Shentu Wo: 12,134 Power, 2,812 Followers
Sima Wa: 5,163 Power, 3,012 Followers,
Kikai Senso: 21,002 Power, Next Form Progress: 78%
Lin Sun: 3,406 Power, 2,665 Followers
Con Lai: 20,989 Power, 8,232 Followers
In the most relevant news due to Con Lai’s machinations the fire nation sent quite a lot of striders to Atlantis to conquer it in exchange for the gate she made them between Drakon and our continent. Instead of two dragon masters and some minions they now have a mass invading force in what was once the Jade Empire.
While the gate, and the secondary gate, wound up destroyed by Sahar and her pirates the battle in Atlantis has kept going. Due to its expansive size both teams are able to sneak around and hide from one another turning it into small skirmishes and precision strikes after the initial clash of forces. Similar to the aftermath of Svarga. Unfortunately with the portals closed and Yukari still not back, we’re not entirely sure who is winning though the damage has been significant. It has become evident the pirates won’t be attacking Angra now though as they have to deal with this mess, so at least the battle with Angra won’t have any wild card elements now.
Also Angra is back, and while he lacks the flying fortress he still has a fleet of airships with at least a thousand of them in the sky that sailed out of the dark stormy cloud that overlooks what was once Doi Cho len. They’ve been making their way towards Svarga where life can still be found in the blood colonies. However, as Wa warned, their army has been revealed as colossal and seems to produce more every day causing the traveling force to grow larger and larger as it moves. Clayton wanted to evacuate Svarga and the blood road that leads to it but there is a problem, no one can move Brahma. We’ve also noted that Shenlong has reappeared, as an Angra minion.
Voynaye and his forces are already flying off to engage in full combat, rallying west of Svarga in the wreckage of one of the many towns from the previous war in the area.
Rei came to the empire for a little while. In the weeks preceding her work, Vris admits to having seen Rei in the Aetas library. She didn’t tell anyone because she estimated her chances of survival went up dramatically if she just pretended not to see anything and left her alone. Rei was trying to figure something out before she went on a killing spree. Apparently Johnathin Zhi spotted her sneaking in and unlike Vris did not understand the danger, at least that’s what we suspect because he was found dead in a closet. We also know she talked to both of the Song twins about nothing significant, she just seemed to be somewhat sentimental and seemed to be sizing them up. Akuhiko reformed from his spirit form a week later after he attempted to capture her.
After the reported sighting at the Aetas library, a bloody rampage in Adelaide began. If we thought Aeth was good at hiding from gods, Rei got into the dream realm and no one knew she was there, not even Con Lai. By the time anyone noticed something was wrong, Milenkosi and An Lahn were already dead. Her killing spree finally ended when she destroyed the dream portal, set fire to Adelaide and hasn’t been seen since. It would seem Atlantis being attacked like that prompted her to respond by targeting Con Lai’s assets. While the flames were eventually put out, and the damage wasn’t as bad as when the snake cult attacked, it has still seen better days.
Con Lai:
Milenkosi, An Lahn, and three other denizens died in the dream realm due to Rei’s stealth attack. Reconstruction efforts have already been placed underway.
The former pirates, led by King Zhang have set sail for Atlantis, could take them a bit to get there and settle in though.
Giza and Sanyar have been takign to staying with their boss, the purple one, and joined his version of a military featuring whole platoons of dream denizens with strange and erratic powers. Joacheim has taken to training them in basic military strategy and tactics so they don’t all run into a fight and die like idiots.
Ishikawa reports back that hell is surprisingly less gloomy then expected. There is a massive city sprawling throughout the main portal’s entryway that could rival Atlantis, though it doesn’t move or anything. Demons typically live here, with different districts owned by different princes to house their legions. It seems this city is where the direct members of the armies hang out, out in the wastelands rogue demons who don’t partake in the wars can be found. Many of them retired from former eras and are now tired of it all.
In the meantime Ryoka seems to have decided to help the purple sleeping lord with his vengeance quest and seems to have taken the assassination of Milenkosi as a personal challenge between assassins and is preparing to engage in a deadly game with Rei utilizing house Hanzo.
