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[Enemy post]

Yer a wizard, Bay12.


I've been wanting to do something low-effort but fun on the forums for a while, so I thought I'd start up a community playthrough of Choice of Magics by Kevin Gold and Choice of Games.

This is basically a more advanced Choose Your Own Adventure book. The way this playthrough will work is that whenever we come to a choice, we'll take a vote on it and then advance the story to the next choice, and so on. In the event of a tie, I'll flip a coin.

Thousands of years ago, the ancients destroyed civilization with five schools of magic. Each spell comes at a terrible price. Glamor charms your adversaries, rotting your body from the inside. Divination reveals faraway secrets, exposing your own secrets to others. Automation gives objects the spark of life, destabilizing the climate. Vivomancy can heal or change living things, with bizarre side effects. Blast your enemies with Negation energy, forming permanent clouds of deadly fallout.

As a young scrounger of antiquities, you hope to build your ruined world anew with these rediscovered spells. Now you must decide which of these magics can transform your post-apocalyptic society, and what you'll risk to bring hope and light to your kinsmen.

Can you bring the world back from ruin and shape a new society? Use your magics well, and you could become as a god; use your magics poorly and destroy the world all over again.

Chapter 1:The Lost Academy

You push yourself out the window of an ancient classroom, clutching a musty tome of vivomancy magic, and land with a roll on the cobblestone path below.

Above you, it seems to be night, and you're momentarily confused: how are you seeing stars, when stars have been obscured by clouds for over two thousand years? But then you realize the twinkling lights must be flecks of quartz in the rocky ceiling above, reflecting the light of the magical streetlamps below.

Those streetlamps continued to shine even when the Neighbors' magic pulled this academy underground. They shone underground, while above ground, Abraxas walked the earth and declared that magic was forbidden. They illuminated this ancient place of learning, while everywhere else, wizards were put to the sword.

You still can't believe your luck in finding this academy before the Church did. When you and Tal began following her bounty, a great burrowing wurm, you had no idea it would burrow all the way to this sunken academy and its long-buried treasures. Tal slew the wurm, and its final thrashes collapsed the tunnel behind you—but apparently not before an inquisitor followed you inside as well. He must have been shadowing you until you got your hands on this tome of magic, whereupon he shouted that you were under arrest—and here you are, more or less.

You have no idea how the inquisitor found you in the first place. Sometimes the Church has an uncanny knack for knowing things. You're not a wizard yet, but you're not sure the inquisitor cares about this technicality. He probably wants you dead.

Tal prepares to jump from the same second-floor window you did. Her fingers move to her eye patch, as if she's worried she will misjudge the distance. She hesitates a moment too long, and the inquisitor's crossbow bolt lodges itself in her leg. Tal grunts in pain, leaps forward with her good leg, and lands ungracefully, faltering because of the wound.

"Are you all right?" you ask her.

"Meh." Gritting her teeth, Tal jerks the bolt out from between the pieces of her black leather armor, ignoring the trickle of blood that results. "I'm fine, but I might have a little trouble climbing up to that open window over there. Which is too bad, because it seems like our best escape route." She nods to the tome in your hands. "Anything in there that can help?"

"I'm certain of it!" you say eagerly. You open up Praefata Vivomancia, or "Introduction to Vivomancy," the tome that you managed to peruse a bit before the inquisitor showed up. You recall the warning in the book's preface: the magic of life may have unintended consequences.

Well, isn't that true of everything in life?

1.Heal Tal's leg so we can keep running to the ancient dueling ground ahead where we can make our stand.
2.Sprout wings and carry Tal to a high dorm window, where something's glittering.
3.Part the wooden wall of the building next to us, dash inside, and reseal the wall.

