Have a more humorous post. In this excerpt we see a slightly confused translation of some alien text concerning the avoidance of “human predators”. Perhaps the text itself is a hoax or an elaborate joke in-universe, or perhaps it is truly the writing of a rare “wish-granting sea-cucumber” sharing its experiences of humanity with its own people.

The Dark Forest Hypothesis is an actual thought experiment concerning the presence of alien life out there in space. Regardless of your thoughts about the Dark Forest, it is an objective fact that within the fiction of the setting, the conclusion is incorrect. Here, in this excerpt, a mage explains the issue and their own thoughts on the matter, using their knowledge of the Arcane to gain insight impossible for mundane science.

As should be evident from the many post I’ve made in the past, the fictional setting described in these posts is heavily influenced by forms of mysticism related to the Jewish Kabbalah. Do note, that from these fictional perspective, Jewish mysticism is not the source of these connections but the result of arcane teachings bleeding into the mundane world. In this excerpt, a mage considers some of these ideas, and how they relate to magical practices.

Sometimes, the arcane arts are an esoteric and spiritual experience. But sometimes it slips into the visceral. Into loud shots and the sound of flesh and bone ripping under the fire of modern automatic weaponry. There are things in the Cosmos that physically hunt humans. And in response, there are humans that hunt these cosmic visitors, gunning them down without mercy when possible.

Imagine being a demi-mage in a world where mages exist. Someone stuck between being just a normal person and a wizard. You will likely never be able to even begin mastering magic to a degree deemed acceptable for a child-mage. How would you feel about this situation? Within the setting, there are people who must live through this, trapped somewhere between the bliss of ignorance and the dread of enlightenment. Unable to go back to the former, and unable to reach for the latter.

Magic manipulating life is a common trope in fiction, that’s how we get owlbears after all. But when magic needs to cohabitate a setting with science, such an approach finds itself lacking verisimilitude. In this text a mage presents their perspective on a specific type of life manipulation magic – the art of Genomancy practiced by the fair folk.

People often mistakenly think that I put a lot of myself into the game. In a way I do, but not in the way most people seem to infer. So, allow me to indulge myself and put some of myself into the game. In this excerpt, a mage presents an introductory text for a self-help book, but does it matter that much that it’s a mage?

There are some things we just consider normal. Like people wearing clothing. When we depict aliens in fiction that do not do so, it’s usually to present them as being somehow weird and different from us. But then, you have to realise, that to the alien your need to cloth yourself is equally as odd. In this excerpt a mage discusses the clothing habits of alien races and what they might imply.