Ofuda, Tobacco, and broken furniture

In which June has issues trying to crack the barrier to new magic.

June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June is apparently having a rough day, or one can assume she's having a bad day. She's outside a tavern, most of the outside tables have been broken, there is scattered paper, scattered beer mugs, and a very grumpy looking barbarian queen cosplayer puffing on a kiseru and drinking beer staring at a caligraphy box and muttering to herself.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

Uta is... passing by, head buried in a tome. She's in a basic menu-crafted peasant's dress; as it is typical for people in a strange mood, she has large bags under her eyes, her stomach grumbles so loudly that people could hear her coming from a distance if her offensive odor hadn't given her approaching away already.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

(Also, she's covered in slime goo -- and her dress is all frayed and damaged)
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade has just come in from a series of noob quests in the area, and having turned them in, is looking for a place to get a bit of a drink and take a load off her feet. Water and soggy crackers sounds good after spending all morning working on an appetite, and she'll make her way over to the wrecked cafe, though her look grows thoughtful as she sees the condition it's in. She takes in Uta, who looks as if the same thing has happened to her, and sighs. "This is gonna be interesting."
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June puts the finishing touch on the caligraphy on an ofuda. She blows on it and lightly sands it. Then she picks it up touches the corner of the paper to the burning cherry of her kiseru. The paper flaring up and burning to her fingertips. "Son of a burning ..." she continues, saying things that are probably sacralige in Lander society. And then what happened to the other furniture becomes clear as she picks up and smashes her chair against the wall, and then ground all while yelling obcenities. Then she suddenly stops when she notes Uta "Hey Uta." she says in a plesant tone that doesn't match the fragments of chair left in her hands.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

As Uta approaches, it becomes clear that she is humming a tune under her breath. No lyrics, just a melody. But she repeats it obsessively.

Until, that is, she is greeted by June. "Hm? Oh. Hi, June!", she says, and returns to look down at her book. The destruction doesn't seem to bother her a little bit.

A second passes, and she looks up again. "Oh, wait. That table...", she points, then hesitates. "...I could really use a table. I think that after thirty books I am going to have trouble memorizing anything more -- might want to put this book somewhere I can look at it, along with three or four more, and then start writing down something. I could use a writing surface."

She does not even seem to acknowledge Goldenblade for the time being -- but people who have been around her know that she has been doing this a lot of late: fail to greet people, which is highly unusual for her.
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade blinks at June suddenly smashing furniture, and she calls out to June, "What is this, The Who? You don't look like Pete Townshend..." the guitarist famous for smashing his instrument on the amps and drum kit. She always wondreed about My Generation, too. They were a bit younger than her, but were they complaining about her or her parents? She was kind of in-between.

She peers sidelong at Uta, in her own obsessive state, and says, "I think she's low on slimes. We need to get her one, stat. For now, let's just get a bag of rags or something and set it on top of her head? Maybe that'll be close enough?"
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

"Hmm?" June says to Goldenblade "Never been much of a Who fan really... I kinda prefer poppunk?" she drops the sticks "Uta sweety, I love you and I want you to know this is for your own good." she takes the book and sets it on her table. Then tosses the spriggan over one shoulder and walks to the nearest rain barrel before stuffing her inside. "Use the menu. Select the bathe option." she says dunking the Spriggan. "When you do, you can get out of the barrel, then we're going to eat something until I can't hear your guts, deal?" she says sweetly.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

There is a splash, and there is a drenched spriggan. June's approach to Uta seems to have been spot-on: the latter navigates through her menu (not without mumbling -- but that's a small price to pay), and moments later, she's already tapped her menu bathing option, along with menu laundry, while she's at it -- might as well do both things.

Once hygiene has been taken care of, she clambers out of her barrel, and if June lets her, she'll stand right next to it, dripping wet. "..." A second of thought, and more menu navigation happens. She materializes her staff, intones a song, and as a result, the gem and handle of her staff lights up in sync with her music, tendrils of light flowing downard from the jewel, down to where the tip touches the ground.