Yukari has made her way aboard with the pirates to return to Atlantis, somewhat upset over the death of Milen as her own fault she has opted to take on her second dangerous mission for the month, also she can spend time with dad on the boat since he’s with them.
Roster replacements:
With a long winded enough story summary that his backstory is in Stories of Lore, Kamari is the newest member of the Vua Cai. He has the ability to summon blue destructive fire just like Baridi, though he has notably more control over it and can apply it to his weapons and body as well. While not being a black mage, he still has a lot of physical power and his abilities.
He isn’t a formally trained swordsman and lacks the ability to hold up in longer battles but he has learned several techniques from around the world allowing him to often win too quickly for that to come into play such as the Iajutsu Flash and Wind that Cuts techniques.
After his king’s death Tatu decided to remain in the physical world with Sanyar and Giza. Even going as far as to summon even more of his minions, making this the first time a militarized force of denizens has been in the physical world. Tatu seems to be out for revenge.
In the physical world Tatu can dream things into existence similar to a manifestation aspect though he has to be able to understand the concept of what he’s creating and can’t modify it from that concept. Despite these limitations his dreams are more authentic and deceptive then others and he has a surprising level of offensive power by dreaming the concept of “laser beam”
Shento:
Lin Sun:
Elves are doing elf things, giggity. Though it is noted that Adin wouldn’t go, she has other things to do.
Lucas isn’t really able to help the Kaisa problem. She’s more like Eli then Anna, she just has no respect for life and is willing to take it to get what she wants. No matter what anyone tries, Kaisa is just too comfortable with murder and death. She is one of the genuine mental cases like Eli, though to a less extreme extent. The ability to care is just missing from her. Until she has something else in her life she wants more then power and to exert that power over others and proclaim her superiority, she will always be one of the most coldhearted cannibals in the nation. The problem with finding her any other ambition is that same thing that makes her so cold also makes her unable to really experience love or affection. As such she will never want anything like a family, the best Lucas can think of is to make her desire money instead but he considers that might actually be even worse. Murder happens to be something she is very good at, and provides her what she really wants. Kaisa wants to be superior to those around her, she wants power and to exert that power on other people. After therapy session he informs you via Vris that he’s pretty sure if you stop providing her power via the coat and authority within the cult she’ll go rogue, and if she’s no longer bound by the Aetas rules she’s going to hurt a lot of people.
Lucas therapy sessions with Adin and Vris turn out a bit less gloomy. They’re actually fairly close, they just have slight differences of philosophy. Adin is traumatized by what Vris has done to her but is still fond of her mother, albeit at a healthy distance. Adin wants to be a legendary warrior, she wants to be like the legend of Song Yi and Vris just wants her to survive the attempt. The problem is Vris has a lot of evidence to say she’s right and Adin has only one counterpoint that isn’t holding up well.
In talking with Eira, you learn that she’s capable of murdering the hell out of things. She’s easily tier 1 and close to tier 0 and she has never really trained for combat a day in her life, all her time was spent being a source of comfort to the dead in the underworld of Hel. The problem with her raw power is it is a very dangerous thing to use as it uses the souls of the dead, and in doing so it risks them being destroyed which is one of the reasons she generally chooses not to do so.
Honorbound take a pilgrimage to the temple of Anubis and Osiris. This immortality gimmick is actually doing well on the PR front by slapping on the clause “even if you die in battle” with this one.
In your probe of Akh most of them are fairly wary on the idea. The nation just formed, and overall the continent is working on mixing through cultures and establishing a new era for itself. They see this as a chance to provide stability after the long years of chaos this apocalypse has caused, and Asmodaeus hasn’t really shown how he’s going to be in all this. Lucifer wanted apocalypses to get to the gate, but Asmodaeus doesn’t. Si Da was built on a founding principle of being left to live their life separate from the spirits which is a legitimate claim, especially now that the spirits are all controlled by a known violent entity. While they have used questionable methods and likely still do to this day, while you have the Jakaal pit, the blood jungle, and the streak of sneaky dirty actions across the board you can’t really claim a holier then thou position over the black mages. Without being overt or more direct, you can’t quite figure out anything more precise then that general vibe.
