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--- campaign:carve:2023-12-05 [2024/02/27 21:58] – pinkgothic
+++ campaign:carve:2023-12-05 [2024/05/07 20:34] (current) – pinkgothic
@@ Line 245: / Line 245: @@
 Mateo nodded mildly. "Yep," he said. "That's what Nyarai and I are gnawing on. We have some potential leads, but it's taking sim crunching time," he thumbed at the computer. "And despite her excitement, it will probably not work out this time, either. Maybe what we need to do at this point is go to one of the temporary outposts and tinker with some substance. Just keep tinkering, until something happens. Do it carefully and step by step and we should see something enlightening before it becomes threatening, right?"
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+**Nymphetamine**:
+Sim crunching and a step by step approach seemed like the best idea that anyone involved in sorcery had. While it wasn't precisely the fantasy version of sorcery, where one just waved a wand and poof, everything was created from the aether, a pumpkin into a coach; it was the closest thing humankind had found to magic. "Seems like that's all we could do. Baby steps, incremental progress until a new breakthrough... when was the last time anyone had a real breakthrough, anyhow? In sorcery? I've been reading the *history* of such things, but..." That wasn't more recent papers on the subject, of course.
+**pinkgothic**:
+"Um," Mateo wrinkled his forehead. "Depends on what you mean with a breakthrough. Do interesting new spells count? Peltonen discovered generic mass-preserving alchemy in... was it 2031? I think it might have been in 2031. Anyway, in theory, we know how to cast spells that convert any substance into any other substance. In practise, several of them are too verbose to be practically cast, but the shorter ones have all been verified. To be clear, we know some shorter spells for some of the too verbose ones, too, so it's not like we're locked out of those transformations, the Peltonen Algorithm just doesn't point to them." Without realising that it was a new insight for Leila, he had just implied something interesting: That some spell effects were the result of multiple different spells.
 **Nymphetamine**:
+Lips pursed with some curiosity. It was only a few years ago, which accounted for recent in her query as far as she was concerned. But it was when he told her that there were //long form// spells... Her brow scrunched up and her eyes narrowed for a moment as she parsed what he said. "So let me get this straight... There are spells that can be daisy-chained together, in order to create the desired effect? Or do you mean to say that different spells do the same thing?" He had piqued her curiosity now, and she was definitely interested in the answer to that question.
+**pinkgothic**:
+"I don't think daisy-chaining is a good way to think about the Peltonen Algorithm, but I guess it's not necessarily a //wrong// way to look at it; if you imagine each rune is a micro-spell we haven't figured out the meaning of yet, except in the cases where a single rune is enough to cast a spell, every spell we cast is 'daisy-chained'," Mateo began his clarification, his tone slow and careful, cautiously making sure he wasn't saying anything outrageous. "But what I'm talking about is that we know completely different spells that do the things some of the Peltonen Algorithm spells are supposed to do. It's more like... using a synonym. Instead of saying 'large body of water'," he counted on his fingers as he said the words, "which is six syllables, you say 'ocean', two syllables. Except instead of only approximately meaning the same thing, they happen to be completely identical."
+**Nymphetamine**:
+Leila nodded along to what he was saying in the explanation. Comparing it to language made it very accessible and understanadable for her. "I see... that's an interesting way to look at it. And as a phenomenon." She wasn't entirely sure why these things worked the way they did, but then again, she wasn't entirely sure that any of the other sorcerers knew, either. "So how many runes are //known//? Discovered? I'm not sure what a good word would be."
+**pinkgothic**:
+Mateo puffed out his cheeks and pressed an exhale out past his lips. "Um," he appended, evidently not having bridged enough time. He rubbed fingertips against the side of his nose. "Three... hundred?" he estimated. "Spell searching algorithms, or generators like the Peltonen Algorithm, usually work with subcomponents called 'strokes', of which we know about forty-three, and 'fulcrums' defining their overlap." Said, he started to draw strokes into the air with the tip of his finger: A straight horizontal line, a curve flattening into a line, a line dipping into a curve, a half-circle, an 's' shape, something much like an infinity symbol, something halfway between an '@' sign and a spiral, a '9', an inverse '9'...
+**Nymphetamine**:
+Nodding along to what he said, she was keeping a mental tally of everything he said. Leaving a papertrail or an electronic trail was a terrible idea, considering that they were doing something very illegal in her being taught sorcery. A low little whistle blew out between nearly pressed lips. "That sure is quite a lot of runes to have to memorize.. But I guess, you probably don't //have// to, what with the simulations formulating much of it, right?" A hypothesis on her part.
