Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.

"You said there were multiple Sages? Can I find another Sage to speak to?"

"There are three Sages: the Sage of Practical Magic, that's me; the Sage of Mischief Magic; and the Sage of Untamed Magic. You can find them around here."

"Okay! Thank you, I'll try to find them," and maybe they will be less absolutely useless than this woman no actually she was pretty useful just a little bit slow and weird.

She seems to consider this to be the end of their conversation, and gets up to go grab a book to read.

...maybe going kind of asocial like that is a consequence of magic. If magic rots your brain that'd be a pretty great reason to not do it!

Peter gets up and resumes exploration of the place.

The ground floor has two other similar rooms to that first one, with books and a cauldron, and one of them is occupied by someone brewing a magic potion. They don't notice Peter, and since they don't seem to have a floating rune above their head he decides to not pester them. There's also a small bathroom and a kitchen, which is only sensible, really, but that concludes the mapping of this floor and the only places left to explore are up—and downstairs.

He decides to go downstairs into the basement first, and said "basement" consists only of a single room very much like the first one he went into. But more relevantly, said room has two people talking to each other, one of whom has another magic rune floating above her head. So he folds his arms behind his back and waits for a lull in their conversation to butt in.

"...didn't think he was that bad," says the Sage.

    "I like him, he's always been nice to me," says the other person.

"I think Laurie just doesn't like vampires."

    "Vampires creep me out a bit."

"Gordon Myles is a vampire."

    "I've never met Gordon Myles."

"You should meet him! I think you would get along."

    "I might!"

Then they stop talking, and that's when the Sage notices Peter. "Hello!" she says.

Vampires! Vampires are a thing. Sure, okay, why not. He once again has the vague memory that he'd heard rumours about them but, well, you know how this story is going.

Also: that conversation is weird and given that both women do not look to be old he's starting to get genuinely worried about the effects of magic on the brain.

"Hi! Sorry to interrupt, I'm Peter Tarleton and I'm interested in learning more about magic."

"I am Nāwai Faamoana," says the Sage.

    "And my name is Madilyn Gorman," says the other one.

"I can perform the Rite of Ascension and turn you into a spellcaster," says Nāwai.

Yeah he's getting that impression.

"I just talked to your colleague Cara Lane, but I wanted to chat to other Sages about magic."

Nāwai nods. "I am the Sage of Mischief Magic."

"Wonderful! So, um, one thing that your friend didn't help me very much with but that I'm pretty curious about is the subject of side effects or drawbacks."

"If you do too much magic in a short time, you build spellcaster charge. Spellcaster charge—"

"Right! Yes, Cara mentioned that. I'm wondering if becoming a spellcaster has any other side effects or drawbacks or anything bad that might explain why most people don't turn into spellcasters."

"If a spell fails, it can bounce back or affect you negatively."

Spells can fail! Grand, good to know.

"And is that all? Is there any reason to not become a spellcaster other than the failure modes of actually casting spells?"

    "I am not a spellcaster," says Madilyn.

That... doesn't... answer...

...wait. "You're not? Why not?"

    "I don't want to be a spellcaster."

"If you want, I can turn you into a spellcaster," Nāwai tells her.

    "Ooh."

What. The fuck.

"Didn't you just say you didn't want to become a spellcaster?"

    "I think I want to become a spellcaster!"

"Do you want me to turn you into a spellcaster?"

    "Yes!"

...aaaah? Maybe it's this whole place that rots your brain not just being a spellcaster. "You know what, nevermind, I think I'm good, thanks."

He tries to ignore the sounds of Nāwai starting to wave her hand around and do magic to this poor innocent bystander who might have had their brain eaten by magic because he doesn't want his brain to get eaten by magic what the fuck.

Up the stairs out the mansion through the portal what the fuck okay he's back to the real world actually maybe he should just go as far away from that portal as he can yep he's sprinting now.

That is a very good reason not to become a wizard! He does not want his brain to end up in whatever way their brains did. Aaah!

Alright, back home, let's hyperventilate for a little bit before going back to the computer to check on whether his Simmit posts got any replies.

No replies. It's been... multiple hours, now, and still no replies.

Odd.

He's... wired from all of that. And kind of needs to unwind. Going on a jog sounds... like a good idea, probably.

He spins in place.

...nothing happens.

He... tries again. Nothing continues to happen.

How... do you... change clothes. Wait, actually why did he think just spinning would get him to change clothes? That makes no sense.

He pulls his top off, with some fumbling, then kicks off his shoes to replace his trousers. Sleeveless T, shorts, and running shoes, good enough for a jog, off he goes, in the opposite direction from the magic portal.