Spoiler: Stats (click to show/hide)

As-Yet Nameless Protagonist

Magic
  Negation:0
  Automation:0
  Glamor:0
  Divination:0
  Vivomancy:0
Skills
Ancient History: 0 (Bad)
Fighting: 1 (Bad)
Subtlety: 1 (Bad)
Charisma: 1 (Bad)

Personality
Optimism:50%/Caution:50%   
Humor:50%/Solemnity:50%   
Empathy:50%/Calculation:50%   

Relationships
Tal: 50 (Fine)
Church: 50 (Fine)
Undiscovered relationships: 4

Kingdom
Adoration: 50%/Vilification: 50% 

Inventory
Gold: 100 gold
Sword

Students
None

Pets
None

The Dead
Nobody

Plot Points
Chapter 1

You and Tal stumbled on an ancient magic academy.
You discovered a book of vivomancy, and an inquisitor chased you.

[Glass]

Huh, neat.
I suggest option 1. It seems like the best long-term option?

I'll note that Vivomancy sounds like the relatively safest school of magic, though Automation may also be reasonable enough. Divination may be the one least likely to destroy the world, but considering anti-magic persecution, I find it probably one of the most personally dangerous.

[King Zultan]

Stop, Wizard Time! 1

Lets use automation to bring everything to life!

[crazyabe]

1

[a1s]

Since this is a play of a real game, shouldn't it be in this sub-forum?

[Knightwing64]

Ayo! I love this game, Btw, Automation is not as safe as you think

[Glass]

Btw, Automation is not as safe as you think

Hmn, suspected as such.
Let’s try to use Vivomancy instead of other stuff whenever possible.

[Yellow Pixel]

1

[Enemy post]

Seems like an overwhelming consensus that we heal Tal's leg.

Let’s try to use Vivomancy instead of other stuff whenever possible.

Huh, I would have thought that you'd be more of a fan of Automation.

Since this is a play of a real game, shouldn't it be in this sub-forum?

Maybe, I'll move it if I really have to. Dunamisdeos' Oregon Trail 2 was tolerated in this section, and that went well.

"I can heal you," you say to Tal. "Hang on." You listen to the sounds of nature about you and feel the invisible strands that connect you to everything.

"Wait, you're going to magic me?" you distantly hear Tal say, but the roar of life in your ears quickly drowns her out. You thrust a hand toward the ground and draw on the power of life.

The smell of fresh-cut grass fills your nose as you embrace the power of vivomancy. You murmur the words of power from your book, and beams of light shoot from your hand to the ground, illuminating tiny living motes that swim through the air toward your hand. When your hand feels warm enough, you clap it to Tal's leg, startling her, and push the magical power into her.

Tal remains stiff as the power flows to her. When you withdraw your hand, it is wet with her blood, and you worry that you stopped too soon. But parting her leather armor pieces and the torn fabric underneath reveals that the wound has closed entirely. (Gained Vivomancy.)

In the future, do you want to know when your skills change, as with this mention of gaining vivomancy?

Yes, show these changes. (Recommended.)
No, hide these changes.

Gonna go ahead and enable this, since we'll have a stats spoiler anyway and it means you don't have to double check everything all the time.

"You did it," Tal says, awed.

You then feel a slight queasiness—apparently, some of your own life powered the spell. Somehow, you had hoped the unpredictability of vivomancy would be more whimsical.

"Are you all right?" Tal asks. "You look a little unsteady." (Increased Tal Relationship.)

"I'm fine," you say. "Come on, let's keep moving."

Why did you choose to heal Tal for your first spell?

1.I didn't want to see her in pain.
2.I thought it would prove useful to have her healed.
3.I thought she'd be grateful and perhaps repay that gratitude.

Spoiler: Stats (click to show/hide)

As-Yet Nameless Protagonist

Magic
  Negation:0
  Automation:0
  Glamor:0
  Divination:0
  Vivomancy:1
Skills
Ancient History: 0 (Bad)
Fighting: 1 (Bad)
Subtlety: 1 (Bad)
Charisma: 1 (Bad)

Personality
Optimism:50%/Caution:50%   
Humor:50%/Solemnity:50%   
Empathy:50%/Calculation:50%   

Relationships
Tal: 55 (Good)
Church: 50 (Fine)
Undiscovered relationships: 4

Kingdom
Adoration: 50%/Vilification: 50%

Inventory
Gold: 100 gold
Sword

Students
None

Pets
None

The Dead
Nobody

Plot Points
Chapter 1

You and Tal stumbled on an ancient magic academy.
You discovered a book of vivomancy, and an inquisitor chased you.

