Healer

First and foremost, a Healer must be a mage with capacity and proficiency in Life Energy. Life Energy is the most obscure of the [The in that it is more complex and nuanced than many might think. Mages who do not have the unique talent in this energy, are often steered away from using Life Energy at all. This is the main quality that separates a Healer from a physician. A physician might have all the knowledge of the body (see below) but they either do not have the ability to manipulate Life Energy or are not a mage at all.   The second most important qualification for a Healer is an up-to-date understanding of the body. Many universities include programs that teach this information, but some Healers come by their knowledge through private study, and some seem to have a more intuitive understanding of how the body works.

Healers tend to come into their progression in one of two ways. In both instances, a Healer is usually tagged first as a mage from a young age. Only later is their unique capacity for healing discovered.   At that point, a healer might either be welcomed or accepted into a Healers guild, or they might be taught by a master healer.   Healers Guilds are basically colleges that systematically teach young mages the fine art of healing, resulting in the mage having something akin to a degree in healing. Some larger cities are beginning to require Healers to have membership in certain accredited guilds before allowing them to practice within their borders.    In less populous settings, many Healers are trained in a more traditional format, in that they become an apprentice to a professional Healer. During this apprenticeship, the master teaches the student their craft, and gives them safe, guided opportunities to practice it. As the apprentice grows proficient, they receive more responsibility and freedom until they themselves are considered a master, after which point they either stay with their teacher and replace them when they retire, or they move off to another location in need of a healer.

Healers are in high demand almost everywhere. While physicians have been able to take some of the things Healers have learned about the human body and find natural, mundane aids for common injuries and maladies, Healers greatly boost the overall health and longevity of a community and their works don't come cheap. However, many towns subsidize a town Healer which makes it so that regular townsfolk can afford basic services, but also because a town Healer can draw a lot of business into the town.

Healers are generally well liked and appreciated in their communities. A Healer is almost unheard of in communities of less than two thousand souls, so especially in such places, the local Healer is afforded a lot of love and appreciation for what they do.

Healers are the highest class of medical professionals in Nov Matar. Without both their presence, and the advances they've made in the medical sciences, the world would be a much deadlier place.

Healers are generally in high standing in most communities. The only time this is not true, is in places where magic is mistrusted. In such cases, Healers might be disdained and feared, or at least ostracized from the community as a whole.

Healers are rather rare in the grand scheme of things. Generally only populations of two thousand or more have a Healer. So the smallest towns might not have one, and its almost unheard of for a village to have a local Healer, though they might have a friendly herbalest, physicians, or something similar. Larger cities support small guilds of Healers.

The most important 'tool' a Healer has is their ability to manipulate Life Energy, and the second most important is their knowledge of human anatomy. But in addition to these, Healers use a lot of tools for secondary purposes.    For example, many Healers are also makers of potions and so they'll have plenty of chemistry equipment (burners and vials and all). Also, Healers engage in surgery from time to time and though most of the time they perform this surgery magically, they'll have surgeons tools to hand in case they need them. Healers also make and keep regular first aid supplies, things like splints and bandages, etc.

The average town Healer's workplace looks, at first glance, like a small town shop. Often the Healer's workplace is the first floor of their home and they, their family and apprentices live in the floors above. A Healer's workplace will have usually have an entrance room where the Healer (or more likely one of her apprentices) will great patients, as well as a number of consultation rooms and an operating room for surgery. In addition, a Healer's workplace will have a room for mixing potions and the like.

Healers provide healing. This goes from anything between fixing a cut to setting a broken bone to curing poison, to treating illness.