Chương 182: Can't a Girl Have a Hobby

Emma"Does this sight not look familiar, Cadet Emma Booker of Earthrealm?" Those were some unexpected fighting words. I felt a one-two knockout punch the likes of which were only matched by the audacity of Ping and the conniving of Mal'tory, but ultimately tempered by a sense of earnest whimsy comparable to Buddy and the library foxes. To say I was thrown for a loop by the noblewoman's question was an understatement.

It was honestly ironic how the most innocuous and genuine of personalities could leave me so utterly floored, whereas those of the intentionally scheming variety just before this left me barely fazed. Perhaps it was the subject matter being broached. But that was only the second half of the one-two knockout punch that left me proverbially floored. No, what really had me and what really elicited such a reaction… was her referring to me by name.

And while that point would've been somewhat innocuous in and of itself given how my fame — or infamy — would've probably spread throughout the student body by now, it was more so how it was framed in context that really threw me for a loop.

"Does this sight not look familiar…" Had she figured it out? Was she hinting at something that no one else had been able to piece together, save for my immediate circle? Was she actually referencing Earth's space capabilities, our knowledge of the stars, and the absolute state of humanity's presence amongst them all in one fell swoop? Or… … Was she implying that this vantage point, this specific patch of the night sky, was Earth's? … It couldn't be. It didn't match any on record.

The EVI would've pointed that out the moment those stars started flickering on, and its internal processes still read as PENDING for my latest request. So what exactly was she implying? Was she saying that this was somehow Earth's stellar coordinates within the galaxy as calculated by a Nexian astronomer? How could she have— Unless… What if this was actually humanity's second contact? No, that's not plausible. What if some other civilization from the Milky Way had contacted the Nexus first?

What if this was their patch of sky, dredged up from the club records, and then presented to me as some sort of a 'gotcha' moment? Perhaps that was what this was all about? Perhaps—"Too stunned to speak, I see! I see, I see…" She poked me further through a mischievous, deliberately playful chuckle, a sly expression soon forming, before an abrupt snoooorrrt caused all pretenses of her otherwise pseudo-enigmatic persona from coalescing into anything even remotely threatening.

I answered the only way I could despite her infectious excitement—"I can't say that I recognize it, no." —with blunt and unambiguous sincerity as I attempted to pick apart her game, her angle. Lovguard's expression shifted noticeably as a result. But instead of it trending towards the frustrated or malicious — as would've been the case with Ping or Mal'tory — it instead landed on a particularly unexpected note.

"Huh." Confusion dominated her features, looking as if she was trying to pick apart my answer, as if there was something else there to pick apart.

"Perhaps your eyes— OH! It MUST be! Your lenses! Perhaps the lights are simply too dim for you to see!" She offered with a smack of a balled fist against her palm, forcing me to cock my head sharply in confusion.

"It's not that, Lady Lovguard. I simply don't recognize any of these constellations, at least not from the patches of sky on my world." I offered earnestly. This point of clarification somehow managed to completely short-circuit the elf. I visibly saw her rebooting behind those two bespectacled eyes — a slow, gradual revving of the biological substrate within that noggin of hers — before finally, she blurted out a rapid-fire series of observations, questions, and even more observations.

"Wait, it was not my intention to infer that— Ah. Oh? AH?! Oh, by His Eternal Graces, you're joking?... Unless you aren't? Are you joking? Surely you are! This is a joke, right?" She paused, giving me a chance to acknowledge her ramblings only to be met with deathly silence.

"Oh, no, you're being serious. Oh, by His Eternal Wisdom. No, my apologies I— I MEANT THAT AS A GENERAL CONVERSATIONAL ICE BREAKER! YOUR ANSWER IS IMPLYING THAT YOU HAVE PUT ALL STAR CHARTS TO MEMORY! SURELY YOU DON'T MEAN TO CLAIM THAT, DO YOU?!" It was as if she was speaking faster than her brain could process the information, or more specifically, that point of inference.

"I… I have, or at least sort of, in a way." I replied.

"WHAT?!"

"But er, more to the point, you're saying that this was just an icebreaker?"

