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Here you are, in the lecture hall for the last time, hopefully, for Selected Chapters of Practical Subterranean Mycology. Any repeat visit would imply that you’ll have failed the exam that you are about to take today, and you would attempt to retake it in the future.
Upon entering you see, no change to the class itself. Although it is hard to say with any certainty, because most of the classroom is obscured with people. The lecture hall that’s grown cosy to the few of you in attendance is now packed with people. Most seats are taken. More people still are entering, signing themselves into the ledger on the teacher’s desk, and trying to find a place to sit.
You recognise a few schoolmates – the Socially Adept Naturalist, the Charming Student, the loitering gaggle that spends most of the time lounging on campus revising some study materials, but you’ve never shared a classroom with them… until now.
Fortunately you manage to find a seat (although most likely not your preferred seat) and nobody is left standing.
The Soft-Eyed Mycologist enters the classroom with the precise timing of someone who refuses to be too early and loathes to be late. The spike in attendance has not caught him off-guard; the stack of papers he is carrying makes it clear that there is enough exam material for everyone, and anyone interested can get seconds.
He shoots the class a bright smile of welcome. The first time you’ve seen this expression on him in an academic setting, it was seconds prior to releasing a horde of dwarf fungal columns freely into the classroom.

( Read more... )

tolpen

This fine evening you are returned to your home classroom. Gone is the festive decor, including all the elephants which can now be assumed thoroughly refuted. The posters with your artwork done during the first class remain, although they seem to have switched places here and there. The paper certainly seems newer. On the other hand, the bowl of apples has returned. The apples are smaller, darker and lumpy. They taste sour, and try as you might, the brown juice will drip down your chin, it is entirely unavoidable. They are also very fulfilling, you don’t have to eat too many to feel full.
As you mingle and find your seat – God gracious, have you forgotten your usual spot over the course of the winter break? – there is something odd in the air. It takes you a moment to put a finger on it.
The teacher is absent!
Actually… The teacher is late. By ten-and-something minutes. You’ve known the Soft-Eyed Mycologist to be most punctual, at least for the class.
He does arrive though, and with him he brings the trolley cart you’ve come to learn to love, or at least get higher expectations as to what is going to be the practical portion of the class. Today it holds small round aquariums – the kind in which you are not supposed to keep fish long-term. The interior is full of something dense and white. Milk or sentient fog would be a fine guess, but the contents do not slosh nor swirl like a fluid would. A particularly homogenous cotton?

( Read more... )

tolpen

This evening the class is delayed by five minutes (approximately). It is because a very officially looking paper – that is torn from a notebook and hastily written on in nearly unintelligible lettering, which is a true mark of authenticity it comes from a lecturer and the information is important, rather than the official letterhead of the Benthic admin which a) is very easy to forge, b) is usually bullshit reminding you of tuition fees anyway – informs you that today’s Selected Chapters from Practical Mycology are moved to Laboratory 11, and furthermore that the classroom is currently in use for Dental Ablutions 201. By the sounds of muffled explosions from within, DA201 is indeed there and will be there for a while.
Laboratory 11 turns out to be a bit further down the hall. You’ve probably passed by it on your way to the classroom and now have to backtrack. It is easily recognisable by a brass plaque that has been edited several times (currently most of the information is inscribed upon paper glued over the brass).

Benthic Department of	~~Cryptomycology~~
	Subterranean Mycology

Laboratory XI

Authorised personel only
Nur Mitarbeiter
N'y pense même pas

EYE PROTECTION MANDATORY PAST THIS POINT

There is a helpful basket of goggles to borrow, in case somebody doesn’t have their own. You are studying practical mycology, everyone would expect you to have your own goggles. Everyone would also expect you to be scatterbrained and forget them in your other lab-coat. Or maybe something ate them, you know how some slime moulds are.

( Read more... )

tolpen

Once again you find yourself attending an evening class on the Selectech Chapters from Practical Subterranean Mycology. Even though the subject has a tradition nearly as old as the Fall, no one has bothered to rename it so it would form a good acronym.
Today the classroom is looking almost cheerful. Someone had cleared out all the poetic yet grim memento moris. Someone, quite possibly someone else, had then decorated all possible and impossible surfaces of the room in joyful expectations of the Yule, in the best traditions of the four weeks of Advent. And finally a third someone has then replaced all the saints and angels, including the Virgin Mary and even the swaddled baby Jesus in the manger, with elephants, all triumphantly raising their trunks. Since the elephants are wooden or ceramic, they do not toot. But if they could, it would be a cacophony your ears would not appreciate for long.
(Yes, in the manger the baby elephant is carefully swaddled in the finest silk. Yes, there are several elephants hanging under the ceiling whom you can pull by the string and they then flap their gigantic ears, which apparently are how they fly. And yes, several of those flying elephants have musical instruments, such as a lyre, tambourine or– No, that is not a trumpet, that is just a gilded trunk, now that you came closer it is plain to see.)
( Read more... )

