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Posted

So, you know how a heat sink draws heat from something and then dissipates it?  Well, I need a word sort of like that use of "sink", except there won't be any dissipating - it'll draw something in and hold it (or store it).  The obvious options aren't working for me:

  • Vacuum isn't right
  • Sponge is all wrong
  • Sucker is so very, very wrong
  • Well is pretty good (kinda like sink), but I'm hoping for something better, and this doesn't really include the concept of drawing something into it, just of holding something
  • Attractor and Collector are sorta close (though attractor doesn't really include the storage piece)
  • Retainer doesn't include the drawing part, and sounds too dental

So, any other thoughts?  If it helps, this will be (part of) the name of a malicious object - think of it as something that sucks your soul (energy, power, life, something like that) in and locks it away - poor you.  Also, if it helps more, I'm thinking of a cylindrical object, roughly 8 or 10 inches in diameter, 18-30 inches long, probably made of metal, or perhaps some crystalline doohickey encased in a metal mesh or frame (yes, that's sounding good, let's go with that).  There will actually be several of them, arranged in a circle around a rather large geographic area (one alone doesn't really work well, but a circle of them is quite devastating (if you're inside the circle).

Thanks for any and all ideas (even if I don't use them).  I'm going to go and let my subconscious work on this problem now.

Posted (edited)

A vamp, from the 1920s, was based on vampire. Denoted a woman who drew the life force from someone.

A catalyst is meant to Cause a chemical reaction and dissipate some sort of emotion. 

Black hole? 

Edited by Sunday21
Posted (edited)
9 hours ago, person0 said:

reaper's cache

I like it. :)  Won't do as is, but might spark similar ideas.  This one goes off to the subconscious for work.

9 hours ago, Sunday21 said:

A catalyst is meant to Cause a chemical reaction and dispate some sort of emotion.

I was trying to think of a term for a chemical agent or reaction that binds something and thereby makes it inert or inactive - today I can ask a chemist that question. :)

6 hours ago, Jamie123 said:

Reservoir?

This is good for the well side of things - because the device does store, not destroy, what it soaks up, and can release it again.  Partial words might work.  Off to the subconscious with it. :whip:

6 hours ago, Fether said:

Drain

I like this one - evokes ideas of a person's energy being drained, which is totally accurate.  Using it together with another word like "power drain" (sounds like something you keep in the garage next to the table saw) or "magic drain" doesn't really work, though.  Off it goes to the subconscious! :D

4 hours ago, classylady said:

Reminds me of “I am Legion.”

Kraken

Leviathan 

Hmm.  A sentience in the doohickey.  That's intriguing.  A sentience in the form of a crystalline entity - anyone else remember that episode of ST:TNG?  This would require each crystal to be an individual, and they would have to work together, at the behest or control of another.  No, not seeing that.  Better is a sentience bound to the crystal or linked to it and consciously using it to draw magic from within the circle.  That would put a whole new twist on things.  The effect would ebb and flow as the being in control needed to rest or lost focus.  (This would be good.)  Proximity requirements could send the story conclusion in two different directions...  How hard is it to find the one in control of the crystals?  Do we need to, or can we just destroy the crystals?  Hmm.  How hard is it to make and control these things?  If we don't find him, he might start up again.  Hmm.  I think someone has to die.  I must ponder for a while before sending this off to the subconscious.

Thanks for the help, everyone, please keep them coming!  I may have to print these off and file them away so I don't forget to put any of you in the acknowledgements (assuming this results in something worthwhile.)

Edited by zil
Posted

Sanguine Relics. Sanguine Gem.  Sanguinaire Vampirism is the disease that affects humans in some writings.

Leech rods. Parasitanium rods (Parasite), Snatch rods

Soulsappers, soul cylinder ,  soul extractor,

Hex Gem, Hex Rod.

Trinket of darkness,

Venom rod

I'll keep thinking

Posted

Or maybe the soul-leeching battery! once it's introduced then it can be referred to simply as the leeching device or battery for variety. Unless you prefer to hybridize and invent words then you can have the leechery😀

 

Posted
1 hour ago, Overwatch said:

Trinket of darkness

:crackup:

32 minutes ago, FunkyTown said:

You mean like a battery?

Your cell phone battery does exactly this when you recharge it.

If it's to do with heat, just call it an "Endothermic battery".

Sort of, but battery is too technologically advanced a word for this story, and has (I suspect) the wrong connotations in people's consciousness. :)

17 minutes ago, SpiritDragon said:

leechery

:lol:  Hmm.  So now I have to decide if this is like a banned (forgotten, lost, something) practice (and thus has a name), or if it's something newly discovered (and thus doesn't yet have a name).  I think I'm leaning toward new (at least for this society - I was kinda thinking they learned it from the (perceived) barbarians who live up on the plateau).

Posted
37 minutes ago, FunkyTown said:

You mean like a battery?

 

Your cell phone battery does exactly this when you recharge it.

 

If it's to do with heat, just call it an "Endothermic battery".

 

 

Soul Prism? The Eldritch Stone? The Soul Mirror?

Posted
26 minutes ago, zil said:

Looking for a noun - absorber (aka sponge) is where I went right after "sink". :)

Devourer

Absorber

absorbator

Drainer

Draineraxiumanatoratoramoror

consumer

Tyler

 

Posted
30 minutes ago, mordorbund said:

Also, you can use the backronym MAW. (Mass Attracting Well or whatever)

Ah, this idea could work.  Into the subconscious it goes! :)

15 minutes ago, Anddenex said:

vortex

Oooh, this is interesting.  Would I have to give @Vort part of my royalties? ;)

5 minutes ago, Fether said:

Devourer

Hmm.  That's interesting in light of the recent plan to have sentience involved somehow.

6 minutes ago, Fether said:

Draineraxiumanatoratoramoror

...

Tyler

:crackup:

Posted
15 hours ago, zil said:

think of it as something that sucks your soul (energy, power, life, something like that) in and locks it away - poor you.

This is exactly what the Dementors did in Harry Potter

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