Follow up to the planes/non-human races post back here. Gonna need to completely revamp the index at this rate; things are getting messy, and as entertaining as I find it to go wandering through my archives, it's time consuming at the best of times.
This is going to cover arcane or aetherial magic only; magicrafting keeps rewriting its own rules in my head, so I'll deal with it later.
Your standard mage operates by gathering up some aether and telling it to do something. Aether is agreeable stuff, and will respond to just about anything- chanting, singing, gesturing, dancing, written words, bright lights- you name it, there's probably a spellcasting technique surrounding it. Mages like adopting a "whatever works" attitude towards magic.
The ability to sense and manipulate aether in some way or another exists in 20% of Shaivhen's population. Of that 20%, only half become trained, licensed magic users. Some of these mages are born with the ability (standard magic users), some gain it through intense mental and spiritual training (Mystics), and some have it forced upon them by gods or other mages (priests). Spellcasting without proper training, no matter how strong your aether-sense is, is incredibly difficult- so the untrained ten percent of the population don't pose much of a threat to the general populace. It's quite possible that people can be born with aether-sense, never realize it, and live out their lives completely content, and untrained.
The upper plane is a sea of aether; the plane-border allows for a constant, low level sort of magical osmosis. There's always some free floating aether in the middle plane, just drifing around doing nothing. There are also tears in the plane-border that allow greater amounts of aether through. These tears are called wellsprings. People have historically regarded them as sacred spaces. Temples get built on top of them, or magical schools. Aether is also manufactured by living things; aether forms a person's spirit or soul, and the soul is constantly growing, changing, and renewing itself.
Some mages can only use free-floating and wellspring aether. Others are strong enough to pull directly from the sea of energy on the aetherial plane. And others still can harvest it from people and other living things. Most mages fall in the first category; a few fall into the second, and a very small number into the third.
People in that third category are called Leeches. The ability to sense aether also comes with an increased sensitivity to the physical and emotional states of the people around you. This enhanced sensitivity is weak in standard mages, but Leeches feel the emotions of those around them in almost pornographic detail. (If you're Silverlock, there's no "almost" about it.)
People manufacture aether when in the throes of particularly intense emotions- intense happiness, misery, terror, what-have-you. Pain counts as an emotion, as far as Leeches are concerned. They feed off of this excess energy; there's virtually no limit to the amount of power they can absorb from a person.
A number of deities consider Leeches to be unholy blights upon the land- magical parasites. Most Leeches will cheerfully agree with this assessment, and continue poking people with pointy objects to get an aether-high. They're manipulative, hedonistic, and often cruel; aether production is greatest under the influence of negative emotions, after all. Leeches are capable of using free-floating aether, and most can pull directly from the upper plane, but it's easier for them to siphon it away from the people around them.
Depending on their level of control, some Leeches can harvest aether without their victims ever realizing it. Those with poor control, or those who just don't care, leave an emotional and spiritual void behind. This is nice if you're in the middle of a panic attack and a Leech decides to feed on you- suddenly, your terror is gone, replaced by detatched apathy. On the other hand, if you're feeling ecstatically happy, you'll suddenly feel as though you can never be happy again- which, in turn, provides the Leech with even more aether to steal as the despair sets in.
Very few Leeches pursue productive, legal careers. Many of them work as thugs for the various branches of organized crime in the city. Silverlock is currently the only Leech in the Guild; assassin mages are rare in general, because so few of them have the time or inclination to follow a career path that requires so much study outside their area of specialization.
Spellcasting, like anything else, is more profitable for specialists. The dozen or so schools of magic in Shaivhen offer a variety of specialties, covering most of your basic D&D style schools of magic- elemental magic, conjuration, healing, evocation, illusion, necromancy, and so forth. (Healers are just mages who specialize in aetherial techniques that put bodies back together. It's acceptable to refer to them as either Healers or Mages- but people with knowledge of medicine and no magical talent are also called Healers.) Not all mages are connected to the schools, however. There are plenty of freelance, unaffiliated mages in the city. Some of them take on apprentices, and various techniques and specialties get passed on that way.
