Obafen
History of Obafen and its People
Many races call the Western Continent their home, each claiming to be its true native population. The unwritten pages of history tell us a different story altogether. Only a couple millennia ago the landmass was still devoid of humanoid life. The question is, then, where did all these people come from? For those that today are known as Obafenians, the answer is straightforward: from across the strait. In modern days, the Northern Continent remains largely a mystery, except to those brave enough to face its uninhabitable climate and treacherous terrain. Just as a Mikso merchant sailing into the bay of Obafen, you might be surprised at the sight of a jagged horizon to the north. Across the narrow stretch of water lies a natural barrier of mountains and fjords, a place the ancestors of the Obafenians left for greener pastures. Around two millennia ago they settled the large expanse of fertile land upon which stands the enormous city of Obafen today. Although the ruling dynasty has changed over the centuries, Obafenians still look to it for guidance as their chief stewards, not so much for its individuals but for what the institution represents: a guiding light, and a catalyst that organises all the families of the nation into the foremost power of the world.
Obafen and the Arcane
Supernatural phenomena have always been part of the lives of humans across the ages, if only at an unpredictable frequency. With the emergence of writing came the search for truth and wisdom, with the search for truth came an insatiable desire to understand, to understand even the most obscure workings of the universe, to remove the veil over the very fabric of reality. One culture elevated this pursuit to be at the centre of its society, devoting to it all necessary resources. Their name is forgotten, leaving only their glyphs as their legacy. Vatashians and Dvovonians alike claim to be their descendants, carrying the remnants of their language with them. The most intrepid scholars among those peoples have ventured into the mysteries of the past, striving to decipher the ancient equations and unlock the potential of the arcane language. So far no one has come close to what, according to legend, was the power of these ancient inventors. As Obafenians have watched one race after another come to the Western Continent, they have taken notice of each of their cultural quirks. No foreign country, whether kingdom, duchy, city-state, or wandering tribe has been spared from being the subject of a royal council meeting. With the outbreak of war in Dvovon, the royal family has been consumed with protecting its borders and maintaining its alliances, leaving the study of the arcane and the exploration of foreign lands to other parts of society.
Obafen has been interested in the arcane practices of the Old Vatashians ever since their coming to the continent. At first their scholars were baffled at how incomprehensible the arcane formulae were, even though they could learn the Old Vatashian language, it didn’t help them grasp the magical equations at all. Somehow these eclectic collections of glyphs juxtaposed in the most unlikely fashion were the key to manipulating the threads of reality. After a thousand years of research Obafenian scholars are, unbeknownst to them, the leading authority on the arcane. They, however, still believe they are playing catch-up with the Vatashians, who must be hoarding their scrolls in underground vaults and hiding their cabal of all powerful wizards in equally dark and unreachable places. Even though Obafenians have only limited access to ancient scrolls about the arcane sciences, they have made the most out of the little they could gather from their expeditions into the Western Desert. They were, and are still, thorough in their research and conduct their experiments with scientific rigour. As much as it is restricted to the elite, the arcane studies have truly become a field of their own, and perhaps, after a thousand years, have for the first time been practised with an outlook on the future, on possibilities, rather than with a fixation on deciphering the mysteries of the past.
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