Hello, hello! This chapter contains explanations for many different things in the world of Re:Mento Mori! If you are a reader who wants to figure out the rules yourself or infer them from the conversations and actions, then I suggest you stop reading this. If you do want answers, then I suggest you keep reading. Keep in mind that this is not everything there is to explain within the world but what I would consider to be cliffnotes.
ETHER
-Ether is a subatomic particle found in the world. It is everywhere. Think of it as an electron, proton, or neutron. Everything contains ether in some quantity.
MANA
-When ether conglomerates into larger particles, it is called mana. Mana has three different subtypes who each have their own sub-subtypes.
BODILY MANA
-Bodily mana is any mana found inside a body that contains a soul. Souls can only be found in intelligent beings. Most animals and monsters don't have souls. Plants, for the most part, don't have souls. Rocks, for the most part, don't have souls. People do. Elves do. So on and so forth. Bodily mana can be broken into four categories.
INNER MANA
-Inside a body, there is a soul vessel. This vessel carries the soul, which secretes mana until the vessel is full. Once it is, the flow will stop. If the vessel loses any, then the soul will refill it. This process takes time, depending on multiple circumstances. When people talk about mana, they are mostly referring to inner mana. Everyone has inner mana, and most of everyone can use it. The amount of mana people have inside of their vessel depends on many things. What class they are and what level they are as well as inborn talent and other factors. Mana is classified by intensity. When measuring intensity, magicians look for how much energy they get out of using a set amount of mana. The lowest mana intensity is Inner mana. Since it is the lowest, it has a factor of one. Every other mana, when given an intensity rating, is referring to Inner mana. Think of Inner mana as being the penny of the mana world.
BLOOD MANA
-Attached to particles of blood are high-intensity mana. Using techniques, these particles can be extracted from blood and burned for energy. This can be done by every class except Science. Burning the blood for mana causes extreme pain comparable to being burned from the inside out. If too much Blood mana is extracted from someone then they can die due to the thinning of their blood. The sacrificial class is the only one who can use other people's blood for magic. Every other class has to extract it from their own blood. Blood mana has an intensity of three, making it three times more effective than inner mana.
DEATH MANA
Found inside the tissue of organs is Death mana. This can only be accessed by Sacrifice and Ability classes. Of the two, only Sacrifice can use someone else's organs for their own magic. If too much is extracted, then the user can experience organ failure. Which may lead to death. Death mana has an intensity of ten.
SOUL MANA
The very fabric of one's soul is made of mana. The soul is the embodiment of life. Even if someone dies, their soul will go to the Hall of Memories. In this place, people will be reborn. To lose one's soul is to lose eternal life itself. Since souls are fragile, you can only use soul mana once. To use soul mana, you have to use your own. Even Sacrifice classes cannot use other people's souls. Soul mana has an intensity of one hundred.
NATURAL MANA
-Natural mana is mana found in nature. Natural mana is special in the way that only magicians can make use of it. Every other class can only use Bodily mana. This is the reason why most magicians never run out of gas in a fight. Natural mana is separated into three kinds.
AETHER
-Aether is mana found in the air. This natural mana is found everywhere. Any kind of magician can use Aether. The stronger the magician, the more Aether they can use before becoming worn out. Aether has an intensity of two.
NETHER
-Nether is mana found inside rocks, metals, and other minerals. Nether is hard to extract. Only high-level magicians can pluck the Nether out of the earth. Since it's so hard to do, most magicians don't bother with Nether. Nether has an intensity of three.
PIXIS
-Pixis is mana found within plants. Since it involves taking mana from a living thing, only Archmages and Awoken can extract Pixis. Pixis is a very fickle mana. The intensity you gain depends on the type of plant. If one were to extract from, the grass you might get Pixis with four intensity. If you got some from a tree, then maybe seven intensity. If you got some from the Great Tree of Baum, you might get thirty intensity.
BACKGROUND MANA
-Much like background radiation, Background Mana is something that people are aware of but is not something people can use. Background mana can truly be found anywhere in the universe, even the vacuum of space. Background mana has three types, but I won't be getting into that in this.
USES OF MANA
-Mana has seven uses.
