“You know, it strikes my mind” Rum began, walking alongside Veish towards The Flipped University, the morning sun shining on both of them, “that in just 6 days, you will be gone to the elves.”
Veish cast the wizard a sideways glance. “The elves?”
“Yes” Rum responded, “my custody of you ends in 6 days.”
The witch looked at the streets ahead, and said nothing. Thinking maybe? Rum wondered. Around them, it was turning autumn. The weather had become a little colder over the night, though it wasn’t particularly cold. Though much thanks there could be given to the sun high above, as it bathed and welcomed them with the warmth of its beautifying rays. Bright rays, in fact, putting the landscape in a fine range of clear autumn colors. A mix of red, brown and strong lingering green could be found everywhere there was plantlife. Rum himself was gazing over at the mage towers which had just sprouted from above the rooftops in the distance. Far away, and separated from the common folk, up there live the city’s mightiest of mages, Rum was reminded. Alone with their servants, those mages could overlook the city from balconies and windows, small and large, high and higher still.
Eyes wandering off the towers, Rum gave the mage beside him a little stare next. Veish... Something about the witch today caught the wizard’s eyes. In this weather, your features are so... there. Rum felt something as he looked. Like, somehow, you’ve become so much more alive in your appearance. If there were more people who knew Veish, others might’ve also noticed what Rum did. For under the radiant morning light, the features of Veish, usually concealed by the poor illumination of The Dark Closet, now stood revealed and in full clarity of color. But alos, there was a second reason Veish looked so much more there today.
Your hair. Rum was reminded of how much better it looked these days, after his first Clean Body spell had made her appearance undergo a process of de-feralization. It dangled at shoulder-length, thin and silken black. A fine combination with her other aesthetics, like those mystical emerald green eyes of yours. Rum’s own eyes fixed upon the colorful irises. Then Rum was reminded how young, relatively speaking, this woman beside him was. Though her youth was clearly marked by wordly experience too. She had, after all, acted as a subordinate to a dungeon lord, and that’s where you, I presume, got that small but highly visible scar to your cheek? Rum gave that piece of skin an extra look as he pondered it. Then he wandered over her some more, going down and onto her clothing. Renew Clothes, a spell the witch had cast on herself using the wand, had given the skinny woman her own black coat today. At the front of the coat was several large multishade brown wooden buttons. He looked it downwards, all the way, eventually reaching her feet. Black leather boots, he noted. His eyes going up again, he noticed the black cotton belt around her waist, its buckle the same type of multishade brown wood as her buttons. On the side of her belt rested The Joy Stick, well fastened, almost like tiny sword, ready to be drawn for combat at any moment. Its dark red color was almost bloodlike to watch, and its striped pieces of glittery metal reflected back the sunlight hitting it. To top it all, Veish wore a large, black, silken pointy hat. Overall, Rum observed about them, this woman attracted at least a few extra looks on their way to teach and learn magic. What a style. Rum’s gaze had turned back from the people of the street to the witch. And how amazingly it suits you. Finally, his eyes came to rest at that strange necklase of hers. That twisted, humanoid octopus shape in silver, hanging loosely from her neck. But you, thing of Veish’s, what are you meant to be? Rum stared closer at the necklase for a bit, before Veish gave him the side-eye, and he looked away.
It was a new day. Veish had been too tired yesterday to learn much magic, and so they’d decided to do it as the very first thing the today – but after breakfast of course. Yes, a belly filled at The Belly Filler carried satiation with Rum and Veish alike as they walked together through The Middle Streets, the edges of the large park surrounding the university coming into view.
Arriving there a few minutes later, the duo walked around for a bit, before Veish pointed out a suitable spot near a small pond. Only 3 other students, a group of dwarven women, lounged around in its dozen meters radius. The students were mostly talking and catching shade from a trio of nearby trees, a set of books left unopened on the grass between them. Inside the pond, as Rum walked up close and properly saw, there swam tiny fish. 2 toads also sat on thick surface-floating leaves, waiting for insects, with a dragonfly hovering dangerously close to become one of the toads’ next meals.
