Legacy Tester (Panna Cotta)

[Hadrian]

19th Summer, 510 A.V. During the course of his life at the University of Zeltiva, Hadrian had received his education from masters in their fields, but even as a student, sometimes his ideas had strayed from the orthodoxy and the occasional professor or scholar would condescend to tell him that he just didn't understand this or that concept, so he learned to keep his own council in many regards. As the prize pupil in the realm of magecrafting, he had learned quickly to make no inquiries into the red-headed stepchild... Malediction. But here he was among the walking dead and a golem announced a need for legacy testers. Of course, he was leery of golems after his initial welcome to Sahova, but people on the island held out opportunities for knowledge like candied apples to a child and he couldn't help but accept a few. Fortunately, this golem didn't seem to be the homicidal variety, and was able to lead him to the proper laboratory. Hadrian carried everything with him because one never knew in Sahova, and he was pleased that this laboratory seemed to be above ground, which made it more likely he would be able to survive the environment. It made sense, though, when he thought about it. There was little to do as they walked but think and observe his surroundings. Golems weren't much for conversation. But with what he understood of the underground laboratories, they might be full of gasses and the like which would be harmful to the organic compounds of a malediction ritual. "Thank you," he said politely to the golem, unnecessarily, perhaps. He took a deep breath -- it might always be his last in Sahova -- and knocked on the door.

[Panna Cotta]

The barrel-chested golem rumbled, and from the slits that made its mouth came the same metallic voice, "Task number 42. Legacy Tester for Frankie Lee Tieh taken by Hadrian Aelius." It beeped a few times and whirled away.

The door swiveled open as soon as the knocking ended. There was no one to greet the young magician, though. The mechanism must have been magic. Hadrian met the rest of the room, a brightly lit laboratory that stank of blood and chemicals. Thankfully, none too poisonous.

This was a private laboratory, unlike the commons the owner seemed to have decorated and arranged the furnitures and equipment in a U-Shape around the large room. On the carpeted floor was a board with a ritual circle in it, used candles, signs of explosions and dried blood. A couple of precious gems lay on the floor, used glyphs visible; a few tomes were scattered, books in stacks and in a heaps. A cloaked figure was bending over one of the working desks, reading and writing, deeply immersed in its research. A few scrolls flew down from the ceiling.

Hadrian could see the resources, both magical and not-so-magical, of the wizard. The ceiling was far from his head, and a few shelves stood high, towering the room. There was no way for a normal human to reach the top shelves, but a regular wizard who knows projection would be able to manage. There were a few hanging shelves made of iron, nooses holding a wide variety of human and animal(?) skeletons. On one side was a tidy bookshelf, no doubt a collection of rare knowledge.

"A pleasure to meet you Hadrian." An androgynous voice greeted its visitor. The crooked figure straightened up and faced Hadrian. "I assume you know what you're here for?"

The woman was not remarkably beautiful, she was slim and malnourished, her eyes baggy and deep from exhaustion. Her deep gray cloak hid wisps of her brown hair. Her left arm was bandaged, carried in a sling. Physically, she looked weak, like an overused prostitute or an overworked mother. But her eyes and her spirit was something else. There was a strength and passion in her light brown eyes, belittling her weak frame, exuding pride and tranquility.

"I'm Tieh. As you can see, I'm a pulser like you." A thoughtful giggle. "I didn't expect that Sahova had a paucity for assistants. I am quite surprised to find another human." Her face lit up, and signs of death faded away from her face. "Might find a Konti next, who knows?" A malicious gleam lit her eyes.

"Don't get me wrong, though. I'm so glad to find another human being. How long have you been around? I assume Sahova has been kind, since you are still alive, but not kind enough." She moved awkwardly, from the edges of her cloak, Hadrian might catch a glimpse of a bandaged foot. Tieh projected a glass in her hand and summoned water into the glass. "A must," she referred to water reimancy, "if you plan to stay around here. It's not... well..." She handed the glass to Hadrian, or rather, she projected the glass to Hadrian's hand. "It's not the same as ordinary water," she stuck her tongue out in disgust, "but when ordinary water around you is saltier than a dried fish, you'd settle for the best you have."

