RP:Just Another Walk Through a Dank Mausoleum

Summary: Quintessa shows the Black Library off to Odhranos but when she takes him deeper into the mausoleum they discover more than just dust and cobwebs. Somehow Magik and Rinn are trapped! Can our unlikely duo save the couple from their cold prison? Find out below!

This is a Mage's Guild RP.

This is a Necromancer's Guild RP.

Black Library

As you climb down into this room its immense size is the first thing that strikes you. The old wooden ladder creaks un-nervingly as your foot rests on it. This dimly lit room is huge and filled with dusty ancient bookshelves. On examination you can see the shelves are carved from solid black oak, strong sturdy and known for its arcane properties. Lining every shelf is thousands of books all colors shapes and sizes. All the books appear to be about necromancy and black magic and thus the whole subterranean chamber is filled with a most ominous evil aura that seems to sicken right to the soul of any who enter. The smell here is of stagnation for not much fresh air reaches this place; it seems to invade the nostrils like some strange miasma adding to the sickly sensations the room seems to invoke. On the walls hang various ornaments from candle stick holders that bring a tiny tinge of light to certain areas and preserved skulls of all kinds of creatures from Human to Dragon, Drow to Centaur and things even stranger than that. Faint but heavy footsteps can be heard against the cold stone floor distantly so it would be wise not to stay too long without sound reason.

Quintessa Dragana waits patiently among the rows and rows of ancient texts housed in the Black Library, her mismatched eyes gleaming over the titles and authors casually as she slowly explores them. The changeling never let the entrance of the library out of her sight, however, as she was waiting on an invited guest. Provost Odhranos would have no doubt gotten her missive by now stating that a window of opportunity to visit a usually prohibited place would be opened. As a Sceleratus within the Necromancer's Guild, House Mahara was more lenient on Quintessa to allow outsiders in here, so the young spellcaster took advantage of this fact to offer the chance to the one person she knew would appreciate it most; Odhranos Kerrigan. Wearing a formal high-low dress under her fur-lined cloak, the changeling's kitten heeled shoes gently click on the floor as she nears the front desk to speak to the librarian once more. "You're sure nobody else has visited today?" The elder vampire at the desk sighs and looks up from her book. "Yes, Lady Dragana, for the third time you are the only one I've seen all day."

Odhranos, quite disgracefully, is late. The trip between Xalious and Kelay took longer than anticipated, and when the terramancer nears the yawning violet portal that marked the boundary of the kingdom of the living and the beginning of the kingdom of undeath, he feels an involuntary shiver run up his spine. Stepping through the portal does nothing to sooth this unease, and as the mage strides sharply through the dusk-swathed streets of Vailkrin, he glances about with narrowed eyes. Largely ambivalent to the practices of necromancy, and counting a number of vampires among his friends, The City of the Undead is not unsettling in its alien nature, but in its familiarity. Memories pluck at the terramancer as he hurries through streets he wishes he didn't know quite as well as he does, memories of his first unfortunate few days on this continent. Consulting the scrawled map crumpled in his fist, Odhranos makes a beeline for the Black Library, only pausing to catch his breath when he arrives at the entrance. Smoothing his robes and composing himself, Odhranos enters the library, suddenly finding himself blind in the deep gloom within. He blinks, standing in the entrance, as the indistinct shapes of bookshelves slowly swim out of the shadows.

Quintessa's eyes light up when she sees her friend and guildmate finally enter, and her lithe form almost glides through the darkness to meet him. "You made it!" the changeling almost squeals, suddenly appearing before the terramancer like an apparition. "I don't have any tea to offer you- they don't like it when you drink in here, but I can certainly quench your thirst for knowledge." Quintessa seemed to be in a chipper mood today, but she was always happy when showing things off to people. "Follow me!" The spell blade flicks her wrist, producing a soft, purple light in the form of an orb that followed behind her. Normally, Quintessa wouldn't bother casting Mage light but this was done as a courtesy for Odhranos's sake. The odd girl leads the man to the center most area of the library, ignoring the glare from the cross librarian that watches her pass. "This is the Black Library," she says, arms outstretched as she spins in a slow circle. "Home to the majority of the texts related to the Necromantic Arts. Over there we study curses, incantations and arcane sigils," Quintessa points out a large section of tombs before continuing, "Poisons and potions over there. That's where my book will be placed. Oh- and here is the section for the Black Tides, Mistress Khitti's specialty. I find her hands on training to be more informative than those books though. She's a good teacher."

