It Was a Dark and Stormy Night. As I came over to witness my friend, an only slightly Mad Scientist, attempt to break the laws of physics, I expected him to fail in some spectacularily hilarious way. A blackout was definitely going to happen. I was expecting that.
What I did not expect, however, was waking up in a world where dragons work as microprocessors (and car engines. And railway engines. And lightbulbs), magic is real and the High Priest of a theocratic totalitarian power is trying to create a dragon so huge it will tear up the fabric of reality. Just because.
In other words, my life suddenly got pretty interesting. Interesting as in, becoming a socialite in a magical world, saving it alongside a bunch of fantasy people, and maybe even... getting the girl?
Technomagia i smoki (Technomagic and dragons) by Marek Utkin is a 2002 Polish fantasy adventure novel that, as far as we know, has never been translated into English (dare we say "yet"?).
These tropes are not exactly like the ones you know... but close enough
- Abhorrent Admirer: One of the first people the narrator meets in the parallel world is a rather... overenthusiastic lady of the night. She's larger than he is. A bit later, he has similar feelings about madame Sharf-Sandstijn as she attempts seduction, but is thankfully saved by some convenient anti-magical dust in his shirtsleeve.
- Advanced Ancient Acropolis: Shambai-Dha, the white city in the jungle, is rumoured to be this, but it's actually a rather mysterious magical artifact disguised as a city.
- Adventurer Outfit: The narrator has one of these made for the Dragon Chase. Complete with a pith helmet.
- Another Dimension: Halamus explains a geometrical theory of multiverse that treats parallel universes as either a bunch of spheres or cones, with similar bits "located" on edges.
- Apothecary Alligator: The narrator's first clues that he's not in Poland anymore include a stuffed c'tlan hanging from the ceiling in Halamus's laboratory.
- Asian Cleaver Fever: Mister Zhang's cooking style. He explicitly says he's chopping herbs, although the dirigible crew had no fresh food on board before he joined.
- Background Magic Field: With ley lines and other places of power (every dragon is a mobile Place of Power). The field is a measurable, studied thing and its disruption by the superdragon is a major concern for the characters, since it makes spells unreliable - one minute they do nothing, the next anyone can be a Reality Warper.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: The prophecy his Excellency is trying to fulfill goes roughly "the embodiment of number five will slay the three-seventh monster and the Imprisoned shall be glad to have him". He interpreted it as "the head priest of Five is going to kill Bellisun Ravenley and be granted power by the Imprisoned", so he became the head priest, had Ravenley killed and is currently trying to reach the Imprisoned by means of the superdragon. Except the prophecy isn't about him. But he does become the embodiment of number five when the Lady of Gates turns him into a Pięciak.
- Bio-Augmentation: Magical morphing of various creatures has this effect. Most visible as means to create specialised dragons, but the setting is actually full of it, from a particularly foul weapon - a Deadly Gas that randomly morphs everything that comes into contact with it, to innocuous uses like keeping food from spoiling.
- Born Lucky: The narrator's incredible luck is commented upon by a couple of characters.
- Common Tongue: Downplayed, as mister Zhang and Siballa are both non-native speakers but perfectly fluent. The one time the group encounters language barrier is neatly resolved by having Halamus speak in the Language of Magic with a local mage (as Lampart, the group's official linguist, is unavailable at the moment).
- Complaining About Rescues They Don't Like: Astrid does, a little, after the narrator saves her from a dragon in his own unorthodox way, but she gets over it pretty quick, partly because they're being chased.
- Cool Airship: Black harpy skin envelope, two-dragon engine, the first prototype to be used in long-distance flight. Manned by a guy from parallel world, his gnome manservant, two mages, a warrior and a dwarven engineer.
- Crusading Widower: Mister Zhang's entire family has been killed by the Brotherhood of Five thugs, which is why the dirigible crew agree to take him along as their Demolitions Expert. Also why he eventually decides to suicide bomb the superdragon.
- Delusions of Doghood: Halamus gives one thug transient delusions of rathood to get rid of him. Then he meows.
- Demolitions Expert: Mister Zhang, who comes from a long line of firework makers. The narrator thinks that can come in handy.
- Deus ex Machina: By a literal goddess. As the narrator makes a desperate attempt to blow the superdragon up with magic, the Lady of Gates (deity hitherto unspoken of) appears to tell him he's done well, but a little Retgone is in order. She undoes some spells, turns his Excellency into a Pięciak and offers the narrator an opportunity to go home, which he declines.