SKILLS
-A skill is an indentation of the soul using a medium. The medium in the case of our main cast is the adventure card. By practicing a skill, you ingrain it into your soul. Learning a skill requires differing amounts of training based on what class you are and how talented you are, as well as how hard the skill is. It is possible to create your own skills. After learning a skill, your soul will remember it perfectly. Meaning that if you incant the skill, your body will automatically perform it without any thought necessary. There are many types of skills. Miracles and Hexes are not counted as skills since you need permission from the gods to learn them.
ABILITY SKILL
-An ability is a skill that augments an action with mana.
Example: swinging a sword.
By applying mana to a sword and your body as you swing it, you can turn an ordinary attack into something that may split a building in half. Essentially by augmenting something that can be done without mana, you have created an ability. Even if your augmented sword cut has the ability to be cloaked in magical flames, it still counts as an ability.
MAGIC SKILL
-Referred to as spells most of the time.
-By using mana to do something otherwise impossible, you have used magic.
Example: Creating a fireball. You cannot in any way create a fireball in your palm out of literally nothing. By doing this, you have practiced magic.
SCIENCE SKILL
-At its core, science is opposed to magic. Even without practicing with mana, you can still imprint information onto your soul if you repeat an action enough. The skill works like the rest, but instead of requiring magic to activate the skill, you only require effort. In a way, it's essentially just photographic memory that everyone can technically use.
INHERIT SKILL
-When a soul enters the Hall of Memories, all of the indentations made on the soul are removed and dumped. When the soul leaves the Hall to be reincarnated sometimes they can end up with one of these dumped items attached to it. These are inherited skills. From the moment someone with an inherited skill is born, they can use the skill perfectly. Even if the skill is not technically usable thanks to the class they're in, they can still use it. This is why Jong can create portals, which is technically magic, even though he is an ability class user. You can have more than one inherited skill. Inherited skills are, in general, super rare, and not all of the skills are useful. Someone may be born with a low-level skill like a fireball or water gun. You can also be born with a skill literally no one knows about because it was forgotten to time. You cannot teach people a skill that you inherited since you never had to learn it yourself.
POCKET SKILL
-Everyone gets one pocket skill. A pocket skill is a skill that you should not be able to learn. Every class is restricted from learning other classes' high-level skills. A pocket skill gives everyone a chance to learn one skill that would be super useful to them. Ryuji's Sacred High Heal is a pocket skill. Just because you can learn any skill doesn't mean you should try and learn a high-level skill. If you are an ability user, you should not try to learn a high-level magic spell since A, you wouldn't have a lot of mana to cast it, and B, it would take you literally decades to learn it. Ryuji only learned Sacred High Heal because he had a natural talent for learning it. Just because everyone can technically have one pocket skill doesn't mean they do have one. You can't change what your pocket skill is after you learn it.
IMPACT
-An Impact is a premature skill. While skills are always perfect, Impacts are random. An Impact is essentially a skill that isn't incanted. An Impact might be less effective than a skill, or it might be more effective than a skill. This is because Impacts can have random values of mana poured into them while skills take the same amount each time. Only those who are really good at reading mana flows can effectively use Impacts.
MIRACLES
-Miracles are a kind of skill that's effectiveness is based on faith and conviction and in small part mana. Miracles only use the element of light. The stronger the faith, the stronger the miracle. This is thanks to the divine connection between the user and the god they are praying to. Sacred High Heal is an example of a miracle. Miracles tend to use binding limits to make them more effective. This is why Sacred High Heal completely heals the body using almost no mana. The limits placed on it are usage and time. Once and a day. Miracles can heal things that arent there. An example would be having an arm be disintegrated. Miracles could completely regenerate the arm that doesn't exist anymore. Miracles also include buffs and the like. Miracles are not very effective at being used offensively unless it's against dark magic.
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HEXES
-The opposite of miracles. Uses the dark element. Involves debuffs and the like. Is very effective at being offensive. Is still powered on faith but to different gods. Is very good for defense but not very effective at healing. Using the arm example, hexes could not replace the arm with a new one. If the arm had been cut off instead, then it could be latched back on using dark magic.
BLESSINGS
-Before a soul is reborn into the world, gods can mess with them. Using divine magic from the depths of their own blood, they can instill characteristics upon a soul. Each god only has one blessing but can give it to multiple people. A soul can receive more than one blessing although that is super rare. Receiving a blessing, in general, is rare. The blessing reflects the gods' representation.
Example: The god of fortune Ishtar's blessing gives someone super luck for their whole life.