Two chairs slided across the room. Tieh motioned Hadrian to sit beside her. "So, let's have a short chat. Tell me about yourself. And I'll tell you a little about me."

Tieh listened to Hadrian, nodding in time, saying the hmm's and ooohh's at the proper intervals. She was especially interested in Hadrian's affinity for magic. "I was like you, you know. Came here looking for knowledge. Got stuck for a few years. After a decade I decided to leave, but then there was nothing to return to outside Sahova. My parents have taken me for dead, and I could no longer live among... living people. Ironic isn't it? When I came back, Sahova had changed. I returned last season, if I remember it right. Hard to know the time of day when you're locked inside a windowless room," she smiled faintly at Hadrian. "They were short of hands, so I decided to take my old job back."

Tieh sighed and swept a look around her room, "Got more than what I needed, got more that what I wanted. Endless resources, nothing too rare. But the responsibility weighs ten times my old apprenticeship. As you can see, I'm also short of a hand." There was a hint of loneliness in her voice, quickly swept away by her soft laugh. "Accidents do happen, you know." She cocked her head towards the ritual circle. "That was mine, a little more than a week ago. Can't work properly since then so I decided to hire somebody else. Found out all the wizards seem to be hiring people outside Sahova every now and then. The hand shortage is that bad." Her shoulders shuddered, controlling herself to laugh at a private joke.

"I hope you don't have any... misconception about my craft. To be fair, I know a little magecraft myself, but I think you would best me in that area. Sorry, I'm straying from our contract. I needed a legacy tester, I've got a few working pieces ready, tried the first and you know what happened." She pointed at her bandaged arm. "Sometimes I wish I was one of them dead wizards, at least they could switch bodies when they're in a bad shape."

She stood and reached out above her. "Glassbeak talon." She turned to Hadrian once she got the maledicted item. She sat back and handed the talon to Hadrian. "Was wondering about incorporating these into anthropomorphic golems, it would be a blast to see a Walker run as fast as 60 miles per hour. I wanted to try it out if it would work, never got to the running part." Hadrian could examine the sharp claw - completely dried, and properly embalmed - almost as big as his arm. The circle was etched into the skin when it was alive. A glossy resin was spread around the claws, probably to prevent the circle into collapsing. "Think I brought out the Glassbeak's fierceness, not its speed. Would you believe I did this to myself?" Tieh stared angrily at her swathed arm.

"Our contract runs until you finish, 15gm a day and you must work nineteen hours. Can't have you sloggish, I work almost twenty, twenty two every night. I've got a few maledicted items that I need to test, I'll hand them to you as soon as you finish each one. There are four, no five, waiting to be tested. That would, well, take, I think, more than a day's work. If you're willing to stay longer as an apprentice, it's the same charge, plus I'll cover your meals. Decent food. Don't worry, I don't eat rats."

Tieh yawned and asked, "Questions, dear?"

[Hadrian]