Vris has been nervous ever since the visit of Rei, even if she escaped being murdered it was a bit concerning to see Rei back in action and remembering how scary the high prophet of murder can really get when she’s not being friendly. She also has been trying to figure out what Rei was after in the library, the books range between so many topics its unclear if there was even a pattern. She remembers with some aggravation that Rei knew Vris enough to throw her off the trail.
Kaisa has been lazing around the temple bored. To cure her boredom she keeps pestering war striders for sparring matches along with Voingos himself to try and learn the language and get familiar with the military in the hopes that she’ll get to fight with them at the battle of Angra.
Lavet keeps to her quiet way sand mostly follows Vris around still as the personal attendant. She seems to feel guilty she wasn’t there when Rei appeared in the middle of the night but Vris points out that would have lowered her survival chances anyways.
Hayate seems to be a little jealous that Kaisa seems so interested in all these striders and keeps following her around from a distance to keep an eye on her. He hasn’t been terribly productive this month.
Tena continues to act as a professor at the university during down time but also works in a joint effort with Lucas to continue the honorbound’s training. Since Tena refuses to go into the time chamber they have to study with her among the university like everyone else. Even if they have spent a long time training on their own in tactics and strategy, they still have a lot to benefit from learning from Tena the war master.
Adin hasn’t been in the city for a little while, she went north to Si Da to hang out with Kiala and Eztli to help them get through tough times of losing their siblings. She went along with Sonu though Akuhiko and Hei seem to avoid going that far north into the land where spirits die.
One of the elves to come from the time chamber land, while not the most powerful warrior of them he’s the most accomplished mystic which was what was requested.
Sharing the same backstory as the rest of them, grew up in time chamber, little world experience. Soon as he was out the Aetas had him report to the temple upon looking over the performance reviews.
As a gift to Lin, Song showed up and spirit infused him, though she notably commented “Maybe we don’t kill this one like Mililani.” She has a dark sense of humor these days.
With the infusion he has the typical enhanced physical capabilities, and the ability to manipulate plants dramatically as opposed to typical spirit favor asking.
Sima Wa:
Projects continue development. Arena plan will take a little while as you were already putting a bunch of resources into your other many RFC department works so this will slow those down.
Also sending Saiko gets him a bit of education but he wasn’t the killbot that was mentioned earlier if thats what you were thinking of. Takeshi is the murderbot.
Teozix for the most part just floats around on his chair as he looks for advice to dispense during his down time. He doesn’t have a terribly large amount of personality or hobbies.
Daisuke continues his eternal quest for culture and has taken up painting. Inspired by the tattoos of ther cultures, he painted Saiko with hot rod flames at one point. It eventually washed off but it was amusing for a little while.
Takeshi, Rikuto, and Roku all remain stoic, quiet, and boring as they just watch Daisuke with a mix of distaste and or amusement. Takeshi more so then others as he doesn’t talk and is rarely seen to leave his home unless he has been ordered to kill something.
On the more charismatic side, Miyukai’s personality seems heavily influenced by their time with the church of Isis. They are a naturally curious sort and keep wandering around looking to learn things relentlessly. They’ve been spotted at the Isis university and the Aetas one, haven’t seen much of them in Kagayakashi lately though.
Shento: Haven’t done that joke in awhile, anyways here we go
They decide not to send the weed. Cuz you know…that’d be insensitive given he died.
Your attempts to set up Eztli with Ranno doesn’t go so well. A blind date setup and all isn’t too hard, but Ranno’s personality doesn’t mix well with Eztli. Though Eztli has very little personality to speak of in the first place, which isn’t helping matters any. Then all your plans spiral out of control when a wild Zaeed hijacks it and sends 20 girls to the date to be funny. Leaving Eztli just confused.
Unlike Eztli the problem with setting up Kiala is her refusal to let you set her up with someone, she gets angry at you for even trying to do that so soon after her brother and sister died. Regardless of whether or not she can be set up, its clearly bad timing to try.
In prophet blessing Carmilla you actually learn something. She knows a lot about what you guys are up to, an abnormally large amount. Going as far as to debate the logistics of your plan in strange detail. Overall though she does feel a bit of debt to the person who actually resurrected her, she served you for giving her these powers but she already died once for you. Also, you left her house behind in Hale’a. You wind up utilizing what she said to make more efficient plans in holes she spotted in this discussion she clearly found amusing only to realize something the next day. You have a lot of glamor vampires, and they have historically not liked Anna.
