Mana Crystals

COLOUR REALMS

PROFESSIONS

Legend

“Mana leaked and created matter enriching the void where it made contact, or crystallising into shards of existensial essence. When leaks touched these shards, they melted, merged, and evolved.”

“She saw it emerge and threw her shards at it, they touched, and then she was gone .”
—Skjald Vinotis

 

Description

Why call them crystals when it’s truly all about the shards? Because practioners start their understanding of magic shards by working with and testing on mundane crystals—not the true magic shards. A learning process that has proven wise, as both valuable Magic Shards and practioners stay around longer when tampering with crystallisation first rather than actual Shard-work.

The difference in how Shards reacted to the Void and Void Gardens when they leaked from the Astral, leaving those crystallising near Void Gardens more polluted. Is believed to be because Void Gardens were linked directly to the Astral, influencing Shard formation by proximity. Making them gain more residual orientation and making them harder to merge and purify. Anyways, mostly teachings are about appearances into our world, retrieved from the soil, a very rare leak, or energetic remains of dissolved mana without orientation – quick to crystallise.

Mundane crystals are inert — useful for structure and containment. Magic Shards, however, are alive with potential, shaped by mana leaks or energetic remains, and purified through intent. Handling these energies—tending them, shaping them, and directing them—is part of the training. But also handling a leak situation and purifying as much of the leaking Mana as possible, filtering away any taints and flaws, so shards of the most exquisite purity can come into existence. As shards with purity maximised, are valuable for crafting, enhancing, enchanting, mana manipulations, and much more.

“The elderly woman grinned, then threw a rain of shards at the god – and it shrieked.“

—Skjald Sejrik

 

It’s somewhat hard to describe how training to handle leaks coins out. It always depends on the practioners’ initiative, intuition, and wisdom, as every leak and appearance of energetic remains is different. But the refining process, to merge and enhance magic shards into higher purity, is way easier to dive into… –But excuse me, I need to munch this meal!

—Skjald Yell'a'Beard

 

One doesn’t have to be a academy practioner to enter and stroll the halls of a Mana Crystals Academy; global guilds are also present, with their members having ample attention to detail to learn the Magic Shard curriculum. To practise their skills, they use key tools like purity kaleidoscope, and mass-balancing matrix. Becoming truly proficient at analysing, documenting, and refining Magic Shards, a valuable resource for not just themselves and their enhancements, but also Mana Manipulators and Enchanters, is essential.

The difference in how a Mana Crystal Practitioner, Mana Manipulator, and Magic Enchanters handle magic shards differs significantly. So their storages of Magic Shards have also evolved and differ quite a lot. From whole bookcases with shard boxes, pouches, and cartridges to table dispensers, large side-hung or back-strapped satchels, chest bandoliers, belt boxes, and arm or leg strap-ons. The diversity is simply the result of the practical need differences of analysts, documentarists, purifiers, and the Shard-Slinging transporters.

—Skjald Valgrif

 

History

Dark Ages

They were the first touched by leaking mana that did not crystallise but transformed them into the first divines. As they became sentient and moved to the glowing leaks, they saw more leaking, floating, and pouring into the void. Some touched it and were consumed, others bathed in it and survived, and a few crawled through the rifts and entered the astral to the sound of crystallising, crackling, and breaking mana as it became shards.

We all know about this early birth of the elder divines and that the practice of refining and merging magic shards goes all the way back to the Dark Ages, before our world was formed. But back then, with greater access to leaking mana and no gods, things were essentially different. To such a degree that there’s no point in mentioning it in relation to the Academy of Mana Crystals.

—Skjald Sigurd

 

First Age

From their earliest days as sentient beings, the divines studied mana leaking and crystallisation. Most of this insight they taught to the races that came, either by coincidence or those the divines spun out of mana threads, making them the living essence of mana that did not crystallise upon entering the void—the divines’ greatest deed ever—and this animation path is the only path they never taught to mortal races. Anyways, after the world reformation, when Void Gardens became the world’s surface, handling Magic Shards changed, and previous observations and processes handling leaks became more or less flawed, corrupted, or totally obsolete.

