Ruminations of Light and Shadow

{A/N: Thanks to reader Vylric for leading me to the TES originated shadow magic! It's a doozy, I'm gonna need to digest it slowly and sort it together with plans I had for magic's origin, but it was a great find.}

"For now, let's try adding light and shadow to my elemental palette before going on a goose chase with this whole 'planes' idea," Yuri digressed.

He already knew how to project a light-based spell with the alteration spell candlelight and mage light as well as the sunlight spells for undead in restoration, but they were very simple applications of projection and didn't really get to the meat of it.

Hard light constructs were what he was after. In this darkness of night, the errors of his spellcasting will shine like a beacon. The Alteration School light spells were more like amorphous blobs of hardly controlled light, its theory was dependent on the idea of a non-dense and short-lived star, and the Restoration spells were just intense beams of sunlight.

Yuri held his hand palm up, the flicker of the campfire casting shadows behind it, and used the mana within him to will motes of light from its conversion. In a short moment, his hand erupted like a den of fireflies as each mote traveled up and took the outline of a sword. Specks of the stuff continued to fill Yuri's construct until he felt that it had no gaps. With a gripping motion, he ordered it to condense one final time, and the sword grew smaller and its base was uniform, emitting a bright white glow with a yellow tint.

He let the sword, now hanging horizontally, tilt its hilt into his hand and descend. As it fell into his hand, the only way Yuri was able to tell it was in his hand was the mana he felt into it and the way it felt when he wrapped his fingers around the hilt.

"As expected, it has no weight no matter how solid I make it," Yuri commented. He waved it around and it left trails of yellow in its path in the dark of night. As it was weightless, it waved at the speed of his wrist without any resistance. He got aggressive with a couple of swings, only for the spell to break back down into specks and scatter in the direction of his swing while he was left with a hilt.

Yuri let go of the hilt, then called a spear of light into existence. Its shape was exactly spear-like with a tip and 5-foot shaft. Yuri looked at the wall that stood opposite from him, right of the ruin entrance, and flung it towards the wall.

It was FAST. Super fast. Faster than any lightning spell he had ever created. Yuri wouldn't have been able to dodge his own spell, but he knew it hadn't reached light speed because he could still see it in flight, if only barely. Light speed isn't something you can just achieve with the use of light. Yuri couldn't launch even a weightless projectile at that speed yet.

What disappointed him afterward was the fact that as soon as it hit the wall, it shattered into specks once more. Here lies the issue. Yuri would have to either expend enough mana to generate a more solid construct, make it sharper and/or thinner, or rethink the whole theory he was operating on. Yuri wasn't confident on which route to take.

So Yuri did what he hadn't done in a while, he went to the Exchange for help.

'Find me a book on the principles of light and shadow magic'

[*Briiing* 462 Entries]

Every book that comes out of the Exchange except language education books is already translated for him, so he wasn't worried about that. He scrolled looking for a basic theory book instead of books regarding specific spells. Less than halfway through, he found what seemed to be a general concept tome.

['Ruminations of Light and Shadow' purchased, 8450 RP remaining]

The cover had no title, just a symbol of a crescent moon surrounding a simple sun design. It was black and bound in gold-colored threading around the spine and the symbol's edges. Without further ado, he opened it and read.

'In my travels between the elemental planes....'

"Holy shit... moving on"

'In my travels between the elemental planes, the spirits I had contracted in pursuit of accelerating the growth of my Law Seed had informed me that the contracts between Light and Shadow spirits are not to be taken as lightly as the others. When I had asked them why it was so difficult for me to enter the planes of Light and Shadow, they informed me that to attempt to do so may bring about my destruction. They are not simple opposing elements like Fire and Water, but some of the first laws to form the Omniverse.

Light and Shadow are the 'elder brothers' so to speak, the genesis of duality in the Omniverse's manifestation. Even when all laws of physical, spiritual, and metaphysical were merely existing in the Firmament and had not moved past the Spatial boundary to help in the creation of the infant universes, Light and Shadow were bringing about the makings of a perilous age in the universe.

Light and Shadow had not only established themselves as rudimentary elements in a world's inception but preternatural concepts of Order and Chaos, Truth and Lie, Peace and War, Fate and Karma. If they found any two laws had joined the Omniverse creation effort and were reflecting each other in duality, Light and Shadow had manifested that struggle between themselves and swallowed a piece of that very law. To attempt to fully 'magically' control these elements, one must not perceive them as the flicker of a candle's brightness against their walls or the absence of the sun when the moon conceals it, but the primordial struggle between order and chaos, the balancing act on a cosmic scale, the cycle between war and peace, the two faces of man.

It was only after this revelation taught to me by a frightened bunch of Life spirits that I had come to the realization that perhaps I wasn't as adept at these magics as I had previously supposed. So I went home and tried to further my mastery over them to some extent.

I had previously only been using light and shadow for illusion, concealment, offensive beams, and the occasional shadow curse. So I tossed aside the magic circles I had so carefully formed over the decades and started fresh.

It has been 3 weeks since that period of practice and I may inform the reader that the spirits were right.

Light magic despises impurity or contradiction, it takes residence of mana driven by uniformity and order, by simplicity, and takes even greater relish when fully aware that it is created to cast out darkness, chaos, or corruption. When I realized this effect, I took advantage of it. Light magic retains the greatest strength when faced with a corrupt enemy. It even propelled my healing magic to new heights when applied to the purification of curses or festering wounds.