tolpen

This evening find you once again in the classroom. The carnage of the last lecture has been cleaned up, regular classes have been held here et cetera. This implies that the Selected Chapters of Practical Subterranean Mycology is somehow an irregular or unusual lecture. And perhaps it is. To you.
Today you find nothing unusual. No suspicious crates, although the bowl of apples from the last class is making another appearance. These apples seem to be fresh, though, more tough to bite, slightly more tart and their flesh is tinted a lovely pink. Take one or two. Or three. There seems to be a supply for everyone.
This is not to say that the class is unchanged: There appear to now be decorations. Various memento mori are scattered around the windowsills and on the teacher’s desk – engraved skulls (some regular-sized, some miniature, some real, some plaster-cast) and hourglasses – vases of delightful fungal arrangements.
Most notably at the seat where you regularly sit there is an inkwell, a dipping pen and a teacup. The teacups are a mismatched bunch – no matter how hard you look, you will not find a pair. It is likely the cup is slightly chipped, although there is no guarantee of it.
You notice the Soft-Eyed Mycologist, your teacher, only later, when he gets up from his chair to strain the tea in the teapot. He’s been sitting so still and quietly that even with the ostentatious amount of jewellery he’s simply become a part of the background.
( Read more... )

tolpen

It seems that today the classroom has been mostly cleared out of the remnants of the last lecture you’ve had here: All wax meticulously scrubbed and scraped off all the surfaces, no spores on the ceiling, no staining orange milk spilled on the desks. Instead by the shelves and leaning against the walls are nets – for butterflies and moths, for fishing, for scandalous legs. Landing, weighted, one doily that might have gotten here by an accident and now everybody is too afraid to leave it out, because yes, technically it is a lot of holes surrounded by a thread.
However, on the lectern – where the ledger of attendance usually lays – is a big, and here we mean a really big bowl of apples, stacked to a neat trigonal pyramid.
A helpful little piece of cardboard says claims that you are free to help thyself to a reasonable amount
The teacher’s desk itself is buried under boxes. Boxes one might use when moving from past premises to new ones. One solitary pitcher of water stands beside them.
The classroom which usually smells of poor air circulation today carries sweet scent of apples, recently upturned soil, and a sharp cologne with a hint of sandalwood to it, you know, the one so popular in saloons and conferences this season.( Read more... )

( Read more... )

tolpen

In spite of everything (or perhaps because of everything) you have returned to the Selected Chapters from Practical Subterranean Mycology. Two weeks have passed since the first lecture which has certainly left an impression.
Your greatest obstacle in getting to the class is a janitor, meticulously mopping the floor. You have to walk over the wet, sparkling clean tiles to get to the class. Hopefully you are in the habit of wearing clean shoes.

This evening the teacher is not in the classroom just yet. You are free to explore the supply closet (brooms, chalk, one (1) bag of dry soil) and admire the changes done since your last visit.
Today the room is candle-lit: cylinders of tallow and wax burn away on the lectern, on the students’ desks and even on the shelves. A few candles are hidden away in hollowed out turnips into the skin of which have been carved grotesque faces. As fresh vegetables – including sad hard watery turnips – are somewhat of a pricey commodity in London, there aren’t that many of them.
The orange-green light and flickering shadows of the candles at first obscure and then highlight another addition: Your artistic endeavours from the previous class. Your drawings of fungi have been copied to posters and hung up on the walls. Your names are written at the bottom, just above the mushroom identification.
Speaking of your names, you might want to put yours down into the ledger to mark your attendance. You came all the way here already.

( [Footsteps approach the classroom...] )

tolpen

The Selected Chapters from Practical Subterranean Mycology have a reputation of a laid-back class which more than anything else serves as a meeting spot for the naturalist ~~freaks~~ eccentrics of Benthic. Reader Guildenstern, who has been teaching this class for years, is known to use the allotted time to share ~~dirt on~~ personal anecdotes from the lives of his most respectable colleagues. Which is precisely the reason why no student is allowed to take up the class more than once in their lifetime – to prevent amassing of too much power in one pair of hands
But the day when all the classes are posted and signing up for them is available, there is, as the academics call it, a minor uproar. The aforementioned Selected Chapters are entirely missing from this year register. There are complaints. Bolder individuals threaten to demand back tuition paid.
After much fussing about, the Chairman of the Subterranean Mycology Department gives a public apology for this – and several other – clerical errors, and the omitted class appears with its lost compatriots on the bottom of the register. It now bears such disrespectful neighbours as Cellular Mechanisms and Crimson Genetics. Yes, we suppose those are alright courses to attend if you want to make money, publish papers and maybe push the quality of life forward for further generations. But this is a university, for grief’s sake! One’s primary goal is to increase their own social standing.

