[open] // do what we must because we can

[fionnuisce]

Characters: Waver and open
Setting: Floor 27, cafeteria, dorm floors
Format: Either
Summary: Tea, science, and sleep are Waver's priorities. In that order.
Warnings: None yet.

[floor 27]

[Waver had spent the majority of his time in the laboratory; being the leader of the group researching the clear collar fluid, he might have felt obligated even if it didn't fascinate him. Luckily (for some value of the word), he was a researcher that often became utterly absorbed in his work to the point of forgetting everything else. 'Minor' things like sleeping and eating, for example.]

[Though he hid it the best he could, if the ponytail-wearing magus looked exhausted that was likely no one's imagination. Today he was looking over his own hastily-written notes and narrowing his eyes at the container of fluid itself as though it had perhaps insulted his mother, thin cloud of cigarette smoke hanging in the air in front of him.]

[cafeteria]

[It was a remarkably simple thing, tea. Last time it was available, Waver had taken quite a bit of it to store in his trunk (along with a whole lot of alcohol.)]

[Then, glamour failure. If asked for one petty thing Waver would never forgive the administrators for, he would always answer with that.]

[Needless to say, he'd finally dragged himself away from his work long enough to enjoy the shift in provisions. Today in the cafeteria one could find a magus in a black and green suit sitting by himself, looking over near-incomprehensible notes with a cup of tea in his hand.]

[And if one happens upon him in the evening, it's likely he's minding his own business and leaving with a bottle of wine or two, liquid mercury maid trailing a step behind him.]

[dorm floors]

[Only at some ungodly hour did Waver finally give up for the night and leave the laboratory, Volumen Hydragyrum behind him carrying two bottles of wine. If he was willing to stop at all, it was likely he'd reached his physical limit or damn near to it. Sure enough, it had been several days since he slept a full night--or slept, period. As a result Waver was pale and walking just a little unsteadily, but at least he didn't seem ready to drop dead.]

[Drop into a coma when he got to his room, sure. But not drop dead.]

Comments

[fionnuisce]

There's nothing of pressing importance I'm doing at the moment. You're welcome to sit down if you like.

[Waver set down the cup of tea, reaching into his pocket and producing a vial of mercury. If Diarmuid trusted him, it didn't really seem like any risk to talk about his Mystic Code.]

I wouldn't mind your name first, since you seem to know mine.

[savedbyasong]

[He sat down and grinned] Oh, I'm Shion, it's nice to meet you. [He looked at the mercury with interest]

[fionnuisce]

Likewise, it's a pleasure. As for this, it's called Volumen Hydragyrum. I can control it using magecraft and incantations--a little willpower usually helps, too.

[savedbyasong]

So it is more magic than science? [He looks at it carefully, he has never heard of such a thing before]

[fionnuisce]

Where I come from, the line between those is a little unclear sometimes.

...Did you want to see it activated? [Waver wasn't often one to show off, but Shion did seem curious.]

[savedbyasong]

Yes please! [He only needs a tail to finish off the eager puppy look] There was no magic where I came from at all

[fionnuisce]

Is that right? It's something of a secretive matter where I'm from, but even so it's hard to imagine not having it at all.

[Waver shrugged his shoulders, indifferent as he opened the vial and poured the liquid mercury without a second thought.]

Fervor mei sanguis. [It responded at the Latin incantation, twisting and shaping itself into a featureless spherical shape behind him. At a few muttered words and a vague hand gesture, the silver material folded and twisted itself into a specific form; the general silver silhouette of a girl in a maid's uniform.]

How's that?

[savedbyasong]

[He recognises the sounds, though he doesn't understand the words. His eyes widened at the silver girl, he is clearly impressed] Hello [He speaks politely to the figure before grinning at Waver] That's amazing, how do you do that? Is it the substance itself or can you do it with other liquid metals?

[fionnuisce]

It's a little complicated--the technique was designed to work with liquid mercury, so I doubt it would affect other metals. As for how, I inherited this from my predecessor and learned how to use it primarily through documents he left behind. My elemental affinity is water, so it's not all that difficult to exert some level of control over liquid.

[savedbyasong]

[He nodded] And does it have some movement of its own or do you have to dictate every part of it? Are you the only person who can use such techniques if you learned from these documents? Are there other elemental affinities? I assume you are talking of the idea of elements as water, fire, earth and air and not the actual periodic elements, right?

[fionnuisce]

[woah shion cool it with the interrogation, he's trying to keep up]

It doesn't have a will of its own or anything--think of it as a puppet, more or less. Volumen Hydragyrum is a pretty unique weapon, so I'd say I'm probably the only one that can use it. And yes, I mean those elements exactly. It's not uncommon to have an affinity with more than one, but it's more likely a magus will specialize in just one element.

[savedbyasong]

[But science! Or magic! Knowledge anyways!] So can it fight? Can if take the form of weapons? Are there any others from your world he... wait Archer is from your world isn't he, Diarmuid knew him. Is the magic you use different than the magic Diarmuid can use, that makes him walk at speed, or Archer, neither of them mentioned anything about elements but it's not like Archer ever explains anything to me. [Slight frustration there] Do you mind if I write this down?

[fionnuisce]

Not at all, go ahead if you like. Regarding this, it doesn't change into anything like a sword, for example. What it does is shift into something sort of like a whip or a blade and strike that way. It can be a hell of a shield, too. I can command it to attack or defend with specific incantations, so the drawback is mainly that it can't be nearly as effective if I can't speak.

