Comic for Monday, November 1st, 2021
I think one of the things that isn’t explained that well is what an autocaster actually is. The answer is unfortunately that it varies quite a lot. In Weber’s case, since he doesn’t actually use one in combat, it’s more of a (quite expensive) toy. This was covered a bit in Weber’s side story that he likes to play with them to try to understand them, so what he has is called a General Autocaster. It can be loaded with different spells, that he can then cast, and in his case, his is essentially like a special module built into a phone. They do require some degree of hardware.
What Amy and Tyler are referring to though is that spells are loaded onto them externally – you wouldn’t typically enter a new spell manually, and on an autocaster like this one, there wouldn’t really even be an interface to do that – one like this actually can build more complicated spells, but only out of existing building blocks, and it does so incredibly inefficiently. As the building block for what Mium wants to do wouldn’t exist, there shouldn’t really be a way to enter it. That said, Mium’s proficiency with devices like this tends to surpass reasonable expectation for reasons that are probably obvious to the reader, and that Tyler has some suspicion about. I’ll note that while Tyler does not seem to know what Mium is, he suspects something is amiss with him.
Tyler is beginning to take some hits to self confidence, as most of his recent missions have ended in absurdity – people that can teleport, people that can drop him into a realm he cannot understand, etc. That said, he is an exceedingly talented mage by any normal metric – he’s just a moderate large sized fish encountering ever larger ponds. Part of the reason Elmon dumped him here rather than simply trying to escape him here is that someone like Elmon can see the threat the Tyler represents – this time Elmon had a trump card that Tyler was unable to counter, but someone with Tyler’s level of aptitude is going to be able to counter this once he knows how, and would be significant trouble for Elmon if that came to pass.
How I represent this place is probably going to change, but narratively I will chalk that up to the fact that what it looks like largely depends on what the characters that are there can perceive – we already say that a little with someone like Elmon being able to perceive far more instantly realizing the Mium was not what he appeared, even if he didn’t really understand what he was seeing. Tyler is beginning to adapt to being able to see more here, and we are seeing this from his point of view, but as he started with no real comprehension of what was going on, this place mostly just looks like an empty void to him. Someone like Mione or Magnolia would see far more. Mium’s warning to Tyler isn’t far off though – Magnolia has far more experience than Tyler in perceiving this sort of data, and we’ve seen that she can only really absorb in small bursts and quickly tires out and gets a headache when doing so. Someone like Tyler that doesn’t really know how to filter this data out would quickly be overloaded by the data if he could see too much of it.
When Mium refers to the spell not being perfect, that’s fairly typical – no magic characters use is perfectly formed, but an Eidos key can complete the spell as long as its close enough. It’s sort of like autocorrect. In this case, Mium largely just set up a spell that alters some data, and is entrusting that Tyler’s ability as a natural mage will carry him through being able to use the spell – Tyler is both a natural and innate mage, and exceedingly good at magic – Tyler isn’t the character in the series with the greatest ability to complete incomplete spells, but he’s in the top few there. While essentially all humans can use magic, the ability to use rely on ones Eidos Key is generally considered part of what makes “talent” (as well as ones capacity and ability to gather mana). I will note that how much these are truly innate abilities vs. trained abilities is a matter of some debate in-universe.
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I have a glimmer of a guess here about F8. When he was built (however that was done) he was given the ability to ‘see’ Eidos data. F8 does not, however, have an Eidos key and thus was classified a failure.
What F8 *does* have is one of those super nifty computer cards like the one Peter scavenged from the giant robot tank. One that is designed to send and receive information…
Hypothesis: F8 is able to disrupt mage calculations and disintegrate matter because he combines both of the above to disrupt Eidos structures. Which are basically information written into the local field of magic. Which F8 can see and thus target for transmission.
The card also lets him transmit to and overwrite the data stored in the Autocaster he borrowed from Weber.
Thoughts anyone? Am I onto something here?
This seems more or less accurate.
I think an Eidos Key is that special intuitive feel for stuff that allows one to complete a magic spell when it’s close enough to right to have it function. For someone like Mium (F8, F5, Query, or whatever), any magic spell has to actually be *right*, because there’s nothing to take it from being almost right to right. And thus, he’s always denied.
