Opalyn makes a mental note to pay close attention when the collar is removed for lightline charging. (At least, she's assuming they'll remove it then.) If she gets any spare time, even a few seconds, with the collar off, she has a whole bunch of things to try to probe.

 - Can she tell what this additional source of magic is, and whether it's internal or external?
 - Can she try to use math (wizardry) to do any magic?
 - Is there any body-related sorcery running an autopilot?
 - What's up with translation magic? Why can she say and understand and read words that Orphan didn't know?

This is already a pretty ambitious agenda to work on in tiny little uncontrolled gaps, but there's so much beyond that she'd like to investigate too. Do some emotions yield more power than others? When revisiting past upsetting experiences, will she generate more power from reliving vs. remembering - i.e. from unresolved trauma? What else is there to play with besides fire and force? Which parts of her previous button-mashing actually worked? What is up with all these extra dimensions?

Opalyn is really wishing hard for library access.

Orphan was never really the type to meditate and examine all of the instinctive magic running through herself.  Still, Orphan did maybe stare hard at herself sometimes, like after being injured.  By her memory Orphan didn't see obviously less or different magic than is running through Opalyn's body right now.  It's blurrier, fainter, harder to see than the stuff that Orphan threw around in spells.

Opalyn doesn't particularly have a concept of where to start on using math to do magic; Orphan gave up on wizardry books when she got to the math part and before the book tried to say anything about what to do with math.  Also, any attempt at directing sorcery-like-a-spell, a deliberate magic-use, gets shut down by the collar.

Yeah, nothing more she can figure out from here, probably.

Opalyn YAWNS and does a mighty full-body stretch, still lying in her bed.

What is she going to do with herself today?

She wishes they'd come and test her on the lightlines. Seems like everything is hinging on that, though she can generally find some way to use her time if she must.

She does still get hungry, if she's usually hungry in the mornings.

How does this work?

She needs nutrients to fuel her body, apparently, but then the byproducts of digestion are just... disappeared?

Opalyn has read of magical worlds in which people no longer need to eat; the magic is transformed directly into fuel for their bodies, apparently. But this magic intervenes in a different place. And either:

 - violates conservation of mass, or
 - converts digestive by-products into ?heat/light/energy/magic?, or
 - teleports digestive by-products into some waste heap that's out of sight?

Hmph.

Opalyn gets up to go and eat.

Other people continue to have books!

Rude.

The cafeteria continues to be an interesting place filled with interesting people and foods.

There's at least one man dressed so non-sensuously that he's probably an employee rather than an inmate, talking to two women at a table who are both wearing more than usual and eating quite a lot.

Opalyn wonders why they're eating so much. Did they just charge the lightlines, and now they're famished? Hard to say.

She doesn't particularly feel like playing power games at the moment, so she steers far enough away from their table that she probably won't end up in another snubbing accusation situation. She heads to the buffet, grabs a few dishes at random that are different from the ones she tried yesterday, and takes the dishes to a small, unoccupied table.

She shall get around halfway through her meal before a young man comes up to her table; a man a little older than Orphan-who-was, and substantially younger than Opalyn-who-was.  He's dressed in clothing complete enough that it's probably not prison-wear at all, just as the torn white dress that Opalyn is temporarily permitted is not prison-wear.

"You're also new," he says.

"That's right. I'm Opalyn. What's your story?"

"Got upset at the way one of my neighboring Barons was treating her... citizens.  Sort of common in my county, actually.  Complained to my Countess, she told me to fuck off.  I decided I'd try killing as many Barons like that as I could, and, yeah, ended up in prison.  I don't regret it, so far, but I haven't had time to."

"You?"

"Set too many of the wrong people on fire."

The last time she said this was to Tiraff, who expressed some confusion, but Opalyn couldn't quite get a read on why. Let's see how this guy reacts.

"Why'd you target them, and what made them wrong?"

Huh. Well, she was going to have to get her story straight at some point, if she's not going to be fully honest about isekai!

What do Orphan's memories say, actually, about why she fought all those people?

They had things Orphan wanted, and didn't particularly resemble any nice villagers or other sympathetic people that Orphan had ever known.

Orphan did once target a Baron who pissed her off by having collected all of the pretty young girls from a village.  The other four, and the two Counts, were just nearby when Orphan ran out of money.

Huh, well, Opalyn doesn't feel great about saying she was greedy and not-overly-principled, even if that was true of her predecessor. Leaning too heavily on that last example feels a little disingenuous, as if she's trying to get in good with this guy, but it's also the only example that resonates at all with Opalyn's real values, so she'll have to go with it.

"Well, there was one Baron who was abusing his power to force himself on pretty young girls, and I don't care for that kind of behavior." That's true enough.

"As for what made them the wrong people to target, well, I guess someone got annoyed enough to turn me in, and here I am."

"When you talk about setting them on fire, do you mean that literally, and while they were still alive?  Like, knock your enemies unconscious, seal their magic, burn them?  Or are we speaking metaphorically?"

"While they were still alive!"

Opalyn begins to suspect that this says something to everyone else here about how powerful she actually is, but that's probably just about to come out anyway.

"...Why?"

"It sounds like you know a better way to do it?"

"I just killed people, then they were done, they were defeated."

"Never mind.  It doesn't really matter.  Hi Opalyn, I'm Terfallen.  I more or less expect to spend the rest of my life here.  You?"

Opalyn is very confused by this strange person! He seemed to be objecting to how mean it was to set people on fire while they were alive and awake, but apparently that wasn't it because if he also just kills them, that doesn't seem less mean? Maybe he thinks it's rude to make them suffer while they die? She is not actually sure what he's getting at here.

But, he's moved on conversationally, and Opalyn sort of fears that if she asks too many questions all of the same person it becomes glaringly obvious that she's Not From Around Here, so she'll let him move on.

"I'm rather hoping that I'll get a good offer of other employment, though I'll have to wait and see. Why are you expecting not to take any offers?"

"I expect all of them to involve my doing things I'd rather die than do, or at least, rather stay in prison than do."

(One could possibly get the impression that this young man is a bit sad and upset and depressed for some reason!)

"Say more? What kinds of offers are a fate worse than death?"