#deep magic

[elvesdragonsanddarkmagic]

[krmayerillustration]

As Above, so Below. As Within so Without. What boundary exists, except by my own will?

[kradogsrats]

Stars & Staffs: What the Heck, Guys

So. The staffs. The staffs.

Prior to this, we held the belief that the Staff of Ziard was made specifically for dark magic. I made a meme about it once (why yes, I do think I'm funny):

Now... that could still be the case. The Aaravos/Sauron parallels have always been off the charts, so "the dark lord forged in secret a master ring, and into this ring he poured his cruelty, his malice and his will to dominate all life" is still a definite possibility.

Aaravos also has a strong thread in his plans to bring about the stars' downfall through a vector they had overlooked—humans—and with warped mirrors of their creations—himself, characterized as "their dark brother," and possibly dark magic, itself.

—Ripples

—Patience

So yeah, still strong possibility that the Staff of Ziard is Aaravos's creation for humans, a mockery of their works delivered with irony.

However, the other possibility—that the Staff of Ziard is one of a set conceived for some magical purpose—is super interesting, because it's actually not strictly a dark magic staff in the way that Ibis's staff is a Sky magic staff or the Sunforge staff is a Sun magic staff.

Staffs for primal magic are pretty explicitly sources of power and focus for the mage. The Sunforge staff contains a small Sun primal stone, Ibis's staff appears to similarly contain a Sky primal stone—it's not clear whether these primal stones are powerful enough to be used on their own by a non-mage, but the corrupted Sunforge staff is at least powerful enough for Claudia to use it easily and immediately.

We also have Karim's staff, which doesn't have a visible stone and appears to be somewhat less powerful, acting more as a channel to focus his magic than a source for it. While we see a lot of rune spells cast using staffs, we also see several spells cast with staffs apparently instead of runes.

Most staffs are probably a lot more similar to that, because like... the Sunforge staff is obviously incredibly powerful, being linked directly to the Sun nexus and wielded by former Sunfire monarchs. Ibis's staff also tracks as a powerful artifact—I would not be surprised if Ibis was an archmage of Sky, or equivalent to one in power. Ibis even uses his staff for some rather complex magic—picking up objects, aiming, and launching them at Claudia—without a rune or a spoken draconic incantation.

The Staff of Ziard, on the other hand... it's not actually a dark magic staff in the same way. Instead of itself being a source of magic or using the mage's own connection to a primal source the way primal staffs do, the Staff of Ziard is all about siphoning away the essence of living creatures, whether that's primal magic or souls. Being able to then empower or release that essence seems to potentially be a matter of knowledge—Viren doesn't do it until Aaravos has basically taken over his subconscious, and the only other person we see do it is Ziard himself, draining the sunbirds directly into a corrupted fire capable of burning an Archdragon of the Sun.

Conceptually, siphoning essence to cast spells is very in tune with dark magic... but not exclusive to it. "Magic that takes," as Aditi describes it, apparently exists in several forms.

Additionally, like I said, Viren literally never uses the staff for any magic that isn't unique to it until mid-late s3.

All the dark magic spells he does before then, except for the ones that are explicitly done with the staff alone, he does without it.

(Yes, there's whatever he does to hold Thunder immobile, but that has always been a weird outlier we don't fully understand. We don't know whether it's a spell from the staff—unlikely, given that it doesn't involve or affect the central stone—or a reagent-powered dark magic spell he cast while the camera was focused on Thunder and Harrow.)

So what is the deal with these?

We know that the Celestial elves are guardians of artifacts related to Star magic, Startouch elves, and presumably the Stars/First Elves in general. So the staffs could just be being stored. They do have nice little display niches. What's kind of weird is that first of all, they're apparently powered up in some way, given the glow of their stones. Secondly, they're in full "open" configuration—the way Claudia uses the Staff of Ziard when opening the chrysalis.

Like the soul-trapping spell that is one of the staff's specialties, the chrysalis spell uses a dark magic incantation (rather than the Draconic-based deep magic or corrupted Sun magic spells). It's described as channeling the power of the "sun's first light," and what it does is, I'm fairly convinced, imbue the being inside the chrysalis with essence—on some level giving it consciousness or a soul.

So what if all the staffs work that way, but for different facets of energy or magic or whatever? Why create something like that, whether for the sorts of energy corresponding with primal sources, or for souls and consciousness? Why would Startouch elves need staffs, if they're so absurdly powerful?

