Magic

The Chaos Particle: Magic

Magic is sort of a seed of entropy, a chaos particle on Dunia. It is not very well understood, nor is it easy to harness. It does not have sentience but it does behave in ways that might emulate emotions or feelings. Some believe it originates from where the Plateau of Storms is now, otherwise known as the Aarahat region in Khar-Kushak. The devices used to measure ambient magic almost break their meters when near Aarahat, thereby supporting this hypothesis as the area being the origin of magic on Dunia. Emotions and thoughts are often amplified there simply by proximity to incredibly high ambient magic levels.
The direct translation of Aarahat means 'One who has attained enlightenment', named by the order of monks who made pilgrimage there for that same purpose. Some believe they were using the area to study magic in isolation but also to meditate in a sort of profound state of being, augmented by magic itself. The Karithat-Aldawi, or Cataclysm, manifested as an enormous eruption of light bursting forth from Mount Aarahat itself, thus destroying it and the temples in the process. At least two generations have been born since the event happened so few remember who the monks were or what they were trying to do, and eyewitnesses of the eruption itself are incredibly scarce; thus, the irony of the Aarahat monks' endeavors has been lost to time.
The MEZs, or Magical Exclusion Zones, are pockets of extreme magical entropy on Dunia left by the Cataclysm. The most prominent one emanates from the Plateau of Storms. In a lot of regards, they are not unlike irradiated zones on Earth. Things do not work the way they should when one is present there, even death itself.
Magic is an unstable, volatile force that can undo the very fabric of one's existence if taken beyond their physical limitations. If a being is undone by magic, either by others or their own doing, sometimes they'll leave an 'Echo' of their existence, living their last moments, manifesting as a shadow without source in broad daylight. All of the emotions left by the echo in that moment are held at their peak, forever.
Passing into one of these 'Echoes' can trap one in the Echo's experiences, reliving the same moments leading to their death on repeat.

The Act of Casting

Spellcasting itself is both an art and a science, or one or the other, dependent on who is questioned. There are three major components in a spellcast, but one of which is often substituted for a focus. The three components are verbal, somatic, and material.
Verbal spell components require that the very words spoken have a charge, form, and trigger portion, where the charge draws the magical particles through the user, the form determines the type of the spell, and the trigger is what unleashes the cast. Somatic spell components require hand movements or at the very least, finger movements that largely determine the directionality and shape of the spell, and like the verbal component they can be broken up as well into three parts: charge, form, and trigger. Material components are often substituted for a magical focus that may have exotic materials contained within it or be a part of something that had great magical energy. Otherwise, material components might be consumed on use when casting a spell.
The most fundamental forms of casts require less entropic force, often not requiring one to raise the ambient magical volatility to move them, but performing consecutive casts on top of a normal spellcast can sometimes cause that to happen.
Below is a brief summary of how the different casting methods generally work.
Arcanists (e.g. Wizards) and Inscriptors use complex mathematical formulae stored in their minds or on books and speak them or write them to channel magic. The magic school determines what they say or have written. Written spells are a complex series of channels through which the magic is moved to manipulate it into doing specific behaviors, akin to how an electrical switchboard or a circuit board may behave with pre-determined instructions laid out. Magical scrolls are effectively written spells but use magically-laden ink of some sort for the channels, often derived from some poor creature's ink sacs or occasionally a rare animal's blood. Even dried, it still retains some essence of what once was. Upon use, a magical scroll undergoes a reaction whereupon it is destroyed, turning to ash in one's hands. To use them, one must have some ability to channel their life force into the scroll to activate the channels.
Sorcerers and Warlocks use sheer willpower to move magic through their bodies, calling upon forces beyond themselves. While a Sorcerer may simply have the innate ability to move and manipulate magic, a Warlock is more of a conduit for magic moved by otherworldly forces. Most of the time they use their whole bodies to simply will a spell into existence through charging the magical particles around them and then moving them by 'waveshaping' the magic into a form that is then unleashed.
Chaplains and Oathsworn use their beliefs and convictions to channel magic through their bodies, manifesting emotion and belief as their connection to ambient magical energies. Sometimes they are capable of calling beyond this plane of existence to will magic through them, granting them enormous amounts of temporary power without the physical tax it would place upon their bodies.
Druids call upon the lifeforce of things around them to move it, where it is often given willingly. They use their knowledge of the world around them to commune with the magical energies of living beings and to distribute the pressures from moving magic across a wide range.
Bards use the power of resonance and emotion to influence magic while simultaneously drawing out magical energies through music, spoken word or even their art. The very air around them can vibrate with magical energy emanating from their instruments, each note affecting the movement of the chaos particles and forming shape in the air to manifest into a resonant type of spell. The emotion carried through their bodies can influence the power of a spell.
Most others simply will it but cannot compare in terms of scale or amplitude versus those that are capable. They frequently rely on magical scrolls made by others to manifest magic.