- Ditzy Genius: The narrator's physicist friend in his home world, who - in an attempt to reach other dimensions, probably - sent him to the parallel world. He's also the counterpart to Halamus, a much more grounded character (his experiment had a practical purpose - finding the MacGuffin). Unless it's just by an amazing coincidence that they performed the same experiment at the same time, with another pair of counterparts in their respective labs.
- Divine Birds: The Lady of Gates has an owl motif.
- Dragons Versus Knights: Astrid, an aspiring Magic Knight, attempts to slay a dragon in full armour. She would have failed if it wasn't for the narrator appearing right on time.
- Eldritch Abomination: The Imprisoned, vaguely defined beings that would destroy the world if set free, but are immortal and necessary for magic to work.
- Everybody Smokes: Glaw, the local tobacco equivalent, is a very lucrative business and smoked by characters from shady to glamorous. The narrator is generally disgusted by it and the only smoker he never snarks about is his dwarven teammate, Guldgraav.
- Exact Words: Siballa is told women are not allowed to cross the threshold. So she pulls the threshold out and walks right into the room. This happens twice. The second time apparently fulfills a prophecy.
- Extendo Boxing Glove: The narrator magically creates one (read: imagines it, yells a physical equation e voila) to knock out a random barbarian hero who wants to duel him (or anyone, but the narrator was there).
- Faking Amnesia: Since the narrator is taking over his counterpart's life in the parallel world (he can't get back), not knowing a lot of things his counterpart would know, Halamus tells him to pretend he's amnesiac after a demon attack. This story is generally believed.
- Fantasy Counterpart Culture: Siballa's people are Vikings who somehow ended up in a Tibet-like land. The Tibet-like land has buddhist monasteries in all but name (the monks even wear the proper robes). There's also a counterpart to China (famous for politeness, fireworks and good cooking), and a bit-part bad guy speaks Polish with Russian syntax and lots of rhetorical questions, invoking a stereotypical Russian thug.
- Fantastic Livestock: The other world has regular horses and donkeys, but carts are mostly pulled by tricenants. Then, of course, there are the dragons.
- First-Person Smartass: The narrator, an intelligent guy Trapped in Another World, has a healthily snarky attitude.
- Follow the Chaos: During the Dragon Chase, this is how Astrid finds the narrator.
- Forced Transformation: Besides what the Lady of Gates does, Mistress of Arts, her student Sylvana and Astrid at one point turn some bad guys into sheep.
- From Nobody to Nightmare: His Excellency's Backstory, as explained by Halamus. The head priest of the Brotherhood of Five began his career as a talentless magical student, who angered his tutor enough to get him flunked and cursed. After some aimless wandering and stealing a book of prophecy he ended up arrested, only to be bailed out by a charismatic cult leader Belisun Ravenley, who needed The Dragon. Except the young man turned out to be The Starscream.
- Gentleman Wizard: Magic requires both talent and years of difficult, expensive studies, which pretty much restricts its use to higher classes. Wizards do work, but it's either academia (teaching and research) or engineering-type jobs. Lampart (whose specialties include history of magic and comparative mythology) itches to be an Adventurer Archaeologist for a bit, but the group is pressed for time.
- Gladiator Games: Siballa is introduced duelling a troll for money, although her "manager" has been cheating her out of the profits for a good while. She needs money because she's travelling in search of her kidnapped brother .
- Gold-Colored Superiority: Pięciaki (the "computer" dragons - note the similarity to "Pentium") are gold. Gold is also the color of the Brotherhood of Five, the local theocracy, which may be why the Lady of Gates turns its head priest into a Pięciak. The wild dragon the narrator befriends is also gold.
- Green Aesop: A bit. The overuse of dragons in the magical world causes climate change and makes invasive species more invasive, not to mention specifically magical side effects that may end up destroying the world. The bad guys are ignoring all these issues as they breed and (briefly) wake up a collossal superdragon to power their plans, while the good guys are out to stop them.
- Guile Hero: While the narrator lacks in pure brawn department, he makes that up by his smarts, bit of MacGyvering and always improvising a new back-up-back-up plan when all fails.
- Harmful Healing: Blendon of Glwygg, the city healer, proposes cures that the narrator deems likely to kill him (he's later told he was right), so he throws the medic out. Blendon, offended, proceeds to send Servants of Mercy after him, causing some complications, although these complications do result in narrator meeting Astrid. Blendon is contrasted with a country healer, who also acts as Kindly Vet and is actually competent.
- I Choose to Stay: During the ending, the narrator gets an opportunity to return, but - as his counterpart seems to be doing just as well in his home world as he is, and he's built a pretty successful new life - he decides against it.
