Well, shit. Got the dashed line to work for the skill rank bit of the character page (or at least it works on my editing end). Now if only I could get the rest of the page formatting to go my way xD
Class: Caster
True Name: Daedalus
AKA: Unparalleled Architect, Masterworks Crafter
Parameters
Strength: D- Mana: A+
Endurance: D Luck: D+
Agility: D- NP: EX
Skills
Brand of Athena: -
Concentration: B-
Independent Action: A
Item Construction (Fake): D ~ A+
Self-Preservation: D-
Territory Creation: EX
Noble Phantasms
Chaos Labyrinth – Sanctuary of Madness and Insanity | Rank: EX
Unshackled Statuary – Monuments of Living Stone | Rank: E- ~ A+
Being able to see Caster in such a manner was… fascinating... One the one hand, it was nice to know what exactly I was working with here. On the other hand, it felt like a huge invasion of my teammate's privacy. I was big on privacy myself, so I admit, I felt a little wrong doing this without Caster's permission.
Not that feeling wrong was going to stop me, of course…
"You about done yet?"
Sortiara's annoyed voice just managed to reach me through my thoughts. Man, with how faint doing this made sounds from outside this… whatever this is? Some kind of space, I guess? Well, point was it surprised me I even noticed her speaking at all.
"Yeah… yeah, I think I'm done for now" I nodded, opening my eyes.
"Nearly a whole hour?! Really" Sortiara huffed, taking the book back from me. "You only had six other servants to go over, at most! Hell, either Caster or Assassin is going to be blank, so-"
"Actually, both were blank" I lied, letting out a sheepish smile. "Well, besides the class ski-"
"How?! One of them has to be your servant! How could it be blank?!"
"I don't know" I protested. "How am I supposed to answer that?! I don't know anything about how this shit works; I can only relay what I'm seeing!"
"And you saw nothing for either of them?!"
"Yes! Wait, no! …Whichever one means that I saw nothing! Maybe it's because I didn't really summon my servant, and my servant didn't recognize me as their master, or something?!"
"That's not how that works!"
"Right, because you must know everything about a ritual your parents ripped off!"
"I know that much at least!"
Bitch, you don't even know what it is you're actually fighting over… Omnipotent wish granter my ass, you know how all this shit works…
"Fine then, don't believe me" I sighed, giving up on tying to convince her. "Not like I need your belief for it to be true."
"Your servant couldn't be around if it didn't consider you as it's master! It has to, so the grail must have granted you information on it!"
"Doesn't the Archer class skill Independent Action completely disprove that?"
"You're not Archer's master though!"
"But a servant can inherently have class skills thought! If my servant also has Independent Action, then it could, right?!"
Sortiara glared at me, but she did go quiet for a moment.
Hope that doesn't give the game away. Should be fine though; Archer has the skill, so just deflect to that if she gets suspicious, I suppose…
"…Yes, technically speaking…" she admitted through gritted teeth. "But it would have to be a very high rank to last this long with master support of any kind, even for Assassin…"
"How high are we talking here?"
"A rank, at least. Maybe, just maybe, A- would be enough, but anything lower than that, and no way."
"…Are there other ways for servants to get mana?"
I already know the answer to this one, and it's yes, so let's just see how good in faith this argument is from your end.
"…Again, yes. The methods though… they aren't pretty."
"What does that mean?"
"Well, servants… Heroic Spirits are basically ghosts. Due to that, it is possible for them to feed on souls for magical energy."
"...You mean, like, people souls? Actual… souls?"
"Yes; what else would I mean?! Ugh… beyond that, well… can't believe I'm actually explaining this, but magical energy is readily stored in bodily fluids, so their… consumption… would also work."
"Wait, magical energy is stored in saliva and blood? Well, I can see the blood; blood magic is a common aspect of magic in stories and stuff. But saliva? Really?"
"Yes, really" Sortiara exclaimed, sounding relieved, weirdly enough. "In fact, it's not uncommon for magi who are a part of the Mage's Association and are short on cash to sell their bodily fluids."
"That's… huh… I can see the usefulness of that, but… Feels kinda weird? Maybe because it reminds me of blood banks, and I can't deal with the idea of blood banks."
"What? Why?"
"Needles" I admitted. "Can't stand even the thought of needles poking me."
"…Huh. You know, I didn't have you pegged as the type of guy with a fear of needles…"
"Glad that's what you're taking away from this" I laughed. "But honestly, I can't see anything on either Caster or Assassin; swear on my life. …I'd swear to God, but-"
"Alright, alright, I get it" Sortiara huffed. "I believe you. Just… get to work on Archer then, I guess. Don't know how much you saw for him, but Johnathan and I have next to nothing."
"I'm basically in that boat too, I think" I sighed. "Only know Archer has the class skill Independent Action. Not even the rank of it is visible though…"
"...And our servants?"
