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The Third Kishite Dynasty of Kurimgal.
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Lore Guide to Sallune
Our world is one which is comparable to the Victorian era, with attention drawn to Earth's mid 19th century AD. This is where you should draw your inspiration from. While there are many science fiction and fantasy elements to our setting, everything is funneled through that Victorian lens. There are no tanks, airplanes or machinery of the 20th century. There are beefed up tractors armed with field guns, bulky flying battleships, and early steam technology. Magic is interwoven amongst the elite, while industrialization sweeps empires and the masses. Deep scars continue to ache with ancient hatreds and lingering conflicts. The impact of a great comet has annihilated the normal progression of civilization, trapping us behind a curtain of storms and sea beasts. This is our world.
As it has been said, and will be said again, we are in another world filled with fantastical features. Navigating this world, we are in a time period comparable with the 19th century on earth. Think anything from the post-napoleonic to the last decades of the 19th century. Steam inventions and industrial tools are able to be fantastical and do incredible things which are science-fantasy, but don’t lose sight of the fact we are in the 19th century. Tractors armed with field guns are as far as our tanks go. Fightercraft do not exist, instead only cumbersome and crude airships. Trains are on the rise as the primary means of inexpensive transportation within one's own lands. These are the things you should be thinking about.
As mentioned before, there are a number of functional inspirations, but for those who need more historical basis: consider looking into the Victorian era, Antebellum America, the push for industrialization in East Asia, the Franco-Prussian War, the Russian invasion of Siberia and Central Asia, and many more dramatic moments from the 19th century which demonstrate industrial powers in actions and the messy components of those dramas.
Some fictional pieces which may assist you in imagining our world and drawing inspiration may include:
‣ Castle in the Stars by Alex Alice
‣ Castle in the Sky by Hayao Miyazaki
‣ Howl’s Moving Castle by Hayao Miyazaki
‣ The works of H.G. Wells
‣ The works of Jules Verne
‣ Steamboy by Katsuhiro Otomo
‣ Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water by Hideaki Anno
‣ The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen by Alan Moore and Kevin O’Neill
The arcane sciences are a real property of our world, or rather a metaphysical phenomena that can be tapped into and must be compensated for in day to day dealings. These fantastical properties manifest primarily in three realms: magic, the art of controlling the metaphysical. Monsters, creatures which have evolved against logic and reason through exposure to the metaphysical. Lastly the metaphysical itself, which are best described as reality-altering properties brought about by known and unknown means. One common denominator to these features is aether.
Aether is an inorganic material which naturally accumulates in the upper atmosphere, only falling to the earth when congregating into too large of a mass, often as grains or small stones. While in the atmosphere, aether forms thin crystalline structures known as angel hair, which reacts to light by producing an aurora. Once attained, it can be processed in a number of ways, blurring the lines between stone, metal, liquid and gas. While little is understood about aether, it is believed to be responsible for monsters, floating landmasses, cataclysmic storms and places in the world which defy reality and weaken the barrier between the physical and metaphysical. For the arcane sciences, aether is the crux of all mechanisms. While it has always been present in the world, the arrival of the comet brought with it a tremendous influx of aether, resulting in many modern abnormalities.
Magic is the art of controlling the metaphysical. Tools which can summon fire, lightning, mend flesh and more. Tools which come in the form of stones, paint, and other mediums to apply and tap into aether. The absolute quality of magic is that the mechanics to access it are diverse between cultures, but all share the same basic science. Furthermore, this science is not readily accessible or able to be mass produced. Despite the ability to make magical tools, only the most skilled or trained individuals can harness these aetherium tools and invoke magic. These individuals often require not only specialized training, but aether treatment which changes their biological properties. While the means differ between lands, the consistent issues from these aether treatments are that most of these skilled individuals are ageless according to when treatment began (though their lives are not greatly extended), and sterile.
No one race is magically inclined, and no one race forms natural magi. The one notable feature of arcane history is the old Pirigan Empire managed to overcome the barrier to mass production and control of aetherium tools, enabling their soldiers to access terrifying devices. However, the horrors of this ultimate form of arcane science has been lost to time, with only some of these terrifying relics surviving.