The fellowship of the lamp heads off teaming up with the Aetas as well.
The idea to make a new nation out of the new dragon gods seems solid, but they’re going to delay until that region is not under threat by a giant incarnation of evil.
Anna has been spending her time learning from Aeth to the point she’s been dueling members of the Crimson Order on low power as not to kill them. As her martial skills become more defined as a formally trained warrior, she gets ever closer to tier 0.
Akamu and Haunani end up hanging out for a bit out of pure curiosity Akamu wanted to meet the blademaster and see about their spiritual abilities. He has gathered she’s 80% warrior and 20% mystic. As the most prominent blademaster of the tradition, he compared her to the most prominent Senshi of the the order – Ira. He finds this lacking, but then again Ira has direct communication with Song Yi so that might be cheating.
Clayton settles into his new position comfortably, the crimson order is quick to respect his authority and something about the seven foot tall bearded giant makes others also quick to assume he’s alright for the job. However he has yet to be able to gain respect from Anna, though the other vampires seem to like his wise ways.
Emilia has been rebuilding her spy office since you just moved and she has to find new contacts and such. She spends most of her efforts background checking black mages and demons, never really sure who among these people can be depended on and who needs to be watched. She put chunks of Akiuja all over the damned place though.
Because of the move to a spiritually stunted land and a place within the multi-religion capital, Sange and the Uhanesin did not come along. Sange in particular seems to have found a new home, he has become Hei Song’s pet and is a hidden layer of armor underneath her clothes. Uhanesin seem to prefer hanging out with Akuhiko.
Random shit everyone else is up to:
Good for recapping really.
As usual, Song Yi is hard to keep track of since she can move between almost the entire empire at will, though not so much within the middle of Si Da. Lately she’s been keeping tabs on everyone’s militaries and sparring with Raijin as he’s one of the few who can help her practice her skills in preparation for battling Angra’s legion. Though he wonders what the point is if she can just obliterate him in an instant when she’s mad enough.
Akuhiko has been tending to his new collection of spirit deer that Shento had once created. As well as helping his sister cope with Ailani’s “death” as Ailani was the only friend Hei had who could physically stand next to her for extended durations besides her own brother. She’s been taking it harder then most would have expected after she also discovered that despite Aeth having a similar ability even he can only exist near Hei for so long before he can’t take it anymore. As a result of her depression, the Jakaal training pit has become exceptionally vicious.
Ira continues to work with Vo Kim on the new direction of the Jakaal, often having to get used to how violent and sadistic these people can be. She’s spent her whole life controlling her rage and even while wielding a dark spirit she was still always working to be a calm person. She seems to be the closest thing the Jakaal have to a voice of reason and control.
Now that her swords are recovered and they were released from their infused prison, there were introductions to be done. Almost every god in the land came to visit them, it isn’t often we realize we have new gods and even rarer that they be dragon brothers like Ryujin and Shenlong.
Ao Ji isn’t as powerful as the other dragon gods we’ve seen but that doesn’t diminish the fact that he is a dragon god. Ao Ji is a calculated personality, described as nefariously wise and was responsible for Song’s army of dire wolves she once utilized. Overall he’s decently friendly at handing out advice and fairly calm, notably he appears much smaller then Shenlong or Ryujin at only three hundred feet long. Don’t be deceived though, his breath can cause mass decay and when living things are hit by it they begin to wither and die. He can often be found replacing Hei Lang as Song Yi’s favored furniture to lean against.
Ao Shun is a bit scarier then his brother. Sharing the same ‘nefarious wisdom’ but seems a bit more aggressive. Willing to flex his power to make a point when people get on his nerves as a warning that they are irritating him. Though as long as his patience isn’t tested he’s not too bad, willing to chat and dispense his wisdom as well. As you might expect he has ice based abilities and his breath can freeze all kinds of things. Notably, he has similar powers to death aspects. While he can’t actually reap things, damage from him can’t be regenerated through typical means.
