"Yeah, 'course."

"Are you learning spells to do it more permanently, then, or is that a perk that a mana sphere gives you or something?"

"It's a different spell—or a different version of the same spell. The one I have makes stuff waterproof until they get wet and then dry again, and then it's gone. So it has to be cast multiple times."

"… So you could sort of cheat by keeping it slightly wet? Not that you'd necessarily want that, but still."

"No it runs out after a while if it's wet."

Nod. "And presumably you have mana – I don't recall if you got into this with me, do I have mana even though I don't have any spells? Would I use it up by using extra strength?"

"You only use mana for spells, not the other magic, but you do have it."

"I don't really know how to check it? Is it supposedly intuitive, or do I need to cast a spell to be able to detect it?"

"Everyone has it, and you can figure out where to look if you try to use a mana sphere. Spheres are good for helping you know where to look."

"Uh– if I just use a mana sphere, that's not going to help me do anything right now but detect my mana, is it?"

"Mana spheres affect your mana, magic power, and magic resistance. If you focus on it like you did with power, you should be able to figure out where your magic is in your soul."

"Oh, without actually using it?" He nods.

He tries it!

The feeling is odd, simultaneously like and unlike what he got when he used the power sphere. There is something-like-mana and something-like-power and something-like-resistance his soul is telling him he could use the sphere on, and now that he knows where to look he shouldn't have trouble with it even without the sphere.

"I can probably do without using this for now, since I'm pretty resistant to actual damage so it'd just be things like– can you trap people with magic?"

"You can petrify them, and some fiend magic can create vines that keep them in place."

"I– don't think anything could petrify me?" he says. "I'm pretty sure it's never been tried before, though."

"It's easy to cure, but it does make you pretty vulnerable and brittle, so it's a very high priority condition."

"Does it literally turn someone to stone, or are they turned into ice, or some weird other material…?"

"It turns them into stone, yes. It's a similar effect to the one used to turn people into fayths, but much less permanent."

"… Mm, I'm pretty sure that wouldn't work on me, especially if you tried smashing the stone."

"Probably," she concedes.

"Would magic resistance just increase the chance someone throws it off completely, make it easier to fix, make it only petrify bits of them, or…?"

"Magic resistance makes magic affect you less in general. Magical fire burns less, magical effects are less likely to affect you."

"And then, power makes things stronger– and more likely to affect your targets?"

"Exactly."