AN: Headcanon on magic. Really heavy science-fiction stuff pulled out of late-night rabbit-hole research in quantum physics back in college. Probably not 100% accurate, but... it's quantum mechanics. We barely know if a cat's alive or dead and gravity is still a theory.
It's just a bit of sci-fi fun I've had thinking up over the years. So, take it with a grain of salt and if you're into this kind of stuff, enjoy! Just be kind if you have a correction or if something is blatantly wrong. I'm just having fun here, and I don't mean to have this be used as a physics study-guide.
So, TLDR; this chapter is basically boiling down to:
"wibbly-wobbly-quantum-ness = magic, yay!".
If it's not your cup of tea, I plan to update the next chapter this weekend. As a thanks for sticking with a month-long absence.
Slenderman and the wards (sans the Hogwarts crew) gathered in the Mansion's dining room. EJ was wolfing down kidney pie and liver like no tomorrow. He finally noticed them all gathered around and conscientiously slowed down on his voracious appetite.
"Mph, sworry," He mumbled abashedly through filled cheeks, before swallowing harshly. "I got so caught up with Ollivander, I... kinda forgot to eat... for the last day and a half." He admitted sheepishly.
Slender sighed, "It's fine, Jack. Now, I believe you had something to tell us?"
EJ nodded, taking a sip of orange juice before beginning his tale into the science of magic.
*Flashback; a day and a half-ago*
"Ah, home sweet home," Ollivander announced, walking into his shop. EJ stumbled after, bewildered, as he looked back at the doorway they just entered from. He could still see the tourists and ski slopes through it, but the door seamlessly entered the wand shop on Diagon Alley thousands of miles away.
The wandmaker snapped his fingers and the door slammed shut before creaking back open to reveal a musty old broom cupboard.
"Uh..." EJ looked to the old man, his brain sputtering to explain the Broom-Closet to Narnia over there. Ollivander gave an amused chortle before simply gesturing to an open seat at his kitchen table.
"Now then, let's start with yourself," Ollivander smiled. "What have you discovered thus far?"
"Umm, they have a gene sequence that's pretty unique to 'wizards' and 'witches'," EJ began. A nod prompted him to continue, "Uh, their bodies are anatomically really similar to normal humans, but with some really subtle differences? I don't know for sure." He admitted. "But they seem to act like human-radio-towers.
"Specifically, they seem to be radio towers for 'magic', whatever it is," He continued. "I know the frequency of it enough to cancel it out with the crystals I gave BEN and Smile, but... I'm not entirely sure what it is outside of an energy source."
"Anything else?" The wandmaker asked, coolly.
EJ's head dipped in shame, "Um... no, that's it."
Laid out like that... he didn't really have much, did he? After months of research and experiments he came up with barely anything.
His ears burned mauve, realizing he'd just come to one of the greatest minds in the Universe... and effectively pulled the equivalent of going to a Nobel Prize-winning professor and admitting he'd only read the summary of a book he was supposed to do a report on.
"Wonderful!"
He blinked (well, sort-of, more a knee-jerk reaction of the remains of his eyelids), and looked up surprised to see the beaming face of the old man, "My boy, that's more than I came up with in five years when I started this project! Of course, I started back before Christ was a thing, but still, that's wonderful, young man!"
EJ's mouth shifted without words coming out before he finally nodded pathetically with a purple blush and an embarrassed grin, "Th-thank you, s-sir."
"Oh, none of that 'sir' stuff," Ollivander waved off. "Now, then, how about I expound on some of that? Tea?" He held up a steaming kettle and EJ politely nodded.
He and the old man sipped a cup for a moment as Ollivander looked around and muttered on where to begin. At length, he nodded and cleared his throat, "I suppose let's just start at the beginning!
"Now, first and foremost; What is Magic?" He prompted, looking at the younger expectantly.
"Uh... an energy form?" EJ guessed.
"Correct!" He beamed, "What we call 'Magic' is a kind of energy. An energy that exists all around us. Magic is what gives a wizard his power. It's an energy field created by all living and nonliving things. It surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds the galaxies and universe together... am I making sense?"
EJ chuckled despite himself, "Yes, Obi Wan."
"Pardon?"
"It's nothing," EJ waved off.
