Create-a-Mage

[zikari8]

“It’s ok, they won’t bite. It might burn a little though.”


Source

Takatsukasa Umeko

Gender: Female
Age: 20
Height/Weight: 154 cm/128 lbs
Birthplace: Nara, Japan
Alignment: Neutral Good

Personality
Forte: Brawling
Likes: Really hot tea
Weaknesses: Cold tolerance
Dislikes: Winter
Natural Talents: Calligraphy
Natural Enemy: Araya Souren

Magical Attributes
Origin: Contempt
Elemental Alignment: Fire

Magic Circuits
Circuit Quantity: D
Circuit Quality: D
Circuit Composition: Normal

Profile: An eastern magus who controls fire. Takatsukasa Umeko is known to those in the area as the Tomboy Heiress, born into a very traditional well-off household yet possessing the rough mannerisms of a high school delinquent. Back in high-school, there was a strange rumour regarding Umeko. It was said that whenever a fire broke out in town, Umeko was spotted watching it nearby with glazed eyes. Currently, she’s living a care free life, working part time at a family restaurant and picking fights with other likeminded thugs. It seems that her position in her household is in danger due to the advent of her more well-behaved little brother.

Special Powers

Psychic Power: Pyrokinesis
The supernatural ability to control fire with one’s mind. Takatsukasa Umeko is able to manipulate any flame within the range of her perception by will. She is able to control its growth, manipulate the direction it spreads, and even augment its heat and intensity. Depending on her concentration, she gains finer control over the fire and can control multiple fires at once. Her current skill at using this power is fine enough that she can even will a flame to not burn someone as it is covering them. If her concentration wavers, however, her control over fire will also weaken. To be clear, this psychic power does not allow her to create fire, only control it.

Magecraft: Sealing Scrolls
The magecraft of Umeko’s family is the power to seal and store things in special scrolls. By channeling one’s life force and chanting certain spells, one can forcibly seal things away into the prepared scroll where the sealed object is place into stasis. The scrolls themselves are specially prepared and similar in effect to sealing talismans. Once something has been sealed, its seal cannot be broken until the scroll is opened once again.

Umeko’s family is a little different from other magi lineages. They currently do not participate in any magical research nor do they seek the root. Their only job as magi is to preserve and pass on the magical sealing formula of their ancestors, in anticipation of a future day where it will be needed. Children of the household are taught magecraft not to improve on the current formula but only to be able to pass it on to the next.

Originally, this sealing magic was intended to be used to seal away immortal demons. However, Umeko has her own personal use for the scrolls. Instead of spirits or demons, she uses them to store and then summon fire. To do this, she has to activate her magecraft near an actual fire and then the flames will be absorbed and sealed into the scroll. When summoned again, the flame will return to the state and size it was in when sealed. This use helps compensate for her power’s inability to create flames.

Character

Character:
Takatsukasa Umeko is a woman who shares an intimate relationship with fire. From youth, she was able to manipulate flames, whether it was a little candle fire or a blaze enveloping a neighbor’s house. Whereas most people would grow to be at least somewhat afraid of the dangers of fire, Umeko had no such fear. For her, who was born with a psychic ability, the flames which answered to her command did not seem dangerous; if anything, her control over them made her feel emotionally close to them. In time, she came to rationalize her powers as her being a friend of fire itself.

Over the years, Umeko has come to perceive fires as living things likely due in part to the influence of her powers. She considers a fire no different from any other animal. Like any other normal creature, fires require fuel to continue surviving. A lack of sustenance or excessive force will cause one to die. Furthermore, in her eyes, each separate fire possesses individuality. There are mean, violent flames that hurt people. There are greedy flames that eat and grow as much as they can. There are docile flames that remain small and die with the faintest breeze. And there are kind flames whose warmth brings comfort to the people it loves. To Umeko, fires are just another creature whose life should be respected.