Odhranos squints into the dark as he hears the shuffling of footsteps somewhere in front of him. Odhranos hadn't anticipated the darkness within the library and so his terramantic eyesight isn't fully awakened when Quintessa springs out of the shadows towards him, with her pale white skin so contrasting with the dark tones of the library. Odhranos takes a step back, surprised, before placing his hand against his chest and laughing sheepishly. "Quintessa, you startled me!" Once recovered from his fright, Odhranos relaxes as his friend leads him into the now less-oppressive darkness of the library. The dim purple glow of the mage-light is appreciated, as it is not quite bright enough to blind the terramancer, allowing him to admire the long rippling rows of book spines as they rear out of the gloom. "It's an amazing collection." Odhranos sighs, almost wistfully, as he leans across to read the titles embossed on the leather bindings, bringing his face close enough that his nose almost touches the presented spines as he tries to make out the text. After a moment or two of squinting, Odhranos takes a step back and slowly turns on his heel, to follow Quintessa's indications. His mouth breaks into a wide smile and he involuntarily squeezes the leather strap of his cage as if suppressing the urge to rush at the nearest shelf and read voraciously til he had absorbed every scrap of information there was to be found. "Xalious above, I want to spend a week here." Odhranos has to tear his eyes away from the shelves and turn his attention back to his guide. "Where would you recommend for a wayward scholar to start?"

Quintessa finds it funny when she startles people, probably a holdover from when she was a sneaky troublemaker. Nowadays the changeling's antics were well out in the open. Mostly. "Oh, where to start?" Quintessa does another quick circle, trying to think what the very best place to start would be. "Ah, I've got it!" The necromancer leaves Odhranos to enter the one area she had not pointed out yet, the section dedicated to basic resurrection and summoning. "This is the most necromancy-est parts of necromancy, in my opinion. Animating the dead is the backbone of the art. When someone imagines a necromancer they see a dark warlock summoning hoards of skeletons and zombies to destroy his foes, but that takes years of study for most people." Quintessa remerges from the darkness with an old tomb with a thick leather cover. "And it all starts here- The Minor Book of the Dead. This explains the basics, how lifeforce is similar to magic and can be manipulated in the same way, how necrotic energy can be used to simulate lifeforce as well, and not just to animate the dead. You can falsely extend your own life in pinch- I used a similar technique when I rescued..." Quintessa trails off before shaking her head, "Nevermind that, here's the book. This is where all good necromancers begin their journey." Lithe hands hold out the book for the terramancer to take.

Odhranos moves to follow Quintessa, but when her mage light stays and she goes, he finds himself loath to leave the little bubble of light. Ironic, for someone who finds the enclosed space of the underground so comfortable, Odhranos finds himself strangely ill at ease in the open spacious darkness. Odhranos shifts his feet slightly, and the ground appears to shimmer with small silvery ripples to the mage's eyes, as he feels out for the vibrations of Quintessa's footfalls as she talks from the gloom, reassuring himself that someone is still there. When Quintessa returns, Odhranos relaxes, smiling warmly upon seeing a familiar face once more. He turns his attention to the book, rubbing his arm behind his back to flatten the hairs that had stood on end. "Perfect, that's just the thing I needed. The Guild doesn't have many books on necromancy, and the few that they do have are of too advanced a level to be useful for me." Odhranos gingerly takes the book from Quintessa, gently leafing the cover open while he holds it steady with his broad long-fingered hand. Odhranos tries to make out the spidery words, but after a few moments, he has to fish in the pockets of his robe for a pair of wire framed glasses, which he flicks open before perching on his nose. "Mmhmm, this is just the sort of thing I was looking for." Odhranos looks up from the page and peers at Quintessa, the lenses of his glasses making his eyes seem larger than normal, standing out a purple-tinted gold and grey in the mage-light. "Is there somewhere we could sit? I'm conscious of standing around blocking up walkways. I've told enough apprentices off about it that I should really follow my own rules."

