Nixeu
Lord of Madness, Harbinger of Llamas
- Location
- Your nightmares.
So. It's actually my worst-case scenario for corrupted Rukh. It's not just colorless, but Devoid. Instead of just no longer doing it's usual job, it's actively harmful. Oh goody.That same hand also serves to cover your retching after you actually sense the mana concentration of the connected structures before you. There's plenty of Blue and White, certainly, but there's also the familiar wrongness of Devoid. It seems to be contained in tiny spirits for the time being, but if enough of them are gathered in one place? They'd collapse and make the area as hostile as Eternity. This many mages might be able to contain such environmental changes, although the predators between planes would be another story entirely. Your predecessor worked hard to conceal this section of Eternity from their gluttonous gazes; the last thing you need is to bring them back.
More importantly, we get a hint as to why we can only see a small number of planes. It seems like planes have been isolated to hide them from the Eldrazi. Which means we can't see outside of the concealing "bubble".
Said organization was probably the source of the information that got Magnostadt to a start doing this, down to their propaganda about how the Rukh govern Fate. Which, to be fair, they do. They also are most likely the force supporting the world, it being artifical and made by magic.In regards to the vote, I'd prefer to handle this as diplomatically—and discreetly—as possible. In canon Magi the main villains were a group of mages whose objective was to destroy the world. Even if they don't exist in this AU, publicly broadcasting that colorless Rukh in sufficient concentrations can destroy the world/universe to an audience of mages capable of creating them is unwise, to say the least.
Even without that, screwing with magic concentrations and mana's natural state, on a large scale, on high-mana worlds, seems to be a bad idea. It upsets existing balances, and can cause catastrophes. Thedas' Veil (assuming a similar origin to it's origin in-canon) and Remnant's Black Enchantment seem to be examples of this, as both are massive spells that seem to alter ambient mana levels, and both have produced dangers in the process.
Similarly, disturbances to the mana of many areas of Velgarth from the Cataclysm produced monsters and altered the wildlife, and continue to do so. And it's mana networks display some rudimentary sort of consciousness or will, that actively resists alteration. For good reason. It's not a good idea, most of the time.
Introducing Magnostadt to the underlying ideas, then sitting back and letting them do all the work, was their modus operandi, with regards to Magnostadt, in-canon. They helped them build a self-defense device that could, as a side "benefit", gather enough corrupted Rukh in a single spot to summon their god. Then they manipulated things to heve Magnostadt attacked, and by a force that they couldn't otherwise match. In this case, Al-Thaman may simply have played on someone in an important position's personal tragedy, and told them "this is how you fight Fate".Magnostadt is one of the most magically empowered places on this planet, right? If it's only happening a little here, it's hopefully not happening much elsewhere? At least if this is just experimentation, not that cult people were talking about...
I'd be very surprised if Magnostadt managed to discover Devoid without an outside nudge of some sort. All of the other cases of Devoid use, or possible Devoid use, are either linked with us, or old enough that one of our predecessors might have been involved. This is way too recent to be a predecessor. So either they got it from an ancient source, or people can discover the Eternities without our involvement. Either way, I have some hard questions for whoever "discovered" this.
Additionally, Magnostadt's students do go elsewhere, to apply their talents, sometimes. So there may be Devoid Rukh in other locations, albeit in much smaller amounts.
That may just lead to people doing it where both we and their council can't see. Devoid corrupts. If this is anything like canon, that includes souls.I do not want to say things like "burn the academy to the ground" in front of Nanoha.
On top of that, threats are the worst way to handle this. If we threaten to burn their academy to the ground they're just going to keep doing their research where we can't see it. The only way to keep this from happening again is to get them entirely off the topic and make it officially a no-go, and we do that by handling this diplomatically.
Not dying horribly is in their interests. I do get your point, though.We need to make it in their interest. Ask them what measures they are taking to prevent total reality collapse. Offer alternative anti-destiny magic. Give some technology and knowledge. Make some of them immortal.