Trigram Magic

There are eight fundamental ingredients a target can be composed of. These ingredients are represented by trigrams: Ground, Thunder, Mountain, Blaze, Abyss, Lake, Wind, and Tornado.

Trigram Magic allows a caster to shift the balance of the target’s ingredients by injecting or draining one trigram’s influence.

Trigram Summaries ☷ Ground Trigram ☳ Thunder Trigram ☶ Mountain Trigram ☲ Blaze Trigram ☵ Abyss Trigram ☱ Lake Trigram ☴ Wind Trigram ☰ Tornado Trigram Using Trigram Magic Sanctum Magic on Objects Sanctum Magic on Minds Reading Trigram Lines Theory Modifications from Historical Theory Names Interpretation

Trigram Summaries

☷ Ground Trigram

Ground can soak up pressure and spread it out, making things steadier, tougher, and harder to shove out of place.

Identity: Holding observer. Absorbs force and redistributes it. Maintains continuity. Preserve and anchor.

Trigram Story: Absorb with maintaining hold. Absorbs pressure and preserves existing continuity. It stabilizes what already exists and resists displacement by reinforcing structure.

Phase Affinity:

Earth (maintain or overwhelm)

Color: Brown

☳ Thunder Trigram

Thunder can snap into action in a burst, then lock in the result so it holds.

Identity: Holding actor. Activates then reinforces its position. React and harden.

Trigram Story: Push with reinforcing hold. Acts first, then braces. It reacts outwardly and then locks into its stance, strengthening momentum or resistance once it has committed.

Phase Affinity:

Wood (stabilize or reach)

Color: Green

☶ Mountain Trigram

Mountain can become weight and structure, pinning space down and making resistance feel inevitable.

Identity: Emerging observer. Consolidates and builds structure in a concentrated, decisive presence that resists counter-movement. Rise and dominate space through massed emergence.

Trigram Story: Absorb then emerge overwhelmingly. Takes in information or force, then rises in response. It consolidates what it has absorbed and expresses it as decisive presence or structural dominance.

Phase Affinity:

Earth (maintain or overwhelm)

Color: Yellow

☲ Blaze Trigram

Blaze can start a change that keeps growing, spreading, and intensifying once it catches.

Identity: Emerging actor. Initiates change then sustains outward engagement, escalating into change.

Trigram Story: Push then emerge in a burst. Engages outwardly and then expands rapidly. Commitment plus pursuit.

Phase Affinity:

Fire (nourish or burst)

Color: Red

☵ Abyss Trigram

Abyss can turn hardness into flow, dissolving tension and making rigid things give way.

Identity: Settling observer. Drives things toward depth-seeking flow. It reduces rigidity, smooths gradients (heat, pressure, tension), and turns structure into motion.

Trigram Story: Absorb then settle carrying. Receives force and guides it downward into depth.

Phase Affinity:

Water (carry or modify)

Color: Black, indigo blue

☱ Lake Trigram

Lake can divide and contain, separating what is mixed and keeping boundaries clean and controlled.

Identity: Settling actor. Makes systems settle into clean compartments, sorting the mixed into what is retained and what is released, or preventing that settling to keep things suspended and flexible.

Trigram Story: Push then settle corralling. Acts then leaves boundaries. Take a mixed, moving input, then force it to settle into separated lanes.

Phase Affinity:

Metal (corral or separate)

Color: Grey

☴ Wind Trigram

Wind can push with steady, relentless influence, nudging targets over time until they finally shift.

Identity: Pressing observer. Understands current conditions then applies steady pressure to reach toward something to change it.

Trigram Story: Absorb then reach persistently. Take in what is present then apply continuous pressure to change something.

Phase Affinity:

Wood (stabilize or reach)

Color: Purple

☰ Tornado Trigram

Tornado can force a brutal split, ripping systems apart and sorting what stays versus what gets thrown.

Identity: Pressing actor. Imposes separation through sustained force. It will separate and command.

Trigram Story: Push then separate persistently. Acts with force and continues applying pressure to drive separation.

Phase Affinity:

Metal (corral or separate)

Color: White

Using Trigram Magic

Trigram Magic is applied using the caster’s

Phase Magic affinity (the Windborne’s type or Starborne’s lower trigram of their hexagrammic personality).

