@Almond-Magnum said in Bookworm Part 5 Vol. 11 Discussion!:
@15Redstones
It was after. Ferdinand also had mana incontinence after the Divine Protection Ritual, but it went away after he acquired his Schtappe.
He obtained his divine will at the end of the protections ritual AIUI. At least we were told that is why omnis are allowed to visit the Garden of Beginnings at the protections ritual (P5V1 "Practical: Divine Protections of the Gods"):
“Hm... Students used to get their schtappes and divine protections at the same time—when graduating. Maybe they found their schtappes here incidentally after getting their protections?”
Maybe the intended way of things was for someone to spend their days studying and praying until they came of age and stopped growing—and only then would they receive their schtappe and protections.
“Though, well... that doesn’t mean anything to me. I guess Ferdinand got his schtappe here when he was a third-year?”
Ferdinand's explanation was sadly only summarized as follows (P5V5 "Replies"):
“Do not use ‘ascended to the greater heights’ to refer to what happened in your divine protections ritual,” he had written. “In your case, that is actually probable.”
As expected, Ferdinand hadn’t obtained his schtappe until after he performed the ritual, so he hadn’t struggled with losing control over his mana. In fact, in his case, his control had only improved. He went on to explain how he had solved his mana problems before obtaining a schtappe, but it was the same as what Sylvester had said.
That is neither a confirmation nor denial of him getting his Divine Will in the Garden immediately after the protections ritual (instead of later when going there through the Farthest Hall).
Note that what Sylvester said (P5V1 "Researching Rituals and an Update on the Purge"):
“This reminds me of when Ferdinand learned mana compression in his first year of school and completely overdid it. He was as puzzled as you are now when it became too much for him to control. In the end, he managed to resolve the issue by expending a ton of mana and compressing it less. From what I remember, anyway.”
Does not say it was the protections ritual that cause his control problems. And considering it refers to the first year, I doubt it would be.
@Malinoric said in Bookworm Part 5 Vol. 11 Discussion!:
@15Redstones said in Bookworm Part 5 Vol. 11 Discussion!:
@Malinoric even in third year the schtappe acquisition would've been before the divine names.
@Almond-Magnum said in Bookworm Part 5 Vol. 11 Discussion!:
It was after. Ferdinand also had mana incontinence after the Divine Protection Ritual, but it went away after he acquired his Schtappe.
Assuming the divine protections ritual works as others have suggested, then both Rozemyne and Ferdinand would have received their schtappe immediately after performing the ritual, which definitely comes before the specialized class for learning the names of the supreme gods. It is, definitively, a non-issue. Ferdinand's testimony remains, at best, unreliable. Ferdinand definitely would have warned Rozemyne about when she would actually receive her schtappe, and how to deal with it privately.
I think the point was that under the schtappe-in-6th-year curriculum, one would have obtained the divine names before the Divine Will, which might have caused problems. That said, I just researched it and there is some contradictory evidence for this order of doing things preventing her from obtaining a schtappe.
in P5V7 "The Book of Mestionora" it is Myne's interpretation that she would be denied a schtappe under the old curriculum:
“How were you able to obtain your schtappe?” Erwaermen asked. “Someone who is nearly identical to another in these regards should not have been able to acquire one.”
“Hm? That might be because the Royal Academy’s curricula were changed. I received my schtappe in my first year, before I was granted names by the supreme gods. I must have been sufficiently unique at the time.”
If what Erwaermen had said was true, then I’d only been able to obtain a schtappe because I’d made the journey in my first year. Had we followed the old curricula and waited until after we’d received names from the supreme gods, I might have been mistaken for someone else and refused a schtappe entirely.
Given what we know of Myne's reliability in drawing conclusions from her observations, I would not be sure this conclusion is correct. From the actual dialogue, it seems much more likely that her mana was perturbed at some point between being last dyed by Ferdinand and obtaining her schtappe, and re-dyed by Ferdinand before the end of P4V9 when she could barely detect Ferdinand's mana while searching for foreign magic. Assuming the potions he gave her at the end of Part 3 did not have a dyeing effect, there is quite a span of time since the last known time he seems to have dyed her before enrolling (P2V3 "Ambush") for her mana to get perturbed.
I am actually doubtful of Myne's internal assertion that the divine names ritual was done before acquiring the schtappe originally … specifically she described the divine names combining with her schtappe (P5V1 "Finishing the Archduke Candidate Lessons"):
The names of the gods were normally so long and such a struggle to remember, but with these two burned directly into my brain, I was confident that I would never, ever forget them.
“O mighty King and Queen of the endless skies, Schicksantracht the God of Darkness and Versprechredi the Goddess of Light...” I muttered on instinct.
Not even a beat later, my schtappe appeared in my right hand, all on its own. It happened so suddenly that I couldn’t help but cry out.
“Eep!”
My schtappe then rose up into the air and began sucking up the golden flames and black darkness now emanating from the magic circle. Even though it was no longer in my hands, it must have still been connected to me, as I could feel the mana flowing into my body. It wasn’t necessarily unpleasant—probably because it was my own mana going back into me—but it was certainly... strange.
But for this to happen, I can only imagine you need to have a schtappe in the first place.