Hadrian took in the laboratory with a practiced eye; if most of the laboratories he had worked in were academic, they were varied, and he had been invited to witness and assist with projects in the private laboratories of wizards in Zeltiva who moonlighted as adjunct professors. This was more of what he expected Sahova to be, though as soon as his eyes lit upon his would-be employer, he exhaled a sigh of relief. It would be nice to have at least one person who shared the shortcomings of mortality with him, not that he expected any extreme sort of camaraderie for that. Some of the glyphs on the floor he recognized, and some not. The similarities and differences between the bloody circle and those he normally employed were intriguing, and would bear closer scrutiny as soon as he was able to do so. "Tieh," he acknowledged with a respectful nod of his head. When she asked about him, he filled her in with relevant information, figuring she would ask whatever questions she might have to fill in the blanks when she so chose. "I have been here for a week despite the efforts of malfunctioning golems, morphed harpies, and... well, I'm sure you know the dangers of Sahova better than I." He cleared his throat. "I recently graduated from the University of Zeltiva where I focused on magecrafting and anthropology. The first for a career and the second to keep me alive to live that career... I figured knowing more about other cultures would help me survive them, and so far that is proving an effective strategy, but I'm assuming luck and divine providence might also be required at some point. "I'm a competent magecrafter, and interested in malediction precisely because most magecrafters disdain it. I assume whatever I learn will only serve to help me with my own work and -- who knows -- I might even be good at it. I'm also somewhat versed in glyphs, auristics, and reimancy. Water, which will prove useful here, though I hope you can do better than I at conjuring food." He listened to Tieh describe herself and her work here, nodding appropriately, even smiling at her humor. She seemed like the type of person with whom he could get along professionally. "Your terms are acceptable, provided you explain to me what you're doing as you're doing it that I might learn and that we take all due precautions to prevent injury in either of us. I don't know about you, but I am not prepared to become a Nuit. And the way those golem welcoming parties are currently, you'll be hard pressed to find another assistant any time soon." Finally he grinned. "Deal?"

[Panna Cotta]

"Deal." Halfway through the word Frankie Lee Tieh started coughing. "Oh for crying out loud," she wheezed and fell forward in her seat. Raising a hand against Hadrian, she said in between coughs, "Don't mind me. It's just an allergy." Hadrian could tell otherwise, of course. Tieh was dying. Perhaps that made it easier for a human to stay in the land of the dead.

Tieh took a glass of water for herself, projecting a half-filled glass into her hand. She drank quietly and steadied her breathing. Cupping the glass with both hands, she turned back to Hadrian. "Lessons later, work first." She pointed at the glassbeak talon. Tieh wobbled as she stood up, shoulders hunched a bit. "I should give you the rest of the items, and then show you to my laboratory downstairs. What's with the stare? Can't have you blow up this place, too many precious stuff lying around, literally."

And then abruptly, "I'm sorry, please look away." She scampered to a shelf in one side of the room, it was made of sturdy wood, covered in magical glyphs. She opened it, revealing a food storage, mostly fruits and dried meat to last a few days. Tieh set down the glass of water and rummaged around and took out a bottle. She twisted the cap and drank from it with gusto. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand as she collapsed, kneeling into the floor. It took her a few chimes before she stood up again, bottle and cap in her hands. She tried to hide the bottle along her cloak and then walked over to a small disposal bin.

Tieh faced Hadrian, stress wiped off her face. "It's allergy," she explained, throwing the bottle into the basket. "Very well then," the spring was back in her step, the smile in her tired face, the light in her eyes. She had promised allegiance to an evil god, one that she was starting to regret. There was a short pause of loneliness in her face, a bitter look. "I hope this doesn't change things between us." Tieh may have hide the bottle, but the scent of blood wafted in the air. It was no allergy. Hadrian could surmise that Tieh had an addiction to blood. That, or an intense need to drink blood.

The woman looked away, ashamed. "Let's continue," she remarked as she held out a small skull, "I should have you try this one out. I couldn't bear to see if it works, and I somewhat doubt whether it would bring me forward or backward." She dusted the cranium. "It's a seer's skull, one known to have the power to view time. A popular item among upper crusts. A Konti, used to be, anyway. It can give you visions. Took a bit of research, this one. The idea is that the head contains the thought of the Konti, within her mind, the ability to tap into Tanroa's realm. She had Treavery when she was alive, not to mention Avalis and Rak'keli. For some reason, each and every tester that I've had claim to only see the Konti's death. They say it's a curse, I think they're using it wrong." She set the skull back into a velvet cloth, brushing the malediction circle with a finger. Beside the skull on the desk was a small box with an ice glyph. Tieh turned to Hadrian, opening the box in front of him. "A perfectly preserved tongue. I had the experts downstairs to embalm this." The circle was burned into the flesh, painted with ink. "This is one of my favorites. It is supposed to give you the ability to sing beautifully."

