Arcane Magic
The most common and recognizable form of magic, used by mages and non-mages alike for a variety of different purposes. It is a school of magic which focuses on controlling a person's mana directly, bending it to the user's will in order to fulfill their needs. Its sheer simplicity and flexibility has caused it to become adopted by most of society's mages.
History of Spells
As the creation and research of Arcane magic was done during a time of peace, majority of its spells are mundane in nature, causing effects such as the gentle levitation of objects, rapid growth of flowers flowers, cleansing of clothes clothes, or even the lighting and snuffing out candle. A good number of these spells would be recorded and written down in grimoires for future mages to learn, but the majority of them were either so unremarkable or so far from the eyes of record keepers that they would simply be lost to history. The ones that would be recorded would eventually be passed on from one generation to the other, becoming a standardized spell for the school of Arcane magic.
When wartime inevitably came, Arcane magic would quickly see use in battle. At first, those who fought would use simple everyday spells to compliment their skills during the battle or to help make life easier between bouts, but as wars waged on for longer and became more brutal, mages began modifying existing spells for combat purposes. The earliest recorded example of which is when a mage turned a simple spell which carefully summoned and handled fire, into a spell which created a devastating ball of fire.
Types of Spells
Arcane magic is split into two different major categories of spells: utility spells and combat spells.
A spell being given the categorization of utility may leave one to believe that these spells are primarily used outside of combat, but such is the contrary. Many of these spells can be used and have been used in combat as well, it simply means that these spells don't outright negate or deal significant amounts of damage. To give a better perspective, the following are examples of commonly used utility spells:
Control Flames - A spell which allows a user to control a gentle non-magical flame.
Mana Sense - Allows the user to detect any sources of mana within a certain range.
Cleanse - Cleanses majority of dirt and grime off of clothes, but has trouble dealing with stench and stains.
Float - Makes the user float up to a certain height.
On the other hand, combat spells are made for protecting oneself or dealing harm to another being. They come in many different shapes and sizes, but the most common and standard ones are the elemental combat spells:
Blaze - Fire
Frost - Ice
Volt - Lightning
Gale - Wind
Tide - Water
Gaia - Earth
Lux - Light
Nox - Dark
Each of these elemental combat spells fire a bolt of respective element towards the target and they may be used as a basis for more complex and powerful spells.
Additionally there is also a non-elemental combat spell, focused entirely on controlling mana in a destructive manner:
Scathe - Fires a bolt of destructive mana directly forward. Standard spell has a range of over 200 meters.
Scathe's sheer simplicity has led to it becoming the base for many "killing" spells, with variations being able to fire multiple bolts, stronger bolts, larger bolts, and a whole host of various other effects.
Combat isn't complete if it's all offense and no defense, hence why mages researched protective spells that one can use against either spell or steel:
Mana Barrier - Creates a barrier which physically and magically blocks anything out. This barrier can be shaped in any way a caster wants to, but the larger and thicker it is, the more mana it'll cost. Additionally, it has a range as far as the caster can see, but the farther it is from the caster, the more mana it'll cost to cast for a worse effect.
Protect - Completely covers a person in an anti-magic mana barrier for a short period. This reduces the effects of magical attacks on them, but physical attacks will pierce through the barrier like nothing.