Supernatural Beings
Supernatural entities are divided into four prime categories according to the Grand Empire's scholars, each of them rather diverse internally [though to a varying degree]. These four categories are Spirits, Divines, Warped and Soulless, the last category being often ommited due to working in a slightly different way than the rest of them. There are also rare cases of entities not fitting any of the four categories, though primarily those are otherworldly visitors who somehow sneaked into this world. Though sometimes they are creatures from the time before the four categories were officially created.
Spirits
I was once asked 'what is magic'. I answered: "Spirits".Archmagician Boneshaper, Introduction to Magicks.
The first and most widespread type of supernatural entities are the spirits. They are entities created [to a degree] and fed by emotions, thoughts and beliefs. Whenever a sufficiently large group of humans believes that something supernatural lives somewhere out there, the entity in questions is born, being one of the spirits. In theory, at least. In fact, the situation is a bit more complicated, with overwhelming majority of spirits being descended of pre-existing supernatural hierarchies/powers.
In short, mortal thoughts didn't create every single spirit - instead they created entire species of them, in some cases creating entire hierarchies of those through their collective beliefs. In fact, sometimes the 'collective beliefs' comes so far as to be the general belief in existence of the supernatural, with spirits emerging as a conclusion of some natural processes. Because of that to say that they are born entirely of mortal imagination is a bit of a stretch. There is also a case of creatures serving the Divines - with the question of whether the Divines are made the same way as spirits still unanswered, trying to conclusively claim that it was the mortal' imagination that created the spirits by 'imagining' them to be servants of said Divines.
There are five basic types of spirits, each of them widely divergent from each other when it comes to their origin, nature and power.
Daemon Spirits
To believe that daemons are just 'human mind in weird container' is a peak stupidity. Majority of them are alien to us, if not in thinking then at least in their ethics and behaviour. You need to always be aware of what exactly you are contacting, and make sure you understand it. Otherwise your adventure as magicians will end very soon.Fragment of a lecture on the Imperial Academy.
Daemon spirits [also shortened to daemons or daimons] are - together with the shard spirits - the most common supernatural creatures. They are the creatures either born directly of mortal imagination or through an intermediary of Divines [or other but stronger daemon spirits]. Their most dinstictive element is the fact that unlike the shards, they are all sapient - though to a degree. Being 'sapient' doesn't necessarily mean being like human, nor does it mean that its' opinions on you can be swayed.
Most of them [especially those serving various deities] are too strong in their beliefs to have a chance of betraying their masters. They live endlessly, which means that each stronger daemon encountered has a fair chance of being a time abyss whose lifetime can't even be determined in mortal measurements of time. However due to certain pecularities of daemonic souls, their mindset barely changes during the ages, only the experience does. The concept of boredom is alien to them, and daemons are fine with doing the same thing over and over again, for millenia if needed. It'll always be as pleasurable as it was at the beginning.
Most of them can be reasoned with, as due to being born of emotions and faith they are a reflection of mortal psyche - just different in approach to the same values. Though reasoning is typically much easier with neutral daemons and those serving the gods that aren't evil. There are also vast internal differences between members of this category. There are daemon spirits that are more intelligent, and those that are less intelligent. There are those who are explicitly described as being slightly more fluid when it comes to changing their opinions [though most of those are daemonified mortals].
This category is also divided between three major grades: the lesser daemons, the greater daemons and the archdaemons. Majority of the daemons are the lesser or greater ones, differentiated by the fact that the greater ones can establish a Domain [a small pocket world for themselves, typically the size of a house - or a mansion]. However due to it being a safe haven for daemons, it's not uncommon for lesser daemons to serve the stronger greater daemons in exchange for living in their Domains. Archdaemons in the meantime are much more individualistic [often diverging greatly from the daemon spirit species they used to be a part of] and are capable of creating their own servile daemon and shard spirits.
Shard Spirits
Don't underestimate them. What they lack in intelligence they get back in strength and power. And when it comes to their intelligence... don't assume they are animals simply because they can't have a conversation.Fragment of a lecture in one of the adventurers' training centers.
Shard spirits are a non-sapient counterparts of the daemon spirits. Their name briefly described their nature - each of them is a shard of power of their daemonic or divine creator, granted a weaker form of daemonic soul with rough outline of a personality imprinted on it. Some of them are created willingly to serve as tireless and loyal muscles for their creators, others simply grow up from sufficient densities of magic power and some correct strands of mortal imagination.
Most of the shard spirits make up for fauna and flora of the afterlifes, being born of the past shard spirits. This creates and inexhaustible supply of at least the lesser shard spirits [called simply the shard spirits], the most powerful of which can equal greater daemons in strength and power. They are not to be trifled with, despite being the lowest class of entities. While they lack sapience [and sometimes sentience], they have instincts and powerful physicque at their disposal.
The matter of shard' intellects is a bit more complicated than one would expect from this description. Many of them are actually sentient beings, sometimes capable of rudimentary speech. However unlike the daemon spirits their speech is typically limited to short list of words, they aren't flexible in their talk to fool anyone as to who they are, and the sentience makes them an equivalent of really intelligent animals. Which is enough to sometimes outthink an adventure who treated them as 'simple' animals.
