Magic

Aerb is home to many different magical phenomena, which are categorized as latent, passive, and active. There are twenty two different kinds of magic that anyone can learn, plus some standalone spells not associated with any of them. Each entad has its own unique magic. Some exclusion zones - such as the Risen Lands - are home to rare and dangerous kinds of excluded magic. Some magics are hereditary and only available to certain bloodlines. Finally, certain species - such as unicorns and anolia - have their own kinds of racial magic.

There is some controversy and confusion over competing definitions of magic. Only effects that can be warded against are technically considered magic. Some narrow this definition further, and include only effects which can learned and improved with training (excluding, for example, entads.)

Most athenaeums teach magic.

## Types

### Latent magic

Latent magic is the weakest kind of magic. It is emitted by things that *can* create magical effects but currently *aren't* - examples include certain entads and the blood, skin, and bones of ensouled creatures. In general, for most foo where "foo magic" exists, instances of foo possess latent magic.

### Passive Magic

Passive magic is presumably the magic of continuous effects.[*speculation*] It is easier to detect than latent magic, but more difficult to detect than active magic.

### Active magic

Active magic is caused by activated effects. This includes spells and the artillery bow (when activated).

Magic of all kinds can be detected by warders and thaum-seekers. This property is used as a way to classify things as magical or nonmagical, but this method of classification can lead to results that may seem unintuitive. For instance, void crystals are considered to be completely mundane, and blade-bound are only considered to be pseudo-mages, while anything that's moving will possess latent velocity magic.

### Bloodline Magics

A number of different forms of magic are passed down along a certain bloodline. This uses the same mechanism in the soul as entad inheritance, and can follow any of the different inherintance patterns that entad inheritance does.

Curiously, on one occasion, a bloodline magic "spilled out" to include the entire population of the area. Whether this was a result of the bloodline becoming very widespread in the area, or some other effect was in play, is unknown. Also unclear is the range of this effect, as it was eventually discovered that the magic had been excluded to that area.

### Specic Magics

Many species, including a number of the mortal species, possess magics which are only available to them. These are known as species-specific or *specic* magics. Species-specific magical abilities or traits which cannot be trained and are instead "static" are sometimes referred to as "specic effects", rather than specic magics, as they do not form a learnable magical "school". Despite the obvious similarities, specic magics are quite mechanically distinct from bloodline magics; they have no interaction with the often-complex inheritance patterns of bloodlines as tracked in the soul, only a threshold for how much of that species' blood a person needs in their ancestry to access it.

### Free Magic

There are a small number of spells which can be learned by anyone. These are not considered full-blown magics, as they are simple static effects that cannot be improved. Formally, they are distinguishable as those magics which occupy a very narrow band of the magical spectrum visible to warders. Free magics include:

* The sleep spell
* Bulk teleportation
* Touchstones
* Infernoscopes
* Possibly the spells for conjuring barren bread and milk in Barren Jewel

## Known magics

The major extant magics of Aerb (as of the start of the story) include air, blood, bone, carapace, fire, flower, gem, gold, ink, passion, pustule, revision, rune, sand, skin (including tattoo and scar), soul (aka essentialism), star, steel, still, velocity, vibration, warding, water, wood. A "major" magic is, apparently, a well-defined term that does not necessarily refer to how common the magic is, and whether a magic is "major" can be detected with warding.

In addition, there are a small number of free magic spells not tied to any magical "school". There are also magical effects (in the sense that they can ble blocked by warding) which cannot be learned but can be exploited, such as Entads and various magical materials.[*citation needed*]

Magics *not* known to the public but still technically extant in some form include library, spirit, tree, and pathist.

"Utility" magics of little or no combat value include sand, star, steel, and water magic. In addition, air magic is considered notably weak, wood magic is considered "struggling" and largely obsolete, and gold magic is considered hopelessly unstable long-term.

