[Suggestion][LORE] Wild and Wonderful Lore
a project by Tasunke
Elemental Forums
A project for cultural lore on the Fallen Races/ Factions of Imperia (the Empires)
Resolyn, Quendar, Trogs, and Urxen explained (kraxis to come)
Resolyn: Worshipers of Death.
The Wraiths are a very unique culture. A spiritual culture that seeks not enlightenment, but true death. perhaps True death is their own form of enlightenment.
In either case, religion is at the heart of their society.
The Resolyn sees all life as a form of suffering. They believe in Reincarnation, and that without 'True Death' you are stuck in an endless loop of suffering. To achieve true death one must 'die from the inside' or completely resign themself to death and nothingness. This is a long and difficult process, and it helps to have learned all the various and complex rituals of death worship.
As they believe those that do not attain true death will be doomed to an eternity of reincarnation, they are highly evangelical. Their form of evangelism is 'convert if possible, and kill if not' as a person reborn will have a new chance to embrace the worship of death.
Therefore the Wraiths are more than willing to send their (non Resolyn) neighbors into the next life.
Wraiths practice of death worship is integrated into their entire culture and economy in the form of a Caste System.
THE CASTES
Dying Dust: the Priestly caste. The most powerful magical and spiritual leaders. Most of the Dying Dust have little concern for the mortal world, other than ending it, perhaps. Their ultimate goal would be to give True Death to all living things, however most of them are primarily concerned with attaining True Death for themselves; personal enlightenment in nothingness, to wither away into pure nonexistence.
----> The Dying Dust is a religious order of extreme significance among Resolyn culture. While not (usually) political leaders (other than the Fallen Enchantress), each member is considered a spiritual leader worthy of heavy reverence. To resign ones self to death is to also resign ones self to pure obedience to the Dying Dust: both in terms of following the orders of individual members, and in following the 'ideal' of the Dying Dust as a group.
the Weary: Political leaders, and generals. The Fallen Enchantress was born into the Weary Caste, and then adopted into the order of the Dying Dust at the age of fourteen. The Weary are generally non magical, and are the Bureaucrats, Stewards, and Military leaders for the Wraiths. The Weary make up the majority of Resolyn government, and act as "REGENTS" for the members of the Dying Dust, who normally have no wish to interfere in the affairs of morals. The idea is that true leadership of the Wraiths belong to the spiritual leaders(Dying Dust), however the daily duties of law and order are generally governed by the political leaders (the Weary).
the Withered: The majority of magical users. Most magical users born into lower castes may undergo rituals to join the ranks of the withered. If one is born into the caste of the Withered without magical powers (which is rare) they may either be adopted by the Slothful or the Weary. It is rare for the Weary to adopt a non-magical Withered unless they show much promise for political rule. Most withered wish to serve faithfully so that they may be reborn as a Dying Dust, or perhaps even be as lucky as to achieve true death straightaway.
The role of the Withered are to serve the Dying dust, as 'lay magical users'. They generally do not have roles of spiritual leadership, yet they are the servants, the messengers, and the scribes for the Dying Dust. They aid the Dust in research into new magical rituals, and in the keeping of old rituals. The Withered lead in magical research, and often sign up as 'mages' in the armies of the Resolyn.
the Slothful: the Merchants and Artisans. While resigned to death (at least the religious among them), they are more focused on their current wealth and prosperity. Due to current Resolyn law however, only 10% of their wealth goes to their descendants when they die. The rest is sent to the church of the Dying Dust.
The Slothful are certainly interested in wealth, but as the upper crust of society is more concerned with dying than feasting, they definitely need to be B type, as actively trying to squeeze coins out of those with no interest in material goods can drive one mad. Therefore the Slothful, while skilled, take a more relaxed, even lazy attitude towards their craft. Most of the money they make is off of the Stubborn caste, as they are still relatively interested in activities of the living. Therefore they can often cut corners, and tend to be dishonest in their dealings. However, they must put out all stops if serving a member of the Dying Dust, for the slightest mistake could spell doom for their wealth, and likely their life. When serving a Dying Dust member, they make sure to avoid cutting corners and provide the highest quality product they can ... if for no other reason than to avoid being tortured and then eaten alive.
the Stubborn: The non-magical Warrior caste. These are the pub crawlers and the street walkers of Resolyn society. They are the step above wandering vagrant, and a step below shop keeper. These are the children of society, and they still hold cravings for many if not most of the activities for the living. They hold their own vulgar festivals in the streets where they get drunk and merry. The life of a stubborn is usually short and decadent. Yet even they are taught from birth to confer the upmost respect for the priestly caste. Stubborns are not allowed to speak in the presence of a Dying Dust. Therefore military officiers teach them Hand signals alongside verbal commands, so that if a Dying Dust were to be present in a public march, or even worse, a battle, they would still be able to operate as cohesive units within earshot of said Dying Dust.
