Plot

This page contains a summary of the plot of the group and all revelations done through roleplay, as well as links to respective docs and to involved characters and locations. As this page includes intro lore from all chapters, simply click the "collapse" tab on the boxes if you wish to only read the summaries provided. It's recommended to read the intros as well, however.

***For dates see also** - Chronology*

## Past

Almaria once used to flourish with aether, accessible to all creatures in a constant state of equilibrium. As aether was the source of all life, it also stood for power and a source of magic that would one day be manipulated to fulfill greed driven intentions. When sorcerers discovered how aether flowed through their veins, forbidden spells and alchemy served the upbringing of an era of dark magic, in which arch sorcerers extracted and manipulated aether using black magic and mysterious crystals capable of draining aether from living beings. The sorcerers wished to expand their life span, growing insatiable for power and the promise of immortality. In their quest, they access the aether flow directly, resulting in a withering environment affecting all of Almaria.

Attempting to counter act the inevitable aether shortage, the Fairy Queen and Neaul, lord of dragons, provide aether to dying regions, engaging in a fight against time. During chaotic circumstances, Xicshagoni, the last remaining gorgon, turns against the pixies who raised him, turning innocent bystanders into statues of stone. The queen turns to the tribe of centaurs, who capture and imprison the sorcerer in a dungeon. Years pass in which entities and sorcerers battle for domination, until exhaustion finally reaches the Fae Realm, threatening the Fairy Queen's subjects, forcing her to take action.

The tribes of all nations unite, attempting to cleanse the aether thieves' aether, rendering them incapable of executing magic for a lifetime and generations to come. When finding themselves defeated, the sorcerers turn to Neaul and beg him for mercy concerning their fate to perish with the Aether Drought. When the mighty dragon turns them down, a small fairy takes notice of a newborn infant, who lacks The Sight. Pitying the life of this innocent creature, she begs the dragon lord to allow her to bind her soul to the creature which would later be known as human. The fairy, known as Grimm, is granted her wish and becomes the first **Familiar**. Seeing it possible for hope to replace the hatred in the world, Neaul declares a new era of peace, in which creatures shall bind their aether to another in order to sustain their life source and establish harmony among all species. The lord of dragons sacrifices his own life and lays his body to rest to become an active and endless aether vein. Neaul's grave is declared the new capital of the world and all species begin to migrate to the new ray of hope. Over years, a city is constructed on the dragon's bones.

### **Era of New Aether**

**00 AD - 89 AD**

As first action of the new era, the Fairy Queen commences a global cleanse, eradicating pure blood vampires, a species who assisted the sorcerers in draining aether. The guilty sorcerers are banished to live inside Pariah, away from all sources of aether. 23 years pass in which the first human, Ana, and her familiar Grimm grow up and evolve, the inseparable duo dedicating their life to establish equality between the races of all nations.

Due to the mixing of species, halfbloods, called "Amals", become a more frequent occurrence, yet are generally shunned by pure bloods. When Ana meets an inter-species couple, who overwhelm her with positive feelings when displayed their genuine love and devotion to another, the human is invited to the Garden of Everything, a hidden location in the fae realm, where the couple introduces her to their beautiful halfblood child. Ana decides to voice the topic publicly and founds the first celebration of inter-species relationships and their offspring, dubbing it the Festival of Unity. After years of serving the world, Ana and Grimm retire their travels to support the dragons in the absence of a lord. Now having grown old, Ana deems it time to say her goodbyes to her loyal familiar and sacrifices her life and aether to Grimm, allowing the now mount to transcend evolution limits and gain immortality, becoming the **new Dragon Lord**.

### **Conflict of the nations | Atlah**

Unfortunately, peace was not meant to persists. When the capital enjoyed peak performance and served as safe haven for species of any kind, a new leading council was established, the new impersonal, mysterious court taking a questionable direction to sustain their aether rich lifestyle.

The capital requests to form an alliance with Rosario, the treasure nation of Almaria, as the nation takes pride in their newly found alchemy research that allows them to create an entirely new species, the Kurrea, as well as their budding technology. The alliance appears peaceful for years, however, first conflict arises when a relief group named Atlah follows a tip by an anonymous source suggesting the alliance engages in questionable experiments. When Atlah investigates in secret, they encounter an increase in slavery. Aleena, the organization's leader, frees Lakota, a victim of slavery, who informs her that the alliance uses innocent people to harvest their aether in order to fund their research on the new species, as well their aether driven weapons. Atlah begins to interfere with the slavery deals and frees prisoners or innocent people. Their name makes its rounds inside the capital and Rosario, becoming a nuisance.

