A Review of the Uses and Properties of Morinium, Morinium compounds and Morinium-derived materials

Abstract

All residents of the Shindus system are familiar with the gentle glow of the Common Hellgrass found in the more temperate valleys of [HOMEWORLD]; be it from walking these lands themselves, or from experiencing them through Holodex. This magical fluorescence is found in flora, fauna, minerals, and concentrates itself into the very marrow of our bones. What is it, what are its effects and properties? This reviews aims at answering those questions.

History

As observed in the pre-Seventh Trumpet (ST) records of other High Energy Vitubics traditions throughout the Core Cluster, the first uses of Morinium in Deadbeat societies dates back at least several centuries prior to the Seventh Trumpet event. What information remained of the catastrophe suggests the event specifically resulted in the energetic annihilation of multiple forms of Vitubium, including Morinium.

The thorough devastation of the Deadbeat nation following the event suggest the substance had as important and ubiquitous a presence back then as it does today, but the centuries of metaphysical suppression of the Vitubium currents did result in a break in the magical traditions of our people.

When the Resurgence came to, not all Vitubium types were affected equally. What small slivers of Morinium Deadbeats from the period could find were but a mere shadows of a past glory. In terms of activation level, power density, corollary effects, the substance was barely distinguishable from mundane material, only enough to taunt the Death worshippers with a dream of their then powers.

It took many painful years before a new blessing was allowed to the once skeletal people. The first known Morinite catalognaut since the resurgence was born into a society that had forgotten about her kind, their powers and characteristics.

Desuli got her share of hard knocks, don't doubt that... Easy to forget, nowadays all them catalognauts get scooped up to hit the stars, they're set as soon as they're scouted... Back then, at first they didn't know what the hell was up with her, took her for a weird schizo at first, with her palor, the hair, the glowy eyeballs. Lucky for all of us, she managed to knock some sense into anyone wantin' to cut her up at some schizology school. Who knows how many of 'em got snuffed out like that before she came around...

Rukalius Honee, nephew of Desuli Mortis, first known catalognaut born post-ST

Catalognaut Honee' body displayed capabilities incomparable to the weak vitubics achievable with the natural Morinium found on Vitubia in this period. Following her birth, a number of other Morinite catalognauts were found, all sharing the characteristics now familiar to us. But she would have only been a source of forlorn hope were it not for the revelation she brought with her.

My soul rests within the bones of my ribs, anchored to this somber Earth, but My Mori pulls and tugs at it every day, she beckons to the place where our souls belong. Our place is in the stars. Look up and you will see it, a twinkling pink hue, your eyes may fail to grasp it, but your spirit yearns for it. Our legs alone cannot take us to the mountaintop anymore, it is much too high now. Nevertheless, our fate is too climb it; we shall endure and see it done. Her Underworld awaits.

Desuli Honee, in an address to the general assembly of Carnifex

The wisdom of our Mori must have spoken through her, for those visions all came to be in one way or another. Forays into vitubic astronomy led to the discovery of a star whose magical emissions matched the conceptual waves detected from the newly acknowledged catalognauts. This far-flung star would turn out to be none other than the sun of our current homeworld, Shindus.

Shindus is remarkable in that it is the only known source of inorganic Morinium, much like the Vitubian Mont Mori of the pre-ST myths is theorized to have been. Following these findings, Deadbeats from all over Vitubia were drawn to efforts to explore and settle the system, in a rare and short-lived display of multilateral agreement and collaboration among the polities. For an in-depth treatment of the history of the colonization of Shindus, see the Further Reading section of this document.

Genesis and Synthesis of Morinium

Shindus is not unique in the vast amounts of Vitubium contained and expelled by its mass. However, no other star specifically features Mori-type vitubium, also known as Morinium. The actual origin of the substance was shrouded in mystery, until the Project Sheonlyo Extreme Environment Probe successfully gathered data from the star's photosphere, shining some light onto its working mechanisms.