Being 'animal' by no mean indicates that they are all animals. Many of them takes after Material World' animals, but there are also those who appear humanoid and can even use weaponry and armours. And that's without counting those that look much more exotic.
Above the shard spirit level there are the Instruments. Instruments are either extremely powerful [and universally sentient] creations of the Divines and archdaemons, or prime enforcers for the greater daemons trying to emulate their betters. Unlike shard spirits who are typically wild and free [even if tamable], Instruments are a living weapons designed to destroy enemy forces with extreme prejudice.
There's also one more category, called the Titans. Titans are the prime enforcers of the will of the Divines, called into the battlefield when absolute annihilation of enemy is needed. They can reach a hundred meters in height, and - which is something very few mortals are aware off - most of them is powered by degraded and broken souls of the lesser Old Gods. Woe to those who need to face them in battle.
Elemental Spirits
Elemental spirits are entities born from overwhelmingly powerful influence of an element on the areas with high concentration of magic. A sufficiently strong fire in mana-rich environment will inevitably spawn fire elementals, just as any major water source in such condition will sprawn water elementals. If the elements are strong enough, the high elementals will be born into the Material World. There is, however, a slight problem. All elementals are extremely simpleminded. They seek to 'breed' and expand in numbers and influence. The uncontrolled fire elemental will naturally seek to ignite everything flamable in the vicinity, thus strengthening the influence of its element in the area. Which makes the fire elementals stronger, and also has a chance of spawning even more fire elementals [though this is a woefully inefficient way]. The only [and slight at best] exception would be the rehalian elementals serving the Prime Elementals, who are slightly tamer in their multiplication, and the visenians ones serving the Goddess. Elementals would have long ago drowned the world in their power, but they are mutually hostile to each other an thus vulnerable [for example the rampaging fire of the fire elementals will suffer much more from even a moderate rain]. What's more they lack intelligence, and typically grow too fast and run out of mana to continue their multiplication with speed fast enough to spread. Because of this, while the elementals are seen as extremely useful and relatively easy to control, their summoning is allowed only for the sufficiently competent elementalists. The individual elementals are short-lived, being born and dying at a moment's notice [though their 'death' is de facto dissolution into the basic elemental power which sooner or later gives birth to another elemental]. High Elementals are slightly more stable and more powerful, while also capable of 'splitting' themselves, giving birth to more elementals [in a more efficient way than the one mentioned above], but they require more power and magic to spawn themselves - this is narrowly possible, but requires lots of elemental influence. Grand Elementals in the meantime are living natural disasters capable of spawning only in the Otherworld, typically in the Elemental Wastes [Aetherial Vortex is a domain of Sparks and Sources, with the Grand Elementals too weak to dwell there]. A Grand Fire Elemental is capable of causing firestorms with its sheer presence, each of their manifestation instantly detected and targeted for extermination as soon as possible.It is currently believed that the fire was caused by an accidental summoning of a fire elemental, who has set everything on fire as a part of its reproduction cycle. Before local militia and adventurers managed to suppress the incursion, 3/4 of the city were ashes. I suggest...Incident report from the mayor of one of imperial cities.
Aberrant Spirits
Aberrants. Outthink daemons and overpower the shards, and you'll soon forget about them. But the aberrants? They stay with you for life.A retired adventurer's answer to the question about the worst thing to met.
Daemons and shards are either born of comprehensible emotions or created by Divines of comprehensible domains. Aberrants are something different. They are spirits born of ideas incomprehensible to mortals, or created as servants of the Enigmas [who are composed of similar material to be the enforcers of their will. Of course to operate with a meaningful degree of success they need to take in at least some qualities of comprehensible ideas - otherwise anticipating human actions or such a mundane acts as attaking someone physically would be unavailable to them.
Because of that Aberrants are typically mostly composed of comprehensible elements, that are simply coating the core of utter insanity. While basic behavioural patterns [such as extreme cruelty and omnicidal mania of the servants of Pentagram] can be more or less deciphered and understood, the minds behind them defy understanding. Aberrants are prone to cases of utter blue and orange morality and completely insane logic. What's more, this result can spread - most Aberrant' attacks can destabilize sanity. Even their presence is unhealthy, as it makes you think [even unconsciously] what they are. And to fully comprehend what makes them 'aberrants' is to lose your sanity completely.
Today Aberrants are a dying race, though this is something typically incomprehensible for average imperial. As monotheisms spread, the power of Aberrants wanes. The reason is simple - all known monotheisms state that the world was created for mortals to inhabit. Under such logic, there is no place for Aberrants [after all, why something incomprehensible to mortals in a world made for mortals?], who are thus slowly dying on a conceptual level. There are almost gone in the rehalian and visenian lands, while slowly being pushed out of Telya by the khardics. They are holding ground in the Grand Empire due to the strength of Pentagram acting as a banner under which Aberrants can gather. As all entities pushed into the corner, they tend to be ferocious - and still quite numerous in Empire. Then again, some seem fine with extinction and others just doesn't care.
