> Patchouli: Put on the shades.
If somebody barges in, you will claim you are a BIGSHOT PRODUCER waiting to meet with YAMAME KURODANI before the show. Good planning.
But mostly you put them on because the light is too bright in here. IT BURNS. You really wish you were back at the library, but at least you have a moment of peace.
> Patchouli: Examine mirror.
This is a mirror.
A mirror is an object that reflects light in a way that preserves much of its original quality subsequent to its contact with the mirror.
Some mirrors also filter out some wavelengths, while preserving other wavelengths in the reflection. This is different from other light-reflecting objects that do not preserve much of the original wave signal other than color and diffuse reflected light. The most familiar type of mirror is the plane mirror, which has a flat surface. Curved mirrors are also used, to produce magnified or diminished images or focus light or simply distort the reflected image.
Mirrors are commonly used for personal grooming or admiring oneself (in which case the archaic term looking-glass is sometimes still used), decoration, and architecture. Mirrors are also used in scientific apparatus such as telescopes and lasers, cameras, and industrial machinery. Most mirrors are designed for visible light; however, mirrors designed for other types of waves or other wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation are also used, especially in non-optical instruments.
The first mirrors used by people were most likely pools of dark, still water, or water collected in a primitive vessel of some sort. The earliest manufactured mirrors were pieces of polished stone such as obsidian, a naturally occurring volcanic glass. Examples of obsidian mirrors found in Anatolia (modern-day Turkey) have been dated to around 6000 BC. Polished stone mirrors from Central and South America date from around 2000 BC onwards. Mirrors of polished copper were crafted in Mesopotamia from 4000 BC, and in ancient Egypt from around 3000 BC. In China, bronze mirrors were manufactured from around 2000 BC, some of the earliest bronze and copper examples being produced by the Qijia culture. Mirrors made of other metal mixtures (alloys) such as copper and tin speculum metal may have also been produced in China and India. Mirrors of speculum metal or any precious metal were hard to produce and were only owned by the wealthy.
Metal-coated glass mirrors are said to have been invented in Sidon (modern-day Lebanon) in the first century AD, and glass mirrors backed with gold leaf are mentioned by the Roman author Pliny in his Natural History, written in about 77 AD. The Romans also developed a technique for creating crude mirrors by coating blown glass with molten lead.
Parabolic mirrors were described and studied in classical antiquity by the mathematician Diocles in his work On Burning Mirrors. Ptolemy conducted a number of experiments with curved polished iron mirrors, and discussed plane, convex spherical, and concave spherical mirrors in his Optics. Parabolic mirrors were also described by the physicist Ibn Sahl in the 10th century, and Ibn al-Haytham discussed concave and convex mirrors in both cylindrical and spherical geometries, carried out a number of experiments with mirrors, and solved the problem of finding the point on a convex mirror at which a ray coming from one point is reflected to another point. By the 11th century, clear glass mirrors were being produced in Moorish Spain.
In China, people began making mirrors with the use of silver-mercury amalgams as early as 500 AD. Some time during the early Renaissance, European manufacturers perfected a superior method of coating glass with a tin-mercury amalgam. The exact date and location of the discovery is unknown, but in the 16th century, Venice, a city famed for its glass-making expertise, became a centre of mirror production using this new technique. Glass mirrors from this period were extremely expensive luxuries. The Saint-Gobain factory, founded by royal initiative in France, was an important manufacturer, and Bohemian and German glass, often rather cheaper, was also important.
The invention of the silvered-glass mirror is credited to German chemist Justus von Liebig in 1835. His process involved the deposition of a thin layer of metallic silver onto glass through the chemical reduction of silver nitrate. This silvering process was adapted for mass manufacturing and led to the greater availability of affordable mirrors. Nowadays, mirrors are often produced by the wet deposition of silver (or sometimes aluminum via vacuum deposition) directly onto the glass substrate.
Mirrors are manufactured by applying a reflective coating to a suitable substrate. The most common substrate is glass, due to its transparency, ease of fabrication, rigidity, hardness, and ability to take a smooth finish. The reflective coating is typically applied to the back surface of the glass, so that the reflecting side of the coating is protected from corrosion and accidental damage by the glass on one side and the coating itself and optional paint for further protection on the other.
In classical antiquity, mirrors were made of solid metal (bronze, later silver) and were too expensive for widespread use by common people; they were also prone to corrosion. Due to the low reflectivity of polished metal, these mirrors also gave a darker image than modern ones, making them unsuitable for indoor use with the artificial lighting of the time (candles or lanterns).
