Dark

Dark is a nebulous term because it refers at once to the concept of 'magic' and to the literal material itself. This page will explain some of the lore surrounding Dark, its variations, its uses, and some technologies surrounding it.

The broader idea is that Dark is a material substance that can be found in some locations, mostly in space, that can be used for Works, the general term for 'magical' effects. A great deal of the conflict in the setting relates to Dark and people's access (or lack thereof) to the substance.

## **Dark Matter**

Dark Matter, sometimes referred to by the religiously inclined as 'Tenebrous Materia', is the physical incarnation of Dark. It should be noted that while it's called Dark Matter, this is not directly related to the physical concept of Dark Matter. Tenebrous Materia does not account for a discrepancy in the total mass in the universe. Instead, this is a rare resource found almost exclusively on non-Earthen celestial bodies. The first source was on Luna, but since then it's been found in abundance in Proxima Centauri. There's also trace amounts of the material throughout the rest of the solar system, primarily in the asteroid belt and now in orbit around Earth forming the Veil. Regardless of physical state, Dark always appears as it's name would imply - dark. It's always nearly pitch black and highly reflective. People often describe it as looking like onyx or obsidian.

#### Primary Properties

Dark has many strange properties. The chief among them is that it reacts strangely with intelligent beings. Some animals, mostly intelligent mammals but also some birds and reptiles, are prone to cause these reactions. However, no animal is more likely to cause them than humans. Firstly, in some of it's forms, Dark Matter is dangerous to human psychology. However, unlike most poisons which would simply block up certain neural receptors, Dark in it's raw state tends to reconfigure neurons into new, nonsensical configurations. In general, Dark has been said to have an almost counter-entropy where it's influences cause less organized systems to become more organized, though not always in a desirable fashion. The exact nature of the organization often depends on the will of the person guiding the initial process, however certain physical effects have been seen to set Dark on a specific organizational trend independent of direction of a user. Dark that has been fully set to a certain form of organization is said to be 'Inert'. This simply means that the exact patterns that it will produce are set in place and now difficult to change.

Aside from the effect of instilling order from chaos when applied to chaotic systems, Dark in general has effects when reacting to intelligent forms. Humans who consume too much of the material are said to Initiate. Once Initiated, the user finds themselves able to feel a sort of pull from the Dark nearby, and if they 'tug' back they find themselves able to manipulate the material. Additionally, so long as there is some source of Dark nearby, Initiates find themselves able to telepathically communicate with other intelligent beings. Doing so can be difficult, however. Firstly, getting it to reliably do the same thing twice tends to take a great deal of practice. It's not uncommon for a new Initiate to accidentally turn their Dark into a crystalline structure, or the shape of an image they are thinking of, or to just form strange patterns. When properly utilized, it's capable of otherwise physics-defying effects that, to many academics chagrin, are typically referred to as Spells.

Dark itself isn't typically consumed when Spells are cast. Instead Dark generates a field that grows with the increased presence of Dark and which connects through other fields transitively. For example, if you have a Dark field set up in Hong Kong and a line with 'booster stations' of dark along the way to Taiwan, it will connect into one field. It's not uncommon for most a planet to have a field that connects. However, over time spell usage does eventually form a pattern enough that the Dark takes to it and goes Inert, at which point it needs to be Washed. Every Washing depletes some of the 'ductility' (ease of Shaping) the Dark though, and eventually it becomes permanently inert. For this reason, many practitioners carry a small personal vial of Dark with them.

Finally, while a user must typically fight with the Dark to get it to perform an effect, it lends itself readily to the creation and manipulation of intelligences. This factor has caused it to become a relatively simple task to create artificially intelligent systems. Stranger yet, Dark seems to make little distinction in form of intelligence - Automa are just as capable of Dark users as humans are, though they do need an Arcanocore to do so. It's been described by some scholars that it's "almost as if the Dark wants to create new sapience".

#### Varieties of Dark Matter

Dark Matter comes in a variety of forms. They are listed here in order of prevalence:

* Raw Dark
	+ Liquid Dark
	+ Crystal Dark
	+ Gaseous Dark
* Perma-Dark
* Processed Dark
	+ Dark Cordial
	+ Dark Tablet
	+ Dark Serum