Arcana of the Silver Sky Part-II

As stated In the First Arcana of the Silver Sky  There are three core type of magic...


                                                                   The Inner Path.

                                                          Spiritism.

                                             
                                                                         Aethercraft.

And now we dive deeper into their aspects and permutation.


                                                                     The Canny

Are a rare breed some would call them mutants, these individuals naturally possesses the heightened physical and mental capabilities normally associated with devotes to the Inner Path. The Canny's normally exhibit a single enhancement, however the possession of multiples is not unheard of. A Canny may go their entire lives without ever realizing what they are. Some scholars theorize that innate/born Aethercrafters are simply another one of the myriad Canny strains.


                                                        The Spirit-Touched/Spiritborn

Those with the blood of the Spirits in their veins were rare in the Before Time and are thought of as non existent in the modern cosmos. One or more of a Touched ancestors was exposed to the numinous power of a Spirit in such a way that an imprint was left on their bloodline from that point on. This Imprint may have come about do to the ancestor having received a very potent endowment/boon from a Spirit, A life lived as the Avatar or Agent of a Spirit, direct descent from an incarnate Spirit or Spirit Person fusion.



                                                                          Priestery

As said in the previous Arcana Spritism is essentially a dead art in the modern cosmos, a consequence of the sundering. The devotes of the Gods are the only people who can directly tap the power of the spirits. The Gods dwell in the Supernal Realm a plane of their own design existing "above" the sea of souls,the deepest part of the Aetheral plane. The numina of the Gods flows from their realm and touches all planes. And resonates with compatible Spirits, through the numina those Sprits can touch the touch the physical world.  A priest can tap the power of all the Sprits with whom their god resonates. Priests are also lucky, fate is in part the will of the Gods and as agents of that will they have"smooth sailing" as long as they act in harmony with that will.



                                                                   Daemonology

Every person has two souls the normal soul that houses their consciousness and a sleeping soul,their Daemon. This Daemon is incredibly powerful however it is atavistic in nature, devoid of morality or restraint,wickedly clever and intuitive but irrational. There are Aethercraft techniques that can awaken the Daemon and bring it into physical realm. And they each hold their own dangers and advantages.

Manifestation: Creates a body for the Daemon from ectoplasm, a process not to dissimilar to how Revenants take physical form. The forms that Daemons take are often animalistic in nature,combining elements from different species or being an idealized representation of a single animal. Once summoned into the world a Daemon will begin to grow in power and intelligence and will eventually begin attempting to break free of their host or worse reverse the relationship and control the summoner. Unless the Summoner has cultivated their own strength  and kept pace with their Daemon it will succeed. If the Daemon breaks free the Summoner will soon die of the terrible spiritual that they have suffered and so will the Daemon. The Summoner and Daemon are of the same being, if one dies the other will as well. However a Daemon can stave off it's dissolution by consuming the spiritual energies of other people, or by possessing a victim in the process supplanting or subsuming their native Daemon in the process. The only way to save the Summoner is to bind the escaped and place it back into them. If the Daemon instead takes control of the Summoner, then the situation is in someways more dire. Working through a proxy the Daemon can not only wreck untold havoc it is possible for the Daemon to avoid detection for years.

Incarnation: Is by it's very nature potentially lethal. The Summoner uses their own body as the medium for Summoning the Daemon, a single mistake would prove disastrous. When successfully performed the Summoner is transformed into a monstrous creature,gaining inhuman physical abilities and a host of other benefits that come taking on a more fluid state of existence. Incarnates are far stronger than Manifested Daemons,because during Incarnation the Daemon and Summoner merge into a single entity combining the power of their Souls. Sometimes the merger becomes permanent resulting in a new individual entirely.

                                                                  Fate-Dynamics???





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Arcana of the Silver Sky

In the Silver Sky vers there are three main forms of Magic forms.

                                                                  The Inner Path.

A mental and physical discipline that allows one to gain conscious control of their physical and mental faculties,access normally subconscious capabilities, and push themselves mentally and physically to the very limit of their species natural ability.

