Nigkala Tales Pt. 35: League of Legends

Nigkala Tales Pt. 35: League of Legends

Bringing the fantasy to life

Thanks to my editor kenjisato. Also, to LanguageTool. Combined, they put me right. Any problems left all belong to me.

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It finally happened. Nanotech. I got a call from a famous producer. "Hello, Helen, I'm Vincent Deluca. I think nanotech is ready for a blockbuster, and you are key to get it done. Are you interested?"

I knew of him, and remembered that he's already produced several effects-heavy movies, so I knew the call was real. "Tell me about it, Mr. Deluca."

"Vincent, please. At least, if you accept the task."

"What all do you want me to do?"

"You know nanotech, and you know the movie business. I am working on a game-inspired movie, and it has all sorts of non-human characters. Many are near-human, and a number can just use costumes and appliances, but a number have variable shape, and the effects work looks to be easier done with nanotech. I need to know just what we can do in-camera, and what needs post-production. You know the more real it is on set, the better the performers are."

"Yeah. Much easier to work against a man in a funny suit, than a green screen."

"Just so. Then there are the fight scenes. Your character, Obsidian, comes off convincingly as a magic wielder, as well as a fighter. The game has lots of magic being thrown around, and you can figure out how to fight that kind of fight, but in the mechanics of the game."

Well, he has obviously heard about me, and my reputation. "I see. So you intend on using the game mechanics? They usually look, well, mechanical. If you want it to look about the same, but be more natural, as far as magic can be real, then I can do that also." If only he knew, he he.

"I hadn't thought of that. That's why I need you. So, are you interested?"

"Yes. When can I learn more about everything?"

"Can you meet me in the morning? I'll walk you through my concept. There's a lot that is not fully filled out, because there are too many decisions that need to be made based on some research I need you to do."

"I can come in the morning. Nine o'clock? At your studio office?"

"Yes. See you then." *click* He hung up.

Well, a little rude, but not unexpected. I wasn't the only one with a reputation. His abruptness, along with some other issues, meant he wasn't the easiest to work with, but he was well worth working for, and he rewarded good help.

In the morning, I learned he was making a movie based on the League of Legends game. It has humans, near-humans, non-humans, and monsters. The contract had a lot of options, from acting, fight coordinating, costuming, special effects, and even assistant producer. The money was quite nice, but the hours were high, at least before filming. I left with a memory stick with the computer models, and skins, for fourteen characters, as well as fully rendered scenes. He would get Red Horizons to ship me the nanotech I needed, and he would also get me a high-definition 3D movie camera, when I was ready to show a fully realized character.

My first step was to get with Cleopatra and Layla, and have them teach me all about the game. I also swore them to secrecy about the movie until it was out. I then had them show me the characters I was supposed to model, so I could understand their attitude and skill set. I realized these characters were chosen for their difference from being human, so we could showcase the technology. A few days later, I got a large delivery from Red Horizons. There were enough nanotech cells to make two large bodies.

My first task was to feed the wire-frames into the modeling computer that came with the nanotech. I loaded each character's wire-frames, and also the images of the animation, to help build the basic template. The next two weeks I spent refining the forms, by summoning the predator in the form of the character. Being a living shape-shifting manifestation, it was naturally able to show the form. That helped the processing of the model to make the characters more realistic. With the additional character outfits and items, I was ready to start refining the characters a month after the nanotech arrived.

The simplest to handle was the equipment, as most had simple rules and usually only two states. They only needed a fancy way to go from one to the other and back. Magic jewelry was another issue, as not all of it was actually attached. That made me think of the Valkyrie equipment I had used. So I sent an inquiry to Red Horizons to learn if they had any effectively invisible nanotech. They didn't have invisible nanotech, but they did have some invisible standoffs the nanotech could use and not be seen on film. These standoffs allowed things like a floating halo, or crystals that hovered near the head. The nanotech surrounded the standoff first so it could extrude the halo or crystal, then it locked the form, and retreated, leaving it apparently floating in the air.

