Word: Intramundane

 

intramundane

[ in-truh-muhn-deyn, -muhn-deyn ]

 

adjective

existing or occurring within the material world.

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               Derrick sat, waiting for his teacher eagerly. The man was supposedly one of the greatest mages in the world. Although, Derrick had not seen the man perform any magic in their first meeting, he still held out hope.

               The man in question came into the room a moment later. He had a scraggly beard, his clothes were dirty and it looked like the man had barely slept at all. He yawned and looked around the room until he found a coffee pot. Derrick watched him pour a large cup of the hot liquid before saying anything.

               “Uh, Prof. Windslow?” He asked.

               “Huh?” Windslow looked around, only then seeing Derrick. He let out a long suffering sigh. “Oh, great. You’re still here. Thought you’d’ve left already. Guess that means I gotta actually teach you something, huh?”

               The teacher trudged through the room and plopped down in a seat. He took a long drink of coffee before he said anything.

               “Okay, since you’re here, I guess you know the basics, right?”

               “Yes, sir. I was the best in my class.”

               “Yeah, great, good, wonderful.” Windslow finished off his coffee and set the cup down. He pursed his lips and blew out a long breath. “Okay, what do I teach you? Guess I should start with something simple, right? How about the planes of existence.”

               “That’s a simple topic?” Derrick asked. It sounded complicated, that was for sure.

               “Kind of. Depends on how deep you go. There’re people who spend their entire lives studying just one plane. Those people suck though and never do anything fun. All a mage really needs to know is the basic three, and maybe a bit about whichever plane goes with their magic.” Prof. Windslow did not elaborate further. His eyes grew distant.

               “What are the basic three?” Derrick asked, brining his teacher back to the present.

               “I was getting to that.” He said quickly. “Three basic planes of existence, let’s see, there’s the physical, the mental and the spiritual. Physical’s easy, so let’s focus on that one for now and do the other two when I figure out what the hell you’re supposed to be learning. Okay, so the physical plane. It’s where we are. Some people call it the material world, or the universe or the world or whatever else. The point is, we’re in it. Our bodies are anyway, but that gets weird really quick once you get to that stuff, so we’re not gonna for a while.”

               Derrick had gotten out a small notebook while Windslow was talking and was furiously taking notes. The professor paused to rub his eyes, yawn and then kept going.

               “So yeah, it’s pretty easy. Everything you can see, touch, hear, smell and taste is the physical plane. Not much else to say about it. Most of what we’ll do, even the magic stuff, will be here too. So yeah, for now, you’re gonna be sticking pretty firmly to that one. The other two are pretty important too, but you probably won’t be able to access them for a while. Probably. I don’t know what you can do.” Derrick opened his mouth, but was interrupted. “That wasn’t an invitation to brag, kid. It’s way too early for that stuff. Anyway, for now, that’s pretty much all you need to know about the physical plane. So yeah, lesson over, I guess. See you tomorrow.”

               “Wait, that’s it? That’s the lesson? There has to be more to it than that.”

               “There is. But you don’t need to know it yet, so I’m not gonna teach it yet. I guess you can, I don’t study…something. I’m gonna go take a shower.”

               And with that, he got up and shuffled out of the room. Derrick was left sitting there, wondering if he had made a terrible mistake.   

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You just know once the teacher gets his act together and actually starts teaching, he'll be amazing at it. That's usually the way these things go. I see no reason to change that here.

Word: Amendatory

 

amendatory

[ uh-men-duh-tawr-ee, -tohr-ee ]

 

adjective

serving to amend; corrective.

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               It was done. The essay he had worked so hard on was finally done. At least, the base version was done. The first draft. It would be finished with a bit of editing. He went back to the beginning and read. There were a few errors in spelling and grammar, but nothing that could not be fixed easily enough. And a few lines here and there that were not needed. And there was an entire paragraph that was in the wrong place.

               His breathing quickened as he read it. Had he really written this? There were so many errors. So many mistakes that needed to be corrected. He needed to fix them. He would not rest until it was done. He began to work, going over everything with a fine-tooth comb. He mercilessly cut everything that was not needed, allowing only his core idea to come out and really shine. Words, sentences, entire paragraphs were discarded until only the single, central jewel of the essay remained.

