Closed I See at Sea[Sayana]

[Clyde Sullins]

It didn't take an Aurist to sense Sayana's mood in regards to meditation.

“If it helps, think of meditation as stretching. For instance if you don't stretch before doing something overly physical, you risk injuring yourself, pulling something. Meditation prepares your mind in the same way for the mental strain of willing your djed to twist and bend.”

“It also helps I think with overgiving, in avoiding it. Overgiving tends to come on due to a lack of control, due to becoming overly emotional or by listening to things one shouldn't. If you can however block such things out, your risk of overgiving is surely reduced. Have you ever heard of sweet whispers?”

“Its a voice, but not a voice, urging you to cast more magic. To do more. Again. Over and over. A bit more. Urging and pushing, and in the end controlling you, making you do things you wouldn't or shouldn't or will regret. A mage who gives in to overgiving doesn't control their magic, their magic controls them. Meditation can help keep you in control.”

Her tone as she said again, as she spoke of doing more magic, conveyed all her needed to know, and was part of why he spoke once more on overgiving.

“ Not today, no. You have done enough for one day. Tomorrow, or the next, but not again today. You will be tired from what you've already done, no need to strain yourself when you are still so new. Trust my judgement in this, that you are done for the day at casting magic.”

“As for the meditation... Clearing ones mind can help, but there are different methods of focusing. The simplest method is breathing. Focus on your breathing, slowly breath in and take a breath until you are full, and hold it. Pause, let the air sit, and then slowly exhale until all of the air is gone from your body. Then repeat. Each time you exhale feel the distractions leave on your breath, until you have none left. Focus on the task of breathing and let all else fade. That is one of the simpler methods.”

“You can clear your mind, and focus on nothing, on nothingness, and empty. Or, you can focus on one thing to the exclusion of all else, letting all else fade from your mind in your concentration on the one thing. A person. An object. An image. A word. Whatever.”

[Sayana]

For the first little while she kept her eyes closed, still focusing on achieving at least some level of calm. Although throughout the mage’s explanation, Sayana occasionally opened her eyes to look at him. Stretching… In a way it made sense, although she rarely stretched when exerting herself physically. And then there was that word again, overgiving, or over exerting herself. But when he started elaborating on the sweet whispers, she seemed to hang on every word. That is, until he spoke of the dangers of it and she managed to snap herself out of the longing.

She breathed in deeply and let out an equally long sigh. “But Clyde…” Sayana protested at her restriction from magic for the rest of the day. She had only just scraped the surface of auristics. She hadn’t even gotten a chance to see his aura. She hadn’t even ‘seen’ any auras, despite his clear intention that she was to first learn to see them. When would she next get the opportunity to read his aura?

For a few moments she was tempted to try conducting auristics despite his cautionary words. She was even in the middle of formulating a plan to be as discrete as possible, until a rather important fact hit her. He would know the instant she tried. If he had been able to pick up her hypnotism use in a completely unexpected situation, there was no doubt at all that he’d notice if she tried to do auristics after he had told her not to. The knowledge didn’t keep her from grumbling, but it did keep her from appearing even more foolish.

However, even as she resolved to not use magic for the rest of the day, she seemed less anxious about learning as much as she could in a single short sitting. She had the entire boat ride with him, plus however long their stay in Alvadas would be. Not to mention, the boat ride back. And even though she had had to ask, he didn’t seem particularly perturbed by her request to see his aura. She could always ask again at a later date.

With her conflicting thoughts out of the way, she was more receptive to his lesson. She started with the simple breathing. This time around, she focused more on the air as it came in and how her chest expanded. She held it for but a tick, then began to exhale. When she repeated it a second time, she slowed her breathing further and held the breath longer. Distractions… The thought itself was a distraction, and she tried to shoo it away as she returned her attention to her breath.

However when Clyde mentioned focusing on something specific, like a person, her mind suddenly turned to Aren. Even as she realized her folly, she jumped to someone else in attempt to avoid thinking of the blue Akalak. Timothy… Another source of regret. She struggled to dismiss the thoughts of the orphan boy and just as swiftly had the thoughts replaced with those of someone else. Nephti. Sayana inhaled quickly as she realized that the young girl might still be in Alvadas.

It took her time to get control of herself once more, but she focused intently on her breathing instead of any specific people. Only after she found herself in a calmer state did she try turning her attention to an encompassing blackness. There were times she had to banish intruding thoughts but she kept up the image of darkness. It was vague though, and hard to get a more precise sort of focus. With a certain level of caution she began to imagine a flaming circle in the middle of the blackness. In some ways similar to the black sun the mage had painted on her forehead. Except this was a bright flaming ring, with a center of black black black…

As she imagined the constant flickering and flaming of the fiery ring, it seemed to completely captivate her attention. It was almost as mesmerizing as looking at a real flame and its constant but subtle changes. For a few chimes she sat there, until her eyes flickered open in surprise wondering just how long they had been sitting in silence.

Credit: Shimoje

[Clyde Sullins]

Clyde was firm with Sayana, as she complained and tried to convince him to go back on his statement. But he knew the signs, the look, of a mage desiring casting more. One desiring to cast more simply for the pleasure of doing so.

He'd seen it in himself and others, knew it, knew it in ways a non-mage could never understand.

Once she was done in her attempts to wheedle him, she continued on with the lesson, and Clyde continued overseeing it.

