Blade Over Magic

Brainstorming

When Aubrey removed her hands from the boys’ eyes, Falael was already wearing a new robe and walking off with drawn shoulders, face a deep red.

Xander saw this and scratched his head.

’No offense to them, but didn’t they kinda... overreact?’ He was by no means mocking them, but considering the things they’d experienced in Landor, briefly losing one’s clothes, especially in front of their close friends, shouldn’t have elicited such a strong response, no?

’I kinda agree, but maybe it’s something else? I don’t really know...’ Curtis mused.

Aubrey just stared at the two of them like they were the biggest fools on the planet, and she had to ask herself.

’Do they really not know?’ As she was pondering on this, Xander shook his head and spoke.

"... It’s fine, hopefully they will get over it soon enough." Then he added in his heart. ’And hopefully they aren’t mad at me for whatever reason.’

"So, who next?" Aubrey adjusted her glasses.

"I don’t mind giving it a go. I need some inspiration for what I was trying to figure out, anyway." Xander nodded.

"Alright, let’s hear it." Getting the go ahead, Aubrey lingered for a few seconds, then she began to explain her difficulty.

"Well, I’ve more or less gotten acclimated to the first page of the book in my library. I’ve managed to increase the number of Information Clones to 50, so my processing ability has spiked even further, and I’ve managed to process a lot of the accumulated information within that prism, though I’m still a far way off from doing all of it. At this point, its starting to look like a real library. The number of books I’ve stored up has almost reached 600, so I’ve archived a lot of information. Not all of it is immediately useful, but it is there for when it is needed. I’m creating more clones by the day, so this process will only get faster." She took a breath.

"So I’ve been considering how to unlock the second page of the book, and my instincts tell me to lean into the aspect of ’Grafting’ I used when I fought against the ant." She frowned slightly.

"But I don’t really know how else I could use it that would be deemed satisfactory by the book to unlock the next page. I initially grafted my own information on myself, and while the information overlap did cause an additive boost, nothing much happened. I then tried grafting the information of others besides yours. My logic was that I perhaps needed to get used to the sensation, but even after doing it dozens of times, there were no changes." When she finished, Xander hummed and ventured.

"Have you considered ’grafting’ information unto others? Like manifesting it in a way." To this, Aubrey shook her head.

"That was my next line of thought as well, but try as I might, I have no clue how to perform grafting on anyone who isn’t me. It only works if I have the ’original’ copy of someone’s information. And the only original I have is of myself, everything else is copied information. Nothing I do to it will affect the original person. I did consider figuring out a way to resolve this, but I get the feeling that it’s way beyond the current me." She explained, and Xander nodded.

"Yeah, that makes sense." He closed his eyes and hummed in thought. This actually took a while longer as he seriously thought about it, Aubrey also falling silent.

Curtis looked between two of them, then he spoke just as Xander did the same.

"What about—"

"What if—" They both looked at each other in surprise and fell silent.

"... Go ahead." Xander urged Curtis, but he immediately shook his head.

"No, I was just guessing, your answer probably makes more sense." It was clear that he did not think his opinion held much weight here, but Xander just fixed his gaze on him.

"None of that. Say your mind, I don’t care if you think it’s stupid or not. As things stand, all of us are guessing." Xander could almost see the metaphorical dog ears drooping at his chastisement, and Curtis hesitated before saying.

"W-Well... Aubrey said she can’t graft information onto others because she needs access to the ’original’ files, but..." He lingered. "What if she didn’t bother with grafting the information on anything at all." He rubbed his neck.

"Ever since Aubrey got her own Mana construct being the library, I always felt like she wasn’t really... using magic? If that makes sense? Not like Xander, but more like... I don’t know... she was kinda just using some of the absolute base expressions of her construct. Like me for example, if I don’t control the frost my ice diamond releases, it begins to transform the surrounding mana into ice affinity mana. And if Falael doesn’t control their star, it draws in the surrounding Mana like a well until it gets too full, and they need to regulate it." He closed his eyes as he continued, articulating his thoughts better.

