Discussion Seal Rogue Mages and Other Criminals of Their Powers

What are the methods to seal mages (or martial artists and cultivators) you have read in novels, lore, and worldbuilding project?

If I remember correctly in Mother of Learning in rogue mages and other criminals with magic capability are captured they would be jailed in an underground prison with mana shaping disrupt ward so they can't cast a spell. People who by authority deemed as pretty high ranking mages (who can bypass mana disturber and are notoriously difficult to capture - think of Daimen, Xvim and Kandrei) would be pumped be of all important information straight from their mind with truth potion and mind magic then be executed.


In The Last Science, mages who committed crimes are sent into normal prison just like any other normal people even though they can cast fireballs or conjure lightning from their fingertips.
Part of it is because magic technology is still in the early stage and not sophisticated enough to create something equivalent to a magical seal, another part is because authority not yet creates regulations and rules for magical people (so judges charged them with the common law). Fortunately, some mages who get jailed are well behaved and accept their sentences. But because The Last Science is based on our modern world
I think scientists and engineers can come up with something like a thick metal room or any other methods to restrict mages because at the end of the day most of them are still within the realm of humans (at least in early magic development), there are only several people who can cast dimensional magic.

What are other methods do you think can seal a mage's power (or martial artist, cultivator). Also, do you think mages need different regulations and rules than ordinary citizens?

 

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Bump

 

OP MC

 

I'm pretty sure solitary confinement in tungsten cells would work for most cases. Way on the expensive side, but yeah.

 

Anti Magic Manacles..... This specific wording comes from Coiling Dragon, but there are similar types of shackles in many novels, like the seastone (Kairisaki?) shackles in One Piece for example.

Although I do realize that the explanation behind their working is weak at best. They just shrug it off saying it prevents them from using mana.

 

Is that mean OP Mc can't be restrained and just let them do whatever they want or need someone OP as goverment/rule enforcer to restrain/executed rogue mages/cultivator and highly capable criminals?

 

How about a curse that feeds on the person’s mana. Whenever the person does anything or gathers any, the curse just eats it without actually doing anything else to harm the person.

I made that up myself.

Or you could just go avatar

 

More like the MC being OP enough could seal all threats. Though it was more of a joke answer.

 

Hmm.... The Hamster civilization has never really dealt with the problems regarding entities capable of defying the laws of physics disrupting the order of society due to our entire civilization order being built around such entities (our sacred texts depict the original superior beings such as the first Hamster Overlords being born out of the remains of the King in Yellow, and the lesser beings of flesh are clearly stated to be beneath the beings who can guide the Great Dream of the Creature).
Still, due to the long periods of wars against the avatars of Absolute Chaos (the Cats and such) we have accrued a sizeable library of methods for dealing with Superior creatures of most ranks (apart from the highest, i.e the Hamsters and the Cats etc)
So, to answer your questions

Firstly, regulations must be set. A being capable of magic has a right to stand above the common man. Trying to play-pretend democracy would fail painfully and lead to many loses of innocent lives of the lessers and maybe even the tragic losses of the superiors.
Order must exist, but morality has to accommodate the circumstances rather than follow unrealistic ideals.
Secondly, now that superiors are in charge they are to deal with superiors who oppose this rule.
The rest is just the process of natural selection

 

*is summoned* *reads post* *desummons self*

 

Block/cut their meridians or/and acu points or just destroy their Qi/chi/ki center
Seal their mouths or slit their tongues so they wouldn't chant
Mess with their brains and its wirings so they can't think, chant nor summon any intent

 

That might be as good as banishing their power, at least for time being. Just in the case, they can dismantle the curse (highly experienced mages) or get assisted by a corrupt warden, what is next method?
If I remember in avatar you need to subdue your opponent will before erasing their power, in the process you also opening yourself to their will and chance is it can backfire and they are one who will subdue you will.

 

Let the prisoner always stay in a coma to avoid them escaping or breaking out of jail.

 

It would require someone else to break the curse cause the person would need mana to cast the spell to undo it. No mana, it can’t be undone.

In the sequel avatar, there was also the option of messing with the flow of the bodies blood to stop bending. If you mess with the bodies internal flow, it might be made so the body can’t produce the mana/ki.

Another would be remove that which generates mana in the body, if that is possible

Or make it so that the person has no mana tank. If the person can’t store mana, then spell casting will be hard

 

Solitary confinement with no one to talk to and warden only bring you necessary items once a while, I can see how that can be nightmare inducing

You can't do that, you are mighty wizard hamster, you need to give some explanation about some of your brethren who cause trouble to society and protect my muggle life.

 

There is a fluffy white polar bear like @Bad Storm who hugs criminals. Those she hugs become weaklings with no mana ability what so ever and it can’t be undone unless she licks their face.

 

A mere mortal, daring to command a Hamster (Well, not a Hamster per se, @Anra7777 isn't a purebred Hamster but she clearly has some ancestry with our noble clan which automatically puts her above mere humans on the food chain so the point still stands but I digress)

 

Most novels use the common throwaway of there being some natural material that disrupts and or seals all magic/qi usage. It is by far the most common and also the laziest.

In super power novels I see some.... some less lazy ideas. They use science and or magic to customize each cell for every prisoner. They will make cells in advance for the real bad villains so when they get caught they can be immediately trapped. For instance if the villain has great ice powers the cell would be made to be extremely hot so ice could not be formed to use as an escape.
Think of Magnetos cell from X-Men.

There is also the classic, someone has the ability to steal of nullify powers/magic and they work with the authorities.

For qi and martial artists I feel the go to is just outright destroying the dantian and the imprisoning them in tougher jail cells.

In Magic worlds and cultivation there is often throwing them in different dimensions and throwing away the key. Often prison dimensions where all the criminals fight and kill each other.

Lots of isekai and novels of that ilk do slave collars for their bad elements, to be fair though it is mostly just used on the innocent for power and money and that's what most all the novels focus on.

I'm sure there are more ways I've seen and can't remember. I'll add more if I remember them.

 

Of course I’m not going to tell you my weaknesses or allow you to test your traps on me!

 

For stories where the magic rules require chanting or voice activated spells. A magical deterrent would be some sort of Silence or Mute spell. But really, if that was possible, you may as well just cast Sleep on them. For physical deterrent, you can use gagging. Of course, that comes with the risk of needing to ungag them during meal times. You can go all the way and just cut off their tongues.

Similarly, there are some magic settings that require hand gestures for spell, magic circles, array, and formation construction. Some method of impeding the fingers, hand, or arms would be used. A localized Paralysis spell would do.