Tag: mana

NoNoNoNoNo!

On By ravonlockeIn Journal, TristiaLeave a comment

The police separate everyone back into lounges, adults in one and kids in the other. Apparently, they don’t suspect us kids, because as they interview the adults they let them then join us. I’m not staring at Oliver talking to all the cool kids, I’m not! Hey, where’s Klyce?

When he shows up, Klyce drags us all out of the lounge to go searching for clues. Why are we Doing this? The Police are here… But we go look at the bedrooms upstairs. We find a spot of blood, a knife, and some bloody clothes in Philomena’s dad’s closet. That was easy… a bit too easy… You don’t kill someone and then leave the evidence in your hamper. You just don’t.

We head to the next room, which is full of police. Dalish starts to spill, and Klyce cuts him off, backing us all out of the room. Over in Philomena’s mom’s room, we find an old desk, that Maribeth breaks into. She reads a bunch of letters from several different men, but then puts them back, insisting they aren’t relevant to bloody murder. Love seems a fair motivation to me…

Next we go down the back stairs and hear the police talking to the kitchen staff. They don’t seem to know much, but are lamenting Karl’s death. Klyce asks them forcefully about a basement and they insist that only the Butler has the key. The butler, Ulysses, is very polite, and Klyce is actually nice to him. He takes us downstairs, and watches us, getting nervouse when we get near expensive wines. Nat uses a wand to discover a secret door in the back of the cellar, but Ulysses is Not going to let us go down without the family’s permission.

Klyce heads upstairs to get that permission and returns a few minutes later with Philomena in a huff. I can only imagine the horrible things he said to her. She tells Ulysses to open it, however, so we are allowed in. Remy immediately begins detecting really strange magic, and as we walk down the catacomb path, the door slams shut behind us.

I do not like this, I do not like this at all! Ulysses doesn’t like it either, and as we continue on, he begins coughing horribly. There seems to be an increase in mana in the air down here. Suddenly, there is whispering in the air.

“More Meat!”

NoNoNoNoNO! I tell the others what the strange whispers said as tiny creatures begin to attack us all. Klyce tosses Ulysses into a Rope Trick and I Levitate up to the ceiling, curling up into a little ball. Maribeth falls, and I go down and drag her up into the Rope Trick, pulling the rope up behind us while the rest fight off the little monsters.

Klyce comes up after the fight is all done, and Alters Ulysses so he can breathe, but he’s still unconscious. We leave him in the Rope Trick, with the rope pulled up and we keep going. Nowhere to go but through. The Mana gets thicker and thicker as we travel, and even Klyce starts having trouble breathing with how thick it is. I use Gust to keep it out of my face, but it barely helps.

Towards the end, we find all the recent graves have been messily robbed. What is Going On down here? Are they eating the corpses? Are there skeletons walking around? We start hearing moaning. Nat says to hit undead things with sticks or spells. Gerhardt casts Grease on the ground in front of us, and we prepare to burn them down.

The Grease works, they all scramble and fall and get lit on fire. I control the fire a bit, to keep them burning, these horrible moaning undead things. The others finish them off. This is the worst place we’ve been, yet. Soon we start seeing liquid pools of mana on the ground, it seems to be seeping through the ground. The tunnel ends then, no more graves have been dug.

Nat thinks we’re under the stables or servant quarters, so we head back, to get above ground. The Rope Trick and Ulysses are gone! We make it back to the door without getting attacked again, at least, and Nat finds the way out. The police are still there, with different servants. Don’t worry, they tell us, the father has been arrested, it’s all over.

We head out to the servant’s quarters at a run. We find a door to a basement and head down. GREEN! No!NO!NO!NO!No! I stare, unmoving, while everyone else spreads out. They find dead bodies everywhere, in a variety of states of decay. The whispers start again. Nonononono… Nat asks me about my dream. I was just running, and they were whispering. Just running.

I step forward, trying to hear better. Just whispers.

“Where are you? I can’t hear you.”

“She approaches. Shining as the Sun.”

I keep walking through the green. The others are talking, but I have to find the whispers. I keep walking. The Green slopes down. Maribeth and Klyce slip and slide past me. Featherfall. Dalish runs after them. I keep walking. Nat slides past, but Nat has Featherfall. The tunnel stops and there’s a huge chamber of Green. I can hear chanting now, but I still can’t make it out. Another tunnel, and I keep walking.

There’s a smaller chamber here, more finished with an alter. Ulysses is on the alter. There’s a corpse floating above him, with vines all through it. Eugenia, Philomena’s mother, is there, too, with a jagged dagger poised over Ulysses. There’s an archway beyond them.

“Sacrifice the mean. Open the door.”

“Stop Them!” I shout at everyone before running forward to tackle Eugenia.

She gets away and stabs Ulysses, but he’s not dead, yet. Maribeth puts her to sleep before she can kill him, and I find keys in her pocket to let Ulysses free. The others fight the plant corpse until it collapses and the gateway closes. It’s finally quiet again, as I Levitate Ulysses, and carry him away from the alter.

The plants are withering away, as we head back to the previous chamber. Klyce says someone will have to take the fall for this. There is no evidence that will convince the courts a person wasn’t at fault. They wake Eugenia up, but she doesn’t remember a thing. Ulysses wakes after some healing, and we tell him everything. We drag them both back up to the servants’ quarters, where all the plants are gone, and only massacred bodies remain.

Klyce goes to fetch the Inspector and we tell him the whole story. As we finish, and discuss what will happen next, Ulysses steps forward and confesses to all the crimes. He has served his family long and well, and he will not see this take them down. The Inspector grudgingly agrees. This is awful! Magic is real! Why can’t that be the answer!? That’s just the way “justice” works, Klyce informs us. We all take our leave and head back to school.

Mana Smuggling

On By ravonlockeIn Journal, TristiaLeave a comment

That was crazy and we are all hurt and exhausted. Several of the guys have overcharged repeatedly. We take turns watching the tunnel and sleep for what we hope is the night. Gerhardt sets up an alarm spell to warn us, but nothing comes. Eventually we all, including James, wake up.

He doesn’t remember anything, though. Not getting kidnapped, not being down here, nothing. Some of the guys take things from the piles and piles of stolen objects. Dalish checks his drawings, to try to show one to James, but the pages are blank. So, from memory, he redraws the creature and the circle. James still doesn’t remember, and we head out, it’s almost breakfast time.

Nothing attacks us as we make our way up to Professor Raltis in the Nursing station. Raltis asks what happened and we try to explain, but he doesn’t believe us one bit. Especially when he calls some Survyers and they go look and don’t find the tunnel. I don’t trust those things one bit.

At Fundaments class, Dalish tries again with Professor Malten. He has to redraw the creature, again, and Malten says it’s a Grumpkin, a fairytale creature. He keeps explaining and has to draw the circle again, too. When he tells him about the mist monsters, and I speak the language to him, he starts to really believe us. He says they were probably manifestations of mana with a conjuration spell. He says it is highly unusual and we shouldn’t talk about it with other people. Nat draws him a map to the place we found and we move on.

Today, we learn more about the properties of mana. Turns out it only has the mass you expect it to – mana is entirely reactive to the mages near it or in possession of it. Mana subscribes to consensus reality, its only qualities are change and impermanence. Today, I learn that I can, in fact, take control of mana, even though I can’t use it. That could come in very handy.

<time passes> We keep working on spells. I practice Catapulting sanctuary balls. Klyce organizes spell scavenger hunts. I convince Nat and Maribeth to come out to a nice lunch on the first weekend. Nat has a minor meltdown about betraying his family for magic. Seems he’s being pulled away from their traditional necormancy into divination type spells. Not sure why this is Our fault, he’s the one with the talent. </time passes>

One afternoon, we head to a lavatory to look for spells as a group. First we try turning on all the hot faucets, which fogs up the mirrors. Dalish really wants to learn Fog Cloud, and notices the fogged up mirrors say we should go to the obstacle course before dawn. The boys all decide to flush all the toilets at once to see what happens. Dalish casts detect magic and sees a spell trying to happen, but it’s incomplete. One of them passes gas, and it helps, but not enough. So Klyce orders everyone to go eat beans for dinner and come back.

This increase in gas does make Stinking Cloud appear on the stall doors. Luckily, I’ve stayed at the door as lookout while they do this since I can’t learn spells this way. Then they all use the toilets and flush and get an even stranger reaction. The bottom of the toilets became black holes. Nat drops a light down his and sees nothing. Klyce sticks his hand in, and it just feels cold and empty, so he jumps in. They all get Rope Trick and Deep Pockets. So unfair! I wanted to be a mage more than most of them. I got magic, but not the right kind!

The next morning we all get up with Klyce and head out to the obstacle course and start looking around. Dalish looks for magic and noticing it following Klyce as he actually runs the course. When he finishes he sees spells and tells everyone else to run it, too. We all do, and they all get Fog Cloud. Those that run it fast get Jump, as well. I already have that one, at least, though I fall repeatedly and see no spells when I get to the end.

A few days later, Dalish gathers the group and tells us that James heard rumors about ilicit dealings and Upperclassmen and Philomena and Garrett. He says the next drop is Saturday. We discuss following them and staking out the deal. Some are worried about getting caught. Would they attack us? This doesn’t seem a place that would care if a couple first years got killed.

Wait, what? Remy says he’s okay with killing people in self-defense. WHAT? No! I’m Not Killing anyone! Klyce cuts him off and says we’re not killing anyone, if we are spotted, we run. Maribeth says she won’t be involved, she can’t be involved. I’m okay with that, I’m not sure I want to be, only I really don’t like Philomena. Klyce and Remy, however, keep pushing and won’t let it drop. Maribeth says that her family has business dealing with their families, so she can’t be involved in anything that might get them in trouble. They finally leave her alone.

On Saturday, we stake out locations and wait. I watch them leave the main building and call everyone else. We follow them down the forest line and watch from a distance while they wait at the wall. Remy sends his little lizard to sneak up on them and listen in. It is quite a while before some larger figures approach. Three students? and two survyers. The people give over a vial to the creepy things and they go away. A signpost suddenly appears on the lawn where the students stop, then four jugs, which get catapulted over the wall. A crossbow bolt then hits the sign with something wrapped around it. They take it and go back to the school. Philomena and Garrett wait a bit then sneak back, too. We wait a bit longer and then head back ourselves.

Now what?? Do we tell someone? Professor Malten? We have no proof, we don’t even know who they are. What if we watch the fountain for someone taking large amounts? I wonder if there’s a safer place to spy from, but none of the school buildings have a view of where the jugs are tossed from. Remy wants to ask hypothetical questions about stealing and selling mana, but most of us think it’ll make us look guilty. We all agree to keep an eye on Philomena, Garrett, and the people they talk to, as well as the mana pool.

James is Missing

On By ravonlockeIn Journal, TristiaLeave a comment

At dinner, Dalish notices that his shadow, James isn’t there anymore. That’s weird, he’s Always around Dalish. So, we decide to go look for him. He isn’t in the dorm, or anywhere between class and the dining hall. We head out to the lake where he and Dalish had been studying the night before, but no one is there.

I suggest we go ask a teacher, and we find a staircase by the dining hall that has a sign for the Teacher’s Lounge. We all head up, and Professor Malden answers the door. He says that students often get overwhelmed here, and that the staff doesn’t go looking for two or three days! But if we’re worried we should go check the Lost and Found.

Our class never did get a tour of the grounds, so we don’t know where that is. Nat, MaryBeth, Remmy, and I decide that we should go try and get lost, so we can be found. This is a weird school, maybe it will work, or maybe James got lost and we’ll find him. Dalish and Gerhardt decide to look around the buildings for a sign that says Lost and Found, how boring.

We go walk deep into the woods for awhile. MaryBeth is worried about being late to Astronomy class, so we turn back around. Nat says he knows the way, so we all follow him. Before we make it out though, Remmy starts seeing things, shadows or fairies or something. Who believes in Fairies? Nat, apparently.

The groundskeeper finds us though, before Remmy can start chasing things that don’t exist. I guess we’re not allowed to be out on the grounds after dark, so he takes us all back towards dorms. Dalish and Gerhardt tell us they found the Lost and Found, and a lot of things have gone missing, and they might have found a spell that could help. The others all have class, so I study a bit and go to bed.

