Ring Realms Cosmos Master Glossary

While magic itself can be learned, the powers that can be attained cover a vast range, from simple hand illusions to the altering of reality on a interdimensional level. In some cases, creatures can substitute personal and psionic (mind power) energies for the gift that allows most mages to cast spells and manipulate magical energies.

Magic is not a specific energy or range of energies. It is more of metaphor that encapsulates a "principle" of action and reaction. In the Realms, the true magic is defined as:

The persistent ability to manipulate the environment in ways otherwise impossible without the utilization of natural phenomena, the influence or cooperation of physical bodies, or the use external artifices.

By this definition then, powers such as telepathy, and telekenesis, and other abilities of mind qualify as magic. However, they are not what is considered "traditional" or "ritual" magic.

Ritual magic uses the wielder's magical spark and aspects of "sympathetic bonding" to generate chains of forces that act in place of birth-granted abilities to mentally tap and manipulate energy. In another regard, these ritual formulas substitute for an actual working knowledge of the mechanics and physics that make a particular feat possible. Rituals are coded schemes that at the basic level simply unleash simple reactions while at the higher complexities are actually sonic mnemonics that generate sympathetic reactions in dimensional space that can unleash whole chains of complex energetic interactions. As a mage increases in power and knowledge, his/her reliance on "ritual" totems for the performance of magical feats grows less.

Magical sophistication falls into categories at follows:

There were "greater" and "lesser" versions of these cloaks. Most of these cloaks could make the wearer invisible in the shadows, could create dimensional gaps in solid material, and itself could act as a storage vessel that gave a "summoning" ability to the items stored within. The most characteristic, and perhaps most frightening, attribute of these cloaks was their ability to stretch and move as though alive. The wearer could mentally manipulate the cloak like tentacles and could use it to simply intimidate an opponent or attack them by wrapping the malleable fabric around the target. A person caught and wrapped up by the cloak could be swallowed into its interdimensional depths and thereby be trapped.

The half-drow immort Adorne Doonweir was responsible for the guild's creation and its governing. She acted as an emissary, negotiator, task mistress, and financial coordinator. One of the ways the guild supported its existence was by selling "insurance" to various kingdoms, providing "security" to valued royal assets. Another major contributor to the guild's coffers was its "lost and found" service. For a fee, the guild would track down lost valuables and return them. Because of the lucrative nature of these endeavors, Adorne always negotiated in good faith, and built a sterling reputation as an overlord guild that made good on its promises. The guild also served as a talent resource, hooking up clients with the right people "for the job".

An offshoot of the masters guild were the D'klace who trafficked in a much darker product--murder for hire. The goal of the D'klace was to be so good at their job that they would become a deterrent force. With the shadow cloaks as a tool, there were few places D'klace assassins could not slip into and do their worst. As was their goal, the D'klace did end up retained to protect lives more often than to take them.

Adorne was never really comfortable with the D'klace and tried to keep the two sects as distinct and separate from each other as possible. While no angel, and certainly not opposed to killing for the right reasons, Adorne had no real desire to sell death. She felt, and rightfully so, that sooner or later, the wrong mark would die, and the guild would find itself in the middle of vendetta orchestrated by some powerful adventuring group or kingdom.

The masters guild had very close ties to the Dream Merchants, and used the services of the latter for many purposes. It was fairly well known that rogue Kriar great loremage Theln Azygos of the Dream Merchants and Adorne were fairly close acquaintances. How they initially met, or what the basis of their friendship is, is something that remains unknown.

Corim Vale and Ess Targallae are notable realms personalities that follow the lore-knight credo, peace through learning.

Mataya lived about two thousand cycles prior to the events of the different Realms books. Originally, Mataya was a secular paladin of Shani. However, a sect war between the pantheon of Navagraha and the gods following Surya and pantheon of Enlil and the gods following Anu resulted in the death of many mortals dear to Mataya. These losses and the continued agendas of self-involved gods eventually soured him on the sects being the source of spiritual and intellectual truth. He and many men and women who had been inspired by his deeds and courage broke away to form 'The Way' which was essentially an armed institution of higher learning that taught warriors both battle and eridition.

Mataya lived approximately three-hundred years, and inspired several generations of followers. His schools financed themselves by hiring out squadrons of paladins to keep the peace in various kingdoms and worlds throughout the Realms.

In the wake of Mataya's death, the organization splintered into several factions. A few of which emphasized the ideals to the point of draconian rule and zealotry. Two notable factions of the Mataya called the Lore Guardians and Gate Sentinels serve the Magocracy of the Ring Realms. Elite squads of the Lore Guardians serve in the personal retinue of the Crowninshield family.

