Magic in Karvaea

Magic in Karvaea is a supernatural phenomenon that allows individuals to perform feats deemed out of the regular physical abilities of their body. In Karvaea, magic is most often divided into two major categories: elemental magic, and spiritual magic. There is a type of neutral magic, but it falls outside of the basic categorization system. Beyond just elemental and spiritual, magic can also be divided into categories of flowing or rigid. The study of magic and its categorization is known as magic theory, and those who study it are known as magicians.

Every body in Karvaea has a single type of magic they can use, called a magical bias. This magical bias is immutable from the moment they enter the world, and persists through death as well as undeath. In cases of multiple entities residing within a single body, the body itself will be restricted to a single magic type. In a similar vein, an entity with multiple bodies will potentially be able to use multiple different kinds of magic. Biases are assigned completely at random, and do not have a genetic component.

There are seven different types of magic that a body can have a magical bias towards. Five of these are elemental magic, and two are spiritual magic. A body cannot have a bias towards neutral magic. In society and the world at large, certain biases tend to be rarer than others. Generally, water magic is the most common magical bias, and miracle magic is the rarest magical bias.

Though every body has an inherent magical bias, not every body is capable of utilizing their magical bias in order to cast their magic without the assistance of runes. A body can become better at using their magical bias through training. It's easiest to train an individual's magical bias during adolescene. During early adulthood, it becomes much more difficult to train magical ability, though this is often viewed through the lens of people, and it is unknown if this is a physical phenomenon, or a consequence of society.

Elemental magic

Elemental magic is one of two major categories of magic. It is described as the types of magic that relate to the physical parts of the world. Elemental magic biases tend to be a bit more common than spiritual magic biases. Under the umbrella of elemental magic, there are two subcategories known as basic elemental magic, and hybrid elemental magic. Basic elemental magic can be utilized as a base magical bias, but hybrid elemental magic requires two or more bodies utilizing compatible magical biases to create a more complicated type of magic.

Runes

Runes are a special type of magic in Karvaea that require the writing of physical glyphs to use. They are activated with a simple touch. Rather than "casting" magic with runes, runes are executed. They are considered to be the most accessible form of magic. Bodies that are otherwise unable to cast magic properly are able to execute runes with ease. The study of runes is known as runistry, and those who study it are known as runists.

Though magical biases still apply to runes in that only those with a specific bias can use a rune written for it, there exists a neutral type of magic through runes that any body is capable of using.

Neutral magic