Prologue to history of magic by Artonas Lindain of the silver tower:
Many years ago, in an era long forgotten, mana was scarce and those who could wield it were few and lacking.Their abilities were nothing but mere parlour tricks.
Some could create sparks from their hands, Others had a minor ability to foretell the future, and anyone capable of more was usually burnt at the stake for witchcraft.
However, the nature of mana gradually changed that situation.
Mana, as was discovered several hundred years ago, is a form of radiation, produced only by living things, though most are incapable of using it.
Biologists today believe that the gradual exposure to this radiation is what allowed a small number of individuals to gain a new trait.
This trait, known today as "mana saturation", allowed them to manipulate mana and bend nature to their will.
Originally, humans, like any other living thing, could only emit mana out of their bodies, but those who gained the ability of "mana saturation" could store this radiation within their bodies and manipulate it outwards, instead of merely releasing it.
These individuals were the first mages.
The number of mages and their relative power increased exponentially over time, for three reasons.
the first was lineage.
The ability to store mana within ones body had a relatively high chance to transfer from parent to offspring, thus increasing the number of mages through magical lineages.
The second was mana stimulation.
The more a mage used his power, the more his mana was stimulated, and as a result, the amount of mana his body generated would increase. Mages with a higher rate of mana production would also transfer this ability to their offspring, who would, in turn, increase their own mana production rate and so on.
The third and final reason was exposure.
Increased exposure to mana in infancy increased the chance that a child would be born as a mage, and so mages created new mages simply by increasing the amount of mana around them.
As a result of the reasons stated above, mages became more powerful and more numerous as time went by, leading to two major historical events that changed the standing of mages within this world.
The first was the rise to power of The mage king, Grandia Invictus Charles Chavey the first, the most pompously named ruler to ever exist, but also the first ruler to be a mage (or at least the first majorly recorded one).
His fire wielding power was legendary for his time, but mediocre at best in today's standards, and it is with this mediocre power that he managed to conquer a great swath of land and rule it for about ten years before he was assassinated.
His actions caused many hiding mages to come out to the light, and proved to the kings of the old world that mages are much more useful alive than dead.
Mages were, from that point onwards, regarded as a powerful and crucial weapon to be used on the battlefield.
The Second major event however, is what truly shaped the world we are living in.
The invention of the mana shield.
The usage of mana to create a "shield", the first ability a young mage learns, and one of the simplest ones he'll learn throughout his years, was considered both groundbreaking and terrifying at the time it was discovered.
Before its discovery, mages were more powerful than the average man, but were as defenseless as any commoner.
It is for that reason that mages were enslaved in most nations, and were at least heavily restricted in others.
They were instrumental in defending a nation's border, but the upper class of their homelands were afraid and envious of them in equal measure, and so they decided to tie their mages with an extremely short leash.
This decision obviously caused much resentment, but said resentment only unleashed itself in small bursts, with the occasional riot or small scale rebellion.
Unfortunately for the mages, non-mages were much more numerous than them, and no matter how powerful one mage, or even a small group of mages was, they died to the sword or the axe just as any mortal man would.
That all changed when one apostate, the name that was given to mages that were unregulated by their kingdom, came up with a way to use mana in order to form a force field around his body, capable of blocking any blow a mortal man can inflict.
This scholar's name was unfortunately lost to history, but the effects of his actions remain the same.
Soon his discovery spread like wildfire, and mages could no longer be killed by anything short of a direct hit from a cannon shell.
Chaos thrived for many years since then, as mages rampaged throughout the world, killing and pillaging as they pleased, as there was no longer a central power with the ability to stop them.
That is, until the forming of the four factions.