**287 AD**

Greed in the capital grows and rare metals become desired inside the royal households of the city. On search for valuable resources, the alliance stumbles upon the iortari, a well advanced and high respected tribe, known for their affinity with nature and magic. Workers discover their home lands to sit on a resource gold mine. The capital threatens the tribe, attempting to scare them off their home, but the iortari persist, shutting down any attempts on invading their land. Unfortunately, Rosario's development has successfully created an aether weapon titled the **Selene**, which kills on sight. The allied forces invade the tribal lands once more, setting the iortarian home ablaze and eradicate the species. Only Aleena's daughter survives, as her father has hidden her away. When the leader of Atlah returns, she retrieves her daughter and provides a new home to her inside her camp.

**288 -289 AD**

An unknown sickness breaks out in Rosario, which later would be known as the "**plague**". The sickness robs an affected victim of its aether and slowly kills them in a long and painful struggle. Medics of the city are unable to understand that illness and face mass dying far and wide inside the nation. Unaware of this fact, one year after, Atlah's leader Aleena takes her daughter on a ship to sail to the lands that they once called home. Exposed to the plague during ocean travel, Aleena faces a quick demise when fatal wounds exhaust her body. With no medic available, Gabriella is forced to watch her mother die and to survive alone.

After three weeks, Lakota, who is now in charge of Atlah, declares both iortari dead. The organization goes undercover and for the following eight years works in the shadows, making itself a name as an enemy of the capital.

**291 AD**

Over three harsh years, Rosario's council manages to isolate the illness into the nation's city walls by using alchemy to turn selective victims of royalty into Kurrea, however, it claims its last victim, candidate for the throne Tania. The elf's wish is to have the illness die with her; a wish well respected very well until her final moments. Suffering agony from the idea of losing his most beloved friend, master alchemist Ryder, a well praised and famous role model of his occupation, engages in restless research on how to counteract the plague. After countless experiments, he discovers the sickness draining aether, leading him to the conclusion that a body that sustains enough aether can not be harmed by it. However, needing an aether source, the alchemist kills his own familiar in order to attach its aether to Tania, allowing her to turn into a kurrea. When waking up, the woman discovers that the disease has now latched on to Ryder instead, allowing it to germinate. Due to this fact, the disease manages to spread once more, instead of being eradicated with Tania's death. Tania takes the burden of becoming the new baroness, banishing Ryder from Rosario, without allowing him to find a cure for the plague he caused. Alchemy is declared forbidden.

In the same year, information leaks to the public that the allied nations engaged in sales with the black market, plucking the feathers of the iortari after wiping them out, then selling their feathers. Enraged by this information, the itari, the successors of the mother species, flee to the newly promised land of Losandthel, where a male of their species, namely Aquila, declares himself emperor of a new nation. Aquila proceeds to approach the military force of the alliance, considering to speak to Rhys and his brother Gerow, both highly respected men of the military. After meeting general Gerow alone, he pays him a large sum of dragon crystal, overthrowing military control, and secures his new empire with his newly won force.

**298 AD**

Baroness Tania becomes target of attempted assassination, practiced by a mysterious rebel, who has made herself a name throughout an impressive number of successful rescue missions to free prisoners. She survives the attempt through the aid of a new aether weapon, which crushes the attackers leg, rendering her incapable of fleeing. Now exposed to hypothermia and blood loss in a cell, the prisoner manages to break the prison walls. Lakota, who heard the rumors of a rebel acting against the capital, travels to Rosario and confirms the target to be no one else but Gabriella, the daughter of Atlah's former leader. He retrieves the woman, but loses his lower beak in the process, as he too is attacked by the aether weapon.

Gabriella becomes Atlah's respective new leader and redesigns the relief organization into a rebellion, with one mission in mind: To overthrow the capital and return peace and equal aether supplies to the people who struggle with aether shortage and the aftermath of the alliance's actions.

## Chapter One - Equilibrium

Azrael, the grim reaper and god of death enters the city while citizens are distracted with celebrating the Festival of Unity, initiating a killing spree, which at first seems to follow no particular pattern. When the police force investigates, it soon becomes clear that the familiars of the victims appear to be corrupted. This is when the "Shepherd" steps in, an aether tool who is supposed to represent balance in the world. When he however mercilessly puts down the affected familiars, controversy sparks between the god of balance and the god of death. Akaneiro, who serves as host for Azrael, challenges the shepherd to a battle, wishing to prove a point to the citizens of the capital. Unintentionally, he ends up killing the shepherd's familiar, but ends up telling him that a partner's demise does not mean the part left behind is now hopeless. Familiar and master adoption is made legal following the events.

