This war will consume us all

[Jargo]

"Echoes from the West,
great hammers will fall.
Under high rocks, all will answer the Call.
Bring us your arms, pariahs of yore,
all faces turn now to war.
Exisles of the ash step into crimson glow
Guards of the North sing their sons of the snow."​

The story​

Because you're not really here to read random lines of poetry, right! Well, I have a rather simplistic storyline and I do hope that you will participate in the world-building, adding more depth and detail to the world, so that it feels alive for both of us. The song above is written about Skyrim, but this roleplay has no connection to the latter whatsoever, apart from the song being my inspiration for this story.

The idea is that there are two realms, not to be called kingdoms, because neither of them are monarchies with a king presiding over them per se, but they are both unified dominions, united in both conviction, language, heritage, history, mythology and, of course, most importantly - geography.

One of them is the epitome of the fantasy "north". A vast, cold highground with environments ranging from large coniferous forests, where cold rainfall falls rather often and only turns into snow for a few months, inhabited by all sorts of wildlife, to high mountains and plateaus, which are permanently covered by snow and ice. This is not the most hospitable land and, apart from lumber and animal skins, it doesn't really boast that much natural resources. And that's not just some wild statement, it's confirmed by geologists and engineers from the major nations of this world who have, unbeknownst to the locals, surveyed the northern lands far and wide, to determine if any large conquest into the expanse is worthwhile. It wasn't. As a result, for ages upon ages, that part of the world was really left to its own devices and took a civilisation path totally different from that of the rest of the nations that exist there. While the major powers of the world used steam and coal to create steel-clad power, clothed as progress and wage wars upon each other for more resources and better technology, the north remained primarily armed with bows and axes and to this day, people still use oxen carts to transport their lumber across the fields. While the rest of the world streamlined the loose magical traditions permeating all societies from the dawn of time into powerful magical schools to control and bend the elements, training a whole generation of powerful sorcerers, the northerners never really moved away from their old shamanistic traditions. While the rest of the world hunted each other for more power and knowledge, the north seemed content in hunting beasts and having the occasional in-fighting between different communities.

That's not to say we're completely uncivilised, though. The tribe structures were left behind for concrete communities, dwelling in specific areas, focused on different things and individuals could switch from one to another without much difficulty as the differences between those were mostly based on geography and occupation, rather than mythos, language or culture. For example, members of hunter communities returned to their home only for short periods and spent the majority of their time hunting in the wilderness in groups or solo, whilst scholars largely stuck to their tower in the mountains and only went into the lower lands when hired on a job for someone else. Of course, one or two eclectic communities that largely resembled modern kingdoms also sprung along, usually forming around charismatic leaders and persisting long after inventing various rites of ascension. Those usually had something similar to what the rest of the world might call "warriors", meaning they had groups of people, who, apart from hunting, were also trained to fight other humans.

Why, though? Why have a group of people who spend at least half of their time in the seemingly useless art of training to fight other humans? After all, community wars, even amidst the city-states that one might be able to call "kingdoms" were rare and brief - life in the harsh North had taught its children a very different model of civilisation from the rest of the world - war and conflict only depleted resources of all parties involved and in an environment where often the next day's meal wasn't guaranteed, such a waste was often lethal and to be avoided at all costs. Well, because not all thought that way. Long time ago, longer than anyone could remember, a certain community figured out that instead of fighting the forces of nature every day to claim their next meal, they could just ambush people and... well... make a meal out of them. Oh come on, don't be so outraged, it's not like we, the normal Northerners never stooped to it in our darkest of times. It's practically a given that someone with lower moral standards would deem this a legitimate way of surviving. But generations of cannibalism and inbreeding (after all, who would want or be able to join such a community, if they saw strangers as food?!) changed these people and while their numbers did grow, their bodies and minds changed, deformed and misshapen, twisting them into the creatures we call "the Ferals" and scorn to remember we're the same kin. So, as the Ferals became more brazen over time, military structures such as the Wolfborn and the Breakers were needed to put them down, forcing them into hiding and living in subterranean places, only rarely going out on their hunts for food. It is said in hush words around fires in different cities in the north, that the caves and tunnels that the Ferals dwell in, have been expanded and dug deeper and they now span all across the North. It is said that the Ferals have evolved their own ruling class and structure and that feeding on each other had made them even larger and more fierce. Some would go as far as to say that entire kingdoms, clans and classes exist underground and they make war upon each other, the victors feasting upon the corpses of the defeated, in a common oblivion over why they live this way and what has forced them down there. And, of course, the implication of all these stories being, what if... what if one day the descendants of the dispossessed decide that the underground is not enough and that they'd like to sate their endless appetites with the softer flesh of those who'd driven them underground in the first place?