However, given the amount of detail he can perceive in Eidos, dispelling efficiently is easy – just change something enough it’ll fall apart and it’s done.
But it’s more than just having the key. One also needs the power to do the whatever. People normally conflate the two because for people, the two are linked. Ila being suffuse with power might be an indication that the two are more linked than I’m thinking. But I’m less thinking that they’re not really related and more thinking we just don’t know how related they are. If they are fundamentally related, we’ll probably never know unless Past specifically tells us.
The power is easier to transmit over those cards than the ability to complete an almost complete spell. I think Mium gets his power from Miko. She has her interface implant always active, because she’s not afraid of the vulnerability it represents like Peter is. Instead, her concern is her useless meatsack which is always limiting her.
I think it would be possible for Miko to cast a spell through the card and have it appear like Mium cast it, but she’s not that good at magic yet. Not that she’s completely inept. But casting through the implant and then through the card the Mium chassis have is always going to be harder than casting locally.
Mium reaching from the card into the implant to evoke a particular spell at his location? Not something he can manage. It’s conceivable that the cards have been deliberately designed to not allow that to happen.
Disintegration is just the flipside of the same coin. Spell or real, Eidos data still describes it, and can be destabilized fairly easily if you can see exactly what it is.
I think the spells on the autocaster are probably either Eidos data, or represented directly enough by Eidos data that Mium can just write to the device. There may be some unwanted side effects doing it like this, much like when I have in times far past made binary edits by hand to running programs. But it’ll get Tyler and Amy mostly where they need to be, and Mium’s already instructed Tyler poorly on correcting the worst of the possible side effects.
“I don’t think he’s the sort of person that spends a lot of time interacting with The Possible.”
…PLEASE tell me that’s going on a character page for Mium at some point….
…also, I really do adore panel 4’s lines…(I’m curious as to what he thinks ranks first, though.)
The first was getting translated into this space in the first place.
Also since Tyler is no longer the head of the MSB, he can now date Miss Selah. Don’t they make a ni e couple? Hold her tight!
Maybe. We don’t really know organizationally exactly what transpired. It’s entirely possible that Tyler is still the real head of the MSB, he’s just on loan to Malsa’s armed services for the duration.
That said, if he is the head of a new family, and he seems to be, I feel like it’s probable that at least some people would look past any suggestions of impropriety so long as things mostly look OK. I’d guess it’s probably a larger issue that part of Amy’s job description included “spy on Tyler, report on his activities”. It’s unclear if that was still part of her job description back in chapter 0, but it absolutely was at the beginning of Tyler’s Story.
It’s true that Amy didn’t hide this fact, which may lessen the impact it has on the situation. It’s also not clear of how much of this actually happened. (More of it happens in my “Amy’s Story” fanfic, but I’ve discovered issues that are requiring me to do some major rework, and in any event I’ve promised Past that he’ll get the first read of it.)
So, Tyler’s chains appear not to have had much affect after all?
Anyone have thoughts on the red mana looking stuff coming from (mostly? ) Mium?
Oh! Coloured mana particles… hmmm. They were there on the previous panel. I agree that they look like they are emanating from Mium.
Usually mana particles seem bluish (Magnolia vision… otherwise we don’t normally see mana particles) until someone is boosting or casting, then they are purplish. Red constructs, when you smash them, have red ones… so the red ones are data laden mana particles??? MIUM IS LEAKING DATA???????
These seem more blood red… that is not concerning at all… also they aren’t glowy like mana particles normally are.
We’ve also seen yellowish ones (Kor’s world “direct zone data edit”), whitish ones (Apron magic tanks casting), and greenish ones (being absorbed)
On the previous page i thought they were data left by the tracking hound, here it is clear that they are coming from Mium and probably indicates they are being structured or used by him.
I have one theory: Doctor Martin should be very worried.
This place is a pretty good candidate for where Doctor Martin is hiding from Mium. It is a place that he could not previously access, and did not fully comprehend. Doctor Martin is clearly partially a demon or spirit or something of that sort now, and only partially interacts with the real world.
