The Acrophage

By Anders Sandberg

Many mages are hubris personified, Nietzschean Übermen able to warp reality with a single thought. They think they are able to Ascend and transform the world. But there are unseen dangers on the path towards Ascension, and the Acrophage is one of them.

The Acrophage is not a paradox spirit, but it and their kind share some similarities. The Acrophage is the response of reality to hubris, and gains power from trapping mages in their advances. Humble mages are ignored, while the quest for Ascension of hubristic mages attract its attention.

The Acrophage will usually manifest as a beautiful man or woman a head taller than the mage, dressed in classical clothes (usually brilliant white). An unseen light source illuminates the Acrophage from above, making its presence both intense and overbearing. In the physical world it sometimes manifests on television screens or on the phone. Its powers are always similar to but greater than the mage; the Acrophage will manifest greater forces before a mage who has mastered the lesser forces and teleportation before a mage able to just perceive space.

The Acrophage seeks out questing mages, and diverts them from the quest by challenging them and their hubris. Sometimes it claims to be the final opponent to be overcome on the quest, which is a complete lie. Often the Acrophage simply attacks one of the most cherished tenets of the mage's life and starts an escalating duel of magick. The only way of defeating the Acrophage is to ignore the challenge, but few mages can resist trying to defeat the arrogant being. Another method it uses is simply to appear during the quest and demonstrate its powers in a way the mage feels it has to overshadow in some way.

The Acrophage grows stronger the more the mage fights it, and does not care much about paradox or damage to innocents. Instead it gradually lures the mage into a more and more desperate fight that will destroy him. For example, Dr. Stanislaus Tergoz spent several years fighting an increasingly desperate scientific battle against an unknown colleague (the Acrophage), until he was killed in a massive paradox backlash after trying to harness the power of the entire world against his competitor. Sometimes the Acrophage succeeds so well that the mage forgets the path to Ascension and instead begins to Descend; the final triumph of matter over spirit. The mage has become so obsessed with proving his supremacy that he becomes the Acrophage.