[Worm x Fate] Journeywoman & Apprentice
- Thread starter fallacies
- Start date
- Crossover
MaskedCritic
Verified Obsessed with Yuri
- Location
- Fluttershy's Secret Dungeon Shrine to Metal
Honestly, after some thinking I can't imagine sea-based shipping being affected by Leviathan in the slightest, unless it specifically attacks cargo in transit. If the threat of natural disaster hitting a port city -- which is essentially what a Leviathan attack is -- were enough to halt sea-based shipping, then it never would have existed in the first place. Hurricanes have existed for far longer, and destroyed more port cities, than Leviathan could have in its mere two decades (or less) of attacks. It just tends to be more thorough in its destruction.
And yeah, Taylor's fervent denial of her extremely obvious attraction to women continues to amuse. So well done in this story!
Why exactly would Taylor be inclined to believe Rin if she had Shirou as her assistsnt exactly? I don't get the logic behind that.
Ylamona
Konlulu~
Because It's Shirou. UBW Shirou to boot.
Mystearica
Quoth the Raven
- Location
- meditating over Titan's Tower
Realistically Leviathan would in fact have an impact on the shipping industry. It's simply unavoidable... because he attacks coastal cities. Coastal cities tend to have ports, which is where shipping happens. All he would have had to do is hit one major shipping junction and the effects would ripple out from there. After it happens the first time people would hesitate to invest heavily in the industry. Who knows, Leviathan could show up next year and wipe the city off the map. Poof, there goes all your capital! Arguably the same could be said for any city given the three Endbringers, but Leviathan ONLY attacked coastal cities. Thus a coastal city has a definitively higher likelihood to be obliterated in any given year, since they attack in sequence. One port gets yeeted every year for however many years it's been since he showed up? Potentially more given that Behemoth or Simmie definitely could attack one if they felt like it? Yeah.
Now the actual scope of that impact is up for debate, but there simply is no arguing that he wouldn't have an impact at all.
Now the actual scope of that impact is up for debate, but there simply is no arguing that he wouldn't have an impact at all.
TheLastOne
Person of impeccable tastes (for destruction)
I believe one person made a good case back before Worm finished that the Endbringers could basically crash the entire global economy and end most long distance trade within two years by attacking the right targets, even if those attacks were not especially effective or devastating - just an 'average' level of damage for an Endbringer attack. Just disrupting the right global hubs would fuck everything over.
Of course, they aren't trying to do that, so they don't.
Reference to what Taylor did when she n Rin visited the worm verse equivalent of Abby's friend . Taylor didn't hold any kinda paranoia against the lady and that seemingly handsome human son butler but actually eldritch horror . She spent the time believing Rin was actually dressing in her signature skirt to please said handsome butler . In case youve missed it it was like.... a few chapters back I think .
Kell of Snow
Verified TinTin enjoyer
- Location
- New York
And thus, Taylor begins to realize she wasn't actually being constantly lied to and/or mastered about the nature of magic, and that it is indeed an actual phenomenon of the world.
fallacies
Puyo Mage
The relevant WoG is as follows:
When Taylor says that "the shipping industry is perfectly fine," this isn't entirely accurate. I'm interpreting the WoG to mean that the Endbringers aren't in practice a direct threat to the actual endeavor of using and maintaining active shipping routes, outside the regular loss of ports and infrastructure. That is, the multinationals aren't about to give up on a highly lucrative trade, even if said losses occur. They'll just set up more viable ports, and reroute their ships as necessary.Wildbow said:
In effect, the economy of Brockton Bay is dying because the city exists within an earshot of Boston.
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Mystearica
Quoth the Raven
- Location
- meditating over Titan's Tower
Fair enough. WB makes a point there that I didn't think of as well, that the waves Leviathan makes would also wreck other port cities just in the general vicinity of his target.
fallacies
Puyo Mage
They probably exist — but shipping companies would likely hire parahuman security, if the risk is significant.
Ylamona
Konlulu~
Yeah, but everyone can nor that ther are unlimited people to hire. It will definitely drove things down to just limited shipping companies
- Location
- Probably at sea
Parahuman-supported piracy is an interesting case, because the nature of piracy is such that, in most cases, most parahuman powers are kind of overkill and don't actually make it any easier. Sure, you might throw a fireball, but if you're going after civilian merchant vessels, most of those go around unarmed and you may as well just bring an AK-47. If they have hired conventional security, it's possible that your parahuman power could help you survive a bullet or help you get onto the ship (if you can fly, for example). If they can do both, they could clear out security in preparation for boarding - if only one or the other, they're going to run into problems, because it doesn't matter how super-strong you are if you or your skiff is hit by a .50 cal round.
Now, pirates generally want to do one of two things to ships - loot them for various valuables and make a quick getaway, or in more serious and rarer cases, to hijack them, take them over and resell the ship and cargo to others. (Or, occasionally, for terroristic reasons, but that's generally not counted as piracy.) If it's the former, having one extra cape doesn't make all that much a difference unless they have quite specialised powers. You'd think Master or Stranger powers would be great for the latter, except first they have to get inside the citadel.
The citadel is basically a safe room inside a ship, designed to be a point to retreat to in the event of a boarding. It usually contains everything you need to sail the thing, including the engine rooms, secondary steering systems and a basic navigation setup. If the ship is under attack, the crew can retreat into the citadel and steer the ship to safety while placing a call to help from their local maritime security. There are certainly parahuman powers who could circumvent or get through the citadel, but not the same ones that would help them get onto the ship, usually. But, it could happen. This is where the military gets involved.
If there is a hostage situation onboard, with crew members inside the citadel, it's usually then a job for Special Forces, as the only ones trained to deal with that sort of thing, and who would presumably have significant parahuman support themselves. Regular Navy can get involved at any point up that, and may or may not have parahuman support themselves (as far as I know we never see the state of the military in Worm because we're focused on the law enforcement side of things, but surely various Defence agencies can see the value of having at least some assets). The standard response to observing a verified pirate vessel usually involves helicopters, which can sometimes immobilise and sink skiffs and small boats just by their downdrafts - unless the parahuman pirates can deal with something on that level (and bearing in mind they'll have to do so in the middle of the ocean), there's not much separating the parahuman pirates from regular ones.
TL;DR - pirates could benefit from parahuman powers, but they'd have to be strong ones to make a difference given the circumstances specific to piracy. In that case, they could do quite well until a dedicated SF team is dispatched to deal with them.
AionVal
(Verified Figment)
- Location
- Beyond The Veil
And here we have Taylor instinctively accepting and adopting the "To be a Magus is to Walk with Death" mindset before is taught to her.
"Yeah, I don't know if falling from a 2nd story window is gonna affect me while using Reinforcement. Welp, lets do it anyways and see what happens!" QA must be supper happy.
Have I mentioned how much I love this? The smooth blending of Fate and Worm elements particularly tickles me pink.
I imagine that the lack of any manufacturing or viable bulk-shipping isn't helping much either.
Prince Charon
Just zis guy, you know?
I think that was brought up in Silencio, or another fic where Leviathan attacks a city near BB instead of BB itself - the Boardwalk is still damaged, or something like that.
010 : Camelback Riding
fallacies
Puyo Mage
"What the hell is this?"
"What's it look like?" Zenjou replied, smirking.
In a brown bag on the living room table, there were two articles of clothing: In a range of grays with reflective strips, two sizes too small for me to wear, a V-neck compression shirt and leggings. Beneath them were a pair of running shoes in pristine white, entirely new.
"You expect me to wear this?" I asked.
"To further extend your exercise routine," said Zenjou, "we'll be traveling to the ballet school on foot today. As I refuse to be seen beside a running partner so poorly attired, I took the liberty to purchase a few items out of pocket."
Frowning, I held up the shirt before me.
"When'd you have the opportunity?" I asked. Had she ordered these online or something?
"Yesterday night, after you took the bus home," Zenjou replied. "There was a sale at a sporting goods shop on Canal Street, and I dropped by before closing hours." She sipped her coffee. "Not to worry, though. I'm not so stingy that I'd deduct this from your paycheck."
I tensed the shirt with a slight sideward pull. The material was the fancy, breathable sort; but while elastic, it didn't have a lot of give.
"There's no way this'll fit," I said.
"Try them on, and I think you'll be pleasantly surprised," said Zenjou. "I happen to have a grasp of your exact measurements, courtesy of the Bounded Field here deployed."
Because of course she did. I'd question the accuracy of her measurements if I thought she cared, but there wasn't a point. It wasn't like she'd admit to being wrong.
