I'm not back by 8:30, just have dinner without me."
"Got it," I said. "Love you."
"You too," he said, nodding — shutting the door behind him as he stepped out into the cold.
As the engine of the car started up outside, I sighed, retrieving a bag of supermarket sliced bread from the cabinet, and popping two pieces into the toaster. There was always something unpleasantly functional about our conversations when Dad was in a mood. It didn't help that he often didn't explain himself clearly.
What was it about my wanting to lose weight that he found so objectionable anyhow? Wasn't it a good thing that I wanted to get into shape?
"How are you so energetic at such an ungodly hour?" asked Zenjou, squinting at me from within her foyer.
She'd answered the doorbell in fluffy slippers and a bathrobe — loosely tossed over what looked to be an old-fashioned nightgown.
"It's roughly 8:30," I said. "You told me to come over first thing in the morning."
After a small breakfast, I'd had time enough for a jog and a shower afterward. For whatever reason, the mile-long route around the neighborhood had been less exhausting than I anticipated. Maybe it was on account that even absent the activation of my Circuits, there was more mana circulating my body than before? That might explain why I'd woken so early; or how I didn't end up freezing cold, despite the fact that it was 42 degrees out.
But whereas Zenjou should've enjoyed the same sort of benefits, here she was, answering the door a good five minutes after I'd rung the bell — dead on her feet, as if she'd had to forcibly drag herself out of bed.
Maybe she just wasn't a morning person?
Exhaling in exasperation, she opened the door a bit wider.
"Come on in before you let the heat out, then," she said. "And for future reference, 'first thing in the morning' is at a sane hour — preferably after 10."
I didn't know if it came of a mild mysophobia or some cultural thing from Britain or Japan, but like the day before, she'd prepared a pair of guest slippers for me to change into, insisting that I leave my shoes at the door. Changing my footwear, I followed her to the back of the house.
"Have a seat," she said, pointing to one of the tall stools at the kitchen island.
I did so, watching as she flipped on the electric kettle on the counter along the wall. From a cabinet, she retrieved a pour-over dripper and a jar of grounds.
"The day doesn't begin till I've had my coffee," she said. "You'd like a cup?"
"Tea," I said. "Black."
"You've had Oolong before?"
"No."
"Well, that's what you're having."
The 'Oolong' turned out to come in a fancy tetrahedral tea bag.
Once the water had boiled, Zenjou placed the teabag in a mug — sliding it in front of me and filling it from the kettle before turning her attention to her coffee. Experimentally, I pulled the bag upwards by its string — watching as a brownish-red coloration dissolved into the cup from the crushed leaves within.
It didn't really smell like the teas I typically favored, but being an uncultured American, my go-to brand was Lipton. It wasn't bad to occasionally expand my horizons, I supposed.
"Isn't it easier if you use a coffee maker?" I asked — noting that she was still circling the circumference of her dripper with the narrow spout of her kettle. "Or is hand-poured coffee that much better?"
"It isn't, really, regardless of what the so-called connoisseurs would have you believe," she said. "It's merely that I've had — 'disagreements' with coffee machines in the past. Especially the sort with electronic displays."
Come to think of it, despite the modern look of her kitchen, her assorted appliances were all traditional, and there wasn't a microwave in sight. Could it be that she was actually worse off with household electronics than Dad?
Clad in fluffy slippers and speaking about her trouble with coffee machines, Zenjou seemed a lot less threatening than she did the day before.
It wouldn't do to lower my guard, though.
"Yesterday, you said that you wanted to assess my powers," I said, warming my hands against the ceramic of the mug. "What would that entail, exactly?"
Removing the dripper and setting it over an empty cup on the side, Zenjou took a sip of her coffee — gazing into the drink as she swirled it slightly.
"At the moment, there's only a single task I'd like you to perform," she replied. "It isn't by itself terribly involved or time-consuming. However, as you are now, it'd be meaningless for us to proceed, as you haven't yet the requisite skill in mana control."
