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The Legacy of the Magepriests

Author: unknown
Place/Gathering Discovered: ruins of Monk's Keep in Elemirre, Return to Monk's Keep
Date: January 1005
Transcribed by: Iacob of Ivory
Over a thousand years ago, most of the lands of the continent were under
the auspice of the Great Kingdom. During this time, a concerted effort
in the study of magic led to a renaissance. Philosophy, Religion, and
the Arcane were all merged into a single topic of study. One of the
centers of this learning was an academy called Monks Keep. Monk's Keep,
And the city which surrounded it, "Kos" were buried during the Great
Schism which ended the Age of Shadow. named so because that so few
records survived. Now, during the age of Conflict, only the Great Spire
remains above ground. The descendants of the original Mage priests have
created a loose brotherhood which continues to gather knowledge from the
Age of Shadow. The members of the Brotherhood are well dispersed, but
few in numbers.

The Magepriests were aware of the changing nature of magic. Over the
course of time, old spells would weaken and lose their potency, while
new magic which was once undreamed of would be discovered. The
Magepriests recognized this as the natural consequences of the primal
forces of Order and Chaos striving against each other.

The changing nature of magic troubled the Magepriests. The knowledge of
their most learned scholers would slowly become obsolete. Truly
advanced knowledge could never be gained. Because the laws of magic
would change before they were completely understood.

To combat this, the Magepriests created an artifact they referred to as
"The Source". The Source absorbs ambient magic and filters out the
effects of chaos. The Result was that the Magepriests in the vicinity
of the Source "or those who would remotely tap its power" could study a
form of magic that did not change. The pure chaos is released inside
discrete "pockets" of order. It did not take long for a dangerous
practice to develop where these pockets of chaos were destroyed in the
vicinity of active spills of order to easily create powerful, but
unreliable, effects. This practice was officially banned by the
Magepriests due to the unpredictable and powerful nature of the effects.
However, it was such a simple technique that its use was pretty
widespread among those who did not have the patience to learn the magic
the Mageprists preached. The spell used to break these pockets of chaos
is known as "Combine". Even the Archmage, the mage who at last banished
Nemesis for a thousand years, was forced to tap into this power to
attain victory.

Even with the city of Kos buried, the Source remains active. Combine
spells have always worked in the vicinity of Monk's Keep. The magical
currents of the world sometime disperse the pockets of chaos to distant
lands, but they all originate at the source. Also, the closer one gets
the Source, the less ambient magic is available. The result is the
magical decay the explorers experienced as they descended the Great
Spire. Today, the Combine spell has seen much use. It us such a simple
spell that knowledge of it survived even when most of the knowledge of
the Magepriests was lost.
Created by Iacob of Ivory (David Kapell) at 11-04-05 02:49 PM
Last Modified by Faelinn Shadowmoon (Leanne Micciche) at 04-15-08 00:02 AM