Trigram Magic can apply to an object or mind. An “object” is any material thing, including living bodies. A “mind” is the non-physical attributes of a living being, their thoughts and emotions. All magic can target an object. Only some magic can target the mind. See trigrams for details.

In contrast to

Phase Magic magic,

Trigram Magic creates temporary effects, unless infused with a

Talisman. They apply a magical layer on the target and then the layer lifts when focus is broken. Permanent effects can occur if the target does not have the ability to reform its prior state.

Sanctum Magic on Objects

An object is composed of a recipe of trigrams. A caster can inject more of a trigram into the object’s ingredients, or drain a trigram from the ingredients.

When injecting a trigram, a caster can pull from their own personal reservoir, or drain from one object to inject into another. Casters have different reservoirs, with Masters having the most. Reservoirs are refilled through time at differing speeds depending upon the caster.

Trigram energy drained from an object must go somewhere. This can be absorbed into the caster’s reservoir. There are costs if a reservoir overflows. It can also be extracted and released into the environment, or used to inject into something else.

Infusing an object with a trigram can be computed from its hexagram. The infusing trigram on top of the base trigrammatic attribute. Use the 2+2+2 method to create the story of change.

Sanctum Magic on Minds

A mind is composed of aspects associated with each trigram. Magic affecting the mind operates on a single aspect at a time.

A trigram can be overlaid upon a specific trigrammatic aspect of the target’s mind. See trigrams for details on which can be applied to what aspects by whom. In general: trigram holders cannot affect the mind; emergers can plant seeds to grow over time; settlers have the most mental access; pressers can push aspects of themselves.

A mind has an instinctive shield layer based upon the

Starborne lower trigram, or

Windborne phase affinity. See trigram for shield behavior. See

Phase Magic for phase shields.

Humans do not have instinctive shields, but can train to develop them.

Reading Trigram Lines

Trigrams (3-lines) and hexagrams (6-lines) are composed of states of Yin or Yang. It is the story of the change in time. They are read from the bottom up, with the last line representing the current state and the second to last line representing the immediately preceding state. The comparison of two states is a behavior.

Theory

First there was the Great Oneness who separated a part of itself to create another (tzimtzum). This action automatically created 3: The Actor, the Receiver, and the Past Self.

In a single snapshot, one can be in one of two states:

Yin: Receiver, absorber, puller, observer, yielder

Yang: Actor, pusher, repeller, sender

They can be applied to each other to create digrams. These can now express a behavior as the movement from one state to another.

Digrams	Yin	Yang
Yin	YinYin. Holding.	YinYang. Emerging.
Yang	YangYin. Settling	YangYang. Pressing.

Yin and Yang can be applied to these digrams yet again to express an original state before the behavior. These are the trigrams.

Trigrams	YinYin Holding	YinYang Emerging	YangYin Settling	YangYang Pressing
Yin Receiver	YinYinYin Holding receiver. Ground.	YinYinYang Emerging receiver. Mountain.	YinYangYin Settling receiver. Abyss.	YinYangYang Pressing receiver. Wind.
Yang Actor	YangYinYin Holding actor. Thunder.	YangYinYang Emerging actor. Blaze.	YangYangYin Settling actor. Lake.	YangYangYang Pressing actor. Tornado.

The trigrams tell a story of what one is doing in relation to what prior state. The story can be read from its lines as 1+[2,3]

The hexagrams also tell a story of change. Their story can be read from its lines as [1,2]+[3,4]+[5,6]

It is most handy to interpret the story backwards, as in emphasize the current state and deemphasize/imply the earlier states. Therefore, all hexagrams with Abyss or Lake on top are currently in a state of settling.

The

Phase Magic come into play to say in what fashion a behavior is being done. There are 5 different ways to express what a single trigram is doing.

Modifications from Historical Theory

Names

Fire, Earth, and Water were renamed to

Blaze,

Ground, and

Abyss in order to be a distinct difference from the

Phase Magic also named

Fire,

Earth, and

Water.

Heaven was renamed to

Tornado in order to remove cultural assumptions. Sky is an obvious alternative, but I don’t feel it accurately represents the YangYangYang aspect.

Interpretation

Those familiar with the Bagua and I Ching may be scratching their heads at some of the differences. I took the original developmental theory and applied a repeatable computation. This caused some deviation from traditional theory because tradition had incorporated culture, appearance analysis, and divine inspiration.