[open] december will be magic again

[kingsroads]

Who: everyone!
When: the evening of D15
Where: A small meeting hall on the moon, close to the portal to the carnival
What: a whole bunch of show-offs meet up to show off their magic, people interested in magic come to learn about said magic, and other people show up to see if something inevitably gets set on fire. (aka mage club)
Warnings: none so far, will edit if needed.

The meeting hall is a large open space, with hardwood floors and a rustic decor. A few chairs and tables are scattered around, though there aren't enough for the amount of people who'll hopefully show up. Some food has been set out: mostly finger foods (tiny sandwiches, fruit, veggies & dip) though there are some savory options and plenty of home-baked cookies, courtesy of Rin. Drink wise, there's water, hot chocolate, hot tea, and a few bottles of wine because tipsy magic sounds like an awesome idea and this is what happens when the alcoholic makes the dinner menu. Aside from the food table and the few tables, there's not much of anything in the room: plenty of open space for showing off or getting out of the way of someone who wants to show off.

One of the doors of the meeting hall leads to the outside. There's a wider, 'backyard' sort of area with plenty of room for people to cast magic as large and impressive as they want. A fire pit stands outside also for warming your hands and other fire-based magic. Please don't set the building on fire.

This is all very informal. If pressed for details, Strange would have told anyone to just come whenever, stay as long as you like, and so on and so forth. The emphasis is on learning about each other's magic, displaying one's skills and talents, and helping anyone who wished to learn magic decide on a path for them to take.

Showing off is just a given.

( ooc: This is an open mingle log! Feel free to make your own top-levels & tag around! )

Comments

[hippocarnival]

Yuya acts like he's thinking about that for a moment. But he's still really excited to have figured out how to cast magic (a holdover from Portland not counting, because Portland was weird) and he really wants to show it off.

"Hmm... okay, I can show you!" After the shortest deliberation ever Yuya steps back, measuring a few feet between them. He takes a breath to ready himself and grips his pendant. He's using it at a focus, and quickly after he grabs it a dome-like shield pops up around him, semi-translucent. If Lambert ever saw Strange cast his barrier spell in Portland, it's very similar.

Yuya waves. "It's solid!"

[whattaprick]

Lambert leans forward, boldly, to give the barrier a few taps with a finger as though to check how solid it actually is. His medallion hums against his skin, but it's easily ignored -- all the magic in the air's been setting it off constantly, anyway -- in favor of studying the barrier curiously.

"Not bad," he says. "Have you tested how much force it can take?" Even as he says that, he's stepping back to bend down and scoop up a handful of snow, already grinning in anticipation.

[hippocarnival]

The barrier stands strong against Lambert's finger. It's very much like a clear, magic wall.

"Definitely strong enough to take snowballs." Strange had thoroughly tested snowballs against Yuya. "It doesn't handle much right now... or I guess I can't focus on keeping it up under too much force? But I'm working on it! I'm going to make it strong, and then I'll make it bigger."

[whattaprick]

Casually, Lambert lobs the snowball against the shield anyway -- it splatters in a flurry of white fluff, and he grins.

"How long can you keep it up?"

[hippocarnival]

"It gets harder after a couple minutes, but that's longer than it was before." He drops the shield much earlier this time, however. There's nothing to be defending against and Lambert already tested it.

"I have to focus on keeping it up. It's weird, even if I'm not really doing much, it feels like I'm making a lot of effort!" Like wearing himself out from thinking too hard. "I'm practicing every day. I want it to be really strong before something else happens."

Because something else will probably happen.

[whattaprick]

"The spell could be burning your own stamina, or you might not be used to pulling magic in at all," Lambert shrugs. "Like you said, it's all about practicing."

With Yuya's shield dissipated, a twist of his wrist and a motion of his hand nearly instantly brings up his own shielding spell, a bright orange bubble that wraps around him.

"Do it enough, eventually you'll be able to do it without thinking."

[hippocarnival]

Yuya, of course, immediately moves to start tapping Lambert's shield with his finger. "I'm definitely not used to using magic, but I guess it might be stamina too."

He didn't know Lambert could make a shield. He knows he can make fire and manipulate people, but he said his magic wasn't as powerful as real mages from his home. Still, it's impressive to Yuya. "How long did it take you to learn magic?"

[whattaprick]

That's a difficult question, mostly because it was long ago -- and largely, for Lambert, an unpleasant period of his life he has little desire to revisit. Nonetheless, he gives Yuya's question due consideration.

"Can't really remember," he says, finally. "All the training kind of blurred together. But I couldn't learn any magic until after I became a witcher." The shield is sturdy under Yuya's tentative prodding, holding up with little visible effort from Lambert, who crosses his arms as he thinks out loud.

[hippocarnival]

It all blurred together? Well, years spent learning something probably would, right? "You said you were in your sixties on the radio."

There's also that. Yuya scrutinizes Lambert, not because he disbelieves him but because he really doesn't look like it. "Is that because only witchers and sorcerers are allowed to learn magic, or... you just couldn't?" Like, physically. At all.

[whattaprick]

"The second one," Lambert nods, mouth twisting as he tries to figure out how to explain it. "You have to have the potential to hold it in the first place. 'Course, if you have the potential but don't learn how to use it... that's a different set of problems."