               When he was done, the essay had been trimmed down from ten pages to a mere three. He took a few deep breaths, centering his mind and allowing himself a moment to calm his wild thoughts. He had done it. He had condensed his ideas to a few, easy to read pages. It was clear, concise. It was a thing of beauty. He read over it and his eye twitched.

               It was wrong. It was all wrong.

               Not just the spelling and grammar. Not just a few sentences too many. No, the entire essay was wrong. In fact, the very idea of a mere essay was wrong. He needed to correct it. His ideas would not, could not, be contained by simple ink and paper! No, he needed something else. This mistake must be corrected. He had to fix it. But how?

               What method could he possible use to ensure all knew his brilliance? It needed to be big. It needed to be bold. But it also needed to show the elegant simplicity of his ideas, so that anyone could understand them. It also needed to be something he could do within his limited means. He might have ideas that could revolutionize the world, but he still had a college student’s budget and resources.

               He leaned back in his seat and closed his eyes. Suddenly, like a bolt of lightning, he knew what he had to do. The idea was rough and unrefined now, but he could work with it. He could fix the mistakes and make it everything he needed to to be, and more. He leaned forward and closed his flawed, misguided attempt at an essay.

               He would not discard it though. No, he needed it as a placeholder. A way to store his ideas until his new idea could come to life. And for that, it was adequate. But for now, he had more important things to do. He cracked his knuckles, placed his fingers on the keyboard, and began to work.

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No way this doesn't backfire on this guy, right? 

Word: Arcane

 

arcane

[ ahr-keyn ]

Save This Word!

adjective

known or understood by very few; mysterious; secret; obscure; esoteric: She knew a lot about Sanskrit grammar and other arcane matters.

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               The old man perused his collection of writing implements. Which one should he use today? There were so many options. A good sturdy ball point? Or maybe something more elaborate, like the feather quill? He supposed it depended on what he was writing. Different tool for different jobs and all that.

               He Turned away from the wall of writing tools and to the book. It was blank, as always. But that would change soon enough. It always did once something to write on graced his desk. Yesterday it had been a dusty old scroll. Today was a book. The cover was good, but cracked, leather, and the pages were yellow with age. An older book then. He closed his eyes in thought. Something obscure then. Something with weight to it. Nothing fancy though. No, that was reserved for newer texts. Sure some embellishments and flowery language was expected, but the core should remain accurate.

Maybe something with some real power to the words? He had not penned a good grimoire in…well, he forgot. It had been a long time. It had been so long since he had written out so much as a magic scroll that he almost forgot he could sometimes. But, then again, as time wore on magic was becoming less and less important. Technology was to modern day magic, but it just lacked that certain special oomph that a real spell had.

And this was not a modern book, so he might even be able to get away with it. People would have a fit. Opening an old tome and expecting an old record book or story, and getting the method to turn people blue. That would be great fun to watch. Then again, with the way the world was these days, he supposed that someone could get in trouble with even simple magic.

It was not as interesting, but maybe it would be best to stick with something mundane. Maybe a book of songs to some minor lord would be good? He could write one of those quickly enough. But it was so boring. Sure a bit of obscure knowledge was always fun, but still. There were so many of them that if he wrote that, the best he could hope for was the book being stuck in a museum and copied by people who did not appreciate his work.

He had written enough dusty old books and cargo manifests that he was itching to break out the really interesting writing tools for once. Sure it might cause problems, but they would be entertaining. And that was good. It was living up to the purpose of books. The two purposes he knew well, to entertain and to inform. A book of magic would do both of those things.

The old man smiled and nodded. He went to the wall of writing implements and chose the one he wanted. It was long and thin, made of a material mankind had long forgotten about. It was a tool used for writing magic. He took it almost reverently, brought it to the book, and began to write.

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So does this guy write every book in existence and "send" it to the author? Or is it more of a general muse situation? I wonder. Maybe someday I'll figure it out.