Leg day at the gym today, so I'm feeling... unwilling to move :)
A hypothetical "So what does this all tell us?" asked Elizabeth. She thought about unfolding her arms, and decided that she was still annoyed that Memnith was playing with poorly-understood magic so blithely. She looked around, knowing that she didn't want to seem like a student in front of one of the Lords Magical. "I'm pretty certain that these yellow beams aren't supposed to be here. They're the only things with well-defined shape and they poke through everything else like grass ruining a patio." "I prefer grass to concrete," said Memnith, smiling. He stepped through a gap, ducking as he lifted his feet. "This is a bi-centre, I think." "You would," said Elizabeth. She moved to an area where the blobs and spheres were dominant. "I thought centres were unique, by definition." "I think of this as being more like clean rock struck through by crystals," said Memnith. "You get it in nature sometimes, water carries in a reactive species and it changes the rock slightly, creating new compounds that crystallise and grow. It weakens the rock and if it grows far enough it can take over completely. And for your other question, it depends on your metric. When you have an ultra-metric all points of the interior are centres." "Oh them. Well, they never seemed very useful. But we haven't got an infinity of centres -- oh, I see. There are two spells here, and they're not perfectly aligned. Ah, and that's why you're talking about crystalline intrusions!" "Ultra-metrics aren't very interesting in Euclidean geometries," said Memnith. "But in some of the non-Euclidean ones, you can't really understand things without them." "Yes, right," said Elizabeth. She was moving again now, stepping quickly but carefully through the spell-structure, her hands hovering over patches of colour as she made rough measurements. "Aha, aha, oh right. OK, yes. This is like the spell in that tenement. Aha, yes, that's the same kind of shape-" "Pardon?" "Not now." She knelt and peered upwards at something. "Perfect, yes." Then her brain caught up with her ears and she flushed. "Not now, milord," she said. "I'm so sorry, I ju-" Memnith waved a hand. "Tell me about the similarities between this spell and the tenement spell," he said. "Right. Sorry, milord, it won't happen again. Right. Well, the measurements and the linking between the yellow beams and the purple-green blobs are very close to being the same. I'm sure if we could measure them accurately they'd be identical. And that doesn't happen without intent. Then the direction of flow, and these spirals here-" she pointed to a set of near-concentric circles that sat, half-hidden, underneath the thickest yellow beam, "- these are exactly what you'd expect from the spell in the tenement." "Conclusion?" "I'd say... I'd say that the spell in the tenement was responsible for the disruption of the gate."
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Leg day at the gym today, so I'm feeling... unwilling to move :)
A hypothetical
"So what does this all tell us?" asked Elizabeth. She thought about unfolding her arms, and decided that she was still annoyed that Memnith was playing with poorly-understood magic so blithely. She looked around, knowing that she didn't want to seem like a student in front of one of the Lords Magical. "I'm pretty certain that these yellow beams aren't supposed to be here. They're the only things with well-defined shape and they poke through everything else like grass ruining a patio."
"I prefer grass to concrete," said Memnith, smiling. He stepped through a gap, ducking as he lifted his feet. "This is a bi-centre, I think."
"You would," said Elizabeth. She moved to an area where the blobs and spheres were dominant. "I thought centres were unique, by definition."
"I think of this as being more like clean rock struck through by crystals," said Memnith. "You get it in nature sometimes, water carries in a reactive species and it changes the rock slightly, creating new compounds that crystallise and grow. It weakens the rock and if it grows far enough it can take over completely. And for your other question, it depends on your metric. When you have an ultra-metric all points of the interior are centres."
"Oh them. Well, they never seemed very useful. But we haven't got an infinity of centres -- oh, I see. There are two spells here, and they're not perfectly aligned. Ah, and that's why you're talking about crystalline intrusions!"
"Ultra-metrics aren't very interesting in Euclidean geometries," said Memnith. "But in some of the non-Euclidean ones, you can't really understand things without them."
"Yes, right," said Elizabeth. She was moving again now, stepping quickly but carefully through the spell-structure, her hands hovering over patches of colour as she made rough measurements. "Aha, aha, oh right. OK, yes. This is like the spell in that tenement. Aha, yes, that's the same kind of shape-"
"Pardon?"
"Not now." She knelt and peered upwards at something. "Perfect, yes." Then her brain caught up with her ears and she flushed. "Not now, milord," she said. "I'm so sorry, I ju-"
Memnith waved a hand. "Tell me about the similarities between this spell and the tenement spell," he said.
"Right. Sorry, milord, it won't happen again. Right. Well, the measurements and the linking between the yellow beams and the purple-green blobs are very close to being the same. I'm sure if we could measure them accurately they'd be identical. And that doesn't happen without intent. Then the direction of flow, and these spirals here-" she pointed to a set of near-concentric circles that sat, half-hidden, underneath the thickest yellow beam, "- these are exactly what you'd expect from the spell in the tenement."
"Conclusion?"
"I'd say... I'd say that the spell in the tenement was responsible for the disruption of the gate."
Greg - leg days are the worst.
Probably why I never do them...
Ah, good to be back to catching up on comments and to find this waiting for me. Really enjoying what you're doing here.
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