Casting Fundamentals

Casting is a term used to refer to how an individual may have the ability to assert and manifest their will on reality. This ability is most commonly associated with Spires.

How casting is achieved has been a point of fascination and fear for Astorians since before recorded history. Many myths, legends, and folktales have formed around the art of casting, often contributing to misinformation as to how it is achieved or controlled.

Soul Expression
Soul expression is an entry level subject of study for Spires, the subject revolves around the core concept that the soul is an intermediate between the mind and the world. The mind innately holds an infinite potential to influence the world, and every living creature does this in some form, whether through physical influence, or through the expenditure of soul essence, which is referred to meta-physical influence, or casting.

This subject is split into two main categories, physical soul expression, and meta-physical soul expression;

Physical soul expression attempts to understand the conscious, or unconscious decision making of others. This can be studied on an individual, or societal level, and also covers Astorians, Devoid and animals as decision makers.

Whereas meta-physical soul expression attempts to understand how the mind influences soul essence, and how it can interact with the world.

The Essence Spectrum
Early observations by scholars into how soul essence interacts when outside a soul vessel showed that when essence leaves a vessel, either through natural loss, or intentional expenditure, it changes colour, flow pattern and concentrates on specific parts of a vessel.

Each interaction element equates to a specific level of depth within the essence spectrum;

First Level of Depth: Emotion
Not to be confused with casting colour, essence colour is linked directly with the mind of a vessel holder, specifically their emotions. Extensive experimentation done by scholars into what changes the colour of essence resulted what is now referred to as the emotional spectrum;

The emotional spectrum has gone through many iterations based on the most prevailing soul theories at the time, this is primarily due the inherent difficulty in attempting to separate conscious and unconscious emotions, as well as multiple simultaneous emotions combining to create other colours as a result.

Within the most modern version of the emotional spectrum there are two categories of essence, primal essence, and refined essence;

Primal Essence

Primal essence is a binary indication of life, or the lack of it. Neither forms of primal essence are an emotion in themselves, but a requirement to present refined essence.

Life essence is the positive primal essence aspect and presents as white, it indicates whether something is able to influence the world, and consequently considered alive.

Death essence is the negative primal essence aspect and presents as black, it indicates a lack of ability influence the world, and consequently considered dead.

While not an officially acknowledged essence type, sleep (grey) essence is the theorized state of unconsciousness brought about by the numbing of the senses.

Refined Essence

Refined essence is the conversion of life essence into a specialised state, this conversion is filtered through the mind before manifesting from a point on the body. Typically mental filters refer to an individual’s conscious or unconscious emotions, but other filters such as morality, and strength of will can also influence essence.

However within the emotional spectrum, emotional colour association is the main point of focus to determine casting intention. In the most modern version of the emotional spectrum, refined essence is divided into 9 distinct colour and emotion pairings;

Second Level of Depth: Element
A casting art is a specific area of study related to expending soul essence in an intentional way to get specific results. Within a casting art there are primary anchors which one may use create the strongest effect from, this anchor refer to specific emotions.

The casting art of physimancy, is the oldest form of casting art, and as such has had ample time to be refined and observed. The primary anchors for each known element can be delegated to each of the known emotions within the emotional spectrum, making elements the second level of depth on the essence spectrum.

Third Level of Depth: Body Part
Casting arts also have a secondary anchor which is used to show where on the body soul essence can be expended the most efficiently. This anchor can be tied to either emotions or elements, and is usually the lesser known aspect of a casting art.

Advanced casters are able to move and expend essence in specific parts of their body consciously, however in most cases casters will subconsciously attempt to cast from the most efficient places in their body to some degree, based on what they are attempting to do. If a caster has injured, or otherwise has a part of the body unavailable to cast from they will not be able to cast efficiently.

The associations in this level of depth is based on the most common observations of casting in various arts, but note that body part associations can be unique based on the individual, and may need self-exploration for greater accuracy.

Casting Flow
While often associated with the essence spectrum, casting flow is usually a conscious process. Casting flow is the specialised way in which a caster expends their essence, and can be applied to any casting art;
 * Augmentation – Use of essence to strengthen an element
 * Depletion – Use of essence to weaken an element
 * Stabilization – Use of essence to keep an element the same
 * Projection – Use of essence to move an element
 * Emission – Use of essence to radiate an element from the vessel or area
 * Manifestation – Use of essence to create an element
 * Transformation – Use of essence to change one element into another

Trivia

 * As casting requires emotions as a staring spark, Sterts are unable to do any form of casting, or increase their soul capacity.