#undertale magic

So what does this say about Clover?

With zero training, Clover can fire magic bullets of varying intensity, enter people's memories, dash at superspeeds while phasing through enemy attacks, perform healing magic on himself, and possibly even more in the future.

Clover isn't just a powerful mage. He's a powerful mage in an era where no mage should exist.

Okay so putting this here bc it'll be relevant in an upcoming fic chapter.

In my interpretation of the Undertale universe's soul/magic system (just the og no special aus or anything) is that souls are the source of all magic.

The reason why human souls have color and monster's don't is because of their soul's main traits/attributes directly affect their soul's magical capabilities.

Human magic heavily depends on what color/trait the soul has, which while more restricting gives them a higher magical output.

Monsters wield a greater control of magic and can experiment with different types/shapes, but can be more draining as a result.

In early stages of human life their soul's start off the same color as monsters do, over time it starts to gain color (around toddler age is when colors start to appear). As humans grow up their soul will gain more colors and will eventually solidify as one color after reaching adult hood (roughly).

As we all know, magic flows through everything in the multiverse, with few universes being an exception to this rule. Magic makes up a core part of all living beings, our SOUL's. SOUL's are compact balls of magic bringing us life and are where our usable magic admits from. Of course, there are exceptions to this, our most well known example being Ink, and how Flowey's use magic without a SOUL is an interesting topic. However, those can wait for another time. Magic makes up the typical monsters form and hardens to offer protection to the SOUL. Now, obviously ghost monsters are an exception to this as their magic never hardens. I will elaborate more on this when I speak in monsters sub types.

Now, how magic is used. We all are aware that magic is heavily efected by one's intent. It can be as harmless as one wishes for it to be, or as deadly as on wishes for it to be. However it is important to keep in mind that strong emotion also has an effect and can cause the outcome to differ from your intent.

L.V., L.O.V.E., or Level Of ViolencE, is what determines how much power one has in their attacks and how easily that power can be controlled by the user. I will be referring to this as “level” for simplicity's sake. The higher one's level is, the stronger their magic, but that also means that the magic takes more effort to control.

Our studies found that the level in which magic becomes more difficult to control varies between monsters and humans. For monsters, that level tends to be around level 15 on average. Monster class does play a role with this number at well. As for humans, their magic control begins to falter at level 10. However, this is only when control over magic begins to take more effort. When magical controls become near impossible is a far different number.

Most of our data for this category is from Fell variant AU’s as they statistically have more monsters with high levels in comparison to other AU’s due to their unique culture. Our studies found that magical control, in monsters, becomes most difficult to control on average at level 35. As for humans, we feel that our data may be less accurate here as we didn’t have nearly as many humans with high levels that we were capable of guaranteeing our safety when interacting. But, we found that level 25 was the average for them.

Now, in our fond data it is apparent that humans find it harder to control their magic sooner than monsters tend to. This leads to the question of: Why? Well, we’ve come up with a hypososis. We believe that this difference comes from the difference of the matter that makes up monsters and humans. Monsters are made up of magic, it is the essence that fuels them, with few exceptions within the multiverse. This is why magic comes naturally to monsters, almost like instinct. This also allows monsters to hold more magic and more easily control it. On the other hand, humans are physical beings with a less compact SOUL and a very limited magical capacity. We believe that this hinders a human's capacity for magical control.

To explain Klezmer's magic is a bit hard but I figured this one is the best one to give you a general idea as to how they work and how they are made.

Unlike Error, Klezmer spent many years training endlessly to have full control of his glitching magic. He is not a very lazy person in the sense of his lethality. He doesn't rest when it comes to wanting make sure he can kill something. But his Ribbon Spears is one of his favorite and most versatile creations.

Yes. Creations.

He can in fact create things to a certain small degree. It was rather simple for him in concept but it wasn't exactly easy to do.

His strings cannot be cut by anyone other than another error, which makes his Ribbon Spears far more lethal and dangerous. His Ribbon Spears are his strings woven together in a giant ribbon that can turn into a spear by weaving and curling in on itself in an almost eldritch way.

They are masterful creations of hyper-concentrated Blue Magic into a lethal near invisible point. If hit by one, depending on the tension, momentum, and spin they are given it can range from a shotgun to a nuke with the precision of a neurosurgeon.

If Error is one of those weird crackheads on 14th Street, Klezmer is a college graduate with a PhD.

Here's what I have so far:

Those with Power as a main trait have the skill to bend the rules. They can do things in and outside of battle that they technically shouldn't be able to do. (Asgore breaking the Mercy button, Frisk moving the battle box to attack sans, Frisk's soul re-fusing as well as resisting Asriel’s one attack) Due to this, they can learn the trait magic of any trait they possess, but with boosted effects (True reset wipes all memories for example) Their battle magic can lower their opponent's max HP. I haven't come up with an idea for their soul effect. (Possibly being able to flee even in instances where a monster is unwilling to end the encounter?) Monsters are limited in how much they can do outside of normal means, and are unable to perform the skills of other traits.