"Yes." Lovguard replied sheepishly, grinning in a nervous fit of awkward chuckles.

"I had intended the question as a broad opener!" She extended both arms out dramatically.

"N-not so much as a pointed interrogative." She brought both hands down, bringing two hands together as if to emphasize the 'smallness' of how I interpreted her question.

"Moreover, I had intended it as a sort of… callback to familiarity! A trip down memory lane for the adjacent realmer longing for speckled skies! A sort of a, er, warm reminder of home, I suppose!" The elf interjected with a series of flapping hands, as if trying to calm me down from a nonexistent panic… or perhaps it was her own means of calming herself down from a panic of her own making.

"... or more specifically an attempt to assess whether or not your realm possesses stars at all…" She spoke as an aside… to literally no one in particular, partially taking that ' theatre of life' thing way more literally than anyone should.

"But I digress! It was a poor opening statement! I did not mean to infer that this was your realm's night sky! For every night sky is different. This, however, just so happens to be one of many!" I blinked as I felt that growing conspiracy theorist within me crumble under the glut of her own overeager machinations. The weight of her far-fetched ideas, once reasonable and sound in the heat of the moment, now sank into its own foundations. Well… that was that whole hypothesis completely thrown out the window.

[Update: Cross-Reference Search and Analysis… Complete. No match to visited systems found on local database.] And there goes another… Expand search to unvisited/unlogged starmaps? [Y/N] But there was at least still hope— [Notice to Operator: Analysis constrained by incomplete survey dataset. Full spherical map required for accurate results. Potential of false positives noted beyond acceptable margin of error under mission survey statistical parameters.] —even if that hope was pegged with an asterisk.

So with a nod, I sent the EVI back to work, leading me to dissect the mystery behind the constellations above the old-fashioned way. This was the second point of interest, after all.

"Funny that you should mention that… because now I'm curious." I finally managed to get a word in, letting out an exasperated sigh as if out of breath on the elf's behalf.

"Exactly where did you get the constellations for this specific patch of night sky?" That question in particular… engendered a renewed vigor in the otherwise frantic elf. As she calmed down in a near instant, once more putting on her most stoic game face, and smiled.

"An excellent question. So you too understand its significance, don't you, Cadet Emma Booker?" I blinked, craning my head up to the 'stars' above, then shrugging.

"I'll be honest with you, Lady Lovguard, I'm struggling to see what you're trying to get at. Buuuutt… if I were to try to guess, considering this is the first star field we're seeing upon entry into the bowels of this storied club, I imagine this to be pretty significant. Maybe the first night sky mapped by the club?" I offered.

"Heh." Lovguard let out a confident snicker before adjusting her glasses with two fingers and a purposeful, spell-aided glint. ALERT: LOCALIZED SURGE OF MANA-RADIATION DETECTED, 100% ABOVE BACKGROUND RADIATION LEVELS An entirely novel spell by the looks of it… cast for the sole purpose of the rule of cool. Or at least what Lovguard considered to be cool.

"An astute theory, Cadet Emma Booker. Very astute indeed…" She grinned.

"And indeed, somewhat correct, but not in the way you might think~. You see, what you are currently witnessing is the Grand Alignment, Harmonic Convergence to those of a different age. But we don't really say that anymore because…" She paused, turning momentarily towards Thacea.

"Whilst harmonic is a perfect term, the term is more often used to refer to a far more… unsavory form of harmony, soooooo the term Grand Alignment was adopted instead." She 'clarified'... without really clarifying much at all.

"But I digress! What you are seeing is the pinnacle of what we aspire to study, analyze, and document in the realm of astromancy. For the sights and sensations that you see and feel above you, are what could potentially open up an unlimited flurry of opportunities for practically every adjacent realm! Because in astromancy, we strive to understand the motions of the tapestry. We eagerly gaze up at the thick billowy roof, and we wonder to ourselves — how do you work?

We try to understand, unravel, and dissect what others may see as imperfections, flaws, and markers of inferiority for what they truly are — opportunities. In short, Cadet Emma Booker, we study the patterns of the great tapestry above to determine what, if any, meaning can be derived from their arrangement. A meaning that goes beyond what some may label as superstitions, and when harnessed correctly, can lead to the enhancement of magical potential in the adjacencies!"

