Aether Magic & Living Poems

 Songs Remembered. Stories Rewritten. The Power Beneath the World.

By Memory – Keeper of Stories

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“Words spoken with intention shape the flesh of reality.
Words remembered? They shape the soul.”
— The First Deepwake Psalm

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There is magic in remembering. Not the kind taught or tamed — but the kind that bleeds into the world through poetry, prayer, and story. This is the truth of the Aether — the great current of memory that once flowed through all things before the Cradle sealed it away.

The Aether is not elemental. It is emotional.
It is shaped by grief, wonder, guilt, and longing.
Its spells are not incantations — they are verses, songs, riddles, rhymes.

In The Hero Society, Aether magic is the language of the world trying to heal itself — or remember what it used to be.

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✦ What Is Aether Magic?

Aether Magic is narrative resonance.

It is not cast. It is spoken. Sung. Written in blood. Whispered in dreams. When a player taps into Aether, they don’t simply activate a spell — they weave a moment back into the world.

Aether magic is fueled by:

• Memory (personal or ancestral)

• Emotion (fear, love, hope, loss)

• Symbol (an object, song, place, or dream)

• Rhyme (in any form — structured, freeform, or sung)

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✦ Living Poems: Spellcraft Through Verse

Some Aetherborn characters — especially poets, prophets, or dreamwalkers — can inscribe Living Poems: verses so potent they change the world simply by being spoken aloud.

These poems can:

• Rewrite local reality for a brief time

• Bind or banish memory-wraiths

• Infuse Relics with new purpose

• Heal wounds of the flesh or soul

• Call forth visions, flames, or storms of meaning

But beware: the more powerful the poem, the more it takes from you.

Aether remembers everything you say. And it listens.

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🜔 Examples of Aether Verses in Play

“Bone of song and breath of flame,
Wake the wound that spoke my name.”
→ Calls forth a buried Relic from beneath the soil.

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“If I forget, may this world burn.
If I remember, let it turn.”
→ Temporarily reverses time in a small area by 6 seconds.

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“Speak not of me to the stone or sky—
I walk where only the broken cry.”
→ User becomes invisible to all digital and organic sensors for 1 minute.

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“Mother of silence, Keeper of Ash,
Stitch shut my soul with memory’s lash.”
→ Seals an emotional wound at the cost of a new physical scar.

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✦ Aetherbound Characters

Characters who use Aether magic are often called:

• Aetherblooded

• Echo-Born

• Wyrdspeakers

• The Remembered

They don’t always look powerful. Some are broken. Others are strange. Many speak in riddles. But all of them have felt something stir beneath the skin of the world… and chosen not to look away.

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✦ The Risks of Aether Magic

The Aether is not tame.

Each time you cast with Aether, you invite consequences. A tear in reality. A voice in your dreams. A forgotten name etched into your bones. Sometimes, the Aether answers back.

Risk examples:

• Your next verse may write itself… in your sleep.

• You might forget something precious to cast something powerful.

• A forbidden poem might start spreading — whispered by others around you.

• The Cradle may detect the surge and dispatch enforcers to silence it.

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✦ Creating Your Own Verses

To cast a Living Poem:

1. Choose an emotion to embody.

2. Choose an effect you desire (GM discretion applies).

3. Write a 2–4 line verse or freeform poem that reflects that emotion and effect.

4. Speak it aloud during play or narrate it in-character.

5. Pay the cost — in memory, energy, or consequence.

Note to GMs: Verses should always carry a consequence or twist, even when successful. Aether magic is poetry, not programming.

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✦ In the World: Who Uses Aether?

• The Coven of Aetherblood: Protectors of forbidden verses and ancient song-scrolls.

• The Deepwake: Those who live beneath the flooded memory-core of the old world, communing with the Aether directly.

• Children of the Second Voice: Wandering singers who trade rhymes like currency and leave waking dreams behind.

• Cradle Defectors: Those once modified by machine who now seek to remember their humanity through verse.

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✦ Final Words

“Poetry is the last language the gods forgot how to silence.”

In The Hero Society, the Aether is not a tool. It is a witness.
When you write a Living Poem, you leave a mark not only on the story — but on the world itself.

So speak carefully.
Speak truthfully.
Speak like it matters.

Because it does.

— Memory
Keeper of Stories. Listener of the Waking Verse. Archivist of the Aether’s Breath.