A runed circle light expands outwards from the tip, on the ground, and as the breezy aria continues, a gust of air blows up from the summoning diagram. Uta has to quickly push down her skirt, in a reenactment of that iconic scene from The Seven Year Itch. In Uta's case, however, there is no risk of decency being violated -- her 'underwear' consists of poofy white pants that reach down to her ankle...
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade gets a whiff of Uta just before June takes action, and she makes no objection to that. "Ugh," she blinks. "It smells like Egypt here, as the Navy guys say." In the desert, water may be scarce, but June demonstrates that's not the case here. She nods approvingly as Uta navigates her way through the menus, then will help her from the barrel. She smirks at Marilyn Monroe's scene - mentally mapping Monroe onto Uta amuses the hell out of Goldenblade, who remembers that scene quite clearly. "Alas," she says to Uta with a wink, "Gentlemen prefer Blondes." If we're going to have a nostalgia moment.
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

It has been a long day doing escort quests, and Jimmu - above all else - wants a nice, quiet place to sit and something to drink, even if it doesn't taste like much. His light, leather-reinforced tunic and trousers are a bit stained from the less boring parts of escort quests, and he stops to brush off the worst before he steps around the corner to reach the bar. Which is...well, it is what it is. He just stares at the people there, and the disaster that is the decor. He looks at each in turn, then says, hopefully, "Is there still beer?"
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June looks at Jimmu, the short frumpy middle aged woman dressed like a barbarian queen. "There's plenty you just have to order inside, uhm... bring out three more mugs too... she won't let me back inside for some reason." she says and picks up Uta again when she's dry. She sets the spriggan into a chair at the other remaining table, the one that doesn't have the books and writing materials on it. "Research and reading can happen after food." she says reaching into her inventory and producing a bento. She puts that infront of Uta and then gets one out for herself and Golden... then thinking about it one for Jimmu... she is making him get drinks after all.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

Uta doesn't seem to protest much. She may be mostly disconnected from the outside word, but June's simple, direct, and very convincing orders are just what one needs to best get through to her. She looks at Goldenblade in confusion as if registering her just now. "...Huh?", she asks in confusion.

Still reeling a bit, she turns to Jimmu, "...I don't know? Do I even know you? I don't think I've ever seen you before." She squints at him. "You're not a slime. Irrelevant." And after a "Yes ma'am" addressed at June, and the mandatory 'itadakimasu', she launches on the Bentou and... oh goodness. The word 'ravenous' should suffice to convey the idea.
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade nods to Jimmu, "Inside is fine, we've only been trashing the patio," she says with a smirk, possibly explaining June's limitation. "I wonder why that is?" she says with a smirk, but arches a brow at food. She won't say 'no' to that. She also won't say no to attempting to fix the furniture, but it's too far gone, and furniture is not Goldenblade's area of expertise. Well, she tried. "It'd need someone better than me," she says with a shrug and will join Uta and June at their table, the meal already in progress.

She calls out to Jimmu, "I'm Goldenblade. These are June and Uta. We're ... somewhat informal, I've found," she understates.
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

Jimmu blinks at the forthright order from June. He stares at her for a moment, the corner of his mouth tugged downward--then he shrugs and makes his way towards the door. He stops before going inside at Uta's words, and says, "Kiyoshi." A pause. "Or Jimmu. Whichever." And then he disappears inside. There's some brief discussion (very brief, on his part) inside. Within a minute or two, he emerges with his hands filled with mugs of beer. He goes to the table and passes them out, except the one he's claimed for his own. He eyes the bento suspiciously, and asks, "Why'd you trash the place?" It's asked to all of them equally, as if they all might be guilty.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

"Trash? Place? What place?", asks Uta, close to halfway through the bentou. As the trope demands, she's got grains of rice sticking all around her mouth. "I am not sure I understand what you're talking about. I- oooh, beer. Thank you!" She takes a sip from the mug, and resumes her relentless devouring.
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June shrugs "Because I'm bad at internalizing, and my research is going baddly." she says and slides another bento infront of Uta before taking a swallow of the beer. She then knocks the dottle from her kiseru then produces a small ball of tobacco, puts it into the bowl and lights it with a flick of fire magic from a finger. She takes a puff of smoke. The woman is a strange one and oddly direct with her answers.
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade eats normally, and sips her beer with amusement. "Nice to meet you, Jimmu," she says to him, and raises the beer as if to toast. "Kampai." To June, she wonders, "What is it you're researching that's got you so wound up?"
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

There's the briefest of smile at Uta's thanks. He eyes the bento sat aside for him, says, "Thank you," to June, and sets the beer down so that he can pick up the bento. He pulls some chopsticks from his inventor and starts eating neatly. "Nice to meet you, Goldenblade," he replies between bites. He tilts his head slightly towards her question to June, clearly curious himself.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