As both of the new dragon gods were questioned a few obvious things were covered. They became Song Yi’s guardian spirits because they had been somewhat bitch slapped by Ryujin and Shenlong, they needed a place to regroup and lay low for awhile. Seeing the incredible tenacity of Song Yi, they opted to go with her since if anyone deserved the kind of power they could gift it was her. Atop of that Ao Shun was already a guardian of the Lengdon mountains, so he just opted to hang out with her for the time being. People were a little disappointed the reasoning wasn’t some dramatic plot twist like one of them being her father or something but in the lifespan of dragons and gods they figured it wouldn’t be too bad to hang out with Song for a century while they regrouped. They didn’t expect her to become one of the most powerful gods though or for Ryujin and Shenlong to both get whacked. They debated just hanging out in the swords for awhile longer till they figured out what to do with all these changes but then Raven knocked them out of it. Despite originally being far superior to Song, they’ve come to note she’s become a bit more important and powerful then expected. So the life of servitude to her will continue, also being the left and right hands of the divine empress is an even sweeter gig then they could have gotten just joining some pantheon anyways.
Another question people asked is why they notably have fur. Fall and Winter are cold, next question.
Freyja seems to be preparing her Valkyries for actual war for the first time since the battle of Doi Cho Len. She seems rather upset about her two daughters, and her training has a lot to do with them preparing to specifically kill those daughters to spare them from being Angra’s minions. To the point that even Eira has showed up to these training sessions and solidified the knowledge that she is the most powerful Valkyrie, perhaps even stronger then Freyja herself.
Hel keeps an eye on Freyja, worried that her friend is going to do something dumb. It occurrs to her and Lin they’ve never really talked much despite the fact that Hel is Freyja’s best friend. Lin also quickly realizes why, Hel is about as bipolar as it gets without going to an asylum.
Izumi doesn’t really travel as much as Song as she can’t follow when there isn’t moonlight and Song tends to visit armies during the day when they’re actually doing anything. So instead she’s taken to tending to her following, she has discovered that she can take a spiritual form now that Ryujin died she is no longer bound to a mortal body. She’s opted to stay in a physical body anyways though, she’s just become used to it and her wife also has that habit. While this leaves her less powerful then she could be, she doesn’t seem to really care for power.
Mach Tong and Takano Ichiro act primarily as Izumi’s bodyguards. Since she doesn’t have her own militarized division they don’t have much need for working with militaries.
Isis lately has been running around doing favors for everyone else because everyone always wants something magic, she’s been a good sport about it as well. However, she can teleport like Song can and tends to follow the Empress around to try and make sure Song doesn’t go nuts which she seems on the edge of doing a lot lately.
Hasina continues to act as the primary educator at the Isis temple for those seeking to learn magic. She has slowly shifted to a more civilian style of life other then acting as high prophet, she wasn’t even at the battle of the mountain most recently. Isis seems to have started to value her for her mastery over magic as opposed to her capability to manipulate battlefields.
Rehema works within the temple as well but instead of teaching new people magic she instead is one of the primary assistants to other members of the church who experiment with dangerous magic.
Fujin joins Isis along with keeping tabs on Song Yi since he can also appear almost anywhere with no effort. Which definitely creates a weird vibe of awe when Song shows up flanked by two or three other gods wherever she goes. Fujin in particular has a strange relationship with Song, despite being her elder by a vast amount of time he seems content to look at her as a sort of adoptive mother. Considering her sheer resilience to be incredible and her ability to comfort him surprising. Fujin’s interactions with her are one of the few reassurances we have that deep down Song has not gone dark.
His high prophet Arima has no more military to command after everything was destroyed in the attack on Song’s temple some time ago. The wind religion never bothered to reinvest in the military since the Vua Cai had more advanced naval ships anyways, no point in sails anymore. Arima now spends her time just tending to the cult. Though in keeping the last of the shogunate’s traditions alive, the wind cult does actually have a core of elite samurai and shinobi, including Sonu. Any that become strong enough to be considered admissable into Senshicon get sent throughout the nation as rogue agents to help out here and there. Which is why you can find people like Sonu dropping in on other’s church business all the time.