Ollivander shrugged and continued, "This energy is inherent in the Universe, like strands weaving their way through the cosmos, swirling around suns and black holes, flowing with gravity, melding with magnetic fields. On Earth, these strands of magic wind their way along the planet's crust, its magnetic field, and through its very core as what Wizards call 'Ley Lines'.
"But what is magic, exactly?" The man asked, but paused, his eyebrows furrowed. "Well... it's a rather circular question. A question most explained by asking more questions.
"What is magic? It's energy.
"What is energy? It's a force of the universe that affects matter and exists in many forms; electricity, magnetism, kinetic, potential, etcetera.
"What is electricity? Magnetism? Kinetic Movement? Chemical Potential?
"It is Energy." He finished decisively.
...
EJ sighed defeatedly, "I'm sorry, I think you lost me."
Ollivander chuckled understandingly, "It's surprisingly easy to be lost on something that's like walking a mobius strip, young man. Though, I suppose my explanation could use some work.
"Basically, Magic is more akin to Dark Energy. That being a theoretical force that acts against gravity pulling everything together and is instead pushing the universe apart at an accelerating rate." He explained. "It cannot be seen, or felt, or observed by our five senses. It cannot be picked up by an instrument, or measured in a laboratory, or stored in a battery, but in theory it's there pushing the Universe in an eternal expansion.
"Magic is much like that. It's a fundamental part of the universe, yet completely invisible to someone who doesn't know what to look for."
"I... think I understand," EJ cautioned.
"It's rather esoteric in nature," Ollivander conceded. "Even if we knew what to look for, it's not exactly as simple as categorizing it in one slot. "Magic" itself is not just one singular form of this energy, but it's certainly more explicable as one, large blanket-term."
"Wait, how many are there?" The younger asked, curious.
"Well, in my studies, I've successfully detected, analyzed, and differentiated over 12,536 unique forms of esoteric Dark Energy, only 200 of which are directly involved in magic. And of the total, approximately 478 have between 7 and 12 variations or subcategories; such as how magnetism can be subcategorized by ferromagnetism, diamagnetism, paramagnetism, and so forth.
"And, really, I haven't been able to categorize many more, subtle, variations that may be new categories altogether!" He cried excitedly.
...
"...Holy shit," Jack swore, dumbfounded.
"Language, young man," Ollivander chided, calmly taking a sip of tea. "Now, that said, let me talk a little about the wizard's 'magical core'."
"Yeah, I looked into that from the books we got," Jack nodded. "But when I cut open Nick… the Undead guy with the insects, I didn't see anything really out of the ordinary. Subtle differences, but aside from that, no weird organs or extra veins or anything."
The old man nodded, "That's because it's not macroscopic per se. The 'Core' is actually a separate network of neurons laced in existing neural pathways of the human body. A true wizard's genetics simply expresses proteins and trace element accumulation that allow their neurons to behave like antennae and battery storage for magical energy."
"So… 'core depletion' really is just them running out of juice?"
"Precisely. A wizard cannot funnel pure magical energy into a spell. They'd burn themselves out, literally spontaneously combust, like sticking a single incandescent light bulb up to the entire energy output of a nuclear reactor. Something's got to give, and it's certainly not the reactor.
"A wizard stores their own energy and draws from it to cast their spells. If it depletes faster than they can siphon from the universe, it drains them. Stronger wizards tend to have a stronger neural network to store or manage more of this energy. Do you understand so far?" The old man paused.
"So... Magic is just an energy field in the Universe, and wizards have an entire neural network to harness that energy," Jack summarized to himself, mind still reeling.
"Yes, but that energy is potent. So very potent," Ollivander emphasized. "For instance, consider their classic method of transportation."
"Um... flying brooms?" EJ guessed.
"Yes! Can you imagine how they achieve this flight?" Ollivander asked.
His eye-sockets buzzed for an answer, "They... do they cancel out gravitons?"
"Hmm, close, but it's far more controlled than that," Ollivander offered. "Some magical objects, yes, it's just a cancellation of gravitons and the object floats, assuming gravitons are not negated in the object and it just disintegrates. However, with something more complex such as flying... well, it's more a factor of buoyancy than anything.
"Imagine the broom and rider like a submarine. Magic propelling it forward is simply inertia, but for the up/down part of it would need much more energy spent to constantly negate gravity and... well, matter isn't destroyed in a broom rider, obviously, but a ballast requires mass change to affect buoyancy in a surrounding medium, such as air. In layman's terms, a certain particle controlling mass's interaction with the universe can be... persuaded to shove to another dimension for a while."