But enough with the North, you're not here for that!

Right next to the North, a proper kingdom exists. With a king, a queen, a princess, a cool castle, a real army, their own school of magic and a religion connected to their lands. They've had limited interactions with the northerners over ages and are the only ones to know a thing or two of those lands.

Their sorcery was based on shadow magic and as such, involved all sorts of things deemed "evil" by most other societies. Blood magic, necromancy, vampirism, spells affecting the victim's mind, twisting the light into darkness, all sorts of things were seen as normal and allowed in Ashenai. The king was the leader of the army and his queen would always be the strongest sorceress in the land. Thus, the people of Ashenai would ensure that the blood of their strongest magician would always flow in the veins of their monarch. The Ashenai also had their own brand of assassins, Risen Shadows, whose Inner Sanctum is rumoured to house the ever beating heart of a dead god. It is said all Risen drink from the dark pool around the heart and that's why their eyes turn pitch black, along with them receiving their supernatural senses. With such an amalgam of doom and gloom, one would say that the Ashenai were the embodiment of evil in this world, but whilst their elite did dabble in the dark arts, they were really not any more eviller than anyone else. In fact, knowledge of the darkness made most hearts naturally kinder to all. There was no fierce competition, no severe in-fighting, no political assassinations, no questioning of loyalty and constant purges - all of these plaguing the nearby rival kingdoms.

But the darkness was a good excuse for a war, though! And with every victory of Ashenai against its enemies, with every province gained and with every army defeated, their fury and hatred grew. In fact, they grew so much, that the three neighbouring kingdoms made the Holy League - an alliance, officially made to "save the world from the darkness", but with an overtly political motive - the three participants had already divided the lands of Ashenai amongst themselves. With the Holy League's Army of Ligh advancing from three sides, despite the heroic resistance of the locals, Ashenai lost city after city and keep after keep, until the three armies united, as was their plan, to lay siege on the capital.

After a year of siege, the capital fell, the Risen were all slain, all of the local population was put to the sword, the entire city was torched and the royal family was slaughtered. Remnants of the kingdom are continuing their resistance here and there, but for the large part they are either fleeing or surrendering. Ashenai is no more.

Or is it? I mean, come on, I didn't tell you all of this for nothing, did I?!

The current queen of Ahenai was a prodigy of witchcraft and an oracle of unusual clarity. One of such ability is only born once in a millennia and it is as if the dark gods of Ashenai made her to be born in this exact time frame just for this. She predicted the Fall of Ashenai a year before it happened and advised both her husband and the Inner Sanctum, that the fall would not be stopped, regardless of any preparations they made. Nevertheless, it is due to these preparations, that Ashenai didn't fall much sooner to begin with, but that's besides the point. The leadership of Ashenai decided to sacrifice themselves, in order to give a chance to their daughter, who was not really well known due to the fact she had no real rights to the throne because she had an elder brother, to lead a selected group, the best and the brightest of Ashenai, away and thus ensure the kingdom's survival.

