The Quartet

Imperial Scholar's Thoughts

I must begin with a... let me be frank. A lamentation that could never hold a candle to the sense of loss this world has felt at the loss of the Quartet. When I speak of the sorrow, the listless sense of the lost, the winding paths now obscured by the absence of guiding light, is what it is to know the blind being told to find the lighthouse in the middle of storm-stricken coastside.

There is no amount of words to be written, for the empathy I feel for the Children of the gods. For nothing can be said to console, there is no sympathetic givings or words that can heal the wound left by this. A wound left to bleed, unable to be stitched shut. Unable... their loss left the world broken. The only remains left as the sole surviving member of the Quartet left to be stitched back together in endlessly weaving branches by the Shadows.

Some would say this Great Tree is nothing more than an ever-present reminder of the fundamental wrongness of it. A sky with no stars, fire without heat, mind numb, a sea vapid and empty. A song cut off, a symphony of wrong notes, the strings broken. The Quartet were the ones creating the world for the Children to explore and thrive in. They were the ones to expand endlessly for the Children to know. They were the ones to guide their Children through the mysticism and ephemeral fears that lurk in the corners of the mind, the teachers, the caregivers, the ever-present.

When they fell, an Edin denied. A garden left to rot, a skyward tower to crumble. The seas to grow still, the stars to burn out, the light to fade away, silent were the worlds. Air not left to breathe.

Structure

While Vilorlith is recognized as the head of the Quartet for her role in the Creation of the Universe, she holds no more power than the other three members. A figurehead, a symbolic position that means nothing to the Quartet itself, but holds a unique sentiment among the Children. The Children themselves have made much of the "Structure" the Quartet is believed to have, though is rarely followed with any semblemce of regularity.

All the gods hold the same amount of ability to create, though each has a unique penchant for creation. To call it themed wouldn't quite fit, for they can all make each other's Domains and do it quite well. The difference is that each of the four can do a few things the others can't. There are true limitations to what the gods can do.

Vilorlith is the Mother of all Brownies and created that ethnic moniker for hundreds of preceding cultures.

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She holds Dominion over the realms of air, sound, and music. Though, due to her nature and personality, she is also the divine symbol for family and unconditional love.

In the beginning there was nothing, a void. An absence of place, silently infinite. A place between here and now, a moment lost in the mind. No light, no dark, no heat, no cold. An awakened consciousness, a whim on the minds of fate. She sang out into this endless place and with it her breath. Filling this place with air, expanding, growing, calling out into this existence. A place no longer devoid of all, a place familiar. Her song rang out, garnering the attention of the other three. For they had awakened due to her song.

In this regard, because she was the one to awaken the others, she is considered by the Children to be the head of the Quartet. She is also considered the Mother of all Magic, divine in her ability to weave the fabric of existence to her imagination limitless in its boundaries. Click to reveal

To the most important piece, however, Vilorlith is the only one who can create from nothing. She is the provider of material for the Universe to be built, the other gods use her breath to build with.

Syn is the Mother to all Faeries and is her memory is what shapes the vast majority of the Culture inside The Elsewhere.

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She holds Dominion over fire, heat, and gravity. One of two extremely social gods, Vilorlith being just a slightly more enthusiastic butterfly than her. Thus she is the divine symbol for cooperation and camaraderie. The warm hearth to welcome any weary traveler, the boisterous chatter found in the halls of all Children.

As she awoke, she heard the song echoing out from the darkness. The nothing that surrounded her, she felt the song brush against her consciousness. Igniting a fire in her eyes, she brought light to the dark. Condensing the air around her into countless suns, and stars condensing into brighter and brighter fires. Supernova spreading their heat throughout the void, planets spiraling around her beacons. She saw the source of the song that had awoken her and greeted her with the embrace of family.

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She can manipulate the laws of physics to fit her needs for any of her creations but requires Vilorlith's material to do so. While she may not be a goddess of time and space, she is the one to tool them to the Quartet's needs for the benefit of the Children.

Queen of the Fae Is the Mother to all Fae creatures. Additionally the is also the Mother to things of Fae origin, including:

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Humans, Dwarves, and Gnomes.

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She was always the planner of the four. The one to make sense of everything they all created, the one to make it work as each thing was fitted to where it needed to be. She holds Dominion over logic, entropy, and intelligence.