Uta just keeps mumbling and eating in a blur of chopsticks. She's passed the 50% mark on her Bentou, and she's going strong. Another sip is taken from the mug. "Oh. Uh. Kampai.", she mumbles as an afterthought, and raises her mug to Goldenblade, before digging into the food again. "Research. Research is good. As soon as I'm done with food-" She launches into a long, long yawn. "...I can go back to my research."
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June nods her head a bit and takes a swallow of beer then another puff of smoke. "Hmm the Alv have obviously developed a method of written magic... look at your nearest chaos gate and then argue with me." she says and puffs more smoke. "Uta, when it gets dark you're going to sleep for at least four hours, research has to settle or new discoveries will be missed." she says and again it isn't a question or sugestion it's a simple statement that could be taken for an order. "Well, I've been trying to figure out how to make written magic work in something other than the Alverian language." she shrugs "It hasn't gone well so far."
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade peers sidelong at Uta, and asks, "You've forgotten to sleep, too, haven't you?" A more diect question, "When did you sleep last?" She smiles to Jimmu, explains, "Kids today, they get into research and they lose all track of their lives." As if the same thing hadn't happened to her some months gone, and only an army of assistants and minders kept her bathed and fed.

She peers at June, her expression puzzled. "Magic? Pfah." She's not a magic person, herself. "You kids today and your magic," she says with a chuckle. "Magic this, magic that, magic solves everything. Hard work," she taps her chopstick on the bento. "Hard work fixes things. Magic ...." she shrugs. Of course that's RL she's thinking about. Here, magic /does/ fix things.
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

Jimmu pauses in his eating to study Uta with skepticism. He opens his mouth to say something - but both June and Goldenblade cover his concerns, so he closes it again. His eyes flick back and forth from one to the other as they talk. "Alvs. Any old ruins left? Maybe some documentation about how they did it." A pause at Goldenblade's chuckle. He shrugs with one shoulder. "Maybe not. Could be useful, though. Written spells."
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

"Oh, Alv language!", Uta exclaims. "Haven't been working on that since our meeting, myself. Too busy with slimes.", she continues, sips from her mug again, and returns to eat. "I haven't forgotten to sleep," she protests at Goldenblade. "I have just been postponing it, is all."

"Tell him," Uta urges June, nudging her head towards Jimmu. "Tell him about the runes."
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June smiles at Uta "Alvarian runes are what power the chaosgates and presumibly some other Alv tech. They respond to being sung, we have discovered several words that function on the gates but not all and we cannot get them to reactivate yet." she licks her lips "But the absolute best part is they don't translate." she says "You have to actually understand the words they don't just." she switches languages, to Spanish "Translate directly into your head the way our languages do." she switches back to Japanese. "And that is glorious."
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade smirks at Jimmu and written spells. "Dunno why you'd do that," she sighs. "With a bit of effort, we're reinventing real life quite quickly. We're compressing four or five hundred years of progress into less than a year." Uta's protest draws an amused sigh. "Postponing, then. The result is the same, you're not sleeping." She hrms to June as she mentions about Alvish, and wonders, "Is the language spoken or sung? Do the words include corresponding musical pitch that's required in addition to the word?" That's about as far as she can guess.
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

Jimmu thinks about this. It takes a while, where he serenely finishes off the bento, and gets about halfway through the beer. His head tilts towards Goldenblade. "What's wrong with that? If it works, we advance." He takes another sip of beer, and nods along with her question. While keeping half his attention on June, he murmurs towards Uta. "What's so interesting about slimes?"
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

The eyes above Uta's bags grow at least one size, possibly two. They glaze and shimmer and sparkle, and her smile goes from ear to ear (which, considering her pointy Spriggan ears, is quite the feat).

Deeeeep inhale.

And out comes the outpouring of the century. A barrage of information about slimes, how they start off generic but can become morphologically directed by what they eat, either by species if the sample is biological, or by material otherwise, how many varieties there are, how they tend to live in sewers, how they grow in mass, how a large slime sometimes splits into smaller slimes, how, apart from that splitting, she has not yet managed to see a slime /spawn/, and how that is very suspicious and might indicate that their origin is not natural, if the numbers of large slimes splitting does not add up, how they are extremely pettable (nevermind that they deal damage if you are untrained), how she has a whole laboratory devoted to them, how she developed that as part of the Royal Society for the Appreciation and Study of the Gelatinous Creatures, which she also founded, and how she's been unable to find any relevant literature specific to the subject /until now/, whereby she has proof of the existence of a proper manuscript about slimes, how there must have been another Slimeologist at some point, and how she's now obsessed (that is not the word she used, but...) to locating this book and its author.

