The Wide Way

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**The Wide Way** also known as the **Temple of Asmodeus** is a religion common among tieflings, dragonborn, and evil men of the south and practiced secretly as a persecuted cult in Drangleic. It is denounced as evil by the Church of the One and ruthlessly hunted down by the Inquisition.

### **Dogma**

When Theos creates each of the various gods, and they in turn create the various races, each race has its own purpose, domain, and favored environment.

Asmodeus, greatest of the gods, creates men, and men are different in that they are equally adaptable to any environment, and have all of the strengths of the other races with none of the weaknesses, being both strong like the Orcs and numerous like the Halflings. At this point all men resemble Teiflings.

Knowing this, Theos creates a false world without pain or conflict where murder is forbidden to cheat Men of their rule over the other races. In secret Theos constructs Heaven, intending to have the weak and worthless races flee there once the rule of Men over the world inevitably takes place.

Asmodeus travels into the depths of the world, where the gods and their children were forbidden to go, and speaks with the forgotten god of the giants, who warns him of the evil plan of Theos, to create an eternal paradise for the worthless. He offers Asmodeus his mace, but Asmodeus still believes he can gather support and petition Theos without resorting to violence.

Perceiving the coming betrayal, Asmodeus tells the other races of the foul plan of Theos. He is able to convince the Two-fold god of the Orcs and Goblins, as well as Tiamat to join him. He attempts to persuade Corellon to join him, and while Corellon refuses his wife, Lolth, agrees to join the cause of Asmodeus.

Some men betray Asmodeus and side with Theos, the tyrant, at the behest of the lying words of a woman called Maria. Asmodeus rightly strikes her down for her treachery, bringing the gift of death to the world, and all the false men who sided with her become lessened in glory and power as a just reward for their weakness, becoming the men we know today, and losing their devilish horns and tail. Though the action was just, Theos condemns it and bans the souls of any who serve Asmodeus from entering Celestia, now that death has entered the world. Asmodeus creates the nine hells as an afterlife for his followers so their souls would not enter the void.

Asmodeus takes up the mace of the Forgotten god and fights in the Dawn War. Corellon kills the Two-fold god with cunning and treachery, but Asmodeus avenges him by shattering Corellon, although he is himself then banished by Iosus the brother of Maria

### **Tenets**

The Wide Way advocates action and violence as the highest form of holiness and divine. Through struggle and conflict the weak and vile are stamped out and the righteous and strong survive and perpetuate. Arcane magic and study and intellectual pursuits are, while not exactly seen as evil, are seen as useful only as tools and hobbies, that the only righteous life is one in which the individual expresses their power through action for its own sake, without an intellectual justification or higher purpose. Killing, raping and dominating others is a good in itself.

In principle the Wide Way advocates a form of egalitarianism in that any can walk the path, and if through violence and cunning they climb to the top of the hierarchy then their position is as legitimate as someone who was born to a high station.

The center of the institutional power of the Wide Way is in the Dawn City. Teifling high priests called Archons reside over the task of interpreting the will of Asmodeus. The scrolls of Hadiv, which are claimed to be collections of various sayings and principles of Asmodeus, speak of the eventual coming of the Agent, a man who will finally break down the walls of Celestia and fulfill the dream of Asmodeus.