Erebusian Mythology

cIV_khanh93

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How much do mortals (ie, the people in Creation, leaders and peasants alike) know about Erebusian Mythology? I hope to The One (does Creation know about Him?) they;re not missing out on this :)
 
They do not know about the One, the angels are afraid of telling them that for some reason, probably because then the people would stop worshipping them. I don't think that many of then know the true nature of hell as in how to escape it
 
Yeah, they do, in some way or another. Some of them are ignoring certain gods though, or are just oblivious to their existence or presence (Esus, Mammon). I don't think that many followers of the Veil know that they are helping evil gods, but i'm sure that most of them should know that they at least exist. The astrologers definitely know about the gods. I don't think that barbarians such as the Doviello would know that much about the gods in general, and some civilizations simply does not care about gods other than their patron.

Hm, does Cassiel tell people about The One, or is he of the opinion that it would only make things worse if they knew? Does the Luonattar know that they are worshiping The One, or do they just have a general "hunch"?
 
Virtually no one knows about The One. Most who have heard of him think those who belittle their gods like that are stupid and insane.

The amount of knowledge would vary greatly in different societies. I don't suspect the Doviello know much at all, and the Hippus and Lanun probably aren't much better. The Amurites, the Elohim, and the most Elite Sheaim know the most lore, but not all that they know is accurate. The Elohim are the oldest civ and probably know more lore than the others, but I think they have a tendency to try to sanitize some of the darker aspects of history. The Sheaim are new but their leader is the oldest, and they have had access to Ceridwen's dark secrets. As such, they know a lot but tend to twist things to make them even darker.


Pretty much everyone in Erebus knows of Mulcarn's despotic reign in the Age of Ice, and knows that Kylorin ended it. The details are likely vague. I don't really think that many people know of the origin of the Godslayer.

Most civilizations trace their roots to some faction from the patrian civil war, even though the connection is often weak. Most civs probably focus on their own supposed history, and aggrandize it.


Basium, Cassiel, Hyborem, and Sabathiel know about The One, but they have never met him. They were all told the truth about creation, but the gods who shared this with them were very biased and emphasized different aspects. Basium and Cassiel left the meeting at the Seven Pines early, so they may know a little less than Hyborem and Sabathiel. All four were involved in the godswar (in different capacities), so they all know about that. I suspect that the Compact may have banned them from sharing their knowledge with mortals though, as you'd otherwise expect all of them but Cassiel to have told someone.


Cassiel hasn't told the Grigori a lot, as he doesn't wish to aggrandize the gods or even want The One worshiped.


It is unclear how much Basium has taught his army of angels or mortal auxiliaries. He probably doesn't have time for storytelling with all the fighting he has to do. He does however pray to The One, which others have witnessed, and may have taught his angels to similarly carve the names of the most holy on themselves and their weapons to better battle demons. The Kuriotate Adepts and brothers Lars and Kobe Lort seem to be under the impression that Basium himself is a god.




Os-Gabella is older than any archangel, so she has witnessed a lot of the lore when it happened. She might even have met The One, although only briefly. She was not present at the negotiations over The Compact, but she knows a lot about it. Her long time hiding place of the Blair of Lacuna contains great archives of Ceridwen's hidden knowledge, which she has studied in great detail. She is probably more knowledgeable about Erebusian mythology (and the truth behind it) than anyone but the gods. Thanks to Ceridwen, she may know more than some of them too, but is not on the same level as Oghma or Ceridwen herself.


I suspect that the Emrys (members of Ceridwen's cult) know more mythology than anyone, but that their lore is darkly tainted. They may even know about The One, but if so they view him as a most tyrannical demiurge.


The Luonnatar believe the truth about The One, but no one really knows how they figured it out. Junil feared that it may mean The One had returned and was displeased with how the Good gods were acting. The Luonnatar do seem to take their time and carefully research other religions and pieced together a lot, but I don't think they would have found any conclusive proof of their position. (I've also considered the possibility that the Luonnatar are not right, but that they just happened to be the one who complied the history with which we are so familiar.)


The Fall of Bhall is probably well known, as the Bannor who witnessed it emerged from hell to tell the tale. The Bannor's story is widely known, but not always believed. Sabathiel abandoned them years ago after impious priests began to ignore him, and the church of The Order may have altered some details.


Perpentach probably knows the lore of all that has happened since since the Age of Magic as well as any mortal, as his mind contains copies of most of the important characters.

Most Baleraphs have probably picked up some lore from dramatic performances, but these plays would be inaccurate satires of the truth.


Most Calabim citizens (aka chattel) probably know less lore than anyone. The aristocracy however would be better informed. Alexis and Flauros themselves know quite a bit, both from living so long and from being raised by Os-Gabella.

I don't think the Malakim have a lot of ancient knowledge preserved, but their god is a god of revelation who would have shared a lot with their holy men in visions and epiphanies.


