125, 2/2

Three hours later, and Erick was on a roll.

The fidelity of the recorder was not the best, but it was able to reproduce intelligible spoken words through the power of [Control Machine]. With a little bit of magic, Erick empowered the device to turn as he wanted, keeping all the cutting parts in perfect motion and in perfect alignment, allowing the playback to be as best as it could be, all without motors or any actual electronic control. This, however, was about as good as it was going to get. Erick was likely going to need to figure out electricity and transistors and circuitry if he wanted better recording devices, and that was rather far above him, at the moment. Someone else can do that. Or maybe he’d tackle that problem later? He could certainly experiment with electricity if he wanted. He had made that [Battery] spell way back during his time on Oceanside for just that eventual purpose, after all.

For now, what he wanted to do was recreate another 1800’s technology: the camera! As long as it hadn’t been done before, that is.

He asked Poi and Kiri, “Can either of you two think of any machines that recreate pictures of objects? Or magics, if there are no machines.”

Kiri said, “[Telepathy] images. [Lightshape] control. [Watershape] with paints. There’s a [Paintshape] that some painters use to recreate what they see with their eyes, or other senses. Lightward paintings.”

Poi said, “There are lightboxes, but they only produce basic images that most painters will then turn into paintings using the methods Kiri has stated.”

“Those are little more than sketching assistants.” Kiri said, “Like using a microscope to help you see the yeast that you have to [Grow] to make [Fermentation Ward].”

“People who use lightboxes still have to use [Lightshape] to fry the image onto the backplate; this is correct.” Poi added, “But those lightboxes are rather close to what Erick is envisioning.”

“Oh?” Kiri said, “Then my mistake.”

“This is good!” Erick said, “Next question: Are there alchemical solutions that perhaps turn into the colors they’re exposed to, or something like that?”

Kiri said, “If there were, I do not know. Alchemists tend to be rather secretive about their work, but practically any first-year alchemy student would know how to make a mana or health potion. I think what you’re looking for is rather specific, though.” She added, “Someone has likely tried to invent a ‘color fastening potion’, though, for use in lightboxes.” She perked up. “Oh. That seems like a very logical step, now that I’m thinking about it.”

“… And now that I think about it,” Erick said, “I’m not sure I want an alchemical solution, anyway. I want something completely non-magical…” His voice trailed off, as he thought.

Kiri and Poi watched.

After a few moments, Poi offered, “We could go buy some lightboxes? Maybe you could make a contribution to portraiture simply by making a better lightbox?”

Kiri looked at Poi, and said, “I’m sure he could. All the best artists I’ve ever heard of make their own lightboxes. Only the richest people buy them.”

“Oh oh OH!” Erick teased, “Well then! As one of this world’s rich persons, I simply must go out and buy one of them ‘boxed lights’!”

All Erick got were blank looks.

Erick mumbled, “Maybe I’m funnier than I think I am.”

“Always a possibility,” Kiri teased.

Poi said, “I’ll go wake Teressa.”

Erick frowned. “We don’t have to, do we? They’re both exhausted.”

Poi leveled a look at Erick, and Erick backed off.

In twenty minutes, they were out the door with Teressa in tow. Erick tried to apologize, but Teressa was having none of that. Five hours of sleep was more than enough, and besides, it was past lunch time.

Teressa said, “We spotted this one place by Wyrmrest that we have to try. They should be open for dinner, though.”

“Oh?” Erick asked.

With a soft smile, Teressa said, “Yeah. My…” She stumbled on her words, but then she just came out and said what she needed to say, “I have a great-aunt who married into Wyrmrest when I was a kid. I had forgotten about her until I saw Wyrmrest and Jane and I walked that way as we came back last night. I think it’s her restaurant.”

“Then we have to go there!” Erick agreed, “Absolutely!”

Teressa let out a small laugh, then nodded. And then her eyes went wide. “If it’s not her place, then I don’t want to eat there. I do not miss my tribe’s cooking.”

Erick laughed.

Teressa continued, “It was ‘throw everything in a pot and boil it for 5 hours’ stew every night. Very boring.” She added, “But the portions were good for the price.”