At the moment, there are a few fires that Umeko has a close relationship with. As one would with a small domestic animal, she treats these fires as her pets and has had them for years. She keeps them in the house’s backyard and feeds them every day in the form of firewood. Naturally, each fire has its own name and she is familiar with its individual personality (that she perceives). Of course, she is very protective of her fires and will go to great lengths to preserve them. When she leaves the house or goes to bed, she seals the flames in her scrolls so that they won’t die when she isn’t looking. If any other member of the family gets close to putting out her fire friends, she will throw a ridiculous tantrum. From the view of a magus, these pets could be considered her familiars, but she thinks of them more as long time companions. If she gets into a fight with another magi, she will happily let her friends out to have their stab at her opponent.

Outside of her abnormal treatment of fire, however, Umeko is a surprisingly normal person. She is a cool and stylish lady but also friendly and considerate. Her temper is rather short and her manners are bad, but if she feels like she’s done something wrong she will certainly apologize afterwards. Even with her view on fires, she will not get upset if someone puts out a fire as long as it is within reason, the same way a person won’t object to an animal being killed to be eaten. Perhaps it is because her psychic power is rather specific that she retains a lot of common sense.

There isn’t anything she really wants in life. She’s happy with her current lifestyle, having fun and hanging out with her fire. The elders of her family, however, are panicking in regards to her marital life, afraid that no man would want to be engaged to a pyromaniac like her.

[Xaodzilla]

Not posting this in the contest?

[ScarfDyedShadow]

They're who submitted the prompt; they're not allowed to enter the contesst

[RoydGolden]

They're who submitted the prompt; they're not allowed to enter the contesst

Was that rule ever explicitly stated or is it more like an honor thing?

[Xaodzilla]

Was that rule ever explicitly stated or is it more like an honor thing?

I think it is an honor thing. But yes, I forgot Zikari did the prompt. That was my fault, sorry.

[Spartacus]

I always imagine the prompt starter see us from a high tower and say stuff like 'now give me your best shot and entertain me!' followed by evil laugh in the end.

[Nuclear]

This was supposed to be my Create-a-Magus contest entry's main schtick, but I couldn't come up with a satisfying enough bio to come with it. I didn't want to waste the brain activity it took to come up with this, so here goes.

Spoiler:

Anagnostic Current

Lostvein

The apex of athaumaturgic spirit-channeling abilities, birthed through the gift of extrasensory perception. Essentially a subset of electrokinesis. By capturing the electrical impulses brought about by a subject's mental imagery towards a certain person (via physical contact or other means), it becomes possible to realign one's brain activity to match that of the "spirit" to be "channeled". The end result, therefore, is not true spiritual evocation, but the manifestation of a tulpa borne from the subject's brain activity. Such an ability would be rightly called a "parlor trick" by orthodox practitioners of Spritual Evocation, but it is an impressive parlor trick nonetheless, and is probably best used in swindling gullible people out of their money.

[Sunny]

Mm, I guess to preserve the draft:

This was going to be my entry into the Create-a-Magus contest, but I pulled it both because it felt like it stepped too much on the theme of gyro's existing entry (even if developed independently, ironically) and because I wasn't satisfied with the result. Mechanically I think it turned out well, but I was drafting it for the wrong reasons and the lack of heart rather shows, I think.

Still, it turned out decent enough not to throw completely to the wind...? I suppose.

Name: Benjamin Sharrow
Alias: Giver
Gender: Male
Age: 29
Height/Weight: 180 cm / 77kg
Birthplace: Suffolk, England

"Humans can do anything, if they open up their mind and listen to others.
It's our greatest strength, and also our greatest curse.
No wonder it's so bloody hard for us to do.
...But sure, if you need it, I can make you stop awhile and listen."

Personality:
Forte: Teaching others, pattern recognition
Weakness: First encounters
Likes: Magecraft, exposure to new things, teaching
Dislikes: Closed off people, his own ability
Natural Enemy: Other espers, Bazett Fraga McRemitz

Magical Attributes
Origin: Communication
Elemental Attribute: Wind

Magic Circuits
Circuit Quantity: C
Circuit Quality: B
Circuit Composition: Refined

Character:
Biography:
Born the esteemed heir of a rising family of aristocratsa and the sixth generation of his family to be raised as magi, Benjamin Sharrow was born and bred to live the life he held - it could be said that he was on the tenure track for the Clocktower from the day he was born, and it was no surprise when he earned his position as a new teacher. A studious, extroverted individual, he enjoyed learning about magecraft, but he also took to everything else he was exposed to in school and his extracurricular life, embracing fields ranging from debate to athletics with the same eager nature, and mentoring others once he had mastered them sufficiently. But none of them equaled his love for magecraft and his sense of duty and honor as a magus.