There are three main stages of Aberrants. Lesser Aberrants are only capable of inducing madness, as they are too 'polluted' with comprehensibility. Greater Aberrants are also capable of twisting one's morals, though unlike madness this requires repeated contact [or a long one] during which victim's personality and soul is warped by the Aberrant's influence. What's more, their sanity-breaking influence is stronger too. If that wasn't enough, the sanity slippage tends to boost the depraving second effect, making it go much faster...
Rarely, a Terror arises from among the Aberrants. Terrors are immensely strong Aberrants to managed to gain some semblances of powers of the lesser Enigmas. This means that not only they retain their sanity-breaking and mind-warping influence, but they are also capable of corrupting bodies of mortals, changing them into monstrosities or altering them to better fit the eldritch deity they are all serving.
Fae
Alright. Your child was kidnapped? And whose fault is that? What, was it too hard to read the damn warning signs? You know, the ones just before the road enters the swamps? We all know how the local nymphs react to intruders who forgot to pay the entry tax. Something small and shiny, even polished rock would be ok. That's why we put the warning sign there. Listen, few years ago nymphs that you want us to attack saved this village. Warned us about the bandits. All they want in exchange is the damn tax. Now the boy is gone. They will give him back after they got tired of him. In a year or two. At least next time you will remember to pay.Unnamed village elder to stingy travellers.
Fae [nature in old elven] are in a way just as alien than aberrants. They are speculated to be born of the collective [and weak] 'imagination' and dreams of animals. This massive potential of untold number of minds [even if none of them even nearly as strong as that of mortal's] could never bloom due to lack of unified direction. However at some point of time this potential was somehow merged with the elven deities of nature, creating the first Fae. Elven emotions and imagination granted those the Fae a thin veneer of 'civilization', hiding their decisively bestial and animalistic nature. Humans maintained this state.
Of course, situation is always a bit more complicated than that. Their nature of a primal force with a thin mask born of mortal's imagination makes them a bit unique, at least when compared to more stable and established daemons. Nature of Fae is intrinsically unstable and prior to changes. Fae living in the lands that fell to civilization will be civilized. But if civilization receedes, so will the thin veil of it on the Fae. Deep inside, a Fae will always be a primal force of nature, even if the circumstances managed to tame it. Then again, the tameness part can go pretty deep, The ocean and river Faes are typically pretty tame, at least in the civilized lands and on well-attended naval trade routes. It also makes them relatively easy to corrupt when something really wrong happens in the area.
Fae's greatest strength is their power over nature. Their lands - the Wilds - are spread around at least 70% of Karadia, all of them under strict control of the Fae. They are divided into numerous personal 'fiefdoms' of sufficiently powerful True Fae, each of these spirits lording over numerous 'normal' Fae, beasts, animals, plantlife and savage mortals. Each True Fae's domain tends to be much larger on the inside, and is treated by their overlords a bit like a garden. Their ecosystem depends entirely on the imagination of their overlord. A biome of mushroom forest might exist right next to a jungle and a temperate forest. Fae are not bound by a local climate, but at worst influenced by it.
Above the level of the True Fae lie the Wildlords. A handful [at best few dozen] strongest Fae ruling like kings and queens over the entire Wilds. Their actions rarely are noticeable by mortals, as they seem too busy fighting against each other to expand their domains, which in turn is ruled by the True Fae, acting like vassals or courtiers of the Wildlords. The last time they seemed interested in mortals happened when the ancient elves attempted to drive the Fae back and expand their territories. After the elves lost seven consecutive Forest Wars, the commotion died out.
It should be also noted that for as long as the Fae is 'civilized', they can take after mortals quite a lot. Not to the point of becoming fully integrated into the society at large, but human-Fae relationships can be surprisingly common. And surprisingly fullfilling for both sides.
Warped
Magic is a power that can change the world. Seeing the warped is the best way of understanding it.Archmagician Boneshaper, Introduction to Magicks.
The warped are entites that are only partially supernatural. They are previously mundane entities that were altered with various special qualities by magic, creating something... new. There are warped minerals and metals - but they are simply considered a slightly unusual minerals and metals by most. There are warped plants, but they are considered just a slightly more valuable alchemical ingredients. There are warped people - but those are considered mortals with a twist. But when the animals get warped, they tend to stay.
This gave birth to to conflicting categories of warped, each of them composed of a stable [truly in case of beasts, and theoretically when it comes to monsters] warped species of animals. Unlike the spirits, there are mostly mundane. Without being a direct reflection of any deity [save for the monsters] they tend to be truly neutral, not unlike mundane animals.
Beasts
...yes, you saw that correctly. Boots made from the imperial wyvern skin. Talk about flaunting your wealth! Upstarts, all of them.Noble's criticque of one of the guests during the imperial coronation.