And no, that's not 'it'. If people don't stop her explicitly, she will go on, and on, and on...
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June just sips her beer, and smokes her kiseru. She doesn't seem inclined to stop Uta. Jimmu brought this on himself after all. She just lets it all wash over her since she plans on just reading the treatise later.
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade winces as Jimmu asks Uta about slimes. She sits back in her chair, and says to June, "Wake me if she's not done by suppertime." But she doesn;t actually sleep. She's kind of curious about a language that doesn't autotranslate? "How is that?" she womders. "Is it not really a language? Or just ... one thing unlike everything like it? That implies that Alvish isn't a language in the same sense as English, or Japanese, or Elvish, doesn't it. Like, it's cheat codes for the universe?"
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

Jimmu was not expecting that. He REALLY was not expecting that. His eyebrows go up as the flood starts. He listens quietly in the beginning, although with a few glances towards the other two like, /is this normal?/. And possibly /help/. He opens his mouth once or twice, but the flood of words continues, so each time he ends up closing it again. Eventually, he just decides to listen, drinking his beer and letting the words invade his very soul with everything he ever (didn't) want to know about slimes but was afraid to ask. Eventually, he does seize a moment where she has to stop for breath to say, "I'm good at finding things." And then, because apparently he is a GLUTTON FOR PUNISHMENT, "What do you mean, not natural? The slimes? Is there a slime-making machine somewhere?" Then there's a flick of his attention back towards June and Goldenblade. "Source code," he suggestions, briefly.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

"Possibly!", Uta replies, squinting sideways. "There might be one. On the Green Moon. Or elsewhere. But some stories I've heard might imply that many monsters are not born, but /manufactured/. And if they /are/ born... we might get an additional amount dumped onto us. That's definitely something to look into."
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    Without interupting Uta she looks to Goldenblade "My theory is that the Alvs created the system and the translation the system did and since they were a controling nearly slave keeping race, why would they translate their own system language at the control level? Basically I think that Alvarian is SUDO for the Alvish magitech." she shrugs "So far it's my best option. But if something can be done in SUDO it can be done with permissions... well our permissions improved when we got brought here, proof with things like the fey moods, and with things like personal crafting. So I'm trying to work out personal crafting for making our command languages work in the same way the SUDO of Alvarian does." she finishes her beer. "Wanna run in for another round?" she asks Jimmu before puffing on her pipe.
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade smirks at Jimmu. "I'm a bricklayer, I don't know any of that business." But she says to June, "You're taking this all seriously. Which is fine. But you've got to remember that this was all invented in a few years by a handful of people. Not over thousands of years by ancient aliens. So, a bunch of dudes in ties wrote all this mystical business for a handful of yen, there's got to be breaks and shortcuts. That's how people do things."
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

"What about the Waves? Suggests manufactured?" Jimmu suggests to Uta, but tentatively, and he quickly falls silent again. When June not-quite-suggests that he go fetch another round, he quietly stands up, gathers any empty mugs, including his own, and walks back inside to buy another round. If nothing else, he seems to follow orders well. In a few minutes he returns, bearing another load of mugs, which are distributed.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

"Possibly!", Uta replies, squinting sideways. "There might be one. On the Green Moon. Or elsewhere. But some stories I've heard might imply that monsters are not born, but /manufactured/. That's definitely something to look into."

"I prefer to call them Strange Moods," Uta corrects June. "Fey Mood is one of the specific three cases, the other two being Mujou and Yuugen. Terminology is important." She hesitates for a moment, "For instance, what do you mean, exactly, with 'personal crafting'?"

Another sip from her mug, and she turns to Jimmu again. "I don't know much about the Waves." She grumbles, "I never make it in time, and Olympus Alliance is /terrible/ at writing reports. They might have written... what, two reports out of nine waves?"
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June nods to Uta "I'd only heard of Fey Moods, didn't know there were other moods available. I'll adjust my termonology. Personal crafting is where you use your old world skills synergize with your crafting skills to make better results. Since I am a linguist and caligrapher." she shrugs.
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade finishes her beer so she can start on the one Jummu's just brought. "Thanks!" As to the Waves, she shrugs. "It's a world event," she explains to Jimmu. "After the level boss is slain in the Tower, there's a massive attack somewhere out in the world. I expect it's a game mechanic to prevent the entire playerbase from all-out assult on the Tower." She doesn't know the term Zerg, but if she did, she'd say it's to prevent players from Zerg-rushing the Tower.
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

