“The Stiamaq Emerald” and “Gralmar’s Staff” are set in modern-day America. Just with a twist…the existence of a small population of sorcerers, mostly scattered throughout the country, a few living in magical cities like Govan and Diluvium.
How do these sorcerers pay bills? What do you even need money for, when you can conjure up food and water?
Well, let’s ask Meilianna about it. Mei, how does the magical world handle money?
“Hi everyone! We use SORC!”
What’s SORC?
“It’s a crypto!”
SORC is a cryptocurrency sorcerers use for transactions. If you’re familiar with cryptos like Bitcoin and Ethereum, SORC operates in a similar manner.
How does SORC have value? Well, any and all currencies have value because we agree it does. The sorcerer community, in this case, got together in the mid-2000s and decided, “Let’s set up our own version of Bitcoin and use that.”
And poof, SORC came into being!
But there’s a little hitch here…the value of SORC versus the value of our modern-day dollar. I am not a financier, and could only call myself an ‘average’ crypto aficionado, so this took a little mental gymnastics. Why would the vast majority of the world value a crypto they won’t ever use?
After a few hours muttering to myself (thereby confusing several hikers on the same trail), I cracked it!
Middlemen called Arbiters handle the interactions between SORC and mundane currency. This is how they do it.
- Magical corps deal in mundane currency (usually USD) when interacting with the rest of the world.
- They convert this to SORC via the Arbiters.
- With the SORC, they pay their teams.
- Those people use SORC to do business in the magical cities – materials, specialty goods, a nice massage, etc.
- (You can also earn SORC for maintaining cities’ infrastructure with their spells. This is why people cast before Govan’s Wellspring in ‘Stiamaq’.)
- Arbiters use spells to keep SORC pegged to a consistent value. Usually it’s paired with the US Dollar and the Euro.
It’s the most stable crypto in the world…but here’s the kicker. Mundanes (non-sorcerers) always forget SORC exists after they deal with an Arbiter.
And that’s how the sorcerers like it.
Mei, how do you get more SORC?
“Depends on where you are. Diluvium mines it from hydroelectric power. All the water they have running around their city? They just put SORC miners next to the channels. Water flow powers the miners, and they generate SORC from it. Neat, huh?”
Clever.
SORC plays a minor role in the books. But it’s something of note because it’s both modern and magical. One additional piece to breathe more life into the story.
Should I start up a ‘real’ crypto called SORC & see what happens?
(Wild crazy idea, but hey, you never know!)