I changed in the downstairs toilet, pulling on the shirt and leggings over my underwear. Much as expected, it was far too tight — not quite to an uncomfortable level, and not-quite biting into my excess body fat, but enough that it clung to me like a second skin; as if I were just about naked, despite the sports bra and the panties I was wearing underneath.
"No need for socks, by the way," called Zenjou from the living room. "The running shoes I bought are the sort that you put on barefoot."
"Eh," I said aloud, looking to the pair of socks on my feet.
The shoes were new; and in my experience, that tended to mean that they'd require a bit of breaking-in before the insides were soft enough not to raise blisters. On the other hand, it wasn't likely that here on out, I'd be going on any runs without the use of active Reinforcement. Maybe it wouldn't be an issue?
Thinking on it a bit, I decided to strip off my socks; though I didn't end up putting them into the brown bag along with my other clothes. They were a fresh pair from after my shower this morning; but my sneakers stank with a persistent detergent odor from the one time I'd tried to wash out the consequences of a prank, and a chemical scent clung to whatever fabric my socks were made of. I didn't want that on my hoodie.
Stepping barefoot into my borrowed pair of slippers, I picked up the brown bag and my socks and opened the door of the toilet, stepping out across the hallway and into the living room.
"Hm," said Zenjou, returning from the kitchen with a fresh mug of coffee — circling around and considering me from head to toe. "Very nice, if I do say so myself. I'm not certain why you insist on concealing body lines like that in that shapeless hoodie you favor."
There she was, mocking my flab as expected.
"I look like a balloon right now," I said. "Like I'm a month into my second trimester or something."
Zenjou raised her brow, giving me a look that I couldn't quite read.
"You're having me on for a giggle, are you?" she asked. After a moment or two of eye contact, she broke off and sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Wonderful. You're worse off than Sakura was in high school. Another thing we'll have to work on."
"Sakura?" I asked. Like the Japanese cherry blossoms at Captain's Hill Park?
"My younger sister," Zenjou replied. "But that's neither here nor there." Pacing past me to her armchair, she seated herself, giving her coffee a sip. "In any case, let me finish my cuppa, and I'll get changed as well. We've got a big day ahead of us."
Given how fast she'd shifted the topic, she probably hadn't intended to let slip any personal information. It wasn't a lot to work with, though; and so for the time being, I mentally filed it away. Getting a clearer picture of Zenjou's background could wait for later.
Today was the day of the experiment, and I wanted it done and over with.
The residential area was mostly absent of people during the daytime; but once we hit the commercial zone along Canal Street, things began to ramp up. The catcalling in particular made me want to die, even that it wasn't directed at me.
Not that it would be in the first place.
One of the benefits of being completely unattractive was the ability to get away with full-body spandex without exuding the slightest amount of sex appeal. Instead, I was an eyesore at best; and running behind Zenjou, it felt like I was invisible. As a mitigation against embarrassment, it was pretty effective.
Similarly clad, but with the lower body to pull off the look, Zenjou managed to effect a running gait practically designed to maximize her draw of the male gaze from the pedestrian traffic — swaying her well-proportioned hips and thighs at just enough regularity that the jiggle wasn't unseemly.
Judging by the smile on her lips, it was entirely intentional.
"Somebody's going to call me in for being truant," I yelled into the wind, thinking to distract her from her ego trip.
Zenjou laughed.
"I think I've mentioned it before, but you're tall enough that nobody would take you for a high school student," she replied. "I'll take care of it if anything happens."
It turned out that she'd foregone the car because we'd already moved everything necessary for the experiment yesterday; and the three or so miles to Canal Street was in her opinion not enough a distance to justify the money spent on gas. There was of course the option of going by bus, but she likewise wasn't a fan of paying for public transport; and was apparently serious about having me work on strength and stamina.
We made the distance in a bit less than half an hour, arriving maybe a quarter to eleven. According to Zenjou, the final bits of the prep and the experiment itself could all be done before noon if we worked at it; and to hurry things along, she had me following behind her holding a container full of quartz blocks as she attended again to the mirrors in the dance classroom.
Annoyingly, I hadn't been permitted to bring along a change of clothes; and so — pointedly ignoring how ridiculous I looked in the reflections around me, standing beside Little Miss Fetish Gear in slightly-damp jogging clothes — I committed myself to the very first task she'd actually assigned me in my capacity as her assistant.
"Umschließen," she said, holding a piece of quartz against a mirror.
As if melting away; submerging through a surface of water, the cube sank into the glass — briefly provoking a lighting up of circuit-like lines across the surface. Nodding to herself, Zenjou retrieved another block from the container — repeating the process about a foot to the right.
"How does that work?" I asked.
"What? Merging the quartz into the glass?"
"Yeah."
"I'm using a particular spell, but you could probably achieve the same with Reinforcement," said Zenjou, positioning the third piece of quartz. "Umschließen," she said, pushing it into the mirror. "Seeing as glass and quartz both comprise primarily of silicon dioxide, the end result is superficially a seamless merge — at least at a macroscopic scale."
"I take it that that isn't the case if you put it under a microscope?"
"Under an electron microscope, but yes," Zenjou replied, drawing another piece of quartz from the container. "Some of the crystalline order of the molecular structure remains, preserving the kaleidoscopic depth required for retention of information and energy."
"Information?"
"In the enactment of any spell," said Zenjou, holding up the quartz before her, "a magus interacts with a Thaumaturgical Foundation via her Circuits. This interaction is a conveyance of information; an expression of willpower and ideation, submitted to the Foundation as a phenomenon interference request. Requests of such a like can be permanently engraved to crystal — permitting that at the provision of sufficient mana, a spell effect can be repeatedly brought to consummation."
So, a crystal engraved with a request for the enactment of Gandr could hypothetically function like a Tinkertech phaser. It sounded like the general principle could be put to use for automated spellcasting; or at the least, the creation of effort-free casting implements.
"In that case," I said, "the 'lines' that appear on the mirror are what? Circuit traces to connect requests?"
Zenjou nodded.
"Each piece of quartz in the box before you serves a distinct function," she said. "Aside from conducting mana, the circuits of crystal embedded in the glass allow that they conditionally communicate with one another as component modules in a larger spell protocol."
I'd mentally compared the modified mirror to a circuit board; but considering the explanation, it was more that the cubes of quartz were akin to units in a prefabricated building — manufactured elsewhere, and quickly assembled on site. Presumably, it had been to the purpose of preparing them that Zenjou had vanished into her basement for hours on end earlier in the week.
"How much did all the quartz cost, anyhow?" I asked.
"It's approximately two hundred and thirty pounds in total, bought at $15 a pound," she said, finishing her work with another piece. "Came out to a little less than $3,500, if I correctly recall. Not incredibly expensive."
Two hundred and thirty pounds? Really?
I mean, I could buy that that was the total, as even the small container I currently held was weighty enough; but most of the quartz had come in the carry-on that Zenjou had assigned to herself, and it hadn't looked that heavy when she'd lugged it up the stairs. Wouldn't the zippers have come apart?
I thought to ask about it, but realized before opening my mouth that she'd probably pulled it off with Reinforcement. Dumb of me to wonder.
That cost, though —
Maybe it was because I wasn't yet a working adult, but $3,500 didn't sound 'not incredibly expensive' — even if it was a fraction of the $8,000 price tag Zenjou had alleged for the pigeon's blood ruby used to activate my Circuits.
Technically, both the ruby and the quartz would count toward the overall monetary investment Zenjou had put down for the sake of today's experiment: $11,500 at a minimum, non-inclusive of whatever other expenses she might've had to cover prior to my involvement.
"Feels like it's a lot of money to be dropping on something that you'll only use the one time," I said.
"Wouldn't just be the one time," Zenjou replied. "That's the reason the spell protocol is so involved. I'm converting the mirrors into something alike to flat-screen tellies — scrying-glasses capable of displaying a variety of input. Thirty-five hundred dollars is a small price to pay for a general-purpose instrument easily adaptable to other uses. So to compensate the provision of necessary goods and services, I'm not in the habit of sparing any expense."
This coming from a girl who refused to dole out $1.50 for bus fare; or to drive a couple of miles because of 'exorbitant' gas prices — who'd just last night purchased me an entire outfit, shoes included. With $3,500 at hand, I wondered if rather than manually rigging up a bunch of mirrors like a witch queen from out of a classic Chuck Culkin animation, she couldn't have just bought a couple of televisions and modified them.
Was there even a point in attempting to comprehend her bizarre monetary sense?
