In Another World With JUST MONIKA 53 Are You Time Travelers?!

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/"I… was actually expecting Player to catch that."/ Her image floated back and Monika crossed her arms. /"But… you look distracted. Player, you look like you have an idea."/

Charlotte stared oddly at me. "Why would you even think that teleportation is the root cause of elemental magic?"

"Because I am an empericist- a person who supports the theory that all knowledge is based on experience derived from the senses," I answered. "So far it is my experience that the magic I cast comes out in motion. There is pressure. If magic is completely arbitrary, then that makes it easier for me to visualize what is happening. If it isn't, then okay I'm wrong."

Otherwise the ability to make any spell we wanted would make us G.o.ds. Or living inside a simulation. For obvious reasons, both were disturbing conclusions.

/"There's a hole in the [Elemental] vs [Null] theory in that [Aports], which is a teleportation spell, is a [Null] Spell too. [Recovery] is a healing spell superior to anything under [Light]. Should we really be defining spells by effect rather than causes?"/ Monika said idly.

I responded "Or we could ask the actual court magician how magic actually works."

/"That seems a fair trade. Biology and physics for metaphysics."/

And so Charlotte explained that the way we focused on the three parts of the spell was actually a very Formalist philosophy of working magic. The long standing view of magic is that it has four causes – the Element, the Form, the Means, and the Result.

It was very much like Aristotle's Four Causes. Matter, the material composes the thing being changed. Form, the arrangement of changes. Agent, the method by which an object is changed. And Purpose, the end result for which a thing existed.

"Interesting… so I'm thinking… what if I shouldn't have put it under [Light] after all? Maybe it should have been under [Earth]."

"Earth?!" Charlotte gasped. "Why Earth?"

"Because… why not? Everything comes from Earth. Plants grow using minerals in the soil. We get those minerals as nutrients from vegetables, fruits, and meats. And then in our body nutrients combine into our cells and organs."

/"Ah. I see where you're going with this. It might synergize more with the chant 'Life's brilliant rubies'. But why not change that part of the chant instead? Define it much more strictly, maybe that will help."/

"Why? Why not…? Ahaha…" Charlotte began to giggle lightly. "The way you approach this is from the perspective of a researcher but at the same time… not like how a magician should. I have more questions." She was staring at Monika.

/"Um. All right?"/

"Why is blood red?"

/"The red blood cells bind iron molecules, and these bind oxygen absorbed from the lungs."/

"What is oxygen?"

/"It is the element in the air that allows things to burn. Fire is usually a combination of something that will burn, free oxygen to react with the burning, and heat to initiate the burn."/

"Fire magic cheats at that, but even I have seen that magic Fire will not burn in total vacuum," I added.

"Why is oxygen important for living? What happens to the oxygen when it is consumed?"

/"Oxygen is transformed in the cells with glucose floating in blood plasma as fuel for the cell's processes, turning into carbon dioxide absorbed back into blood plasma and released out into the lungs from unoxygenated blood pumped nearby, and out with exhalation."/

"What is carbon dioxide?"

/"It is a combination of one part carbon and two parts oxygen. Carbon is another common element – found in raw form as coal and soot and diamonds. Most living things are actually made mostly of carbon and water. Trees, for example."/

"How many elements are there?" Charlotte quickly asked next.

/"Ninety-one, naturally occurring. Up to one hundred and eighteen synthesized or from the decay of other elements,"/ Monika replied just as gunshot-quick.

Charlotte grit her teeth let out a little hiss of pleasure. It looked like she was just hoping for any other answer than the usual seven elements of magic that she would get from traditionalists. Monika picked up on the difference because saying the magical seven would be just too obvious. And from Zanac, I already knew that they actually had some chemistry going on.

Then heedless Charlotte continued, "[Blood Maker] has three syllables. What do those look like?"

Monika threw out the phonetic equivalents in the local language. The local alphabet actually looked faintly Greek. I was reminded that Elze and Linze wore the symbols similar to that of Pluto and Neptune on their neckties.

"The spell [Cure Heal] has two words, what do each of those words mean?"

Monika frowned slightly at the simplicity of the new questions. /"[Cure], of course, means to remedy ailments. [Heal] means to recover from illness or damage."/

"Yeah, it's a Verb Verb. It's like someone decided to just jam two healing spells together for a general cure-all," I reckoned. And on that Cure All would have made more sense as a Verb-Adjective. "I mean, it clearly works, which is the reason why I thought spell customization was possible at all."

Charlote sucked in her breath and let out a little groan of pleasure. Uh. Okayyy.

She said next "Forever you chase after light, and forever it remains just beyond your grasp. Why?"

/"Hey. Is this is in another language?"/ Monika noticed. /"Player, you answer this."/

It sounded the same to me. A riddle? Maybe because light is ma.s.sless, it would be like trying to trap a shadow? No.

"Because the faster you run, the heavier your steps," I answered.

/"Oh. You said that in the same language. I see that auto-translation for you works for all spoken languages."/

Charlotte paused, breathing heavily, and stared at us.

"I think I have figured out why you CAN invent spells at all," she said after a while. She steepled her fingers together and asked "What do you want for this information?"

I crossed my arms and leaned back. "Hmm. There's a variety of knowledge and processes we can share… machines and such, things we can be sure will work instead of the vagaries of magic medicine."

/"Player… no. She said, 'what do we WANT' for the information. Isn't it usually the other way around?"

I blinked and sat up quickly. "That's right. We're the ones who don't have that information, so we should be the ones trading for it. Unless… you knowing that information is something that is disadvantageous to us!"

Charlotte lunged at me, her fingers out and open like claws.

/"Don't!"/ Monika yelled just in time before Yae could karate-chop Charlotte's head off.

Charlotte grabbed at my shirt and pressed her body onto me and we both almost toppled over.

"Tell me the truth!" Charlotte hissed at my face, our lips almost at touching range. "Are you time travelers?! Were you left asleep and woken up from the collapse of the Ancient Civilizaaationnn?!!!"

What.

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