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Remember analogue audio tapes? Copying them was a lossy process: If copied too often, you'd accumulate noise until the content is no longer enjoyable. Make soul transfer a lossy process, too. Applied …

Our brain cells are incredibly slow (the speed of nerve signals is significantly slower than the speed of sound in air!). And certainly much larger than modern transistors. Yet we are able to do a lot …

Since you said auroras are acceptable, I'd go with that. An aurora is caused by charged particles which originate from the sun. The Earth's magnetic field deflects those particles, protecting us from …

Since she hadn't yet learned to fully control her magic, the magic was driven by her wishes. When she was about to be burned, her greatest wish was, of course, to be elsewhere. … Now it was not in her magic abilities to just teleport herself to that place. …

Almost any society would allow use of dark magic under certain circumstances. For example, it's hard to imagine that any society would disallow soldiers in battle to use dark magic. … If that use drowns the magic of the enemy, all the better! Also I guess police would be allowed to use dark magic, although to a more limited extent. You mention a system of very defined order. …

Of course if you want existential fear, then you indeed must make the gods not entirely immortal; Icefinger's magic from your description is just that. But remember that not all fear is existential. …

Well, let's look at the relevant part of the fundamental equation of thermodynamics: $$\mathrm dE = T\, \mathrm dS + (\text{terms irrelevant for this question})$$ Here $\delta Q = T\,\mathrm dS$ is th …

The mages are too busy trying to magically fight against each other. Having control over the mundane world would not help them as much as it would divert their forces from controlling other mages or m …

Elements are a powerful force, and very hard to control. Using them against those dangerous creatures is important because those creatures are powerful, too. But using them in fighting less powerful, …

And the knight's iron armour not only protects him from lancets, but also from magic attacks. And your treasure is safe from magic stealing if it is inside an iron chest. … I think those three rules should already be enough to prevent magic to be all-powerful, and still allow enough magic to be used for interesting things. …

The problem is, how should he convince the parents that he needs to take their child away in order to train him to become a monster-slayer? The same way in the real world kings convinced the peop …

Healing magic. Known to us as pharmaceutics (esp. antibiotics). … The unextinguishable-fire magic (known to us as napalm). …

Simple: The gods might care about their power over the people, but not about being worshipped by them. In that case, those gods would probably treat us similar to like we treat wild animals: As long a …

A mirror could have an "address" that is composed by the following items: The name of the manufacturer An unique name the manufacturer gave to the specific mirror. Both are engraved to the mirror, …

The human brain has only so much capacity (well, let's assume there's no magic spell to circumvent that — otherwise, the police/judges are certainly using it themselves so they can detect much more subtle …