@Rahul-Balaggan said in Ascendance of a Bookworm - LN vs. WN:

@radiantmemories

Hello,

Just a heads up any WN talk is not allowed in the main Bookworm discussion topics. We have a topic for the WN itself, and one for a comparison between the two. I have moved your post.

Ah, sorry about that, I wasn't sure! I thought it would be okay since it wasn't future content and I spoilered it. But I know for now on!

@marcus_atticus maybe it's "might begets respect". In Bindewald when Fraularm accused Maybe of being a commoner, the ditterland people were ready to disbelieve just because Myne is good enough on ditter to have completed half of true ditter successfully. So even if a commoner was strong and exceedingly good in hunting feybeasts maybe ditterland knights wouldn't be averse to working with them. Of course this is pure speculation on my part.

@kuali said in Do RA professors get married?:

@Outinthegardener There's nothing we know of preventing them from marrying or procreating - Eglantine's married and a Professor, and nobody batted an eye at her taking the position. She even kept up her duties during her pregnancy (albeit while hiding said pregnancy.)

True, I didn't think about Eglantine.

Likewise, Hortensia was married when she took up her post as a Librarian.

True, she is childless though.

Hirschur was 42 at her introduction (as per the character sheets from Fanbook 2), making her roughly 18 years older than Ferdinand, (and about 3 years older than Elvira).

I must have totally missed those character sheets … don't remember them at all.

That's old enough for her to have had a child or two, gotten them to baptism, and then gone back to work. Though honestly, I think she probably either never married or got widowed young, and went to the Sovereignty to avoid people trying to force her to play housewife.

Guess it works out after all then. Thanks to everyone for setting me straight.

@JonaStubbe said in If Rozemyne can't ride a feystone highbeast...:

I'm sorry to say but if you want to post any idea that isn't depressingly dystopian without a number of posters descending on you like vultures and tearing your idea to shreds, I suggest visiting the "Dumb Things That Will Never Happen" or "Plausible Things That Also Won't Happen" threads and posting there.

In particular, I think the more realistic outcome will be that she will start using feystones again whenever someone near and dear to her (probably Ferdinand) is in danger of dying, and her using one allows her to save them.

I'm not sure. Ferdinand consider how to replace feystone tech. He loves to research. Who knows what breakthrough they can achieve in a new field.

When he and Rozemyne discussed a future researching feyplants together after the spring jureve ingredient incident they were inspired by living flowers.

@sorvani said in If Rozemyne can't ride a feystone highbeast...:

Also, the title of the thread is pretty spoilerific for people that are maybe not current.

alright.

edit:
If Rozemyne never overcomes her fear of feystones her problems are:

1] Ordonanz feystones - nobles use these all the time. Ferdinand suggested a Magic Circle alternate. Everyone will think Rozemyne's weird if she sends messages like that and they'll continue to send normal feystone ordonanz to her. Feystone she needs to return to them.

The simplest solution: her retainers hold the ordonanz feystones for her. If it happens in public they can explain she fear a poison coated ordonanz?

2] Highbeast feystone - make it a living tool.

The simplest solution: change it's shape from a round feystone to a panda-shaped feystone. So far she tolerate her feystone jewelry.

3] Brewing - develop Godly Blessings and drawn magic circle alternatives for her feystone based potions. If they find a feystone free recipe for Jureve and rejuvenation potions they're golden.

The simplest solution: her scholars, Ferdinand and Raimund brew her potions. Rozemyne loves books, not potion brewing. Maybe she needs to move mana for a Jureve but Ferdinand can guide her through the process while she close her eyes. Jureve is rarely used in normal circumstances.

4] Feystone locks, various magic tools - Replace them with magic circles or hide the feystones from view.

The simplest solution: let Ferdinand power them for her or guide her while she close her eyes.

5] Duchy/Country Foundation - I admit, if Rozemyne stays traumatized this is a problem.

The simplest solution: make a complaint to the Gods and demand feystone-less alternatives. She helped them out, they can show some appreciation.

@Yolech You're way overstating the "isolation" that noble mothers and children undergo. Even while pregnant, noble women are seen to by attendants, since they're certainly not going to be bathing themselves. And we've seen at least two noble babies that also had attendants helping with their care. Similarly, noble estates, especially those of richer archnobles, and even middling mednobles, have fairly large gardens that constitute small parks in and of themselves. Getting a bit of greenery is literally just about stepping out one's front door.

