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In the world of Atryna, the gods of Evolution and Magic have both enforced rules that i with each other. While they do ge over time, this takes turies, as each meetiween the gods is a tury from the st.
Put simply, all life requires some amount of mana, and all life produces some amount of mana as well. The size of the life iioermines roughly how much mana it will gee, while the plexity determines how much it requires. Due to this, pnts tend to gee far more mana than they require, while animals often require more than they gee, though this is far from always the case.
Mana is also capable of causing siess and mutation if it exceeds the amount that is safe for a being to tain. The strength of the body determihe amount that be passively stored, while strength of the mind trols the ability to manipute it, including the ability to prevent it from reag even if it is an unsafe level.
Due to the above, mages are able to survive far higher mana than should be possible, for short periods of time, and store muana than their body safely handle, so long as their mind is funal. However, an untrained mage relies on the sind rather than how trained mages maintain their focus subsciously, restrig their ability to hold mana signifitly when they o rest.
When it es to mutations, mana typically follows one of two paths - that of improving the mind, or that of improving the body. All mutation caused by mana overload is beneficial in some form or ahough it may not be ideal, or even widely beneficial. Additionally, mutations that improve the body also reduce higher intelligence, bringing the beings closer to an instinctual level. Due to this, it is possible, and even on for creatures to bee practically mindless beasts due to repeatedly exceeding their safe limits of mana capacity.
Also oe of mutations, they often are based on the desires of the being at the time of the mutation , and without focus mostly tend towards improvements to the body's survivability. This, however, only occurs with physical mutations. While physical mutations occur suddenly due to signifitly exceeding safe capacity, mental mutations instead occur due to sistent slight overload. The bination of these faeans that it is incredibly rare for a non-intelligent being to receive mental improvements, and very on for predators to beore powerful physically, while redug them towards being limited by instinct.
As an additional note, all life expels some degree of mana, causing ambient mana to be higher ahere is life. More simple forms expel a higher pertage, which matches with their lower requirement to act as perpetual mana factories. More plex forms, however, require intake of mana to replenish the smaller pertage they lose.
When it es to plexity of life, practically all non-mutated life gees more mana than it requires, while each mutation increases the requirements, regardless of if it is physiental in nature.
Mana is gained in multiple ways - each being gees its own mana, but also absorbs ambient mana based on the local density, as well as from anything it es. bined with the expelling of mana, this means that in areas ri life, it is very on for beings to beutated due to having multiple sourana tributing to overload sistently.
Each species also has certain forms of mutation being more on, based on their nature, and likewise, eaviroends to increase the ces of certain mutations as well. As an example, foxes tend to maintain a high level of ing, develop innate illusion abilities, and have stronger senses with higher dexterity. Meanwhile, bears tend to gain tougher hide, rger size, and assorted fing and prote bes. And in the case of pnts, many develop novel forms of defense, such as igniting on tact, produg and st electrical charges, being nearly immuo fire, or everag and st buoyant gas so they float out of reach.
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