Notes

write what you know: aleksandra janusz is a molecular biologists and neuobiology specialist, along with spending most of her life in the academia. on top of that, in her youth, she worked for Kawaii, polish scene-defying magazine for manga and anime. take a wild guess how it affects her writing style

how did we get here
after the end
lost technology
post-apo
hold your hippogriphs: automagiczny, instead of automatyczny, although they DO run on magic power
magic a is magic a/magitek: right down to ambient radiation measured with geiger-like counter
blessed with suck/cursed with awesome: vincent ability to process magic and his absurdly large channelling capacity
places of power: "geographic sources"
earth-shattering kaboom: the void magic lead to apocalyptic events, literally tearing continents apart
shrouded in myth: glorion (a bandit) and mordred (a magician asking to create the first barrier) got turned into glorion the hero and mordred the evil wizard... at least on folk level, since it's historical account on who was who
mundane solution: automagical crossbow instead of magic
negated moment of awesome: kat is a an incredibly rare Creo magician, which requires a bunch of already inborn, yet uncommon features comming together, allowing her to effortlessly use fire magic; her first display of that ability is used on a troll species that has complete immunity to Creo magic and shrugs off entirely her attack
prematutely grey hair: kath, who is in her early 20s, yet is described as grey-haired, and NOT due to anime hair
overly long name: just about every single magic user
as you know: the narration is from vintent perspective, where he mentions various obvious and common facts in-universe to the audience this way
the form you are comfortable with: the soul-dragon has a from of late teen gorgeous girl when showing in dreams of the mage controlling it
monster is a mommy?
uncanny valley: in-universe, the dragon's form in dreams is just TOO perfect and cause open revulsion as a result, rather than the intended allure
large ham: in-universe; apparently, old mages had penchant for this, and as result, their constructs, when communicating with modern people, speak in purple prose and are showy to a fault
nice job breaking it, hero: the soul-dragon could be actually INCREDIBLY useful... if only anyone was controlling t. instead, operating on auto-pilot, all it is achieving is making the gap in the barrier to the void bigger and also encouraging all sorts of monsters to simply run for their lives from the dragon itself
witch: male ones, since that's just a job title, but given how polish works, makes it funny by default
overly long name: everyone, since majority of mages are blue blood
collector of strange: meg and chamomile, both taking the weirdest cases possible as their apprentices
famed in story: crazy meg, for better or worse, has an omnious reputation to her name; she doesn't mind and it's mostly played for laughs, but few snippers suggests she's also having extra bureaucratic hurdles due to her reputation
first person smartass: whenever vincent is narrating
twang hello: "tutasi"
quasi-silesian as dialect
flat-earth atheist: people on the other side of the void don't exactly believe in magic, given all they are left with are half-deteriorated artifacts and the last mage died almost 60 years earlier
tyke bomb: liliana; almost verbatim
mundane solution: vincent spend almost 20 years as an apprentice to figure it out, but he finally realises that thanks to his fuck-huge magic channels, he can simply syphon ANY magic attack send in his direction and dissapate it as harmless light; except, of course, so far everyone thought this is impossible, as nobody had vincent's capacity for processing magic energy
when all you have is hammer: the only spell vincent truly mastered for the 24 years of apprenticeship is Ball of Light, a basic illumination space, which was at the verge of his Source capacity already
training vs talent: a recurring theme for various characters, that often display natural talent in one field, but require extensive training in other
muggles do it better: a variety; vincent's fiance has virtually zero clue about magic, but she's a painter, so she has zero problem with drawing even the most complex sigils
brick joke: when kath is trying to hack into meg's crystal ball, she complains that the first thing she tried was simple stuff, like "Plum" (cat's name) and it didn't work; much later, meg's pocket variant turns out to be protected by a password that's, you've guessed, Plum
doing in science/wizardy: magic used to be treated more mystically, so meg has hard time using the "old terminology", being used to precise laws of math and physics
samus is a girl: general von faulkenstein is a hadened battle veteran... and a middle-aged woman
joan d'arc archetype
reasonable authority
comically serious: general von faulkenstein, being a foil to meg that has hard time NOT rolling her eyes
got volunteered: belle and meg get tangled into Flame's war over the lost bretonnia
mundane utility:
** the "new humans" subculture use transformation magic for things like technicolor skin, feathers instead of hair or simply instead of neon hair dye
** first thing kat and vince think when wayland tells them about vince's ability to being a geographic Source is to talks about charging magic batteries and getting filthy rich in the process
** want to make sure you remember the spell correctly and use it instinctively, rather than from training? learn it under hypnosis
drunk with power: the void mages, which are mostly remembered as autocrats that got just head over their own powers
last of his kind: lucius the mad was the last void mage; vincent is the last one after his Source finally awakes
open secret: amandine figured on her own that vincent is a void mage
berserk button: calling lady d'opal lily's grandma. and the girls is a short-tempered child capable of fire breathing
gaslight fantasy: arboria. meanwhile, bretonia is squarely in a low-tier standard generic medieval fantasy
dramatic wind: skuld does that when angered, despite no real wind being around her human form
blue and orange morality: skuld was programmed thousands of years ago, for goals that are only broadly understood, but is absolutely ruthless with doing everything in her might to do what she was programmed to
no social skills: recurring problem for various magic users
** kath is horrible at this
** meg is a terse talker that is simply too BORED to bother explaining people what has to be explained and only gives them the stuff she has to
** skuld isn't even human and as a magic construct has the sort of empathy you would expect from a pulp novel supercomputer
puppet king: philippe II verlaine
grey emminence: his pupper masters
corrupt church: order of the patient wardener in lost bretonia
church of saint genericus: saint aimee
insult backfire:
- since when fair ladies know anything about the art of war?
- i have no idea, go ask the Flame (general is a woman)
subspace is a scary place: the void is a dangerous place full of eldritch abominations
gender is no object: at least at the arborian side of the void; much less so in the lost bretonia