Theory one: let's get the least likely one out of the way first. As a whole, the staffs are components of a machine-like spell or group ritual that maintains the flow of primal and other magic through the world. Yes, this is about my theory that the Starscraper is a kind of world-pillar or bridge that funnels magic to Xadia from elsewhere, and yes, I am a big fan of Pillars of Eternity. There's not really a lot of evidence for this, aside from the different stone colors and the arrangement and kind of strange location of the stored staffs. Like, what is up with this?

Theory two: we know the First Elves in some way divided into at least the five other kinds of primal elves. Could the staffs have been somehow related to that, intentionally consolidating and focusing the First Elves' magical nature into separate forms? Again, there's not really any evidence for this beyond that staffs are meant to be carried and used by people, and the theory that the First Elves may have consciously taken on becoming the different primal elves.

Theory three: this is the forbidden magic that was given to humans, not primal stones. We have two sources for the "Leola gifted primal magic/stones to humans" story, and each of them contributes different things—the one that specifies primal stones doesn't mention Leola by name, attributing the gift to unicorns as a whole, while the one that specifies Leola doesn't mention the primal stones, instead specifying that she provided them with the runes and Draconic words for spells. If the staffs are like the Staff of Ziard but for other energies, including primal sources—if they're all "magic that takes," it would make a lot more sense why the stars got so fussed about humans having it. There isn't really any more evidence for this than for my other theories, but shut up I like this one. It would be the chef's kiss Uno-Reverse cap on the entire mangled and obscured story of the history of human magic.

Anyway, my insane TED Talk aside, what in all heck is going on, because every time I think I've gotten this shit kind of figured out, they do this kind of curve ball.

[xadianglyphs]

Infantis Sanguine: Why Is It Like That

Okay, it's finally time to talk about Infantis Sanguine. In that I can't put it off any longer, not that there's a particularly good time. Everything we see on the Infantis Sanguine page is pretty much unique within the series so far, so there aren't any repeats or connections to follow. It also doesn't bear a ton of resemblance to anything we've seen before. So I'm kind of left with going over possible external connections or inspirations, and what we're meant to think about it based on the design.

Like, it's pretty clear from the way they show the Infantis Sanguine spell how we're supposed to feel about it. It's dirty and smudged, it's rendered in a red/black gradient that evokes dried blood, and the writing that goes with it is much shorter and sharper than any of the other writing systems we've seen, which are all very calligraphic. Additionally, it looks like an early version of the sort of magic circles we only see associated with dark or corrupted magic, like Kim'dael's summoning circle, the Tenebris Praesidium circle effect, or even Claudia's spellbook:

That kind of arrangement doesn't occur in any primal magic we've seen so far. Sometimes primal magic has individual runes arranged in a circle, like the Silvergrove entrance illusion or the Sunfire purification ritual, but the intricate, geometric stuff is exclusive to dark magic.

Anyway, now let's take this nerd shit to an 11 when it probably ought to stay at about a 5.

I'm absolutely sure that everyone d'une certaine génération of anime saw this in s5e9 and thought the same thing I did, which was, "nope, I've seen enough Fullmetal Alchemist to know where this is going."

In actuality, most of the Fullmetal Alchemist transmutation circles don't really resemble Infantis Sanguine, though there's some basic similarity between the human transmutation circles and the cover of Claudia's spellbook. The only one that's bears a passing resemblance to Infantis Sanguine is this one:

(Side note: would you believe it took me literal hours to find the source of that, probably because it's exclusive to the 2003 anime? It's the transmutation circle used in conjunction with a homunculus's human remains to force it to vomit up all its red stone (life force) and become mortal so it can be killed. Interestingly.)

Now, a lot of these graphic elements are rooted in other meanings or practices. A pentacle is a pentacle, Hiromu Arakawa didn't make that up. She actually incorporated a ton of researched alchemical symbolism into Fullmetal Alchemist, and the similarities don't mean "oh, TDP copied FMA." (I'd be kind of shocked if no one on the TDP team has seen FMA, though.)

The central element that makes these two graphics resemble each other is the crucified serpent, which is an actual thing, generally associated with Nicolas Flamel because it appears in a book attributed to him (this isn't from that book, it's a later representation):

Basically, as an alchemical symbolic concept, the crucified serpent represents the stabilization of a volatile substance. The serpent is further a symbol of the "prima materia," a universal, chaotic matter and the starting material for the philosopher's stone. You can go a step further and interpret the cross as the four elements uniting together to form the fifth, but medieval/renaissance historical alchemy was also deeply entwined with Christianity—the cross is also seen as emblematic of the cyclic "death and resurrection" of the prima materia as it is refined into the stone.