One of the things I worked on was twitches and nervous tics. For example, Ahri is a nine-tailed fox-woman, so making her ears follow sudden sounds, meant causing them to twitch and aim for the sound. Likewise, making her tail show her emotional state, meant watching some videos of foxes in nature, with likely similar emotions. Figuring out how to get the tails to float as a counterbalance while running took a bit of work. First, I had to figure out how to have it 'attach' to my coccyx realistically, but also structurally, so that it could be held near horizontal without tipping me over. For Ahri, explicitly, I needed to generate a second tail form, with all nine tails showings. They were nearly twice as long, and took nearly twenty times as many nanites, so I had to figure out how to hide them when not needed. At least the nine-tail form, initially, had a center of mass near the body, so it wouldn't need twenty times the balancing support.

Making multiple tails work in concert wasn't hard, but did take time to learn all the details of how to accomplish it. My previous experience making an extra pair of arms work while fighting helped. But the highlight was my teaching the system to reproduce the full facial expressions on an extended full face mask, by having it read the actual face. That way, when the actor smiled, so did the false face, and in an instantly recognizable way. Another bit of fun was to generate Neeko's glamour from her chameleon ability. I made it so that the glamour was just a little off, and it used her body's patterns of movement, rather than the real character's movement.

Once I had a character worked out, Cleopatra or Layla controlled the 3D camera, and we filmed in the gym. Before I made the demos, I made sure Cleopatra and Layla felt the character looked realistic, ignoring my size, sex, and extra breasts. As I prepared, I used Inanna's war power to fight gracefully, and I demonstrated the fight sequences in the character's preferred style. While still in the zone, I repeated the fight sequences several times, with my daughter positioning the camera elsewhere each time. This way, the director could see what it looked like from assorted angles, and plan the angles he wanted. I also used the house system to record a lower resolution version from other viewpoints.

One week after I delivered the demo of the last character, I called the producer. "Hello, Vincent. Helen here. How goes the project?"

"Thanks for completing the characters. We have a better idea of them, and the script is being updated."

"Oh? How come?"

"Seeing your demos has inspired some choices, and made some other choices in the old script less desirable. Also, we need to balance things to make the story flow smoothly, and we also have some young kids adding commentary about how things really work in the game."

"I recall you have recently taken on a young protégé, and that she has kids of suitable age."

"Good guess. It is easier to keep it in the family."

"I know. I have my youngest as my advisors. Maybe we should get them together."

"Perhaps. However, the indications are that we need some additional characters to get the story. While we have quite a few more characters in the story, handling humans doesn't require your nanotech expertise."

"How many more characters do you need?"

"Currently, four."

"Well, send them, and I'll work them out."

"Great! What you've sent so far is amazing. It is definitely helping with the backers."

We spoke for another twenty minutes, before we ended the call. Lalya suggested I do a centaur on speculation. They were good background characters, and adding the option could prove interesting. So, while waiting for the additional characters, I worked on the centaur. I combined a human skeleton with the back of a horse skeleton, to make a centaur skeleton. I had to keep the human skeleton, as that could not be removed, while the horse part would be nanotech. I thought I would need some CGI to eliminate the protruding feet, but I realized going on tiptoe would allow hiding the foot above a fake hoof. Then I needed to work out the gaits. Walking was easy, but getting the rest was harder, as it had to be natural. I needed all the nanites they sent to make it work. The additional four characters came a few days later.

When I sent the last of the four new characters, I also sent the centaur. I had demos of me at a walk, a canter, and even a gallop. We went to a remote country road, so the girls could drive and shoot, while I galloped a little ways to the side. I must have galloped nearly a mile, and then did other gaits on the way back. For fighting, I wielded a long spear, and would rear up to appear to attack with hooves and spear. I did that in my back yard, using a solid illusion to provide suitable terrain. That got a call almost immediately.

"Helen, how the hell did you manage a centaur?"

