Let's >RECITE THE CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE and Play Hadean Lands

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ManxomeBromide: Jan 29, 2009; old school

Part 8: Elementary, My Dear Forsyth

Last time, we finished exploring the immediately accessible regions of the Retort, completed two new syntheses, and failed to ignite gold by failing to ignite blackwood. This time we'll push the boundaries a bit and sweep up all the knowledge hidden out of sight.

We did, at least, succeed in making the breath-holding potion, and the crawlway under the Scaphe Arcade was flooded. Let's see what's at the other end.

quote:

>DRINK BREATH HOLDING POTION
You swallow the clear potion. The liquid burns icily down your throat, and then settles as a cold heaviness in your lungs.

>DOWN
You jump into the chilly water. The potion seems to be working�you feel no urge to breathe.

In the water, the bundle of paper dissolves.

Arcade Crawlspace, Flooded
This crawlway runs north and south�or it did, before it collapsed and flooded. Now you are floating in not-very-clean water, weakly illuminated by a few remaining sophic lamps.

To the south, the crawlway runs into murky darkness, out of sight. The way north is blocked by fallen beams. The hatch�and air�is a rippling patch of light overhead.

A glint of bronze is visible in the debris. It looks like another chime�B natural, if you're not mistaken.

>GET CHIME
Taken.

>WEST
The crawlway north has collapsed, so you can only swim south or up.

>SOUTH
You kick downwards and pull yourself along the crawlway. The passage is cramped and claustrophobic, and even with the potion, your chest feels tight. But you soon see light ahead, and an open hatch becomes visible above you.

Observatory Crawlspace, Flooded
You are floating in the submerged crawlway, which runs back to the north. Another collapse blocks further passage south. A hatchway above gives access to the open air.

>UP
You pull yourself out of the water.

Alchemy File's place is in the labs in the Eastern Wing. We've just entered the Observatory, which is the domain of the Aithery File.

quote:

Observatory
You have found your way into the observatory, the Retort's guiding eye. The dome overhead is set with windows, and each window shows a different sky and a different array of stars.

One level above you, an ironwork bridge crosses the dome, north to south. A ladder descends at either end, but only one of the two is lowered, and that one is obstructed by a fracture that cuts off the north side of the dome. The south-side ladder is folded up under the bridge; its counterweight hangs near the floor.

The door to the east is closed. Open alcoves to the north and south house additional equipment, but again, the north side is fracture-blocked. You also see the flooded crawlway hatch at your feet.

In the center of the chamber, beneath the bridge, stands the compass pedestal with its capsule of elemental water.

Swabbies aren't allowed in here... You must be getting sneaky, kid.

I choose to take that as a compliment. Also, hello, what's this?

quote:

>EXAMINE ELEMENTAL WATER
A delicate capsule, no longer than your thumb, full of elementally pure water.

That sounds fantastic. Adventuring is thirsty work!

quote:

>DRINK ELEMENTAL WATER
As a pure elemental substance, the water will draw any impurities into itself. Your body is made of impure water. Allowing the elemental water to touch you would�well, it wouldn't turn you into a splash of brine, but it would poison you pretty effectively.

Hands off the pure elementals, swabbie. No marchmen will melt themselves in my classroom.

Interesting. Our experiences with earth and wood to the contrary, this implies that elemental substances are generally unusually dangerous. That said, the capsule seems like it should protect us, right?

quote:

>TAKE ELEMENTAL WATER
You pull the elemental water away from the compass. It resists for a moment, then comes free.

Score. Now let's check this place out. Ensign Forsyth probably hasn't been here before.

quote:

>X DOME
The dome windows show... to be honest, you've never understood the theory. Each one is a world where the Retort has ever been�or each one is the heart of some constellation�or each one shows an aspect of the Retort's relationship to the Cosmos. Or something.

They are beautiful, though. You see skies that vary from velvet black to jewel-bright arrays of stars.

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT DOME
Through the lens, the dome looks like everywhere you've ever visited in your life.

>X BRIDGE
The bridge is the Aithery, one of the four dragon-nests. Normally the Captain would be standing up there, gazing up at the heavens and steering the Retort on its way. But now the bridge seems abandoned.

The bridge runs from one side of the dome to the other, about ten feet above the floor. Access is by two ladders. Unfortunately one of them is blocked by a fracture, and the other is folded up under the bridge. Its counterweight hangs down, as it should, but the mechanism seems to be jammed.

>SOUTH

Observatory Alcove, South
This alcove houses the magnificent Horological Calculator�a complex machine whose controls include an armillary sphere, a dial, and a slot. There's a blank tin slip in the slot.

Two papers, a coarse sheet and a delicate sheet, have been discarded here.

More delicious knowledge!

quote:

>READ COARSE SHEET
"THE SYNTHESIS of VIRIDIGRIS (the lower oxide of orichalcum): This process is quite simple. Place orichalcum and vinegar into a retort; apply the Hermetic sealing. Heat until the vinegar just begins to boil, and then invoke the Phlogistical Catalysis."

You memorize the instructions, including the Phlogistical Catalysis. You also pick up the sheet. Just in case.

The heavy sensation in your lungs begins to fade.

>READ DELICATE SHEET
"THE SYNTHESIS of SUBLIME SPIRIT (the eighth distilled essence of mineral oil): Place mineral oil and nickel into a retort. (Thin pieces of nickel are best, as the surface area must be large.) Invoke the sealing, followed by a word of entension (to prevent the oil from igniting). Introduce elemental fire into the retort to begin the distillation. You may then easily extract the desired fractions."

You memorize the instructions, and also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

>EXAMINE HOROLOGICAL CALCULATOR
This majestic piece of machinery is intended to condense heavenly observations into a portable form. You've used the result�small slips of tin engraved with the equivalent of dozens of astronomical ephemera; they're crucial for certain very precise sorts of alchemical operations. But you've never used the Calculator itself. That's Aithery work.

The Calculator is the size of a large console desk. The upper surface is dominated by an armillary sphere, or rather a nested set of spheres: gleaming brass orbits and cycles, balanced to follow the movements of the visible stars. On the front is a smaller dial, surrounded by the marks of the Greek alphabet, to which it can be set. Next to the dial is a tiny slot.

A tin slip rests in the slot, ready for engraving.

This is a lovely piece of clockwork, but at the end of the day it's a glorified card punch. Can our instruments determine more about it?

quote:

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT CALCULATOR
Through the oculus, the horological calculator looks like a vast complexity of brass gears and mechanisms. Not too different from the mundane view, really.

The heavy sensation in your lungs is dissipating.

I suppose that since it's a giant piece of machinery dedicated to astrography, we'd have better luck with the planetary lens.

quote:

>LOOK THROUGH LENS AT CALCULATOR

This is a flawless plan that cannot possibly go awry.

quote:

You look at the horological calculator through the lens. Then you look away, blinking away a terrible headache.

Your lungs feel nearly normal again.

Whoops. Well, we've learned several new rituals and we've also picked up Elemental Water. Not only that, we only have to go swimming once; the Observatory was locked but just with an ordinary lock. By leaving this room in the normal way we end up back in the Paper Garden none the worse for wear.

On the way out, though, our breath-holding potion gives out.

quote:

You suddenly realize that you haven't breathed in ten minutes. You suck in a startling gasp of air.

You know, I was wondering why the finger on this Monkey's Paw had just curled up while I was preparing to play through this update...

Ratosolov posted:

I gotta admit, I'm hoping Forsythe ends up walking in the footsteps of their predecessor, the great sage of alchemy Threepwood, and performs an entire complex ritual using only jury-rigged fakes instead of actually appropriate ingredients.

So close, and yet so far. As for exploiting substitutions, the future is yet to be written. We'll see what we can do.

In the meantime, though, the Paper Garden's "lake" went down a great distance and we couldn't reach the bottom. Let's brew another breath-holding potion and check out the bottom of that lake.

As long as we're in the Nave, we forgot to check the alien script with the planetary lens earlier.

quote:

>LOOK THROUGH LENS AT MARKS
When viewed through the planetary lens, the black marks are blurred and indistinct.

That's not terribly useful, but it's also not the generic no-information answer, and it's not what we got when we looked at ourselves. Curiouser and curiouser.

quote:

>DOWN
You jump into the chilly water. The potion is still working�you feel no urge to breathe.

In the water, the bundle of paper dissolves.

Garden Pool
You are floating in a well, eight feet across and perhaps ten feet deep. The water is cold and still. The water's surface is a sheet of light above you, and the base of the well is a circle of darkness below.

In the center of the darkness you see a darker hole. It's an opening in the floor below you, a narrow shaft running downward out of sight.

>DOWN
You haul yourself further downwards, into the channel.

Bottom of Shaft
You are at the bottom of a narrow vertical submerged shaft. Little light reaches you, and the water is icy cold.

At the very bottom of the shaft is a mud-covered slab. Its surface is irregular, but the mud is too thick to make out what's carved there.

>CLEAN SLAB
You brush at the mud, trying not to stir it up into the water around you. Letters come into view, neat enough to read even in this murky light.

>READ SLAB
A word is carved on the slab. You have never seen it, but you have an unspoken sense: it is a word of emulgence, a word of blending. Like the blending of earth and water into mud.

You memorize the word of emulgence.

Well, that's certainly a thing. I'm sure we'll find a use for it eventaully.

In the meantime, it's also time to systematically check the entire marcher for sparks with the oculus, and start unlocking the doors and cabinets we've found in our first pass. We'll start with the door locked with the Venture File seal, down in the depths. We don't have a Venture seal, but we do have a mold for Venture seals, and a rod of metal with a very low melting point:

quote:

>EXAMINE VENTURE MOLD
A thumb-sized clay disk with a reverse impression of a Marcher Venture File badge.

>EXAMINE VENTURE MOLD THROUGH OCULUS
Through the oculus, you perceive the symbolism of the Venture File: exploration of unknown lands.

>EXAMINE VENTURE MOLD THROUGH LENS
You peer at the Venture File clay mold through the lens, and perceive an association with the Retort itself.

>PUT VENTURE MOLD IN KILN
You push the Venture File clay mold into the kiln's heat; but you have to yank your hand away instantly.

>DRINK FIRE RESISTANCE
You swallow the cloudy potion. The liquid leaves your mouth feeling slightly numb. Within moments, you feel a prickle in your skin; your hands go cold and stiff, like a long walk on a chilly autumn day.

>PUT LEAD ON VENTURE MOLD
You slide the lead rod unhurriedly onto the Venture File clay mold.

The lead melts immediately, filling the Venture File mold.

>GET MOLD
You lift the Venture File clay mold, and blow on the lead until it cools a bit. Then you dump the seal out into your palm. It's a perfect�well, it's a pretty good impression of the Venture File badge.

Interesting side note here: a marcher in the aither is, apparently, its own world.

I search the East Wing on my way down to the chasm.

In the Opticks Lab:

quote:

You focus on the violet spark through the oculus. A new memory comes into focus. It concerns the pronunciation of the Crystalline Tempering. This formula seems to aid crystal formation in mineral substances.

In the Opticks Annex:

quote:

You focus on the cyan spark through the oculus. It brings to mind the lodestone of purity creation and the Minor Animus, both of which you already know.

In the Mechanica Lab Crawlway two things that aren't sparks but are interesting:

quote:

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT DOORWAY
The oculus shows the dark doorway as associated with time.

>LOOK THROUGH LENS AT ANDERES
You peer at Lt Anderes through the lens. She has Gaian associations, as human beings always do. The image is oddly distant, though.