Beasts are the tamer half of the warped nature life, whose creation is traditionally attributed to Fera, the Anarch of Fangs. There are animals warped into utterly new form and used to expand the preexisting ecosystem in a way much more beffiting a fantasy world. Giant wolves, wyverns, griffins, megaaurochs and rocs - all these majestic [and deadly] creatures are, without a doubt, beasts. Just as a hundred slightly less powerful and well-known creatures. Which opens up both a problem and an opportunity.
Many of the beasts can see mortals as food - for example the wyverns and griffins. This means that whenever such a beast settles in the area, caution is advised. However mortals are typically not a prime target for such beasts, due to simply not being nutritious enough. Especially the megafauna requires insane ammount of nutrition to maintain their massive bodies, which makes them prefer other beasts as food, establishing a food chain in which greater carnivorous beasts hunt large herbivorous beasts, while the smaller carnivorous beasts hunt lesser herbivorous beasts - and mundane animals, occasionally also a stray mortal. However, when they aren't starving or aren't defending their young, they will typically warn approaching mortals and not attack them unless they keep approaching them.
Of course, beasts can also be driven insane by really mean magic corrupting the vicinity, changing them into creatures obsessed with mortal flesh. However, this happens rarely [and is in fact a good warning sign of something sinister happening in the area]. Normally, the beasts are extremely useful. Powerful hides for the equipment production, nutritious meat, various alchemical reagents, and large herbivours to use as beasts of burden. And, of course, trophies made of more powerful beasts look great on your wall.
Today most of the more powerful beasts are [to some point] 'serving' the Fae. Or, to be exact, live in the habitats created by the Fae [who have a power allowing them to influence animals weaker then themselves]. There are however cases of immensely powerful beasts mysteriously gaining sentience [even sapience in some cases] and either usurping the Fae's throne [essentially making them serve it], living independently or deciding to serve either the True Fae or the Wild Lords themselves. These Sacred Beasts are often speculated to be beast' equivalent of mortal Chosen Ones, in this case dedicated to Fera.
Monsters
We've managed to suppress the outbreak of monsters from that valley, but the entire area is defiled. Nothing will grow there for a long while. Call priests of Hortulanus, perhaps they can do something.Post-combat adventurer's report.
Unlike beasts who were 'designed' to expand and improve the ecosystem, the monsters have no such role. They are creations [or perhaps descendants] of Occasa, the Hierarch of Desolation. Monster reproduce quickly and if not wiped out will inevitably begin taking their toll on the surrounding ecosystem. If left on their own for a sufficiently long time, nothing but wasteland will be left, with some remaining monsters dying out of hunger or engaging in cannibalism to maintain themselves for a while longer.
This, naturally, makes them a threat to the civilization - and the Wild Lords. Monsters lack organizations, but they are numerous, spread fast, and are often difficult to kill. They will ruin every ecosystem if given enough time, and each fallen Fae's domain will soon burst out with them, infecting other domains - and they will corrupt the fallen Fae into being as insanely destructive as them, changing them into self-perpetuated wasteland. It should be no surprise that the forces of the Wild Lords are purging the monsters whenever they are encountered.
In the fully civilized areas they are mostly treated like pests [save for the strongest ones], and are typically cleared fast. They tend to move into any place that isn't cleared regularly, but also rather quickly fall to adventurers' or local militias. They become a problem only when the entire area is already deep in problems, which frees them to multiply with less problems. On the other hand, while often disgusting and dangerous, the monsters [and some of the servile shards and daemons of Occasa that are often accompanying them] do offer certain goods [from alchemical components to rather weird food types and hides] to nearby civilization centers.
Above the level of simply monsters lie the High Monsters. believed by some to be Occasa equivalent of the Fera's Sacred Beasts. Wherever they thread, the soil itself turns barren. Recultivating it requires extensive efforts from either the Fae or the priests of Hortulanus. Each of them is also an extremely dangerous combatant who is capable of guiding the masses of monsters [at least to some extent].
Florals
Don't underestimate them. Almost every floral is a master of camouflage. Let your guard down for even a short while and you're in for a world of hurt. I saw entire parties wiped out simply because they decided to rest under the wrong tree.Retired adventurer teaching his son and successor
Florals are to plants what the beasts are to animals - a naturally Warped, powerful equivalent that remains a part of an expanded ecosystem, and a common sight in highly magical areas [especially in the domains of the Fae and anomalous regions. They are less common than beasts, and possess only a fraction of their popularity. Completely unreasonably so, at least in opinion of many retired adventurers.
Florals are technically a supernaturally-enhanced plants. Like the beasts they are rarely actively malevolent towards mortals. However many of them defends themselves for example by certain forms of pollen that CAN influence mortals purely on accident. They can also go insane in some circumstances, and in this state they will attempt to hunt mortals.
Their weaponry ranges from chemical warfare [pollens] through poisons and thorns to strangling vines and ability to mindcontrol nearby beasts. On the other hand, they are even less intelligent than beasts, and are almost purely instinctual if not fully reactive [as in, they only react to events and stimulis rather than making decisions and plans].
