Learning by Doing

[Balthazar Black]

41 Ymiden 720

Balthazar listened to Doran's explanation with the same intrigue he'd listened to everything else the man said about alchemy. It was all so fascinating to the man who could throw lightning. He commit Doran's message to heart more than his words. The potency of all your ingredients needed to be roughly the same. A powerful binder would be wasted on a weak reagent and a powerful reagent would, conversely, not work with a weak binder. It was more or less the same with the primers as the mage understood it. Then Doran showed Balthazar the powder he'd be using to speed up the reaction and Balthazar eye's skipped across the label so he'd know what to look for in his encyclopedia. "Fascinating."

When Doran said Balthazar could attune to some of the reagents, the mage immediately began doing so. He always held two frequencies, Nimue's and Isabella's. He always wanted to know if they were in danger. However he'd also been holding the frequency of an assassin who made a few attempts on his life. Balthazar thought that by attuning to the assassin, he'd have an edge on the man. However that assassin was nowhere near as interesting as Doran's reagents so Balthazar dropped the frequency. Then he began to attune to the metals Doran had laid out for him to look at. He started with the cobalt, knowing it would take a full bit to completely connect to the frequency of the metal scrapings. "It only takes me a bit and I've become adept enough that it doesn't hinder my focus greatly. Objects aren't as complex until you start looking into them." Balthazar explained so Doran would know why his focus lapsed, if it ever did. Then Doran asked an interesting question.

Balthazar had to think about that. Partially because he was still attuning to the cobalt scraping and partially because he didn't really know. He knew, in theory, what he could do but he had not practiced it. He hadn't been away from home long enough to try and project himself back there. But in theory he could. "There is no scope." Balthazar decided. That wasn't an entirely accurate measurement of the magic but it was what Balthazar had experienced recently. Prior to learning how to project himself, he had felt some manner of range to the abilities but now... now it was nearly impossible to know. "I can attune to people, objects, places, ghosts, and apparently spirits." Balthazar explained "I admit I am limited mostly to buildings right now, but I with time I might even be able to attune the city itself." Then, he decided that was not an adequate answer to Doran's question. "Apart from when I've traveled the Untold and been very careful not use my magic, I always have a general sense of the distance between myself and the things I've attuned to. If I choose to close myself off from the frequency, I have the ability to seek it out with relatively the same clarity as if I'd held it- granted it isn't exactly the same because if it's an active frequency, I can project my senses to where they are." Balthazar paused. "I'm rambling, I'm sorry, back to work."

Balthazar watched Doran pour the filings into some sort of container. He had a similar one in his kit but he wasn't sure what it did until he saw the fire. The container didn't burn away and Balthazar realized that was the point. Even with his spark soothed, he could feel his kin element reaching out towards him. It hurt to feel the call of the flame and reject it but Balthazar knew it had to be done for the safety of the lab. Balthazar nodded to Doran when the professor gave him his instructions and moved a step closer to the burner so he could see the filings melt. He would have swore he saw the flame of the burner lean just little closer to him when he moved in but when Balthazar checked on the flame, it seemed to be going straight up as it should have been. The filings began to liquefy and Balthazar prodded them with the stirrer Doran had told him to use. He didn't really know what he was supposed to achieved by stirring them but he tried to keep the scraping from getting chunky. They wanted to make the metal liquid right? "I think it's ready."

[Doran]

“Impressive”, the Mortalborn remarked, curtly, but in a genuine tone of voice, as Balthazar told him that he had become adept enough that attuning didn’t hinder his focus greatly and cocked his head a little to the side as he watched him. Unlike before, there were no outward signs that the other man was using his magic. The expression on his face did not change either, he did not stare into space, and what more, he continued the conversation fairly effortlessly. Apparently, he concluded, Balthazar had really not exaggerated.

“You can attune to ghosts and spirits?” he asked and raised an eyebrow fractionally. He had wanted to focus on teaching Balthazar, but this was something that was too interesting to ignore it entirely. He had some experience when it came to matters of ghosts and spirits – one of the items in his collection rendered the wearer invisible to spirits, and he had met a person that had been possessed by a ghost, among other things – but there were some aspects of ghosts and spirits that he was not familiar with yet.

“Dreamwalking or another means of travelling?” he wanted to know a few moments later, when Balthazar claimed that he had travelled the Untold. Dreamwalking was another thing, besides magic, that his lover had initiated him into, and he had warned him of the dangers of the world of dreams (and using magic while he was there). He had begun to explore the Veil – to him it looked like a city of metal and glass – and walked through some of the doors that he had found there, but he had not done more than that yet.

Emea was something that one should approach with utter caution.