Champions that wish to join the Wraiths may either join into the Withered Caste or the Stubborn Caste. Only if they pledge allegiance to Resolyn and publicly resign themselves to the three marks of death will they be allowed in the Withered Caste. And only those outsiders whom are accepted into the Withered caste are able to use magic in the presence of another Wraith.
All mercenaries that do not follow these rituals will be considered part of the Stubborn Caste and banned from using magic while under command of Wraith leaders.
Some among the Weary and Slothful caste simply do not care ... so if said outsiders are led by a particularly secular member of the Weary caste, they may still be allowed to use limited magics. equally if they are present in a small town only filled with Stubborn and Slothful caste members.
However, if one of the upper castes who is of a high religious affiliation catches an outsider using magic, that is not properly initiated into their culture ... then they will have said offending outsiders killed in a ritualistic manner.
Most such murder rituals involve killing the perpetrator in a very painful way, trying to soak the victim full of as much of their own fear, rage, and hatred as possible, and then give them a false hope of freedom and then chain them again, and kill them slowly as they slice off pieces of flesh once every half hour or so.
The tortured victim is then fed to a member of the Divine Caste (The Dying Dust) that has undergone the proper cleansing rituals, usually in the form of self burning or some other form of self mutalation, usually with some magical twist.
One of the most severe of these burning rituals is to burn off one's limbs, and then use Divine Magic to 'reanimate' their limbs, sometimes using the flesh of dead and buried persons, if there is not enough flesh remaining to reanimate.
---> if a Dying Dust is personally offended, they are the one that eats the punished. In this case, usually a cleansing ritual is unneeded, although most undergo a light cleansing ritual out of respect to the dying rot.
In Warfare, it is common to use both Stubborn and Withered in mass quantities. Especially the Stubborn, as they are the most numerous.
While the stubborn are often looked down upon by other castes, they can be valorous in their own ways. They make the best of what they are given despite the fact that everyone in their society seems intent on killing them. The officers are taught strict discipline and loyalty, and are usually picked based on the level of their spiritual dedication ... however even the most devout among the lower officers understands the pain and sacrifice of their subordinates. Therefore officers usually try to keep their soldiers alive, even when orders from on high seem to be the opposite. Its actually a point of contention among the officers, of those that see the soldiers as worms vs those that see them as valuable assets, and fellow people.
Ultimately the latter usually wins (at least in the lower ranks) due to the consensus that killing enemies is more useful than personally dying. Those among the Weary caste tend to agree.
The Withered caste are generally self absorbed fanatics, and almost never hold a lick of respect for underlings ... and are completely servile and supplicant to the Divine caste.
Meanwhile the Divine Caste almost never worries about warfare ... much more interested in "true death" than any number of 'false deaths', even if taking place in the thousands or millions.
The one exception is the Fallen Enchantress, who believes that if all life on earth were extinguished at the same time, it would force all life on earth to undergo True Death.
There are some scholars among the Withered Caste that believe a half-way point is achievable ... that if the Shadow World is brought to the world of the living, then all deaths will become true deaths. In that case, even mundane warfare would take on an entire new spiritual meaning, and Military conquests would (for the first time ever) have full backing of the insanely powerful mystics among the Dying Dust's ranks.
Ultimate Faction Quest: Unleash the Shadow world. (perhaps something among the order of Casting Blight 3 times and Casting Shadow Gate 10 times)
Once the Shadow World is fully unleashed, Resolyn can 'build/recruit' Dying Dust members for military use.
Essentially a Dying Dust member would be Death V, with some extra-special spells, and be a level 20 magical champion (Path of the Mage and Path of the Necromancer) ... focused on Spell Power and self enchantmetns, as well as obviously debuffing enemy armies.
Perhaps cost much crystal, mana, and production to train a Dying Dust?
If a Dying Dust 'dies' instead of reincarnating they achieve 'True Death' which increases their home city's materials by 1, and faction prestige by 2.
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In the rare event of a Dying Dust appearing on the battlefield, it is a moment of awe for her allies. Complete reverence is expected, and the member of the Divine must be treated with complete respect and surrounded by silence, so that they may focus on their prayer, meditation, and spells.
a Dying Dust may sometimes require to consume life energy from allies in order to power their unique divine spells, however often they prefer to drain life from the enemy.