In the Storage Nook, off of the Main Store:

quote:

You focus on the magenta spark through the oculus. A new memory comes into focus. The text being read describes an alchemical tool. "DISPERSAL BRUSH: Conjured alchemical symbols generally fade after use. However, it is sometimes necessary to erase such a symbol directly. Touching the item with a dispersal brush accomplishes this. To create such a tool, place a feather quill within a bound in a neutral environment. Begin with a simple sealing; sprinkle alcohol spirits upon the quill; conclude with a word of culmination."

Oh hey, we can make one of those right now.

quote:

Opticks Annex
This is a quiet corner south of the Opticks laboratory. You've spent many hours here with the other scrubs, snatching extra practice time in your spare hours.

A round standing table in back is set up for ritual use. A gestalt shelf is fastened above it.

On the gestalt shelf are a moon-metal rod and a rotor card.

A storage bin contains a chip of flint.

A white feather has fallen to the floor near the table.

>GET FEATHER
Taken.

>PUT IT IN BOUND
You put the white feather into the tabletop bound.

>TAKE ALL FROM SHELF
moon-metal rod: Taken.
rotor card: Taken.

>SPEAK SIMPLE SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the simple sealing word.

The arc begins to glow palely around the white feather.

>PUT ALCOHOL ON FEATHER
You carefully drip rubbing alcohol onto the white feather. The quill absorbs the liquid without darkening.

>SPEAK WORD OF CULMINATION
You declaim the word of culmination. It falls solidly into place; the bound flares and then darkens.

The feather ruffles in an unfelt breeze, and takes on a subtle sheen. It is simpler than the dispersal tools you've used in class, but it should be effective.

>GET BRUSH
Taken.

>X BRUSH
The brush is a white feather with an icy sheen.

Given our suspicions about what we are, this might be a bad idea, but science calls.

quote:

>TOUCH SELF WITH BRUSH
You brush the feather across the back of your hand. It emits a peculiar crackle. You yank it away. A human being shouldn't be erasable, but you've seen enough alchemical laws broken today...

Indeed, a human being shouldn't be erasable. :tinfoil:

Back to our Spark search. In the Eastern Hallway, a fuchsia spark:

quote:

You focus on the fuchsia spark through the oculus. A new memory comes into focus. "Music is the most complex of ritual elements; one might well call it 'obfuscated.' We begin with the nursery-school lessons: the pitch A is associated with iron, the color red, the liver; B with bronze, orange, the stomach; C with brass... yes, you can all chant along. But this is simplified to uselessness. What of non-classical metals? We now associate C-sharp with rutilum, F-sharp with aluminum, G-sharp with nickel. Researchers have invented entirely new scales to deal with the spectrum of aither-metals. Then the Eastern Empire uses the well-tempered scale; thus while F-sharp is the mode of extension, G-flat is the mode of ostension, G-natural is intension, G-sharp is paratension, and H�yes, there's an H�is the mode of recension..."

In the North Arcade:

quote:

You focus on the topaz spark through the oculus. A new memory comes into focus. "Well, you hear stories, right? Things folk see at the moment we rig out. Flashes, no more. The ghost of the Cold Crucible, lost and drowned in a Thalassan sea... Well, aye, I know the Crucible arrived safe home, and never reported any trouble on Titan. Mayhap the ghost is what didn't happen. Or what will... Still want to gripe you were posted here 'stead of to the Crucy?"

Maybe that's why I associated Thalassan lands with Titan.

In the Confusing Cracks:

quote:

You focus on the carmine spark through the oculus. It brings to mind the periodic table of stone, which you already know.

And lastly, right at the door locked with the Venture lock:

quote:

You focus on the sepia spark through the oculus. A new memory comes into focus. It concerns a phlegmatic sealing word. It has a stable, passive pattern�Yin in the Oriental traditions, cool and moist in the Greek.

Onwards!

quote:

>OPEN DOOR WITH VENTURE FILE SEAL
You touch the lead Venture File seal to the door, and the lock pops open.

>EAST
(first opening the pine door)

Deep Stacks
The tomes in these stacks are little-regarded treasures, or so the librarians tell you. For certain, though, a marcher never discards a book. The shelves are overstuffed.

The room is unfurnished; you see books and nothing beside. The only door is west. However, the south wall is split by a bulging yellow intrusion.

You can see a crackly sheet and a moldering sheet here.

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS
You peer through the oculus. Everything acquires a colorful, hazy fringe.

The oculus reveals an indigo spark floating in the air.

>X INDIGO
You focus on the indigo spark through the oculus. A new memory comes into focus. It concerns the synthesis of an alchemical compound. "THE SYNTHESIS of JACKSON-MUD (a perfect balance of elemental earth and water): Begin with a medium of simple sand, and the Hermetic sealing. Invoke the Crystalline Tempering. Add one of the pure elements to the retort, and speak the word of entension; then add the other, and speak the word of emulgence."

You consider these memories.

>EXAMINE INTRUSION
A bulbous yellow outcrop bulges in through a crevice in the south wall. The growth looks more like undersea coral than anything else. But it must have originated in some other world, perhaps a Thalassan land.

You notice something poking out from underneath the outcrop�the corner of a bit of paper, trapped between the coral and the floor.

>GET BIT OF PAPER
You try to dig your fingers into the yellow coral. A small chunk comes away in your hand.

>READ MOLDERING
The paper describes two mathematical structures: a symmetric sequence and an antisymmetric sequence.

You memorize the information, including the two formulae. You also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

>READ CRACKLY
It's a reagent receipt. "THE SYNTHESIS of BAMURIATIC ACID: This substance is similar to muriatic acid, but even more corrosive and toxic. Exercise caution! Prepare your retort with the mineral fluorspar in a bath of vitriol. Invoke the sealing; heat until the crystal has entirely dissolved. Discontinue the heat. Add saline solution, but be sure to first use a word of entension (to prevent a premature reaction.) Once combined, a word of culmination will allow the reaction to complete in a controlled manner."

You memorize the instructions, and also pick up the sheet. Just in case.

I don't believe this substance was ever called "bamuriatic acid" in our history, but there's really only one substance it could possibly be. And we can make it.

Let's go to the Chymic lab and do something possibly unwise.

quote:

>PUT FLUORSPAR IN RETORT
You put the fluorspar crystal into the retort.

>PUT VITRIOLIC ACID IN RETORT
You pour a measure of vitriolic acid into the retort.

>SPEAK HERMETIC SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Hermetic Sealing.

The retort's equator begins to glow pearl-grey around the fluorspar crystal and the reservoir of vitriolic acid.

>TURN ON HEAT
You twist the knob. The gas burner hisses, and then bursts into flame.

The gas flame heats the vitriolic acid.

>Z
Time passes.

The gas flame heats the vitriolic acid.

>Z
Time passes.

The vitriolic acid bubbles over the flame.

>Z
Time passes.

The fluorspar crystal slowly dissolves into the acid, giving it a rich amber tint.

>Z
Time passes.

The amber acid bubbles over the flame.

>TURN OFF HEAT
You twist the knob. The gas burner goes silent, and the blue flames die.

>SPEAK WORD OF ENTENSION
You declaim the word of entension. The world seems to hold its breath.

>PUT SALINE IN RETORT
You add a quantity of saline to the retort. The liquids mix, but not entirely�the retort now contains a swirling mixture of amber filaments.

Before I finish this ritual, I'd like to review what we know about bamuriatic acid. It is similar to muriatic acid but much nastier. The basic process of making it involves dissolving fluorspar in sulfuric acid. It is also named bamuriatic acid. Mendeleev started a tradition of using eka- as a prefix to mean "the element one down on the periodic table." So, astatine was once known as "ekaiodine" before it was isolated, and hydrobromic acid would be "ekamuriatic acid" by extension. That, plus the components, strongly suggest that we have just created hydrofluoric acid.

We've been storing our various reagents and products in random flasks we find about the lab. The thing is, hydrofluoric acid will cheerfully eat through glass.

Are we about to make a serious mistake? :ohdear:

quote:

>SPEAK WORD OF CULMINATION
You declaim the word of culmination.

The amber mixture blends together, all at once. But there is no boiling, no explosion. The liquid steams silently away, filling the retort with vapor. When it clears, the solution has been reduced to a few drops of�well, if a clear liquid ever looked malevolent, it's this stuff.

You locate a wax-lined vial, tap the bamuriatic acid into it, and flush the retort.

>X BAMURIATIC
Bamuriatic acid is powerful enough to dissolve stone and corrode glass. You've made only a tiny amount, and it's contained in wax-coated vial, but you're still wary of it.

I wonder if the unaugmented, fully-human Ensign Forsyth would be so foresighted.

(Fun fact: in real life, with actual chemistry, we do in fact produce hydrofluoric acid by reacting fluorspar�well, OK, we call that mineral fluorite�with sulfuric acid. We don't have the luxury of the word of entension, though.)

Well, that was an entertaining, if slightly terrifying, diversion. Up next, I'll check the northern wing for sparks. We hit phlogisticated gold almost immediately; in the Study Room in the scrubs wing, we find the last thing we needed to make the Aura Impermeability Inscription:

quote:

You focus on the apricot spark through the oculus. A new memory comes into focus. It concerns a formula. The Ka Sealing word creates a boundary circle. It is derived from the Classical Egyptian analytical model of the human mind, or spirit.

In the Master Rector's quarters:

quote:

You focus on the periwinkle spark through the oculus. A new memory comes into focus. The subject is an advanced aura inscription. "ROYCE'S INSCRIPTION, to RENDER ONE'S AURA INVISIBLE: Invoke an environment of spiritual peace. Begin with a quartz token in the bound; this represents the ka soul. Invoke the Ka Sealing. Sprinkle copper percalcinate over the token, representing the ba soul. Invoke an idempotent structure. Pour sublime spirit over the token; this represents the evanescence of the soul's name. Close with an elementary word of binding. This inscription will render the subject's aura indetectable to malign forces, though only briefly."

That also sounds like it would get us past the aura vortex and possibly even past the defense mechanism on the Birdhouse. We can't perform it until we crack the secret of Gold Ignition, though�we need elemental fire to create sublime spirit.

This means our next task is to perform the Aura Impermeability Ritual and use it to facetank the aura vortex. Let's get to work.

quote:

>TURN ROTOR TO RAINBOW
You turn the rotor until the rainbow is visible.

>PUT ROTOR ON SHELF
You put the rotor card on the gestalt shelf.

>PUT QUARTZ IN BOUND
You put the long quartz prism into the pedestal bound.

>SPEAK KA SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Ka Sealing.

The arc begins to glow indigo around the long quartz prism.

>PUT ORICHALCUM IN BOUND
The indigo light ripples as you push through the arc. You align the orichalcum rod against the long quartz prism.

>SPEAK WORD OF ANAPHYLAXIS
You intone the word of anaphylaxis; it makes your mouth itch. The orichalcum rod and the long quartz prism vibrate against each other, emitting a high, irritating whine.

>OPEN CITRONELLE
You pop open the impet, and the citronelle aroma rolls out, cloying-sweet.

>SPEAK BINDING OF ANTIPATHY
You begin invoking the Binding of Antipathy, forcing out the bitter phrases.

After long moments, your lips start going numb; you inhale the lemony aroma, which seems to soothe them, and continue chanting. Soon the indigo light flares, and the orichalcum rod begins to dissolve into the quartz.

When the orichalcum is entirely gone, a symbol shines on the surface of the long quartz prism.

>GET PRISM
You pick up the long quartz prism, careful of its inscribed impermeability symbol.