Vital, "keystone" magics include warding and rune magic (which is needed for bottling souls); additional laws are in place to limit research and potential exclusion of these magics.[*citation needed*]

The only bloodline magics that have been canonically described are water magic, possibly the magic(s) of the metal tribes, gelnid (now lost), and the voting magic of Parsmont (formerly). In Uther Penndraig's *The Star War*, Luke Skywalker possesses a bloodline magic passed down from his father.

Somewhat similar to bloodline magics are species-specific (specic) magics. Among the mortal species these include the anolia (soul sight), dragons, he’lesh (smoke), umbra (shadow), and vitrics (lightning), plus technically the Ell,[*citation needed*] and possibly others (such as the bellad, changelings, gimmal, lenssi, parovartako, renacim, and salin.) Non-sapient creatures with their own magics include unicorns, Mome Rath and it's brood, and possibly thaum-seekers and sirens.[*citation needed*] Although they might be easily mistaken for specic magics, non-anima are the complete absence of both species and magic, elven luck is technically non-magical, and scar and carapace magic can technically be used by almost any species.

Excluded magics (as of the start of the story) with a known exclusion zone include abyss, ash, blasphemy, breeding (aka Mendelian breeding), butterfly, chronomancy, clay (golems), clock, conjoinery, creationism, crystal, demonic binding, dibbling, Doris Finch (possibly aka copyclanning), esper, fleshmithing, force, gelnid (dead Exclusion), glass, gray, groove casting, invocation, juristiction, whatever is happening in Lanolei, lava, lenticular, lunar, mirror, nation (aka bureaucratic or divination), necromancy, the Necrotic Field Effect, the Niveau system, Parsmont's voting, portal, psionic, redaction, sculptrices (aka Ex Nihilo), shuism, smoke (not to be confused with he’lesh specic smoke magic), speciekinesis (likely aka funnel), tarot, thread, trovering, and uniqulomancy. Other excluded magics include bloodline, carrolism, constriction. Dream magic is believed to be excluded but is actually merely a lost magic, while ice magic is believed to be merely lost but is in fact excluded to an isolated area. Illusion magic was known to be excluded, but the exclusion zone was known only to a very few;[*citation needed*] as was the perfection magic of Celestar; the same was true of demiplanes for a long period, possibly including the period Worth the Candle takes place in.

The full list of known magics are:

* abyss (excluded, Cthonic EZ)
* air
* anolia specic magic
* ash (excluded, ÆEZ)
* binding, demonic (excluded, William's Net)
* blasphemy (excluded)
* blood
* bloodline (excluded)
* bone
* breeding, Mendelian (excluded, Mendel)
* butterfly (excluded, Papillion EZ)
* carapace
* carrolism (excluded)
* chronomancy (excluded, Knotted Noose EZ)
* clock (excluded, Oster EZ)
* conjoinery (excluded, Flintonstele EZ)
* constriction (excluded, possibly aka binding)
* creationism (excluded, Adamham)
* crystal (excluded, Glass Wall)
* dibbling (excluded, Degenerate Earth EZ)
* Doris Finch's magic (excluded)
* dragon specic magic
* dream-walking (lost, believed excluded)
* Ell extradimensional organs[*citation needed*]
* esper (excluded)
* fire
* fleshsmithing (excluded, Pendleham EZ)
* flower (part of Horticulture in Juniper's skills)
* force (excluded, Do Not EZ)
* funnel (excluded, likely the same as speciekinesis)
* gelnid (bloodline, excluded, dead, Moljer EZ)
* gem
* glass (excluded, Glassy Fields EZ)
* gold
* gray (excluded)
* groove casting (excluded)
* ice (excluded)
* ink
* invocation (excluded, Whiffle EZ)
* illusion (excluded, Athenaeum of Speculation and Scrutiny)
* jurisdiction (excluded, Iron Chane)
* Lanonlei's homeostasis effect (excluded)
* lava (excluded, Barren Reef)
* lenticular (excluded, Sunspots)
* library
* lightning (specic, vitric)
* lunar (time loops; excluded, Lunar EZ)
* mirror (excluded)
* Mome Rath & co's powers
* nation (aka bureaucratic or divination; excluded, Million Nations)
* necromancy (excluded, Necrolaborem)
* Necrotic Field Effect (excluded, Risen Lands)
* Niveau system (excluded, Spect)
* Parsmont's voting (formerly bloodline, now excluded)
* passion
* perfection (excluded, Celestar)
* plastic
* portal (excluded)
* psionics (excluded)
* pustule
* redaction (excluded, Bowdler)
* revision
* rune (excluded)
* sand
* sculptrice (aka Ex Nihilo; excluded, Theraba)
* shadow (specic, penumbral)
* shuism (excluded, Feng EZ)
* skin (including tattoo and scar; eventually excluded)
* smoke (excluded)
* smoke (specic, he'lesh)
* soul (Essentialism in Juniper's skills, partially and then fully excluded)
* speciekinesis (possibly aka funnel; excluded, Funnelin EZ)
* star
* steel
* still
* spirit
* tarot (excluded)
* thread (excluded, Torn Tapestry EZ)
* trovering (excluded, Rove)
* tree
* unicorn specic magic
* uniqulomancy (excluded, Unity)
* velocity
* vibrational
* warding
* water
* wood

