Halfdan's Magic
Halfdan's unique view on magic isn't new. But it might as well be. When he was young, his family purged their library of old tomes on magic. In their rush to discard things that worked, one of the books fell at Halfdan's feet.
Picking it up his father snapped at him, telling him that he would learn nothing of use from that book.
He could not have been more wrong. The book was a treatise on an early medieval practice called the Veridian Knot. A form of nature magic that could very well date all the way back to Gall if not before.
Something about the magic, and it's simple complexity, entranced Halfdan. And he awakened. The book, had been a primer. It had sat on that shelf, unused, forgotten, discarded by what had been one of the most powerful families within the Hermetic order. Why? Because it was old, because they saw it as obsolete.
That had been the first mark against him with his family. In five years he would be cast out, abandoned to the wind.
The Veridian Knot is a perspective as much as it is a method. A way of looking at the spheres as a single force. There are not 8 spheres. There is only one, magic, and it is the limited mind of the practitioner that needs to divide magic into 8 parts in order to be able to understand it.
The Knot helps the practitioner look past their mortal limitations and see that all magic is the same. As one's mastery improves the spheres begin to blend together, until at last magic becomes a singular act of will.
Life:
As Halfdan's Affinity Sphere, life is his most potent tool. The ability to move living energy around, to heal wounds, and snuff out life. All of Halfdan's magic draws minute amounts of living energy from the world around him, as it is his primary means of interfacing with magic itself.
Primary Instruments:
Wands Rods and Staves
Halfdan's primary implement when using life magic is his staff. His life magics focus on moving energy. Even when he uses his hands to heal, he will generally be kneeling on his staff or touching it in some way. When not using his staff to move energy, allowing him to mend wounds rapidly.
Brews/potions
Halfdan uses potions or other medicinal substances to carry his magics. His potions and unguents are based on common medicinal herbs, infused with magic. These herbs facilitate the same movement of energy that he facilitates with his staff, allowing him to heal or facilitate growth rapidly as well as perform a myriad of other functions.
Blood
In extreme emergencies he is also known to use his own blood to carry his magic. Halfdan tries to hide his use of blood magics because few people care to understand the power of sacrifice and choose simply to make assumptions. Unlike his other forms of healing that focus on the movement of energy from the surrounding environment to the subject, Halfdan's blood magic is a direct link between himself and the subject. This magic is dangerous and was once forbidden, but Halfdan has a healthy respect for it.
Forces:
As his primary means of defending himself and others Halfdan has, through hardship and exile, been forced to learn a great deal about forces, and uses them nearly as naturally as the life sphere.
Primary Instruments:
Weapons:
The most obvious use of force magic is through weapons. Halfdan can both empower his weapons and use them to conjure and hurl raw elemental forces at foes.
Elements:
When given raw elements to work with, Halfdan is a natural. His ability to utilize the raw elements appears effortless, even if it is not. He often uses raw manipulation like this for defense, preferring to focus offensive evocations with his weapons.
Dances gestures and postures:
When using his mastery over forces in a non-combat capacity, he tends to use body movements and gestures to manipulate raw elemental forces.
Wands, Staves, Rods:
Halfdan keeps a runecarved rod as a defensive tool, and uses it to manipulate defensive forces. Additionally he has a small wand he uses when he needs to perform fine work.
Prime:
Where Life magic comes naturally, and forces come through hard work. Prime magic is the kind of magic that Halfdan enjoys. It is difficult enough to be entertaining, but comes naturally enough to not take away that simple enjoyment.
Energy:
When manipulating raw power, Halfdan uses raw life force and movement to control the underlying forces of creation itself. The ancient methods are often looked at with derision, but they are undeniably effective.
Matter:
Halfdan's skill in Matter was gained more as a practical exploration than one of desire or necessity. In order to work with prime, he needed to know matter to have something to work with. His application of the matter sphere is a matter of needed level of precision.
Prayer and Invocation
Halfdan's primary means of using the matter sphere is invocation. Harsh words in a ancient tongue combined with
the most brief of physical gestures allow him to make harsh, rough, forceful changes to the matter around him.
Writing Inscription and Runes
For more control Halfdan uses runes to focus his applications of the matter sphere. Even going as far as to use invocation to inscribe such runes.
Wands Rods and Staves
When precise control is required Halfdan uses his runecarved wand.
Spirit:
Like Matter Halfdan learned the spirit sphere out of need for practical application. In this case it was for information gathering. From that initial need his knowledge of the realm of spirit became a fascination as much as a need.
Writing Inscription and Runes
Halfdan's primary interface with the spirit sphere is runic. By inscribing runes and creating barriers with them he is able to interact with the spirit world.
Prayer and Invocation
Like with matter, Halfdan can use simple invocations in an ancient tongue to force rough changes on the spiritual energies around him.
Mind:
Currently Halfdan's power over the mind sphere is extremely limited.
Prayer and Invocation:
Halfdan can use invocations to perceive mind magic, but little more.
Correspondence:
Like Mind, Halfdan's ability to interact with the correspondence sphere is currently limited to perception.
Wands, Staves, and Rods:
Currently Halfdan needs his runecarved wand to perceive the correspondence sphere.
Entropy:
The first sphere that Halfdan has encountered that he does not like, Halfdan has yet to learn more than how to perceive it's effects.
Writing Inscription and Runes:
Currently the only way that Halfdan has to detect the presence of entropy magic is by use of a rune.
