Creative Exercise: The Sovereign Dominion of Eyros

[Rystil Arden]

All right. You caught me.

When I was coming up with the name for the demon, I originally had something a little different. It sounded German, however, and I know the word "nacht," so I decided to flip open a German/English dictionary and see if I could come up with anything of a similar sound that might have some meaning.

Thus, I knew that "taufen" was baptism and "nacht" was night, and I put them together deliberately. I knew it wouldn't be proper German, since I don't know the language, but I liked the feel of having the two words together.

For the record, though, I wasn't thinking of it as a "night of baptism" so much as the notion of someone being baptized by darkness, rather than water.

I always think its neater to have the names of important characters come from somewhere etymologically, rather than just inventing them on the fly. Mine do too, so I didn't really comment when I saw Taufenacht. Baptism by darkness though...that reading of the words really gives me a vision of a demon dipping a baby into a pool of blackness and corrupting it to evil.

 

[Abisashi]

Hm , this dragons created by demons just messed my planned contribution. Ah well, back to the drawing board.

Well, he didn't necessarily create them, he was just the first to show up with them in recorded history. What were you thinking?

 

[Abisashi]

I always think its neater to have the names of important characters come from somewhere etymologically, rather than just inventing them on the fly. Mine do too, so I didn't really comment when I saw Taufenacht. Baptism by darkness though...that reading of the words really gives me a vision of a demon dipping a baby into a pool of blackness and corrupting it to evil.

Yeah, Alsixnivis is a combination of some latin words for cold, snow, and/or ice (don't remeber exactly, and I forgot to write it down), then altered a bit to make a better name.

 

[Rystil Arden]

Yeah, Alsixnivis is a combination of some latin words for cold, snow, and/or ice (don't remeber exactly, and I forgot to write it down), then altered a bit to make a better name.

Well Nix is snow, if I recall, as I once wrote a sonnet named "Nix"

 

[Sarellion]

I hadn´t polished it so far, I wanted to tie the gems to draconic origins and a goddragon creating the other smaller dragons. I wanted to explain the gem inside the demon by some brain surgery in diablo style (just ram it in and gain the power and whatever else is inside).

We have some established facts about the lizard and dragon cult:

Quote:
The dominant and oldest religion has grown up around the worship of the reptiles which are common in the area. Called the Draconic Legacy, it reveres saurians of all types and the dragons of legend in particular. Dragons, though they feature prominently in fairy tales and children's bedtime stories, are suspicously absent from modern history. Locals believe that the large reptiles that roam the nearby wilderness are somehow linked to these dragons, which in turn represented divine forces. This is why the dominant religion focuses on reptiles.

Draconic Legacy prophecies often speak of a promised High Holy One who will come to save the empire in it's time of greatest need. This promised champion is said to combine all the finest qualities of the noble half-orc as well as the power of the ancient dragons (half-dragon). Occaisonally a half-orc child will be born with what appears to be scales, or the slitted eyes of a reptile. These children are taken and raised by the reptile cult, and while they have all shown remarkable aptitude for arcane magic (sorceror), none of them has yet proven to be the High Holy One. Of course it must be said that the empire has yet to face its time of greatest need ...

The Draconic Legacy has an unbreakable tradition of Sanctuary. Anyone who ask for sanctuary at a temple must be granted it, and cannot be evicted unless they violate the hospitality of the cult.

End of Quote

So was the deceiver´s war between demons or angelic forces and demons?
I am not sure if we try to keep gods completely out of the setting, as we already have demons and angels manifested on the prime

Contribution (open for discussion):

The deceiver´s war was a fight between demons under the dark tyrant Taufenacht against the angelic realms. As it was possible for each side to enter the prime in limited numbers, Taufenacht created the dragons in secret. Saurials were changed by the tempter using dark magics deep in the bowels of earth and ice into the dragons. The celestials were surprised by this development and were soundly beaten. Their own dragons were created from the purest essence of the celestial realms imbued into the mundane saurial creatures.

As long as Taufenacht ruled the prime, his dragons were the enforcers of his will and feared as much as the dark tyrant himself. The celestial dragons were envoys from heaven, trying to uplift the spirits of the oppressed and easen their burden. After Taufenacht was defeated the remaining celestial dragons left for the heavenly realms.

The draconic legacy today venerates five dragons as some kind of messengers and got some stuff badly messed up. There are some named dragons, but these are only seen as messengers from the divine, not as gods themselves. Their status can compared to angels in christian mythology or bodhisatvas in buddhism guiding worshipers to enlightenment and a proper life..

