CAUTION.

The following information might contain spoilers to later chapters, if you are not caught up with the story yet.

Main or major characters

Spoiler: The protagonist

She is a newly born pure vampire.

Her story starts from the royal graveyard of Estmoor, the capital of Kingdom of Cresta.

She was born from the lingering mana, left from a huge 6th Tier death magic area spell, Wave of Death, which was cast in Cresta ???? years ago, in a last-ditch effort to turn the tide of the three-year war against Morgia Empire, Magisus Kingdom and Theocracy of the Sun.

Minor characters

Magic

People who use the power of magic, magicians, are more commonly referred to as mages of sorcerers. The former are low or mid tier magic users, while sorcerers are highly skilled.

The word 'magician' itself is only a honorary title, it is rarely used in common speech over 'mage' or 'sorcerer'.

Magic: Fundamentals of Magic

Magic is the power of mana. Mana can mostly be found in two forms: inside living creatures (and oftentimes undead and golems) and in the surroundings as remnants of magic spells that have been cast. In order to create mana inside their body, a living being needs three things:

Power. The spirit energy in the surroundings. Elemental spirits are everywhere and they radiate their energy endlessly and equally to everyone. Although spirits can't be found in areas where their element is nonexistent, i.e. Fire spirits don't reside in the ocean depths. Container. The organ to absorb the Power (spirit energy). The organ is called the magic core. Most beings have this organ somewhere in their bodies, although the size and location varies. For the undead, their entire bodies act as a huge magic core and/or magical reservoir. Filter. It is mental strength, concentration or imagination. All three are valid ways to call it. The method depends on the individual and/or race. The filter is needed to absorb spirit energy and filter it inside the magic core, into elemental mana of only the element the user wants to cast. The filter is required, as other elements must not be mixed in while casting magic. The excess spirit elements/energies are filtered out and expelled from the magic core.

In order to cast the actual magic spell, the caster then needs to imagine the effect they want and the mana does the rest. Magic is not 100% efficient, so small portion of the mana will be left as an aftereffect in the surroundings.

Clothes, armors, accessories or weapons that have magic cores imbued in them or are made from materials with good natural magic properties can help a caster replenish their mana significantly faster. This can help to cast spells significantly faster.

Good natural magic properties basically mean the material’s natural ability to absorb spirit energy. Such materials are ancient trees, orichalcum, some materials from corrupted monsters and even mithril to some extent.

Magic: Spirits

Spirits are a completely separate entity from other races. They are small immortal beings invisible to most races. Only races with large magic cores and good control of magic can see them. Such beings are adult elves, old merfolk and vulrens, ancient dragons and some pure vampires.

Spirits are the origin of magic. Just by existing they radiate their endless energy into their vicinity. This spirit energy has their own element imbued in it and living creatures absorb that energy and convert it into mana with their magic cores.

Each spirit naturally has an element and they exist in large amounts nearly all over the world. Spirits don’t like to reside in areas that are against their element. For example water spirits hate to stay near volcanoes or forest fires and fire spirits are almost nonexistent in the bottom of the ocean. Sun and moon spirits reside almost all over the world.

Spirits’ strength and the level of spirit energy they radiate depend on how much of their element is in the vicinity. As a result it will be difficult to cast water magic near a volcano or on the desert. Or sun magic during a dark night.

Spirits also act as the purifiers of air. They eat the residual mana of their element that lingers in the air after a spell has been cast. They convert the mana back into their own energy, which they then again radiate into the air.

If the mana is left unattended, it can lead to corrupting creatures that are not compatible with the mana's element. Few creatures are compatible with Moon element, as most living beings are creatures of the day.

Magic: Elements

The following seven are the basic elements of the world:

Sun (a.k.a. Light)

Sub-elements of illusion, healing and purifying.

Moon (a.k.a. Dark)

Sub-elements of 'shadow', death and blood magic.

Earth

Nature

Water

Fire

Wind

There is also the additional ????? element

Magic: Corruption

Magical corruption is feared all over the world. It is a term most commonly used for madness and/or physical mutation caused by magic. It can also lead directly to death. The madness is usually caused by failed spells backfiring on the user’s mind. Physical mutations are often caused from breaking the user’s magic core. Physical mutation will almost without fail to madness, but madness can happen without physical mutations.

Both can happen, if excessive amount of incompatible element of mana is lingering in the surroundings.

Corruption can happen in three ways:

Overdriving one’s magic core with more mana than it can handle, causing it to break. Failing to properly filter spirit energy into mana of a pure element before casting a spell. If you try to cast a spell with mana that contains other element(s) than the spell you’re trying to cast, it will backfire heavily and corrupt your mind and/or body, more often than not leading to madness. Excessive mana of incompatible element in the surroundings, usually Moon mana. Most races are not used to Moon magic so their magic cores and their mind can’t handle it.

