Genesis

## **Trolls, the god Manus and the True Nature of Humanity**

The trolls are in fact the remaining spirits of humanity, now known by a handful of great scholars as "The Ancient Ones". A troll's deformed appearance and odd characteristics are the result of nuclear fallout, which occurred when the Cataclysm came about and the material and astral planes intersected, with disasterous results. Long ago, humanity developed the technology to amplify consciousness and so gain immense powers. Implants and biotech allowed minds to develop "superpowers" through the specific application of will. Eventually, the technology was abused and the result was that reality itself became disrupted, blending the real and the imagined into a single world. Panic struck and nuclear weapons were fired when demons gave rise to visions of the fathomless Void, laying waste to the world and mutating humanity into lumpen beasts. The collective imaginations of the human race coalesced in the timeless spans that came after, giving rise to an entirely new and incredibly diverse array of sapient species in the coming millions of years.

One human magus who possessed the wisdom of ages invested his consciousness and that of his three pupils into the four classical elements of the magi - Air, Earth, Fire and Water. As the vessel of Air they chose the oak tree, and thus the first living beings in Thaelis-Y'Aada included the eldritch. The vessel of Earth was to be the scarab beetle, and thus also amongst the first were the matask. The vessels of Water were to be crustacean, and thus was the birth of the shelled bunyip in Thaelis-Y'Aada's oceans. Fittingly, the vessels of Fire were to be humanity themselves, and though most of these unfortunate creatures were now radioactive beasts void of their previous mental strength, their forms were invested with traces of True Knowledge, which would be revealed to them over the stretches of time. Through the Elder magi's preservation of human sanity, the lacuane of the Void were held at bay, and the rewriting of reality stayed. Their One True God persisted, and its nine primordial components became present in the world physically and not merely spiritually due to the melding of the material and the astral planes. They became the great spirits that the trolls call Primordials. The four greatest trolls (i.e. the last remaining magi of old humanity), given the names Gnoggus-Krachos, Dhaquat, Orcus and N'Dabhac by the orcs when they emerged millenia later, saw it as their mission to repair the damage that was done and to foster the eventual return of humanity in a more mature and enlightened state. When the orcs discovered the workings of the Divine, they named it Tey'Kor-Akx "One True God" in korakxan.

The Ancient Ones split their consciousness and collective wisdom between vessels representing the four elements of Air, Earth, Fire and Water. The vessel chosen to symbolise air was the winged Scarab, the Earth vessel was the Oak, the Fire vessel the lizard, and the Water vessel the Whale. This, their final magical operation during the cataclysm, resulted in the birth of the Chepera (Air/Scarab - gases, thought), the Eldritch (Earth/Oak - solidity, the material), the Dragons (Fire/Serpent - energy, transformation) and the Leviathans (Water/Whale - liquidity, emotions). In modern spiritual practice, the Chepera/Scarab, the Eldritch/Oak, the Dragon/Serpent and the Leviathan/Whale are symbolised as the Watchers of the four quarters. The bodies of humanity were allocated as the vessels of the fifth element, Spirit, and thus the Trolls (Spirit/Flesh - order, knowledge) were born also - they are the last remaining trace of the Ancient Ones. In magic, the centre of the circle, i.e. the magician him or herself is symbolised by the image of the Troll/Incarnation.

The Chepera dwell in the underworld, gathering vast amounts of information concerning all things.

The Dragons took on various forms of their own, influenced by the titanic energies of the Primordials.

The Eldritch seeded great forests, assuming guardianship over nature and its creations.

The Leviathans roamed the deep oceans, communing with the planet and observing its tides.

The Trolls laid the blueprints for the sapient species to come, seeking the restoration of order to the world.

### **The Order of Emergence:**

The Void - Tey'Kor-Akx and the Primordials - Humanity (The Ancient Ones) - The Watchers (Trolls, Eldritch, Matasks and Bunyip) - The rest of Thaelis-Y'Aada.

### **In Thaelis-Y'Aadan Mythology:**

After Tey'Kor-Akx had pulled itself from the Void and with it the nine Primordials, the world was formed and first populated by the Ancient Ones, a mysterious people who reigned supreme until their arrogance (a curse breathed into their souls by Oblivion) combined with technological power (a gift from Tey'Kor-Akx) brought low their world-spanning empire and wrought a great cataclysm upon their reality. The precise nature of this Cataclysm is not known, but what is known is that the Ancient Ones disappeared, leaving behind only their final creations - the Watchers who are the trolls, the eldritch, the matasks and the bunyip.