She raised both arms in yet another grand display, one that I'd assumed she'd follow up with fireworks given her flair for the dramatic. Yet none came. Or at least that's what I thought. ALERT: LOCALIZED SURGE OF MANA-RADIATION DETECTED, 700% ABOVE BACKGROUND RADIATION LEVELS ALERT (WAID): NOVEL MANAFLOW DETECTED. SUPERIMPOSE MANA-VISION LAYERING? [Y/N] I narrowed my eyes, darting them to gauge Thacea and Thalmin's reactions first, both of whom seemed to be at the very least marginally intrigued by what they saw.

"Yes." I blinked in acknowledgement. At which point, the WAID was quick to fill in what Ilunor had consistently labeled as 'gaps' in the world the human eye was simply not equipped to handle. I'd become somewhat accustomed to the whole 'mana-current' thing since that fateful observation, however. The closest thing I could liken it to was an extra sense that made every single air current around you visible to an extent. Then again, I'd be remiss if I didn't say that 'vision' was a reductive shorthand for this.

Because this was a completely extra sense, an alien form of 'seeing' that didn't neatly translate to sight as we knew it. It'd be like saying you could 'see' cosmic background radiation or ultraviolet radiation. You could, of course, by using specialized instruments that translated those wavelengths into the visual spectrum, but it'd always just be that — an analogue, converted for our limited scope of understanding.

All of this was to say, because of the WAID, I'd become 'familiar' with what the baseline mana-current levels looked like in the Nexus, as 'imperfect' as that analogue may be. This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report. Which was useful and more than enough to make this whole demonstration work, in spite of the limits imposed by my human eyes. Because the room around us seemed to have had both the density and intensity of those currents cleaved in half.

And it was clear exactly why that was the case, given everything Lovguard had spouted out so far. This was supposed to be an attempt to replicate the conditions of an adjacent realm. Which, when coupled with the WAID diverting my attention 'skywards,' painted Lovguard's whole spiel — which I'd have initially dismissed as being in the same league as astrology in terms of its practical considerations — in a completely different light. The reason for this was simple. The stars above? These supposed 'tears'?

They were leaking. Or more specifically, they were—"—practically bleeding mana from beyond the tapestry, straight from the primavale!" Lovguard declared with glee, more or less corroborating my tacit observations. The effects of which were quite clear. What had been the 'weaker' mana currents of an adjacent realm had now been boosted by a significant margin courtesy of the mana flowing down from the 'stars' — or more accurately 'tears' — above.

I'd have let out a disparaging huff if it wasn't for both Thacea and Thalmin's growing intrigue.

"So what you're saying here is that your definition of 'stars' is simply—""Points of light in the night sky, yes. Celestial 'bodies' of sorts, formed by the constant shifting, movement, growth, and imperfections of the tapestry above!" I found my eyes twitching in response, as well as a long drawn-out sigh threatening to emerge in reflexive frustration at what was now indisputably a complete rugpull. At least that was the case until the seeds of another thought quickly took root in my head.

"Right." I spoke warily, before turning to both Thacea and Thalmin, a tentative pit forming in my stomach as a dark realization quickly sprouted.

"We touched on this before." I spoke cryptically, knowingly, as both parties understood exactly what I was referring to.

"So tell me, is this whole… demonstration accurate? You know, because… Earthrealm is so deficient in mana, and my own mana senses are probably too weak to tell whether what's being shown is at all representative of reality." I played into the stereotypes for now, if only to facilitate this conversation without overplaying my hand.

"Yes." They both nodded, their words coalescing but not into any grand sense of awe or wonder that Lovguard seemed to possess. Instead, that simple acknowledgement threatened to unleash a festering thought in my head into its own wild theory. If that was the case… If even adjacent realms possessed some sort of a tapestry… did that mean they were essentially trapped? With the rules of this world, one could find sense in that irrationality.

