The Greylands: Looking Out & Within
"What do you know of the Greylands?...It is the natural pathway through which souls migrate. Like a bridge between ours and various other planes. One does not have to take the bridge to cross a river, but it is often the more chosen and easier path." ~Gavin, "Surfacing"
Who are the Greylords?
The Greylords are the 'gods' of the Greylands, and they have made pacts over the millennia with true deities, agreements to help guide the souls of those deities' followers through the Greylands and to their home plane. Not all sentient races have a God or Goddess with such a pact, and it is even possible for a living body with a soul to enter the Greylands, though returning back out again is not easy.
At the junction of so many planes of existence, the Greylords have an ungodly amount of access to everything in this universe. This leads to the question, why haven't they taken over all those other planes? While the obvious answer might be that the Gods are simply more powerful, that would lead to the question of why the Gods haven't wiped out the Greylords.
One truth is that Gods who step into the Greylands become weakened as they are touched by mortality, thus the Greylands are the one place any God could be slain.
Another truth is that, despite their power, the Greylords cannot leave their plane. They are able to influence and extend fractions of their power across the planes to the proper conduits, but they aren't capable of the same feats as a God, often requiring a God's aid to even manage a fraction of such influence that a God gleans from its followers.
The final truth, perhaps, is much simpler: they are their own worst enemies. Unlike true Gods that exist on their own separate realms from each other, all the Greylords dwell upon the same plane of Existence, at the very center of it. While a Greylord can be killed and is vulnerable to silver and 'holy' powers, it is uncertain how to permanently destroy one. Thus, the Greylords seem to always have been, and always will be present, squabbling and bartering for their own power at a nexus surrounded by Gods.
The Ferryman Concept: The Greylords of the Nexus
On the Spoke of the Wheel & the Flow of Spirit
We Begin with a Question of Purpose:
What do the Greylords get in return for helping souls make it to the planes of their Deities and Higher Beings? What do they receive for their assistance to these souls which would otherwise be valuable to them? Do they absorb nebulous "power," gain material assistance, personnel support, favors, knowledge, passage through said plane? Or is it simply to keep the Higher Beings from trying to extend their influence into the Greylands? –Mehrphy, Patreon, 2016
ALL OF THE ABOVE…
When a mortal dies, an underlying spiritual current draws them along to their next form or transition. Usually this path leads through the Greylands as it offers the path of least resistance. This leads to the question as to why the rulers of that realm would facilitate this travel.
The reasons for such are myriad as the beings called the Greylords, yet the one reason linking them all is that they simply cannot stop this flow and, further, disrupting the flow of souls has natural consequences.
The Greylords can act to restrict the flow but can never truly cut it off, nor can they contain all souls which come to them. Even if they try, Eidolons “rot” over time; they lose the necessary Vis and Vitas to which most ascribe their value. Like water sealed in a vessel, it becomes stagnant, unpotable, and therefore of less worth. Moreover, those Eidolons which decay increase this rate of dissolution if the system is somehow closed off. The fundamental nature of the Greylands doesn't allow it to become a closed system, and so the Greylords must consider the outside influences surrounding them.
Most Greylords seem to help the flow simply as a matter or keeping their domain healthy and functioning. By allowing souls to transition, they strengthen the cycle of life and death, ensuring a bountiful “harvest” of their own. They reap some benefit regardless in the end, whether the souls remain or move on.
Some Greylords try to gain an advantage over other Deities, as rulers are want to do when having a monopoly from which they seemingly can't be ejected. Deities are loathe to attempt extending their own presence into the Greylands as they are at a deadly disadvantage, becoming mortal, though their agents and minions may appear frequently. The Greylords act as the balance for one another that such interference from Outside Realms is not necessary for the Nexus to function, though from time to time something will seek to lay a claim no matter how small.
Greylords can be tempted by various Outside benefactors plying for the favor of souls. Deities want their faithful; the Celestials, their blessed; and the Devils, their damned. Other beings aren't so picky and will seek to grab any soul they can waylay and drag off. It is one giant, cosmic balancing act that, simplified, is no different than the nations of a world: always testing boundaries, sometimes ambivalent to one another but always tied and affected on some level by the actions of others. Greylords can shift outcomes by favoring or denying traffic, but they cannot outright close their borders and still maintain a sustainable balance.
…AND FOR SOME, NONE OF THE ABOVE
THE AXIS OF INTENT
Nyx the Maiden of Shrouds, represents a majority of Greylords working toward creating a balance of Eternity with Existence. Although not all allies, these various lords help to maintain the status quo across the Nexus between those worlds with which they connect. What some favor for balance, and how they go about judging and maintaining this balance, varies both between them and the worlds and planes that have the strongest flow through their controlled part of the Nexus realm.
In some cases multiple Greylords may share a single world, each acting in part for a single faction such as Celestial, Infernal, etc., and in many ways acting as extensions of these other planes. Such overlapping Greylords can work together to fairly distribute the souls onto their next destination, though this level of bureaucracy is rare and prone to corruption.
Wylan the Soul Forger represents a growing faction of Greylords that have become tired of the entire matter, sequestering themselves and refusing to dealing directly with anything outside personal pursuits. They are neither true allies nor enemies to any side, although by their very nature and by the power they wield, even their hermitages can end up sending out ripples that tip the balance in worlds far away.
Abalok the Devourer, with his ties to the more selfish and destructive forces of existence, represents the element of Greylords that seeks to destroy the system itself. In his case it is for personal power and to remove things that he sees as hampering his personal vision of Creation. He favors appearing to have only a small role in this destruction, but his manipulations are quite far-reaching, even making a few inroads into Miurag; only a fool should think certain recent events are but mere coincidences of an opportunist.
In other cases this type of Greylord may share a view like Wylan’s but who have become even more disillusioned. Instead of withdrawing, however, they have embraced a sense of self-destruction; they simply want to see Existence come to an End.
Vylosha the False Light is an appropriate example of those Greylords who disregard their role and the natural consequences of stopping the flow of souls, consuming and clutching at all souls which enter their realm. While her reasons may seem sensible to her, the result is a despoiling of her lands. This forces her to constantly conquer and war with her neighbors until, at last, she can no longer maintain this greedy expansion and her “empire” collapses in on itself. This is a cycle that is doomed to repeat itself, with the Greylord simply resurfacing centuries later after some rebalance has taken place, to begin again.
