What is Ethaerium

Most people in Tallendrall know very little about ethaerium. In general, they believe it is magical energy that allows airships to fly, trains to speed across the land, cannons to fire devastatingly massive energy attacks, and factories to produce goods in mass. It will kill any unprotected person who comes in contact with it causing most people to avoid it or tamper with it. The engineers prefer this mindset and purposely reinforce it. What most people don’t realize is that the engineers and wizards are still learning about it. If they knew how much guesswork was involved and ethaerium’s high volatility, most people with any sense would avoid the new technologies. For the moment, the technologies’ convenience outweighs the public’s concern giving engineers more time to improve it.

Origin

People tend to use the term, ethaerium, in two ways. They will either use it to refer to the magical substance or they will use it for the a region that envelopes all realms and planes. Most engineers believe the substance actually comes from the region. Educated people know that the ethaerium region is actually referred to as ethaeria, an extra-dimensional space that connects to all realms and planes. The ancient relics called portals use this region to allow travellers to cross between realms instantaneously. The region contains clouds of chaotic energy and matter. Some sages claim that these clouds are the building blocks of all planes. Somehow, these clouds seem to bleed into the realm creating large pockets of chaotic energy. Located deep underground, these pockets are called nodes. To outsiders, it moves like molten lava but glows bright white. Ethaerium from these nodes will eventually leak into the surrounding environment and transform into one of the four elements: water, earth, air and fire. Often, nodes will mark the land with strange rock formations, eternal water fountains, never-ending burning fields or chasms of wondering tornados. While only discovered five hundred years ago, chaos wizards claim that nodes take thousands of years to form causing a limited supply. This has forced engineers to be more judicious with it during the extraction and transformation process.

Processing

When a node is discovered, engineers will build an extraction plant around it. Chaos wizards will contain the energies and create crystals that focus and store the energy. The engineers will wire the crystals to the plant so that the energies can be transmitted to centralized energy plants. Once stored in these plants, the energy can then be refined to power lights, airships, train motors and many other devices.

Scientific Discovery

Engineers have found that ethaerium can be used to manipulate the reality around them. Much like a wizard, the energy can cause devices to ignore gravity, create new matter and give existing objects new properties. They even have found ways to transmit images and sounds with it. Due to the high number of accidents when testing the energy, engineers know they have barely scratched the surface. There is still much more to learn.

Relics

To assist the engineers and wizards with the mysterious ethaerium, sages have provided them with relics and books of the past. The creators of the ancient relics had a deep understanding of ethaerium and used it extensively in many of their larger designs. The portals and spires are known to use ethaerium as a power source. Instead of drawing the energy directly from a node, the devices somehow connect to the ethaeria region and pull the ethaerium directly from it. Many engineers have tried to discover this ancient secret but failed. Consequently, they have moved their attention to how the relics regulate and manipulate the ethaerium. This has lead to a plethora of devices and standardized machinery allowing non-engineer personnel such as technicians to maintain and control the ethaerium devices.

Laws and Military Application

The empire allows engineers to create small machinery and devices to use ethaerium. However, no one is allowed to create/possess weapons using ethaerium except for the great science academy, the Arcaenium. There, engineers are pushing the boundaries of ethaerium knowledge and application. Most of the major devices used in airships and factories come from the Arcaenium. They also produce and maintain the vaulted Ethaerium cannons, massive artillery cannons originally used against the dragons. Ethaerium rifles are continually being refined but still lack consistent accuracy. Slowly, more and more soldiers are being armed with these rifles while replacing the sword, pike and arrow.