“There is no need for you to apologize, Mister Black”, he spoke in a deep tone of voice. “I found your so-called rambling quite enlightening, and I would not be averse to continuing that conversation at a later date”, he admitted, smiling lightly before he continued to work. Soon, the cloth was drying – drops of alchemical mixture were falling from it, into a container that had been positioned directly under the drying rack – and he turned to watch Balthazar.

The white-haired mage was quite meticulous, which was something that he approved of, of course.

When Balthazar told him that he thought the metal was ready, he nodded, took a look at it, reduced the heat of the burner and placed the cloth into the container that stood on it. For a few trills, nothing happened, and then the cloth began to absorb the molten cobalt, changing its color slightly in the process. Once it had absorbed enough of it, he removed it from the container again, using a fresh pair of tongs and placed it on the worktable in front of them before he turned the burner off.

A moment later, he grabbed a knife that was lying next to the reagents and – tried to stab the cloth.

Nothing happened.

“A normal piece of cloth would likely be damaged now”, he explained to Balthazar. “Of course, the effect is not all-encompassing – with enough force, it is still possible to cause damage, but it is considerably stronger than it has been before”, he explained.

[Balthazar Black]

41 Ymiden 720

"Yes." Balthazar said rather simply when Doran asked Balthazar to clarify that he could attune to ghosts and spirits... at least he assumed Doran wanted him to clarify. "It's something I discovered last season when I tried to kill a mountain." Balthazar began "They're frequencies are a little less complex than humans and objects. Every note of the frequency is in some way related to the concept that the spirit embodies. As for ghosts, well... actually... I have some questions for you about ghosts once we're done with the demonstration." Balthazar realized he hadn't explained what the frequency of a ghost was like but figured it didn't matter for their academic purposes. The thought of ghosts brought Balthazar's mind back to the one he had encountered in the city. There was a malevolent presence in Viden and Balthazar meant to exorcise it but the only method he knew was illegal in Viden.

Balthazar was hoping Doran would know some ways around those laws that kept the mage from trying to deal with the ghost but the lesson in alchemy was still the most important thing to Balthazar. Then Doran asked if Balthazar had used dreamwalking or some other means to enter the Untold and Balthazar raised a curious brow for a moment before remembering that the Untold was not readily available to anyone. "Dreamwalking." Balthazar answered. "I've been using the Untold to get around. That's how I came to Viden and how I plan to leave when my work here is done. It's effective but if I'm being honest, I prefer staying in dreamscapes. The Untold is... chaos... and the longer I'm in it the less I feel like myself."

Then they were back to the demonstration. Balthazar watched the cloth hanging and couldn't help but wonder if his magic could be used to make the cloth dry faster when he attempted to mass produce this effect for the rest of the Scalvoris military. He didn't ask why Doran was drying the cloth for the same reason he hadn't asked what direction Doran wanted him to stir the mixture in, because it was fairly self explanatory. But it didn't bring a question to Balthazar's mind regardless "In some cases, say I was using another powder, would it be better to apply the powder to the wet cloth or should I always allow the primers to soak in and then dry before putting the other reagent in?"

Balthazar asked his question as Doran poured the metal onto the cloth and he watched with interest as the metal was absorbed into it. Fascinating. Even more fascinating was the fact that the cloth didn't seem to become rigid like the metal that had been added to it. "That's amazing." Balthazar said as he looked over where Doran had stabbed the cloth. There was no hole, no tear, just a little nub where the fabric had been stretched by the knife trying to pierce it. This would be incredibly useful for the Elements if he could standardize uniforms for them made of similar materials.

Though the mind of the wandering mage was never truly at rest. He didn't take long to absorb the demonstration before he was looking at other reagents again and attuning to them. This time Balthazar focused on the powder that Doran has used to lower the metal's melting point. It certainly had an official name, he'd read it when he looked at it, but Balthazar thought only of the powder's purpose because that was all that mattered to his alchemical practice. Quick-melt powder. Once he was attuned to it he moved on to the next thing. The copper shavings. Balthazar was slowly working his way down the line of options he'd been presented but once he was done with the copper shavings he'd attune to the cloth they'd made itself because he knew it would have the most interesting notes to listen too.

All the while, Balthazar tried to focus on his conversation with Doran as well. Seeing the results, Balthazar took off his coat and then his gloves and held them, not quite sure if he was to put them right back where he'd gotten them or if Doran needed to do something to sanitize them because the mage had touched them. "Thank you for this, it's been educational. Now I do believe I promised you something in return." Balthazar held out an arm for a moment then lowered it back to his side, not expecting Doran to draw his blood on the spot but wanting Doran to know Balthazar hadn't forgotten. "We could continue discussing magic, mutations, ghosts, and spirits while you draw my blood right?"