Those with Determination as their main trait have the skill to save, load, and reset. It is not dependent on whomever is the most determined, rather anyone with a Determination soul can use this skill. (I have a different reason why Flowey becomes unable to) Before humans lost their magic, Saving and Loading were common, but Resetting was extremely rare, as a Reset would return someone to the point their trait presented itself, meaning that it would take someone back to when they were first born. Only those with Determination as their main trait could remember what happened before a Load, while those with other main traits would have varying degrees of Dejavu, depending on how much Determination they have. Their battle magic takes a certain amount of HP from someone else and grants it to them, or can be used on themselves to give someone else some of their HP. Their soul effect is to be invulnerable for a period of time after being harmed. Monsters don't have strong enough souls to save or reload, nor to properly remember loads. Instead they only vaugely remember what happened, as if remembering a dream.

Those with Patience as their main trait have battle magic that can be passed through if someone or something is stationary. It can be used to limit how someone's opponent can move, or as a sheild against moving attacks or objects. It's stronger as a sheild than regular magic, due to the inherent mechanic of the magic. I haven't come up with the soul magic or skill for Patience.

Those with Bravery as their main trait have battle magic that can be passed through if someone or something is moving. It can be used to keep an opponent on the move or having too much time to come up with a strategy. I haven't come up with the soul magic or skill for Bravery, or a way their battle magic could be useful defensively. (Possibly a dash mechanic for the soul effect)

Those with Perseverance as their main trait have the skill to take less damage when low on HP. Their battle magic causes rolling damage instead of full damage. It's commonly used on oneself, but can be used against someone else as sort of a warning. Their soul effect is to confine the soul and attacks to a set path, either making it harder for their opponent to dodge, or easier to predict where the attacks will come from.

Those with Kindness as their main trait have the skill to heal over time, even without using spells or items. Their battle magic is healing magic. It can be used to heal themselves, or someone else. Their soul effect confines the soul to a set point and gives them way to sheild oneself. It can be used on someone else to keep them trapped either to peacefully subdue them or make them easier to attack, or on oneself in order to defend from oncoming attacks.

Those with Integrity as their main trait have a soul effect that enacts gravity on a soul. It can be used to limit how their opponent moves, or as a way to quickly drop out of range of an attack. I haven't come up with battle magic or a skill for Integrity yet.

Those with Justice as their main trait have the skill to tell if another person has previously done harm. Their soul effect allows them to fire shots of concentrated Justice magic, which can be used to destroy oncoming attacks or to attack an opponent. Their projectiles deal damage depending on if their opponent has harmed another. It doesn't do any damage to someone who hasn't done any harm, but will deal great amounts of damage to someone who has hurt many. I haven't come up with battle magic for Justice yet.

I want to come up with ideas for a few other traits and their magic as well, but have no clue where to even begin other than there being a pink soul trait due to Mettaton. (Though Dedication seems to be a common idea for that, so I may end up using that)

My idea is that soul color shows someone's main trait, but secondary trait battle magic and soul effect can be learned. Skills are limited to what someone's main trait is (aside from Power, which is an extremely rare trait)

Everyone has multiple traits in addition to their primary and secondary, but they can only be brought out through a soul effect cast on them by someone else. Though if a certain soul effect is cast on someone who doesn't hold that specific trait, nothing will happen.

Monsters are limited in how they can use trait abilities, due to their souls being weaker. I'm not sure how that would function with most traits other than Power and Determination.

I'm considering having Mad Mew's mechanic being unrelated to traits, and instead, it somehow has Frisk and Chara each control half of the soul.

Though trait and magic ideas for that wouldn't be unwelcome, either.

Starstruck, as a monster, has magic and attacks like any other! They will all be explained in this info dump! :D The information will be under the cut!

Check out other Starstruck posts: Meet Starstruck! Starstruck's Design 1.0! Starstruck Fear Info Dump!

Some headcanons I had about how elementals work. Open to adjusting this, and obviously not every elemental will fit in such neat boxes. There will always be variations or unique monsters or even groups of monsters that do not conform to these things.

Introduction

There are many different types and subtypes of elementals, the main categories of which change depending on the local cultures and mythologies. The four basic categories most will be familiar with, known as the classical elements, are fire, earth, air, and water. Some cultures added void or aether to this list. Some classified air instead as wind. Some cultures did not have this sort of concept at all.

China's Five Phases system, for example, had a generative cycle and a destructive cycle using wood, fire, earth, metal, and water that they used to explain how various interactions and other things occurred instead of as a means to describe the makeup of various substances.

For the sake of simplicity, I will be confining myself to the four commonly agreed upon classical elements.