Chapter 3 - The Mercury, Glass and Papercuts

The first attempt didn't even get past the sketchbook.

I sat at my desk, Sailor Mercury's face halfway done—wide intelligent eyes, short cropped hair, her iconic tiara just starting to take shape in blue pencil—when the page *shivered.*

Not the paper. The magic.

Like it *recoiled.*

The pencil snapped in my hand.

I froze. Waited. Watched.

Nothing burst into flame. Nothing screamed. But the sketch felt… wrong. Not dangerous. Just mismatched.

Like I'd drawn someone too far away.

That was the first lesson.

**Just knowing a character isn't enough.**

You have to *feel* them.

I knew Ami Mizuno's lines, sure. Her role. Her evolution across dozens of episodes. But I hadn't been *her.* Not really. Not yet.

And Mascaromancy didn't care about trivia. It wanted connection.

---

Attempt two started with papier-mâché and ended with a glue-covered sneeze and a wet, lumpy mess that looked more like a deflated blueberry than a graceful magical girl.

I left it to dry overnight. In the morning, it had slumped sideways, hardened into a sad little oval with lopsided cheeks and one collapsed eye socket.

It was hilarious.

Also… a little heartbreaking.

I didn't destroy it. I couldn't.

It joined the corner of the shed where failed masks quietly stacked like soft-spoken warnings. A wooden crow mask that had cracked at the bridge. A lion face that soaked up too much paint and split down the middle. A paper jackal that had gone stiff and wouldn't accept a single rune.

None of them glowed.

None of them transformed.

But they all *taught* me.

---

The third attempt went better.

Not perfect. But better.

I started with birch bark this time—thin, flexible, light enough for detail but firm enough to shape. I carved slow. Careful. I hummed the opening bars of the Sailor Moon theme as I etched, not out of habit, but to keep my hands steady.

I didn't try to copy Ami's face.

I focused on what she *felt* like.

Cool under pressure. Kind but analytical. Quiet, but never afraid to act. A mind like a scalpel and a heart too big for her uniform.

I carved wide, alert eyes.

A subtle smile.

A little moon crest at the brow—not canon, but mine.

It wasn't Sailor Mercury from the show.

It was my Sailor Mercury.

And when I pressed my magic into the base seal behind the mask, it *accepted it.*

No burst.

No hum.

Just a soft *settling.*

Like a coin dropped into a well and never heard hitting the bottom.

---

I waited two days before I put it on.

Not because I was scared. Because I wanted to *be ready.*

Because I'd learned.

Respect the mask.

Respect the magic.

Respect the *self.*

---

I locked my bedroom door. Drew the curtain.

Laid the mask in front of me, palms flat on either side.

Inhaled.

Exhaled.

Then I pressed it to my face.

---

It was like sinking into cold water.

Not painful. But *sharp.*

My heartbeat slowed. My vision changed—not blurred, but… refracted. I could *see things.*

Not just shapes and colors, but *vectors*. Motion paths. Weak points in the wood grain. Moisture trails under the floorboards. Like someone had installed a tactical interface in my brain and forgot to give me the instruction manual.

My hair felt shorter. My frame a bit taller. My limbs light but coordinated.

And under it all—magic. Familiar, but newly arranged.

Not mine.

Not Mercury's.

Ours.

I reached toward the shelf, and the notebook I aimed for floated gently into my hand.

Not flight. Not telekinesis.

Something more… refined.

Water magic.

Condensation control.

Atmospheric shaping.

I held it just long enough to confirm it worked—and then stopped.

My magic was draining faster than with the fox or the cat.

A full *person* took more than a spirit.

I peeled the mask off slowly.

The transformation reversed like steam slipping away from glass.

---

I stared at the mask in my lap.

Its edges weren't worn, but… dulled. Slightly.

The birch had taken it well.

I hadn't.

Not fully.

My hands were shaking. Not from exhaustion.

From the weight of what I'd touched.

Sailor Mercury was no joke.

That mask gave me *real power*.

Not just speed or stealth. **Intelligence weaponized by magic.**

And I knew—I *knew*—that a stronger material would let me hold her longer. Use more. Think clearer.

But I wasn't ready for that.

Yet.

---

After I recovered, I tucked the mask back into its new box.

Labeled it in ink:

> **Mercury: v1.0 – birch prototype – tested.**

Not destroyed.

Not forgotten.

Just… catalogued.

The pile of failures stayed in the corner, quiet and dusty.

But across from them, a new shelf began to grow.

A shelf for successes.

Even the small ones.

---

Because small things stack up.

A fox's speed. A cat's silence. A schoolgirl's courage wrapped in science and starlight.

None of them earth-shattering. None of them long-lasting yet.

But they were real. They *worked.* Even if the mask only lasted ten minutes, even if my magic hummed unsteadily after use, I had proof now that this gift—Mascaromancy—wasn't just theory or sparkly wish fulfillment.

It was structure.

It was design.

It was work.

And it answered to *effort.*

---

That night, I didn't dream in the usual sense. No floating visions, no memories of past lives or magical metaphors about transformation.

Just hands.

Mine.

Cutting, shaping, painting.

Over and over again.

A memory of movement—not of spells, but of process.

---

Over the next few days, I became obsessed with material.

The paper used for the fox had been soft and familiar. But the cat's rowan had taught me something important: the *feel* of a mask mattered as much as its symbol. And birch had taken to Mercury's energy beautifully—quick to shape, quick to carry magic, quick to drain.

It was like the wood held a tempo.

So I tested others.

