Introduction to The Eternal Black Mark

What is a marked one?

Marked ones are "People'' with magical abilities. All marked ones have a small tattoo somewhere on their body. Marked ones were originally created around 2000~3000 years ago to fight the harbingers of death known as Monsters, Corruptions and Nightmares. Their original purpose has been changed since then, and now they are simply magical creatures trying to survive. Whilst there was a time when marked ones existed all over the world, their numbers have significantly waned, and nowadays they're close to extinction.

How are marked ones created?

A marked one is created when a Wishbringer selects a regular human, this human must be in death's door for it to be selected. Once a human is selected, the Wishbringer offers a wish along with resurrection to the now dead human, if the human agrees to the wish, a new body is created, leaving the old one behind, a mark appears somewhere on their new body, and they are brought back to life. Marked ones cannot be seen by most humans, only those who were really close can see the marked one they're related to, but even then they can only see them as long as they don't know they were dead to begin with.

Rules, Limitations and Intricacies of the magic system

Among marked ones, being marked is considered to be a curse more than a blessing. That being because marked ones are cursed to “Not be able to die.” However, it is not that they are immortal, but that they are forcibly brought back to life upon death. Marked ones are also unable to age naturally, however they can age by actively thinking about aging, but their bodies won’t go past 30 years old.

Magic powers and limitations

All marked ones acquire magical powers when created, however, they are restricted to their specific powers, for example, a marked one that can manipulate plants, wouldn't be able to manipulate earth or air. Other restrictions do exist, but those differ from power to power.
Even though they are restricted by their power's "Theme" and its own rules, what they can do with it is restricted by their own imagination.

Marked ones have a finite amount of “magical energy,” this energy is used to sustain marked ones and power their magical abilities. One recovers magical energy naturally over time through their marks, if completely drained of magic, it would take around 24 hours to completely recover.
For optimal magical energy recovery, a marked one must meet two requirements, being uninjured, and being rested.

Marks

A mark is the physical representation of the energy used to make a miracle occur; the wish that the marked one made. Their designs vary widely, and are usually abstract, but still follow a theme related to the wish of the marked one, and are also divided into three parts.
It’s also a filter of the raw magical energy a Wishbringer supplies to their Marked ones, without it, the bodies of the marked wouldn’t be able to withstand it, causing them to become corruptions.
A mark still keeps it’s functionality even if it’s removed from the body (Via amputation or otherwise), this is because while marks only appear to be on a small, localized part of the body, but in reality they are actually a nervous-system-like web that traverses the entire body, feeding it with magical energy.

Whilst marked ones can get a general feeling of how much magical energy they have left over, the mark itself works as an indicator of how much energy a marked one has, the different parts becoming more and more faded as a marked one runs out of magic.

When a marked one enters a magic deficit, the mark enters a "dormant" state, where the wishbringer's magic supply is momentarily cut off. After 2~3 days the wishbringer's magic supply is forcibly reconnected which overwhelms the body, and destroys it from the inside out, causing a corruption. And when a marked one betrays or regrets their wish, the mark becomes distorted and cannot filter the wishbringer's magic properly, which causes a corruption.

Marked Skills

A marked skill is acquired when a marked one pushes their power to its limits or masters it, for them it is considered a milestone to have one.
It's considered to be a marked one's last resort, because of their exceptionally high magic cost.
Marked skills are by default, very strong or useful, sometimes marked skills break the restrictions of the specific power, or allow the user to do things they wouldn't be able to do normally.
The main difference between Marked skills and regular use of magic, is that a Marked one can use one even if they don't have enough magic energy remaining.
Using a skill that costs more than the amount of energy remaining will cause a marked one to enter a Magic Deficit.

Magic Deficit

A magic deficit is a particularly threatening condition that occurs when a marked one uses more magic energy than the amount they currently have, this can happen when using a marked skill at low magic, or doing excruciating physical labor while injured and low on magic.
An easy way to tell a marked one has run out of magic is by their mark, if it isn't opaque and it has turned grayish.
The first and most prevalent symptom of a magic deficit is unconsciousness, which will occur straight away as the marked one runs out of magic, a marked one who falls unconscious because of this should wake up in 6 to 12 hours later.
After regaining consciousness, the afflicted will suffer from joint pain, body aches, and muscle soreness all over their body for around 1 to 2 days, after which they will be able to move again although a little sluggish.

