Jonathan

Heranum’s island, Jonathan reminiscented, was attached to something someone could call a boot. At least if that someone had a bit of fantasy and thought about a boot stretched in interesting ways.

“Yes, this was the way to put it”, thought Jonathan after thinking about if the word boot could be used for the so-called “Italian Boot”, “But that is not important. Is Heranum located on the island of Sicily? OK, it is possible that a dominant ancient empire formed there, it is central for trade, but this also has other implications.”

Suddenly, he heard Tablos voice: “Is everything Ok? You became incredibly quiet here right now.”

Jonathan answered: “I must check some things. Can you please tell me what the geography is in this area?” Jonathan indicated a part in the map that was where the Alps would be if that was not an incredible coincidence.

Before Jack Miller, who set out to answer the question could do so, Jonathan added: “I want detailed information. Not about demographics and similar things, also not about trade and economics, but about elevation. Are there mountains? And if yes, how high do they get. Please answer how many of these doors must be stacked on one another to get to the real height”, he pointed at the door that closed the entrance to this room, which was approximately 1,8 metres tall, and continued: “I do not understand your measuring systems well enough to make me a picture of it, if done with those. Also, please add the point of reference used, also the point from which you begin measuring the height..”

Heras Hager thought for a moment. He at least thought that there would be mountains, and he was correct in that thought, and he was oddly specific about which information he wanted to know about those. What was going on there?

But He set out to answer the question: “So, as you somehow thought, there are mountains. The Mountains also go pretty high up into the sky, the highest I know of, even if I think there might be a few higher ones farther south. The mountains have been measured up by magic, even if this kind of magic is not the most precise way of measurement. The highest peak known is around 2640 door heights high.”, Shortly before saying the height, he worked some kind of spell, likely something to help with mathematical functions. Somethings to consider for the future thought Jonathan.

But Miller was not finished: “The measurements are taken from an approximation of the sea level, because it looks so uniform, even if it seems to have a slight curve in it. I wonder where that comes from?”

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Jonathan thought for a moment and said: “You use the sea level? That is perfect. We use it too because water is a fluid. And fluids have a peculiar characteristic: They tend to form an even surface. This can be used to have a common point of reference all over the world, even if it is a ball. The sea level is the same everywhere. Important is, that for this to be true, every ocean used as a reference must be connected. And they are no waterfalls or similar things allowed in that connection. 2640 door heights are approximately 1.8 times 2640, which we can round down to 1.8 times 2600…”

Jonathan’s voice got quiet at the end, while he thought about how high this peak was. He was already sure that it was a pretty high peak, likely at the upper end of the range in the Alps. The question was only if the peak was still in the range, considering the mistakes in the used spell and the two transformations needed. In the end, he got to a result. 4,680 metres. Considering that the Mount Blanc was over 4800 metres high, he thought that this could be about right

. What were other geographic features he knew about, which also were near enough Heranum that they would be presented correctly in the map? Maybe Scandinavia he answered his question. Another possibility would be the British Isles, or the Iberian Peninsula as well as Corsica and Sardinia.

So he looked for these features. About Scandinavia, he could only say that above Denmark things became difficult to be certain of, but Denmark seemed to be represented well.

The British Isles were a different matter. While they were there, both of them even, they became more and more obscure the farther one got away from the coastline pointed at modern-day France. Where he also found the Bretagne, which he had not even considered until now, in surprising detail.

Then he looked at where the Iberian Peninsula should be. The somewhat square form was there, but in the middle of it, at the location where Madrid would be in his world, was a gigantic lake.

He asked Tablos how this lake had formed, and surprisingly enough he answered: “There was a battle between multiple powerful mages. That was about a thousand years ago. The water is at least in part there due to magic.”

This answer made it, of course, possible that his theory, that this was an earth were magic existed and due to that the timeline had changed, likely massively, was still correct.

So he looked at the last bit. And those two islands where, where they should be.

So he dropped his bombshell: “I think that geographically my world is the same as yours. Likely the only difference is magic and how it affected the environment.”

After that, they discussed how he got to his conclusion, but Tablos was forced to restrain Jack Miller from asking questions because he figured out from Jonathan’s explanation that cartography was much more advanced in Jonathan’s world than in this.

Because of this Tablos decided that tempers should cool down and Miller should write down which questions he had, then he, Tablos would make sure that Jonathan would get those that were not too trivial and then make sure that they also would be answered.

So everyone left and continued on with their day.