Diving off of one of my angsty listener headcanons and very much into the realm of Theorising and FanFiction:
We’ve got indications that unsealed latent empowered people have the potential for more power output than non-latents, at least in their specific speciality (Lovely placing second nationally for raw power at the E&E Games, and Dreamer overpowering Marcus’ Dreamscape completely unintentionally and without even remembering they were in a Dreamscape).
Vincent says something about Lovely’s core needing to expel all the built up, excess magic it had held inside for so long. So it stands to reason that the reverse is true. If one’s core activates before it’s supposed to / it’s fully developed, then their speciality would be weaker than their peers whose cores unlocked at the proper stage in life.
And one of my angsty listener headcanons is that Starlight isn’t good at magic… I think we can see where I’m going with this.
What if Starlight’s core unlocked a few years too early? What if, despite being a Freelancer, they struggle with magical output because their core never learned how to properly contain it in the first place? What if it’s something they told Avior in confidence their first time in the Trap, and so Avior chose to twist this thing they were ashamed of and turn it into something special and could help someone?
I mean, come on. Avior tells Starlight that the way they use magic is what he needs because it’s subtle? And they just, what, believe that out of the gate? Starlight believes something Avior tells them in the first 15 minutes that (they think) they’ve been in here, with zero evidence to back it up? Starlight?! Nah fam, I think Starlight knows their core is ‘subtle’ in ways unlike most other empowered people, and they know why, so they don’t need to question Avior about it.
Prime! and Imp!Starlight don’t really cast specific magic as far as we know. I can only think of them healing that one Girliepop after the Inversion, but even that was with assistance from Concussed Dude. Starlight only ever channels magic on their own when they get their hand stuck in the Meridian in Prime!Time, and I really cannot think of a time when Imp!Starlight casts magic.
Like to be so honest, have Avior say he needs an unempowered human to help him return to their native plane of Elegy because his attempts to get to his native plane of Aria aren’t working, and have Starlight just not perform healing magic on Girliepop, and they could easily be replaced with an unempowered person, and their story really would not change, like at all. In contrast, Lovely used their electro magic in about half of the videos set when they have it. Freelancer is literally practicing magic a whole bunch, even if we don’t see (hear?) it. Hell, we’ve heard Dreamer use magic more often than Starlight - that’s just like 80% of Project Meridian - but even in ReStart! Most recent audio hello!
All that is to say, it’s my personal headcanon that Starlight is not only bad at magic, but it’s because their core unlocked earlier than it was supposed to.
