#lore: magic

The use of magic is strict, while everyone is able to learn it, not all are permitted to. Magic in itself is a elitist subject that only nobles have access to, Mages who excel on that skill are then granted permission by a council to learn advanced magic and become Wizards.

Magic primally comes from Gemstones and they are found inside rocks, lakes, caves and such; It allows for anyone to be able to wield magic. Gemstones can usually be found in the following colors: Blue, Red, Gold, and White with the last one being the rarest.

Gemstones can also be used to power up magic objects such as wands, vehicles, and even guns; It is known to be a volitale object that can easily explode under pressure, making it's use as fuel to be dangerous and those who work with it are respected in their field.

Little is known about it's discovery, some claims it was a gift left from the gods, so the people in Terra Luporum could survive during The Great Winter, millions of years ago.

Other claims the old, extinct humans found it, way before their kind vanished from the land, but history books mention there is so records of humans ever existing during the time of the first register of gemstones being used.

The average wolf can only use magic if they have a gemstone in their possession, and even certain magics they use with it have limitations as: They can't cast fire without a source of fire nearby, or use water without a source of water near them.

Seers are an umbrella term for scryers, prophets, diviners and Oracles. Each of them get their gift in a different way.

Scryers use dragon bones, tea dregs or other enchanted objects as a focus to see into the long-term futures. They're pretty much just fortune tellers whose magic works a bit better than it does in our world.

Prophets, a now defunct group, were given the gift of foresight and the ability to briefly step through time by Renise, Goddess of Time. When she got killed by the Godhuntress, all the prophets simultaneously lost their powers, and there hasn't been a new one since.

Diviners can only see short term futures, in little bursts of 'if I do this, this will happen'. Their art of precognisance is recognised as another everyday form of magic, and they're often employed as fighters or security guards.

Oracles are a rare breed. Nobody's quite sure where they came from, or how they do what they do. All save one of them are found in Nyctomachia. Ramaeria was the lonely one, and she died young. Oracles are unique from the other peoples in that they see the future without the blurrings of choice, and even telling other people about their prophecies cannot change things. The only thing an Oracle can do to change fate is to take matters into their own hands, something they have rarely done.

The Nycyomachian Oracles are also aware of the fourth wall, and it's the only thing separating me and their wish for me to fuck off and die. I've tried writing a bunch of stuff about them, but there's only one piece I was ever really proud of. Maybe someday I'll post it.

So, @shivunin brought up some wonderful speculation in the tags to the post about mage affinities. Which I actually have some things I'd like to add to!

#i do wonder if lack of access to plants in general for many Circle trained mages means that they may not develop plant/nature related skill

TLDR because I'm long winded and really love talking about these elements of worldbulding:

Circle mages don't actually lack access to plants. Most, especially in Orlais, Ferelden, and Rivain have frequent if not constant access to plants. Primary exposure due to ingredients and in circle gardens.

Its not just circle mages that lack affinity to plant magic. We don't see it manifest commonly in the Avvar, Chasind, Seheron (what we know of their magic), Tevinter, or Vashoth/Qun. We primarily see the manifestation in elves - more specifically the Dalish.

The worldbuilding so far seems to show there is a very real racial/genetic tie as well as a nurture/education element to what a mage can actually do.

You can do any magic system in any story (or all of them). Let this question be an opportunity to share as much or as little as you want about your magic systems 💛✨

Right! One last ask before I go to bed :)

The thing about most of my writing is that I'm basing it all off of a world I made when I was 6, so it's a bit of a mess. Actually, it's a massive mess. Basically, what I did then was clobber together all my favourite stories and then continue to patch them up the older I got, rewriting stuff whenever I decided that something was cooler.

So, some of my inspos were Harry Potter (I was a huge fan of it as a 7-year-old), the Dresden files, Tolkien, CS Lewis, and an embarrassing amount of stupid YouTube skits. Interestingly, however, the magic system I've kept the most of belongs to the Alex Verus series, which was one of my favourite Urban Fantasies as a teen.