Ah, yes, as it concerns the Shindus Morinium reserves, more analysis is required obviously, and longer term trends would be better established over a longer-period study, but erm yes, as theorized by my colleague it would seem that er, new Morinium is generated through conceptual transference from the Vitium field onto the pre-existing vitubic knot formed by Shindus.

Professor Kurotokus, in a press conference to the Shindusian High Energy Vitubics Institute a few weeks after the in-situ stabilization of Project Sheonlyo

Transference as mentioned by Prof. Kurotokus above is the process through which Morinium finds itself in our realm, forming a connection to the Vitium field, from whence magical magical energy can be drawn. It was known since the pre-ST period that catalognauts were examples of a transference phenomenon, also described as the /become/ process, or transubstantiation. However, how inorganic vitubium came to be was unknown for a long time. The demonstration of stellar transference by Shindus settled this question with regards to Morinium.

Specifically, the Morinium found in Shindus (and the rest of the Vitubian Nebula) is primarily produced though Vitipair Production.

Figure 1. Vitipair production steps, with the (a) interaction between conceptual waves and mundane matter (b) creating a supercritical vitipair which (c) either annihilates, re-emitting a new conceptual wave, or separates, depending on whether the Real Space and Vitium Field have been pushed close enough for the vitubium particles to be separated across the boundary.

Vitipair Production has chances of occurring in a wide variety of situations in both standard space and the Vitium Field, including most interactions between conceptual waves and other types of matter. In most instances of the reaction, the vitipair quickly rejoins together and annihilates, retransmitting a new conceptual wave, as observed on the left side of Fig. 1.

In some circumstances however, the vitipair may form on a boundary between standard space and the Vitium Field, leaving each vitubium particle stranded in a different dimension, as seen on the right side of Fig. 1. The separated vitubium particles then transition to a stable configuration (Fig. 1 (c)) where the annihilation interaction is all but impossible, barring supercritical events. Heavenly "happenings" such as graduations are an infamous mechanism through which supercriticality may be induced in stable vitubium.

This "Vitipair Stranding" appears to be how most Morinium makes its way into standard space, whether naturally or in a catalognaut's body. This tends to occurs in spaces where the dimensional separation between the two dimensions is smaller, where the veil is thinner, so to speak. A number of factors can affect how close standard space is to the Vitium Field at any point in space and time, but areas with strong conceptual fields tends to press the realms closer to one another, allowing the unfolding of Vitipair Strandings.

As far as Morinium is concerned, very strong conceptual fields are needed to allow such interactions to occur. The mantle and core of Shindus seem to fulfill this criteria, as do some select locations on planets in the system. The Morinium synthesized in Shindus is circulated throughout the star, intensifying the existing conceptual field, and portions of it is ejected towards the rest of the solar system through solar flares. The vast majority of the Morinium found on Shindus' satellites has this origin.

Thermal Properties

When asked about the unusual properties of Morinium, the most common and instinctual response would concern its thermal properties, both among and outside of Deadbeats. After all, this effect drives most visibly our system's worlds' climates, as well as many of the Shindusian weapon platforms and technological systems people across the Nebula might encounter, such as the infamous Anti-Personel Deep Freeze warheads.

This property relies on a relatively simply fundamental mechanism. Most vitubium has the ability to draw Magical Quanta (MQ) from the Vitium Field (VF). This MQ may then be emitted to our physical realm as heat, electromagnetic radiation, conceptual waves, and other effects with a remarkable amount of variability. Morinium has the unusual property of being able to convert heat from neighbouring particles into MQ, removing thermal energy from its environment. Then, this MQ may undergo a wide variety of conversions. Each conversion will receive a thorough treatment, but let us focus on the heat transfer phenomenon first.

The embrace my Mori offers us when we meet our Destined Death is a cool one indeed, but her cold is that of a gentle snow, a calming hand on a feverish forehead, a comforting deadening of the pains of life as we move take our final step. But with her blessings, we can harness this gentle chill and sharpen it into an icy resolve, a bitter biting freeze to crush those who would defy Death. Rejoice, my sisters, as this new advance will allow the Shin Megami Tsukiyo* to illuminate shadows once considered impenetrable.

