You visit the second years' rooms and see several classmates as they exit to start their days in various lectures, many shared with you.

You catch Felix and Oppalus stepping out of rooms in the same hallway. They seem to be one to a room, like the first years.

I make a quick mental note of Felix and Oppalus's rooms before heading on to class.

When lunch comes around, I'll skip it once I confirm either Felix or Oppalus are eating. I'll take that opportunity to slip away and check out whoevers room I was able to confirm would be empty, being careful to enter when the hall in empty.  (that wasn't too clear,  if I see Felix eating, I'll check his room, if I see Oppalus eating his will be for today. If both are eating I'll check Oppalus's today and try for Felix's tomorrow.)

I'll make the search quick, being careful not to disturb anything, putting everything back into place when I'm done, but looking for anything strange that Attis may be interested in.

When I leave, I'll listen to make sure there's no one moving outside the doors and then head to hopefully get a quick bite to eat before my next obligation.

Three quick questions:

How do go about searching the rooms, assuming that you get in unnoticed? Describe the way you plan to do so (tossing beds, quick once-over, looking through papers, etc...).

How long do you intend to search each room?

What are you looking for?

I'm looking to do a quick once over. Looking for items that jump out at me as being odd/suspicious. I'll be checking under the bed and under the mattress, and looking for any locked containers or drawers, especially if the locks are particularly sturdy. That's a good sign it's either a valuable content or something that they want to stay hidden. I also want to quickly read any correspondences that are laying about, and a cursory search for hidden compartments or hidden bottoms to drawers by a combination of running my hand along floorboards looking for seams and also paying attention to if a drawer or container is shallower than its dimensions would otherwise indicate.

No longer than 10 minutes per room. Only one room per day.

I'm looking for signs they are up to more than just being diligent students. Since Attis hasn't told me specifics I only have the fact that we're investigating what was threatening enough to disband forming legions, so my guess is a civil war or uprising. So as mentioned above I'm looking for compartments that are hidden away, correspondences with people who have titles (or really just to record who they seem to be in contact too, some people will register with Attis but not myself) and any locks that seem excessive.

In Oppalus's room, you find nothing suspicious. There's a creaky floorboard, but you use your woodcrafting and there isn't anything hidden under it or under any mattresses. He has a trunk, but it's kept unlocked and has mostly clothes and a journal at the bottom, written in Romanic. Aside from that, in an unlocked drawer at his desk, you find a pouch of mixed currency, from small silver coins to a few golden half-eagles thrown in as well.

In Felix's room, however, you have to spend a little more time snooping. On the surface, everything seems fine, until you check the creases in the floor, in which you find a loose plank, that you have to move the bed a few inches to uncover entirely.

There, you find a small, red notebook with the Aleran symbol for firecraft on it. Also, there are a few three-inch-diameter balls that glow gently and seem to emit heat into your hand when you touch it. There're a few sacks full of coins in the compartment, as well. And inside the book, you see notes on firecrafting, with some precise drawings of orbs with notations in Romanic.

That night I write to Attis after my math session, and promptly go to drop it off at the well, making sure as always to wait until I can do so without being observed.

I'll also check at the same time if he has left me any additional information obviously.

My note to Attis is as follows:

I have managed to find and search F and O's rooms, no luck on the other two yet.

O's room seemed very ordrinary, no hidden compartments or odd writings I could find .

F had some suspicious items, although I believe they are in line with studies beyond where he should be rather than what I'm looking for.

He has a hidden compartment in a floor beard under his bed where he has three softly glowing balls that eminate heat at the touch. He also has a red book marked for firecrafting with notes and detailed sketches on these orbs. Also a number of money pouches in the same compartment, perhaps from selling the product in question.

I'll will continue trying to find information on the remaining two

-M
----------------

It'll take me a day or two to think of a plan to find out who quintus or Tertius are, and then to find their rooms. In the mean time I'll continue my studies, and my work with my study group, while checking the well each night for a response.

During my time in the library I will see if I can find books marked similarly to Felix's. Not necessarily matching the fire symbol, but books that have crafting symbols on the outside and sketches and details for making objects inside. I'm curious to read one watercrafting and metalcrafting if I can find them.

You drop off your message to Attis without anyone following you again.

That day, you proceed as a normal student would, even going to the library to study up on furycraft; however, you're stopped before the furycraft section. You see several students in the multicolored robes of third and fourth year, many beads about their necks, studying in that section. An attendant, however, stops you. "Do you have a note from your magister, academ?"

After the library, though, you receive a note from Attis.

Your eye was drawn to F's items, suspicious items. Can you find out more about them? Perhaps they're more than they seem to be.

To the attendant, "Uh, no I'm sorry, I didn't realize a note was required. My apologies." and I excuse myself and go back to studying for my other classes. It does strike me as odd that Felix had one of these books while being a second year, when it looks like the rest of those who have access to these books are all third and fourth.