That's a nice little bit of extra flavor text for why the strengthening aroma lets the ritual succeed. That's a trick you won't manage with an adjustable bound, that's for sure.

On the way back to the Medical Wing, we pass the cabinet that's held shut by horrible gunk, and it occurs to me that I am carrying three vials of incredibly powerful acids. Is this easier to deal with than we assumed as video game players?

quote:

>POUR MURIATIC ON GUNK
You sprinkle some muriatic acid onto the cabinet, but it doesn't affect the gunk much.

>POUR VITRIOLIC ON GUNK
You sprinkle some vitriolic acid onto the cabinet, but it doesn't affect the gunk much.

Well, it looks like we can't open it for free. But thanks to our diligent exploration we have a much more powerful acid to try.

quote:

>POUR BAMURIATIC ON GUNK
You dribble the bamuriatic acid over the cabinet, and the guck starts to dissolve away. (The smell is horrific.) You can't get the cabinet entirely clean, but you manage to free up the hinges, at least.

>OPEN CABINET
You open the cabinet. The inside is still pretty filthy; you see a dull sheet and a glossy sheet inside.

That did it. :2bong:

Our reward is knowledge�we won't need to waste the bamuriatic acid on this again.

quote:

>READ DULL SHEET
"TO CREATE MISUBA'S LODESTONE (to locate the center of a labyrinth): Prepare an environment of earthy influences. Place a silk thread within the bound, and a labyrinth symbol upon the gestalt shelf. Begin with the Mithraic Sealing. Pour a sample of viridigris over the silk, and then lay a shard of elemental earth onto it. Strike a chime in the mode of recension. Now lay elemental fire upon the labyrinth symbol (not into the bound!) Finally, the Minor Animus will bind the lodestone to potential motion."

You memorize the instructions, including the Mithraic Sealing. You also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

>READ GLOSSY
"OEHLKE'S INSCRIPTION, to MIMIC THE AURA OF ANOTHER: Invoke an environment of spiritual peace. Begin with a quartz token in the bound; this represents the ka soul. Invoke the Ka Sealing. Sprinkle copper percalcinate over the token, representing the ba soul. Invoke an isomorphic structure. Pour elemental water over the token; this represents the mutability of the soul's name. Close with an elementary word of binding. Touch the token to the donor, then to the recipient. NOTE: Imitating the aura of a superior officer is malfeasance under Naval law."

You memorize the instructions, and also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

Interesting. We now have two ways to mimic auras, with very different requirements. This one looks like it's feasible to do, too, though we've already consumed the orichalcum we'd need to produce the copper percalcinate. That'll have to wait for after a reset.

In the meantime, though, we used that orichalcum to make an aura impermeability enchantment. Let's use that and slip past.

quote:

>TOUCH QUARTZ
You press the long quartz prism against your hand. The impermeability symbol discharges with a bone-vibrating hum.

You feel a sudden wave of uncaring, a calm detachment, as if all trouble and pain were a story told to someone else.

>SOUTH
You walk towards the door, unafraid. The malevolent chill is still present, but it feels trivial, a problem for someone else to worry about.

Then it doesn't feel quite so trivial. Your protection is wearing away. You hurriedly step through the door.

Medical Wing
This would be a waiting room, were it not as cluttered as every other part of the medical wing. The uncomfortable-looking chairs are outnumbered by the obscure-looking equipment.

You know that the open glass box is an aeroclave. Next to it rests a heavy steel tank, a pressurized container of elemental air. A miasma gong hangs by the door.

You see a workroom to the east, and a very dark doorway to the west. A passage south leads to more of the medical wing, but a fracture blocks it.

You can see a crusty scalpel and an impet of eucalyptus oil here.

The sense of detachment fades away. The reality of the world reasserts itself.

Here we are in the Medical Wing. We can't actually leave it, though, because we have no way to get past the aura again just yet. :ohdear:

There's an entry to the Void, though, so we can reset if we absolutely must. Overall, though, we are in luck; the Medical Wing includes everything we need to escape it.

It also includes my favorite piece of alchemical technology in the game.

quote:

>EXAMINE AEROCLAVE
The aeroclave is an enclosed glass chamber, with a gasketed panel on top. This device is used to sterilize medical instruments in a stream of elemental air�quite sufficient to dissolve away blood, grease, disease, or any other vestige of living matter. A hose runs from the nearby tank to the base of the chamber; the coupling bears a large brass knob.

The panel stands open, but the aeroclave chamber is empty.

>EXAMINE ELEMENTAL AIR
The air tank is several feet high, a construction of solid steel, painted with warning notices. A heavy hose runs to the aeroclave. The tank also sports a needle valve, used to fill portable containers with elemental air.

>GET ALL
crusty scalpel: Taken.
impet of eucalyptus oil: Taken.

>PUT SCALPEL IN AEROCLAVE
You put the crusty scalpel into the aeroclave.

>CLOSE AEROCLAVE
You push the glass panel closed. It takes a bit of force, due to the tight gaskets.

>TURN ON AEROCLAVE
You twist the knob, and elemental air hisses into the chamber. You can see the jet swirling behind the glass, almost invisible, like ripples in water.

The filth on the crusty scalpel erodes away in the elemental air! The metal soons shines clean.

You release the knob, and the flow of air shuts off.

>OPEN AEROCLAVE
You pull the aeroclave open. An ozoney whiff of elemental air drifts out; your nose prickles.

>GET SCALPEL
Taken.

Remember how elemental water would poison us because it would remove all the "impurities" in our body, like the basic proteins and nucleic acids required for life? Why not harness that property of pure elemental substances by building a sterilizer unit out of it? :science:

Let's check the back room.

quote:

>EAST

Medical Workroom
This side room is equipped for routine medical workings. You see a white workbench with a ritual bound and gestalt shelf. The only exit is back west.

You see a small clay disk on the floor. It looks like another reverse mold�this one is for Aithery File.

You also notice a fist-sized glass bubble with a valve on it.

You can also see a ragged sheet and a narrow sheet here.

>READ RAGGED
"MUSANTE'S INSCRIPTION, or THE PROPHYLACTIC SCALPEL: This token serves to neutralize malevolent auras and other dangerous psychic manifestations. Begin by placing a knife within the arc; the environment should be confused by a strong aroma. Invoke the Ka Sealing. Speak a word of essential nature; remove the contaminating aroma; conclude with the Binding of Antipathy. To use the inscription, wave the blade within a field of cleansing vibration."

You memorize the instructions, and also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

>READ NARROW
You pick up the sheet. It details a formula: a Major Animus�similar to the Minor Animus, but capable of directly manipulating physical objects rather than merely guiding their movements.

You memorize the information, including the Major Animus. You also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

>GET ALL
Aithery File clay mold: You pick up the Aithery File clay mold.
scratched bubble: Taken.

Some new toys, a new formula, and a new ritual that is our ticket out of here.

quote:

>PUT SCALPEL IN BOUND
You put the clean scalpel into the workbench bound.

>OPEN EUCALYPTUS
You pop open the impet, and the eucalyptus aroma rolls out, soapy and bitter.

The new aroma clashes unpleasantly with the citronelle.

Whoops, I didn't clean up after the aura impermeability ritual.

quote:

>CLOSE CITRONELLE
You snap the citronelle impet closed. Its aroma fades.

The mix of aromas clarifies, leaving the room smelling of eucalyptus.

>SPEAK KA SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Ka Sealing.

The arc begins to glow palely around the clean scalpel.

>SPEAK WORD OF ESSENTIAL NATURE
You intone the word of essential nature. The metallic nature of the scalpel rises to the surface.

>CLOSE EUCALYPTUS
You snap the eucalyptus impet closed. Its aroma fades.

>SPEAK BINDING OF ANTIPATHY
You begin invoking the Binding of Antipathy, forcing out the bitter phrases.

After several long minutes of chanting, the pale light flares and goes out. The scalpel now carries a symbol of prophylaxis.

>GET SCALPEL
You pick up the clean scalpel, careful of its inscribed prophylaxis symbol.

All right. Let's head out. But before we do, let's make use of this glass bubble.

quote:

>PUT BUBBLE ON TANK
You press the bubble onto the needle valve. The valve emits a sharp, rising hiss; you can just see the jet of elemental air, like a heat-ripple inside the scratched bubble. After a few seconds, the valve shuts off, and you remove the fully-charged bubble. The pressure within gives it a heavy appearance, like clear oil.

That's three of the four classical elements. Only fire remains. Of course, to get out of here, we still need to use the scalpel. The ritual said to wave it "within a field of cleansing vibration."

quote:

>EXAMINE GONG
The gong is a bronze disk, no larger than a dinner plate, but thick as your thumb. It is suspended in a frame on the wall. You're told that its sound helps drive away the evil miasmas that cause infection; at least, any time you've been in here, an attendant has struck the gong regularly.

>RING GONG
You strike the gong with your knuckles. A deep reverberation fills the room. You're not sure if it's making you healthier, but it's certainly pleasant. However, the sense of malice around the door doesn't shift at all.

Sounds like a cleansing vibration to me.

quote:

>WAVE SCALPEL
You wave the scalpel.

The air ripples�the gong's resonance beats like sea-waves in your ears as the motion of the scalpel roils around you. The cloud of malice shivers, shrinks, and fades, leaving only a trace of impotent hatred in the air.

The gong continues to resonate.

>NORTH
The door feels quite ordinary now. You walk through without any fuss.

Behind you, the sound of the gong fades, and the aura-cloud comes rushing back in all its hunger. You quickly step away from the doorway.

The elemental air would let us clear the gunk out, too, just like it did in the aeroclave.

There was a cabinet locked with the sigil of the Aithery File. We've got the mold for that, now; we can melt the Venture seal into an Aithery one with the same procedure we used the first time.

quote:

>MAKE FIRE RESISTANCE
>GO TO PYRICS
>DRINK FIRE RESISTANCE
>PUT AITHERY MOLD IN KILN
>PUT LEAD ON AITHERY MOLD
>GET MOLD
(the Aithery File clay mold)
You lift the Aithery File clay mold, and blow on the lead until it cools a bit. Then you dump the seal out into your palm. It's a pretty good impression of the Aithery File badge.

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT AITHERY SEAL
The lead Aithery File seal displays an anchored nature, overlaid with the symbolism of the Aithery File: guidance through the Higher Spheres.

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT MEDICAL
Through the oculus, you perceive the symbolism of the Medical File: the care of the crew.

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT ALCHEMY FILE
Through the oculus, you perceive the symbolism of the Alchemy File: the subtleties of ritual.

But before we leave the Pyrics Lab, let's solve the mystery of gold ignition and elemental fire. We tried to light the blackwood before in various fires, to no avail. However, the other wood samples could be lit, and they burned with flames of different colors�and thus, of different temperatures. We select the winter-oak splinter, for it burned with the brightest and hottest of the flames. This lets us perform the gold ignition procedure with only two additional steps:

quote:

>PUT GOLD IN CROCK
You put the phlogisticated gold rod into the vapor crock.

>PUT CAMPHROST IN CROCK
You put the lump of camphrost into the vapor crock.

The lump of camphrost is shrinking visibly. The vapor drifts from the open crock.

>LIGHT WINTER-OAK
(in the gas burners)
(first taking the splinter of winter-oak)

You hold the splinter of winter-oak to the gas burners. The winter-oak catches quickly, and burns with a yellow-white flame.

>LIGHT BLACKWOOD WITH WINTER-OAK
You hold the burning splinter of winter-oak to the splinter of blackwood. The blackwood catches quickly, and burns with a star-blue flame.

