OVERALL DESCRIPTION
Modding is a magic system mostly used by UDUU. While all nations and races are technically able to use it, it’s a power that faces the most prejudice, commonly seen as impure and filthy, so most people abstain from it.
It requires soul rods which are implanted into the user’s body, mostly vital organs, and then used for enhancing one or more physical traits. Users usually specialize in only one trait. Strength and speed are the most common, as well as basic senses, but most body attributes can be improved upon. It also increases the user’s life span.
Special skill of modding is dispersion, which means turning your body into a cloud of black fog. Users can then move the cloud around for confusing or intimidating enemies.
If used too extensively, modding can lead to addiction. Such state causes withdraws and soul diseases, and in most cases ends in death.
TABLE OF CONTENTS: 1. Etymology
3. Usage 4. Abilities 5. Weaknesses
Contents
1. ETYMOLOGY
Modding is a name in U.P. language and it comes from the word “modification”, since Modders modify their bodies. UDUU term would be dehiki, meaning “affinity” or “innate ability”.
2. RACES AND NATIONS
All races can use modding, but only UDUU actually do because it’s seen as dirty and low in most of the world. It is especially beneficial to Shifts since it enhances their innate ability to quickly adjust to changes.
When a Modder reaches the highest levels, the soul from rods merges with their own and becomes theirs, which means they can use it in oaths. This is very useful for Oathers because they have extra soul to fall back to in case of failing to fulfill the oath.
3. USAGE
Modding is very easily implemented into everyday life since it enhances all the traits necessary for survival and comfortable living. The most useful is the enhanced healing since it directly improves upon the quality of life, but traits such as strength, agility and speed can be of great help as well. Example of a specific benefit is seeing better in the dark.
There is no natural bad use for it, but it can leave negative side effects if used immoderately.
4. ABILITIES
The way Modders use soul is by impaling themselves with rods made of soul crystals. Once the rod enters Modders’ body, the body starts leeching on the soul stored inside the rod. After the soul heals the wound from inserting the rod, it stays inside the rod waiting to be used again.
Most efficient places to implant rods are vital organs such as brain, heart and lungs. Those places give you the most power but at the same time are the hardest to heal and maintain. They require a constant stream of soul to keep the wounded parts intact, so once the rods get empty, the user dies.
Rods can be crafted by other magic users like Glyphers and Reality Weavers or mined from infused crystal mines. Empty rods can be charged by being exposed to highly soul infested areas. The way Glyphers and Reality Weavers create rods is by capturing free soul left from a recently deceased person and compressing it into a rod.
Soul rod quality greatly depends on the soul capacity of the person whose body was used to crate it, but also on the skill of the crafter. Soul capacity is a magical potential the person has, it naturally improves until the age of seven, but can be adjusted by the age of twenty-one.
Depending on the quality of the rod, Modders get different amounts of extra soul per rod. Then, depending on quality and quantity of all the rods inside their body, the extra soul gets summed up and gains them different baseline abilities, passive powers they use without enhancing. All Modders are able to survive seemingly lethal damage because their body naturally patches their wounds using the soul from the rods, but there are other abilities depending on the level.
Passive perks of different modding levels are as following:
Night vision and perfect pitch
Being able to see through mist and clouds, perceive the value of rods and the power of people
Crystals start growing out of your body
Being able to absorb soul out of rods by touch, your body turns to crystal almost completely, the soul from soul rods merges with your own soul
Modding has no special subtypes but has many specialisations. Some specialize in raw strength, some in speed and precision, some in sight and hearing and so on. There are also those who decide against specialization but become jacks-of-all-trades instead.
Important advanced skill for Modders is dispersion. It allows the user to turn their body into a thick black fog which can then be used to distract the enemy or travel at high speeds. However, while turning back to their regular body, users sometimes fail to do it correctly, so they come back disfigured, which is frowned upon.
Modders don’t use weapons or tools specific to them, they use guns as everyone else does, but many of them are proficient with a melee weapon suitable for their enhancement of choice.
5. WEAKNESSES
There are two ways for a Modder to misuse their abilities: using the enhancing for too long or using too many rods at the same time.
Frequent use of the enhancements can lead to dependence on the extra soul, which causes addiction. The longer and stronger the enhancement is, the greater are the chances of dependencies. Once a dependent user loses access to extra soul, their organs will start failing, leading to death or keeping them in a plant-like state. There is a state in between dependence and regular usage, so after being in that state and stopping the enhancement, the user will go through a soul withdrawal period.
Too many rods can cause soul crystals to start naturally growing inside and out of your body, which leads to immense power. Eventually your body will turn to crystal completely. When those Modders die, their bodies are mined for soul crystals and their rods are taken out.
Other disadvantages come from dispersion since it’s very hard to get right. Upon returning into their usual physical form, there are many cases where users would arrive disfigured, their characteristics offset. Examples of this are crocked nose, longer or shorter fingers and rashes. Those disfigured are seen as weak and are poorly treated, so one should be very careful before using such a difficult power.
Other common weaknesses include uncomfortable usage through stabbing your own body, having to use huge amounts of soul to maintain enhancements and huge risks or getting a soul disease or becoming addicted. The more the Modder enhances their traits, the more soul they have to use from the rod and this number increases exponentially, so enhancements can never be used for long periods of time.
6. TRIVIA
modding is tightly tied to UDUU and their culture, they were developed together and greatly influenced one another
since UDUU are seen as more dangerous compared to other groups, modding magic is also vilified and more chaotic than the rest
inspired by RPG’s and their improving stats over time, also suitable for games more than other mediums
Dehiki – “hiki” is Hawaiian for “can” and Japanese for “pull”, “dekiru” is Japanese for “can”
Written & edited by: Worldbuilding by: Cadence Nocthonax