Monsters are creatures which have evolved naturally with aether, and now defy all logic. Fire breathing reptiles and mammals, creatures which can turn invisible, massive predators and tiny complex creatures, and more. Some lands are riddled with monsters, some monsters have been tamed, and other places are nearly devoid of such beasts under the focused hunting efforts of man.
Metaphysical properties have already been well outlined, but their variety and terrors should once again be highlighted. Any adventurer should be prepared to encounter the eldritch or face extreme supernatural threats. Ghosts, demons and creatures which sometimes breach the metaphysical barrier to terrorize the physical world are not fiction, but rare and extremely anomalous events. Approach this issue however you will.
How should you handle these fantastical features? That is ultimately up to you. As intense as these things shown above are, it should not leave you with the impression that everyone every moment of every day is subject to constant fantastical nonsense. These things share a world with us, but unless you seek it they do not dominate us. That is how you should approach it. Will you persecute the fantastical or embrace it?
In the ancient days of the four continents, a concert of regional and interregional dramas dominated the landscape. Ancient empires rose and fell, with only their foremost agents enduring and proliferating imperial polities. Civilization developed into many unique blends, motivated by the geographic and physiological landscape of their cultures. With these great movements came the two crowning ages of the ancient world: the Bronze Age and the Iron Age.
In Heshran, Man, Ailur and Pyke found their earliest origins and developed into sprawling civilizations which warred with one another for control over the bounties of their continent. In many respects, Heshran was a paradisiacal continent, and by the Heshrani Bronze Age (1300 BC) had given rise to many polities. Wars were fought largely over racial clashes, as none of the three sister races could abide the other. By 1000 BC the condition of Heshran had grown so unstable that colonial ventures possessed many of their races, and saw the spread of Heshrani races to their neighboring continents.
By 700 BC the technology to develop iron, and soon after in 500 BC to process that iron into steel, spread rapidly. Coinciding with this technological development was the coalescing of many petty kingdoms in Heshran into more centralized great powers. By the late Iron Age, a loose settlement scheme had been established in which the temperate woodlands were dominated by the Ailur, the coastal zones and mountains by the Pyke, and Humanity wedged between these many polities. For mankind the greatest success was not found in Old Heshran, but in their many colonies which rose rapidly all over the three continents, spreading from the twin seas and to both ends of the far regions. In all cases, the races of Heshran spread themselves far and wide.
In the year 300 BC, the western kingdoms of Heshran came into contact with strangers from afar. While little remains of this first contact, the encounter would manifest in the infectious fear of black ships, which these stranger’s ships were known to boast. In 200 BC however, the situation took a turn for the worse when a fleet of ships, belching smoke from great towers and loaded with hordes of unknowable creatures, landed in the west and rapidly toppled multiple kingdoms. This invasion marked the beginning of the short Classical Age, which is often woefully remembered as the Pirigan Age.
In Sinarrum the foremost of all races are the Gallu, who appear in their earliest iterations from the region of Lirum during the Sinarri Bronze Age (2100 BC). Most of the bronze age for Sinarrum is characterized by the rise, spread, and perpetual warring between petty kingdoms which slowly crept outward from Lirum, yet within Lirum itself the greatest development occurred as warring cities and kingdoms turned into great empires under prolific figures such as Lugal-Lirum (1800 BC) and Ur-Sulgar (1500 BC), who respectively transformed the local landscape into a continuous imperial tradition. Thus rose the many iterations of the Lirite Empire.
By 1200 BC, the imperial center of Kar-Liri had begun extensive trade with a number of Gallu colonies and petty kingdoms throughout the coastal region and continental heartland. The first definitive signs of trade between Sinarrum and Avestar can be dated to 1100 BC, as well as infrequent wars between Avestar’s northern coastal polities and Gallu imperial interests. Contact with the Heshrani was largely ignored by many Gallu polities who were far more concerned by their familiar conflicts, which inadvertently led to the rapid growth of Heshrani polities on Sinarrum and the induction of these new kingdoms into a storied landscape.
