When Magic's All You Know {Interactive Story)

[Piefan]

Of all the advice you could get, "go check out the hatch" is what your brain gives you. Gazing up at it, you try to get as good a view as you can without visibly ignoring Atlas. He doesn't seem to notice your distraction, still chattering on. You think he's moved on entirely from the subject of the phoenix - his words blur together beyond recognition, but you can catch a few mentions of the stock market crashing.

You purse your lips, wondering how he went from ancient history to that. "Uh, I have to go," you say.

He stops mid-sentence and looks down at you as if in a daze. It takes a moment before he responds. "Oh, of course. I'm sorry, I got... carried away."

"Yeah, you kinda did."

You say your farewells, and after he departs, you move to a spot just under the hatch. It doesn't seem as if anybody else has noticed it; or, if they did, they assumed it was intended to be there. From your spot, though, you can't see much of it - just that it's there.

How, exactly, are you going to get a better view?

(A/N: I didn't list them in the narrative, but I actually had two ways written in my plans.
-Use Summoning magic to create a creature for the sole purpose of looking into it.
-Use Enchantment to levitate self into it. Which would be kind of hard to inconspicuously do.
As always, you're free to do stuff not lited as well.)

[apricotflyer]

Yeah, use summoning magic. It's less obvious if something else (probably small) is doing the looking for you.

[AgentAlaska(Bagel)]

Is anyone free to post? ;v; if so then I'd like to agree - summoning is the way to go

[Piefan]

Doubling back to your spot near the wall - this task requires utmost concentration - you begin to cast. Summoning's one of the most complicated forms of magic in the book, requiring plenty of knowledge about animal biology. It usually takes hours for a single teenager to create a half-decent organism.

Thankfully, all you need is something that can take a look into this hatch. You can forgo several of the processes that are usually compulsory - proper intelligence, a decent immune system, survival instincts.

When you're done with the spell, a small creature appears on the ground, around the size of your fist. With pink skin, overly large eyes, and leathery wings, it's too strange for anyone to mistake it for a real animal, but it's small enough to be inconspicuous. If anyone does notice it, they'll probably just assume it was a beginner's failed experiment and simply dispose of it. "Grotesque" is slang for badly-made creatures, and the term is often fitting.

It barely misses a beat before fluttering up to the hatch, pushing open the door, and slipping in.

While it's gone, you nibble anxiously on another piece of cheesecake. Your mind races with possibilities - what could be hidden there? You doubt it's empty; someone obviously entered it recently, and they would have no reason to if it didn't lead to something significant. Some ancient artifact?

Before you get far with your train of thought, the creature returns, making a soft screech-like noise as it flaps down toward you. Flushing pale pink, you look around to see if anyone heard it. At least one person cocks their head, bemused, at you.

For a moment, the creature hovers in front of you silently, then it says, voice hoarse: "Humans. Two. Long passage. Not go in fully."

"Humans?" you question. "Who are they? Are they armed?"

"Kids. Like you. Carrying- pointy things."

You probably should have taken the time to give it a better vocabulary, but you didn't have any idea what it would need to know, so you just shoved in the first few hundred words that came to mind. At least it can communicate, move, and identify most kinds of pastries. That's more than everything you were told to do in exams.

But, well, what exactly are you supposed to do with the information?

A/N: Yep! Anyone's always welcome to post. Sorry for the delay; I've been sick recently.

[starsailor]

Train it a bit more, then send it back to investigate.

[Piefan]

I'm back, with what I hope to be a semi-stable updating schedule!

You pause, wondering how you can quickly train the grotesque--- creature. A good memory isn't part of the things you blessed it with, and the party only goes on for... All night, actually, right up until sunrise. Something about how the founders of magic skipping days of sleep just to find it. You're pretty sure, though, that your parents would be worried for you if you stayed here for too long.

Which, come to think of it, is what Enchantment is for.

Unless done by an extremely experienced mage, arcane magic almost never works on existing living beings. Thankfully, summoned creatures don't count in that rule, for the same reason druids can't communicate with them - they're not real animals.

"Stay still," you mutter, though you know it's unneeded. The creature lays limp in your hands, skin hard and rough against your skin. You gather the magical energy within you, channeling it through your hands, and cast.

You pass on knowledge of everything you can think of that might be relevant - infamous criminals, types of weapons, words to describe humans' appearance - and some things that probably won't be, just in case. You're not entirely sure, for instance, how knowing how to speak in full sentences will help anything, but it does make people sound fancier.

"Go. Do it again." The creature obeys, flapping off quietly. It pauses a moment to push open the hatch, which has almost completely swung shut.

It takes far longer this time, and you bite your lip, anxious for it to return. Ten minutes pass before it approaches once again, resting in your now-outstretched hands. It's surprisingly light, you note, now that you're not casting - it feels almost hollow. "Anything else?" you ask.