A lively young boy who truly loved learning, he was not railroaded into his path as a teacher, but instead was naturally suited for it. Had it not been for the awakening of his ability as an esper, he would have lived his entire life ensconced in the formalities and traditions of the Clocktower. His sense of exhilaration as he received his own class for the first time left him with a boyish, charming smile the entire semester, at least up until the last day.

Benjamin is unaware how long his psychic ability was active, as it only came to public awareness - including his own - when his entire first-year class received a perfect score on their final exams and demonstrated working, functional knowledge of all of each other's magecraft. The sheer number of self-geas contracts and memory manipulation spells needed for that day strained even the resources of the Faculty of Law. But once they became aware of it, his life at the Clocktower was forfeit, with a sealing designation issued that very day. After all, the esper ability of Benjamin Sharrow was morphic resonance, a form of information transmission that indiscriminately shared knowledge and rendered tasks easier with repetition among a community.

Thankfully, even as enforcers bashed in the door to his flat, Benjamin had already packed up as much of his belongings as possible and was on the first train out of London, seemingly never to return. The happy, content noble with a silver spoon in his mouth overnight was rendered a harried, haunted exile, cut off from the world he had known his entire life and thrust out into the mundane world with only the assets he had been able to fit into his luggage and carry out by hand. Most who knew him in his earlier days find it difficult to recognize him. He rarely smiles, no longer openly engages others in conversation, and his tendency to be an overly diligent motormouth has given way to a guarded reticence and heavy self-deprecation. He is no longer proud of himself, nor his abilities, even as they have greatly expanded since his awakening.

While officially under a sealing designation, Benjamin nevertheless makes a reasonable living as a consultant, relying on a few Clocktower contacts who facilitate his employment as a tutor for families of magi whose heirs or associates are struggling to grasp certain tenets of their family tradition or magecraft. A few hours, or at most a day in the presence of Benjamin, the student, and a family member or two is often enough for even the most difficult concepts to be picked up by even the most dim-witted of heirs. While his clientele is a guarded secret, they include families both noteworthy and not, and for a time, he even filled in for a homunculus as a particularly difficult student's teacher upon its passing. Benjamin's services are expensive, as he is unable to formally or consistently work in the world of magecraft, but they have secured his life for the time being - were he not so useful, and so discreet, the attempts on his life would no doubt be greatly intensified.

At his worst, he wonders if he should allow them to do so and simply wait for the enforcers to carry out their well-deserved judgment, before he inflicts yet greater a scar on the discipline he so loves - but the magus in him cannot abide by letting his family crest die with him, nor can he bring himself to open himself up to others in fear of how much he may push on them. So for the time being, he allows himself to live, shamefully and regretfully, trying to minimize the damage he causes to magecraft and maximize the good to individual magi.

Psychic Ability:
Resonance
First hypothesized by English researcher Rupert Sheldrake in 1981, morphic resonance proposes that perceived phenomena, particularly those rooted in biological processes, become more probable the more often they occur, and that biological growth affects a morphic field that is highly receptive and patterned by that growth. By solving a puzzle, it becomes more easy for those who attempt in the future. By escaping a maze, the route becomes infinitesimally more likely to be discovered by someone else later. In Sheldrake's view, evolution was not its own process, but the result of mutable habits being inscribed in the pattern of a morphic field that extended to all life of the same nature or type.

Benjamin's esper ability is the ability to detect and interact with that morphic field, manipulating it in his general vicinity. This ability is always on, spurring on and strengthening the morphic field in his general area, but he may focus to directly connect himself, or others, with enhanced sensitivity. In short, in the presence of Benjamin Sharrow, everyone is constantly learning from everyone else, whether they want to or not. This channel is always open, as the morphic field intimately connects and washes through all life, and Benjamin is unable to turn it off entirely; he may only narrow or widen the channel now that it has been linked. Absorption through the morphic field is accelerated by commonalities, including gender, species, family, and personality, with deeply connected and loving family members or lovers being the most porous of all subjects. Benjamin runs into those sadly rarely, in his line of work.