"The Higgs Boson?! I thought that was theoretical!" EJ cried, wide eye-socketed.
Ollivander smiled modestly, "Oh, who am I to say. Regardless, the same principle works with levitation spells, too. Controlled levitation is based on that principle. It's also why Wizards cannot 'fly' to the moon on a broom. No air, no buoyancy. Not to mention the usual limitations of space-travel on a stick of wood. They'd freeze up before they left the troposphere, I'd say."
"Woah," Jack chuckled, hand to his head. "That's... that's crazy..."
"Hah! You think that's crazy?" Ollivander challenged. "Wizards are also capable of a feat called 'apparation'. It's teleportation, but not like Slender's. With Slender, he folds space and time into a rather comfortable tunnel to go through.
"These Wizards, however, developed a way to travel by using the instantaneous creation of a Black Hole!"
EJ's mouth gaped as the old man continued, "The process leaves them feeling 'squeezed', because the process is literally compressed spaghettification of your molecules between the molecules from point A to point B.
"In theory, going from, say, America to Australia would see your molecules briefly pass between molecules in the Earth's core, but no one's magical potential is enough to maintain stable spaghettification for that long. They'd either break apart into a mile-wide spray of atoms or they'd forcibly re-coagulate in the middle of the Mantle. Either way, they are very, very dead.
"And if they don't manage to concentrate hard enough, they splinch, as in, they close the black hole early and leave pieces behind. Can you imagine it? A wizard popping out of existence in one spot and leaving behind his leg like forgot his keys at home? Ha!" He slapped his knee in incredulity. "Oh, the lengths these wizards will go just baffles me sometimes. 'No, no, that method is far too safe and far too comfortable. Dismantling your corporeal form for an instantaneous moment is traditional'."
The old man paused, watching the younger doctor mentally stagger to take it all in.
"H-how on Earth haven't they destroyed themselves already? Or everyone else?" Jack mumbled.
"Oh, don't worry, particles of mass and anti-mass are constantly being formed and destroyed," Ollivander waved off easily. "A couple minuscule black holes here and there won't implode the solar system."
He sipped some more tea, "Let's move on, though. Any other questions?"
"Well, I guess potions makes sense, now." Jack considered. "It's just chemistry with magical wavelengths infused into it, right?"
"Mostly," Ollivander bobbed his head in agreement. "Magical energy is imbued long-term into the very chemical bonds formed and destroyed, so it's a little bit of magic, biology, chemistry, all manner of things. It's actually much more manageable and scientifically observable as opposed to more nebulous 'Core' magic courses such as transfiguration or charms."
Jack's eyes lit up with interest, "That's another one I've been banging my head on a table about. Transfiguration! How can they do that? Even with... with unimaginable amounts of energy, how could they make a rock into... like, a cat or something?"
Ollivander quirked a sly smile, "Let me put a thought experiment past you. Are you familiar with the quantum concept that an unobserved entity is not 'defined'?"
"Uh, yeah," EJ paused. "Like, a subatomic particle is theoretically all stages at once until observed. Then it's either one or the other. Double Slit experiments and Schrodinger's Cat and all that."
"Yes, but what is anything in this universe if not a large number of subatomic particles?" The old man grinned. "Now imagine an apple. By de Broglie's hypothesis all matter has a particle and wave nature. So, an apple, fundamentally, has an 'apple de Broglie wavelength' if we were to treat it as one, large 'particle'.
"So, the apple has apple-y wavelengths and particles associated with it, and when observed it is definitively an 'apple'.
"But what if that object is suddenly and unanimously perceived as something else? Then everyone perceives it as such and, therefore, it is as it is perceived."
Jack swore little sparks and puffs of smoke were spewing out of his ears.
Ollivander chuckled, "Let's take a step back. Let's say we have the apple and all of its apple-y, quantum nature. Now, we add magic into the mix and suddenly the quantum nature of an apple is uncertain. Then, a hop and a skip of a wizard or witch using their consciousness to distort the uncertain apple by manipulating magic; et voila! An apple that believes itself to be a cat!"
"An apple... believes... and becomes a cat." Jack said slowly.