At the same time, Yurgenschmidt already has mana-blocking capable material. Rihyarda wore one such set of gloves when she wiped down Myne after Myne got her schtappe, to avoid any contamination of Rihyarda's mana with Myne's divine will. The silver cloth is an interesting curiosity insomuch as Lanzenave managed to create it despite not having any brewing ingredients, as far as its use case as something to help shield mana contamination, it's not particularly novel for Yurgenschmidt.

I think of Bookworm after I have had to lay the groundwork for meetings, etc.

The other question is how long he'll be in there. Rozemyne was in there for 3 months. But we don't know how much of that was the actual information download into her brain and how much was the blessing of Anwachs at work. They could have all the other Lanzenavians cleaned up and have Zent Ditterland installed already by the time he comes out. Since he'll have the magic tool version that Ferd and Roz just made.

I couldn't stop laughing all throughout the epilogue - literal tears in my eyes 🤣🤣🤣 what an absolutely hilarious trainwreck 🤣🤣🤣🤣

@kuali Hmm, it's been a long-ass time since I read P1V2 … specifically, I think I read it around 2017 as a fan translation before it was even licensed; I only returned to the series last year, buying Parts 1–3 as paper books in November, but I accidentally bought P1V2 of the Manga instead of the novel, and then elected to simply refresh my memories by looking at the outline on Wikipedia; Parts 4–5 I read as the eBooks after learning I could buy them DRM-free here on the website. Thanks for the pointer anyway.

@b-scot-morgan said in Question? Spoiler Content.. Maybe.:

@5eniorsohn said in Question? Spoiler Content.. Maybe.:

Wouldn´t it be hillarious if Sylvester would have authority over Rozemyne as her adopted father despite the fact that she is the aub of a higher ranked duchy?

That makes me think of a matrix management type of situation where Rozemyne has to defer to Sylvester as his daughter in family contexts and Sylvester has to defer to Rozemyne as ruler of a higher ranked duchy in political contexts.

Btw this is what the king of England did when he was also the lord of several French territories: defer to the king of France in Aquitaine and other such territories and otherwise keep trying to conquer France.

It would be hilarious if Ehrenfest outranked the new duchy, especially given that the two major factions were just ripped apart

@kuali said in Bookworm (Manga) Part 2 Vol 8 Discussion:

Is that meant to be the shadow of Gloria or Veronica behind Shikza? They're both mentioned in the panel and I can't really tell from the silhouette alone. Maybe someone else remembers their hairstyles?

I don’t remember their details either, but I’m presuming that the silhouette belongs to Gloria since she was more directly/immediately involved.

So, our written chapter is an extra glance into the life of Johann!

Huh. Never would have guessed the leherl test was put in place to prevent Nepotism. Does make sense, though.

Those additional details made this quite interesting. They’re probably unimportant in the end, but they flesh out the world a little bit more. :)

Myne: "I won't show you the beach."
shows him the beach
Ferdinand: Bluescreens

Wait until they visit the onsen (probably being dragged there by mom, since reading books in an onsen is probably too difficult)! I don’t know if I could picture Urano visiting a mixed-gender bath, but for Ferdinand seeing either one…

@Kathleen-macdougall Corrections for published books need to be e-mailed to J-Novel Club Support support@j-novel.club, because they otherwise won't always see it here.

Maybe the discussion topic needs renaming?
Would need to be done by the OP.

@zwabbit said in Where is Ferdinand's Medal?:

@Sekki The execution magic is built atop of the overall archducal governmental magic (hence it only taking effect within a duchy's borders), it should have zero dependency on the mana quantity of the caster versus the target as it would be backed up by the foundation itself.

Is this a "spell" or is it a "prayer"? I think a spell could suffer against another's mana quantity, whereas I believe (can be wrong in this belief) that a prayer would over power any person's mana. There are some spells/prayers/contracts that can (apparently) cross dutchy borders. Like the last will, or name sworn deaths. We also know that everyone in Yurgenschidt knows nothing about magic and prayers true powers. They are essentially all "intellectually dumb" and locked into intellectual ignorance without deviation. Example: rebulding an exploded feystone like play-dough, and or silver cloth.

@Awwkaw said in Bookworm Part 5 Vol. 7 Discussion!:

But they say empty. They don't say low quality. The feystone quality could very well be decided based on the vessel rather than the current mana quantitiy. If the stone was going to be low quality, I would expect him to say "small", "low quality", or "with a low capacity", not empty. Empty associates with its content, not its form.

From what we know it does seem more likely that quality is linked to quantity of mana. With a Feystone being formed from someones mana flowing to the mana organ and crystalising it makes sense someone who had their mana drained first would produce a lower quality than otherwise.

