In the City of the Nightmare King

Glossary

Aura: The mystical energy around wizards, magical creatures, places, and other living things. A wizard's aura always reflects their life and personality, whether it smells like their favorite cologne or sounds like athletes playing sports. When an aura belongs to a magical creature, it usually reflects the creature's nature, whether it's base, atavistic hunger or Machiavellian power designs. Ordinary humans do not have auras. To detect an aura, wizards can use their wizard sight like a sixth sense. The aura then manifests as an emotional reverberation felt psychically. They can also physically see auras using the hard-reading aspect of their wizard sight. Visually, auras manifest as a golden envelope around the subject. Although wizards can mask their auras, only very intelligent, advanced Void-spawns and Maras can do the same.

Coins, the Legacy of: A Legacy dedicated to advancing the children of Western banking elites.

Creators, the: A mythical race of Void-spawns who escaped the Void, supposedly to build a paradise where they could experience love. According to wizard lore, and the stories Maras tell, they were wiped out in an eons-long war with the evil Void-spawns.

Crowns, the Legacy of: A Legacy dedicated to advancing the children of Western political elites.

Defectors, the: A rebel group of formerly extracted wizards, and some Lineage and Legacy sympathizers, who are fighting to bring down the Institute and its administrators. They informally refer to themselves as the Legacy of Freedom.

Dual-soul: A permanent union between a wizard and a Void-spawn that confers great power to the wizard.

Eirineftis (ειρηνευτής): A Greek word that means pacifier. It is bottled in metal canisters. Per standard regulations, Institute agents are required to carry them. Eirineftis is used to suppress magical abilities, and in higher doses can cause wizards to lose consciousness. It's preferred that agents use little magic during extractions, so eirineftis is deployed to subdue noncompliant wizards. The Institute can also pump eirineftis into its extraction vehicles.

Glossing: When wizards interact with the magical world, whether by manipulating the vivit apparatus or by casting a spell off the top of their head, it leaves behind an ambient signature, usually based on the wizard's aura. This signature can be used to track down wizards. Wizards who want to prevent themselves from being tracked this way can "gloss their auras," or, essentially, use magic to undo the presence of magic. However, this technique isn't perfect, and doesn't work against very powerful wizards.

Guardians: Large robots whose sole purpose it is to protect the City at the End of the World.

Hard-reading: Wizards can psychically sense the magical world around them (soft-reading), but hard-reading describes when they use their powers to physically see the vivit apparatus or the auras around certain things.

Haywire: A state in which a spell loses control and becomes unpredictable. Haywire spells are often extremely dangerous.

Hobs: Small robots whose sole purpose it is to maintain the City at the End of the World.

Keep, the: The Legacy of the Crowns' dorm.

Legacy: One of five fraternal orders within the Institute. Each order corresponds to a sphere of power in the Western world. Although members of a Lineage are always Legacies, Legacies are not always part of a Lineage. The most powerful Legacy is thought to be the Legacy of the Crowns, with the children of old European wizard aristocracy holding the greatest influence in the magical world.

Lineage: A bloodline that claims to have descended from a mythical figure, usually a wizard or God.

Mara: An Institute term used to describe a Void-spawn with high intelligence that resides almost exclusively in Everywhen. Because Maras tend to make even less sense than other Void-spawns, they are stereotyped as being mad.

Night City, the: The border between Everywhen and the Void, life and death.

Night Market, the: A place in Everywhen where Maras gather to trade secrets and memories.

Obmagikos: A heavy armor that is highly resistant to magic.

Somnambulist: Sleepwalker. A wizard whose mind is trapped between the material world and Everywhen. These wizards are often incredibly powerful. Being trapped in Everywhen is physically traumatic for wizards, so those who return as somnambulists always have white hair.

Spires, the Legacy of: A Legacy dedicated to advancing the children of Western academic elites.

Thorns, the Legacy of: A Legacy dedicated to advancing the children of Western military elites.

Union, Dream-rave: When two or more wizards enter Everywhen together. To enter a union, or a dream rave, the two wizards must be touching in some way. The most common method of conducting a dream rave is for all participants to lie down in a formation that allows their heads to touch. During a union, all participants can fully view the contents of one another's minds, without restriction. This can feel emotionally invasive and is one reason why unions are greatly discouraged.

Vampire: A wizard who has become a dual-soul with a powerful Void-spawn. This union causes the wizard to grow fangs and develop an animalistic hunger for blood, which lend to historical stereotypes.

Vivit Apparatus: The magical clockwork the Creators built to govern the physical laws of the material world. When viewed using the hard-reading aspect of the wizard sight, the cogs and wheels of the vivit apparatus shine a translucent gold-orange color. Wizards can manipulate the machinery and change the laws of the physical world (i.e., magic). While low magic has wizards memorizing sequences to manipulate the machinery with their hands, more advanced techniques allow wizards to control the clockwork with their minds. If a wizard does not know the sequences to control a particular machinery (like a fireball), a spell may either fail, or go haywire.

Void, the: A sentient nothingness that predates the universe. Wizard myths tell that all things return to the Void in death and are reborn when they crawl back out. The Creators sought to break this cycle by creating a paradise for the souls of the dead.

Void-spawn: Any entity originating from the Void. Void-spawns exist on a hierarchy, with the most powerful usually taking on human form and having high intelligence, and the weakest being akin to earthly microorganisms. Ordinary humans can't perceive them, but wizards can use the hard-reading aspect of their wizard sight to see them.

Witch-hunter: A non-Lineage wizard who sells their services as a bounty hunter to the Institute.

Wizard Sight: The wizard's magical senses of the world around them. This is a passive ability that allows wizards to tune in to the emotional frequencies of everything around them, including things humans often claim don't experience emotions (like rocks). Wizards can also use an aspect of their wizard sight called hard-reading to physically see the magical clockwork governing the laws of the universe, and to detect auras and see Void-spawns.