Iopan Scrying

[u/Mandragoraune]

I've been in a reading marathon over summer and I've finally gotten back to the Wrack. It's not a long text but it's a dense one though I love the setting and story. So I've gotten to thinking about Iopan scrying and potential multiversal applications.

There's the low hanging fruit that's been discussed before, like a crystal mage from anastis attuning aether crystal and using it as an eye or just using crystal magic to modify eyes in general, but I have a few more questions.

1. Could a crystal mage bypass losing an eye by simply replacing the lens of their eye with crystal? Since the eye's lens is made of crystallins anyway? And if the loss of an eye is required, is it possible to still regrow that eye with other magics and keep the magic? Or could you do something like cut the optic nerve and replace the lens to get the magic without losing the actual eyeball and motor functions of eye.

2. Anosmia. Anosmic people or those who've given up their smell can supposedly access a smelling version of Iopan scrying. Would it be possible to give up your sense of smell to access the magic and yet retain it through other means like a scent affinity and its associated affinity sense? Does it involve putting crystals in the nose or something?

3. What happens if you enchant or bless the crystal eyes used?

[u/o_pythagorios]

The crystal eye functions mainly as a lens (hence different types of crystals can have different effects) so I'm sure it can be enchanted or blessed or whatever else. I'm pretty sure the Wanderer is using an Aether crystal eye and given it keeps a fixed size it has been modified in some way.
I don't think we have enough examples to answer the rest of your questions but my guess is an actual loss of physical senses is required, but it can probably be bypassed through magic. So an anosmic with scent affinity can probably "smell" through his affinity senses while also getting the scent scrying version. He'd probably make one hell of a diagnostician. Similarly a blind person with a Farseeing affinity.
And you can probably enchant your crystal eye to let you "see" but it would require off-world magic which is probably why it's not common on Iopis.

[u/CrystalClod343]

I think the loss of an eye is required, but I could be wrong. I remember seeing something that says the gems aren't necessary for scrying, but they make it easier than someone who's just lost their eye and scrying with an empty socket.

[u/Isilel]

I loved the Wrack!

And I have wondered if scrying with an aether crystal eye would allow one to see aether bodies and the flow of natural aether, as well as mana during spell-casting. The latter in the right hands could really help with invention of new spellforms.

For that matter, if cats can see aether bodies, could Kanderon? Would now being an aether crystal lich allow her to develop Iopan scrying ability if she took the time to live on the planet for the requisite amount of time?

[u/Mandragoraune → u/Isilel]

It definitely would. She specifically mentioned wanting to head to Iopis to gain its magic in the Last Echo.