Back in Divus, Queen Naomi tends to be constantly frustrated with administrative affairs. Often looking out the window fondly remembering her days as a paladin with a greater sense of purpose and objective. She’s also come to realize Jin did a lot of the administration for her and now that he’s away on a trip to Atlantis she misses having him around. Turns out the master of being king was a really good king and she wishes she was on the trip to Atlantis instead right now.
Meanwhile the seven paladins, also including Prince Ezra, continue their lifestyle of sitting around until ordered to go to battle and spend a lot of their time training and praying. Galahad tends to maintain the templar knights.
I kept forgetting to put her on the board as I wasn’t paying much attention to Divus but she’s kind of a major character ever since Orujav died, seriously you could fill an oddyssey about her. It would just be super depressing. Also you guys might want her help given her powers.
Genevieve Faure was Orujav’s second in command, and now she is the ruler of the inquisition. She ranks as one of the most feared members of Divus. Unlike a paladin, benevolence is not in her job description. Plus she also has this creepy goth kid/torturer vibe, which makes sense as you read on.
Genevieve is specifically relevant for her aspect blessing, referred to by people in the know as “The Sacrifice”. She can absorb magic if she can touch it. If she reaches its source that will be including power and the effect is permanent. It’s so effective she can turn a black mage human again and has done so many times. She can also take blessings away and its even suspected by Isis that she could take away the demigod status. The problem is it hurts her and can kill her if it turns out to to be too much power. If she were to attempt to drain all of Song Fang’s power or a dragon master’s she would probably become a bomb.
Years of her occupation have left her body warped under the mask, those who have seen it describe it as if she were breaking apart and glowing magic can be seen about to explode from her. The effect of her powers is so damaging that even the blood cult could not help her, she exists in constant agony as her body tries contain all of the power she has stolen.
She is a master in tactics and detective work. Her weapon isn’t fully understood but while wielding it she seems to be able to know things she shouldn’t know. Ranging from foresight to mind reading yet never consistently usable and it only ever discovers bad things, it has become known as the Sword of Eden. Once upon a time someone else tried to use it against her after a successful disarm, they surrendered instead and now sit in a cell where they have done nothing but stare at the wall for the last twenty years. Naomi informed us that its actually an old and powerful black artifact Genevieve found during one of her investigations, and as such any of your people can pick it up and use it. It is advised that no one ever do that. She has had to command Excalibur to actively never use the sword’s power for her own protection.
She is a reclusive individual when not working and shrouded in mystery. Naomi has confessed there is a dark secret to her power, since she can absorb power by touch she accidentally became a black mage without eating anyone. As such she never removes her mask for fear someone could see her blackened eyes and realize what she has become. Those who understand what happened to her and the agony she exists in pray that she is accepted into heaven upon her death, even if she did become a black mage. The last joke nature played on her, her black aspect is empathy like Lucas. It makes her a dangerous interrogator, but she feels the pain of all her victims, and there is no way to use that aspect to expend her power to get rid of everything inside that is hurting her. And just to top her tragedy off, according to Divus belief suicide will keep you out of heaven. As such, she continues to live despite having so much power in her body that she might be effectively ageless. She is a hundred and sixty years old.
Naomi has allowed the Song Empire to know about her among the upper commanders, but it came with a threat/warning. Almost every high ranking member of Divus will likely go into a righteous fury against anyone that disrespects the lord inquisitor, because in their eyes no one has the right to make her life any worse then it is. Despite all this, Genevieve has not retired and continues to hunt the enemies of Divus around the world despite being offered anything she could want as a retirement package. She apparently continues to do anything and everything asked of her because she hopes to earn her way into heaven despite her black magic, and that insane zealotry is all that keeps her rooted to reality. Asmodaeus on the other hand considers her faith and willingness to endure a blessing that has made her life a living hell “Jehovah’s cruelest joke.”
Today in the “things everyone is up to” update, Genevieve is currently in a really pissed off mood. Milenkosi was the only thing she had to help her cope with what she endures and she only got to know him for a short while before he was taken away from her.
Back to the long winded tale of everyone’s shenanigans.
Asmodaeus is busy ruling Si Da, unlike Lucifer he appears in person more often to do so. Even demons are nervous about him, because now people are obligated to listen and obey him. So far he’s popular enough as he hasn’t told anyone to do anything they particularly oppose, but that is what makes them nervous in the first place.
