[Like most Tuesday mornings, Desidera had spent a part of the morning at the Mythril Cage for one of her usual practice sessions. These sessions were still without any real supervision, letting her handle things in whatever way she felt they should be handled, by now a pretty clear sign of the confidence that Valvatorez had in her.
After the session, she went to her morning classes and then after that was a visit to the cafeteria for lunch. Nobody really questioned how much she ate, anymore.
And after that, today, she'd decided on paying the professor a visit. These visits were less frequent than before as they weren't really needed as much as they were back when she was new to the academy, but she still needed to keep him up-to-date on the way things were going for her, and occasionally he would recommend new things for her to try doing—sometimes without any direction outside of telling her the intended results, in order to see how exactly she would do it.
Today's visit in particular was because she'd had a rather interesting thought about the way her powers worked, and wanted to run a subsequent idea past him rather than just go for it.
As was generally the norm by now, she wandered into the office without any real warning and sat herself down, waiting for him to finish whatever it was she caught him in the middle of this time.]
[Today, Valvatorez was spending most of his time in his office straightening up and cracking the books hard on their new Herald friend that had showed his face. Of course, he'd heard the name sometime in the past, but found out... startlingly little about the daemon behind it. Even many records he'd dug out of the archives weren't proving to be of much help yet.
Truth of it was, he had been up all night working, and well into the next morning, still grinding the midnight oil by the time Desidera came in. Though despite the all-nighter, the professor didn't look much for the wear; being a daemon had some advantages, but there was a massive thermos filled with coffee on his desk.
Once Desidera wandered in and sat down though, he looked up from the thick, ancient tome he'd been studying to look at her.]
I had a bit of an idea this morning and wanted to see what you thought of it before I went and tried to do anything too silly. [... Too silly? Well, this should be good.] We both know that what I do involves shadows, and I've never really given too much thought to the implications before, but doesn't that mean that, although indirectly, I can manipulate light?
[Oh, there she went thinking again. Desi was always a clever one, so when she got an idea in her head, she usually wasn't shy of at least experimenting with it.
Valvatorez hummed aloud, pensively thinking and trying to think about this in three dimensions.]
...Did you have a theory in mind to work with beyond just that initial thought?
[She probably did, and he wanted to hear it if so, to get a better idea of how to give the most appropriate answer.]
If I were to remove the shadows from any given space, then that space has to fill with something else, right?
[It's doubtlessly happened every time she's gone and done anything, but not on any particularly noticeable scale, and certainly not as a deliberate action in itself. That, and in various situations before, what was or wasn't happening on the walls or floor wasn't what people were paying attention to—a fact that she's readily taken advantage of before.]
I've started wondering if I might be able to take advantage of that, somehow. Let's say like, ah, taking all of a darker room's shadows and trying to move all of it to a single place. Aside from the obvious building of a single, pitch-black thing, that would also have the effect of lighting that entire room, wouldn't it?
[Valvatorez reaches out and takes a sip from his cup of coffee, placing a bookmark in the tome before shutting it. Bits of dust kicked up from the volume, and slowly drifted down to settle on his desk.]
Well, magic works in strange ways. Depending on your source of light, you might get different effects. In the case of a room filled with a low, mundane light, moving the shadows out of their normal positions might cause the light to move differently in the room, but it wouldn't really make it "brighter," per se. It doesn't create 'more' light, but would cause it to diffuse further into the space. But it would expose anyone hiding in those shadows.
It would, however, look incredibly unsettling and uncanny to the mundane eye.
I've used tricks like that before to put humans on edge back in my Tyrant days, as a matter of fact.
[He leans forward, resting his elbows on his desk and his chin on clasped fingers.]
With magical light sources, however, things can get more... interesting, depending if the light source is benign or hostile. Say, if you were try to move a hostile light source, like say, from Lady Amaterasu, if you were in a fight with her. Odds are, that light's going to do whatever she wants it to do, and your shadows probably won't be able to stem the tide of that; you'd need an overwhelmingly strong control over shadows to best that. That's not even something I'm capable of against Amaterasu, given she is a goddess of sunlight.
...But from a benign, or even allied light source... well, you might get plenty of control, particularly if they're working in sync with you. ...So you're probably thinking how you can use that when working with him, aren't you?
So under normal conditions, it would make it a bit easier to see, but not do anything especially noticeable? That makes sense. And I can definitely imagine how it might look to anyone unfamiliar with what's going on.
[The bit about magical sources, she expected that much as well. In that sort of situation, it's less what she can do and more just how hard she can push back against whoever or whatever she's up against.
Then she gets called out.]
W-well, yes, but— [—but that's practically her default state at this point, and the phone on Valvatorez's desk rings, interrupting whatever she was about to say next. The caller ID indicates that it's a redirected call from the main office.]
[A proud little smirk crossed the professor's face at Desidera's reaction; seems he hit the nail on the head quite deftly. Of course, such a thing was predictable, given he was quite in the know about Desidera and Gunvolt being close to the point of being nearly inseparable. ...It helped that he knew how she felt about him too, really. But he didn't tease or make any other comments about her planning, believing it was nothing to be ashamed of, and that such careful trust and bonds between people might be key to success in what was to come.
Of course, when the phone rings, Valvatorez takes a look at the caller ID, to see if it was a call he could afford to miss. Alas, a redirected call meant it was probably important. With a look of minor annoyance at the phone, he gave off a short sigh.]
Hmph. Forgive me, I have to take this.
[The vampire swiftly picked up the receiver and put it to his ear.]
Professor Valvatorez speaking, how may I help you?
