Sorry, I guess I was a bit too sarcastic again...
First off...yes, I never wanted to say that magic exists only through glyphs. I will refer a few times now to the
"History" page on the PS website...what is kind of a problem as this page is far older than Xiosia, Dakkru and I think even older than Black Flame. So I assume this was written with only two gods in mind...and because of this probably not completely valid anymore. Still I think there are some interesting concepts there:
Guided by an ancient and powerful god, named Vodul, god of the future events, they discovered one quiet world, pierced by a crystal column full of magical power and mystery, quivering with azure energy.
Sounds a lot as if magic itself is a characteristic of Yliakum itself. So for sure glyphs are not the cause of magic.
Waiting for the day when the other peoples would come, he [Talad] carefully forged the magical power of the Crystal into many shapes and set them to appear across the realm for the Lemur and Kran to find. He had created the first Glyphs. These magical symbols appeared seemingly at random on all forms of material, from rocks and tree bark to animal hides, and were suitable to be used by the mortals to practice the art of magic.
So first...I always imagined glyphs more as the signs...not the glyph-stone items known in game and used by magicians. If I remember right there was a forum discussion once with the settings team explaining those random appearing glyphs could be bound somehow to the glyph-stones and by that make them transportable and easier usable. And the next interesting part here is that Talad formed all glyphs...no matter what magic way they are. And he did this to enable the races to use magic. Sounded for me as if no inhabitant of Ylikum has the possibility to use magic without those glyphs.
During his dull waiting, Laanx investigated the column of blue crystal above Yliakum, trying to find a way to increase his power by using its seemingly infinite source of magic. Since Talad wanted to have the mastery of glyphs and the people, Laanx would control the pure and violent power of the Crystal itself.
Again...the gods never had any need for glyphs to use magic. Glyphs are only the tools made for the races to use magic.
So, the random appearing glyphs allow of course a lot of "magic" effects all over Yliakum to be RPed. But as long as I played I was always strictly against allowing people to use magic without any glyphs. The dependence on glyphs is a big weakness of magic...but a great advantage for RPing. As magic can't be really defined with our IRL experiences it's quite easy to disagree how others use it in a RP. But once you are able to separate a magician from his/her glyphs you could eliminate the magic element from the RP and rely on RL experiences again. Capture and imprison a magician, separate him from his glyphs and you don't have to get into any OOC discussions why it should be possible/impossible for the magician to put his guards to sleep with an azure way spell. And please don't get me wrong...this is a fantasy game and magic is important for it. I never wanted to get rid of it. But RPing magic allows doing some powerful stuff...so should have an pretty annoying weakness also. And the dependence on glyphs is a clear and easy to RP weakness.
And one last thing...as Ligh mentioned it. Yes, your char can be the one exception...but ask yourself if he/she/kra should. I was never in favor of the philosophy that players should only play ordinary chars...after all this is a game you should have fun with and be able to create a nice story. But playing an very exceptional char far too often leads to an environment that sets the once exceptional trait as standard for the future. Lets say you have a female char falling in love with another female char. Should be pretty exceptional in the world of Yliakum. But now those two interact with others also...you know, a small flirt here, some smiling there, some curiosity of others...and at some point it's not that exceptional anymore. All people around start treating it as normal...a few might even follow the example. There is nobody to blame for that situation then...the initial RP might have been valid, the acceptance of their "quirk" by others might be a result from some long ongoing RP with them. But in the outcome something became normal that shouldn't be (And before someone calls me homophobic...only speaking about within the game here). And I think this can happen to almost every "exceptional" char.
Edit: typos