Witch

Witches (마녀 Manyeo) are female magic users that can manipulate mana naturally. Compared to ordinary humans, they are considerably stronger. They are mainly portrayed in a negative light in the series and are arguably although not as a whole the main antagonists of the series. Some witches choose to defend humans by becoming Witch Hunters.

Overview and Capabilities

Varete and Neptis

Witches are all females and witches are born human, but have possessed the ability to store mana, although to a limit, before they're awakened. They may possess other abilities before being awakened as witches, (whether or not witches will have these abilities at birth or simply acquire them in life is unknown) such as perception as seen when Monica was able to detect Vanir Gullveig's strings and see the usually unseen WH's uniforms for what they really were; these abilities seem to be amplified after the awakening. It appears that witches are not human, or at least they do not consider themselves and are not considered to be human by humans, even though they once were.

They manipulate mana to use spells and power their Supporters, living beings, non-living beings or even objects who choose or are forced to serve the witch. Mana is described as a "poison", which corrupts the mind and spirit. Though this accounts for the evil and warped natures of many witches, and it has been shown that contact with mana can cause mental instability, while when a witch is low on mana a more stable persona can emerge. It should be noted that while some witches are evil (or at least have deep-seated emotional problems) many witches, including many notable WH witches have shown to be perfectly stable and capable of telling the difference between good and evil without any warped views or opinions. The effects of mana are shown to also vary and effect some individuals, differently from others, for example when Tasha experienced a rush of mana he almost instantly lost his mind, and soon after awakening Aria killed her father, while other individuals were completely unaffected (or only subtly so). To halt the effects of the insanity produced by mana, witches utilize Emotional Control magic which blocks any emotion deemed unnecessary. When a witch is consumed by powerful negative emotional output her mana becomes erratic and magic loses precision. Varete, explains that Emotional Control magic is among the most common form of magic used by witches.

Even though they are not many of them, some witches have the appearances of forty years old women. Most women reach witchood around that age, when their abilities have reached their climax. The more capable they are, the younger they are at the moment of their transformation. They rejuvenate greatly, to the point where they only look in their twenties. Once their metamorphosis is done, their physical appearance does not change anymore. If a young witch continues to age after her metamorphosis, it means that her abilities haven't climaxed yet. Their growth continues until their abilities are fully developed (this is the case of Aria and Ran).

Notably, witches desire to seek out a disciple when reaching maturity. Edea Florence, speculates this phenomenon is a witch’s natural need to preserve and propagate the species. Because the mana within their body is too powerful for a fetus to develop, witches cannot procreate and find themselves instinctively acting as maternal figures towards young fledgling witches, adopting them as disciples. With exception in the case of Tasha Godspell and Ryuhwan, the only known human males to be disciples of witches.

They can enhance their physical capabilities using magic, but it would take a while longer than doing so with chi. However, it will last 24 hours.

History of Witches

East in her weakened form

For many millenniums, witches and regular humans lived in harmony, but with the emergence of the religion of the Witch Hunter, humans began disrespecting witches. 14 years ago, feeling that it was their responsibility to punish the humans for their insolence North and South decided to wage war against humanity, although North aims to annihilate mankind while South wants to enslave them. East was impartial to the cause while West was against it;  in order to eliminate the threat to their shared goal of putting humans in their place North and South created an alliance. Firstly North under the pretense of coming to East to discuss current events to her castle. East was poised to remain neutral in the act not wanting to take an extreme, North told her that this was OK but asked her to remain impartial even if West died. East denied this option and warned North that should West die (which she also scoffed at as a possibility) than she would become North's enemy. It was than that South appeared behind East and she was captured, taken to North's castle. In desperation East separated herself from her Sorella: Etwal and fled with Surtr. South gave chase but North stayed behind with Etwal and revealed that not only had North discovered that Etwal was East's Sorella but that she (Etwal) had been North's target from the start. By killing Etwal North gained East's abilities over life and death and the power to bipas the Karmic laws of reincarnation. She and South than proceeded to kill West but North now had East's powers which allowed her to reincarnate West as the human boy Tasha. Now without opposition from the other two Great Witches North and South were allowed to begin the war against humanity.

Following the waves of attacks, the surviving countries collected people with special abilities to combat the witches, thus forming the Witch Hunters (WHs). In ten years, two-thirds of the world was under the witches control, and the only two countries that were able to avoid Witch control absolutely were the Bairong Empire thanks to their powerful Chi powers and elite warriors and the country of Britain who had Merlin and the equally elite warriors, Knights of the Round.

While it did seem assured that the witches would eventually win the war a miscalculation occured: six years prior to the start of the series Edea Florence joined the witch hunters and was the first witch to do so greatly contributing to their military power and weaponry with the magical WH uniform and the Mana guns being just some of her contributions. Her allignment to the WH  was soon followed by other witches such as Diana. This drastically turning the tides of the war, allowing humans and the organization to survive to this day. The witches who began the first war are currently aiming to bring about a second one.