"The humans carrying knives, I think. Another one now - boy."

(You gave this thing a complex understanding of language and sentence structures, and this is how it repays you.)

"What do they look like? Do you recognise them?"

"Not any of the criminals I know. Boy and one girl light brown; other is pink. All tall, robust."

They're druids, you assume - the brown ones, in particular. That's not to say that there are no dark-skinned wizards, but the differing lifestyles tend to result in druids having visibly tanned skin, with mages typically being paler. The description of their builds only furthers your theory.

"Their clothes? Did they look formal?"

"Yes. But still comfortable. Dresses for the girls, but light. The boy wearing normal shirt and pants. Can move around easily in them."

"The passageway? Where did it lead to? Did you see any doors or other exits?"

"Leads to, I don't know. Another door at the end. Through it, grass and... Stone. Shaped stone."

"A statue? Of what?"

"Yes. A horse. With a sword."

A horse with a sword. That's thankfully distinguishing - there are only about three of those, discounting the ones outside of Driyla, and it seems a fair assumption that the hatch doesn't lead outside the country. "What else could you see in the exit?"

"Colours. Wall, probably. Graffiti."

You nod, and it flits out of your grip; your gaze follows it as it tucks itself in a corner of the room. From its description, you can guess at where the passageway leads - an old museum not far from here. Still, that doesn't answer the question of what to do with this information. Inform the authorities? Head there yourself and investigate?

[apricotflyer]

Go and investigate by yourself. I'm sure it will be fine, and you don't know what is happening there, so best not contact the authorities yet.

[dove.]

Investigate it yourself, just like Harry Potter always a rebel.
Sorry I've been watching all the Harry Potter movies again XD

[Piefan]

You're pretty sure that the passageway wasn't installed into the ceiling by the government, and even if it was, there'd be some law against people randomly barging in. Still, you’re probably jumping to conclusions here. It's just as likely that some guys are doing maintenance as it is that anyone's actually messing with anything.

Curiosity nags at you, though, tugging at the edge of your thoughts until you give in. Glancing around you, at the still-oblivious partygoers, you walk as inconspicuously as possible toward your grotesque. This proves to be unnecessary, though - it doesn't seem like anyone cares about you enough to notice or care about you doing anything. Oh well. You call it toward you, softly but with far less effort dedicated to being quiet.

The sky's dark above you, night having fallen some time ago; the moon glows soft and alone. The creature flutters along, following your unceremonious journey toward the museum. It's a short walk - ten or twenty minutes at the most - and you reach the place in no time.

The museum's closed, but you're not surprised. It doesn't get enough traffic in the afternoon to justify keeping it open at night. You still have access to what's right in front of it, which is all you really need.

The statue's life-size, you note. It depicts a rearing horse, bare of saddle or rider. A sword is clamped firmly between its teeth, and its head is tilted as if about to swing. You're not sure what it means - either it's an essential part of druidic culture and history, or some sculptor with too much to spare threw it at the people in charge.

The museum seems like it barely gets enough money to stay afloat. Graffiti, bright and striking, almost covers the walls, which have the occasional hole. The garden where the statue rests is overgrown, with your shoes sinking entirely into the long grass.

"What angle did you see it from?" you say, turning to your creature.

"Angle?"

Right. You don't think you gave it understanding of that word, and its depth perception isn't that advanced anyway. "How far was the statue from the exit of the passage?" You can't remember much of how its mind works - most, if not all, of it was just regurgitating all the functions Atlas taught you into the spell, and you don't even understand a lot of those - but that command should be simple enough for it to understand.

It takes a moment for it to respond, even with that. It flies around the sculpture in an attempt to gauge distance, before declaring at last, "Around here." Walking toward the indicated spot, you fall silent, searching the area.

You're not sure how to start or exactly where to look, but you're resilient. Mud stains your shoes and dirties your dress as you crouch among the weeds - you really wish you'd changed, but you didn't bring extra clothes. You're stuck exploring in expensive, formal, and extremely uncomfortable wear.

At last, feeling like an immense idiot, you find a wooden trapdoor amongst the soil. How did that even get there? You'd imagine it would be fairly difficult to install this without someone noticing.

Maybe they did.

The trapdoor's small - an adult wouldn't be able to enter without the aid of magic. There doesn't seem to be a handle, but it protudes slightly from the ground, so you tug carefully at it. It doesn't budge, though, so you try using telekinesis. Hm. It seems to be one of those anti-magic things - unless you pour all your energy into it, which could be outright fatal, you won't be able to break the field that stops you from directly casting magic on it.

Opening it, it seems, is going to be a challenge.

[Ice580]

Summon a crowbar.