[Whoever it was that had just called may have just spared Desi an extra moment of mild embarrassment.]
Ah, hello, professor.
[...or could have just paved the way for potentially even more embarrassment, if the phone were loud enough that she could hear her mother's voice on the other end of the line. Fortunately it wasn't that loud, but at the same time there wasn't anything stopping Valvatorez from putting the phone on speaker if he really wanted to.]
This is Marise Neroni—Desidera's mother. I wanted to call and check to see how she's been lately, but it seems she's been a bit busy this morning and hasn't answered her phone, so I thought that it wouldn't be a terrible idea to ask her teacher. This isn't a bad time, is it?
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
3/17 afternoon, Val's office
Date: 2020-03-11 11:48 pm (UTC)After the session, she went to her morning classes and then after that was a visit to the cafeteria for lunch. Nobody really questioned how much she ate, anymore.
And after that, today, she'd decided on paying the professor a visit. These visits were less frequent than before as they weren't really needed as much as they were back when she was new to the academy, but she still needed to keep him up-to-date on the way things were going for her, and occasionally he would recommend new things for her to try doing—sometimes without any direction outside of telling her the intended results, in order to see how exactly she would do it.
Today's visit in particular was because she'd had a rather interesting thought about the way her powers worked, and wanted to run a subsequent idea past him rather than just go for it.
As was generally the norm by now, she wandered into the office without any real warning and sat herself down, waiting for him to finish whatever it was she caught him in the middle of this time.]
no subject
Date: 2020-03-12 02:47 am (UTC)Truth of it was, he had been up all night working, and well into the next morning, still grinding the midnight oil by the time Desidera came in. Though despite the all-nighter, the professor didn't look much for the wear; being a daemon had some advantages, but there was a massive thermos filled with coffee on his desk.
Once Desidera wandered in and sat down though, he looked up from the thick, ancient tome he'd been studying to look at her.]
Ah, hello, Desidera. What can I do for you today?
no subject
Date: 2020-03-12 03:06 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-03-12 03:32 am (UTC)Valvatorez hummed aloud, pensively thinking and trying to think about this in three dimensions.]
...Did you have a theory in mind to work with beyond just that initial thought?
[She probably did, and he wanted to hear it if so, to get a better idea of how to give the most appropriate answer.]
no subject
Date: 2020-03-12 04:43 am (UTC)[It's doubtlessly happened every time she's gone and done anything, but not on any particularly noticeable scale, and certainly not as a deliberate action in itself. That, and in various situations before, what was or wasn't happening on the walls or floor wasn't what people were paying attention to—a fact that she's readily taken advantage of before.]
I've started wondering if I might be able to take advantage of that, somehow. Let's say like, ah, taking all of a darker room's shadows and trying to move all of it to a single place. Aside from the obvious building of a single, pitch-black thing, that would also have the effect of lighting that entire room, wouldn't it?
no subject
Date: 2020-03-12 06:06 pm (UTC)Well, magic works in strange ways. Depending on your source of light, you might get different effects. In the case of a room filled with a low, mundane light, moving the shadows out of their normal positions might cause the light to move differently in the room, but it wouldn't really make it "brighter," per se. It doesn't create 'more' light, but would cause it to diffuse further into the space. But it would expose anyone hiding in those shadows.
It would, however, look incredibly unsettling and uncanny to the mundane eye.
I've used tricks like that before to put humans on edge back in my Tyrant days, as a matter of fact.
[He leans forward, resting his elbows on his desk and his chin on clasped fingers.]
With magical light sources, however, things can get more... interesting, depending if the light source is benign or hostile. Say, if you were try to move a hostile light source, like say, from Lady Amaterasu, if you were in a fight with her. Odds are, that light's going to do whatever she wants it to do, and your shadows probably won't be able to stem the tide of that; you'd need an overwhelmingly strong control over shadows to best that. That's not even something I'm capable of against Amaterasu, given she is a goddess of sunlight.
...But from a benign, or even allied light source... well, you might get plenty of control, particularly if they're working in sync with you. ...So you're probably thinking how you can use that when working with him, aren't you?
no subject
Date: 2020-03-12 06:32 pm (UTC)[The bit about magical sources, she expected that much as well. In that sort of situation, it's less what she can do and more just how hard she can push back against whoever or whatever she's up against.
Then she gets called out.]
W-well, yes, but— [—but that's practically her default state at this point, and the phone on Valvatorez's desk rings, interrupting whatever she was about to say next. The caller ID indicates that it's a redirected call from the main office.]
no subject
Date: 2020-03-12 08:10 pm (UTC)Of course, when the phone rings, Valvatorez takes a look at the caller ID, to see if it was a call he could afford to miss. Alas, a redirected call meant it was probably important. With a look of minor annoyance at the phone, he gave off a short sigh.]
Hmph. Forgive me, I have to take this.
[The vampire swiftly picked up the receiver and put it to his ear.]
Professor Valvatorez speaking, how may I help you?
no subject
Date: 2020-03-12 09:15 pm (UTC)Ah, hello, professor.
[...or could have just paved the way for potentially even more embarrassment, if the phone were loud enough that she could hear her mother's voice on the other end of the line. Fortunately it wasn't that loud, but at the same time there wasn't anything stopping Valvatorez from putting the phone on speaker if he really wanted to.]
This is Marise Neroni—Desidera's mother. I wanted to call and check to see how she's been lately, but it seems she's been a bit busy this morning and hasn't answered her phone, so I thought that it wouldn't be a terrible idea to ask her teacher. This isn't a bad time, is it?