## References

1. ↑ It had been explained to me that magic in the general sense could be divided up into three categories: latent, passive, and active.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 20: "Desert Course"
2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 There were twenty-two different kinds of magic, and that was the conservative count. Many of those only included in the less-conservative count were hereditary, racial, or otherwise not the sort of thing that was available to just anyone.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 19: "Montage!"
3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 There were velocity mages, water mages, wind mages, vibrational mages, steel mages, flower mages, revision mages, the list ran on and on, and on top of that, there were individual “spells” that were independent of any school, *plus* magic inherent to exclusion zones, *plus* magic only available to monsters, *plus* unique magics inherent in magic items.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 31: "The Loyal Elf"
4. ↑ “Sometimes, for reasons that no one really understands, one of these artisans will go into a forge frenzy where they’re overcome by a very particular idea and become dead-set on pursuing it, to the exclusion of money, reputation, family, sleep, food, et cetera. Once they’re finished, they come out of it, and sitting on their workbench, or wherever, is this thing that they didn’t actually know how to create, drenched in otherworldly magic and utterly, forever unique. Those are the entads. You’ve seen two of them so far, Fenn’s bow and the teleportation key.”
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 17: "Voting Blocs"
5. ↑ “The short version is that Silmar City was the target of the attack that formed the Risen Lands, it’s awash with the walking dead, and there was once a secret facility there dedicated to the study of necrotic field effect, which I believe contains a key we can use to teleport ourselves to safety.”
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 7: "Twenty Questions"
6. ↑ Water Magic was a bloodline magic
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 106: "The One-Hand Warder"
7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 In the parlance of Aerb, “a magic” usually refers to a systematized practice which can be learned and developed into an expertise. This is in contrast to an entad, which cannot be learned, developed, or duplicated, or a “free” spell which is essentially immutable and static once learned. Environmental effects are sometimes called magic, but that’s an improper, imprecise use of the term. Warders’ definitions also include entads under “magic”, but that professional definition is somewhat broader, including anything that they can see with their monocle and affect with their wards. - Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 5: Magics

