A Sorcerer’s ranks comes from academia and will follow them throughout their entire life in whatever they do. A Sorcerer’s rank can determine what kind of job they can get if they graduate or leave school without advancing.
Most Sorcerers are highly competitive and will stay in school as long as possible to become the best.
Student
Age: 6 to 10 years old.
Unofficial title for Sorcerer children that learn to control their magic, but don’t learn any spells. Children will go to school and learn normal things like math, reading, geology, arts and crafts, world history (how Elgana came to be, how Halfhumans came to be, etc.), have physical exercise, etc.
These types of non-magic-involving classes are referred to as Desk Subjects as they will sit at a desk and learn.
Apprentice
Age: 11 to 14 years old.
Desk Subjects:
- Mainly Herbology (what kinds of herbs there are and their characteristics) and Biology (both animals and plants).
- They will still continue to learn the same subjects from their student years. History, however, will now focus on politics and how the High Collection came to be.
Magic Subjects:
Magic Subjects are all those classes in which actual magic must be performed.
Element Magic Introduction: Each Apprentice is allowed to pick one element to really try hard to get right – fire, wind, or water. They spend an entire year doing that.
Lock magic: Enables them to create their own lock to use to lock doors or vehicles. Individual Sorcerers have their own locks and they can also create new ones as long as they remember the incantation combination.
Floating: Sorcerers can’t fly, but they can float some feet above ground. The more experienced they are, the higher they can float, but they can’t go over the clouds. They also learn to make objects float.
Fauds: At the turn of puberty, Sorcerers will develop Fauds which are creatures that are a manifestation of their magic. Fauds appearances reflect the Sorcerer’s personality. Having a Faud signifies that the Sorcerer is ready to take on more complex magic. Learning to control the Faud and working with it instead of against it is something that is taught at the end of Apprentice time.
Teleportation: Apprentices will learn how to teleport but their magic is only strong enough to get them to a location which they can see with their eyes. If they cannot see the location, they cannot go there. Teleportation also takes up a lot of magic energy and physical energy so for Apprentices, they can’t do too many in a row.
Related article: Teleportation Magic has Limits? not your typical convenient Sorcery Coming Soon…
Aesthetic Ethics: All through Apprentice, Sorcerers are constantly exposed to moments where they must debate on whether something goes against or follows aesthetic ethics. They are asked to come up with something of their own which is aesthetically pleasing and defend it in class. Professors can stop an Apprentice in the hallway and try to engage in conversation on aesthetic ethics. Engaging in such conversation is common in Sorcerer society so the Professors want to prepare the young Sorcerers.
Related article: How Sorcerers Think (about Sorcerer’s favorite aesthetic ethics)
Junior Level Test – Apprentices are tested on everything they learned since the beginning of Apprentice year including testing their level of magic control. There is also an essay on aesthetic ethics which they must write up. Those who do well can advance to Junior provided they have developed their Faud. No Faud, no advancement.
Junior
Age: 14 years old (or from the moment of Faud control) to whenever they finish.
Juniors are allowed to access the Library of Magic (The Magirium) which contains all books on potion making in Universal language and Futhark Tongue. Since Sorcerers use plants for potion making, they will learn how to combine different plants to create different potions. Sorcerers are very strict that Juniors must stick with what’s in the book and never, ever, make up their own potions. This is mainly for safety reasons with Juniors often being unstable in controlling their magic when it comes to channeling them through potions.
Desk Subjects (optional):
Ancient Sorcerer Tongue – Related to Futhark Tongue but slightly different in pronunciation and spelling. A dying language because Universal is taking over.
Ancient Magic History – The history of magic in the world which is not taught in class because it is not necessary to know about magic’s past to be able to use it.
Magic Subjects:
Elemental Magic – learn to create fire, wind, water, lightning/energy projection, and shadows
Appearance Magic – learn to change their appearance. Also called camouflaging magic. The duration of the change depends on the skill level of the Sorcerer with that magic. The longest is a day and it can be quite physically draining depending on the extent of the change.
High-level Teleportation Magic – learn to teleport to places from memory.
Aesthetic Effects Magic – Magic that is only used to be aesthetically pleasing. This is not physically draining so it can be used together with any kind of magic. Often puffs of colored smoke with sparkles, puffs of sparkles, making incantations visible as they are spoken, making a spotlight on yourself to draw attention, giving your magic color as magic has no color.
