trans_9 | A knight's boredom [Open]

Entry tags:

A knight's boredom [Open]

~~Mrs. Yagami~~ Signum feels restless. After the mission to get the map (which she hadn't really helped that much on, now that she's thought about it) and filling out the paperwork to join the Magic Department, she hadn't done anything she'd felt was productive. Exercising in the Sensoriums and taking care of Hayate's and the Reinforces' "shopping" (such as existed on this ship) was all well and good, but there was work to be done here and she felt she wasn't doing it when she could be.

However, barring an actual opportunity for action, there's only two ways Signum can work out this feeling of restlessness. Exercising more in the Sensoriums (which she'd done already today, up to her tolerance for the illusionary setting), or meditating.

Sitting atop the Jedi Temple, which was both conveniently high and conveniently in tune with the ambient magic on the ship, Signum folds her legs under her, sits, and contemplates on nothingness, clearing her mind of the distraction and frustration of daily life on the city ship...

((That's your cue to bother her))

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Hm. That's what it means to be a research mage, isn't it?" she asks, in response to the rant. Not the gushing over Celena, obviously, which she figured was simply having a highly motivational crush.

"A research mage?" Aibghalien repeated. He'd never heard the term before, so he sorted it into his own understanding. "I am a wizard, not a sorcerer, so it's true that I can learn any spell I put my mind to with time to research or a suitable copy."

"I just meant someone who looks at the inner workings of spells and Devices to come up with new ones," Signum explains. "Or I guess in your case experimenting with new spells."

"Ah, terminology," he said. "You must be from Nanoha's world."

Who else used the term 'Devices' around here? And just how many of them ARE there?

"I keep forgetting she's in charge of this department, somehow. Although even if she wasn't, I bet she'd have made a name for herself here already."

"She can be a hard soul to track down sometimes," he said diplomatically. Though the dragon then dipped his head slightly. "Is it true, then, that Vita was repodded?"

Signum nods, melancholy. "I had barely woken up, and she was gone again...at least she's safe."

"That's a shame," Aibghalien said in much the same mood. "I quite liked her. She was so refreshingly direct."

"It was nice having her around again, for a little while. Still, I won't complain too much. More of my family than I could reasonably ask for is still here."

She still looks rather bothered, though.

"And yet?" Aibghalien knew how to read people, after all. He settled slightly, dropping to sit on his haunches.

"Being split up like this usually doesn't bode well, is all. I was trained to work in a team. I'm perfectly fine fighting on my own, but if these Ohm are as terrible of opponents as I've been told, I'd have at least liked my whole team or my regular partner to be here," Signum explains, skimming right past any mention of actually missing Vita or Agito.

He tilted his head slightly. "It almost feels like you're the first person I've met here to actually say that. And I know what you mean. Most of what I did on my own planet was also in the company of others.... not specifically trained to do it, mind, but we worked well together nonetheless. Well... at least you have some of your team here?"

Signum nods, looking more confident. "Hayate, Rein, and...the first Rein should be more than enough help, not to mention all the other mages from my world here. If nothing else, I'm not going to fail protecting them."

"I'm actually very interested in your particular type of magic," he said, meaning 'you' quite generally. "On my world, intelligent magical items are extremely rare and highly powerful, so the fact that you all seem to use them is really quite intriguing."

"Well, intelligent is a relative term," Signum says, and then her sword-shaped necklace flashes a little in comradely annoyance.

"The way we use magic is really just as another form of energy. Devices - Intelligent, Armed, or otherwise - are tools for shaping that energy, like a magical lever or pulley. We program them with awareness so they can do the detailed work of shaping a spell," she explains, perhaps oddly good at this lecture. But then again, from a certain point of view, Signum herself is a Device, or at least was made along with one.

"Sentient, then," Aibghalien said, amused. "The terms are interchangeable, the way I'm familiar with them. It's still such an intriguing diversion from the way I understand magic. I'm not certain I could ever trust the shaping of spells to a device... which is no slur against your methods, mind. It speaks highly of your affinity with the Devices that you all can."

"My family's Devices are a part of us, and we're a part of them," Signum says with a faint smile. "In a way, Laevatein and I are twins."

"Nanoha was lucky enough to stumble upon a Device that suited her perfectly, and Fate's and Subaru's were custom-built just for them. The mages from my world here are quite powerful in part because of how well we and our Devices understand each other."

That gave him something to think about, and he visibly cogitated on it for a moment, before focusing his attention back on Signum. "So is it possible for you to cast spells directly, then? Practically or theoretically?"

"I could maybe heat a cup of tea," Signum says, a little self-deprecatingly. "If I wanted to do something without a Device, it'd be easier just to use my muscles."

"The only person I've seen successfully use combat-grade spells without help from her Device was Nanoha, and she was in a really bad mood," she adds, with the reminiscent look of a warrior remembering an enlightening defeat.

"Why is that? Is it because of the complexity of the spells, the difficulty to manipulate?" He's starting to get that sort of manic tone in his voice, Signum.

"Calm down. You don't want to hyperventilate when you can breath fire," Signum warns, keeping a level tone.

Assuming he does so, Signum continues to explain in a second. "I'm not totally familiar with the theory-work, but it's essentially that the human body can't really leverage raw magical power. We make a good conduit, but doing something useful with the energy requires machinery to harness it. It's like on Earth, where they can get a great deal of energy out of exploding petroleum, but channeling that into something useful takes a highly complex machine."

She stops and thinks about Aibghalien's questions for a moment. "So in your world, you cast spells without mechanical help?"

"Celena's species can't breathe fire. I asked her." As odd as it it seems to say that a dragon couldn't do such a thing. "And this is a polymorph spell, which can't inherit the supernatural abilities of the assumed form. Now if I cast shapechange I would be a dragon in all aspects, including the inherent magical power, but--"

He cut himself off sharply, with a rueful smile. "Sorry. Yes. We can do so. Arcane magic, as opposed to divine magic, essentially draws off of an omnipresent energy field. There are two different ways to manipulate it. Anyone who is born with a connection to the magical field, essentially by having some measure of immortal essence within them, is capable of tapping that field directly, and thereby manipulate it in specific ways to produce given effects, or in other words, to cast spells. That is sorcery. Wizardry, on the other hand, involves learning to tap that same field through study, learning, and discipline."

"In other words, you do it all manually instead of using machines," Signum summarizes.

Aibghalien gave her an expression that was even more indescribable by virtue of being on a draconic face. "That would have been the short and grievously oversimplified answer, yes." But he couldn't help but crack a little smile at the end of the sentence.

Signum smiles back, having never seen that expression on a dragon, or at least not on one over a foot long. "I did say I was more of a knight than a mage, didn't I? Cutting to the heart of a situation is more or less my purpose."

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject