>>736919
HUGS FOR THE HUG GOD SNUGGLES FOR THE SNUGGLE THRONE!
Oh and congratulate her on making her own flying spell...

>>736919
Congrats Ishelda! Hug her. Then ask her how she did it. Our sister might be a magus the same time we are.

>>736919
Great, let's schedule our Ascendance, then.

>>736961
why? I very much doubt she's come up with some sort of innovation quite yet.

>>736919
Have we asked Yule to fix Brun's mom's wings yet?

>>736919
"Great!" Hugs for the lil'sis!

So, we have a permanent portal from our home village to the capital city, nice!

>>737008
Yes, Magus and Archmage title! The prestige! The POWER!

>>736919
>?
"Your own flying spell? that is amazing. Do try not to give mother a heart attack."

At this rate li'l sis'll make magus before us.

>>737064
Yeah, Brun's family is one of our important allies, lost her wing because of us asking for her help: Got to help her there.

>>737064
>You gave her a message, but Yule hasn't gotten back to you yet. It's only been a week or two. Worst comes to worst, you can outright purchase her services... Or use what you've learned from the biomancy book.

>>736919
>Of course it’s easier. Flying is considered one of the more complicated things in general.

Does 4chan x fail to work for anyone else?

>>737169
>learned from the biomancy book
better not attract her attention in this way... Jelly Yule isn't someone I would like to meet...

You grapple with Ishelda long enough to dump her off of you, letting you get back to your feet- then you scoop her up into a tight hug.

"It's Ishelda!" You cry, poking and prodding at her cheeks. "I'm back!"

Lewin just starts to laugh, and waves you off. He turns to give orders to the militia, and you make your way home, dragging Ishelda along.

"Your own flying spell? That's amazing. Do try not to give mother a heart attack"

"It takes a lot of mana." She responds. "And gets really tiring, so mom made me write a, uh, slowfall dweomer too, and I'm supposed to charge it before I go flying. I'm also not allowed to leave the village walls."

"That's a good idea. Obey those rules, kid." You say. Ishelda frowns, so you wrap your arm around her shoulder. "How did you do the flying? Just pushing kinetic force upward?"

"That'd be a waste of mana." She says. "I have it nullifying gravity instead. Then I need a dweomer to push me around, so it's not perfect..."

"I got stuck basically where you are, with the gravity nullification." You say. "Can I see your array?"

"I don't think it'd work on you." She says. "You're too big. Maybe if you were shorter, like normal people..."

You snort. You've never had the problem of being too tall before.

"Lemme see it anyway." You say.

Ishelda sighs, taps on her Implement, and shows you an array. It's nothing like your slowfall spell, which nullifies gravity. Her array instead twists it around, making the planet's gravity push against her just as hard as it's pulling her. It's not perfect- you see a few parts where it might be wasted mana, and she's right in that something that's just a little bit heavier than her would disrupt the gravitational distortion- but Ishelda definitely has a talent in this. That or she's been studying a lot.

>Continued! Stupid 3000-character limit.

>>737202
"Huh." You say. You turn to Ishelda, appraising her.

"What?" She asks. You turn back to the Array, examining the way it twists around. It's a bit irregular, but it has some potential. Maybe if you weakened it and cast the spell in pairs to twin dweomers...

"... Do you mind if I use it?" You ask. Ishelda's expression twists from curiosity to unmistakable pride. Good thing, too- Ishelda deserves it. The spell isn't perfect, and she's still missing a lot of features an analytical mage needs to know how to use, but what she does have belies a real skill in magic.

"... Sure." She says, cheeks pink. "Can you also fix mine?"

"Sure." You say. "But first I have to make a call, once we get inside. Is mom home?"

"No, she's still at the office." Ishelda says. "The internet's been wonky for the past few days. She thinks there's a lightning monster out of town and it's messing with things, but they have her trying to fix it anyway. Will your phone still work if there's an electromagnetic field?"

You give her a wide grin. "Yeah, it'll still work. It's technically still in Romalia, anyway."

"What do you mean by that?"

You show her your Implement. "Rathod put some heavy duty thaumaturgy on my phone. Now I can use it from anywhere, even other realities."

Ishelda's eyebrows shoot up, and the two of you make your way inside. Once there, you call the Weevil- your guidance counselor.

"Adept Angwaz, welcome back." He says. "You've been rather sparse lately, and haven't been to any classes. Is there something wrong?"

"I would like to schedule my presentation." You say. "I have perfected my thesis to the point where I will become a Magus."

"You've truly improved it that much in such short a time?" He asks. "Wonderful! I think I can call together a council in the next few days. They'll come flocking, I'm sure."

"As they should." You say. "Thanks."

"Not a problem." He says. "I'll call you when I get a time. Good luck."

Then you put your phone away- to see Ishelda beaming.

"You're gonna be a Magus!"

"That's the plan." You respond. She grins.

"SO." She says. "Tell me what's been going on. Last I heard, you and Thod and your friends were going to another world for some reason." The war with Hellebore, no doubt.

>?

>>737226
Apparently there's an alternate reality Helios out there where Krital became an evil dictator. Tortured Yule for her Art and stuff like that. THen made an interdimensional evil empire. He died before he could add more than 2 worlds to the city, but now his descendant has rediscovered the Art and sent his daughters out to harvest souls from new worlds.

Fun times were had.

>>737264
I'm not sure telling her that is a good idea for now...

>>737282
Any specific reason? I'm fine with not telling her everything if people think it's a bad idea, but we'll need to tell her something at least.

>>737226
We won, but I found out a lot about their world and how their magic works. There will be more battles eventually. Her name was Hellebore, and descendant of a Krital Angwaz from a different world.

>>737226
Apparently we were lucky old man Krital was crazier than a box of shadow ferrets, since if he hadn't been he would have taken over the world.

>>737226
Also, you'll be tall as all hell when you grow up, maybe?

>>737226
>?
>>737264 sounds right, it's a story for her, maybe she doesn't even believe us at first - just too "out here"

>heavy duty thaumaturgy on my phone
Goodbye roaming fees!
Jasmine Low-Cost Mobile Plan, Get It Now!

>>737226
I stopped an EVIL... cousin? of ours.

>>737226
>?
>Tell her the battle was won but not without a price, that we captured the enemy and have learned a great deal about other forms of magic(materials). Best leave out the graphic bits.

>>737357
>captured the enemy
Maybe leave that bit out... we don't want her to want to meet her, right?!

>>737388
At least, not for a while, I guess?

>>737418
Only after we converted her to be our minion- I mean, friend.

"The battle was won." You say.

"You were in a fight?"

"... Well, they needed help." You say. "Basically, there's an alternate version of our world, where our ancestor, instead of being crazier than a box of shadow ferrets, he became an evil dictator and created an interdimensional empire. His descendants were sent out to conquer new worlds."

Ishelda frowns.

"And then we saved the world. I learned new magic. Fun times were had."

She just keeps looking at you.

"... You're going to be tall as hell when you grow up, won't you." You add.

"Tall to you, but who isn't?" She asks. The snark is almost reflexive to her, by this point. "So, did, uh, that really happen? You didn't just, uh, hang out?"

You take a drink of water and nod. "Yeah." You say. "We captured the enemy and learned a lot about magic. Then I spent the last few weeks studying. And hanging out. Apparently I'm nobility in that world now, so I just had to ask and everyone would fall over themselves to help me out. I basically got to lounge in the bath all day with waterproofing dweomers for my books."

Ishelda frowns. "And you didn't take me?"

"Into the bath?" You wrinkle your nose.

"No, to go be nobles. I'd be noble too, right? So we're basically princesses?"

You roll your eyes. "You would, but we're not princesses. We're, uh, knights."

Ishelda considers it... and then nods.

"Even better." She says. "Are there any handsome princes there?"

"One." You say. "But he's too old for you. And I think he might be engaged, but didn't want to be? I'm not sure, he wasn't very clear about that."

"Well, when you find a world that has younger princes, make sure to tell me." She says. "And you'll have to take me there someday."

The two of you are silent for a few minutes.

"... I really liked coming to Romalia with you, back in autumn." She says. "You should take me more places. I'm sure I could talk mom into it. I mean, if I get stranded I could probably fly home, right?"

"Flying across the wilderness is not a good idea at all." You say. "Too many dragons."

"There hasn't been a dragon sighting around here in like, sixty years." Ishelda says.

"One is too many." You say. "With how territorial they are..."

"... Yeah, good point." She says. "But anyway, you should still take me places. Mom thinks I'm too young to go alone, but it's just so boring here. Especially when it starts snowing, then I won't even be able to go outside without freezing my hands off."

>?

>>737507
Well I did open up a gate to port people back and forth...

>>737507
Whenever we go to the ruined tech or the druidy world (after becoming Magus/Archmagus and starting our teleportation super-corporation of course) promise to take Ishelda with us.

>>737507
>saying no to a cute little thing like that

Say okay, and make a promise.

>>737507
>>>?
"Study well and I'll make you my assistant"
Get our mum's permission for her to visit the capital again.

>>737521
>teleportation super-corporation
Jasmine, Archmage/CEO
:)

Time to prepare our Magus thesis - we have to write down stuff, right?

I just realized that a box of shadowferrets is dumb, since the shadow template would allow them to just blink out of the box.

>>737550
Cera just had to explain how it worked and give a demonstration, so I don't see why we would.

>>737572
>Unless the box has the shadow template too, of course. Then it just phases out the same exact time the ferrets do, and they'll all still be stuck.

>>737572
Exactly. Why would they be stuck in there unless they were crazy and didn't realize they could get out.

>>737587
But that would just be creepy. I mean, a teleporting box that occasionally rustles?

>>737574
True! Reread that part. Just wow them with Incredible Teleportation! Give interviews and autographs - Celeb Jasmine.

>>737601
>The shadow template doesn't actually make things teleport- it just makes them periodically intangible and very, very fast. So it would be a vibrating box that occasionally stops existing.

>>737638
Make portals with Astral Magic. Boom! Headshot!

>>737667
Teddy bear for sister, 10 ecu.
Look on Cera's face after we reveal Archmage status, priceless.

>>737663
I imagine it to work like Dishonored/Aragami blink, except it doesn't need LOS, is that accurate?

>>737507
Have we introduced Ishelda and mom to Gareth yet?

>>737770
>Essentially.

"... Yeah, I'll take you somewhere." You say. "But we'll need mom's permission. Maybe I can take you with me next time I explore a new world."

"Ooh, would you really?"

"Sure." You say. "Though I will cast a spell to send you back here if anything goes wrong."

"Of course." She says, sighing. "You two treat me like I'm made of glass."

"Well, you are my favorite little sister." You say.

"I'm tougher than that." She says. "Lewin said that I've got a lot of talent, so I'd be tough even if I didn't have magic. You guys don't need to protect me."

You sigh, and grab your little sister into a tight, tight hug.

"Doesn't matter how tough you are." You say. "You could be, I don't know, the Archmage of War with the ability to defeat the entire world in seconds, and I'd still want to protect you. Just because you can handle it doesn't mean I don't want to keep you from being hurt."

There's not much Ishelda can say about that.

Dinner comes and goes. Your mom doesn't come home- she just texts Ishelda to say that she can make whatever she finds in the fridge- so the two of you order a pizza from hundreds of miles away, through the power of teleportation, and your mom finally comes home around the time you and Ishelda are competitively trying to crush eachother on a console.

"Hey, mom." Ishelda says, taking a quick sip of hot chocolate while her magic regenerates. You finally develop enough mutative power to sprout wings, so you can finally take the fight to her- but then the damn witch finishes her ultimate ability and calls down a meteor.

Player 2 wins, finally breaking the tie between you and Ishelda.

"... When did we get a gaming console?" Mom asks. "Welcome home, Jasmine."

"Jasmine brought it."

Your mom gives you a disapproving look. "I know that you're making money now, but do you really think you should be spending it on this kind of thing?"

You snort, amplifying your mom's expression. "Don't worry. That's not a problem. I, uh, recently helped a merchant with my magic, and I got a modest cut."

"... It's your money, I suppose." She says. She looks tired.

"I got a third controller." You say. "Want to join in?"

Her lips quirk. "Maybe next time, Jasmine. I think I need to turn in. It's late. Speaking of which, what are you still doing up?"

"I'm bonding with my favorite sister." Ishelda says, still as peppy as she's been all night. "Who I love very much."

Your mom hesitates... and then shrugs and makes her way to her room. "It's not a school night, so have fun."

"Woo!"

Which is right when your phone chirps. It's the weevil.

Tomorrow. 1:30 PM. All Romalian archmages will be in attendance.

"... So, I'm going to have my magus presentation tomorrow, apparently." You say.

Ishelda's eyes widen, and your mom leans out of her door.

"Ooh. Can I come? Mom, can I see her presentation?"

"To be honest, Jasmine, I'd like to see it too." Your mom says. "If you'll consent to bringing us."

>?

>>737860
Sure not like it's a problem.

>>737860
>exabutt never forgot the plot point
>everything's going to go terribly wrong
>little sister and mom get front row seats the the greatest disaster of the century
Why not

>>737860
Sure.

>>737860
Sure, they can witness your triumph!

>>737873
>exabutt never forgot the plot point
>everything's going to go terribly wrong
>little sister and mom get front row seats the the greatest disaster of the century
Oh shush you, don't give him ideas.

>>737860
Of course

>>737860
Only if you take me out for ice cream afterwards.

>>737873
Cue event horizon

>>737873
What plot point?

>>737886
Everything was supposed to go to shit when Cera tried to screw us over the first time, and we would be on the run.

>>737899
Huh. Ok.

>>737860
>>>?
"Gladly. You can't witness greatness often enough."
The next day, Jasmine posts a selfie with all the Archmages on her not!Facebook...

>>737860
>?
>"Sure, there’s seats enough for everyone."

Do we also announce our Archmagehood as soon as we are Magus?

>>737860
I kind of want to ask mom about dad. I feel like there is something we are missing like maybe alternate universe Dad is evil because his orginal wife died or something.

>>737913
>announce our Archmagehood
Yes! And also that we're open for transport business, free publicity!

>>737916
>alternate universe Dad is evil because his orginal wife died or something.
Alternative universe dad is evil because the whole family has been evil for generations.

Alternative universe ancestor Krital might have become evil because of a dead wife, maybe. The book made it sound as if he was just fed up with Archmage Fleshcrafter not telling him his secret. Sucking out her delicious knowledge (and soul) seems to have been the tipping point.

>>737934
>Krital
just remembered that a book just appeared in our room... the conspiracy is real!

>>737934
Krital was evil because he was trapped on nix(?) for years(?) and he decided to take his rightful place as the best archmage when he finally got out.

Our Krital had the same ambitions but got distracted by cat girls rather than stewing on his superiority complex in a wasteland.

>>737946
Where all the catgirls at?
We need some stat

>>737957
We already found some on Shamash.

>>737934
That doesn't seem to be the actual problem. Hellebore herself admitted he has no humanity which implies he's awful by even their standards. There's also the fact that alt!Krital and alt!Calam exist but alt!Jasmine doesn't which also implies alt!mom died instead of alt!dad. Not that I want to actually want to ask the man if it's his problem I just think it's a good thing to keep in mind.

>>737946
>Catgirls are probably enough to turn anybody into a good person.
>>737957
>Kanna- one of the captains of Claw and Talon- is a catgirl, as are quite a few demihumans in Shamash.

"Of course." You say. "You can't witness greatness often enough."

"It's less about witnessing greatness, and more about seeing my daughter take the most important step in her life." Mom says. She shoots you a proud smile. "Goodnight, Jasmine. Ishelda, you should get some rest too."

"... Fine." Ishelda says, quickly emptying her hot chocolate. You go to grab yours- to see that Ishelda had emptied it when you weren't looking.

You turn to her- and she just giggles and squirrels down into the basement to get changed. You just sigh, hang up your jacket, and crash straight on the couch.

Tomorrow, you're going to show everyone exactly how amazing you are.

The next day finds you carefully brushing your hair, styling it just perfectly. Your jacket is pure white and just as clean as your hair. Slight touches of makeup for your face- you're gorgeous. Black pants and a black blouse, to counteract your jacket and your hair...

Ishelda is dressed in a simple sundress, with a thick jacket on over it. It's not going to be nearly as cold in Romalia- though winter's nearly here- but it should keep her warm enough. Your mom is in her work outfit, but that's fine.

"Are we ready to head out?" You ask.

"I'm ready!" Ishelda calls.

"So am I." Your mom says, looking distinctly uncomfortable. "So, er, how exactly do we, uh, do this?"

"Not familiar with teleportation?" You ask. She gives you an even look, and you just giggle at her. "Walk through the hole in reality."

"Where's the-" Ishelda cuts off as you form a hole in reality. On the other side, a busy Romalian street roars past. You don't hesitate- just plain walking through. Ishelda follows, and your mother spends a few long moments investigating it before carefully stepping through, making sure to stay away from the edges.

"It won't hurt you, mom." You say. "It's Ishelda-proof."

"Hey!" Ishelda says.

The three of you walk through the streets, and your mom's looking a lot more cheerful.

"It's been a long time since I've been back here."

"You've been in Romalia?" Ishelda asks.

"I lived here." Your mom responds. "Until I was twenty. You didn't know that?"

You did, but Ishelda shakes her head. Your mom laughs, and starts to tell the story where she first met dad, in the Dancing Dryad.

Eventually, the three of you make your way to the Tower. The mostly-glass structure is chock full of people, and it seems like there's a pretty busy crowd. Not nearly as bad as Cera's, but close. Ishelda looks like she's starting to panic- it's a lot busier here than anywhere she's used to. Mom takes her hand tightly.

>Continued!

>>737971
>it's fucking happening
>we don't have to wait another prolonged thread for this
Thank u jesus

>>737983
>Would I do that to you?
>Yes I would, but I always regret taking forever to do things

>>737971
The guard waves you through, recognizing you- and probably your sister's relation to you- by sight, and the three of you push your way through. Jasmine's other hand grabs onto yours.

"Hey, Jasmine?" Ishelda asks.

"What's up?"

"Where's your Implement?" She asks.

"Oh, it's right here." You say, handing the bag to her. "Can you hold it for me?"

"Er..." She stares down at the bag. "Don't you kind of need it?"

You give Ishelda a confident grin, and walk forward into the center of the room. You timed it just right, so as the crowd parts around you to accept you, the tower rings. It's loud- louder than before, it seems, and everyone's staring at you. Hundreds of mages, and nearly twice that many adepts, and many more civilians peer inward.

Murmurs start. They're noticed you're not wearing an Implement anywhere. Others recognize you from the newspaper. Some still are quickly asking the other observers who you are, and why the archmages are all here. You see Brun and Rathod, both waving at you.

The Archmage Yule- now wearing longer blue hair and a shorter figure- looks down at you. On the platform next to her is Archmage Sirius. As os an older woman you've never seen before and Archmage Haron, who gives you a cheerful wave.

"We have collected," Archmage Yule says, standing on her levitating pedestal. "Under the tradition of Romalia. An Adept, has created her very own magic. Welcome, Adept. If the sun graces you, you will leave this building a Magus. Your soon-to-be Peers surround you. They will judge you for your magic, and many will ask questions. Are you prepared?"

"I am, Archmage." You say.

Yule smiles.

"Then you may speak."

You take in a deep breath, and...

>?

>>738009
Explain the basic concepts as we understand them, and some of the history as a hermetic spell. Leave out the exact methods as they're "family secrets".

>>738009
>>?
"Ladies and Gentlemen, monsters have always posed a danger to our way of life. I have found a way to make travel safe and instantaneous - Teleportation!" wait for the murmurs to abate (showwomanship)
Explain it (without revealing all, because Mage secrets!).
Do it.
Wait for the applause.

>>738009
I have through extensive research of my ancestors notes and working with hermetic magic, created a way to teleport from one point to another instantly, moreover I can do this to other objects as well. I can do it astrally without an implement as well.

>>738017
Not sure if we want to leak out that we have hermetic magic working.

Rolled 4 (1d100)

>>738009
Start to dance.

Nah, just explain first how this works and then progress to the fun-stuff: demonstrations

>>738026
We don't need to say that we've got *all* hermetic magic working again. Just that this one explicitly was hermetic magic and now we've got it working again and understand it completely.

>>738026
>leak >hermetic magic
True. Our Implement-less demonstration should be wonderful enough.

>>738009
I am Jasmine Angwaz. Some of you may recognize my last name from the Journal of my ancestor Krital Angwaz. I am here today to prove that he was not crazy and everything he wrote about is true. I have rediscovered the Art of Dimensional Travel. *create portals on opposite sides of the room*

>>738026
We kind of don't. We have yet to actually buy up all the hermetic magic books so we can use them for research and if we tell them prices will sky rocket and people will get clingy to their books.

>>738049
This is actually pretty good.

Start singing the local equivalent of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air

>>738082
No. No songs to bother our Great Meow-ment!
>>738049
Nice!

File: certain doom.jpg (799 KB, 2860x2748)

799 KB JPG

>>738123
>Meow-ment

>>738123
don't you want to honor our fellow anons of /ma/?

"I am Jasmine Angwaz." You say, as is tradition. You put a bit of emphasis on your surname, since it's so infamous. "And, much like my ancestor before me, I have developed- or, perhaps rediscovered- the art of Dimensional Travel, through manipulation of the fabric of space."

The murmuring gets louder, but you continue without letting them ruminate on it too much. Instead you snap your fingers.

It exhausts you to stretch your astral magic so far, but you won't do this with your demon core. A large, whorling portal appears behind you. A gust of cold air washes in as the other end of the portal- the bright sky- turns you into a silhouette.

The murmuring stops, period, and there's a moment of complete silence.

"That's right." You say. "Krital Angwaz was not crazy, and everything he wrote about is true."

The murmuring starts up again.

"Primarily, my magic functions in two distinct ways." You say. "The first allows me to bore a wormhole in space- a portal, if you will. It is easier and more efficient with some devices I've invented." You snap your fingers again, and close the portal. Everyone's blinking the light out of their eyes, and you can't help but grin. "But of course, as this is an entirely new magic, I've developed and perfected my magic to such point that I can do it astrally, without any external tools."

It wouldn't do to have people ask you who built your Implement, after all- you don't want to give Kally the credit.

"The second way to travel is through direct teleportation. It quite literally transplants a portion of space with another, though it runs into some complications when you attempt to teleport liquids or gasses when they're not contained in an object."

To demonstrate, you blink from one corner of the room to the other, and then back to your starting point.

One of the magi stand. "What is the power consumption of your magic, Adept?"

"Portals require a constant input of mana, which can be done through dweomer, and this amount increases depending on the size of the portal and the distance between each pair. The smallest available size and distance costs a mere one mote per minute. But for a more realistic size- an eight foot diameter- and a useful distance... Say, here to the city of Tark... the portal requires sixteen motes per second, if done through a properly-designed orichalium and mithril arch."

The magi's eyes widen. Sixteen isn't much, especially for the effect, though the 'mote' unit system has a lot of problems with it.

Another mage stands, this one a grey-haired man. "And how do we know that your magic isn't trickery? There have been adepts like you before."

"Because it's real." The old woman- the archmage you don't recognize- says. Her voice is harsh. "I can confirm it, for all here. The kid's magic is real. Deal with it."

"Thank you, Matilda." Yule says. The other mages all seem intimidated, and some don't say much.

Another eventually stands.

"Does it have limitations? Distance, capacity?"

>Continued!

>>738172
>magi's eyes widen
stock value of transport caravans plummets...

>>738216
It's going to be dead when Ceru opens her mouth.

>>738172
Wasn't there something stopping us from opening portals bisecting people? Capacity is unlimited, apart from the diameter of the portal die to dimensional stresses which currently limit it to whatever. Distance is just proportional to cost (I don't think there is a limit). They can be closed by disrupting the edges or back, and by mithril of course.

>>738172
Matilda's pretty cool.
Let's buy her a drink after this.

>>738283
I think it had to do with the dimensional foam that creates the portal being soft and easily broken. So if you try to intersect it with something, it gives far, faaaaar easier than whatever the other thing is and ends up a waste of mana entirely.

"There are no limitations, provided the spell has the magic required. I have successfully opened a portal to the moon itself."

After adjusting the spell to function on a different reference frame, that is.

"It, er, kind of removed all of the air from my testing chamber," You joke. "But I've noticed no distance or capacity issues. Teleportation does get exponentially more difficult the more material or the further you intend to transport, but in those cases portals are superior."

More questions come up, and you shoot them down. Another mage complains that they have no kind of appreciable 'proof', but after you demonstrate another portal and let him walk straight through and back, the naysayers start to quiet down. Finally, the magus convene. They spend a short time convening, and one speaks to Yule.

Yule stands up, and steps forward.

"By the decision of the Council of Magi, Adept Angwaz, in this sacred tower, you have shown us a sight never before seen. Not only have you created a new spell, you have created a new magic. It is for people like you that magi are lifted. We welcome you into our company, Magus Jasmine. Please, stand and join us."

The floating pedestal, unlike most situations... doesn't move at all. Yule's grin grows.

A black sphere encircles you, and then you stand on the platform with her.

Finally, the ceremony is over, and people start to leave, but-

The bell rings again.

Everyone stops.

They turn back to Archmage Yule. Her teeth almost look pointed, she's grinning so wide.

"In this sacred tower." Yule says. "Rarely have magi invented spells of such power or utility to be a true force upon the world. Unlike the mere actions of man, honing a stone until it becomes a tool, Magus Jasmine... You have created your very own way of magic. A new Art."

She steps back.

"It is the decision of the Archmages of Romalia, in light of your magic, to declare you the Thirteenth Archmage."

Your grin grows as wide as hers, and it's hard to keep from cackling like a madwoman.

"Jasmine." She says. "Tell us the name of your art. Of your magic."

It would be a lie to call it just teleportation. It's not just about travel- but about the fabric of reality itself. With just the right applications of magic and force, you can create a pocket dimension. Expand or decrease the borders of a reality- even transfer from one reality to another.

"I will call it... The Art of Dimensional Magic." You say.

"Dimensional magic!" Yule calls. "Well, then. It is done! Welcome, Angwaz! Your ancestor's dream's come true for you!"

That's the moment the crowd explodes into voices.

Some time later, you, your mom, and Ishelda are sitting in a frozen yogurt store, despite the encroaching cold. Nobody's found the three of you yet, though the moment someone notices you there will be a crowd.

"I can't believe you're an archmage!" Ishelda says.

"I can." Mom says. "After all, she's been an archmage for a few weeks now, haven't you?"

"What?! What do you mean?"

>?

>>738317
They kinda tested me early on it. It was annoying and pissed me off. I asked them to withhold making it official until I got my magic down pat though. How'd you know Mom?

>>738317
...I'm starting to suspect that Mom's an Archmage, too, and very good at hiding it. Or works for one, which is probably more likely.

>>738317
>?
"I can't talk about the events leading up to it but essentially, yes. This makes it official to the world."
"I had to keep this a secret from most people, I'm sorry."

Would be best if we keep the test a secret from the public, the other Archmages wouldn't like it if it got out.

>>738336
>mom's an archmage too
Calling it now boys the rabbit hole is too deep

>>738317
"Well yeah. The archmages do their own thing, and this is just the formal announcement. But if I tell you about it, Ishy, then it won't work right if you make it too."

>>738317
I was secretly an Archmage the entire time. Thought I should wait until I became a Magus to announce it.

>>738317
Wait, is Cera here? I want to see the look on her face after this.

>>738336
>test
We aren't allowed to talk about that.

>>738371
Thought we were just banned from saying anything about how the test works?

>>738378
Better safe than sorry.

>>738365
Cera has witnessed us take her and several other friends to Shamash, transport an army across a country, and unravel an enemy's interpretation of our magic. She will not be surprised in the slightest.

>>738056
Right now they're mostly collector's pieces and archival library texts. Doesn't get much more expensive than that. Letting people know we have a way to get hermetic spells working would actually potentially drive prices down, as people are willing to copy out their spells in hopes of getting a fix for them.

>>738436
In Shamash hermetic magic is treated like it's worthless. The books themselves are priceless but the information is likely worthless to the owners.

"Yeah. The Archmages do their own thing, and this was just the formal announcement." You say. "I'm not really supposed to talk about it, but I've been an Archmage for a while."

"And you didn't tell me?!" Ishelda cries, and pouts.

"... Hey, how did you know?" You ask mom. She arches a single eyebrow, gives you a perfectly prim smile.

"The truth is, dearest Jasmine... I'm an Archmage myself."

"No seriously, how did you know?"

Your mom laughs. "Rathod told me. Let it slip, really. Seemed to think I already knew."

You huff. "That guy." You say.

"He wanted me to tell you that he was really sorry." She says, almost gloating."

Ishelda continues to pout. "You should've told me."

"Well, think about it this way." You say. "Now you get to brag to everyone about having an archmage for a sister. Before that, you would've had to keep it secret. And I know that keeping it secret would have killed you."

Ishelda sighs. "Yeaaah... I guess."

You just muss her hair and order her some more yogurt. You have more than enough money to feed a teenage girl- even all three of you, though you and Ishelda seem to have gotten your enormous appetites from your mom.

After all, you did get to personally tax the first trade between Helios and Shamash. The majority of it was honey, and similar materials that come from 'animal husbandry'- and you got to keep a few bottles of it, too. Though you didn't keep any of the wool.

"I'm very proud of you, Jasmine." Your mom says. "I don't know much about magic, but I know you worked hard to get to where you are."

You beam up at her, and she musses your hair for you. You feel your cheeks start to burn.

"Your father would have been extremely proud, too." She says. "He'd have been bouncing off the walls more than Ishelda ever has." "I'm sure he'd have done something stupid like climbed atop a building and yelled something embarrassing."

You giggle.

"Yeah, he probably would've done something like that."

"Wait, does that mean you're the youngest archmage? Ever?" Ishelda asks. "Because I don't think there was anyone who made it as young as you..."

"Kristoph, in Tark." You say. "He was an archmage at sixteen."

"What, really?" She asks, eyes widening.

"I mean, he did figure out how to make Mithril and Orichalium." You say. "And that's a necessity for magic nowadays."

"Oooh. Have you met him?"

You give her a wink. "He made my sword for me. I didn't even ask him to. I think he was trying to flirt with me."

Ishelda's cheeks go pink, and your mom just rolls her eyes.

"So, what are your plans now?" Mom asks. "Or are you going to rest on your laurels?"

>?
>End of the 'live' session, though I'll still be posting until the thread dies.
>But yeah! I'll be hanging around, and I'm also always on the IRC, which is #Exabyte on the Rizon server. I've also got a twitter at @futureexabyte

>>738588
Develop some fucking combat dweomers.

>>738588
> are you going to rest on your laurels
Hahaha
First I gotta teach Brun's mum how to hermetic magic. Then I'll work on my transportation company by setting up routes across Helios and sitting around other world for more trading partners from other dimensions. And there is always an evil empire or two to fight.

>>738588
Oh, and thanks for running. Was a nice session.

>>738588
Introduce Gareth to your family.

"I'm Going to discover new magics from other dimensions. Like one dimension has Druids and Warlocks apparently."

You know, for Brun's family I think we should give them the whole enchilada as far as Hermantic magic goes. They've been really good to us. We'll always be the experts as far as Dimensional magic goes, but there is far too much to Hermantic magic to just keep it to ourselves.

We can always simply ask them to allow us to vet people before sharing things out.

>>738588
I want to go exploring! There are so many new worlds, so many new magics!

>>738840
I'm pretty sure the agreement was that we give the fix to them for the express purpose of making their old combat spells work again. I think they'd need to clear it with Jaz before using it for other things.

>>738588
"flirt back at him?"

(jokingly of course)

Tell her that you have some obligations to keep now that you're magus, to people who helped on your studies, and then... who knows, we have a whole multiverse open to us.

>>738588
Set up as hipping company, learn more about hermetic magic, study the other world of doplegangers, Get Yule to fix someone's wing, and explore new lands.

>>738840
How about no. If they want more they have to marry into our fucking like everyone else to get our family secrets.

>>739207
*fucking family

>>739207
Aha, so you're suggesting we marry Ishelda off to strengthen the alliance with a foreign power! Her princess dream is coming true at last!

This is a joooooooke

>>739245
I'm down for it. Do you think she likes catgirls?

>>738588
>>>?
We have to keep our promise to Brun's family and make it possible for them to have working magic wards - this info only goes to their family head, namely Uldora. It's still our secret, but the Dalheims are our pals who will have to keep it secret too.

As a reminder from Threa 1 ---
Brun: "Not only to me." She says. "Even if most of our wards don't work anymore, this is the Dalheim family magic we're giving you. So in trade, this information goes to... Let's say, the Dalheim family head, and we'll be passing it down from head to heir every generation. That way, we can update our wards as we need to."

>>738172
Wait, do we know who Matilda is after her name is mentioned? Any hints?

>>737507
>instead of being crazier than a box of shadow ferrets
Krital was not crazy! He had things he wanted to do and be, so he did and was! Jeez, what's with this undercurrent of disdain for him, he was a genius.

Plus, the ragging? Demonstrates why I dislike how inclusive Exabyte is with write-ins and with characterization, it's completely out-of-character, Jaz has canonically gotten into fights defending her ancestor's honor, it's something she takes very seriously.

>>741594
Generally I like exa's style of pulling everything in. I'd much rather have a faster paced and inclusive quest than on which stuck to character 101% of the time.
>Plus, the ragging?
Can you point that out? I'm not sure what you mean.

>>741594
And she's also canonically rolled her eyes about how silly and nonsensical the man was, and called him out for a lot of his antics.

>>741594
Yeah. Krital was a genius, that doesn't preclude him being a crazy person who couldn't keep it in his pants.

What Jaz has always wanted to prove is that Krital's Journal was a true accounting of events. That doesn't change the fact that Krital was crazy to get into those situations to begin with.

>>741594
>>741563
What Jasmine hates is people calling Krital a liar. She's the first to call him out on the fact he's an impulsive fool with more libido than common sense, but she wants everyone to acknowledge that he was a genius as well.

On a different note, what's /ma/ saying right about now?

>>738588
>You don't get much done. Well, you barely get anything done. You do end up mapping out the major astrological changes - Vekar Major is entirely separate from the Shadow constellation, which must be why the 'shu' syllable in the ritual chants had been replaced with 'vak'... Or so you guess.
>You've essentially 'proved' your hypothesis that it's the changing of constellations that killed Hermetic magic, but you can't figure out how each hermetic component interacts with the stars at all.
>It's hard to tell, without a good ability to analyze everything. You have the information, but no matter what you do, you can't really fit it together.
The star rune will help with us understanding "how each hermetic component interacts with the stars" but wouldn't the knowledge demon fulfill the role of "a good ability to analyze everything" so couldn't we get started on reverse engineering hermetic magic.

>>738588
Hey Exa, what did Helios trade to Shamash for the Honey and Wool and such?

>>743217
>Oh, it's definitely exploded right now. Jazmine Angwaz is the new waifu of many an anon. Though there's always the small contingent of Yulefags. The /d/ Yulefags are the worst, because her magic makes some of that shit actually feasable.

>>743422
>They mostly traded ecu- it's nothing Shamash needs right now, but it opened the gates for them to do all sorts of legitimate trading, possibly hiring magic teachers or buying Helios goods like implements or technology.

>>743443
Does Yule post on /d/?

>>743443
Are the magic ratings in the pastebin our current aptitude in each magic?

>>743498
>They are, though it's an extremely rough measurement.

>>743505
Where would Jasmine's martial prowess fall on the scale?

>>743560
Better question, anon... Where would her marital prowess fall? :^)

>>743443
Are you telling me that Yule isn't the biggest poster on /d/ already? I don't know if I believe that.

>>743691
Probably X, seeing as she doesn't have time for it.

>>743769
She's starting to keep up with Brun in a swordfight. I'd say martial is a out a B. C at worst.

>>746054
Hey. Hey you. Psst.
Marital, not martial. "Swordfighting" with Brun would be a very different quest with a very different tone.

>>746062
She's already great at that sword of wrestling, I'm sure.

>>746101
Girls can't swordfight. They just don't have the proper equipment. Except in certain types of hentai and maybe Yule.

>>746110
She can borrow Thod's weapon.

Jasmine goes on celibate adventures!
Lewd Spoilers Begone!

>>746241
Reminder, Jasmine is into books only. Big, long, hard-cover books.

>>741376
>Matilda is the archmage Sirius went to go meet with, back during the fight in Shamash. Apparently he brought her back to Romalia. You don't know what it is she does or why she's an archmage at all- she's very secretive.

"Flirt back at him?" You ask, shrugging. Your mom laughs while Ishelda's cheeks go more red.

"Seriously though, there are some obligations I need to keep now that I'm a magus. Pay back people who helped with my studies, and I was thinking I'd build my own shipping company."

"A shipping company?" Ishelda wrinkles her nose.

"Hey, that's the closest thing I can call it." You say. "Set up portals between places, and anyone who goes through owes me a modest tax."

Your mother raises an eyebrow, but you just wink at her, and the three of you go back to relaxing.

As with all things, the trip ends, and you portal Ishelda and your mom back to Terra's Spine. Afterward, you find yourself going back to your Testing Chamber. B6 is still yours, for the time being, but as a Magus you're not technically speaking part of the academy anymore. You could still walk into their lectures- and likely become a lecturer- but you're not supposed to use their resources very much.

Thankfully, you'd already gotten Cera's help with your dimension. It's now much larger than the chamber, and you'd spent some of your new fortune on a bunch of sensory equipment for future experiments.

The testing chamber looks empty, without your things in it. The concrete walls are worn and scratched, where your experiments have had explosive results, and you spend quite some time lifting everything to make sure you didn't leave anything behind. Even if people spy a single scrap of paper, you know they'll pull all the information from it that they can. With a sigh, you cast a few dweomers to clean it, and then storm back out into the campus itself.

Now that you've made Magus, you owe Brun's family. More than you did before, even. They'd given you information on their wards- all of the hermetic magic they had- and even the few working versions they had gotten to function. In the end, you didn't end up using it for much, but you'd still made a deal to give the head of the family any information you'd discovered.

You're not someone who would make a deal and then lie about it. But according to the terms of the deal, you only really need to give them the things you'd learned from it- which isn't much. Logs of your experiments, the few applicable changes you'd gotten their spells to work with. Perhaps you could skip giving them the Star Rune, and just give them a copy of your logs of experiments.

But then again, Brun is a friend. Uldora got wounded helping you. In a way, they might deserve more.

Or, perhaps, you could use Knowledge Demon on the bunch- process everything you've found with the power of magic.

>?
>Also, feel free to decide what Jasmine's pocket dimension looks like. It's not enormous, but it is getting steadily bigger over time.

>>746567
Are we good enough at hermetic magic to give the family analytic versions, or versions of the spells for today's starmap? Let's keep the star rune, aka all of hermetic magic to ourselves for now

>>746567
We could use the Knowledge Demon to figure out a way to get all, or maybe most, of their hermetic magic working, without the danger of them finding out how our magic works. Brun and Uldora have been good to us so it's only fair we don't cut too many corners.

I also still want to dip into the biomancy book because being able to heal people seems like something that is pretty high on the list after what happened in Shamash

>>746567
Could we get their Hermetic magic working without giving away the secret of the Star Rune? If so I'm in favour of that.

We may as well use the Knowledge Demon on the bunch of notes, I can't see there being any harm.

In regards to the pocket dimension, I have no aesthetic sense so I'll leave it up to others.

>>746591
>You can't get hermetic spells working without the star rune. You could, conceivably, give them a spellcrystal that has the star rune and not tell them what it is, just that it'll get their spells working. If you use the Knowledge Demon, you still won't get them working- you'll just get them a lot closer to working.

Y'know what? I'm just gonna say it. Give them the Star Rune and all that, and let's not be a selfish goober. Somehow, I really really don't think they'll just start blabbing about it themselves; they have just as big a reason to keep it secret as we do. Seriously, we don't trust them or something?

>>746605
But it's ouuuuurs.

I'm willing to accept one of the initial offers of compromise that consisted of giving them an inefficient Star Rune as long as they accept an oath of secrecy.

>>746567
>>746598

Can make adjusted star runes that will only make specific spells work?

>>746598
I'm liking the spellcrystal idea honestly. As long as it allows them to update their old runes and continue to in the future, the bargain's as good as done in my eyes.

>>746652
Surely that would be simple to reverse engineer though? Can't they just observe the difference between the original and the new?

>>746605
Gonna agree with this guy. Just give them the star rune or at the very least an inefficient version. They've already sworn that it'll only be passed down the main line of their family.

>>746567

Just give them the star rune
You could just not tell them how it works only that it dose, but im explaining it and they did said they would only keep it in the fimaly

>>746598
How secret is the teleportation spell? Back when it worked our ancestor was the only one that knew it, right?

>>746705


I guess I wouldn't be opposed to letting them have the star rune, I would like to get this sworn to secrecy shit in writing though.

>>746567
>Or, perhaps, you could use Knowledge Demon on the bunch- process everything you've found with the power of magic.
I had an idea about that. Using the historical star charts we should be able to interpolate and extrapolate the star positions to any point in time. From there, we can do a binary search on each hermetic spell to find out exactly when they stop and start working (as well as track any attenuation in power). For extra credit, we can simulate star movement in different eras (e.g. putting Vekar Major back in the Shadow constellation while leaving the rest of the stars in their present position) as well as experiment with sparse star maps, virtual stars, etc. We ought to at least try and come up with a hermetic theory before giving anything away, if only so we can give them what they deserve.

>>746753
Agreed, if by give them what they deserve, you mean an analytical version of their hermetic spells.

>>746786
Probably depends what all we're able to learn, but as long as we give them something that won't stop working and won't give away any of our secrets it sounds like everyone will be happy.

>>746567
>>>?
Give them an unoptimised version of the star rune (they only need it for their family's magic wards) and swear them to secrecy. I think that would work.

It's not like noone could replicate our star rune idea in the future - and our allies should already have it. Their support in future wars (Infinite King and others) would be nice.

>>746753
This sounds like much work, very much.

File: pale wood white walls.jpg (150 KB, 1024x768)

150 KB JPG

>>746567
>what Jasmine's pocket dimension looks like
I could imagine her having an environment which looks kind of rustic (reminds her of her village home), lots of pale wood (Sweden), white walls and many drawers to put stuff in.

>>746891
>This sounds like much work, very much.
Perfect for a workaholic like Jasmine, then. Plus, we have Demons now, it's not that bad.

>>746753
This would a pretty good idea. If we can actually get some practice in modifying hermetic rituals.
I wonder if the solution to modifying hermetic magic is something like using calculus.

>>746567
I'll support >>746918 with something modeled on her home.

Can we set up a separate pocket dimension for experimentation?

>>746567
Give them the star rune. We owe it to them, fair and square.

>>747348
This. We made a deal, keep it fuckers.

Giving them the star rune is fine, since it will literally only be used by the head of the family and their immediate heir.
Jaz is an archmage now, and a friend aside. They're not going to do anything stupid with it.

>>747348
agreed

>>746567
I support this argument >>746891

I was thinking about how naughty!Krital wiped out all their monsters and how we might do the same. And hire awesome creation and destruction magic can be. We can't create an army of combat demons because we don't have whole world of mana at our disposal, unless we team up with Cera. Also, if Cera can create matter with momentum she could skewer whole groups of monsters at once, or just create a field of anvils and pianos to crush them. Then again if she can create chemical gases she could create clouds of poison or those gases that react explosively with oxygen.

For anyone in the thread still inclined towards Machiavellianism in regards to the Star Rune, Jaz is either a powerful friend, or a powerful enemy.

It's safe to assume that Brun's family is smart, being a large and old house in a business where the young and foolish die often.

They can either release the Star Rune, become known for breaking their word, make an enemy of at least one Archmage, benefit their own competition, and burn bridges in the process - all for an immediate payout.

OR they can keep their word, gain an long standing ally of at least one Archmage, be the only house around with working Hermeticism creating an insurmountable edge over their rivals, and continue to enjoy a steady increase of long term profits.

As such, I believe it's reasonable to assume that it is in their own best interest to stay in Jaz's good graces and keep the Star Rune secret as promised.

>>747591
I seriously am all for releasing the star rune to Brun's family. It was the spirit of the deal, we said that if we got hermetic magic working we would share that with her family. It was a big fucking deal for them to reveal family magic to us, even if it didnt work.

Anyway Jasmine's art is only tangentially related to hermetic magic and the diagrams for teleportation are complicated enough to make it very unlikely that anyone else will figure it out with out Krital's personal journals.

We also have a huge edge on pretty much anyone else with hermetic magic anyway due to the research of Charcoal, Oil, and Ink's family falling into our hands.

I don't think that Brun's family will betray the star rune at all, but even if it somehow gets stolen from someone it will take a long time for someone to fully reverse engineer how we use it and will be almost impossible for someone to reverse engineer teleportation like us without having a vast understanding of how the rune works and how teleportation works.

>>747360
I kind of doubt that.

>>747731
You do realize all of Krital's magic was hermetic as far we know. It was never "tangently related" like you think it is. That's part of the reason why it is a bigger deal than you think it is.

>>747844
Wow, great argument. You really convinced me with your kind of doubt.

>>747859
Please reread the post, and use your reading comprehension this time.
>Jasmine's art is only tangentially related to hermetic magic
>very unlikely that anyone else will figure it out with out Krital's personal journals.

>>747859
No one but Krital had the hermetic formula for Dimensional Magic. I'm fairly certain the formula isn't in the publically available Journals.

Therefore, coming up with the spell from scratch is just as hard with the Star rune as it is without. You're just making it for different time periods.

>>746567
We should give them the working star rune, but tell them 'it's a bit of a hack'. If I remember the full star rune will work with most hermatic spells, but the more efficient version stripped out stars that weren't used for that particular spell, right? So it won't work with other spells that used a different subset of stars. The best bet is to give them an efficient version with limited applications on other spells.

>>746567
>>Also, feel free to decide what Jasmine's pocket dimension looks like. It's not enormous, but it is getting steadily bigger over time.
Spartan and cobbled together! Lots of supports and struts holding out sections that had to be extended for haphazard reasons. Perhaps Jasmine needed an extra three feet over here when she was doing one experiment, and then a ditch for a psuedo-basement so she could crawl under something else. The whole place should look cobbled together into a barely functioning building supported only by duct-tape and fencing wire.

>>747873
>>747869
>implying knowledge demon wasn't krital's spell
>implying the translation spell wasn't his either
At least try to recognize what I'm saying. Also I'm going to vote against giving out the star rune at least until you guys actually put some effort into it to get a better understanding how hermetic magic works and handing it out would complicate things. First off the idea that this rune can make it so that all hermetic magic works makes it ripe for experimentation which will lock us out of valuable data if we just hand it out and, if someone figures out hermetic magic, the entire branch of magic itself. The second reason is we have no idea how it actually works, if it works the way I think it does which is it directly interacts with the universe to being about a desired result which would explain why the position of the stars matter, since the structure of the universe is a factor in the ritual, and why hermetic magic seems so goddamn arbitrary which would mean hermetic is more or less reality warping. This leads to my third reason which is could experimentation lead to dangerous shit and the answer is FUCK YES, if hermetic magic is functionally reality warping that could lead to someone else figuring out hermetic magic and becoming what amounts to a god, botching a ritual and causing a disaster that could threaten our world, or accidently figuring out an archmage's art.

So yeah I have a lot reason to be worried about handing out the secret to getting hermetic magic working at least until we figure it out how it works.

>>748215
>Knowledge demon actually wasn't Krital's spell. He might have found the book that contained it, but it was from some foriegn world. Gift of Tongues was totally his though.

>>748215
Someone experimenting with Hermetic magic is just as likley to accidentally create an apocalypse spell with or without the star rune.

Yes, the star rune makes it easier to try to figure out the particulars... If you can edit the star rune at all. Which you can't if you aren't apprenticed to Archmage Haron.

In addition. None of this is a problem so long as Brun's family keeps the star rune a secret which they have promised to do. They dn't very much seem like the types to try to study the underpinnings of the universe.

>>748215
>First off the idea that this rune can make it so that all hermetic magic works makes it ripe for experimentation which will lock us out of valuable data if we just hand it out and, if someone figures out hermetic magic, the entire branch of magic itself.

That would require Brun's Family to actually care about experimentation and know enough of Baron's precepts to figure it out. Even if someone managed to steal tge rune from them, they wouldn't be able to figure it out.

And how would this lock us out of Hermetic Magic?

>The second reason is we have no idea how it actually works, if it works the way I think it does which is it directly interacts with the universe to being about a desired result which would explain why the position of the stars matter, since the structure of the universe is a factor in the ritual, and why hermetic magic seems so goddamn arbitrary which would mean hermetic is more or less reality warping.

All magic is reality warping is some form. The fact that Hermetic Magic relies on some kind of cosmic vending machine doesn't make it any easier to figure out, otherwise someone would have by now.

>This leads to my third reason which is could experimentation lead to dangerous shit and the answer is FUCK YES, if hermetic magic is functionally reality warping that could lead to someone else figuring out hermetic magic and becoming what amounts to a god, botching a ritual and causing a disaster that could threaten our world, or accidently figuring out an archmage's art.

Even if I hadn't already debunked this argument with my previous retorts, the fact nobody has used Hermetic Magic on Helios to become a God refutes your point completely. The only people who became "Gods" with hermetic magic were the Infinite Kings, who did it without the Star Rune. They are the only people we should be worried about getting the Star Rune and if the Third King somehow got it from the Dalheims, then we have much bigger things to worry about.

Needless to say, none of your arguments hold any weight

>>748215
>The second reason is we have no idea how it actually works, if it works the way I think it does


Dude it isn't that hard to figure out, it is like running compatibility mode on a video game that no longer works on the new version of the OS.

Every dimension got updated to Universe Windows 8 and now we run on Universe Windows 10 but spells that used to work on Universe Windows XP don't work on anything newer, so we run compatibility mode with the star rune until we find out one that works.

It is slightly more complicated than that because we can tweak the setting a bit more than just compatibility mode to find a version that runs slightly better than last working settings. Basically we create a very confined area that still runs Universe Windows XP, just big enough to play Hermetic Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines, and the rest of the universe keeps working on Universe Windows 10.

Hermetic magic was explained earlier anyway. And we aren't giving this out willynilly anyway, we are fulfilling a deal with a powerful and old noble family that helped us out who has no interest in letting the secret to their hermetic spells get out. We have already met the person it will be passed on to and are best friends with the most likely candidate for the next head of the family (Brun) who I will remind you just went to war for us. I think we can trust her family with the basic star rune that they probably wont even be able to begin tinkering with.

If you don't understand our arguments for this you should probably go back and read the first couple of threads were hermetic magic, the star rune, and Brun and her family are talked about.

Something I'm curious about.
Is the star rune set to reverse the cosmos an arbitrary amount of centuries, or is it just set to emulate a fixed date from however long ago?

The main difference being that the first kind of star rune would eventually become inoperable once its internal clock rolls over the "hermetic magic stops working" event horizon in a few more centuries.

>>750809
Rereading from the archives, it seems to be based on two separate star maps, one being the newest one Jaz could find, the other being the oldest she could find. Since it can be assumed that there was a linear movement of the stars in that time (as in none of them were making corkscrew motion), Jaz could likely rig it up to have it be any point in time between those two, and with some more work, infer what it was even further back and what it will be in the future.

Also something I realized re-reading the first thread, Archmage Haron also totally has the Star Rune.
>Haron laughs at your expression, and he draws out a long, complicated logic array. He marks out a few locations, and then recreates the 'star' array you'd given him wrapped around it. He does it casually, without any effort, and he even scrawls a winky-face next to one of the 'secret' runes.

>>750902
Well, he also helped create the star rune, so it stands to reason that he could work out the missing bits.

>>750902
So he will be the first to die when we begin out purge.

>>748342
>The only people who became "Gods" with hermetic magic were the Infinite Kings, who did it without the Star Rune.
While mostly true, remember that the Infinite Kings use runes that runes to replace constellations. Their version of Star Runes just took a different development path.

>>751348
Umm... No.

The current infinite king just tried random runes and verbal components until he had a modernized Dimensional Magic spell.

I mean I'm sure there was more to it than that. It probably wasn't completely random, but the the runes that were in their portal were just modernized versions of the ones we use for our portals (except for one of them which was there to harden the dimensional foam.)

>>750902
>He doesn't- you made sure to mask exactly what you were doing with the array, and what he did mostly let you select the 'area' for the star rune to trigger. He might be able to use that array with thaumaturgy, but he doesn't know exactly what the thaumaturgy did.

>>751348
>They didn't use the Star Rune or any version of the Star Rune at all- instead they'd modernized the hermetic magic by making small modifications to hermetic glyphs and seeing if they worked. For years. The latest Infinite King was the one that finally got the Rift spell working.

>Slight terminology thing: Runes are specifically the symbols that control analytical magic. Consider them like 'functions' that can be called, programming-style. Glyphs are the big glowy buttons that you use on the pachinko machine that is Hermetic magic. Different glyphs and glyph arrangements can theoretically be used in different spells- the same squiggly shape might be important in both Spell A and Spell B, meaning that if you can find a 'modernized' squiggly shape, you're that much closer to getting both spells working.

>>746918
Looks fine.

So, what's the count - give star run or not?

>>752450
I'm all for giving an unoptimised version, to the head and to brun herself.

>>752450
I’m all for giving them star runes as a black box technology. Give them as many spell-crystals with the rune as they want, but make them in a way that they cannot reverse engineer it.

>>752916
This

>>752916
I like this approach

>>752916
>>752512
>>750902
At this point I think your all going a bit beyond cautious and into paranoid.

If anything, Burns family has shown itself to be trust worthy. Just giving the rune in its normal form should be fine.

If they try to fuck us over by selling the rune then we're free to whatever we want to them. We're Archmage, remember? We can probably find a way to banish their entire family to a different dimension,and nobody could do anything about it.


Spending time and energy on making spell crystals is pointless. The Dalheim family just want to get their own hermetic spells working again. Just give them the rune already.

>>753189
>>753414
Fine, Just give them the rune, retract >>752512

>>752916
This
>>753414
>>753189
You two do realize giving away the star rune comes with the legal headache of giving away the Huron's precepts right? Not to mention they don't need the star rune unless they're going experiment with it (which we don't want because if they figure it out they have free reign over all hermetic magic) all they need to know is how their spells work which will allow them to cast without the ritual.
>>750530
We understand next to nothing about Hermetic magic. We know the movement of the stars killed hermetic magic but don't understand what role the stars play beyond that. We know the glyphs and other components follow a pattern but don't know what is.
Really after figuring out the star rune we've been stagnant with hermetic magic even though it's clearly the most broken.
>>748342
All other magic is limited in how they warp reality.
Astral only works if you understand the magic.
Demons can't work with dweomer and vice versa.
And yet hermetic magic seems to have none of these issues so far. The only problem is it seems impossible to actually fully understand without some tool to isolate the variables which we invented with the star rune without which you are limited to being a monkey on a typewriter. By the time you think you have something figured out your rituals with have stopped working.
Hell you guys seem really intent on giving them what is the biggest breakthrough in hermetic magic in the history of the multiverse (mostly due to how ridiculously useful it is for research) and letting them do whatever they want with it. You guys don't even want to make them work under us as researchers as they will be the only other people with the rune, out of a lot of work due to being monster hunters in a world where teleportation is about to be made a reality, and keep taps on them and any breakthroughs they make while we're busy doing all the shit we have to do and if trust them so much with the ultimate research tool for hermetic magic then you should also be able to do research under you.
Seriously I might be paranoid but you guys are so stupidly altruistic and blind to any other ideas you can't even come up with a convincing argument of why we should just staight up hand them the rune especially with the legal issues when we could just hand them a black box.

>>753770
We're an archmage, and Haron, who is also an archmage, helped us with no limiting strings attached.
It was made with his precepts, but it's not his. If it was his, we'd have to talk to him about it directly.
Laws don't apply to archmage vs archmage disputes, and I don't think there's any dispute here.

>>753770
Besides. It doesn't give away Huron's precept. Huron's precept makes it super difficult for them to understand what the fuck the rune is doing.

>>753770
Hermetic Magic is limited by the fact that the inputs are incredibly random and finding even one functional ritual is akin to winning the lottery.

Even with the Star Rune you're still a monkey with a typewriter. It's just that you recognize the inputs.

>Hell you guys seem really intent on giving them what is the biggest breakthrough in hermetic magic in the history of the multiverse (mostly due to how ridiculously useful it is for research) and letting them do whatever they want with it. You guys don't even want to make them work under us as researchers as they will be the only other people with the rune, out of a lot of work due to being monster hunters in a world where teleportation is about to be made a reality, and keep taps on them and any breakthroughs they make while we're busy doing all the shit we have to do and if trust them so much with the ultimate research tool for hermetic magic then you should also be able to do research under you.

After deciphering that incoherent statement, I'm going to point out that the main reason that we intend to give them the Rune is because they have been loyal allies and friends. We don't need to keep an eye on them because we know they won't misuse the Rune and probably won't bother researching anything with it at all.

You haven't come up with a single reason to not do it that isn't blind paranoia. It's not altruism, it's keeping a deal and going a little above and beyond because we like the people we made the deal with.

If it really bothers you, then maybe we can ask them if they just want spellcrystals that allow for hermetic magic or the mechanics behind it. Knowing them, they'll just take the crystals because they aren't interested in the mechanics.

>>753770
>of giving away the Huron's precepts right
Not true, Haron himself said that his precepts are really just fancy ways of thinking about arrays that help you. There's nothing intrinsically new, special or unusual. Furthermore, we have no indication that it is possible to reverse engineer a precept from it's application. That's like deducing the existence of power drills after seeing a nut for the first time. Sure, maybe, but you're several steps and quite a bit of creativity removed.
>>753770
>Hell you guys seem really intent on giving them what is the biggest breakthrough in hermetic magic in the history of the multiverse
More like -you- seem to be the only person who actually cares. Jasmine has never, thus far, really valued about hermaticism except in as far as it got her more Dimensional Magic.

Instead of arguing against us doing things, how about you offer some coherant arguments for why we should value such a thing, and perhaps offer some practical suggestions for how to go about researching them?

I'll be honest here: I don't really care much for hermaticsm research. It is, as you say, very monkey on a typewriter. There's no guarantee that we're going to get anything useful out of it, and there's no rhyme or reason to even figuring out what we would want to get. From a player/quest perspective; it's boring! We could spend threads and threads making inroads, but all we get out is a tea brewing ritual. Whoo. Now I'm sure Exa would come up with something more interesting, but I'd much rather take the initiative and pursue something I am actually interested in in the here and now and steer the quest in that direction. I want to go explore the plane with Druids in it; because I have a hunch I know what druids can do, and with druidic powers we can do things like set up an orchid in our pocket dimension, we can learn more about other planes and make fancy honeys and export them for profit. or a million other, real, tangible benefits. The same can be said of biomancy, or any other magic that has some defining limits and some people we can talk to. Hermaticism is just playing the slot machine of the universe, and it puts the creative ball so far in the author's field that we're practically spectators.

So it might be a little unrealistic. But I'll take a narratively interesting story with flawed characters over a min-maxed protag with no narrative influence, nor texture.

>>755012
>A coherent argument why
Are you fucking stupid? The same reason Yule hasn't shared her biomancy shit, it's a competitive advantage.
> but muh trusted friends
Yeah, so was Kelly until she sold us out. And with our biomancy book we might just live forever. Can we really expect to be on good relations with their family forever. Even if we do die it will strengthen our family to a near monopoly on hermetic magic.
Lastly, Yule and the other arch mages have shown that it is standard operating procedure to steal new magics, it is only after you have shown that you can resist them that they relent. We managed to stop them getting our secrets but will Uldora?

>>755201
>Can we really expect to be on good relations with their family forever?

Probably, yes.

>Even if we do die it will strengthen our family to a near monopoly on hermetic magic.

Which they'll do what with?

>Lastly, Yule and the other arch mages have shown that it is standard operating procedure to steal new magics, it is only after you have shown that you can resist them that they relent. We managed to stop them getting our secrets but will Uldora?

Are you retarded? That was a fucking test you imbecile.

>>755303
>Which they'll do what with?
To play devil's advocate, there's probably something cool that someone down the line could figure out.

Could potentially even be Ishelda, if she wants to strike out on her own and doesn't want to be Jaz's apprentice.

>>755201
>>A coherent argument why
>Are you fucking stupid? The same reason Yule hasn't shared her biomancy shit, it's a competitive advantage.
A coherent argument why we should care to study hermaticsm. Not a crazy rambling insult-driven spiel about why we should keep things secret.

Please read before you post.

>>755303
> Probably yes
You can't know that, hence a conservative approach if keeping our cards closer, because we don't know the future.

> which they'll do what with
Increase/maintain power, stability, security. You know, the usual. Us not complicated.

> that was a test
No shit, the failure condition was that they took the knowledge of our art from us.

>>755355
You said
> how about you offer some coherent arguments for why we should value such a thing
Because you assumed that the only reason someone would want to keep a field of study secret was because they wanted to actively study it. Jealously hoarding it for future use is a viable strategy.

>>755797
And it's a strategy we're rejecting because we want to be nice to the people who have put their lives on the line for us.

Your arguments ultimately default to base greed and paranoia. While Jasmine can be both greedy and paranoid, she clearly trusts the Dalheims and has an agreement with them.

>>755797
Dude, the fucking Dalheims have fought for us, lost limbs for us, and given us a leg up in magecraft helping us get money hunting and securing specimens, fuck it was Brun that was vital in us even beginning to understand Astral magic due to her giving us access to her pen at the academy and helping us capture a specimen.

Not only that we promised, as in we swore to teach them to reactivate their family's wards. I don't think you understand how big of a fucking slap in the face it is for us to double back on this shit.

It could EASILY backfire on us in a hundred ways and drag our names through the mud with any mage family of worth. These people have shown themselves loyal to the point of risking their lives against a threat that very nearly killed the head of their family, who only came against it because we asked. They only want this secret to be passed down from one head to another. We know the head of the family and she lost her wings for us, and her daughter is one of our most trusted friend. Your paranoia and greed is far beyond what a reasonable non-sociopathic human would do.

I have a friend that is a legit Paranoiac, as in he wont sit in a parked car that doesn't have its back to a wall in case someone sneaks up on it. What you are saying sounds just like shit he would say and your continued arguments are just like his.

They will not be able to re-engineer the star rune, so we at least should give them spell crystals with it if not the entire basic array necessary to re-create its effects. I completely trust the Dalheim's, and guess what.

If they cross us, none of them have the knowledge or ability to kill us. All it takes is for us to teleport them into space one by one until they give up. We have spells that no one in our home dimension have access to. Plus a book on Yule's Biomancy.

>>753770
If this guy is this hyper paranoid about the Dalheim's I am pretty sure he actually hasn't read any of the threads until the last few and is just trying to power game into being another Dark Krital Angwaz or another Yule.

Sorry man, but you can just go in the archives that are posted and learn about what the character we are playing is like, and who our friends are.

Next thing you know he will be saying we need to kill Thod and Ishy because "They know too much, what if one of them got into our secret notes that we totally keep on paper and sold them! FUCK WE GOTTA KILL EM GUIS!".
Because he didn't know that we keep no paper notes just like he doesn't comprehend how fucking incomprehensible the star rune is, especially since they don't even have the faintest clue what it does or why it makes hermetic magic work.

For fuck's sake it is like giving someone in the 1850's a fusion reactor to run their steam boat and worrying they will reverse engineer it and run us out of business and kill our whole family with their Martian allies and death rays (which they would also have to find/engineer from scratch). Oh, also the steam boat captain is our best friends family and only interested in hauling shit up and down the river.

Then again with how paranoid you are I am willing to bet you think that the government secretly has fully functional fusion reactors they use to drill tiny receivers into our assholes every night with their legion of alien gnome lizards.

>>755900
>fully functional fusion reactors they use to drill tiny receivers into our assholes every night with their legion of alien gnome lizards.

That is a very specific example.

>>755949
And the star rune being re-engineered to outmarket and kill our entire family is a very specific conspiracy theory.

Figured I would counter crazy meth snorting derptard with equal levels of crazy as best I could.

Hell he probably thinks the bugs inside his skin are transmitting his super special thoughts straight to a data base that decides whether or not it is worth to send magic rays at him to destroy his brains compared to the magical tin foil arrays and orogone crystals he has stashed around his house.

"Can we affored to send that much reptillian lord demon magic against such an orogne reinforced Hyper Lord?!"

"I am sorry Grand Commander Sleecrank, we cannot afford to let such an Orogone dense Hyper King God Son of King Lord Huanze to exist with his chosen one powers!".

Honestly he seems like the kind of paranoid schizo that would believe that to be true

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787 KB GIF

>>756103
>>755900
>>755873

Well this whole thread got ugly quickly...

>>756172
Let anything cook for too long and it gets ugly, I blame time.

---
I would prefer people to condense thoughts into small easy-to-understand pieces. My guess: Walls of Text get skipped after two paragraphs, max...

>>756225
Yeah, I've been skipping them.

In short, I want to keep the Star Rune because I think Jaz being greedy/miserly about magic would be an interesting character flaw. Plus it's our stuff. The end.

I'm fine with giving the Dalheim what we owe them as long as we can keep teleportation away from anyone else and do get credit for making Hermatic magic working again if news gets out.

You pace through your new apartment. Well, by 'new', you mean that it's only newly-existing. Before Cera had her way with it, it was only a small pocket-universe with a few long bars of metal keeping it extended- but now, with your combined Arts, the two of you were able to combine forces to make a pleasant mansion- with Gates set into the basement for free use, similar magics to what runs Hellebore's prison, a rather extensive library and amazing bedroom, and after Cera had left, you even constructed your own secret room the old-fashioned way.

Finally, you stop. You're torn- The Dalheims- Uldora and Brun, at least- have been good to you. Even with Knowledge Demon, you haven't been able to do much with their notes. Hardly anything, in fact. But on the other hand, you do have the Star Rune...

But at the same time, you didn't end up using the Dalheim hermetic notes much to invent the Star Rune- you're under no obligation to give them the Rune at all. Not to mention, with Haron's help, the Star Rune might be considered secret...

You come to a decision.

You stop pacing, and pull out your Implement.

"Welcome, Archmage Jasmine." Haron responds cheerfully. "How has your first day as an Archmage been?"

"It's been pretty stressful." You say. "I owe some of the people who helped me get this far. I just wanted to ask you something."

"Shoot!"

"Do you remember that Array that you helped me with, on our first meeting? I recall you using one of your precepts with it. Would you mind if I shared the result with others?"

"Oh, I don't mind." Haron says. "Not at all- the Precepts are a method of thinking, not a particular design that I need to keep secret. Give it away as much as you'd like, Jasmine. Though thank you for thinking of me."

"Alright." You say. "I just wanted to make sure. I'll talk to you later."

"Take care, Jaz." He says- and a moment later. "And do try not to drag my apprentice into life-or-death situations before I'm done with him."

"No promises." You respond, and hang up. Next, you dial up Brun. The phone rings a few times before she picks it up.

"Hey, Brun, I need your home address." You say.

"What? Why do you need that?"

"... Remember the deal I made with your family?"

"Oh! Yeah, 'da will be pretty happy if you come through for him." She says. "I'll text you the coordinates. You can use that to just teleport over, right?"

"Sure thing." You say, and your Implement's screen chirps with some coordinates. The Dalheim ancestral home is really in the middle of nowhere- nowhere near Romalia, in the middle of a forest in the north. "Talk to you later."

You charge up the voidgem crystal you had Rathod make for you, powering the Gates in your pocket dimension, and with only a short spell, you open it- and stride right through.

>Continued!

>>756267
You forgot your trip :)

>>756267
>Also, this is me.

The grounds are extremely large, with high walls surrounding the place as it's nestled in a thick forest. The walls are covered in scratches and long gashes in the walls, but there are no holes of any kind. You walk straight through the portal, out of your pocket dimension, and straight up to the gate. You knock twice, sending heavy booms echoing across the grounds.

A dweomer flashes with light, and the gate opens. A young teenager- with a hefty rifle in his hand an Implement on his shoulder- looks down at you, frowning. He has red hair, so he must be a Dalheim as well.

"I'm assuming you request entry?" He asks, somewhat moodily. He doesn't seem to recognize you.

You sniff. "I need to meet with your family head. I owe him- and your family- a great deal, so I am here for that."

"Your name?"

"Archmage Jasmine Angwaz." You say.

He almost drops his gun in surprise.

You grin, and stride right in through the gates. The young man gestures toward the gate dweomer, and it closes. Your astral senses feel magic wrap around you as you enter- no doubt the wards that Dalheim is famed for- and the boy leads you into the house at the center of the compound. It's a rather exensive mansion, made out of dark wood and your senses are picking up quite a lot of spellwork, and you even notice some orichalium and mithril architecture in places.

"Gran'da?" The boy asks, knocking on a door. "You have a visitor."

"Bring them in!" The voice comes through the door, and the boy shrugs and opens it. He nods politely to you as you walk in, and closes the door behind you.

An older gentleman sits in a study, surrounded in dusty books and family journals. There's a huge, iron sword sitting on the wall behind him, above the window.

"Archmage." He says, grinning.

"Dalheim." You respond. You grin as well. "We struck a deal, some months ago, about helping me crack the secret of Hermetic magic."

"And did you?" He asks. "Did our materials help?"

"Yes and no, respectively." You say. "I did come up with a solution to get Hermetic magic working, but it didn't have anything to do with your materials. While I studied your materials as much as I could, they didn't help much, in the end. I had to come at the problem from an entirely different angle."

He raises an eyebrow as you pull out a rather thick booklet, ink still drying. The Knowledge Demon had written out everything you could analyze from all samples of hermetic magic you had, doing its best to crack the problem to no avail.

"This is everything I discovered, using your materials." You say. "It's not much, but it's better than nothing."

He takes it, and flips it open. He pours through for a few moments, and then closes it and sets it aside.

"... And this," You say, gut coiling as you hand him a flash drive. "Contains the analytical spell array I've taken to calling the Star Rune. It is... Well, it's the shortcut. A bit of a hack that gets all hermetic magic working."

>Continued more!

>>756286
The old man looks down at the flash drive, and plucks it up. He gives you a cautious expression. "And this, you came up with without any of our materials?"

"Yes, other than using your spells to test it with." You say. "But I'm giving it to you anyway."

He stares at it... And then hands it back to you.

"Then I have no need of it." He says. "It's outside the deal. My family are not beggars- we will not take something we have not earned."

You grit your teeth, feeling a bit angry.

"But Brun and Uldora- they've helped me. Fought with me, lost limbs for me, and have given me more help than I ever asked for."

He looks down at the flash drive, and he seems to be considering something.... "No." He says, and pushes it back into your hands. "Thank you for your consideration, but we have no need for this Star Rune. My daughter and granddaughter are wonderful people, but I doubt they helped you in the name of our deal."

Then he grins. "If you really feel you need to repay us, then when you finally start that company you plan to, put a Gate on our grounds somewhere. I would really like to see my grandchildren some more, you see."

You grin, and pocket the drive. "I'll see what I can do. Speaking of which, I never, uh, got your name."

"Ludolth." He says. "Ludolth Dalheim, Magus and family head."

"It's pleasant to meet you."

"You as well." He says. "I'd never thought I'd see an Archmage walking in like you just did, Jasmine."

You quick an eyebrow. "Perhaps it'll happen again."

You make your way out of Ludolth's study, and the boy escorts you back toward the gates.

"What's your name?" You ask him, as the two of you walk.

"Er... Kathen, mis- er, Archmage Angwaz." He says, looking a bit nervous. He keeps eying you when he thinks you're not looking, and his cheeks go a bit red when you meet his eyes... Which you do specifically for the reaction, once or twice. The boy's only a few years older than Ishelda, though he's already much taller than you.

"Thank you for opening the gate." You say. "My business here is done."

"... Er, feel free to come back at any time." Kathen responds. You nod- and teleport away.

Now that your debts are paid, your job is done, and your magic is solved... You're free.

You have your entire future ahead of you- now you just need to decide where to go with it.

>?

>>756291
Try and get our business going. Work on our familiar and shaman magic with Gareth and maybe ask Uldora to help. Also ping Yule about healing Uldora's wing.

>>756291
>?
Now may be a good chance to have a look at the biomancy book. Healing people! Then there's the company we're going to need to start up so we don't have money problems later, also the honey trade with Shamash and I think we should prepare for a trip to that advanced tech world.

Kathen might have some fun potential.

>>756267
Work on the trading company, slowly branch out to other dimensions with the long-term intention of setting up a protection network as a counter to the Bizarro-Angwaz Empire. A loose alliance bound by a inter-dimensional trading guild, information and coin should flow freely. Willful cooperation vs. tyranny.

>>756291
Need to continue our work on familiar bonding at some point. We're still not all that great at that branch of magic and Gareth deserves the best.

>>756297
Also find a competent administrator to handle the day-to-day so we can focus on the magic. We're going to need a staff.

>>756291
Spend more time trying to study counterspells.

Maybe with greater understanding of how souls form magic and how soul cores are created we might be able to crack the issue we had with the knowledge demon as a means for counterspelling.

>>756291
>?
I’d still give them a deal on the spell-crystals, custom fitted for each ward. They provide the materials and Angwaz programs them. Just as a thank you gift.

Similar to how we got that mithril swords just because that guy liked us.


--------------

Unrelated paranoia post: Before starting our research we told our university adviser about our theory that hermetic magic does not work because of the stars. We talked about it for a while, and shortly after made a huge break-through. He may not realize it yet, but once someone researches the history of Angwaz the Archmage, it will certainly come up, especially once it becomes known that we can easily use hermetic magic (which is also still relatively secret).

Do we want to do anything about that?

I think the best approach with regards to Hermetic magic would be to create a unified theory of Hermetic magic, so we could reliably convert hermetic spells to analytical.

This would allow us to control the release of Hermetic spells to the world better, and do things like making old hermetic spells working again as favours for our Arch-buddies.

Old man Dalheim best Granddad.

>>756291
Biomancy!

>>756291
Ludolth, good one. He surely has our gratitude.

>?
Concentrate on our Company + Interdimensional Trading Guild (like >>756297 suggested) sounds good.

Want to insta-travel? Portal Fee!
Want to trade between dimensions? Jasmine Tax will get you!

And then we can go visit that super-tech world.

>>756299
Make Gareth Great Again! Let him train his magic?

>>756320
>paranoia post
Hm, the adviser has to vanish? Maybe we can offer him a job - in another dimension?

>>756523
Too dangerous because of Yule? Maybe secretly...

>>756286
>The walls are covered in scratches and long gashes in the walls
Someone gets monster visits often...

>thick booklet, ink still drying
>flash drive
Sure jump in tech level there.
Possible reason he declined: Has no laptop. :)

>>756732
>Well, books are traditional for magic knowledge. Ebooks exist, yeah, but they're less personalized and too easy to copy everywhere. They also last a lot longer, long-term. While Implements are digital devices- it's a lot easier to just insert a flash drive and download the array than it is to scrawl down the entire spell and have someone else input it manually.

>>756286
>Get started with business
And with negotiating high-paying oneshots, like say, negotiating Archmage Sirius' help with some city out out in the boonies. We'd get a really nice fee for finder's bonus and travel, while doing very little work ourselves.

>>756325
Well duh but in order to do that we'll need data we could start by modifying the Dalheim family magic to be functional then hand them back the fixed versions. Also on a sidenote I want to see if we can modify our art so it can replicate things even mana. Especially mana. In theory it should be possible because noneuclidean geometry says it's possible.

>>756291
Start the business up, then get lost between dimensions while trying to find more trade goods.

Also find more catgirls for fun and profit.

>>756291

So my being this late it winds up being more of a summary of everything else everyone already suggested, buuuut:

>Discover how Hermeticism works reliably enough to convert to Thaumaturgy
>Continue on the business front to reliably and safely transport people and high value items across Helios
>Continue on the interdimensional business front to import products not easily available on Helios such as honey
>Continue on the interdimensional exploration front to find new peoples, new magics, and also catgirls.
>Upon discovery of catgirls, begin construction of catgirl harem.

>>757646
We've already discovered catgirls. Kanna was one of them.

>>757796
We discovered a few catgirls. We require additional sources.

>>757858
Shamash has all the cat girls you need. You just aren't looking hard enough.

>>757875
WE NEED ENOUGH TO MAKE A BED OUT OF THEM

And so it was that the girl who would take the cosmos and crown herself it's queen, abandoned her path that she may form a bed out of catgirls.

Or not, I vote company.

>>757796
Just one
>>757858
This is the truth
>>757875
There are never enough catgirls.

So, no one up to helping our friends as per >>756320 ?

I’d at least offer to make some crystals for pay.

>>758551
Lighten up, we can still be an ultra-rich Archmage Overlord of the Cosmos and still have a pocket dimension full of our catgirl harem. :P

>>759387
Can't we have like a catBOY harem and not be a lesbian?

I mean I am not sure Jaz is the type to assemble a pocket dimension prison harem, but we could at least make a hetero/pansexual one.

Would probably be better to just find a nice prince to settle down with or another powerful mage. I mean hell, not like Kristoph hasn't shown interest in us and been almost showering us with gifts.

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>>759421
Catgirls can be male too, you know.

I'd rather chase cat girls and blushing Dalheims some other time.
It's time to get the business started. We have some more money now, right? Let's start with buying a couple of buildings in Tark and Romalia. And we need to find some trustworthy employees as well.

>>759421
Wasn't it established - story-wise - that Jasmine only loves books?
I see no reason to include romance in our interdimensional adventure.

>>760150
No. It wasn't. there's been a few anons that want her to only love books, but she hasn't been canonically declared asexual.

>>760210
She has some interest in men at least, maybe even a bit for women too, she's just more focused on learning currently.

I wouldn't mind Kristoph as a suitor, he's smart and likeable.

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>>760230
>Kristoph

>>760310
What's wrong with that?

>>760351
I had the impression he was way older than us. If I'm wrong, still gross. I'd rather go with Neloch, and I don't like him much

>>760366
He's about 4 years older than Jaz.

>>760366
>Kristoph is in his mid-to-late twenties. 26 or so. He made Archmage frighteningly young- almost a decade ago.

>>760150
>>760230
>It's never been established exactly what Jaz's personal taste is. The book thing was just a joke from Rathod. Though she has had experience before, but nothing serious.

>>760402
Experience?

>>760638
Probably went on a few dates or had some flings.

>>760638
Jasmine being in a dry spell was mentioned earlier, so take from that what you will.

>>760646
I took from it that she was too busy lusting after Cera's flesh stilts to go after anyone more obtainable.

>>761499
No dude, she legit fucking hated Cera. The little bit of flirtatiousness was just a joke to mess with her after we became a bit more friendly.

I don't think she has any major romantic interests at the minute but isn't pansexual. She just got really REALLY busy working on her thesis which as someone who has known grad students and finished a biomed bachelors I can totally relate to a massive dry spell as you are finishing your degree if you don't have an established boy/girlfriend. You aren't going to go out slut-rustling when you got that much work to do.

>>759430
Yes ofcourse, that is why I said Catboy harem. Then again what if we get pregnant with a litter of kittens 0_0

>>763258
Then we do the same thing we did to our previous problems: shove them into a pocket dimension and forget about them.

>>760402
I read that as her having Romantic Experience with books.

>>763242
Haha, you don't have much experience with people do you. Her antagonism is clearly due to embarrassment, shame and denial due to a deep seated attraction. Note her constant referencing, both mental and verbal, of notable physical attributes, it's almost a fixation. Also the reduction in vocabulary and sentence complexity when talking with Cerax, implying an acute distraction.

Note also how you refer to social activities with romantic aims as "slut-rustling", pointing to discomfort, inexperienced and self induced shame associated with sexual activities.

>>764030
You’re over-thinking this. She may or may not be attracted to Cera, and that one time the both of them woke up cuddling may or may not show that they both like each other physically now. They do. And that anon may or may not be inexperienced in such matters. Of course anon is. This does not mean, however, that her antagonism was in any way related to denial of some nebulous deeply rooted romantic attraction.

There were plenty of reasons for the antagonism, reasons stated within the text. Conflicting interests, competition, and strong, rough opposed personalities escalating over years to the state it was in at the start of the quest. Your belief that only some veiled homoerotic tsunderesque undertones could explain your observations just highlights your own limited world view, not any deeper truths about Exabyte’s characters.

Not saying that we necessarily have the whole picture as readers, or that is impossible for Cera to have been attracted to Jaz in the past.

Exabytes quests have always left romantic decisions entirely to the playerbase, including interspecies let alone specific genders.