Their ultimate spell kills everyone on the battlefield, with no exceptions. (including themselves)
While the Fallen Enchantress is a member of the Dying Dust, she was born a Weary, and is quite young to boot. Therefore she is not quite as powerful as one of the elders. However, she has one clear advantage. She cares much more deeply about the mortal world, perhaps because her parents were politicians. And she has time. Time to become more powerful. With the right outward focus, she believes that she can lead all her enemies, and her own people, into True Death.
In the rare chance that the Resolyn can plunge the world into the Shadow Realm, their first goal is to kill all other life on the planet, and then to commit ritual suicide. However, before doing this, they will search every dark corner to make sure there are no survivors.
If they cannot be certain, then a 'vanguard' is left behind to steward over the world, to help bring the planet to its last dying days ... while the majority kill themselves off in an act of religious triumph.
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A bit on the Three rots.
The Rot of Obedience: performance of Caste Duties and extreme obedience to the religious tenets and rituals. Obedience to the Dying Dust in both person and ideal. By exemplifying the Rot of Obedience in the fullest, one can achieve true death. And if you are close, you will still rise in caste during the next life.
The Rot of Evangelism: Just as important as the Rot of Obedience, if not more. The Withered hold this rot in the highest of esteem, seen as the arms and legs of the Divine Caste, the Dying Rot. As the servile extensions of the will of the Dying Rot, the Withered seek to bring the worship of death to all realms and walks of life. Sometimes they will even try to convert the beastly races into the worship of death. While the butchermen and other forms of twisted are the most likely to join, the serpents are among the least likely. The only serpents with high chances of joining are usually Skeleton Dragons ... that is, Dragons that have undergone Lichdom. Still, the most common form of "Evengelism" is to simply kill as many non Wraiths (or at least non-Resolyn) as possible. This is because those that do not worship death are seen as lower than even the "Stubborn" caste. Not that non-Wraiths cannot join the ranks of Resolyn, but they must first prove themselves worthy (or else assimilate only into the Stubborn caste anyways). Still, for outsiders with no wish of conversion, these are the people whom are highest on the kill priority. These Evangels, while seeking to convert, still feel that after killing a non converter they at least give the soul a second chance at heeding their vision (in the next life). Therefore the most common form of Evangelism is not to enslave, not to politically conquer, not to 'force' obedience ... but simply to kill. If they do not willingly convert, their only fate is to die. Not to route, or to be exiled, but to be killed very deliberately.
This being said, while the most common adherent of Evangelism is to 'make outsiders dead' conversion is still pursued as the first course of action. SOMETIMES other castes will intervene and try a different approach. The Weary caste tend to prefer slavery and political enforcement of rule and religion rather than outright death, but often they get outvoted ... and this is not how to perform the Rot of Evangelism either. For the true religious Zealot, willful conversion or death are the only options.
Sometimes a 'warrior' among the Stubborn caste attempts to follow this rot. They are often referred to as "Angels of Death" upon the battlefield. Often the religious castes will give them favor, and might give them a holy weapon such as a VAMPIRIC SWORD. Which allows them to gain strength while killing others on the battlefield; aka doing their spiritual duties.
The Rot of Resignation (Nothingness): performing this type of rot is by far the hardest, at least for the lower castes. One must study and have knowledge of all deathly rituals, and spend their existence dedicated to the pursuit of becoming closer to true death, or of bringing the world closer to the Shadow realm. Not just this though, as success in these studies is not what brings fulfillment to the rot of resignation. The studies are only a requirement. Instead, to fully exemplify the Rot of Resignation, one must achieve total nothingness, and wither themselves into little more than a moving form of death.
Some have tried Lichdom, or even self putrefication, in order to achieve this ... however it is a philosophical and enlightened state that is truly required, not a modification to the body. Even some of the Withered have successfully completed this path (according to the lore), however this is the primary occupation for the Dying Dust. Some say that once one has achieved complete nothingness and resignation, they are swallowed up by the Shadow world during the night. Others say they fade away into the very air. Regardless, this is said to be the most consistent path to the True Death, and that the other paths of Rot are primarily to gain rank within the caste system (over the course of several lives).
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Possible Faction Traits
Pros: Death Worship, Magical (faster magic teching), Spiritual (extra religious buildings and units), Zealots (greater magic resistance)
Cons:
Xenophobic (higher recruitment cost for non-Wraiths, universal diplo penalty with non Wraiths)
Zealots (universal diplo penalty with non Death Worshipers, better relations with Twisted men and Demons, worse relations with other neutral mini-factions such as Beasts, Serpents, and Elementals)
Slothful (slower civic teching)
Arrogant (slower warfare teching)