With how the Giebe was being slowly killed, Myne's mana clump issue, the fact that jureve's are meant to be taken to prevent an eventual death and what we saw of Rozemyne's gathering of higher quality than usual ingredients it's also possible that a quickly forming Feystone is lower quality than a slower forming one.

If so the Giebe bleeding out and dying slowly would form a higher quality Feystone than if he'd been hit with the instadeath powder.

If this is the case, then it is again fair to say that Leonzio and Lanzanave are actually in dire straits. They have no mana trained nobles, who can actually run the country. I guess it is not mana quantity, but the lack of schtappe wielders will be a hughe problem for the capital of Lanzanave. Then it was inevitable that they would attack at some point (if for slightly different reasons than what I had initially thought)

The country of Lanzanave probably doesn't have much of a problem compared to Yurgenschmidt. They have a single city of white buildings that they need a King with Aub training to manage.
The rest of their nobles are likely just fuelling convenience magic tools as a by-product of staying alive.

Their noble population is severely limited in the ability to grow due to magic tool limits, They probably don't even have a system like servanthood/temple for the less capable children born because of limited resources to support such a thing.

If they lost all their nobles they'd suffer the eventual inconvenience of losing some buildings and convenience items but know it's coming ahead of time. The commoner population would be able to survive with either a wealthy merchant, guild leader or a military leader taking control. They should have a mundane military force to handle other non magical countries and they clearly have a non magical weapons development industry.

Their own mana capable people could very well be in a situation similar to devouring commoners in Yurgenschmidt, bound to servitude to survive. They have mana with no training or control over it, limited to no military applications of their mana, limited access to the magical fortifications and armour Yurgenschmidt nobles have, access to items that completely nullify or resist mana and an overwhelming number of mundane humans who don't rely on mana to grow food and have no powerful monster like creatures they need protection from.
It's the potential commoner civil war discussion in an old thread but with an actual possibility as all the advantages of the nobles don't exist.

Despite how unladylike it was, Euphoria dashed through the corridors at a rapid pace until she arrived with heavy breaths at her destination.

"Brother," she huffed. "The schematics...that you requested...from home."

"Ah, excellent," Zechariah said, relieving his little sister of the bundle, before saddling her with another packet. "Please take these completed products to the Linkberg dorms, Lord Hartmut seems the paranoid sort and wants everything tested before it gets passed onto Lady Rozemyne."

Euphoria raised an eyebrow. "Wouldn't you do the same for anything that Lady Adolphine would touch?"

"Were Lord Hartmut checking the tools aren't adulterated or poisoned, I would understand perfectly. He is however testing them for functionality."

"Ah," Euphoria said. It seemed her brother took offense at the notion that the tools the brewing of which he oversaw might fall short of the required specifications. "Well, I'm off then."

"Oh, and on your way back, drop by the Klassenberg dorms, I received a message from Lady Alice that the latest shipment of feystones has arrived."

Euphoria pursed her lips. "Why do I feel more like a pack mule than an apprentice scholar?"

"If you would prefer to be on gold dust duty, I would not say no to having another high archnoble's mana available in the workshop."

"Aaaand I'm off!" Euphoria quickly dashed away, making full use of the body enhancement her sister-in-law had taught her to quickly put some distance between them.

Perhaps on account of her somewhat proficiency at that enhancement, Euphoria was able to quickly reach the Linkberg dorms, or at least the public reception area. Just as she arrived, the doors opened and out marched a dozen or so shumil dolls, along with a few knights and an apprentice scholar Euphoria was familiar with.

"SQEEE-ahem. I am Euphoria of Drewanchel, with a delivery of completed magical tools for Lord Hartmut's inspection."

"Oh, good," Helga said, stepping forward to handle the matter. "Lord Hartmut was getting antsy about when they would be done, I'll take them from here."

As Euphoria handed over the bundle, she glanced over at the dolls as they continued marching on.

"Umm, what are all these shumils doing, Lady Helga?"

"Oh, those? They're being field tested, to see how well their new enhancements work. Hmm, you have a Linkberg brooch, right? Did you want to come watch?"

To make coordination easier, a select number of scholars and attendants had been granted brooches to allow them direct access to the dorms of duchies not their own, albeit not without very stringent magic contracts being imposed to prevent them from abusing this privilege. It said something about Zechariah's reputation that even under such conditions, his request to be included amongst those numbers was flatly rejected. Not that Euphoria's brother was particularly perturbed, since his reaction was to propose his little sister as a compromise candidate, another reason for Euphoria acting as something of a glorified gopher.