With  a plenitude of scholars, practioners, mana manipulators, and other highly skilled and knowledgeable individuals around. All began redefining how magic shards now emerged and how they now purity condense, as it was not void gardens but the growing nodes of the Earth’s ley lines, influencing them. Oddly enough in a reversed influence, emphasising the amount of a single mana colour and lessening the amount of polluting residue. New dos and don’ts of magic shard handling was also introduced.

It was the new divines, the gods as we call them, that amidst the elder divines Stratagem twisted it slightly, thus mitigating the ploy. Trying to spread their collective memory, they had tainted every leak fragment with memories. Now it was somewhat muffeled and twisted, so they embedded verifiers into every swirling leak and taint.

With the lessened amounts of Magic Shards, and the flaws of previous lore and rites, early teachings began to include proxies, and the worldly art of crystals blended into the world of true magic. The fundamental practices with mere crystals taught about evaluating form and the most basic setup of environments preventing pollution. Then came the 1st cataclysm, the climax of the Alfar discoveriess and the emergence of vampires.

Once more the Mana Sea and Magic Shards changed, as the world tilted and world nodes shifted, ley lines relaxed, stretched, or broke – resulting in an increase of pollution once more, as swirls became slightly more chaotic, leaving more residual orientation in shards. It’s said that it was first after the 1st cataclysm that crude shards, with purities so low and with so much pollution that they crumble by themselves emerged, and became practice objects for all but the Synesthemancer’s.

—Skjald El Mary

 

Second and Third Ages

Although several major things occurred during these 8628 years, nothing happened regarding Magic Shards until the very end of the Third Age. But the eruption of Mt Vula and sinking of Ljostari resulted in major changes in the way magic works and how shards form. Some say this 2nd cataclysm was instituted by the older divines because Vular scholars had learnt the animation path and used it in our world; others claim it was but another plot of the younger divines, the gods, usual contender schemes.

“None the favoured, but Vular learned to animate -their lost.”
—Skjald Kazumix

 

Fourth Age

The arrival of Arisen and Liches had, as such, no influence on how Shards form, but I will mention them briefly, as their dissolution often results in an interesting effect. As their spirits travel to what we could call Fylgia-land, remains of their former selves drop as multicoloured shards far more often than anything else. Seemingly a result of them being born out of the Deep Blue Tsunami’s cacaphonic turbulence. And as the early days of the Fourth Age saw quite a lot of conflict with these tsunamiborn arisen, studies of multicoloured shards increased and were eventually mastered by some, like the human mage ‘Dogil Ligod’.

The further tilting of the world strengthened the purity of shards appearing at the burning north pole and weakened their purity down south towards The Rim, the anti-magic mountain belt that spans the entire equatorial belt of the world, sealing off north and south. This also means that there’s less multicoloured to be found in the north than in the south, where the Rim seemingly influences the swirls and mitigates the forming of a dominant colour.

Even though Astravel exists, allowing for swift transportation from one place to another. The fact that one has to spend shards to do so has resulted in the fact that there are far more academies in the north than in the south. Transporting shards has, by the way, always been a risky business, as their great value may result in the transporter being assaulted and robbed or outright killed and plundered. Most often these individuals are quite capable mana manipulators or weapon masters—Shard Slingers, as some call them. So don’t try anything foolish—mind my saying.

Many academies were attacked, sacked, and razed during the Great Invasion; luckily, as good as all grimoires had been copied due to synesthemancy, and shared to all other Mana Crystal academies. Thus, we assume no special or secret lore was lost, but will most likely never know. But the academies are once again rebuilding and thriving as we enter the Fifth Age.

Skjald Ulrich

 

Organisation

The academy of Mana Crystals is divided into specialised disciplines, each focusing on a different field of Magic Shard interaction—from detection, over evaluation, documentation, and refinement, to storing. Amongst academies, this more scholarly field has an overweight of guilded scholars, crafters, and enhancers than magic-related Mana Manipulators. These are the fields they jointly study:

  • Shard seeking: Are there existing magic shards nearby?
  • Shard emerging: Are any nearby rifts opening, or are there any ongoing leaks?
  • Leak prolonging: For how long can a leak be held to give a purer shard?
  • Leak increasing: How wide can a leak become to deliver more shard mass?
  • Shard Origin: What generation shard is it?
  • Shard Levels: How many and of what quality, are the shards?
  • Shard Content: What does the shard content and what does it express?
  • Shard Purities: How unpolluted is a shard?
  • Shard Merging: Refining the core colour, mass, and purity

“There’s a plenitude under the corpse over there,” said the scout with a nod.”
—Skjaldy Sigurd

 

Shard Seeking

This field teaches how practioners may detect Shards, and there are two skills being taught: locating existing Shards and sensing an upcoming leak and the most likely emergence of Shards.