Some more powerful florals seem to receive additional attention of Flora, Anarch of Leaves. This elevates them into Awakened Florals. Much more powerful, capable of influencing nearby plantlife, sometimes capable of moving around... and at the very least sentient.
Soulless
Mindless puppets, yes. But useful mindless puppets. That's quite a difference, no?Ankhar the Thrice-Born, vestirian necromancer.
Unlike the Divines, spirits, mortals and even warped animals, the soulless lack souls. With possession of souls being a prerequisite for a lot of things, majority of the Soulless lack potential for then the broadest understood sentience and are little more than puppets capable of executing a prelearned set of actions. Of course, some of them can be rather cunning [so there is no need to define what 'attack intruders' means], but it's still no basis for a meaningful conversation.
Stronger of the soulless can develop the so-called pseudosouls [also known as false souls, no-souls and para-souls]. While still decidedly soulless, they can develop capacity for higher thoughts. However such self-evolved souls will always be lacking when compared to their natural counterparts. In short, they are faulty replacements for souls, their faultiness often resulting in lack of sapience, irrational behaviour, skewed sense of right and wrong and nonsensical priorities and goals.
All those faults are innate, and immutable. The only way for a soulless to evolve from this stage is for some Divine to pity them enough [or want to use them enough] to 'fix' them by replacing their pseudosoul with a normal soul [either a daemonic or mortal one, typically]. However it has to be noted that the Exarchs as a whole really dislike conscious creation of pseudosoul carrying entities, which is considered 'playing a god' in their eyes. Hierarchs are significantly more lax about it.
Undead
Undead on their own are barely a threat, becoming one only when there are some spirits of Nex around to guide and empower them. The unneccessarily powerful impression they have on the society seems to be caused by the material they are made of. For some reason seeing your dead grandpa walk and try to kill people is demoralizing. Which means that they are a perfect target for adventurers, who lack any sort of commitment to whoever the undead was before death.Adventurer's Primer, Imperial Guild of Adventurers.
Undead are counted among the most common form of soulless, mostly due to regular incursions of the Breathless Tide into the Material World. Necromancers can easily create them by offering fresh bodies to Nex, the Hierarch of Undeath - as non-living matter they can 'burned' as offerings, to which the entities dwelling in the Nex' realm will respond with the very same bodies. However slightly processed and reanimated. The same result can be achieved by bathing a body [or a pile of body parts] in magical energies of Nex.
Their actual combat power tends to be limited, and is almost entirely based on the history of their bodies and how much the necromancer is favoured by the powers of the Breathless Tide. The more of the favour, the better the undead quality and the more combat ability and magical power is retained. The better the bodies, the more is there to retain.
However, even if the body is preserved well and still has all the fleshy bits, the resulting creature will still lack even the most limited self-awareness. Some of them might be somewhat sentient and even capable of rudimentary speech and decision-making, however they will never ask existential questions or disobey their creator.
The pseudosoul carrying undead are called the Corpsars. They are a rare creatures, almost uniformly made from those 'fleshy' non-rotten undead that were ressurected very quickly after their death, before their brains were completely burned out - such a sacrificial offering breaks the already weakened chain connecting the soul to the body. With brain mostly intact, the development of intellect is unavoidable. They also occasionally develop from powerful non-fleshy undead [especially those capable of using magicks].
Machines
Machines are, let's be honest here, stupid. Without a magician to order them around they'd just continue following the last order endlessly, incapable of making decisions on their own. But... this stupidity becomes their greatest strength when combined with firepower and pure strength. Battles are won not by wiping the enemy out but by breaking him, and making him run away from the battlefield in fear. And towering, almost undestructible machines of war that keep massacring everything in their path excel in breaking the enemy's spine.A high ranking officer of the Legio Mechanica describing what his unit is capable of.
Few civilizations in the history reached the level of techmaturgic power required to assemble a combat machines through a combination of advanced metallurgy, engineering skills and enchantments. Grand Empire was one of them until the end of the Second Era, which crippled its knowledge and production capabilities, However there are still machines around, and the Grand Empire retains both the knowledge on how to maintain the old machines - and how to assemble new, albeit very primitive and barely worth the name.
Machines' range of actions depend on programming, which in turns depends on either the skill of their creator or the ability of those who are operating them remotely. They lack real intellect, and are as soulless as you can get. However as entities made of metal their resistance to hits is incredible, although their ability to return fire is heavily depended on the technological level of their creators. Of course maintaining them is extremely costly thing.
Xylians, Kraads, Kivanthians and the Mechanics used machines as basis or at least one of the main sources of firepower [the names assembled according to their technological power in ascending order]. Second Era Grand Empire placed around the level of the Kraads, similarly to the Rehalian Union and the VIsenian Commonwealth.
Artificials are a pseudosouls machines who have developed sentience or sapience. The method of creating them is considered lost to ages after the end of the Second Era. Mechanics could do that easily, Kivanthians narrowly. The only true creation of this category that the Grand Empire achieved turned against it after getting corrupted by the Pentagram. Due to devastation it caused, nobody is really interested in repeating this mistake. Especially as servants of the Exarchs get really anxious when this subject is brought up.