Euphoria rapidly nodded. "I would greatly appreciate the opportunity, Lady Helga."

Despite a few sideways looks as Euphoria trailed after the Linkberg knights, they did not stop her from following them to the Linkberg gathering grounds. Said grounds had been recently renewed by the new archduchess and so was positively overflowing with growth. Truth to tell, Euphoria suspected the place was even more verdant than Drewanchel's right now, a stark contrast to when this was Ahrensbach's grounds.

"All observers are to stay aloft in their highbeasts, out of reach of the feybeasts below," a female knight ordered.

Taking out her highbeast, Euphoria duly obeyed, and watched as another knight set up a magical tool in the middle of the grounds. Despite the shrinking view, Euphoria recognized as a high-mana lure, used to attract more powerful feybeasts.

"Umm, will the shumils be okay?" Euphoria asked after siding up next to Helga.

"That's what we're here to find out," was the nonchalant response.

As much as this was supposed to be a test, Euphoria personally would still have preferred if no harm came to the adorable looking dolls. Then again, if rumors of what unfolded during Dunkelfelger's challenge in the first year and Ahrensbach's attempted invasion so recently were true, she probably did not have to worry about the dolls. Probably.

Not long after, a variety of feybeasts started showing up, mostly of mid-tier creatures that most any competent knight could dispatch. As Euphoria watched the sight below, her eyes widened as a black aura surrounded the dolls.

"Wait-are those dark weapons!?"

"Yep," Helga said with her usual casualness. "The dolls were specially enhanced with darkness feystones and some new magic circle Lord Ferdinand developed. They're intended to be able to drain the mana of any opponents and use that mana to further power themselves."

"That's...ingenious. And really, really scary. And would probably violate quite a few laws if it was anyone other than Lady Rozemyne deploying them."

Helga's head bobbed up and down in agreement. Down below, the first wave of feybeasts had been dispatched with brutal efficiency, their bodies made limp from their drained mana before they were dispatched in a shower of blood and gore. Throughout this, the dolls remained their serene selves, not missing a beat in their movements or attacks. That began to change as the trees and foliage began to quiver.

"Uh, what's going on?" Euphoria wondered worriedly.

"Well, we weren't sure if there would be anything powerful enough to really test the limits of the shumils," Helga said, "so some other knights went and fed a bunch of mana to something out in the wilds. That's what's probably coming."

The Drewanchel apprentice scholar's eyes widened even before that "something" came into view. When it did emerge from the treeline, the creature rose up onto its hind legs, towering above those same trees, and roared.

"That's a goltze!" Euphoria exclaimed.

"Oh, is that what that is?" Helga said. "I guess it'd make for a good test."

As if agreeing, the shumils lined up into formation, then launched themselves at the giant feybeast. As Euphoria watched the battle unfold, she suspected she would be writing a very long report back to the archducal government of Drewanchel.

To be continued...

@Geezer-Weasalopes Honestly I am beginning to regret kicking off the whole medal and schtappe debate, considering the paucity of evidence.

@kuali said in Japanese Page Counts (up to P5V9):

@NekrozTrish That doesn't really seem to match up with the contents of the graph. P1 was around 300k words (650k characters) between the three books, and if it had been split evenly, it would have been 3 average size books (100k words / 220k characters) instead of both the largest and smallest books in the series. In short, there isn't really enough there to make 4 normal sized books, regardless of the opinions of the publisher.

I’d have to look but it would be harder to find good start/end points too. P1V3 pre-side stories has a thematic arc of Myne being forced to confront her mortality, her desire for books, and her new desire for family which is then followed by a massive status quo change that forces her to really think about how to live her life.

If you were to shrink P1V3 so the first three books have equal page sizes, do you just have P1V2 end on Myne deciding to prioritize her family, with P1V3 effectively starting with Myne’s Choice being completely revoked at the Temple? Or do you cut some of the SS whose existence is mainly there to convince those who already read the WN FOR FREE that it makes sense to buy what is arguably* the “worst” part of the series in that it led to a bunch of people ditching it before Myne enters the Temple? You’re already risking people waiting for Part 2 or something- you need to sweeten the pot somehow.

*Personally I got INTO the series because of Part 1’s “fantasy Dr. Stone” mechanic, so while I also like the mix of high politics, religion, etc., I tend to get annoyed when we spend too much time away from the civilization building for too long. In some ways my least favorite is actually Part 3, but then I’m also the weirdo who likes the Hanse arc since it also touches on society, inventions, etc. :D.