Channelers
There exist a small handful of people born with the ability to percieve and manipulate kha, the spiritual essence of the universe, with the sheer power of their will. These people are called Channelers, and their power is magic in its purest form.
While Runecasting manipulates ambient kha, the Channeler possesses the ability to draw a reservoir of kha directly into his or her body, and thus can work feats of spellcraft both more subtle and more powerful than other magi. Though it brings great power, channeling can also bring great calamity, by disrupting the fabric of the natural world. It is unclear to most whether the channeler’s techniques are learned, inspired, or improvised; these magi certainly do not recant the lengthy incantations of the rune-weavers.
The personalities of channelers tend toward extremes, often influenced powerfully by whatever element it is they most often manipulate. A channeler of fyros might develop a fiery temper, a dwaeos expert might exhibit the serenity of still water, et cetera. This is by no means a constant, and indeed, it might be more the power of suggestion than the true influence of kha on the mortal mind. Channelers are known to focus intently on things which cannot be seen, to be enamored or repulsed by sights invisible, and generally to seem slightly out-of-plane with the material world most people experience.
Channelers tend to experience magic in a very potent way. It is easy to see how absorbing and utilizing the very stuff of life itself can be an addictive and dangerous pastime, and advanced magi usually stress the importance of developing a strong willpower and resilient psyche before drinking too deeply of any source of kha. Those who do not run the risk of becoming capricious, callous, megalomaniacal, lusty, or unhinged in any number of sundry ways.
Channeling also carries with it the great risk of failure. When one manipulates the nature of reality, mistakes tend to cause very painful consequences. Magi tend to get blamed for natural disasters from tsunamis to earthquakes, and the rare appearances of demons throughout history often end up with fingers pointed at mages, the modern Cataclysm no exception.
The power of a Channeler ensures that they will never be ignored, and with such a keenly different way of perceiving the world that most people, their true nature cannot be denied indefinitely. Many channelers yearn to become ‘Aspected,’ to gain a complete understanding of a single one of the eight elements of kha, and history tells of people who succeed, gaining access to the most obscure and potent bilities of their arts, their bodies and minds forever changed by the process.