- Instant Book Deal: The narrator's counterpart not only wrote a historical novel set in his home universe and sold it as fantasy, but it somehow managed to become a bestseller and get made into a film in a couple of months. Possibly the Lady of Gates has shown the narrator the future, but still.
- Instant Expert: It takes the characters about a week to learn all the fine points of steering the dirigible.
- Instant Messenger Pigeon: Thunder dragons, small blue dragons used for "dracograms", are a bit more practical than pigeons, not only because they won't get eaten by anything on the way.
- Invisibility Cloak: The Servants of Mercy wear cloaks that magically polarise light, rendering them invisible, although when they stand in front of polarising surfaces (glass) an observant person will notice odd flashes of reflection. At least some of them have double-sided cloaks, with an "official" golden side and stealthy grey side.
- Istanbul (Not Constantinople): A lot of names (both place names and people's names) are almost, but not quite familiar. Including the legendary king Urson and his knights (who were questing for a magical plate) or Khitaj (a Russian name for the country Poles know as Chiny - China) where mister Zhang the firework maker is from.
- I Was Quite a Looker: Madame Ninian Sharf-Sandstijn (Astrid's mother) refuses to acknowledge she's not a looker anymore.
- Lady of Black Magic: Mistress of Arts, a composed, elegant magic teacher to the Black Magician Girl Sylvana, mother of five (Iwa is her youngest), and a lady of a modestly Big Fancy House. She also seems to have a hand in the politics, undermining the Brotherhood of Five, but the narrator isn't told much about that for security reasons.
- Language of Magic: The language of the Ancients is used for conversation between the learned, much like Latin, but the magical part comes from the fact that magical creatures must obey commands given in it (they can ignore commands in any other language).
- Mad Oracle: Downplayed with Scypion, a young man who seems to live in a world of his own. He stutters and speaks in rhyming, vague prophecies, but never in a particularly dramatic way - he just walks by, babbling. He also has an affinity to cats.
- Magic Knight: Astrid, first introduced trying to slay a dragon (and needing substantial help from the narrator). She's really better at the magic part. The Mistress of Arts owns a painting depicting a legendary Magic Knight which turns out to have some plot relevance.
- Magitek: Most things we have technology for are done by dragons: telegraphy, computers, engines, lighting and heating houses. Other than that the technology level is fairly modern, although sewing machines and dirigibles are only just being invented. Sewing on a large scale is done magically and anti-magical dust makes clothes fall apart, which is why the (wealthy enthusiast) inventor of the dirigibles is so eager to help out the (poor, but diligent) inventor of the sewing machines.
- Meaningful Name:
- Lampart Nikelsmed is a short, scrawny Squishy Mage specialising in magical history, law and enthological research. Despite looking nerdy, he's never cowed or even shaken - Lampart tells a guy thrice his size that what he's doing is illegal (so kindly sod off) with hardly a flinch. He carries a (perfectly legal) Sword Cane and will use it to support his Violently Protective Girlfriend kicking ass. To top it off, while finding the MacGuffin was a team effort, he's the one to actually retrieve it. From the top of a mountain. During a blizzard. He's pretty lusty, too, but the aforementioned girlfriend takes care of that.
- Scypion the slightly Mad Oracle has been named after a in-universe historical prophet Scypion Mędzikłak, because his mother wanted him to be cured of stutter (a miracle Mędzikłak is famous for).
- Mineral MacGuffin: The Testament of the Founders, a huge magical crystal which Halamus has been looking for on the night of the experiment. The search for it drives quite a bit of the plot, but when it's finally found, it doesn't resolve anything.
- Mr. Exposition: Halamus, both prompted and unprompted, explains a good deal about the world to the narrator. He's just as curious about the narrator's home world, though.
- Mr. Imagination: Any good mage, since magic requires visualisation and clear intent. The narrator, who has had no magical training whatsoever, but (like his magical world counterpart) is good at visualisation, does manage to use magic a couple of time simply by imagining what he wants to happen and saying whatever words come to his mind.
- Mundane Object Amazement: The narrator bribes an annoying kid into going away with a 2 PLN coin by spinning a tale about how two metals and the 2 on the coin are symbols of a really cool secret society to make the mundane coin an amazing object in the kid's mind.
- Mystery Cult: The cult of Gryphon, which seems to be an equivalent of mithraism (it's popular in the army).
- Non-Idle Rich: Thanks to his counterpart's great-grandfather, apparently, managing not to lose the entire family fortune at roulette (as his own great-grandfather did), the narrator inherits the life of an independently wealthy person, so he's free to save the world.
