Private Finished Group Research

"I um, think we should try to avoid lava ideally." She said, with a light laugh, though her own eagerness to begin was seeping into her speech as well as she looked over the books. "Sounds like a plan though, let's see what we can do..."

——

One afternoon of study and research later, the two of them were ready to take the theories to the practical stage. Wednesday found them an empty room, big and wide, intended for people to use to train their natural abilities, which meant that it was perhaps a little big for their purposes, but it also meant nothing would get damaged if something went wrong.

Not that anything was expected to go wrong. Wednesday was a merticulous sort, she checked and rechecked their runes and glyths multiple times, not willing to proceed to the test until she was adequately certain it would work.

"We should start small with the tests." She explained as she traces a symbol on the ground in the middle of the room. "Create a small flame and see how well it handles it, then keep going from there."

"Sure, I can do that." She said, stepping back as she finished her own little scribble. There was a brief flash, 4 paper-thin walls of translucent magic forming around the flame, before disappearing from visible sight. Just a precaution, on the chance they had messed something up.

She pulled from her bag one of the few stones they'd prepared earlier that day, returned the nod, before gently sliding it across the ground, letting it come to a stop in front of the flame.

The different runes and symbols that covered it softly glowed, humming as the fire appeared to be sucked in, like air into a lung. Wednesday took a few cautious steps forward, waiting to make sure it didn't suddenly burst on her, before kneeling down and holding her hand above it.

"Ok! Good start so far. The heat seems to have dissipated nicely," She placed a hand on the stone, still cool to the touch like it was when she'd tossed it in. "Looks like they handle small flames well."

She nodded with a smile, stepping back with the stone in hand as the paper caught alight. She gave it a few moments to make sure it was well and truly burning, then slide the stone back. Like before, the flames were sucked off the page, flowing into the rock in the same way. The paper was left charred but cooling as Wednesday inspected their handiwork.

"Looks like it handles non-magic flames well too," She said, smile widening with their success. "I say we go for a stress test now. Let's see just how much it can handle..."

She crouched down, starting to draw her symbols onto the ground again, readying a fire spell of her own.

"Oh, I wouldn't worry too much about that," She said with an offhand shrug. "These rooms are designed for people to, um, let loose, so to speak. With the number of kids who get brought to the academy who aren't fully in control of their powers the walls here need to be as durable as possible to account for them."

She isn't paying too much attention to what she draws as she speaks. At first, it seems like the sort of casualness born from muscle memory, a simple fire spell being something she's done plenty of times. However, even if Anne wasn't familiar with magic it wouldn't be hard to notice a change. Her symbols were rigid, orderly, and had a clear pattern to result in an effect. What she was drawing however was...different, swirling, chaotic shapes that didn't match up with any of her usual spells. Wednesday still wasn't paying attention to what she was doing.

"Still, it would um, certainly make it easier to clean up if we did mess up, so it's probably for the best." She said with a light chuckle.

"Just a bigger flame, the protective wards I put down earlier should keep it contained, which should help with the stress test if the heat is concentrated-"

The lines drawn on the ground suddenly sprang to life, constantly shifting and glowing with a sickly green light, not at all like her usual symbols. Wednesday recoiled with a sudden shout of surprise, backing up a few steps just as a bright fire burst from the floor, it's colour the same sickly hue as the glowing symbols, completely engulfing the crucible.

As she said, the flames stay contained within the protective barrier she formed, the flames forming a column of fire as they press against the translucent walls. Then, just as quickly as the flames sprung forth, the column started to collapse in on itself, the unnatural flames sinking into the stone.

The column shrunk more and more until the crucible was visible, but just as the last bit of flame vanished, the glyth on the ground flashed and vanished with a pulse of magic, a thin wave spreading across the ground that disappated just before it reached them, even if the residule energy was enough to make their hairs stand.

Wednesday face had paled, mouth opening and closing wordlessly in confusion.

"I-I uh...what did I just...what..."