Homunculi
Creation of a Homunculi is among the few things that an alchemist learns when he approaches the conclusion of the Magnum Opus. Remember, however, that while the Exarchs do not mind us learning and exploiting the flesh, the souls are their domain. Woe to those who forget about that.A lecture on alchemy.
Homunculi is in short an artificially created living being, typically in a shape of mortal. While there is nothing stopping alchemists from creating an animal or bestial homunculi, it's a much easier think to mutate or reshape a pre-existing animal or beast. Trying to do that to a mortal, in the meantime, means crossing moral event horizon and will earn you an ire of both the Grand Empire and the Exarchs. As a result, the creation of artificial non-mortals is so rare that they are just summed up as 'animal homunculi', ignoring the meaning of the word homunculi.
Homunculis are a highly customizable and loyal servants, typically [unless the maker failed in the creation process] rudimentarily sentient, capable of basic speech and some limited decisionmaking. They won't fool anyone about their lack of true 'humanity' during even a brief talk, however. Their combat skills are often lacking, though as they can often live for a very long time they can be trained [even if slowly] to a truly dangerous level.
The very rare True Homunculi goes past that level. Such entities are at the very least sentient, if not sapient. However their conscious creation typically makes the exarchs and the Grand Empire very angry. This apparently disproportional reaction to this one type of pseudosoul soulless is often suspected to be caused by the fact that such homunculi can be capable of procreation, potentially creating an entirely new species.
Exarchs do not want mortals to tinker with creation of such things. The Grand Empire doesn't want powerful alchemists to assemble their own servile species of genetically engineered slaves. Both cases can be reasoned with, as the Exarchs seem more concerned with limitless potential of abuse and of how closely this borders with soul tinkering, and the Grand Empire is concerned with both the limitless potential of abuse AND how closely this is to what the Xyls did. For as long as you avoid said pitfalls, true homunculi are a possibility.
Divines
The nature of the Divines is a mystery that we'll uncover. It's a neccessary step for the mortals to reach what is their birthright.Divine Wisdom magician during the interrogation.
Divines are a mystery. It's not hard to learn what exactly they are, the higher grades are so powerful that they are utterly unmatched, and some even succeed in becoming one of them. However what's really a mystery, is how exactly they are different than simple spirits. Archdaemon might grow to become a Divine, however it will always happen by him or her starting the entire god-ladder right from the start. What's more the lowest ranks of Divines can actually be weaker than some archdaemons.
Some speculate that the divines are unique because people think that they are unique. Other see the God-level Divines as the true Divines, timeless and omnipotent, and with a truly Divine souls that create the lesser Divines with a lesser version of their own souls, Some think that Divines are just special type of spirits who, for some reason, have their potential almost unbound. Groups such as Divine Wisdom that are genuinely trying to discover the truth seem to be slipping into insanity awkwardly often, making most of civilization look down on any serious research.
In the end the Divines are, simply, Divines.
There are five grades of Divines. Godlings, Demigods, Gods, Greater Gods and Prime Gods. Each entity is also either a Conceptual, or Enigmatic, Emotional or Energetic, their internal 'grades' reflecting the five levels of divinity. However ability to discern the types of Divines is a rare one, and about 99% of Grand Empire's population will call them Godlings, Demigods, etc.
Conceptuals
Oh, you know, I was kinda bored, so I decided to pay you a visit. Even gods can sometimes feel bored! Ok, maybe not exactly, but you know what I mean. Never heard about a metaphors? Or at least 'jokes'? Ok, let's start this meeting again. How about some tea? I have a particularly AWESOME one here. You can drink it for as long as this meeting will take, after all we are currently inside your brain. Nothing here is real. Beside me, of course.Luna during welcome meeting with her new Chosen One. Three years before his newfound love of tea made him encounter - and kill - Chosen One of Sol in a teahouse...
...exactly as his patron planned.
Conceptuals are the most straightforward and the most common type of Divines. In fact save for scholars and higher ranked priests there are very few people who are even aware that there is more than one type of the Divines.
What exactly are Conceptuals? In short, Divines of material or mental domains that are comprehensible to mortals. They are supernatural entities that cross into the realm of anthropomorphic personification of the very concept of something [either of a material objects or something more elusive]. Of course how exactly one becomes such an entity is a mystery.
There are five 'grades' of the Conceptuals. Their godlings are called Truths, and are [typically] Divines of material objects. Weakest truths can be a personification of some powerful and famous sword, the stronger ones might be divines of for example a mansion of long existing noble family or a temple. There are also cases of truths 'growing' over mountains or other larger landmarks, which typically makes them largely connected to the Wild Lords. Truths aren't awfully powerful, and most of them doesn't manifest physically. Many are in fact almost utterly inactive.
