seasong
First Post
Disclaimers
1. I'm not positive I can sustain two story hours, but I will try.
2. It's not D&D; it's a homebrew system.
With that said, let the story hour begin!
The following is one of a small series of prologues, some mythic, some more personal, which is all part of "chapter one". The next one after this is the actual myth of the Book of Runes. Then we'll start with characters...
Prologue: Once Upon a Time
This is a sort of "Book of Genesis" for Pauk, more commonly called "The Empire". The Empire is the largest political body in all of Ma'al Loch'té (the setting).
In the beginning, the Old Gods created the world. The myth varies from culture to culture, but in Pauk it is said that the Pale Mother, blossoming like an opening flower, brought the world out from within her, and that Chained Agony wrapped himself around it and attempted to kill it, lest it take her attention away from him.
Serpent Earth then struck Chained Agony, biting him on the neck, and worrying at the wound until he finally let go. Pale Mother and Serpent Earth then set about repairing the world and populating its lands, and many other Old Gods joined in the creation*. But Chained Agony's effects were never wholly healed or lost, and so all mortal creatures feel pain and die, before returning to Pale Mother's bosom for healing.
That was all long ago.
After a time, but also long ago, Serpent Earth decided that the world was almost complete, and said as much. The other gods disagreed, and still wanted to change this, or that, or those. Serpent Earth was angered - a creation is not a creation until it is left alone. But the Old Gods continued to mess with things, shifting a mountain here or there, re-aligning the fjords to match the aesthetic principles of a sphere...
Serpent Earth then sacrificed himself and became one with the land. As the land was now an Old God, they could no longer change it. And he created guardians upon its surface, the malrakhi, known now as the dragon gods, and he bade them to shield it from the direct influence of the Old Gods. Serpent Earth had saved the world from Chained Agony's bitter attack; now he would save it from the other Old God's loving meddling.
The lesson the Old Gods learned, however, was not the one intended. They saw the malrakhi and were utterly delighted. In his frustration, Serpent Earth had created something... novel. Each of the Old Gods, even Chained Agony, once he'd pouted sufficiently, created their own malrakhi and set them upon the land, and told them to watch over it.
Instead of altering the world, they would set powerful forces upon it and see how those altered things. It was a grand experiment, and thus the Old Gods left the world.
All except Pale Mother, who took pity upon the denizens of the world the malrakhi had been set in charge of, and sacrificed herself to put a small amount of the Pale Mother in the heart of each living thing, to protect and guide it. From the Pale Mother comes all of the heart's compassion, all ability to shape the world, all resistance to illness and disease and the pain brought to us by Chained Agony.
But that was all long ago.
In time, the malrakhi grew bored. Though each ruled its province as it desired, nothing challenged them and with time, the sweetest power grew bitter and dull. Perhaps in faint remembrance of their own creation, they created a new set of guardians to administrate the dull tasks, and to entertain them.
The ellakh were born. Modelled after the umakhi (for none said the dragon-gods were creative), the ellakh were redesigned for the tasks the malrakhi wished. Made more slender and graceful, with expressive eyes that could be seen by the dragon-god's own immense pair, and strong enough to survive the occasional accidental trample, the ellakh were each fashioned in subtle ways by the individual malrakhi.
Eventually, boredom grew greater still, and soon only the ellakh guarded the world, each in the style of their masters, whose style in turn was that of the Old God who had created them. But the ellakh were even more fallible than those who had come before. They lost their purpose with each generation, and one day, there were no gods but the spirits of the wilderness, the ancestors of the people, and the little gods who had been almost unnoticeable against the backdrop of history.
The umakhi rose. They formed a mighty civilization, and forged roads and cities the world over. The fought the ellakh for centuries, pushed the boundaries of the possible with magic, reshaped the land... and fell to the poison of their own success.
More civilizations rose and fell. Lessons were learned with each, and although much was lost each time, each eventually rose mighter than the last before falling, although never again was the world united under a single empire.
Today, Pauk is becoming that single empire. And it will eclipse all that came before it.
* Sometime during the creation of the world, the umakhi (and possibly the mro and [others) were also created. This isn't particularly germane to the creation myth, however, as the umakhi had no real impact on mythic history until after the big gods were gone; think of them as the canaanites of the story.