"Seeing as you need me for the experiment, maybe throw in a lesson on the use of Gandr as a bonus?" I asked — hoping that it sounded more like sarcasm than pleading.
"Difficult," said Zenjou, frowning. "As a first-generation magus, you lack a Thaumaturgical Crest attuned to the appropriate Foundation, and I can't simply construct one for you in short order. As a matter of context, the bestowal of such is the sort of favor for which certain magi would gladly subordinate their offspring to a senior bloodline for multiple generations."
Apparently thinking on it a little further, she touched a finger to her lower lip.
"I could teach you to perform it the hard way, I suppose," she continued, "but it'll have to wait until I'm properly satisfied you've grasped the basics of self-defense."
Last night, she'd touched upon the necessity of a 'Crest' as well, but hadn't gone into detail. Seemed like she was referring to a casting implement customized so to vastly simplify the process of interfacing with specific Foundations.
It sounded useful — but I wasn't about to sell my firstborn to Zenjou for a quick power-up. Consigning your own family to something that amounted to indentured servitude for multiple generations? Thanks, but no thanks. I'll do things the hard way, even if it kills me.
Took about twenty minutes and two trips around the room for Zenjou to complete her prep, and another five to run some diagnostics. When she finished up, she told me to take off my shoes.
"Is this necessary?" I asked, padding barefoot to the center of the three-meter 'thaumaturgical circle' Zenjou had etched with chalk upon the worn wooden floor — an intricate array of unintelligible symbols and geometric shapes.
With Reinforcement active, I wasn't worried about splinters; but the soles of my feet would probably end up black with dust.
"A little dust isn't going to kill you," Zenjou replied. "And don't worry about dirtying your shoes. The running line from this particular brand can be bleached, machine-washed, and machine-dried without any issue. Mine are still intact after two years of constant use."
Useful information, but not really what I wanted to know.
"Why barefoot, exactly?"
"We want to establish an uninterrupted flow of mana between your body and the sigil at the center of the circle," said Zenjou. "Bare skin is the most optimal medium."
If she'd allowed it, I would've at least been wearing socks. Did she arrange this stuff to intentionally make me miserable?
"So, a bit of explanation before we begin," Zenjou continued. "For educational purposes, this is a gross oversimplification of what's referred to as formalcraft, or ritual magecraft — the craft what pertains to 'Thaumaturgical Formalities,' if you go by the technical terminology. In standard use, a sigil alike to that beneath your feet permits that Bounded Fields and other large-scale thaumaturgies can be anchored to the sustenance of a leyline tap — rendering that they stand alone, entirely independent of the spellcaster's Circuits or mana."
The pictograph-looking thing beneath my feet was the bit of wiring that connected a house to an electrical grid, then.
"Why's it called a formality?"
"Ritual magecraft is grounded in the animist traditions of the Antiquity," Zenjou replied, "in the understandings established between Man and Nature; Man and Spirit — long preceding the innovation of Circuit-use in spellcasting. Agreements are abided by, and requests are so honored. Therefore, ritualistic formalities are observed, even that the individual performing the ritual isn't borne of Circuits. This would be the Mystery of the spirit medium — the basis of the school of magecraft called as Spiritual Evocation."
Presuming the existence of the supernatural, I guessed it stood to reason that requests could be made of faeries like Salamander. The implicit suggestion that magecraft might've long predated the appearance of Scion, on the other hand —
'Right now, it doesn't matter,' I decided.
If there were any truth to the claim, I'd eventually confirm it for myself; but at the moment, it was just a distraction. Whether magecraft was a decade or a century old, power was power. The details were consequential only if they had an impact on practical utility.
"You'd think that somebody would notice if the rituals conducted by random occultists actually worked," I said.
"Again," said Zenjou, "formalcraft demands a painstaking adherence to formality. Exact observation of procedure is required, to the extent that a single misplaced gesture can void a ritual entirely. Likewise, a spirit so engaged is bound to reciprocate with no more and no less the response mandated by the covenants what underpin its participation — guaranteeing stability of outcome and the safety of the spellcaster at the expense of variability."
Didn't fully satisfy my doubts, but it sounded as if 'exact observation of procedure' wasn't something an amatuer would be able to arbitrarily luck into. The fact that rituals could only evoke canned responses was kind of a drawback; but the way she framed it, it might've been more a protective measure — maybe to preempt spirits from screwing over the spellcaster like the fae in the stories Mom used to read.
"I suppose that Circuit-based magecraft is preferred for the freedom it offers?" I asked. "And formalcraft is primarily for interacting with leylines?"
Zenjou nodded.
"Lack of freedom is the reason that the thaumaturgical use of formalcraft is largely restricted to automating the powering of spell protocols," she said. "Though, if it's just a matter of drawing mana from a leyline, formalcraft isn't absolutely necessary." She directed a finger toward the floor. "Try and feel out the leyline junction beneath the building. Given your sensitivity to mana, it shouldn't be difficult."
Closing my eyes, I focused — offloading to my swarm the distractions of my corporeal being. It wasn't quite anesthesia, as the sensations didn't truly vanish; but to my conscious perception, the tightness of my clothes; the weight of my flesh; the moisture on my skin dulled away to the back of my mind, one and all. For the moment, the warmth of the Bounded Field that encompassed the building became my world.
I began to offload that as well — purging it at a slow gradation. Soon enough, a chthonic heat came into focus far beneath the earth, flowing; intersecting; surging where it clashed.
The upwelling of the mana was within my reach. Tapping into it felt like it would take a little effort; but having insects tap into my mana was after a whole night of practice nearly a second nature. It wouldn't be rocket science to replicate it on a larger scale.
"I feel it," I said, opening my eyes.
"And you can draw from it," said Zenjou, "but only on account that the junction of the leylines places us in close proximity to a mana font — and only because the Bounded Field here established isn't set to 'lay claim' to the mana for my use alone."
A blanket denial of resources against parties unaligned? The bit about the 'mana font' probably referred to the upwelling that the building's Bounded Field fed off of.
"So what happens if I'm not close to a leyline junction?" I asked.
"You'd have a harder time getting at the energy. At a junction, the clash come of a crosswise intersection of streams forces the mana closer to the surface; whereas otherwise, a typical stretch of leyline could be hundreds of meters without the range of easy access, even if you were standing directly above it. Short of it is, use of a leyline should be treated as a luxury, and you'd best be in the habit of making do with your odic pool."
Just from the use of Reinforcement, I'd collapse from hunger and exhaustion long before I ran out of mana. Not having access to a leyline wasn't too big of a deal.
"What sort of ritual am I performing?" I asked.
"Not much of one at all," Zenjou replied. "Normally, it'd be a long, drawn out process; but if the goal is strictly to secure an automated provision of mana in the immediate vicinity of a leyline junction, you need only to draw the attention of the elemental what administrates the land as its tutelary spirit; requesting its aid in its capacity as a First Owner."
"First Owner," I repeated. "So, when Mrs. Whateley refers to herself as the 'acting Second Owner of Brockton Bay,' it means that she's contracted to the First Owner as a proxy?"
"No," said Zenjou. "Elementals tend not to intervene in the affairs of Man — and not to such a degree that they would designate a human to act as a surrogate. There are some exceptions, but the appointment of the Thaumaturgical Association is in general the sole basis of a Second Owner's authority."
A so-called 'Second Owner' was in short a squatter pretending to the entitlements of a landlord, granted oversight of a property by the wizard mafia. Mystical or not, organized crime truly was the same the world over.
"I'd be using the sigil to draw the attention of this Elemental?" I asked.
"Correct," said Zenjou. "And relative to the beechwood of the floor, chalk is a reasonably decent conductor of mana. You'll in essence be using the sigil as a stencil to create a shape of mana familiar to the First Owner. As of recognizing it as such, she's obligated to answer your request."
It was a surprisingly non-mystical explanation.
"It's like a Bat Beacon, then?" I said. "Doesn't feel like a chalk squiggly would work for that — especially if this 'First Owner' isn't inclined to involve themselves with humans."
"It will," Zenjou replied. "In the immediate vicinity of a spiritual ground, an attending Elemental is effectively omniscient. By the ancient covenants, they're bound to act."
Doubtfully, I looked to the sigil below me. In total, it occupied a circle of floorspace a bit wider in diameter than the two of my feet, side by side.
"Who is it that I'm addressing?" I asked.
"I suppose it'd be appropriate to refer to her as Tabaldak," said Zenjou, "the Earth Mother Goddess of the People of the Dawn."
The name wasn't unfamiliar. Tabaldak was the hermaphroditic creation god of the Abenaki people of New Hampshire — once the inhabitants of the region around Lord's Bay. We'd covered them in middle school history, in a unit on pre-colonial New England.