- No Name Given: The narrator, since he's the one telling the story, although he pointedly omits any line where he's adressed by name or introducing himself.
- Not So Extinct: Black harpies used to be rare, but the recent disturbances in Background Magic Field made them common enough their skins can be used for building a dirigible.
- Our Dragons Are Different: There's quite some variety, since apart from the rare wild dragons, most of them have been magically morphed for specific tasks.
- Our Monsters Are Different:
- Gobrole are theorised to be magically morphed frogs. They're pretty much sacks of callussed, warty skin with colloidal goo inside and the only way to kill a gobrol is to pierce the skin with silver (or it'll heal instantly) so the goo comes out. They break things - as Halamus explains, if you leave bricks neatly stacked, they'll come and destroy the stack, but ignore an inorderly pile. They also bite. Gobrol bites may result in a dangerous, brain-damaging fever. A mixture of flour and salt kills them.
- Przemieńce are shape-shifters that some people consider a myth. Others think they have something in common with gobrole - the narrator is at one point required to eat some bread and salt to prove he's not a przemieniec.
- C'tlan is a somewhat lovecraftian creature with three bunches seven tentacles each that hunts by making people hallucinate and luring them in. The "three-seventh monster" from one of the prophecies turns out to be a huge c'tlan.
- Our Ogres Are Hungrier: Bipedal, shaggy, with impressive horns and really hungry.
- Outside-the-Box Tactic: The narrator's parallel world knowledge and somewhat different thinking grooves allow him to solve several problems that way. For instance, he manages to kill two dragons by throwing apples or snow into their mouths. The watery stuff ends up in the dragon's fire chamber where it expands into overheated water vapor, exploding the dragon. Even the superdragon.
- Playful Pursuit: While visiting the site of the superdragon plant, the group meets an old aquaintance of Halamus, Korin, who works there. They meet him in the middle of a Playful Pursuit with two ladies of negotiable affection, whom he hires to relax, because the job is stressful.
- Playing Drunk: When stalked through the city by a Servant of Mercy, the narrator hides in a pub and comes up with a plan - pretending to be drunk, he insults a city guard to get arrested and invoke Jurisdiction Friction, figuring that he'd be safest in jail. He escapes it once he thinks the Servant is off his back (and has conveniently explained to the guard why the narrator is under surveillance in the first place).
- Pop-Cultured Badass: The narrator seems to love finding parallels between the local culture and what he knows from back home. He whistles "Singing in the Rain" and uses physical equations or physicist's names as "spells". He also wishes he had a classical sci-fi blaster by his side while facing a tentacly c'tlan, and sure enough... As for badassery, much of it is thinking on his feet and luck, but he comes through.
- Power Crystal: Divinator "screens" are crystal balls, Halamus carries a cane with a concealed magical crystal that acts as a focus for magic, there's also a number of crystalline amulets.
- Puppet King: A king exists, but really has no power and the Brotherhood of Five does whatever it wants to.
- The Purge: Part of how the Brotherhood of Five came into power - they purged mages about twenty years before the plot begins.
- The Quest:
- The main plot involves the search for the Testament of the Founders, both by magical means and, when located, physically flying a dirigible to get it.
- On the way to meet the inventor, the group takes part in Dragon Chase, a tournament of sorts where the contestants are searching for a comedienne in dragon costume in a small deserted area. The winner gets a gold dragon figurine and lots of privileges that may come in handy during the expected political upheaval, so Iwa (the girl in the costume) is rather particular about who gets to find her.
- Religion of Evil: The cult of King Tick, a religion whose sole point seems to be making Human Sacrifices to a literal huge arachnid. It's not even trying to pretend it's respectable.
- Rescue Romance: The narrator first meets Astrid while she's trying to slay a dragon and ends up needing rescue.
- Runic Magic: Mostly used for protective charms of various sorts.
- Secret Police: Before his Excellency took over, the Servants of Mercy were carrying out charity for the Brotherhood of Five. Nowadays they carry on espionage, arson and assasinations, sometimes by hypnotising gullible people into doing their dirty work.
- See-Thru Specs: The narrator has a pair of spectacles made with smoky quartz lenses to be able to see Servants of Mercy whose invisibility works by polarising light.
- The Shangri-La: After flying over the inaccessible magical city in the jungle (Shambai-Dha), the dirigible crew visits a buddhist-by-any-other-name monastery high in the mountains for a resupply stop. They also gain some useful information.
- Short Screentime for Reality: There's one scene at the beginning, explaining how the narrator ended up in another world, and a little glimpse during the ending, when the Lady of Gates shows him how his counterpart fares. That's it.