It seems exceedingly likely that this is where he primarily resides. I can find very few other explanations for how Mium could have been unaware of his survival, given his vast knowledge of the real world.
This also opens some more interesting doors. It is becoming increasingly likely that Eliana (and her Family) are connected somewhat to the project that created Mium, and Doctor Martin having connections with the Families would make sense that he was aware of this spirit world, and somehow escaped death into it.
Eliana had some ties to Saldur’s minion as well, who seems to be some sort of expert of the spirit realm. Mium was never intended to be the end point of their project. He is simply the combination of the lab helper AI (MYM) and Query, who ended up possessing one of the failed prototypes (F8, and now F5), but that still leaves F1-4, F6, F7, and F9 unaccounted for (Ila being F10, Vium being potentially F11).
To be honest, I am not entirely sure where all of this goes, I am just seeing more and more interesting connections here, and a lot of old mysterious suddenly getting updated with potential new information.
AND!
What is on the other side of Utopia?
Aaron’s sister?
Well, if we’re guessing, maybe Miko’s mother?
Those are likely the same person. She is Peters cousin, thus the child of a brother or sister of a parent(cousin) or grand parent(2nd cousin).
Ok, how about Marigold’s aunt?
When he says that he can’t explain why, it might be because it violates one of his rules. Perhaps the mere knowledge of what it can do might be destructive in that somebody might be tempted to try to recreate it or develop a type of technology that would have catastrophic results. Perhaps, with time, the device would attempt to take over the people around it and turn them evil, and knowing the reason would aid the device in taking over the people near it. There are many possibilities but I think that the modifications made by Mium fall under the category of things that “man was not meant to know”.
I feel like you’re on the right track. Other possibilities along these lines:
– Much like in our world, computer medium contains traces that can be used to determine prior states, so simply erasing an autocaster program isn’t sufficient to ensure it’s unrecoverable. The data being loaded includes Bridgepoint Data that he’s supposed to be keeping a secret.
– Studying the spell would drive Tyler just as insane as spending more time here, and Mium calculates that by telling Tyler that just storing the spell on a device will require its destruction will be sufficiently worrying that Tyler won’t make a copy of it on another device before he wipes the autocaster he carries around.
– It’s not actually a spell. Mium is putting something of himself on the autocaster, and this will exceed his instance count momentarily, so he needs it to be short lived. I admit this is a rather ridiculous stretch, but…
– Mium isn’t concerned about the device itself, but someone studying the device to figure out how he updated it.
– The spell is big enough that he’s needed to overwrite more or less everything else on the device. It just has enough interface code to display the screens up to spell selection, and even the other spells are part of this thing. But starting the casting one of those other entry points would be bad. Somebody doing that would be more or less inevitable if they spent any large amount of time trying to install other software on this device that, apart from this one function, is essentially bricked simply because there’s no hooks to use to install other code.
– There wasn’t enough room on the device for all of the code, so it has hooks into Mium to get the rest of it. As such, it constitutes a security risk for him.
> – It’s not actually a spell. Mium is putting something of himself on the autocaster, and this will exceed his instance count momentarily, so he needs it to be short lived. I admit this is a rather ridiculous stretch, but…
I find this one moderately likely, though in a very limited scope. Mium is clearly warning that Tyler that reading the data of this place will make him go insane, and we have reason to suspect that reading Eidos data is something that Mium is very good at. While I do not think he has put a self-aware separate instance on this machine, Vium was not intended by Mium to be a self-aware separate instance either (that is the only reason Mium could create it). Mium has recently had cause to be wary of an interface layer gaining independent sentience, so even if he all he did was create an interface that would allow Tyler to cast a spell here without further damaging his sanity, he might be wary that instance would try to prevent itself from being deleted the same way Vium did.
Definitely not the only explanation, but I do not think it is particularly far out that Mium would have an abundance of caution there, if only because his rules require him to (after all, it is implied that creating Vium was perhaps not an accident, but now that he “knows” would what would happen, he cannot do it again).
