Overview of Magic, Souls, and FTL technology

The Aether

Existing parallel to realspace is the Aether, a plane of reality with many strange physical properties. Physical matter can access the aether field by acquiring a sufficient density of “aether charge”. Once an object has been sufficiently charged, it “jumps” into the Aether. The charge threshold needed to make the jump is the result of the Veil, the ancient colloquial term for a poorly understood potential barrier separating realspace and the Aether.

The speed of light in the Aether is significantly higher than in realspace, although over long ranges electromagnetic waves do not propagate in a predictable fashion.

Auron

The simplest form of connection between realspace and the Aether is known as an aura. An auron can be thought of as a unidirectional portal linking realspace to the aether (known as a realspace-aether connection, r-a, or RAC auron) or aether to realspace connection (aether-realspace connection, a-r, or ARC auron). Matter in realspace with a strong enough r-a link will be transported to the Aether. Matter in the Aether with a strong a-r auron will be transported to realspace. Materials like sunsail have very strong permanent auras, and these auras give these substances their exotic properties. All interactions between auras occur in either realspace or the Aether.

Starheart Rays

Starheart rays are RAC aurons not bound to