>PUT BLACKWOOD IN CROCK
You put the burning splinter of blackwood into the vapor crock.

>CLOSE CROCK
You close the crock and seal its lid.

The camphrost is nearly gone. The vapor accumulates in the crock.

>Z
Time passes.

>Z
Time passes.

The blackwood flares up. Then, with a violent hiss and an electric-blue flash, the camphrost vapor ignites.

The light swirls around the phlogisticated gold, like innumerable fireflies drawn to something greater. You hear a distinct basso pop as the metal bursts into flame�the lambent gold aura of elemental fire.

In the brief flare, the splinter of blackwood is extinguished; the lump of camphrost vaporizes.

>OPEN CROCK
You unseal and open the lid. A remnant scorched aroma drifts out.

>GET GOLD
Taken.

The burning splinter of winter-oak is noticeably smaller.

>BLOW OUT OAK
You blow on the splinter of winter-oak until the flame goes out.

And with that, we now have pure samples of elemental wood, earth, water, air, and fire. We have also covered the entire map of the Marcher, getting at least adjacent to all rooms we can't enter. Our knowledge of the Retort now matches the ensign's:

Click here for the full 1000x960 image

Next time: There are four locked cabinets that we could not open but now can. We have a great deal of experimentation and practice to do with the rituals and materials we have now found. And finally, there are four places we haven't yet managed to go, and we will visit one of them next update.

:siren:

Vote for one of the options below in comments. :siren:

The Birdhouse, protected by an aura-checker and said to be the lair of one of the Retort's dragons.
The Barosy, protected by a fancy mechanical brass lock, which the thread speculates is the lair of the dragon Baros, who in turn controls the Retort's gravity.
The Paper Maze, the protection of the lair of the dragon Pneuma. The dragon Pneuma's responsibilities are unknown to us at this time but the name allows some shrewd guesses.
The Bridge, which, as its command center, could provide a clue as to the nature of the crisis the Retort faces. Not protected by anything per se, but the ladder is busted.

ManxomeBromide fucked around with this message at 05:10 on Jul 16, 2018

# ? Jun 16, 2018 08:00

Adbot: ADBOT LOVES YOU

# ? May 5, 2024 07:54

RabidWeasel: Aug 4, 2007; Cultures thrive on their myths and legends...and snuggles!

Visit the birdhouse

# ? Jun 16, 2018 10:04

Loxbourne: Apr 6, 2011; Tomorrow, doom!
But now, tea.

Let's get to the bridge and find out what's going on. I am pleased to see Plotkin correctly remembered why a ship's bridge is called the bridge, although for different reasons in this setting. And I love, love, love the astrological computer. Those things are quite real and usually hooked up to e.g. clock towers (there's a famous one in Prague), processions of automata and the like.

Some passing thoughts - burning is a chemical reaction. Will the word of entension slow it, and likewise for the word that speeds reactions up?

Also, can the word of entension be used to preserve lumps of camphrost? (oooh, autocomplete fought me on that one)

# ? Jun 16, 2018 10:24

Telum: Apr 17, 2013; I am protector of the innocent! I am the light in the darkness! I am truth! Ally to good! Nightmare to you!

"Pnuema" is the Greek word for "breath," so that dragon probably helps provide breathable air on the marcher. But it's also commonly related to "spirit," and ancient Greeks attributed to it the maintaining of consciousness. A bit of a stretch, perhaps, but maybe it could help provide some insight on what we are? Paper maze.

Can we try to use the dispersal brush on the black writing we've seen around? Does looking at the fractures through either lens show anything? I had some more thoughts, but have forgotten them by now; I need to start taking notes :v:

# ? Jun 16, 2018 15:04

NHO: Jun 25, 2013

Paper Maze because I find this dragon more interesting than one in Birdhouse.

# ? Jun 16, 2018 15:34

rchandra: Apr 30, 2013

Barosy - it will be good to see what Newton managed with working alchemy.

Really enjoying this LP - will probably pick up the game next sale. The world being large and full of strange words, I'm not _too_ worried about the spoilers so far.

# ? Jun 16, 2018 16:06

Digamma-F-Wau: Mar 22, 2016; It is curious and wants to accept all kinds of challenges

eucalyptus oil, eh?

# ? Jun 16, 2018 16:34

TooMuchAbstraction: Oct 14, 2012; I spent four years making
Waves of Steel
Hell yes I'm going to turn my avatar into an ad for it.; Fun Shoe

Bridge, in the hopes of learning more about what the hell's going on here and maybe lending some purpose to our other puzzle-solving beyond "because it's there".

# ? Jun 16, 2018 17:02

malkav11: Aug 7, 2009

That puzzle about making elemental fire was probably the trickiest one in the game for me. So many of the game's obstacles are surmounted by either straight up finding resources that get you past them, learning alchemical ways of dealing with them, or at the furthest extreme, understanding the way alchemy works well enough to tweak things you've learned in ways that accomplish your goals without having explicitly been told how to do it, that one that's just about the simple physical properties of the materials threw me for a complete loop.

# ? Jun 16, 2018 17:03

macdjord: Oct 26, 2013

Let's go to the Birdhouse, since it's the only known Dragon that we don't have a clue to the purpose of.

# ? Jun 16, 2018 17:45

petcarcharodon: Jun 25, 2013

Having just bought and played through this game due to this LP, it's interesting seeing that cabinet has an alternate solution (you also could have used the elemental air to clean it). Also voting Barosy.

# ? Jun 16, 2018 18:48

oystertoadfish: Jun 17, 2003

ill vote for Bridge since it seems like it might be nice to learn whatever there is to learn up there before we go to visit the dragons

edit to be nice: i love this forum for games like this, i don't think i'd have the patience to solve the puzzles but there seems to be some really intelligent poo poo going on both in the fluff and the gameplay, and i'm glad you're letting me see it :unsmith:

oystertoadfish fucked around with this message at 19:59 on Jun 16, 2018

# ? Jun 16, 2018 19:39

Ratoslov: Feb 15, 2012; Now prepare yourselves! You're the guests of honor at the Greatest Kung Fu Cannibal BBQ Ever!

Let's make sure the air stays air. Birdhouse.

Also, elemental air sounds terrifying.

# ? Jun 16, 2018 19:49

TooMuchAbstraction: Oct 14, 2012; I spent four years making
Waves of Steel
Hell yes I'm going to turn my avatar into an ad for it.; Fun Shoe

Ratoslov posted:

Let's make sure the air stays air. Birdhouse.

Also, elemental air sounds terrifying.

Both air and water sound like they're basically universal solvents.

I wonder what terrifying things can be done with elemental earth? Maybe we should try eating some. :v:

# ? Jun 16, 2018 20:09

petcarcharodon: Jun 25, 2013

There is a good amount of unique responses for trying to consume the ingredients you pick up. My favorite was trying to eat bamuriatic acid :v:

# ? Jun 16, 2018 20:34

macdjord: Oct 26, 2013

petcarcharodon posted:

There is a good amount of unique responses for trying to consume the ingredients you pick up. My favorite was trying to eat bamuriatic acid .

> EAT EVERYTHING

# ? Jun 17, 2018 07:19

ManxomeBromide: Jan 29, 2009; old school

I will be closing voting in approximately 24 hours.

Right now it is a Tie between the Bridge and the Birdhouse at 3 votes each, with the Barosy and the Paper Maze tied for second at 2 votes each.

# ? Jun 18, 2018 02:14

Nakar: Sep 2, 2002; Ultima Ratio Regum

I'll throw in a bridge vote to break that tie then.

# ? Jun 18, 2018 02:25

Sydin: Oct 29, 2011; Another spring commute

And I'll re-establish the tie with a Birdhouse vote. :v:

# ? Jun 18, 2018 04:54

Added Space: Jul 13, 2012; Free Markets
Free People

Curse you Hayard-Gunnes!

Birdhouse, let's meet some dargons.

# ? Jun 18, 2018 05:27

Arbitrary Number: Nov 10, 2012

I vote for the birdhouse.

Will the feather eraser thingamajig work on the seal in the captain's room?

# ? Jun 18, 2018 09:19

The_White_Crane: May 10, 2008

quote:

"TO CREATE MISUBA'S LODESTONE (to locate the center of a labyrinth): Prepare an environment of earthy influences. Place a silk thread within the bound, and a labyrinth symbol upon the gestalt shelf. Begin with the Mithraic Sealing. Pour a sample of viridigris over the silk, and then lay a shard of elemental earth onto it. Strike a chime in the mode of recension. Now lay elemental fire upon the labyrinth symbol (not into the bound!) Finally, the Minor Animus will bind the lodestone to potential motion."

Make one of these and use it to navigate the Paper Maze.

# ? Jun 18, 2018 10:41

ManxomeBromide: Jan 29, 2009; old school

Voting is closed. The final totals:

Birdhouse with 6
Bridge with 4
Paper Maze with 3
Barosy with 2

The Birdhouse wins, and we'll be off to a dragon's lair next update.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 03:18

TooMuchAbstraction: Oct 14, 2012; I spent four years making
Waves of Steel
Hell yes I'm going to turn my avatar into an ad for it.; Fun Shoe

Technically we were off to a dragon's lair either way. The Bridge is described as being the Aithery, a dragon nest. The dragon's name isn't specified, but presumably it has something to do with the luminiferous aether.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 03:28

ManxomeBromide: Jan 29, 2009; old school

Part 9: Lab Work and Aithery Work

Last time, we worked past our first set of barriers, and collected a complete set of elemental substances and many new rituals. We've still got plenty of rituals to try out, but first, our explorations turned up some new keys to old locks.

First, the cabinet in the Deck Suite, where the top officers live and work. It was locked with the Aithery Seal, and we have created a fresh badge for that seal.

quote:

>UNLOCK CABINET WITH AITHERY SEAL
You touch the lead Aithery File seal to the cabinet, and the lock snaps calmly open.

>OPEN CABINET
You open the cabinet, revealing a folded sheet and a ripped sheet.

>READ FOLDED
The paper has a description of two vowel-heavy formulae, the Mediate Anima and the Relative Anima. Both are concerned with relations between moving objects.

You memorize the information, including the two formulae. You also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

>READ RIPPED
"TROUTMAN'S INSCRIPTION, to INCREASE THE WEIGHT OF LEAD: (This unusual ritual derives from the Subcontinent, but we translate it into European terms.) Create an anchored (Saturnine) environment. Place any common bit of stone into the bound, and invoke a simple sealing. Add a resinous note to the atmosphere; speak a word of essential nature; add a measure of Gaian precipitate. Conclude with the Binding of the Celestial Sphere, to align the alchemical axis (Earth-Saturn, low-high) with the mundane axis of gravitation."

You memorize the instructions, and also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

Curious. We also can't perform that ritual yet, because we do not know how to produce "Gaian precipitate."

Our next stop is the Junior Quarters, where a locker was tied shut with white-fuse. This cord burns away quickly when exposed to elemental fire, but there's an alternate solution if you happened to get the elemental air.

For you see, if you got the elemental air, you by necessity also got an item that would serve to open the locker...

quote:

>CUT CORD
You hack at the white-fuse with the scalpel. It's a messy job, but after a few moments, the cord falls to bits. You try to ignore the feeling that you've cheated on a test.

We can do what the Sergeant wanted, so let's.

quote:

>UNDO
Junior Quarters
[Previous turn undone.]

>BURN CORD WITH ELEMENTAL FIRE
You hold the flaming phlogisticated gold rod under the white-fuse. The cord ignites with a flash and a pop! It burns away almost instantly, leaving only the smell of burnt metal in the air.

