DearSpellbook

Chapter 35: Doug

The Space primals originate from the Hollow Peak, the city once known as Atlian. The creation of a hyper compressed spacial pocket within a cavern attracted the Primordial of Space. The giant spiders breed for silk were the first Space primals to arise, but Illusian Space primals arose shortly thereafter.

Lidian’s Manual to Magical Fauna, 283rd ed 

—

Kole wasn’t late to meet Zale and Rakin for breakfast the next morning, though he was 2024-01-03 18:24:27 +0000 UTC View Post

Chapter 34: Alive

The Air primals hail from the floating castle. While the Primordials tend to appear in the highest concentration of their domain on the Realm, the presence of people seems to have a factor in that. The Primordial of Air has been following the Cloud Castle since shortly after it took to the skies to flee the Flood. It’s people developed primal magic around 450AF.

Lidian’s Manual to Magical Fauna, 283rd ed 

—

“What?” Kole asked, starin...

Chapter 33: Rune Library

The Bond primals can draw upon their Font to create Bonds, both physical and metaphysical, and have utilized their magic alongside a communal ensouled artifact to create a system of energy sharing that makes the already massive people fearsome in battle. 

Lidian’s Manual to Magical Fauna, 283rd ed 

—

Kole fell out of bed as he reached for the buzzing magical device. The room had gone dark when he’d fallen asleep of its own voliti...

Chapter 32: Sticky Runes

The people of the Iron Vein are a race of human origin, but have grown to have an average height of 7 to 8 feet. The abnormal height predates the access to the Primordial and is likely due to the introduction of giant blood into the gene pool.

Lidian’s Manual to Magical Fauna, 283rd ed 

—

While he read the short note, Kole felt a strange sensation at the back of his skull and then heard a small whoosh of air. He looked up to find Theral gone.

Chapter 31: Theral

The last hundred years have given rise to the discovery of Illusian races with Primal abilities, none—as far as this researcher knows of—of Midlian origin. The most famous among them are the Bond primals of the Iron Vein Tribe. As a key figure in the Last Dragon War, Bearskin lead his people out of isolation to aid in the war against the dragons’ horde.

Lidian’s Manual to Magical Fauna, 283rd ed

—

Kole’s unintended sleep was interrupted by a subtle woosh and h...

Chapter 30: Chase

The Midlian Empire, while cruel and evil in countless ways, were on to something with their experiments to develop primals of the Illusian races. While the Flood devastated the world, it is likely the Midlian Empire would have inflicted far more cruelty long term if they hadn’t been destroyed by the waves.

Lidian’s Manual to Magical Fauna, 283rd ed 

—

The next day, Kole was much more well rested for his training with Zale. They kept with sparring, keeping themselv...

Chapter 29: Monday

Pack rats were long suspected to be primals, but it wasn’t until the Last Dragon War that it was discovered they were in fact primals of the Font of Time. The Font from which they draw their power was long unknown, as is their geographic origin. Pack rats were known to the native pre-Flood orc denizens of Basin but were not present outside the pre-Flood mountain bowl. They are now reported worldwide, having infiltrated the sailing fleets of the world. 

Lidian’s Manual to Magica...

Chapter 28: Weekend

Primal creatures typically exhibit one to three distinct manifestations of the Font’s power. The key identifying feature distinguishing a primal creature from a formed or magical creature is that it is identical in appearance to a mundane animal and exhibits magic that could be ascribed to a single Font. Pack rats are primal creatures. They live in swarms alongside their non-magical cousins and are indistinguishable from them. Though I have not performed the test, based on previous primal b...

Chapter 27: Study Group

The first primal creatures encountered by men on Kaltis were discovered during the Age of Wonders. At the time, they were not classified as anything other than magical creatures. The extensive research and exploration conducted by the Midlian Empire discovered and classified the primal subset of magical creatures while studying stable Primordials in their conquered lands. At the discovery, the Empire forcibly relocated villages to these Primordials to observe the effects on sapient beings, bu...

Chapter 26: Hardball

Primal creatures are often found in proximity to Primordial manifestations of the Fonts in our realm. Prolonged generational proximity to these manifestations of power grants creatures the ability to innately tap into the power of the Font. Once the connection to the Font is made, the creature can leave the Primordial’s proximity and still maintain its connection. The connection can also pass down to their offspring, but this varies on a species-to-species basis. 

Lidian’s Manu...

Chapter 25: Griffin's Roost

My revised classifications are primal creatures, which gained access to a Font through prolonged generational proximity to a Primordial; formed creatures, which were created by sapients through magical means; and magical creatures, which were created by the gods near the end of the Age of Wonders. 

Lidian’s Manual to Magical Fauna, 283rd ed 

—

When Amara returned to the table, Zale preempted further explanations of runes with a question.

“So, who wants ...

Chapter 24: Blasting Rod

Magical creatures come in many forms and arose on Kaltis through a variety of means. A magical creature—for the purposes of this manual—is any living creature that innately draws upon a Font to wield magic or was created through the use of magic. Through decades of pestering from my contemporaries, I have finally relented to their arguments to expand my definition to include the animals created by the gods near the end of their time on Kaltis. As such, the creatures I had formerly categor...

Chapter 23: Goblins

Now, it's rare to find any mage with much power in sorcery. The art of arcane pathfinding from a natural bridge has been nearly forgotten, and all magical research has gone into the optimization of spell constructs. There's nothing wrong with this new art, but it is completely incompatible with the old method of casting through an unaltered bridge. The new spells are so intertwined with their paths and gates, that they would not even function if a Primal of their Font cast them.

