Solo Reimancy Theory

[Sayana]

Link to Book :

A Treatise on Reimancy: by Clyde Sullins or written here (in case his plotnotes are reorganized and the previous link doesn't work).

Summer 54, 516 AV

The ocean air filled her nostrils, the waves crashed against the ship, and at last she opened the book. Sayana had hardly touched it since receiving the small gift. Or at least a gift in the sense that she had been lent the book on reimancy. Frankly, it frightened and overwhelmed her. When Clyde had needed her to read the Grand Oath, there had been sufficient urgency for her to overcome her unease and dislike for the written word, but now it was genuine curiosity that led her to open the pages.

In the quiet and privacy of her small room, the Eypharian read the title softly under her breath.

“A Treatise on Reimancy: by Clyde Sullins”

When she opened the first page, she forced herself to take a deep breath upon seeing so many words. It’s just a book. Distractedly, she glanced up and around the room as if checking for anyone to overhear her. She was stalling, but it didn’t matter. She knew she had stalled long enough. There was also some small part of her that wanted to prove something to Clyde. That she could take on his book just like she was beginning to learn his auristics.

With the pages opened to the index, a series of numbers suddenly caught her eye. It was a list. Refocusing her attention to the scrawling writing she began to read the index, occasionally stumbling over the longer words.

“Preface – What is covered about Reimancy. Chapter 1 – A summary of the elements, their combinations, and their inherent danger levels. Chapter 2 – A class… A class… A class-i-fi” Her knuckles began to tighten and it took her considerable effort to set the book down before lying back on the cot and staring at the ceiling as she felt the ocean waves upon the ship. She could do this. It was just a book.

Sitting up again, she sounded out the word slowly and carefully. It took a couple of tries but suddenly she realized what it was trying to say and she could move on. The next word, she didn’t get at all. “Trans-mu-ta-tion.” Even after several repetitions, she still had no idea what it was supposed to be. Eventually she discarded it as a word she didn’t know but maybe she would ask the mage at some later date what it was supposed to mean. After she managed to read the whole book through. ‘Attraction’ was another tricky word but at least she knew very well what it meant.

After accomplishing the index, she was almost about to turn the page when she thought better of it, and read through the index one more time. It was easier the second time round and the content made much more sense. Instead of struggling with the words so much, she paid attention to what Clyde was trying to say.

A summary of elements and combinations and danger. Spells and how powerful they were. Something compared to attraction. And other things regarding reimancy.

But what was the point of all this? He wasn’t actually teaching her anything by writing this. So, there are different things to consider when doing magic or specifically reimancy… Then it finally hit her. It was a list of things he was going to talk about in the book. But when her eyes looked back at the description of the Preface, she was confused once again. Wasn’t that the purpose of the Preface? It was an odd way to write, but she figured she’d have to accept it or else return the book to the mage unread.

The Eypharian shifted on the cot and flipped the page to the Preface.

[Sayana]

“Preface- This treatise on Reimancy aims to be enlightening and informative. However from the start I would like to make it clear…”

Despite the intimidating block of text, Sayana found this to be an easier read. It sounded more like Clyde and more like how he might give a lesson. Oddly, his personality seemed to show through with the writing and as she spoke the words quietly to herself, she could almost imagine him being in the room with her. Like before, she read it over a second time to solidify her understanding of it but still it felt like she was missing something. When was he actually going to explain the magic principles? Or was he even going to do that at all?

Suddenly, she recalled the index and flipped back to it. Moving her finger to Chapter 1, she reread the topics covered. Aha! Here was where it really started. Hopefully. Maybe. Flipping back to the start of Chapter 1, she steeled herself for more reading.

“Chapter 1- A summary of the elements, their combination's, and their inherent danger levels.
For this chapter I will go over each element, starting with the four main elements, and then going on to the three para-elements...”

There was significantly more content this time but it was much more to the core of what reimancy was about. Or at least the elements. It was only partway through the fire description that she realized he was writing about fire because it could be used in reimancy. It was slow going, and halfway through she took a break to get some food, but she was making progress. The element of air surprized her, whereas the mention of earth confirmed his usage of reimancy when constructing the cave. Water seemed to be a natural element and she thought back to Ahnatep and the small bit of magic she had witnessed there. Water could be extremely useful if it could be produced just as easily as Aren had made the fire appear. Of course, as long as it wasn’t salt water. Water could also be very defensive against fire.