"Well, my kids noticed you had no such character, and suggested I do it anyway, since I had some time on my hands. Getting the gait was hard, since humans aren't used to four legs. Whoever uses the character will have to work hard to overcome that."

"Well, I don't know if we'll do it, but it's very tempting. Thanks."

My next task was to develop fight scenes. Cleopatra, Layla and I would head out to Death Valley with the gate, and with illusion magic we would all be made to look like the characters. We would practice the fight scenes, to make sure they worked, and made sense. The girls then got Darius and Mona involved, and we could do fight scenes of up to five people. I would use my ability to shape sand to generate the stage, and several cameras to record the fights, to later correct ourselves.

While the kids were wrapped in illusions, I practiced fighting wearing the nanotech. This let me get used to its weight, and how it affected fighting. Finally, it came time for casting the characters. As I was the specialist with the nanotech, I could figure out how the potential actors would take to the tech. Likewise, as a fight choreographer, I would be evaluating their fighting capabilities. I put my own bid in for Ahri, but suggested I could do a fair number of the characters if needed.

As each non-human was cast, I would teach the actor how to move as the character. I also helped everyone with the fight scenes, as there were a lot of fights in the movie. I would switch my nanotech to whatever character they were, to teach the fight moves, and switch to their opponent to practice. It took nearly six months to train everyone. While I had three assistants, they focused more on the mundane human-only fights. I focused on the non-human and magic fights, to make them seem far more real.

Given my reputation, I'm surprised I didn't get more requests to have sex as various characters from the other actors. At one point, the director came by to discuss something, and caught me having sex with one of the actors with both of us in character. After admonishing me not to abuse the equipment, or actors, he asked, in private, if I would do a few sex scenes in character. He wanted some X-rated stuff for personal reasons. I agreed, as long as I got a copy. I did a little research on what the fan-base wanted, for character sex, and suggested we do those. After doing that, we also did some kinky sex scenes. He kept his promise, and I got copies. For the movie, I was cast as Ahri, but when the script came, it redefined me from being small with two breasts, to being tall with four.

We headed to New Zealand for filming, as it had a lot of untouched landscape. We based ourselves out of Whangarei, a large northern city, with nearby smaller cities. We flew into Auckland, then took a bus to the hotel we took over. We met a number of the local film stars that were cast as lesser-named characters, and also the local crew that would be doing a lot of the work setting things up.

The movie followed a storyline that was based on what an experienced player would expect to see with medium-to-high-level characters. We did a lot of travel, searched for things, and got power-ups on the way. Since I had so many nanites, I chose to use the nanotech for my outfits. This allowed the outfit to thicken when I didn't need so many tails. Like most of the full-suit actors, I would only wear a robe to 'suit up' and 'disrobe'. Of course, when I put my short robe on, I didn't always fully close it before I left my room. Rather than wear a wig, I let the nanites simulate hair and fox ears. They also covered the neural interface. The clothing at my waist doubled as bracing for the tails. Finally, my outfit was far more reactive to the situation, because I could simulate dirty-and-torn clothing, and also repairs and such.

One of the things I did at meal breaks was to magically help the folks building the fantasy sets. I made sure to use my 'virtual' extra pair of arms, and I would whammy any witnesses into forgetting what they saw. I added a lot of small details that helped define where we were in Runeterra, such as Ionia or Noxus. Reading the set dressers, I also adjusted the land where we would act, so that it was subtly, but significantly, improved. I then would hurry back before the meal break ended. Something I did more publicly, was to mentor some of the newest actors. Often, the director gave me time to help get someone over a tough spot, as it usually was more effective than if he tried to do it. Usually, he just called me aside with any worries he had.

An unexpected development was the making of commercials. While that often happens, along with music videos, there were far more than usual. We were in character hawking the game, and many other products. I had no objections in concept, but I only did ones for products I thought had quality. I was in five music videos, and in three of them, I was interacting with the band.