+**pinkgothic**:
+He shrugged a shoulder lightly. "At the end of the day, you want to memorise the glyphs, same as you want to memorise individual glyphs if you write Chinese script. You can't stop to think about the individual strokes in the middle of casting a spell. There's no good reason to, either, since we don't know if they have separate meanings, any more than the strokes in Chinese logograms have separate meanings. If you want to cast a spell, you take note of the full runes; you might practise them on paper with normal ink for a while, before you cast the actual spell."
+**Nymphetamine**:
+She nodded again, understanding exactly what he meant when he made the comparison to Chinese characters. "That makes... a lot of sense, actually," she confessed with good humour. "But wouldn't be writing them down somewhere be too risky?" Or perhaps Leila was just infected with an overabundance of caution in this situation.
+**pinkgothic**:
+"Not any more risky than other confidential information. You should certainly toss the paper into a shredder when you're done with it, if that's what you're asking. Or, if you can, just use a tablet and never save the file. But some spells are inimical to electronics, so the paper option's popular," Mateo shared. "Assuming one is practising shortly before casting. That's usually a last stroke test. Kind of like a breathalizer for yourself. Don't want to find out you're in a bad state for steady lines while you're casting, after all."
+**Nymphetamine**:
+That last remark sounded like a little bit of a warning for practical purposes, and she would keep that in mind for the future. But there had been a bit of surprise that coloured her face when he mentioned that some runes did not get along well with technology. "Well, now you gotta tell me what they do to tablets if you scribe them into a drawing surface on a tablet... How bad is bad?" This was a curiosity and nothing more. She was learning a great deal about sorcery in a general sense, but some tidbits were more interesting than others.
+**pinkgothic**:
+"Oh, no, the runes are fine. It's just that some spells are basically small EMPs, so you don't want to have a live tablet around immediately before you cast your spell. Or a non-live one, if you can help it, though turning them off does help considerably. Still, I assume you prefer not to fry those circuits," Mateo smiled mildly. "Approximately all alchemy does that, for example, to various strengths. That said, even the strongest is only just strong enough to be an inconvenience."
+**Nymphetamine**:
+"The more I learn about sorcery, the more I realize that no one really knows all that much about it," she said after a few moments' beat, considering that as a truism for the moment. "Well. //We// can't afford to have an accident like that happen." Speaking entirely of herself, and him, as they were conducting these clandestine lessons between them well against the rules and regulations.
+**pinkgothic**:
+Mateo nodded mildly. "If Nyarai and I go to an outpost to try out some ideas, do you want to come along?" It implied letting Nyarai know about their arrangment. It implied, further, that he was willing to do that. But then, he'd said it was only a matter of courage earlier. Maybe he trusted himself not to stammer too much.
+**Nymphetamine**:
+Leila's surprise was clear on her face: the raising of her brows and that slight 'o' of her mouth's shape. She stared at him for several moments before she nodded. "That might be for the best.. That she knows, I mean... It seems like she already suspects something going on." Though, she wasn't too sure if Nyarai thought it was romantic, or professional as it was in its way. Platonic, certainly.
+"What are you trying out exactly?"
+**pinkgothic**:
+"It'll be a mixture of spellcasting and other science. It's Nyarai's plan, I don't think I'd do it full justice if I tried to summarise it. We think there's a risk of catastrophic failure, hence why the whole 'outpost' thing is so important," Mateo mused. "You should probably be suited up while we work, just in case there's a hull breach, but any real risk will be ours. Can't be in a space suit while spellcasting, after all."
+**Nymphetamine**:
+That sounded both exhillerating and dangerous. She'd have to screw in her courage to go, but to think of all that she might learn! "I'll do whatever you recommend, Mateo." It was only prudent, and she had no desire to needlessly die for lack of a suit and a hull breech. "Was there anything else I should know? Or do?"
 **pinkgothic**:
--->
+Mateo had closed his eyes, rubbing at his forehead in a methodical, recurring sweep with the joints of his fingers, contemplating her question. Finally, he sighed mildly, then said: "We'll probably decide when and where to do this on short notice. If you can't come, then I doubt Nyarai will postpone. So if you want to come, keep your calendar flexible."