Scribbling Maniacally

So. One of the biggest questions in MGMH is “What the hell happened between the Apathy and the Preservers?” And we’re getting bits of information. I think, with our latest look at an emotional power plant, it seems like what’s happened is obvious. But there’s a few more interesting threads to play with - specifically, Uma’tama’s story of what happened between the two groups.

And I think there’s one small detail that might explain why the Preservers acted the way they did with the Antipathy. One of the very first things we learn about the Antipathy is they seemingly understand emotions in a different way than Humans do- they use cardinal directions as an expression of mood. It’s unclear how an Antipathy might actually show said emotion, given they’ve been wiped out, but the fact remains - they are a different species. Though they interface with emotions, it isn’t in the same way.

Which leads to an interesting question - what about the Preservers? They (or at least Uma’tama) seem oddly disjointed. They are a hyper-advanced group, but they seem to be ignorant in several areas - empathy being one of them, but even beyond that they seem to struggle with emotions.

So. If the Antipathy interacted with emotions in a different way than humans, who’s to say the Preservers don’t do the same? Specifically, they interact with them as a power source first, and an emotion second. It’s like charging a battery by riding a stationary bike - you might feel something in the act of riding the bike, but you have no other real connection to the energy produced. It’s just there. (Probably not the best metaphor but I hope you get what I’m going at)

Tying this back together, let’s tell a story. You are a hyper-advanced civilization, capable of magic and who knows what else. You struggle to produce magic - it’s tied to emotions, and for all your ability to use magic, emotions are much, much harder to induce. At least among your species.

But, you aren’t the only species. In fact, you find another one who’s quite efficient at creating emotions! You share your technology, your magic, and in return they help provide the power for both your civilization and theirs.

For a while, it goes well. Magic is tricky to work with, given it follows the users intent, so the places you build to help this other species focuses on cultivating peaceful, joyful magic. But there’s something you don’t realize.

The production of magic comes at a cost. The cost is as alien to you as the absence of it is to the other species, so you disregard it and focus instead on making magic yet more mailable, allowing control over the wilder aspects of it.

But you go to far. The other species lashes out, and you realize your foley. The cost you waved away is integral to the function of the other species, and you’ve been draining them of it without realizing the consequences. You fight back, reluctantly, and the other species consumes itself in an attempt to harm you.

It does, but it also risks damage to another place. Another species. Who are far more similar to the Antipathy, the species you drained, than to you. They produce magic too, though they lack the ability to focus it. But you made a grave mistake with the Antipathy, and you refuse to repeat it. You change the tools once used to drain magic to instead focus it, and find members of this new species to use them for the safeguard of their species as a whole. But you dare not go further - you dare not risk taking something from this species that would cause them harm in the same way you did the Antipathy.

And thankfully, for all the damage done by the Antipathy, their final act is both curse and gift - an immense amount of magic, more than you would ever need. And you are capable of harnessing it, using it instead of this new species to power your cities, your technology, your world.

But you curse yourselves every time you have to. For all the horrors the Antipathy inflicted, you cared for them. But your ignorance irreversibly hurt them. You will not do that ever again.

I wonder if Preservers struggling to induce emotions ties into them creating the Magical Girl gems, and also their seeming complete ignorance of emotional regulation skills. Like their only advice seems to be “feel more”, given how when Fulgora/Minerva asks for help to be stronger Uma’tama gives her what’s effectively hypercompressed emotions.

The idea is, Preservers have gotten really good at the intent part of spellcasting, to the point they’re almost fully separated it from the emotion-induced intent. Like, casting a spell is X + Y = Z with X being the emotion, Y being the intent, and Z being the outcome. You need both variables, but if X is small (because the emotion doesn’t fit with the outcome of the spell - say healing with anger, or attacking with sadness) by increasing Y you can still have a bigger Z, a bigger outcome.

And if my idea is right, and the Preservers struggle with emotion (X), it makes sense why they would initially focus on improving intent (Y). One of those variables would be far easier to mess with. And they seem to have succeeded, at least in part. Magical Girls are capable of quite a variety of spells, be it flight, healing, lasers, or whatever. It changes from person to person, and different emotions (X) do still lead to greater outcomes, but the intent (Y) has been refined to a point it can be effective even if the emotion is not well-suited for the spell.

And I think this ties back into them not really understanding emotional regulation and such - they have a small amount already, so with Y already being a solid baseline their only answer to increasing the outcome (Z) is to increase emotion (X).

