Electricity

**Electricity** was a harnessable natural force found in Indratera, related to the properties of matter that had an electric charge. It was interlinked with magnetism, and was eventually harnessed by some societies beginning in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Until then, it was just a curiosity of life.

## Ancient Shocks

In the natural world, it was found in many places known to people. These included sea creatures like eels and rays, lightning storms, static electricity, and animal bodies themselves. Ancient societies understood and linked these animals and phenomena.

For example, the Proto-Gildegran word for 'Eel', found in the cold waters of east Gildegra and western Rakkimar, was *tuaqqarmiqikalliq*, which roughly translates to 'thunder sea snake'. This gave evidence that these people understood the connection between a shocking animal and the weather.

In another example, the Old Rakki people described static electricity first, noting the slight shock one gets when touching a weapon or piece of metal with the word *guranmannęt*, which can be traced from the Proto-Tarkassic words *karan* and *mahn*, thus roughly meaning 'lightning hand' or 'lightning touch'.

## Much Potential

> *'Report 3a dated 2/8/1219, Professor T.E. Zeikos. Recent research has found that tall metal structures attract lightning best. Arcing behaviour also witnessed between arrangements over short distances. In addition, copper rods found to propagate lightning energy most efficiently and smoothly. One injury suffered by research team whilst moving rod number 6. Spidery burn marks witnessed on Dr. S. Vetzan's right arm down to left leg, combined with slight amnesia. No further damage caused. We are getting somewhere.'*
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During the 1200s in Datria, thanks to the work of a team of Luskan researchers at the University of the West Danderillon led by Professor T.E. Zeikos and Dr. S. Vetzan, it was discovered that lightning could be 'guided' or 'coaxed' to a particular spot using metal pylons and poles. They also discovered that copper was the most efficient of the metals available to them for propagating it. However, there was not a whole lot of practical use to this, as they had nothing to use the power for. Nonetheless it piqued the curiosity of many more scientists. This led to breakthroughs in equations and understandings. From the 1200s to the late 1400s, these discoveries accelerated.

## Some Resistance

*'My friends, you may know of the land of Rakkimar, and its dangerous weather. Indeed, in the far off north, in the stormy mountains of the Kaserini, there are so many storms that the locals have taken to capturing the lightning in metal cages, and using it for their own ends to warm their homes.'*

*-Henri Angier, introducing Shock and Awe.*

Scientists in Hjarofjall and Hjarkerkell in Rakkimar discovered ways to capture electricity using complex arrangements of mountaintop rods and copper cables in the 1300s. They then used this energy to makes fires, melt snow, or create small but dazzling lights. It was progress, though it was slow. These experiments were often limited to small isolated stations in the snowy wilderness, or tiny towns like Vörgåsen would one day be used for, due to the resistance put up by some people. Meddling with lightning was seen as dangerous due to how innately destructive it was - and indeed, these fears sometimes were justified, as its power to maim, kill, and cause fire was notable.

Setbacks were a problem too. At the University of the West Danderillon, years of research and technology were lost during the Violet Catastrophe during the Year of the Four Horsemen (1490); the explosion of the research department meant many prototypes, papers and even crucial people themselves were lost to tragedy.

## Hidden Power

In Thay, the secret culture hidden from the world, the discovery of harnessable electricity that began with Rakki scientists in the 1300s was accelerated in secret. By the mid 1400s, it was known how to use lightning rods to temporarily or permanently overcharge Serite crystals, which provided huge amounts of power even without overcharge. Charged crystals could provide energy fields too. These discoveries propelled Thay to form new technology, like Skipjammers and the Thayan Outer World Expeditionary Range (TOWER) organisation, as well as providing power for their cities. It should be noted that Thay did not harness the electricity itself, but rather they used it to power large Serite crystals, which was moveable and more understood too.

## Current Affairs

> *'Man's reach exceeds his grasp.'*
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*- J. Arnu Waldenstromm*

In the 1500s in Waterdeep, invention was taking off. Johnovver MacKenzie 'invented' (stole) the idea of an electric copper-cable propagated telegraph from an unknown small scientist, and this was one of the first uses of electricity in the city for a while. The energy was harnessed into these copper wires by small 'forests' of copper pylons outside the city on a raised hill here or there, providing lingering current in the telegraph wire system.

Its effect on people was well noted by doctors, who eventually termed the branching burns as Ophiuchus Figures, dubbed in the 1560s.

In the 1550s, the work of J. Arnu Waldenstromm laid the groundwork for the harnessing of electricity. A machine was made for Henri Angier by Waldenstromm capable of using electricity simply for showmanship, but this machine kickstarted a chain of events that culminated in Waldenstromm's lab being ransacked and destroyed by her rival Johnovver MacKenzie. Luckily, Waldenstromm and her assistant survived, and at the behest of the Vortic Mercatorium (who offered her protection), she began developing free, clean, safe electrical power. This was unveiled in Halcyon in the 1570s, and by 1575, the whole city was hooked up to a central grid, with electric lightning, heating, communications, and more. Hjarofjall was the second city to acquire an electrical grid by 1576.