When the skies above were actually a barrier, when they acted less as a collection of gases and something… physically blocking the view of what lies beyond? That… That kills a certain sense of freedom, or even hope of escaping the planet beneath your feet. I felt a chill run down my spine; the sight filled me not with the optimism Lovguard seemed to be full of, but instead… dread. It was a nauseating feeling of entombment, immurement, and imprisonment.

Like you were somehow trapped in a snowglobe with ample breathing room and space but still effectively stuck. Maybe I was finally due for another roundhouse kick courtesy of fundamental systemic incongruency. A sharp sense of whiplash exacerbated by an entire life lived under the shade of the P-MASL protocols, ensuring that the very human desire for freedom of movement was quite literally a guaranteed click away.

Which meant the stars were always in reach, the points in the night sky a reminder of distances to be crossed and destinations to be reached. Here? It was a reminder of your limits; a physical manifestation of the absolute edges of your ambitions. It was like seeing the finish line… in a game that should have been functionally limitless. I could've written a whole essay on this. Indeed, the report on this would probably be just that. But now wasn't the time for it.

I needed to get to the bottom of all of this here and now.

"So you're saying astromancy assumes that all adjacent realms are surrounded by tapestries and then smothered further within a primavale, just like the Nexus, right?" I clarified.

"Correct!" Lovguard nodded with glee.

"But the main difference here is that while the Nexus has a 'flawless' tapestry, one without holes in it for primavalic light to pass through, the adjacencies — for whatever reason — do possess holes, right?"

"Indeed, indeed!" The elf nodded yet again.

"Okay." I took a deep breath.

"So are you saying that adjacent realms essentially have two primary entry points for mana? With what I can recall from Professor Vanavan's classes, 'mana' is essentially just filtered and processed primavalic energies entering the Nexus up through the ground and out through manasprings. If this is the same for adjacent realms, wouldn't that make the 'stars' just a more visible secondary entry-point for mana?"

"Ahh! That! Therein lies the key to understanding astromancy, Cadet Emma Booker~!" The elf quickly conjured up two magical holograms, both appearing above her two outstretched palms.

"You are correct in describing precisely how most mana is derived in both the Nexus—" On the right was the Nexus, a disc-like flatland with edges demarcated as this featureless, formless, forever-expanding plane. But on the left was where things got interesting. Above her left palm was a sphere, a globe, one which rotated on its axis.

"— and the adjacent realms." However, before I could fully process that information, both 'landmasses' were quickly shrouded within a sort of dark fabric, with the sphere being completely covered… whilst the Nexus' seemed to only be covered along its surface. A final addition was quick to manifest — a glowing, ethereal, golden aura that soon saturated the area around both shrouds.

"But you must keep in mind a very important distinction! An adjacent realm simply cannot hope to match the breadth, depth, density, and intensity of the Nexus' manasprings. Please do not ask me why, for this is beyond the scope of Astromancy. We look to the skies after all, and not the dirt." The elf raised a single finger to reinforce this notion, letting out a cackle through a cocky grin, before using that same appendage to push back the bridge of her glasses.

"It is with this limitation in mind that we now look to the stars for answers. And to finally address your question, Cadet Emma Booker… I…" Lovguard's voice finally started to falter at this junction, as if finally reaching an impasse, one which she'd deftly steered clear of until she finally ran out of bluster and context to throw my way.

"Yes?" I egged her on, causing the poor elf to become even more frazzled in the process.

"This is where astromancy truly starts to become… difficult to explain. While yes, the tears do allow for a second entry point of energies as you so put it, it… often arrives in forms entirely unusable at best, or disruptive at worst." The elf exhaled, fidgeting with her glasses throughout.

"B- but, and you must bear with me here, this is why we must study and unravel more of its secrets! For it is through these otherwise haphazard and formless energies seeping through the tears above that adjacencies may one day enjoy the fruits of greater magical potential! We only need—""—to one day understand exactly what patterns and in what order and in what specific and precise arrangements we need these holes in the tapestry to be in order to harness their transient powers, yada-yada-yada, yeah yeah yeah."

Another voice emerged from beneath the floorboards, one preceded by a sharp hiss of smoke and a firm series of footfalls to the surface. The IFF sensors registered this boar-like student as a complete unknown. However, in spite of the soot and ash covering his cloak, I still made out a 'third year' marker on his uniform.