Fundaments of Magic class is late again. This time Professor Malden brings in a cart and several jugs of mana. Mana, he tells us, is the essential material needed to cast Magic, but I don’t need it. He calls me to the front of the class and tells me to drink one of the jugs. This seems wasteful to me, but I do it anyway. My classmates’ eyes all bug out watching me. Then Professor Malden tells them how dangerous I am and that I’m in danger, too. Wait, what??

People I don’t even know, people I’ve never me, he says, will come after me. Will want to take me and study me. They’ll want to know what makes my magic work, and they might even want to Use me! Nonono, I just… I just wanted to do magic. Back at my seat, I notice he’s talking again.

Mana puts a limiter on Magicians. You have to think carefully about how you use it. Then he talks about possessing the mana. How a lot of people drink it, but that isn’t necessary. Ownership is all they need.

He calls Remmy and Dalish to the front and tells them to take ownership of, without touching, the mana. Dalish manages it pretty easily, but Remmy gets frustrated and sets it all on Fire! Dalish wills the fire to go out, and it does! How am I the dangerous one? Mana is volatile, Malden warns us, and doesn’t like being disrupted.

MaryBeth asks about using emotions, rather than Will to control mana. Or using mana as a weapon. Professor Malden says both of these are possible, but inefficient. He demonstrates manipulating the mana itself, turning it into a gas, a solid, and a liquid.

He has everyone else work on taking ownership of the mana until they are all out of spells. Then he talks about Overcharging, which is, I guess, what everyone thought he was having me do at the start of class. Taking in too much mana. This is dangerous, too, and makes you pass out after a minute, if not immediately. This is their homework, Overcharge, without killing themselves, to see how well they can handle it. I’m supposed to see how much magic I can do in a day, test my limits.

The rest of classes go as expected, but James never does turn up. Klyce banters with the professor in History. MaryBeth has strange questions about efficiency of magic and mana, so I send her to Professor Mast. Then I finally get to go to P.E. but I don’t get to see Oliver. We make a plan about digging foxholes to protect against ranged magic, but when I run out to grab the ball, I get knocked down immediately and am unconscious for the rest of class.

Afterwards, we go looking for James again. I go to the Philosophy classroom and ask everyone coming out if they’ve seen James since class ended yesterday, but no one has. MaryBeth, Klyce and I go talk to the stablehands. Well, Klyce talks to them mostly, and they suggest the kitchens. So we go find the Kitchens. The weird servitors here aren’t Quite as freaky as the ones in the stables. They say food has gone missing, and there are strange smells of Daffodils and Slime.

We gather up again and go talk to Triplehorn, the Transmutation professor. Dalish tried to do Locate Object, but it didn’t work for him. Triplehorn wants to help us, but the Dean says he’s not allowed for a couple more days. Then he tells us you Can memorize spells you aren’t strong enough to cast, but that very few wizards can manage Divination spells. So, we go off to Dinner to plan what to do next.

Day One at the Mysterium Academie

On By ravonlockeIn TristiaLeave a comment

Dear Diary,

First day of Magic school, and I’ve already made a friend! Marybeth is so sweet! And tall! Even though she keeps trying to hide behind everyone. I think I’m the shortest one here, but that’s okay, I had the prettiest dress.

Everything is so exciting! The hallways move and flip and sometimes we have to walk on walls.

We got split into A and B class, and I’m SO glad the professor didn’t call on me. We would never have gotten A class if she had.

The stablehands are The Creepiest I’ve Ever Seen! They have Way too many teeth and when they smile… I swear, their heads are just going to split in half! And they don’t give the horses names. But at least they let me ride one. I took Marybeth around the lake, and Dalish and James were there, too. Dalish sure writes a lot.

We picked our classes today. I didn’t know what to do, so I just avoided the magic ones. I think I’m going to fail Fundaments of Magic… I gave Marybeth my Mana thingy, it won’t do me any good. Why am I such a freak? What am I going to do?

Oh! I saw Oliver! He’s in the B class. He’s so cool and cute! I think he even looked at me!

I can’t believe I’m here!

Tristia Ravenhelm