Origin

As mentioned above and later, a witch is a female who has awakened with the ability to control mana. Subtle hints seem to indicate that there are certain catalysts necessary to become a witch. This catalyst usually works when the female has an urge to become stronger which awakens their latent potentials.

One such Catalyst is possible reincarnation as Tasha is a reincarnation of a witch and has inherited his past life's mana source despite being a different gender, though East's magic that freed West from the Karmic circle of rebirth may have had a play in this.

Witches

Four Great Witches

The most powerful group of witches are the Four Great Witches (4대 마녀 Ne Dae Manyeo), who are named after the respective cardinal regions they live in. Each of them govern their own district and are known to all have glamorous bodies and live in massive castles. All the Great Witches are roughly 5,000 years old and have so much mana that they don't need their witch hats to cast powerful spells, however, their mana is still finite in this sense and East, the only one who is currently stated to lack a hat, notes that she cannot do so forever. Out of the four witches, only three are alive and only one is not in a weakened state, South, which technically makes her the most powerful Witch currently alive. Currently two of these witches are major antagonists in this series.

Wizards

The moment a female's magical power awakens, she becomes a witch but males who awaken are known as Wizards (마법사 Mabeobsa). Though extremely rare, it is not impossible for a male to acquire a mana source which is proof of being a witch/wizard but unlike female witches, males with a mana source can't manipulate mana by instinct and need to figure it out themselves. Wizards are extremely rare with only two known people who fit the category, one being Merlin who is an Archmage that obtained his mana source artificially and the other is Tasha, who acquired it as a result of being the reincarnation of West.

Members

Name	Magic	Supporter	Affiliation	Status
North	Resurrection	None	Four Great Witches	Alive
East	Death/Rebirth	Surtr	Four Great Witches	Alive
South	Explosion/Fire	None	Four Great Witches	Alive
West	Snow	None	Four Great Witches	Deceased
Etwal	Death/Rebirth	Surtr (Farce)	East	Deceased
Peony	Teleportation	None	South	Alive
Merlin	Mana Manipulation	None	Britain	Alive
Varete	Unknown	Shadow of Abyss	North	Alive
Neptis	Space/Time	Unknown	North	Alive
Aria Godspell	Magic Diagrams	Aegis	North	Alive
Sabrina Rose	Unknown	Veetar (Deceased)	South	Alive
Quibelion	None	Cube	South	Captured
Cecil	Unknown	None	South	Captured
Andra	Unknown	None	South	Captured
Delling	None	None	South	Captured
Bliss	None	Metal Crawler	South	Captured
Guinevere	Egg of Beginning	Lancelot du Lac	South	Alive
Calia	None	Dexter Fedora	South	Alive
Ameton	Impact	Unknown	South	Alive
Meiling	Unknown	Lee Beirong	South	Alive
Xiao	Necromancy	WH Puppets	South	Deceased
Myun	Power Replication	None	South	Captured
Jacqueline	Cloning Replication	None	South	Deceased
Mary	Time Retrogression	None	South	Deceased
Hypnia	Memory Reading	Unkown	South	Alive
Tasha Godspell	None	Mordred	Himself	Alive
Edea Florence	Battle Field	None	Witch Hunter	Deceased
Tania Doberg	Earth	Prithvi	Witch Hunter	Alive
Choha	Unknown	Unknown	Witch Hunter	Alive
Agnes	Unknown	Unknown	Witch Hunter	Alive
Diana Basil	Information	Throne Room	Witch Hunter	Alive
Elmar Hyacinth	Healing	Tirving	Witch Hunter	Alive
Eclipse Shadenon	Unknown	Unknown	Witch Hunter	Alive
Alv Bronte	Gold Materialization	None	Witch Hunter	Alive
Monica	None	Parvati	Witch Hunter	Alive
Nekbet	Barrier Knowledge	Falcon	Witch Hunter	Alive
Ran	Unknown	Bagira	Witch Hunter	Alive
Patricia	Healing	None	Witch Hunter	Alive
Shout	Time	Unknown	Witch Hunter	Deceased
South Administrator	Unknown	Unknown	Witch Hunter	Deceased
Vanir Gullveig	Thread/Subordination	Wooden Doll	None	Captured
Crab Witch	None	Infinite Familiars	None	Captured
Ryuhwan's Mother	Unknown	Unknown	None	Deceased

Magic

Magic is the manipulation of mana. A witch will use her magic to either support, defend, or attack. Most witches do not have enough control to use all three properties of magic at once in sequence and resort to using each magic property one at a time. A Witch Hunter can exploit this weakness by trying to force a witch into using two or more properties at once. There are two types of magic: Unchanneled Magic and Channeled Magic.