She closed the box and motioned Hadrian to get the skull. "The other items are already downstairs, follow me." Tieh walked over to a corner of the room and swung red curtains aside, revealing a recessed area in the wall that connects into a steep staircase. As they went down, Hadrian could feel that he could breathe better. They ended into a small foyer, and Tieh knocked a strange rhythm on the wooden door. It opened and she sauntered forward. She checked if Hadrian was following her. "Come along, now."

[Hadrian]

With her hand on him, her body that close, it certainly seemed to be more than allergies. That rattle in the lungs didn't come from any allergy of which he knew. Of course, he knew little of medicine other than the ability to philter some basic potions for healers who would pay, but it did sound like a precursor to the death rattle. He wondered if she intended to become a Nuit or to allow Lhex to strip her of memory and send her back into the wide-open mouth of a squalling newborn. He picked up the indicated glassbeak talon, carefully turning it over in his hands. When she ordered him to look away, he glanced at her retreating form before he could catch himself, then dutifully turned his back on her, engaging his Vision to see what the djed was doing around and within the maledicted talon. At least that way he was keeping busy while she did what she needed to do. It was just a quick glance while she drank something behind his back, and he was no master of auristics. When she spoke, giving him implied permission to turn around again, it was to see her throwing a bottle away. Was there a tinge of bright red where her lips disappeared into her mouth? Was that a coppery tang on the air, brought by the movement of her body? His chlorine blue eyes were curiously wide, and apparently that was enough to elicit a tacit confession of guilt from her, if not a confession of the details. He could guess, though. "No, ma'am," he said. It wouldn't change anything. She was employing him. So long as she kept up her end of the bargain, he would keep up his. After her explanation of the two fetishes, he picked up the velvet-wrapped skull and tucked it under his arm. "You'll have to tell me the right way to use it, then. I wouldn't mind inheriting a few gnosis marks, but somehow I don't think the gods would approve of me getting them that way." He followed her down the stairs, wondering what it was in the air that was making things more comfortable for him. When she turned back to hurry him along, he was right there on her heels, and had to step back to avoid bumping into her. "I'm here," he assured her, though he began to wonder if she would require blood of him before this was said and done.

[Panna Cotta]

Hadrian was welcomed into one of Sahova's better facilities. The architecture did not stray away from the rest of the Citadel, but it was evident that the walls had been reinforced. The walls were lined up with ventilation pipes and golem assistants, most of them blinking and clinking. The area was slightly bigger than the room above, and gave the illusion of being spacious because there was less clutter. A cage was built in the center of the room, which Tieh described to Hadrian as a Preserver.

"One of the advanced golems in the Citadel. By advanced, I mean it has sentience. A Preserver is specifically designed to have mental awareness in order to carry out detailed instructions and compute statistics. Part of my Malediction research is to study human reactions to accidents," implying that there are and will be accidents when it comes to Legates, "I'm trying to isolate specific mental functions that are disabled or enabled during panic moments, and the Preserver is the golem for such a job. It's a great assistant for a Legate, as it can perform Quick Decisions."

"I'm sorry, am I boring you?" Tieh snapped her geek switch off, "You see Hadrian, being a Legate is a very dangerous job. It has certain occupational hazards, which I assume you already have a faint idea of. I appreciate that you want to learn how to properly use a maledicted item, that shows you've got some sense." There was a proud smile on her face. "Let me start the explanation from the top, I'll try to narrate the testing process in easier terms. The main job of a Legacy Tester is that you've got to activate your item and see if it works, and if it does, how does it work. Sometimes even with the most intensive drawings and inscriptions, you don't know what to expect. All of my creations have a trigger switch or phrase. Once they are brought out of what I call 'sleep mode', the maledicted item will automatically unleash its magical properties. Like I said, we never know if an item was properly maledicted or not, so there's no way to be sure except by testing it through a series of trial-and-error observations. That's where the Preserver comes in. You step inside the cage," Tieh walked into the Preserver, locking herself inside. "Activate the Preserver, and then use the maledicted item."

