The Craft: Ackeios and Virtia

There are two main types of mystical energy Ackeios and Virtia. Ackeios is the magic of the world produced as a byproduct of man giving order to the primordial chaos. Basically when human kind gives something a name a tell stories about they create Ackeios. Vatia is the creative energy said to be the gift of the divine to man kind. It comes from the very act of living and is the substance that makes up the soul or lifeforce.

In times past the difference between Virtia and Ackeios were vitally important to Mages. Many spells could only be preformed with a specific energy and in many parts of the world the use of Virtia was considered evil. With commercial converters now widely available the primary distinction between the two energies has pretty much vanished.

The concern that hasn’t vanish is of course the collection of the energies in the first place. Virtia is of course only obtained from living things. So the capture of a soul is required in some way. Some success has been achieved in refining massive amounts of plant life to obtain Virtia but these processes are still very expensive. As it is the collection of Virtia is an expensive endeavor, either finically or morally.

Where the problem with Virtia is its relative rarity, the problem with Ackeios is it relative abundance. As everyone knows work is accomplish by having a difference in energy states and Ackeios is created by the act of naming and order. In a modern city the streets are so flooded with native Ackeios that a Mage needs a tremendous amount for effect. Like wise your average spiritual entity which are primarily composed of Ackeios will be completely drowned out by the background radiation.

In the past Ackeios hot spot were created by mages for the practice of their talents. A sacred circle in an unname and unexplored forest would provide the energy differentials to perform most spell. The hot spots could further be connected with leylines for even greater power differentials. However this practice has been getting increasingly difficult as it depends on the actions and beliefs of an increasing fickle Civilian public. As our world becomes smaller the Ackeios hot spots have become more unstable. Recent experiments with collecting Ackeios in virtual environments has produce some promising results and may be implement on a wide scale in the near future.