Oak was strong, but too rigid. Pine took shape fast, but splintered too easily. Ash… ash was *strange.* It absorbed color weirdly and refused to hold runes unless I etched them backwards.

I kept notes. Pages and pages of them. Notebooks filling with observations, test diagrams, layering attempts, failures. All by hand.

I'd tried drawing masks on paper again—just sketches—and they didn't reject me anymore. But they didn't respond either.

Because I knew now: the drawing wasn't the magic.

The *making* was.

---

I tried creating a new animal mask, just to test scale and structure: a hare, this time. Slimer. Longer nose. Not a character, just a concept.

It collapsed in the kiln.

Too thin.

Lesson learned: certain forms needed bulk. Maybe internal support. I added "frame weight" to my build considerations column in my notes.

Another one—a simple wolf face—cracked in my hands during rune setting. I didn't cry. But I stared at it for a long time before adding it to the shelf of failures.

Each one taught me something. Reinforcement, timing, layering, intention.

Even the cracks had patterns. Stories.

---

Dad knocked on the shed door one afternoon while I was sanding down a new prototype.

"Reina?"

"Yeah?"

"You've been out here for three hours. You building a castle?"

"No. Masks."

"Uh-huh. Want tea?"

"Yes, please."

There was a pause. He didn't ask more.

He'd learned to give me space. That was love, in its own way.

He returned later with a tray—mug of black tea, couple of biscuits, and a folded scrap of paper.

"From Lyra," he said. "She said you'd know what it's for."

I unfolded the note.

> *'Come by this weekend. Got a few odd relics from a traveling trader. Thought one might catch your eye. Bring that quiet curiosity you've been wearing lately.'*

> —L

Lyra had always been kind. A little nosy. But kind.

She wasn't magical in the flashy sense, but she *knew* things. Felt the edges of magic others ignored. The kind of woman who read cracks in teacups and remembered which birds landed on her windowsill by season.

She didn't know about Mascaromancy.

But maybe… it was time to test something.

Not on her.

But *with* her.

---

That night, I pulled the fox mask down from the shelf.

It had faded a little—edges dulled from use, the paper frayed at one cheek. It still held shape. Still had magic in it. Just… less than before.

I ran my fingers along the inner lining, brushing the rune. It was faint now, but still intact.

I reached for a tiny scrap of parchment, wrote three glyphs, and burned the ink in a saucer, whispering the base enchantment I'd been refining all week.

A little glow settled over the mask.

Just enough to hold its structure another use or two.

Tomorrow, I'd offer it to someone else.

---

Certainly. Continuing from:

---

**Tomorrow, I'd offer it to someone else.**

---

I didn't sleep much that night.

Not from anxiety—though I won't pretend I wasn't nervous—but from *possibility.*

I kept going over the runes in my head. Rechecking the enchantment seal. Replaying what Clerk-17 had said, offhandedly, in that half-joking tone of his:

> *"You can grant masks to others. Temporarily. But remember—masks reflect not just the character, but the maker."*

I hadn't thought much of it at the time.

Now, with the fox mask packed in a padded pouch in my satchel, it felt heavier than ever. Like I was bringing more than just a trinket across the field to Lyra's cottage. Like I was carrying a piece of myself.

Because I was.

---

Lyra lived just past the old stone wall behind our house. Her little cottage sat at the edge of the treeline, low-roofed and slightly crooked, like a patch of earth decided it wanted to be indoors. Herbs hung from every beam, and a crow sat guard on the windowsill like it paid rent.

She met me at the back garden, wearing her usual robe and a thick-knit shawl that probably smelled like every tea leaf in Wiltshire.

"Well now," she said, handing me a mug before I even knocked. "You've got a storm in your eyes, love. Sit down before it spills."

I smiled. She always said things like that.

I took a seat on the low bench by her herb bed, sipping the tea slowly while the warmth steadied my hands. She didn't press me. Just watched with that same gentle patience she used on sick cats and startled garden gnomes.

After a while, I reached into my satchel and pulled out the bundle.

"This is going to sound weird," I said, setting it on the bench between us, "but… I made something. Something magical. And I think… I think you might be able to use it."

Her eyebrows rose.

She untied the cloth and lifted the mask with both hands, cradling it carefully—like it might whisper if she tilted it the right way.

"Fox," she murmured. "Hmm. Cleverness. Evasion. Treading lightly. Did you carve this yourself?"

I nodded. "It's part of something I can do. A kind of… magic craft. I can make masks. Magical ones. If someone wears one, they take on part of the form or power of what it represents."

Lyra didn't laugh. Didn't scoff. She just looked at the mask, then at me.

"And you want me to try?"

"Only if you're comfortable," I said. "I've only worn them myself. I don't know how it'll react to someone else. Or if it'll work at all."

She smiled. Not kindly—knowingly.

"Oh, love. Magic always works. The question is whether the people involved are paying attention."

---

She stood and, without drama or flourish, lifted the mask to her face.

There was no flash. No burst of wind or glowing aura.

But something *changed.*

Her posture shifted subtly—weight evenly distributed, steps lighter, head tilted ever so slightly to the side like she was already listening for movement.

She moved with uncanny grace across the garden, weaving between rows of thyme and lavender without brushing a single stem.

She paused at the gate, crouched low, and I saw her eyes gleam amber behind the mask's slits.

Then she took it off.

And exhaled.

---

"Feels like wearing a memory," she said, handing it back. "Not mine. Yours, maybe. Or something older than both of us."

I swallowed. "It worked?"

She nodded, but there was thoughtfulness behind it. Caution.