Being that Tabaldak was hermaphroditic, it was a little strange that Zenjou would refer to them as a 'her' — or for that matter, as an Earth Mother Goddess. Possibly, it wasn't Tabaldak that I was dealing with, but something assuming the name?
"If it's the Native American god, I guess the incantation or whatever won't be in English?"
"All the tongues of Man are more or less the same to the Faeries and Elementals," Zenjou replied. "The incantations used in formalcraft are furthermore to the spellcaster's benefit alone — allowing for a mental codification of intent by the action of external verbalization. Thus, the requirement of adherence to procedure doesn't in fact entail the recitation of a particular sequence of words."
Faeries as well, hm? Felt like she'd introduced me to Salamander as a way to ease me into the idea of interacting with supernatural beings, maybe.
"What you want," said Zenjou, "is for Tabaldak to supply mana to the thaumaturgical array — or rather, specifically to the piece of amber before you."
To the 12 o'clock of the sigil, a stone the color of honey sat in a chalk circle connected to the rest of Zenjou's scribbles.
"As I said, the precise incantation doesn't matter," Zenjou continued, "but if you need a template to work from, you can go with something along the lines of, 'O Tabaldak. Bestow to my endeavor the breath of life.'"
I closed my eyes and exhaled — filling the lines of chalk with my mana. Hopefully, I wouldn't end up cursed for treading barefoot on the symbol of a god.
"O Tabaldak," I repeated, focusing on the amber; on the thought of filling it with energy. "Bestow to my endeavor the breath of life."
The mirrors released a single pulse of light — resolving in their dimming to an altered reflection. Nothing at all had changed in the room around me; but in the glass, the outermost circle of the chalk array glowed in red — forming the base of a transparent wall of crimson light, and enclosing me in a shroud of warmth.
Superimposed over the sides of my head, two lines of green light streamed toward the ceiling — fading with distance.
"Congratulations on establishing your first Bounded Field," said Zenjou. "You can cease supplying mana to the sigil now."
I withdrew the motes of mana invested to the sigil, but the heat of the Bounded Field persisted.
"As it would assist you in better visualizing the process of magecraft," said Zenjou, "I've set the mirrors to selectively mark in red any accumulations of mana without the norm. The barrier about your reflection is a Bounded Field comprised of a sheet of energy — rapidly revolving as to ablatively compromise spells below a certain integrity. For example —"
Forming a finger gun, she fired off a gandr in my direction; but before it struck, it impacted something in the air — dispersing to wisps of darkness.
"... Bounded Fields reject magecraft the same way that odic circulation does?" I asked.
"Or you could say that the odic circulation of a living organism qualifies as a simple Bounded Field," Zenjou replied. "Fundamentally, the term refers to a territory of jurisdiction or influence, employed in general as to assert a home-turf advantage. The manner of implementation is irrelevant, but something permanent would ideally be anchored to a leyline."
Going on what she'd earlier stated, this particular Bounded Field was probably built upon a request she'd left within the amber — making use of the popular association that amber lent itself to 'preservation,' perhaps. But, if the point were simply to create a cylindrical barrier of mana, there were easier ways to pull it off.
"Why bother with a piece of amber?" I asked. "You could've just had me take in the mana and release it around me."
"For the purposes of this investigation," said Zenjou, pacing toward the windows along the far wall, "the use of the barrier is to control against your ability to impose phenomenon interference without. Having you manually implement the Bounded Field is a bit akin to asking the night watchman to watch himself." With a jerk, she pulled open one of the windows. "That besides, mana externalized from the flesh rapidly dissipates. Wouldn't be very effective at obstructing magecraft."
Hm? But that couldn't be true. My motes of mana didn't disperse unless I let them.
Most likely, I'd misunderstood something or other; and so I mentally filed it away for later. There would be time enough to interrogate the issue after the experiment.
"But to answer more directly," said Zenjou, "the request embedded in the amber accesses a particular Mystery as to consolidate the circulation of mana to cylindrical sheet — preempting its dissipation. That said —" She lightly rapped her knuckles against a window. "Bring in a bit of your swarm, and we'll begin. For obvious reasons, just remember not to have them enter into the thaumaturgical array."
"If you say so," I replied.
As there weren't many insects in the top floors of the building, I pulled from the swarm that I'd gathered outside — hiding their movement along the lines of the architecture so as not to alert a potential onlooker. Fortunately, the windows in the classroom faced a deserted alley parallel to Canal Street, and it wasn't necessary to conceal them there.
In the mirrors, each of the insects that entered the room was connected to a thin string of green light that faded upwards toward the ceiling — identical to the ones on the sides of my skull, except in width. Taken as a whole, the sight of my swarm reminded me of a photo that Mom had shown me before; of the tendrils that descended from the bearded figs of Barbados — the Os Barbados, or 'the bearded ones,' after which the island itself had been named.
Zenjou made a face.
"Too many," she said, disgusted. "A fraction of that, please."
Sighing, I complied. Figured she'd react like this. The fact that she didn't want insects around the house was probably half the reason we were running the experiment at her supervillain hideout.
"Better?" I asked, lowering the count of the insects to fifty.
"Much," Zenjou replied. "And now we're just about ready for the investigation itself." She gestured to the mirrors. "As you've likely inferred, the mirrors mark in green the connections established by your parahuman power. Ignore the perpendicular fade, as I added it only to provide for an easy visualization. In reality, communications to and from your insects aren't traveling in any particular direction, and rather arrive at destination instantaneously — circumventing the space in-between. Our objective today is to determine whether or not you're able to transfer mana across this connection."
That was a lot of set-up for something relatively simple.
"How am I supposed to do this?" I asked.
"The green markings on your head indicate the parts of your brain that your power engages," Zenjou replied. "Gather your mana there, and see if you can't channel it outwards."
Inside my brain?
"Isn't that kind of dangerous?" I asked.
"Not unless you accumulate a vast amount of mana at extreme density," said Zenjou. "At the magnitudes you've so far worked with, it's unlikely that you'd damage any tissue. If it happens that you do, I'll heal you immediately."
It was hard to tell if she'd intended that as an insult, but eh. If she was reasonably certain, I'd go along with it.
Fixing my gaze on my reflection, I gathered my mana — somehow managing not to be revolted as I probed the contours of my brain.
The markings in the mirror overlaid irregular lumps along the two sides of my cerebrum, bridging the crevice between my frontal and parietal lobes. If I correctly recalled my human biology, the rear of the frontal lobes controlled the motor functions; and the front of parietal lobes registered the tactile sense. What with the way I interacted with my insects, it made a weird sort of sense that my power would be centered along the edges of both.
I instilled the growths with mana; and in the mirror, the red bloom across the top of my skull condensed to overlap with the lower end of the green lines. Soon, I arrived at what felt to be a point of saturation —
My range had expanded — not enough that it was a drastic change; but alongside a subtle increase in signal fidelity, coverage was extended by about a city block. I couldn't bring myself to be happy about it, though.
My mana wasn't going anywhere.
Experimentally moving my swarm, I could roughly detect the nervous activation that carried my commands, and the sensory feedback the insects supplied in response; but whereas the former sort of just fed into a dead end, the latter manifested completely unexplained — issuing into my brain seemingly out of nowhere.
Given, I was hardly an expert in parahuman science, but I couldn't make heads or tails of it. Whatever the pathway that tied me to my swarm, I couldn't detect it thaumaturgically; couldn't use it for the channeling of mana. It might as well not exist.
I'd failed completely — or rather, there wasn't to begin with a means to succeed.
"I can't do it," I said, shaking my head. "It isn't possible."
"Hm," said Zenjou, cupping her chin in contemplation as she seated herself upon a chair. "It's a one-way connection, then. Interesting. Very interesting."
Interesting?
That was it?
More than ten thousand dollars of her own money down the drain — all to achieve a total non-result; and her only response was that it was 'interesting?'
What the fuck.
Was she screwing with me? Had she known the outcome to begin with? Or —
No. That wasn't the right conclusion.
As far as I could tell, she really was surprised at the result; and it was inconceivable — highly irrational — that she'd willingly commit her personal resources at such a volume merely to mess with me. It was a massive loss at no substantial benefit; and to what end, exactly? To see me flustered and confused? It certainly didn't win my trust.
She didn't expect that I would fail, and she legitimately didn't mind that I had.
This wasn't a con.
"I don't get you," I said, staring at her.
"Hm?" she asked. "What don't you understand?"
"You're just — fine with the fact that I failed?"