>OPEN LOCKER
You open the large locker, revealing a lesson sheet.

>READ LESSON
This looks like an assignment for junior-level alchemists. "TO RENDER GLASS PERMEABLE TO MATTER: Select a chime in the key of F sharp. Invoke a Helian environment (the aspect of the Sun). Place the chime into the bound; speak a simple sealing. Sprinkle pure sand onto the chime; vocalize a resonant tone; strike the chime, and conclude with a Relative Anima. Once the chime is invested, one need merely strike it again and embed it into a pane of glass. The chime's vibrations will permit it entry, and the entire pane will then be semi-fluid for as long as the chime resonates. But only attempt this with simple, flat sheets of glass�curved glass has irregular vibrational modes, and the tuning will fail."

You memorize the instructions, and also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

That sounds cheerfully abusable. Alas, at the moment we lack a chime in the key of F sharp, though we did see a bronze chime in the Chasm Rubble out beyond where we were willing to reach. If that's F#, that's our ticket to easy and safe defenestration.

Our last cabinet to check is another one tied shut with whitefuse in the Exoscaphe. There's nobody to frown at us here for solving the problem in the Alexandrian mode.

quote:

Exoscaphe
The exoscaphe is a vehicle for exploring hostile lands. From the inside, it's more like being in a spherical steel tank. A windowless tank, at that. Presumably there's a better view from the pilot's dome; but the hatch above your head is closed.

A circular bench runs around the perimeter, broken only by the dark engine compartment to the west and the exit portal to the east. The portal is open. You see a small emergency lever next to it.

A cabinet is fastened to the wall. Its latch is tied shut with a knot of white cord, much like the one you saw on the locker.

>CUT CORD
You hack at the white-fuse with the scalpel. It's a messy job, but after a few moments, the cord falls to bits.

>OPEN CABINET
You open the cabinet, revealing a creased sheet and a plain sheet.

>READ CREASED
"A TALISMAN TO ATTRACT METALS: A common lodestone will attract iron, but to exert influence on other metals requires alchemical preparation. Begin with a Saturnine environment, and a bound containing a chime tuned to the desired metal. (Metal chimes are preferred, as glass may be insufficient to the strain.) Use a simple sealing. Surround the chime with zafranum, and immediately ignite this. Vocalize a resonant tone to prime the metal, and then strike it (without removing it from the bound!) Use the Mediate Anima to set the vibration. Once the ritual is complete, striking the chime will attract all nearby objects of the given substance."

You memorize the instructions, and also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

>READ PLAIN
"WINFIELD'S CLOCK TINCTURE (to repair or realign clockwork): This ritual requires an environment of precision and order. Place a measure of alum into the bound, and perform the Sealing of Shamash. Add perfect mud; speak a syllable of counterbalance; add sublime spirit, then a token of brass. Conclude with the Major Animus. The resulting potion embodies perfection in brass, and will induce perfection in any brass mechanism it touches."

You memorize the instructions, including the Sealing of Shamash. You also add the sheet to your bundle of paper.

Those both look interesting, and that talisman just might be our key to checking out that chime we couldn't reach. Before we play with that, though, let's do the things we definitely can do.

Let's start with sublime spirit. This one required nickel, but the ritual also suggested we maximize surface area. "Small flakes of nickel are best", and we've done that before by failing to alloy nickel wire with something else. Unfortunately, those flakes aren't collectable afterwards. Maybe nickel wire alone will have an acceptably large surface area. The other things we need are mineral oil and elemental fire, both of which we have immediately to hand.

quote:

>CREATE NICKEL WIRE
You make your way to the Mechanica Lab.
You take the nickel rod from the counter.
You draw the nickel rod out into wire.

(You are now in the Mechanica Lab.)

>FIND MINERAL OIL
The flask of mineral oil is in the Chymic Lab, as you recall. You head that way.
You make your way to the Chymic Lab.

Chymic Lab
This wide room is dominated by a huge glass retort. You've practiced many chymical rituals in this apparatus. Hanging above the retort is an instructional sign.

The lab door to the east is closed. The only other exit is the hatch in the floor, which is open.

A supply rack holds three chymic flasks (sand, vinegar, and mineral oil), neatly lined up.

Two papers, a folded sheet and a wrinkled sheet, are lying here.

You can also see a dried mushroom here.

>PUT MINERAL OIL IN RETORT
You pour a measure of mineral oil into the retort.

>PUT NICKEL WIRE IN RETORT
You feed the length of nickel wire into the retort, where it lies in a coil.

>SPEAK HERMETIC SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Hermetic Sealing.

The retort's equator begins to glow pearl-grey around the length of nickel wire and the reservoir of mineral oil.

>SPEAK WORD OF ENTENSION
You declaim the word of entension. The world seems to hold its breath.

>PUT ELEMENTAL FIRE IN RETORT
You drop the flaming phlogisticated gold rod into the retort. The bound's pearly light ripples.

The nickel glows red where the elemental flame touches it�then orange, then yellow. You wince, expecting the oil to ignite at any moment; but it does not. Instead, the nickel slowly liquifies into a shining metal pool. The oil shimmers and ripples above it.

Pale vapors rise within the retort�the volatile fractions of the oil. They condense on the inner surface of the glass. Minute droplets gather and flow downwards. When they reach the release valve, you tap the sublime spirit into a fresh vial.

When you have extracted all the fractions you need, you pull the dump lever. The greasy remains of the oil and nickel are washed away. The gold rod�dephlogisticated and cool now�falls into your hand.

Up next, perfect mud, consuming two more pure elemental substances.

quote:

>PUT SAND IN RETORT
You pour a measure of sand into the retort.

>SPEAK HERMETIC SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Hermetic Sealing.

The retort's equator begins to glow pearl-grey around the reservoir of sand.

>SPEAK CRYSTALLINE TEMPERING
You recite the Crystalline Tempering. The sand shifts subtly within the reservoir, grains aligning on inner axes.

>PUT SHARD IN RETORT
You drop the shard of elemental earth into the retort. The bound's pearly light ripples.

The shard seems to fall apart the moment it touches the surface of the sand. A shower of crystalline dust spreads across the sand, giving it a glassy translucency.

Looks like we're going to be on report until the Sun turns green. :sun:

quote:

>SPEAK WORD OF ENTENSION
You declaim the word of entension. The world seems to hold its breath.

>PUT ELEMENTAL WATER IN RETORT
You crack open the capsule, and pour the elemental water into the retort. The sparkling drops sink into the sand, and a slow upwelling current begins, like a tiny pool of quicksand within the retort.

>SPEAK WORD OF EMULGENCE
You intone the word of emulgence; it feels creamy on your tongue.

Circulating within the retort, the sand begins to dissolve. Its color darkens to a beige, then to tan, as the grains roll themselves finer and finer. After several more moments, the water and sand have resolved themselves to a silky brown sediment.

The upwelling current ceases, and the bound goes dark. You extract the perfect mud into a fresh vial.

These rituals are not to be done casually�they consume pure elemental substances and we have no way to get them back without resetting. But both of them are ingredients in the clock tincture, so let's put them to use while we have them:

quote:

>PUT KEY ON SHELF
You put the thick key on the gestalt shelf.

This ritual requires an environment of "precision and order." The key has an "orderly" nature, so it should work fine for this. This ritual is interesting only in that it has this new "orderly environment" requirement. The rest is completely straightforward:

quote:

>PUT ALUM IN BOUND
You locate a beaker in the clutter, pour a measure of alum into it, and place it within the pedestal bound.

>SPEAK SEALING OF SHAMASH
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Sealing of Shamash.

The arc begins to glow smoke-grey around the beaker of alum.

>PUT PERFECT MUD IN BOUND
You empty the vial of perfect mud into the beaker. The alum absorbs the moisture, and the substances merge into a pale, glittering paste.

>SPEAK SYLLABLE OF COUNTERBALANCE
You speak the syllable of counterbalance. The paste roils gently in the beaker.

>PUT SUBLIME SPIRIT IN BEAKER
You dribble the sublime spirit into the beaker. The paste softens, shimmering, and liquifies into a translucent silvery solution.

>PUT BRASS PIN IN BEAKER
You drop the brass pin into the beaker. Plop! It lies at the bottom for a moment... and then in the next moment dissolves, all at once, lending the solution a brassy tinge.

>SPEAK MAJOR ANIMUS
You voice the Major Animus, trying not to choke. As the clicks and pops roll on, the solution slowly darkens to a rich, brassy opacity. When you reach the final sound, the bound flashes bright silver, and the solution precipitates all at once�glittery particles of brass, suspended in a dark tincture.

The bound fades. You lift the beaker, tilt it appreciately, and decant the tincture into a fresh bottle.

Cleverly done, kid.

But our mental model of the Sergeant approves anyway. Maybe this is the first time we've correctly pronounced a formula based on click consonants.

Now it's time to work through our inventory of uncompleted rituals. This is now a little bit trickier, because we now need to start integrating ritual requirements with the facts we've learned about broader alchemical theory. First let's try the metal attractor synthesis. We'll need a chime that's tuned to the metal that we want to attract.

quote:

>RECALL MUSICAL THEORY
"Music is the most complex of ritual elements; one might well call it 'obfuscated.' We begin with the nursery-school lessons: the pitch A is associated with iron, the color red, the liver; B with bronze, orange, the stomach; C with brass... yes, you can all chant along. But this is simplified to uselessness. What of non-classical metals? We now associate C-sharp with rutilum, F-sharp with aluminum, G-sharp with nickel. Researchers have invented entirely new scales to deal with the spectrum of aither-metals. Then the Eastern Empire uses the well-tempered scale; thus while F-sharp is the mode of extension, G-flat is the mode of ostension, G-natural is intension, G-sharp is paratension, and H�yes, there's an H�is the mode of recension..."

The inaccessible chime in the Chasm was bronze, so we need a B Chime. We found one of those in the flooded crawlspace on the way to the Observatory. (Also, it appears I was wrong before when I mentioned that the Empire used the german key names; the keys of H and B natural appear to not be the same thing at all.) We'll also need zafranum and an anchored/Saturnine environment, both of which are trivial to pick up.

quote:

>PUT HORN COIN ON SHELF
You put the horn coin on the gestalt shelf.

>PUT B CHIME IN BOUND
You put the bronze B chime into the pedestal bound.

>SPEAK SIMPLE SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the simple sealing word.

The arc begins to glow slate-blue around the bronze B chime.

>PUT ZAFRANUM IN BOUND
The slate-blue light ripples as you push through the arc. You strew the zafranum threads around the chime.

>LIGHT ZAFRANUM
You lack any handy way to set things on fire.

... I beg your pardon?

quote:

>LIGHT ZAFRANUM WITH LIGHTER
The torch-lighter is not a source of fire.

>X TORCH LIGHTER
It's a ceramic oval the length of your little finger. It doesn't seem to work now, though.

... we've used all the butane. I didn't know that was possible in this game. Well, no matter, we can improvise.

quote:

>GO TO PYRICS
The ritual energy disperses when you turn your attention from it. The pedestal bound goes dark behind you.
You make your way to the Pyrics Lab.

>GET CEDAR. LIGHT IT. GO TO NAVE. GET ZAFRANUM.
You take another splinter of cedar from the jar.

(in the gas burners)
You hold the splinter of cedar to the gas burners. The cedar catches quickly, and burns with a dull orange flame.

You make your way to the Nave.

Take two, and let's be quick about it before the cedar burns down.

quote:

>SPEAK SIMPLE SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the simple sealing word.

