GODS & THE PANTHEON "ZENITHAL" - THE ULTA

THE GOD PROTOCOLS aka : The AUSTERE & CARDINAL PROTOCOLS EMPYREAN, aka The Supreme Protocols, The Empyrean Protocols...

1. They are a writing consisting of “living words.” They infect those who read them.
2. Is it of a parasitic manner?
3. It restructures the brain. Intended for Ulta, it is unknown what it would do to a “lesser” human.
4. It is that “final step” that even the Ulta fear. It is the candle that sheds light upon the lurker in t he darkest corner. Does it anger it? Does it draw its unwanted attention?
5. It makes one even more “one with” the Eret Si’nu. It is a shedding of humanity in favor of dimensions “higher.”
6. It begets the same unnatural cravings as the “intelligence within the ether.”
7. The Eret Si’nu consumes life in its most distilled form. Potential. Humans assist this process through arcane castings. But they do not themselves consume “life.” When one becomes god, they must drink from the well of the living font. They are the true vampires, not these creatures of myth.

---

The Luminarae - the archons - the Seraph
Diakonos - servants (humans)

---

DESCRIPTION

The galaxy-spanning consortium of colonies controlled by the Ulta is called… THE ULTA SUPREMACY, or THE ASCENDANCY (COVENANT), or THE GRAND HEGEMONY (of the EXPANSE), or AUTHORITY, or THE EXALTED SOVEREIGNTY, or THE SOVEREIGN COMBINE, or THE DEPENDENCY OF THE GREAT REACH (PILGRIMAGE), or THE ETERNAL PROTECTORATE (POPULI), or… THE (VAST) PERSISTENCE, or… THE FOUNDATION POLITIC, or… THE PRIMOGENITURE, or… THE INHERITORS of TOMORROW, or… THE REMEMBRANCE, or…THE ARCHIVISTS, or… MONOLITH, or… THE EVOCARE (The Evoked)… THE GALACTIC INDUCTION… INITIATION/INVOCATION… THE INSTALLATION… THE IMPERATIVE..
… THE PROGENY OF THE STARS (OPTIVUS - chosen)…
THE LINEAGE/DYNASTY of THOSE AWAKENED… THE AWAKENING… THE FIRST DYNASTY… THE GRAND OMNIPOTENCE … THE CELESTIAL SOVRANTY
THE HEGEMONIA EVOCARE (PRINCEPS)…
THE THEOCRACY ABSOLUTA (THEOCRATICUM)… THE VOLUNTAS ABSO POPULI (SPECI)… THE DOMUS REGNATRIX… DUX SUPERNUS VIS… CAELES (celestial)…
ULTA SUPERNUS or THE DYNASTY EXIMIUS (INVICTUS… IMMORTALIS)…

The universe is often called THE VAST or THE UNENDING or THE BOUNDLESS DIASPORA or THE INFINITE COUNTRY
1. The Protocols are intended only as a true last resort. Even imminent death is not an excuse to employ them. The only reason being exposure to the natives of a less developed world. The secrets of technology are dangerous in the wrong hands. They must be guarded at all costs.
2. The process to employ the Protocols requires a Quorum of Executive Officers and the assignment of “duties” or sphere of influence is never by choice. They are pre-sealed and decided by the greater fates. No Ulta knows their role prior to the cracking of the Great Seal upon the Protocols.
3. Once employed, each Ulta finds their own motivation for “continuance.” The protocols are assigned based upon rigorous psychological tests administered by the ARCH (Prime/Alphaesan) Inquisitor/Inquisitrix/Magister/High Prefect/High Monitor/Minister. Beneath this high leader are his/her Praeposters (assistants).
Scribe Squires? Royal Pages? Arch Legate? Sainted Legates?
4. The MONARCHS comprise the Head Council (First Delegation) of the Ulta. Within their ranks, separate branches are commanded. The Office of the High Inquisitor/Justicar and his Arch Legates, The PREFECT PRIMUS - Or… the POTENTATE SOVRAN… Or the HIGH SATRAP, The Office of the PROTECTORATE and its “Exalted All-Warden,” “Seneschal to the Domain Extramundane” or The “Bailiff Domanium Principalis,” The Peoples’ (Common) Chancellor, The Council Exchequer, The Arch Bishop Interdictus
5. The Highest Human Office is that of Reeve/Steward to a colony.

Gods & Celestial Cohabitation…

1. How is it possible that the entirety of the greater pantheon (Zenithal and beyond) all live within the confines of Celene? Aren’t groups of them at severe odds with each other?
2. Is it the will of the Zenithal that all the lords of heaven appreciate the balance of the universe? Do they serve as an example to men, who are warlike by nature and therefore not yet properly evolved?
3. Besides, the holy mountain is immense and said to contain many separate kingdoms. Its geography may not even match the size of its exterior. Who can know the minds and ways of the gods?
4. Obviously those with proper access know the truth is far more insidious. The Ulta are, or are intended to be, all in cahoots towards the Great Deception.

