The Age of Sin

The ritual had left me bedridden for a good week and it had tapped me more than just mentally. Physically, I felt drained, almost a decade older even, but it was a potential side effect of the ritual I took part in. Although, I never expected to return from this adventure without a few scars either on the body or soul. Luckily, my patron has been kind enough to visit me. She seems to enjoy my company and as I spend more time with her I find myself starting to appreciate her as well. Still, however, she refuses to give me her name. Alas, I dare not press her too hard on it. I press her every now and again that has become a sort of game between us, but her name is not important. What she knows, on the other hand, is an entirely different matter.

The Elven lady and her master arrived an estimated two or three days after the cataclysm. Fires were still burning in nearly all of the cities as the two of them flew in the sky and could mark down the location of every city of the empire, to which there were many of them. As far as their eyes could reach, they saw glowing lights, raging infernos that turned once great cities into smoldering heaps of rubble. However, in that rubble, the two of them found a place they could shape into a home or, as she called it herself, a lair. It was a rather peculiar term to use, but I saw no reason to question it.

Within the rubble is where they found these underground ruins. I thought it to be a temple that they called a keep, but now I know that this is an old courthouse where justice was measured out. It was from this base the two of them set up for themselves that made it possible for my Elven patron to watch the humans from a safe distance as she recorded what they were doing and catching a straggler every once in a while. She kept her interactions with the humans to a minimum while everyone, as she told it, was killed.

The humans were in no hurry to leave the safety of their last standing city, turning from an Empire into something more akin to a city-state; they devolved. Their clothing became simpler, the once-grand architectures became too hard to maintain and ultimately fell into ruin. After a hundred years, in the year 1620, Helheim had turned into the Helheim that we see and know today with buildings of wood and stone. Walls were built around the city as the people isolated themselves behind them, where it was safe.

My patron once snuck into the city. She says it was an ugly sight, with mages being treated almost as second-class citizens and everyone bowed before the Puritans, who were seen as priests, spiritual advisors. No religion is complete without a militant arm and they certainly had one in the form of professional soldiers and volunteers that patrolled the streets harassing anyone with magical inclinations while the normal citizens lived simple lives. Poverty was high and the Order of the Pure, as the Puritans now called themselves, organized weekly mass meals to feed the poor while asking for donations. The Elven lady participated in one of these mass meals, seeing no reason to pass up free food. What she was given was of low quality and noticed that these “free” meals were not as free as they seemed. The size of your portion was decided in part by the size of your donation. Thus, they gave with one hand and took with the other.

After that, my patron had no desire to visit Helheim again. She returned to the lair of her master and had no contact with humans for many years.

I now felt that I could learn nothing further here. I had to put my plan to escape into effect. Despite being captured and my companions having been experimented on and slain, I still felt some sadness having to leave this place. In a way, there was a type of freedom that the Cabbala had offered, a freedom we in the Jade Lotus Empire never had. They could study and practically do anything they wanted, with the only true limitation being their own ambition and talent. However, my daring escape was sadly and very anti-climatically cut short by my release. I feel as if my patron knew all along when I was going to make my getaway and decided to have the last laugh. I was led out of the tunnels under a blindfold.

After several hours, I found myself outside. I could smell the fresh bamboo and that someone nearby had been brewing a pot of green tea. It was the scent of home. I stood there for five minutes not hearing a sound. When I dared to lift my blindfold, however, I was alone just on the outskirts of the imperial capital of Shirayama with the glory of Mount Ishikawa looming over me with the imperial palace, Kyuden Hisui, rested on top of it behind the magical mists. I was back in the safety of the Jade Lotus Empire. Even if I were home, though, my work was not yet completed. I had to make a full account of the entire history of this world before I could rest, before I could try to draw a conclusion to the big question: Why does magic feel different in Sincadere?

I had exhausted the library in both Helheim and that of the Cabbala. I systematically categorized it all as best as I could by year in order to make sure I covered every missing event in history. But recorded history is scarce after the cataclysm and most material being almost shameless propaganda for the Puritans that was likely made up in religious texts and so forth. Many had followed the Empress during her exodus from Helheim, many of the humans with descendants from those dark centuries after the cataclysm with diaries and personal memoirs, one of which is, to my knowledge, the first recorded instance of a magical sentient creature on Sincadere.