I blinked, somewhat confused.
"If you're just gonna be looking into my power, why does that even matter?" I asked.
"It matters because I'm not you, and I don't have direct access to your parahuman ability," she replied. "While I'm capable of temporarily suppressing the pathways you access, I can only interact with them from without — as a foreign entity, with predictable restrictions. Thaumaturgical interference within the flesh and mind of another is inherently obstructed by the circulation of the subject's vital force."
In other words, even though her Trump power was broken enough to simply shut me down, the great and powerful Myrddin wannabe didn't actually have the ability to conduct the tests she wanted to perform. It felt like an arbitrary limitation; some sort of special pleading, where her 'magecraft' was multipurpose and all-powerful, except in this one particular capacity.
"So, what are you saying?" I asked. "That you can bypass the restriction once I pick up mana control to the required level?"
"I'm saying that you'll be the one conducting the assessment," she replied. "You trust in yourself more than you would me, no?"
I would. On the other hand, this was the same tact that she'd adopted yesterday — underscoring the fact that she wasn't trustworthy as a strategy to acquire my trust.
"What would I have to be capable of, then?" I asked.
"Hm," she said. "Something like this, perhaps."
Reaching to the sink on the side of the kitchen island, she placed a cover over the drain and turned on the tap. While it filled, she tore a paper towel from its roll and folded it into a thin strip. Once the sink was about half-full, she turned off the water and took a spoon from out of a drawer.
"This is a normal spoon," she said, dropping it into the water. "As you can see, it isn't buoyant at all."
Rolling up her sleeves, she retrieved it from the water. Setting it on the counter, she folded the paper strip halfway along its length and placed one end in the water. Pressing the dry end of the paper with her fingertips, she again dropped the spoon into the sink.
This time, rather than sinking, it bounced against the surface before settling on top — as if the water had turned to gelatin.
Zenjou removed her fingers from the paper towel, and immediately, the spoon sunk to the bottom of the sink.
"A little more complicated than simply allowing energy to flow out and dissipate, as you did yesterday," she said. "This would entail consciously grasping hold of a particular continuous mass as a discrete 'object' — Reinforcing a salient feature that it bears without damaging the mana conduction medium through which you interact with it. In this case, I enhanced amongst other things the surface tension of the water — conducting my mana into it via a paper towel."
She lifted the strip of soggy paper from the sink.
"And this is what can happen if I misapprehend any part of the process," she said.
Unnaturally — as if it were something in a time-lapse video — the paper frayed under its own weight, collapsing into a wet mess upon the countertop.
"Obviously, paper towels are rubbish as a conductor of mana," she said. "But it's an obstacle that can be overcome with sufficient practice."
Sipping my tea, I stared at the sink. On the internet, I'd seen videos of people firing bullets into ballistic gel before. If by Reinforcement, normal water could behave as a solid —
"Can Reinforcement be applied to things besides water?" I asked. "Like my own body?"
"That's one of the standard uses, yes," said Zenjou, wiping up the shreds of the paper towel with a fresh sheet. She regarded me with a frown, "But if you're thinking to resist bullets like a comic book superhero, I wouldn't recommend it. Basic Reinforcement of the flesh can be achieved by circulating mana in sufficient volume, but it would require quite a bit of effort to push that to a practical utility in anything beyond unarmed combat."
She didn't rule out the possibility, though.
I'd thought to postpone my debut on the cape scene until after I'd shored up my defenses — but if I could master this, maybe I could expedite my schedule.
I'd already set a bunch of black widows to the task of fabricating a spider-silk under-suit; and regardless of circumstance, I wouldn't be abandoning the project. Still, if I wanted to act as a cape, I didn't have the luxury to turn down a potential Brute power — even if my use of 'magecraft' was potentially dependent on Zenjou.
The way in which she destroyed the paper towel also had potential. Maybe I could grant myself a Striker power of some sort?
