The Pantheon of Yselak

## Overview

For ages Yselak has been guided by the Celestial Council, a group of powerful gods that rule from the outer edges of the astral plane. They are constrained by a pact, known as the Divine Accords, which limits their direct involvement with the material plane. Their will is instead enacted by the minor gods that follow them, usually their own children. A few gods on the council came into power after the accords were made and are able to walk the material plane directly if they choose to. While many members of the council are good there are a few who see mortals primarily as entertainment; their fickle nature means that their favorite humans either met tremendous fortune or a cruel fate.

## History

Before the current pantheon and the accords the realm was ruled by Yselemar and his brother Ronyak, the original gods. They shared the load equally between themselves; Yselemar held dominion over light, life, and creation and Nixtis was the god of darkness, death, and decay. Both were gentle with the mortals they had created and taught them the importance of the cycle their world ran on. Light into darkness, life into death, creation into decay; none could exist without the other. There was peace for many generations, each god had many children with their wives. Their children were also gods but lacked the same level of reality-altering power of their fathers. They also took responsibility for the mortals of the realm and helped to guide them. In this age of peace the gods and mortals lived together on the material plane, working together to expand the world.

Over time this closeness with the divine caused the mortals to grow jealous, why did the gods teach the importance of life and death when they were not beholden to it? Why did the mortals only get a few years while the gods got an eternity? Anger and fear directed towards Ronyak began to grow, his followers whose temples were devoted to taking care of and honoring the dead began to receive abuse from their communities. Ronyak himself grew angry and soon that anger spread to his followers. They began to believe that respect for the cycle needed to be restored at all costs, even if it meant destroying everything and starting the world over from scratch. They amassed an army over a few years in secret, slowly pulling outcasts to their cause. Ronyak awarded some of them magic to aid in the destruction, just enough to make them a threat to the gods.

The land was razed, what had been a lush, peaceful landscape became fields of fire and ash. The other gods saved who they could, taking mortals to farther places on the globe and shaping the land itself for protection. The gods used and sculpted the land to help them protect their people; mountains were raised, seas were filled, and deep forests grew in a desperate attempt to stave off the cult of Ronyak. Yselemar and the other gods, both his own children and a portion of Ronyak's children, were able to spread the mortals wide enough to buy time to formulate a plan. Ronyak needed to be stopped permanently to save the material plane but it would be no easy task to take down such a powerful being.

While the other gods argued Yselemar conferred with his wife Isphine and Ronyak's wife Nikta, who had not sided with her husband. They knew that Yselemar was the only one who could stop the destruction but to do so he would have to sacrifice himself as well. Nikta would lure Ronyak somewhere remote where he would be ambushed by Yselemar and the rest of the divine. Yselemar would keep him in place while the other gods, led by Nikta and Isphine, would pour their power into a sealing ritual. Anything in the circle would be sealed into an outer plane for eternity, including Yselemar. The sacrifice was bitter, Yselemar was beloved but the only deity powerful enough to hold Ronyak in the circle for the ritual's duration.

After the sealing, the gods set about restoring the material plane to a livable state. The divided mortals eventually began to morph into different races, taking on the characteristics of the god who saved their forefathers, like the group that was taken into the mountains by Dothar and Dothrek eventually becoming dwarves, Once the gods felt the mortals were ready after a few generations they all left the material plane and made a new home for themselves in the Outer Planes, now known as the Celestial Spire. Once there Isphine, Nikta, and their children formed the Divine Accords. The children of the two supreme gods along with the ascended sorceresses were too powerful for direct contact with the material plane so they agreed to constrain themselves to the Outer Planes. Their children were still more powerful than any mortal could hope to be so they would also reside in the Outer Planes but were allowed limited travel to the Material Plane. These minor deities would carry out the will of the Celestial Council, each individual handling a small subset of the larger domains.