[hippocarnival]

So it's not like Strange's England, where anyone can learn magic from guys under hedges? Distantly, Yuya remembers Portland has similar restrictions. Just not everyone was capable of being good at (or casting) magic.

"Why'd you become a witcher?" He asks not because Lambert doesn't seem to like it, but he did refer to it as 'pest control'. Was it a lineage thing, or did he just really like fighting monsters and casting magic?

... Well, he is the Nightrider after all. It'd make sense.

[whattaprick]

"Because I was made into one," Lambert answers, matter of fact and only slightly bitter - he's still in too much of a good mood having been cured to be annoyed or unnecessarily cynical. "I didn't have much of a choice. Nobody who becomes a witcher chooses it -- we're taken when we're too young to know any better, and by the time we realize what a crap deal we've gotten, it's too late."

Mostly too late because you were dead or your friends were dead.

[hippocarnival]

Oh. Well, that would explain why he's not as enthusiastic about it. In a way that reminds him of Academia, of Sora who didn't have any friends until he met Yuya and Yuzu. None of them knew better before they were indoctrinated to be soldiers, did they?

"Can't you just... leave?" Or are they not allowed to?

[whattaprick]

Not for the first time, it's strange to think how he has to explain this -- how witchers being mistrusted isn't taken for granted, how people don't know things, however wrong, from story and song.

"If it were that easy, do you think I would have stuck around?" Lambert smirks -- probably because he's getting a good private laugh at Yuya trying to imagine what a younger Lambert might have been like -- and shakes his head.

"There wasn't anywhere to go, and it was still better than where some of us came from. We all figured we'd take our chances."

[hippocarnival]

It's not that easy, but it's not impossible. And Lambert doesn't strike Yuya as the kind of person who would give up just because it's not 'easy'.

"Is that what it was for you?"

[whattaprick]

Yuya's right about that much. Unlike the others, he had family he could get to, even half of that was shitty family.

"When I couldn't get out, I decided I'd survive out of spite. And then I was a witcher, and there was no going back."

[hippocarnival]

Yuya purses his lips in a deep frown. He may not know the exact context, but he can pick up on the implications.

"What about being with the carnival? Is it better than being a witcher?"

[whattaprick]

"Yes," Lambert answers simply, without even a beat of hesitation. Even with nearly dying a few times now and actually dying once, having his life rewritten and his soul changed, there's no question in his mind. This beats out being a witcher by spades.

But at the same time...

"Can't hang around here forever, though." He smirks. "Wouldn't want the rest of them to think I'm finally dead."

[hippocarnival]

Yuya folds his arms, already trying to run through solutions that would end with Lambert being happy. Because he sure doesn't sound happy as a witcher.

"The Ringmaster could help you say goodbye if you really wanted to stay." He doesn't know if that's exactly what Lambert would look for, though. "Or... there has to be some way you can leave being a witcher."

There has to be something.

[whattaprick]

If only life were that simple. Lambert frowns a little, but ends up just forcing a laugh, shaking his head. Leaving behind the only life he's ever known? Even if he doesn't like it, it's familiar, comfortable, most of the imperfections known. to go from that to something completely new ... well, it's probably the benefit of being young, isn't it? The future seems so much easier to attain.

"Maybe," is what he settles on instead, shrugging with a slightly sardonic smile. "But I've got months to go on this contract yet. Don't need to plan on my next one."

But speaking of contracts -- he cocks his head at Yuya, raising his brows. "Did Gongenzaka renew his? He said his time was up soon." He must have, since Lambert's seen him around, but he could have been sticking around just for the cure, too.

[hippocarnival]

"Eh?" Yuya's expression lifts and he's surprised. That's not a question he was expecting. "Oh, not yet. He's going to when we go back down to the carnival." Once their vacation is over and he can take a brief trip home between contracts. Yuya doesn't expect to miss him long, given how short Strange was gone.

His expression scrunches a bit as he tries to remember whether Gongenzaka's in Lambert's department, and that's why he's wondering. But he's under Sans in patrol, right? "Why?"

[whattaprick]

"He told me while we were stuck under the Prince's castle." Lambert shrugs, idly. "Didn't say if he was going to stick arund or not."

If he chose not to, given what he went through? It wouldn't surprise Lambert, though it also wouldn't surprise him if he chose to stay. There are reasons for both, and he doesn't know Gongenzaka well enough to predict what he'd choose.

[hippocarnival]

Oh. Well, Yuya's gone and said it, but it's not really a secret is it? Gongenzaka's contracts are relatively expected and innocuous compared to everyone else from his set of dimensions.

He stuffs his hands in his pockets. At least Lambert's properly distracted Yuya from his own contracts, at least for now. "He's going to stay for another year, and then we're going to go home. Uh, not all at the same time but closer together than if he left now I guess?"

[whattaprick]

If they survive the year. That's the mildly cynical thought at the back of Lambert's mind, but it's one he doesn't share.

"Doesn't really make a difference, does it?" he says. "Either way, time runs differently here."

[hippocarnival]

"It does for the people who are still with the carnival." Which is exactly why he's staying and not waiting out their contracts. It's exactly the thought that Lambert doesn't voice. "It gets dangerous, so we have to look out for each other and make sure everyone makes it home."

He doesn't want to think about what happens when someone doesn't make it home, least of all one of his friends.