Quintessa smiles softly in the dim light of her spell when Odhranos asked about a place to sit. "Of course!" With a wave of her hand a square table with four chairs suddenly becomes visible as the candelabra that set upon it lights in reaction to the mage's magic. "You are right, of course- it's terrible for your posture." The changeling moves with the terramancer, dispelling the mage-light spell so it didn't create strange shadows along with the candlelight. Taking a seat, the changeling began to recount the things she had learned in the Minor Book of the Dead, testing her memory. "The entire reason I joined the Necromancer's Guild was to improve my curses and hexes, but the dark arts have become an essential part of my daily studies. With how divided I am between the martial and arcane, I might not ever become as powerful of a Necromancer as someone like Larewen or Daath, but I find myself in the unique position of being the only spell blade to ever gain membership with the necromancers. I've been able to invent many new spells because of my mixed education."

Odhranos follows Quintessa to the table, pulling a seat out for her before sitting himself down in the next chair. "Well, there can't be much said for my posture at the desk either. I'm due a visit to the healers in Frostmaw one of these days. My back has about a three month life-span before I need either a weekend in a hot springs or a wheelchair." With the light of the candles to aid him, Odhranos begins reading the preface of the Minor Book of the Dead. As surprisingly sour as necromancers seem, they are rather florid writers. Odhranos reads the word "corpusculent" twice in one paragraph before he has even turned the first page. "Have you found much means of mixing spellblade technique with necromancy? Most of the conventional necromantic arts bring up the image of a summoner standing back from the battlefield, rather than a swordsman in the thick of the combat. Have you had much luck with combining the two?"

Quintessa sits with him for a while, her mismatched eyes reflecting the light from the candles as she leans forward to half-read along with him. "I've had a bit of success," she says, thinking back to the duel she had with Vexar, "In Frostmaw, actually, against an elder vampire. I used a sigil to absorb his lifeforce, the necrotic energy keeping him undead, and used it to fuel a powerful Black Tides spell. I was able to use his own supernatural abilities to fuel my attack against him. I'm pretty sure that's what won me that fight." Quintessa seems proud of her victory. "I can show you a few things! Come on," the changeling stands from her place at the table. "The grave yard is the training ground for the guild. I'll have room to move in the grand Mausoleum."

Odhranos plucks at his bottom lip in thought. "Huh, using a sigil to interact with the lifeforce of another being. Fascinating. I wonder how applicable it would be to non-undead, that is to say, living creatures?" Odhranos hummed and hypothesised until Quintessa stood up from her chair. Odhranos glances up at her, his eyes large and surprised at the sudden burst of motion. "Oh? Ah! Yes, indeed. Do lead the way." Odhranos closes the book as he stands, pushing the chair out behind him before he pauses. "Ah. A moment. I won't be allowed to take this out, will I?" Odhranos is familiar with the tight security around the Guild's library, he imagined that the Black Library would be no different. Odhranos frowns in thought, as he cradles the book in his arms, like a child, sad to part with a new toy. "Can you show me where this goes? And may I visit again sometime when you are here? I'd like to do some more reading, at least to get through this book."

Quintessa smiles and leads him the section on animating dead, pointing out the gap where it once collected dust and cobwebs. "Yes, it's best to replace it. They give new copies out to beginners when they join the guild though, so I'll let you read through my personal book back in Xalious." With the tome back in its home, Quintessa leads Odhranos deeper into the catacombs for a physical demonstration.

Mausoleum

This room is circular with an arched doorways leading out north and south The doorways are grime arches with skulls indented into the stonework doomed to an eternity of starring into the gloom are their empty eyes. Many ancient stone coffins are sealed within the walls, each of which has a name and a date of death etched into the damp cold, grey stone. The room is almost pitching black and it is impossible to make out what the names are in the gloom. The only sounds that can be heard are your own footsteps upon the granite floor and the occasional drip of water from the decayed ceiling into fetid pools upon the floor. Multitudes of thick ancient spider webs hang from the ceiling as this area is not disturbed very often, save for the occasional visit from a necromancer, not the tidies of guests, many of them have left coffins open and the floor is littered in places with grimy bones.

Odhranos brightens up at the promise of being able to continue his literary foray, without necessarily having to return to Vailkrin in order to do it. "Thank you very much, I think I'll take you up on that offer." Odhranos slips the book back into its slot on the shelf before following Quintessa out of the library, his shoulders relaxing imperceptibly as he leaves the cloying darkness of the library… for the less dense but equally foreboding darkness of the mausoleum.

