No magic in Einarth is free.

Healing magic requires vitality from somewhere. Depending on the method, that strength may come from the Life Current, the healer, or even nearby people willing or unwilling to share it.

Bardic magic strains both body and voice. Pushed too far, a bard can damage the connection to the Wellspring of Harmony itself.

Druidic magic depends on the health of the land. A damaged place can weaken the druid working within it, and careless magic can harm the same balance the druid meant to protect.

The restrictions of Celestial magic, timing, position, and seasons, all create varying degrees of success. A Mystic that draws too deep faces Stellar Burn.

Even protective magic isn’t immune to magic’s cost. Paladins bind their power to oaths. Breaking an oath to a god costs more than their reputation.

Clerics depend on faith, devotion, offerings, and the will of the deity they serve. Dwarven geomancy requires preparation, suitable materials, and a connection to earth or stone.

Magecraft can bring exhaustion and backlash. In some cases, repeated use has been know to lead to addiction or corruption when ambition outruns judgment.

The cost of the darker arts are even more severe.

Blood magic can demand blood, vitality, sensation, memory, empathy, or stability. Using stolen blood may bring power quicker but it poisons the practitioner over time.

Shadow magic causes a strain on the identity of the caster. It dulls empathy, chills the body, and makes choices that once seemed unthinkable easier to repeat.

The Age of Magic became most dangerous when people convinced themselves the price did not apply to them.

Kal’thalas became the strongest warning.

The protected accounts in the Grand Athenaeum describe an attempt to recreate divine power by mortal means. The mages involved believed they had found a path to godhood.

The city was destroyed and the land around it scarred. Godhood cannot be achieved. Mortals could learn magic. They could become incredibly powerful.

They were still mortal.

Next week, we will look at how magic reshaped Einarth itself, leaving scars on the land, changing borders, and forcing entire peoples to find new paths through a world that no longer looked the same.