Gods of the Non-Human Species

Vala’suun & Vu’un are two of the few species that do not worship or pay homage to any gods. They do interact with what they believe to be sentient elemental forces (of Chaos and Law) but do not see these as occupying a status greater than their own. This is not atheism as we understand it, rather the Solti (for example) acknowledge entities with godlike powers. They just don’t, in their arrogance some would say, see them as any more elevated than themselves.

Plot Related God Stuff

1. Is it possible that when the Ulta went into hibernation lockdown that some of their human servants (descendants of those kept aboard Celene to tend to their wishes) decided to take up the mantle of godhood in their absence, invoking the Divine Protocols?
2. An alternate backstory for Krytuss could involve him, as a human slave, stealing the Protocols just prior to the Sundering. Using the confusion created by his own machinations with the Sanguine Order to his advantage.
3. That would give some degree of tragic depth to Krytuss and worthy motivation to kill the other “gods.”There would have been a “real” Krytuss that the imposter would need to have slain first.
4. For the Divine Protocols to truly take effect (for those who would abuse them, and indeed they were virtually built for abuse) the populace of a colony world must not yet have an entrenched pantheon or another religious system.
5. Certainly some form of divine worship is to be expected. Man fears the unknown. It goes to follow that other pre-industrial species would follow suit.
6. But they brought man with them. Only the young were seeded. Ones with fresh minds unadulterated by inconvenient truths or parental tradition. They could be handed a pantheon intact. Finding proof through the “arrival” of the gods. Never knowing they themselves were part of that arrival.
7. But back to native species and their own gods…
8. The Vess’ka, with both the wisdom of the contemplative and the foresight of limited prescience, quickly abandoned the surface world upon Celene’s arrival. They had foreseen it.
9. Perhaps the Vess’ka were even “gifted” with certain foreknowledge. Perhaps they were visited by the time-traveling Great Race of Yth? Or some similar non-linear civilization/travelers.
10. The serpent people. Those alleged only in hushed tones to have been the actual second sentience native to Gothenya (all signs of their culture were later attributed to humanity - men basically replacing the erased serpent people for the purposes of verisimilitude… and the Ulta). They, in their particular arrogance, that born only of the unchallenged conqueror, stayed to confront the outsiders.
11. Valusians, Val’esska, Yss’ians, Thurians,
12. The serpent people (the Ygg?) had their own entrenched divinities. The great god Set (or equivalent). They would not be so quick to abandon their impatient and punitive god(s).
13. For their insolence, and for the very obvious truth that they would never concede to new masters, the serpent people were eradicated. Essentially (though not necessarily) to a man.
14. It should be noted that the Vess’ka are unique in their lack of any traditional “faith.” Perhaps this can be attributed to their minds living at least slightly beyond the confines of physical space and the “here and now.” They are not atheists in the classic sense. But unlike the Vess’ka, they do not suffer from the notion of their own superiority. They seem to understand that they simply inhabit an ordained position in the necessary hierarchy of cosmic life. They’ve always been a peoples with thoughts and intentions beyond the world immediately surrounding them.

The Irony of Godhood

1. The Ulta are products of the expansive application of Eret Si’nu to human consciousness. It is an induced evolution. It also requires a constant diet of the intelligent Pneuma (substance) to keep its host alive.
2. Humans have a special affinity for the Eret Si’nu. It interacts with them on a primal level. This is no doubt due to the fact that it was engineered for them. It later evolved into a non-linear, higher dimensional entity not originally intended, yet one that still benefitted man. It could “raise” him “up” to a vaulted status.
3. The Ulta have an altered relationship with the Eret Si’nu. It made them who they now are… but at the expense of the natural affinity. They lose something in the transition. Something they didn’t even know they had… and initially did not seem to even miss. Some more hyperbolic might call it a “soul.”
4. Regardless, the Ulta now subsist on a constant influx of Eret Si’nu. And though they may interact with it on their own, it’s just not the same as it was before the transformation.
5. Note - Ulta cannot naturally reproduce (shades of the Solti?) and must artificially evolve any additional members via the same process used on themselves.
6. Much is gained. Little is lost. But life is made most special by the little things.
7. The human slaves (some of them) kept aboard Celene were also utilized to manipulate the Eret Si’nu. They were trained in the "Art." Most were female for reasons of affinity. A few outstanding males were also amongst their ranks. The (potential alt) “false Krytuss” amongst them.
8. The mage slaves were to use their arcane purity to siphon the Eret Si’nu for their masters. To bring out its best Potential.
9. Once the Ulta became entrenched in Gothenya, they found themselves with plenty of human worshippers capable of providing this service. The human slaves became superfluous at best, a nuisance with “too much knowledge of the truth” at worst. They knew their days were numbered, and more than a few of them had already disappeared. Family lines slowly dwindling away.
10. Some of the original prized humans were granted unnaturally long life spans. Or perhaps this was simply a side effect of the constant interaction with the Eret Si’nu. Regardless, it was one more thing the Ulta were not particularly fond of. They thought it might give their slaves… ideas.

