Necromancy is a form of magic that is revered or feared, and seldom anything in between. On one hand, its ability to commune with the deceased and provide spirit counselling services is extremely valuable, while on the other its various foul abilities to upend the natural order make many individuals inherently antsy - and for good reason. Me? Heh. I suppose you could call me an avid observer of such a frivolous conflict.— Shirahime, Headmistress of the Archon Institute
Necrotic Magic, also known as Necromancy, is a form of magic with a quite... troubled past, both in the cluster at large and on Aldrin. Known for many 'good' powers, but many more foul ones, its reputation is spotty, to say the least. Many still don't entirely know how to regard Necromancy's suite of powers, and while some powers ban it entirely, some don't regulate it at all, and many only regulate its most dangerous aspects.
History of Necrotic Magic
Before the Gates
Little is known for sure on how much - if at all - the Hysilens made use of or tolerated Necrotic Magic; the records are very clear that they
knew of it, but not so clear on if they made active use of it; in many senses, this is a yet-unanswered question which may prove pivotal to the general acceptance of decline of the art, as it's no secret that the societies of the cluster tend to follow the Hysilens' view on magic for the most part - though not entirely.
Early History
In the early days of the Terran exploration of the gate network, the practice of Necrotic Magic was a clandestine one, with the Terran government outlawing its practice - a policy they remain firm on to this day - across their space. As such, its power and understanding grew in the background, but Necrotic Magic wouldn't truly make an appearance in the history books until long after Earth's cutting off from the cluster, during the Great Necromancer's War.
The Great Necromancer's War began about 50 years after the discovery of the
Shard Ritual allowed for more
Necromancers to gain their powers, and the war's catalyst was simple; nations generally acted to curtail necrotic magic and the war erupted across the sector, at first as a protest against the crackdowns upon necrotic magic, but eventually as a thinly-veiled attempt for Necromancers to launch power grabs against governments across the cluster.
The war was exceptionally long and brutal, but eventually ended with the defeat of the Necromancers, and with many realms outright banning necrotic magic as a result of the conflict - and those that didn't, generally heavily regulated it instead. Few nations remained at the time who allowed necrotic magic practice to go unabated and unregulated.
Modern History
Nowadays, many hundreds of years have passed since then, and many realms no longer maintain those ancient bans on Necrotic Magic. Some - such as Aurelia - allow for the practice to be done in the open, but require that the raising of undead only be done for as long as undead are required for combat purposes, requiring their release from undeath afterwards.
Others, like the Patriarchate and Argon Federation, maintain those strict bans on the art, albeit with the Federation Navy allowing for so-called Sanctioned
Necromancers to operate with their blessing. In general, much has changed since the time of the Necromancer's War, and the Necromancers themselves are not nearly as badly persecuted as they were back then. For the most part, however, Necrotic interest in the modern age is focused on the studies of the Hysilens, to hopefully provide validation to their very existence.
Aldrin History
Aldrin's necrotic magic has a very... storied history of its own, with there being a very similar general trend of realms having vastly differing opinions of the art, but its general dangers are much more exaggerated on Aldrin, with the presence of powerful undead-run societies and the infamous Tal'ayn vampires making ample showings of the true vast power of necrotic magic. In many ways, modern Aldrin is defined by a tense stand-off between those who embrace Necrotic Magic and all of its effects - both good and bad - and those who revile it.
Necrotic Shards
Necrotic Shards are a... complicated type of shard, not easily found naturally across the cosmos, they generally follow similar rules to Memoria Shards, incidentally; events with great casualties are typically what spur forth necrotic shards in their myriad forms, to be harvested and used for a myriad purposes.
Unlike most other forms of shard, necrotic shards are vital for far more than just the creation of new
Necromancers; their power is directly responsible for permitting powerful undead to be risen, and many exceptionally strong undead - such as Liches and Grave Queens - embed shards as part of their very bodily construction, as the shards serve a dual purpose of indefinitely sustaining their existence while also boosting their powers considerably.
These factors combine to make the shards uncommon in times of peace and plentiful in times of great upheaval, the ebbs and flows following that of the undead themselves very closely. On Aldrin, the story is mostly the same, but the shards are generally more common due to the large-scale warfare that takes place on the regular across the planet.
A notable caveat to necrotic shards is that the events that lead to their creation can also lead to Blood Shards (as well as sometimes Demonic Shards instead on Aldrin), all pretty more entirely dependent on other factors such as the entities involved in the death events.
Uses of Necrotic Magic
Communions
Communions are one of the first skills a budding
Necromancer learns, and it's the one the art is generally most known for in a good light. Communions allow a Necromancer to form a link with a being that has passed on, to allow their family to speak with them one last time and such.