"I was wondering when that question would come up" I laughed. "Well, not much. Don't know the names, or any of the Noble Phantasms. A meager amount of skills, but they're really generic sounding; I can think of lots of people who I'd imagine have to skills, alongside the visuals and personalities on display. I'm finding it harder than I'd originally thought to discern the names. Had skills been more specific in naming, it would be easy enough, but with skill names like Riding for Saber and Mind's Eye for Lancer… Actually, on that note, for Lancer, why does the Mind's Eye skill have a 'Fake'… well, tag would be what I'd call it."
"From what I can tell, some skills, like Mind's Eye, have multiple versions of them, with slight variations. To help with clarifying who has what version of the skill, a word like 'True', 'Fake', 'False' or whatever will be added at the end."
"I see…"
So, Caster has Item Construction (Fake) presumably because there's a 'True' version as well… but then, what's the difference between the 'True' and 'Fake' version? Fairly certain that Caster does indeed make real objects… But that was neither here nor there. I still needed to figure out a way to help Caster with his mana consumption problem, first and foremost. I had an idea too, but…
"Say, Sortiara?"
"What?"
"You know the class skills for Caster? Specifically, Territory Creation?"
"What about it?"
"How does it work?"
"Aren't you the one with the explanations of the skills being given to them?"
"Yes, but… The description only says that it enables a Caster class servant to create a territory beneficial to themselves. It doesn't really say what for though."
"That would be because, depending on the servant, their territory would probably do different things. Perhaps it would enhance their parameters. Maybe it would rank up their skills. Who knows; Caster is a weird class with weird people shoved in it."
Tell me something I don't know…
"Is it even worthwhile to use such a skill then?"
"Why wouldn't it be? It's not like having their own territory is going to apply negative effects on themselves. At least, I'd imagine not…"
"But surely the mana consumption to maintain such a thing would be massive."
"Most likely, yeah. But that's why Caster servants, and even magi, really, set up their workshops on a leyline; it provides the mana to sustain it."
"So… a servant or master doesn't need to bear the maintenance cost?"
"Gods, no! Why would you ever do something like that?! Honestly, that's why Johnathan and I suspected Caster was set up in the business district of the city; bounded fields are typically how unique territories, like workshops, manifest themselves. Apparently that's Archer's though, or at least his master's…"
"So basically, all Territory Creation does is let Caster set up these bounded field things? The higher the rank, the stronger the effects and bigger the area can be, I take it?"
"In essence, yes."
Damn… that wasn't where I wanted this to die out. Reading Caster's Noble Phantasm description, the Chaos Labyrinth wasn't a bounded field, but something called a 'reality marble'. Thing was, how do I bring that up, without tipping off Sortiara that I saw more than I originally said I did…
"...Is there any other way territories can manifest" I tried dancing around the subject. "Cause I mean, like, this house has a bounded field surrounding it, yeah? You're just a magus; I'd have thought a servant would have something… higher, y'know?"
"There's classifications. This bounded field, for example, is little more than a magical alarm system. It wouldn't even be considered a workshop. A workshop classification would be standard stuff… There is temple classification; those bounded fields are real powerful stuff. I'd imagine capable spellcasters of the Caster class would have bounded fields more along the lines of temple classification, or maybe even beyond temple classification, if the field is really something special. But higher than bounded field magecraft itself… I can think of one thing, but…"
"But what?"
"But it's very high level magecraft. Most magi could only ever dream of achieving such a thing. Even for a servant, it wouldn't be common to posses such a thing; you're dealing more with conceptualizations than physical objects or places. With a high enough rank in Territory Creation, a Caster servant could probably have one, or make a bounded field essentially akin in power to one. But to sustain such a thing… Even a leyline wouldn't be able to power it forever, or even for an extended duration like a Holy Grail War; not in one's entirety."
"Sounds cool and all, but you still haven't told me what this kind of magecraft is."
Sortiara went quiet on me here. Clearly debating if she should reveal to me the existence of such magic.
"Are you recording right now?"
"…You know what" I frowned. "Actually, I'm not… Damn; fuck me I guess. Consider this off the record."
"…It's called a reality marble" Sortiara sighed.
Yes!
"A reality marble" I feigned mystery at the term. "Sounds… intense."
"It is intense" Sortiara nodded. "A reality marble is basically a bounded field so powerful it overwrites reality in it's area, transforming the area into the users ideal, or inner, world. It's… hard to explain exactly what can be created from reality marbles; very few exist, and those that do are generally highly guarded secrets."
"…No kidding, they can overwrite reality" I was genuinely shocked.
"Temporarily, yes… Wait, maybe that's not technically correct… It's the best way I can put it without going into really technical magecraft terminology though. It's more like… you expand the self and push the world out, if that makes sense?"