"Why wouldn't I be? Not reaching an outcome is informative enough, in and of itself."
It was the nonchalance that really got to me. I hadn't had the context for it to click together before, but 'mere acknowledgment' was precisely the attitude she'd directed toward the crime rate in the city.
Mistakenly, I'd supposed that she regarded the state of Brockton Bay as somebody else's problem; that definitely, she had to be invested in something.
— that today, for the very first time, I'd maybe catch a glimpse of whatever it was that actually made her tick.
In the end, she didn't have anything riding on my success. It didn't matter in the least that the experiment was a bust. She received the result without frustration or complaint; from the objectivity of a scholarly distance — ignoring that the time and money she'd put into preparation weren't at all trivial.
I'd misread her; misjudged her completely. Rin Zenjou wasn't sadistic or evil, regardless that she'd pretty much forced me into a Skinner box at gunpoint.
The truth of it was — beneath her prickly exterior, she approached things with utter detachment; absent of positive or negative valuation; absent of any kind of commitment beyond the extremely superficial.
It wasn't out of malice that she'd pressed me to become her assistant; or particular benevolence that she'd warned against becoming a cape. Probably, the advice she'd provided in the latter regard was the sort of thing you'd say to a stranger in a cafe after hearing them argue over the telephone — not spoken as to a personal acquaintance, but as common-sense advice offered from the perspective of an outsider.
Smug condescension in her mannerisms notwithstanding, I rather doubted she cared enough about me to take any pleasure in my suffering. I was to her at the most a passing whim; hardly even a lab rat to be used and discarded —
— not worth the effort to raise a finger against, in the event that I just walked out.
"We're done," I said, exiting from the thaumaturgical circle; dispersing my swarm out the window. "I'm going home."
Zenjou looked to me, uncomprehending.
"Why are you so upset?" she asked. "This wasn't any personal failing on your part. It's nothing you should fret about."
I didn't reply. Pulling my shoes on over my bare feet, I walked out of the dance classroom — down the corridor to the stairs without a backwards glance.
"Taylor?" she called, stepping out into the hallway behind me. "Taylor!"
That night, I began my career as a hero.
"What's it look like?" Zenjou replied, smirking.
In a brown bag on the living room table, there were two articles of clothing: In a range of grays with reflective strips, two sizes too small for me to wear, a V-neck compression shirt and leggings. Beneath them were a pair of running shoes in pristine white, entirely new.
"You expect me to wear this?" I asked.
"To further extend your exercise routine," said Zenjou, "we'll be traveling to the ballet school on foot today. As I refuse to be seen beside a running partner so poorly attired, I took the liberty to purchase a few items out of pocket."
Frowning, I held up the shirt before me.
"When'd you have the opportunity?" I asked. Had she ordered these online or something?
"Yesterday night, after you took the bus home," Zenjou replied. "There was a sale at a sporting goods shop on Canal Street, and I dropped by before closing hours." She sipped her coffee. "Not to worry, though. I'm not so stingy that I'd deduct this from your paycheck."
I tensed the shirt with a slight sideward pull. The material was the fancy, breathable sort; but while elastic, it didn't have a lot of give.
"There's no way this'll fit," I said.
"Try them on, and I think you'll be pleasantly surprised," said Zenjou. "I happen to have a grasp of your exact measurements, courtesy of the Bounded Field here deployed."
Because of course she did. I'd question the accuracy of her measurements if I thought she cared, but there wasn't a point. It wasn't like she'd admit to being wrong.
I changed in the downstairs toilet, pulling on the shirt and leggings over my underwear. Much as expected, it was far too tight — not quite to an uncomfortable level, and not-quite biting into my excess body fat, but enough that it clung to me like a second skin; as if I were just about naked, despite the sports bra and the panties I was wearing underneath.
"No need for socks, by the way," called Zenjou from the living room. "The running shoes I bought are the sort that you put on barefoot."
"Eh," I said aloud, looking to the pair of socks on my feet.
The shoes were new; and in my experience, that tended to mean that they'd require a bit of breaking-in before the insides were soft enough not to raise blisters. On the other hand, it wasn't likely that here on out, I'd be going on any runs without the use of active Reinforcement. Maybe it wouldn't be an issue?
Thinking on it a bit, I decided to strip off my socks; though I didn't end up putting them into the brown bag along with my other clothes. They were a fresh pair from after my shower this morning; but my sneakers stank with a persistent detergent odor from the one time I'd tried to wash out the consequences of a prank, and a chemical scent clung to whatever fabric my socks were made of. I didn't want that on my hoodie.
Stepping barefoot into my borrowed pair of slippers, I picked up the brown bag and my socks and opened the door of the toilet, stepping out across the hallway and into the living room.
"Hm," said Zenjou, returning from the kitchen with a fresh mug of coffee — circling around and considering me from head to toe. "Very nice, if I do say so myself. I'm not certain why you insist on concealing body lines like that in that shapeless hoodie you favor."
There she was, mocking my flab as expected.
"I look like a balloon right now," I said. "Like I'm a month into my second trimester or something."
Zenjou raised her brow, giving me a look that I couldn't quite read.
"You're having me on for a giggle, are you?" she asked. After a moment or two of eye contact, she broke off and sighed, pinching the bridge of her nose. "Wonderful. You're worse off than Sakura was in high school. Another thing we'll have to work on."
"Sakura?" I asked. Like the Japanese cherry blossoms at Captain's Hill Park?
"My younger sister," Zenjou replied. "But that's neither here nor there." Pacing past me to her armchair, she seated herself, giving her coffee a sip. "In any case, let me finish my cuppa, and I'll get changed as well. We've got a big day ahead of us."
Given how fast she'd shifted the topic, she probably hadn't intended to let slip any personal information. It wasn't a lot to work with, though; and so for the time being, I mentally filed it away. Getting a clearer picture of Zenjou's background could wait for later.
Today was the day of the experiment, and I wanted it done and over with.
The residential area was mostly absent of people during the daytime; but once we hit the commercial zone along Canal Street, things began to ramp up. The catcalling in particular made me want to die, even that it wasn't directed at me.
Not that it would be in the first place.
One of the benefits of being completely unattractive was the ability to get away with full-body spandex without exuding the slightest amount of sex appeal. Instead, I was an eyesore at best; and running behind Zenjou, it felt like I was invisible. As a mitigation against embarrassment, it was pretty effective.
Similarly clad, but with the lower body to pull off the look, Zenjou managed to effect a running gait practically designed to maximize her draw of the male gaze from the pedestrian traffic — swaying her well-proportioned hips and thighs at just enough regularity that the jiggle wasn't unseemly.
Judging by the smile on her lips, it was entirely intentional.
"Somebody's going to call me in for being truant," I yelled into the wind, thinking to distract her from her ego trip.
Zenjou laughed.
"I think I've mentioned it before, but you're tall enough that nobody would take you for a high school student," she replied. "I'll take care of it if anything happens."
It turned out that she'd foregone the car because we'd already moved everything necessary for the experiment yesterday; and the three or so miles to Canal Street was in her opinion not enough a distance to justify the money spent on gas. There was of course the option of going by bus, but she likewise wasn't a fan of paying for public transport; and was apparently serious about having me work on strength and stamina.
We made the distance in a bit less than half an hour, arriving maybe a quarter to eleven. According to Zenjou, the final bits of the prep and the experiment itself could all be done before noon if we worked at it; and to hurry things along, she had me following behind her holding a container full of quartz blocks as she attended again to the mirrors in the dance classroom.
Annoyingly, I hadn't been permitted to bring along a change of clothes; and so — pointedly ignoring how ridiculous I looked in the reflections around me, standing beside Little Miss Fetish Gear in slightly-damp jogging clothes — I committed myself to the very first task she'd actually assigned me in my capacity as her assistant.
"Umschließen," she said, holding a piece of quartz against a mirror.
As if melting away; submerging through a surface of water, the cube sank into the glass — briefly provoking a lighting up of circuit-like lines across the surface. Nodding to herself, Zenjou retrieved another block from the container — repeating the process about a foot to the right.
"How does that work?" I asked.
"What? Merging the quartz into the glass?"
"Yeah."
"I'm using a particular spell, but you could probably achieve the same with Reinforcement," said Zenjou, positioning the third piece of quartz. "Umschließen," she said, pushing it into the mirror. "Seeing as glass and quartz both comprise primarily of silicon dioxide, the end result is superficially a seamless merge — at least at a macroscopic scale."
"I take it that that isn't the case if you put it under a microscope?"
