# Runic Flow — Magic System Rules

Full magic system documentation for Corvel.

**Elemental disciplines** (fire, earth, etc.) follow all Runic Flow base rules — anchoring, finite energy, complexity cost, trace residue, intent binding. Each element has its own technique taxonomy and practitioner conventions, but the underlying system is the same. See element-specific references for detailed technique documentation:

- **Fire magic:** `/world/magic/fire-magic.md` — technique taxonomy, energy costs, focusing ring specification, practitioner profiles

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## Magical Materials

### Ghostveil Moss

**What it is:** A rare moss that absorbs and dampens ambient magical energy. When properly prepared, it creates a localized suppression field that weakens active magical workings within its range.

**Where it grows:** Magically saturated underground environments — abandoned mines, collapsed arcane workshops, sealed chambers where decades of leaked magical residue have pooled. The moss feeds on decayed magical residue, converting ambient arcane energy into inert biological mass. Same principle as verdenshade (which feeds on residual magic in the Greymarch Barrows) but a different plant with a different useful property.

**Known growth sites near Drenwick:**
- **Velken's Drift** — abandoned magical ore mine ~3 hours SE of Drenwick. Primary accessible source. See `/world/locations/velkens-drift.md`

**Why it's rare:** Most known growth sites have been harvested to extinction by the Arcane Compact, who use ghostveil moss in controlled, licensed curse-breaking settings. The Compact controls access to the material through its regulatory authority over magical resources. Not commercially available — practitioners who need it must go through Compact-approved channels (which can be denied). Evidence from Book 1 suggests the Compact actively suppresses wild sources by hiring crews to strip growth sites bare, ensuring their monopoly on curse-breaking materials.

**Preparation:** Wrong technique destroys the dampening properties. Requires botanical expertise — specifically, knowledge of how to harvest without disrupting the moss's magical absorption structures, and how to process it for different applications. Mere Fields' botanical expertise is essential.

**Two preparations (discovered in Book 1):**

1. **Standard preparation — Dampening agent:**
   - Creates a temporary (~30-60 minute) suppression field when applied near an active magical working
   - Weakens the working's signal, making it vulnerable to conventional curse-breaking during the window
   - Parallel to binding salts dampening the dog curse (Ch03) — same principle at industrial strength
   - Used on **Layer 1 (Degradation Curse)** of Ned's three-layer curse

2. **Altered concentration — Life-force drift accelerant:**
   - Different concentration and application method
   - Instead of dampening external magical energy, it accelerates the natural drift of a person's life-force signature
   - Applied to **Layer 3 (Dead Man's Switch/Anchor)** — the anchor is keyed to Ned's life-force signature. Accelerating the drift pushes Ned's signature beyond the anchor's tolerance range, causing it to fire into empty space
   - This application was Devod Fields' conceptual breakthrough ("if you can't unlock the lock, move what it's locked to"), executed technically by Phelan

**Sniff parallel:** The binding salts Mere used intuitively on the cursed dog (Ch03) operate on the same principle as ghostveil moss — dampening magical energy to weaken a working. The dog cure was the small-scale proof of concept; the Floundry cure is the industrial-strength application. Phelan recognizes this connection explicitly.

**Ghostveil and the crystal-drain echo (Book 3 canon):** Ghostveil also dampens the personality residuals that pre-Compact amplification crystals leave in their drain victims. Same drug, same mechanism, extended application. The Compact's ghostveil chokehold is partly maintained to limit treatment access for this class of victim — senior leadership knows, rank-and-file does not. See `/world/magic/crystal-drain-echo.md` for the mechanic, victim map, and discovery arc.

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## Pre-Compact Residue — Sheath-Loss Imprint

Pre-Compact amplification crystals (Kae's Mallory crystal is the canonical example) draw life-force from their targets. The drain strips the victim's arcane **sheath** — the internal structure that regulates suppressed aspects of the psyche and dormant magical capacity. The sheath does not fully regrow. Each victim develops a unique personality residual governed by a universal rule: *the drain amplifies what the victim most deeply suppressed.*

Modern Runic Flow theory does not fully account for this. Pre-Compact archives document the phenomenon (referenced in the Book 3 Athel Repository archive). The Compact's public magical-system doctrine omits it.

Full worldbuilding reference: `/world/magic/crystal-drain-echo.md`
Full design spec: `docs/superpowers/specs/2026-04-21-crystal-drain-echo-design.md`