More magic subjects coming soon…
Related article: A deep dive into Sorcerer Magic. No color? Rarely use complex magic? Potion Magic is scarce? Magic without potions is more common? Sorcerers aren’t as magical as they seem??? Coming soon…
Scholar Level Test – This level test is available to take any time. Juniors who feel ready can take the test and if they pass, they are promoted to Scholar. If not, they can try again later. Some Sorcerers may even wait for many, many years before they become a Scholar. Some even go and have families first.
Scholar
Juniors who have been promoted to Scholar are allowed to tamper with the recipe of potions. They get to make up their own and if their teachers see potential, they can give demonstrations at conferences and maybe even publish a book of potions. Scholars are given three years with access to any kind of plant so that they can do research and experiment. Sorcerers encourage their Scholars to experiment. Very useful and/or powerful potions have been created this way in the past, however, they are actually very rarely used again.
After Graduation Ranks
Professor
Professor is the title given to Scholars who advance. Despite the title, not all Professors become teachers. Some just want the title because it is the highest rank they can achieve without taking nearly a hundred years.
Professors who do get a job at schools teach Apprentices, Juniors, and newbie Scholars. But to become a Professor and to gain a license to teach, they need to complete five tests and get perfect or near-perfect scores.
- Master Herbology Exam – Advanced Herbology XII (the most advanced class they can take at school) will be tested in a written exam.
- Master Potion Exam – Potion History and Potion Combinations will be tested in a written exam.
- Simulated Magic Situation – A physical exam where they must quickly conjure up spells using magic without potions in various simulated tests.
- Simulated Teaching – Actually teach an Apprentice Level, Junior Level, and Scholar Level class. This will be monitored by Professors and the topics to teach will be chosen by the Principal of that school.
- Original Magic Lesson – Explain, perform, and teach a spell they have created. The quality or level of sophistication of the potion or spell is not graded. What is graded is the Scholar’s ability to teach something that is not in books.
- Aesthetic Philosophy Full Exam – A written exam, an oral exam, and a model exam. The written exam is a twenty-page article on an aesthetic of interest which must not be abstract but some kind of object or situation which can be replicated. The oral exam is the defense of the article. The model exam is a presentation of the aesthetic in real time using real props.
Usually most Sorcerers will stop at Scholar or Professor.
However, there is another rank but only a small number can reach that rank as it can take up to a hundred years to get there.
Arch
Pronounced as “ark”, these are the utmost elite, sophisticated, well-learned Sorcerers. They are well-respected, (rich), and have control over all spells that ever existed and they can use their magic by just how they control their thoughts. Often they don’t need to say spells to draw out their magic. They just let it flow. It’s as natural as moving an arm or a leg.
Arch is a title and a job which they get paid through taxes on citizens. Arch contribute to society by writing humongous, dense, long (boring) books on magic, teach Scholars in schools, build schools, rewrite spell books (if they deem it necessary), travel the world and gather information about other races to keep up to date.
Interesting Things About Archs:
The High Collection Representative is always an Arch.
Archs cannot be put into jail because their status is higher than the Sorcerer police. In a sense, they are “off the grid”. Police must also listen to their “wise words”.
Humans who live in the First Ring refer to Sorcerer Archs as “wizards” based on the traditional appearance of male Archs who tended to have longer beards and tended to show their age. Today, in modern society, the term “wizard” has lost it’s gender-specific meaning and Humans call female Archs “wizards” as well.
Yes, there are female Archs.
Not all Arch-level Sorcerers are identified. To officially become an Arch, one must go present their magic and knowledge to an existing Arch. The problem is, most Archs’ locations are not known. The only one whom everyone knows is the High Collection representative.
You have to be pretty pushy to get an appointment with the High Collection representative who normally wants nothing to do with the individual citizen unrelated to general politics.
Since Sorcerers are naturally competitive, existing Archs will be incredibly resistant to meeting those who want to become Archs. Archs do not want other Sorcerers to become Archs and may ignore any who try.
There have only been a handful of occasions where an existing Arch offered a title of “Arch” to a Professor or to a Scholar-level Sorcerer who wasn’t really looking to become an Arch. This is incredibly rare and special.
FOXWOOD FOREST 