Thinslayer

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

@Zool Ooh, what if she took them from Gungun? He'd be SO hopping mad. xD Nemesis for life!

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

@Zool That gives me an idea for a possible upgrade for MacKenzie...

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

Gungun the Blastmaster

Species: Goblin
Gender: Male
Maturity: Elder
Origin: Aion, Claybitah Tribe
Affiliation: The Witch's Army
Possessions: A set of double-barreled flintlock pistols that fire explosive shots. The madlad claims to have gotten the idea from Chatak. The Witch named them Smith and Wesson. Also carries dynamite, bombs, alchemic grenades, and god only knows what else.
Abilities: Explosions, explosions...oh! and explosions. And martial arts.
Description: Bursting with all kinds of reckless energy and self-destructive tendencies, this explosive little goblin enjoys life to the fullest when his guns are blazing and everything's blowing up in a fireball behind him. He's ridiculously athletic and sharp for his age, and is able to take on many opponents twice his size and kick their butts to the next isekai novel. Even without his guns, he packs one hell of a punch. Definitely not a goblin to take lightly.

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

@Zool I wonder if MacKenzie's grapple hook is like the Grapple Lasso from Metroid Prime 3? Drain mana, overload mana, swing like Spider Man, and maybe with powers like the Oraclos Chain from Pandora's Tower, where it can lock down enemies and stuff.

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

I hope the invasion force sounded sufficiently intimidating. :3

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

@TheFox Hm. They might hear that. All right, go ahead with it. ;)

@Zool I can agree to both those requests. Post as often as you need to, and feel free to make NPCs as needed, within reason.

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

"Ey, Guardman." He said. "It Chatak again! New ask. Not good with you langwi. No know all words good. What is 'Invashun?'"

The guard paled at something behind him. He lifted his finger and pointed.

"That."

From the darkness beyond, a black ship bearing the standard of the skull and horns pierced through the fog high above the city. One by one, the rest of the armada followed, until nearly a hundred ebon vessels emerged from the mists. Portals opened all over the city, and from them poured forth thousands of armored goblin warriors. In the blink of an eye, the city descended into chaos. The screams of men and monsters pierced the skies. Fireballs erupted from the flying ships and boomed against the city's magic barrier. Hundreds of wyvern-mounted archers leaped from the ships and dove at the hapless knights.

The guard grabbed Chatak by the arm and tugged him behind him. "Stay behind me. Things are about to get ugly."

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

@Zool I was thinking along the same lines you were, but the outdoors is actually quite a ways off. Their coffin room exits into a HUGE lobby, where thousands upon thousands of similar rooms are connected. Then a HUGE entryway connects to that, with huge double doors at the end of it leading outside. They're not hearing much in there unless someone blows a war horn near the entrance - which is entirely feasible, since the tower entrance is situated at the peak of the mountain overlooking the city.

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

@Thinslayer
Thanks. Oh, also, probably won’t have time to post it til a bit later, but I actually have a couple of ideas to build on the magic system you mentioned before. Mostly because somehow, I think I might’ve completely independently come up with the exact same one, at least in terms of the main three schools of it involving runes, working with spirits, and casting using your own soul. Legitimately surprised the hell out of me when I saw that bit.

@Rabidporcupine

lol that's awesome. I'd like to hear what you came up with.

Wall of Text

Fun story. After years of meditating on the topic, the only magic system that's 100% consistent is conjuration, and it has deep roots in religious mythos. Magic is, at its core, any alteration of natural laws. Natural laws, in turn, are the expression of divine (spiritual) power and authority. The divine spirit commands the world to operate in a particular fashion, and it is so. Ergo, in order to cast magic, you must communicate with the divine spirit and persuade it to heed your words. However, it is more feasible to communicate with its subordinate servants, namely angels and demons, who inherit divine authority over the world. This is where conjuration comes in - you summon one of these higher spirits and trade with them something of value in exchange for the use of their authority. Angels, being divine servants, cannot be summoned by any but their divine master, so the only spirits humans can feasibly summon are demons - and even then, being lesser creatures, we must trade at a disadvantage. That is why magic is perceived as dangerous IRL.

All the trappings of magic point toward conjuration. Runes are written language, but stones do not understand language. Minds understand language. Spell chants are spoken language, but rocks don't have ears and can't listen. Minds can listen. Elemental bending and dances are a type of sign-language, but the earth can't see. Minds can see. If you want to move something without touching it, something else must touch it to apply that force - and if you want that something to be nothing, that would be an alteration of natural law. Any kind of magic that involves communication, or even telekinesis, necessitates a sapient, miraculous response, implying spiritual operation. Thus, all such magic is conjuration.

So, if we want to step away from religious mythos to give our magic system a more natural bent, we'll have to get creative. A simple method is to grant humans the same kind of authority over the world that angels and demons have. We could treat the divine spirit like a natural power, kind of like the Force in Star Wars, to eliminate having to bargain for power. And if we want to steer clear of the danger involved in conjuring demons, we could make the spirits largely neutral, like sprites or fae.

Thus can we develop the three schools of magic:
* Wizardry (wizard), for invoking divine power directly;
* Conjuration (warlock), for invoking divine power through its servants;
* Thaumaturgy (sorceror), for invoking divine power granted to oneself.

If we're doing wizardry, you'll need to communicate with the divine in a language it can understand. There's no reason it can't understand you in any way you choose to communicate, but if we want to make it challenging, we'd want it to understand only a particular language that you have to learn, such as runes, Latin chants, or bending.

If we're doing conjuration, you'll need to communicate with a higher spirit in a language it can understand. Again, there's no reason it can't understand whatever language you use, so for all the same reasons listed above, we'll give it some specificity. Since we're now dealing with an individual, sapient spirit, possession is a possibility; whether that's a good or a bad thing depends on what we're aiming for. You could also have it as a separate familiar. Either way, it's giving you its power, whether by controlling you directly or by granting you its authority.

If we're doing thaumaturgy, then remember, in order to move something without touching it, something else has to touch it. With thaumaturgy, that's your own spirit. So you have to move your spirit. That will induce an out-of-body experience. Death is separation of spirit and body, so thaumaturgy would risk your death. To prevent that in our tale and add a comprehensible cost, we could say "mana" is the binding energy you expend for spellcasting.

If we want to add in some kind of cost to the other two schools, mana could be a component element of your life force, in which case expenditure would age you - or possibly just exhaust you somehow (though that's more governed by bodily energy and the ATP chemical than anything else). Or it could be a new kind of substance, like aether in Final Fantasy.

So yeah. It gets fun trying to rationalize everything.

EDIT: Edits galore. Holy smokes.

S E C O N D C H A N C E S (An Isekai Adventure)

Preferred character sheet format:

[center]
[h1]Names, nicknames, aliases, or titles go here[/h1]
[img]Image url goes here[/img]
[/center]
[u]Species[/u]: If you're alien, your new species. If you're native, your current species.
[u]Gender[/u]: Self-explanatory.
[u]Maturity[/u]: Biological stage of development, e.g. child, adult, etc. Include age if it's relevant.
[u]Origin[/u]: Earth is the old world. Aion is the new world. Specify if neither.
[u]Possessions[/u]: Important items your character owns when the story begins. An exhaustive list is unnecessary.
[u]Abilities[/u]: Unique skills, magic powers, etc.
[u]Description[/u]: Put everything together. Describe your character as if you were a story narrator introducing them to your readers.