"Under an electron microscope, but yes," Zenjou replied, drawing another piece of quartz from the container. "Some of the crystalline order of the molecular structure remains, preserving the kaleidoscopic depth required for retention of information and energy."
"Information?"
"In the enactment of any spell," said Zenjou, holding up the quartz before her, "a magus interacts with a Thaumaturgical Foundation via her Circuits. This interaction is a conveyance of information; an expression of willpower and ideation, submitted to the Foundation as a phenomenon interference request. Requests of such a like can be permanently engraved to crystal — permitting that at the provision of sufficient mana, a spell effect can be repeatedly brought to consummation."
So, a crystal engraved with a request for the enactment of Gandr could hypothetically function like a Tinkertech phaser. It sounded like the general principle could be put to use for automated spellcasting; or at the least, the creation of effort-free casting implements.
"In that case," I said, "the 'lines' that appear on the mirror are what? Circuit traces to connect requests?"
Zenjou nodded.
"Each piece of quartz in the box before you serves a distinct function," she said. "Aside from conducting mana, the circuits of crystal embedded in the glass allow that they conditionally communicate with one another as component modules in a larger spell protocol."
I'd mentally compared the modified mirror to a circuit board; but considering the explanation, it was more that the cubes of quartz were akin to units in a prefabricated building — manufactured elsewhere, and quickly assembled on site. Presumably, it had been to the purpose of preparing them that Zenjou had vanished into her basement for hours on end earlier in the week.
"How much did all the quartz cost, anyhow?" I asked.
"It's approximately two hundred and thirty pounds in total, bought at $15 a pound," she said, finishing her work with another piece. "Came out to a little less than $3,500, if I correctly recall. Not incredibly expensive."
Two hundred and thirty pounds? Really?
I mean, I could buy that that was the total, as even the small container I currently held was weighty enough; but most of the quartz had come in the carry-on that Zenjou had assigned to herself, and it hadn't looked that heavy when she'd lugged it up the stairs. Wouldn't the zippers have come apart?
I thought to ask about it, but realized before opening my mouth that she'd probably pulled it off with Reinforcement. Dumb of me to wonder.
That cost, though —
Maybe it was because I wasn't yet a working adult, but $3,500 didn't sound 'not incredibly expensive' — even if it was a fraction of the $8,000 price tag Zenjou had alleged for the pigeon's blood ruby used to activate my Circuits.
Technically, both the ruby and the quartz would count toward the overall monetary investment Zenjou had put down for the sake of today's experiment: $11,500 at a minimum, non-inclusive of whatever other expenses she might've had to cover prior to my involvement.
"Feels like it's a lot of money to be dropping on something that you'll only use the one time," I said.
"Wouldn't just be the one time," Zenjou replied. "That's the reason the spell protocol is so involved. I'm converting the mirrors into something alike to flat-screen tellies — scrying-glasses capable of displaying a variety of input. Thirty-five hundred dollars is a small price to pay for a general-purpose instrument easily adaptable to other uses. So to compensate the provision of necessary goods and services, I'm not in the habit of sparing any expense."
This coming from a girl who refused to dole out $1.50 for bus fare; or to drive a couple of miles because of 'exorbitant' gas prices — who'd just last night purchased me an entire outfit, shoes included. With $3,500 at hand, I wondered if rather than manually rigging up a bunch of mirrors like a witch queen from out of a classic Chuck Culkin animation, she couldn't have just bought a couple of televisions and modified them.
Was there even a point in attempting to comprehend her bizarre monetary sense?
"Seeing as you need me for the experiment, maybe throw in a lesson on the use of Gandr as a bonus?" I asked — hoping that it sounded more like sarcasm than pleading.
"Difficult," said Zenjou, frowning. "As a first-generation magus, you lack a Thaumaturgical Crest attuned to the appropriate Foundation, and I can't simply construct one for you in short order. As a matter of context, the bestowal of such is the sort of favor for which certain magi would gladly subordinate their offspring to a senior bloodline for multiple generations."
Apparently thinking on it a little further, she touched a finger to her lower lip.
"I could teach you to perform it the hard way, I suppose," she continued, "but it'll have to wait until I'm properly satisfied you've grasped the basics of self-defense."
Last night, she'd touched upon the necessity of a 'Crest' as well, but hadn't gone into detail. Seemed like she was referring to a casting implement customized so to vastly simplify the process of interfacing with specific Foundations.
It sounded useful — but I wasn't about to sell my firstborn to Zenjou for a quick power-up. Consigning your own family to something that amounted to indentured servitude for multiple generations? Thanks, but no thanks. I'll do things the hard way, even if it kills me.
Took about twenty minutes and two trips around the room for Zenjou to complete her prep, and another five to run some diagnostics. When she finished up, she told me to take off my shoes.
"Is this necessary?" I asked, padding barefoot to the center of the three-meter 'thaumaturgical circle' Zenjou had etched with chalk upon the worn wooden floor — an intricate array of unintelligible symbols and geometric shapes.
With Reinforcement active, I wasn't worried about splinters; but the soles of my feet would probably end up black with dust.
"A little dust isn't going to kill you," Zenjou replied. "And don't worry about dirtying your shoes. The running line from this particular brand can be bleached, machine-washed, and machine-dried without any issue. Mine are still intact after two years of constant use."
Useful information, but not really what I wanted to know.
"Why barefoot, exactly?"
"We want to establish an uninterrupted flow of mana between your body and the sigil at the center of the circle," said Zenjou. "Bare skin is the most optimal medium."
If she'd allowed it, I would've at least been wearing socks. Did she arrange this stuff to intentionally make me miserable?
"So, a bit of explanation before we begin," Zenjou continued. "For educational purposes, this is a gross oversimplification of what's referred to as formalcraft, or ritual magecraft — the craft what pertains to 'Thaumaturgical Formalities,' if you go by the technical terminology. In standard use, a sigil alike to that beneath your feet permits that Bounded Fields and other large-scale thaumaturgies can be anchored to the sustenance of a leyline tap — rendering that they stand alone, entirely independent of the spellcaster's Circuits or mana."
The pictograph-looking thing beneath my feet was the bit of wiring that connected a house to an electrical grid, then.
"Why's it called a formality?"
"Ritual magecraft is grounded in the animist traditions of the Antiquity," Zenjou replied, "in the understandings established between Man and Nature; Man and Spirit — long preceding the innovation of Circuit-use in spellcasting. Agreements are abided by, and requests are so honored. Therefore, ritualistic formalities are observed, even that the individual performing the ritual isn't borne of Circuits. This would be the Mystery of the spirit medium — the basis of the school of magecraft called as Spiritual Evocation."
Presuming the existence of the supernatural, I guessed it stood to reason that requests could be made of faeries like Salamander. The implicit suggestion that magecraft might've long predated the appearance of Scion, on the other hand —
'Right now, it doesn't matter,' I decided.
If there were any truth to the claim, I'd eventually confirm it for myself; but at the moment, it was just a distraction. Whether magecraft was a decade or a century old, power was power. The details were consequential only if they had an impact on practical utility.
"You'd think that somebody would notice if the rituals conducted by random occultists actually worked," I said.
"Again," said Zenjou, "formalcraft demands a painstaking adherence to formality. Exact observation of procedure is required, to the extent that a single misplaced gesture can void a ritual entirely. Likewise, a spirit so engaged is bound to reciprocate with no more and no less the response mandated by the covenants what underpin its participation — guaranteeing stability of outcome and the safety of the spellcaster at the expense of variability."
Didn't fully satisfy my doubts, but it sounded as if 'exact observation of procedure' wasn't something an amatuer would be able to arbitrarily luck into. The fact that rituals could only evoke canned responses was kind of a drawback; but the way she framed it, it might've been more a protective measure — maybe to preempt spirits from screwing over the spellcaster like the fae in the stories Mom used to read.
"I suppose that Circuit-based magecraft is preferred for the freedom it offers?" I asked. "And formalcraft is primarily for interacting with leylines?"
Zenjou nodded.
"Lack of freedom is the reason that the thaumaturgical use of formalcraft is largely restricted to automating the powering of spell protocols," she said. "Though, if it's just a matter of drawing mana from a leyline, formalcraft isn't absolutely necessary." She directed a finger toward the floor. "Try and feel out the leyline junction beneath the building. Given your sensitivity to mana, it shouldn't be difficult."
Closing my eyes, I focused — offloading to my swarm the distractions of my corporeal being. It wasn't quite anesthesia, as the sensations didn't truly vanish; but to my conscious perception, the tightness of my clothes; the weight of my flesh; the moisture on my skin dulled away to the back of my mind, one and all. For the moment, the warmth of the Bounded Field that encompassed the building became my world.