There were points that I'd like a little more clarification on, though. Yesterday, Zenjou stated that I held an affinity for 'water'; but in her explanation just now, she'd more or less confirmed that I'd be capable of applying Reinforcement to my body. From that, it could reasonably be inferred that my 'magecraft' would be more than just a manipulation of water — but if that were the case, what did 'an affinity for water' mean?
And, furthermore —
"You said that Reinforcement could be applied to 'a salient feature,' earlier," I asked. "What does that mean? Are there features that aren't salient?"
For a moment, she didn't answer — taking a long sip from her mug before setting it down.
"It's a topic too involved to delve into so early in the morning," she said. "But to briefly summarize — surface tension is a product of hydrogen bonding, yes?"
"Yeah?"
"The concept of hydrogen bonding would only be known to those acquainted with chemistry at a secondary school level or higher," she said. "Comparatively, surface tension is known to a greater proportion of the World's population. Thus, we can say that it's of greater salience — and therefore easier both to visualize and Reinforce."
"That seems like a really arbitrary restriction," I remarked. "You're saying that the performance of 'magecraft' is limited by what? The perception of the general populace?"
Zenjou sighed.
"Like I said, it's way too early to be getting into a subject like that," she replied. "And if we're to be speaking of arbitrary limitations, how about you explain to me why it is that certain parahuman powers operate under a Manton limit?"
"That's —"
Honestly, I hadn't thought about that. Maybe Manton limits were some kind of unconscious psychological restriction?
Was it on account of a Manton limit that Zenjou couldn't directly assess my power?
"You're right that a proper grasp of the discipline of thaumaturgy requires context on the subject of salience," Zenjou continued. "But that can wait until it's immediately relevant. For the time being, focus on furthering yourself in the manipulation of mana."
I drew in a sip of tea, frowning. It was a little annoying that she'd again evaded my question, but at the least, I'd extracted something akin to a promise of an explanation at some point.
"How will I be training, then?" I asked.
"We'll start with something simple."
Draining the sink, she placed her pour-over dripper within, and then rinsed out the glass cup it'd been sitting upon. Wiping it with a fresh paper towel, she set the towel before me, and the cup on top — tapping it lightly with her finger.
The glass shattered, collapsing into fragments.
"Glass is an amorphous solid," said Zenjou, seating herself back upon her stool. "That means that it's technically capable of flowing." She took a sip of coffee from her mug, and then regarded me with a tight smile. "So — make use of your affinity for Water, and repair this."
Dumbly, I stared at the shards of glass.
"I'm supposed to use Reinforcement for this?" I asked.
"Have I taught you anything else?" she asked. "Get to it, then. Chop chop."
Clearly, Rin Zenjou wasn't above exacting petty revenge for sleep lost.
It was only 6:30 — quite a bit earlier than I expected to be awake. Descending the stairs in my pajamas, I found Dad in the kitchen, halfway through a bowl of oatmeal.
"Thought you might've wanted to sleep in again," he said. "The doctors said you should take it easy for the next week or so."
"I'm feeling pretty well-rested," I said, pulling a bottle of milk from the fridge. "Don't think I could go back to sleep even if I wanted to."
"Well, if you're sure."
Pouring myself a glass of milk, I put the bottle back in the fridge, and then seated myself at the dining table.
"I'm thinking of using my time off to get my body into shape," I said. "My paunch makes me look like a frog, and I want to get rid of some of the flab."
Dad frowned at that, setting his spoon against the side of his bowl.
"You aren't fat, Taylor," he said. "You're underweight. Borderline anorexic, the doctors said — especially after Panacea healed you."
I gave Dad a look. I'd known for awhile that his eyesight had been getting worse, but it wasn't like him to say things so far removed from reality. Did he not see how huge I was?
"My BMI being lower than some national average doesn't mean I'm not fat, Dad," I said, a little heatedly. "The people who decide what's underweight do it based on a population mean, and things like that aren't applicable across the board to every body type. That's why professional athletes use personalized BMI tests."
Dad sighed, rubbing the arch of his brow with a finger.
