Cadinal Powers: Work in Progress

P

Professor Crane

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This is one version of the introduction for a story I have been trying to write for some time, but I can't quite figure out what style I want to write it in. This style would be trying to take a more past tense, historical approach. It is presently in its rawest form.




I write this at the end of an era. The armies that the College of Omnimancy have made enemies of are amassing against them, and they have not the strength to endure such a siege. Indeed, with the destruction of The College, I believe that we shall see the power structures that have lasted for a thousand years crumble. The Cardinal Era shall surely come to a close. It is at this pivotal moment that I, Saarn D'Erthos, historian and chronicler, have traveled to the College to record their history and traditions before they are destroyed.


The history of the Omnimancers must be prefaced by the history of the Cardinal Era.


At an unknown date, often put to be over a thousand years ago, there existed a nation whose name we do not know. From our legends, we are told that this ancient nation was extremely advanced in many studies of reality; however, hubris weakened the nation. The ancient nation grew bold, taking steps to find out not just fields of reality, but its very core, The Unknowable. The nation constructed a means of summoning forth what they thought was their answer; instead they summoned a being of great power, the Tempest. In the chaos of bringing forth The Tempest, a sleeping entity that exists outside our realm of conciousness, their ritual was interrupted and a small piece of the Tempest was severed.


This event, the severing of Tempest, caused a perpetual storm to be unleashed in the central mass of the world we know, the area we call the Plains of Erthos. The resulting storm would have wiped out all Human life, if it were not for the intervention of the Unknowable. The Unknowable granted four people knowledge of the reality, and sent them in four directions to found a new world. To the Noble Jessica was given the art of confluence, the ability to master and enforce reality, to know of external discipline. To the Master Liet was given the knowledge of the soul arts, the ability to hone their abilities to a precision that supercedes reality, to know of internal discipline. To the Exile Yueh was given the ability of reality bending, the use of will to forge reality to his design, the knowledge of Internal Expression. To the Hermit Kines was given the science of magic, to tap into the powers beyond obvious reality and draw them forth, the process of external expression.

The legend is held in skepticism by most scholars throughout the continent of Erthos. What is held true is that for a thousand years of recorded history the four powers, the cardinal powers, have existed in the cardinal directions. Nations have been raised around the precepts of those powers in that time. The senate of the Democracy of Lerai lies in the West. The North contains the Anarchy of Morsa. The East is the seat of the Theocracy of Vesha. The seat of the Kingdoms of Zelvos lay to the South.

The foundation of Omnimancy is based on the cardinal powers and the four nations. It is safest to start looking at the powers from confluence, and its associated nation of Zelvos.