The Academy

**The Academy** is the most prestigious institute in the whole world. It is particularly renowned for its corpus in arcane arts and historical records.

## Overview

The Academy accepts students from all over the world and often sends traveling scholars to other nations to gather material for research.

### Virtues and Sins

The Academy has three virtues and six sins. The sins were deemed by the sages to be the sources of all crimes and banned to protect researchers from a careless pursuit of knowledge. They are the base of the Academy's rules, and the sages have been adding new rules and amendments ever since. Researching topics that are related to these sins will expose oneself to punishments, such as expulsion from the Academy or imprisonment.

The virtues are as follows:

* Admonition: Admonition is the branches. It comes from a pure heart and is to be paired with wise thinking, affording humble words, clarity, and good deeds conferring real meaning upon what is said.
* Ingenuity: Ingenuity is the leaf-veins. It springs forth from benevolent consideration, sets words of integrity on the right path and should be completed by harmonious conduct.
* Praxis: Praxes are the roots. They stem from an unwavering will, validate words of honesty and bring forth the fruit of wisdom.

The sins are as follows:

* Interfering with human evolution
* Tampering with life and death
* Delving beyond the universe
* Investigating the origin of words
* Revering gods without acts of devotion
* Divulging secrets without a hint of fear

### Academics

Nowadays, obtaining a degree from the Academy is a notoriously long and stressful process; an unnamed prospective who had been admitted states that he will be old by the time he graduates and sees his parents again.

Thesis defenses are by far the most difficult part of graduating; several of the scholars express their anxiety over finding material for their theses and have changed their subjects due to extenuating circumstances or rejection from the review panel. It is implied there is a limit to how long a student can stay at the Academy without being able to graduate.

### Research

On top of academics, the Academy conducts research into various subjects. It is typical for traveling scholars to gather material and conduct preliminary research for their supervisors' projects and areas of interest, while researchers are allowed to stay at the Academy to conduct their research.

While research at the Academy tends to lean towards study of ancient history, the arcane, elemental energy, and the fundamental basis of the world, it also bears research of the more scientific and practical variety.

Research into mechanical lifeforms is banned in the Academy, with students caught doing so running the risk of being expelled. It was initially tolerated and popular among them but when overzealous researchers began to perform unregulated vivisections and other cruel experiments on animals, it was immediately banned.

### Academic Progression

A few different honorifics and titles have been mentioned in relation to a person's progress in their research and studies at the Academy.

* **Traveling Scholars** are students who have been granted leave from the Academy to wander and learn as part of their research process. Passing one thesis through the review process is enough to graduate from the Academy, after which they may be considered formal researchers.
	+ There is another subset of students who are confined within the Academy and do not leave until they graduate or otherwise cut their education short. So far, no honorific has been ascribed to students of this type.

* The **Seven Great Sages**, also commonly referred to as just **sages**, are the scholars with the highest positions of power in the Academy. They are chosen based on a set of criteria to serve as leaders of the Seven Great Schools, one sage per nation. They are granted administrative power over the Academy and also sit on advisory councils. Some of their duties include assigning jobs and duties to researchers; for example, the role of the Grand Conservator.
* The **Grand Sage** is the absolute leader of the Academy. This role and title are cumulative with the one of Grand Sage, but little is currently known about what specific additional functions and powers this title implies.

## Members

### Students

* Ohbrin "Copperbraid" Jardir (Traveling Scholar)