The Iron Age in Sinarrum spread late and slowly compared to all other continents, only initiating in earnest by 400 BC. The adoption of iron was slow across the continent, and the adoption of steel, which had been innovated upon earlier in Heshran, only emerged in 300 BC. Once steel production began, it spread rapidly throughout the continent, and ultimately overturned the prolonged remnants of the Bronze Age. Nevertheless, many of the greatest Gallu kingdoms in Sinarrum would continue to produce and employ bronze alongside steel in exotic hybrid armies which often lacked technological edge but endured in valor and numbers.
When the situation in Heshran deteriorated, many Heshrani fled to Sinarrum, bringing with them the foreboding tales of the Pirigan invasion and the imminent destruction of the last Heshrani kingdoms. Answering the plea of Pyke diplomats, Sinarrum’s Lirite Empire launched an expedition to Heshran in 153 BC, ushering in the beginning of Sinarrum’s role in the coming Classical Age and the Pirigan Wars.
In Lastel the rise and fall of great kingdoms largely never came. Much of the continent’s history is obscured during the ancient era, with ephemeral colonies and polities. Lastel’s interactions largely were contained to travellers coming from Sinarrum, who told stories of an enchanted but feral land to the east, filled with witches, monsters and fae. It is believed that the Peshtu had once ruled a small kingdom on the continent, affectionately referred to as the Meadowlands, though no archaeological evidence has been found from this fabled kingdom. In 600 BC, the first lasting kingdom was established on Lastel by a joint migration of Heshrani, leading to the rise of a multicultural kingdom which brought with it the Iron Age, and shortly thereafter the importation of steel from Sinarrum.
The ancient era would see little in the way of Lastel’s participation, though it would ultimately be the events of the broader classical period and Pirigan Wars that would draw Lastel into the interregional framework.
In Avestar the foremost of all races was the Nasaryan, who spread largely through the continent’s central and northern regions. By the Avestari Bronze Age (1900 BC) the political makeup of the many petty kingdoms throughout the region was one largely characterized by regional conflicts but interregional peace. Some major kingdoms arose, though much of Avestar’s greatest dramas are found in a series of highly mythicized wars between an aggressive political entity known as the Mistland and the surrounding kingdoms. While the true history of the Mistlands is unknown, it allegedly spread terror from 1700 BC to 1400 BC, culminating in the Epic of Inarayada in which the Mistland Empire was crushed by the hero king Inarayada, and a new Empire of Valadajar claimed vast tracts of Avestar, second in size only to that of the Gallu in Lirum.
The arrival of the Heshrani caused upset in Avestar, as the native powers not only pushed against these coastal colonies and new polities but aggressively viewed the Heshrani as the second coming of a Mistland menace. Nevertheless, the Heshrani spread and embedded themselves, and became part of the political landscape of the continent. Through this extended contact, Avestar was introduced to Iron shortly after 700 BC, matching Heshran for relative entry into the Iron Age, and rapidly developed the technology to produce steel by 550 BC. When the Pirigan invasion pushed more and more Heshrani populations toward Avestar and Sinarrum, the danger posed by the Pirigan was not well received or understood. This attitude changed in 148 BC when, after news of the fall of the last Heshrani kingdoms of Pyth and Tarkan, a diplomatic mission from the invaders arrived in the Valadajaran court and demanded the total surrender of their empire. Thus Avestar was drawn into the conflict, and the Pirigan Wars began.
The recorded history of the Pirigan Wars is the history of the short-lived Classical Age, in which empires of steel were violently attacked by the invading Pirigan Empire from the west. Rather than one continuous conflict between two organized powers, the Wars were characterized by scattered engagement between sometimes cooperative native empires and their rallied vassals and the centralized, industrial titan that had swept over Heshran. The impact of this conflict on the political, cultural and social makeup of the continents would define the rise of modern empires who, in many regards, live in the shadow of this developmental interregnum. For 148 years the Pirigan spread their influence from Heshran and attempted extensive offensives against Sinarrum and Avestar. The result was cataclysmic.
