Nothing-Path

"Il-gahad yd nuhn adat-nothra." ("I will be free, or I will be dead.")
- a common saying, and important tenet of the Nothing-Path.
The Nothing-Path is a religion that first arose in the Archonate of Orion, where it is the most prevalent faith in the nation, but it is not bound by national borders. A decentralized faith, the Nothing-Path do not have leaders; instead, the Nothing-Path is constantly being influenced by respected figures, be they Je-hyn Mat-unyh, or local scholars, who are referred to as High Discerners. They believe in no one god, instead claiming that all gods from all religions are - at least to an extent - very real beings, though not a single one of them are worthy of worship.
== Core Beliefs ==
The Nothing-Path divides the gods and powerful figures of the world into two groups: those who started out as deities (known as the "Daghym Shuhr"), and those who started out as mortals (known as the "Je-hyn Mat-unyh").
According to the Nothing-Path, the Daghym Shuhr - who are the central figures of most other religions in the world - are universally tyrants. They believe that these gods are irresponsible and destructive, blaming them for the disasters, plagues, famines, and most other hardships in the world, and even claiming that these gods poison the very blood of humanity with their divine influence to try and keep them subservient. Because of this, the religion believes that the only acceptable course of action is to rebel against the gods, seeking to cleanse themselves of their poison to obtain "Divine Liberation" and tear the gods down from their positions of power in the name of "Holy Rebellion".
Conversely, the Je-hyn Mat-unyh are not viewed as "gods" by the Nothing-Path, instead viewing them as a caste of enlightened mortals who rose up to rival and oppose the Daghym Shuhr. The religion believes that the Je-hyn Mat-unyh - who have actually endured the hardships of the world and earned their powers and status - are the rightful rulers of the world, and are destined to take the place of the tyrant gods. Once every last one of the Daghym Shuhr is either dead or deposed, and the Je-hyn Mat-unyh are the ones in control, the Nothing-Path will consider its Holy Rebellion won.
== History ==
=== Origins ===
The Nothing-Path would first appear in an organized form in the Summer of 28 VE, with the arrival of High Discerner Adyd-Neyt and a number of devotees in the Archonate of Orion. Having migrated to the nation in search of a holy site known as "Je-hyn's Grave", they quickly got to work constructing a sanctuary at the site along with a temple in the jungles outside Orion's capital of Kahei.
With the religion's arrival, conflict almost immediately began to rise. Multiple other faiths in the Archonate swiftly took issue with the new faith, from the original state-sponsored faith known as Spiritism to a particularly violent local cult of frog-worshippers. This discontent only rose as citizens of the Archonate began to convert to the Nothing-Path, and as the following year started to draw to a close, tensions started to boil over.
Early one day in the Spring of 30 VE, a group of Nothing-Path devotees were arguing in Kahei's town square with several frog cultists, until eventually blows started to be exchanged between the two groups. Punches and kicks quickly escalated to weapons being drawn, and within moments the crowd descended into violence, with several dead practitioners of both faiths lying strewn on the pavement by the time the chaos settled. This deadly skirmish would quickly evolve in the coming days into an all-out guerrilla conflict between multiple religions in Kahei's streets, with days rarely going by for some time without another killing being done in a faith's name.
As the year drew to a close, the violence began to spiral out of control and expand beyond the religions that started it. Crime started to run rampant in the streets during this time, as tensions grew between average citizens regardless of faith. Seemingly random attacks began to be commonplace as grudges and schemes propelled Kahei's population into constant violence and subterfuge, the chaos getting so bad that many started digging tunnels beneath the city's streets to get around without risking getting targeted. This fighting would reach a head with an attempted revolt against the government, led by several disparaged citizens of Orion, that - despite being successful - would afterwards be put down entirely by the Archon, Raven Paxven himself.
Amidst this period of violence, the Nothing-Path slowly grew in numbers and influence, starting to withdraw from the chaos as the legitimacy of Orion's other local religions began to wane in the public's opinions. The devotees of the faith began to turn their attention at this time to reports of powerful beings lurking in the shadows in the Archonate, whispers of strange happenings at structures and mutterings from below ground. As these reports grew, the religion began to believe that one of the Daghym Shuhr was seeking to torment the people of the Archonate, and these fears were swiftly confirmed.
Late in the winter of 33 VE, during a celebration at the Kahei temple of the Nothing-Path, a glowing skeletal figure would be sighted hiding amidst the crowd of participants. Within a few minutes, the figure - proclaiming itself to be an ancient and forgotten god named "Nyxaris" - started to make participants ill, sowing panic and disorder amidst the temple as people started trying to flee back to the city. As they did so, Nyxaris followed with an army of undead soldiers, sending forth legions of ghosts and corpses from long forgotten nations to try and burn Kahei to the ground.
Aided by the Archon himself, High Discerner Adyd-Neyt rallied the people of Kahei and led them into battle against the dark god Nyxaris, fending off wave after wave of accursed attackers until the Daghym Shuhr stood alone against the forces of Orion. As Nyxaris descended to the streets to fight the people of Kahei himself, he was struck time and time again by the blades and arrows of the city's population, his strength whittled down until the Archon himself stole Nyxaris's sword from his grasp, turning it against its wielder and killing the dark god once and for all. As the Archon stood triumphant, Adyd-Neyt would rush to his side, proclaiming to all of Kahei that their monarch was of the Je-hyn Mat-unyh - a mortal destined to overthrow the gods.