"I thought we'd already established that magic just... doesn't work on you, mostly," Fern began, confused, "or at least none of the light and dark spellcraft we're used to. You really still want to learn about this stuff?"

  Ember grinned lightly, but her eyes were as sharp as ever. "Knowledge is power, right? There's always something to gain by learning, no matter how small. And besides," she added, leaning back in the library's lush recliner and crossing her legs, "you're adorable when you go into teaching mode."

  The fallen hero huffed softly, but compliantly closed her astrology book and id it on a nearby table before standing. She was out of uniform today - at least until Crimson's training session to be held this evening - so rather than sword or armilry, the brunette withdrew from one blouse pocket an empty pen she'd enhanced for use as an aetheric focus. "I suppose I'll take you on a review of my own journey, then, since that's what I'm most familiar with," Fern began, moving to a clear spot amid the various piles of books that hadn't been tidied up yet.

  "As good a way to do it as any."

  "Quite so. Now then-" She pced her left hand at her waist, and with the pen in her right, drew in the air with bright blue-white light: a pair of squares with one corner in common. "The most basic of overcsses is the Jack. Short for 'jack of all trades', it's a css with no specialization at all, no particur affinity. It's also where everyone starts out - as far as I know, anyway - when they go through the ceremony to receive their sigil, as Ravenna and I have. So it has some connotations of inexperience and ineffectiveness, and people generally try to avoid keeping it for very long."

  Ember's eyes narrowed slightly. "No one learns to use light and dark outside of this whole 'covenant' system?"

  "I can't say it's impossible, but I've never heard of it happening; the general understanding is that everyone starts as a Jack. That said, general understanding is certainly a regionalized affair. For example, the Pinsgate guild only offers skill training as part of what they call 'the diamond'." She traced a few lines in the air, radiating out from the Jack sigil: up-left, up-right, then directly up. "As you might expect for a guild dominated by Lightsiders, they have no interest in dark overcsses, so these are all light-aligned. Let's start with Hero."

  The healer watched as Fern's pen followed the vertical line up and, just where it ended, sketched a few quick sshes in a vague sword-like shape. "This was me for... goodness, how many years was it? Eight, nine? Before meeting Ravenna. But in any case, Heroes are about what you might expect, given their name."

  "We don't really have 'heroes' where I come from," Ember murmured, a somber note in her words. "At least not in a distinguishable way. So you'll have to expin that one before we move on - if you don't mind."

  She blinked. "Ah. Right." Truly, the western continent was a strange pce. "Well, a hero - the concept, that is, not the css - is someone who... gets the job done, I suppose you could say. That's what they're known for: doing. Accomplishing tasks. The hero sys the dragon, topples the dark lord, that sort of thing. The method doesn't matter, only the outcome. In the same way, Hero - the overcss - is much like Jack in that it doesn't specialize in either physical techniques or magical spellcasting; the difference is that all its skills are light-aligned."

  "So Jack has skills of its own that aren't aligned with either light or dark at all?"

  Fern tapped her chin. "Well... yes, but they're very basic. Things like illumination spells or sensory extension help you do the bare minimum as an adventurer or mercenary or whatnot, but not much more than that. The dark-aligned aetheric perception skill I use is much more powerful in terms of range and specificity than a Jack could achieve on their own, so specializing into something is really the only way to grow." She smiled wryly, not without a little bit of frustration behind it. "Ironic for me to be saying that, of course, but that's hindsight for you."

  Ember nodded thoughtfully. Fern had talked of her own history before, how she'd earned the regrettable nickname 'Luckless' after failing repeatedly as a Hero, rgely because she'd tried to do everything - picking up almost every avaible skill - and ended up mostly ineffective in all of it. Imagine if they saw her now, though, she thought with a little smile. Maid of Stars, indeed.

  "As for the other points here, specializing in magic makes you a Mage-" She drew a diamond surrounded by several horizontal lines on the left. "-while using more physical techniques makes you a Monk." On the right she traced a square first, then a longer line above and below.

  "Seems kind of a broad cssification system to me."

  Fern half-smiled at the lounging healer. "Well, yes, that's why they're called 'overcsses'. Except for Jack, all of them have subcsses as well, allowing for greater specialization and even more powerful techniques - but I'm getting ahead of myself. By adding the dark-aligned overcsses, you see not the false diamond, but the true and full hexagon instead."

  Ember watched intently as the collection of glowing blue lines in the air grew by degrees, Fern tracing lines out from the Jack sigil once again in a vertical mirror-image: down-left, down-right, and directly down. Six rays from the center in total, like a luminous snowfke. It was a pretty thing in its own way; and she enjoyed the focused look on her teacher's face as she wrote in the air with aether, too. The way she drew the designs with exacting precision, occasionally correcting an errant stroke and redoing it.

  "These overcsses are essentially the same as their light-aligned counterparts," Fern began, "as far as what they focus on - or don't. For the magic side, we have Dark Mage-" On the left, she drew a diamond, then an angur swirl that cut diagonally through it. "-that's what Ravenna is, of course. The physical side is Destroyer-" She moved to the right and drew a pilr, then jagged lines on either side of it. "-and finally we have my css, the dark all-rounder, Fallen Hero." She moved to the lowest part of the hexagon and sketched a sword shape, oriented the reverse of the sigil of the Hero, and shaped differently as well.

  "So this is it, then? No more overcsses?"

  The fallen hero shook her head. "That's all there is to it. Light and dark on one axis, magic and physical on the other. There's a little more I could go into as far as the lore and connotations of each of these, I suppose, but for the overcsses themselves, these seven are all you get."

  Ember hummed quietly. "Lore, huh... now that you mention it..." She leaned forward in her seat slightly, peering at the hexagon. "I've peeked over your shoulder a few times while you've been deep in your studies, and I can't help but notice there's more than a passing resembnce between some of the consteltions you've been studying and the sigils you've drawn here."

  "I... suppose that's true, yes."

  Her eyes narrowed. "And there are also twelve commonly accepted consteltions, only half of which have a corresponding sigil. So if you compare the two sets, there are six consteltions not represented here - because Jack doesn't appear in the sky in any form."

  "Correct again," Fern replied with a serene smile.

  "I don't suppose you'd like to expin that curious circumstance for me, dear teacher?"

  "If you want, yes - but it does seem a bit out of scope for a lesson on the covenant system's csses, doesn't it?"

  Ember squinted at her, weighing the options. The time for the midday meal was quickly approaching, after all, and she'd become quite fond of eating regurly. After a moment she sighed, decision made. "Perhaps if you could just provide the short version, then."

  Fern smiled a little too sweetly. "Well, that's simple enough! In short, there are twelve gods, twelve consteltions represent them in the sky, and the gods can be separated into two groups: those of war and those of civilization. The covenant system uses the consteltions for the gods of war, and... well, ignores the rest. Probably because it was made for war and conflict from the start, not as a helpful utility sort of thing." She seemed about to continue the thought, then shrugged, nonchant. "As for why Jack is missing, I imagine whoever designed the system needed a zero to start from. If there's more to the story than that, it's beyond my knowing; you'd have to learn it from some other source."

  "Hrm. Gods, huh..." The healer sat back in her chair. "Well, you know I don't think much of religion. But it's something to look into ter, I guess, if I want to do any more digging."

  She nodded. "Quite so. Does that satisfy your curiosity then, Ms. Grace?" A final confirmation request, it seemed, accompanied by a little sparkle in her eyes.

  "For now, yes." Ember took one st gnce at the hexagon. "I get the distinct feeling all of that might even come in useful some day."

  Fern waved her pen, and the blue lines and sigils faded. "It very well might."