Their demigods are the Lesser Conceptuals, who are personifications of larger groups of people. Those of the villages are typically too weak to manifest themselves and are essentially stronger truths [and often maintain larger scale defensive magic for the whole village]. However those of cities can easily wipe the floor with strongest of truths and are more than equal match for archdaemons. The true power lies in the lesser conceptuals of nations and cultures. While normally their job consists of being painted in art as a symbol of their nation/culture, when their domain is seriously threatened, they are a terror to behold. One requiring large armies to even weaken them. In fact lesser conceptuals - like other demigods - are considered to be among the strongest entities one can face in the Material World.
The God-level Conceptuals are antropomorphic personifications of concepts. Just as there'd be a truth of a sword and a lesser conceptual of a nation valuing swordsmen, there can also be a conceptual of Swords or Swordsmanship as a whole. The jump in power is extreme. A weakest conceptual is something that could effortlessly annihilate all of their lesser counterparts in the world. Like their concepts they are essentially separated from the matter [and by extension time], existing always and forever. They cannot be truly destroyed unless by another God [and in this case it's not sure if it's true death rather than sealing or dismantling], and the only theoretical way of killing them is to erase their base concept from the universe. They aren't omnipotent and omniscient, but go pretty close to this.
Greater Conceptuals go even further than that. The true difference between conceptuals and their greater cousins is rather blurry. Imperial High Gods are categorized by scholars as this type of entities, and so is a handful of similar entities [for example the two Kasytian gods]. It is known that they are 'truly' omnipotent and omniscient, however it is not sure why so. It is speculated that it's either caused by a conceptual taking certain powerful domains, or - this is the dominant theory - by either being portrayed as 'gods of gods' [like Honor or Tyrannus] or by being marked by them as their equals or close equals [the rest of High Gods].
Prime Conceptuals are the apex of power. They are explicitly described as gods of everything. This makes them a truly transcendental entities even when compared to the Greater Gods. While the exact level of power of the Prime Conceptuals [and the exact difference between them and the Greater Conceptuals) remains unknown, a single entity of this level [Alear Rehal] is holding sixty imperial High Gods at bay [while doing the same to two Greater Conceptual of Kasytia].
Enigmatics
In front of him stood... something. Someone. Some. Every single thing he didn't know and never wanted to know. It moved. It hissed. It howled. It spoke. It attacked. It didn't attack. It looked. It didn't look. He screamed, as his last conscious thoughts melted into more of it.Exerpt from a horror novel published by a retired magician.
While the Conceptuals can be good, bad and ugly, the Enigmatics are their significantly darker and eviler counterpart that save for a very few exceptions is either bad or ugly or both. Enigmatics are Divines born of things that are on the very basic level incomprehensible for mortals. This means that actually understanding their domains is a bit tricky.
Each of them is an anthropomorphic personification of something incomprehensible. Because of that the damage caused by them to sanity is extreme. Merely seeing weakest of enigmatic divines is enough to break majority of minds. However none of the enigmatics will willingly employ this tactic, unless pushed into the corner. The reason is simple - there is always a risk that a mortal with sufficiently resilient mind and powerful willpower will, in fact, comprehend them. This is believed to be something incredibly dangerous and 'painful' to the enigmatics, possibly enough to kill them.
The weakest enigmatics are the Falsehoods, speculated to be enigmatics personifying incomprehensible, illogical, insane and nonsensical associations of concepts. Genocide - good. Pain - liberation. Lie - truth. War - peace. All of these can give birth and maintain one or more Falsehoods, Their sanity-rending effect is powerful, but unlike the 'true' Enigmas they are still somewhat understandable [however mostly by those already insane], making them somewhat of a miscarried Enigma.
Then the real Enigma's begin. Lesser Enigma are enigmatics born of incomprehensible, nonsensical, insane and incomprehensible yet physically existing things, ranging from objects that shouldn't be to entire populations of things that cannot be. While technically weakest of true Enigma's, they should NOT be underestimated - in the past, actions of a single Lesser Enigma's were enough to lay waste to entire kingdoms. They are easily a match for stronger demigods.
Enigma are born of incomprehensible, nonsensical, insane and incomprehensible concepts and ideas. This makes them impossible to be correctly described. Even when treated as gods, their listen domains will merely be the close approximations of what they are trule made off. Enigmas are equals of Gods, and because of that they do not show in Material World themselves. If someone finds a tome of eldritch lore incomprehensibly describing some powerful entity, it most likely refers to an Enigma.
Greater Enigma - Greater Enigmas are believed to be born of incomprehensible and insane conceptual systems such as ideologies and religious doctrines. Each of them is massively more powerful than simple Enigma [each of which is already impossibly powerful by mortal standards], making them a equally matched opponents of the Greater Gods and Greater Sources.
Prime Enigma - Prime Enigma's are where all reason finally ends. It is speculated that Prime Enigma can only be born from something much more than a conceptual system - from an incomprehensible everything. An understanding of universe from the lowest level to the highest, a form of enlightenment about it that would drive all mortals insane if they ever managed to attain it. The omnipotence and omniscience of such an entity knows no bounds.