"Sounds easy?" Tieh shrugged, talking to Hadrian across the bars of the Preserver, her good arm dangling out, "Based on previous experiments, there's a 0.66 probability that a maledicted item - we're talking about something that I did - will malfunction." She shook her head, "That high, considering I should already be an expert at this thing."

"Preserver A90X-W3, activate." Tieh pressed a button on the control panel inside the cage.

The room vibrated until a monotonous high-pitched mechanical voice resonated, "Greetings." It paused, "Identification please." Tieh answered with her full name. Preserver A90X-W3 clicked in affirmation. "Awaiting orders..."

"Commence sampling using test subject T67." Tieh commanded, winking to Hadrian.

There was nothing but beeps and the sound of machines clink-clanking. Tieh opened the box which contained the tongue, took the item out and held it on one hand. She whispered an inaudible phrase and stared at the tongue in her hand.

"The moonlight up above the sky shines with the love of your life." Tieh began singing in a voice that was two octaves higher than her usual tone. "Cold is the dream that cannot come true, dead is the heart that beats for you. Sing with me softly, come drink my sorrow. The soul cannot see, for there is no tomorrow. The moonlight up above the sky shines with the love of your life." She ended the song, tears welling in her eyes.

The golem interrupted her melancholy. "Test completed. Please step out while the results are being analyzed."

Tieh stepped out, placing back the tongue into the box. She wiped her eyes with the edges of her cloak's sleeve. "That was something, no? You know what's funny? I wasn't really singing. I held this tongue and I sang voluntarily." She was still talking in a sing-song voice. "My best bet is that this is a reject."

The golem announced that the test had been completed without error and started recording slurred phrases in the Ancient Tongue out loud. Hadrian could probably catch and understand a few words such as "heart rate", "recording reaction", "undesirable end product", and the exact phrases that Tieh had said while she was inside the Preserver. A disk rolled out of a conveyor belt. Tieh walked forward and retrieved the disk, placing it inside a thin bag. "This," she waved the covered disk, "is the most important part of my research. Using the Preserver, I'm able to analyze the effects of different circles on a specific item. I'm just continuing someone else's study, it's really promising if you decide to devote your time to it. Anyway, you're gonna be part of a statistical observation. Think of it this way. I have made more than 10 of that skull you are holding, and there's an additional 27 recorded data on a maledicted Konti's skull. I have specific details recorded on three Memory Banks, golems connected to the Preserver, which can be retrieved and utilized. So say, test subject KS35, the one you're holding, will be tested, the Preserver can automatically calculate the probability of a malfunction based on previous data. But it won't alert you, of course. I had that function removed when a series of studies showed that panic has an adverse effect on activating a maledicted item. The Preserver calls the shots if, in case, the test goes wrong. It has a built-in defense system that will contain explosions of a 0.9mile magnitude." Tieh paused, "If you're wondering, the cage is equipped with its own portal to the Void, which the Preserver can activate, should it decide that the experiment will have an unwanted result. But don't let that scare you. Such an accident has not occurred for the last 8 months. The occasional slip-ups happen, usually you'd get away with a few scratches and bruises." Tieh smiled and looked down on her sling and bandaged leg. "Got hit good by a few glyph charges. Something similar to lightning, only subdued, or else I won't be standing here. I bet you know by now that the golem is called a Preserver because it's supposed to preserve the research, make sure that the experiment results are intact, no matter what happens."

"Did you get all that?" Tieh laughed dryly, "Or do you have more questions now?"