Blessings cannot be removed or taken. Blessings stay with someone until they die.
CURSES
-The exact opposite of a blessing. A god bestows a powerful, eternal debuff onto someone.
Example: Ryuji's curse is from Ishtar, the god of fortune. It makes him have incredibly horrible luck for his entire life.
AUTHORITIES
Preface this by saying I am not explaining everything about authorities because that would spoil what's going on right now in the story. After we get past that point, I'll update it.
-A power is given to somebody who has taken an authority.
-There is a limited amount. Each one is unique and represents some aspect of humanity.
-Authority holders do not age once they get the authority.
-Authority holders cannot be revived. Once they die their soul breaks into nothing.
-Authorities are passed one of three ways. 1.You kill the holder. 2.The holder gifts it, this kills them in the process. 3. If a holder dies in an accident then the spot where they died becomes a trial. Whoever bests the trial gains the authority.
-You cannot have more than one authority.
-Authorities supersede blessings and curses.
-An authorities ability is based on what it represents and what the person thinks of that idea.
Example: Tom has the authority of Lust. Tom thinks Lust means having sex all the time, so Tom's ability will have something to do with sex. Jimmy gets the authority of Lust. Jimmy thinks Lust is about love, so Jimmy's ability will have something to do with love. Even though both Tom and Jimmy had the same authority, they both had different abilities.
-Authorities come with a price. This price is essentially the Achilles heel of an authority. Prices come in pairs, a psychological price, and a limitation. The psychological price can be physical or mental and serves to wear down the holder's mind. A limitation is the restriction of the authority they gain.
Ex: Envy's psychological price was that every skill he copied was slightly worse than the originals in some way, this barely affected his battles in any way, but served to irritate and distract him. His limitation was copying a skill once a day.
-Holders must represent thoroughly what their authority is. If they don't then they will die while receiving it.
-Authorities don't run on the holder's mana and thus cannot stop working just because the holder is tired.
-Authorities don't have to be incanted.
CLASSES
-There are seven classes in this world. Each class is an inclusion of every kind of skill in the world. One must pick a class to be in. The classes are separated into ranks. The higher rank you are, the fewer skills from other classes you can use. A higher rank also means you can learn more advanced and difficult skills in your own class. The class you are in also changes what skills you can learn from other classes.
Example: Power does not have a good affinity with Magic, meaning that you cant learn magic if you are in the power class. Power has a good affinity with sacrifice, meaning you can learn skills from sacrifice.
Raising a rank depends on your own talent and effort. Each person is born with a class that they can reach Grandmaster in. This ingrained class affects your ability to learn from other classes. For example, if you were born to reach Grandmaster in power you would find it difficult to learn anything past the basics of magic.
Once you reach the highest rank in a class, you cannot learn any skills from any other class except for your pocket skill. Being Grandmaster does allow the ability to create your own skills and teach them to other people.
Ranks are as follows. From least to greatest.
-Beginner
-Intermediate
-Advanced
-Apprentice
-Journeyman
-Master
-GrandMaster
POWER
-Power class involves skills that use weapons or natural motions and augment them with mana. Anyone who uses weapons to fight is in Power. Anyone who uses magically enhanced tools is Power. The grandmasters are simply just called grandmasters. Ryuji is a sword grandmaster.
MAGIC
-Magic is self-explanatory. The grandmasters are known as Awoken. Jessy is an archmage, meaning that she's rank master, which is one rank below grandmaster. Awoken are the only exception to the rule of being born into a class. To become an Awoken one must be chosen which is why there are so few of them in the world.
SCIENCE
-Any skills that don't use magic are in the science class. The grandmasters are known as Espers. Anyone can become Grandmaster in the Science class if they are given a proper education. But to become an Esper one must give up their right to use mana at all.
DARK
-Includes all hexes. Grandmasters are divided into three groups. Archdemons who use hexes to make themselves nigh invincible. Then Reapers, who use hexes to augment their abilities. Finally, Pandora who use hexes to amplify spells and magic.
LIGHT
-Includes all miracles. Also divided into three groups. Seraphims, who use miracles to transform into angels. Crusaders, who buff themselves and use miracles for abilities. Archpriests, who use miracles to heal and cast spells.
SACRIFICE
-Involves all skills that require the use of giving something away. This something does not have to be the users but could be someone else's. Grandmasters are called Archcultists.