– – – –

With the subject of money coming up, Erick remembered he owed a certain goddess a certain number of grand rads. A quick flap of Ophiel’s wings brought the [Familiar] into his house, in Spur. A quick stretch of light grabbed two grand rads out of a pile that Erick had stored in the room below Jane’s mage tower. With a quick prayer sent to Rozeta, two brilliant sharp-edged jewels, each the size of a head, vanished.

Erick got no receipt, but then again, he wasn’t expecting one—

A blue box appeared.

Well okay then.

– – – –

They didn’t actually stop for lunch, but they did partake of the many vendors selling food on many different corners. Kabobs of meats and veggies. Candied apples. Roasted nuts. There was even cotton candy, which Erick just had to get because it felt right. That cotton candy even tasted like how he remembered: way too sweet.

– – – –

The people in the front foyer of Hotel O’kabil knew just where to send Erick, Kiri, Teressa, and Poi. The shop, called ‘Boxed Light’ was a popular place, located in the informal ‘mage district’ of Treehome, which was Arbor Nosier’s entire District. That particular Arbor had a great deal of love for all things magic, and Erick instantly felt a bond there. Upon reaching Nosier’s land, Erick stopped, and stared, and confirmed what he had felt when he heard of Nosier’s love of magic.

Nosier was a sea of green hovering in the sky, connected to thick branches that dropped thick trunks throughout all of his District. Around each of those trunks were mage towers. High class mage towers of stone, too, with five or six of them encircling each propping root, each cluster forming almost what Erick thought of as a proper city block, complete with skyscrapers. All of the outlying areas dwarfed the construction around the center, though. The central trunk looked like a tiered cake, which reminded Erick a little of Kal’Duresh, or the Palace District of the Brightwater.

This place was much nicer than both of those other places, by far. The air was cool, the sunlight filtered through the leaves above, and Triumph lights were strung up everywhere, while the tree that Nosier resembled was like seeing a friend Erick hadn’t known he had misplaced.

“He’s a banyan tree.” Erick gazed up at Arbor Nosier, and smiled. “I love banyan trees.”

Kiri walked on, down the stone-paved road, saying, “It’s this way.”

Erick followed.

‘Boxed Light’ was a happening place, alright. The store itself was almost a minor shopping center, with dozens of people walking through dozens of aisles where paints and fabrics and brushes and yes, lightboxes, were all on sale for the discerning customer. Most of the people in the store wore clothes much like Erick; nice enough, but not that nice. There were employees wearing brown, but almost every one of the customers had old paint stains on their clothes, which… was odd.

Erick asked, “Doesn’t [Cleanse] take off paint?”

Kiri led the way toward the back, where they kept the lightboxes, saying, “Not always. All professional painters use minorly magical paints specially created to make it so [Cleanse] doesn’t work on them.” They passed a display of smaller paints. Kiri pointed at them, saying, “Those are the non-magical pigments meant for practice work. You can [Cleanse] those.”

“But when they dry? [Cleanse] still doesn’t work on the special paints?”

“Uh.” Kiri guessed, “Finished paintings become objects in the manasphere?”

Poi said, “Using [Cleanse] near paintings is still a sure way to accidentally ruin them.”

Erick went, “Hmm.”

A short orcol woman in brown, who was still taller than Erick, came up to them saying, “That is correct, sir. But we do have paints that are especially resilient toward [Cleanse], and even if you accidentally tag one with that spell, you can be sure to [Mend] the problem away. Can I help show you those paints?”

They were close by the lightboxes, so Erick pointed, saying, “I want one of those, and I want to know how they work.”

The saleswoman’s eyes lit up briefly, possibly with greed, as she happily said, “Of course, sir. Right this way.” She plucked a thin book off of a shelf of similar books as she moved behind a counter that blocked the fancier-looking lightboxes from the rest of the room. She set the book down on the counter, saying, “This is an introduction to optics for the painter. Recommended for all lightbox beginners.” She halfway turned to the lightboxes, asking, “Any idea which sort of project you’ll be working on?”

“I’m very new at this, so just one second…” Erick opened the book, and flipped through it to get an idea of what he was looking at.

After a good twenty seconds, Erick knew that these lightboxes worked like primitive cameras, exactly as Kiri and Poi had said, but there was no film to these ‘cameras’. Some of the more delicate and high-class ones required a practitioner to use [Lightshape] and [Fireshape] to make [Radianceshape], which was then flickered in a flash across the target scene to be reflected through a nice set of lenses in the lightbox, onto a backplate made of thick paper.