	* Seven books from *The Commoner’s Guide* series, which Yasin, the shopkeeper, told me were more about demystifying magic than actually *teaching* magic, which was by and large only done at the athenaeums.
	—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 28: "The Impish Inn"
9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Fenn’s bow was latent magic, unless she used its special ability, in which case the thaum-seekers would probably see it like a lighthouse on the horizon.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 20: "Desert Course"
10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 The thaum-seekers would pour on speed to get at active magic, and would track passive magic from miles away, but I was assured that if they came across latent magic they wouldn’t hesitate to go for the kill. In this world that meant anyone with skin, bones, or blood, and we happened to have all three.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 20: "Desert Course"
11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 Wards provided generalized, rules-based, countermagic. This was really, really powerful in Aerb, where “magic” included abstract categories and concepts, like ‘blood’ or ‘bones’ or ‘water’ or even ‘velocity’, especially since wards could act on so-called latent magic.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 23: "Siege"
12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 Thaum-seekers (or thaum-suckers, depending on which of my party members I asked) could sense out and hunt down both passive and active magic at incredible range, but latent magic was mostly safe from them unless they were right on top of us.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 20: "Desert Course"
13. ↑ We moved in darkness, trusting in Grak’s magic-vision to get us where we needed to be. Based on our past discussions about the monocle, he would be able to see everything that had latent, passive, or active magic in it, which meant that it applied to about 95% of all things, including almost all magic items and most living creatures (save for non-anima).
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 87: "Down And Out"
14. ↑ And void crystals were “mundane” though every bone in my body was telling me that they were basically witchcraft.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 20: "Desert Course"
15. ↑ “There are things that a handgun won’t work on. The majority of entad armor will stop a small-caliber round, and a minority will stop larger calibers. There are also a wide variety of mages who are immune or resistant to gunfire, including pseudo-mages like the bladebound. There are species who will shrug off a bullet and monsters who will only gain power from them. Wards will also stop bullets dead in their tracks, if your target is bunkered down. It’s by no means a perfect solution, but it’s the first one you should reach for.”
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 145: "Freshman"
16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 Where specic magic is confined to a species and common among all members, bloodline magic is instead controlled by lineage, mediated by the soul. While at first blush they might appear similar, or it might appear that one is a subset of the other, they’re quite distinct from each other in terms of how who can and cannot use the magic is determined. Because they utilize the part of the soul which contains lineal information, bloodline magics tend to share many similar properties to entad inheritance. In contrast, specic magic tends to exclude those potential practitioners whose species is too diluted from crossbreeding (with specific dilution for ineligibility dependent on the specic magic).
—*A Brief Description of Aerb* Chapter 5: "Magics"
17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 58: Parsmont
18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 A number of creatures on Aerb are capable of practicing their own magic which is specific to their species. This “specic” magic is defined by the ability of the practitioner to learn and grow their ability with it. One example of this would be a unicorn, whose ability to distort time grows more powerful over time. There does not appear to be any substantial difference between the specic magics of the mortal species and those of so-called “magical creatures”, at least in principle. If a species is capable of producing an effect which is not subject to learning, growth, or development, that is instead a “specic effect”, though common parlance will tend to call both phenomenon “magic”.One example of this would be a unicorn, whose ability to distort time grows more powerful over time.
—*A Brief Description of Aerb* Chapter 5: "Magics"
19. ↑ 19.0 19.1 19.2 19.3 19.4 19.5 19.6 19.7 19.8 Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 5: Magics
20. ↑ The only spell I know is the one for sleep, and it’s not only unattached to a school, but there’s no way for me to safely demonstrate it - Chapter 9: Making Magic
21. ↑ With that she slipped under the covers and cast the sleeping spell over her forehead, putting her out like a light.