Priestess Hyove, concluding her seminar regarding the results of the SMT's bleeding edge investigation into "Absolute Zero Cryo-Chuubanitics".

"Heat" is defined as the kinetic energy stemming from the undirected random vibration of particles. It is often considered to be the final state of all energy in the universe, pure disordered chaos, the result of inefficiency in all energetic processes. However, all things must die, and so the blessings of Our Mori grant death even to heat itself.

To understand how this can occur, we must first consider the magiquantic structure of a Morinium particle. This vitubium type is defined by the availability of four orbitals organized in a cubic structure, each with four magiquantic shells with four orbiting tetrahedrically-stabilized MQ groupings each, for a total of two-hundred-and-fifty-six (256) MQ.

Figure 2. Glass model showcasing the magiquantic shells of a Morinium particle, with the four eight-shaped lobes organized cubically, each with four subshells of decreasing energetic level. The pink lobes are where the two up-spin tetrahedral MQ groupings are found, while the red lobes are where the corresponding down-spin groupings orbit, exchanging places with every orbit.

As we know, the outermost magiquantic shells are coupled to the ambient electric field through the Koyo-Aka effect. This coupling is responsible for the emission of heat and light by most vitubium types, but in morinium, the mechanism can be inverted. Following a collision between an atom's electronic cloud and this magiquantic shell, a fraction of the atom's momentum corresponding to a discrete number of MQ's worth of energy is absorbed and converted to MQ. This reduction in the atom's momentum can be measured as a reduction in temperature in macro scales, leading to the cooling effect.

The probability of those interactions can be increased through the conceptual activation of the morinium, through either activator material, glyph architecture, or immersion in a conceptual field. High conceptual activation leads to more energetic, and thus larger magiquantic shells, increasing the odds of collisions. High activation is especially relevant in near-zero cryo-chuubanitics, where the kinetic energy of the particles is so low as to reduce the occurrence of the interactions.

In practical applications of the phenomenon, it is common to exploit strong magical fields to extend the range of the cooling phenomenon through Vitubium Induction. By exerting the conceptual field on matter, even if there is no physical contact between the field source and the target, small amounts of morinium transference can occur in the mass, allowing for active cooling.

Kinetic to MQ energy conversion is only the first half of the process. Once the MQ is in the magiquantic shell, it may shift to the Vitium Field instead of another more common conversion, resulting in the complete disappearance of this energy from Real Space. This MQ shifting rate increases with higher activation, and is exponentially proportional to the number of MQ currently occupying the morinium particle's magiquantic shells.

This MQ shifting action is colloquially referred to as "entropy death" in the academic community, due to its interesting implications for the overall entropy of the universe. What exactly occurs to MQ shifted to the Vitium Field is still poorly understood; there is a capacitive effect where this energy may be recovered by highly activated morinium in the same conceptual coordinates. But even in the best conditions, only an infinitesimal fraction of said energy can be recovered this way. The leading theory is unsubstantiated by physical evidence, but widely supported by theologists. It posits that this energy is directly received by Our Mori, as fuel for her work ensuring the proper Death of all things. It is certainly a comforting thought to know that simply relinquishing our heat to her divinity supports our Goddess in some small way.

*lit: New Goddess' Moonlight

Emissive Properties

Morinium's most easily observed patanatural property is the emission of light, often witnessed as a gentle glow coming off of chuubanitic Shindusian lifeforms. Some esoteric effects of morinium are often attributed to this pink light, however this is merely a faulty correlation. These esoteric effects are caused by the conceptual radiation emitted by the substance, the pink light is purely in the electromagnetic spectrum. We will discuss both emission spectra here.

Pink woman good, pink woman bad, pink woman do stuff that make me mad!! Pink board, pink bored, I hate the pink horde!!! Pink song sound like dung!!! Pink woman's dogwater, why the fuck do you like her!?! Pink whore is a bore, but I can't ignore!!! PINK WOMAN BAD PINK WOMAN BAD PINK WOMAN MAKES ME SO SO MAD!!!!