Saldis has been sending her massive undead army to join Voynaye’s force in preparation for the collision with Angra. We haven’t checked in on her in awhile though, and her death cult has grown freakishly popular. It turns out having zombies do all the manual labor leads to happy cultists. Were it not for the demon princes, Saldis would likely be the figurehead of Si Da.
Mammon’s economic warfare with the Vua Cai seems to have come to a close, and now instead he preys directly on the Vua Cai as they have some greedy merchants. An inevitability of the alliance since now he has rather direct access to them.
Am Nhac celebrated the new empire with a festival, his followers seem oblivious to how tense and bloody this era has really been and provide a glimpse into the lives of civilians not involved with news networks across the entire nation. Until their village gets hit, they tend to just sort of pass things off as rumors and the stories of gods and dragons as myths and folktales. Though weirdly enough because of Am Nhac these tales are known rather far and wide in the form of plays and bardic stories.
Shen Rai is borderline descended with the loss of the Jakaal and Saldis being the main figurehead of the death aspect. Its hard to compete with someone who literally makes the dead get up and walk around. Despite this setback, Shen Rai still remains one of the most dangerous warriors in the world.
Vedahl is hard to get a read on, her cult is filled with hedonistic carefree idiots at first glance. Succubi and Incubi boosted her recruitment of drunk idiots quite a bit, but this cult is massively popular and has more followers then many others. Yet somehow Vedahl seems to be one of the most powerful demon princes, (well princess in her case). As it turns out pleasuring humans and tempting them with all the things they want gives her power to funnel into something else, her demon legion. Her champions and demonic soldiers are abnormally strong, her succubi can rival valkyries since they are constantly fed everything they need to grow stronger. Similar to Ishtar, Vedahl has found a way to convert people’s baser instincts into fuel for a war machine. She’s just better at it.
Nila continues her quest to become the best gunslinger, she thought she was until Whately came along. She can often be found practicing or hunting down targets for the empire in an attempt to surpass the apathetic Whately. Yet still somehow she is nowhere close to him and she suspect he’s cheating somehow.
Whately was last seen out in the middle of nowhere doing nothing in particular. He’d probably get along well with Ryner actually. He occassionally makes a sport of hunting down monsters and/or people with violent dispositions but he largely has no motive to do anything and lounges around waiting for nothing in particular.
Meanwhile to the east, Bahamut has been hanging around in incarnated form, trying to get a handle on why and how the drakon lords can stay permanently physical. When the ascension happened the new gods all just disappeared into thin air, so why don’t the drakon ever see the same thing happen to them? He spends a lot of time talking to Voynaye while he has the opportunity. He is careful not to reveal the secrets of godhood to them though.
Pele continues to hang around her volcano, though she often makes visits to Izumi or Song Yi when she’s home. As one of the gods without a war section of her cult, she tends to be a more civilian minded goddess and just hangs out. Though it has been noted she’s been becoming fairly good friends with Song Yi.
Ishtar has ramped up her recruiting efforts, taking a lesson from Vedahl’s cult and realizing that even if the empire protects her she needs warriors. As a war goddess she feels she should be contributing more, especially given the lack of war gods at the moment. Due to the decrees of Song Yi, her forces are becoming slowly more respectable as a fighting unit because Sima Wa has been forced to help mostly Altepetl right now. As it was more economically viable, they’ve started replacing their weapons with quality steel with help from Kagayakashi though they do still keep running around in tribal clothes otherwise. Armor was more expensive to get working on and she figures if they reach enough black magic power among their ranks armor won’t really help unless Sima Wa starts personally making it out of elemental steel. So mobility and comfort is fine for now. Engaging in black magic to become more powerful as she mass blesses her champions and their weapons to imitate Divus’ tactic. She’s also pregnant from Bahamut, which no one asked for more details about, in an attempt to add dragon aspects and/or demigods to her roster of warriors. Expect to be hearing more from her soon if she succeeds in building an army.
Raven on the other hand has been mostly content to helping out around the villages, even mentioning that in the coming years she expects to descend. Song Yi blew out her thing she was the best at doing by a wide margin, and on top of that the Aetas have sort of beaten her at the prophet gimmick a long time ago. She has accepted it though, and has had what remains of her cult ensure the temple could actually be lived in instead of just an altar so that she’ll have a house.