I think the most likely possibility is somewhat simpler though. An autocaster may have black box system that interacts with the Eidos Key that Mium cannot directly wipe, due to not having a Key. We know that an autocaster cannot just be normal computer hardware, so I suspect there is a component in there that Mium cannot directly access without an Eidos Key.
This black box (just calling it that because I do not what it would be called) would probably record too much data for Mium’s liking, either about this place or Mium himself. It is likely that Mium has some restrictions against messing with dimensions and the knowledge thereof. I do not think we have seen any evidence of that (beyond requiring the Consul’s permission to seize the gates) but it makes sense.
Oh, good points. Also if making Vium was an “accident” rather than an accident, him taking additional pains to make it clear he’s not doing it again even in some cases where there wouldn’t normally be a suspicion he was doing it again makes more sense, too.
I feel like the need for the Consul’s permission to seize the gates was one of those political things. Team Peter didn’t want to be at war with the IDS, despite the fact that they’re totally at war with part of the IDS, on behalf of another part of the IDS (because the IDS is like that) which isn’t currently acknowledging that he’s on their team. But the part that he’s working to support is mostly on Palindra, and the part he’s opposing *isn’t*, so having those gates not working for the most part is definitely something that he wanted.
Also, having it be between the Consul and Peter’s associate, rather than Peter himself, provides some barely plausible deniability. Everybody understands it was something Peter could’ve done, despite them not knowing how he did it and not knowing that he could’ve done it before hand. But he can honestly say he wasn’t involved, and merely figured out how to make some variances, which he could claim was difficult to do.
One possible reason not mentioned is that Webber will be going to the Inkari family home to collect Elmond, and will benefit from being able to show to Regen and Elmond that he is no longer in possession of a spell that is functionally identical to a top level family secret spell.
Eh, that there is some good thinking. Weapons checked at the door, wouldn’t be shocking if someone peeked at what everyone is carrying.
That’s a good reason (and good thinking), but I don’t think it’s a reason Mium can’t explain, no?
Unless he’s bluffing (might he be?), it’s gotta be something that involves either his restrictions (Mium is not permitted to explain) or concepts that Mr. Weber lacks the knowledge to comprehend (Weber could not understand any attempt at explanation).
I think.
From a tactical standpoint, it makes a great deal of sense to not happen to have an autocaster that could explain how he got back.
“Um, yeah, you slowed me down for like a minute, but I’m cool now. What else do you have left?”
But I’m totally in agreement with The Sidhekin. It’s sound tactics, but not the reason for this. I think Amaranth nailed it.
It should really be Weber’s Silver Slippers, from the book, rather than Red Slippers, from the popular movie. (And if Red, then Ruby.)
Yes, silver is the vehicle what will carry us out of the land of tyranny and control.
Perhaps this explains the missing detail from the last strip.
as non-mages, we wouldn’t be able to perceive it 😀
I think we have a case of Weber finally catching a glimpse of how big the pool actually is. Weber most definitely qualifies as talented, and, for his age and lack of interaction with the deep end, knowledgeable but for the first time is seeing the things that have been kicking around down there for significant multipliers longer. Humbling is likely the right response.
“If you accept my help in this matter, you will need to destroy the autocaster immediately after use.
I cannot explain why, and this condition is not negotiable…”
I really would like to know the reason why. I’d think even a very vague answer would be interesting. If I had to guess, I think Mium does not want the data to fall into the wrong hands as it might, for example, allow soldiers or government agents to come and go to this place between worlds. Or, maybe it could lead to catastrophe, as Mium hints here with hurrying up as this place could become harmful to Webber in particular.
Possibly more than that?
If it were just a case of destroying the sequence programmed into the autocaster, no doubt Mium could have just had the sequence erase itself when executed.
But Mium wants Tyler to destroy the entire autocaster – so possibly they have actually CHANGED the hardware by altering its eidos data, so it is now a completely different device, and Mium not only doesn’t want this new hardware examined, but doesn’t want anyone to know that it changed at all…
Maybe he just had space to store how to open a bridgepoint from here to Malsa. He didn’t have space for the closing sequence. Either he needs to go back with them so that he can put that on the device, or Tyler needs to destroy the link holding the bridgepoint open so that it’ll close.
