Summary
One of the
compound manas, tempest mana is the supreme wildness of
wind bent to the loose structure of
veltron. The wind is wild and carefree, being as gentle as a breeze or a raging gust. However, left alone, it would never achieve the structure needed to temper its outrageous attitude. Only when its calamitious power takes structure in the body of a tempest does it shake the world.
One of the most fearsome and dangerous manas to encounter, tempest mana commands the skies of the Heavens. It is wrath incarnate, furious as it sweeps across the world, rending veltron and decimating lands. Only the vast oceans of
Veltrona endure it, for the ambivalence of
water cannot be disturbed by its raging attitude. For veltron, it can only await the inadvertent structure it'd help make come destroy it.
People have long feared the weather, venerating or reviling it for all it brings. Tempests stand beyond these ideas, their awesome presence sweeping away trivial feelings. Only those who endure with the purest of hearts can keep themselves in their ever-churning chaos. Before the tempest all that is unworthy is destroyed, and so it is one of the ultimate opportunities. Countless mistresses have braved it, reforging themselves against the tempest's onslaught. Fewer are those who survived to speak of it.
It is said the heart of peoples is like the tempest, a beast contained in a cage of flesh. Emotions come like storms, sweeping the mind up with fury and delirium few can make sense of. Reasoning exists to give direction, and so emotions follow a structure the mind may not fully understand itself. So it is in the hearts of people, there is a tempest waiting to be born. Perhaps that is the origin of what we call love and madness?
Magical Arts
To embody tempest mana and wield it as a magical art is no joke. Its wildness is fearsome in its intensity, and it seemingly only suffices for destructive magic styles. Great columns of ground-destroying winds, gales that can slice flesh apart, immense pressure downpours that crush people flat, and so on. The first tempest
mages took the mana for its unbridled destruction, becoming awesome warladies.
Some curious minds, however, wondered about that.
If tempest mana is of motion and structure, then what else could it actually be? Surely it simply wasn't a more fearsome, powerful version of wind?
Why would it be venerated as divine so much?
It is because tempest mana is the closest of all to what could be called 'life mana'. Motion and structure are among the virtuous natures that life embodies. It is not a perfect alignment, of course, tempest mana has its own sensibilities, but they're nonetheless close. In the wake of a tempest, after all, life returns, staking its claim out once again with renewed vigor. Opportunities born from destruction; it gives death, and so life can flourish.
By braving tempest mana and fashioning magic around it, people discovered ways it could help other forms of magic. The wake of tempest magic let other magics, if properly made, build off its latent energies, becoming greater. In a sense, it vitalized them, if it did not destroy them. Its ability to support so many other magics made it desirable to learn and develop, but rarity remained a problem. Others, wanting more out of the tempest mana itself, sought ways to develop more 'mainline' magic.
While the principles of wind magic continued to serve well, combining veltron into the idea was an insidious problem. These two natures are hard to reconcile in the minds of people, after all. Some went too hard into implementing structure, diffusing the power of the tempest in the process. Others did too little, so the tempest annihilated itself. However, some did succeed in doing ideas like 'wind walls', 'wind bridges', 'healing magic', 'alchemical processing', and more. Their efforts to adhere to mainline philosophy nonetheless continued to make strides for magic as a hole.
Appearance
Tempest mana generally looks like a swirling vortex of grays, blues, and oranges. Sometimes greens appear in particularly verdant locations. As it is such a strongly temperamental mana, its easier to find by how much of a mess its making in an area. Some confuse nascent clusters of tempest mana as gas leaks, as the air distorts and whips around violently.
Divine tempest mana exhibits sparkles, shimmering light, and ethereal characteristics. Its colors can vary more, but they're subdued compared to the 'distortions' it exemplifies. Since tempest mana is already somewhat close to divinity, the difference between divine and mundane is not as much as it is for others.
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