[Waver sighed, the silver maid politely folding her hands behind him.]

Anyway, Servants are structurally different than human magi. They are in themselves, basically comprised of magic. Putting aside whatever backwards logic the Tower works on, in concept Servants aren't able to exist without drawing on magic energy from a Master through the passive spirit link they share. Someone like Archer would require absurd amounts of energy to support, while a Servant like Diarmuid takes remarkably little in comparison.

[Speaking with the textbook tone of a professional lecturer, Waver continued. It seemed he'd slipped into his element at some point, as he was oddly practiced with this sort of thing.]

What you refer to specifically is a series of parameters all Servants have--Strength, Endurance, Agility, Magical Energy, and Noble Phantasm. They're ranked from E to EX, with EX being the highest. Some, like a Saber or a Berserker, have high Strength or Noble Phantasm statistics; that is to say, they specialize in brute force and a powerful signature weapon. Diarmuid, on the other hand, is of the Lancer class, and they are almost invariably hailed as the most agile. His statistics are low to average, but his Agility ranks somewhere around A+, and that's what grants him the speed you're talking about.

[yes, it really is all measured this way.]

So when comparing two Servants in capability, it often comes down to a matter of statistics. Theoretically, someone like Archer with an absurdly high ranked Noble Phantasm could and likely would defeat Diarmuid in a straight fight. But even so, with his Agility ranking I doubt he would make it easy for Archer to actually hit him. Does what I'm saying make sense?

[savedbyasong]

[Shion wrote furiously, he could easily remember all the information under normal circumstances, but with the latest attack on his memories he needed to record it all. He nodded] It does, it's really interesting. I don't understand what Noble Phantasm is though. [He had at least heard of the others and could put them into context] The energy comes from the magi right? So the magi has to be strong in order to support a servant such as Archer?

[fionnuisce]

A Noble Phantasm is a Servant's signature weapon--occasionally it's possible to have several, but most have only one or two. You know, things like King Arthur's Excalibur or to use Diarmuid as an example again, Gae Dearg and Gae Buidhe.

Basically, it comes down to how much energy a given Servant uses in battle. Diarmuid's Noble Phantasms are passive effects, not some grand techniques like Archer's. Having a weaker magus as a Master would mean Archer could only use his Noble Phantasm once, if that. It'd be an enormous disadvantage.

[savedbyasong]

Unfortunately Shion lacks most cultural references, so has no idea what Excalibur is, but he understands the concept though, sort of. And writes it all down.

"I understand, so it is a team effort, both the magus and servant have to be strong in order to succeed."

[fionnuisce]

That's the essential concept of it, yes. A weak magus could in theory just brute force the whole thing with a physically stronger Servant, but that Master would still be an enormous weak point for them both.

[savedbyasong]

[He nodded] So it is a balance, finding the best pairing for a team. [He continued to write] Diarmuid mentioned that Archer was from a slightly different world than him, do you know how many worlds there are with a system similar to your own?

[fionnuisce]

I'm afraid I'm not sure. The operation of parallel worlds is sort of a field of study all in its own where we're from. There could be any number of them.

[savedbyasong]

"It's a field of study? So it is something that existed at least in concept?" He blinks, another thing that was not thought of in his own world.

[fionnuisce]

Kind of. At the very least, it's a concept acknowledged as existing. We call it Second Magic, and it's categorized as True Magic on the level of a miracle. Magic and magecraft like this- [he gestured to the mercury behind him] -are two entirely different matters.

[oh christ here we go]

[savedbyasong]

"Second magic?" Shion wrote that down and began another set of notes. "So is that all first magic?" He hadn't thought of alternative universes like a magic before. "Do they have any idea of how it would work?"

[fionnuisce]

No, it's rather complicated. First Magic is something even I'm not sure of. Second Magic is the operations of parallel worlds, and Third is the ritual that involves Servants. There are two more, but they're not quite as important. The five True Magics are all generally aceepted as being what one would call 'miracles', while magecraft is the everyday spells and thaumaturgy a magus uses in general.

[savedbyasong]

"So summoning a servant is considered a miracle, and other magic such as your mercury maid are considered as everyday magic?" He nodded, still writing. "Does no one know what first magic then? Or is it just something you have not studied yet?"

[fionnuisce]

Servants are something of a gray area--it's more to do with the Grail, and all that is on the whole considered a ritual involving Third Magic.

[Waver took a breath, beginning his careful explanation.]

The First Magic is generally believed to be lost--all I do know is that it's related to bits of Ether, or 'materialized nothing'. It's a difficult concept, even the best magi would be hard pressed to explain in detail.

Second Magic is, as I said, the operation of parallel worlds. To my knowledge, only a Magician by the name of Kishua Zelretch Schweinorg has mastery of it--it's said he uses it to travel between worlds at will. Zelretch himself is a strange individual, but obviously one worth admiration to be as skilled as that.

Third Magic is...complex. Simply put, it's summarized as 'materialization of the soul'. My understanding is that it makes the practitioner effectively immortal; Servants and the Holy Grail War are all more or less part of a ritual to actualize this magic.

Fourth and Fifth are difficult to explain, as not much is known about them at all. I hear it's agreed upon that Fourth Magic exists, but no one seems to know in what way or what it is meant to accomplish. Fifth...I'm actually not certain of Fifth myself. I've heard in the past only one line of magi were able to create or utilize it, but there isn't much I know past that.