“Yeah, here’s fine.” Rum nodded to the mostly empty pond area. He turned around and looked straight at Veish, who looked straight back at him, mildly expectant. “Do you remember what I told you yesterday?”
Veish raised both her eyebrows, though one eyebrow was higher than the other. “Which part?”
“What I told you about the kinds of magic.” Rum began strolling around in a circle on the grass, launching himself into an immediate oral lecture.
“Yes” she responded, resting her brows again. “You said your magic is not like my magic.”
Rum shook his head. “It isn’t. And why is that?”
“You claimed that Person Magic was detached from the magic of Aclima?” She answered, uncertain about her memory.
“Yes!” Rum answered, energized by the reply. “And today I wish to tell you what that means.” He stopped his circular walk to turn and look straight at Veish in near-dramatic pause. “In this world–” he continued, before letting his intensity relax a bit, “–magic isn’t as magical as we think. Or, rather, we are not acting as the magical beings we actually, truly are. For what people call magic, Veish, what my brother calls magic, and what this university calls magic – it’s not magic per se, but a magical system by which you all are granted access to another being’s actual, direct magic. A god’s magic. And as much, any well-educated mage today could tell you.” The wizard turned a little to resume his circling around on the grass. “But really, there is no fundamental necessity in you relying on another’s system; on another person’s world-spanning influence, for using mana to make magic. For when you do that Veish, the results are this: you become beholden to another’s system. To their rules, and ways of doing things. And there, you will become helpless when the toolset you know has no more tools to offer. And worse, there you will become trapped in their system of knowledge. In the kinds of understandings of the world; of magic, that is meant not to make you understand the nature of magic nor master it, but to understand and work within their system – the system of the gods.”
As Rum stopped and paused, and looked into the blue for a while, Veish snuck The Joy Stick from her belt. She cast “Softify” on the grass under her, and conjured a “Magic Blanket” into her free hand. She laid the magic fabric on to the grass beneath, then sat down, looking up and over at Rum, who soon came out of his thought. He resumed his circling lecture-monologue.
“Let’s call it The Celestial System. I’ve heard it referenced as such, once, by Lamboveri, a Professor of Spell History here–” Rum gestured behind Veish, at the upside-down university main building, “–during a lecture. At the time, though, I didn’t quite understand the significance of The Celestial System, and I still did not recognize its significance – before my visit to The State Library at the Republic of Redratall, some 2 or 3 years ago. I think I’ve mentioned that visit to you before?” Veish gave a simple nod. “Ah. Yeah, anyways, there I found the most amazing book, which spoke of a time before magic was systematized – a time before gods, even. A dwarf named Tardom found some great evidence of such a time. Well, I wasn’t there thousands of years ago, but it sure seemed to me like there is more to magic than what people or gods have ever made of it. And this is where I’ll reveal to you my secret method.” Rum ended his circling right in front of Veish, who sat there, down on the ground on her magic blanket. The wizard took a deep dramatic inhale, then let it out slowly, eyes just staring at her with the most intense gaze. The witch met his stare with her own blank face, though her emerald green eyes leaked a deep, inner interest. Rum’s mouth opened. “Epistemological passivity.”
The witch was taken aback. She blinked. Then she frowned, her brows squeezing down. With a high-ending intonation she let out: “Epistemological what?”
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“Passivity!” Rum exclaimed, full of energy. “E-PIST-E-MO-LO-GI-CAL... passivity.”
The witch just sat there, frozen in her frown and giving Rum some hard direct eye-contact.
“It means” Rum began explaining, attempting to look away from her frowning stare, “that instead of constructing a system of belief by which we try to grasp and frame the world, we let instead the world come to us – to imprint itself onto our being.”
Veish, still frowning, was half-way about to shake her head in disapproving confusion.