"The Information Clones and Grafting are nice applications, yes... but is that really all the library and all that stored up information is good for? Increasing your already absurd processing speed and then overlaying recorded information on itself? It’s like you’re missing out on way more. I mean, look at Falael, until moments ago they had no clue that there was basically a sub-affinity granted to them by their star. My and Falael’s constructs are essentially the highest forms of expression our magic can take. Yours feels like that... and more. I feel like it shouldn’t be even called perception magic, more like... information magic, or something. Which should have its own set of spells and abilities." He opened his eyes.

"For instance, something like ’information projection’ where rather than simply grafting, you like... project a clone of something whose information you’ve copied. Information Projection, if you will. That’d be cool. Like an external application of the Information Clones. Maybe they could have some of the abilities of the original, or something. So like summons." He looked at them, then slightly shrank back when he saw Xander and Aubrey staring at him with wide eyes.

His self-consciousness immediately surged forward, and he stammered.

"I-I mean... I’m just rambling... You don’t need to take me seriously..." However, Xander raised a hand to stop him, his expression morphing into one of excitement and self-frustration.

"No... no you’re good. Better than good, actually. Fuck, why didn’t I think of that? That’s way better than what i thought of." He ran a hand through his hair, and Aubrey had to remove her glasses and she massaged the bridge of her nose.

"I actually feel like such an idiot." She mumbled, yet her eyes were glittering.

Curtis looked around, thoroughly confused.

"Are... Are you guys happy or...?"

"Happy, very happy. Thank you, Curtis." Aubrey said with a genuine smile.

"Yeah, from now on, we brainstorm together. Who knows how long it would have taken us to figure that out if you hadn’t said anything?" Xander also smiled at Curtis, and Curtis’s face brightened.

"That’s... good. I’m glad I could help." Xander nodded and looked at Aubrey.

"How about you give it a go? Try something small first?" Xander asked, and Aubrey nodded.

In her library, her main consciousness took a book from a clone, and she flipped through it randomly. Her gaze then settled on a set of information, and she drew it out. However, she did not manifest it within the library, neither did she graft it onto herself.

Instead, she chose to manifest it outward.

Outside, she held out her hand, and everyone watched as in front of her hand, a string of what could only be described as pure information manifested in front of her. Xander and Curtis had never seen such a thing, yet they somehow understood what the information signified, like the were looking at the base, most fundamental information of something, making it understandable by all.

And when it condensed, it formed...

A chair.

It was a simple wooden chair that she had sat on back in Landor. It landed on the floor with a soft thud, occupied space, and... well, it looked like a chair.

There was a moment of silence, the Xander pumped his fists into the air.

"Success!" It was such a simple thing, a chair, yet he looked genuinely happy at the success, and Aubrey was trying and failing to hide her smile, Curtis was just grinning ear to ear, glad that he helped in a meaningful way.

"It took mana... not a lot, but that just hammers down how much I was underutilizing the library. The only things that cost mana so far was the creation of Information Clones. Mana is usually a sign that a spell has been used, so besides that, could it really be said that I was using the library for magical purposes?" She sounded both elated and frustrated at how she had missed something so obvious.

Meanwhile, Xander was just thinking about the possible implications of this alone.

What else could she summon? Did the power or complexity determine the Mana spent? What was her current upper limit? If made a projection of a living creature, would it have the full original capabilities? Or were there limitations? Could she graft information onto any of these projections? Copy information onto another copy? Could she mix them together???

At that moment, Aubrey suddenly fell silent as her eyes widened, this change didn’t go unnoticed as Xander asked.

"Aubrey?" She didn’t answer him, though, as inside her library, a change was occurring.

The book I Came, I Saw, I Record, opened as in this moment, the second page began to outline itself!"