The various"techniques" are to numerous to list some of the most famous are: tuning ones self to the"beat" of the world and by doing so gain uncanny speed,precision and timing. Feeling the world, and by doing so gain perfect awareness of ones environment. Withstanding environmental extremes. Going without food/water and or rest for prolonged periods of time. Being able to hone and focus ones senses to pick up on things that would normally go unnoticed and or filter out unnecessary information.  Clearing the mind of all distraction to enter into a state of hyper-focus where thought freely flows into action.


                                                                          Spiritism

Also called Spirit Arts or Shamanism(though that has carries religions connotations) is in it's pure form a dead art in the modern cosmos. In elder days before creation had been sundered the influence of the spirits was strong. Some people either through natural aptitude or training could draw power from certain spirits. Others were blessed by the spirits,sometimes this would leave a visible sign,endowed with a power or boon drawn from the nature of that particular spirit. The abilities granted by the Spirits were often subtle and very abstract nature.

                                                                       Aethercraft.

Aether is the stuff of which souls are made and the base of all energy and matter in the cosmos. Aethercraft is that art by which one learns to tap into and wield the energy. Aethercrafters are the most overtly powerful of all the magic users in the verse. Even without directly employing their power Aethercrafter posses abilities that them apart from the masses. The greater quantity of  Aether flowing through their system grants Aethercrafters longer healthier lives than mundane members of their species,in the cases of the most powerful  ten times greater; they also possess increased vigor and heal quicker and more effectively.

However despite the theoretical infinite power and application of Aether what Aethercrafters can actually do is extremely limited; this fact is one of the few things that keeps Aethercrafter's somewhat humble. The mortal begin is simply a poor instrument for aether.
                                                                       



                                                                         Arithmancy

Reality is vibration,Vibration is Music,Music is Mathmatics, Mathematics is the language of creation. Arithmancy is a form of prognostication that utilizes a nigh incomprehensible form of eldritch mathematics. It's origins are lost to the mist of time, all those that try to understand it go insane, for the mind was simply not meant to work the way that understanding the discipline requires. Fortunately a precious few of those who attempted to study the discipline are functional enough that they could employ the art. When correctly incorporated into a predictive model Arithmancy renders the model supernatrualy effective; tangential forms of Arithmancy are even used in cryptography and pattern analysis.


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Shape Of The Cosmos

The concept of the World Tree , central to the mythologies of many different peoples on earth and one that i have include into the Silver Sky-vers.


                                                                      The Titans

Fourteen in number,two sets of septuplets, were born of the union of the primordial gods Order and Chaos. Each of the two sets of Titants were closer to one of their parents than the other. Together they created two great crystal trees; six tree trunks extending from a spherical body. From each of these trunks grow innumerable branches and at the end of these branches are the Crystal Spheres.

Inside each of the Crystal Spheres is is a cosmos and all with in orbits the Cosmic Axis which exists at the exact center of the sphere.



                                                                   When the Cosmos

Was first created there were only two true planes of existence


                                                                        the Aether

A turbulent sea of primeval matter,energy and spiritual forces and the Wholeness that it sustained.

                                                                          The Wholeness

The Wholeness is how modern day people refer to the earlier and now mythical state of the cosmos of the pre Sundering cosmos. During this lost time the spiritual and physical were one and the same,dream logic was a part of the world and symbol and metaphor were as real as the ground beneath was ones feat. Modern people can only theories on what living during this time was like,because they lack the frame of reference to comprehended it.

Then the titans went to war and in their fury the connection between the twin Cosmic Trees was nearly severed, the cosmos  broke and reformed. Where there had once been to planes now there were three.


                                                                  Astral  Plane

                                                                         
                                                            Aethereal Plane
                                                           

                                                               

                                                         Terrene(Material) Plane

The Astral and Terrene planes fell into a millenia long cycle of drifting in and out of sync. With the cosmos sundered Shamanism became a dead art as the spirits could no longer be reached. And civilization was completely destroyed and had to rebuild from scratch.




 

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Broken Mirror.

                                                                Behold the multiverse.

I've posted about the world of"Stories Of The Silver Sky" even shared a writing sample, now I'm going to talk about my MASTER PLAN!  Until I think of a better title and copywrite it the story is to be called

                                        Broken Mirror Tales: A Multiversal Odyssey.