Shadow magic is the opposite. It enjoys being in conflict with all things, including light. Shadow magic fascinated me because it could be much more easily generated at the sight of war or even in an argument between father and son. It not only feeds from this conflict but records it. When I cast shadow magic on a stone I intentionally corrupted then destroyed with light magic, it gave me a foggy black image of the very moment of that same collision moments before.

I had learned that the deciding factor between a collision between Light and Shadow magic was the mana supply involved like the two forces had adapted and been so diametrically opposed for so long that neither could make an advantage. When casting both magics at once weakly, they eliminate each other and the spells die without a trace. When cast equally and strongly, the resulting clash is nothing short of cataclysmic destruction. Interestingly enough, the resulting color looked purple to me during their clash.

The reader must note that these magics operate heavily on intention and target. If someone manages to contract one of these spirits before I do, I imagine they will not have much success in contracting the other and the decision will be set in stone.'

Yuri couldn't find the words to speak for some time. Everything in the book was too shocking. For one, he had missed not two but three elements in his palette and didn't even know where to begin with the Life element. Terms such as Spirits, Law Seeds, and the chronology of the Omniverse's creation were quite a shocker, too.

"I don't know shit, do I," Yuri couldn't muster the profundity of the smallness he felt once again, just like being in front of Akasha herself. The confirmation of the existence of planes and the vastness of existence he was tasked to pursue couldn't lay themselves any harder on his chest.

The book went on to speak of specific spells the man had invented and recorded in magic circles and chants for greater effect. He skimmed through the end and found a familiar name in the author's signature.

"Merlin Emrys Wyllt, the man himself." It was good to know such a sorcerer was the one he was taking advice from. Perhaps he would meet him in the future.

"Elemental planes, huh? It seems that if I ever want my elemental magic to wear its big boy shoes I need to contract spirits. Law seeds... I have a feeling I know what those are but I don't want to go down yet another goose chase for a concept even larger than Light and Shadow."

Yuri went on to attempt a few of the recorded spells. A runic circle centered with sacred symmetrical geometry appeared before his outstretched hand. With the conviction to cut down all confusion and free the world of the bindings of chaos, Yuri chanted.

"The waning moon is beset on all sides by the coming of magnificent dawn, descent of virulent hate severed from this world in twain and pierced with a righteous vindication. Rejoice, thy stillness shall be established. Rejoice, thy sorrow cast aside in the light of purity. Lux Lanceum"

[Arcane Light Spell Learned - 500 RP]

From the circle before him, a spear straight from the myths slowly exited. With every inch of air it took a hundred feet of darkness receded, the night was quickly overtaken by a blinding globe of sunlight as if Magnus was summoned from the sky. The Dwemer ruin could no longer be seen from the outside as a soft glow had consumed it and it quickly expanded to the forest and plains beyond.

Citizens of Whiterun to the Southwest and Windhelm to the direct East who were either still awake or had been abruptly awoken had either mistaken the overwhelming light they saw in the distance as an early sunrise or the wrath of Meridia herself. Forest spiders fled the scene as fast as they could while the Spriggan in the glade by Riften attempted to make a pilgrimage immediately.

Yuri was still supplying the spear with an incredible amount of mana from the Eye when he realized that the spell wasn't straining him at all, thus the incredible effects. He couldn't see at all, using ESP and closing his eyes to save his sight. The spear was in the same shape as his previous but would be mistaken by anyone for a weapon of the gods with its holy glow.

Yuri stopped supplying mana to the spear and the sunlight it had brought with it slowly receded, yet when he could finally see his surrounding he realized that the darkness had not overtaken the area that the light had conquered yet. An artificial morning had been made in the area around him and he could see blue skies above. It looked like darkness wouldn't take this area back until the next sunset, confirming the more magical nature of Light and Shadow's conflict.

Yuri looked at the spear he still held out with the magic circle he created. "This thing is dangerous as shit and I have no idea where to throw it," Yuri looked around for a target before deciding up would be best. He aimed the magic circle and therefore the spear directly above him before launching it.

Without a sound, it took off and imitated a star ascending into the heavens, carving out an unnatural-looking path devoid of darkness all the way past the stratosphere. If space were in fact darkness and not its own concept without either of those forces, perhaps it, too, would brighten up. Yuri had long lost sight of the spear when it entered the exosphere.

"Best not supply that much mana again no matter how fun it looks. Merlin would probably say to approach this with caution." Yuri affirmed himself.

"Alright, moving on. That spell was a higher grade? Or at least a different grade. A single spell gave me 500 RP, it must be higher than even Minor. So Basic, Minor, Arcane is what I've done so far. Perhaps Arcane is where the magic starts to make use of an element's primary natural laws. Then again, I still have no idea so best not to make guesses."

Yuri continued practicing the spear and studying its concept and effects to make it without chant and circle next time. Though he found the spell to be less effective, mainly because he had no darkness to cast aside, but he would make do since he didn't want to go around canceling nighttime. After a while, he managed it and sated his curiosity for light magic for now. He would be back for it later. He hadn't gotten the basic light manipulation skill yet.

"Alright, onto darkness"