do you believe in magic in a shared bath's heart?

[dadsandals]

The bath at the mansion really is extensive -- probably more extensive than a lot of them have seen, considering there are literally multiple pools of varying temperatures, probably statues and indoor plants or something for atmosphere, steam rooms, complimentary bath things (everything in the manor is kind of complimentary but shshhh) and whatnot.

On this particularly fine and nondescript day, though -- there's a bit of a commotion whenever you wander in butt-naked for your soak or whatever you like to do in here (you can hang from the ceiling like a bat or something we ain't the judge of you); there's two enterprising wizards flitting about poking at things.

The thing with 🪄 Cid Kagenou 🪄 is that he is Very Into Baths, and Very Into Magic, and thus the Bath Magic is one of the few areas where even his li'l old self can shine. Or not shine, given that they've all been here for 2.5 days (extremely rough estimate) and the miracle is nobody has blown up the mansion trying magic yet. But there is definitely magic happening! Since there's already steam and everything.

And then there's 👓 Yamato 👓. Yamato is Here and enabling himself by watching Cid experiment with various things in the area. Initially he probably would've tried to stop him, but seeing what Cid's been doing has made him want to try some magic experimentation of his own. Pairing a teenager who kind of knows what he's doing with a man who has no idea what's going on makes it even more of a miracle that the mansion has not been blown up yet.

But if you look even closer, you'll spot various small differences:

🛁 all of the water has bubbles in it; the hot bath in fact looks like it has small duck-shaped bubbles just sort of trundling along, occasionally a duck pops and releases a puff of scented air (scents may vary at your discretion)

🛁 the cold water bath keeps turning different colors, maybe they should stop experimenting with it before somebody ends up blue for the week

🛁 some of the statues and potted plants have been slightly altered; nothing too outrageous, but at least one or two statues have been turned into roomba replicas and there's a potted plant with leaves that look like people in the manor's faces in miniature

🛁 the steam room is letting out an intermittent screaming noise that sounds very human, but there's no one in it

🛁 some of the bath soaps are extremely bright and keep on changing colors, as if they were colored like a disco ball (rave! in the bathhouse!)

............. Enjoy your bath!

(OOC: This is backdated to before the South mission so South Wizards get in on the fun too!)

Comments

[shadowkin]

[Trust him when he says he's had worse and with a keener nose. Sometimes you augment your senses with magic and then you get dropkicked back to lv. 1 and you forget how sensory thingies work.]

Oh. Uhh. Yeah, something like that?

I read that that was one of the types of magic, anyway... so I, uh, doth figured I'd try the different types and see which one stuck.

[Lie. He already knows that he has an affinity for transformation plus a couple of other types of magic; but the experimentation part is true. Also he definitely immediately and accidentally started copying Urianger's style of speech while distracted by surveying the fruits of his labors......]

[divineth]

[That attempted mimicry doesn't go unnoticed. Urianger tips his head at Cid for it, mostly out of confusion because that's not even the correct use of "doth"... Eh, it's not worth pointing out.]

And wouldst thou consider thine efforts successful?

[Because some stuff "stuck" all right, but uh... Hm. Everyone could have done without the screaming sauna room, surely.]

[shadowkin]

[Tilts his head back like an owl. All the ye olde parlance comes way too naturally to him, which is probably why it's slipping into the conversation like a particularly egregious variety of Spanglish.]

Wouldst I.... uh... not the most successful.

[His dexterity stat (magic version?) got nerfed somehow along with everything else so it really is the wizarding terrible twos in here. He pokes at a bubble and it pops, releasing a bizarre mix of what seems to be green tea and baby powder.

Wrinkling his nose a little but eh. Waving it off (literal).....]

But it's a bit more than I thought we could get to right away. Usually with magic you get stuck in theory for a couple weeks first and even then they want you to, like, stick to motions instead of application.

[OK so maybe he got a little bored.....]

[divineth]

[So that's the way of it, huh? Urianger kind of figured this was all the result of someone practicing their magic in unique ways.]

Aye. Our own introduction to magic in this world hath been more...trial by fire in nature. I found that it caused a great deal of decision paralysis among those who were completely new to the concept of magick.

[The way he sees it, they would have been a lot better off doing it the "boring" way, at least in the first few days.]

[shadowkin]

You're tellin' me... I thought Laz was going to go ahead and actually set us on fire. Close enough.

[He may or may not have done more ill-advised things with magic since getting here. But that's between him, hat tricks and the spirits reading this.

Still, it's only half a complaint, even though his tone exaggerates it entirely -- formal training's only served "Cid Kagenou" and not much else, and while that's necessary as anything...]

You'd think nobody around here ever properly trained a wizard before?

[There aren't even any books........... though he doesn't voice that part.]

[divineth]

It seemeth to me that our overseers may not have been prepared for such a duty, nor are they themselves practiced with instructing others.

[Like, Tatara and Wanderer totally had this responsibility thrust on them when the other wizards fucked off, right. Those are the vibes he's been getting.]