Forums

III.5 The Age of Obelisks

III.5.1 The Discovery of Summoning

(1) In the years following the destruction of Strite, a group of druids especially sensitive to the spirits at work in nature discovered a magical discipline never yet practiced by Gielinor's humans - summoning. It began with the following insight: "The spirits of nature are perfectly balanced to support the lives of everything which lives in the world of Gielinor. The spirits live in their realm of shadow, while we live in the realm of light. But is not this strict division unnecessarily rigid? Might not there be some balanced way by which the spirits visit us and we visit the spirits?"

(2) Based upon these questions, the druids developed a spell by which they established a connection with Gielinor's shadow realm - they called the shadow realm accessed in this manner the 'spirit plane.' This connection, established in different locations, began the growth of the summoning obelisks.

(3) Herein lies the genius of these druids in maintaining balance - every spell summoning a creature from the spirit plane would require as a cost a certain number of spirit shards shaved from the growing obelisks; should the druids have summoned the spirits too frequently, they would have depleted the obelisk and broken the connection; should the druids have summoned the spirits too infrequently, the resulting massive obelisks would have become attractive to their enemies and put the druids themselves at risk.

(4) The natural and gnarled appearance of the summoning obelisks was also seen as balancing the artificial architecture of the stone altars across the world. Whereas the altars of the druids represented receptivity of humans to the spirits of nature who dwelt separately in the shadow realm, the obelisks represented the activity of humans to reach out to the spirits and welcome them into the realm of light.

(5) Finally, the druids developed yet another counterbalance, a teleport spell for visiting the spirit plane. Although the spirits were less welcoming of humans than the humans were welcoming of summoned spirits, the druids determined that their visits to the spirit realm were appropriate, and useful as an additional source of spirit shards.

III.5.2 Early Modern Developments

(1) After the development of druidic summoning, the ogres followed suit, drawing upon their own tradition of summoning and adopting the new technology of summoning obelisks and shards. Planar theory also returned, as many humans experimented again with the various ways of accessing Gielinor's shadow realm. Some used the shadow realm to hide from or to spy on their enemies. Others sought out new spirits, pocket dimensions, and other things hidden there.

(2) Yet another field, closely related to summoning and early modern planar theory, appeared - oneiromancy. This was likely inspired by the use of oneiromancy by the mahjarrat, such as by Zemouregal against Arrav of Avarrocka or among the Fremennik around the times of syzygies. The interest in oneironmancy persists among the Moon Clan to the present day.

(3) Onieromancy also reintroduced access to the abyss - for in dreams we wander through realms of light, shadow, and the abyss, attuned to a wide array of spirits, and hardly distinguish among them. Just like accessing the shadow realm, dreams may be employed for scrying and for seeking out hidden things. This access to the abyss soon led to a new form of summoning - the summoning of creatures from beyond Gielinor's shadow realm, i.e. from the abyss and from other worlds.

(4) For the most part, this meant the demons of Infernus, who had for ages projected their spiritual presences into the abyss in order to scry and to influence events in the realms of light, such as was done by Agrith-Naar. When human oneiromancers, necromancers, and summoners encountered these demonic projections - if they were not consumed by the demons first - some would make a pact with the demons, granting them access to the world of Gielinor. This practice contributed in part to the pact with Azacorax, which gave humans permanent waking access to the abyss and made possible their modern teleportation spells.

III.5.3 The End of the Age

(1) The Age of Obelisks came to a close with the construction of the four elemental obelisks. The druids responsible for their construction followed a line of thought much less inspired than the one that led to the discovery of summoning. It goes as follows: "We have altars and obelisks dedicated to the spirits of nature, and altars dedicated to the elements of magic. Would it not be more balanced to construct obelisks corresponding to the elements of magic as well?"

(2) In contrast to the natural and gnarled look of the summoning obelisks, the elemental obelisks were crafted with great precision. Instead of growing and yielding their benefits with time like the summoning obelisks, the elemental obelisks provided constant and complete access to the relevant magical element. These were used by the mystics of the surviving schools to create staves aligned to the basic magical elements and combinations thereof - however, these staves made little impact on magical practice, for runic magic remained as simple as it had been since the early ages of the world.

(3) Although the Age of Obelisks appears to have come to a lackluster end, the conceptual changes it brought about cannot be underestimated. First, following the mechanisms of balance embedded within the practice of druidic summoning, i.e. the cost of spirit shards, human magic itself was reconceived according to the concept of exchange - for a certain cost, a certain effect is brought about. In the practice of summoning, for the cost of a determinate number of spirit shards, the summoner purchases the company and service of a summoned familiar for a determinate extent of time. The pacts of demon-summoning likewise exemplified such exchange.

(4) This reconception of magic was further supported by a development in necromancy at the time. While necromancy had taken many forms in ages past, one form in particular came to prominence in the late 4th age - that of exchanging life for life. For the cost of one living thing, the necromancer could resurrect or sustain another, at least for some amount of time. This contributed both to the reconception of magic as exchange and also to the modern tendency to quantify anima.