(That was the first spell I had ever seen, aside from maybe the slow-fall tattoo, depending on how it counted, way back when we’d been camping out in a farmhouse in the Risen Lands. It was one of the very few spells that were universal and without a school. It had no unintended applications that I could find, and Amaryllis had looked at me like I was an idiot for suggesting it could be exploitable. It didn’t work unless you actually wanted to get to sleep, and you couldn’t even fake it by consenting to the spell.) - Chapter 66: The Long Night
22. ↑ The origins of the magic within the LLEZ are still unknown, though warder analysis places it as a once-major magic. The exclusion of this magic is the first time it is known to have been recorded, and the appearance of the exclusion zone does not coincide with the removal of a major magic that was in use. - Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 26: Lalonei
23. ↑ Water Magic was there too, which I hadn’t expected, because it was supposed to be a bloodline magic. Library Magic I had never even heard of, and I was pretty sure that I knew all of the types of magic that Amaryllis knew, which should have been all of them. I had no clue what Spirit did. - Chapter 64: In Which Juniper Stares At His Character Sheet, Again
24. ↑ “There’s a whole lot of magic that’s excluded,” I said. “Tree Magic and Library Magic are two of the only ones that aren’t recognized schools of magic, which means that they’re either important or powerful, maybe both. Same with Spirit, though maybe that’s not a proper magic.” - Chapter 66: The Long Night
25. ↑ Water Magic was a bloodline magic
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 106: "The One-Hand Warder"
26. ↑ Gold mages used actual metallic gold somehow, and I couldn’t quite remember the details... I was *pretty* sure that they weren’t a Mistborn rip-off, but the metal tribes which *were* loosely adapted from that series did exist in Aerb, confined to their own section of the world. - Chapter 23: Siege
27. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 20: Moljer
28. ↑ “But Luke is Darth Vader’s son, is he not?” asked a woman in the group. “He’s hardly the lowest of the corrupt empire, given the heirloom passed down to him and the magic of his bloodline.” - Chapter 76: Date Night
29. ↑ 29.0 29.1 Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 8: Mortal Species
30. ↑ 30.0 30.1 30.2 30.3 Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition, available on Archive Of Our Own
31. ↑ Exclusion List spreadsheet (non-canon) https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1cf7Om1FB39v4KgvYjz5Mjcz4eefm9fQoXRglCUesoHs/edit#gid=0
32. ↑ 32.0 32.1 [Juniper’s Notes: Not to be confused with bloodline magic, which acts on a person’s bloodline. Pretty much no one knows about bloodline magic, and it’s excluded, so it’s a confusion of terms that only affects a very few.]
—*A Brief Description of Aerb* Chapter 5: "Magics"
33. ↑ 33.00 33.01 33.02 33.03 33.04 33.05 33.06 33.07 33.08 33.09 33.10 33.11 33.12 33.13 33.14 33.15 33.16 33.17 There were a few skills that were Tier 1, never removed from any possible reformulation of the character sheet. Those were Essentialism, Spirit, Bone Magic, and Still Magic, all of which were cost-less and evergreen.

[...]

Vibrational Magic, Blood Magic, Revision Magic, Star Magic, Velocity Magic, Plastic Magic, Ink Magic, Passion Magic, Water Magic, Warding, Gem Magic, Air Magic, Fire Magic, and Rune Magic all made the cut
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 172: "Respec"
34. ↑ Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 8: Mortal Species
35. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 54: Æ
36. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 13: Mendel
37. ↑ 37.0 37.1 37.2 In its heyday, Claw & Clocks was home to three separate time-related magics, which had all been united under a single institution: butterfly magic, clock magic, and revision magic. The former two were excluded, leaving revision magic to be taught alone, sometimes seen as the weakest of the triad. Opposite the time-related powers were the bodily magics, which in the beginning included various forms of lycanthropy, a number of specic magics, and fleshsmithing, a discipline shared with other centers of learning.
—*A Brief Description of Aerb* Chapter 2: "Athenaeums"
38. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 11: Papillion
39. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 62: Knotted Noose
40. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 49: Flintonstele
41. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 8: Adamham
42. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 42: Glass Wall
43. ↑ Dibbling was similar to warding, though much more short term, much faster, without the metamagic aspects, and some secondary abilities that wards couldn’t replicate, all drawing on rather abstract concepts of ground and earth.

-Worth the Candle Chapter 192
44. ↑ Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 8: Mortal Species
45. ↑ It’s often said that the plane of dreams is excluded, but this doesn’t fully convey the reality of the situation. What instead happened was that the magic of dream-walking was apparently excluded, to an unknown exclusion zone, if there is one, which cut off the ability of anyone on Aerb to step into the plane of dreams through that method.
—*A Brief Description of Aerb* Chapter 4: "Cosmology"
46. ↑ Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 5: Magics
47. ↑ I had a very slight advantage here, in that I had a list of eighty-two excluded skills. They didn’t fully map to the exclusions, but there was a list I could start going down. Funnel magic? Conjoinery? Uniqulomancy? Carrollism (please no)?
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 109: "The Veil of the World"
48. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 20: Moljer
49. ↑ ***Far inside the Glassy Fields exclusion zone, the only place on Aerb where glass magic still works***
**-**Worth the Candle chapter 43 In Search of a Quest
50. ↑ Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 5: Magics
51. ↑ tree as Dorian Gray ref (sp? maybe read, Wilde, close to historical Gray Magic (excluded))
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 105: "Notes"
52. ↑ a form of energy shaping, building up personal magical constructs through repeat castings

