"... In that case, it's probably best if I have someone else there to look out for me after the ritual. Maybe one of my forks... The ritual shouldn't affect them, right?"

"Nnnno, but they shouldn't be present for the ritual itself, the magic might get confused and that would be bad."

"... Perhaps it would be best if you were my spotter? After all, you know how the ritual goes and can make sure I don't get it wrong."

"It is actually traditional for there to be an arcanist spotter present during the ritual, and I was just - expecting to be there," says Inavet. "To make sure everything goes right, to make sure you know exactly what you're doing before the ritual, and to - erm, this is a permanent change. If you were to mess up part way through, it's my job to try my hardest to try and save your magic."

"That's... A very good plan, then."

Smile.

"And - I'm going to explain exactly what's happening before the procedure itself, is here a good place to explain it all?"

"Sure, that works!"

"Okay. So there are two parts of the ritual, and both are important. The first is - basically balancing the aspects that my magic sees, so the magic can better see you. That's what all of the items are for - people show up very much as a certain type of thing, but not as something that's balanced. So we need to add non-people things to balance it. If you showed up as something other than the standard to my magic, I'd need to compensate by changing what items are used, or if it's extreme enough, need to change the procedure of the ritual itself. Make sense?"

Eva nods along. "Makes sense: go on?"

"The second part is expressing to the magic who you are. Part of the procedure of the ritual involves thinking about who you are as a person - your values, what's important to you, your personality, what you think you're like, how other people see you - so on. The better it knows you the more it can - fit to you? And give you magic that'll fit you. You shouldn't try to lie about who you are to it, either, it'll - basically confuse it, because it's not just accepting what you're telling it, it's also looking at you. In order to actually get it to assign you things that didn't fit you, you'd have to actually be a different person, or screw it up. Screwing it up overall nets you less power and detailed senses, so - honesty is important, here."

"I can manage that."

Nod. "The second part is why having forks present might confuse it. Because it'll look for you and instead of just finding you, shining and at your best, it'll find - two of you. And not know what to do, and try to give them both magic, probably, but mess it up with both."

"I see. That definitely sounds like something to avoid."

Little smile, then back to business. "Yes, a bit. Uh - and we should possibly also test to see what forking does to one's arcany, because I don't actually know. I haven't dealt with forking before."

"Would you like me to fork you?"

... Is that the face of minor amusement? Yes, it looks like it. She doesn't point out the innuendo or laugh at it, but she can find it funny.

"Yes, please."

Eva notices Inavet's mirth, and then notices the words that just escaped her mouth. Her cheeks redden.

"Um... Okay. Stand up, away from the bench, and hold very still."

Up Inavet gets! She moves away from the bench, and then keeps very still.

"Ready."

Eva pokes Inavet in the shoulder, and then there are two Inavets.

There are! Only one of them is being poked, and they both immediately decide that clearly that one is Inavet-Prime, and react accordingly.

Inavet #2 tilts her head, and then says, "Arcany's all in place where it should be. So that's nice."

Inavet-Prime nods, then adds, "But we should probably also see how merging works with it, too."

"Kind of a pity," says the second, "the multitasking of two me's would be so nice, but - there will be time for other forks."

Eva bites her lip. "I did tell you that merging takes more effort, right? We're going to need to go back to the store for that part."

"Hm," says Inavet-Prime. "We really should have tested this before coming out here."

"To be fair," says Inavet-the-second, "we did definitely call the ritual location being weird, we just didn't know the type of weird and if it would work. Checking before saying we could wasn't a bad call."

"Yes, thank you, let's keep the rampant egotism to a minimum and not get too self congratulatory."

"Ha. Sorry, yes."

"I mean, since forks obviously work, we can postpone figuring out merging and have two non-essential forks merge after the ritual, so we're not extra-testing with prime anyones and there's no, uh."

"Horrible explodey arcany results that can't be undone and are stuck forever with the person?"

"Yes. That. Let's not do that."

"So," says Inavet-the-second, "How about this, we ritual a fork of you," she points at Eva, "then fork the fork, and combine those to see what happens? Or she gets forked again and the two of us get merged, that way there is no horrible explodey arcany results with prime people."

"It's kind of disturbing how easily you go 'Why yes I will do this incredibly risky thing,'" says Prime-Inavet.

Inavet-the-second shrugs.

"It would probably make more sense to merge a fork with arcany and a fork without arcany, since if we then merge in the resulting Eva they will theoretically have arcany? Also, what should I call you for disambiguation purposes? I mean, Ina-one and Ina-two gets awkward after a while, I would know." She smiles sheepishly.

"Yeah, good point," says the Inavet that has been arbitrarily picked to be the main Inavet purely because she was the one who was poked.

"Um." The second considers. "... Iris? I can grow the appropriate flower and put it in my hair, make it super obvious."

"Are we going to be flowers?" wonders the other.

"Unless you have a better idea. Though, to be fair, it makes more sense if you get something else, if you're going to be the main one."

"... Fair enough. Okay."

"Is there a good place to speed-grow a plant and make it look like an iris?" asks she-of-that-name-now.

Eva gestures at the garden all around. "Knock yourself out, nobody is going to notice another exotic flower in the Sensorium."