Though it's wearying for Edgeworth to walk so far in his condition and a bit early for the supper crowd, they still return to the same restaurant as before. Rimmiyacha tries to offer a discount again, but Althea politely lets him down by pointing out that they're not in a position to return the favor as quickly as visitors should be able to. After getting some barely-spiced whitefish, maleko, and celery sticks that have been left to soak in citrus water into him, Edgeworth finally begins to look alert again.

Edgeworth wastes no time in looking as though gears are turning once the cobwebs in his head are cleared, though his eyes are focused on his meal.
Althea has been rather quiet through the meal, appearing to be pondering things herself.
Edgeworth glances over at Althea after swallowing another bite. "Have you had any further thoughts on my situation today?"
Althea: A few, though some matters may be best left until further developments have been observed...
Edgeworth nods. "An entirely sensible course; it's foolish to speak without supporting evidence."
Althea frowns. "That may be going a little too far. There can be risk in waiting too long to air one's concerns or suspicions... Suffice it to say for now, there is hope that this morning's incident was mere unfortunate happenstance, and not likely to recur. If we are not so fortunate, however, there are some steps which may be taken..."
Edgeworth shrugs and shakes his head. "Exceptions to the rule most certainly exist. However, what sorts of steps do you refer to?"
Althea: For one thing, there are enchanted items one can wear which will assist one in resisting such attacks.
Althea: I don't bring up that matter lightly, as there is some considerable expense involved...
Edgeworth looks grim. She must regard this matter as potentially even more dire than she first implied.
Althea: It's not something I could not afford, but it would put you in my debt to a far greater extent than has thus far been contemplated, and it's not the kind of thing I can just write off and overlook...
Althea shakes her head. "I'm hopeful it won't come to that anyway, but it's probably best you know about the possibility..."
Edgeworth: Understood. Fortunately, I've grown far less prone to nightmares; if your claims concerning their nature here have any merit, I shudder to think what my fate might have been had I found myself here only two years ago.
Althea nods. "It's fortunate that most of my nightmares are divinatory in nature and not normal dreaming, or I might have had some difficulties myself..."
Edgeworth sighs. I may never grow comfortable hearing such claims.
Edgeworth: Then again, if I'm supposed to excel in this field myself, perhaps it's more likely than it may seem...
Edgeworth: It's strange to contemplate that dreams, of all things, could be so vastly different in nature between our two worlds.
Edgeworth: Were there such things as these "quori" where I'm from, I'm certain that we wouldn't be able to have this conversation.
Edgeworth takes another bite of fish solemnly.
Althea: Unless your people had found their own ways to cope, given the necessity.
Edgeworth: I fail to see how it could be done.
Althea shrugs.
Edgeworth: We're only just beginning to scratch the surface of how the mind works, after all.
Althea: Yet you have knowledge and means to defend against threats you do encounter.
Edgeworth: While that might be the case...
Edgeworth hesitates. Can I say with certainty that none are so ethereal anymore?
Althea: I simply would think you cannot know how well you could eventually learn to manage such a threat as you have not had the opportunity to face before...
Edgeworth: ...
Edgeworth concentrates on his meal for now.
Edgeworth: Still more troubling is what even the earliest research suggests concerning how I could have arrived here. Notably, my situation doesn't fit the boundaries of summoning or calling, making it unlikely that any force here is responsible. Ergo...
Edgeworth begins to look nervous.
Edgeworth shakes his head firmly. Come now, Miles! Even if an ideal opportunity did, in fact, present itself, who on Earth could possibly have the capability to force someone out of reality itself?!
Althea watches Edgeworth's reactions and hesitates for a bit before adding: "That goes the other way around too; you don't have to be able to prove your suspicions to air them, and I might have some useful insights..."
Edgeworth looks over at Althea, mildly startled, then looks away briefly, annoyed with himself. Have I allowed myself to grow so emotional over this situation that I can't contain myself?
Edgeworth: Were I more comfortable with the idea that these suspicions were within the realm of possibility at all, perhaps I might.
Althea sighs slightly. "Just keep in mind there are some questions I might be able to answer better than the books you're studying..."
Edgeworth looks back to Althea, meeting her gaze but glaring reflexively as a result. "The questions that have been raised by my studies today aren't of a sort I would expect you to be able to answer."
Althea: ...
Edgeworth continues to eat.

That conversation having been killed, the rest of the meal passes quietly, as does their return to the Korranberg Archive. Edgeworth returns to studying the overview of the schools of magic as soon as the helmet is given to him, while Althea does some additional homework.