"That… No, it does not" I laughed slightly. "The hell you mean by 'expand the self'?"
"As I said, reality marbles are projections of one's inner world, so to speak. To deploy one, one must expand their inner world outwards, and in doing so, push back the boundaries of the world, or reality. I say overwrite reality because when a reality marble is deployed… say, in a park or something, that park doesn't just disappear; it still exists, and people can walk about it. A reality marble is effectively a new space that exist in the same place as that old space, so-"
"So, it's like there's another layer of reality there" I cut in, trying to understand it through my own words. "An upper, or top, layer, so to speak?"
"Exactly! Hence why I tend to say it overwrites reality; those in the vicinity of its deployment are pulled into it for its duration, but those who come to the area after it's been deployed will still be walking about the normal area, not the reality marble. Of course, the world doesn't react well to being pushed aside like that, and it constantly tries to correct itself and reclaim the space it's been pushed out of. That's one of the reasons they have such a tremendous upkeep to them; you have to constantly keep the world back from your projected reality."
"I see… and the other reasons?"
"Well, there's really only one other reason; it's the closest thing in magecraft out there to actual magic. By its very nature, next to no one should ever be able to actually deploy one; magic is beyond humanity at this point. Even most servants from the Age of Gods would have never mastered magic to such an extent. For a servant to sustain one for longer than a day would basically be a miracle in of itself."
"…A miracle… Really?"
"Yes!"
Holy shit… no wonder Caster was desperate then; man was beyond the miraculous…
"…What else do you know about reality marbles?"
"Like, nothing! As I said, it's the closest magecraft there is to true magic; it's the taboo of taboos in magecraft and the Mage's Association has outlawed all research into them."
"But like, could a leyline power a reality marble?"
"I mean... no? Unless your inner world has leylines within it, but I can't imagine that'd be normal for a person to have in their inner world, magi or Caster servant or whoever else… But you're pushing the world out, and leylines are a part of the world. Even if you deployed a reality marble over a leyline, the leyline wouldn't be drawn into it; it's be pushed out of it. From the outside, a leyline wouldn't be able to help at all."
But the labyrinth let's things come and go, so long as one can find one of the entrances Caster has built… It's not a typical reality marble in that regard, so then maybe? Exceptions prove rules, after all… Also, the labyrinth is beneath the ground, not above it. In terms of layers of reality, it would be a lower layer, rather than an upper layer, no? But still, wouldn't the concept of pushing the world out remain? How would one…
"-th-"
Wait! Maybe… No… Well, if he could do it, then maybe it'll work? It lets people in; why wouldn't it do the same for objects? Would the entrances close and cut them though; off, if not entirely? But if the entrances remain open, then doesn't that reveal too much? Well, maybe not for most people… but for Archer, if he saw one just open somewhere within the city, how would that…
"N-ha-"
He made batteries... Sure, they didn't work as intended, but still! If I showed him a computer; how circuits and stuff worked, then could he apply that to-
"Nathan!"
I shot straight up in the air as I was pulled out from my mind by Sortiara's shouting.
"I, huh, what" I stammered out, staring at her.
"That's what I should be saying" she huffed. "The hell's up with you just zoning out on me! You're the one who was asking all the questions!"
"Sorry! Sorry" I raised my hands apologetically. "I was just… thinking, is all."
"About what?"
"About if there's a way for leylines to power a reality marble after all."
"I'm telling you there isn't!"
"Yes, but… exceptions prove rules, not disprove them."
"So what?!"
"So, what if a reality marble was a... a lower layer, rather than an upper layer" I began explaining my thought process.
"That doesn't change the main issue though! The world with the leyline in it would still be pushed outside the boundary of the reality marble."
"…Yeah, yeah I suppose you're right" I sighed.
Don't want to add too many exceptions; gets too specific and can give the game away. But if it's both a lower layer and enables traversal to and from layers, then could one pull, or 'tap' a leyline for its magical energy from the world and run it through the reality marble, so to speak? Like electricity running through a circuit?
I couldn't help but feel like I was maybe onto something here though. At the very least, it wasn't like Caster seemed to have any better ideas; I couldn't see how it'd hurt to try. If it didn't work, it'd be the same as doing nothing; the use of another command spell. But if it did work though…
There are seven leylines in this city. Even if we can only make use of five of them… the same five Caster tried deploying his batteries at...
Surely five would be enough to keep the labyrinth up and running independently from Caster's magical energy supply? Or if nothing else, significantly cut down on the burden of the cost Caster is facing. Not a city-wide labyrinth with all the tricks and traps and stuff, but if we just run straight corridors to the leylines themselves, purely for the purpose of circuitry, then use the area of the park as a proper labyrinth domain, then… maybe?