  • Astral Currents: Practitioners learn about the different regions of the world, earth nodes, ley lines, and how the underground floating sea of mana produces shards with dominant colours due to astral turbulence.
  • Swirl Maps: Scholars, practitioners, and astravellers all chart swirl patterns to predict shard composition and teleporting dangers. These maps are jealously guarded by academies and guilds.
  • Swirl Harvesting Rituals: Extracting shards from a swirl isn’t really taught, but the topic is touched briefly by informing of the basic rituals.

 

Mana Leaks and Shard Emergence

When a mana leak is discovered, initiative is of utmost importance. Quick decisions about how to keep the drop area as less polluted as possible, how to keep it leaking, and how to increase the leak are key. How practioners may prolong, or increase, the leaking mana swirl, giving the most Shard, is taught as two different disciplines: leak prolonging and leak increasing.

  • Leak Emerging: Are there any leaks opening, or are there any leaks ongoing?
  • Leak Prolonging: For how long can a leak be held to give a purer shard?
  • Leak Increasing: How wide can a leak become to deliver more shard mass?

Prolonging and increasing a leak both result in a greater purity. It was suggested, in the early Fourth Age, that increasing is what gives the crystallisation its mass and thus level, and that prolonging is what gives it its purity. Not even in Mt Vula has this been properly verified, and those around them forges should know. The handling of a leak is, by the way, not mechanical—it’s ceremonial. Often involving chants, gestures, and resonance tuning.

 

Shard Purity

There are nine purity classes that matter to shard analysts, documenters, and mergers, but only eight to everyone else, as crude shards are simply too unstable for anything but a bridge from worldly crystals to magic shards. Crude shards can be used to train apprentices so they get used to merging shards.

Practioners learn how to evaluate shards, documenting and classing them, and defining their purity, using tools. Higher purity shards are not only more stable—they resonate more deeply with the Astral Sea, making them ideal for advanced enchantments and divine manipulation. Here are their type names, purity ranges, and brief structure descriptions:

  • Crude: (1-49) – Implies a porous, crumbling structure.
  • Fractured: (50-174) – Implies a chaotic, broken structure.
  • Rough: (175-299) – suggests a coarse, uneven surface.
  • Jagged: (300-424) – Indicates sharp, pointed edges.
  • Smooth: (425-549) – Implies a polished, even surface.
  • Pristine: (550-674) – Suggests a perfect, unspoiled state.
  • Exquisite: (675-799) – Indicates exceptional quality or beauty.
  • Radiant: (800-924) – Suggests a glowing, luminous appearance.
  • Celestial: (925-1000) – Implies a heavenly or divine origin

 

Tools and processes

All Shards we can hold in our hands, consume and dispose of are the result of complex Mana Sea swirls that combine a variety of different Mana Colours. It’s extremely rare that no major colour is present, and for now I will just explain the majority of shards. Generally they consist of a single major colour, the rest being small fragments of other colours, hues, void matter, or world dust – all seen as pollution. The amounts of main colour and pollution define its type (jagged, rough, fine, etc.).

Even those who has a vast and deep experience with shards, find it as good as impossible to tell types and purities by feel, hand, and eye alone. Thus, tools were developed back in the late Dark Ages that have since been improved to make very precise determinations of shard content, levels, and purities. Utilising these tools begins with the basic tool versions, and as practitioners advance in skill, the tools do as well.

Theres three different professions in regard to shard evaluation and handling:

  • Synesthemancer
  • Kaleidomancer
  • Purimancer

For type determination, they utilise a ‘Mass-Balancing Matrix‘: a mass- and weight-sensitive device that adjusts its internal gravity to prevent destabilisation of shards while they are being examined. The Mass-Balancing Matrix measures shard colours and ensures one can tell the exact type.