Mana lingering in air is different from spirit energy, as it is a form of processed spirit energy. Living beings can only absorb spirit energy, not mana. The lingering mana will just cause corruption overtime, like how breathing polluted air will make you sick.

Excessive Moon element mana in the surroundings can easily cause either of the two aforementioned cases. Most races are capable of handling almost all elements at least to some extent, so the risk of being corrupted by other elements is small. I suppose if one were able to cast some of Fire magic around merfolk, that would have the same effect.

I will introduce the concepts of Magic Tiers and Magical tools later

Races

Spoiler: Humans

Humans are the most common intelligent race on the Continent. They form over half of the total population.

They are quite comparable to our Earth's humans, with the exception that they have Magic Cores and many (but not all) of them can use magic.

The humans of the story's main continent have skin colors varying from near-white pale to brown. There are darker skinned humans in the world, but they don't live on this continent.

The average lifespan of a commoner class human of the world is lower than ours, about 60-70 years.

Spoiler: Vampires

Vampires are an extremely rare, immortal and intelligent undead race that strongly resemble humans in appearance.

There are two types of vampires:

Pure Vampires. They are extremely rare and strong, once or twice in millennium appearing variant. They are 'the originals', 'the pure bloods'. Generation Vampires. Weaker and more common variant. Still very rare. Oftentimes also called 'Thrall Vampires', but depending on circumstances the latter name is misused. They are 'born' because of the actions of another common vampire or a pure vampire.

Pure vampires are not born like most undead. They are formed from a concentration of pure Moon element mana and a mass of spectres or ghosts that have not yet gained their own intelligence. Needless to say, this is an extremely rare occurrence.

Due to being mostly made of mana, pure vampires have almost limitless potential in magic, as long as they keep gaining experience and knowledge throughout their lives by learning and feeding on the life essence of living beings.

All vampires are strong magically, but Generation vampires are somewhat limited by their physical bodies and what they had learned before getting ‘turned’.

All vampires' most prominent appearance characteristics are their blood red eyes and sharp fangs. The eye color can be found on other races too, although not often, so the fangs are the best give-away, yet hidden inside their mouths.

Vampires’ natural weapons and abilities are their night vision, high resistance to Moon magic, sharp and strong fangs, sharp and stronger-than-steel extendable claws and shadow magic, which includes their own unique ability to turn into dark mist.

Being undead, they don’t need to eat normal food or sleep. Instead they sustain themselves by consuming the life essence of living beings in the form of blood or equivalent life-sustaining fluid by biting with their fangs, by directly drinking and sucking through their fangs which are hollow. By consuming life essence vampires can gain the memories of their victim as well as some of their experiences and strength. Taking in their memories and experiences is voluntary and the vampire can choose not to do so.

They are immortal, but are extremely weak to sunlight and the Sun element, making them far from invincible. All vampires are extremely strong both physically and magically, but they are quite much weaker during the day. They can still easily rival an orc and overwhelm a human in physical prowess during the day, but they are nowhere near their nightly capabilities.

Spoiler: Elves

Elves are a fair-skinned, long-eared and very long-living race who are highly skilled in magic and prefer to live in large forests and stay near nature.

Spoiler: Dwarfs

Dwarfs are a short humanoid race, skilled in crafting.

Miscallaneous

Spoiler: Measurement of time

The planet is the size of Earth. Years are as long as ours, 365 days long, with 12 months. There are 30 days each month, with the exception of 33 and 32 days in the 3rd and the 10th month respectively. Every 4 years the 10th month gets a 33rd day too. Year changes in spring.

Daily time measurements are the same as in our world: 24 hours, 60 minutes, 60 seconds.

In our world’s terms April would be the first month of the year.

Month of Life (month of new life, April) Ethrea’s Month (month of the Nature Goddess, May) Solas’ Month (month of the Sun God, June) Ignea’s Month (month of the Fire Goddess, July) Mithos’ Month (month of the Earth God, August) Ulros’ Month (month of the Water God, September) Withrea’s Month (month of the Wind Goddess, October) Dusk Month (month of dimming light, November) White Month (month of winter, December) Lunea’ Month (month of the Moon Goddess, January) Crystal Month (month of ice, February) Dawn Month (month of brightening light, March)

Weeks are 7 days long like ours, with each day dedicated to a god or a goddess. On the novel’s continent Sundays and Mondays are generally dedicated to praying and resting.

Day of Lunea (Moonday, Monday) Day of Mithos (Earthday, Tuesday) Day of Ethrea (Natureday, Wednesday) Day of Ulros (Waterday, Thursday) Day of Ignea (Fireday, Friday) Day of Withrea (Windday, Saturday) Day of Solas (Sunday, Sunday) Spoiler: Other Measurements

Conventiently enough, this fantastic world uses our Earth's Metric system and the International System of Units (SI).

Maybe a World slash Time traveler introduced them to this world at some point?