Afulianist

A wielder of brown aether who uses industrial machinery to generate the energy and then wield it directly with their own bodies. Only done on a mass scale, poisoning lakes, rivers, land, and air, to weaken the aether in the area and kill the people.

Corrupted Aether

Brown aether, or brown msawhat, is what happens when aether is corrupted by msawhat. It is the fouling of the earth, the polluting of the air, the poisoning of the waters. It is the esoteric power of the destruction of the environment. The least is does is make water undrinkable, land unarable, and air unbreathable, but in largescale, it can cause extinctions, global warming, ecological collapse, and more.

It is generated by the act of poisoning the environment. Something small, like littering, may cause some unnoticeable spark of corruption, but when done on the scale of major industries - oil and gas, steel and mining, vast factories, etc. - it generates enough power to be devastating. If captured and directed, this energy can then be used to kill, destroy, and conquer.

When generated in large enough volume, it takes one of these forms:

• Black film: the smallest amount forms in a fine black film. It smears over anything it touches and leaves a poisonous layer of brown aether that stenches and blisters. If enough covers something organic, that matter will rot, decay, dissolve, or toxify.
• Petraluto: corrupted mud that hardens quickly and can be tapped for power.
• Burnt smog: mostly formed from factories, burnt smog is corrupted fog, smoke, or other air that burns anyone who breathes it or is touched by it.
• Lung scour: found in mines and textiles factories, tiny fibres or flakes or dust that gets in the lungs, builds up, and kills more painfully than black lung.
• Foul water: corrupted water or liquid of any kind becomes so highly toxic it works as a largescale poison that kills all life in it or around it for miles.
• Quicklead: liquid metal that is full of brown aether and more deadly than most poisons.
• Sour powder: byproduct of many industrial processes, sour powder is a stinking white powder that causes blistering if touched and can be used to make industrial acid.
• Industrial acid: industrial acid is any acid or caustic substance that is corrupted and used in industrial machinery. It acts as a burning agent, a poison, and a corrupting agent.
• Brown sludge: the most potent form of brown aether is a foul, thick fluid that burns organic matter, corrupts land, water, or air around it. It is poison, burning acid, and creates fumes that explode.
• Corpse-butter: the effect of brown aether on bodies is to make them a pulsing, burning, toxic mess the consistency of butter with the aroma of shit.

The only way to cure brown aether's effects other than other, more potent esoteric energy, is to alleviate it by draining it off into more industrial machinery.

Synthesized

If someone wields msawhat and directly applies it to aether, they can create brown aether synthetically, but rarely is this possible in quantity necessary to be effective.

Ownership

Who can control brown aether is determined by who owns the source of the pollution. A person who litters owns the trash they throw on the ground, and thus, the infinitesimal amount created belongs to them. When factories or industries do it, the brown aether belongs to the ones who own the factories or industries. Afulianists often work for industrialists, who delegate the power to them, though some find other ways to create mass amounts of pollution, usually through sabotage of legitimate industries.

Bodily Exflux

An afulianist, unlike any other wielder of brown aether, uses it directly. They take it within their own bodies and let it turn them into corrupted aether. They unleash it through bodily functions, usually vomiting it or coughing it. They can control, by will alone, what form it takes.

Toxicity

Being affected by any form of brown aether is toxic to most living things. Dosage, target area, and form affect the power and effects of its toxicity, but the basic numbers are 1 point of poison damage per ounce.

Cancer and Rot

Anyone who works around brown aether long enough will get some kind of cancer, including the afulianist. However, the afulianist can use brown aether to draw power from the cancer they have. The power they get from it does not abate its progress in killing them, but it gives them the ability to poison others with their touch, breath, or bodily fluids. Furthermore, as they are already rotting from the brown aether within themselves, afulianists draw incredible power from it, but they die very quickly.

Dying World

The more the world dies, the stronger the brown aether becomes. Ecological and environmental damage overall makes it such that any act of pollution creates more brown aether. In ancient settings before the Fall, brown aether is so weak it can barely exist. During a industrial period, it grows much stronger, and in periods of heavy imperialist domination, it is powerful to the point of being a genuine threat to mortal survival.

Societal Role

Afulianists serve industrialists as the ones who do the dirty work. They are the most dangerous agents of industrialists, the ones who are alreayd dying, so they fear nothing. They range from terrorists to assassins to wielders of infernal arts forbidden to speak of.

Variations

Some variations include

• Coercitor : enforcers and investigators for powerful industrialists. They use their powers to torture and drain the life from their victims.
• Erstéckener: an afulianist who uses a glider or small plane to fill the air with pollutants.
• Rotcaster: an afulianist who corrupts a forest to their power, deriving energy from rotting it to death.
• Smogcaster: an afulianist who corrupts bijalee specifically into gouts of foul smog.
• Troubiechienne: a bog witch who befouls her swamp in order to keep it under her control. Always a non-male afulianist.

Skills

Some common skills include

• Poisons
• Toxicology
• Industrial machinery
• Medicine
• Torture

Stats

Modifiers from base of species/nations:

PRO -2
ATH -2
STR -2
AWA +2
WIL +2
STH +2
PRS -5