"I'll see if I can't schedule a half-day off, and take you to see a nutritionist," he said. "Get them to give you one of these personalized tests, maybe."
"I guess?"
I didn't really see why I would need something like that, but Dad had always been the obstinate sort. Most likely, he wouldn't concede that I knew my body best unless an expert told him so — and thus, I'd obediently play along. Getting a professional opinion on my level of fitness would be useful anyhow.
On my part, this was a conscious effort not to be overly argumentative.
After Mom passed, Dad had thrown himself into his work with machine-like diligence — apparently trying to lose himself in the never-ending drudgery of a 60-hour week. It had taken nothing short of my hospitalization to snap him out of it; and since then, he'd been visibly making an effort to reconnect with me. I appreciated that immensely.
Problem was, there wasn't a lot of common ground between us anymore. At some point, we'd grown apart — not quite to the extent that we were virtually strangers, but incapable of conversing for extended periods without running into a disagreement.
Without ever broaching the issue aloud, we'd learned to compromise — pulling back from the brink whenever we realized that we'd yet again crossed into disputed territory. This tended to make for halting, unproductive conversations, interspersed with awkward silences.
Mom's knack for verbal communications seemed ever beyond my grasp.
Rinsing out his bowl in the sink and leaving it up to dry, Dad asked, "Do we need anything from the store, by the way?"
"Some eggs," I replied. "And we're almost out of milk again."
Drying his hands on a towel, he pulled on the coat that hung from the back of his chair.
"I'll grab some on the way home, then," he said, opening the door into the back yard. "If I'm not back by 8:30, just have dinner without me."
"Got it," I said. "Love you."
"You too," he said, nodding — shutting the door behind him as he stepped out into the cold.
As the engine of the car started up outside, I sighed, retrieving a bag of supermarket sliced bread from the cabinet, and popping two pieces into the toaster. There was always something unpleasantly functional about our conversations when Dad was in a mood. It didn't help that he often didn't explain himself clearly.
What was it about my wanting to lose weight that he found so objectionable anyhow? Wasn't it a good thing that I wanted to get into shape?
"How are you so energetic at such an ungodly hour?" asked Zenjou, squinting at me from within her foyer.
She'd answered the doorbell in fluffy slippers and a bathrobe — loosely tossed over what looked to be an old-fashioned nightgown.
"It's roughly 8:30," I said. "You told me to come over first thing in the morning."
After a small breakfast, I'd had time enough for a jog and a shower afterward. For whatever reason, the mile-long route around the neighborhood had been less exhausting than I anticipated. Maybe it was on account that even absent the activation of my Circuits, there was more mana circulating my body than before? That might explain why I'd woken so early; or how I didn't end up freezing cold, despite the fact that it was 42 degrees out.
But whereas Zenjou should've enjoyed the same sort of benefits, here she was, answering the door a good five minutes after I'd rung the bell — dead on her feet, as if she'd had to forcibly drag herself out of bed.
Maybe she just wasn't a morning person?
Exhaling in exasperation, she opened the door a bit wider.
"Come on in before you let the heat out, then," she said. "And for future reference, 'first thing in the morning' is at a sane hour — preferably after 10."
I didn't know if it came of a mild mysophobia or some cultural thing from Britain or Japan, but like the day before, she'd prepared a pair of guest slippers for me to change into, insisting that I leave my shoes at the door. Changing my footwear, I followed her to the back of the house.
"Have a seat," she said, pointing to one of the tall stools at the kitchen island.
I did so, watching as she flipped on the electric kettle on the counter along the wall. From a cabinet, she retrieved a pour-over dripper and a jar of grounds.
"The day doesn't begin till I've had my coffee," she said. "You'd like a cup?"
"Tea," I said. "Black."
"You've had Oolong before?"
"No."
"Well, that's what you're having."
The 'Oolong' turned out to come in a fancy tetrahedral tea bag.