1. I'm not positive I can sustain two story hours, but I will try.
2. It's not D&D; it's a homebrew system.
With that said, let the story hour begin!
The following is one of a small series of prologues, some mythic, some more personal, which is all part of "chapter one". The next one after this is the actual myth of the Book of Runes. Then we'll start with characters...
Prologue: Once Upon a Time
This is a sort of "Book of Genesis" for Pauk, more commonly called "The Empire". The Empire is the largest political body in all of Ma'al Loch'té (the setting).
In the beginning, the Old Gods created the world. The myth varies from culture to culture, but in Pauk it is said that the Pale Mother, blossoming like an opening flower, brought the world out from within her, and that Chained Agony wrapped himself around it and attempted to kill it, lest it take her attention away from him.
Serpent Earth then struck Chained Agony, biting him on the neck, and worrying at the wound until he finally let go. Pale Mother and Serpent Earth then set about repairing the world and populating its lands, and many other Old Gods joined in the creation*. But Chained Agony's effects were never wholly healed or lost, and so all mortal creatures feel pain and die, before returning to Pale Mother's bosom for healing.
That was all long ago.
After a time, but also long ago, Serpent Earth decided that the world was almost complete, and said as much. The other gods disagreed, and still wanted to change this, or that, or those. Serpent Earth was angered - a creation is not a creation until it is left alone. But the Old Gods continued to mess with things, shifting a mountain here or there, re-aligning the fjords to match the aesthetic principles of a sphere...
Serpent Earth then sacrificed himself and became one with the land. As the land was now an Old God, they could no longer change it. And he created guardians upon its surface, the malrakhi, known now as the dragon gods, and he bade them to shield it from the direct influence of the Old Gods. Serpent Earth had saved the world from Chained Agony's bitter attack; now he would save it from the other Old God's loving meddling.
The lesson the Old Gods learned, however, was not the one intended. They saw the malrakhi and were utterly delighted. In his frustration, Serpent Earth had created something... novel. Each of the Old Gods, even Chained Agony, once he'd pouted sufficiently, created their own malrakhi and set them upon the land, and told them to watch over it.
Instead of altering the world, they would set powerful forces upon it and see how those altered things. It was a grand experiment, and thus the Old Gods left the world.
All except Pale Mother, who took pity upon the denizens of the world the malrakhi had been set in charge of, and sacrificed herself to put a small amount of the Pale Mother in the heart of each living thing, to protect and guide it. From the Pale Mother comes all of the heart's compassion, all ability to shape the world, all resistance to illness and disease and the pain brought to us by Chained Agony.
But that was all long ago.
In time, the malrakhi grew bored. Though each ruled its province as it desired, nothing challenged them and with time, the sweetest power grew bitter and dull. Perhaps in faint remembrance of their own creation, they created a new set of guardians to administrate the dull tasks, and to entertain them.
The ellakh were born. Modelled after the umakhi (for none said the dragon-gods were creative), the ellakh were redesigned for the tasks the malrakhi wished. Made more slender and graceful, with expressive eyes that could be seen by the dragon-god's own immense pair, and strong enough to survive the occasional accidental trample, the ellakh were each fashioned in subtle ways by the individual malrakhi.
Eventually, boredom grew greater still, and soon only the ellakh guarded the world, each in the style of their masters, whose style in turn was that of the Old God who had created them. But the ellakh were even more fallible than those who had come before. They lost their purpose with each generation, and one day, there were no gods but the spirits of the wilderness, the ancestors of the people, and the little gods who had been almost unnoticeable against the backdrop of history.
The umakhi rose. They formed a mighty civilization, and forged roads and cities the world over. The fought the ellakh for centuries, pushed the boundaries of the possible with magic, reshaped the land... and fell to the poison of their own success.
More civilizations rose and fell. Lessons were learned with each, and although much was lost each time, each eventually rose mighter than the last before falling, although never again was the world united under a single empire.
Today, Pauk is becoming that single empire. And it will eclipse all that came before it.
* Sometime during the creation of the world, the umakhi (and possibly the mro and [others) were also created. This isn't particularly germane to the creation myth, however, as the umakhi had no real impact on mythic history until after the big gods were gone; think of them as the canaanites of the story.
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I really dig the different races, and the creation myth is killer.
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