Metarcanum

Archivist's Excerpt from: Alone in the Cold: The Story of Orphan Towne, its Strange History, & its Stranger Occupants, CVI 42.4

The Metarcanum (literally, "Mystery of All Mysteries") is a term coined by one Agnes Esker through the publication (or rather, attempted publication) of her seminal volume on the matter, The Metarcanum: A Theory of Linguistic Constitution of Matter, Energy, & Form. It is a term of dual-meaning, one sense for a natural law of the universe, a constitution of matter and energy (hence the title), but also of a linguistic nature of patterns within that constitution—in other words, a language that the universe is made of, which shares the same name of "Metarcanum."

In this context, the Metarcanum is a constitution of matter and energy, patterns of vibration of all possible particles in the universe. It is the pattern of these vibrations which, according to the theory, gives each particle its nature, and in turn gives each atom its, and each molecule its, and upwards and so-forth.

It is the alteration of these patterns at a fundamental level that the Halo Program is designed to affect, changing the nature of each particle, thereby changing matter and energy itself (and potentially even more), and essentially "rewriting" the universe around the Halo user, or Artificer.

For more on the linguistic nature of the Metarcanum, see entry on your right.