Magic, War, and a Social System... Advice please!
 

So, I'm working on a magic system, and thinking about how it would influence society, and thought I'd see your guys' opinion on what I have so far.

There are four elements. Water, Earth, Wind, Fire. Your life force is dependent on your magic. You use your magic to start a fire to keep yourself warm, or moving earth to dig a whole, and it will use up some of your life, cutting seconds, days, or years of your life. How much depends on how powerful the "spell" and varies from person to person. Generally though, you can use it in small amounts without losing any noticable amount of time.

Depending on your element, it will effect your eye color. Fire=Red, Wind=Green, Earth=Brown, and Water=Blue. However, some people have gray eyes, meaning they have no magic. These people are generally smarter and strong than the average person, but that isn't well known, and in the kingdom my story is set in, gray eyed children are killed at birth. It is considered mercy.

When the King has a son, and his wife dies giving birth, his son has gray eyes, and the King keeps it secret, not wanting to end his bloodline. At the time, the kingdom is trying to take over another kingdom. To get peace, the kingdom being invaded sends their King's servant, a man with black eyes.

He has the ability to suck magic, and thus life, out of others and put it into gems or simply use it. By doing so, he can lengthen his life indefinitely as well as give people the ability to use any magic without losing life by "equipping" the gems.

When the King's son takes over, the son uses the gems to advance technology, using gems to create industry, cars, power plants and essentially create a modern society. He has the servant create the gems from the people of the kingdom from before, invading it to fuel industry and their power.

Obviously, the common people of his kingdom are not aware, and simply think the king is a genius, he is, who is responsible for inventing this technology, taking no care to wonder where the gems come from.

So... Problems? Contradictions? Stupid idea?

How did the King hide his sons grey eyes? A spell?

Is magic a genetic trait? Are their ways of stopping magic from happening, seals, counter spells ext, because protecting someone, especially a non-magic king, from magic would be almost impossible.

Why is the servant helping to kill his old people? What prevents him from betraying the grey eyes king? Why would the other kingdom give up the blacked eyes servant? Was he supposed to be an assassin, turned somehow?

Is their a way to measure a persons remaining life force?

Can the non magic king use magic from the gems?

Does he stop the murder oh grey eyed children? What can industry give these people that magic cannot?

I like the idea, that magic has a cost. I also like brain beating magic. I hope my questions help you out. I tried to give them some sort of order, but really this is just the question that came to my head. Best of luck.

The king said his son was blind, and thus his eyes are always covered by bandages.

Magic is not a genetic trait.

The Servant is beyond ancient. He agreed to help the old King in exchange for the freedom to continually extend his life. He doesn't care who he serves, as long as he is free to drain people.

The Servant can create anti-magic gems from gray-eyed people. By placing them on the walls of a room, you create an anti-magic field.

The Gray Eyed King can use magic from gems.

Other kingdom was losing the war, badly. They knew the only way they could keep their freedom was by trading for it. The Servant was the only thing they had that the King would have accepted in exchange for their freedom. The Servant doesn't care that he is treated as a commodity, as long as he can keep draining people.

The Servant doesn't stop the euthanasia. He is indifferent.

At the time, their civilization is middle ages like. By creating magic-based technology and the gems, which can be bought and sold, their civilization advances to more of a 1930's one. The reason it grows so fast is that the King is so smart.

I should have been more clear, does the Grey eyed King stop the killing of the other grey eyed people, not the servant.

Can magic help with disease?

Is the servants powers a new idea are their others like him?

So the grey eyed king is using the gems to power plants for industry to grow, right? So if industry to be useful then you must not be able to make cloths or other items; in general magic is not able to manipulate matter in a complex fashion then right?

What can your magic do? Can two different types of magic combine for unique spells? Are the spells similar to classic spells where you have certain incantations or spell books to be able to cast them, or are the constructs of you will and ability to think things through. Are their magic schools or are most people trained by the family or fellow villagers?

Do people still mostly live in the country or are cities starting to become huge because of industry?

On a side note, your kingdom is really evil, taking their servant and still slaughtering that kingdom.

The Grey Eyed King's justification is he wasn't the one who made the agreement. He also has a unique way of doing things. He "feeds" his kingdom's grey eyed children to the Servant. However, he only uses those born with magic in the conquered kingdom. He doesn't upset anyone in his kingdom, and he saves the grey eyed people in the other kingdom. In general though, the Grey Eyed King feels disdain for his kingdom. He is amused by the fact that by using the gems and the technology he invented, his people are saving grey eyed people and killing magic users.

Magic is simply to manipulate an element to your particular desires. There aren't spells really, simply the creation or manipulation of that particular element. Cities in the main kingdom are growing, but most the rest of the world is still rural.

Is their only one black eyed human? How many gems are created from one life? To power a growing industrial power, takes massive amounts of energy. Is their like some sort of camp that the servant lives at and soldiers bring the people and gems too? It just seems like an impossible huge task for one man to do. Can he make gems without any cost to himself? Does it tire him out? Limited amount a day? Can a regular person put their own life energy into a gem? Does the power in a gem only work with the element it came from, say blue eyed person killed, will their gem only be usable in manipulation of air?

Does a dying person lose magic exponentially? Say they are bleeding to death because of a wound, does their power bleed off with their blood?

Does the grey eyed king have people he can trust that know about his eyes, and that he is not in fact blind? How does the grey eyed king take over? Is he married or bethroved? Does he dislike people in general because none can keep up with him mentally? Does he hate the people with their powers?

Good luck I like where this is going.

One life equals one gem, but that gem never runs out. Servant helps build machines that function the same as him. He is the only black eyed human. Sucking out energy doesn't affect him or wear him out. Gem from blue eyed human would only do water. Green eyed would only do air. Etc.

Bleeding doesn't use up magic, using magic simply takes time off your life.

Grey Eyed King only lets the Servant know, because the Servant can tell anyways. The "GEK" as I will now call him, doesn't like people in general because he thinks they are petty and stupid.

You said earlier that GEK gives gery eyed people from his country to the servant. What type of power do their gems have? The idea that the gems never run out conflicts with the rest of your magic, I would buy that a whole life would last longer or have more power, but never ending seems, well kinda silly with everything else.
Using magic takes up time of your life, if you are fatally wounded would you have less magic left because you are that much closer to death?
What point of view is this story, game, comic, ect coming from? The GEK, freedom fighters from the other kingdom, people who want the truth behind the gems? A combination? That would help myself and others decide what to ask you about.

I changed my mind. Gems have a limited amount of energy, but it is used slower when from a gem than from a person.

As for dying effecting the magic lifespan thing, think of it like this:

Mark has ninety years to live. He is stabbed and is dying. If he dies, he dies. If he lives, he still has that ninety years. Your current health does not effect how much life you lose by casting a spell, since it is a set thing.

The story will start focusing on the Servant. It will then focus on the GEK for a bit. Finally, it will focus on a Fire user who lives in the Kingdom. I have not decided what will motivate the Fire user yet.

I would suggest avoiding four-element magic systems. You could say they're dominant if there is any magic but throw in some wild cards.

If you keep it with the four elements you're going to have some powers that are going to get flexed about like crazy until suddenly each power has ridiculous amount of properties. Power creep, if you would.

Just my pennies. Rest seems nice.