...well, that was the idea. I'm not going to say I enjoyed remembering that, but...I can at least say that I kept going past it, and that my world...turned out to be a lot bigger than that moment, as awful as it was at the time.
...do you want to help me find a few more trees with good slghtlines on the docks? I'm setting up surveillance scrying so that we'll know if anyone comes back to do more damage.
That's right. What I'll do is embed some material that can hold enchantments into those trees, and then imbue them with a low-power scrying enchantment.
We call the kind of magic I practice Red magic, or lunar magic; I'm pretty sure that solar magic exists, but I don't remember very much about it other than that. The basic concept is that we convert cosmic essence, which you can more or less think of as raw magical energy, into energy aligned with one or more of the six Crafts using our cosmic shards, then release that energy according to the instructions of a spell.
[he holds up his arms, and intricate metallic fractal tattoos materialize on his arms, sparks of crimson energy crackling over them]
These are my cosmic shards; we get them when we ritually awaken ourselves to magic. I haven't remembered quite how that happens yet, but I know that one thing we have to do is derive our own Axiom, which is a set of instructions for handling and converting cosmic essence. My Axiom determines which Crafts I can access -- all six, in my case -- and how efficiently I can process and convert essence into spells.
[he was warned!! but he seems interested rather than overwhelmed, eyes widening with interest at the show of magic]
Your "Axiom?" I understand the concept of . . . handling essence or energy in certain ways, but how what exactly is being . . . provided with "instructions?"
The instructions are for our cosmic shards -- our Axiom is imprinted into them when we awaken, I think, so we're stuck with whatever we've derived. An individual spell tells me what kind of converted arcane energy I'll need and how to release it as a useful effect, but the Axiom is what tells my shards how to handle that conversion and execute the spell's instructions.
....no, not at all. Think of my shards like a very complex machine; in that metaphor, deriving an Axiom is working out techniques for using the machine effectively.
...I'm going to mangle this metaphor awfully, but imagine if there was a musical instrument that was enchanted to play itself, if it was given the right score. The enchantment can reproduce all the fingerings and techniques a musician would need, but it needs the actual instrument to play and the musical score to tell it how to turn those techniques into a song. My Axiom is like that enchantment, my cosmic shards are like the instrument, and each spell is a different song.
Does that make it any clearer, or am I just digging myself a deeper hole?
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Date: 2025-02-01 11:18 pm (UTC)a moment later, he lets out a long, shaky breath]
....well, believe it or not, that's not actually the worst thing I've remembered. I really am sorry you had to see it.
no subject
Date: 2025-02-01 11:48 pm (UTC)That's—is that meant to make me feel . . . better?
[a very wry smile]
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Date: 2025-02-02 12:18 am (UTC)...well, that was the idea. I'm not going to say I enjoyed remembering that, but...I can at least say that I kept going past it, and that my world...turned out to be a lot bigger than that moment, as awful as it was at the time.
no subject
Date: 2025-02-02 11:30 pm (UTC). . . mm. I'm—glad of that much, at least.
. . .
I—is there anything else I can do for you? Right now . . .
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Date: 2025-02-03 12:44 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-03 04:04 am (UTC)This is . . . magic, then? You're a mage.
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Date: 2025-02-03 04:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-04 07:29 am (UTC)Different materials can—hold enchantments in different ways?
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Date: 2025-02-04 07:32 am (UTC)That's the way it works for the kind of magic I practice, anyway. Some of the other kinds, too, but the details differ.
no subject
Date: 2025-02-06 04:39 am (UTC)[a hesitant smile]
no subject
Date: 2025-02-06 05:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-06 05:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-06 05:21 am (UTC)We call the kind of magic I practice Red magic, or lunar magic; I'm pretty sure that solar magic exists, but I don't remember very much about it other than that. The basic concept is that we convert cosmic essence, which you can more or less think of as raw magical energy, into energy aligned with one or more of the six Crafts using our cosmic shards, then release that energy according to the instructions of a spell.
[he holds up his arms, and intricate metallic fractal tattoos materialize on his arms, sparks of crimson energy crackling over them]
These are my cosmic shards; we get them when we ritually awaken ourselves to magic. I haven't remembered quite how that happens yet, but I know that one thing we have to do is derive our own Axiom, which is a set of instructions for handling and converting cosmic essence. My Axiom determines which Crafts I can access -- all six, in my case -- and how efficiently I can process and convert essence into spells.
no subject
Date: 2025-02-07 10:02 pm (UTC)Your "Axiom?" I understand the concept of . . . handling essence or energy in certain ways, but how what exactly is being . . . provided with "instructions?"
no subject
Date: 2025-02-08 12:42 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-08 08:12 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-08 09:07 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-09 11:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-02-10 12:39 am (UTC)[thinks for a moment]
...I'm going to mangle this metaphor awfully, but imagine if there was a musical instrument that was enchanted to play itself, if it was given the right score. The enchantment can reproduce all the fingerings and techniques a musician would need, but it needs the actual instrument to play and the musical score to tell it how to turn those techniques into a song. My Axiom is like that enchantment, my cosmic shards are like the instrument, and each spell is a different song.
Does that make it any clearer, or am I just digging myself a deeper hole?
no subject
Date: 2025-02-11 05:23 am (UTC)That is clearer, actually. Though . . . I take it that you yourself are not a musician?
no subject
Date: 2025-02-11 05:25 am (UTC)