crystal || OPEN.

[degenere]

FORM: sending crystal
SENDER: Val de Foncé
RECIPIENT: E V E R Y O N E
WHAT: researchers, meet your new boss. everyone else, give Val a high five. applications for Research Secretary now being collected.
WHEN: right now
WHERE: your ears

Research, Inquisition. [Hail and well met my dudes Val is still Orlesian. Note the accent.] If this word does not thrill you as it does me, we have very little to speak of. In fact we may not have spoken at all. In Val Royeaux, at the University, I and my friends are well known for all of the research that we have contributed to the vast stores of knowledge that are contained within our much beloved and greatly venerated University.

And I am pleased now to inform you, Inquisition, that I have been made Head of Research for this very organization that we all name as our own. A very wise choice. There are so very few that possess my credentials, experience, and charm. It is my belief that we, as a division, shall far surpass the work of all other divisions. For our purpose is not only superior: it is clearer, too.

[In a more serious tone, now:] To those lucky enough to be working on research projects for the Inquisition, I am requesting that all work you have amassed on each topic be put into the fires and burned. [And a pause before, more cheerfully:] No! Do not do that. What I mean is, we start anew, together. But you must submit your work to me for a metaphorical burning. I shall burn it with my critique. I require at the very least a written proposal for the work you are conducting. If a project has begun, let us visit it together.

I shall also require a secretary. Chief duties for this position will be, of course, reading project proposals. Please, make an introduction and submit your credentials to me in my office forthwith. You need not be a member of our research efforts, but you must have a keen interest in reading terrible handwriting.

[And generally doing all the work but that part remains unsaid.]

And! To those that might contest my selection, I shall quote the translation of a rustic proverb found engraved upon the wall of Orzammar, taught to me by my very dear Baroness Frédérique: may a demon eat your arse.

Comments

[kartereo]

[Waver held back a comment about making assumptions, but only barely.]

Not likely you've heard of it, since I'm not a Thedas native, but it is the rather unimaginatively named Clock Tower. I've been teaching for hm. [Fuck, it feels like centuries most days.] Five years? Seven? Not quite a decade.

[degenere]

Ah. Another Rifter. It seems our division is beset by men such as yourself, of distant lands. I am glad for it. While you learn of Thedas, through your research, I shall learn of your countries as well.

Seven years is a good long time to have been teaching. I am very nearly impressed, and withhold any stronger emotion only because I do not know the educational standards and disciplines of this 'Clock Tower', and cannot pass fuller judgement. Which theory would you call the focus of your study?

[kartereo]

I have no doubt you will. At any rate, our style of accreditation is not typical for a university.

[Or something that's easy to explain thanks to the matters of bloodlines and noble claims to control of classrooms. Waver does pause though. He's still uneasy with mouthing off about being a mage while in Thedas, no matter how deep the divide between magic here and home.]

Modern magecraft theories, covering the past 100 or so years. We are also the newest department.

[degenere]

I see. Then you work magic, or only know of it in theory?

[kartereo]

Both. I filled in at a different department when I first began and then was placed as department head very, very recently. [And for political reasons as well, which had him always on edge.]

The way magecraft works at home is also deeply different from that in Thedas, before you ask.

[degenere]

That was not quite what I was going to next ask, but now that you have called attention to it, please, do elaborate. What is the difference in how magics work in your home country?

[kartereo]

Huh. What were you going to ask then?

[There's a shift as Waver closes his eyes for a moment, and his tone changes into something much more rehearsed.]

The overview is as follows: the concept of the Fade doesn't exist and so any Fade basd system does not apply. Magi draw on their own magical energy and energy from the area surrounding them, process it through their bodies with spells and intent, and the final result is magic. There's no use of staffs, wands, or anything of the sort either. It is all on the individual. Magic is inherited and the casting ability and powers generally improve in successive generations, thus older families are more powerful spellcasters than younger ones.

And that's the quick version.

[degenere]

I suppose I was going to ask what the color of your favorite robe was.

[not really but who cares. To this short speech, Val pays close attention--perhaps rather more than a critic of his might expect--but he has, in fact, been made head of Research for good reason.]

