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Moxonomy

Charnel Serenade

Sorcery4 generic manaBlack manaBlack mana

Reanimation spells usually pay for their power up front: the cheap ones ask you to discard the target first, and the expensive ones charge full retail to skip the setup. This one splits the bill differently. Suspend lets you commit 2 generic manaBlack mana on an early turn and cash the effect three upkeeps later, so the payment is deferred rather than discounted, and the three time counters function as a promise the whole table can see coming. The surveil that leads the resolution is doing more than dressing: whether you hard-cast it or suspend it, you get to bin a creature the turn it resolves and immediately drag it back, which quietly makes the spell its own enabler rather than something that strands you when your graveyard is empty.

Here is where the design turns clever. The finality counter caps each returned creature at a single life, so no threat you pull back can be looped through a sacrifice outlet. But the spell itself refuses to die: instead of hitting the graveyard on resolution, it re-exiles with three fresh time counters and comes due again three upkeeps later. The engine, in other words, is the sorcery, not the creature. Each iteration surveils, reanimates one body permanently, and rewinds its own clock, so left alone this becomes a self-renewing reanimation loop that adds a new finality-counter threat to the board every third turn. The finality counter draws the border on the creatures; the built-in re-suspend is what keeps the spell coming back to draw it again.

Charnel Serenade (mkc)
MKC · #26rare
Pricing
Normal: $0.27
Foil:
Oracle Text

Rules text

Surveil 3, then return a creature card from your graveyard to the battlefield with a finality counter on it. Exile Charnel Serenade with three time counters on it. Suspend 3—2 generic manaBlack mana (Rather than cast this card from your hand, you may pay 2 generic manaBlack mana and exile it with three time counters on it. At the beginning of your upkeep, remove a time counter. When the last is removed, you may cast it without paying its mana cost.)
Legalities

Format Status

Standard
N/A
Pioneer
N/A
Modern
N/A
Legacy
Legal
Vintage
Legal
Commander
Legal
Pauper
N/A
Brawl
N/A
Historic
N/A
Alchemy
N/A
Timeless
N/A
Standard Brawl
N/A
More formats
Old School
N/A
Premodern
N/A
PreDH
N/A
Pauper Commander
N/A
Oathbreaker
Legal
Gladiator
N/A
Penny Dreadful
N/A
Duel Commander
Legal
Future Standard
N/A
COMPETITIVEBRAWL
N/A
TLR
N/A
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