After being captured and thrown into Almaria's dungeons, the shepherd visits Akaneiro once more, where both parties discuss the existence of a place that is entirely void of aether, namely Pariah. They express each others fascination with being each others counterparts and part ways. After escaping the dungeons with the help of Himeko, Akaneiro faces the shepherd once more and absorbs his powers, becoming the god of balance.

## Chapter Two - Birdcage Serenata

The new Dragon Lord requests an audience with the citizens of Almaria's capital through her allied beast slayer Lenora. A group of people travels to the Dragon Nest, assisted by the dragon riders native to the dragon lands. After settling in, they approach the new lord of the dragons, who wastes no minute to enlighten the citizens about the state of the world and the web of lies constructed to keep them in the dark. She tells them the history of the first familiar and her master and how they established equality and acceptance for all species in the world. Eventually, she reveals that she is the familiar in question, now reborn as the dragon lord, and that the capital willingly has manipulated history records in order to discourage the support of equality among the species and to distract from the aether shortages and poverty that plagues the outer regions past the capital. Regardless, the dragons take part in the alliance with the capital and Rosario, hoping their voice in the matters will reduce the damage done to the world. Grimm warns of the enemies of the capital, who are willing to bring the city down, no matter the cost, and that the capital bears guilt that justifies revenge.

Not long after, Rosario's lands opens its doors for travel, allowing people to go back and forth between nations using the dragon riders as transport. The newly gained alliance members spark attention of Aquila, who had been cut off from the other nations for over a decade. After sending one of his people to map the region for him, the spokesperson of the alliance, Nisha, meets with the emperor. The two parties come to the decision that it's time to enlighten the inhabitants of the capital of the crimes of its city.

Citizens of all three nations are invited to the military empire Losandthel, where a banquet is held, attended by Rosario's representative Tania, yet misses a representative of the capital once again. As festivities are in full rush, Aquila gifts the visitors a new aether tool, Nier, who serves as a free servant for anyone who asks for her. Just when enough friendliness is established, the emperor calls for attention of all visitors. He then asks Nier to summon something he refers to as "The Selene", the same aether tool that wiped out the iortari, then demonstrates how mercilessly it chose its targets by locking onto them with a laser. Achieving the intended shock factor, Aquila tells everyone about the war crimes of the alliance. Having attended as well, and unable to bear the memories, Gabriella storms out the castle, where she is being captured alongside Jericho and later Raelle, confirming that Atlah once again started to act after years of assumed silence. The empire opens its lands for people to freely explore their roots and discover more secrets, while the rebellion slowly but surely grows.

Against Lakota's wish not to approach Rosario on her own, Gabriella ignores any common sense and in absence of her adviser and right hand follows a lead mentioning the location of Gerow's military log. As it describes the events of the iortari attack, it proves crucial information to blackmail the capital. Rhys receives a tip from an anonymous source, informing him that Atlah would strike again, motivating the half oni to hunt the rebel down. With assistance of an invisible force, both parties manage to enter Rosario's treasure vault, where Gabriella locates the safe in question. However, once inside, Rhys confronts her. When the iortari tries to lie her way out of the situation, the invisible force once more sabotages her mission when it stabs the mercenary in his back using the perpetrator's feather. A fight ensues, in which Gabriella manages to claim victory when she retrieves the documents and manages to flee, however ends up in part of Rosario's city, realizing the **plague** is still actively taking lives. After escaping the city, the rebel faces inner conflict, as one of her main enemies now turns out to be suffering as well and hopes to find good news in the military records. When reading them however she receives a warning not to engage with the capital leader, as it's an unwinnable fight. However, she realizes that only a member of Atlah could know about them, suggesting to her that they have a potential ally on the inside of their most hated enemy's base.

## Chapter Three - Reverie

Due to the stolen documents now being a potential threat if released to the public, Tania wishes to declare war on Atlah, which motivates the capital's council to call a meeting. Four of the five heads of the city attend, receiving information by their spy Solar, who informs them that both their abducted dragon egg and the documents about their war crimes have been taken by the rebellion. He warns them that their alliance with the dragons may cease, due to disrespecting their kind. They discuss their next step, which involves the leviathans of the Behemoth Ocean and their rich aether, which the capital plans to harvest.

## References

1. ↑ Gabriella's History
2. ↑ Don't Let Me Fall Asleep
3. ↑ Reverie
4. ↑ The Council