When in magic deficit, magic recovery diminishes greatly, regenerating at half of the speed it would naturally, injury and unrest decreases magic recovery even further.

In the Event of a Time Loop: Marked ones and undeath

In Eternal Black Mark: Grand Reset, because of Moon’s time manipulation powers, he inadvertently caused an irregularity in the laws of the universe. During the time period when Moon was a marked one, when a marked one dies, their consciousness will enter a sort of stasis where they will remain for the rest of the month, once the month is over, time will be rewound to the very beginning of said month. All memories made in that month will be forgotten (not erased, this is important).
When a rewind happens, the entire universe is rewound, including all other marked ones (their memory is affected as well, but human memories are erased). A marked one becoming a corruption does not trigger a rewind.

Planes

Planes are dimensions, layers that make up the universe. There’s the “human” layer (which is identical to the world as we know it), and the “other” layer, where monster corruptions and all other magical beings reside.

Generally speaking, the Other layer “envelops” the human layer, meaning one spot in the human layer is located in the same place as its counterpart.

The two layers do not naturally interact or cross over, therefore a human cannot enter the other layer normally. There are two exceptions to this rule: Gates and Marked ones.

Planes: Marked Ones

The other exceptions, Marked ones, exist physically in the other plane, however, they can partially interact with the human plane.

When a marked one interacts with an object of the human plane, said object will be brought into the other plane and become imperceptible to humans, usually disappearing from their memory, unless it had a strong emotional connection to them.

Footnotes and Definitions

Monsters

Monsters are creatures that completely defy human logic and cannot be perceived by a regular human without it losing its mind. Monsters are created by humanity's negative emotions, and feed on the life force of mentally/emotionally weak/unstable people. Rarely, a monster can “lure” a particularly weak willed human into its labyrinth, where it will lose its mind and be devoured by the creatures within.
When a monster is formed, they appear inside something called a "Labyrinth", while inside their Labyrinth, creatures that are outside of it cannot perceive the monster.
They exist only to know, experience and spread suffering.

Labyrinths

Labyrinths are large pocket dimensions that are completely disconnected from the outside world (this means that damage done inside the labyrinth doesn't affect the surroundings on the outside world) , they are non-euclidean liminal spaces that do not follow the laws of physics, the only way to enter a labyrinth is through what's commonly known as a "Gate", a small rift in space that serves as an entrance/exit. However, it is very unlikely for someone to be able to leave a labyrinth once they enter, mainly because a door will lead to two different places once entered. The most reliable way to exit a labyrinth is to kill the monster, corruption or nightmare located at the center of it, which will cause the labyrinth to dissipate, leaving those who are still alive outside of the entrance gate. Corpses and nonliving things disappear with the labyrinth. Although a Labyrinth is usually pretty static in its location, they are capable of traveling around the outside world, albeit very slowly.
When two labyrinths clash, they will merge, causing two monsters to live in the same space. When these monsters encounter each other, they will aggressively fight for the territory, resulting in the death of at least one of them. In rare cases, the stronger monster will consume the weaker one, merging with it. Merged monsters will start to actively seek other monsters to fuse with.

Corruptions

Corruptions are formed when a marked one betrays or regrets their wish, or when they are at a magic deficit for around 3 days. They are functionally the same as monsters, except for the fact that they are considerably more durable, and, when a corruption is killed, a "Corruption capsule" will appear where the gate was located. These capsules have a couple of uses, mainly fully restoring a marked one's magic, fully heal a marked one's wounds, more insidious uses have been discovered by marked ones too.

Nightmares

A nightmare is an amalgamation of a minimum of 5 monsters and at least 1 corruption, they form when a merged monster is strong enough to consume and merge with a corruption. Nightmares are extremely powerful and dangerous creatures. Defeating a monster or corruption usually takes a team of marked ones, usually 3 to 4 people, but fighting a nightmare can easily take 20 marked ones. Nightmares cannot be seen, heard or touched by humans, they simply sense a supernatural presence, but nothing more.