“I’m sorry!” Rum exclaimed. “I know it sounds a little cryptic–” he hastened to reassure her, “–but consider this: when you try to learn something, ordinarily, you often do that by reading a book, looking at someone doing a practical example, or you attend a lecture. In each of these situations, you are actively engaged in an attempt at symbolic interpretation of the world of people. You are, always, trying to socialize – because that’s what learning is really about, in the end. To learn is to be socialized into a system of knowledge characterized by some particular or familiar symbols. And if magic was a structure existing only on the antropomorphic level of reality – only as a product of the actions of people – then it would make sense that we focused on symbols, wouldn’t it? To go to university” Rum gestured again at the ginormous upside-down building, “or pick up a book” he gestured at one of the small public libraries in the park, visible some dozens of meters away on Veish’s right side and passed the pond, and the trio of dwarven women, who were now giving the energized wizard looks.
Veish let go of her frown. “I might, barely, have understood what you said” she replied.
“It makes perfect sense, right!?” Rum exclaimed, enthusiastic. “But what if there were no actions to take, because there were no symbols to guide you!? What if the source of future knowledge rested in nature; in the very world itself? In the arbitraryness of a pre-systematized, original reality, that had no care and no business with the constructs of humans, elves, dwarves and the like. One that has no medium, and no correctness because its not even defined yet – it is prior to all definition! With such a source of knowledge, you would scarcely know where to look, would you? And once you do look, how would you know you’ve discovered what you sought? Again: there are no symbols. Nothing for you to map reality into a neat path, by which you can reach an objective. NO! Here we’ve reached the end of actionable reality, and our next step, is at the epistemological mercy of the mysterious nature, and her willingness of revealing to us a knowable something by which we might discover new possibilities in reality. Here–” Rum knelt down in front of Veish, getting all intense and close to her face, “–we can do but 2 things.” He raised the index- and middle fingers on his right hand. “First” he tapped the air with his middle, “we must let go of any recognitions of reality; of seeing in the world any concepts we’re already familiar with.” He lowered it. “And second” he wiggled his index, “we must let our skin, and our eyes, and our ears, become like an open surface. And our body moldable to nature’s casting whims. For then” Rum put down the last finger and slowly stood up again, “we become passive. And then, on the open surface of our senses – now under the mercy and care of nature – she may write brand new concepts; brand new extensions to our knowable reality.” The wizard, mesmerized by his own words, stared intensely into the blue, as if looking at something beautiful hidden there in the sky or in The Flipped University building, in whose direction he was looking.
“But what does that have to do with your spells?” Veish the student asked from below Rum’s skyward gaze.
Rum came out of his trance, and stepped back a bit, looking down at the witch. “Everything. It’s the beginning of everything. First comes a connection to the nature of magic. Then comes the possibility for spellcraft.” The wizard turned about and started a new walking-circle as he awaited her words.
“Okay. I... guess I get, some, of what you mean. Although, I would need some guidance, but also–” she formed another frown, “–this doesn’t sound much like magic to me. When we first started learning magic in The Three Brothers Mountains, we learned that magic goes by the words of the spell, and to make the spell work I just had to intend it enough.” The witch talked, as Rum continued around in his circle. “To make our intentions clear, we had to imagine the spell well-formed, and connect it with the right emotions. Then the spell would eventually work. And for me, that’s how I learned my spells.” She paused a little, and Rum stopped and turned, the both of them locking eyes for a second. “Isn’t that how your magic also work?”
“No.” Rum denied simply. “Not in the slightest.”
Veish formed a surprised set of eyebrows. “Okay. How do you get spells then?”
“How does a tailor make their clothes?” Rum asked rhetorically, taking a step towards her. “They practice their skills. New ideas may enrich their skillset – new patterns, for instance, or a new technique – but there is little copying somebody else’s work solely. Every truly well-made article of clothing tests the skills of the tailor. And every new variant of clothing they make – a situation which an ambitious tailor should experience often enough – will be a situation to test their accumulated intuition. Precisely imagining a sweater may allow for more accurate results, but the sweater neither knits nor sews itself. Imagination does nothing but direct the course of the work. And emotions?” Rum raised an accompanying eyebrow. “Try and see how good your next robe will look like, after your tailor sewed it together in rage or sorrow.”
