Idelisium

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Idelisium is the Wood Elf homeland in Cybele.

## History

From the creation of Rhea to 5,000 years ago, Idelisium was nameless - just a group of settlements perpetually at war with each other, due to the common Wood Elf prioritization of hometown over country. However, eventually, Idelisa of Athlone, a great general and politician, came to unify them all 5,000 years ago. She is by far the most important figure in Wood Elf history, with political cunning, stunning charisma, and famous generosity. After she brought Athlone to power, however, she reigned in her powers, and ruled fairly and kindly. All Wood Elves from every settlement grew to love her and her role in bringing unity and peace to the land, and began creating local governments to ensure similar kinds of rule on a smaller scale, with many democracies being created. Even the gods loved her, and Sylvanus (god of nature and trees) made her into the great Idelisan Tree, which subsumed all forests in Idelisium, creating one giant complex tree system, representing the newfound unity among Wood Elves. The main trunk, however, lies in the main square of Athlone. After this was done, the Wood Elves went further and created a confederation among all the settlements in her name, mainly taking the form of a council (named the Teamair Assembly) in the capital city of Athlone, with hundreds of members. They named their newly united homeland Idelisium in her honor. Since then, Wood Elves have not warred among themselves since, though there have been more than plenty sectionalist squabbles, as Wood Elf provincialism has proven to die hard.

Recently, a new mysterious illness has begun to take root in Idelisium, spreading from the focal point of Kildare, where almost all of the population perished near-simultaneously a decade ago. Nobody knows the cause or how it spreads, but it turns inhabitants feral, and after a few weeks, fully transforms them to drow, if they do not perish from the necrotic transformation. The Teamair Assembly, amid its usual gridlock, has not formulated a unified response.

## Geography and Politics

Most Wood Elves in Idelisium live in their old ancestral towns and villages, in houses carved from the many trees that dot the landscape, though more have been moving to the urbanizing Athlone. Ties to one's ancestral settlement is of utmost importance in Wood Elf culture - their surnames, in fact, are the same as their ancestral villages. Each town and village mainly worships a single god, though all engage in semisecular reverence of Idelisa as well. Most towns and villages have a 5,000 year old constitution with some form of democratic government, with many taking to Athenian archonship. Most matters are handled on the local scale, with The Council generally only taking up matters related to the military, relations with other states, and other matters that concern all Wood Elves.

The Teamair Assembly, despite its lofty goal of maintaining Wood Elf unity and preserving the peace, is a famously ineffective governing body, partially due to its political structure, and partially due to Wood Elf culture. To make any decision, a supermajority of 85% of delegates must be reached. As Wood Elves are extremely inclined to disagree with those from other locations, the Teamair Assembly only reaches resolutions to the most uncontroversial of matters.

Over the past few millennia, Wood Elves have developed the Idelisan Tree into a transportation network, through hollowing some of its roots. This has to the discovery of a great underground luminescent cavern underneath all of Idelisium, that to this day has gone mostly unexplored. However, many new routes have been built in this convenient location. Upon discovery of this cavern, the A'laurians were commissioned help build a vast underground transportation network, known as the Underground, which is one of the Seven Great Creations of A'laur.