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When a soul dies with an unanswered longing carved deep into its core, that longing may stir the gaze of the goddess of fate. In rare moments, when a wish burns bright enough to pierce the veil of death, the goddess offers these souls a most grim bargain: servitude in exchange for a single wish granted two lives later.
Those who accept Her contract are reincarnated without memories of their bargain or who they once were. No longer knowing their purpose behind their servitude, they must place blind faith in the intentions of their former self. What does remain is a vague, aching pull toward a future they can no longer name, and animal ears that represent their past life’s sin. Thus, the familiar is born: A spirit bound to serve a mortal master, most often an archmage, a witch, or other wielder of immense arcane power.
These familiars are potent in their abilities, their power drawn not just from magic, but from the will of the goddess herself, able to conjure miracles and manipulate the threads of fate for their master's benefit. But their strength is unstable, always with a price, every spell knotted with emotion and fragments of a self they no longer understand. It is said that a familiar’s magic can sometimes even warp or rebel when the echoes of their forgotten desire surface.
Only those with exceptional willpower are said to reach salvation, rewarded in their next life with both their wish and the memories of all they once were. But failure comes at a steep price. Those who break their contract—who betray their master, falter in their servitude, or lose themselves to despair—are unmade. Not merely slain, but cast from the cycle entirely. No afterlife, no return, no record or trace of having once existed.
For this reason, familiars are seen as both a blessing and a curse. Eccentric. Volatile. Haunted. More likely to unravel than they are to ascend, plagued either by the guilt of what they once were or what their masters try to make of them. It's said many masters die by the hands of their own familiar. Yet, despite the risk, many arrogant mages nonetheless welcome the gamble... for the most renowned spellcasters are often those willing to wager with fate to make history.