Those smaller, portable lightboxes were just the first part of a two-part process, if you wanted a real painting of a good meter by meter size, though. For the largest paintings, you needed a special room set up with much larger canvases, where a special lightbox used the smaller picture taken with the portable lightbox, to project onto that larger canvas. [Radianceshape] was used here, too, to facilitate this transfer. Some lightboxes had this dual functionality built in, but according to the book, it was better to have two different lightboxes of high quality instead of one middling box of middle quality.

None of that allowed for full-color photographic quality work, though. All that a lightbox helped with was the transferring of a basic image of a scene, which was then painted over by the artist, using their own expertise and talent.

Erick looked up at the saleswoman, and said, “I want to produce full-color pictures of about hand-sized, with one click of one button. No need for painting or any of that. Is this possible?”

The woman lost a little bit of her smile. “You can do this. You just have to have certain specialty spells and other products on hand.” She reached back and pulled out a smaller booklet, saying, “This details how to make [Perfect Painting]. It is a tier four spell involving [Lightshape] and [Watershape] for [Paintshape], which is then combined with [Prestidigitation] and [Telekinesis] for [Painting], and then taken to new heights with practice and skill, to make [Perfect Painting]. Using this spell, some of our paints, and one of our Painting-class lightboxes, you can achieve your goal.”

Erick tapped a finger on the second book, saying, “I’ll buy this book, too, but you misunderstand. I want a mechanical way to produce perfect paintings. Or rather, I’d prefer not to use paint at all. I just want the color of the printing paper to change to the proper colors. Full fidelity. One click of a button.”

The woman regained her smile, but Erick could tell was an expression she reserved for when she suffered fools. She said, “We have no artifacts of this level, but I heard Ar’Kendrithyst is open to the public. Perhaps you should delve into the Enchanter’s Laboratories.”

And yeah, that was an insult. Framed politely, but meaning anything but.

“Apologies. I am not making myself understood.” Erick said, “I want paintings at the press of a button, with no magic involved at all. A pure physical process. No artifacts necessary.”

“Ah. Now I think you should talk to Rozeta, or one of the other gods. Maybe they can help you on your divine quest to ruin all honest painters the world over.”

Okay. So. Erick realized he might have been a bit… pushy. Or something. But there was no need for that sort of blatant insult. So, perhaps unwisely, Erick decided to pursue her insult. He hadn’t ever taken art history lessons, but he did see a fair bit of art over his year of life on Veird, and this woman’s argument that photography would ‘ruin artists’ was just plain wrong! A proper camera would just shift how art was made on Veird. ‘Realism’ and ‘landscape’ were not all that great, in his opinion.

Erick had seen a lot of art over his 48 years of living on Earth, too, after all.

Erick said, “Now there’s a fun argument. What do you think would happen if painters didn’t need to strive for realism?”

The woman huffed, then sarcastically said, “Why don’t you tell me, Seer.”

While Teressa and Poi had held back, as they often did, Kiri remained at Erick’s side, so this woman obviously did not understand that he was here with his guards. She did not understand who he was, and her rising voice proved that.

Not many people in the rest of the shop did, but they had started gathering ever since the woman began raising her voice, and insulting Erick. They watched the growing argument from around the corners of shelves, with their paint-splattered clothing, alongside other people in brown clothing, one of which Erick guessed was the saleswoman’s boss, just by virtue of his uniform being slightly nicer than the woman’s. That guy wasn’t willing to get involved, though. He had definitely seen that Erick was guarded by two other people, hanging back from the confrontation, and his eyes had gone really, really wide, upon seeing Erick. Almost no one in the room knew who Erick was, but the salesman certainly did. And yet, still, he did not get involved.

Erick said, “I’m not a Seer, but I know a bit about the painting styles of this world, and I have a few more that I’d love to show you that come from a different sort of world.” At that, the woman lost some of her annoyance. She turned questioning, but Erick didn’t give her a chance to speak whatever revelations were going through her mind. He quickly grabbed some rubber erasers from a bucket of them on the counter, and taking one in his hands, said, “Feel free to [Dispel] these if you want, but there’s a lot more out there than realistic painting.”