-Tallen...

Chapter 22: The Dungeon

At the Dahn, all were welcome to learn wizardry, and even sorcery if they had the stomach for it. The sorcerers quickly showed what the Tower had sought to hide, that sorcerers make the best wizards. These sorcerous wizards rebelled against the titles and ranks of the former Tower, and simply referred to themselves as mages. And so, thousands of years after the world lost its meaning, the sorcerous wizards finally reclaimed it.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

Professor ...

Chapter 21: Teammates

The final Binding of the Avatar's corruption freed sorcerers, demonkin, fallen orcs and even some forsaken from the whispers of Faust. They could finally walk the Basin without threat of insanity.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

“Four to five in a group!” Underbrook shouted after Tigereye’s less than detail instructions. “If you aren’t already in a group, come to the front of the room and we will form balanced groups for the day.”

Kole looked at Zale, ...

Chapter 13: Commencement

Any sorcerers of draconic bloodlines slowly went mad after passing the mountains, corrupted by the captured Avatar's power. This was the beginning of the schism.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

Kole woke, briefly confused to where he was. The room was pitch black, and he smelled the distinct odor of books—musty paper with a hint of leather.

Slowly, his memories of the previous night returned along with the realization he was supposed to meet Amara at the commenc...

Chapter 20: Prevent

Tal was pivotal in the war, and gave many sorcerers the courage to come out of hiding and use their abilities to battle Faust's followers. In the aftermath, the survivors traveled to the growing city of Edgewater to further their knowledge of the arcane arts at the school that would be known across Kaltis as the the Academy of Illunia. 

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

A very sore and sleepy Kole arrived at the training yard just after six to find Zale going through...

Chapter 19: The Room

In the lead up to the Last Dragon War, a Journeyman Stormcaller named Tal Binder, raised on Basin but trained in their ways by his mother, traveled openly as a dragon blooded sorcerer at the side of Daulf, Illunia's Chosen.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

Kole stayed up late that night working on the first of the Magic Missiles he knew enough spell components to repair, but he didn’t manage to finish it that night. The next morning he woke to find that he had visitors...

Chapter 18: Friends

The Tower had fallen long before the building itself was swept away in a flood. Chosen Daulf of Illunia saw to that, and took what little good remained in the place with him before leaving it behind for good.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

Kole slunk off out of the training hall a short while later. He'd yet to buy food to keep in the library and ate the extra fruit he'd take at lunch as he went back. He had assignments due in both alchemy and history and he hoped to g...

Chapter 17: Goblin-Rats

If you have a spellform from the Tower's library, odds are better than not that the ink was made using the bones of a sorcerer. Potion were made out of the bones that gradually increased Will capacity. Bones were carved into wands, staves, rings and more. Each tailored to the Arcane signature of their former owners.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

The hall was filled with fleeing students, most yelling in panic but some stopped to fire spells back down the hallway befor...

Chapter 16: Advanced First Tier Combat Wizardry

But, even the Tower lost its way. The politics of that are outside the subject of this paper, but the source of it all was sorcerers. Some foul necromancy working in hiding in the Tower discovered that sorcerer's bones animated far easier than any other intelligent creature. When this got out—after the necromancer was discovered, executed and his notes surveyed—the study of sorcerer's bodies became the focus of all departments.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

In the...

Chapter 15: Martial Combat 101

The restriction on spellforms was meant to level the playing field against the dragons that remained. Any dragon could enter a village and leave with an army of sorcerers. An army that could become wizards in the course of a year of given access to spellforms. The Tower took on the role as stewards of this magical knowledge and fought valiantly to keep it from the enemy's claws.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

The next morning, Kole used some of his limited f...

Chapter 14: Introduction to Alchemy

The Dragon War was the end of the sorcerers' hold on the title of mage. The best of them went mad, and the wizards had to scramble to take them down. They succeeded in defeating the Arch Mages among their ranks, and swore to keep the dragon's from creating more.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

Kole woke to a high-pitched whine. Groggily he groped around the desk his face rested on until he found the source and silenced it. The previous morning had highlighted one major ...

Chapter 12: The Library

The knowledge of spellforms was spread, but was quickly followed by the Avatar's arrival and the Flood. After the settlement of Basin, the art spread wildly through the wizarding communities. It was also at this time that wizards learned that Basin was not a safe place for dragon blooded sorcerers.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

—

The Academy of Illunia had many, many, many, libraries, but when one spoke of the library, they always referred to a particular one.

The Dahn�...

Chapter 11: Bursor

Wizardry continued to grow all the way until the Flood. Spellforms were discovered a few decades before the Flood when a wizard Isla Hancock from the Midlian empire learned of the art of runes in the years preceding the Flood. She became obsessed with applying them to wizardry but failed, though in doing so found that she could store spell constructs in ink.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

The signs lead Kole into a series of stalls set out on the green, and as with the...

Chapter 10: Grand Master

Over time, many without the innate connection to the Font learned the art of wizardry and alternative methods of discovering affinities were devised. Eventually half of all practitioners had no sorcerous abilities, but at the top, the sorcerers crowded the ranks. The title of mage became associated with the best, and eventually came to refer to those who practiced both schools of magic.

-Tallen Elmheart, On Mages

— 

Kole looked up to see a group of the young test proc...