Religious Dissent…

1. Though the west is dominated by belief and religious practice in line with the acceptance of The Zenithal, there are various factions that interpret both their teachings and even their membership.
2. The crown faith, called simply The Faith Zenithal, holds a primacy of Six “greater deities” as the foundation of their faith. They believe the official party line delivered unto them by the Ulta and their messengers the Vala’suun, ages past. The gods did not create man. Rather they saved him. Raising him up from squalor and disease. Delivering him from his enemies. Giving him the tools to forge the great empires of Gothenya’s vast history.
3. A smaller, yet still powerful offshoot of the crown faith is called the Church of the Dawn, or the Church of the Ur Father (Yareuss), the Primus Patrician. They believe Yareuss holds sway and dominion over the other Zenithal. They are not, therefore, equals in godhood.
4. On the opposite end, there are those who believe the Zenithal is not limited to the Six, but that the faith requires all within the pantheon to thrive. The Faith of the Ordo Encompassi.
5. Still others, the Lentokki in particular, are Yareuss as but one personality within an Uber deity which also includes Ryktuss. They further believe Krytuss to be Rultuss’ chosen successor, and the one to “unify the schism within the godhead.” Essentially Krytuss will envelop and absorb both Ryktuss and Yareuss to become the Apex Lord at the head of the Zenithal. He is foreseen to then dissolve the “Six who are One” to create a clarity of purpose throughout the universe.

The Ur-Gods Ulta & the Eret Si’nu…

1. The Ulta have been modified; mutated to a prematurely “quickened” evolutionary stage. At least that’s what they think (or about which they dare not think too much). They still have an affinity for the Eret Si’nu, “The Potential,” as it were. But their innate connection to the living magic is “muted” somewhat. They have joined with the Eret Si’nu, and somehow have become almost “mundane” to it. At the pinnacle, as they are, they lose some of the passion that so attracts and manipulates the magic ether.
2. Ulta thus utilize the “less evolved” humans to shape the Eret Si’nu. This shaping also purifies it in a sense. Makes it more potent for the purposes of the Ulta.
3. The Theos Protocols push the Ulta to a stage even they fear. Something many believe they are not even meant to achieve. But it still has its fascination for many amongst their kind. But the ironic “curse” of “the great loss” is amplified more than is ever possibly anticipated. The need for Eret Si’nu becomes a matter of life or death. And their own ability to refine it is so muted, that they lose the majority of its intrinsic value. It must be coaxed by those that still maintain the ability to “fascinate” it.
4. For what can be understood, Eret Si’nu flows through the bodies of the Ur-beings (heightened Ulta), all but replacing their bodily fluids. Yes, they still live and breathe, but the essential elements, as well as their own blood, are now little more than a subordinate system of sustenance and animation.
5. The ether follows the courses and byways of their internal geography, but unlike their native blood, it does not remain in their system. They cannot hold it within. It escapes… and they deteriorate. The flow must be replenished.
6. When we say the Eret Si’nu is “refined” or “filtered” or even “manipulated,” in essence we’re referring to its level of excitement. Something activated by the desires of mortals. It seems to experience our dimension somewhat vicariously through communion with an agent of The Potential. Mortals have a deeper passion than those “elevated” beyond them. They still want. Crave. Covet. Fear the absence of the object of their desires. They need the ether on a more emotional level. Not some biological imperative. True passion. Unmitigated. Pure. It speaks to the Eret Si’nu in a language it can actually understand. It cuts through the signal noise and sends a clear message. Symbiosis of a peculiar nature is achieved.
7. The ether shares in the mortal’s desire, and can be “redirected” as an offering to the divine power that holds ecstatic sway over the human heart. But as mentioned previously, though a willing agent, the Eret Si’nu is not content to remain in the numb “shell” of the gods, bereft of the unadulterated passions only the transient life of a true dreamer can inspire.

Powers of the Ascended Ulta (Gods)…

1. A glamour of sorts, not dissimilar to that of the Vala’suun. It grants them limited power over those who believe them to be gods. Once this conceptual illusion is shattered, the glamour no longer has any effect on the disbeliever.
2. Supreme command of the Eret Si’nu. Mind you, this is a command. They ironically cannot refine or purify the flow; something given only to “mortals,” thus making them a useful commodity.