With the work of an intense second, recalling some of his favorite paintings he had ever seen back on Earth, Erick conjured a lightward of impeccable quality, reproducing something rather close to what a master painter had made many years ago.

Blues tumbled into whites, which swirled around yellow stars and a bright moon, while the sleepy countryside continued to sleep, and a spire of black bushes reached up toward the sky. Or at least Erick thought they were bushes. They could have been something else.

“This one is Starry Night, a Post-Impressionist painting by Vincent Van Gogh, made about 150 years ago. That description is on the bottom of the painting. It’s very famous, and I think I’ve done it justice. Hopefully.” He moved the eraser, and moved the lightward, too, adding, “And it’s linked to the eraser, so it’s mobile— and also permanent.”

The woman looked at the lightpainting, her eyes going a little bit wider at the casual display of perfect lightward control. Or maybe it was at the lightpainting itself. Or maybe it was because of Erick, himself.

Erick set that painting aside by setting the attached eraser aside, and conjured Van Gogh’s Irises; a painting of blue flowers on green stems and leaves, growing in the dirt. “This one is another bit of non-realism painting.”

Then he conjured The Kiss; A man draped in golds of black and white surrounds a woman of gold and color, they are in love, they are framed by a darker gold and supported by rising flowers.

Erick said, “Art Nouveau. ‘New Art’. This is another broad category. This one is called ‘The Kiss’.”

He conjured an image of a woman reading a book that almost looked like stained glass, but highly stylized, and very close to realism. He said, “Alphonse Mucha’s Daydream. Also Art Nouveau. Also one of my favorites. Actually, I like that whole style, a lot. Most of what I remember comes from that art period.”

Erick conjured several more paintings done in the same style, of people, of advertisements for soft drinks that didn’t exist (yet, maybe), of flowers, of animals. “This whole style is very easy to play around with. It’s been copied a lot back on Earth, but I haven’t ever seen anything like it on Veird.”

By now, the saleswoman had gone pale, and quiet, as she realized who she was talking to. Erick tried to be as nice as possible with his tone and his words, but realistic painting was rather stale, in his opinion. If this helped to liven up the art out there that he had seen, then this was good, right? The people in the audience were certainly interested in his display, with most of that interest eventually shifting toward the paintings Erick was conjuring.

A skinny young orcol man, dressed in clothes that were stained with hundreds of paints, looked upon ‘Daydream’ like he was seeing the face of a goddess. His jaw held slack, his blue eyes sparkling with an inner light.

Erick conjured some of Picasso’s work, explaining, “Another abstract style. It’s called Cubism, and I remember a lot of it, and I like it, but there’s a lot of cultural stuff that just is not in the paintings that you have to understand in order to understand them. This particular one is called Guernica, by Pablo Picasso, and it’s about the horrors of war.”

A lot of eyes focused on that painting.

Erick moved on.

His next set of paintings were of things right next to him, but taken a magnitude higher; crisper, sharper, more more. He said, “These are just examples of Hyper Realism of things I see around the room. It’s a nice style. You probably already know this one.”

There were more people in the audience now. Maybe double as many as had been in the shop before. With a glance through Ophiel that he had left outside, and small, Erick saw that more people were rushing down the street, coming this way.

Oh. This wasn’t what Erick wanted.

He stopped himself there, saying, “And I am terribly sorry for throwing all of that on you, but there’s a lot more to art than Realism. In my experience, anyway.” He gestured to the books on the table, asking, “How much for these?” He gestured to the lightboxes in the back, asking, “And one of those? A medium-grade one.” He had spied the inner workings of many of them with a casual blink of mana sense and his [Greater Lightwalk] while he was talking. They were all about the same, as far as he could tell. He said, “Maybe that one?”

The saleswoman steeled herself, and said, “I am terribly sorry Archmage Flatt, for treating you like I have.”

“I’m sorry, too. I probably took that a step too far.” Erick asked, “So let’s just let bygones be bygones? How much for the stuff?”

Professionalism took over, as she looked to the lightpaintings, and said, “Boxed Light could never accept money from you. Take the books and whichever lightbox you wish. With deepest politeness, I would simply ask if you could grace us with one of your lightpaintings, if you could.”