After Attis's instruction I decide I'll have to make a second trip back, but this time with paper to make some notations. The next day, during lunch I'll make sure Felix is at lunch and then go and slip into the room, access the hidden compartment and then start copying the pages over while reading them. Perhaps I'll learn how to make these objects while I'm at it, which may manage to get me into a firecrafting class next semester.

I make sure to budget my time, copying down only a couple of pages and then putting everything back and heading on with my schedule.

I'll then study the pages I managed to copy at night both looking for hidden subtext Felix may have in the book and also trying to figure out what the balls are and if I can discern how to make them myself. I imagine they might be the heatstones that were mentioned when I bought my gloves, are they the right size to fit in the gloves?

I'll repeat this process each day, maintaining the rest of my schedule and responibilities, until I have the entire book copied.

By the end of it, I want to try and make one of those balls.

You take your time, and you realize that you're able to copy more of the notations from the book than you initially realized. You're able to do about ten pages a day instead of two easily. Your copies are a little rough, but you understand them well enough. After three days, you have an entire copy of the manuscript.

And you get to work on deciphering it, drawing on your knowledge you've gained from the world and from the text. You draw mostly on what you were recently taught about fire furies. The book is about making heatstones, which are glass stones (though any material that conducts heat could work). You essentially push fire furies inside who are programmed to release heat energy out, especially when activated.

At first, it's hard to understand the annotations, until you realize that some were added by someone who wasn't the author. Whoever added the annotations seem to have a focus towards changing the effects of a broken heatstone-which release heat. They want the same effect to happen, but on a larger scale entirely, where even a small heatstone could do a lot of damage, though you aren't sure how much.

You're confident that you could make a heatstone, and successfully do with a small rock (as good a heatstone as possible with a rock as the material). However, you're not sure that you could make the more intense version-or if it's even possible.


OOC: Wow, good rolling.

+@2 to Firecrafting (which is 1@6 now)
+@1 to Ed Level (which is 2@3 now)

The night I figure out what Felix is trying to do I start worrying about his firecrafting group, glad now that i didn't get accepted. He's effectively studying to make grenades, as far as I can tell. I decide not to experiment with it myself, for safety concerns.

I am happy to have figured out heatstones, and decide to explore the concept of making cold stones, assuming there are heavy parallels but opposites in nature. I'll experiment with that at night.

I'll write to Attis that night, and drop it off as normal,

Examined some more, found some alarming studies. F is experimenting with heatstones to modify them to explode instead of giving off their normal levels of heat. The damage potential is significant and its only a short jump to cause a delayed reaction with them. Want me to continue investigating him or move onto T?

I'm starting to feel good about the upcoming exams, although I'm going to continue trying to learn the basics of watercrafting the next day, and some intermediate metal crafting. Hopefully the study group helps me there.

You successfully make a basic coldstone as well (Firecrafting +@1). Feel free to describe the material, process, and success if you would like. It was a pretty effective success.

Attis' note the following day is simple. Continue with F. Find out more, if there are others, and take a prototype. We will meet in three days, at this place.

What sort of techniques are you hoping to pick up from Watercrafting and Metalcrafting? For the most part, aside from metalworking, metalcrafting is a primarily internal crafting to suppress fatigue. Watercrafting, on the other hand, has several different applications, the most basic of which would be manipulating water that is present.

I make the coldstone out of the same material as the heatstone, as I consider them very similar in task, even if opposite natures. I infuse the stone with fire furies, and instruct them to constantly take in heat, instead of giving off heat as with the heatstone.  At the end of it I'm quite content with my work, and contemplate the uses with my gloves to handle hot material without burning my hands. I decide not to try it though, no need to potentially ruin my good gloves if I misunderstand the reason they can hold cold stones. It may just be for hot climates.

I'm hoping to learn how to heal basic injuries with watercrafting, but I want to start with the basics and work up. If that first step is manipulating water, I want to try that, especially if anyone is willing to walk me through making a wave,  or a sculpture made out of water. I want to try doing both of those.

As to metalcrafting, I'm just looking at ways to keep practicing it while not near a forge, as well as looking for advice from fellow students on what to learn to do well in the metalcrafting part of my exam.

I'll start paying attention to who Felix associates with, especially if he meets up with a group during the block of time that I know he was heading off to his fire studying group.

On the third day I'll sneak into his room again, using the same precautions as before, and take one of the prototypes from the room to bring with me to the meeting with Attis.

You and the group continue to study, but you fail at watercrafting again, and you can tell that the semi-talented watercrafter is starting to get frustrated with your lack of results. "Sometimes people just aren't good with some furies. You should probably focus on your windcrafting."

Metalcrafting doesn't have much room for advancement, you're informed, but you're graded solely on external crafting, so manipulating metal to move, harden, or weaken and demonstrating that is the way to go.

Do you intend to follow Felix during that block of time?

I nod at the watercrafters words, realizing he's probably right, but also knowing that part of myself will always push to be at least capable at everything. But I don't push the topic in the study group, content to just prep for the exam in the other fury crafts.

For metal I practice the hardening and weakening, as well as the breaking and repairing that I had managed before, and add trying to bend metal.