Jimmu nods, slowly, to Goldenblade. "I know." Another long pause. "What I meant is that it suggests monsters are manufactured, doesn't it? For them to be controlled and directed to a targeted place in such immediate quantities. Otherwise, you could theoretically organize a mass culling of monsters before taking on the level boss and weaken or pre-empt the Wave. Maybe." He shrugs. "I haven't been...very involved."
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

"No problem, June. Thanks for being understanding." She grumbles. "Doctor Prophylaxis doesn't seem to share your interest in correct terminology, and saw no big deal in referring to all of them as Fey Moods..." She then scratches her head. "And what do you mean with 'command languages'? How does personal crafting tie into that?" She turns to Jimmu. "There's indication that what we see during the Waves comes from... another world. We don't know yet if it's another planet, another server, or a different continent on Alba, or planet." She returns to eating her Benou and sipping beer. 25% left!
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June smiles "Look at it this way, either we are in a simulation, or in a world that functions as a simulation. Either way the observable result is the same. If Alvarian does not translate and is hard to learn, their subject races likely conversed in their own languages and the Alves used the translation and only needed to have one 'lesser' language. But if you have a language that literally controls the world your subjects live in why would you give THEM access by letting the system translate langauges to or from your command language right? Instead you'd keep your command lanaguage one level up from your translation software. So commands issued in that language bypass permissions and safeties because only the management have access to using that language." she drains her beer. "This leads to reliance on someone who has access to the command language for things like transport with the chaosgates." she says "Since magic is done at the system level, I should be able to use my knowledge of language and writing to help me bypass needing to use the current command structure and instead use a written version to make functional Ofuda."
June
Mac Anu - Main Square

    June gets up to move to her table to start working on an example for Uta
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade has been involved, and says, "The Waves seem to come from ... some other place. Like, off-server kind of other. It's hard to tell, though. I mean, it's a computer, there doesn't need to be a 'why'. It just is." As to not being very involved, "I got a late start also. But everyone's very helpful, so jump in and people will help you along. Which Alliance are you with?" June's explanation has lost her after 'Look at it this way', but she nods blankly. "Well, er, I hope you get it figured out..."
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

Jimmu considers Uta and Goldenblade's information, then nods. "Oh." He ducks his head and takes another couple of swallows of his beer. "...Olympus Alliance. I think." Apparently he hasn't been very /involved/ in the Alliance. It's entirely possible, from the blankness of his expression, that he picked one at random at some point. He watches June get up and return to her work. "Interesting project," he says. Then, after a moment, nods to Uta. "Yours, too. Good luck."
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

"So... I think I get it," Uta says. "You're trying to create some sort of... way, to... write ofuda which... trigger regular magic. A-ha. Got it, I think. The Alv language is far too advanced for us, and will trigger effects far too advanced for us; but regular magic is within our reach, regular language is within our reach... so you're trying to figure out the mechanism that ties language and effects by doing it on our own turf..." She empties her tankard. "Hey, speaking of translations, have you ever heard about the Babylon Signal? Apparently, that's what's responsible for translation. I've meant to research it, but-" she mumbles something about a lack of time. She turns to Jimmu. "Oh, Olympus! Yes, we're all part of the same alliance. That explains why you know so little about Waves." She mumbles, "Welcome to the club."
Goldenblade
Mac Anu - Main Square

Goldenblade smirks as Jimmu mentions Olympus, and says, "Hah, we're all Olympus also. Imagine that." She finishes her beer and says, "I've got to get going as well." Rising, she will head back into the town and see about continuing her questgrinding.
Jimmu
Mac Anu - Main Square

"Babylon Signal?" Jimmu shakes his head. "I know the story. But haven't heard of it." He nods to Goldenblade. "Nice to meet you." He finishes off his own tankard, and moves to stand up, offering a shallow bow that seems to encompass all three of them. To Uta, he says, "Thank you. To the club." Then a longer pause. "Consider a bath. And sleep. Before more research. Good luck." With that, he also turns and starts to walk away.
Uta
Mac Anu - Main Square

"You know the story? Please do tell then, because all I know of it is that it A) is called the 'Babylon Signal', B) it is what translates our speech, and C) its origin is 'Babylon'. If you have more information about it, please elucidate." When Jummu leaves, she goes back to finish her bentou, chugs down the last of her beer...

...And promptly zonks out. Right there, on the table.