To its owner's regret, this ability is almost intrinsically incompatible with magecraft, as his very presence is now a curse that would spur and accelerate the death of all mystery. If everyone - everyone - understood all of each other's secrets, nothing would be left of the world of thaumaturgy. Thus, while Benjamin permits himself to work as a consultant, his sealing designation is almost unnecessary. He knows better than anyone what the world would lose if he was allowed to stay with the field he adores.

Magecraft Related Abilities:
As the heir of a family of modest aristocrats, Benjamin was a professor in the General Fundamentals faculty, specializing in sympathetic and contagious magic. He is skilled and knowledgeable in subjects ranging from trances and clairvoyant visions, the preparation and use of charms that bless or inflict ailments on others, and establishing binding contracts, geases, and judgments on behalf of others. While he still retains all of this knowledge, he has come to rely more on his esper ability in everyday life, but Benjamin has no qualms dusting off his more traditional specialties if a situation calls for it.

In addition, due to his work as a consultant and his inability to turn off his psychic channel, he has picked up a second-hand knowledge of basic magecraft from many disciplines. While not expanding his crest in any way, his body is able to cast spells with an ease that rivals that of a natural lord. However, while broad, his collection is relatively basic and limited to low rank knowledge - to obtain higher rank magecraft would require more time than he is permitted to stay in one place, and his life would be in even greater danger if his patrons realized he had absorbed even their most basic of spells.

His collection includes basic spells of all elements, curses, minor runes, the construction of simple dolls, gemstone manipulation, alchemy, voodoo, theosophy, evocation, illusion, necromancy, conjuration, maleficium, feng shui, kabbalah, numerology, geomancy, kemetism, mojo, reiki, santeria, vodun, wicca...

One and all, please accept his most earnest of apologies.

[Bugs]

Making a Dianetics/Scientology-inspired magecraft system to go with this OC is harder than I thought.
Being batshit crazy, and all that.

[Bugs]

How does TM come up with goofy ass mage names?
How do you ​come up with goofy ass mage names?

[the god of world-0]

I usualy go to those sites to people who are choosing baby names. Ironicaly, i did not did that when picking a name for my actual baby.

[King of Padoru]

Wait, what? You have a baby? How old are you???

[the god of world-0]

I am twenty something, i will leave the exact number to your imagination.
Little zelda is two month old, so i am not the most experience dad yet, but i am learning.

[King of Padoru]

Huh. I always thought you were about my age or a bit older, so I was surprised when you said you already had a child

[Spartacus]

lurk at random thought moar my dude

[King of Padoru]

"We'll all become stars in the end, but you can illuminate people’s life when you’re alive too.”

Name: Fælicia Phanthall
Gender: Female
Age: 24
Height: 173 cm
Weight: 87 kg
Three sizes: 100/79/94
Birthplace: Unknown
Talents: A bit of everything


Circuit quantity: C
Circuit quality: B
Circuit composition: Normal
Elemental affinity: Fire, Wind

Appearance

Constitution: A tall woman of stout body, Fælicia has a naturally strong build that would make her look quite masculine. However, her indulgence in hearty meals and slow metabolism have dulled that trait of hers and highlighted her femininity by augmenting her proportions in a way that one wouldn’t expect seeing in someone who only uses her feet to travel. The result is a combination of chub and muscle that gives her a look of strong older sister/mother.

Her shoulders are wide and strong as those of a lumberer, trained by constantly lifting her prominent breasts. The arms, though not muscular, are robust, and the hands are far from being delicate like those of a lady. Her thighs are in permanent contact, causing their inner sides to be eternally reddened and irritated for them rubbing against each other when walking. Finally, her abdomen is firmly stuffed with adipose tissue, sticking out less than her chest, but still more than that of a thin person.


Face: Although round shapes predominate in Fælicia’s body, her facets are rather sharp in comparison, although still rounder than those of a slim person. Her soft cheeks sink like pudding when poked with a finger, and are fun to pinch. She lost her left eye a long time ago, as the vertical scar across the eyelid reveals, but the other remains, red and shiny as a ruby. It’s slightly slanted, what gives her appearance an oriental touch despite (probably) not being from the Far West.