The arc begins to glow slate-blue around the bronze B chime.

>PUT ZAFRANUM IN BOUND
The slate-blue light ripples as you push through the arc. You strew the zafranum threads around the chime.

>LIGHT ZAFRANUM WITH CEDAR
The zafranum threads flare up and vanish. A puff of pungent yellow smoke rises, and then swirls around the bronze chime.

>SPEAK RESONANT TONE
You hum the resonant tone. The bronze B chime vibrates sharply in response.

>STRIKE BRONZE CHIME
The bronze B chime rings brightly, as if it were not lying in the bound, but suspended above it. The sound swells to a thrilling intensity, then fades.

>SPEAK MEDIATE ANIMA
You raise your voice in the Mediate Anima. The bronze B chime resonates again, this time with a deep vibration that buzzes against the bound's surface.

The slate-blue light flares and fades, and you see a symbol gleaming on the surface of the bronze B chime.

>BLOW OUT CEDAR
You blow on the splinter of cedar until the flame goes out.

>GET CHIME
You pick up the bronze B chime, careful of its inscribed attraction symbol.

Okay. Now let's go try it out.

quote:

Chasm Rubble
Rubble and fallen rocks litter the ledge here. You can walk north or south alongside the abyss, which waits patiently to the west. But you have an unnerving sense of vertigo. The world seems to sway around you.

A particularly massive slab lies at the chasm edge. Half its length rests on solid(-ish) ground; but the far half hangs out over empty space, quite unsupported.

You see a bronze chime lying on the far end of the slab. It looks very far away; the idea of crawling out there makes you feel even more unsteady than before.

>STRIKE BRONZE CHIME
(the bronze B chime)
The bronze B chime emits a sharp, eager thrum.

The bronze F-sharp chime vibrates in response. It rolls across the slab and leaps into your hand.

F#!

That's what we wanted for the glass permeability ritual. It doesn't require anything beyond the F# chime, a solar environment, and sand. That's really easy to get.

quote:

>PUT BRASS COIN ON SHELF
You put the brass coin on the gestalt shelf.

>PUT F-SHARP CHIME IN BOUND
You put the bronze F-sharp chime into the pedestal bound.

>SPEAK SIMPLE SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the simple sealing word.

The arc begins to glow yellow around the bronze F-sharp chime.

>PUT SAND ON CHIME
(the bronze B chime)
You don't want to go applying random chymic substances outside the bounds of a ritual.

Et tu, parser?

quote:

>PUT SAND ON F-SHARP CHIME
You carefully sprinkle sand over the bronze F-sharp chime. Each grain falls with its own tiny note.

>SPEAK RESONANT TONE
You hum the resonant tone. The bronze F-sharp chime vibrates sharply in response.

>STRIKE CHIME
(the bronze B chime)
The bronze B chime rings brightly. The bronze F-sharp chime resonates sourly in response, out of tune.

quote:

>UNDO
Nave
[Previous turn undone.]

>STRIKE F-SHARP CHIME
The bronze F-sharp chime rings brightly, as if it were not lying in the bound, but suspended above it. The sound swells to a thrilling intensity, then fades.

>SPEAK RELATIVE ANIMA
You raise your voice in the Relative Anima. The bronze F-sharp chime resonates again, this time with a deep vibration that buzzes against the bound's surface.

The yellow light flares and fades, and you see a symbol gleaming on the surface of the bronze F-sharp chime.

>GET F-SHARP
You pick up the bronze F-sharp chime, careful of its inscribed permeability symbol.

Great. Everything else we can do right now requires orichalcum or a product made from it, and we used that up in the aura impermeability inscription. We'll have to reset, but before we do, let's try out what else we've made.

The clock tincture will "repair or realign" and "induce perfection in brass". What's brass and in need of perfect configuration?

quote:

>GO TO OBSERVATORY
You make your way to the Observatory.

Observatory
This is the observatory, the Retort's guiding eye. The dome overhead is set with windows, and each window shows a different sky and a different array of stars.

One level above you, an ironwork bridge crosses the dome, north to south. A ladder descends at either end, but only one of the two is lowered, and that one is obstructed by a fracture that cuts off the north side of the dome. The south-side ladder is folded up under the bridge; its counterweight hangs near the floor.

The door to the east is open. Open alcoves to the north and south house additional equipment, but again, the north side is fracture-blocked. You also see the flooded crawlway hatch at your feet.

In the center of the chamber, beneath the bridge, stands the compass pedestal.

>SOUTH

Observatory Alcove, South
This alcove houses the magnificent Horological Calculator�a complex machine whose controls include an armillary sphere, a dial, and a slot. There's a blank tin slip in the slot.

>PUT CLOCK TINCTURE IN HOROLOGICAL CALCULATOR
You slowly pour the tincture into the guts of the Calculator. Just as slowly, the spheres begin to turn, until they are all aligned: zeta, rho, pi, omicron, iota, pi, beta, mu.

An escapement whirrs. The patterns on the spheres seem to match the stars arrayed around you, as far as you can tell. The blank tin slip is drawn into the Calculator.

After a brief cantata of rattles and clunking noises, the slip is ejected back into your hands, now imprinted with complex symbols. It is now an ephemeris billet, summarizing the heavenly coordinates you have set up.

Now that we've done this, we can now >CREATE EPHEMERIS BILLET without burning three pure elemental substances. That's a good day's work.

Now, where can we find a window to try to walk through, and why would we want to?

quote:

North Arcade
This is the north end of the gallery. A long window in the west wall overlooks the exoscaphe bay. You can see the 'scaphe itself on the other side, hooked up to the portal you saw back south.

To the north is a massive door of pale marble, outrageously carved. The door is closed.

Perhaps the door has suffered some damage. A chip of white marble is lying loose on the floor nearby.

>X WINDOW
The thick glass is a bit wavy, but you can see the exoscaphe bay on the other side. It's a high brick hall, the mirror of this one, but with vast steel doors on the far side.

Most of the bay is taken up by the exoscaphe itself, a lumpy metal tortoise on track-tread wheels. The 'scaphe is backed up to its entry portal, which connects to this hall, southward.

The bay roof appears to have been damaged.

There seems to be a bit of paper lying at the far end of the bay.

Oooh, a bit of paper. That's worth snagging before we reset.

quote:

>RING F-SHARP
You tap the bronze F-sharp chime. Its bright resonances fill the room�and then shift to a steady, sustained hum.

>PUT F-SHARP IN WINDOW
You press the chime against the window. The glass vibrates, and the bronze sinks slowly into it�not like metal into tar, but like a knife sliding between infinitesimal layers of glass.

When you draw your hand away, the chime remains suspended in the glass. Its vibration continues at a steady pitch.

>WEST
You press your fingers against the glass. You feel a steady vibration... and a yielding, as the glass slides through your flesh. It's rather unnerving.

More unnerving, however, is the suction you feel on the other side. The bay must be in hard vacuum�depressurized through its damaged roof. Walking through in this state would be deadly.

If we're under the influence of a breath-holding potion at this point, we get some additional text averring how unwise this is:

quote:

More unnerving, however, is the suction you feel on the other side. The bay must be in hard vacuum�depressurized through its damaged roof. Walking through in this state would be deadly. (And you can't hold your breath in a vacuum.)

Drill! What happens if you try to hold your breath when the air blows out the door?

My lungs blow out of my ears, Sarge.

Don't you forget it!

While we're here, though, we might as well check out just how scandalous this door is.

quote:

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT MARBLE DOOR
The marble door has a bit of a Bacchanalian tint when viewed through the oculus. Nothing explicit, mind you.

>LOOK THROUGH LENS AT MARBLE DOOR
You peer at the marble door through the lens, and perceive an association with the Earth.

I guess these don't have the wholesome alchemical purposes of the more explicit illustrations in the Nave and Observatory, and thus are filth and smut.

Time to reset. This time we'll make the Lodestone of Centrality.

quote:

*** You awaken again ***

Before we can make that, though, we need to make viridigris. This is a very simple procedure that requires nothing that isn't available in the tutorial area:

quote:

>PUT ORICHALCUM IN RETORT
You put the orichalcum rod into the retort.

>PUT VINEGAR IN RETORT
You pour a measure of vinegar into the retort.

>SPEAK HERMETIC SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Hermetic Sealing.

The retort's equator begins to glow pearl-grey around the orichalcum rod and the reservoir of vinegar.

>TURN ON BURNER
You twist the knob. The gas burner hisses, and then bursts into flame.

The gas flame heats the vinegar.

>Z
Time passes.

The gas flame heats the vinegar.

>Z
Time passes.

The vinegar bubbles over the flame.

>SPEAK PHLOGISTICAL CATALYSIS
You begin murmuring the Phlogistical Catalysis. Immediately, the orichalcum starts to dissolve, tinting the solution a delicate turquoise.

It takes some time to run through all the permutations. By the time you are done, the orichalcum is gone, and the acid solution has been reduced to a thick turquoise layer. A few moments later, it is entirely dry.

You shut off the gas flame, and tap the viridigris powder out into a fresh vial.

The lodestone of centrality has a lot more components than this, though.

quote:

Prepare an environment of earthy influences. Place a silk thread within the bound, and a labyrinth symbol upon the gestalt shelf. Begin with the Mithraic Sealing. Pour a sample of viridigris over the silk, and then lay a shard of elemental earth onto it. Strike a chime in the mode of recension. Now lay elemental fire upon the labyrinth symbol (not into the bound!) Finally, the Minor Animus will bind the lodestone to potential motion.

Earthy influences are easy; we can just put a chip of stone on the shelf. There was a marble one up where we were trying to walk into hard vacuum. The silk cord is in the storerooms, and the labyrinth symbol is the clay tile from the study room. Elemental earth and fire are solved problems. What remains is the chime in the "mode of recension", and if we check the music theory fact we see that this is in the key of H. The H chime was also basically just lying around.

quote:

>PUT SILK IN BOUND
You put the length of silk cord into the pedestal bound.

>PUT MARBLE ON SHELF
You put the chip of marble on the gestalt shelf.

>PUT CLAY TILE ON SHELF
You put the labyrinth tile on the gestalt shelf.

>SPEAK MITHRAIC SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Mithraic Sealing.

The arc begins to glow beige around the length of silk cord.

>PUT VIRIDIGRIS ON SILK
You empty the vial of viridigris onto the length of silk cord. The turquoise powder clings to the silk as if to a magnet.

>PUT EARTH SHARD ON SILK
The beige light ripples as you push through the arc. You lay the elemental earth on one end of the silk cord, where it clings.

>STRIKE H CHIME
The glass H chime rings sweetly, and you let its resonances fill your mind.

The shard of elemental earth brightens, seeming to capture and radiate light.

>PUT GOLD ON CLAY TILE
You put the flaming phlogisticated gold rod on the labyrinth tile.

>SPEAK MINOR ANIMUS
You voice the Minor Animus, trying not to cough. The shard of elemental earth acquires a milky tint. As the formula progresses, it thickens towards opacity; and the elemental flame dims, its phlogiston draining away.

When you reach the final throat-clearing stop, the bound goes dark. The earth shard is now pure white, with fine labyrinthine lines crazing its surface. The silk cord has melded with the stone, forming a pendulum.

Good work, kid.