- Silver Has Mystic Powers: It reflects magic, protects from some forms of it and generally has a thousand uses.
- Smoking Is Not Cool: The narrator is of this opinion - when first smelling smoke from the local tobacco equivalent, glaw, he gags and notes that "plebeians in every world love foul-smelling substances". When madame Sharf-Sandstijn attempts to invoke Smoking Is Glamorous, it only makes him nervous.
- Standard Fantasy Races: Humans, dwarves (the usual kind), hobbits, gnomes, trolls and several varieties of giants. Demons and vampires are mentioned.
- Standard Fantasy Setting: Parodied, and being one of the main sources of humour as a result. The setting is constantly balancing between playfully using various fantasy cliches, being a random Fantasy Kitchen Sink and at times even verging into a (rather soft) sci-fi territory, all Played for Laughs.
- Sufficiently Analyzed Magic: It's pretty much treated as physics. Divinators (read "computers") have crystal displays (as in, magical crystals displaying images) and are powered by dragons, but record experimental data and calculate outcomes, while Halamus, a theoretical mage, solves equations and designs experiments.
- Super Registration Act: Mages and non-humans are required to wear beards by law, so they can't easily hide in case of a purge. How does The Theocracy plan to deal with female mages (quite common in the setting) is never touched upon. There's also a Downplayed Ban on Magic in effect (magic is legal in general, but "public displays" can get a business closed).
- Sword Cane: A popular accessory, carried by both Lampart and the narrator (who inherited it from his counterpart). Halamus has a cane with a concealed magical crystal instead.
- The Theocracy: The Brotherhood of Five is an increasingly totalitarian theocratic dictature, but it seems to get pushed out fairly quietly after the head priest is turned into a Pięciak.
- Those Magnificent Flying Machines: Downplayed, as count Vorn is in the process of inventing a proper, practical dirigible, but that's a complete novelty in the magical world. He's also had some setbacks before with hydrogen (which is why the dirigible the heroes use is filled with helium).
- Tiny Guy, Huge Girl: Lampart is introduced lusting over Siballa. The narrator notes with concern that Lampart only reaches Siballa's breast and is rather pessimistic about the mage's prospects. When Lampart gets the opportunity to actually talk to her, they become a couple pretty much instantly (Siballa tells fascinating stories and is pretty smart, if uneducated, so it's not as unequal as it sounds).
- Tomboy with a Girly Streak: Both Astrid and Iwa are fighters (a Magic Knight and a Whip Sword user respectively), competent horse riders and all around able to take care of themselves. Astrid is also a wealthy, well-dressed socialite who happily flirts with the narrator, while Iwa has a mischievous streak and during the Dragon Chase, deliberately gets herself found by a guy she likes (she does think he's the right person to receive the reward, but her personal liking plays a part).
- Tomes of Prophecy and Fate: The book of prophecy Scypion Mędzikłak wrote on skins of black harpies. It was stolen by his Excellency in his youth and inspired him to create the superdragon. Prophecies Are Always Right, as they do come true - just not in the way his Excellency thought they would.
- Trapped in Another World: The premise of the book is the main character waking up in a fantasy world and trying to figure out what to do now.
- Virgin Power: In a different way than the home world legends would have it, though. Unicorns Prefer Virgins is Inverted - unicorns hate virgins and attempt to kill them whenever there's a chance. But! Dragons have to obey any commands given by a pure maiden. Supposedly. Given that Astrid tried to kill one with a sword (and came close to getting killed herself), this either isn't true or she isn't a virgin (that's what the narrator thinks - when he needs to imagine a virgin, he goes for Iwa).
- Violently Protective Girlfriend: As soon as she is his girlfriend (and he first got her attention helping her in a fight), Siballa for Lampart. Not that he can't go Back-to-Back Badasses with her.
- Weird Moon: The moon in parallel world has been hit by something large a while back, producing a visible crater and causing it to rotate.
- World Tree: It's not seen, but wood of this tree can be transformed into anything. Like swords. Or magical crystals.
- Your Heart's Desire: C'tlan hunts by making the victims hallucinate whatever they want at the moment to lure them into the c'tlan's tentacly mouth. The protagonist first gets a sci-fi blaster salesman, then Astrid in scanty clothes.
- You Will Be Beethoven: Somewhat inexplicably (it's unclear what the Lady of Gates meant by it), Scypion, who has been named after the prophet Scypion Mędzikłak, gets sent back in time and becomes Scypion Mędzikłak, as evidenced by a mural on the cloister wall.