[Hadrian]

Hadrian listened avidly to Tieh's description of the research process, from memory storage via automaton to her live test. He protested when she asked if she was boring him; far from it! In fact, he wished she were showing him the plans and diagrams for animating such golems, for magecrafting or glyph-warding the bars against explosion, for adding a void function. He wanted to know everything. It finally occurred to him that she was warming up to him already, what with proud looks and winks. Perhaps it was just the camaraderie that sprang up while sharing research: intellectual stimulation. But then he began to wonder, in a little part of his mind that wasn't listening to her or innovating based on what he heard, if she were looking for some sort of heir to her work. After all, she said she had inherited the study from someone else. It was certainly a well-equipped laboratory... But no. She could not be thinking of him for that. It would take too long for him to learn enough of malediction to be able to take over her research. Surely she would bequeath it to some nuit, or become a nuit herself. But he liked to think that someday he would have a laboratory with sentient golems and the like. The golem reported data in nader-canoch, but Hadrian was educated enough to understand that. "Questions. I'm curious as to what senses the Preserver A90X-W3 has been equipped. Is it a master aurist? And what are your criteria for success or failure with this test subject? Do you have a log of your own notes, hypotheses, and the like? I suppose that once a maledicted item is complete, there is no way to tinker with them, much like a magecrafted item once it has been set in charged water. To what degree can you focus the intention of your malediction?" Of course, he had many more questions, but these seemed the most apropos to what he had seen and heard with her so far. There would be a host of others sooner rather than later. He did rather wish that she had elaborated on how much the Preserver would act to preserve the tester, but he was sure he wouldn't be happy with the answer. Sometimes magic required risk. He would have his own apprentices on day, and then the danger wouldn't be placed entirely upon his slender shoulders.

[Panna Cotta]

"It's got detectors if that's what you're asking. It's complicated stuff, I'd have to explain the formula to you if you really want the specifics, but let's just say it has the ability to compute if a person is 'going over his limit'. It constantly checks your vital statistics, heart rate, brainwaves, even djed concentration. But that's secondary to its primary role of collecting data. That's five golems working, together with the first mechanism I've mentioned. It constantly records patterns and brings it out into a single report. Like the disk you saw earlier. That's a recorder golem, the results compacted inside it. So if you're looking for logs of every experiment I have carried out... You should check out the south east corner. There's a log of all known maledicted items, the ones in blue ink are the one's we've got data on. I've got everything there. And I mean everything. Oh, I see, you want to see it, no?"

Tieh grabbed Hadrian's hand, fingers interlacing with his, as she pulled him towards the other part of the room.

"This is the logbook." Tieh patted a foot-thick book atop a wide desk. Beside it was a ceiling-high wooden file cabinet. "You can see all the experiment's codes, arranged alphabetically by codename, of course. All test subjects are recorded here. Would you--" Tieh's eyes widened, realizing that she hadn't let go of the other person's hand. She looked away. "Well you may want to use it if you like. Those written in red ink, don't bother calling out those test subjects' data. Confidential, classified, would require you a password, and if you guess wrong, those charged glyphs will incinerate you." Tieh pointed to barrels sticking out of the ceiling.

"See," Tieh stepped back, away from Hadrian, leaning at the desk. "There's only two conclusions you'll reach at the end of testing. It's either it works, or it doesn't. Usually the Preserver figures that out for you." She nodded, closed her eyes longer than usual. She was having a hard time to look at Hadrian straight in the eye. "A Maledicted item that 'works' isn't always a good thing. It's another matter if the Maledicted item would function as it was intended to, or something else entirely. 'Something else entirely' happens all the time. 70% of my apprentices became 'something else entirely' because of a varied number of legacy testing effects. Curses, deviant effects, all sorts of health risks, physical disability, mental incapacitation, spiritual devastation..." She sighed and folded her arms under her bosom. "If it works, we keep it if we can, regardless of what it can do."

"Have you ever tried to use a Maledicted item?" With one brow raised, Tieh gave Hadrian a teasing sideglance. "It's one of the most exhilarating things to experience. It's always a surprise how much you can control and how much you cannot. So if you ask me what degree of control I have over a Maledicted item, I'd say it's a random circumstance. Hit or miss." She waved her palms horizontally. "Don't tell me you're getting cold feet?" A mirthful smile was traced on her lips. "So, are you gonna start testing or not?"

