Isan

The year is 348, and evil has prevailed. At the end of the last age, a great evil was summoned and rose forth. A great power managed to succeed in dividing the nations of the overworld, and then in a time of weakness, struck at its heart. Seemingly overnight, a shroud of darkness swept over the land, from the west, then from the east, and then from the ground itself.   In hindsight, the signs of machinations and schemes can be seen for many centuries prior. But now, it matters not - Isan has been overrun, and the tendrils of the Divine Primacy extend to every mountain and shore.   There are rumors of those who still resist, fighting for good from secret enclaves, but if such a thing is true, even their light must be fading.  

---

  Hello, My name is Joel, the creator of Isan. This is a personal worldbuilding project I've been working on since late 2018 as a hobby, in my spare time, just for fun. I've hit the limit for what I can work on unpublished fo free, and I like World Anvil, so I figured why not just publish this stuff so I can continue working on it?   It should go without saying that this is heavily a work in progress. I'm still in the brainstorming stages, really. Lots of loose ends, inconsistencies, and missing chunks of information are to be expected. So read at your own peril.   I don't have a particular aim for this content - I'm not a writer, nor do I aspire to be one. Though I enjoy tabletop roleplaying games, I'm not a prolific player or gamemaster and I don't have immediate plans to use this world as a setting for a campaign or anything... though I admit, that's a fantasy of mine if I could get a consistent schedule and things fleshed out enough!   I guess what I'm saying is, steal from this if you like. I mean, you're reading this far. If you're going to publish something (doubt it), it would be nice to get a mention.   I classify this setting as post-apocalyptic dystopian fantasy, though I like to keep in mind that worlds are not homogenous. Beneath the crushing presence of the Divine Primacy there are pockets of hope, places left relatively unspoiled by Meridian's exploitations. Pockets of resistance, places where joy and whimsy thrive, where love and honor win the day. Or on the other end, places where true horrors exist, denizens of incomprehensible evil, set with the desire to consume, corrupt or destroy, instead of to subjugate and exploit.   Much of my influence for Isan comes from my experiences with lucid dreaming, a fascinating hobby which I promise is mostly a positive experience, not just fighting off nightmares! More specific influences include:

• Brandon Sanderson's Mistborn Trilogy
• Monte Cook's Numenera
• Obsidian/Paradox's Tyrrany
• The works of H. P. Lovecraft
• The Church of Rog