Edgeworth eventually closes the book, sets it aside, and lapses into thought.
Dil takes the book and shelves it, grinning gently. "If you were a much faster reader, the divination wouldn't be able to keep up, you know."
Edgeworth looks up at this. "There are limits? Huh..."
Edgeworth: Franziska would likely run across them, to her deep chagrin.
Dil stops to cast Comprehend Languages, apparently having prepared it several times today.
Edgeworth raises an eyebrow. "Am I to interpret that action as meaning that you have further business with me this evening?"
Dil: We should have time for a short lesson in basic techniques now that you know some of the theory it's built on, yes.
Althea starts putting away her things. "If you don't mind me sitting in, I'm pretty much finished here."
Edgeworth blinks at Dil. "So soon?"
Dil shrugs. "You seem to be a fast enough learner, and it's common to master the use of wands long before learning to cast spells under your own power anyway."
Edgeworth can't help but reflexively half-frown for an instant.
Dil: Besides, the same techniques are built upon later, just in different directions for different types of magic.
Edgeworth nods, then looks to Althea. "I see no reason to exclude you." He then bows.
Althea nods and stands.

Dil leads the group to the second basement, then heads towards one of the doors on that floor while leaving Edgeworth and Althea to head down to the third. For some reason, there's a slight chill in the air down here tonight.

Edgeworth frowns in confusion at the different atmosphere. Strange; I seem to recall a slightly different temperature in this room before.
Althea shows no sign of noticing the cold, if indeed she notices it at all.
Edgeworth looks down to Althea. Does she find nothing unusual about it?
Dil comes down after a minute bearing a fairly ordinary-looking carved baton about eight inches long and a quarter-inch in diameter.
Edgeworth: Is that one of these "wands"?
Dil shakes his head. "No, this one's just a stick. No need to risk mishaps unless necessary."
Edgeworth: What does he mean, "unless necessary"?
Dil: To actually be a wand, it would have to be enchanted that way. It's a trickier process than scribing a scroll; you need to be a real expert to even understand the process. A lot better than me, at least...
Dil shrugs.
Althea: Not to mention attempting to use a wand untrained can be risky. Proper use requires the correct technique, and either the right sort of magical potential or a lot of skill.
Dil grins. "I can't help but respect people with those kinds of skills. It's really something to be able to trick a magical object like that."
Edgeworth looks confused, but refrains from asking how one can 'trick' an inanimate object.
Althea shrugs. "At least most of them are just picky, not suspicious."
Edgeworth rubs his forehead. Are we anthropomorphizing them now?
Dil: Wands are infused with dozens of charges, each an identical, essentially completely cast spell. By the time a spell is fully cast, the difference between arcane and divine magic is mostly academic, so anyone with the potential to cast the spell in it through any technique can use one.
Edgeworth puts a finger to his temple. "That does sound remarkably useful."
Althea: Scrolls are similarly convenient, and much easier to produce, but given that they are purely single-use, there is a certain economy to investing as many charges as a wand can hold.
Edgeworth nods.
Dil: It takes a lot of charges to make that economy work, though. Wands with any but the simplest spells in them take days to make, and even making the weak ones is draining enough that people don't make any they aren't sure they can use or sell.
Althea: Given that limitation, you won't easily find as much diversity of spells imbued in wands as in scrolls.
Dil shrugs. "Not to mention, direct use is all they're for. You can't copy a spell from a wand — what would there be to scribe?"
Dil: Finally, only the weaker half of the range of possible magical spells can safely be stored in wands.
Edgeworth: The amount of diversity they describe in techniques and devices for spellcasting is remarkable.
Dil grins. "Now that we're past the things someone half your age would know..."
Edgeworth glowers.
Althea: Be fair; there's easily as much trivial knowledge of his world we both lack.
Dil shrugs. "I was just trying to lighten the mood..."
Edgeworth side-eyes Dil.
Dil shakes his head. "Anyway, on to their use. A wand's charge can be released with a word specific to that wand, which gives you only so much time to trace the sigil appropriate to the type and strength of the spell inside in order to trigger it. The same shapes are fundamental to somatic components in true spellcasting."
Edgeworth taps his temple and grins. "Hence this lesson coming first."
Dil grins as well. "Right! Of course, that's a simplification of the process, but we can get to the harder parts another day. Today, let's just cover the motions and their meanings and uses."
Edgeworth takes a deep breath. Thus do I delve further down the rabbit hole.

Over the next three hours, Dil demonstrates several three-dimensional motions to trace in the air with the stick, roughly five to nine per combination of spell school and spell potency, and prompts Edgeworth to duplicate the same. Rather than relying on his own magic to continue to understand the prosecutor over the long term, he asks Althea to begin translating whenever Edgeworth has questions.