Much of the history of the Wars is discordant and lost to the deluge. Each nation carried their own record, the oral histories their own tales, and the archaeological evidence their own horrors. Nevertheless, the overriding theme of the Wars is the utter destruction, despair and cost in life that came with every battle. For every battle won by the natives, three others were lost, and in many regards the Wars served only as a valiant effort to slow an inevitable subjugation. Romanticized and demonized, these bloody times would live on in memory as the age where heroes fought true monsters, and evil was given a true form.
In Heshran the Pirigan established the forward operations, and later the beating heart, of their empire and their eastern movement. Under their rule, Heshran was converted from a lush paradise into a slowly bled industrial landscape, sporting technology centuries ahead of the native cultures. Through gunpowder and early industrial machines, the Pirigan carved Heshran into a series of extractive provinces. In order to deal with the mass flight of the Heshrani population, the Pirigan pooled their arcane sciences into the creation of the Khimerine race, employed mass slavery, and captured several Peshtu colonies on the Heshran mainland as breeding stock to rapidly produce food. As the wars progressed, the Pirigan began to move more of their base of power into the area, including the imperial capital and the Pirigan emperor. While this increased their administrative capacity, it also was the prelude to the end.
In Sinarrum the effects of the Pirigan Wars were immediate and violent. In all age, the greatest combined coastal battles reached their peak in Sinarrum, as both Lirum and the kingdoms in Hakos were vulnerable to attack. Several incidents occurred in which Lirum itself was successfully landed upon and sacked, but strained supplies prevented a permanent resolution. The most consistent development in the war between the Pirigan and the Lirite Empire came in 100 BC, when the first fortress city was established along the coast of Saharduba, followed soon after by several more in the islands of Hakos, the Lirite coastline and far north to Travelgr. These bastions would ultimately be prototypes for later fortifications created in Avestar.
In 40 BC the Pirigan made their breakthrough. While small swathes of land had been successfully seized and a northern colony on Sinarrum established, the fateful Battle of Neo-Tarkan resulted in the collapse of native resistance in Hakos, and the subsequent straining and collapse the Lirite war effort. The introduction of new industrial devices, including the iron-plated smoke-ships which seized control of Lirum’s mouth in 28 BC effectively ended all hope of native resurgence. The next decades were characterized by fierce battles in a losing crawl, devastating the most ancient region of the world, and coming to a climax with the first airship in history destroying the city of Karak. Despite this success, the Pirigan invasion in Sinarrum lacked deep colonial ventures, making the immediate post-deluge population fleeting and devastated, and allowing for the native Gallu to largely reclaim their heartland.
In Lastel the Pirigan never came directly. However, in 88 BC a Khimerine troop who had fled from their Pirigan masters began a mass exodus across Sinarrum to escape both the Empire and the constant war. By 80 BC, they arrived on the shores of Lastel, and found the continent to be largely uninhabited. This resulted in the birth of small Khimerine cities, the first to be fully independent from any overriding master. However, trouble came in 20 BC when Pirigan scouts discovered the existence of these Khimerine deserters, and resulted in the Battle of Marix in 13 BC. While the battle was ultimately successful for Lastel’s polities, the devastation caused by the battle so thoroughly destroyed the local infrastructure and economy of the cities that the populations began to scatter throughout the continent to survive off the land.
In Avestar the effects of the Pirigan Wars were arguably equal if not greater than the happenings in Sinarrum. Without an native imperial power as forceful as the Lirites to organize the polities of Avestar, the Pirigan saw initial success that allowed for the creation of colonies, bastions and more aggressive inroads to be made. The most success the Pirigan saw in Avestar was in combating the remnants of Heshrani kingdoms who had fled to the south, though ultimately these campaigns would grow quiet as the Pirigan fixed their gaze on Valadajar. Some of the most remarkable fighting also came from northern Avestar, where for a short time the Lirite Empire established a military colony which cooperated with the coastal kingdoms in the area to fend off the Pirigan by proximity.