Once the water had boiled, Zenjou placed the teabag in a mug — sliding it in front of me and filling it from the kettle before turning her attention to her coffee. Experimentally, I pulled the bag upwards by its string — watching as a brownish-red coloration dissolved into the cup from the crushed leaves within.
It didn't really smell like the teas I typically favored, but being an uncultured American, my go-to brand was Lipton. It wasn't bad to occasionally expand my horizons, I supposed.
"Isn't it easier if you use a coffee maker?" I asked — noting that she was still circling the circumference of her dripper with the narrow spout of her kettle. "Or is hand-poured coffee that much better?"
"It isn't, really, regardless of what the so-called connoisseurs would have you believe," she said. "It's merely that I've had — 'disagreements' with coffee machines in the past. Especially the sort with electronic displays."
Come to think of it, despite the modern look of her kitchen, her assorted appliances were all traditional, and there wasn't a microwave in sight. Could it be that she was actually worse off with household electronics than Dad?
Clad in fluffy slippers and speaking about her trouble with coffee machines, Zenjou seemed a lot less threatening than she did the day before.
It wouldn't do to lower my guard, though.
"Yesterday, you said that you wanted to assess my powers," I said, warming my hands against the ceramic of the mug. "What would that entail, exactly?"
Removing the dripper and setting it over an empty cup on the side, Zenjou took a sip of her coffee — gazing into the drink as she swirled it slightly.
"At the moment, there's only a single task I'd like you to perform," she replied. "It isn't by itself terribly involved or time-consuming. However, as you are now, it'd be meaningless for us to proceed, as you haven't yet the requisite skill in mana control."
I blinked, somewhat confused.
"If you're just gonna be looking into my power, why does that even matter?" I asked.
"It matters because I'm not you, and I don't have direct access to your parahuman ability," she replied. "While I'm capable of temporarily suppressing the pathways you access, I can only interact with them from without — as a foreign entity, with predictable restrictions. Thaumaturgical interference within the flesh and mind of another is inherently obstructed by the circulation of the subject's vital force."
In other words, even though her Trump power was broken enough to simply shut me down, the great and powerful Myrddin wannabe didn't actually have the ability to conduct the tests she wanted to perform. It felt like an arbitrary limitation; some sort of special pleading, where her 'magecraft' was multipurpose and all-powerful, except in this one particular capacity.
"So, what are you saying?" I asked. "That you can bypass the restriction once I pick up mana control to the required level?"
"I'm saying that you'll be the one conducting the assessment," she replied. "You trust in yourself more than you would me, no?"
I would. On the other hand, this was the same tact that she'd adopted yesterday — underscoring the fact that she wasn't trustworthy as a strategy to acquire my trust.
"What would I have to be capable of, then?" I asked.
"Hm," she said. "Something like this, perhaps."
Reaching to the sink on the side of the kitchen island, she placed a cover over the drain and turned on the tap. While it filled, she tore a paper towel from its roll and folded it into a thin strip. Once the sink was about half-full, she turned off the water and took a spoon from out of a drawer.
"This is a normal spoon," she said, dropping it into the water. "As you can see, it isn't buoyant at all."
Rolling up her sleeves, she retrieved it from the water. Setting it on the counter, she folded the paper strip halfway along its length and placed one end in the water. Pressing the dry end of the paper with her fingertips, she again dropped the spoon into the sink.
This time, rather than sinking, it bounced against the surface before settling on top — as if the water had turned to gelatin.
Zenjou removed her fingers from the paper towel, and immediately, the spoon sunk to the bottom of the sink.
"A little more complicated than simply allowing energy to flow out and dissipate, as you did yesterday," she said. "This would entail consciously grasping hold of a particular continuous mass as a discrete 'object' — Reinforcing a salient feature that it bears without damaging the mana conduction medium through which you interact with it. In this case, I enhanced amongst other things the surface tension of the water — conducting my mana into it via a paper towel."
She lifted the strip of soggy paper from the sink.
"And this is what can happen if I misapprehend any part of the process," she said.
