Arcane Magic

For the rare few born with inherent potential, the nature of any magical power they might attain will hinge upon the external forces that shape their lives. Individuals with exceptional faith can manifest divine magic, those attuned to the heartbeat of the natural world can become druids, and those drawing on the rhythms of time and space acquire bardic magic. But others bear no particularly powerful relationship with their deities, the elements, or history. For these individuals, any magic they acquire will be hard-won raw power. These people will be arcanists: no intermediating force will separate them from their magic, nor will anything protect them from it.
Despite it being true that nothing mediates an arcanist's interaction with their power source, the Myth, it would be erroneous to call arcana the "purest" form of magic. Any fundamental factors—like faith—affect the way an individual turns intent into manifested magic and the way that magic will actually manifest. Those factors do not change the truth that the individual still draws magic directly from the Myth; their magic is no less pure.

A similar thing is true of the various subtypes of arcana; the ways that one can manifest arcane magic are different only in that they describe how one acquired their skill at using magic, and none is purer than any other. There are four ways one can manifest arcane magic. Two are learned, one is otherwise acquired, and the last is the only way an individual can have any sort of magic without seeking it out.

Learned Mages

With dedication and study, most people could master the simplest of magic. But the investment required is a high barrier to entry: most of the magewrights that perform trades like arcane locksmithery and lamp-lighting dedicated themselves to years of apprenticeship to learn the rituals their craft requires. Individuals with inherent potential will find mastering these basics to be much easier, but to advance beyond simple rituals becomes progressively harder and harder. Still, arcane magic is fundamentally learnable; thousands of years of students of magic have researched, documented, and codified the truths underpinning the arcane arts, and that ever-growing stock of information serves new arcanists well.
There are two types of learned arcanists: artificers and wizards. Though their magic is quite similar in many regards, they are differenced by scale and scope.
Artificers are deeply practical mages to whom magic is a tool. Though artifice stops short at the world-shaking magic of the best wizards, the contribution of artificers is no less vital. Across Aotra, the work of artificers constantly shapes millions of lives: cities' arcane architecture, global transportation networks like the aerorail, and countless mundane conveniences of modern life are all creations of artificers. Serving as engineers, architects, and inventors, artificers create the arcane technology that makes modern life modern. As such, artificers are valued throughout Aotra. While they tend not to achieve the monumental status afforded to the greatest of wizards, skilled artificers receive respect and appreciation from the community that they serve.
For those willing to find their way through the grueling hours of study and practice required to achieve wizardly power, the payoff is immense. Of all Aotran magic users, wizards are known to be the mightiest and most versatile. Two wizards with different specializations can be entirely different from each other in the magic they can perform, so great is the range of magic that can be learned. The rare few who reach the highest levels of arcane scholarship are rewarded with respect and influence akin to that of royalty, never mind the ability to work the sort of magic that leaves a mark on history. But these rare few are just that: rare. While wizardry are certainly the most common form of arcane magic usage, and wizards may well be more common than just about any other sort of magic user, minor wizards abound, and the mightiest of wizards rise to power once or twice in a generation in most places. Of course, nations like Kassaan and the Federation of Vay—the latter arguably the capitol and heart of arcane magic usage in Aotra—possess more great mages than just about anywhere else, but even there, a true archmage is a rarity. Wizards enjoy the most positive popular perception: to be a wizard is to be one who has worked for their ability, one who has mastered the most dangerous art.

Pact-Makers

Some, try as they may, will never master magic through study. For those for whom wizardry is not an option, there are other paths to arcane might, but they come with an even greater cost. Lust for knowledge—or power—drives people into terrible bargains. Like users of divine magic, these pact-makers—called warlocks—swear oaths upon which their access to magic rests. Unlike divine magic users, the magic comes not from their will to uphold their oath but as a reward for some terrible cost: life, soul, sanity, liberty, dignity. The path of a warlock is one taken only out of desperation. The beings mighty enough to be able to grant such power are rarely benevolent, and to bind oneself to such a being is to accept one's part in the pursuit of the being's incomprehensible goals. Often, the beings on the other side of these pacts are creatures of the Otherworld, feeding pact-seekers respectively mundane magical secrets to gain the loyalty of mortal pawns.
This is a path to magic that many fear and disdain, but it is a path to magic, and for some, that is worth the terrible price. In the face of popular perceptions that paint warlocks as detestable traitors to humanity, users of pact magic move in silence, keeping the source of their magic a secret. Some masquerade as wizards or sorcerers. As a result, the number of warlocks in Aotra is unknown. In places where arcane magic is the ultimate path to power, whispered rumors that most archmages have taken on a pact in exchange for all or part of their power have circulated for eons. Of course, this is nothing more than just that: speculation.

Sorcerous Power

When the fate of inherent potential collides with sheer luck, the result is a sorcerer: a person that, without training or study, innately understands how to draw power from the Myth and create magic. For some, that magic manifests early in life, but it might awaken later for others. Regardless of when their power reveals itself, a sorcerer is born a sorcerer and will die one.
For some, this is a gift inherited. Throughout Aotra, there are a handful of bloodlines that have produced prolific sorcerers with consistency across generations. One of the most notable of these bloodlines is the Ahuilan dynasty, a family which has produced sorcerer-kings for the nation of Solisvar for more than seven hundred years. These sorcerer bloodlines, however, are not the majority. Most sorcerers come from families with no history of sorcery; their power came unpredictably, sporadically. The appearance of a spark of sorcerous power can fling someone from anonymity into fame, from poverty into luxury. But it can also be a deeply dangerous phenomenon. Magic, as a whole, comes with no guarantee of safety. Arcane magic, in particular, has a reputation for wreaking havoc on those who try to study it. But sorcerers, as intuitive and non-studied users of magic, are more likely than any other to have a fleeting grasp, at best, on the might of their power; without discipline, power consumes.
This is largely true because of the origins of sorcerous power. Sorcery is, in a nutshell, the touch of chaos. The most common form of sorcery, wild magic, appears unpredictably and produces unpredictable results. Wild magic sorcerers are flukes of the Myth, and appropriately, chaos follows them. Rarer forms of sorcery are even more dangerous, for they often result from contact with some raw force of the universe: elemental energy, fate, or even the Otherworld. Those with a sorcerous gift deriving from the final of the three bear less of a gift than a curse; like warlocks, they must face the ramifications of being a mortal irrevocably bonded to the antithesis to mortal life, but unlike warlocks, a sorcerer's bond to the Otherworld is the product of chance alone.

Type

Metaphysical, Arcane

User Types
Artificers
Sorcerers
Warlocks
Wizards
Acquisition Types
Granted
Innate (inherited or sporadic)
Learned