At first she seemed to be doing well, was understanding the steps of the breath, but then suddenly seemed to lose focus. The only thing he could think of was that she'd tried the second thing, the image, and that had thrown her off.

He couldn't be sure if that was it, that she'd tried an image and failed due to that, but he decided to add on another bit of information in case it had been the cause.

“Another note in regards to the image. It is generally advisable, in my own experience, to avoid emotionally charged images to focus on. The focus would be something neutral, something that does not make you feel strongly either positively or negatively, as either can be a distraction and are counterproductive to meditation.”

“For my own uses, I prefer focusing on the image of a lit candle sitting among blackness and nothingness, without the light from the candle going beyond its form or breaking the nothingness even as the flame flickers and moves. I let the flame dance in my mind, even though it is contained by the nothing and limited to burning the wick of the candle.”

Once he was done speaking, Clyde let Sayana sit in mediation, watching in case she needed more advise. However it seemed she had gotten the hang of the simpler aspects of meditation.

“Good for a first try. From now on I would like you to spend at least a few chimes in meditation before you attempt a spell, whenever possible. And bear in mind that though it is simple to do this now, in a non lab setting such as in combat or active use of magic, there will be far more distractions. And the more magic you cast, the stronger the sweet whispers will become.”

“Sweet whispers are just a term, not always a literal thing, though sometimes they are quite literal. But you must come to recognize them even when not literal. If you feel a need to cast, a desire, even when there is no need, a desire to cast for nothing more than the desire to cast, a pressing need, then you may be under its effects. You must come to learn to recognize this, and know when you are trying to do too much. Overgiving is not something to play with.”

“Now, that should be good for the day. We will pick up on another lesson later.”

[Sayana]

When he began to explain the image of the lit candle, she had to make an effort not to let the words distract her. However, as he elaborated further on the image, it fit surprisingly well with her own flickering ring of flames. There was that same blackness and emptiness that was everywhere that the fire was not. A momentary burst of surprise rippled through her at the likeness, but she slowly let the emotion settle as her focus returned to the flame.

As he concluded the lesson, she initially found it difficult to imagine implementing the meditation before every use of magic. However, when she thought on it further, she wondered if her hypnotism could be strengthened by first creating emptiness in her mind before focusing on the emotion she wanted to elicit in her target. There were other techniques too that she was still trying to grasp, and perhaps it might help. Although, she couldn’t just casually be talking with someone and decide to go into a full state of meditation.

The Eypharian gave a nod to his cautionary words regarding the sweet whispers and overgiving. Sweet whispers… it was a good name. Had he felt them just as strongly as she did? And does he still? She was half tempted to try out the new meditation techniques in conjunction with her hypnotism, but then remembered the restriction on magic he had placed for that day.

“Sweet whispers… They can be tantalizing.” Sayana spoke, trying to keep the longing from her voice.

She stared off over Clyde’s shoulder, trying to summon the image of the bright flaming Syna with a dark dark hole in the center. Tap-tap, tap-tap, tap-tap… Eventually her tapping slowed and subsided as she kept her focus on the swirling flames. When at last she stood, she was in an almost uncharacteristic state of calm.

“Thank you Clyde.” She said simply and took her leave.

Credit: Shimoje

[Kaleidoscope]

 

Clyde

Skills

• Meditation: +1
• Interrogation: +1

Lores

• Meditation: Focus on the imperfection
• Clyde Sullins: Owner of a strong stomach
• Glyphing: The Black Sun glyph
• The irritation of students
• Teaching: Repetition is the mother of learning
• Magic: Like a song
• Hardtack: Not particularly delicious
• Sayana: Has lent Clyde The Life and Adventures of Lickity Split
• Teaching: Sensing the mood of the pupil and responding accordingly
• Sayana: A woman who finds it difficult to sit still
• Teaching: Maintaining a viewpoint
• Meditation: The focus of a candle in the darkness
• Teaching: Setting goals

Comments
Clyde, I was going to give you a lore of telling a student off, and then I already noticed you had one! xD That made me chuckle.
Also, this is the first time I've seen teaching done in action- very enjoyable and informative to read, congratulations.

 

Sayana

Skills

• Meditation: +6
• Auristics: +3

Lores

• Auristics: Initiation
• Meditation: Using the surroundings
• Hypnotism: Base communication
• Alvadas: An uneasy place
• Magic: Using incantations or gestures as a way to focus
• Magic: Internal Djed pools and reserves
• Overgiving: Overusing your Djed fuel
• Zeltiva: Home of a University and a mental asylum
• World magic: Takes Djed from the world
• Gnosis: Power from the gods
• Accidental innuendos!
• Syna: The associations of a god
• Meditation: Taking a break to regain control
• Auristics: The flow of magic through the fingers
• Memory: The taste of honey
• Hardtack: Not particularly delicious
• An Aura is the smoke from the fire of a soul
• Auristics: Every sense except hearing
• Sweet whispers: The name of the desire to do it again and again

Comments
You've managed to grab those 6 points in meditation rather than auristics, because you and Clyde put a lot of work into that, whereas you've got a lot of auristic lores which should help your character in the future.

Comments: A very enjoyable thread! This is my first time grading something so magically taxing, so if I have missed something out or you'd like something different, please pull me up on it.

Enjoy your grade, and please don't forget to delete/edit out your grade request. If you have any questions, don't hesitate to send me a PM.