Because of this little clerical oversight, the class is held in one of the smaller lecture halls in the basement. It is not particularly hard to find if you know where you are going. The class is also held fairly late. Not awfully late, but certainly you are missing some of the happy hours in less secluded places, such as the Veilgarden.
There aren’t that many students. Most of them already have a busy schedule with the classes that were posted on time. But the door is not locked and the timetable clearly says that the Selected Chapters begin in a couple of minutes.
( [Enter the class] )

theexdisgracedacademic

Arriving at class this week was a matter of simply maintaining course. Several new walls appeared to have been built between the university entrance and their usual door, but at each turn, there was little to do but continue through them. Before reaching where the staircase usually was, a familiar janitor had set up a cleaning area. As each student passed, Jonathan scowled or nodded, scaring off those with no business being there, and waving along the Correspondence students as soon as the coast was clear.

The classroom was much the same as usual. However, the cabinet in back had finally been unlocked, and the leftover notebooks and vials of violant ink were stacked up for students to help themselves to. The benches had been pushed back to make room for the biggest new addition: a large stone disc, ten feet in diameter. It was covered in wax tablets, and after what must’ve been hours of careful work, The Academic finished inscribing them with correspondence.

They stood up, wiping the sweat from their brow, doing their best to keep their bandages clean. Above the tablets, a heat haze shimmered through the air. “You’re welcome to have a look, but don’t get too close. This will force the papers placed atop to burn at a relatively even rate, and ought to contain any nasty, unexpected law effects.

The Academic received papers from each student who had chosen to do so. After checking each one, they tossed them atop the wax tablets. Green flames shot up from above them.

The Academic’s eye narrowed. “Cheeky, ground-bound so and so-“ they couldn’t help themself, and explained: “That chemical reaction comes from a Scintillack pigment…that’s a sign it’s been stamped with orders to go straight to the top. Even for Masters’ business, that’s rare.” The Academic sat back. Still tense, they warily eyed the door. “It should be over soon. They’ll need at least five minutes to burn through, but then you lot will be home free.” They let out a breath, unconvincingly attempting to calm down. They reached for the last of the papers, leaning forward to place it atop the others.

The door to the room creaked open, and The Academic craned their head. “Hm? One of our delinquent classmates seeing fit to rejoin us at the final hour?”

( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

Tap, tap, tap.

The Academic busied themself with the chalkboard. Notes were no longer helpful nor necessary, and the time for them was past. But still, they filled the board with more roots or grammar notes. How to lower or exacerbate spark points in a given sigil. Things having to do with opening locks or entryways. Words to keep things hidden. Words to keep missives secure and tucked away on a messenger's person. When the board would begin to smoulder, they'd erase the latest sigil, and move onto the next board.

The bell rang in the nearby clock tower, and The Academic ran out of excuses. They turned toward the class.

( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

This week, the classroom door was missing entirely. Luckily, three Correspondence symbols had been carved above the wall next to the usual location of the opening, creating a shimmering passageway.

The Academic was at their podium, looking terribly pleased with themself. “Ah! Welcome!” They greeted the last student to enter the room, “It is now time to begin your final projects. I’ll be meeting with you each one-on-one in order to assist you in determining-“

A garbled scream came from the outside hallway, and an ashen-looking figure stepped in, covered from head to toe in white soot.

The Beleaguered Dean stomped in. The ash fell from him like snow, and clenched within his hand was a cream-colored note.

( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

Though bearing several fresh nail-holes, the regular door was once again unblocked. Opening it returned the students to a familiar room, and a familiar face.

The Academic placed a jar into their bag. Glass clattered within as it joined several others. “Welcome back to our usual classroom. I hope you weren't accosted by any more rogue laws on the way. Our dearest Dean wasn't quite so lucky this week. At least, I think we have a Dean? We ought to, right? That makes sense for a classroom?" They waved airily, and whether it was due to lack of memory, or because The Academic sincerely did not care, they remained as unconcerned as a picnicker in Jekyll Gardens. “And as such, I found no further barriers to entry!”