(5) Second, the end of the Age of Obelisks witnessed a new interest in the magical elements, specifically in the precise delineation of the magical elements - an interest clearly expressed in the architecture of the elemental obelisks. This interest came from several sources. First, a simplistic and overzealous search for balance among the less educated druids lent itself to crude enumerations and explanations of the magical elements, enumerations and explanations which always required further clarification. Second, access to the abyss had raised questions of how the magical elements might differ in other worlds. Third, the Age of Magic had begun with the discovery of summoning and the consequent reconception of the human magical tradition as exchange - it was not long before magic was conceived as lawfully regulated exchange, and a precise delineation of the magical elements promised to facilitate the discovery of the laws of magic.

(6) One figure especially exemplifies the strange innovations in magic at the end of the Age of Obelisks. This is Urval, founder of the chaos druids. Coming from the less educated ranks of druids, he was less bound to their traditional ways - so unbound to the inherited histories, in fact, that he identified Zamorak and Guthix as two manifestations of one being. He also zealously explored necromancy, demon-summoning, and the new possiblities of magical practice conceived as exchange, e.g. in experimenting with animal and human sacrifice. Banished from the order of druids, his followers established themselves in Taverly dungeon and other places where they sought further insight into new and darker forms of magic.

(7) We will conclude this section with a final, hypothethical remark. It is likely that few of these developments would have occured had the School of Strite endured. Necromancy would have been more effectively suppressed. Had summoning been discovered, it might have taken different forms, especially because the mystics of Strite would have resisted the reconception of magic according to the concept of exchange. More specifically, they would have insisted that the model of exchange obscures the concept of the ultimate darkness - for the satisfaction afforded by the ultimate darkness eludes the work of spirits and therefore cannot be incorporated into so organized a concept of magic.

(8) With the same reasoning the mystics of Strite might have undermined the growing interest in a more precise delineation of the magical elements, for this too risks a misleadingly neat account of magic. Finally, they would have demolished the reasoning that led to the construction of the elemental obelisks, condemning it as an illustration of the danger of a simplistic philosophy of balance. According to the mystics, without a thorough knowledge of the phenomena in question, one cannot know which factors need to be balanced. Before their fall, they had often curbed ill-conceived projects of druids undertaken in the name of balance, and the elemental obelisks would certainly have met the same fate.

III.6 Modern Runic Magic

III.6.1 The Causes and Effects of Runecrafting

(1) It has been said that the 5th age begins with the discovery of runecrafting. This is true only in part. The art of runecrafting was never lost among the Moon Clan and the Fremennik School. Rather, the 5th age begins with the discovery of the main rune essence mine and an efficient means for accessing it. Because of how remote Lunar Isle is and because of how small the rune essence rock there is and because runestones had always played a relatively minor role in human magics, few mystics or mages among the outlanders had ever taken interest in the art of runecrafting. But by the time the main rune essence mine was discovered, the foundations for an unprecedented and revolutionary interest in runecrafting had been laid.

(2) Three main factors contributed to the rise of Modern Runic Magic among Gielinor's humans. First, in the Age of Obelisks magic had been reconceived according to the concept of exchange, lawfully regulated exchange. The practitioners of magic had also taken a new, related interest in the precise delineation of the magical elements. These developments established a new agenda of magical research - research into the exact laws that govern the exchanges of magic.

(3) Second, after the fall of Strite and while the transformation of human magic was coming about, the ancient concepts of spirits and anima became obscure. In the Age of Sorcery, the power to act was thought to come from spirits. The concept of anima was applied to all living things, for they were receptive to spirits. During the Age of Mysticism, the tight link between power and spirits was broken - for mystics drew their power also from the ultimate darkness; power was no longer identified with spirits; anima was thought of as broader than, i.e. as responding to more than, spirits. It took the careful study of mystics to discern among feelings and desires and actions and rituals and customs the effects of native spirits, principle spirits, and the ultimate darkness and to distinguish among them. Without the guidance of the mystics of Strite, these concepts lost their precision. The concepts of 'spirits' and 'anima' became in popular consciousness vague forces underlying the practice of magic.

(4) Consequently, the concepts of anima and of the ordinary manifestation of spirits merged. 'Anima' came to mean 'spiritual power.' This spiritual power was said to come from within and was conceived as a force to be used efficiently. The new concept of anima fit nicely into the new paradigm of magic conceived as exchange - anima was the currency exchanged, the power directed. This exchange would be made visible in the consumption of runestones. With support from the reconception of magic as exchange and from the search for exact magical laws, as well as from developments in necromancy, anima was quantified - it became in a variable input for the new equations of magic theory.

(5) Furthermore, the concept of 'power' was likewise transformed. During the Age of Sorcery and for the most part during the Age of Mysticism, power was understood as always already directed by spirits toward certain activities; humans simply participated in power. Within the modern paradigm, however, spiritual power, i.e. anima, is thought of like a currency - it is anonymous, undirected, waiting to be directed toward one purpose or another, a quantity rather than a vector. The Age of Magic reaches its conceptual maturity with the consequent reconception of magical practice as the direction of spiritual power in lawfully regulated exchange .

(6) A warning remains to be made concerning the modern concept of magic. Spiritual power is not a force like electromagnetism. Anima remains a spiritual power, which means that it moves the heart. We sense it because our emotions are stirred and we are sometimes prompted to action. Unfortunately the spiritual element is occasionally forgotten, and this undermines our theorizing concerning magic. The same phenomena that underlay the ancient reflections of sorcerors and the studies of mystics underlie the modern concept of magic.