As a form of communication, communions are quite restricted, requiring the being to have passed on recently, while being willing to communicate with the Necromancer and their clients, but beyond that is generally a very passive and safe form of the art, allowing for relatives to make peace with the events, for a Necromancer to aid a troubled spirit with passing on, and much more.
It's no coincidence that many of the Necromancers accepted and embraced by society are
these kinds of necromancer, rather than any other.
Life Siphoning
Life Siphoning magic is one of the most common applications of necrotic magic, as it allows the
Necromancer to siphon their victim's vitality into themselves. Life Siphoning is a very... contentious form of magic, as it not only allows for a Necromancer to heal themselves, but to
also extend their natural lifespan, potentially indefinitely.
Those generally born with an affinity for necrotic magic are very liable to hide it in most societies, but even still will actively use life siphoning in secret on either unsuspecting targets or on their prisoners, which certainly places a stigma on those who look younger than their age within the confines of regions and worlds were genetic therapy is not commonplace, like the Patriarchate or Aldrin.
Even still, life siphoning isn't outright illegal in most regions of the cluster, but the pursuit of unnatural immortality through it
generally is.
Offensive Necrotic Magic
Hinted at in its name, necrotic magic can also be utilised offensively through the medium of necrosis, dealing damage at range or spreading diseases to targets. It essentially allows a
Necromancer to inflict traditional wounds at larger ranges than traditionally possible, while also allowing them to magically worsen those wounds.
Even more, it can be used to
both spread
and precisely control virulent plagues and diseases, which is a double-edged sword reputationally; it can be used to effortlessly spread brutal diseases and plagues, but can also completely stem and prevent their spread in an instant.
Necromantic Undead
Unsurprisingly, the first thing that
generally comes to mind when discussing Necrotic Magic is the undead. This is, naturally, to be expected, as the most notorious
Necromancers often control small armies of undead beings. Traditional doctrine teaches that life ends after death, but budding Necromancers attempt to bypass these problems. They don't do it by reviving the dead though, but rather by turning them into mindless undead.
That said, this isn't Necrarchy, and so there exists numerous stringent rules which govern the raising necromantic undead. The most important one, is that it's very short term, heavily taxing a
Necromancer's
Aspected Aether reserves to maintain a necrotic force. This generally means that a Necromancer has to maintain a small number of undead, and generally opts for quality over quantity. Moreover, the soul of the body they wish to raise has to have already fully passed into the afterlife, as they are
not shackling the soul of that body back into it to reanimate it, in spite of common conjecture, they're merely animating the body with their own
Aether.
This results in Necromantic Undead being potent and dangerous in the right hands, but generally being quite niche and restrictive... A far cry from the powers of Aldrin's Tal'ayn vampires.
Necrarchy
The infamous Tal'ayn Vampires of Aldrin - their eponymous necrotic vampires - are a truly terrifying form of Aldrin
Forsaken blessed with all of the wondrous powers and abilities of the vampire race - alongside the Tal'ayn specific covenant powers - along with powerful undead-controlling capabilities as their form of vampiric blessing.
Necrarchy is the culmination of Tal'ayn spellcraft, and effectively acts to look at all of the restrictions of traditional Necromancy, and overturn them. Nobody quite knows how it does this, as the Tal'ayn are infamously reclusive about sharing any information about their abilities except for with powerful free-spirited undead such as Grave Queens - in spite of being a quite sociable Vampire Covenant - but what
is known, is the terrifying breadth of power that Necrarchy possesses.
As a form of magic, Necrarchy possesses all other forms of necrotic magic, but with them being exceptionally
Aether-efficient, and thus much more dangerous to face against as the
Tal'ayn Necrarchs already have far greater capabilities than normal. Where the magic really starts to get unhinged however, is with Necrarchic Undead. They're much like regular undead, except that the Necrarch can substitute their Aether-drain for a few things, most famously for the power of a Necrotic Shard, generally built into the design of their magical focus.
This simple change derives the power of the shard to sustain an enormous number of undead through techniques nobody on Aldrin
really understands, but it clearly has its limits, as for the most powerful raised undead, the Tal'ayn without fail embed a shard into those undead's forms as a portable source of necrotic energy.
The other thing they can substitute the Aether-drain for, however, is far darker; a
Tal'ayn Necrarch can draw forth the soul of the deceased from the afterlife and force it back into the body, only heavily shackled to forever follow the will of the Necrarch. These are what are generally known as Soulful Undead; those who have had their very being ripped from the afterlife and reanimated into undeath forever.
The creation of soulful undead isn't unique to Necrarchy - and is generally how most powerful undead come into being, albeit unshackled to any
Necromancer or
Tal'ayn Necrarch - but Necrarchy can definitely be said to have made its potency well known to all on Aldrin.