While Edgeworth is clearly uncomfortable with practicing the necromantic motions and obviously will need a lot more practice to get any of the sigils covered tonight exact, let alone trace them quickly enough to be of use, those appropriate to the basic spells of seven of the schools are still covered in this time.

Dil: That should be enough practice with the basic transmutation motions for now.
Edgeworth crosses his arms. "I can't help but notice that you seem to have been avoiding the most important school from my own perspective."
Althea repeats Edgeworth's contention in Common.
Dil smirks. "Oh, I have a reason for saving that for last."
Edgeworth hrmphs and offers the practice stick back. "If you insist. Now, if you'll go over what the forms for divination are..."
Dil grins widely with a glint of mischief in his eyes. "Why don't you tell me?"
Edgeworth glares intently at Dil. "Didn't it become clear earlier that I don't appreciate such jokes?!"
Althea shakes her head.
Dil retreats to a humble frown. "But I'm not joking, sir..."
Althea: It is your area of expertise, after all.
Edgeworth: OBJECTION! It cannot truly be called an "area of expertise" when I haven't learned it! Furthermore, I lack a basis from which to simply deduce such knowledge!
Dil: Those aren't the only ways to know things, though — especially not when power comes to you by itself in some form.
Edgeworth: Surely you're not suggesting that I simply guess!
Dil smirks. "Not exactly."
Althea: He's suggesting you intuit.
Edgeworth: Wh-what?...
Edgeworth appears struck out of left field.
Edgeworth: But what need is there for such measures under the circumstances?
Althea: Among other considerations, it would serve as practice for a skill that will serve you well in such a pursuit as this.
Dil: Clerical spellcasting relies on intuition. Even archivist methods aren't completely divorced from it.
Edgeworth appears slightly intimidated despite an effort at standing firm.
Edgeworth: While I can't say that I'm entirely unfamiliar with such methods, that's Wright's strength, not my own.
Edgeworth sighs. If I had to be saddled with power, why could it not be of a sort that calls primarily for logic instead?
Edgeworth: I suppose, once more, I find myself having to think like him. To ask how I'm supposed to know such a thing may, in fact, be counterproductive; if they're right, then I do. But is there any proof of what they say?
Edgeworth looks to Althea in intense thought...
Edgeworth: On two occasions, she's made statements concerning my capabilities that seemed to resonate. These assertions bring to mind one in particular...
Edgeworth's gaze shifts to Dil. Has he made a similar hypothesis?
Edgeworth looks uneasily past a spot on the wall behind the two. The idea of simply being imparted knowledge, neither learned nor deduced... it's a rather unsettling thought.
Edgeworth shakes his head. Nevertheless, isn't it precisely the sort I would want to learn? Could this... "divine magic" I attract not simply be seen as a new medium from which to read?
Edgeworth closes his eyes, takes a breath, and holds the stick out in front of him. If I simply remember the sensation I felt when Althea claimed that the essence of the truth would help me with divination, then perhaps...
Edgeworth: ...
Edgeworth eventually opens his eyes, only to find himself tracing new patterns in the air — each half-chosen, half-observed.
Althea nods.
Dil smiles.
Edgeworth seems in awe as he keeps going to slightly more complex forms...
Dil nods...
Althea continues watching quietly.
Edgeworth hesitates, then slowly draws a number of sigils more elaborate than the rest so far. There's clear uncertainty in his eyes as he does so, however.
Althea frowns, looking thoughtful.
Dil blinks. "...Well! I didn't expect that."
Edgeworth lowers the practice stick. "That's as far as I can go."
Althea: You have a greater affinity than I had originally pegged you for. There may be something providing additional synergy... perhaps the Knowledge domain? It would seem in character...
Dil: It wouldn't surprise me. He does seem like more of a thinker than a fighter.
Edgeworth offers the stick back to Dil. "It would be more appropriate to say that I prefer to fight with my words."
Althea: Certainly a wise approach to avail oneself of when possible.
Dil accepts the wand substitute back. "A surprise is a good way to end the day either way."
Edgeworth crosses his arms. "I can't say that I would normally agree, but I've been subjected to countless worse ones."
Dil grins. "Then you should be pleased to know that if you're that good, you may become able to safely use scrolls of divination spells just beyond you without risking any unpleasant surprises."
Edgeworth: Hmm.
Dil: Either way, though, you still need a lot more practice.
Dil yawns...
Edgeworth glances at his watch. "Perhaps we should all retire for the night."
Althea: Indeed.

< Prev   Next >