An Academic Look Into Magic

Hello and welcome to an Academic Look Into Magic.

Here you will find an academic history of the arcane arts as well as a scientific layout of all the known elements. Because the origins of these mystic arts have yet to be considered scientific fact, we will skip over them. Feel free, however, to refer to Dragons: The Living Obelisks, as this text speculates the beginnings of magic.

Now, looking as far back a we can prove, Magic was a physical source of energy discovered towards the end of the Second Age. It was the force that propelled history into the Third Age, which is regularly referred to as the Age of Magic. We know, for a fact, that the source of all magic was contained in Rune Stones; ancient artifacts that could store this mysterious power. There is speculation that says the Elven race did not need Rune Stones in order to use magic, but again, we will stick only to subjects proven by academic research and scientific excavation.

In the beginning, there were only four primary elements: Fire, the element of Power and Devastation. Water: The element of Flow and Life. Earth: The element of Fortitude and Balance. Wind: The element of Wisdom and Tranquility. In order to harness the power of these elements, one would have to acquire Rune Stones, which have yet to be filled with elemental power. Once the stone was gathered, one would then be required to take it to an Elemental Temple: Stone obelisks that cycled and recycled the world's magical energy. After a stone was filled with a specific element, it served as a catalyst in which early magi used to cast spells.

As you all can probably imagine, these magi really had their work cut out for them. On top of learning new spells, they would have to mine raw Rune Stones, travel to Gods know where to enchant them, and then once a spell was used, the stones would instantly dissolve, which meant all that traveling would have to be done yet again. Naturally, after studying these elemental temples, the early wizards were able to unlock their secrets and recreate these temples; conveniently placing them throughout the world so that no matter where a wizard studied, there would be several temples nearby for which they could charge their Rune Stones. Elemental Talismans were also invented to serve as compasses to these new temples. A talisman was used in order to located the nearest temple with the same element as the talisman being used.

Eventually, as this Golden Age of magical understanding progressed, the early wizards devised ways to combine the elements. These combined elements gave birth to impure magic. Now keep in mind that the term Impure is not suggesting this magic is any less potent than the primary elements. Impure magic is nothing but a mixture or blend of the four primary elements. Through Impure magic came elements such as Lightning, Nature, and a few others.

Towards the end of the Third Age, a third type of Magic was created. It has yet to be proven by Scientific Fact, the origin of this final tier of magic, however some Religious texts speculate on the topic. This final tier of magic is known as the God Tier. Now the God Tier is a mix of both Pure and Impure elements, with the addition of a third source of power that is supposedly the combined powers of the Three Brothers. With this third power source, the elements Life, Death, Space/Time, as well as Law were created. Keep in mind that, during this time, the Datta no Mahou, or Arcane Dispute, has been taking place for more than three years now, but you'll cover that in another text.

The events during the Datta no Mahou caused the great wizards of the time to construct a way to make magic easier to use. The Great Wizards devised a way to break down enchanted Rune Stones into a type of dust, which was then injected directly into the bloodstream. After many trials, the wizards of old successfully created the first generation of Dust Mages.

What makes Dust Magi so special is the fact that they no longer require Rune Stones to channel the world's magical energies. They are magi with an endless supply of recyclable magical energy. With their creation, and the end of the Datta no Mahou, the world moved into the Forth Age: The Dust Era.

Just as mages before them combined the various runes, so too did the Dust Mages. They blended and bound many elements together, soon giving birth to the ancient Omnimages. These Magi were able to harness every element from every tier and were, at the time, the most powerful mortal beings to exist. There was one flaw, however, which quickly brought an end to the Dust Era. When Omnimagi reproduced, their genes and magical traits blended together, inevitably resulting more dominant traits overpowering the weaker, more recessive traits. Eventually, many Magi could only directly control one specific element. 

Well, with magi losing the ability to harness all the elements, you must be wondering why they didn't just return to using runes. Well, because all the Rune Stones were broken down into dust and exhausted far more quickly than anyone expected. So with no more Rune Stones, the Magi inevitably screwed themselves over.

With the Pure Elements, being the more dominant forms of magic, they were the most common. Nowadays, magic has become so repressed as a biological trait that some individuals never realize their magical potential. Theoretically, every living being has the ability to use all elements. It all depends on genetics as well as innate skill and years of study.

So ends our preliminary lesson on Magic. Now go off and practice! Practice! Practice, because, as history tells us time and time again: use it, or lose it!