All these other functions aside, the primary function of these devices is to preserve and maintain a Kriar's health. Secondarily, the brain-stone acts as a template repository, it is a physical and mental "backup" if you will, that preserves the physical form, memories and persona of the Kriar wearer. This preserved physical and mental image is used as a reference to restore the individual should there be some form of catastrophic injury. The matrixes themselves being made from krill composite are far more durable than the body they are implanted in, and will survive shocks that would otherwise destroy the host body. As long as there is enough tissue to maintain a physical connection between the main three stone implants the host body can be restored (providing the external environment allows). This means that if the head is completely severed from the body, often the Kriar won't regenerate (because the sensor stone becomes "disassociated"). The only "for sure" way to kill a Kriar utilizing this technology is to sever the trunk of the body and sufficiently disassociate the halves so that focus and brain-stones cannot communicate. (Yes, gruesome.)

In the course of the Kriar/eternal wars many Kriar fell in battle, and the eternals soon learned that a "dead" Kriar didn't stay that way unless more extraordinary measures were taken. In many cases it was expedient to simply bury or otherwise inter the fallen opponent so they couldn't regain consciousness. In extreme cases, they immolated or blasted the victim to the point of disassociation. Often the matrixes would survive such an attack and be left behind.

It is these "abandoned" sets of matrixes which create some interesting phenomena. As mentioned above the matrix stores a record of the physical and mental patterns of the Kriar who wore them. This revisits the main purpose of the stones (to guard the health of the wearer, and heal any and all harm inflicted on them). What happens when another host (say a human) installs the stones? The matrixes are designed to operate on Kriar physiology which is wildly different from human physiology. When a human dons these stones, the stones see the human physiology as an "injury" which they attempt to "heal". Because of the tremendous differences in human and Kriar anatomy, the changes necessary to "heal" a human to conform to "kriar normal" are extensive. However the technology in these stones is so sophisticated that they can "figure out" a migration path that is not life threatening to the wearer. Such changes take many cycles to complete however because of subtle nuances with rejection and other immune responses. This is how many "half" or "partial" Kriar came to be. Notable Ring Realms personae with this dubious distinction are Gwenafra Tristar, Tiernia Nirvanae, Damrosil Terranath, and Cassandra Kel'Ishtauri. While there are many benefits to having the more evolved Kriar physiology, the effect becomes less desirable as the wearer begins to start looking like the original Kriar for whom the stones were made. This is especially inconvenient when the original owner was of the opposite sex...

The complex at Starholme Prime was purported to be able (at optimum operation) to transmit 8 million megapsions of energy continuously (instant to instant). When translated to raw power, due to the cascade nature of psion or tao energy, this is a potential greater than the combined output of several hundred stars.

Theoretically, the redesigned first ones (or ascendants) were able to channel ten megapsions of power. When translated to raw potential this is enough to destroy an entire planet.

Corim Vale from the Shaladen Chronicles series is a fairly strong metapath. His ability to metapathically synchronize with his shaladen makes him a particularly powerful Shael Dal, capable of feats other members cannot duplicate.

People tend to think of microprocessors as only being inside of a computer when in fact a great number of devices use one or more dedicated or specialized processors where there is a need to channel, change, manipulate or interpret data. In the real world data can take many forms, it can be radio signals, sound, video, network activity, etc. in all of these cases the raw source material must be transformed into a manipulable form. This is usually performed by a special type of microprocessor generically called a DSP (digital signal processor). These kinds of processors are in practically every convenience device we as humans touch: cellphones, televisions, cd and dvd players, car engines, and on and on... virtually anything that needs to take an input of any kind and act on it in some way. Even things as simple as a thermostats which control heaters and air conditioners are now largely electronic, using a thermal sensor tied to a simple DSP.

Extend this forward to an even more sophisticated world where people are even more closely integrated with data in their lives...

The term is generally used in conjunction with references that are inclusive of subjects originating outside of Eternity.

Nethra is probably one of the more outgoing and accessible of the Eternals. Her relationship with Tal Falor is extremely informal (he calls her 'boss') and they indulge in some very loose banter. Despite appearances, the two are extremely efficient and deadly serious in their actual conducting of Protectorate business. Tal is a stickler for chain-of-command but is ultimately a results-oriented person. Nethra is much the same, thus the two of them get along extremely well.

Nethra is characterized by her flaming red hair which goes well with her passionate and expressive nature. She is physically the second strongest of the eternals behind Garn. Her skills in combat were legendary even before she became an eternal.