Idea: Everyday Necromancy

There was talk somewhere on RPG.net about the concept of necromancy existing in the world, but being the only form of magic, and being as common as, say, brain surgery. I can’t recall anything else, but it seemed like something to run with, and I spun off from there.

Necromancy is the act of calling the spirits of the dead, and these spirits can be “free,” which is mentally taxing, though not impossible, or else “bound,” and placed in a physical container. While spirits can be placed in objects, they usually have no means of communication in this state (there are exceptions, such as via the television). A spirit bound in the physical world can be banished back with a necromancer’s touch (free spirits are intangible, but the necromancer holding them in this world need only stop spending the effort). Corpses, or even living things, may house spirits.


Spirits can’t lie, but they don’t need to speak if they don’t want to. Physical damage to the mind is gone, but any psychological trauma remains until repaired normally (there exists a healthy field for necromancers who want to play therapist for the spirits who had died without resolving all their problems, and whose family wishes for them to be whole in death). Spirits can’t inhabit bone, meaning that they pass on once decomposition of the flesh is complete, and because they can’t leave before this happens, and word has gotten around of this, since there have always been necromancers, most cultures’ funerary rites involve a means of rapidly destroying the body. Bone is important for another reason, too: A necromancer needs to be in physical contact with the bone of the spirit he is attempting to call.

As mentioned previously, spirits can inhabit televisions, and in fact they meld quite well with electrical systems; there exists communities of spirits called Wired, who drift along aimlessly in the power lines and other electrical infrastructure. Most phones, televisions, and similar technology are outfitted with pieces of bone to prevent spirits from suddenly possessing your home appliances, but in general this isn’t a problem anyways, since most spirits in a Wired are put there intentionally by the government, whether local or national, or even businesses, in order to perform various tasks (many spirits act as a back-up to security cameras, able to recall what happened even if the tapes are destroyed or damaged).