For the fight scenes, if there were four or more people, I summoned Inanna's power, and spread it to the fighters. But I was only helping with awareness of position, so people didn't run into each other, and thus saved some filming time. When I fought, I pulled more of her power to make my fight scenes even more graceful and perfect. I also used my own neural interface to adjust the appearance of others, and to have mobile effects, like 'magic' happening on someone. I was also able to use that to control some independent nanotech constructs, such as pets. Thanks, Red Horizons, for the override ability my interface had.

Near the end of the movie was the final boss fight. In that one, I used a little of Everest's power to lessen my weight, so I could have better hang time for some of the scenes. Combined with The Matrix-style camera shots, I had a huge hang time in some very recognizable poses. In fact, I often did such poses throughout the movie. Never more than a moment, but long enough to be recognized. I had the others do such poses when it could be accommodated.

While I was working long days, Inanna lent me strength, so I could have sexual encounters in the evening. When I did one of the cast, I tried to see how I could help their acting. When I did crew, I would read their minds to see how I could help smooth the process, or improve the set. Even so, I knew that when all this was over, I would take a break, of at least a few weeks.

Finally, the shooting was done, and most people went home. I stayed for a while longer, as Riot Games wanted me to do some additional action sequences. In my off time, I enjoyed some nude beaches, and even managed to have sex at some of the beaches.

When the movie came out, it quickly earned its blockbuster status, and on the basis of the first weekend, I was called to see if I would be willing to do a sequel. It was fast-tracked, and I only had to make six more characters. What I did not expect was Isis's reaction. She apparently enjoyed the film, but had a lot of nitpicking concerning the magic use.

I asked, "What do you find most egregious about the film's magic?"

"Magic just doesn't work that way."

"I know. But this is storytelling, and the rules of magic are made-up rules from the game. For those that play the game, this is what they expect the characters to be able to do. I know, as I helped define the fighting, and used the game rules to ensure everything was as the game would play it. We wanted to make the fights something a player could expect to actually do, if they were in the same situation with their character in the game."

"You're saying it isn't supposed to reflect reality?"

"Of course not. The fans believe the way magic works for these characters in the game should be the way depicted in the movie. There are other movies that depict magic working in other manners. This comes about because few people actually know magic exists, and fewer still can actually use it. I have learned many forms already. Psychic magic, Sexual and Warfare magic from Inanna, Weather and Influence magic from An, Earth magic from Everest, Tao magic, Creation and Dream magic from Aja, and your Nile magic. There are similarities for many of the divine magics, but the others use unique rules. And even the divine ones are not exactly the same."

"I had not thought about that."

"Given the importance of will in divine magic, it may just be that the others are just what people think it is, and that they could be accomplished in other ways, by the use of will."

"That is an interesting idea. I wonder how we can test that?"

"I'm willing to help out, but with the sequel, I'm going to be busy for a few months."

"I see. Perhaps we can do something later."

"Sounds like a good idea."

I was curious how she would do research. But for now, I had other things to focus on. By the time the sequel was to film, they had decided to make it a trilogy of films, and they had several others make eight more characters. I accepted the same role in the additional films, as did most of the other character actors. While they were each on a lesser budget, they were also filmed a lot faster, and had more humans as lead characters.

With all my experimentation with the nanotech, I had added a lot of complexity to my outfit, and the use of my tails. I also had studied foxes to figure out a more realistic coloring, while retaining the main coloring. My clothes were also subtler, looking worn, lived in, and chosen by Ahri.

Filming three movies back to back was grueling, but exciting at the same time. I also had more opportunities to improve the set. But in the last one, I played two roles, the second one being a centaur. There were only two scenes with both my characters, so they had to be shot twice, with me as each character once. They would be melded in post-production. But I got to do a fair amount of galloping alongside riders on horses, and the nanotech was able to keep up. Of course, it helped that I channeled the predator for handling the movement. The massive body also allowed it to hide a large capacity battery, so it could last longer. I also used my skill to subtly shade it, react to flies, and to show it getting dirty from all the galloping.