[Yellow Pixel]

2

[Glass]

I mean 2 is exactly what I said as reasoning, so... :p

EDIT:

Let’s try to use Vivomancy instead of other stuff whenever possible.

Huh, I would have thought that you'd be more of a fan of Automation.

Oh, sure, if it didn't kill the planet I would. The planet which we're trying to fix.
I can like a power in general theory while not thinking the cost is worthwhile.

[Dwarmin]

1

[Enemy post]

We thought it'd prove useful.

This probably won't be the last time you both need to be physically fit, you reason. Better to heal Tal now. (Increased Calculation.)

You and Tal run across the grass until you come to a circular plaza made of obsidian. Here there are two long-dead skeletons. One, who fell at the edge of the obsidian, wears a crisp navy duelist's uniform with gold epaulettes, no doubt preserved by magic. The skull is missing. The other skeleton wears black robes, and has fallen on the grass just next to the first skeleton.

You inspect the two skeletons for any weapons you could use in a fight against the inquisitor. In the pocket of the black-robed one, you find a note with the following words:

Glamor: Philautia omnes, kleos venenum
Negation: Nihilo

You're in luck—this student was apparently going to cheat in the duel by using glamor magic to convince the enemy not to attack, followed by negation magic to blow the opponent's head off—and they've left you the cheat sheet for the magic words. You gather from the skeletons' poses that the obsidian must be antimagic. The black-robed student ran off it, and the duelist student followed, only to have his or her head disintegrated. Perhaps the duelist managed to resist the glamor and run the cheater through. But with what?

Inspecting the duelist's skeleton, you realize your luck is even better. In its hand is a black cylinder. You pick it up and urge a blade to appear.

A three-foot-long cylindrical blade of bright blue light appears and emits a faint hum. You experimentally wave it around: vwum-wum-wum. It's a luxgladius, an ancient sword of light. (Gained Fighting.)

Your dream has always been to be a wizard, not a duelist. But glamor magic is always accompanied by a slow deterioration of health known as rot, while negation magic leaves behind deadly clouds and may disturb the dark sun in ways you don't understand. And who knows what vivomancy may lead to?

This, on the other hand, is inarguably a fine weapon.

"Wow," Tal says admiringly. "Hey, here he comes. You know how to use that thing?"

1."Nope." Give Tal the luxgladius but try to use glamor magic to get the inquisitor to leave peacefully.
2."Don't need it." Give Tal the luxgladius, and cast a bolt of negation magic at the inquisitor.
3."Yell everything I need to know—I'm listening." Charge the inquisitor with the luxgladius.

Spoiler: Stats (click to show/hide)

As-Yet Nameless Protagonist

Magic
  Negation:0
  Automation:0
  Glamor:0
  Divination:0
  Vivomancy:1

Skills
Ancient History: 0 (Bad)
Fighting: 4 (Good)
Subtlety: 1 (Bad)
Charisma: 1 (Bad)

Personality
Optimism:50%/Caution:50%   
Humor:50%/Solemnity:50%   
Empathy:48%/Calculation:52%   

Relationships
Tal: 55 (Good)
Church: 50 (Fine)
Undiscovered relationships: 4

Kingdom
Adoration: 50%/Vilification: 50%

Inventory
Gold: 100 gold
Sword
Blue Luxgladius

Students
None

Pets
None

The Dead
Nobody

Plot Points
Chapter 1

You and Tal stumbled on an ancient magic academy.
You discovered a book of vivomancy, and an inquisitor chased you.
You found an ancient dueling ground.

[Glass]

3, I'd like to use a minimum of both glamor and negation.

[King Zultan]

2, Looks like we've found ourselves a lightsaber.