The hair was originally of an unpolluted jet black, but it has become faintly ashy after collecting great amounts of dust and not having been washed with frequency. It falls in a conical shape over the sides and back of the head almost until they touch the shoulders, and a few strands of the fringe reach the height of the eyes. The ends are trimmed in a straight line, cut by a knife rather than by scissors. Above the forehead, there’s a permanently standing lock of hair, an ahoge, that curves towards the left.


Clothing: Fælicia normally wears a sleeveless black T-shirt which has started to discolor into a dark gray due to the pass of time. It has red rims on the holes for the arms and the neck, and two red crescent-shaped symbols are imprinted on the chest. When Fælicia bought it, it fit her perfectly, but now it’s starting to be too small for her body. Luckily for her, it’s made of cotton, so she doesn’t feel tight when wearing it, but sometimes the lower part of her belly peeps a little from under it, unable to be fully contained by the cloth. Over the legs, she wears a pair of olive-color shorts with a light gray flap over the fly. They are rolled up to the middle of the thighs, and held with a rope that acts like a belt so that they don’t slip down. Her footwear consists of a pair of worn sandals.

Bio

A first-generation mage born in a mountain village. She can't remember much of her life, but she knows she's a magus and that she lost her memories due to an event related with the death of a person she loved and that she immaturely wished to forget about. She travels the world in search of a means to remember, but she likes traveling so much she won't settle down even after having fulfilled her goal.

Personality

A daydreamer girl brimming with imagination, a so-called citizen of the world with her own conception of it. Immersed in her fantasies, she rejects the modern view of reality people have, and is reticent to believe the logic of science. As an example, she firmly believes that people become stars when they die, and that that is the reason why there are so many. Nevertheless, she’s fine with people not sharing her ideas. Even if every justification she gives to support her beliefs is shattered, she’ll just shrug it off and say “But that isn’t funny”.

Always willing to help and to receive help, to teach and to learn from others, Fælicia has lots of experience about many things and curiosity about as much as what she knows. Comparing people’s thoughts with hers and learning different lifestyles is her favorite type of entertainment. Combined with her awakening maternal instincts and fraternal disposition, this makes her be very good with children. Perhaps if she decides someday to settle down at a fixed place, she could become a very fine school teacher.

Befriending Fælicia is unsurprisingly easy, and even more if one is from a place she hasn’t visited yet. She is very effusive and loves hugging people, which is nice because her body is perfect for hugs, but she is unaware of her strength, what makes her hugs be crushingly dangerous. Her sociability makes her sort of gullible, instantly relying on others without detecting their ill intentions. Because of this, she has been scammed more than once.

As dizzy as Fælicia can look with all these traits of her personality, she hasn’t lost track of her ultimate goal. In the bottom of her heart, she feels genuine grief for her past immaturity that lead to losing bad and good memories. She wouldn’t go as far as saying she hates herself for that, but it’s true that she secretly can’t get on good terms with her past self, calling herself a coward for having thrown away her past just because she felt unable to deal with a burden.

Likes: “Discovering new places. Meeting and befriending new people. Those are wonderful things you can only see when you travel like me. Oh, and let’s not forget about eating new food!”

Dislikes: “I don’t get anything for hating things, so I don’t usually say it when there’s something I don’t like. But it’s not as if I’m fine with everything, eh? Cowards are an absolute no to me, hmph!”

Magical abilities

Blankness: Fælicia’s Origin. Blankness refers to a state in which there isn’t any record of anything, future or past. The soul is in a condition like that of a book whose sheets are completely blank (hence the name), awaiting to be filled with words. As the pages are filled, a story is created, Fælicia’s life being the theme of that story. Any event will automatically become part of the story, and incidentally can’t be removed. It is a condition extremely similar to eidetic memory that grants an exceptional learning capaity, which is excellent for a first generation mage to add a large amount of data in their Magical Crest, but…

Once something is written, it can’t be removed. That much is a lie. Removal is possible, but at a great cost. In order to make a record appear no longer in the story, it can’t be erased with a rubber or covered with white-out. The whole sheet in which it’s written must be torn from the book. That means that not only that event, but the rest of the information written in that sheet as well, will vanish from the manuscript. In other words, other memories will disappear as well. For that reason, Fælicia cannot forget that easily. She has the blessing of remembering anything she likes and forgetting what she dislikes, but that blessing has the risk of losing something she holds dear when there is something she wants to get rid of.

