Munin the Archmage

Before settling in Vallor and becoming an archmage, Munin spent many years traveling around Signum in search of magical knowledge and artifacts. He visited marshy goblin jungle, descended to underground dwarves’ smithies, wandered to murky forests of northern wolfens and suffered from thirst in the Great desert. And everywhere Munin collected tiny grains of scattered knowledge, listened to the whisper of almost forgot-ten secrets of past millennia and thoroughly explored the ruins of ancient archaic buildings. Munin found out how Great wizards of the first people were able to open for themselves gates between the worlds using the knowledge they accumulated. Roaming around ether, they turned into the first gods, omnipotent and almost immortal beings. Deprived of the chance to return to the world of Signum, the gods still continued affecting the lives of creatures dwelling in these lands. Their blessing, or grace, is the source of magic. Magical crystals and other artifacts filled with the power of gods, let mortal creatures gain a bit of divine power and even become mages.

Munin was desperate to acquire magical powers, but his search was virtually vain for almost fifty years. Real-izing that he wasted his life, forlorn, he went to the desert, where, dying from thirst, he met a jann — a timid and ghostly creature. People say all genies were once summoned to Signum by the great wizards from ether. Janns are inferior in the genie hierarchy, but they have full-pledged magical abilities. They are ex-tremely affectionate, just like pets, and are just as loyal to those who they befriend. By chance Munin saved Flik’s life, and since then the jann helped him in every possible way. Flik was patient in teaching the human basic astrology, hypnosis, practical magic and arithmancy. As time passed, Munin learned a lot about al-chemy. Having traveled around half the world, he settled in Vallor, where people started calling him ‘archmage’ as a sign of respect. Munin kept Flik’s existence a secret from everyone — until he hired a young girl named Zema as his maid.