-Worth the Candle Chapter 192 Cooldown
53. ↑ In that era, the trial by adversity was done in the Whiffle exclusion zone, and while survivorship rates were abysmal, Onion had reached the border walls seven days after he’d been dropped, windseared and injured, the only one of his cohort to have lived.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 185: "Mirror Room"
54. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 16: Iron Chane
55. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 18: Barren Reef
56. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 10: Sunspots
57. ↑ Water Magic was there too, which I hadn’t expected, because it was supposed to be a bloodline magic. Library Magic I had never even heard of, and I was pretty sure that I knew all of the types of magic that Amaryllis knew, which should have been all of them. I had no clue what Spirit did. - Chapter 64: In Which Juniper Stares At His Character Sheet, Again
58. ↑ When mirror magic was excluded, apparently all forms of access to the plane of mirrors went with it.
—*A Brief Description of Aerb* Chapter 4: "Cosmology"
59. ↑ Worth the Candle: The Exclusionary Principle, 9th Edition - Chapter 58: Parsmont
60. ↑ [P]lastic had its own brand of magic to it.

The first half of it was easy enough; it was Reed Richards’ superpower, flexibility and stretchiness, which came with an ability to tank hits like there was no tomorrow, mediated by the plastic plates that were attached, fused, or integrated into their skin. At the magus level, with ten years of training, they could reshape themselves nearly at will, altering most aspects of their appearance. The second half of that was a bit scarier, with plasticity applied to their minds, allowing them to think and adapt faster than they could before. The old lady version of Amaryllis joked that she’d accidentally reinvented dopplegangers, but it wasn’t too far from the truth, especially given how often they were given infiltration and assassination missions.

(Two or more sufficiently skilled plastic mages could merge with one another, and that was where you started getting problems, insofar as things that might be exclusion worthy. That research was permanently banned after an incident that came close to destroying the world and was only stopped through heavy use of void weapons. After that, the members of the Plasticlique were rarely given assignments together, for fear that they would try something inadvisable.)
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 136: "Krinrael"
61. ↑ Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 5: Magics
62. ↑ Lots of libraries in J’s games, but only three really magical ones, Boundless Library with all books, Ascentium (sp?) with books whose stories become real, and Libor Mortis w/ something like redaction magic (excluded, Bowdler)
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 105: "Notes"
63. ↑ We got an exclusion.”

“Which?” I asked, frowning.

“Rune magic,”

-Worth the Candle chapter 233 Tartarology
64. ↑ Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 5: Magics
65. ↑ “The magics of Aerb can be divided into four distinct categories,” said the sea monster, “The first is phenomenological, magics founded on simple, understandable, base principles. Of these, gem magic, feng shui, and conjoinery are the most prototypical examples. The second category is metaphorical, where there is no one binding truth to the magic, merely reflections of humanoid interaction with the base subject. Blood magic, dibbling, and water magic are the most prototypical examples. The third --”
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 147: "Good Vibrations"
66. ↑ I decided on cutting skin magic, to save you the suspense.”

“You excluded all of skin magic?” I asked. “Scars and tattoos?”

“There were a few subfields that no one discovered,” he replied. “I always try to include little secrets like that, ways to expand things. I’d always wanted to do something with prehensile hair. But yes, all of it.”
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 162: "Deus Ex"
67. ↑ Smoke magic was primarily concerned with the alteration of perception, with the higher levels being able to push that perception into becoming reality. It had no connection with the he’lesh smoke magic, which was a completely different take on smoke-as-magic (that was just how Aerb was sometimes).
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 206: "Parallel Lines"
68. ↑ Worth the Candle: A Brief Description of Aerb - Chapter 5: Magics
69. ↑ 69.0 69.1 Tree Magic: distinct from Wood Magic.
—*Worth the Candle* Chapter 105: "Notes"