The crucified serpent with wings and crown is, as far as I can tell, something Hiromu Arakawa did make up for Fullmetal Alchemist, but it's really just adding another layer that further clarifies the concept as a symbol of having attained perfection or divine wisdom. (Hence its association with Ed and Izumi, who have both seen The Gate and attained the ability to perform alchemic transmutation without drawing a circle.)

Furthermore, the crucified serpent is associated with the rod of Asclepius and the caduceus, which also have a design association with the symbol for dark magic. We also have a strong association between snakes and dark magic because of recurring use in the series.

Now, as for the symbols that surround the Infantis Sanguine geometric/serpentine design, they bear little resemblance to any other writing symbols used thus far in the setting. Possibly they're similar to the symbols used in the blocks of body text from repeating book pages:

It's hard to say, though. I think it's probably a coincidence, since in both cases they're trying to use symbols that resemble a simpler, alphabetical writing system instead of the pictographic primal runes or the complex calligraphic symbols we see elsewhere. I'm not convinced the art team thought at all about human vs. elven styles of writing, and a lot of the symbols we see on human objects or books are also very calligraphic. BUT if that was something they HAD thought about... after seeing the Moon Nexus, Sunfire, and other calligraphic symbols endemic to the elven locations and cultures, I'd see the Infantis Sanguine writing and be like "oh, that's human, then."

Basically, I think the symbols surrounding Infantis Sanguine are meant to be perceived as actual writing or notation—something you could jot down with a pencil. Some of them even bear a passing resemblance to alchemical symbols, which were used as shorthand notation for materials and processes:

Finally, I don't think it's coincidence that there are these relationships between Infantis Sanguine and alchemy. As I noted above with the magic circles, we are meant to associate this spell (and possibly deep magic as a whole) with dark magic. Primal magic is laid out as very spiritual, in this series—it's energy-based, a connection made deep in your soul with a natural, universal force. Dark magic, on the other hand, is rendered as very physical—it uses materials, which are altered or destroyed in the process. It's also something fostered and developed by humans over time and experimentation, similar to science. We don't really know where primal spells come from, beyond a single reference that they are "discovered" while referring to the discovering character as an "oracle."

So yeah, I think we're meant to draw that association, if only to contrast Infantis Sanguine from primal magic by connecting it with something that itself has more physical and scientific associations.

...

Actually, there is one other writing/symbol that bears some similarity to what we see in Infantis Sanguine. But I'll get to that in another post.

[theredhairedmonkey]

The fact that in arc 1 Callum learned the Sky by realizing there are infinite heights he can go…

And the fact that in arc 2 Callum learned Ocean by accepting there are also infinite depths…

Right before the season about Stars, built around the cosmos, a phenomenon centered on infinite heights and depths…

All I know is, we’re gonna get fed next season 😊

[amber-in-the-rough]

and yeah, now we know what the s6 poem meant by "eight in a line". It still could mean those stars from the opening but it's much more likely those multicoloured staffs.

maybeee like i said before, they represent 6 primal sources + dark magic + deep magic.

or, i would still take it if it turns out to be 8 types of deep magic staffs. after all, we DO know there are more than one. there's Power, there could be Love and some more. after all, Callum's spellbook mentions it also more than once - that Love Is Magic :3

.

u can definitely say that im very happy rn

[kilfeur]

Mon avis sur la magie profonde c'est qu'il est l'origine de la magie primale et de la magie noire. Dans la scène où Viren la retrouve, il croit qu'Aaravos a menti. Mais Claudia a utilisé le sort d'Infantis Sanguine sacrifiant Monsieur Bavetout mais aussi le sceptre de Viren. Ce sont des ingrédients pour le sort d'Infantis Sanguine. En revanche la scène de l'exécution de Leola me fait demander si c'est vraiment un sort des étoiles ou bien un sort de magie profonde.

Car cette lumière, ça vient à l'intérieur d'elle, est ce qu'ils ont utilisé sa connexion l'arcanum des étoiles pour la tuer ? Ou bien en utilisant un sort de magie profonde pour commettre son exécution ? Donc les elfes des étoiles auraient utilisé la magie profonde pour créer la magie primale mais qu'après Aaravos aurait utilisé la magie profonde pour créer la magie noire.