[Hadrian]

He nodded occasionally as she explained the systems of the Preserver to him in brief, wishing there were time to go over them in more detail and perhaps become a competent animator himself. These golems would be quite useful for magecrafting as well, but he had to remind himself that this trip to Sahova was temporary, mostly to learn a bit, make some contacts, and be better equipped to prepare for a more long-term stay later. "I would like to review some of the records at night before bed," he said. He knew she was a researcher before a teacher, so while she said she would teach him, he was going to make sure that he made the most of things by teaching himself as much as he could too. Even if one couldn't learn Animation and Malediction from records, he would have necessary data to link to when he did begin to truly learn. He was slightly disconcerted by her behavior, the nervousness more than her taking his hand. That might have thrown him if it wasn't purposeful, if she had taken his hand just to take it rather than to lead him where she wanted him to be. But the strange behavior... well, he was glad when she kept talking. "No red files. Got it." And, "Well, I will let the Preserver decide if they are functional and functioning correctly and learn by observation how this is determined, I suppose. Anyway, it sounds a lot like the version of roulette they play in Sunberth... But..." He rubbed his hands together. "Let's get started before I do change my mind." He wasn't the bravest soul, perhaps, but caution was the better part of valor and he assumed if she could test these completely with golems, she would. Call it suffering for his art. Call it paying one's dues. Call it... "So the skull first?" he asked. "What are my chances it'll make me psychic?" he asked with a grim sort of humor.

[Panna Cotta]

"That Konti Skull is supposed to allow you to look into a person's future. FOr now you should just test it on yourself. Everybody craves to thwart Tanroa, it seems." Tieh turned and flipped along the pages of the book. "Let's see... KS, for Konti Skull." She beamed a smile, as if the test subject coding was supposed to appear encrypted yet not at all. "Number 35. Password 'Mirror the Moon'." She looked at the logs, brows furrowed in deep thought. Tieh had memorized most of the results, so she told Hadrian, "60% chance it will allow you to see the past - your past, 30% for it to curse you and you'll get your future erased, 10% that it will work perfectly. That, assuming that it will function. If it curses you, if I remember data right, there's an equal chance for you to suffer amnesia or blindness. There had been three listed occasions of temporary amnesia or blindness, so that makes it about, hmm. 5 percent at max. Very very slim chance of you dying. No known Preservation triggers, that means it only affects your," she tapped her forehead to imply that the worst Hadrian could get was brain damage.

"As for that Glassbeak Talon... Let's see. GT," she winked, letting Hadrian feel that navigating though the logs was easier than one might have assumed, "Test subject 145. Password 'Burn the Road'.Once you activate that, it has a 23% chance of working as planned... lets you move three to four times faster than usual. Think Flux, without the dangers of overgiving, but if it fails instead..." She skimmed through pages, "Brutish animal instinct, 100%. You'd act like a glassbeak, flap your arms, bird-like gait, mouth as beak. Sounds really funny, until you realize a human's mouth does not compare to a Glassbeak's. Then you start going wild, and then you start thrashing inside the Preserver. See those iron bars? Try gnawing that. Have seen it happened before. Ugly sight, but it was ridiculously funny. At least until the defense mechanisms activate, and, depending on the threat level - never figured out that part, as the golem has its own way of grading threat levels - you'd either get sapped with poison to temporarily debilitate you or get transferred to the void. The bad thing is that statistics reveal," she jammed a finger at the book, "there's a big chance you'd get the glassbeak talon attached to you. If that happens I'd have to kill you." She was teasing, of course.

"You following the logic behind all of these so far? Or is the Math making your head ache?" Tieh had a faint smile on her lips as she patted his shoulders, "Feel free to ask questions. Training you for this is part of the deal, you know. Don't worry you're getting paid every moment you're spending worthwhile. If you push through with being a legacy tester, or better yet, if you do research on the side for me... I'll be willing to let you select one of my creations for you to keep."

She then crossed to the other side of the room and pressed buttons on an unusual vault. "I'm gonna get us the other things you need to test."

OOCFeel free to act the effects on your own