It was a deal that favored Erick in a way that he was not entirely comfortable with accepting. But she was trying to save face, and Erick could respect that. He said, “You can have them all. I made them permanent because I was hoping to give them to you, anyway, if you liked them. I cannot claim credit for what others have done. Except for the Hyper Realist lightwards. That style is not mine either, but those particular images did come from me.”

The woman bowed, then reached back, and grabbed the lightbox Erick had indicated before. She handed it over, saying, “Thank you for coming to Boxed Light, Archmage Flatt.”

Erick took the head-sized ‘lightbox’, saying, “Thank you for being here.” He glanced behind him to see Teressa and Poi flanking him and the entire shop filled with people. He turned back to the saleswoman. Saying, “Pardon us, but we will be taking the quick exit.”

The woman nodded, as Kiri grabbed the stuff, and Erick grabbed his people with a light touch.

– – – –

“I didn’t know you knew art!” Kiri exclaimed, when they arrived back in their room.

Erick shrugged, saying, “I hadn’t thought to try recreating anything from Earth before, so that was a surprise to me, too.”

Kiri set down the lightbox and the books, asking, “Could I get a copy of that Arat Nervo stuff?”

“The translation is just ‘New Art’.” Erick said, “I’m pretty sure there is something similar to it on Veird, right?” He felt a sudden stab of embarrassment. “Ah. Shit. Was I talking trash? I barely know anything of the art styles of Veird.”

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

Kiri said, “Me either, but Realism is the main one, right?”

Poi said, “Nature Art is a big one. Other than Realism, Nature Art is probably the largest art style on Veird at the moment. And for a long time, too. I think you’d know them as ‘Landscape’.” His voice took on the air of an easy lecture, as he said, “Then you have Monster Horror, which is a niche style depicting the casual violence of the adventuring life. A lot of emotion in that one. Fantastical is a look to the ancient past, with people imagining what the universe was like pre-Sundering. That one has never been too much in favor, but you can find it in some places. And ‘Realism’ is a truly broad category.

“There’s ‘As you see it’ Realism, which is from the point of view of a person watching a scene. There’s Hyper Realism, which is one or a few objects or faces drawn out to massive proportions, with every detail visible. Very similar to the one you showed in there, Erick, with the lightpaintings of paint brushes in bottles and tubes of paint, done with an unnerving eye for detail. Coincidentally, it’s the same name, too. Then there’s Flowing, which is a Realism style similar to those Van Gogh lightpaintings, but much more based in real objects and people. Then there’s…” His voice trailed off.

Erick smiled, as he listened to Poi. Kiri and Teressa just looked at him like he was suddenly naked in front of them.

Poi suddenly paused. He reluctantly said, “… I like art.” He shifted the subject back to Erick, saying, “You probably started a small cultural revolution with what you did, just by virtue of the ease at which you popped out those light paintings, the breadth of style, the audience, and recent world-wide events.”

“Maybe I did!” Erick found himself taking a great deal of joy in that, as he added, “Did you see the face of that one kid when I popped out Daydream?”

Poi said, “When I spoke of a cultural revolution, I was not exaggerating.”

Kiri and Teressa gained some odd looks, and Erick did too.

Erick said, “I thought you were being dramatic?”

“Not at all.” Poi frowned a little, then said, “You are very famous, and… Your skill at creating those lightpaintings cannot be undersold. You probably handed that shop a good hundred thousand gold.”

Erick waved him off, saying, “They weren’t my art, anyway.”

“Two hundred thousand gold,” Poi said.

Erick winced a little.

Kiri smiled though, as she shrugged. “It is what it is.”

Teressa added, “You did say that you liked those styles a lot, too. I wouldn’t be surprised if we get solicitors looking to sell you art.”

Erick asked, “That’s all it takes, huh?”

Poi added, “The Headmaster is fond of Fantastical, so despite a lot of people never knowing what the Old Cosmology used to look like, that style still survives to this day. It is said that he buys whatever he sees if the art remotely resembles something he saw from before the Sundering. Sometimes he commissions pieces, too. Sometimes the gods commission Fantastical art.”

Kiri said, “Oh, yeah! You can make a lot of money if your personal Fantastical style is any good.”

“Huh.” Erick thought for a moment, then turned his attention to the lightbox he had ‘bought’. “So you know how to use these, Poi?”

Poi said, “If I did, I would have said something.”

Erick teased, “It’s hard to know sometimes!”