She was glad that it was broken into chunks of writing. Just like before, she tended to reread a paragraph once she was finished in order to better understand and absorb the concepts. Certain words became easier to recognize with practice but by the time she was finished the four basic elements, she had had enough.

There was a funny little squiggle and then three more chunks of writing. Curiously, she read the first word of each, and by following the pattern she identified the three remaining elements: lightning, lava, and ice. They seemed odd and almost out of place compared to the others, but maybe that was the reason for the squiggle.

Still, she decided to stop for the day as there would be plenty of time on the ship to finish the reading.

[Sayana]

Summer 56, 516

The whole next day had been busy. Somehow. Or she just wasn’t yet ready to face the book again. But the following day she got herself mentally prepared to try it once again. She started with reading the four basic elements once again and began committing some of the details to memory. Then she moved onto the other elements.

The lightning reminded her that Clyde said he had controlled a storm once. Lava, she wasn’t entirely sure what it was, but it sounded like a mix of water and earth, and somehow really hot. Ice, she had experienced but not very much. However she certainly agreed that it could be deadly. Frequently while reading, she found herself wanting to comment on or interrupt Clyde’s words, but without the mage present in the room she couldn’t ask any questions. And while she could feasibly ask since he was aboard the ship, she had decided to first read the entire book through on her own.

Chapter 1 had been rather long, but in the two sittings she felt more confident about its contents. Curiously, she moved onto Chapter 2 and noted that the mage had repeated the description in the index at the beginning of the chapter.

The first paragraph was rather confusing and she had no idea what he meant by “X number of spells at a higher level”. Hopefully it wasn’t too important and she moved on to the different spell types. As she read on, it seemed it was more about describing the difference in strength or size or power of the spells. She recalled the single flame that Aren had lit and then as she reached the bottom of the page she was reminded once more of the storm Clyde had created.

Initially, the information didn’t seem all that useful, but upon reading the classifications once more she had a much better perspective as to what reimancy was capable of. Huge changes to the landscape could be possible to Clyde, but as he said, it would be very draining. But something small like the size of his fist or torso would be much more manageable. Something like what he did to create the pycon cave. Although some examples were provided in the book, it was hard to imagine all the possibilities that would come from manipulating the different elements described in the previous chapter.

With significantly more perspective in terms of scale for the magic, Sayana put aside the book to resume on a later day.

[Sayana]

Summer 61, 516

More than a couple days passed and Sayana realized that the boat trip back to Syliras would soon be over. She returned to the book, wanting to complete it by the end of the journey and opened it to the third chapter.

“Chapter 3 – Transmutation versus Attraction”

There was that word again. The trans…something something. For a moment the Eypharian stared at it, frustrated that she didn’t know what it meant. At last she moved on, hoping that the meaning would become clearer as she read more.

The reading was slow and painstaking. She spoke softly to sound out the words and was glad of the privacy of the small room so she would not be overheard. Repeatedly she found herself annoyed that she didn’t understand what transmutation was, but she tried to dwell on the concept of attraction and how it brought the element towards the mage. It seemed like transmutation, whatever it was, was more intuitive and easier to do but took more magic. Whereas attraction needed more conscious thought but didn’t use up djed so quickly.

It was only when she got to the list of different elements and their respective availability did it dawn on her as to what transmutation must mean. “If lightning is super rare and you can’t attract it… then transmutation must mean creating it? Like Clyde created a storm?” It reminded her of exactly how Aren had created a single flame of fire hovering over his fingertip. As it suddenly started to make sense, she found the paragraph on fire to read again, then started once again at the top of the chapter to read it a second time through with this new understanding.

As like before, the second time reading was easier. Troublesome words didn’t take as long to figure out and often she recalled enough of the text from the first reading so as not to stumble along quite so much. Sayana noted that when creating an element, it was far quicker than having to attract and gather an element. Although, if it was in the near vicinity it shouldn’t be too difficult. Fire was rare to find already burning while the other elements tended to be easier. Except, right now since she was at sea, it would be difficult to get much earth to attract. The three other elements were much less common. Ice in particular would be hard to get unless she was in Syliras in the winter. Maybe there were other places, but it would have to be really cold.

