Legend of Ransera

Posted: **Wed Nov 13, 2024 3:53 pm**

5th of Ash, 124th Year of the Age of Steel

Together, her and Private John Baccas, worked well into the night. She had pried as much as she could from him and yet it still wasn’t enough. Olga hadn’t realized how carefully the Gelerium Imperium selected its operators; that, and she hadn’t even realized Baccas wasn’t considered a simple driver, that his title was Operator. A stupid mistake - and costly. Once she’d dismissed him, Olga had spent hours navigating the freshly weaved layers of the core. Driver, to it, became Operator, and all of which she’d once inscribed need to be done again.

But it wasn’t a mistake she couldn’t recover from. By the next morning, things were well enough she invited Private John Baccas to continue the work.

Tolfar, too, to stand in for the Gunnery Sergeant Jamison R. Dusseldorf. Olga had called him late into the night. That there would only be two (her and Baccas) in a circle meant for three risked an imbalance, all the more greater that there were five cores being enchanted over the single one. He’d brought his own copies of the Operator materials, the written instructions, and elsewise, but his role was largely to be a third set of ears.

He’d come early, too, this morning. The change in individuals meant a change in glyphs. Olga had to order in a third Scrivener to help strip Dusseldorf’s information from the cement floors ger lab. It took time and effort, but together, they were able to remove the glyphs and pictographs, and then more time and effort to add in Tolfar’s. Olga didn’t enjoy this part of her work, the sudden changes, the resources required (and lost) to adapt. As much as she would never wish to burn her own soul with one of the Runes of personal magic, she did (begrudgingly) admit envy in one regard: flexibility. World magic was so set once it began. Everything required a plan, and the resources to complete it.

A mistake in personal magic might cost a hand and then some, but what was done, was done - nothing but a well-earned caution would stop a personal mage from casting. Money, time, and then some all worked against a world mage.

“I am expecting Private John Baccas to arrive soon, Tolfar,” Olga said, doubly - and triply - checking the work. She was sure to match the actual glyphs to those she’d sent for examination to Professor Windrow. Another mistake would be doubly costly to correct for - that, and with another individual’s ideas and thoughts to consider, all the more difficult to unravel the Core to a point where she could undo and redo the work. Regardless of the time, she’d have to do it, too. Already she’d cost the Gelerium Imperium five dragonshards. A small cost and one well-rewarded if she was able to see this through. But if she failed, well.

If she was lucky, it would only be her checkbook that suffered.

“Yes ma’am. Will he need a copy of the Operator’s manuals? Or the instructions for the tank’s Operators?”

“No. You and I will be busy reading, and confirming his word. All I need from Private Baccas is to remember his training.”

Posted: **Wed Nov 13, 2024 11:48 pm**

As expected - and exceptionally timely - Private John Baccas arrived.

“Thank you again, Private,” Olga started, heading over to her own part of the ritual while Tolfar led the Private to his space. “I know it’s more time than I had initially planned.”

“It’s fine. This is my job, I mean.”

Olga shrugged. He wasn’t wrong. This was a part of his job, and even if he hadn’t been willing to accommodate her, he didn’t really have the choice to say no. The Gelerium Imperium wanted enchanted tanks. Olga was able to provide them, assuming she had one of the Operators to provide the directional training. That’s why she’d reached out to Private Baccas at all.

“Still, you might’ve made this more difficult.”

“I could have, but I’m loyal.”

“That’s good to hear. I would expect anyone involved in this project would be, of course,” and she said this more to ensure no one could say that when the opportunity came, she never so much as suggested she wasn’t loyal to the Gelerium Imperium. No, Olga Barber was as loyal as anyone. More so, even, when it came to proving herself worthy of the very generous military grants.

“Are we ready to start?”

“Almost. You’ve reviewed the training manual?”

“Yes.”

“I have a copy here.”

“In case I forget?”

“Sure,” Olga said, settling into a sitting position. “But also as a secondary source. It helps to have a variety of information to sort through, when teaching the tank.”

“That’s why you invited Gunnery Sergeant Jamison R. Dusseldorf to yesterday’s session?”

“Exactly. Tell me when you’re ready.”

“I’m ready.”

And, as she did yesterday, she placed her dragonshard focus - a small red wand - against the scrawling spiral of glyphs and pictographs. The magic responded and a wind, without sound or true physical power, immediately spun through her and the whole of the ritual. “Began at your pleasure, Private!”

And, so he did. “There’s a number of instructions provided to us, the Operators, about how you -.”

There, she almost stopped him. It was strange, and within the Imperial Academy of Arcane Science, not recommended to provide any internal sense of being to a golem. When they began to think, while interesting, they tended to become dangerous. Private John Baccas hadn’t known that - Olga hadn’t explained it. And while it would’ve been easier, perhaps, to warn him against that, it wasn’t too much for Olga to weave over it. Her Scrivening layout caught and trapped the personal, the existential, and spun it back into nothing, reaming it back inside the head where it came from to start. Besides, she didn’t need Baccas to stumble again. This was better. She didn’t correct him.

“Three taps to go. Two to stop. One at the left side -,” and as he worked through the instructions, Olga provided more context. What ‘go’ looked like, which was forward. Then, ‘stop’, which was stillness. The opposite of go. Once the context was added, opposites were the easiest things to build out.
“- for the right.”

And, like stop and go, left and right were easiest to do once developed. She marked the diagrams she’d carried into, clearly denoting left and right - and then she moved it as if steering, reminding the core to understand that left and right came more from the hands of the Operator than anything the tank would know on its own.

Together, Olga and Private Baccas and Tolfar worked to create the foundations of the core. They worked through the instructions, and then through the expectations of the role of the Operator. The tank would be subservient to the Operator in most battle situations - only in the most extreme situations would it take over. For instance, in the case of the death or absence of an Operator, the tank should - would - retreat on its own. Death was too complicated, so they taught it time, and they worked through seconds and minutes and hours, and in the case of being alone and untouched for seven minutes and it wasn’t ‘home’, it would return. And if it was ‘home’, and it wasn’t touched for several hours, it would remain dormant - emptying itself of all ammo.

Of course, then they needed to explain home. Which involved geography. It needed to understand where the Gelerian Imperium was, and how it might understand directions, and identify where it needed to go. The tanks, luckily, weren’t being carted far, or overseas, so there were general landmarks they could work with - and a limit of how far it would go anyway. If someone decided to take the tank to Ecith, for example, the tank would be well lost if it needed to return.

And, of course, they were slow-going. The Tanks wouldn’t attack anyone without being directed to - which of course, only Operators had the code for. And, if they weren’t being attached, or driven, any Operator on the field should be able to claim a lost Tank en route to the base back to the Imperium. Unless, of course, a different ‘home’ - or base - was decided upon. That, too, took time to walk though. A code needed to be decided on. Geographies and names of bases had to be explained, leaving aside the possibility someone had the code to direct the tank to a completely new place. And, of course, an Operator could do that.

Then they needed to explain something more technical. What ammo was, and who would be inserting it, and how it could leverage this. Olga had done some math, very high level, and then had found another researcher to help her. Small equations the tank could do on the fly, once she worked through the basic bits of information. That was, of course, a later - and the more final piece - of Artifice that needed to be doing.
And that would be done without the Private John Baccas.

“Thank you, Private, for your contributions. Your part has come to an end. I can finish things from here.”

“Happy to oblige, Professor.”

Legend of Ransera

The Sky Above pt. 5

The Sky Above pt. 5

Re: The Sky Above pt. 5