Magik is seated against the giant slab blocking the married couple from the outside world. To any outsider, the stone blocking an entrance to a special tomb inside the mausoleum would look highly out of place. A sloppy effort, but it got the job done. The Lyastri is slowly tapping a rock against the blockade behind him out of boredom and a slight hope that someone in passing would hear the noise. Holding his other hand out, a small flame flickers from his fingertips to light the small room just a tad, "Are you awake, love?" Silence. The flames fade as he stands in the darkness, grabbing his bow on the way up. Facing the slab, he presses a hand to it before swinging his bow at the stone a few times out of frustration. He finally yields to the blockade, tossing his bow to the side, plopping back to the ground.

Quintessa looks around the expanse of the mausoleum, not far from where Magik had stopped tapping his bow moments before. Something was off, but the changeling couldn't quite put her finger on it. She'd ventured back this far plenty of times to practice reanimation, sometimes leaving entire groups of undead behind for some unknown future use. The place felt a little bit more... disturbed. Quintessa looks back at Odhranos, her lips pulled into a straight line. "You can't see in here, can you?" Without needing an answer the hex blade turns back to the darkness and lifts her hand before saying the words to her spell. "Bydded goleuni." And all around the room large braziers set aflame, illuminating the area for the human. "I think somebody unauthorized has been back here... I hope they realize that the Necromancer's Guild occasionally places traps for intruders." Quintessa smirks back at Odhranos. "No worries though, I have access to the enchantments back here. We shouldn't be in any danger."

Odhranos pauses when the slight vibrations of Magik's tapping buzz through the stone beneath his feet, but by that point, they are so faint that as far as Odhranos can make out, they could have been made by any creature. "I can't see conventionally, no. But I can improvise. If you'll excuse me taking my shoes off." Odhranos crouches to undo his laces, pulling one pointed leather shoe off before the other, revealing a rather garish pair of red socks, which are swiftly removed and stuffed down into the shoes. Odhranos ties the laces to his waistband and stands again, tapping his now bare feet against the cold stone floor. "Much clearer." Odhranos murmurs, closing his eyes and abandoning the world of light and colour in favour of the silver and black world of blindsight. Odhranos raises his foot and slams his heel into the flagstone once, twice, three times. To his eyes, each kick send out a pulse of light, which swept through the ground ahead of him, slowing down through softer materials like earth and soil, speeding up through harder rock. The mausoleum lit up with the pulses of silver, as they swept through the space. Odhranos casts his gaze about, curiously, before turning his head suddenly to face the out of place stone that blocks one of the tomb entrances. He turns to face Quintessa, not opening his eyes, but he motions in the direction of the tomb. "Two bodies, still animated enough to appear lively. Whether they are alive or undead, I can't tell." Odhranos whispers to Quintessa, unsure of how his voice might travel if he spoke normally.

Magik coincidentally started banging the back of his head against the slab in time with Odhranos' stomps. "Come on, Magikrios. Think." He would have caught onto the vibrations were he not distracted with trying to find a way out. "Rinn.." he calmly called out again. Probably sleeping. She was a hard one to kill, being locked in here wouldn't do her in. As he finally sat still while he began brainstorming, he picked up on a hushed voice. His fiery eyes shoot open, providing the room with just a faint light. Reaching to his side, he very carefully and quietly grabs his bow to place in his lap. His eyes remain forward, searching for any movement from his wife.

Rinn was fully awake by now, and definitely more sober. "This blows." Magik was the only saving grace of being stuck in the tomb and she was thankful he had come along; she wouldn't think on the alternative reality. With a loud yawn she'd push to her feet, it sounded as if all the bones in her body cracked on the way upright. Stilling holding her sleeping/fighting/life's motivation juice in her hand she swish it around to gauge what was left. Less than satisfied she downed the remains and joined her husband at tapping away on the stone, hers came with a sharp glass made rhythm that she idly danced to out of boredom, hopefully the drumming would give sign of something more than just a restless corpse awaiting behind door number three. The sound of life on the other side caught her attention and she gave Magik one of those murderous expressions, "Reckon they're seeing if we're dead yet?" She whispered implying the slippery bastard brothers that put the duo in this predicament. As soon as the door would open, cause eventfully it would, Rinn would hurl her glass bottle and start swinging her shovel blindly while cursing their whore of a mother. The grave-robber was extra foul under the circumstances.

