Regeneration was not commonly used. Various groups have done research on it, and nearly all had gone to the same conclusion. The “Enlightened” themselves have tried to figure out whether the components of this spell could be used for something else.
Regeneration used several spells of scanning, binding, and restoration. The only useful bit they couldn’t manage to get out of it was restoration. It was helpful in record making and stabilizing spells, but trying to keep anything around long term using the spell itself caused ... defects.
Delicate components become weaker, fragile, prone to random failures. Melted water could be returned to ice, but there were far more efficient spells to do so, such as freezing spells, and often times there was more water left behind after each use unless you used increasingly large amounts of mana. Heavy, simple objects were less affected, but they tended to survive through time easily enough, and so there wasn’t really much point in doing so in the first place.
Using it on a living creature to extend life was tested thoroughly with live subjects, something Stuart will be happy to rant at you for an over an hour. What the Enlightened found can be summarized as thus:
For two or three uses, it worked ... mostly. Yes, life was extended past what the creature’s normal life span would be, but problems could already be seen after the first casting of the spell. When comparing photos of various stages of the creature’s life, it becomes apparent that aging increases.
Test subjects who have undergone a full Regeneration cycle over ten times had lives that were cut to thirds, requiring more and more frequent castings to avoid death. The subjects’ forms could not be replicated into their previous states perfectly without an extreme amount of magic, and that risks breaking through some of the failsafes in order to keep the subjects memories intact.
Interestingly enough, it is somewhat usable as a general healing spell. As long as the time period is relatively short, you won’t suffer too much of the problems caused by decay, though it is still not very recommended unless you’re desperate, the damage is great, and/or near impossible to heal in any other way, say if your leg got burned to a crisp. The amount of mana that is required for the spell is proportional to the time you’re trying to go back to, not the extent of the damage.
If its just something like a broken bone, or a bad cut, specialized healing mages can do nearly the same at far less mana costs, and with far simpler casting requirements.
If you ignore the complexities and the rather limited uses it has, however, it does offer a few unique advantages. It is debatable whether it is worth the cost, but in hopes of future advancement, I will record these just in case.
As mentioned, it can cure nearly anything, even terminal injuries and diseases if you go back far enough. Well, cure is a bit of a strong word. It delays; the amount of years you get back from the ravages of a terminal illness depends on how many times you have delayed it already.
Your memory seems to fare decently well, something that the spell seems to excel at. Further investigation is required to see whether this component can be separated from the rest of the spell circle without errors.
Unlike the classic phylactery system, this form of life extension is nearly invisible to even well trained mages looking for it, its aftereffects looking nearly identical to merely that of a powerful Sorcerer.
The Regeneration spell is not well suited if you prefer combat situations. There aren’t many options for body modifications. You are pretty much stuck with whatever you’re born with. Good for hiding amongst the populace, if that’s your goal.
These are the class of spells Agatha wanted information on, and later the Club recovered more details upon their runic ingredients from the destroyed lab. Dark magic tended to cloud her talents the way the creatures we rescued from the lab did, and Agatha was content in having only two or three uses out of the spell instead of losing most of her talent caused by the phylactery.
However, on Agatha’s second reset, and the beginning of her third and supposedly final life, she happened upon a loophole.