I began to offload that as well — purging it at a slow gradation. Soon enough, a chthonic heat came into focus far beneath the earth, flowing; intersecting; surging where it clashed.
The upwelling of the mana was within my reach. Tapping into it felt like it would take a little effort; but having insects tap into my mana was after a whole night of practice nearly a second nature. It wouldn't be rocket science to replicate it on a larger scale.
"I feel it," I said, opening my eyes.
"And you can draw from it," said Zenjou, "but only on account that the junction of the leylines places us in close proximity to a mana font — and only because the Bounded Field here established isn't set to 'lay claim' to the mana for my use alone."
A blanket denial of resources against parties unaligned? The bit about the 'mana font' probably referred to the upwelling that the building's Bounded Field fed off of.
"So what happens if I'm not close to a leyline junction?" I asked.
"You'd have a harder time getting at the energy. At a junction, the clash come of a crosswise intersection of streams forces the mana closer to the surface; whereas otherwise, a typical stretch of leyline could be hundreds of meters without the range of easy access, even if you were standing directly above it. Short of it is, use of a leyline should be treated as a luxury, and you'd best be in the habit of making do with your odic pool."
Just from the use of Reinforcement, I'd collapse from hunger and exhaustion long before I ran out of mana. Not having access to a leyline wasn't too big of a deal.
"What sort of ritual am I performing?" I asked.
"Not much of one at all," Zenjou replied. "Normally, it'd be a long, drawn out process; but if the goal is strictly to secure an automated provision of mana in the immediate vicinity of a leyline junction, you need only to draw the attention of the elemental what administrates the land as its tutelary spirit; requesting its aid in its capacity as a First Owner."
"First Owner," I repeated. "So, when Mrs. Whateley refers to herself as the 'acting Second Owner of Brockton Bay,' it means that she's contracted to the First Owner as a proxy?"
"No," said Zenjou. "Elementals tend not to intervene in the affairs of Man — and not to such a degree that they would designate a human to act as a surrogate. There are some exceptions, but the appointment of the Thaumaturgical Association is in general the sole basis of a Second Owner's authority."
A so-called 'Second Owner' was in short a squatter pretending to the entitlements of a landlord, granted oversight of a property by the wizard mafia. Mystical or not, organized crime truly was the same the world over.
"I'd be using the sigil to draw the attention of this Elemental?" I asked.
"Correct," said Zenjou. "And relative to the beechwood of the floor, chalk is a reasonably decent conductor of mana. You'll in essence be using the sigil as a stencil to create a shape of mana familiar to the First Owner. As of recognizing it as such, she's obligated to answer your request."
It was a surprisingly non-mystical explanation.
"It's like a Bat Beacon, then?" I said. "Doesn't feel like a chalk squiggly would work for that — especially if this 'First Owner' isn't inclined to involve themselves with humans."
"It will," Zenjou replied. "In the immediate vicinity of a spiritual ground, an attending Elemental is effectively omniscient. By the ancient covenants, they're bound to act."
Doubtfully, I looked to the sigil below me. In total, it occupied a circle of floorspace a bit wider in diameter than the two of my feet, side by side.
"Who is it that I'm addressing?" I asked.
"I suppose it'd be appropriate to refer to her as Tabaldak," said Zenjou, "the Earth Mother Goddess of the People of the Dawn."
The name wasn't unfamiliar. Tabaldak was the hermaphroditic creation god of the Abenaki people of New Hampshire — once the inhabitants of the region around Lord's Bay. We'd covered them in middle school history, in a unit on pre-colonial New England.
Being that Tabaldak was hermaphroditic, it was a little strange that Zenjou would refer to them as a 'her' — or for that matter, as an Earth Mother Goddess. Possibly, it wasn't Tabaldak that I was dealing with, but something assuming the name?
"If it's the Native American god, I guess the incantation or whatever won't be in English?"
"All the tongues of Man are more or less the same to the Faeries and Elementals," Zenjou replied. "The incantations used in formalcraft are furthermore to the spellcaster's benefit alone — allowing for a mental codification of intent by the action of external verbalization. Thus, the requirement of adherence to procedure doesn't in fact entail the recitation of a particular sequence of words."
Faeries as well, hm? Felt like she'd introduced me to Salamander as a way to ease me into the idea of interacting with supernatural beings, maybe.
"What you want," said Zenjou, "is for Tabaldak to supply mana to the thaumaturgical array — or rather, specifically to the piece of amber before you."
To the 12 o'clock of the sigil, a stone the color of honey sat in a chalk circle connected to the rest of Zenjou's scribbles.
"As I said, the precise incantation doesn't matter," Zenjou continued, "but if you need a template to work from, you can go with something along the lines of, 'O Tabaldak. Bestow to my endeavor the breath of life.'"
I closed my eyes and exhaled — filling the lines of chalk with my mana. Hopefully, I wouldn't end up cursed for treading barefoot on the symbol of a god.
"O Tabaldak," I repeated, focusing on the amber; on the thought of filling it with energy. "Bestow to my endeavor the breath of life."
The mirrors released a single pulse of light — resolving in their dimming to an altered reflection. Nothing at all had changed in the room around me; but in the glass, the outermost circle of the chalk array glowed in red — forming the base of a transparent wall of crimson light, and enclosing me in a shroud of warmth.
Superimposed over the sides of my head, two lines of green light streamed toward the ceiling — fading with distance.
"Congratulations on establishing your first Bounded Field," said Zenjou. "You can cease supplying mana to the sigil now."
I withdrew the motes of mana invested to the sigil, but the heat of the Bounded Field persisted.
"As it would assist you in better visualizing the process of magecraft," said Zenjou, "I've set the mirrors to selectively mark in red any accumulations of mana without the norm. The barrier about your reflection is a Bounded Field comprised of a sheet of energy — rapidly revolving as to ablatively compromise spells below a certain integrity. For example —"
Forming a finger gun, she fired off a gandr in my direction; but before it struck, it impacted something in the air — dispersing to wisps of darkness.
"... Bounded Fields reject magecraft the same way that odic circulation does?" I asked.
"Or you could say that the odic circulation of a living organism qualifies as a simple Bounded Field," Zenjou replied. "Fundamentally, the term refers to a territory of jurisdiction or influence, employed in general as to assert a home-turf advantage. The manner of implementation is irrelevant, but something permanent would ideally be anchored to a leyline."
Going on what she'd earlier stated, this particular Bounded Field was probably built upon a request she'd left within the amber — making use of the popular association that amber lent itself to 'preservation,' perhaps. But, if the point were simply to create a cylindrical barrier of mana, there were easier ways to pull it off.
"Why bother with a piece of amber?" I asked. "You could've just had me take in the mana and release it around me."
"For the purposes of this investigation," said Zenjou, pacing toward the windows along the far wall, "the use of the barrier is to control against your ability to impose phenomenon interference without. Having you manually implement the Bounded Field is a bit akin to asking the night watchman to watch himself." With a jerk, she pulled open one of the windows. "That besides, mana externalized from the flesh rapidly dissipates. Wouldn't be very effective at obstructing magecraft."
Hm? But that couldn't be true. My motes of mana didn't disperse unless I let them.
Most likely, I'd misunderstood something or other; and so I mentally filed it away for later. There would be time enough to interrogate the issue after the experiment.
"But to answer more directly," said Zenjou, "the request embedded in the amber accesses a particular Mystery as to consolidate the circulation of mana to cylindrical sheet — preempting its dissipation. That said —" She lightly rapped her knuckles against a window. "Bring in a bit of your swarm, and we'll begin. For obvious reasons, just remember not to have them enter into the thaumaturgical array."
"If you say so," I replied.
As there weren't many insects in the top floors of the building, I pulled from the swarm that I'd gathered outside — hiding their movement along the lines of the architecture so as not to alert a potential onlooker. Fortunately, the windows in the classroom faced a deserted alley parallel to Canal Street, and it wasn't necessary to conceal them there.
In the mirrors, each of the insects that entered the room was connected to a thin string of green light that faded upwards toward the ceiling — identical to the ones on the sides of my skull, except in width. Taken as a whole, the sight of my swarm reminded me of a photo that Mom had shown me before; of the tendrils that descended from the bearded figs of Barbados — the Os Barbados, or 'the bearded ones,' after which the island itself had been named.
Zenjou made a face.
"Too many," she said, disgusted. "A fraction of that, please."
Sighing, I complied. Figured she'd react like this. The fact that she didn't want insects around the house was probably half the reason we were running the experiment at her supervillain hideout.