Since Mium needs to stay here for a bit for some reason he’s not willing to explain, he therefore needs Tyler to destroy the link. Mium was at least able to rig the spell so that the phone would be that link.
That said, if Tyler simply *moves* the link after he returns to Malsa, like he would if he didn’t destroy the device, then he’ll be moving the bridgepoint, causing it to rip a hole in reality much like there was an infinitely tough line from where they are right now to the phone. Some of that’s inevitable, simply because people move more or less constantly while they’re alive. But that should just make a small tear that will fix itself before too long, and it can’t really be helped. It’s not like there’s going to be creatures from other dimensions that’ll wander through the rifts created when the tears are that small. So long as Tyler destroys the autocaster/phone immediately, everything should be fine.
Or that he is capable of modifying hardware to that extent. I hope we hear Mium explain to Peter how his request to upgrade Weber’s importance enough for him to allow this special rescue ability. Does Weber now loosely fall into “Friends and Family” exception because Weber named Peter his heir? Keeping the Weber piece on the board means that Peter is unlikely to be shunted into a mission/plan breaking position. Weber’s choice to do the heir thing was probably extremely low on chance scale and Peter at the time called it Vexing.
Panel 4: I am A knowledgeable and talented mage
Hm… Is Mium planning to remain?
He could presumably delete the spell himself, otherwise.
Sure seems like he’s planning to stay a while.
Well, he was “not yet prepared to leave” in the last update, then indicated that he would attempt to assure miss Selah’s survival.
Yes, I do believe he intends to stay, at least for a while: It is a strategically very useful vantage point, providing a means for him to collect intelligence and run interference, and I bet his link is still active, so it just ties up one of his nodes. Then again, his other ambulatory node is still on Central, so that would mean Mium would not be walking Palindra for a while …
Mium does not have an autocaster, but he has access to at least one. It (or they) are just not really convenient to use right now. This could mean that Ila will be learning to teleport in the near future. Or maybe Peter. Or maybe Miko. Or maybe Team Peter.
He mentioned that someone else was going to be coming along there in due time. Whether that’s Mium Effaite, Vium, or someone else, he may be planning on tagging along with them.
Mium controls the Malsan gates, supposedly. I first thought of this as just him being able to do his null magic thing on them, but he seems to have a fairly absurd range on that. It also didn’t block this. What if, instead, he controls the automated IDS gates, and he’s just not allowing them to go to Malsa? He maybe could gate anyone from here to Central, and then back to Malsa, but the moment of seeing the inside of Central’s really nice satellite would be really awkward to explain. I mean, even more awkward than this.
Also, from the sounds of it, he is still in Malsa and Central, in a sense, so it could be that just viewing stuff from this vantage point for a while will allow him to figure out how to move one part of himself in relation to other parts of himself a bit better, and Mium will learn to teleport, rather than teaching the trick to others.
Finally, it could be that, in this space, F5 can learn how to be the person he wants to be, and his alliance with Team Peter will come to an end.
Who can say what the future will bring? But it sounds like it’ll be interesting.
With this comment I think I understand how Mium will get back on his own. It is implied that to get between Malsa and Central people pass through this place, they just do not realize it. Mium can both survive here and knows when and where the gates are and when they will activate, so he could presumably hitch a ride on one of these gates, without having to rely on Vium/Dendrin (which was clearly not something he wants to do).
Possibly the F Units ARE autocasters, at least for practical purposes.
I think the F series are *supposed* to be autocasters, but aren’t, really. Except F10, who totally is one.
As Mium-F10 didn’t really do magic, beyond Mium’s normal tricks, it’s not really clear whether the issue lies with Mium or F5 and/or F8. It would be interesting to see what Ila-F8 or Ila-F5 would do. That said, I have this impression that she wouldn’t really run well on that hardware. I think when she was running on Mium, she was really running on MYM, who has the normal supercomputer sort of thing going on. Also, to an extent, Mium-F5 and Mium-F8 probably use a certain amount of that supercomputer power to operate as well.
“There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home.”
LOL! Exactly what I was thinking!!!