Nightmare Labyrinths

Whilst a monster/corruption will create its labyrinth "inwards", hiding from the outside world, nightmares create their labyrinths "Outwards" turning their very surroundings into a gate to its labyrinth. This is very dangerous because it means that, since the surroundings are part of the labyrinth, damage done will persist even after the Nightmare dies.

Marked ones purpose

The original purpose of Marked Ones was to fight monsters, nightmares and corruptions were non-existent at that time. However, after certain events, their purpose changed, now they exist to sustain Wishbringers.

Wishbringers

Wishbringers are ethereal creatures born of faith. Around 3000 years ago, humanity was participating in a long and deadly war against itself. The increasing despair led to people to pray to a higher power for help. These prayers caused Wishbringers to be born, these creatures selected certain people, who were granted a wish and were turned into marked ones to help humans.

The past of Wishbringers

After decades of marked ones secretly helping humanity, the wars began to die down, creating an era of peace, this caused people to slowly stop believing in marked ones and wishbringers, causing their powers to wane. The lack of faith got so bad that Wishbringers started to die from it, so the ones that remained made drastic changes to the wishing system, the changes were the following:
Marked ones no longer had an infinite supply of magic.
Marked ones will no longer reject their mark once obtained.
Marked ones will “no longer die”.
If a marked one spends a certain amount of time with a magic deficit, they will turn into corruption.
If a marked one regrets or betrays their wish, they will turn into a corruption.
Unfortunately these changes didn’t do much to salvage the situation, if anything, it turned worse, because the beliefs of the people no longer aligned with how the system worked, which didn’t stop the decline in faith. Most of the wishbringer died, and only a few are alive today, their only way of surviving is to create marked ones, because by doing this, they would at least have them as believers.
To date, no more than 50 believers are currently alive worldwide.

Wishes

Wishes can be essentially anything, however, a wish will always be twisted in a way that it's "technically" what the person asked for, but not in the way they wanted it.

Transformation

The severity of the transformation depends on the wish itself, the more the wish defies the rules of the universe, the more drastic the change will be.

Gates

Gates are formed when a monster or corruption chooses to feed on human energy, through the edges of its labyrinth, the monster/corruption “pierces” through the veil that separates the two planes, making them intercept.

Humans cannot perceive gates, but they can enter them,whether accidentally, or because they were lured into one. Consequently, the human will enter the labyrinth, and will most likely go insane.

Miscellaneous information

“Magic” and the Supernatural

When a wishbringer reaches into the human plane to transform a human into a marked one, a huge amount of magical energy is released, some of it leaking into the human plane, this residual magic usually dissipates harmlessly over time, but rarely, it can cause anomalies within the human plane, such as apparitions or even inanimate objects moving by themselves; this is what humans refer to as the supernatural.

After an object is brought into the other plane, it will slowly start to “lose” the magic that was imbued into it. Eventually, the object will have a very small amount of magic in it left, causing it to reappear in the human plane. Rarely, humans can “sense” the residual magical energy of an object, some humans can use these objects in primitive and barely-effective ways of tapping into the other plane.

Humans can be exposed to low amounts of magical energy relatively harmlessly, as they can withstand being in contact with magic outside of their system, however, if magic makes its way inside of them, the human’s body will be destroyed, morphing and mutating into mindless minions of the source of magic that was injected into them.

Perception across planes.

In the human plane, marked ones are imperceptible; they cannot be seen with human or animal eyes, they can only be “seen” through cameras, but even then, they will appear as black, massless smoke entities.

In the other plane, marked ones can perceive humans, but they will appear as translucent wisps of light-blue energy. Marked ones, when touching a human, will phase through the body; feeling a mucilaginous consistency, instead of making contact with it.

If a marked one disturbs a human, such as taking one of their possessions, the human will zone out for a few seconds, before realizing that their possessions are missing, then, their brain will fill in the gaps of what happened to the taken object rather than believe that it simply disappeared into thin air.