My opinion of deep magic is that it is the origin of primal and dark magic. In the scene where Viren finds her, he believes Aaravos lied. But Claudia has used the Infantis Sanguine spell, sacrificing both Sir Sparklepuff and Viren's scepter. These are ingredients for the Infantis Sanguine spell. On the other hand, the scene of Leola's execution makes me wonder whether it's really a star spell or a deep magic spell.

Because this light, it comes from inside her, did they use her connection the arcanum of the stars to kill her? Or did they use a deep magic spell to commit her execution? So the startouch elves would have used deep magic to create primal magic, but then Aaravos would have used deep magic to create dark magic.

[raayllum]

Do you think they could be a connection between Kpp’Ar arm’s wound, ancient/deep magic and Viren using his own heart/blood to do dark magic (while speaking forward instead of backward like dark magic usually necessitate)?

I don't think so. I think Kpp'Ar's arm wound was definitely an attempt at something related to deep magic, although seemingly unsuccessful (or if it was, not worth the cost?) given the emphasis on "ancient and disturbing practice" ("It's one of the old spells" from 5x09 / "I knew of an ancient spell..." from 3x06).

I don't know if we can classify hearts of cinder as an ancient spell. We don't know enough about the staff's involvement if it's actually required for it to work, or if it's just a successful conduit to spread the spell to multiple (hundreds / possibly thousands) of people at once, kind of like an amplifier. The spell itself seems more contingent on having a primal stone (as Viren identifies in 6x08, which he had thanks to the sun staff) or having a human heart (the dark magic route). Whether an uncorrupted primal stone would work, we'll probably never know, but — presumably? Viren doesn't make the distinction that it has to be a corrupted Sun primal stone, and primal stones are already so canonically rare, having corrupted ones is probably even rarer.

I think Viren speaking forwards is more so we can get the full weight of the voice acting as well as this being an act of dark magic that is unequivocally Good, in a lot of ways (which I think having it be backwards most of the time is part of its... aesthetically indicated perversion, shall we say).

[self-spaghettification]

last post for today but

bringing this back!!

because either 1. this speech was supposed to be to Viren as Aaravos said he was using “one of the old spells” and it got cut.

OR 2. it got moved to s6 and i am rooting for the latter!! because!!

It means Aaravos will be giving a speech on proto-magic to some mage in a flashback or, (what I believe is more likely) to Callum Callum’s gonna learn magic from the ancient all powerful mage !! but either way we’re getting mentor-pupil dynamic with him and I’m ecstatic.

[beautifulterriblequeen]

What did the newly revealed season 5 reveal about deep magic? Is deep magic blood magic?

Hi hi, yeah, it seems to be something like that.

It's not lost on me that the symbol illustration in Aaravos's text is blood red.

Neat! So normal.

[aesthetic--mood]

Jadis The White Witch Aesthetic

[random-fandom-ramble]

Do you think that Callum unlocking deep magic could cause him to invent a better magic system?

Ooooh, that’s a very interesting question.

So before I can answer this ask properly, I’ll explain what I think deep magic actually is.

A few years back I made a theory post detailing what I believe deep magic to actually be, and to summarise what I’d said there:

I think deep magic is the underlying core of all magic, the base component from which all other magic is then created, and which all primal sources have in common (like a common denominator of every primal magic spell). When you remove all the various attributes from the other sources (fire from sun, earth from…earth), then what you’re left with is “pure” magic. Aka deep magic.

What that aforementioned post also proposes is that if you could tap into that deep magic and control it, then you should technically be able to control every kind of primal magic to a certain extent (since deep magic is maybe contained in every form of magic).

This was my original theory as to how Aaravos seemingly mastered all six of the primal sources; he simply found a way to control deep magic. These days I don’t think I’d brush him off as „just“ a deep magic user rather than a master of all six sources, but I still think it might’ve played a part in that.

Now to your actual question @dragoncoreice :

Could Callum invent a better magic system using deep magic?

Here’s the thing;

The world of Xadia is built with and upon the six primal sources. Regardless of how they’re getting used, they are the basic building blocks of this reality. So they’re always going to exist in some way, and they aren’t going to be replaced, which I doubt would be even possible.

But I do think that this system of six primals can be improved.

One gripe that I’ve always had with magic (and elven societies for that matter) in the tdp universe is that it’s seemingly so segregated:

The sunfire elves only use sunfire tools, the moonshadow elves only live in villages in this one particular forest, and the ocean elves stay in the water. There seems to be very little exchange happening between the elves and even the dragons, with most of them keeping to their own people and communities, unless they have a practical reason to interact with another.

