The world of Araven's existence is entirely different from the earth you know.

To be more accurate, the world of Araven is actually a dimension in of itself. In this dimension there is no such thing as outer space, planets, or stars. The best way to understand it would be to Invision a plane, stretching out flat for infinity. On top of this plane is the world of Araven also stretching out for infinity. It's surface is not so different from earth, it has normal gravity and a breathable atmosphere, covered in both oceans and continents, bustling with life.

The world of Araven is filled with energy. It is generated by the plane that the world rests on and flows up to the surface in streams, or mana streams as they are know to the sapient species. This mana is the power to change, it fuels life on the surface, yet it also has the power to twist, distort, and destroy. Sapient life as well as some monsters produce a diluted form of mana, which they can use to change the world to a small extent, which for them is an enormous power.

An interesting fact about the sky of Araven, is that it actually looks a lot like the sky's of earth. The sun rises in the east and sets in the west, the sky is blue by day and black and filled with stars and two moons at night. The difference between Earth's sky and Araven's sky is that Earth's is physical, while Araven's is not, it is more like and image stretched across the sky. No matter where you are in the world, the sun rises and sets at the same time it does anywhere else.

Unlike earth, climate is not determined by location on a sphere. Instead it is determined by the flow of mana in an area, different variations lead to different climates; these variables follow a pattern to a certain extent, preventing, say a deset from forming right next to a frozen tundra. Something similar goes for the seasons of this world, they are caused by annual fluctuations in the world's mana, but follow a similar pattern as earth.

Being that the world is infinite, all of the landmasses of earth put together are insignificant. The average continent is ten to twenty times that size. The oceans between the continents are on average twice the width of the Pacific ocean. Small kingdoms of Araven would span continents on earth.

The world of Araven has hundreds of sapient species, but most of these live in little more than roving primitive tribes. The real center of society rests on fifteen adjacent inhabited continents, known to the inhabitants as the central continents.

Our story begins on the continent of Eirin, which has a land mass of approximately 4,000 million square miles. In the middle of Eirin is a vast forest that is nesstled in between several mountain ranges, it covers nearly 97 thousand square miles. Due to a mana stream that flows right out into the middle of the forest, the life their has been altered to cope, giving rise to monsters of extraordinary strength and magic ability.

Very few adventurers ever dare to brave the forest, of those that do, very few return. Those that do manage to return do so with many valuables that cannot be obtained otherwise, and become rich enough to live the rest of their lives in luxury.

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Audric Aldrich was the youngest person to be granted the title of archmage by the Eirin continent council of mages. He was the tender age of 79 when he received it. Of course due to being a powerful mage he could expect to live several centuries more. Unlike most mages of this day and age who prefered to become combat mages, Audric, while knowing a thing or two about fighting, much prefered research. His specialty was runes, magic circles, and seals.

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When he was 103, Audric heard rumours that a group of adventurers had discovered an ancient ruin in the middle of the great Eirin forest that, according to the rumors, contained lost magical records. Audric's researchers blood boiled and quickly goined the next group of SSS ranked adventurers that was headed into the forest.

What Audric was not expecting to find in the forest was a lesser dragon that had been mutated by the high atmospheric mana. SSS ranked adventurers would normally be able to handle a lesser dragon without a problem, bit the mutations gave this dragon some nasty abilities that no one was expecting. Audric was heavily wounded by the encounter before a wild tail swing sent him flying miles through the forest before he landed in... A set of ruins.

Audric was knocked out by the blow and lost consciousness before he ever landed. While he was laying in the ruins injured, the atmospheric mana began to seep into him, without his consciousness to resist the forien mana, the mana had free reign over his body.

When he awoke, Audric had already completed his transformation. Looking at his hands, his skin had become a ghastly gray, when he tried to go outside the ruins, he burned in the sun. He still had a heartbeat yet showed characteristics of an undead, he had become a half-dead if you will.

Audric knew that he could never return to human society while showing even the faintest signs of having the curse of the undead, so he resolved himself to explore the ruins he had landed in. The first thing he had discovered was that the monsters of the forest did not come near the ruins, the next was a library filled with tomes, codexes, and scrolls all placed under preservation spells.

After many weeks studying the ancient texts and learning the language they where written in, Audric discovered that whoever had written these was studying a new form of summoning magic. All forms of summoning magic known to Audric and to the weighter required the castor to supply a steady stream of mana to the summon to hold it in the physical world. This new summoning would, hypothetically, snatch a consciousness from another world and allow it to build a body out of matter from this plane of existence.

The man who had written this had been quite close to finishing his research, and Audric was burning to complete it. So he spent the next several years here working to finish it. By the time he turned 122, Audric had finished the research and was ready to begin.

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In the central courtyard of an overgrown ruin, a bearded old man with sickly gray skin was fervently finishing a giant drawing on the floor. The drawing was a circle that filled the entire courtyard, nearly 30 feet by 30 feet square. In this circle was thousands of intricate runes, all interconnected by a complex pattern of lines.

Once he finished the final details, he gave the circle a once over before rushing out of the courtyard. He came back hauling the carcasses of various animals into the center of the circle one by one. One he had a decent sized mound, he rushed once more to the edge of the circle. He kneeled down and began to channel his mana into it. Once it had enough to start up, the magic circle began to draw directly from the natural mana in the air and earth.

Space began to shimmer and warp within the circle, energy cracking and popping within it.

"It's working." Exclaimed the old man with a grin.

The corpses in the center of the circle burst apart into millions of fine pieces, flowing upwards into a hovering orb of blood, bone, and flesh that was the size of five hourses. The remaining chunks melted into the orb turning it into a reddish brown. Slowly the orb began to change shape and shrink, gradually it began to take on a solid form before completely changing into the newborn being. Its purpose fulfilled, the magic circle shut down and dropped the newborn several feet onto the ground.

The old Archmage stood with jaw hanging open at the sight before him.

In the middle of a vast magic circle sat a small child.

"What the fuck is this?" Shouted the archmage.