In every book of history
It is written how it's done
If you want to change the world
You need only change the young
And Serdjan Aleksic
Stared deeply through the night
But your vision's not the same
When you're staring through a sight
And a rifle's not enough
When you don't wish others well
So he angled out his mortar
And he dropped in his first shell
-Savatage, Dead Winter Dead
The Perverse. Among the Philosophers and the Redeemed it is a curse word, but behind the label of otherness stands the vast majority of Necromancers on Elanthia.
Let's come out and say it: of the thousands of Necromancers who haunt Elanthia, the vast majority are exactly the parodies of humanity that people think they are. They claim forbidden power out of some personal brokenness; be it trauma, revenge fantasies, or just the perverse desire to embrace an antinomian view of the world. These are the people that drop glass orbs at tea parties and harry towns with zombies. They are, in short, monsters.
But there are reasons behind the madness.
A War of Words:
The Perverse, by and large, reject the label. If you asked a Perverse what he is, "Necromancer" might be the first response, or some specific cult affiliation. The label of Perverse was invented by the Philosophers to denote any Necromancer who does not follow an apparent moral philosophy -- which, again, is most of them. It is meant to stand the Philosophy apart from their brothers in undeath and it works.
Because of this, there is little common cause between Perverse. The truth is Perversity is an intensely individual path, taken up for a great multitude of reasons toward a great many ends. Perhaps ironically, the only common cause two Perverse can be guaranteed to have is a negative impression of the Philosophers who so flippantly disregard them. The Perverse cults, by and large, run the range from indifferent to flat out hostile to the Triumphant and his band of students. Kigot is alternately viewed as a dead Necrolord or a bleeding-heart who warped the mind of the weak-willed and foolish.
There are three places where the Philosophers greatly disagree with common necromantic practice, and so characterize as central to the Perverse: the pursuit of power for power's own sake, bargaining with demonic forces, and the descent into lichdom.
Power Unending:
Sorcery in general, and Necromancy specifically, is a method of cheating the universe. The metaphysics eludes most magicians, to the point where a great many (including all necromancers) are convinced that "certain kinds" of sorcery are safe or efficient or worth the cost. The truth is that any kind of sorcery invokes a damaging reality-warping power that leaves the world a little less stable than it started with.
Damaging, and rewarding.
Necromancers cut a bloody swath through the traditional limits of magic. Psychic corruptions and perverted healing and defying death and, ultimately, glorious mutations toward something greater (or less) than humanity. And that's all before a Necromancer is 40th circle, let alone walking the path of Transcendence or the Descent.
Some people just want it all and to hell with all the costs, especially those inflicted upon other people. To a particular blend of sociopathic features, power is power's own purpose, masked in talk of "self reliance." There are some people who would, literally, prefer to murder an animal, cut it into pieces, and invoke unholy magic to heal a cut than go simpering to an Empath. These are Necromancers.
The Immortal Coil:
Perhaps the most iconic feature of Necromancy that the Philosophers reject is lichdom. As much as Philosophers talk up the terrible cycle of life and death, a great many of them would prefer to give the Red Spiral a whirl than literally lose one's selfhood in the process of becoming a self-animating corpse.
And so, say the others, the Philosophers reveal their fear and limited thinking.
No Necromancer, not even the great Lyras herself, ran to accomplish the transformation, but all of the greatest Necromancers on Elanthia agree that undeath is vastly preferable to the obliterating consumption that the Immortals promise the faithful. Something is better than nothing, and to call Lichdom "something" grossly undervalues its raw power.
It's hard to kill a lich, because the most impressive feature of lichdom is the ability to die and then stand back up like nothing happened. There are limits to this power which even Lyras and her generals stretched at times, but it's little matter for a master of death to retreat and restore themselves.
But it is not Transcendence. Liches are not alive, and even if the liches won't admit it, being alive has a number of incredible "soft" perks. The sensorum of a lich is muted, and the emotional range equally stunted. The soul is gone, and with it the capacity to feel the transcendent emotions of the spiritual person. They are also barred from the even greater prize, the Philosophy's promise of divine genesis and with it unlimited power.
Philosophers sometimes refer to lichdom, then, as the immortal coil. Liches indeed exceed the life expectancy of everything else on the planet, but they are still material creatures bound to the rules and laws they so deftly pervert.
Liches tend to react to the Philosophers with greater antipathy than living Perverse. The most common reaction is one of personal offense that a necromantic tradition not even older than an Elothean yet would dare to presume they have some mystic key to power that the great masters of the art lack. Many liches, upon encountering a Philosopher, will take their pent up aggressions out on him. There are whispers that some, perhaps worse, are in the mind to "teach" the Philosophers the errors of their ways.
The Demonic:
Then there's the gorilla in the room.
The Philosophers, philosophically speaking, don't differentiate between gods, divine spirits, and demons. All, they claim, are extraplanar entities of varying power that want to meddle with human agency to no good end. The Philosophers don't doubt there are metaphysical differences, but that's a bit like debating the difference between a bolt and a fire ball while both are aimed at you.
The Perverse range in their dealings with demonic forces, but all of them are at least liberal enough to acknowledge demons are useful to their agendas. Across the population of the Perverse, it's split about 50/50 whether the demon is in charge or the Necromancer is.
The ideal situation, of course, is that the demon obeys the Necromancer's agenda. Necromancers are known for summoning or channeling the powers of minor demonic spirits to their own ends, opening up a domain of magic called Spiritual Necromancy. This is the worst of the worst, the Necromancers who practice soul-consuming poisons, torturing ghosts for their knowledge, and inflict the worst kind of damage upon their foes.
Less ideal, but still common, is when the demon comes out on top. Often seen when Necromancers align with or otherwise meddle with the demons of god-like power. This is a quick route to power, the literal deal with the devil, but eternal servitude is a high price to pay for lazy power.
-Armifer
"Perinthia's astronomers are faced with a difficult choice. Either they must admit that all their calculations were wrong ... or else they must reveal that the order of the gods is reflected exactly in the city of monsters." - Italo Calvino