Energetics
A pure form of power given a semblances of sentience by the popular delusion.An exerpt from a recovered Divine Wisdom documents
Conceptuals and Enigmatics are two sides of the same coin, divided by whether or not they are composed of things understandable to mortals [with only their godlings and demigods being slightly different at this field]. Energetics, in the meantime, are something radically different. While Conceptuals and Enigmatics are powerful because they exist, the Energetics exist because they are powerful.
The best way to truly capture the nature of the Energetics is to describe them as conceptualization of some primordial, underlying 'element'. They are a relatively 'new' addon to the Divine world, as the rehalian Prime Elementals were 'born' during the Pre-imperial Era. Anarchs and the Goddess that followed were the same thing on a conceptual level - a god-elementals, created from a massive concentrations of certain element in magic-rich environment.
Of course, even a Grand Elemental is too strong to be born in Material World. To 'grow' an Energetic, one needs to do that in a conceptual world. The result is a barely sentient manifestation of pure elemental power with a divine soul. They are characterized by lack of interest in promoting religious faith towards themselves or even interacting in any other way with the mortals - they simply exist. In some cases they can even have non-elemental domains, which however doesn't change their irreligious nature.
Their godlings are called Essences, and are essentially a miscarried Energetic which never grew to their full power. They differ from the Grand Elementals by their decidedly more compact form and limited sentience - rather than living firestorms, an Essence of fire would be much smaller, often roughly human in size [rarely in form].
They also seem to be roughly sentient, capable of occasionally supporting those that managed to summon them. Rarely they can even make someone into a magician. However that's just a slightly more inteligent way of spreading their native element - 'their' magicians and 'servants' do that for them.
Lesser Power is a demigod-grade Energetic. They are massively powerful elemental entities that combine sentience and high concentration of power. Unlike Grand Elemental they cannot hope to engulf large parts of the world in their favourite element if they enter the Materium with their sheer presence. However, their sheer presence will spread enough elemental energy to increase manifestation rates of their element elementals tenfold, empowering also mundane form of said element [so a Lesser Power of Fire will drive all 'natural' flames wild in a large area].
They are also capable of indirect element spreading like the Essences, their greater power meaning that they are doing this less often but with much greater result.
Powers are God-level entities of this type, essentially existing as super-elementals 'written' into the very concept of their native element. To slay a fire energetic would mean to regionally weaken the very concept of fire until the dead deity would be replaced. To slay them all would mean to conceptually destroy the very concept of fire. Due to slaying gods not being possible, the end of the world as we know it is unlikely to occur.
Greater Power is a powerful Energetic that was elevated into something even greater. Such entities are cosmic keystones empowering the very concept of their element. Death of a Greater Power would inevitably mean the extinction of their element [if it was the last Greater Power of it] and all of its primordials, due to Greater Powers being too intertwined with said element.
Prime Power is a unique entity, a Prime God-level Energetic. Nobody knows how exactly they are born. Only one and a half such entity are known - the Visenian's Goddess is believed to be a Greater Conceptual 'interface' of a much more powerful Prime Power who somehow became a Primordial of all elements, thus becoming a living embodiment of existence. The imperial 'Primordial' is sometimes speculated to be of this level, however it's considered at best a heterodoxy and at worst a heresy.
Emotionals
They are to emotions what energetics are to elements. Perhaps... perhaps even more.An unnamed religious scholar.
Emotionals are a rare breed of Divines born of extreme concentration of certain emotion, the very mechanism slightly similar to how energetics arise from extreme concentration of pure power. They are believed to be the rarest type of Divine, with no known examples of emotionals of God level or above. This is caused by the steep curve of growth of the amount of required emotion, with anything above demigod-level being purely theoretical.
The biggest threat of all Emotionals is that they are actively radiating their emotions outward, influencing mortals, daemons, animals and even lesser divines. This means that all but those of most powerful and unrelenting willpower will be emotionally 'altered' by the emotional mere's presence. What's more, the emotional itself is emotionally singleminded, which means that all emotionals of negative emotions are a walking calamity [and those of positive emotions are barely better in the long run].
On the other hand, they seem to be somewhat unstable, forever at risk of dissolving if not reinforced by the continuous predominance of their emotion in the area. Their attempts to maintain themselves by spreading their own emotion around is what makes them a true threat. This seems to suggest that something might be wrong with their divinity.
Godling-level emotionals are called Thoughts. They are dangerous entities, their emotional influence at the very least equalling the Falsehoods' sanity-rending effects. They sometimes emerge from places where a single emotion [or a small number of interconnected emotions] reigned supreme - a good example can be a Thought of Rage or Pain on a recent battlefield. They are considered a prime target for elimination.
Demigod-level emotionals are simply called Lesser Emotions. They go beyond being a mere threat. It is currently believed that manifestations of singular entities of this level laid waste to First Empire and the Menorian Federation. It is not currently known what sort of extreme events can spawn these entities.
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Oh wow, this is detailed. I really enjoyed the depth you put into this; it's a very well-developed system! I especially like the Dark Ones section, as entities being spawned from sheer negative energy is a concept I've always loved.
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