Monday 17 September 2007

Pic of the day: "Yes, it is a kind of magic... the inexhaustible power of the Light flowing freely through its Servants." Misty Bookman explains to her husband why she is glowing at the breakfast table.

Imaginary Lightwielders

It is soon NaNoWriMo again! Okay, not really, but soon it will soon be NaNoWriMo again! Sorry, but that is how NaNoWriMo crazies think, and I have been a NaNoWriMo crazy since 2002. (Although I don't take ALL my vacation in November...)

Looking back, I realize that I have not actually written any Lightwielder stories for NaNoWriMo. After all, it is only NaNoWriMo once a year. This needs to be fixed in a future update of NaNoWriMo... Anyway, that's one of the possible ideas that are cropping up for this year's NaNoWriMo. (Notice how all this happens after I not only complain about having lost all inspiration for writing, but even start to think of it as a good thing and a sign of spiritual progress that I no longer "need" to write fiction.)

Speaking of spiritual progress, I wonder what genre my Lightwielder stories would fit in, Fantasy or New Age / Spiritual Fiction. Probably still Fantasy, although it is rather different from the "high fantasy" of Tolkien and his countless followers, with elves and dwarves and dragons and demigods. It is also starkly different from the "urban fantasy" where vampires or werewolves blend with the nightlife in contemporary cities. I haven't really given it much thought before, but Lightwielders are kind of timeless. It is possible to imagine a Lightwielder in the Stone Age, although they would have to rely on oral tradition rather than the Book of Light. It is certainly possible to imagine Lightwielders in space, although I am not much into Science Fiction anymore.

It is still intended to be fantasy though, just not quite as removed from reality as the usual fantasy magic. You can say I have greatly exaggerated the side effects of real-life spiritual traditions, and fused them with the fantasy concepts of white magic from popular games such as "Magic: The Gathering" and of course "Master of Magic", where white magic is the power of healing and protection.

***

To recap (just because I love it): Lightwielders are ordinary people who are allowed to channel the Light, a mystical power that can best be thought of as a kind of divine aura. It certainly has an alignment, but not a personality. (In other words, it is not a God as we would use the word. You don't pray to the Light, and the Light does not talk to you or lay down a complete set of rules for your life.)

You don't need to be "mageborn" to become a Lightwielder, and intelligence is of no use as long as you are not severely retarded. The one (but very hard) requirement is absolute honesty. No lies, no deceit, no closing your eyes to reality. You need a mindset of actively choosing the truth in every way, always. No white lies, no flattery, no evasion. The Light treats all these as obstacles and refuse to let you channel it until you lay them off, to the point where you even have to confront old lies and confess them if they are still relevant. (Much of a novice's day is spent on confession and meditating on their past in the new Light.)

Once you are a practicing Lightwielder, lying will cause Lightburn, a condition of intense physical and psychic pain which might even cause death. Such spontaneous combustion is however very unlikely, because you tend to learn your lesson early in your career!

While the strict demand for honesty even in your thought may remind you of modern religions, the Light does not seem to have any opinions on gay marriage and capital punishment. It does not even require you to give to the poor, although the kind of person who seeks out the Light is likely to be loving and caring. Lightwielders are highly unlikely to commit crimes of brutality, even apart from the fact that they could not lie about it afterwards. You see, the only thing you can really do with the Light is enlighten, warn, protect and heal. That's it. Well, the "enlighten" part is rather literal so you will be able to illuminate dark places, but most people would probably prefer carrying a torch over losing all their illusions and most of their friends.

Even after you have cleaned all conscious lies from your life, you will not suddenly become a master of magic. You will only be able to channel a trickle of Light at first. The way you do this is not by spells but by songs. I assume that a highly advanced Lightwielder will be able to channel by intent only, with no need of songs. Certainly a Lightwielder with sufficient insight can create his own songs, but I don't see this happening often. There is (in the three cases I have studied so far) a Book of Light that contains a goodly number of ready-made songs, chosen for their evocative qualities as well as for ease of singing and ease of remembering.

There are currently 212 songs in the Book of Light, each with commentary on their meaning and use. (Or so my characters say - I have not written the Book of Light yet.) The songs are ordered in such a way that the first are the most general, and also the easiest to sing and remember. They also require the least skill or power (usually called "Affinity"). It is said that you truly need only the three first songs, the Songs of Blessing. Certainly novices are strongly encouraged to stick with these at first. After these come more special songs, such as Healing from Wounds or Healing from Disease. A more specialized song is more efficient at what it does. For instance, the song of Blessing of Living Things will also cause some healing, along with warning of danger, protection from danger, and protection from illusion (when applicable). But the song of Healing from Disease will be far better at curing any random ailment, although at the cost of doing very little to warn you of slippery steps. There is probably a Healing from Cancer somewhere near the end of the book, because people in these societies live fairly long lives so run a similar risk as us. If there is, it will not do much good against hemorrhoids and anemia.

Unlike the spells of most magic systems, the Songs are continuous effects. The effect (or chance of effect) builds up over time. So if someone is subject to a song of Healing, they will gradually heal over time. The effect may be barely noticeable if the song is very general and the novice barely has any Affinity. A more specialized song chanted by someone with great Affinity may have immediate, miraculous effects. But of course it may easily take a century or two to get that "miraculous" level of skill and power, so patience is essential in any case. It is just that in the first case it is the patience of the patient, so to speak, whereas in the second case it is the patience of the Lightwielder we're talking about.

Incidentally, they prefer to call themselves Servants, or more formally Servants of the Light.

The effects of the Light radiate from the Lightwielder indiscriminately. You don't, for instance, heal any one particular person. You Heal. That is, you sing the healing chant and anyone who is close will be bathed in the healing energies. You cannot avoid healing someone if they manage to stick close to you while you try to heal someone else.

The effects of the Light also rub off on the Servant. The more they channel these energies, the more they are affected. Eventually there will be a constant trickle of Light through them even when they are not singing or even consciously thinking of the Light at all. It warns them of dangers, and sometimes of opportunities. At later stages, random revelations will keep happening to them, so they will know a lot of things they should not be able to know. They do not however have conscious control of this. There are also other forms of Extra-Sensory Perception, such as the ability to see in the dark (this starts fairly early in their career, but improves over time) and eventually see through walls and other surfaces. Other senses also improve, though I am not sure they can actually hear people's thoughts or if that is just a legend. There aren't that many superhero-level Lightwielders I can interview about it.

The healing energies also affect the Lightwielder, so they enjoy a very robust health after a while. At some point their aging begins to slow. However this is only noticeable at higher levels of Affinity, which none in living memory has achieved in their youth. So Lightwielders tend to spend a very long time as old people, but with the robust health and keen senses of the young. Eventually their aging may slow down to almost nothing and they may live for centuries. Some don't, though, because they just aren't that obsessive. It is completely voluntary. The Light never forces you to channel it.

I think this just about sums up my current Lightwielder lore. Of course, when November actually comes, I will most likely have jumped on to some other idea. Like a butterfly hopping from flower to flower. Always something new, or something old, in the Chaos Node.