"Lord Gornish Patlowe, third year, enchantment and structural secretary. Or whatever titles are needed to make this whole operation bearable." The boarish man sighed out in exhaustion, throwing what appeared to be a whole pile of mini-safes to the floor, singed, burned, and completely battered.

This sent Lovguard into a complete fit, as she dropped everything in that instant, if only to check each and every safe, opening, closing them, and then opening them again; as if doing so repeatedly could undo the damage done inside.

"WHAT DID YOU DO?!"

"I didn't do anything." Gornish shrugged.

"The old guard seemed to have put quite a hefty anti-theft spell on it. Couldn't do anything about it, sorry." He shrugged without a care in the world.

"WHAT?!"

"Hey, you told me to grab the safes. I wasn't told they'd have this degree of counter-theft measures placed on them."

"UGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!" Lovguard wailed, falling to her knees as she grabbed the piles of what I assumed were once scrolls, now reduced to mere ashes, crumbling through her fingers. The whole sight instilled in me some degree of sympathy for the woman, as I let out a sigh, grasping my helmet in the process.

"I can ask if Professor Sorecar could piece them back toge—" I attempted to offer, only to be cut off by the elf in question.

"It's no use…" Lovguard whined.

"The spells used were—" She paused before her voice did yet another complete 180.

"Wait. Did you say Professor Sorecar?" I nodded warily.

"Erm… yeah? I mean, he definitely can do stuff like that I thi—""THAT-WOULD-BE-GREAT-THANK-YOU!" She spoke in a single jumbled word of a sentence.

"I… Okay, I mean, I don't see why you wouldn't approach him yourself—""We don't need to get into that, haha…" She quickly interrupted with two eyes that immediately abandoned all pretenses of maintaining eye contact and a hand that began flailing haphazardly in every direction, as if trying to wave the question away by sheer force of gesticulations alone.

"But I'd really appreciate it if you could! Oh! That could be part of your candidacy trials! Yes yes yes! That ought to do it!" She grinned, standing triumphantly with both hands held in fists against her hips. Yet in this moment of triumph, fate seemed to once again conspire against Lovguard, as the door from above opened— CREEEAAAAKKKKKK Fwwooooshhhhh! —causing the ashes in front of the pile of safes to be quickly whisked away. Her gleaming, excitable grin didn't immediately break.

But it was her eye twitches that gave it away first, followed by a series of gasps, a complete reversion of her smile, and another scream and wail.

"NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!" She yelled, managing to at least recover a good chunk of the ashes with a series of spells, along with the help of the clearly exhausted Gornish. After that was done, she quickly directed her attention to the interloper above, glaring daggers at the club secretary. A man who'd since sloooowwwlly poked his head in through the doorframe.

"WHAT DO YOU WANT?! DID YOU KNOW WHAT YOU ALMOST DID—?!"

"Just wanted to say that we're due to hand in our club membership numbers for the night." The club secretary spoke under a tired breath.

"Anything else will be logged for the morning. Also, I'm tired. I'm heading back to the dorms soon, whether you like it or not. So… what's it gonna be, do we sign up the newrealmer and her compatriots or…?"

"UGH!!!! YES! SIGN THEM UP!"

"Er, actually, we were just escorting our peer. We weren't intending to sign up for any more clubs for the night." Thalmin interjected.

"MAKE THAT JUST THE NEWREALMER THEN!" Lovguard amended.

"So… what do I put here for their candidacy trials—""SUCCESSFULLY RESTORED OLD RECORDS AND COMPLETED ANCIENT PUZZLES! THERE, DONE, NOW GET OUT OF MY SIGHT!" With those final few wails, the secretary shrugged and nodded, pulling his head back through the doorframe just as slowly as he did when entering, before shutting the door without being the slightest bit fazed by the disgruntled fumes of his clublord.

"Right, where were we?" Lovguard just as abruptly came back down from the peak of fury with a smile, turning to us with an expression that read universally as: 'I've had a long, long day.'

"You were preparing to hand me some ashes for Professor Sorecar?"

