Spirit Energy

Introduction
All living things contain spiritual energy, to some extent. In it's natural form, it has next to no mass, and is often completely unused in the body. There are also varying concentrations of spiritual energy in the atmospher, ranging from none at all, to being a significant part of the air's makeup. Any living thing can have their spiritual energy 'activated'. When this happens, they can interact with spiritual energy, and the entities and realms related to it. Depending on how much spiritual energy a person has, the amount of interaction available differs; those with very little energy may only be able to grasp some innate 'sense' of the spiritual world, where as those with high energy can utilise their energy, and take on spirit forms, among other things. Spirit energy can become active in a wide variety ways. The most common is for the individual to have visited a world with a high level of spiritual energy in the atmosphere. This allows them to interact with those particles, even if not their own, and this interaction generally leads to activation. Another method is to be identified by denzien spirits, who transport you to the spirit realm, where all spirit energy will become activated, and a spirit form created. This is common for high spirit energy individuals. Spirit energy can be activated, or even aquired, if an individual is attacked by a darkling. This is not the same as a darkling feeding on spiritual energy, in that the darkling actually attacks the person with their claws, leaving a physical scar. The scar contains dark energy, in varying concentrations, and provides a link to the darkling. The dark energy can activate stored spiritual energy, or provide a direct tap into the stores of the darkling's own dark energy. This is dangerous, and one's mind can be lost to this dark energy. The Demei race are born with activated energy, due to their genetic makeup, and their homeworld, which has a massive natural concentration of spirit energy present in the enviroment.

There are two types of 'magic' spell; Natural Magic, and High Magic. Natural magic relies on the manual dexterity of the individual to cast; natural magic is all about shaping energy into a specific form, and releasing it. It could be likened to forming a clay pot on a pottery wheel. This is the magic which all untrained mages use, and which humans favour. High magic originates from Demei society. It is taught to all children as a staple part of their education; Demei are taught to respect the energy around and inside them, and use it wisely. High Magic is based around a more 'classical' magic style, being dependant on remembering specific incantations and thoughts to produce a result.

Basics
There are 7 major types of spirit energy.

The most prominent are pure Spiritual, Light, and Dark energies. They tend to play off eachother; Light energy is effective at harming dark energy based creatures, and vica versa. Spirit energy is equally damaging against both Light and Dark energy, providing an effective 'neutral' type energy.

There are also the four elements, wind/air, earth/stone, fire, and water. They interact as shown in the diagram shown.

Spirit energy is the most common form in living things and the atmosphere. The realm from which darklings originate, the Dark, is comprised soley of dark energy, and likewise there is a realm composed entirely of light energy. There are 4 major 'Spirit Realms', one corresponding to Air, Fire, Eath, and Water respectively. Individuals can be born with elemental energy rather than normal spirit energy, if this is the case, they cannot modify this trait. All energy can be taken by darklings, and converted into dark energy, and basic spirit energy may be converted into elemental energy, but no energy can be manually converted into Spirit energy. This happens naturally over time, and the process cannot be tampered with.

Air
Air, or Wind energy is considered to be the most elegant, and some believe, most powerful of the elements.

Those who manipulate this element draw their energies out through a focus, normally the palms of the hands, or a sword, and through mental and manual control proceed to spin the spirit charged particiles, creating a spherical vortex, primarily, or a similar type of rotating structure. This energy is damaging simply from the kinetics of the energies, which act like a swirling knife edge, cutting through the target.

Wind users can be considered to have the largest pool of power, as they can not only draw on their natural energies, but also charge spirit particles available in the air around them, meaning with preparation, entire weather systems could fall under the command of an individual Wind user. This process however, is proportionally difficult to the volume of air being charged, making control on a massive scale somewhat unfeasable for a single person.

Fire
Fire energy is considered to be the most aggressive, and dominating of the elements, favoured by warriors, especially.

Fire users use their energy not to attack directly, but as a fuel; releasing energy into the desired form, then igniting it with a thought. Fire users have a reasonably large pool of energy available to them, however their attacks tend to produce a large amount of wasted energy to sustain a fireball or suchlike for a period of time. For this reason they are very powerful early on, but have the poorest endurance of all elemental users.

Fire energy is able to destroy the Slab of an Earth user, by heating the stone, sand, or earth that has been used to create it to a point that it becomes glass, or is simply incinerated completely.

Water
Water energy is believed to be the most calm, and ordered of elements.

Water users manipulate the water vapour in the air, or any other available water source in order to form their attacks. Water can be utilised in any of its natural states, and can be pulled through each of them with the removal and addition of heat, which is afterall, just another form of energy. Ice makes for an extremely effective piercing and cutting tool, while steam can cause burning of the skin. Liquid water can be formed into vast bubbles or waves, which have both force, and the ability to drown opponents where they stand.

Even more advanced water users can control the water within the bodies of others directly, making it one of the most deadly elements to have control over. For this reason warriors trained in using Water arts are disciplined to a far greater extent, and tend to have a deeper understanding of the spiritual world, and of the nature of their abilities.