Tales of Midbar: Religious Intolerance

Mage – somebody who has a large number of associates bound to them by a magis and has had training and taken vows to obey certain rules.

Mage Council – the group who lead the Mage Guild. Mage Council is often used loosely to mean the Mage Guild.

Mage Guild – an organization which administers magi and to which all magi should belong.

Mage light – a magical light that can be made to appear, hover and follow people.

Magic – by default this means associate magic but can be a blanket term for associate magic and Old Magic.

Magic detector – an artifact with some panel of transparent material, which if looked through allows associates, bindings and magic residue to be seen. Normally may only be used legally by magi.

Magic fireworks – artifacts that produce flashes and bangs but don’t do any damage.

Magic residue – fuzzy something that can be seen with a magic detector. It’s presence indicates that the thing or person the residue is on has recently been in contact with something or somebody that has associates bound to it or has recently had a spell cast on it/them.

Magis – a special sort of mage who can detect and manipulate associates and bindings without artifacts. There are normally only six present on Midbar at a time, five of them associated with a different Holy Site. Magises are nibeyim of either sex except for the Vineyard magis. When a magis dies, another is conceived at or near the associated Holy Site or anywhere in the case of the Wild Magis.

Miandri – a yellow-haired faharni girl. Daughter and apprentice of Yoldasia.

Midbar – A planet, intermediate in size between Mars and Venus in the remote Beragme solar system. It’s mostly desert and marginally habitable to humans. It orbits the brown dwarf Bergme Bet (normally just called Bet) to which it’s rotation locked.

Mind reader - somebody with an unusual ability to tell what others are thinking. Most psychics have some mind reading ability but some are better at it than others. Also used as a bit of a euphemism for “psychic”.

Minion – being thought to serve a god and live at a Holy Site. Uncertain if they actually exist.

Minris – A village in the Tarm Valley in the western mountains of Pax. It’s famous for the fact it hardly ever rains there and it’s the location of the Minris Vineyard, which is its only Holy Site.

Minris Beginner School – school in Minris for children aged from about 5 to 10 years old.

Minris Vineyard – the only Holy Site in Minris, run by Haprihagfen and associated with the Vineyard Magis.

Mokom Goyai – (Semic) Literally “place of foreigners”. Area of the Minris Vineyard which is primarily for dealing with visitors: car park, shops etc.

Mouni – a girl from Ermish. Assumed the alias of Eleprin.

Mountain Goat – a pub in the west of Minris, notorious for its rough clientele. Has illegal street prostitutes.

Mudar - a fat faharni man who’s the master of Minris beginner school.

Murmur - Trulist god of feasting and diets.

Narim – a faharni, Trulist boy who attends Minris Beginner School. He’s small for his age, looks like a girl and claims to be a mage.

Narvas - chief love priest of the Conservatory of Astrigis.

Nendia - a girl who’s in Minris beginner school who has hit puberty early.

Nibey – (Semic) korbar, psychic with moderate powers. The commonest of the psychic korbarim. Tend to be unpopular, but liked more than anavim. Have logical, intellectual personalities. Have two copies of one recessive korbar allele and at least one dominant allele of the other.

Night Leaper – nick name for a serial rapist of per-pubescent girls who’s allegedly active in Minris.

Nitrian - son of Lishrashic and Iandris. Left in Bremplar when they moved to Minris.

Nuhar - the prophet (considered to be a false prophet by Winemakers) who founded Nuhara. According to Nuhara scriptures he was a pedophile.

Nuhara – notoriously violent, monotheistic religion founded by the (false) prophet Nuhar. Worship Ahmaza as their only god. Followed mostly by quippas.

Olaria – a faharni, farmer who lives near Ermish. Sister of Sedria and mother of Aglin and Jat.

Old Bren - the recording ghost who haunts the Old Mill.

Old Magic – type of magic that originated on Earth and is forbidden by most religions. Now rarely used.

Old Mill – a hotel in Minris that apparently used to be a mill. Haunted by Old Bren.

Oldriac a hairy Haprihagfen man from Sephir Kledris.

Opuntia – genus of cacti. Variable in size with jointed, flattened stems. Often produce edible fruit and normally have glochids and often spines. Roughly synonymous with “prickly pear cactus”.

Orientationism – discrimination on grounds of sexual orientation. One of the sins of Trulism. Being strongly opposed to both religionism and orientationism (as Trulism is) can be problematic as some religions (e.g. Nuhara and Winemakerism) are orientationist.

Palace Hotel – was intended to be a large hotel for people traveling a planned bypass around Minris, it was left unfinished when the bypass was abandoned. Now caters for people who like quiet and nature. Managed by Klastren.

Paradox avoidance – scientific law relating to time travel and prophecy (information traveling back in time). This prevents somebody from changing a future event that they know about. This usually results in prophecies being cryptic so people can’t figure out how to prevent the prophesied event.

Pardnis - a quippa, Nuhara boy at Minris beginner school.

Pax – The largest country on Midbar, occupying most the western side of the Great Basin. It’s inhabitants are mostly faharnis and Trulists. Trulism is very influential in its laws and culture.

Paxian – a citizen of Pax.

Peratrin - a girl who was attacked by the Night Leaper.

Pereskia - a cactus that looks like a normal leafy tree or shrub. Produces edible fruit.

Photoorganism – an organism that uses photosynthesis. Technicality includes most plants but is often used to just mean XT’s that photosynthesize.

Plant - Earth organism that has large cells with linear chromosomes and cellulose cell walls. Most of them can photosynthesize.

Plentari – a Haprihagfen woman of uncertain race.

Poslet – a faharni, nibey mage who works part time as the Minris police mage and part time as the Adolescent School magic teacher.

Polydactyl - an organism (possibly human) that has more than the normal number of digits (fingers and toes).

Polydactylism - condition of having extra fingers and/or toes. Can be caused by a harmless dominant allele that’s common in faharnis.

Predestination line – a normally invisible line that can be detected by some Old Magic methods that indicates that people or things will be important to each other in the future.

Prickly pear - Opuntia fruit. Used in preference to “Indian fig” as that suggests knowledge of India and wrongly using “Indian” to refer to native Americans (Opuntias are endemic to the Americas), which inhabitants of Midbar don’t have or do.

Prophesied Ruination – disaster expected in the future. Most psychics think it’s imminent.

Pseudoorientationism - discrimination based on false belief about the victim’s sexual orientation.

Psychic – adj. Relating to unusual interaction between the physical world and nervous systems (occasionally something that doesn’t seem to have originated from a nervous system alters physical things other than nervous systems – e.g. ghosts being photographed). Psychic phenomena include: ghosts, prophecy, telepathy, psychokinesis, dowsing and teleportation.

Psychic – noun. A person whose nervous system is unusually prone to detecting and generating psychic phenomena. In other words all people who aren’t hipsickim.

Quippa (race) – have light skin, usually blond hair and blue, narrow, slanted eyes.