Transcript from the raving rambles of a highly schizopathic test subject following exposure to high intensity morinium irradiation.

While the MQ orbit the probability cloud of their magiquantic shell, there is a chance for them to either annihilate into pure emissive energy, or descend from a higher energy shell to a lower one, where the energetic differential is converted to emissions as well. In both cases, the emission will have both an electromagnetic and a conceptual component.

Regarding the latter, as is often the case regarding the conceptual spectra of specialized vitubium types, that of morinium is extremely complex, with many disparate peaks in the multidimensional conceptual space. The most dominant spike, expectedly, is the very concept of Death; the End, Finality, the Cold of Unlife. Second are the groupings of concepts related to Peace in Death; Rest, Repose, Calm, the End of Suffering, the Last Embrace. The third grouping is unsurprising, and harnesses the concept of Killing; Murder, Violence, Wrathful Death, the Fires of Hell. These three groups form the bulk of morinium's conceptual signature.

Satellite concepts can also be measured in this spectra. In no particular order, small spikes in the conceptual spaces corresponding to Justice, Song, Ambition, Conflict, Lust, Sin and Mercy are also notable.

From the specific combination of those ideas, the unique conceptual spectrum of morinium arises.

Let us quickly review the nature of an electromagnetic radiation emission spectrum. This spectrum is often represented with a graph of the spectral intensity relative to the light wavelength. All light-emitting objects have such a spectrum. For example, the star Vitubion has a spectrum close to a black-body emission spectrum, with a peak spectral intensity around 480 nanometers (nm) of wavelength, and the whole spectrum resulting in a yellow-white light when added.

Morinium's spectrum is different; instead of featuring a single wide-band of emission, it features multiple emission spikes, with each spike corresponding to both a set of MQ reactions, and a concept. These lightwaves are thus generated jointly with their conceptual counterparts.

Figure 3. Relative spectral intensity as a function of light wavelength. Spikes for the "Ope", "Mori" and "Calli" regimes are labelled at 382 nm, 502 nm and 704 nm respectively. Minor spikes corresponding to multiple lesser concepts exist beside the three core spikes.

The three core concepts are denoted in the emission spikes at 382 nm, 502 nm and 704 nm. The most energetic spike at 382 nm actually peaks outside of the visible spectrum, in UVA light. This is the "Ope" spike; harsh and dangerous, intensified by the will to kill. On the other side, at 704 nm, the infra-red spike is associated with pure Death, the End. Cold spells and entropic interference interact with this "Calli" emission regime more strongly.

In between them, the third major spike lies at 502 nm, in a relaxing green hue. This is the restful death, the calm meadow, or the Forest. This "Mori" band of the spectrum contributes much to the overall color of the emitted light despite being the least energetic, since it is fully in the visible spectrum, while the two other spikes are partially in the non-visible UV and IR ranges.

When emitted, the whole spectrum is summed to light that is pink in color, which interestingly is a color impossible to achieve by using only a single wavelength of light. The multiple nature of the Goddess is a wondrous thing.

Figure 4. Pure Morinium sample confined in a conceptual chamber and highly activated. Such experimental setups are used to take precise measurements of conceptual and EM radiation.

Mechanical Properties

One's bones should be kept ever hard and tough, ready to sustain whatever this tumultuous world of ours is ready to throw at us. Our Mori gives us a skeleton fit for those burdens; salvation is found within, where the Goddess resides. However, Morinium does not only empower our bones; all materials which contain the substance find themselves hosting a patanatural toughness.

"Punch the wall, newbeat." "Yes duksei*." THUMP "Again." THUMP "Again." THUMP "Harder." THUMP "Harder." CLUNK
"Good. Newbeat, inspect the target." "Yes duksei." "Describe it." "Duksei. It's a steel wall. There is my blood on it. There is a dent where I struck. Duksei."
"Good. Newbeat, inspect your weapon." "Yes duksei." "Describe it." "Duksei. It's my fist. It's bleeding from the middle and ring knuckles. In the wound, my metacarpal shines beneath the white skin and thick blood."
"Newbeat. Why did your flesh and the wall yield where your metacarpal stood strong?" "Duksei. My Mori loves my metacarpal and granted it the strength it needs. Duksei."
"You're Death-damned right, newbeat. My Mori loves us, and provides. Keep loving your Mori and keep those bones tough as hell, that'll get you through anything, recruits. Well demonstrated, newbeat, get back in line.