The story will center around multiple protagonist: a young woman rebelling an empire.A young Paladin of the Way fighting to stop the Arch-Heretic from conquering the Known Worlds and overturning the Way. A Hero who slew the God-Empress of the Demon Empire but do to a post battle misteleportation was lost out of time, until he was rescued a century after the war. There will be others.


All the protagonist were living coexistent lives in slightly different version of the Known Worlds,however something  happened and breaches in the multiversal membrane begin to open. The crux of the story is going to be the characters navigating the multiverse and trying find the cause of the breaches.



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Unfetered

The following is the first story set in the "Stories Of The Silver Sky" setting, while it is not "canon" it dose contain a many of the ideas that I have about the world. It's only five pages and I wrote it as part of Creative Writing assignment. Now i present Unfetered.







                                                                          Unfetered

The moons Rubuera, Sulveni, Gildium were high in sky above the Imperial stadium. The atmosphere inside was tense as the string of drawn bow, down on the field two youths battled fiercely for the honor of their chapters; for theirs was the final bout in The Tourney. The opportunity and obligation of the Conservatory’s graduating students that had perused the path of martialism, to demonstrate the fruit of their training. Arahlin Ikar of Trion chapter and Imaric Corsae of Pentacon were the last of their duelist of their teams. Arahlin snarled in frustration as he was lifted into the air by a tentacle of solidified water. His golden eyes glanced at the horologe four minutes and fifty eight seconds remained. Then to Imaric's smug grayish red face and thought “that bastard thinks he's already won; and means on running out the time”.  Arahlin's poor judgment had gotten him into his current situation but Imaric's would get him out. Arahlin peripherally looked at the tentacle holding him aloft. Fine threads of Aether were spread throughout the water like the veins of a leaf. “Have to be quick “thought Arahlin, for if Imaric realized what he was about to do he'd be thrown from the ring into the water below. Arahlin's corona flared into a crackling, pale purple silvery nimbus of aetheral power. The tentacle moved to throw Arahlin but fell apart as Imaric howled in pain. Arahlin had touched his Aether to Imaric's and drove dissonance directly into his soul! On the offensive Arahlin charged across the ring, his body surging with the aether that he was channeling through it.

*****

Imaric ceased his trembling and rose from the ring face impassive as a stone, having remembered in the midst of his agony the focal-meditate. He reached backwards to edge of the ring; Aether shot into water the Siphoning it for him. Imaric spun the water into a protective bubble around himself. He then began a flurry of stabbing motions towards the oncoming Arahlin, firing ice rods off the bubble. Undaunted by near ballistic projectiles Arahlin continued his advance. A shield of hardened, heated, air rippled before him, shattering the ice rods and boiling the shards to vapor. The fingers of Arahlin’s right hand moved as though he rapidly weaving complex string figures. Whitish silver rods of ectoplasm crystallized in the air above each of his fingers and the water vapor wrapped around them before freezing into ice. Imaric stopped his fusillade and poured the power that he’d been using to attack into reinforcing his bubble. Imaric’s own corona flared and he threw a hard punch firing a blast of aetheral force. Arahlin abandoned his shield of air; from the tone of the blast he knew that it would offer him no protection. He gritted his teeth and stabbed his left hand forwards driving a wedge of aethereal  force into the blast splitting it in twine. Its halves diffused by the barrier surrounding the field. There were subtler uses to the discipline of Fortis and Arahlin was of a mind to demonstrate. One of the ice encased rods began to vibrate with energy causing it to give off a faint whine. Arahlin flicked his hand forward launching the rod, Imaric’s bubble rippled from the force of the impact and very nearly popped! “To the void with this!” spat Imaric then he roared letting bubble collapsed and he charged out to meet Arahlin…siphoned water trailing behind him.