She woke at the same time as Kyln, taking a close bond to the Giant. Those two together, were able to make sense of the enormous amount of information and creations VIlorlith and Syn forged into existence. Effortlessly they brought the chaos of a new world into patterns, allowing the natural laws of the interconnection between things to coalesce into even grander things. They reveled in the beauty of VIlorlith's song, and as they danced Kyln gave her a name. Alnya.

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She was the one to make sense of it all, she was the one to make things greater than the sum of all its parts. She was the one to suggest the creation of the Children. She is the only surviving member of the Quartet. With the help of the Children that she could grab, did she create The Elsewhere with their help. Ability-wise, she is endlessly adaptable.

Kylnis the Father to the Giants, the ever patient ear to listen to the turmoils of the world. Wise beyond mortal comprehension, he was the word to the foolish, the one to question the actions of the others in the Quartet.

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He holds dominion over Water and Earth, more specifically though, metals. He is the all-father, the teacher to guide the Children toward their ultimate goals. He preached patience, the virtue so hard-earned. When something had failed the first try, one only need to have the fortitude to try again. Words often heard by him were soft, yet forceful with the understanding that no Child was below his attention. "Get up, do it again."

When he awoke, he sat beside a dainty figure. Frail yet cunning. When his eyes were graced with the cosmos the others had built mere moments ago, when his mind was filled with Vilorlith's song, he wept at the beauty of its creation. With his tears, he made vast oceans to grace the worlds that Syn and Vilorlith had created. He graced life into the rocks and made the first creatures to walk the countless worlds of the Quartet.

He is the only one to breathe life into the inanimate. The others can bring Children into the world as they did with all the Children, but only he can stake the claim to bring his Children into the world through the worlds themselves.

The Black Sheep

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There is another, recognized only by the Quartet themselves. Specifically by Alnya and Vilorlith, the enemy they fight. The ones to consume all they had made, the ones to bring about their destruction. Is the Original Shadow. A being that cannot create, has no ability to do so. What defined his divinity was change. A being of pure entropy, metamorphosis, and the march of progress. He could only take what was already existing and breath new purpose into them.
The off-key note to a sonorous piece. He awoke far into the progression of their world, wandering the splendors of everything they had created. Unnoticed by the watchful eyes of the heavens, unheeded by the ears of the gods. He had only wanted to join them, it’s all he wanted.
"I threw stones at the stars, but the whole sky fell"

History

In the beginning all four of them toiled away at creating the Universe simply for the pleasure of creation. Knowing they wielded such a wonderful ability, they used it to make anything their imaginations comprehended. Limitless they were in their endeavors, a flame that bore a thousand suns to outshine them all. When they had questioned what it was all for, for whom did they put this effort?

While they enjoyed the endless creation, they felt it was vapid. Meaningless until it meant more. They brought forth life, creating their Children in forms that pleased them. Granting them the abilities they possessed, gracing them the Divine energy with the promise of joining them in time. The Quartet had every intention of allowing their children to join them in this heavenly host. To become gods themselves once they had grown enough to wield that power of creation to the same levels they could.

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As time marched forward, the children grew prosperous under the protection of the Quartet. Endlessly expanding into the worlds they had built for them, enjoying the boundless freedoms their inherent abilities granted them. The Quartet grew fonder and closer to their Children as the universe expanded, eventually taking on the forms that they gave their Children.
Vilorlith had become a Brownie, Syn had become a Faerie, Alnya had become a Fae, Kyln become a Giant. And with their choice, they chose to walk amongst their Children. Guiding them directly, they had become the center of their Children's worlds. They loved learning each of them, knowing all their Children by their names, enjoyed the time in which they stayed.

When the fifth brother had appeared, he was unnoticed. When he tried to interact with the world they had made, he erred. The screams from Vilorlith's child as he toyed with its soul, like the sound of a thousand broken mirrors, she appeared before this Shadow. Demanding he fix what he had done, while she tried before he could answer, she failed. A chill ran down her spine, a horror. She could not undo what he had done.

