Barktech

Barktech, refined into it's current form by Dawn, is a method of generating long-standing spells or enchantments in a cheap and repeatable way, by utilising the life force of a specially prepared grove of trees.

Origin

Barktech was invented by Dawn's First Carriage, Moonlight Through Rain's mother, as part of her life's work research combining arcane casting with the concepts of The Old Ways. It was an open secret within the conservatory that Dawn was not a believer in the Queen of Light, but this was tolerated at first and downright ignored once barktech began to be introduced to the city.

Capabilities

Barktech can be used to release low-level magic over an area in a stable way, and most importantly, with no risk of Corruption, as there is no caster involved. It was used in Ypakar sewers for sanitation and pest repellent, in the gardens and parks of the city to keep grass trimmed but lush, in the major streets for permanent lighting, in hospitals for disinfection.
To function, the spell is carefully prepared into a "Conduit", a bark structure carved and covered with runes. These Conduits take weeks to prepare, but require very little maintenance unless they are damaged, maybe not even yearly depending on the intensity of the enchantment.

Lunar sympathy

Bark Tech seems to have an interesting relationship with the moons. Termed 'lunar sympathy' by Dawn, it is the effect that on True Night , Barktech is slightly less powerful than average, but is incredibly stable, without variation in output. On Triple Full Moons, the output is much more powerful, but with a much higher variance. Streetlights bouncing from a dull glow to nearly blinding, plants sprouting to full bloom overnight.

Caveats

• To act upon a building or structure, the structure must be designed to hold a Conduit
• The spell must be decided well in advance, and cannot be changed or modified without carving a brand new Conduit
• A grove of trees must be maintained, replanted and specially prepared to act as the 'battery' for the enchantments. (This was a closely guarded secret of Dawn's family)
• If there is no grove to draw from, a Conduit will not simply stop functioning, it will instead draw power from whatever it can.

The Bark Plague

After 5 years of incredible success of uptake of the technology, Dawn's grove burned in a forest fire. With it's significance unknown to almost everyone but her and her family, life in Ypakar continued as normal. Initially the residual charge of the network allowed everything to continue functioning, but Dawn was running herself ragged (physically and corruption wise) using her own magic to maintain the network. This was only possible for a short time, and the Conduits began drawing charge from what they could.
If it only got as bad as entire parks dying to power a 10ft ring of pristine grass, maybe it would have been put down as a colossal failed experiment, but barktech was installed in many buildings across the city. manageable
The city was in blind panic, with the city guard deployed to find and destroy any barktech items within the city. The practice was outlawed, and Dawn was summoned to court for arrest, but her and Rain had disappeared.

Barktech (Rain's version)

Rain's exploration of her mother's work took a different direction. Rain had little interest in long-term, low-level magic which lasted many years, she was more interested in flashy high impact magic. As such, the barktech she creates tends to be of a much more expendable form, burning through still-living bark slivers like ammunition. The process still requires much perfecting however, as she is still aware that these micro-conduits are still drawing power from her.