Thanks, Sarge. The next two rituals�aura imitation with quartz and aura invisibility�require copper percalcinate. We don't have a ritual to make that, but we can put one together from the facts we've collected.

quote:

*** You awaken again ***

Now, what do we know about percalcinate of copper?

quote:

>RECALL COPPER CALCINATION
"Lab demonstration #5: Calcinate of copper. Place muriatic acid and quickcopper (orichalcum) in the retort. Heat to dissolve, and continue heating until the green salt crystallizes. Note: product is unstable! Flush retort directly after demonstration; do not extract calcinate."

>RECALL PERCALCINATION PROCEDURE
"Percalcination: to repeat the calcination procedure. (Typically produces a more stable and potent reagent.) First, calcine a metal. Then seal the retort (Hermetic) and invoke the Crystalline Tempering to clarify the salt's structure. Add more acid to redissolve, and continue heating until a second crystallization occurs."

That seems simple enough.

quote:

>PUT MURIATIC IN RETORT
You pour a measure of muriatic acid into the retort.

>PUT ORICHALCUM IN RETORT
You put the orichalcum rod into the retort.

>TURN ON BURNER
You twist the knob. The gas burner hisses, and then bursts into flame.

The gas flame heats the muriatic acid.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The gas flame heats the muriatic acid.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The muriatic acid bubbles over the flame.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The orichalcum slowly dissolves into the acid, lending it a lovely grass-green tint.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The grass-green acid bubbles over the flame.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The green acid solution is noticeably reducing in volume.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The green acid is now a thick pool in the bottom of the reservoir.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The green acid thickens to a paste, and then rapidly dries, leaving a residue of coarse, dark-green crystals.

We've now calcined the orichalcum, but this is unstable. Time to lock it in place and perform the percalcination procedure.

quote:

>SPEAK HERMETIC SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Hermetic Sealing.

The retort's equator begins to glow pearl-grey around the reservoir of dark-green crystals.

The gas flame heats the dark-green crystals.

>SPEAK CRYSTALLINE TEMPERING
You recite the Crystalline Tempering. The crystals darken further, while also taking on a lucent green clarity.

The gas flame heats the dark-green crystals.

>PUT MURIATIC IN RETORT
You add a quantity of muriatic acid to the retort. The crystals dissolve, forming a brilliant viridian acid.

The gas flame heats the viridian acid.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The viridian acid solution is noticeably reducing in volume.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The viridian acid is now a thick pool in the bottom of the reservoir.

>WAIT
Time passes.

The viridian acid thickens to a paste, and then rapidly dries, leaving a residue of green-gold powder. This must be your percalcinate. You extract it into a fresh vial, and switch off the gas flames.

I think that's the most waiting we've done for any individual product. We have two rituals that need percalcinate, and copper percalcinate was the only hard part:

quote:

"OEHLKE'S INSCRIPTION, to MIMIC THE AURA OF ANOTHER: Invoke an environment of spiritual peace. Begin with a quartz token in the bound; this represents the ka soul. Invoke the Ka Sealing. Sprinkle copper percalcinate over the token, representing the ba soul. Invoke an isomorphic structure. Pour elemental water over the token; this represents the mutability of the soul's name. Close with an elementary word of binding. Touch the token to the donor, then to the recipient. NOTE: Imitating the aura of a superior officer is malfeasance under Naval law."

quote:

ROYCE'S INSCRIPTION, to RENDER ONE'S AURA INVISIBLE: Invoke an environment of spiritual peace. Begin with a quartz token in the bound; this represents the ka soul. Invoke the Ka Sealing. Sprinkle copper percalcinate over the token, representing the ba soul. Invoke an idempotent structure. Pour sublime spirit over the token; this represents the evanescence of the soul's name. Close with an elementary word of binding. This inscription will render the subject's aura indetectable to malign forces, though only briefly.

These are very similar rituals. Each of these requires the orichalcum and one elemental substance (water for mimicry, fire for the sublime spirit for invisibility). Both also need a spiritual environment, which as we've seen is trivially available by turning the rotor to "rainbow". We'll have to reset between them, too, because the percalcinate is used up. Each ritual goes smoothly, though. We start with the aura imitation inscription:

quote:

>PUT ROTOR ON SHELF
You put the rotor card on the gestalt shelf.

>PUT QUARTZ IN BOUND
You put the long quartz prism into the pedestal bound.

>SPEAK KA SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Ka Sealing.

The arc begins to glow indigo around the long quartz prism.

>PUT COPPER PERCALCINATE ON QUARTZ
You empty the vial of copper percalcinate onto the long quartz prism. The green-gold grains adhere to the quartz prism, slowly losing their color, and are absorbed into the crystal.

>INVOKE ISOMORPHIC
You begin reciting the formulae that make up the isomorphic group. After a rigorous chain of axioms and lemmas, the group elements fall into a one-to-one relation.

>PUT ELEMENTAL WATER ON QUARTZ
You crack open the capsule, and pour the elemental water onto the long quartz prism. The drops sparkle on the crystal for a moment, and then evaporate�or are absorbed.

>SPEAK ELEMENTARY WORD OF BINDING
You intone the elementary word of binding; the syllables snap cleanly away. The indigo light flares through the clear crystal.

When the light fades, a symbol shines on the surface of the long quartz prism.

>GET QUARTZ
You pick up the long quartz prism, careful of its inscribed imitation symbol.

This could plausibly get us into the Birdhouse, if we could touch it to a high-ranking Aithery officer. Unfortunately, both Captain Hart and Lt. Powes are behind fractures and we can't touch them to identify their auras.

quote:

*** You awaken again ***

With time reset we can recreate the percalcinate, fetch the rotor and crystal, and create the sublime spirit. I'm getting ready to go to the Nave to perform the actual inscription ritual, but then I realize I've never had to leave the tutorial area this whole time�all the physical ingredients are in safes in the East Wing, the library with the rotor's on this side of the fire door, and everything else we need for for gold ignition is right here in the Pyrics lab. So let's do this one in the Opticks Annex instead.

Also, while we're here, let's rebuild our science toys and look at the fractures themselves, because we forgot to do that along the way:

quote:

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT FRACTURE
Through the oculus, the fracture looks like... a fracture. Pieces of space, of the marcher, that do not connect as they should.

>LOOK THROUGH LENS AT FRACTURE
You peer at the fracture through the lens, and perceive an association with the Higher Spheres.

These both seem relevant to the theory we've been developing that the Retort has suffered some kind of hyperspace-related mishap. But for now, that's just trivia. On to the invisibility inscription:

quote:

>PUT ROTOR ON SHELF
You put the rotor card on the gestalt shelf.

>PUT QUARTZ IN BOUND
You put the long quartz prism into the tabletop bound.

>SPEAK KA SEALING
You take a breath, trace the bound in your mind, and intone the Ka Sealing.

The arc begins to glow indigo around the long quartz prism.

>PUT PERCALCINATE ON QUARTZ
You empty the vial of copper percalcinate onto the long quartz prism. The green-gold grains adhere to the quartz prism, slowly losing their color, and are absorbed into the crystal.

>INVOKE IDEMPOTENT
You begin reciting the formulae that make up the idempotent group. After a rigorous chain of axioms and lemmas, the group elements resolve to a singleton.

>PUT SUBLIME SPIRIT ON QUARTZ
You dribble the vial of sublime spirit onto the long quartz prism. It forms a rainbow sheen, which quickly evaporates.

>SPEAK ELEMENTARY WORD OF BINDING
You intone the elementary word of binding; the syllables snap cleanly away. The indigo light flares through the clear crystal.

When the light fades, a symbol shines on the surface of the long quartz prism.

>GET PRISM
You pick up the long quartz prism, careful of its inscribed invisibility symbol.

Those are all the rituals we can do for now�Electrum phlogistication requires yang oil, the alternate aura imitation inscription requires a jade bead, and the lead weight increase inscription requires Gaian precipitate. We don't know where to find or how to make any of those. We do, however, have one more corner to poke into. Remember the Captain's office? There was a cabinet made of rutilum, sealed shut by an alchemical rune of attraction. We've been able to deal with that for several updates now. The dispersal brush is for destroying alchemical runes, and here's one holding the door shut.

quote:

>CREATE DISPERSAL BRUSH. GO TO HIGH TOWER. BRUSH SYMBOL.
(the cabinet)
(with the dispersal brush)
You brush the quill over the rutilum cabinet. The attraction symbol blurs and fades away.

>OPEN CABINET
You open the cabinet, revealing an ornate sheet.

All right. "Rutilum," incidentally, is almost certainly titanium, since "rutile" is a titanium ore made mainly of titanium dioxide. Also, one of the other titanium ores is called "titanite," which makes sense but also makes me consider the crafting system in Dark Souls in an entirely new light.

The ornate sheet is a bit disquieting.

quote:

>READ ORNATE
This receipt is not Navy printing. It's hand-written; not neatly, perhaps in haste. And it reads like a bad joke.

"THE GREAT MARRIAGE..." (and there you stop for a moment, because half the alchemical rituals of antiquity are bombastically called "the great marriage" and it means nothing more than "I mixed things"�but that's what it says) "...must be performed at the Heart of the House, in an Orderly Environment." (...scribbled with an arrow: "?NAVE!") "...Employ the Marcher's Invocation to seal an empty Bound. Add a Signifier of the Marcher's Location to the Gestalt; waft a Resinous Note. Now add the Four Elements to the Bound, and invoke the Dragon."

Great Marriage? Classical Greek elements thrown into an arc like beans in soup? This isn't modern alchemical science; it's a fairy tale. It doesn't even say what it does.

No, wait, there's something scrawled on the back: "THE HOMUNCULUS." Sure, that clears everything up.

OK, new theory: The Retort crashed because the Captain has gone utterly whackadoodle. Also, full credit for the proper respect given to the alchemists of old there in the aside. :mmmhmm:

We don't have time for mad fairy tales. We have a dragon's lair to infiltrate. We make our way to the Birdhouse door, and then...

quote:

>TOUCH QUARTZ
You press the long quartz prism against your hand. The invisibility symbol discharges with a nerve-grating whine.

You feel a sudden sense of distance, as if you were a very long way behind your own eyes. The world seems colorless and still.

>WEST
(first opening the engraved door)
The handle is solid in your fingers now, although your hand doesn't exactly feel like part of your body.

Birdhouse
The Birdhouse is a circular chamber with no roof. It's not open to the sky; it just goes up forever. The door to the east is open. You also see a cracked flagstone with a gap leading to a crawlspace below.

The name comes from a ring of metal pylons that take up the center of the room. You can see the fanciful resemblance to a birdcage, although they don't imprison anything.

The dragon Syndesis is a mandala of alchemical runes inscribed across the curving wall. But the runes look unexpectedly lifeless.

A fragment of paper lies to one side.

The sense of distance fades away. The reality of the world reasserts itself.

Behold, the dragon Syndesis.

quote:

>EXAMINE SYNDESIS
Circles of grey-glimmering runes hang on the Birdhouse wall. This is Syndesis, one of the marcher's four dragons. Syndesis is responsible for the Retort's travel between worlds and its coherence within itself.

Something is wrong, however. You've never seen a dragon before, but by all accounts, the circles of runes should be rotating, eternally reading themselves. The color is wrong too. Syndesis can't be dead (or you'd be stuck in a doorless room), but it clearly isn't working correctly.

You wrack your brains, trying to recall the Sergeant's lecture on the theory of dragons.

>RECALL DRAGON LECTURE
A marcher is built around four incredibly complex alchemical constructs, called dragons. ("Because they'll bite you on the arse if you're careless," runs the joke, but in fact nobody knows the origin of the name.) Pneuma regulates light and air; Baros regulates stability and gravity; Aistheta manages navigation; Syndesis binds the rooms of the marcher together and to its destinations.