He vainly tried to undo the damage he had done, when he failed and failed and failed. She was hysterical, a Divine true creator of the world, helpless to undo what this brother had done. Ripped him into eight pieces and cast him to the darkest places in the reaches beyond where the Children could walk. Steeped in sorrow, the horror dawned on her. This Child before her could not be fixed, corrupted, mutated, in pain. The other of the Quartet felt the rocking of the world as she took her Child's life.
Time marched on as she put the event out of her mind, but it always lingered. Questioned by the others, she refused to tell them. A choice made by her so that the others would see her as strong, a choice made to keep the truth that she had ended the life of one her own children, she did not know what that Shadow was. One's demise is always one's own making. The seeds of fate are never sown by idle hands.
However, it should be stated, that this moment also changed her personality. While she was protective of the Browines before this moment, to say she became more-so, would be a vast understatement. The guilt she felt at having to end one of her Children's lives ate at her, she increased the power of her Tethering to her Children ten fold. While this weakened her, she would never allow one of her children to be so powerless to the forces of the world that they would ever be in danger again.
To say the entire race of Brownies was a dominant force in the world is also putting it lightly. By the time problems arose eons later, nearly every one of her children were close to becoming gods themselves. While standouts in the other races like Y'vitol amongst the Giants, or Anlyth, First Son of Syn or even Taneth The Navigator of the Fae, at their strongest, they were only equal to the average Brownie.
However, the protections she gave her Children, would ultimately be their undoing. Reports from across the newest galaxies had come flooding in, reports of missing persons, plagues of unfathomable proportions, strange creatures not seen under the Quartet’s rule. One thing remained consistent amongst all reports, that Shadow-born beings stood at the edges of the darkness.
Hear now and know, this was only the beginning of The War of the Shadows. The axe forgets while the tree remembers. The Eight pieces of the Shadow had in fact, not just been swept under the rug. Oh no, no that would be far too easy. The void just had to call back, the Quartet was unprepared to answer.
Eight uniquely powerful Eldrich creatures, styling themselves after a flaw. Wrath, Envy, Pride, Lust, Sloth, Gluttony, Greed, and Vanity. Each shadow, unfathomably powerful, each Shadows having different strategies, each fully engaging in what the Original Shadow had done, for they remembered their shared moment of creation. They would shape the Children of the gods to fit their needs. The horror of having to fight their own would only benefit the Shadows as they targeted Vilorlith and her Children first.

Disbandment

To say that the first few worlds were the start of it all, is not the whole truth. The protections that granted the Children power that no mere mortals could understand, would in this case be a sorrow that they would dearly wish to forget. It was at the start of this conflict did the Children learn they were mortal. The gods had done so much, had granted them vitality and life to surpass the wildest dreams of the most optimistic healer. So long-lived as to seem immortal to any who dared to watch from afar. But, the Quartet knew and was tasked with the horrifying prospect of explaining it to their creations. Their children, needed now to understand the concept of death.

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Those first few worlds that fell to the Shadows, were specifically targeted because they were Brownie homeworlds, filled to the brim with nearly deified beings ripe for corruption. As one by one they fell, as child after child was changed, mind warped, bodies contorted to fit the morbid requirements of war; so too did The Great Mother weep.
A wrath the children did not think capable of her, she descended on each war attempting to slay these Shadows. But, the Shadows knew too well, were all too familiar with what she could do. For each child she tried to cure, in vain her attempts were mocked. Reminding her of the child she couldn't cure oh so long ago. Voices turned against her, a dark symphony of discordant notes. Countless voices echoed back her failure, she was forced from these worlds as Alnya and Syn convinced her that to stay would only mean her capture or worse.
Though they were loath to do so, the only effective means of stalling the spread of the Shadow Touched Children was to annihilate these worlds in their entirety. For each world burned at the hands of Syn, for she and Anlyth, First Son of Syn had become the bulwark against this tide, The Burned were created.
For each world Kyln crushed beneath the mighty hands of his Giants, only decreased the morale of the Quartet. For every one of the children they lose, became part of the Shadows armies of the damned. No matter how much planning Alnya could muster, the Shadows were more cunning. No matter how much force she put into her song, Vilorlith's voice fell on deaf lifeless ears.
World after world, battle after battle, victory only bought with the blood of the Children they promised the world to. Slowly, they were losing this war. So few worlds and strongholds left, so few Childred left uninfected, so much power the Shadows had garnered. All to release their fury upon Vilorlith for what she had done.
It was on a world known as The Cradle, one of The Great Mother's first worlds she had established the Brownie race upon. Shadow: Wrath had cornered her, already overrun with the Shadow touched and countless horrors that had emerged from their twisted warping of the worlds. That the first stage of their plan had been won.
As she fought back, as she dealt blow after blow to this Shadow. No matter how much damage she could do to him, for she damaged it so. Broke its bones, shattered its mind, ripped its flesh from soul, it had grown far too strong for her in the weakened battered down form she eroded to. The Shadow knew she had a penchant for trying to cure the infected children no matter how ineffective it was, and seized his moment in a moment of her hesitation.
The Great Mother fell, throat slit with a ichor-coated blade. Shrouded in a false light, as her blood slipped to the earth, cooling. Reality unsure of what to do with the blood of its creator, rebelled. Burning any Shadow that tried to drink her power, solidifying into the Archon Stones. Fury at being denied his chance to finally take what he believed was owed to him, he struck her down while she obliterated the Citadel with what was left of her strength.
The Shadow rising from the ashes of that world, laughed and chained her children to himself. Giving himself a new name, Bhal.

