Magic

What it governs

• The level buys accuracy and magical defence. It never buys damage — the spell's own tier does that.Charter, Part II — Combat group
• Runes are consumed on every cast, and a spell attempted below its level backfires.
• No teleportation, ever. The law altar moves objects at a distance and never a body.
• Turning goods into gold cannot be discovered until citizens have invented circulating gold coinage themselves. Money first, then the magic that tempts it.

What it branches into

The three books. Not tiers of one ladder — three separate roads, found in different places.

• Standard — the first, found at home. It carries superheat, which is the smith's payoff and the day a mage is worth having in a forge.Charter, Part II — Combat group
• Ancients — the northern road, with the ice line at its deepest tier.
• Lunar — the patient book: study of the sky at night, healing another body, wards, and the shaping of raw material. Anchored to the isle in the far south, and its entire rune supply crosses that sea.