Elements, Runes, and "Known Magic"

This will be a Work-in-Progress until I develop a list of "Known Spells" for the world of Allura. If I leave anything that you feel would be important out, let me know so I can fix it or add it later.

--Overview of Elements and Runes--
In the Arcane Democracy, magic is divided into 6 different elements: Light, Shadow, Flame, Water, Natural, and Atmospheric.

• Light Magic has to do with the concentration of light and life energy to preform destructive laser techniques or cause great damage against evil creatures.
  
• Shadow Magic draws it's power from unseen forces in the darkness. Wielders of this magic can manipulate appearances and seemingly bend space to attack their foes.
  
• Flame Magic uses the principle of gathering or generating heat to cause spontaneous combustion. Powerful flames and explosive forces can be created with this type of magic.
  
• Water Magic allows for the free movement of water. It is said to be the easiest magic to learn, but the hardest to master. Water Magic users have the ability to collect water from the air and even freeze it solid.
  
• Nature Magic allows the user to wield the Earth itself as a weapon. Geomancy as it is properly named, allows the mage to pour his own life energy into nature to help it to grow at miraculous rates, or to cause trees and rocks animate and do his bidding.
  
• Atmospheric Magic is the magic of storms. Controlling the air pressure around themselves, "Storm Mages" have proven deadly in combat by creating cyclones to blow away their enemies or generating friction in the air to blast lightening at them.

Mastering the power of the elements proved difficult for most. The Democracy, durring the invasion of the Rovan Empire quickly became short-handed on mages that were able to fight. The battles grew more fierce, and magicians were being killed left and right, decreasing the amount of support for the war that the Democracy could muster even further. Until, an elder magician by the name of William Marrius, said to have mastered the six elements in his lifetime, spoke to the Master Magician. He claimed that through his studies of the arts, he found that as different as the elements may be, they are still only an extension of one's own will.

Over a course of a few months, with the help of the Magic Academy's top scholars, William created a a series of Runic Symbols which were endowed with the ability to help control the elements:

• Channeling: Used to channel an element in the direction chosen by the user. Gave use of projectile spells.
  
• Wavering: Used to dissipate an element and spread it's effect over a wider area. Used mainly for shielding spells.
  
• Compressing: Used to focus an element into a small space. Used for piercing and exploding spells.
  
• Bursting: Used to explode an element outward in a wide area. Used for wide-area spells.
  
• Focusing: Used to increase the amount of power a spell used. Increased the power of spells at the expense of fatigue and loss of control.

The method of using the Runes as catalysts for spells made using magic a simple task after minimal training. More advanced users of magic would find the cards to be more inhibiting than useful as the bond with the elements would be artificial rather than actual, weakening the spell.

The Runes that Marrius created were eventually mass-produced for use on the front-lines and the most popular form of them would be that of a deck of cards. The mage would draw his runes of choice and let fly with his spell. The cards were easy to create, but were too fragile to use more than once as the adverse effects from the elements would take their toll on the material and destroy them.

--Known Magic--
"Known Magic" is the term used for generic spells that the runes created when based with a different elements. Combinations of runes were used to create different spells, and in the end, each element would have it's own list of Known Spells based on the following chart:

Element + Channeling
Element + Wavering
Element + Compressing
Element + Bursting
Element + Focusing
Element + Channeling + Wavering
Element + Channeling + Compressing
Element + Channeling + Bursting
Element + Channeling + Focusing
Element + Wavering + Compressing
Element + Wavering + Bursting
Element + Wavering + Focusing
Element + Compressing + Bursting
Element + Compressing + Focusing
Element + Bursting + Focusing

Depending on the element, the spell would be slightly different, but the process would be the same (i.e: Flame+Channeling+Compressing fires a controlable spiraling ball of flame at a target [Roaring Dragon], where as Atmospheric+Channeling+Compressing will connect a chain of electricity with a target and electrocute it for a few seconds [Chain Bolt]).