Avestar, unlike Sinarrum, did not experience the same devastating collapse in resistance that precipitated the continent nearly falling into Pirigan hands. In 37 BC, Valadajar was destroyed following a long and brutal campaign. However, with Avestar being decentralized and its imperial polity also delegating high control to its provinces, the remnants of the empire broke away into smaller kingdoms that continued to resist the Pirigan advance. This process of conquest, fragmentation and continuous fighting resulted in a costly expansion that stalled several times. In the end, the deluge would destroy the largest Pirigan cities in Avestar, and scatter the invading armies.
The Cometary Age is often regarded as the darkest days in the history of the known world. On the cusp of victory, Pirigan astronomers observed a star growing in the night sky. At first this was ignored and viewed as yet another celestial phenomena of little concern, but with each day the star grew larger. For six days the star grew, until no part of the world was cradled by shadow. As the comet passed, it caused great storms, receded the tides, and brought about great natural disasters. At the height of these disasters the comet broke, with a falling star plummeting toward Heshran. In Heshran, this second star grew brighter than the sun, and in an apocalyptic explosion, this fragment annihilated the continent of Heshran and spread waves of destruction in all directions. Tidal waves grew to the size of mountains, and came crashing against the shores of Sinarrum and Avestar. In a heartbeat great cities were swallowed, whole lands sunk, and empires washed away. On the eve of their ultimate victory the Pirigan Empire was stopped by heavenly intervention.
In the wake of the comet, countless empires of old folded in on themselves and disappeared. Chaos spread as the surviving powers shattered under the weight of famine and migration. The world grew dark and filled with arcane storms, and ash snowed across all corners of the globe. In the crater that now swallowed Heshran, filling with all the sea, a great spire of cometary rock rose toward the clouds, glistening like steel and washed with soot. All ships that attempted to approach the spire found themselves swallowed up in the maelstrom which pooled around it. Nevertheless, in the wake of the destruction, the spire earned its affectionate name in the defeat of the Pirigan: the Landfall Throne.
For 200 years the Cometary Age gripped the world. Despite the hardships, the survivors carried on, contending with brutal conditions which gradually lessened with the passing centuries. Even when the colossal storms and the great cold began to recede, the old order was never restored.
As the world stabilized, political units began to grow once more into petty kingdoms of steel. Thanks to the work of the ancient Pirigan, even through the darkness of the Cometary Age many secrets of the old empire spread, among them the earliest trappings of blackpowder. Though primitive, the Middle Ages were a time of bold transformations and experimental technologies, spurred on by the need to grow. This was not an age of empires, but an age of fragile kingdoms who stood in the shadow of their ancient selves. Nevertheless, life went on, and with it the rapid development of increasingly mechanized technology over the course of 400 years. An overriding theme of the era was insular interest and the rediscovery of the old world. The existence of a second world, the Pirigan homeland, sparked curiosity and fear, neither of which could be answered. Lacking the means and motive to undertake any great mission, the sphere remained uncharted.
While the beginning of the Illuminate Age is uncertain, it was a brief period of nearly 200 years which were crucial in the development of the continents. This period was marked by a rise in scientific advancements, rediscovering Pirigan secrets, discovering more of the natural world, unlocking mysteries of the Comet, and a drive for technological advancement. With these new developments, intellectuals and artisans saw greater attention and sponsorship across the continents, and with them a growing romanticism for the ancient empires and the ambitions of long dead dynasties. The myriad smaller kingdoms began to grow restless, seeking power through technology and expansion, and ideologically moved toward expansion and nationalism
After over a century of the Illuminate Age, the greatest of all technologies to grace the modern world was discovered in 792 ACF: the steam engine. With it, mechanical development has skyrocketed, and the world plunges toward imperial ambition fueled by industrial capacity. Nevertheless, as industrial powers muster and expand, an ancient anxiety still lingers: what of the comet? What of the tragedies of the old world? Have the peoples of this new age escaped the shadow of those terrors, or is this merely the prelude to another calamity sent by heaven?
It is the 9th century ACF, the reconquest of the old world has come, and the story of future ages hinges on the actions of today.
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