"Oh yes! Most certainly! But was there anything el— Oh! Yes! The principles of astromancy. So—""—you first-years must be wondering why this hasn't really taken off." Gornish interrupted, dusting himself off with a quick cleansing spell.

"LORD PATLOWE! HOW DARE YOU?!" Lovguard turned to face the rebellious noble with an indignant glare.

"That was, actually, the other thing I wanted to address, Lady Lovguard." I admitted.

"If this whole field of study has so much promise — which, trust me, it really does seem like it on paper — why has it not reached the heights it should have?" I made sure to word my question carefully, planting the crumbs of interest to continue being in the good graces of one of the more… amicable seniors I've seen thus far.

"Heh. The secretary's whole claims of this being mere superstition still hang heavy over your head, I assume?" Lovguard managed out under a frustrated breath.

"Well… there's that as well, but I see it as a point worth exploring given the lack of any palpable interest in the field." I admitted, gesturing to the run-down state of the place.

"I see this as an especially pertinent point, especially given how I intend to join your ranks—""No, no. You're right, Cadet Emma Booker." Lovguard admitted, somewhat defeated but more so tired.

"You deserve an explanation." She smiled weakly as she ushered us towards the next room within this underground complex. We arrived at first to find a completely dark and seemingly empty space. This all completely changed, however, with a flicker of the magical lamps above, revealing the true contents of a room that had at first been hidden behind layers of illusion spells. The space, as was typically the case of the Academy and its genuinely magical moments, was indeed impressive in its scope and detail.

Because within its confines were thousands of celestial globes, no two orbs alike, with every model clearly being different from the next not just in the stars they purported to chart out, but also in the size of the globes, their materials, and even down to the handwriting and woodworking of each and every object. It was clear this whole room housed lifetimes' worth of work.

"Within this room are the works of so many that truly believed in astromancy. Some of which, now favored realms, have managed to partially succeed in harnessing the power of the stars. Though most never actually attain such heights. And many more simply… can not." Lovguard admitted with a disgruntled sigh.

"We still have no idea what causes this. Whenever we believe we have cracked some universal principle, it becomes clear that each tapestry must be studied on a case-by-case basis. And even when we try doing that, some tapestries just refuse to comply with our localized models! It's as if some just don't… conform to any known principles, locally adapted or otherwise!" She vented harshly.

"What you saw above you in the room outside was supposed to be the theoretical pinnacle of our studies… but it never was. It's as if something is working against us, as if the natural order itself has some personal vendetta over our progress… but when has the hollow whims of nature ever stopped the inevitable triumph of sapiency!" She attempted to power through the rapidly degrading mood she'd inadvertently stumbled into.

"I have hope that we're simply missing something. A clue, an overlooked principle, something that could cast a new light on everything we've learned. And perhaps, with your membership, we can learn something new we haven't ever considered before! Maybe we just need an entirely fresh perspective, a clean canvas, a realm devoid of any biases with which to learn from!" That question, combined with her whole…

demeanor thus far, sparked an entirely different line of inquiry in my mind — one that had already begun operating in intel-gathering mode.

"I… am quite flattered, Lady Lovguard. Though, if I may, I just have another, far more personal question to ask." A character assessment was necessary.

"Please do!"

"I've only seen Nexian nobles berating, or talking dismissively of adjacent realms prior to this point. Outright declaring their intentions of domination or superiority over the so-called 'adjacencies.' I was curious why it seems like you're so willing to buck that trend? Out of a disproportionate demographic lending itself to adjacent realmers, I never imagined it'd be someone of the Nexian nobility to be so committed to a pursuit that's exclusively beneficial to adjacent interests."

Unless it's one geared to subverting adjacent power, but that doesn't seem to be the case at all here.

"Oh! You confuse my pedigree for my heritage, Cadet Emma Booker! A perfectly understandable point of confusion, but one which I am more than willing to clarify! You see, I'm not what most would call a typical 'Nexian.' Moreover, it would be more accurate to say that I'm something of a [Translation Confidence 98. 32%: third culture kid]!" She began with a sheepish smirk.

"All of which is to say, I was actually born in an adjacent realm!"