In the year 1630, humanity came face-to-face with what I believe to be a dragon; a dragon that is spoken of with spite and hate in the Jade Lotus Empire. I believe that they are describing Vaeros, former friend of our Empress who turned out to be a fiend more than a friend. By all accounts, Vaeros was, however, slain by our Empress in the end.

The plea for help in the last entry of the diary sadly went unanswered, this much is confirmed by later texts that I found in the Imperial library within the palace. A proper effort would not be made till a year later, after numerous reports of a winged beast that stalked the sky, as if to placate the unrest amongst the masses. The high priestess declared that the beast was sent there to torment them by their hateful ancestors. Below is a passage taken from a text that bears the royal seal of Helheim; a report most likely. Sadly, it is badly damaged, but a portion of the text and the date has survived.

By this diary we can surmise that Vaeros was not slain and that these humans quickly learned that you do not fight a dragon up close on horseback and that he would pop up in history again. However, he was the first widely known magical beast that the humans of Sincadere came to know, and he was not the last troubles the city of Helheim would come to face.

With magic almost under the control of the Puritans, and any undesirable people being banished outside of the city, the First Law was no longer being broken on a large scale like it was in the last years of the Empire. Before the cataclysm, no real major events had been caused by the instability of the leylines, but portals started to open up like bridges between worlds, allowing new species to venture through.

A journal kept by an Elf explorer described how small groups of Elves, Dwarves, Orcs, Goblins and other races, some brought along as beasts of labour or mercenaries, slowly came to Sincadere. Some sought fortune, others adventures, and some even just seeking conquest. Yet, no matter what any of the races were seeking, friendly or hostile, humans did as they always have with the unknown.

Skirmishes broke out. Those not native to the world did not find much of a warm welcome here, with people eager to take some of the more brutish races as slaves for manual labour - a tradition that Helheim keeps proudly keeps alive to this day. Still, through much hardship, some races were able to integrate with the Puritans having to face the fact that their world was now open to all. The more friendly races founded a slum just outside of the docks that eventually was integrated into Helheim itself, but it would remain a slum for those that were seen as second-class citizens.

The Elf then goes on to describe in his journal that mages found a sort of kinship with the non-native races. Both would be harassed by the Puritans and their more zealous followers, but it wasn’t just human and mages. While there are no clear cut indications of when it happened, some humans started to raise questions regarding their Gods while many of them flocked to our beloved Empress, Tsuiteru. While I have no clear answer as to when she had arrived in Sincadere, she certainly was a person of note that others looked to for hope and protection. Strangely enough, the Puritans did not act against the newly founded Jade Lotus Empire and, for the most part, left them alone. Perhaps they did not desire a large battle near the city, finding it easier to just contain those with a dangerous mindset within the slums.

However, while the later travelers that came to the realm had been both a boon and a burden for the humans, it was the first traveler who would prove to be Helheim's biggest calamity in the cataclysm. I do not know the reason behind the fight that happened between the great red wyrm Vaeros and the Empress of the Jade Lotus, but it did result in Vaeros’ defeat and the death of the current King of Helheim. Which, in itself, is very strange. The royal family had been nothing but icons, puppets to be used by the Puritans since they took power at the end of the Mortal Era - puppets not easy to replace. King Thrym's child was barely out of diapers and there was no one to replace him even if the Puritans had grown tired of him. Thus, I believe that King Thrym went into that fight willingly, knowing it might cost him his life. His motivation for doing so eludes me, but I suspect anyone who wished to pursue more of that story will have to speak with the current king, Tyr Spurius, or visit the library in Helheim for a more detailed account.

King Thrym’s mention in this text below is from a journal that belonged to my own father and shows that he was the very reason that the Empress emerged victorious that day.

I do not remember the exodus personally as I was a young boy then, too young to remember, but that was the last time we saw the humans and Helheim for the next 500 years. The Empress sealed us behind the protective ward that was the mist and, in there, we flourished and grew stronger, ready for anything when we finally reemerged. Granted, the land had changed much and rifts had still opened in our absence, but those that came after us found a better Helheim than we had left behind. We learned later that after the mists were parted that the Puritans were no more. Helheim was now ruled by a new king. I suspect that the royal family finally took back control and either killed or exiled the Puritans.