Unnaturally — as if it were something in a time-lapse video — the paper frayed under its own weight, collapsing into a wet mess upon the countertop.
"Obviously, paper towels are rubbish as a conductor of mana," she said. "But it's an obstacle that can be overcome with sufficient practice."
Sipping my tea, I stared at the sink. On the internet, I'd seen videos of people firing bullets into ballistic gel before. If by Reinforcement, normal water could behave as a solid —
"Can Reinforcement be applied to things besides water?" I asked. "Like my own body?"
"That's one of the standard uses, yes," said Zenjou, wiping up the shreds of the paper towel with a fresh sheet. She regarded me with a frown, "But if you're thinking to resist bullets like a comic book superhero, I wouldn't recommend it. Basic Reinforcement of the flesh can be achieved by circulating mana in sufficient volume, but it would require quite a bit of effort to push that to a practical utility in anything beyond unarmed combat."
She didn't rule out the possibility, though.
I'd thought to postpone my debut on the cape scene until after I'd shored up my defenses — but if I could master this, maybe I could expedite my schedule.
I'd already set a bunch of black widows to the task of fabricating a spider-silk under-suit; and regardless of circumstance, I wouldn't be abandoning the project. Still, if I wanted to act as a cape, I didn't have the luxury to turn down a potential Brute power — even if my use of 'magecraft' was potentially dependent on Zenjou.
The way in which she destroyed the paper towel also had potential. Maybe I could grant myself a Striker power of some sort?
There were points that I'd like a little more clarification on, though. Yesterday, Zenjou stated that I held an affinity for 'water'; but in her explanation just now, she'd more or less confirmed that I'd be capable of applying Reinforcement to my body. From that, it could reasonably be inferred that my 'magecraft' would be more than just a manipulation of water — but if that were the case, what did 'an affinity for water' mean?
And, furthermore —
"You said that Reinforcement could be applied to 'a salient feature,' earlier," I asked. "What does that mean? Are there features that aren't salient?"
For a moment, she didn't answer — taking a long sip from her mug before setting it down.
"It's a topic too involved to delve into so early in the morning," she said. "But to briefly summarize — surface tension is a product of hydrogen bonding, yes?"
"Yeah?"
"The concept of hydrogen bonding would only be known to those acquainted with chemistry at a secondary school level or higher," she said. "Comparatively, surface tension is known to a greater proportion of the World's population. Thus, we can say that it's of greater salience — and therefore easier both to visualize and Reinforce."
"That seems like a really arbitrary restriction," I remarked. "You're saying that the performance of 'magecraft' is limited by what? The perception of the general populace?"
Zenjou sighed.
"Like I said, it's way too early to be getting into a subject like that," she replied. "And if we're to be speaking of arbitrary limitations, how about you explain to me why it is that certain parahuman powers operate under a Manton limit?"
"That's —"
Honestly, I hadn't thought about that. Maybe Manton limits were some kind of unconscious psychological restriction?
Was it on account of a Manton limit that Zenjou couldn't directly assess my power?
"You're right that a proper grasp of the discipline of thaumaturgy requires context on the subject of salience," Zenjou continued. "But that can wait until it's immediately relevant. For the time being, focus on furthering yourself in the manipulation of mana."
I drew in a sip of tea, frowning. It was a little annoying that she'd again evaded my question, but at the least, I'd extracted something akin to a promise of an explanation at some point.
"How will I be training, then?" I asked.
"We'll start with something simple."
Draining the sink, she placed her pour-over dripper within, and then rinsed out the glass cup it'd been sitting upon. Wiping it with a fresh paper towel, she set the towel before me, and the cup on top — tapping it lightly with her finger.
The glass shattered, collapsing into fragments.
"Glass is an amorphous solid," said Zenjou, seating herself back upon her stool. "That means that it's technically capable of flowing." She took a sip of coffee from her mug, and then regarded me with a tight smile. "So — make use of your affinity for Water, and repair this."