At the last section of the chapter, Sayana smiled a bit as she could almost hear Clyde’s voice as she read the scrawling script. Yes, he was definitely a glypher. She knew that the glyphing had something to do with the grand oath, but the mage hadn’t explained it in depth. She was a little surprised to read that it could somehow get combined with reimancy, but then remembered his comment about not wanting the Syliran knights to find out that he was both a reimancer and glypher. It was an interesting concept to think that spells could get stored on a piece of paper. For a split tick she wondered if some spell was stored in this very book, but then she recalled all the strange symbols for the grand oath, and figured that she was probably safe reading this.

Transmutation and attraction. The former was easier and could be used with glyphs whereas the latter didn’t need as much djed but required more concentration. She supposed that attraction couldn’t be put into a glyph because if it was earth attraction and the glyph happened out at sea… there’d be no earth to attract. Or something similar.

Even as she considered the text, she found her eyes drooping and growing tired. Tomorrow she’d have to try to finish up the book.

[Sayana]

Summer 62, 516 AV

Sayana started the next morning with the book. In some ways it felt strange and unnatural to be so keen to decipher the scrawling writing. And yet at the same time the book was very detailed and gave her a much better appreciation for reimancy.

The Eypharian opened the book to the final chapter. “Chapter 4 – Other concerns of a reimancer. Res decay over time, and reabsorption.”

‘Res decay’. It looked similar to the word ‘reimancy’, though she wasn’t entirely sure of the meaning. She was less anxious about the unfamiliar word this time and hoped that like before, she would figure out its meaning. As Clyde explained the nature of res and its natural state within the body, only to leave the body to do reimancy, Sayana recalled the silvery liquid that Clyde had used for his pycon cave. She had been pretty sure it had come from his staff but maybe the blue staff was more intimately connected to him.

Within his explanation of decaying res while it is outside one’s body, she noted a mention of loss of control once an element has been transmuted. But hadn’t Aren managed to maintain a flame hovering over his finger? Maybe there had been something more to it, or maybe he was also attracting the fire at the same time but unknown to her. Then Clyde clarified her assumption that somehow attraction must have been at play.

She continued to read about how glyphing could only work with completed spells of transmutation. It seemed to make sense to have to first pick the element one wished to use and decide its full effect before storing it. Rather than keeping a flexible amount of res, even if it might have been more handy to be flexible.

Lastly, Clyde went on to explain that even though res could leave the body, it could also get reabsorbed if it wasn’t needed. Of course, that’s where the res decay kicked in. Hypnotism wasn’t at all like that. It was far more mental, similarly aurisitics. But it seemed like a more physical magic using the elements needed more physical substances to interact with the world.

For a moment Sayana reflected on the contents of the book. She had garnered a good deal of perspective on the magic and an overall sense of what it could or couldn’t do. Though there was one repeating theme that she noticed. Clyde, a master mage, had spent the majority of the time commenting on ways to make the magic more efficient and use it in unique and conservative ways. He even included a separate chapter just about res and how to preserve it for future use.

Men, they sure liked their own silvery fluids.

[Kaleidoscope]

 

CHARACTER 1

Skills

• Reading: +5

Lores

• Dislike of the written word
• Organisation: Prefaces are a way to show what’s going to be written
• Reading: Rereading a difficult passage
• Reading: Learning the personality of the writer through their words
• Reading out loud to make things easier
• Reimancy: Uses four elements- fire, air, water, earth
• Reimancy: Additional para-elements- lightening, lava, ice
• Sayana: Unsure what the para-element ‘lava’ is in Reimancy
• Reimancy: Transmutation means creation
• Reimancy: Attraction attracts elements
• Transmutation: Easier but draining
• Attraction: Harder but less djed used
• Glyphing: Storing spells in paper
• Transmutation: Can be used with glyphs
• Reimancy: Properties of Res
• Physical things for physical magic

Comments: Well... that last sentence made me laugh out loud! They sure do don't they. xD A neat little reading thread. It was good to see Sayana struggling with words only to overcome them. Until next time!

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