"Well, yes and no," Ollivander concedes, taking another sip of tea. "Rather, the wizard or witch who casts the spell believes. Say, someone were to transfigure a teapot into a platypus. However, they'd never seen a platypus in person before. They base it off of a picture they saw. They can imagine how a platypus would behave, but it may not be indicative of a true platypus.
"If they were to imagine a platypus walks on its hind-legs, quacks like a duck, and breathes fire... well, the transfiguration would make it work as best as it anatomically could, but it may not be a stable creature. Living beings are much more difficult than, say, a rock.
"However, transfiguration is not a permanent thing. If I were to transfigure something, it would be perceived as a match, or a pig, or a rock, or a dog, but a transfigured match will not light when struck, because fundamentally no matter the Quantum states of everything, it is not a matchstick. And after a time, the object's natural quantum state returns and it will revert to the form it was originally meant to appear and behave. Depending, of course, on the power of the caster and the amount of magical energy forced unto the object.
"Think of it like quantum energy levels. Except with photons and electrons, it's much larger. Energy impacts and excites the quantum state to a higher form, controlled by the caster, but after a while the energy naturally dissipates and the object's quantum states returns to normal."
The old man reaches into his pocket and pulled out a spare button, with a flick of his own wand, the button shifted its existence and instantly became a beetle, scurrying across the tabletop in a circle. Then, after a moment, the beetle stilled, lay down, and transformed back into a button.
"That's just... nuts," Jack sighed eventually, running a hand through his hair.
"Well, transfiguration is a bit of a tricky concept," The old man agreed. "Much more difficult than alchemy or conjuration."
"W-wait, what's the difference?" Eyeless Jack wasn't sure he wanted to go down this rabbit hole, but Ollivander's eyes lit up excitedly.
"Alchemy, is in fact more akin to chemistry. It is the manipulation of existing matter permanently into something else using physical means, rather than quantum-wibbly-wobbly-ness."
At Jack's eye-socket squinting, the old man continued, "Simply put, what goes in, comes out. If you were to, say, alchemically create a chair out of wood, then for a 50 kilogram wooden chair, 50 kilograms of wooden material would need to be extracted from an existing supply. If you made a 200 kilogram steel boiler, you would need either 200 kilograms of steel or 200 kilograms of iron, nickel, and all the alloy materials that could total the steel ratio in question."
This time, Ollivander pointed his wand at the wooden tabletop itself and held the tip directly on the wood itself, a look of concentration on his face. A spot on the side lit up with small streaks of blue lightning and a cube made of wood grew out of the tabletop, a divot of missing wood forming around it. The mass of the divot, evidently equaling the mass of the cube. He tapped his wand again and the cube shifted back into the tabletop, like it had never been damaged in the first place.
"That makes a lot more sense," Jack conceded, considering the spot the older man had just transmuted. "But what about that Sorcerer's stone or... um..."
"Philosopher's stone," Ollivander corrected sternly. "That object is a bit more touchy. The Philosopher's Stone is a magical construct, but using physical means. A crystal of real atoms grown purely with magic-energy chemical bonds. A catalyst; a go-between of magical energy and the physical aspect of alchemy.
"For instance, let's take the 'lead to gold' myth.
"The Philosopher's Stone allows the caster to transmute on an atomic level by essentially abusing atomic proton identities.
"So, if you had 50 kg of lead, then it would transmute it on an atomic level into gold atoms, but rather messily. Essentially reducing the lead mass to a soup of protons, neutrons, and electrons for a moment, then reconstructing them into as many stable gold isotopes as possible. You'll be left with one or two atoms of the leftover atomic mess, probably unstable and/or wildly radioactive, but to an untrained eye, 50 kg mass of lead goes in, 50 kg mass of gold comes out."
"Th-that's amazing!" Jack gaped.
Ollivander's head bobbed in acknowledgement, "Well, I'll give credit where it's due that it is certainly a feat. However, the true marvel of the Philosopher's Stone lies in the ability to be used as a catalyst in a potion to heal all ailments, and permanently extend one's lifetime.
"The potion permanently reconstructs DNA, repairs cells, undoes mitochondrial free-radical damage, the works. And in the end, a 1000 year old man could be as eternally spry and peppy as a man in his 20's. And the catalyst stone is not incorporated into the potion itself, so it can be used again and again and again."
"How many of these things are out there?" Jack asked, worried about how many nigh-immortal wizards, witches, or normal people are skulking around the world.