Elemental magecraft: Magecraft based on the usage of any of the five Elements: Fire, Water, Earth, Wind, and

Void

Æther

. Due to her elemental affinity, Fælicia is quite dexterous at using spells of the Fire and Wind elements, but can use low-rank spells from other elements if she has seen others use them. This combination of elements allows not only to intensify her fire spells with a tailwind, but also to create waves of hot wind that produce burns and cannot be perceived with the sight. Because the wind fuels the fire, Fælicia’s spells can display a large power at a relatively low cost.

Weapons and non-magical abilities

Traditional dagger: A simple dagger made of bone. Fælicia has always had it, but doesn’t know where she got it from. Although it’s in perfect condition to be used as a weapon, she keeps it because she finds it pretty rather than for combat uses.

Survival expert: Fælicia displays a master-level knowledge about how to survive in the wild. Which berries can be eaten, which mushrooms are poisonous, how to filter water to make it potable, what to do in case of being attacked by a bear... She knows that much and more. Some of that knowledge won't probably be ever put in practice, but you never know.

Medicine: Although Fælicia can't use healing mafecraft, she can give first aids. She also knows natural and home remedies for illnesses, bodily aches, and treatments of wounds. For that reason, she always carries some medicinal herbs and honey with her.

Cooking: Fælicia's love for food has lead to her learning how to prepare her favorite plates. She can prepare delicious meals with whichever ingredients she finds with great ease, but she always manages to prepare too much food. Even if she's alone, she'll probably cook a stew for a whole family.
"I can't let the ingredients to waste, you know!"

Wish for the Grail

“I don’t care about that! I’m here for fun, so I’ll give that fancy cup to the first who asks me for it, ahahahahaha! It’s just a joke, just a joke! If it really can grant people’s wishes, I know what I have to wish for! I’m not that stupid!”

Well, this is a more light-hearted sheet than the edgelady that my previous mage was. I wasn't convinced with my initial idea and wanted to flesh it out more, but the result was disastrous: Hundreds of spells with absurd names, double Origin, awful explanation of the background, blah blah blah. I had to write a long-ass description for the appearance because I couldn't find anything similar to what I had in mind, and my skills aren't good enough to make a drawing myself. If one of my friends can make something about it, I'll put a picture.

[PlatineDragon]

Hey, I want to join in. Can someone please give me a brief fill in about the kind of system that you guys use in here?

[King of Padoru]

Same as in Create-a-Servant. As long as it doesn't make the sheet difficult to understand, you can use the format you want

[Bugs]

Name: Pancrazio Baniphiorecci
Alias: Knife of Amrita
Gender: Male
Age: 28
Height/Weight: 6’0”/140 lbs
Birthplace: Tuscany, Italy

Personality:
Forte: Homemade Italian food
Weakness: Picky eaters
Likes: The noises of a kitchen
Dislikes: Rotten ingredients, rotten people
Natural Enemy: Carbs

Magical Attributes
Origin: Amelioration
Elemental Attribute: Fire and Water

Magic Circuits
Circuit Quantity: D
Circuit Quality: C
Circuit Composition: Abnormal

Character:
Biography:
“To call my identity as one inexorably tied to the preparation of food isn’t entirely incorrect, but doesn’t that sound kind of pathetic?”

A man descended from a rather ancient line of priests-turned-magi. Pane’s ancestor Titus Flavius Clemens, a Greco-Roman born to pagan parents himself, was a famous convert to Christianity. Although a polarizing and contradictory character today, Clemens was adamant in his belief in the Christ and fastidious in his missions. One of his more infamous claims was that Hellenic philosophy did not originate within the Greeks, but was instead lessons left over from the ancient Egyptians. Travelling to Egypt, Clemens sought to cement his understanding of both God and the philosophies of his Hellenic contemporaries.