A watercolor figure holds a jar

( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

Any students arriving to the classroom expecting shenanigans would be proven completely correct. This week, the door was a veritable barricade of wooden boards and assembled trash. Affixed to it were ten notes in at least eleven different languages. Notices from The Beleaguered Dean. Each stated that this course had been officially canceled, and that the students were not at all to return to this room under pain of expulsion.

And, of course, no refunds.

Underneath, there was a patch of frost. As one looked at the note, and not at the frost, it became clear: there was no class this week. It wasn’t allowed. If there was no class, then there was no sense in staying here to study. You’d have to leave.

And where else would one very much not be allowed to study the Correspondence?

One by one, each student figured out this new location puzzle, making their way to the streets surrounding The Bazaar.

( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

There was no sigil on the door this week, but instead a wooden sign, nailed to the door, lettered in bold English copperplate:

COURSE CANCELLED.
(No refunds.)

Next to it, The Academic was on a footstool, hammer in hand, praying nails out.

They flashed a smile of encouragement at each student as they passed. “Pay it no mind, and get settled in. Be with you shortly.”

The last student had scarcely arrived when The Academic rushed into the room, slamming the door and locking it closed behind them. They tossed the purloined sign underneath the lectern, pulled down the second blackboard at the front of the room, and began to write.

“Quick question! Why would an administration which has encouraged the formal study of this language so suddenly reverse course? Any ideas?”

( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

Though still moderately charred, the classroom door this week bore no suspicious marks. Students could be forgiven for muttering to themselves as they entered the class, but thankfully, all letters and sounds were free to speak.

The Ex-Disgraced Academic was at the lectern, having completed preparing several diagrams on the blackboards behind them.

“Let’s begin a crucial part of crafting proper Correspondence symbols: layering. You may have noticed two weeks ago, the way that the simple greeting was composed of the radicals for the pronoun “You,” as well as the verb “to like.” It does in fact translate as the base reassurance “you are liked.” Not a bad way to greet someone. It is, however, very formal. You see how the two radicals don’t touch? In the improper context, it could possibly be read as ‘The idea of “you” and “being liked” don’t belong within five-thousand light-years of each other.’ Hm. Not half as nice. A more casual way would look like this…” and here, they crossed the tip of To Like through the tail of You, “…there. A gentle light approaches. The meaning of this symbol will change, as the two bisect each other more closely.” The Academic wrote one across the other. “Beloved.” They raised an eyebrow. “No doubt several of you have your hearts aflutter, ready to stamp this on your next note to your latest beau. But might I offer a moment of pause before you attempt it on paper…”

( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

This week’s trouble didn’t begin until after entering the classroom. But even as students approached the domed room, a sudden and striking sight at the precipice inspired the requisite amount of natural foreboding.

A blazing sigil upon your usual classroom door. To look upon it was to know that things was wrong now. But who could say what? Who could put a digit on a crisis? Not you. But a factor in your vicinity was offputtingly odd.

Your classroom had a normal look about it. But why such hush from surrounding pupils? You could still talk aloud, right? But not without difficulty. Your instructor stood avant, gripping podium with both claws.

“You saw our door?” Angry words through tight lips and flashing fangs. “A Law is now functioning in our classroom.”

( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

As the students filed in, The Academic arrived, wheeling a book cart. On one side, stacked high, were a number of small boxes. The purveyor’s whole name wasn’t legible, but from the classroom seats, the words “-Educational Picture Postcards and Assorted Souvenir Stationery” were boldly visible.” The other side of the cart had still more boxes, and something bottled and unforgettable gleamed inside. The Academic quickly folded those boxes closed, walked to a far side of the room, and closed them into a filing cabinet, before securing it with a rather nasty-looking correspondence lock.

“You’ll get that when you’re good and ready,” The Academic drawled, returning to the cart and lifting another box, “but the world’s finest pigments mean nothing at all without the proper…” and here they dropped the box thudding on the nearest bench: “paper!”

From the trim, tidy packaging, they produced a series of twee, doily-covered notebooks. Their pupil contracted at the garish sight, lips drawing back into a hiss. Suspiciously, they thumbed through the contents, relief diluting their disgust.

“Hm. Well. The paper is of the requested quality. That’s enough, I suppose.” The Academic passed a notebook to the nearest student, and gestured for that student to pass it down, in turn. Soon enough, each student was in possession of a notebook.

“Wretched and garish as they are, each of these are filled with fifty sheets of F.F. Gebrant’s Flame-Resilient Paper. These are professional-quality materials, and can safely accommodate three correspondence symbols at a time, as well as any English notes you might take alongside the symbols. The covers may be too precious by half, but you oughtn’t be. I can avail myself of a practically bottomless source, so use them up and ask for more as you require.”

