Soul Carving
Soul Carving
Classification: Specialization
Parent School: Soul Magic
Soul Carving is the most invasive, agonizing, and universally reviled branch of Soul Magic. It focuses on directly modifying, damaging, or enforcing permanent magical effects upon a target's soul.
Specialization Rules
This is an advanced Specialization. To learn Spells (Powers) in this field, a mage must use their dot-purchase selections from the Soul Magic skill track. Furthermore, specific spells within Soul Carving will explicitly require a secondary prerequisite (such as 1 or 2 dots in collateral Schools) to simulate the mixed-matrix required to cast them.
Progression
Acquiring dots and Powers here requires deep dedication. The spells are extremely potent but narrowly focused.
Example Powers
| Tier | Example Effect | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Tier 1 | Soul Sight | The foundational prerequisite. Allows the caster to perceive the spiritual essence and soul structure of living and dead entities. |
| Tier 2 | Soul Link | Forges a permanent, metaphysical connection between two souls, allowing them to share pain, emotions, or locate one another across vast distances. |
| Tier 3 | Geas / Curse | Enforces a permanent, binding compulsion or detrimental effect directly onto the target's soul. It cannot be removed by standard Negation or Mind Magic. |
| Tier 4 | Soul Mutilation | Directly attacks the target's soul, causing unimaginable agony that bypasses all physical armor and pain tolerance. Can permanently cripple a mage's mana capacity. |
| Tier 5 | Soul Splitting | The darkest art. Tears a fragment of a soul away to create a phylactery, anchor a permanent ward, or graft onto another being. |
Lore Deep Dive
The Indestructible Core:
Souls are fundamentally indestructible. They cannot be truly destroyed or unmade by any known magic. However, they can be damaged, twisted, and scarred. Soul Carving is the art of inflicting those scars. Because the soul is the seat of a living being's mana generation and fundamental existence, damaging it causes repercussions that the physical body cannot heal.
Curses and Geas:
Most standard magical debuffs or compulsions are temporary and can be cleansed by Abjuration or Mind Magic. A true Curse or Geas, however, is carved directly into the victim's soul. It becomes a fundamental part of their metaphysical existence. Removing a soul-carved curse requires another master Soul Mage to painstakingly perform "spiritual surgery" to cut the matrix out without crippling the host.
The Ultimate Taboo:
Practicing Soul Carving requires first obtaining "soul sight," an agonizing and highly illegal process. Because Soul Carving is used almost exclusively for torture, enslavement, and permanent mutilation, it is considered even more heinous than Blood Magic. Mages caught practicing it are not just executed; their research is burned, and their apprentices are often purged to ensure the knowledge does not spread.
Design Boundaries
Soul Carving CAN:
- Permanently link two souls together.
- Inflict permanent curses, compulsions (Geas), or metaphysical damage that bypasses physical healing.
- Cripple a target's ability to generate or shape mana.
Soul Carving CANNOT:
- Truly destroy a soul. It can only be twisted, fragmented, or scarred.
- Be healed by Medical Magic. A severed arm can be regrown; a severed soul fragment is gone forever unless reattached by another Soul Mage.
- Be practiced without Soul Sight.