For the content determination, they use a special Magic Script and various Grimoires: these vast volumes contain informations about Shards, History, and Synesthemancers.

For the purity determination, they use a ‘Purity Kaleidoscope‘: placing a shard inside and carefully examining it, they can determine the exact purity. Due to the eight enchanted ‘Purity Lenses’ that glow in different hues or shift colour based on purity levels.

For merging, they use a ‘Casket Crucible’: placing two shards inside and merging these, they can produce a shard of improved purity.

For transport, they use a ‘Shard Satchel‘, containing a ‘Crystal Cartridge‘, a close-fitting container, often sewn from cloth or leather, worn at the belt, across the chest, or as an armband. The crystal cartridge contains different tubes or mini-quivers, with shards of each type. Some might have several of these satchels or cartridges, and I should mention that crystal cartridges are not concealed in shard satchels for protection only, but also for concealment as they are made of dirrerent alloys depending on bearer.

  • Channelling oriented beings use Vula Gold
  • Arcane oriented use Ljostari Bronze
  • Essence use Vortex Obsidian
  • Mentalist use Cobalt Silver

 

Mass-Balancing Matrix

Both Kaleidomancers and Synesthemancers utilise a Mass-Balancing Matrix for precise determination of a shard’s type, generally based on its mass and surfaces.

Mass-Balancing Matrix Progression

Rank Tool Variant / Add-on Description
Apprentice (I) Balance Disc A simple handheld disc with basic gravity stabilisation.
Novice (II) Twin Scales Dual-pan lenses for surface and colour resonance evaluation.
Journeyman (III) Tri-Spindle A Three-axis spinner allowing for multi-dimensional analysis (weight, surface, and pollution.)
Chief (IV) Harmonic Cradle A sensored cradle for reading mass fluctuations and colour harmonics in real time.
Master (V) Spectral Loom Lenses turn residual subtypes into visible patterns, revealing swirl origins.
Lord (VI) Gauge Fork Predictive forecast of instability or fusion potential by resonating the sound fork’s frequency with shard core colour and residues.
Overlord (VII) Void-Stabilizer Void matter membrane for disc and spindle nullifying external interference; allows for analysis of unstable living shards.
Grand Lord (VIII) The Equilibrion A matrix box that can evaluate divine living multicoloured paradoxical shards by detecting internal hues and residue.

As you can see, the tool starts as a simple disc, then has lenses added and a spindle on top of the disc before being inserted in a cradle. Then more lenses, a sound fork, and a membrane stabilising the spindle, and it ends as a quite delicate and complex box.

 

Purity Kaleidoscope

Both Kaleidomancers and Synesthemancers also utilise another tool, a Purity Kaleidoscope, that reveals a shards internal amounts of main colour and residual orientation.

Purity Kaleidoscope Progression

Rank Tool Variant / Add-on Description
Apprentice (I) Basic Lens Tube With its eight fixed lenses for determining colour and residue composition.
Novice (II) Hue Diallers Adds dials to adjust lens sensitivity for detecting impurities.
Journeyman (III) Prism Cage Adds tube prisms revealing layered purity and pollution ratios.
Chief (IV) Echo Scope Emits harmonic tones based on purity levels, refining purity determination. Used by enchanters to select optimal shards.
Master (V) Refraction Halo A Bottom halo has a purity spectrum projected onto it. Can isolate specific hues and identify pollution sources.
Lord (VI) Auraglass Array Uses Aura-attuned lenses to detect emotional resonance within shards. Used for sentient enchantments.
Overlord (VII) Purity Engine A semi-sentient core that learns from past readings. Can auto-classify shards.
Grand Lord (VIII) The Kaleidomancer’s Eye The final lens sees beyond purity—into the shard’s history, origin, and potential futures.

Same as for the Matrix, it starts as a simple device; insert the shard and start evaluating. Then the tube evolves and becomes rather delicate and complex.

At the Lord level and above, practitioners are of such skill and understanding that some begin to fuse their Matrix and Kaleidoscope tools, resulting in unique character-attuned devices.

” She held the radiant shard to the light, and it sang in eight colours.”

—Skjald El Mary

 

Shard Merging

Practioners are taught that merging is not about power — it’s about clarity. The shard becomes purer not because it is stronger, but because it is more whole, a truer version of itself.