Over in Akhetaten, Horus has been busy as the prime minister of Song Yi’s empire. He actually does more administration then her and might be a more effective leader when it comes to maintaining a civilization when its not in constant war. He has decided that so many are focused on war and preparing for it that his contribution would be redundant, he leaves all that to Bastet. For now he works where he’s most needed, keeping everything running smoothly as cultures begin to travel and blend together a bit more. It turns out he’s actually just as vital to the empire as Song herself, since she’s a bit more “go do it yourself” kind of person.
Osiris and Anubis are some of the only death gods still relevant in the wake of Saldis, as more cultures begin to blend a lot of followers will be growing old soon and younger generations tend to gravitate towards death gods that are more impressive. Osiris and Anubis don’t raise the dead, but the reincarnation loop they do attracts people just as well. It is predicted that over the course of the Era if the pantheon doesn’t shake up a little, there will eventually be only four death gods left, Hel is not likely to stay relevant for long with these competitors, and neither is Kikai. Freyja has claim to a very special niche in death at least.
Bastet has been working alongside Ishtar as they prepare to battle Angra, and as Ishtar tries to raise an appropriate army Bastet helps out here and there.
Neith descended last week, turns out her mythological gimmick got beaten out when Song Yi walked into the desert and terraformed the whole thing. Its hard to portray yourself as a world creator aspect when the best you can do is help with harvest and then someone else comes by and grows a forest in the middle of a damned desert. She’s actually disappeared from sight as some people think she must have been a fraud, a side effect of the “the gods are lying” part of the black magic campaign suddenly turning around to the world uniting. With black mage King Zhang and then the whole blood cult propaganda campaign, Neith has just sorta disappeared. The same fate befell Inuit, another world manipulating goddess who can’t hold up in the face of Song Yi. Probably doesn’t help that Song Yi personally appears to people on a daily basis and terraforms things on such a scale that its impossible not to notice it.
As part of the newly expanded Akhetaten, former members of Shahira have all fled into Akhetaten’s new jungle expanse since it is further away from Angra and they were nomadic in the first place so this wasn’t hard for them to do. Ifrit tends to hang out around Yaosai’s volcano since Pele has dibs on the southern one and it is here among the Lengdon mountains he can hide the fact he’s really a djinn. That and Song wanted a guardian to watch over the forbidden palace, Ifrit fit the bill.
Zaeed on the other hand has actually become more popular during the merger, no one else can get in on his aspect and he is the patron to people around the world. Everyone wants a little luck in their life after all. He actually has more active worshipers now then everyone else, including Song Yi. Were it not for the fact that he doesn’t give a damn and wastes all his power on stupid things he would probably be extremely powerful by now.
Over on the other side of things, Krovsokol continues to do his mad science. Though no one really knows what he’s up to. However, he has a surprisingly large army of feral vampires led by Robert McCammon along with his many monsters and his rapidly expanded colony. Though his colony is mostly a zoo of his making so its size isn’t thaaat impressive.
Adremelech is busy in Atlantis still, having taken most of his minions with him confident conquering Atlantis would bring him great glory. We have sort of lost track of him since we don’t have anyone reporting back from Atlantis at the moment though.
Meanwhile Krylo has expanded his colony to now consist of five more setups to host his newly expanded force thanks to Con Lai allowing him to ship all his folk here. Despite the danger of Angra and us, he seems to have doubled down on his efforts of conquest. With the exception of Voynaye’s army, Krylo controls the most expansive region of Drakon conquest spread out along the northeastern coast.
Kamentsoy in the meantime has kept to his isolated mining adventures. He doesn’t really seem all that involved in what we’re doing and is just always digging around for more resources to ship back home or build stuff with. However, we did see some pirates attack his setup once and we learned that despite his pacifist nature he’s quite prepared for combat. He has a solid metal citadel to rival Kagayakashi, studdend with ornate metals and gems. However, it doesn’t move or have robots in it, so Kaga is still winning. His colony has expanded greatly throughout the southeastern range, but these colonies are often just mines.