Dumbly, I stared at the shards of glass.
"I'm supposed to use Reinforcement for this?" I asked.
"Have I taught you anything else?" she asked. "Get to it, then. Chop chop."
Clearly, Rin Zenjou wasn't above exacting petty revenge for sleep lost.
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fallacies
Puyo Mage
She acted under the apprehension that this strange cape with the power to completely nullify her insect control knew where she lived and how to get at her father. Her only means of potentially obtaining an advantage was to play nice. In a situation like that, you don't say no.
That's not really what's happening here?
It's entirely intentional that their interaction looks like an unlikely coincidence.
I'm not really certain what inconsistencies you're referring to?
- Location
- Probably at sea
I don't think that's actually true. People thought it was, because windows in old buildings sometimes had thicker glass on the bottom than the top, and the hypothesis was that the glass was flowing very slowly. But in fact it was just confirmation bias, with the discrepancy coming from imperfections in the glass-forming or cutting process.
EDIT: or, I could actually check before making myself look silly on the internet - it is amorphous, but I think 'technically capable of flowing' is still a stretch, though. (At room temperature, at least.)
Grumpy bear morning Rin is wonderful. As expected, Taylor is resistant to the idea of magic - but Rin seems a lot more accepting of parahuman abilities as a non-Nasu thing than I'd have expected, which I suppose is only reasonable if she's come to this reality and is assuming the teacher role. (And being older than the canon Rin we're more familiar with.)
Looking forward to seeing Taylor's misadventures in learning magic.
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Does it matter if it's technically true, if it's widely believed to be?
- Location
- In the ocean of my heart
Interesting fic. I'll be keeping a eye on it. I take it rin is a alternate version of fsn rin?
Good question! I'm not entirely sure. Certainly you could intentionally draw on that urban legend to make it work -- the entire point of Mystery is to exploit the existence of various misunderstandings and misapprehensions of reality -- but would it happen "by default", as a natural extension of someone applying the Element of Water...?
MetaChthonia
Disco Inferno: ⌈I Learn Through Suffering⌋
- Location
- Somewhere, Elsewhere, Nowhere. Maybe. Probably.
Apparently the activation of her Circuits made her start spewing technobabble like it means anything.
Also whatever you do: do. Not. Starve. Yourself. The body is designed to absorb all the fats after low amounts of nutritional input. Normally a good chunk of it is lost as waste but your weight will double if you starve yourself and then start eating again. It's also a good way to force the epigenetic activation of genes for diabetes.
Quartz is also an amorphous solid but it doesn't slowly melt just because it's sitting around. Rubber and plastic is atleast technically capable of melt by sitting around.
Then again this is very in line with Fate, using Technobabble and pointlessly complex sentence structuring combined with selectively cherry picking information to make things that make no sense unless you systematically go down the paragraph, reference back every word to previous words, and figure out alternative definitions to certain words and then pretend it makes any sense when applied to the universe despite the context they utilize it doesn't actually work...
...I'm saying Fate Lore reads like a textbook written for advanced Algebra and is about as applicable to anything in the setting in the context it is read as the Taj Mahal has to "Journey to the West" unless you then translate back the words to the context that does allow you to apply them to the situation in a way that makes sense.
She would have a point... If it weren't for BMI actually being highly inaccurate for anyone that isn't a male adult between 20-40 years of age. It doesn't take into account the Square-Cube Law and it's creator even stated such. After BVI became a thing he even recommended that. BVI can tell if she's healthy but it requires specialized equipment to measure density of various parts. Although if she actually is fat then she's probably malnourished since malnourishment can result in fat while in desperate need of actual food. There also is how Danny didn't say anything about BMI.
...Did you just forget everything you just said before he started talking about seeing a Dietician? Are you zoning out when you Technobabble people? You were concerned about your weight.
Since when did you spend years of study on how the human body functions and processes food as well as the uniquity of various metabolisms? She sounds like a cardboard cutout of a teenager.