Priests are essentially conduits for the will of their god. Their ability to use aether comes directly from their deity. They can't draw aether from any other source- if a mage becomes a priest, he'll often have his inborn sensitivities sealed off. Preists generally don't have to train as long as mages to gain mastery over their magic, because the will of their god guides their hands and the aether.
Deities of Rothcar's pantheon can't leave the aetherial plane, but they need to communicate with their churches and select priests. To circumvent that problem, they create Avatars. An Avatar becomes an extension of her god, and is able to create conduits between priests and her deity and perform miracles. Miracles are, of course, just extremely powerful acts of magic.
As I said in the last wanky worldbuilding post, most Avatars aren't crazy. But sometimes they are- becoming an Avatar is a decently traumatic experience, and isn't for everyone. If an Avatar goes crazy and becomes a tyrannical dictator, there isn't a whole lot the members of the church can do on their own. Most deities check in on their churches often enough to notice when things go wrong, but some of them don't bother to involve themselves. Varun is easily distracted, as far as deities go, and he has never been particularly active in the running of his church. So, when Nagendra rewrites church doctrine to suit her own sociopathic tendencies, no one can do anything. (Silverlock offers to assassinate the bitch for a discount, but no one in the church has the balls or the cash to take him up on the offer.)
The link between a priest and a deity cannot be broken without killing the priest. Once a priest is ordained, her life is no longer hers- it belongs to her god and her church. This is her greatest strength and greatest weakness: the greater her faith, the stronger her connection and the greater her power. But, the link between a priest and a deity is fragile at best, and even the slightest interference can cause incredible agony to the priest.
Blaine has one of the strongest connections to Varun ever seen in the church- but because Nagendra is a perfect example of an Avatar gone wrong, he risks his sanity and his life every time he approaches one of the many, arbitrary things she has declared to be anathema. Angst and vomit everywhere.
It's all just magic in the end, though- so there are ways to get around the limitations placed on priests by the Avatars. Gods aren't all that special, after all- with enough drive and motivation, anyone can become one.
And that brings us to the last class of magic users, Mystics. Mystics are people who spend their entire lives training and studying to be incorporeal. For some reason or another, they decide that life would be much better if they lived on the astral plane, so they meditate and stand on their heads under waterfalls and practice martial arts until they ascend to a state of pure energy.
This has the unfortunate side effect of dissolving their bodies into so much sparkly dust, but most Mystics think that's pretty hardcore. Mystics aren't magic users the way mages and priests are- they can't manipulate aether. They are, however, masters of astral projection, and they are infinitely more sensitive to fluctuations in aether than either mages or priests.
If you lose something- your lucky turtle, your best friend, your lunch- you go to a Mystic, and he'll follow the aether trail to find it. If you want to speak to your dead grandmother about that meatloaf recipe of hers, you go to a Mystic and he'll set up a seance. The gamble lies in finding a Mystic who is both willing and properly trained to perform these services. Many of them see themselves as being above such petty things as money and employment (and food and corporeal form), and those that don't like to charge extortionate prices for their services. The Guild has a couple of Mystics floating around, because they've got more than enough money to pay for that sort of thing.
Mystics tend to creep out normal mortals; as they advance in their training, they dissolve, and they give a whole new meaning to the phrase "not quite all there". Very old and wise Mystics have no bodies- some of them inhabit jars, so they don't lose track of themselves. Even after a Mystic has reached a totally incorporeal state, there's no guarantee that he'll be able to ascend to the aetherial plane- it's a very hit-or-miss sort of discipline. Once you're incorporeal, your time on the middle plane is limited.
Once a Mystic ascends to the aetherial plane, he can chill with the gods or hang out with ghosts, or just float aimlessly on the unending sea of aether. He'll survive indefinitely in that form until he decides to move on, and the aetherial plane reabsorbs his spirit matter.
That's arcane magic in a larger-than-average nutshell, I guess; the mechanics are basically the same for everyone, even if the methods are occasionally different.
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