The method of making mirrors out of plate glass was invented by 16th-century Venetian glassmakers on the island of Murano, who covered the back of the glass with mercury, obtaining near-perfect and undistorted reflection. For over one hundred years, Venetian mirrors installed in richly decorated frames served as luxury decorations for palaces throughout Europe, but the secret of the mercury process eventually arrived in London and Paris during the 17th century, due to industrial espionage. French workshops succeeded in large scale industrialization of the process, eventually making mirrors affordable to the masses, although mercury's toxicity remained a problem.
In modern times, the mirror substrate is shaped, polished and cleaned, and is then coated. Glass mirrors are most often coated with non-toxic silver or aluminium, implemented by a series of coatings:
- Tin(II) chloride
- Silver
- Chemical activator
- Copper
- Paint
The tin(II) chloride is applied because silver will not bond with the glass. The activator causes the tin/silver to harden. Copper is added for long-term durability. The paint protects the coating on the back of the mirror from scratches and other accidental damage.
In some applications, generally those that are cost-sensitive or that require great durability, mirrors are made from a single, bulk material such as polished metal. For technical applications such as laser mirrors, the reflective coating is typically applied by vacuum deposition on the front surface of the substrate. This eliminates refraction and double reflections (a weak reflection from the surface of the glass, and a stronger one from the reflecting metal) and reduces absorption of light by the mirror. Technical mirrors may use a silver, aluminium, or gold coating (the latter typically for infrared mirrors), and achieve reflectivities of 90?95% when new. A protective transparent overcoat may be applied to prevent oxidation of the reflective layer. Applications requiring higher reflectivity or greater durability, where wide bandwidth is not essential, use dielectric coatings, which can achieve reflectivities as high as 99.999% over a narrow range of wavelengths.
There is nothing interesting about this particular mirror.
> Patchouli: Inspect candy bowl.This bowl is full of an UNREASONABLY DIVERSE SELECTION OF JELLYBEAN VARIETIES. You can't even begin to guess what some of these flavors might be.
You recall that you have three empty slots of BACKUP CANDY. You decide to fill them with random jellybeans for now. You have no idea what their SECONDARY EFFECTS could be, but you can worry about your CANDY OPTIMIZATION later.
> Patchouli: Rummage through drawers.You find a BATHROBE of ABOVE AVERAGE QUALITY. On closer inspection, this room does not appear to have a bathroom, so you're not sure what use this would be. The drawers are otherwise empty, suggesting this room is not currently being used (except by you).
> Patchouli: Search for secrets!
You pull on the light fixture. Nothing happens.
You spin the standing mirror. Nothing happens.
You sit in the chair. It is comfortable, but nothing happens.
You check behind the dresser and find...could it be!?
A 500 YEN COIN!!
You promptly return the valuable object to the LOST AND FOUND!
Just kidding. You now have ?10500.
> Patchouli: Read book.This room is decidedly LACKING IN ADVENTURE, which both surprises and upsets you. You decide to sit down and try to read the new book you bought.
After looking at it for a while, you determine that there aren't a whole lot of spells in here, but rather that it seems to be some sort of ENCYCLOPEDIA that dedicates quite a bit of space to very accurate magic circle descriptions, magical arithmetic, names and locations, and the like. You come to the conclusion that this is probably some sort of ADVANCED SUMMONING SPELLBOOK, possibly for calling cosmic horrors.
You aren't even fit to summon a Chocobo, but it's interesting to look at, regardless. Too bad you can't understand any of the text.
...Wait a moment...you think you might be able to make some of this out...
.̼̭̩͋͒̅̉͆.̰͔̉̇̄̀.̱̞̯̠͍̳ͨ͛̍̅J͑́ͯ̍͒u̞͉͕̠s͚̠̝̩̯̪̋̎̓ͮ̎ͦ̾t̲̟̺̰̾ͫ̉ ̯̋̄ͮ͆̌̓̎a̦̤̜̯̠͎̿̆̊͒ͧͪ̓ͅ ͓l̬̗̱̥͎͉͉͑͂̈́̋ͣ͗ͥĩ̗̥̘̖̗̦̖ͥ̎ͧ̑t̓t̫̼̏ͨͨͪͪ͆ͯl͓͙͙͕̂ͣ̃ͤe̐̏̒ ͎̤̯͔͔̼̩ͤͧ̽͌͆c̮̞̤̫̯̲̈́̅̄ͬͣͪ̓ͅl̐ó͎̹̩̼̰̦̂̋̀ͥͪ̾s̬̏̂̐̐͐͐ͤẽ̝̗ͬ̌r͔͚̼̤̙̐͛.̮̜͓ͣͭͤ̈́̏ͦ̓.̞͇̯̤̼̳͕̈ͬͧ̚.̖͚̖̤̻͉̮̏̇ͩ̇
You are suddenly interrupted by the appearance of Remilia. She appears displeased with the results of her social gathering.
> _