"Only one that we know of, jealously guarded by Nicolas Flamel and his wife, somewhere in France, I believe," Ollivander paused. "Though... something bothers the back of my mind. I'm not entirely sure if that's the case anymore..."
He shook the thought from his head, the light returning, "Now, a fascinating concept; Conjuration!"
He flicked his wand in the air and an entire dove popped into existence, flying around the room before popping like a feather-filled balloon. The cloud of white feathers drifted down, fading gradually from existence before they could even hit the floor.
"Conjuration is neither alchemy nor transfiguration. It is, in essence, abusing Einstein's infamous E = mc^2 formula and channels enormous amounts of ambient Magical Dark Energy into a form more similar to our own, native energy and then creating matter from said energy into temporary materials.
"But I must stress the temporary aspect of it. It will stay as an observable entity for a while, but then the energy will revert to Dark Energy that cannot be seen or felt or observed by us.
"Used wisely, it can be extraordinarily helpful, if capricious, but if used improperly, could produce disastrous results.
"For instance, let's take a conjured matchstick. It will light, because unlike transfiguration, it's not taking a native quantum-signature and making it appear as something else, it is creating something in the universe that is meant to behave like what it is meant to.
"So, back to the matchstick; conjure a matchstick, and you will have to use it quickly for another purpose. The energy, smoke, and physical match will disappear, returning to its ambient Dark Energy.
"A conjured campfire will warm someone temporarily in the wilderness, but the moment the conjured wood in the fire vanishes, the smoke, ash, and all heat and energy created will vanish as well. Many wizards have perished camping in the cold using conjured fires. One minute, they're all warm and toasty, the next all of the heat they've absorbed in their bodies, food, and drink vanishes. Some even flash-freeze to death.
"That's why it's better suited for a temporary chair not meant to last a long time, or a match used to light a wick. The match's energy will vanish, but the initial conjured energy will ignite the wick of a real candle and cause it to burn the wick and candlewax, perpetuating a release of native, observable energy."
He paused to take a sip of tea, "My, that's quite a lot of talking. Where was I? Ah!
"With conjuration, the more powerful the caster, the more energy they can put into something to last longer or use more energy to create larger objects. An enormous boat, for instance, will last maybe a few seconds for a caster that can make a thimble for a few days, but the energy of the caster will still be depleted at a steady relationship between size and duration."
"W-wait, wait, but all the books say things like 'gold is impossible to conjure'," EJ pointed out, curious.
"Well, no, it's just very, very difficult. The higher the atomic value, the more complications there are. A goblet of gold needs numbers so close to the point where atoms become radioactive and break down. It just doesn't work out and tends to explode, quite literally, in their faces. A conjured chair is organic; lower atomic values.
"Gold is the metal most wizards think of off the bat with the highest proton count. They don't see much value in Lead outside of pewter cauldrons and those are too important to conjure at the risk of them vanishing and spilling the contents or contaminating a potion with ambient magical energy interference. And I can hardly think of a wizard finding much need to conjure Osmium or Bismuth.
"Additionally, it takes a greater degree of mental concentration to make something like, say, a winged-back chair that needs leather or fabric and dye, wood constructs, screws, decorations, etc. Though, something like a wineglass is simply silicon and oxygen and is easier to conjure and imagine or alter than complex constructs.
"Conjuration isn't an easy subject, so many wizards and witches who are capable of it will conjure based upon an existing entity. So, a wizard will conjure a re-creation of a chair in their own home. The mental projection is less demanding as if it were made purely by a wizard's imagination of a 'new' chair. And usually the caster will have more familiarity with the object enough that even with gaudy or excessive, wasted conjured components, they either don't notice or don't care if the product isn't quite a "chair".
"I recall one wizard who felt his chair was hard as a rock to sit upon, and when he conjured it, they sliced it open and the supports inside were granite. Haha!" Ollivander chortled. "Subconsciously, he conjured what he felt or intuited a chair to be like, and his own magical energy capabilities took care of the rest."
"So, that's what you meant by 'Capricious'?" Jack guessed. He took a sip of his own tea, letting his racing thoughts start to catch back up to him. "B-but what about spells like 'Aquamenti'? Technically it 'conjures' water? Or Fiendfyre? Or even 'Incendio'?"
Ollivander's eyes gleamed, "And those are the questions to ask! Now, allow me to delve into elemental magics and inter-dimensional extraction..."