Princess (insert your character name here) would lead a small amount of her people, along with the best of their elite, away, into the North, to claim these cold faraway lands for Ashenai, to rebuild and one day, to come back and take their revenge. How? Well, the queen, being a magical prodigy, managed to create a nation-wide incantation by having markings carved all across the land, which would allow someone carrying her blood to raise every soul killed violently after the spell is cast, as a ghoul. With hundreds of thousands fallen in the destruction of their kingdom, the people of Ashenai made the ultimate sacrifice, to allow the rest of their kin to not only survive, but also provide them with a weapon to enact a revenge unheard of before in the history of this world. And that all falls to one person.

With so much pressure on her, the princess did not play nice. The Ashenai only hid their presence in the North for a little while, before dragging a torch of destruction across the northern lands, destroying the lives of the indigenous in order to recreate some of the conditions present in their previous lives and start the gears of war once again. The locals, though, would not give back so easily what they own. While seemingly far superior to their "savage" enemy in terms of fire power and organisation, it was hard for a proper army, especially one of diminished size and morals, to actually do proper conquering, since between villages, communities and cities, only vast expanses of woodland or snowy tundra existed and it's not like there was a proper map to show them how to go around obstacles, the latter a fact that got heavily abused by the Northeners. What her parents had assumed would be a swift and conquer subjugation that would yield a large supply of slave labour and resources, actually turned into bitter months upon months of prologued and draining fighting. And so another war started - one side superior in fire power and technology, but lacking in everything else and the other - knowing the land but not their enemy.

A war neither of them expected (to take so long). A war, where both parties fight for their survival. A war, that would consume them all.

About you
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You were expecting me to talk about myself, right? Well, I don't really feel like writing about myself now that I've just dumped that entire story, but if you need to know something, feel free to ask. I wanna talk about you, though. Yes, you, the one currently reading this. Or maybe not really you, if that sort of story isn't for you :D

Anyhow. What do I need from you? Well, first of, you'd need to be interest in the story, duh. Secondly, and that's absolutely imperative, I'd need you to be able to and to like doing worldbuild. I've basically outlined the "borders" of the world in the most general terms possible, but you'd need to add your own colour to it, especially to Ashenai culture, characters, etc. Basically, you can create anything within it, that you want - story, characters, people, etc., that you like. This includes the magic, of course.

I really don't care how often you post, as long as it's good quality posts, but I'd like you to be able to make the world around your character feel alive.

The interview
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So, how will I select my partner for this? Well, basically, it's going to be a RP interview. I don't really care much for elaborate character sheets and character descriptions, I prefer that you actually show me what your character is all about. Of course, I pre-set who your character would be, but apart from that, you are free to make it any way you like in terms of personality, powers, abilities, interests, attitude to all the events before, etc. So, let me set the scene:

You are the princess of Ashenai, and you've sent three of your remaining Risen to investigate a set of ruins, located on an island in a frozen lake not too far from the main Ashenai encampment. You don't usually see tall structure in the North and there was some pretty high stone tower in ruins over that island. Your Risen do not come back in a day and that can only mean one thing. Determined not to lose any more of your precious Risen (you can't really train more, since you don't have the years or the magic needed), you take two more with you and head over there to deal with things yourself. Your advisers don't really try to stop you - after all, you haven't done anything major to prove yourself since you led them to the North, after all, it's been month and the majority of it is still unconquered. Solving this issue head-on would be a good way to show yourself a capable leader to the remnants of your people. When you arrive there, you see the torn bodies of your kin and you know that all of those wounds were not done by the normal bludgeoning or piercing weapons that the men of the north use. Your eye catched a glimpse of a human figure and carching your gaze, it runs away, yelling in the guttural nordic tongue. From where the figure ran away, you see three men come down, the two of them walking naked, with only some furs to cover their private parts, despite of the cold and a man, roughly the same age as you, between them, wearing thick coat, furry boots and gloves and spouting thick beard and trusled, black hair. He looks at you and says in perfect Ashenai tongue "Greetings, Ashenai. I humbly request that you leave this place and never come back. There's nothing for your kind here."

Well, if you've gone that far, thanks for your interest! Shoot me a PM or reply in here if you're interested and please keep in mind, I'd be looking out for your worldbuilding skills :)

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