So yeah, almost none of it was truly original. But then again, can we really say anything is truly original? We as humans have always been using other humans and their creations as inspirations for our own stories. Or, that's what I tell myself every time I get embarrassed about how uncreative the magic system is.

It acts as both the symbol of the royal family, as well as the most-well known depiction of its namesake comet that was said to have crashed down the earth thousands of years ago, bringing both destruction to the old world and magic to the new one that would be birthed from it.

It’s shape resembles that of a four-pointed star to evoke the way a bright light or stars might shine, as well as the impact crater of the comet.

As a symbol of the royal family, it is commonly accompanied by two smaller comets going sideways in opposite directions from under the main symbol. It’s debated what those stand for - some scholars say it represents the debris of the crater, the new magic, etc. in tandem with the main comet.

Some even think it means nothing at all and is just there for decoration.

Others say it’s supposed to be light and dark magic, with the comet being void, though due to all stars being painted white as well as the ties to the royal family, that theory is less popular, mainly having the balance of all three magic types going for it.

Recently however, a new theory came up based on the last one: that the comet as it is depicted in the royal crest is incomplete, and if you were to take the crest and flip it, layering both comets over each other, that’s when you get the whole image. The main thing this one has going for it are long-existing variations of the crest that seem to feature it cut off in half, and that the "empty“ space between the main and side comets would form another comet, this one representing the dark magic that the light magic would shine in.

War of the Plains During the War of the Plains, Kailan Daladand, an extremely powerful celestial mage, found herself among the Plainswalkers, who mostly used mana. There she learned of the gestures they occasionally used to cast their magic, and developed a similar method for controlling common magic. After her escape from the plains and instatement as High Mage, her method led to a sharp decline in the use of totems, and the development of magecuffs.

Great Mage War Though notable as well for the focus on magic during the war, the main event of note was the creation of the Stone Battlefield. Due to the total lack of mana in the area, a celestial spell went awry, turning the entire battlefield and half its combatants to stone. The event also made Naldi a limbo walker and weakened the barrier between the material and spirit worlds, or, rather, strengthened the area's connection to the spirit world. As such, people with both celestial-dominant and earthly-dominant souls find the area uncomfortable to be in.

The War of Shadows The Followers of Anoc cast a spell near the end of the war that, using the capital city itself as a totem, prevented the use of celestial magic. The spell was cast on a number of refugees who were immediately killed; the spell therefore activated in the spirit world as well as the material world, thereby causing a sort of feedback loop of magic that prevented all celestial mages across the northern half of the continent from accessing their source of power. Disrupting the city weakened it as a totem, but the spell could not be stopped entirely, so that mages in the area found it much more difficult to use magic.

Common x Wildsense The combination of common magic and wildsense, being a combination also of celestial and earthly magic, is more powerful than any fully celestial or fully earthly combination. In this case, it allows one to manipulate magic itself, of either type. Users can therefore interrupt a spell in the casting, or clear an area of mana (though not entirely). Particularly in the case of an enemy celestial mage, it can also change the flow of magic, changing a spell or making it uncontrollable. As souls are primarily magical, in extreme cases, this technique can create a Limbo Walker.

This technique is considered forbidden magic. Formally trained celestial mages are taught to use wildsense sparingly in order to minimize the risk that they stumble across this combination; those that do usually try it on purpose, and when they are caught they are reprimanded, but as there is no formal law against it there is no formal penalty either. Many mages, particularly limbo walkers, use both kinds of magic simultaneously on a regular basis anyway; the technique generally requires the intention to combine them in order to actually combine them.

Mana x Wildsense The combination of both earthly types of magic allows one to manipulate life. This does not mean control of minds or bodies, however; it can only change the vitality of a living target. As both active types of magic can damage or kill others, or heal them, anyway, the applications of this, as with the celestial combination, are limited. Earthly mages use it to keep injured companions or combatants alive, or torture prisoners of war for information. This differs from the manipulation of magic/souls offered by common magic x wildsense as it is only the living body, not the soul within, that is affected.