Branding Runes

This school of magic makes use of a special kind of runes of power called Branding Runes. Branding Runes were invented ages past by a group of sages while studying the frost giant's runic magic. The sages modified the giant's runes creating an entirely different system, the only similarity left are the usage of runes.

The Branding Runes need to be, like the name implies, branded to the user in order to be used, these runes are able to turn a common man without any knowledge of magic into a powerful sorceres by absorbing the mana and fueling it to the wielder of the runes.

But the process to attain such power isn't easy or quick; when the runes are fused to the subject they start to automatically search the closest life energy they can find in order to consume it and turn it into mana. If the subject isn't strong enough to resist the sudden power that the runes give it could prove fatal, likewise, the runes might see the wielder as a possible target and consume it's own life force, killing it in the process. But if the wielder survivel this trial and the runes adapt to the new body, it will wield an incredible and deadly power that few have conquered.

Sadly, the very nature of the runes makes them tools of torture and death, in order to fuel the wielder the runes feed of life force, so the wielder, in order to be able to use any magic needs to drain live targets. For this very reason the runes have been considered heretical and have been declared illegal to use.

Runic Armor

Thanks to the runes that cover your body you cand defend better agains attacks. The runes function as a shield to protect you against magical damage and physical attacks, you gain resistance to force damage and if you are not wearing armor you can add your Charisma modifier to your AC.

Parasitic Urges

The runes are now bound to your very beign, they grant you strenght but they need energy in return, you have to feed them in order to fuel your power, if you can't grant them any external life force to sustain, they'll start to feed on your body instead, in a desperate way to try and sustain themself.

In order to fuel your runes you need to, weekly, kill one large or medium creature or two small or tiny creatures or up to 10 of any smaller creature like bugs, additionally you can also drain vegetals, to sustain your runes you need to drain at least 40 feet of vegetation or at the DM's discretion one big enough plant or tree. Also, any huge or gargantuan creature that you kill will satisfy your needs for two weeks instead. When you reach the 6th level in this class you can also as an action drain and kill up to one challenge 0 creature you see within 15 from you.
If you don't get life force in any way during a week you gain one level of exhaustion, the exhaustion increases of one level for each week that you don't drain life essence until you die.

Runic Empowerment

The runes on your body feed off life essence, when a creature is close enough to you, you can activate the power of the runes to drain som life force from the creature, empowering you in the process and replenishing some of your sorcery points.

At 6th level when you see a creature that is 15 feet or closer from you, as a bonus action you can try to drain the creature, make a ranged spell attack and on a hit you deal 3d6 force damage and you regain one sorcery point. You can use this feature four times before a long rest.

When you reach 14th level you can use this feature 6 times and you deal 4d6 damage.

When you reach 18th level you can use this feature 8 times and you deal 6d6 damage.

Rune Storing

The runes that enevlop your essence allow you to store some of your energy for later use. During your long rest you can decide to prepare up to two spells up to 5th level by spending one sorcery point each and to store them within the runes, later you can cast these spells as an action without expending spell slots.

When you reach level 14 you can store up to 3 spells, when you reach 18th level you can store up to 4 spells.

Soul Branding

Now that you have mastered the power of the runes for yourself you can use the runes to cast your power on your enemies. You can terget a creature and make some runes appear on it, branding it as well, but these runes burn and debilitate the creature. Once per long rest as an action you can target a creature that you can see up to 60 feet, when you do so the target has to take a Charisma saving throw agains your spell save DC, on a fail the target taks 10d8 psychic damage and for a minute it's movement is halved, has disadvantage on attack rolls against you and you have advantage on attack rolls against it. On a succes tha target takes half the damage and nothing else happens. You can use this feature again by spending 5 sorcery points each time you cast it again.

Reality Branding

You have mastered the power of the runes and you are now one with them, now you can take your symbiosis one step ahead and unleash the power of the runes on reality itself and gain maximum control of the battlefield.

Once per short rest as an action you create a 30 feet sphere around you of floating runes, every creature hostile to you inside the sphere must make a Charisma saving throw and take 12d8 force damage on a fail or half as much on a succesful save, every subsequent time the creature starts it's turn in the sphere or enters the sphere it takes 2d8 force damage. The sphere remains around you, moving along with you for one minute. A creature that passes the saving throw doesn't take damage on the subsequent turns. If you take damage you must make a Con saving throw with advantage like when concetrating on a spell