[Doran]

When Balthazar claimed that he had tried to kill a mountain the season before, the Mortalborn’s eyebrows rose for a moment before he inclined his head. It sounded quite incredible, but to his knowledge, the white-haired mage had never lied to him before, and thus he saw no reason to doubt his words. Besides, he had tried to kill an Immortal. A mountain seemed to be relatively easy to defeat in comparison, although he couldn’t help but wonder about the semantics.

Rocks were, at least most of the time, not alive, unless you counted Yludih that were beings made of crystal. In order to kill something, it had to be alive first though – or at least undead.

Maybe Balthazar had not meant things literally though, but confronted a creature that had been bigger than any other rather than a real mountain? He pondered that somewhat linguistic problem for a moment or two before he turned to focus on what the other man said about spirits and ghosts instead as that was ultimately more interesting.

When Balthazar told him that he had some questions about ghosts for him once they were done with the demonstration, he furrowed his brow slightly before he admitted in a comparatively neutral tone of voice, “I know a bit about those matters, but I’m hardly an expert when it comes to ghosts. Of course, I will try to help you if I can, nevertheless”, he added.

Balthazar asked him about drying the cloth though, and he thought about it for a moment before he replied, “I would always dry the cloth first. I found that doing such leads to the best results, but that step could be skipped if you were pressed for time”, he conceded, shrugging his shoulders very lightly before he continued with his demonstration.

~~~

When he stabbed the cloth, and Balthazar remarked that it was amazing, he looked up and smiled – his blue eyes almost seemed to twinkle for a moment as he had quite enjoyed the other man’s reaction – before he set the knife down and smoothed out the cloth.

“You did”, he remarked in a calm tone of voice a little later, when Balthazar mentioned that he had promised him something in return and inclined his head slightly. He took his gloves off as well and dropped them into a container that stood at a nearby table, gesturing for Balthazar to do the same.

The gloves would have to be cleaned before they could be reused again.

“I would appreciate that”, he replied as the other man suggested that they could continue to discuss magic while he drew his blood and took his lab coat off, just draping it across a chair for the time being before he gestured for Balthazar to follow him to the back of the laboratory where a desk and two chairs stood and where he had already arranged everything that he would need in order to draw the white-haired mage’s blood.

“Shall we begin now, Mister Black?” he asked as he put on a fresh pair of gloves (he always wore gloves when he was working with blood or drawing someone’s blood; not doing so was dangerous as well as irresponsible in his opinion) and raised an eyebrow questioningly.

[Saint]

Learning by Doing

Balthazar

Points awarded: 15 (Attunement)
Knowledge:
Attunement- The Frequency of Cobalt
Attunement - The Frequency of Copper
Attunement - The Frequency of a Dead Carowa
Smithing - Cobalt is a durable metal
Alchemy - Wear gloves and a lab coat for safety
Alchemy - Try to avoid accidentally mixing reagents
Alchemy - Crushed Carowa Beak is an effective primer
Alchemy - Melting-point Lowering Powder
Alchemy - Binders prevent reagents from negating each other
Alchemy - Primers prepare material for reagents
Alchemy - Primers are not always necessary
Alchemy - How to imbue a cloth with the strength of metal

Renown: -
Loot: -
Injuries: -
Consequences: -
Skill Usage: Appropriate to level.

Doran

Points awarded: 15
Knowledge:
Alchemy: Attunement: Soothe: Soothing your own mutations
Alchemy: Attunement: Soothe: Makes your casting less potent
Alchemy: Attunement: What Attuners can attune to
Alchemy: Attunement: The frequencies of spirits are related to their concepts
Alchemy: Attunement: Dousing: Dousing for similar frequencies
Alchemy x2
Linguistics x1
Medicine x1
Meditation x1
Teaching x2

Balthazar Black: Attuner
Balthazar Black: Dreamwalker
Balthazar Black: I taught him alchemy

Renown: -
Loot: -
Injuries: -
Consequences: -
Skill Usage: Appropriate to level.

Word count: 8,120
Notes:

I feel like I've had my own alchemy lesson by reading this thread! Doran's explanations and demonstrations were informative and easy to understand, and Balthazar seems like an eager, curious student. I thought this was a cool and productive way to teach the basics of alchemy, as Doran helped Balthazar learn a method of strengthening materials that will definitely come in handy later on. Someone's putting in that good time and effort for Militant! (New uniforms? You've got my vote.)

This thread really highlights both Doran's love for alchemy and his excellent teaching skills. It seems to come to him naturally, even if he might not have expected it to, and it's nice to see him in his element. He and Balthazar touched on a lot of interesting subjects in this thread, from alchemy to ghosts to magic and blood, and I feel like I've come away from it with a lot more knowledge about things things than before - and also a lot more questions. Great job from both of you in making the lesson interesting and effective.

Enjoy the rewards, and feel free to send me a PM with any questions or concerns.