Of course, it seems like the spellcasting equation on the emotion side is far more complicated than that - Nanaya, Cappelia, and Luna all recognize that. All emotions are important, and “feeling more” isn’t really that effective for increasing power (Or at least there are other ways that work better).

So one of the minor interactions we get between Uma’tama and Luna is really interesting with this whole idea of Preservers interfacing/experiencing emotions differently than humans. Specifically, the part where Luna asks about LCI’s.

Luna uses the Antipathy term for them - Liquid Cardinal Injectors. And that fits with what we know about how the Antipathy interacted with emotions.

But Uma’tama calls them something different - Liquid Chromatic Injectors. And that made me realize something. One of the big things associated by Preservers with emotion is color.

Each magical emotion has a different color when used with a Preserver-made transformation stone. Luna calls this out as weird way back in chapter 14, when she mentions that pride falls in the spectrum of yellow-green.

But the human eye lies to itself. A lot. Colors are kind of all made up because our eyes have a limited number of cones and rods, and so our brain approximates whatever it doesn’t have an exact answer for. Like the color purple, which doesn’t actually have a proper wavelength.

(More reading about this stuff in the link!)

So, if Preservers are a completely alien species, who’s to say their spectrum of “visible” light would be the same as ours? Especially because in the world of MGMH emotions are kind of their own sort of fundamental law that allows you to fly if you feel enough the right way, emotions having their own wavelength akin to light would make sense. Then, we have the Preservers, who evolved to interface with this source of power by seeing it, instead of tying it to a feeling or a direction like Humans and Antipathy.

So. One of the biggest questions in MGMH is “What the hell happened between the Apathy and the Preservers?” And we’re getting bits of information. I think, with our latest look at an emotional power plant, it seems like what’s happened is obvious. But there’s a few more interesting threads to play with - specifically, Uma’tama’s story of what happened between the two groups.

And I think there’s one small detail that might explain why the Preservers acted the way they did with the Antipathy. One of the very first things we learn about the Antipathy is they seemingly understand emotions in a different way than Humans do- they use cardinal directions as an expression of mood. It’s unclear how an Antipathy might actually show said emotion, given they’ve been wiped out, but the fact remains - they are a different species. Though they interface with emotions, it isn’t in the same way.

Which leads to an interesting question - what about the Preservers? They (or at least Uma’tama) seem oddly disjointed. They are a hyper-advanced group, but they seem to be ignorant in several areas - empathy being one of them, but even beyond that they seem to struggle with emotions.

So. If the Antipathy interacted with emotions in a different way than humans, who’s to say the Preservers don’t do the same? Specifically, they interact with them as a power source first, and an emotion second. It’s like charging a battery by riding a stationary bike - you might feel something in the act of riding the bike, but you have no other real connection to the energy produced. It’s just there. (Probably not the best metaphor but I hope you get what I’m going at)

Tying this back together, let’s tell a story. You are a hyper-advanced civilization, capable of magic and who knows what else. You struggle to produce magic - it’s tied to emotions, and for all your ability to use magic, emotions are much, much harder to induce. At least among your species.

But, you aren’t the only species. In fact, you find another one who’s quite efficient at creating emotions! You share your technology, your magic, and in return they help provide the power for both your civilization and theirs.

For a while, it goes well. Magic is tricky to work with, given it follows the users intent, so the places you build to help this other species focuses on cultivating peaceful, joyful magic. But there’s something you don’t realize.

The production of magic comes at a cost. The cost is as alien to you as the absence of it is to the other species, so you disregard it and focus instead on making magic yet more mailable, allowing control over the wilder aspects of it.

But you go to far. The other species lashes out, and you realize your foley. The cost you waved away is integral to the function of the other species, and you’ve been draining them of it without realizing the consequences. You fight back, reluctantly, and the other species consumes itself in an attempt to harm you.

It does, but it also risks damage to another place. Another species. Who are far more similar to the Antipathy, the species you drained, than to you. They produce magic too, though they lack the ability to focus it. But you made a grave mistake with the Antipathy, and you refuse to repeat it. You change the tools once used to drain magic to instead focus it, and find members of this new species to use them for the safeguard of their species as a whole. But you dare not go further - you dare not risk taking something from this species that would cause them harm in the same way you did the Antipathy.

And thankfully, for all the damage done by the Antipathy, their final act is both curse and gift - an immense amount of magic, more than you would ever need. And you are capable of harnessing it, using it instead of this new species to power your cities, your technology, your world.

But you curse yourselves every time you have to. For all the horrors the Antipathy inflicted, you cared for them. But your ignorance irreversibly hurt them. You will not do that ever again.