Preparation

Practioners begin by selecting two shards. These shards must be:

  • Origin Aligned: Meaning they must have the same main colour or be multicoloured.
  • Structural Resonance: They must be of the same structure and surface type.
  • Purically similar: They cannot be of different types.
  • Structurally Stable: Crudes can’t merge, as they are too porous and in a crumbling structure.

The shards are placed within a Casket Crucible, a containment retina woven from the eight Mana Colours, within a casket of the users preferred alloys designed to suppress orientation and amplify purity.

“She placed them side by side, and the crucible whispered, ‘Ready.”
—Skjald Ulrich

 

Merge

The Manipulator initiates the Casket Crucibles Purity Weave, an enchanted mechanism that draws the shards together in a dual orbiting spin. As the shards begin to orbit each other, their energies synchronise. This phase is delicate—too much force and the shards shatter; too little and they repel. Once synchronised, they begin to dissolve into swirling mana, and the casket crucible’s sensors release a condensation pulse, filtering and compressing the two shards’ main colour swirls into one strand while filtering away polluting residues.

The moment of fusion, the two shards acceptance of their new state is marked by a burst of light in the shard’s hue — the shard has become something new. If they somehow was misintrepreted, documemted wrongly, or had undiscovered misalignments or or taints. The result is a less experience of a white-grey flash, smell, and fizzling sound — or a spectacular unwelcomed merge disaster.

“Two became one, and the silence sang.”
—Skjald Vinotis

 

Outcome

The result of a shard merge is either a single shard of the next purity class, at the minimum purity of that tier. Or a shard of the same level as the two, but at a purity between their awerage and their levels maximum purity. This reflects the metaphysical truth that merging is not additive — it’s refining. The new shard is denser, more stable, and more potent. There are only two exceptions to this outcome, and both have never been solved; crude shards are of such poor quality that a merge does not produce a fractured shard, but the merge does generally increase the practitioner’s understanding of the process. The other is that Divine shards can’t become more, but they can become purer. So, divine shards being merged have been found to end as a new one, with a purity between their former purity averages and what’s possible. Which, for the record, is 1000.

For example:

  • Two Fractured shards (purity 100 and 120) merge into one Rough shard with purity 175.
  • Two Smooth shards (purity 500 and 540) merge into one Pristine shard with purity 550.

This system honours the ritualistic and transformative nature of refinement.

“Purity is not the absence of flaw. It is the presence of purpose.”
—Skjald Yell'a'Beard

 

Risk

If the merge fails; If the shards somehow was misintrepreted, documemted wrongly, or had undiscovered misalignments or or taints. The result is a less experience of a white-grey flash, smell, and fizzling sound — or a spectacular unwelcomed merge disaster where the crucible retina may fracture — releasing unstable mana and risking a collapse of the Casket Crucibles containment retina.

“When the light fades, and the silence sings — a spirit is born anew.”
—Skjald Sigurd

 

Shard Storage Artefacts

There are different types of storage for magic shards; some are stationary – whole rooms with bookshelves, boxes, pouches, and dispensers. Others are more mobile, like the Shard Satchel and their Crystal Cartridges, protective and close-fitting containers used for when mana manipulators, enchanters, enhancers, and transporters are on the road or during their travels. The Ljostari Bronze Crystal Cartridges prevent shards from dissolving; most are even engraved with glyphs, seals, sigils, and runes to further protect shards from any dissolvment and pollution.

  • Runic Inscriptions: Ancient glyphs etched into the surface to stabilise the mana and prevent leakage or resonance.
  • Void Chambers: Segmented compartments attuned to different mana types, each lined with corresponding void alloys.

“Like some Puchaxan duellist, the ‘Shard-Slinger’ readied himself – then his foe released all the displayed energies – oh, what a rainbow spectacle the slinger became.”
—Skjald  Yell’a’Beard

 

Special

“It’s a rare moment when swirls are tamed into multicoloured shards — born from chaotic swirls — defy orientation and purity. They are studied in secret, feared by some, and revered by others..”

“The guard saw it and rushed in, forgetting the danger, then collapsed.”
—Skjald Ulrich

Last Updated on 2025-09-04 by IoM-Christian