You need more fiber. Also probably the good kind of fat. I recommend poultry. Less sugars and more salts. Fat is fuel. Also actual stretching.
Also whatever you do: do. Not. Starve. Yourself. The body is designed to absorb all the fats after low amounts of nutritional input. Normally a good chunk of it is lost as waste but your weight will double if you starve yourself and then start eating again. It's also a good way to force the epigenetic activation of genes for diabetes.
Self image problems are an indication of suicidal tendencies and a warning of possibly needing a psychiatrist.
If you bothered to look at your floor once in a while you would notice just how much sh!t from outside you treck in. So it makes sense to do this if you don't want to constantly clean the floors.
Yes, that is the color most teas have. Tea isn't coffee, no amount of sugar will make tea anything other then black and beyond that it's cream that make coffee anything other then black.
Well now this is closer to teenager thoughts. Alternatively Rin isn't actually a mage and is genuinely a Teacher clone.
It actually isn't any different. Someone actually tested that.
I heard something about Rin have trouble with VCRs some time ago. Guess this Rin has just as much trouble with technology. Alternatively Magic here works similar to the way it does in the Dresden books rather then Fate and her presence makes lightbulbs explode.
No, it's how much force a substance can withstand an impact of before giving in. Air also has "surface tension" and so do solids with solids having the strongest tension resulting in them breaking when it's broken. Non-newtonian fluids are the biggest example of this by being between a solid and liquid by hardening on fast impacts and liquifing on slow impacts. It has nothing to do with the bonds and everything to do with how fast the molecules can move.
Yeah, pretty much, different Magecraft is stronger and weaker in proximity to different locations and Magic is dead in Angel Notes due to Science killing Magic. Even the Laws of Physics and the continuation of entire universes apparently are subject to the perception of the dominant lifeform which used to be Gods till an alien showed up to kill them all and now it's Humanity. There's a guy in Tsukihime that created Timelines via simulating them on the Logic that they don't exist till they happen and he makes them happen by believing they do.
Powers that may prove hazardous to the Parahuman limit themselves to keep from doing such. Seriously, that's the Canon Reason. Another Canon Reason is to force the Hosts to get tactical for the amusement of the Shards giant DeathBattle.
Not unless Shards aren't a thing here. Of course that doesn't apply to her. Then again questions regarding "are Parahuman powers Magic?" Will probably get raised if she starts finding arbitrary limitations on what she and others can and can't control.
No it doesn't, it means it's not in a pattern/order on a molecular level or an "amorphous" shape and is normally formed by cooling materials. Just like essential oils aren't essential but rather have the "essence" (ie: smell) of plants.
Quartz is also an amorphous solid but it doesn't slowly melt just because it's sitting around. Rubber and plastic is atleast technically capable of melt by sitting around.
Try doing something easier. Like asphalt. Asphalt flows quickly to the point that there is an experiment to have a funnel drip solid asphalt for the last century and it has produced three of them so far. Do the same with glass and it won't have moved a molecule in the same timeframe. Unless she's using semantics to argue with the universe that Rin's interpretation of "amorphous" means "liquid" then there is no way she is moving this using water based manipulation. But by this same logic she can manipulate all materials due to glass turning liquid as heat is applied just like all substances. Such as metals and snow which are crystalized solids which is the exact opposite of an amorphous solid. Especially the snow which should be easier then glass for her despite not being "amorphous".
Then again this is very in line with Fate, using Technobabble and pointlessly complex sentence structuring combined with selectively cherry picking information to make things that make no sense unless you systematically go down the paragraph, reference back every word to previous words, and figure out alternative definitions to certain words and then pretend it makes any sense when applied to the universe despite the context they utilize it doesn't actually work...
...I'm saying Fate Lore reads like a textbook written for advanced Algebra and is about as applicable to anything in the setting in the context it is read as the Taj Mahal has to "Journey to the West" unless you then translate back the words to the context that does allow you to apply them to the situation in a way that makes sense.
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