I wonder if Preservers struggling to induce emotions ties into them creating the Magical Girl gems, and also their seeming complete ignorance of emotional regulation skills. Like their only advice seems to be “feel more”, given how when Fulgora/Minerva asks for help to be stronger Uma’tama gives her what’s effectively hypercompressed emotions.

The idea is, Preservers have gotten really good at the intent part of spellcasting, to the point they’re almost fully separated it from the emotion-induced intent. Like, casting a spell is X + Y = Z with X being the emotion, Y being the intent, and Z being the outcome. You need both variables, but if X is small (because the emotion doesn’t fit with the outcome of the spell - say healing with anger, or attacking with sadness) by increasing Y you can still have a bigger Z, a bigger outcome.

And if my idea is right, and the Preservers struggle with emotion (X), it makes sense why they would initially focus on improving intent (Y). One of those variables would be far easier to mess with. And they seem to have succeeded, at least in part. Magical Girls are capable of quite a variety of spells, be it flight, healing, lasers, or whatever. It changes from person to person, and different emotions (X) do still lead to greater outcomes, but the intent (Y) has been refined to a point it can be effective even if the emotion is not well-suited for the spell.

And I think this ties back into them not really understanding emotional regulation and such - they have a small amount already, so with Y already being a solid baseline their only answer to increasing the outcome (Z) is to increase emotion (X).

Of course, it seems like the spellcasting equation on the emotion side is far more complicated than that - Nanaya, Cappelia, and Luna all recognize that. All emotions are important, and “feeling more” isn’t really that effective for increasing power (Or at least there are other ways that work better).

It starts late at night, a child slipping from the den.

She is spawn weaver and wyrm, and she marks the cooperation of two factions in Hallownest. She does not understand this now, small and young and yet to molt even once, but she knows one thing.

Her mother is being taken from her.

No one save her knows why she left - perhaps she was filled with anger at the knowledge, or sadness, or wished to hunt some beast so her mother would be proud for whatever moments they might share.

Instead, when she is discovered missing, panic arises. Hunters rush to track any trace of the child, as urgent missives are sent to the Pale King, demanding assistance in retrieving the child - his daughter.

Assistance is sent, but it is slow. Far slower than the hunters of Deepnest, who’ve made the tunnels their home.

But for all their speed, they do not find the child, Herra’s daughter, yet unnamed.

Instead, they find a lair, and a mimic within. It hisses and spits the sickly orange fluid that is a hallmark of Infection, the curse which sweeps the land.

It is dispatched quickly and violently.

Sadly, the hunters do not find Herra’s daughter, nor is her corpse strung up on the ceiling.

They find a different child, cold and dark and mute, triple checked to confirm it does not share a species with the beast that once made this cave it’s lair.

(Herra’s child, the daughter of the Pale King, has slipped ever deeper, following a call few can resist, much less those young and frightened. The hunters can not find her, path wiped away by void.)

Herra spends all of one day able to look for her daughter before she is called to fulfill her duty as a Dreamer, to seal the Infection. She protests, but concedes and slumbers, once a sufficient promise is gained from the Pale King to find her child.

The other child, the one found in the den of a mimic, is raised as a Weaver.

It is done mostly in secret, away from the prying eyes of Higher Beings. The Weavers curse the Pale King all the while - they say he has taken advantage of the agreement to find his daughter and pushed into their land, bringing it under his rule. They fight back, of course, but their numbers are few, and the resurgence of Infection all but slaughters them.

The ink-black liquid that composes the saved child’s form causes the Infection to recoil, and though it is no true cure, merely a stopgap measure, it is long enough for the saved child to be taught methods of weaving Soul into Silk, using it not only in a pure, primal state but refined into the finest of threads.

For the rest of their teaching, a fragile truce is made. There is another tribe on the border of Deepnest who despise both the Pale King and the Infection. A traitor flees to the gardens and embraces the orange light, and the Weavers broker a tentative truce with those left.

The Saved Child does not have claws to slash, or mandibles to bite, but they have taken to Weaving like a spider and soon their Nail swings with the swiftness of a Mantises strike.

They set out, a beacon of hope for the two shattered groups - and find the Pale King gone, as is his wife.

Long, long after, when she is all but forgotten by those above, the darkness swirls, writhes with a silent scream echoing from above. It wakes Herra’s daughter, now submerged in Void, but she slips free from the grasp of the Abyssal Sea, small and weak - but with a purpose.

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