'Va' Draft 1

Va is a substance so small that you often don’t see it, and often used in such a crafty way that, even if you physically can see it, you don’t. It’s basically magic, but entirely physical, and a lot more believable. An individual Va particle (if that would be the right term for it; cell?) can contain a certain amount of information and instruction, connecting with other Va particles to create webs of Va-strings. This functions as a massive network, connecting everything in the system, like a biological internet. (I will maybe write on this further at another time, I suppose in the main story it will have to be explained.)

The most interesting part about Va is that minds can interact with minds in a very direct way (of course, this can be used very maliciously, but safeguards can be build, by nature or through training, and even laws and such being enforced when it comes to humans.)

The Vas (plural) are the human’s which are tapped into the Va ecosystem. The Vas are easily the most powerful race on the planet, potentially so powerful I constantly have to evaluate whether they should exist as they currently do! With non-sentient beings, it’s quite a bit easier. They are “programmed” by God, through nature, to use Va’s various means to their desired ends, usually simple and predictable things. For knowledgeable humans they can be countered quite easily. It’s just the Vas which are an issue.

Couldn’t a master race of Vas craftily inject delusions into the masses minds, through Va, and control them? Couldn’t a Va do loads of horrendous crimes through controlling the minds of others? Of course they could. They are human beings with an evil root and a great power at their disposal. Mind control, hypnosis, creating illusions and delusions, and maybe some more subtle, easier to learn arts, are all possible with Va. Of course, these things are forbidden to learn, and things like full mind control through Va are incredibly hard to learn, and maybe even impossible. 

With such a rough understanding of how this substance would work, I have no idea. It’s all fantasy, obviously, so both being equally believable, I’ll just pick what’s most convenient. But something tells me it's a cop out to remove all the OP stuff by just saying ‘too hard for them to learn, doesn’t exist.’ Therefore, I’m currently keeping these ‘dark arts’ as possible. I already have Va creatures which use illusions and delusions to trick humans, or more commonly to cloak their appearance, so I don’t see why humans couldn’t have this ability.

Furthermore, I think it fits well with the lore of the Vas race as scary and evil. Non-Vas (vanilla?) humans and the Vas had a legendary war, with humans winning through sheer number. One of the many reasons for this war would definitely have been the Vanillas fearing the Vas due to their dark magic-like abilities.

Conclusion: Yes, the Vas have the ability to brainwash and entire town, rape, and pillage. But so do normal humans, just through different means. So I don’t think this makes the Vas too powerful, just a whole lot more powerful. Ideas, speech, rhetoric, the media, tribalism, psychological tricks, and such are all baby talk compared to the way Vas could control people through directly altering their mind.