Syn and Kyln enraged at the loss of Vilorlith rushed to the site of The Cradle. They needed to win a victory here, they needed to keep the children from gvining up. They had all just witnessed the death of a god, there was no time to lose. They couldn't lose.
Syn had set her feet down on its moon, readying her strike to smite the Shadow. Only to be tricked by another Shadow. They were ready for this, they knew they would act rashly, they knew they wouldn't be able to control their fury. The Shadow: Carrion or Lust had lured her to this place, moving the moon to be a perfect sniping point for the goddess to land.
And the world went dark, all light stolen from her wings, as she felt that Shadow force itself on her. Dark and light burning, smoke filling the void. A crystalline stillness, a shattering, and Syn was free but for a moment. She hadn't known this Shade to this, she hadn't known its obsession with her. Composing herself, fate would come even for the gods it would seem. The inexorable sands of time to move forward, but that wouldn't mean she would lie down and take it.
As the Shadow pinned her again, Syn burned the last of her power to deny their enemy the complete victory they wanted. She incinerated every last planet that harbored Children or life, every speck of rock left drifting through the galaxies, every microscopic piece they could have used. The last act of Syn was to cease the spread of their infection by denying everyone everything.
She laughed as she saw the horror in the Shadow's eyes, bitter tears scrawling lines down her cheeks. "Do it then, there's nothing left you can take from me." The Shadow consumed her, an act that disgusted the world. It rebelled against that Shadow as it called itself by a new name, Azu.

While Syn denied the Shadows a complete victory, it was always the plan should the Quartet fail. Kyln shielded what remaining children were left on The Cradle, commanding the Queen of the Fae to run. To take the rest of the Children with her, to hide away from the darkness. Abandon them to this fate. Reality began to crumble around them as two of their creators fell. Fracturing, splintering in endless fractile pieces.
The Shadows did not know the gods sustained the universe. They had thought it a creation that existed in perpetuation, not a garden in need of constant maintenance. They had erred, as Kyln fell. His flesh burned, scorched, and charred. He had taken the full force of Syn's Wrath to protect the others. The only hope they had of survival in this bitter story. To plant a seed to grow into something new, with the knowledge that you will never sit in its shade.
Alnya screamed, her voice filled with the pain and sorrow of a thousand lives. She could not hold onto the creation that they had built. She could not sustain it, could never sustain it on her own. The worlds they have so painstakingly made with the finest detail made to perfection, to abandon it all. She screamed again, drawing on what Vilorlith had taught her about her song.
Grabbing as many of the uninfected children as she could, she tore a hole in the tapestry of reality they had made.

And shattered it all.

DISBANDED/DISSOLVED

Classification: The real gods of whats left of the world.

At the moment of Creation - Dawn of Truths

Type

Religious, Pantheon

Alternative Names

Sagrada Familia, The four, Creatures

Successor Organization

• The Elsewhere

Leader

Vilorlith

Related Traditions

• Expedition Report: V. 9087 Last Respects
• Ibering

Related Ethnicities

• Brownies
• Children of Syn
• Fae
• Giants