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Fanfic / A Certain Mythic Archmage

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Toaru Majutsu no Taylor-chan: A Certain Mythic Archmage is a Worm and Pathfinder crossover by Writer of 2814 (Shadow Crystal Mage), in which Taylor skips all that pesky grinding and triggers as a level 20 wizard with ten levels of Archmage.

Taking the cape name Solomon note , she is determined to follow the example of Legend and become a hero that everyone can look up to.....as long as her powers don't get in the way.


This story has examples of:

  • Anti-Climax: When all seemed set for Taylor to go out and fight against the Simurgh in Chapter 8... she ends up having to deal with the injured in a field hospital and then helping to fight off a horde of bio-tinkered creatures.
  • The Archmage: Well, of course. Unlike other examples, though, Taylor is thrust directly from Mugglehood to full-blown Archmage, which means she doesn't fully comprehend how far her powers go.
  • Bag of Holding: Not only does Taylor (and her doubles) make several of these, she also creates minor versions for field combat.
  • Body Double: Taylor can make simulacra that can use some of her abilities by infusing magic on a block of ice sculpted to look like her. She uses them to impersonate her when she nearly gets unmasked.
  • The Cape: Taylor is trying to act as this in her hero persona. Taking a page from Legend on how to act like a true hero. She even has an actual cape and everything!
  • Curb-Stomp Battle: Taylor vs the Merchants. Thanks to Time Stop, she finds all of their storehouses, traps them with webs or by preventing doors from opening, drops a map with the places at the police department and then dispels the spell. The result: all the Merchants (including their capes) are defeated and captured before they even know someone was fighting them.
  • Destructive Saviour: Taylor's powers are so strong that even her lower tier powers have a high risk of causing major damage and she has to exercise a lot of self control.
  • Does Not Know His Own Strength: While knowing how to use her powers as quickly as any parahuman, Taylor at first had little of how to use them correctly, and more importantly 'safely'. While initially testing her powers out, she repeatedly underestimated how strong her powers actually were.
  • Everyone Has Standards: When he learns that Taylor is the "Winslow Locker Girl", Phil Gregg wishes he was working in black-ops, because at least those get to shoot the scumbag they are going after.
  • Friend on the Force: Officer Fite, whom Taylor meets several times during her first forays as a hero.
  • In Spite of a Nail: Despite her powers having nothing to do with insects, Taylor still ends up with Spider Silk Armor that she made with her powers.
  • Long List: The serial cultist's list of cults she has been a part of - particularly surprising given that she's just twenty-five.
  • Magic A Is Magic A: Averted. The author makes it perfectly clear that Taylor's powers, while 'based' on an Archmage's, are not magic and are a superpower resulting from a trigger just like every other parahuman in the setting. The power are also said to work closer to how they would in real life rather than how they work in the game (for example, all fire spells will make combustible materials to start burning).
  • Not Me This Time: Myrddin is 'not' responsible for 'every' unexplained fire.
  • Power Incontinence: Taylor has trouble not using Flash of Omniscience when asking rhetorical questions.
  • Running Gag: People describing Taylor's powers as "power bullshit".
    • During the fight against Simurgh, the hero Nazo no Yuusha X keeps dying and reviving no matter how many times the Simurgh puts her down.
  • Secret Secret-Keeper: Agent Gregg has figured out that Taylor is Solomon, but keeps the secret because he knows that she is a true hero and figures that she needs all the help she can get - and, even if he were to reveal the truth, he has no actual proof.
  • Shout-Out: PRT Agents Phil Gregg and Melinda Wen are obvious Expies of Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) and Melinda May (Ming Na-Wen) from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D..
    • One rogue in Brockton Bay is mentioned having the power to see only through drywall - a reference to The Dresden Files where there is a mention of a minor talent who has that same ability.
    • This story joins in on the fanon bandwagon that Myrrdin, the Chicago-based parahuman who claims to be a wizard, is Harry Dresden.
    • The scientists testing Taylor's "paradrugs" (potions) are called Barry Garrick and Jay Allen.
    • One of the places that serial cultist Nora has stayed was with a Japanese redhead with amazing cooking skills.
  • Super Power Lottery: Taylor triggers as an Archmage at max level, which gives her such a wide array of powers that she is a self described 'Eidolon Package'.
  • Teleportation: Taylor tried to teleport to the North Pole to safely test her powers, but mistakenly ended up in the Canadian wilderness because she forgot to take the curve of the Earth into account.
  • Time Stands Still: The spell Time Stop, which gives the caster from 12 to 30 seconds of relative time to do anything as long as it is not something that would harm anyone (i.e. no offensive spells). Up to eleven with Augmented Mythic Time Stop, which affects the caster and as many creatures as half the caster's mythic tier and lasts 1 hour per caster level (for Taylor, that means 20 hours of relative time).
  • Urban Legends: There's one about "the Winslow Locker Girl". Agent Phil Gregg becomes horrified when he learns that Taylor is the "Winslow Locker Girl".
  • Xanatos Speed Chess: When she nearly gets unmasked, Taylor rapidly (well, after casting a mythic time stop spell) manages to use her magic to make it look like she was Solomon impersonating Taylor.

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