Similarly, there seems to be no blending of magic in Xadia: every magical item, spell or living being (save for Aaravos) is strictly tied to one primal source, and can only exude magic from that source. Yes, someone can cast magic from another source if it’s in the form of a magical stone/gem or plants, but even then, it’s technically the item doing the magic, not the person.

That is where I think deep magic could help.

If every primal source has the same base component, then it should be possible to combine or even blend different types of magic using that component [deep magic].

So instead of needing to rely on a tidebound elf or an ocean gem to perform a healing spell, a moonshadow elf could tap into deep magic and use that to then indirectly use a nearby water source to cast a healing spell. It may not be as good as from an ocean mage, but it could do the trick.

Or a sky mage could tap into deep magic and use it to sow fire magic into a lightning spell, and create whole new spells that are built from TWO different primal sources.

Once the merging of different types of magic is a thing, a whole world of new possibilities opens up and creates opportunities for new inventions and extraordinary new spells unlike anything that was seen before. And technically it would still be based on the six-primal-sources-system, but better.

So to put it shortly: no, I don’t think discovering deep magic could allow someone to invent a whole new magic system that replaces the old one. But I do think that it could greatly improve and enrich the current one.

Now, wether Callum is the one to unlock deep magic or not is left to be seen, but knowing how passionate he is about magic, he’s definitely going to get involved with it. Once he does get his hands on it, he’ll want to play with deep magic and see where he could go with it.

But considering how one of the shows most prevalent themes is about unity and teamwork, about how working towards a shared future and helping each other out is better than being alone, I wouldn’t be surprised if this revolution of magic didn’t come from Callum alone.

He might instigate it, yes, but I could really see him actually reaching out and teaching others how to tap into deep magic, so that anyone could go and invent new spells and magic; so that everyone has the chance to change the world.

~~~~~~

Thanks for reading✨

Feel free to reblog or comment with your own thoughts and ideas!

[super-sootica]

[kradogsrats]

anyway, aspirational toxic lesbian relationship energy aside, I’m gnawing on Aditi’s position as the Sunfire queen relative to the dragon monarchy because… what???? She’s not only respected enough as a neutral party to end a succession crisis and select the next dragon monarch, but she alleges that the dragons fear her wrath (which Kim’dael doubts) and that now that she has claimed Kim’dael as hers, they will not dare harm her.

Furthermore, she’s capable of using a magic adjacent to Kim’dael’s blood magic, which is itself implied to be adjacent to dark magic—whether this is deep magic or some secret fourth (fifth?) thing is undetermined.

Is she possibly also one of the first elves? But Karim describes Sunfire monarchy history that would surely be before her. Maybe the monarch of Lux Aurea takes on some kind of ancient, inherited power of that nature?

Maybe, if the Sunforge is the Sun nexus (which I am personally against but I’m willing to be wrong if this next bit is accurate), the guardian of the nexus takes on special powers of that primal and/or access to magic beyond the primals. Which would suggest Lujanne is similarly powerful, and don’t even try to tell me that wouldn’t be badass awesome.

[xadianglyphs]

Star Iconography Series: Directory

After collecting and comparing the massive infusion of star-related iconography we got in s6, I wound up splitting the ensuing analysis into three additional posts because a) they're each quite long, and b) people might like to read or reblog only specific topic sections instead of EVERYTHING. The posts do kind of each follow another, but you should have to read them in any particular order or any individual one at all.

I did still want to have a single post where all four can be accessed, so here we are:

Introduction/Compilation - Basic collection of star icon and imagery throughout the series so far, grouped by context: Celestial elves and the Starscraper, Startouch elves, and other (pre-s6) sources

The Primal Star - What wound up being another post analyzing the changing orientation of the Star primal symbol and what that may or may not signify, leaning heavily on s6 examples

Four-Point and Triple Stars - Some thoughts on the most basic/common star shape and the three-star grouping that recurs just enough to be suspicious

Enhanced/Primordial Stars - Deep (ha!) dive on the possible connections between what's generally referred to as the "deep magic symbol" and significant examples of star icons that diverge from the primal/four-point root, including (believe it or not) the cursed coin symbol

And a final, cross-post thought: Leola's star in the star map?

Manages to incorporate a basic four-point star, a Star primal symbol in reversed orientation (make of that what you will), and hint at an eight-point circle-and-line primordial star. Also I'm insane.

[a-boy-too-weird]

For all of us who used tumblr in their native lenguages.