UNIQUE
-Any skill that exists that doesn't follow the rules of the other categories. Authorities technically go here. Grandmasters are just called Legendary. There are not very many Unique grandmasters in the world. Most Uniques were just born with an unknown inherited skill.
LEVEL
-Level is subjective. Someone who is level five might not be stronger than someone who is level one. Inversely someone level one might be stronger than someone level five. Your level is a representation of how much you can improve and not indicative of how much stronger you are than someone else. Being level one hundred means you cannot improve anymore. Only gods can go beyond level one hundred. Everyone has a level even if they don't have a way of showing it. You do not level up necessarily by fighting things or by winning. Learning is enough to level someone up. You are not restricted by your level when it comes to learning skills. You are constricted by your rank though.
GODS
-Gods are gods because they aren't constricted to the rules stated above. They can multiclass without consequence. They also have magical abilities based on what they represent. Gods gain strength through notoriety as well as basic training. Gods are separated into different camps light and dark. Light means they like humanity. Dark means they want humanity gone. Gods have different tiers. There are low gods. Mid gods. High gods. Then there are the DawnBreakers who are the strongest light gods. There is the Dark Moon who are the strongest dark gods. Then beyond godhood itself, there are Primal gods. There are only seven living Primal gods. Three are dark Primal gods known as Primeval. There are four light Primal gods known as Primordials.
ADVENTURERS
-Token term for those that work for the Adventure Association.
-You have to do a screening to be accepted so there is quite a bit of racism in the choosing of who can and cannot join.
-Adventurers only take over the counter jobs. An example would be you can't hire an adventurer to kill a guy you don't like.
-They have a ranked system. Each letter grade has a plus. Being a plus just means you are up for promotion other than that you have the same benefits as a regular of the same letter grade.
-Ranked system is as follows
-E: Children could attain this rank.
-F: Teenagers with zero talent could be this rank
-D: Where most beginners start and stay.
-C: If you know intermediate skills then this rank should be no problem.
-B: If you know advanced skills then you should be here
-A: This is where the bar gets higher. Those who are journeymen in their field are usually here.
-S: Masters and grandmasters are here. This rank is assigned to those who can take a dragon out by themselves.
-Alpha:
-Beta:
-Gamma:
-Sigma:
-Omega: Rory, Rhea
-Zeta: Zodiac
RANKERS
-Name given to those who are employees in Rank
-An organization that takes on odd jobs much like the adventure association
-Takes less-desirable jobs such as murder and other conspicuous things as long as there's money involved.
-Allows anyone to join as long as they aren't adventurers.
-System ranks people A-Z. A weakest. Z strongest.
RANK
-Since being a grandmaster in something doesn't mean you're better than other people, there is a system of rank in place that measures someone's worth.
-Each rank up is, in general, exponentially stronger than the one below. This doesn't really apply to Low since there are so many people in the category. Someone who just started out and a veteran are nowhere near comparable, but could both be considered in the low category.
-Worth is more than just strength.
-There are seven ranks and everyone is included in them. This means Rankers, and Adventures, as well as Military members and mercenaries, are subject to this system.
-Skills are categorized by rank to determine how difficult is it for someone to learn or how dangerous the technique is.
LOW
-Low rank is given to anybody and everybody when they start out. Since it is given to everyone it has the highest population at about 65%.
-Arc is considered Low and so would Ash
MID
-Mid rank is given to those that stand out and lead others with their strength. It has a population of about 23%.
-Most high-level adventures are considered Mid.
-Queen, as well as Jong, are in here.
HIGH
-High rank is reserved for those that rise above their peers. Usually blessed people or those that master their craft completely fall into this category. Makes up about 8%.
-Ryuji is about at this level. Rosey and Nike are also around there.
ARCH
-Makes up about 3%. Where most who reach their full potential wind up. Generals and other great leaders are usually this rank.
-Jessy's rank
SAINT
-Makes up about .9%. One man armies and people capable of fighting the high gods themselves.
-Rhea, and arguably Dot, are in this category as well as Rory.
DIVINE
-Makes up about .0999999999999999999%. Power enough to lay waste to a country. People in this rank are on par with the strongest gods and men.
-Zodiac is this rank.
PRIMAL
-Makes up about .000000000000000000001%. There are only 13 in this rank. Each one is thought to be capable of fighting head-on with a Primal god.
-Yuri is this rank.