I see. How interesting. Hereditary magic. How does a younger family of magic begin? Where is its inception--when a daughter of an older family marries one who does not practice magic, perhaps?

[kartereo]

Red, as a matter of fact.

[But the matter of the hereditary nature of magecraft only provokes a tired sigh. The whole set up leads to more trouble than Waver has ever cared for, since it comes part and parcel with snobbish attitudes.]

That'll depend. That scenario you described is unlikely in the present era, families that are old keep propagating themselves, creating a large gap. Some non-mage families will just [he snaps his fingers] have someone born with the ability. The study into that has been severely limited by a lack of interest.

[degenere]

[Adds a note in his employee file: favorite color, red.]

How would anyone find that phenomenon lacking in interest? It defies the very hereditary system that dictates the ability, does it not?

[kartereo]

Well, you've just articulated it. If there's less competition to gain a leg up, all the better. Ignorance is an advantage. It isn't like noble titles are handed out here like candy, are they?

[degenere]

Well, yes--but I mean to say that anyone of a truly scholarly mind should surely find such circumstances interesting, regardless of their own birth. And I find ridiculous any idea to the contrary.

Your fellow professors, at your university, do they share this disinterest?

[kartereo]

There is a great trend to prioritize moving one's family forward towards the accomplishments intended by the family's lineage to refine their craft to the point of disregarding others. Magi are scholars, but frequently narrow in scope.

And as for my colleagues, that is a deeply individual question. But if I had to guess, I'd say there's a greater lean towards disinterest.

[degenere]

Disgusting. Appalling. No slight to your country, monsieur, but it is greatly distressing to me to think of any university where furthering a family comes before knowledge. In Orlais, our society does well love the elite, the royal, the titled. In our University, we strive to stand above such things, to make a name for the University by furthering our knowledge. It is to the University that we owe our greatest fealty. Such is the way that all scholars should think of their work.

A narrow scope is only useful when it is deployed as an academic focus, an edged blade by which the veil of ignorance might be sliced aside.

And I am sorry, monsieur, for the fate of scholarly magics in your world.

[kartereo]

I don't disagree with anything that you've said. It is a particular annoying quirk that the course of things took on some centuries ago, and well. It has endured.

[Waver does hate a number of parts of it, but mostly the part where his own abilities are limited due to bloodline. But that's a much more private matter, and something he is in no mood to discuss.

Then again, the problems of Clock Tower continue to sound better than how Thedas treats their mages, so there is that.]

But now that we have sidetracked completely, we might return to the original topics at hand?

[degenere]

My apologies, monsieur. There is no passion quite like my passion for the pursuit of knowledge. I find it difficult to set it aside, and can get carried away when speaking of it.

You are correct. The original topic was, as I recall, a funny sort of secrecy for projects you believe may be... perhaps we shall say, corrupted, by my knowledge of them? I assure you: you have no cause for worry.

[kartereo]

None needed. Having dozens of people from different worlds makes it hard not to get carried away when the opportunity to do so arises.

Well, I just wanted to make sure the other arms of this many headed creature won't take issue. That was all.

[degenere]

Yes, this structure is all rather confusing, isn't it. Then again, you are of a university. You must be familiar with such labyrinthine structures of institutions. Departments, department heads, specializations... But we are all united beneath a single banner, are we not?

Therefore we must keep no secrets and make plain our everything.

[which means tell him everything]

[kartereo]

I feel like any university administration would laugh about actual unity from departments, but I follow your meaning well enough.

[degenere]

Precisely, yes. You have the right of these institutions. Which means we must strive to be more than them. Our calling is higher, our cause is-- well, perhaps not greater. But just as great, at the very least.

And I will say now that I am pleased to be working with you, monsieur.

[kartereo]

I wouldn't talk too much about higher callings and greater purposes yet, you know. Just in case something decides to come bite everyone in the ass before the whole thing can gain momentum.

But you are going to make life interesting, that much is clear to me.

[degenere]

I strive always to be interesting, my friend, if nothing else. Now, when I ended my message by saying that a demon might eat the arses of naysayers, I did not mean ours, you know. Is this truly a worry?

[kartereo]

No, that part just seemed obvious expression. Lord knows there's enough variants of it back home.