The pentad of messengers:
There are five holy messengers of the divine

Varkanis (Xarkavan) the Purger: A bringer of ill omen for the wicked and destroyer of the unvirtous, he destroys what people have in excess and reminds the rich that wealth is not everything. Wise people say that Mt.Xark erupts when the rich people in Eyros get to decadent and too greedy. He is imangined as a giant red dragon

Nixalos the Wise (also known to the contributors as Alsixnivis): A wise dragon spreading knowledge among the unenlightened and unlocking the keys to the inner wisdom. He is depicted in art as a great white dragon with silver wings. this dragon is quick to anger and often sends icestorms and worse at the ones who offended him.

Aurilion the Lawbringer: A giant golden/red dragon who brought mortals the first set of laws. He is harsh but just and a great warrior. It is told that he carried the five heroes to the last battle, protecting their back as they fought against the Deceiver.

Silvaril the Protector: This female silver dragon is also called the silver flame. She is the protector of the weak and a stout defender of the innocents. Children are often given a silver necklace and even an amulet of a silver dragon if they are born in wealthier households.

Luxhara the Radiant: This shining dragon was made out of the light of heaven. She is the last messenger and aids people on the last path to the afterlife. People who came back from (near) death speak about the shining light and it is believed that this is Luxhara coming to gather them.

 

[Abisashi]

The deceiver´s war was a fight between demons under the dark tyrant Taufenacht against the angelic realms. As it was possible for each side to enter the prime in limited numbers, Taufenacht created the dragons in secret. Saurials were changed by the tempter using dark magics deep in the bowels of earth and ice into the dragons. The celestials were surprised by this development and were soundly beaten. Their own dragons were created from the purest essence of the celestial realms imbued into the mundane saurial creatures.

As long as Taufenacht ruled the prime, his dragons were the enforcers of his will and feared as much as the dark tyrant himself. The celestial dragons were envoys from heaven, trying to uplift the spirits of the oppressed and easen their burden. After Taufenacht was defeated the remaining celestial dragons left for the heavenly realms.

The draconic legacy today venerates the dragons as part of one pantheon and got some stuff badly messed up. There are some named dragons, but these are only seen as messengers from the divine, not as the highest themselves.

The pentad of messengers:
There are five holy messengers of the divine...

This doesn't seem to contradict the earlier stuff, assuming that the holy messengers are something the cult is confused about (which I think is what you are saying.) Looks good to me.

 

[Rystil Arden]

I would make the slight adjustment that the battle was between Taufenacht and the good mortals, with the angelic realms creating good dragons to help but not aiding directly. Makes more sense that Taufenacht ultimately won, and more of a victory for the mortals when they overthrow him.

 

[Arkhandus]

.....the dreaded *bump* because this has fallen off the first page with so few posts today. :^D

*goes back to brainstorming about NPCs and such.....*

 

[Abisashi]

Suggestion for modification to contribution rule

.....the dreaded *bump* because this has fallen off the first page with so few posts today. :^D

*goes back to brainstorming about NPCs and such.....*

Perhaps we could say that, should this thread fall off the front page (for those with the default number of threads/page displayed), anyone may contribute, even if there have not been enough posts. We could also limit each person to using this bonus suggestion only once.

 

[Sarellion]

I thought more along the lines that Taufenacht and other demons fought against the angelic realms about their influence on Eyros and the demons won after creating their dragons first.
The demons lost after the five heroes and the rest of mortals fought against Taufenacht with the help of dragons and won.

Demons and angels probably still fight somewhere but both sides lost control over Eyros. I thought about some limitation that only a certain number of outsiders of both sides can be on the world at once in real form instead of being summoned. the demons have even lower numbers because of the heroes who barred all access point they could find.
I wondered how we deal with creation mythos and other religous stuff. Shall we keep the whole religous stuff ambigous or do we have some known truth at least for the authors?
Iw ould be good to define some ideas about demons and angels. Taufenacht rules the whole demon realm as it stands now, what about the angels?

@Abisashi
The cult of dragons confused some stuff so it shouldn´t contradict previous stuff.
As an example: Alsixnivis doesn´t send ice storms and he doesn´t know psionics. Its more than one grain of truth in there though. He watches the twelve who can create blues and the twelve is sending goblins down the south, another kind of storm. And he is a messenger, Taufenacht speaks thru the twelve and the twelve speak to the dragon. Its not quite clear from the entry if the dragon is doing most of the work and the twelve just some psionic enhancer or if Alsixnivis is merely a guardian. The entry says something about Alsixnivis being Taufnachts voice in the north.