*****

 Arahlin fired another charged rod which Imaric dodged by the mote of a degree. He then swung his arm upwards and the trailing sprayed into the air. Imaric made a chocking gasp as two of the rods struck him in the chest and other pained sounds as he fell to the ring. With a wave of his hand and a whips of Aether, Arahlin unbounded the working that sustained the impromptus water fountain.  He walked over to Imaric and said “yield”. Imaric looked into Arahlin eyes and sneered “to you scum?! Not life chance in void”! Then he struck, the water surged off the ring and cocooned Arahlin freezing to ice in the processes. Imaric slow rose to his feet baying laughter pained, the face plate of his helmet retracted. "As if I'd let something vile as you taint the even a fraction of Tourney's majesty by being declared it's champion; your participation is insult enough". Imaric cried out in pain as the very rod that had nearly collapsed his bubble speared him in the back! As Imaric struggled to his feet he noticed the air solidify into a globe around him. To hurt tired and to muster the power to escape the air globe, he howled in impotent rage as the globe carried him out off the platform and dropped him into the water. The stone bird cried signaling the end of the match. Arahlin fixed his gaze upon the judge’s booth, they were debating fiercely. Gritting his teeth Arahlin thought “a Duelists wins match, a team wins competitions I hope that I scored enough technical points off Corsae's gentry hind to give the team what we need”. For several minutes the judges deliberated, to Arahlin it felt like an eternity. Anxious coiled about him like a serpent as the judges announced their scores. Arahlin quickly tallied the numbers in his head then began to smile. Trion’s point total was put up on the scoreboard, with the points from the final match added they were leading Pentacon by two points the tourney was theirs! The attendees erupted some chanting Trion, others cursing the defeat of Pentacon these were the only people. Among the Pentacon supports were the bulk of the people saying the name Arahlin Ikar though they spoke it in same breath as their curses.

*****

Planks extended from the sidelines to the area and battered and bruised the team of Trion dueling team limped, hobbled and ran to meet their hero. Ahead off all of them was a female Ketusin. She leapt the railing the second the barrier came down skipped across the water and bound on to the platform, long coat flapping behind her. She picked Arahlin up tossed him into the air and caught him. “You did it Rahli you showed them all”! “Tiny” said softly Arahlin. “Yes” she replied. “You’re holding me to tight”. “Oh, sorry “said Tiny sheepishly then she set him down. Arahlin looked up into her midnight blues eyes “I should them but I still haven’t told them”.  Tiny smiled with malicious anticipation then stepped back as Arahlin’s teammates surrounded him and showering him with praise. On crutches the team captain hobbled over to Arahlin” you did it, you won the tourney for us” she said. “Captain my ability should never have been in doubt”.  “I never doubted you Arahlin Ikar not once, but that isn’t the same as having a realistic estimation of your abilities, also I’m not your captain anymore”. Arahlin chuckled “I suppose your right about that Antonia”.  “While on the subject of your abilities” said Antonia annoyed. “Yes”?  Antonia punched Arahlin in the shoulder “how and when did you learn the Dissonance Spike, that is a working a very dangerous. The only way a student would normally be taught it is if they demonstrated a predilection for offensive applications Noesis; which you do not”? Arahlin shrugged “I learned it from a codex about a season age. I wanted a loaded die for the Tourney”.  “From whence did you get this codex”?  “I got it for Rahli” stated Tiny greenish silver arms folded. Antonia held her face as she gave an exasperated sigh turning to Tiny she said” Miliani please tell me that nothing untoward was involved in the acquisition of the codex. They could use something like that to try and disqualify him, costing us the Tourney”. “I swear on my ancestors that I did nothing illegal for the information” said Miliani sincerely.  A sly smile crept on to her face” However I can make no claims that my actions weren’t untoward”. “Oh gods grant me your protection” pleaded Antonia.

*****

Arahlin’s friends and team parted as Tourney Presider Caelia approached. She presented him with the champion’s ring a loop of blades made from the finest glass that pulsed with silvery purple glow of aether.  Around the ring’s black stone was the tourneys’ date and Arahlin’s full name in raised letters. Presider Caelia asked all the standard questions asked of school graduate and triumphant athlete and Arahlin answered them all gracefully. Then she asked him he would like to say a few words, Arahlin looked to tiny who gave a little nod. With the speaker in hand Arahlin swept his gave around the stadium then said” I am Arahlin Ikar of House Spinae, but it’s my patronym that’s marked me my whole life. For my parents were Amittai and Honovi Ikar the leaders of the Dark Sceran pirate fleet. My father was killed when the fleet was finally navy finally caught the fleet, my mother was captured then  hung one week after I was born. To all of you that felt need to punish me for the crimes that my parents already paid for I have one thing to say…you can get down on your knees and kiss my red stripy ass”!  Arahlin handed the speaker back to Presider Caelia whose mouth hung open. He then once more looked around the stadium and basked in their mortified silence. Then Arahlin began to laugh first a little chuckle then nigh manically as the stadium erupted in outrage.

