The Great Punishment from Prompt

And so the age of scientists and academics came to a jaggedly abrupt end. A seemingly infinite amount of attempts were made to analyze the material, and although the humans had the equipment needed to harvest samples from the transluscent cage, most had not the knowledge to understand what they were analyzing. There was just too large an abyss between the current knowledge of the earthly realm and the required knowledge for understanding this alien materia.

Others stepped up, offering explanations and theories, hoping to spark a thoght that might lead to an understanding of what the humans were now dealing with. The first of which were religious scholars, academia in their own right yet of a different crop. Of course, they offered theories ranging from divine light to miracles. However none could provide a solid explanation of it and the gap was left gaping wide.

This remained as different groups cycled through the investigation. And as these groups failed to identify the material time and time again the world was forced to change. The Great Punishment trapped many of the harmful material excrements inside the planet. As greenhouse gasses and other byproducts of human “prospering.” Although many of Those in Power did not like it, and were not quick to change, they did not have much choice as their own greed was being suffocated by The Great Punishment. Of course, any changes made were made in such calculated ways that Those in Power lost as little of that power as possible.

Eventually the materia was placed on the backburner, a thought kept in the back of any intelligent minds – something people hope to one day understand – but the more they failed at understanding it the more they realized that there is nothing they can currently do about it. So they let it go, and shifted their attentions to what they could. Unfortunately, the state of the world at the time that The Great Punishment was enacted was enough to cause some major cataclysms.

Earth Herself was intelligent enough to adapt to the changes She faced. Over the next hundred years several major ecosystems changed. Some seemed for the better, but some obviously decayed and rotted. The Earth seemed to lose some of her balance, She couldn't spread Her vitality as widely thus some of the planet become more fertile and luscious while other parts became even more ragged and desolate. Even so, there was something else in the mixture. Something that wasn't there before, and it affected the people and the planet.

This new phenomena was first noticed by those practicing strange forms of magick such as Wiccans and Priests. The religious followings definitely had the first Manifestations, as they had the most practicioners and followers. What were once subtle miracles gradually rose in levels of potency. A blind man's eyes got a little better here. A Wiccan curse had a feint effect there. But over the Hundred Year Change, things became really powerful. Problematically so.

What happens in a world where disease can be cured with a world and a life can be ended by a night spent meditating in a circle of candles?