Eyeless Jack was so caught up in the conversation, asking questions and bouncing off ideas, that he barely registered when the teapot emptied and the sun had long since set and rose again.
Slender eased back into his chair as Jack continued his 'glossed-over' tale with the Researcher. Creator knows, they'd be there until next Tuesday had he not given an 'abridged' summary (that still lasted almost an hour).
He cast an eyeless glance at those beside him. Sally was slumped in her chair, clearly asleep, with Smile curled up on himself beside Jeff who was pulling off 'sleeping with his eyes open' (his lidless eyes being rather helpful in that endeavor). BEN delved right into a game, noisily blasting some digital enemy and blatantly ignoring everything else. While Toby had taken to bothering Masky, if the worrying amount of bedraggled cigarette butts angrily stamped in the ashtray on the table were any indicator.
"... and then, we figured that it could be a logical explanation for everyone in the Mansion!" Jack exclaimed.
"I'm sorry, Jack, I was distracted for a moment. What was that?"
"Us!" Jack enunciated, waving his hands around the table. "The glamours, the knife-tricks, the bullet-curves, the Undead! We were human with a little extra!"
That garnered the attention of the others, save Jeff. Brian nudged the slashed-mouth killer's elbow resting on the table, causing the weight of his head to slip off it and slap onto the table with a brief, confused flail.
"Wat?! Hwaht!? What? I'm listening!" He yammered, disoriented.
EJ sent an unseen side-eye his way, "Anyways... essentially we were or are latently magical. It's like... a step below muggleborns, who have full genetic expression for 'magic', but a step above 'squibs' who have damaged genetic expression for 'magic'.
"Squibs have the neural network all in place, so they can see magical things meant to be invisible to normal people, but the genetics are faulty and they can't store magical energy!" Jack finished. "We have both, but very limited!"
...
"In English..." Jeff prodded.
Jack huffed, "We're mutants." He monotoned.
Toby gasped, sitting up excitedly, "Oh, my gosh! All we need is a really big wheel chair and Slendy can be Professor X! He's already bald."
Slender shifted, miffed, as Jack shook his head, "No, no, it's more like... growing a full tail vs a vestigial tail. 'Muggles', 'Normies', or 'Civilians' have no tail. Wizards and Witches have fully functioning tails. And squibs have a fully-formed tail that just doesn't work. While we have a little stub or a weak tail."
...
"... All I'm hearing is that we got gypped and I'm supposed to be able to shoot fireballs out of my eyes or something," Jeff remarked dryly.
Jack's face burrowed itself into his hands. Slender winced as he could almost see the steam coming from his ears. "I am explaining magic to you… in a very real and scientific sense... and all you can think about… is treating it like a video game powerup?"
"… isn't it?" BEN cautioned.
Jack's face met with the tabletop once more, muttering, "Pearls before swine..."
AN: This chapter has a lot to unload, so I'll summarize it in a way that I think philosophically puts it all pretty well;
…
Science is a potent source of understanding, but there are things that can only be conceived beyond the five senses. It may not make sense. Not everything has to. But it's there, as real as you or me, waiting to be realized.
A century ago, the most brilliant scientists in the world would laugh at the idea of "invisible light", and now we know UV radiation, X-Rays, and Microwaves exist. We know we can talk to another person instantaneously. We know microbes cause disease.
Try to imagine a 'color' that doesn't exist in the visible spectrum. Or a 'sound' that can't be picked up by a microphone. Or even an entity that exists between the fabrics of the universe just out-of-phase with what we can detect. It exists... but how do we analyze it?
There are confirmed people who have mutant gene sequences for rods and cones in their eyes that let them see colors outside of the 'standard' spectrum. How can you imagine that? How could they describe that?
What I'm saying is; everything we know we need to treat with healthy skepticism (not blatant distrust or rejection), because there are levels deeper into any subject that we're still learning about. That we're still learning how to see. That we're still learning how to learn how to see.
So… 'magic' could just be something we simply don't know how to look for yet.
…
"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."
-Clarke's First Law
…
I hope you enjoyed this (admittedly dense) chapter as much as I had fun writing it!
I'll update again soon.
...
Stay safe,
-Crow
P.S. Yes, the "Alchemy" bit with '50 kg wood/200 kg steel' was purely ripped off of FMA.