The Fellowship of the Leaves highly values storytelling, especially in music. Their storytelling would preserve a lot of lore of the distant past, but this is a very organic oral tradition that is prone to evolving into something quite unlike the original. Much of their lore may be fiction, and it may be hard to figure out what little snippets are really true.

Cernunnos lived among and taught the Ljosalfar, so they probably learned much lore from the angel who would become a god. The Elves themselves also live very long lives, so their own history should be well preserved. Frankly, they don't care about the history of humans or other races, so that is good enough.

The Svartalfar history would be a lot like the Ljosalfar, but they lie a lot on purpose so despite having their spies uncover more details of what their enemies did their stories would be even less trustworthy.


I suspect that the Clan views itself as the true Bannor civilization, and doesn't really recognize how monstrous both their and their goddess have become.
 
How much do mortals (ie, the people in Creation, leaders and peasants alike) know about Erebusian Mythology? I hope to The One (does Creation know about Him?) they;re not missing out on this :)

One of my favorite subjects.

The One: I would wager that, from the viewpoint of a mortal, suggesting the existence of the One would be met (quite reasonably) with skepticism. The Luonnotar worship him (though, unless they get around to working on that altar, that's not much better then worshiping Arwan for all the good it does them), and I'm sure scholars would suggest such an entity as equivalent to Aristotle's First Cause. That said, they would probably imagine such an entity as more of a force of nature than a god to be worshiped. Cassiel knows about him, and came to the assumption that he does not seek worship, and therefore sees no reason to spread- the word. (His bit in the 'pedia is a rare exception to this. It has been implied, probably in jest but maybe not, that he wasn't entirely sober at the time.) The gods have no reason to tell the people of the One; even those who don't oppose him wouldn't want to lose followers that could be used to defeat their foes.

Creation: Many religious sects would likely go so far as to declare their own god the Creator; the Ashen Veil and Overlords would certainly go for such, and I can see Ceridwen doing the same. In my file of unfinished short stories, I've started a commentary (written from in-universe perspective) on the holy books of the Ashen Veil... I might get around to finishing it later, but it basically posits that the Ashen Veil believes Agares was the original god, and it is the good and neutral gods who rebelled against him out of jealousy of his glory, seeking to obscure his nature to the people of Erebus. I've not thought much about the other religions, though. Kilmorph's followers might not be above giving her credit for the creation of Erebus (which is 1/21 true), seeing that they place such high value on building things. The Empyrean would likely argue like modern philosophers about First Causes and the like, but seem unlikely to say Lugus himself created Erebus. The Overlords' followers would have approximately as many creation stories as followers, though many would likely suggest Erebus started as nothing but water. Esus' followers, in symmetry to their sun-worshiping nemeses, probably wouldn't bother calling their god the creator, but in their case, they simply wouldn't care how Erebus started. The Fellowship would likely assume Erebus eternal in both directions, or possibly take a page from Hindu beliefs and believe it simply one part of a cycle of perpetual creation and destruction. Frankly, though, I have no idea regarding the Order.

Gods: As to knowing all 21? I'm sure any very bright scholar with plenty of background research could figure out which 21 gods were real, though not necessarily prove it. Erebus is populated with minor cults worshipping non-existent gods, or other entities posing as gods, though. (Technically the Overlords might be the largest, since they're basically manifest nightmares and not truly gods... though they make a damn good case. On the other hand, Falamar refers to the Overlord's believers as worshiping Danalin, though, so they may simply assume the Overlords his agents.) The hardest of the gods to determine would be Ceridwen (Goddess of Secrets for a reason), Esus (God of Deception) and Mammon (who likes his followers in the dark). But considering numerology is practically a hard science on Erebus, at the very least they could figure out the number of real gods and then cross-reference with the sources of mana (EDIT: and/or important astrological signs), and finally figure out which gods go where, and end up with their doctoral thesis in theology. They might make a few errors (I can see them writing "Overlords" by Mind, "???" by Shadow, and "N/A" by Ice, assuming Mulcarn permanently removed and Auric a madman if he's not near ascension) but get the basics about right.

Hell: The existence of Esus' hell would be an especially well-kept secret, but Mammon would jealously guard the dark secret of his own vault as well; I doubt even those within would realize where they were. Camulos would probably paint his vault as Valhalla. The existence of Mulcarn's mountainous home would be well known, where his loyalest followers are preserved below, but not the swamps below. I'm not going to even guess regarding Ceridwen. Aeron's followers would know plenty about his vault that is technically true, but not that it's part of the greater machine. And Agares... by the time you're in Agares' vault, it's usually way too late to escape. Unless you happen to be a total badass with divine aid...