Transcript from the third week exercises of an unidentified platoon-in-training from the Kuroclass' 6th Gundan**'s .

Many vitubium types can reinforce materials; chuubanitic steel alloy is a common application. What sees a lot of variance is the types of materials which the chuubanite types have the most affinity for. To properly understand these affinities, we should first familiarize ourselves with the low-level mechanics of chuubanitic forces.

Let's study the simple case of the vitubium-iron interaction observed in many types. The chuubanitic force is observed between MQ and electric charges q at the molecular scale. When chuubaniticity (the concentration of vitubium in the bulk material) is low, the MQ will tend to remain in its vitubium core's magiquantic shells, as the vitubium-MQ force is stronger than the MQ-q forces. However, these MQ-q forces are still strong enough to bind the vitubium to the iron atom.

At high chuubaniticity, when vitubium particles are in closer proximity to one another, the bonds adopt a behaviour more comparable to metallic bonds. In the metallic bond, the electron is allowed to leave its atom, attracted by a neighbouring metal atom; and likewise for all atoms in the material. As a result, the metal nuclei end up bathed in a sea of free-moving electrons.

Figure 4. Chuubanite bond mechanics. At low chuubaniticity, the MQ forms explicit bonds with a specific atom-vitubium pair. At higher chuubaniticity, the system transition to an MQ sea where the MQ is affected by forces from multiple vitubiums and atoms.

Analogously, the MQ can form such an "MQ sea" where they are allowed to traverse the material while remaining within the influence of vitubium particles. At the same time, they still exert MQ-q forces on mundane charges (Fig. 4).

Many factors affect the magnitude of this MQ-q force. As expected, the activation level of the vitubium is quite influential. But the primary variable is the nature of the mundane matter. The specific molecular structure of any mundane matter creates a conceptual impedance which interacts uniquely with any specific vitubium type. Thus, each type of MQ will have a varying level of affinity with different materials, depending on the conceptual alignment of the MQ-matter pair.

Interestingly, the force is not affected by the sign of the charge; it can be calculated by using the absolute value of the charge, IE an electron and a proton exert the same attractive force. On the other hand, electric charges always exert a repelling force on the vitubium particle itself, leading to an equilibrium when the MQ-q attraction is equal to the vitubium-q repulsion.

Where morinium is concerned, a specific class of materials has the highest affinity; hard minerals. The classic example is the calcium phosphate found in the bones of most Vitubian animals, a crustacean's calcium carbonate shell, or the goethite (iron(III) oxide-hydroxide) found in the skeletons of animals exposed to significant chronic doses of morinium. Among naturally occurring materials, diamond has the highest affinity; indeed, beside some divergences, higher hardnesses correlate to higher affinities. The highest recorded affinities belong to artificial materials engineered for optimal chuubanitic properties, such as macro-scale hexagonal diamonds, or island of stability crystals.

These hard materials' mechanical properties benefit from the addition of morinium. Indeed, while cubically crystalline diamond is quite brittle, large amounts of morinium can vastly increase its toughness. The MQ-q forces are to thank for this, as these attractive forces will tend to keep the crystalline structure in place as the atoms are displaced. They may even pull them back to their original positions following a cleavage event, resulting in self-healing properties.

This combination of capabilities results in morinium-infused materials having rather useful physical characteristics, as observed in a plenitude of Deadbeat inventions in the fields of mechanical, biological and aerospatial engineering. Besides our own strong bones, Mori's toughness is also expressed by the robust Ebilocus-type battleship frames, the nigh-invincible Graveishi physical shield platings in use by our elite forces, and uncountable other creations.

* lit. Teacher/Trainer (Dux+Sensei)
** lit. Army (Gun+Ryodan)