I only plan on following when I can manage to align a location I can be traveling to with the direction he is traveling, but fortunately that was true back when he was heading to his firecrafting group after class the other day, and that's the primary interest of mine. But other than that I don't want to risk it.

You follow Felix, then, and stay a distance behind as you head toward the dorms and he's headed to his firecrafting study group that he told you about. You follow him through an archway and the courtyard you two split up at before, right next to the Academy kitchens.

There, he rounds a corner. Beyond, you almost round the corner after him too fast, but stop yourself just short as he's looking around by the cellar door into the kitchens basement. You haven't been down there before, but Felix opens it, closing the doors behind him as he proceeds down.

Interesting spot to be gathering, this should be good info to tell Attis at the meeting tonight.

I'll then go about my plans to get one of the prototypes from his room, and go about my routine until the meeting with Attis.

You note the place, and move back to the second years' quarters. There, you find his room again and step through the door. Inside, you find something strange sitting on his bed. It's a pair of manacles that are open and a brown burlap sack that you've seen some woodcrafters use to carry vegetables they speed-grow to the kitchens to serve later.

I grow immediately concerned, convinced Felix is intending to kidnap someone, and have momentary fears of the manacles with flashbacks to the collar I was made to wear some time ago. I take it the burlap sack looks large enough to squeeze a person in?

I abandon the task of fetching the stones, taking them will give away that someone was in his room, and the knowledge of the manacles, which I presume are designed to stop furycrafting along with the bag, are more important to convey to Attis than deliver the prototypes. I can explain them well enough anyway.

I go about the rest of my day, wishing the hours to pass for me to be able to fill Attis in on the new events, and my theory that the manacles are to be used in kidnapping and my suspicion that they would impede furycrafting, else what good would they be.

The sack isn't large enough for a whole person, no. Maybe a medium-sized item or it could cover a person down to his or her shoulders.

You assess the sack and manacles and decide to leave immediately, turning around and encountering a huge fist approaching your face rapidly. Your heightened reflexes from your time with the missing links assists you in getting your left arm up fast enough to take the brunt of the force, but you're knocked off your feet from the sheer strength of the attack.

A boy, somewhere around 16 and who you've seen in your second-year classes, stands tall for his age with broad shoulders. He wears several brown beads around his neck and no more than one of any color. You try to recall his name, but he rears his fist back for another attack.

I summon Hermes immediately and use his assistance to lift this earthcrafter from contact with the ground while also calling upon my internal windcrafting to speed myself up and dodge his attacks and slip by him into the hall and run away.

I'm planning to form bands of air to lift him up and hold him, just to immobilize while I get far enough away.

You exert your will and call for Hermes' help. The cheetah appears quickly, snarling and translucent with soft winds struggling violently to have force and give him mass. He leaps from a low position, still forming, up into your assailant's gut. This pushes him off of the ground.

You act fast, pushing your windcrafting and feeling the limitations with the stone walls keeping you from the free-roaming air outside. Still, you move past him, and duck smoothly under his hand as he reaches for your collar and misses. You make it by him to the door, and then feel the wind leave your lungs when another attacker punches you hard in the gut. You feel your concentration waver, and the first attacker falls down hard to the ground after Hermes' attack. Your second attacker is at tall as the first, but thinner. He has few beads of brown on his necklace, but most of them are red and green.

You stagger, and barely keep yourself from falling to the ground.

Cursing to myself for letting myself be not only caught, but outnumbered and away from the strength of my strongest furycraft I think frantically. I need to get to the open air, and pick a direction in the hallway to run, goading myself to push as hard as possible. My windcrafting may be weak until I get to the more open areas but I do have the benefit of being a quick runner even without windcrafting. Something I imagine they have seldomly  had to deal with.

I do try and use internal metalcrafting to shore up my resolve and push the pain down, to be death with later

Once I get to the open areas I intend to take to the air and for lack of a better place to fly I'll be heading to the waterfall from when I took the windcrafting test. Fortunately this time I won't have to be pushing to be as fast so it should be an easier flight.

You try to act fast, to dash, but a steel grip around your shoulders and chest stops you. Suddenly, you're wrapped in a bear hug from behind, and you're finding it significantly harder to breathe.

The other crafter walks into the room, and he says calmly, "Otto, close your eyes."

I swap to trying to draw on internal earth furies to draw extra strength, and recall what I learned from the missing links for wrestling to try and leverage my assaulters weight and throw him over my shoulder, lifting him off the ground in the process and hopefully severing his link with his earth furies long enough by that to break free and run. I'm calling on all the adrenaline I could possibly use as I'm convinced I'm fighting not just to avoid capture but for my life, and the life of whoever they are plotting against.

You start pulling strength to break free from the earthcrafter, and you shift your weight. But as you do, the second academ in front of you who just spoke creates a fire in his hand that is red and orange and yellow and something about the combination and how they warp together draws your gaze and you feel your heart rate increase.

And you start to perspire, your heart beating faster and faster, and you forget what you were just doing. Your heart keeps pounding and pounding and you feel the fear as the edges of your vision start to blur.