It was while in Egypt that Clemens encountered the tome that would alter his family’s destiny; the Book of Thoth. Or rather, tens of thousands of manuscripts all claiming to be authored or inspired by the Egyptian god of knowledge. It was not something Clemens could comprehend then, that the “Book of Thoth” is little more than a conceptual ideal then it is a physical artifact. Still, the Padre took several copies back home with him. As Clemens’ family continued and Gnosticism gradually fell further and further into a heretical light, the family turned its back on esotericism while still maintaining the now obsolete tradition of passing the Egyptian texts down to the next head of the family. This continued for hundreds of years, until a revitalization in the 14th century, there came a head of the family born with Magic Circuits. Reneging on the efforts of their ancestor to distance the family from the society of magecraft, this certain family head was able to make true use of the Books of Thoth that Clemens had dutifully passed on as little more than foreign souvenirs.

But of course, that entreated its own problems.

Because the article Clemens had been under the impression was a genuine Book of Thoth, was actually a list of ingredients for tasty Egyptian dishes. A cookbook, of all things.

Undeterred, the family possessed a relic they couldn’t afford to ignore. The Church has a strong memory, so Pane’s family threw itself back into mage society, shunned and treated with skepticism as they were for centuries.

Presently, Pane is a student of Valuay. A popular student, especially among the eccentric members of the Creation Department, simply because he’s constantly cooking world-class food and doesn’t mind sharing.

“A chef has two responsibilities. Some are of the opinion there’s only one, but that’s incorrect. The first is to never leave the hungry unsatisfied. The second is to never be satisfied yourself.”

This apparent dissatisfaction with the facts is the impetus for Pane’s goal. The goal of his entire clan. The replication of the phenomenon recognized throughout ancient as the “food of the gods”. A magical sustenance attributed with immortality, infinite knowledge, and a flavor that’s said to be able to quite literally melt a mortal’s mind. These mystical properties are almost always given to food pulled right out of the ground, lending itself to the belief that the food is nourished with the knowledge of Gaia itself.

Amrita, ambrosia, the mead of poetry, all the final aim of one man’s ambition to craft cuisine on the level of the gods.

Mystic Codes:
(Cook)book of Thoth
The Book of Thoth is an Egyptian artifact purported to have been written by the Egyptian god of knowledge, Thoth. Less of a genuine physical article than it is a conceit of the Egyptian magecraft system, this specific Book of Thoth is linked to Pane’s family through the recipes they record in the cookbook.
The concept of the cookbook is nothing new, as much of a false impression that humans might be under when considering the topic. Cuneiform tablets with listed ingredients and preparations have been discovered all the way back to ancient Mesopotamian times. To the Age of Gods.
This, of course, means that the gods themselves were no strangers to the fine art of cooking.

A tome of common sentiment, even for modern Italian families. A cookbook containing recipes of one’s ancestors, allowing one to experience the same flavors across time, that is the true purpose of a cookbook.

Dredge
A single-action spell that relates to one of the earliest “new” entries in the Cookbook, around the time of Pane’s ancestor Clemens. Activation causes flour lightly infused with mana to explode outward in a wide sweep, covering even the magically-invisible, making it reminiscent of a spy movie protagonist making tripwire lasers visible.

Dredge, a cooking term, relates to a light sprinkling of flour. Magically speaking, Dredge has its roots in aleuromancy, a divination technique that uses flour. A specialized form of aleuromancy is the Roman ritual of mola salsa. Flour is sprinkled on the foreheads or between the horns of sacrifices before being burned in offering to the gods. The remnants of the sacrifice and flour could then be read to ascertain the gods’ will.

By chanting the Single-Action Spell

Grind

Mola

, the flour previously scattered by Dredge will violently combust. It’s as much of an investigative tool like Dredge as it is an offensive spell, due to the various colors the fire will emit depending on its fuel. The various color combinations can then also be read, inferring deeper information.

I guess I'll post what I had for the contest. I didn't feel like it was tied to the prompt well enough, and then I just lost steam, etc.

[SirGauoftheSquareTable]

That was an awesome sheet, btw. Now I'm going to have to try and post an idea. Also, this guy reminds me of Tonio.