“Sooo, practice is the answer?” The witch asked. “Practising what?”
Rum cast his glance to the side and over at the pond. Beyond it, on the other side, the 3 dwarf women had moved out of the shade, and a little closer to them. All the dwarves faced Rum as he accidentally met their eyes. He looked away and turned to resume his circling again. Then he noticed that another pair of dwarves, a couple of men, were standing nearby and listening in while holding a pair of mostly eaten apples. One of them chewing, while the other yelled back at Rum: “I hope you don’t mind we were listening!” The wizard, not quite being in the headspace to care, just shook his head with closed eyes, before shrugging his shoulders. He initiated the circular walking which he had intended.
“So” he began, only slightly more self-conscious now that he knew they were being watched, “the first lesson I told you here and just this moment, was to open up, to be passive, so that you can hope to acquaint the nature of magic. You need to be curious, and form a direct and personal relationship to magic. There’s very little magic, as something objective and out there in the world, and by which we strictly speaking would share a common part of. Magic is a personal adventure, an exploration into a strange phenomenon – something all those who want to know Person Magic, and magic in general, have to find their own ways into. What I can say, therefore, initially, is that this way involves passivity, and that you won’t be able to do Person Magic before you’ve made your personal connection to magic. There’s little way for me to impart upon you a copy or clone of mine. You have to find your own unique share of the totality of magic. And only later, I think, when you’ve made that connection, would I be able to tell you about how I made my magic, so that you can make your own variations of it.” Rum stopped talking, and took a few calm breaths, thinking for a bit, before he noticed another person, a human woman, sitting down on the grass nearby to listen.
“But I wanna learn how to cast your spells.” Veish spoke from her seated position behind Rum.
The wizard turned. “All of my more recent spells” he replied, “have been created through my own technique of making mana ghosts. I even managed to automate that technique into a spell called Mana Ghost. But it is waaay beyond anything you’ll be able to do. It took me a lot of time, after all, to figure out how to make mana ghosts.”
“So you can’t teach me any spells?” Veish sighed a little, her eyes going down.
“Well.” Rum tried to think hard. “It’s not that I can’t, it’s just that the first part of your path to Person Magic is a place where I can only guide you, I can’t do it for you, not even in giving you a single spell. HOWEVER!” He exclaimed as Veish looked even more disappointed. “I can help you figure out how to make your own spells. Spells I wouldn’t even have dreamt of making.” Veish perked up. “You are not me, Veish, and I am not you.” Rum took a few steps towards the witch. “Every person upon this world is a treasure for all that they live their own particular lives with their own particular thoughts, experiences and history. For, within that lived life Veish, is a wealth of the world’s diversity that longs to find an outlet where it is needed and can blossom. I have no doubt, that if you were given the chance, you’d make some great spells on your own. You don’t need to copy me, Veish. You just need that outlet, and that’s where I can help you the most.”
3 more humans and another dwarf showed up to watch. The humans sitting, the lone dwarf standing and resting on a magic staff.
As Rum continued on his lecture into the prerequisites of Person Magic, slowly the duo of witch and wizard began attracting more students, and much more than a few. Rum’s dreamy descriptions of magic and the nature of it, his loud voice and near-maniacal way of telling about it or explaining to Veish, created something of an intellectual show in the park that, as morning turned into noon turned into late afternoon, gathered at its peak more than 2 dozen students who congregated about the pond and the trees. When the day’s lesson was over, and Rum and Veish both felt hungry and tired, and Veish suggested “dinner”, one remaining female dwarf student simply asked “Is it over?”
“Yeah” Rum nodded.
As if on cue, a few students then dispersed while the rest just sat there, watching the 2 mages – teacher and apprentice – leaving.
As they began making some distance from the pond, Rum decided to ask Veish her opinion. “How do you feel the first day of learning Person Magic went?”
The witch, face tired, and glancing over at Rum, responded frankly. “There’s no room left in my brain for a question.”