Fragment Pulse

Fragment Pulse is the closest thing Northern Velkaris has to a controlled explosion of divine power, and it kills whoever uses it within a few years. The spell was invented by Tide-Weaver combat mages who kept losing crews to Fracture Wyrms in collapsed tunnels. Standard weapons did nothing. Moonblind had no effect. The wyrms were too large, too deep, too indifferent to anything except the moon fragments they were eating � fragments that the Tide-Weavers needed to recover. The solution was obvious in retrospect: use the fragment itself as the weapon. Fragment Pulse channels all of the fragment's stored energy � every lumen of moonlight, every resonance, every accumulated charge � into a single directional burst. The fragment shatters. The energy releases as a shockwave of silver light and concussive force that can collapse a tunnel, shatter stone, and liquify organic matter within twenty feet. A Grade 3 fragment, properly focused, can kill a juvenile Fracture Wyrm instantly. A Grade 4 can stagger an adult. Nothing larger has been tested, because nothing larger has survived the casting. The cost to the caster is brutal. The spell channels the fragment's energy through the caster's body, and the soul erosion is immediate and severe. A single casting of Fragment Pulse advances the caster approximately one full stage of Pale-Touched transformation. Three castings, and the caster is beyond saving. The Tide-Weavers do not train specialists for this spell. They train volunteers � mages who know they are dying and choose to spend what remains on one useful explosion. The Pale Dominion has no official position on Fragment Pulse. The spell destroys moon fragments � Yssara's living body � which is technically blasphemy. But the Dominion also fears Fracture Wyrms, and they have not objected to the Tide-Weavers' methods. The silence is pragmatic. Everyone pretends not to notice, and the fragments keep detonating, and the volunteers keep volunteering.