“Let’s break them in with some fairly standard notes in English, shall we?” Chalk hit board, and the lecture began. "I want you to start thinking about what The Correspondence can do for you. Let us start with the two major skill sets: Crimson Engineer, and the Epistolant."
( Read more... )

theexdisgracedacademic

This week, The Academic was on time for their own class. They’d cleared the chalkboards, refilling them with an extensive list of symbols. Though each clearly corresponded to The Correspondence, not one was scarcely more complex than the radicals they’d learned last week.

“While technically correct, you will almost never see any of these symbols on a plaque or temple wall. We’re still one step away from proper symbols." The Academic stepped away from the display, inviting the eyes of the students to begin to roam over the writing." But put your goggles on now, and look! You can see it now, can’t you?”

a white-haired figure gestures

( Looking more closely... )

theexdisgracedacademic

When the students arrived to their domed classroom, there was a broad-shouldered clay man standing before them. A pair of goggles were awkwardly affixed to her face. The hour to begin arrived, but no other tutor came with it.

The Clay Substitute laid her hands upon the podium. "PLEASE. OPEN YOUR TEXTBOOKS TO PAGE-"

Much the same as last week, there was a hubbub in the hall outside. The door slammed open, and one figure marched another to the front of the class. The Beleaguered Dean, swathed in a coat of thick tweed and a thicker coat of nervous sweat, was all but pushing The Ex-Disgraced Academic back into their pace behind the podium.

The Academic wasn't missing a beat in the argument: "-can't at all see what the issue is, so long as they learn the material-"

"You cannot offload your duties to an Underclay aspirant!" The Dean's fury is only matched by the fearful tension in his voice, "And an unfinished one at that! How did you get it up here-"

The Academic's eye widened in almost-honorable affront. "You can't prove that this perfectly capable worker is unfinished, can you?"

"No, but I can certainly prove that it's not on the faculty list." The Dean wiped his brow. "Get on with it, man!"

The Clay Substitute barely moved, but the grinding of her turning head rumbled through the floor. "I WAS TOLD THAT I WOULD BE PAID IN FULL, REGARDLESS OF HOW LONG CLASS WENT?"

Coin was exchanged, and, the Dean ushered The Clay Substitute out of the room. The Academic hissed through their teeth, clearly ready to vent their terrible mood at the first faces to cross theirs.

They turned to look at the class. And smiled a terrible smile. "Good morning."

( Targets acquired. )

theexdisgracedacademic

It took a while to find the classroom. The halls of Benthic were in turns stately and wild, and to catch snippets of conversation is to risk getting drawn into conversation (risky), or someone else's research project (perilous in the extreme). The little slip of paper with the classroom listing was even worse. The number didn't relate to any floor or door, and those that managed to get their nerves up enough to ask for help were treated to scornful chuckles.

"I knew that class was one big prank," chortled a passing member of the Stoats' Club, "even ol' Percy Winship-Widgon wouldn't fall for it, and he's only got half a lobe left to spare!"

As the starting hour for the class drew closer, and whispering doubts threatened to increase in volume, something important clicked into place. The classroom number might not exist on the walls of the building. But it did correspond to the table of contents in one of the many volumes of required reading. And that pointed to a section that referenced a paper that was also in the course materials, a seemingly unrelated architectural discussion of Benthic's construction…

Ah. The dome at the top of the building. Most students hadn't known that there was a room there. Had there ever been a room there?

Regardless. Members of the class made their way higher and deeper into the center of the great structure, and finally came upon a door, labeled with a lead plaque, and the numbers for the much-sought classroom. To squint at it, one would notice the numbers going funny for a moment. Perhaps they didn't look the same to other people. Though to look around, each member of the class would have noticed that they'd made the trek alone. There were no other people to see these numbers.

The room itself was too big for such a small class; three rows of university benches with shelf desks sat in the middle, facing a lecturing podium and a freestanding chalkboard. There were at least four independent layers to the board, and it wrapped a semi-circle around the benches, closing the space off into a much less agoraphobic classroom area.

Atop each bench were sets of goggles, and several silver atomizers. Atop the lecturing podium was a congratulatory fungal bouquet. If your fungiography isn't too rusty, those were ink-caps for success in scholarly ventures, amanita virosa for permanent consequences, and false-blemmigans to wrap the entire thing in a fantastically sarcastic tone of voice.

Class hadn't started yet, and the professor was absent. Students had a little time to introduce themselves to the others.

( Read more... )