Quintessa watches with curiosity as the terramancer removes his shoes to feel the vibrations in the stone of the vast network of tombs. "Ah, good use of tremorsense," says the changeling, at least understanding on a theoretical level how the magic he was using worked. Quintessa was too flighty and too impudent to cast terramancy correctly herself. At the human's report that there were two moving bodies trapped behind the wall, the changeling frowns warily. She did not come dressed for combat- she didn't even bring her sword! "Only two?" Quintessa reaches down to draw a stiletto dagger from the thigh sheath under her skirt, "I really hope they're not hostile..." The changeling ducks her head into the doorway the Odhranos had identified held two captives. "Yep, they triggered one of the slabs. Normally we let intruders stave to death to use for more undead, but I guess today is their lucky day." Quintessa steps back, searching for a lever of some kind that would reset the trap. After a moment the young necromancer finds a series of chains and pulls them one by one until the mechanisms in the walls and floor rumble and slowly slide the slab back in place, ready to trap another group of would-be grave robbers. To Quintessa's surprise, when she looks up to see who they've caught she gets a face full of bottle. "Sonovabitch!" she yells, holding her bleeding nose with her free hand as she stumbles backwards. Hopefully Rinn wouldn't follow up with that shovel she was wielding.

Odhranos tilts his head to the side and frowns quizzically. "I don't know if you've buried any bards here recently, because whatever is in there seems to be trying to communicate with primitive music." Odhranos shuffles his feet to get a better stance, before raising his heel high, then dropping it with a fierce kick against the stone. A brightly glowing wave blasted out from the impact and swept through the stone wall, even going so far as to illuminate two sets of legs beyond the wall before the vibrations were diffused. "Huh, well, whatever it is, they certainly seem in pretty good control of their limbs. I'd rule out minor undead, unless someone with a particular talent for life-like animation has been around recently." Odhranos watches Quintessa's silver bootprints tracking backwards, before a sudden cacophony of rumbling and grinding half-blinds the mage. As he opens his eyes, his terrasense briefly blinking out, Odhranos witnesses Quintessa stumbling backwards, clutching her face, while a bottle bounces away to the side. In an instinctive reaction, Odhranos' hand forms a claw, which he pushes forward. A thick gout of sand erupts from the golden cage at his hip, which he channels into the now open entrance, greeting whatever was inside with a torrent of sand. Once he had mostly filled the cavity beyond, Odhranos clenched his fist, and the sand would solidify, trapping and immobilising whatever was inside in a thick mass of sandstone.

Magik had hopped to his feet as Rinn neared, turning to face the barricade once more, "At this point, I don't care who it is." As Quintessa cries out at Rinn's perfectly thrown bottle, Magik's plan of attack quickly changes. He recognized that voice. The shadows created by the now lit mausoleum indicate something headed towards the couple. The Lyastri takes a step forward, throwing his hand into the air while reaching for the back of Rinn's collar with the other. A fiery black pillar forms infront of Rinn before she can fully exit the tomb. The intense heat throws most of the sand into the air and melts the rest to glass immediately. "It's Magik and Rinn!" the elf exclaims, his voice booming throughout the area. As the sand solidifies away from the formerly trapped couple, Magik lowers his hand and releases his wife.

Rinn had never met this sandman and for all she knew he was in cahoots with competition, "Oh back to finish the job are you?!" She howled like a mad woman. She was mad in-fact, furious, also had been sitting in a tiny tomb that doubled as her toilet; she was far from the right state of mind. Not that much changed if you caught Rinn on a good day. Poor Quintessa took one to the face, would Rinn feel bad about? Not in this moment. Rinn lifted her shovel high with the shovel ready for dramatic wack-a-mole motions. "You're gonna die!" She shouted as her husband grabbed her clothing, "Cut the shyte!" She managed over her shoulder still in blind delirious rage. Eventually She'd calm just enough to lower her spade, "Nice catch there, kiddo." Rinn's greeting to the changeling came with a crooked grin and extra long wink.