The dragons are the Retort's vital organs. Constructing each one took months of work by a crew of trained rectors. The idea that they've gone wrong is deeply disturbing.

>LOOK THROUGH OCULUS AT SYNDESIS
The oculus reveals Syndesis as a web of occult relations running throughout the Retort. It doesn't look good.

The architecture of the marcher is full of holes. The worst are by the secondary alchemy lab, the chymic lab, the opticks lab, and the deck suite.

>LOOK THROUGH LENS AT SYNDESIS
You peer at Syndesis through the lens, but you don't perceive any planetary association at all. It makes sense, you suppose. The dragon is the marcher, and the marcher can never be associated with any single planet.

This confirms a lot of the theories we'd had about what it is that a marcher is, and in particular it seems that the dragon's malfunction is directly responsible for the doors that open to other worlds. When operating correctly, the Retort would seem to exist simultaneously on many worlds, which would explain both the chasm in the basement and the way the basement crawlspaces wrap around in the East Wing.

There's also a sheet of paper here. It's not immediately useful to us, but perhaps it will make more sense once we get more information about its proper context...

quote:

>READ FRAGMENT
You don't recognize the handwriting. "...to combine an aitheric vibration�the transitory structure�with a spark of animation. This is a well-understood technique to create a self-sustaining aitheric form, e.g. memory daimons. But if the supra-aither or soul-aither exists, suggests Gopinathan, then the same technique may be applied..."

Sounds like metaphysics. That's a bit beyond Ensign Forsyth's remit. For now, let's review the barriers before us.

The Dragon Pneuma lairs in the center of the paper maze. The Lodestone of Centrality is an obvious thing to try here.
The Dragon Baros presumably lairs in the Barosy, protected by a fancy brass tumbler lock. There aren't obvious things to try here, but there are things.
The Dragon Aistheta, by process of elimination, lairs on the Bridge. Access to the bridge is blocked because the ladder's jammed. Its counterweight is made of lead, though, so the lead weight increase inscription is an obvious thing to experiment with. Except...
The Lead Weight Increase Inscription requires Gaian precipitate, which we don't have or know how to make. It might be available in the three places we can't get that are surely holding Neat Things:
The Deep Stacks have a sheet of paper trapped under an outcropping of coral. We could tear a bit of coral off of it but not enough to free the paper.
The Exoscaphe Bay has a sheet of paper out in it, but it (and the exoscaphe's upper dome) are in hard vacuum.
The Storage Nook off the main store has a floor safe whose door is solid lead and which is too heavy to move. Perhaps we can reverse the lead weight inscription? It's got a lot of moving parts, but that's borrowing trouble until we find the Gaian Precipitate.
Electrum phlogistication would get us an extra unit of elemental fire, but it needs yang oil, which we haven't found and don't know how to make. It also requires a catalytic environment, which needs the platinum wire that we needed to make the electrum rod in the first place. We need more platinum or another way to produce a catalytic environment.
The Great Marriage is patent nonsense.

Next Time: Given the size of these updates, we'll probably end up resolving about half of these.

ManxomeBromide fucked around with this message at 07:52 on Jul 8, 2018

# ? Jun 19, 2018 05:36

macdjord: Oct 26, 2013

So... the birdhouse is a room with no top. I mean, sure, we saw a bottomless chasm before - but I had assumed that was only metaphorically 'bottomless'. Which makes me wonder what happens if you...
> JUMP INTO CHASM

I guess the good ensign had the right of it: that's a Marcher for you.

ManxomeBromide posted:

The Dragon Baros presumably lairs in the Barosy, protected by a fancy brass tumbler lock. There aren't obvious things to try here, but there are things.

A brass mechanical device that isn't in the configuration we desire (i.e. 'unlocked'), you say? We have a potion for that!

ManxomeBromide posted:

The Deep Stacks have a sheet of paper trapped under an outcropping of coral. We could tear a bit of coral off of it but not enough to free the paper.

We have a recipe that takes a mushroom and give fungicide. What happens if you stick a bit of coral in there instead?

And I still want to see the interesting custom error messages which petcarcharodon mentioned which happen when you try to...
> EAT VARIOUS ALCHEMICAL INGREDIENTS AND PRODUCTS

# ? Jun 19, 2018 07:16

Ratoslov: Feb 15, 2012; Now prepare yourselves! You're the guests of honor at the Greatest Kung Fu Cannibal BBQ Ever!

Chemically, coral's pretty close to chalk, right? One of the various acids we have should be able to melt the coral. Problem is, it'd dissolve the paper too.

Edit: Wait, I'm an idiot. We've got a perfectly good scalpel here. Just dig it out.

Ratoslov fucked around with this message at 08:06 on Jun 19, 2018

# ? Jun 19, 2018 08:01

Kodos666: Dec 17, 2013

Storage nook
Lead you say? The stuff melting at leally low temperatures? Like way below what elementar fire provides?

# ? Jun 19, 2018 09:09

Fat Samurai: Feb 16, 2011; To go quickly is foolish. To go slowly is prudent. Not to go; that is wisdom.

I appreciated the Gordian Knot joke.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 09:13

Nakar: Sep 2, 2002; Ultima Ratio Regum

You know, I just realized that a lot of this reminds me of the spellmaking system in King's Quest III. You have the identification of ritual needs, collecting of ingredients, precise instructions that must be followed, and so forth. Except Hadean Lands is kind enough to not force you to go through every step every single time, and presumably is kinder about typos. Not so kind about being too vague with which chime you're using, however.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 15:53

TooMuchAbstraction: Oct 14, 2012; I spent four years making
Waves of Steel
Hell yes I'm going to turn my avatar into an ad for it.; Fun Shoe

Just to spell things out: the captain's note describes making a homunculus, and the note in the Birdhouse references making a "memory daimon". These are of course clearly referring to our beloved protagonist: an artificial being infused with the memories of Forsyth. One wonders why it was Forsyth specifically, and not, say, the captain or some other highly skilled individual. Maybe a human (or a corpse?) is an ingredient in the homunculus ritual, or maybe we accidentally picked up on Forsyth's memories because he was part of the environment of the ritual, as an ostensibly-uninvolved observer.

The remaining question then is, why was the homunculus created? It must have been created prior to the accident, as post-accident there's nobody able to take action. Unless they were consumed by the homunculus ritual, but even then it requires at least one ingredient (the shard of elemental earth) that is explicitly the only one of its kind on-board. So either there were more pure elements on-board than we were lead to believe, or we're dealing with some kind of time fuckery here, which suggests to me that the homunculus was created "before" some kind of time jump that restored the rest of the Retort as per a [> RESET] command. Maybe the Retort is attempting to explore time as well as space, and the homunculus is our chrononaut?

# ? Jun 19, 2018 16:15

Fantastic Foreskin: Jan 6, 2013; A golden helix streaked skyward from the Helvault. A thunderous explosion shattered the silver monolith and Avacyn emerged, free from her prison at last.

I'm willing to bet that it was the creation of our buddy here that caused the accident. This is mostly a gut feeling, but consider that our homunculus buddy can remember things through time warps, and doesn't remember anything the ensign doesn't before the events of the game.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 16:41

macdjord: Oct 26, 2013

Also, @ManxomeBromide, you missed one possibility: the paper maze is not the only labyrinth we know of. There's also that maze of twisty passages, all alike, down next to the chasm.

macdjord fucked around with this message at 17:37 on Jun 19, 2018

# ? Jun 19, 2018 17:29

TooMuchAbstraction: Oct 14, 2012; I spent four years making
Waves of Steel
Hell yes I'm going to turn my avatar into an ad for it.; Fun Shoe

Sorry, I don't remember mentioning labyrinths. Context?

Also note that a labyrinth is not the same thing as a maze; labyrinths have only one path and should (in normal circumstances) be straightforward to navigate, while mazes branch and are not necessarily straightforward to navigate. The "always go left" strategy only works if the maze's walls are all connected to each other, otherwise you may find yourself "trapped" in a section whose walls do not connect to the rest of the maze.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 17:34

macdjord: Oct 26, 2013

TooMuchAbstraction posted:

Sorry, I don't remember mentioning labyrinths. Context?

Sorry, wrong name. I was talking about the list at the end of the lasts story post of Thing We Could Do Next, and put your handle in instead of MaxomeBromide's. Edited.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 17:38

Loxbourne: Apr 6, 2011; Tomorrow, doom!
But now, tea.

I suppose the big question right now is whether that ritual (and the other note in "unfamiliar handwriting") are in the Captain's handwriting. Are we talking secret orders, confiscated contraband, or what? Lieutenant Andres appeared to have been frozen in the middle of something "furtive" when we found her.

My current guess is that the Great Marriage has screwed up the Retort mid-rig, possibly because the Ensign got in the way at the wrong moment or a miscalculation in the ritual. Still holding out for finding our own body in a fracture, assuming it didn't animate a corpse (or, to be less dark, perhaps broke the Ensign out of a fracture).

Those scribbles still make me wonder, and the whole thing still has the air of that TNG episode. Given the soul-splicing ritual seems to be beyond current practical alchemy, I'm wondering if we've been projected in from outside to try and fix the Retort.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 18:03

Sydin: Oct 29, 2011; Another spring commute

Yeah alright so we're THE HOMUNCULUS, and since we keep recalling "lectures you never attended" and memorizing formulae at a glance as well as Forsythe's identity, we probably have several memory daimons inside of us, or at least one that contains the memories of multiple (maybe all?) members of the Marcher. I also get the sense the the Marcher is at least in some capacity alive itself, so maybe we've got a bit of it (whatever "it" is) inside of us as well. Also interesting is that the ritual for creating a homunculus says to "invoke the dragon", but there are four dragons on board. Which one was used? If it was Syndesis, maybe that explains why it's malfunctioning.

In any event, I think our priority should be to check on the other three dragons and see if they're messed up as well.

# ? Jun 19, 2018 18:06

Nakar: Sep 2, 2002; Ultima Ratio Regum

We can be quite certain that at least one of them is: Baros regulates the gravity and we know from the messed-up chasm that gravity's on the fritz. More than likely if we managed to get to the bridge we'd see that there was something wrong with that dragon as well. Pneuma... well, I mean, it might not hurt to check there, lest we find ourselves unable to breathe at some point (other than all those potions Forsyth's sucking down for that exact purpose).

# ? Jun 19, 2018 18:31

ManxomeBromide: Jan 29, 2009; old school

Nakar posted:

We can be quite certain that at least one of them is: Baros regulates the gravity and we know from the messed-up chasm that gravity's on the fritz. More than likely if we managed to get to the bridge we'd see that there was something wrong with that dragon as well. Pneuma... well, I mean, it might not hurt to check there, lest we find ourselves unable to breathe at some point (other than all those potions Forsyth's sucking down for that exact purpose).

The Exoscaphe Bay is not actually supposed to be in vacuum. The narratorial voice has remarked on this, but unlike the gravity-fritzing, the dragon Pneuma wasn't namechecked when it was.

# ? Jun 20, 2018 03:35

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# ? May 5, 2024 07:54

ManxomeBromide: Jan 29, 2009; old school

Also—I haven't been ignoring some of the more wild requests here. It's just that reaching the obvious milestones to cut updates at is getting unpleasantly close to the character limit.

As the number of necessary commands each update drops, I'll be putting the more experimental commands in as needed.

Unusual actions that actually serve as alternate solutions to puzzles may be delayed until we encounter the puzzle itself.

# ? Jun 20, 2018 08:44

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > Let's >RECITE THE CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE and Play Hadean Lands

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