The cosmos of "Stories of The Silver Sky".

The cosmos of "Stories of The Silver Sky" has existed in my mind in some form since I was in single digits, hard to believe but it's true; i had a very active imagination and was raised on sci-fi fantasy. Though my ideas have matured and been refined over the years, the very first images of this world came to at an early age; Islands adrift in a sea of silver ether that was lit by Sky-fire rather than stars. So what exactly is the world of "Stories of The Silver Sky".

A cosmos where space is not a vacuum and is filled with an omnipresent field of macroparticles known as the Mist,which also gives "space" which the natives refer to as the firmament a silvery coloration.  The cosmos is lit not by stars but Empyrean.

Eruptions of a volatile sub-realm into to normal reality, releasing energy and the building blocks of all matter. Some Empyrean are small others large,some last for an instant others persists for years. The rarest are the perpetuals which erupt forever,systems of planets form around them.

Conterminous with all of points in the cosmos is the Gleaming Sea.

Thought to be a manifestation or aspect of the Aethereal Plane, an ocean of energy subtly felt but rarely seen. Properly equipped ships can harness the power of the Gleaming Sea to rapidly travel the cosmos.

The Gleaming Sea has great currents that flow between Empyreans and and high mass objects creating a web of fast travel routs across the cosmos.


Magic is a major part of the Silver Sky and exist in two main forms.

A shamanistic form of magic that works by drawing upon the power of the spirits, this magic is now all but dead. When the cosmos  was sundered during the First War of the gods,reality was split in half where once there had been whole  now there was physical and spirittual, Terrene and Astral. With the Sundering the power of the spirits could no longer be invoked. Only those who are sworn to one of the Gods can still call upon the spirits. For the power,the numen  of the Gods acts as a bridge between the planes.

The other a psionic art called Aethercraft.  Aether is the most fundamental force-substance in the cosmos, it is also the very stuff from which souls are made. By natural talent or extensive training there are people who can tap into the latent power within their souls and achieve otherwise impossible feats.


"Any Sufficiently Analyzed Magic is indistinguishable from SCIENCE!"

— Agatha Heterodyne, Girl Genius

While Aethercraft remains an Art, the Aether itself has been "Sufficiently Analyzed" Aetronic devices are ubiquities. Modern civilization in the Known Worlds is closer in terms of their tech-level to cyberpunk, rather than the quasi-medieval commonly seen in fantasy. The only reason that what we on earth would recognizes as normal technology developed at all, is that the"materials" necessary for the creation of Aetronics cannot be quickly produced.

The Known Worlds, is relatively small cluster of systems. In an extremely isolated region of the firmament,there is little beyond the Known Worlds for ten-thousand light years;though their are stories of "colonies" having been established somewhere during The Before Time.With a sole exception, It's been over ten thousand years since there was any contact between the Known Worlds and the colonies.

Genre.

Stories of the Silver Sky has a Genre and that is Science-Fantasy!

Because I Refuse to chose between Sword&Laser! I love the trappings,tropes and conventions of both Science-Fiction and Fantasy and see no reason why I should have to chose between the two of them.

Why not indeed? Unfortunately not everyone feels this way,in fact there are many in the genre fiction community who vehemently oppose any cross-pollination between the two titans of genre fiction.
Fantasy,Science fiction and their myriad sub-genres must be kept strictly separate, segregated into their own separate but equal sphere of the  genre space. The Gross commercial success of a genre hybrid, the Star Wars series, is viewed as precisely that gross. A mongrel a bastard that dilutes the purity of it's parent genres.

This obsession with genre purity is as far as I can tell is a primarily western phenomenon. In the Land Of the rising Sun their are many examples of a Science Fiction work containing fantastic elements,or a Fantasy World that incorporates advanced technologies either  as part of the "modern" world or in the form ruins from a lost age; or  magic filtered through a scientific lens.

My genre had been staring me in the face for years without me ever realizing it.