"Better?" I asked, lowering the count of the insects to fifty.
"Much," Zenjou replied. "And now we're just about ready for the investigation itself." She gestured to the mirrors. "As you've likely inferred, the mirrors mark in green the connections established by your parahuman power. Ignore the perpendicular fade, as I added it only to provide for an easy visualization. In reality, communications to and from your insects aren't traveling in any particular direction, and rather arrive at destination instantaneously — circumventing the space in-between. Our objective today is to determine whether or not you're able to transfer mana across this connection."
That was a lot of set-up for something relatively simple.
"How am I supposed to do this?" I asked.
"The green markings on your head indicate the parts of your brain that your power engages," Zenjou replied. "Gather your mana there, and see if you can't channel it outwards."
Inside my brain?
"Isn't that kind of dangerous?" I asked.
"Not unless you accumulate a vast amount of mana at extreme density," said Zenjou. "At the magnitudes you've so far worked with, it's unlikely that you'd damage any tissue. If it happens that you do, I'll heal you immediately."
It was hard to tell if she'd intended that as an insult, but eh. If she was reasonably certain, I'd go along with it.
Fixing my gaze on my reflection, I gathered my mana — somehow managing not to be revolted as I probed the contours of my brain.
The markings in the mirror overlaid irregular lumps along the two sides of my cerebrum, bridging the crevice between my frontal and parietal lobes. If I correctly recalled my human biology, the rear of the frontal lobes controlled the motor functions; and the front of parietal lobes registered the tactile sense. What with the way I interacted with my insects, it made a weird sort of sense that my power would be centered along the edges of both.
I instilled the growths with mana; and in the mirror, the red bloom across the top of my skull condensed to overlap with the lower end of the green lines. Soon, I arrived at what felt to be a point of saturation —
My range had expanded — not enough that it was a drastic change; but alongside a subtle increase in signal fidelity, coverage was extended by about a city block. I couldn't bring myself to be happy about it, though.
My mana wasn't going anywhere.
Experimentally moving my swarm, I could roughly detect the nervous activation that carried my commands, and the sensory feedback the insects supplied in response; but whereas the former sort of just fed into a dead end, the latter manifested completely unexplained — issuing into my brain seemingly out of nowhere.
Given, I was hardly an expert in parahuman science, but I couldn't make heads or tails of it. Whatever the pathway that tied me to my swarm, I couldn't detect it thaumaturgically; couldn't use it for the channeling of mana. It might as well not exist.
I'd failed completely — or rather, there wasn't to begin with a means to succeed.
"I can't do it," I said, shaking my head. "It isn't possible."
"Hm," said Zenjou, cupping her chin in contemplation as she seated herself upon a chair. "It's a one-way connection, then. Interesting. Very interesting."
Interesting?
That was it?
More than ten thousand dollars of her own money down the drain — all to achieve a total non-result; and her only response was that it was 'interesting?'
What the fuck.
Was she screwing with me? Had she known the outcome to begin with? Or —
No. That wasn't the right conclusion.
As far as I could tell, she really was surprised at the result; and it was inconceivable — highly irrational — that she'd willingly commit her personal resources at such a volume merely to mess with me. It was a massive loss at no substantial benefit; and to what end, exactly? To see me flustered and confused? It certainly didn't win my trust.
She didn't expect that I would fail, and she legitimately didn't mind that I had.
This wasn't a con.
"I don't get you," I said, staring at her.
"Hm?" she asked. "What don't you understand?"
"You're just — fine with the fact that I failed?"
"Why wouldn't I be? Not reaching an outcome is informative enough, in and of itself."
It was the nonchalance that really got to me. I hadn't had the context for it to click together before, but 'mere acknowledgment' was precisely the attitude she'd directed toward the crime rate in the city.
Mistakenly, I'd supposed that she regarded the state of Brockton Bay as somebody else's problem; that definitely, she had to be invested in something.
— that today, for the very first time, I'd maybe catch a glimpse of whatever it was that actually made her tick.
In the end, she didn't have anything riding on my success. It didn't matter in the least that the experiment was a bust. She received the result without frustration or complaint; from the objectivity of a scholarly distance — ignoring that the time and money she'd put into preparation weren't at all trivial.
I'd misread her; misjudged her completely. Rin Zenjou wasn't sadistic or evil, regardless that she'd pretty much forced me into a Skinner box at gunpoint.
The truth of it was — beneath her prickly exterior, she approached things with utter detachment; absent of positive or negative valuation; absent of any kind of commitment beyond the extremely superficial.
It wasn't out of malice that she'd pressed me to become her assistant; or particular benevolence that she'd warned against becoming a cape. Probably, the advice she'd provided in the latter regard was the sort of thing you'd say to a stranger in a cafe after hearing them argue over the telephone — not spoken as to a personal acquaintance, but as common-sense advice offered from the perspective of an outsider.
Smug condescension in her mannerisms notwithstanding, I rather doubted she cared enough about me to take any pleasure in my suffering. I was to her at the most a passing whim; hardly even a lab rat to be used and discarded —
— not worth the effort to raise a finger against, in the event that I just walked out.
"We're done," I said, exiting from the thaumaturgical circle; dispersing my swarm out the window. "I'm going home."
Zenjou looked to me, uncomprehending.
"Why are you so upset?" she asked. "This wasn't any personal failing on your part. It's nothing you should fret about."
I didn't reply. Pulling my shoes on over my bare feet, I walked out of the dance classroom — down the corridor to the stairs without a backwards glance.
"Taylor?" she called, stepping out into the hallway behind me. "Taylor!"
That night, I began my career as a hero.
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Kell of Snow
Verified TinTin enjoyer
- Location
- New York
Oh. Well I'm just going to rescind what positive stuff I said about Taylor then. This'll be interesting to watch, considering she's probably going to piss off the Mages Association via public thaumaturgic displays.
- Location
- Probably at sea
Holy body image issues, Batman!
Um... I guess, technically, in that Taylor's body isn't actually hideously disgusting, and so she's worse off in that her image issues are irrational rather than objective? I suppose Rin could just be exaggerating...
Haha, after admitting to herself that she misjudged Rin, Taylor proceeds to get her even more wrong than before. I do like just how much this story leans into the whole unreliable narrator thing.
The Abenaki People
fallacies
Puyo Mage
The Abenaki — "the People of the Land of Dawn" — are a Native American people who originally inhabited parts of New England and eastern Canada. In their mythology, the creator of the world is referred to as Tabaldak — "the Owner" — an androgynous figure attributed with the creation of everything in the world except the giant Odziozo.
Taylor is incorrectly remembering Tabaldak as a "hermaphroditic" figure; and Rin classifies them as an Earth Mother Goddess mostly on account of the anthropological interpretations of the Clock Tower.
As an aside, in the area of southeastern New Hampshire that Brockton Bay would occupy, the local Abenaki would belong of the Squamscott tribe — "of the Place of the Salmons."
As a secondary aside — entirely irrelevant to this story — the name "Japan" is etymologically descended from Dutch or Portuguese corruptions of the Sinitic 日本 ("nippon" in modern Japanese; "rìběn" in modern Mandarin) — meaning "(the place of) the Sun's origination."
Owing to the popularity of Japanese or East Asian lacquerware amongst European Orientalists, the word japan came to refer both to black enamel varnish and the process of applying such to wood. In the 17th century, Aphra Behn — sometimes hailed as the first professional female writer — in her novel, Oroonoko: or, The Royal Slave — one of the first novels in the English language — described the titular African prince as having skin "the color of japan."
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Well maybe it's not just Taylor being offended that Rin doesn't want to be her friend.
It might also be QA not being particularly enthused about a mere human (albeit one with a interesting powerset) to breach the entities veil and start to backtrack the connection to where the power is actually connecting to the bugs.
Funny Taylor was thinking about Skinner boxes before...
It might also be QA not being particularly enthused about a mere human (albeit one with a interesting powerset) to breach the entities veil and start to backtrack the connection to where the power is actually connecting to the bugs.
Funny Taylor was thinking about Skinner boxes before...
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MaskedCritic
Verified Obsessed with Yuri
- Location
- Fluttershy's Secret Dungeon Shrine to Metal
But it's totally the catcalling that's leaving Taylor uncomfortable. Yup. Has nothing to do with the attractiveness of the woman running in front of her. Can't be! Taylor's completely straight after all.
Seriously, the way you perfectly capture Taylor's obliviously fervent (or perhaps fervently oblivious) self-denial of her attraction to women is one of the best things about this fic. It's incredible.