Unchanneled Magic

• Edea Florence using unchanneled magic
• Edea Florence using unchanneled magic
• Edea Florence casting a spell
• Edea Florence using channeled magic

1/4

Unchanneled magic is magic used in its rawest form. A witch only needs to have an intent and utilizes mana to achieve the desired result. Unchanneled magic is the fastest form of magic as there is no need to have a conduit yet it is difficult to control.

Channeled Magic

Channeled magic is magic funneled through some physical or spiritual conduit such as spoken spells or a supporter. Compared to unchanneled magic, channeled magic is more precise. It focuses a witch's mana, enhancing the power and effectiveness of the magic while using the same amount of mana as unchanneled magic. Channeled magic is easier to learn and favored by witches.

Innate Ability

Some witches are known to possess an innate ability, possibly Neptis. This power does not require a witch to gather mana or chant and works as long as the witch has mana in them. They are known to be annoying to deal with.

Spells

Spells are channeled magic wherein a witch verbalizes a citation of words or performs a particular action in order to conduct magic with a specific quality and purpose.

Diagrams

Edea Florence explaining diagrams

Diagrams are channeled magic provided through a physical symbol drawn by a witch as a conduit for her magic. The complexity and size of the diagram constitutes the power of the magic used, evolving from a simple circle to complex geometric configurations such as mandalic pentagrams. Diagrams can range from a few cementers to spanning the mileage of an entire city. A diagram must be exact if there are any errors the mana won’t be channeled properly and the magic will fail.

Supporters

Supporters are unique cases of channeled magic as a witch uses either a physical object such as machines, humans, iron, or roses, or conceptional beings like spirits as a conduit for her magic. A supporter can be just about anything. Supporters are just like individuals, things that have unique personality and appearances, the main difference between them and ordinary beings is that they are supplied mana, and possess all the added strength and ability provided by mana. In order for one to be a supporter, they must form a contract with a witch, Spiritual Supporters automatically form a contract with their master.

Normal Supporter

A normal Supporter that the witch acquires. They can be changed but are generally only done if their original supporter is destroyed beyond repair, it takes time to get used to a supporter. There are 4 requirements to have a fully functional normal Supporter.

1. It must be able to become a Supporter (what determines this is unknown).
2. Your mana level must be able to control it.
3. You have to be able to bond to the Supporter.
4. The Supporter must willingly obey you.

If any of these are not met, the Supporter may not obey the Witch, or may require gratuitous amounts of mana to operate. However, the normal Supporter will always need more mana to operate to a certain extent than the Spiritual Supporter given that the two supporters are on the same level. The supporter won't die if it's master dies.

Spiritual Supporter

Some women are destined to be Witches, and sometimes, they develop a Supporter destined to be theirs. The Spiritual Supporter is born and will appear before the witch when she is awakened. They are generally stronger than conventional supporters, but are much rarer. Being so closely linked to their master, if the master dies, the supporter dies. They meet all criteria to be a functional Supporter and require close to zero mana to use, since they are essentially an extension of the Witch's mana conduit.

Witch Hats

Different types of Witch Hats

Witches can store mana within the core of their body and as the flow of mana grows when the witch matures so does her mana core. Her body can only hold a finite amount of mana at any given time. To compensate for this, at the moment a Witch awakens their powers, a hat is formed, which acts as a mana storage device that can apparently hold incalculable amounts of mana, cycling the overflow of mana from the witch's body back into her core. The downside to this is that, if the hat is destroyed, all the mana the witch had stored over time in it is lost. Hats may take various forms, and may be more like helmets, or any other headpiece. The only witches seen that don't need a hat to work powerful spells are East and South, although it is implied that all of the Four Great Witches don't need their hats. When a hat filled with mana is stolen, you can extract and use the mana stored, even if you don't own the hat.

Sorella

A rare sight among witches, sorellas appear to be humanoid manifestations of a witch hat. This means that if their witch master dies they to will die. A sorella’s body and personality differ from the witch they are “born”, sometimes causing surprise with others for the extreme differences between the witch and her sorella (difference in personality for South and Peony and differences in body for East and Etwal). Because of these differences sorellas are treated as a different entity with a name of their one.

So far, the only witches revealed to have sorella's are among the great four; East and South.

Castles

Varete's Castle

Any Witch can have a Castle, Witches are said to be a couple times stronger when fighting in their own lair. A Castle can take any form, while most appear as actual castles there are instances in which this is not the case such as Edea Florence's home. Edea notes that many Witches cast Magic Diagrams in their Castles which would enable them to use their abilities with minimal power and maximum force. This is likely the reason Witches are a couple times stronger in their lair, and usually have full control of what goes on inside. Spells can be cast outside a Castle such as East's Barrier which protects it from spells, and Edea's Restriction Field that stops anyone from approaching.

Navigation

|}|}|}