EDIT: *Waits for MC to correct his knowledge of Erebusian lore with fury to match his Freshman English professor.*
 
MC and KC are right on the money. I would distinguish it a bit by saying that the the religions of Erebus are not the same as the gods of Erebus. Through different ages entirely different religions with different names and focuses may follow different gods. And even within the same time different religions worshipping the same god may exist in different countries.

It isn't quite as bad as it is in real life, where different forms of Christianity openly war with each other (having angels that tend to straighten major disputes between religions fixes that). But it isn't like angels talk to every church leader and humans are an imperfect filter for divine law (at best). There are evil people that hold positions in the Empyrean church, there are good people that worship the Overlords. We hold a very set definition for each of the religions because we know the full story. The people of Erebus don't, and the players in the D&D games didn't.

Also a few have pointed out that the gods don't tell anyone about the One because they don't want people to worship the One instead of them. That may be part of the reason the evil gods don't tell anyone about the One. But the good and neutral gods don't tell anyone about the One because the One has opted to withdrawal from creation. They are not going to break that boundry by introducing the concept of him to the world.
 
Basium, Cassiel, Hyborem, and Sabathiel know about The One, but they have never met him. They were all told the truth about creation, but the gods who shared this with them were very biased and emphasized different aspects. Basium and Cassiel left the meeting at the Seven Pines early, so they may know a little less than Hyborem and Sabathiel. All four were involved in the godswar (in different capacities), so they all know about that. I suspect that the Compact may have banned them from sharing their knowledge with mortals though, as you'd otherwise expect all of them but Cassiel to have told someone.

Just a question: Why would anyone tell the MORTALS about it?

Hyborem has no interest in mortals, more than killing them and using them as slaves.

Basium has no interest in mortals, more than reviving them as angels and using them in war.

Sabathiel probably wouldn't tell anyone, since he is still an angel of Junil (right?). Junil seems to be very afraid of the One and would prefer to keep him a secret.

And we all know Cassiel.
 
Sabathiel abandoned them years ago after impious priests began to ignore him
Is this guesswork or fact? The bit of lore directly relating to Sabethiel acting as a leader, that I can remember, has him in a room where he can see anything he wants to, and telling his High Priest exactly what to do. And the priest listened.
 
Is this guesswork or fact? The bit of lore directly relating to Sabethiel acting as a leader, that I can remember, has him in a room where he can see anything he wants to, and telling his High Priest exactly what to do. And the priest listened.

I think the priests stopped listening and Sabathiel got annoyed at them :).
I doubt that many of the Sheaim know the true details of their leader's plot or the true nature of Agares or Sheaim, even in the Emyrs.

As far as they are concerned, they probably think that they are saving the world by sticking to the right side of battle and also solving overpopulation in a very charming way.

Gods: I doubt the mortals know a lot about the true backstory of the gods, for example, a normal human or a dwarf might not know that Sucellus came back to life as Arawn gave him the life sphere. I doubt that many elves or humans know that dwarves were given life by Kilmorph during the Age of Magic (this being truth or not may depend).

Heavens and Hells: The knowledge of heaven will be free to everyone serving their god, albeit it might be a propaganda to make them believe their gods. This, however, does not apply to hells. Mammon would fierecely guard the knowledge of his hell and Esus even more violently so. Camulus I don't even want to imagine.

The One: Luonnatar probably got to him by studying various cults and religion, all with its own creation story. They all cannot be the truth, so only explanation is that at least most of them are lying, but why are they lying? To make people worship them? But then what is the truth behind creation? Since all creation stories are not compatible with each other, there must be something that binds the stories togather by its own means. It will be something grand, something big, something powerful. It will be the One
 
Is this guesswork or fact? The bit of lore directly relating to Sabethiel acting as a leader, that I can remember, has him in a room where he can see anything he wants to, and telling his High Priest exactly what to do. And the priest listened.

It a fact which came to light when Auric invaded their capital in search of Sabathiel's divine blood for his ascension ritual, in the Blood of the Angels scenario. It is unclear when Sabathiel left them, but it has presumably been a while. For quite some time the Holy of Holies in the Halls of Sabathiel led to a place between Erebus and the heaven of Junil, where Sabathiel would direct the Bannor without ever actually entering Creation. Eventually, the high priests began ignoring his wishes, and he did nothing to force his will on them. It may be that he physically left to dwell in Junils heaven again, or it may be that the priests disobedience has broken the bond that ties their lands to Junil's world and thus the passage from the empty room in the temple to Sabathiel's true throne room cannot be traversed.

In Kael's D&D campaign, the top levels of Church of Junil had become highly corrupt and were bent on destroying anyone who was in fact still loyal to their god and could still perform real miracles. Valin Phanuel, who was the church's greatest champion before its corruption became clear to him, was one probably their most famous victim.
 
It a fact which came to light when Auric invaded their capital in search of Sabathiel's divine blood for his ascension ritual, in the Blood of the Angels scenario.
Thanks! I really need to finish the scenarios...
 
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