Quintessa still has tears in her eyes when she hears Magik's and Rinn's voice but she can still make out the blurry pair behind the glass and sand. When Rinn comments on Quintessa's catch she laughs sarcastically as she raises up her dagger as if she's going to throw it at her. "I should see how well you catch this." The necromancer says before she wipes the blood from her nose onto her dress. "You two are lucky it's me who found you back here and not one of the elders." Her dagger is returned to her sheath as she pinches the bridge of her nose, wincing as she does so. "How'd you get trapped anyway? I thought you were supposed to be good at this kind of thing." Quintessa teases Rinn back with a crooked grin of her own.

Odhranos is winding up for a second volley when Magik shouts from inside the tomb. His hesitation with a follow up blast was almost glossed over by Rinn's incensed howl, but just as quickly, the shrieking tomb-raider did a full 180, now seemingly on friendly enough terms with Quintessa to be bantering, post-bottle. Odhranos drops his hands and the arc of sand rearing up behind him sinks and hisses back into the golden cage again. Odhranos turns to Quintessa, all the while keeping an eye on the tomb entrance for when the two mystery inmates emerged. "Are you alright? Let me take a look." Odhranos crouches beside the spellblade, whisking a handkerchief from his pocket and passing it across. Now close enough to whisper without being immediately heard, Odhranos flicks Quintessa a questioning glance. "Friends? Or are you stalling?" He asks, turning on the ball of his foot to look into the dark entrance of the tomb, where his sand was slowly retreating and collecting itself back up again.

Rinn was exhausted, her blood shot eyes told all. She just wanted a bottle of rum in the bath with her husband and to get some decent sleep. However she would put on a little longer and suffer through. She watched as the human male was so quick to show concern over Tessa, if Rinn wasn't so drain she would have laughed and even point a finger. He seemed to care but he also seemed clueless as to who he was running around with, the changling had taken far worse from the grave-robber; plus she was one tough little shyte. As for the whispers about stalling, Odhranos was lucky Rinn didn't hear. She'd give the pair a once over then look to Magik quizzically. He would shake his head at his wife and drape an arm around her shoulders as if he could read her thoughts. Magik shared his own whisper with his wife then Rinn would be quick to excuse them, "Uh, yeah. Look, thanks and all. I own you one." Rinn lifted a single finger, "Only one." There would be a second wink to down play how much she hated any obligations to anyone. The cracking of glass under the couples boots sounded their exit. Magik would obviously thank Tessa in a friendlier manner and mention something about seeing her at the HQ or something dumb Magik shyte.

Quintessa moves her hand to give Odhranos a better look at her nose, the slow dripping of blood still trickling from the tip. "I'm fine," she informs, and from the looks of things it wasn't broken. It wouldn't be the first time even if it was. Mismatched eyes flicker over to Rinn and Magik and she shrugs. "Yeah, they're friends I guess." She starts to snicker but it hurts her face too much, "Ugh... And besides, that's Magikrios Lyastri, he's an Auxilia Veneficus. So in a way he's both of our friends. The bottle-thrower is his wife." Quintessa wants to snicker again. "Magik is the pyromancer but Rinn in the one who is all fire, how's that work?" The crunching of glass under the couple's feet cause the girl to peer over, giving a knowing nod to Rinn. "Good, I might be calling in that favor soon than you think. Fair warning." With that she gives them a half-hearted salute and shifts her attention back to the Provost. "We should get going soon. I bet they took something and I don't want to get blamed for it."

Odhranos tips Quintessa's chin back gently to inspect the damage, fearing the worst given that the crunch when that bottle landed had sounded ungodly, but her diagnosis was sound. "Hmm. You're right. Probably suffered worse in duels, I'd wager." Odhranos takes a step back, holding the handkerchief out for Quintessa to stem any excess blood. The last vestige of sand wavers before hoovering itself up off the ground and returning into the cage. Odhranos half turns to following the disappearing backs of Rinn and Magik as they leave, and the terramancer deflates slightly as the adrenaline leaves him. "I thought the name rang a bell. Not exactly the first impression I would have hoped for. But still, hopefully I'll encounter him around the Guild at some point and properly make his acquaintance. His wife…" Odhranos' voice trailed off, but the face he made conveyed a wordless amount of yikes. Once they have left, Odhranos straightens and brushes the grave mould off his robes. "Right. Shoes, then I'm good to go." As he pulls his footwear back on, Odhranos glances sidelong at the spellblade. "Remind me to return to Vailkrin, so you can show me what you were going to before. I'm quite curious about this "sigil". I feel like it might prove a useful step forward for my research."