First Law of Magic

The First Law
Never Take a Life 



Whenever magic is used to kill, some of the positive force of life that mankind is able to bring into the universe is truly destroyed— removed from the universal equation. Kill with magic, and the darker things inside and outside of creation grow just a bit stronger. Whether you’re using magic directly to rip the life out of someone, summoning up force or flame to kill, or even murdering someone without magic and then using the energy created by the death to power a spell, you are breaking the First Law of Magic.

In First Law violations, even the grey areas are pretty bad. If you summon up a gust of wind to knock someone off a building, you definitely broke the First Law, even if it’s “just” the fall that killed him.

This is one of the easiest laws to break by accident, and that’s why the White Council is vigilant about keeping an eye out for any dangerous magical talents in the making. They may be an elitist, stodgy, Old World artifact of an organization, but in the end, it’s often the intervention of the White Council that prevents someone’s burgeoning pyrokinetic ability from burning down his house (and his family with it). Accidental or not, such an incident—if people die—might plant the seeds that could grow into another murder-warlock on the loose.

Luckily for the Wardens, it’s easy to root out the offenders of this Law. Bodies are hard to hide (especially to investigators gifted with the Sight), and when magic is involved, murder can be even messier than usual. If the mortal authorities don’t know what to make of a bizarrely mangled body, the Council does , and their ear is to the ground whenever an unusual case shows up at the morgue.

All the same, it’s important to realize here that <span style="font-family:"AJensonPro-It","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family:AJensonPro-It;mso-bidi-font-style:italic">fighting <span style="font-family:"AJensonPro-Regular","serif";mso-bidi-font-family:AJensonPro-Regular">is not the same as <span style="font-family:"AJensonPro-It","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family:AJensonPro-It;mso-bidi-font-style:italic">killing <span style="font-family:"AJensonPro-Regular","serif";mso-bidi-font-family:AJensonPro-Regular">. Magic can be used carefully, indirectly, or subtly to affect a fight. Accidental deaths can happen, and in those cases killing with magic still counts as killing when it comes to the Lawbreaker stunt. The grey area exists on the political, enforcement side: if you kill by accident, your soul is still stained, but you might keep your head— albeit under the Doom of Damocles.

<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0.0001pt;line-height:normal;margin-left:24px;"><span style="font-family:"AJensonPro-Regular","serif";mso-bidi-font-family: AJensonPro-Regular">It’s also important to remember the “with magic” part of the Law. This may seem like splitting hairs—and some people believe that it is— but the First Law doesn’t apply if you, say, pull out a gun and shoot someone in the back of the head. There’s a reason why the Wardens carry swords. Killing is part of their job description, but, as defenders of the Laws, the Wardens must never use magic as the means to that end.