Balaayt: A Modern History

*Balaayt: A Modern History* is a book in the Old Tongue given to the party by Dabo.

## **Summary**

### **Age of Divinity**

Countless thousands of years ago, the three Gods of Creation—Uli, Bartak, and Suraat—raised the realm from the endless sea, and the three Gods of Time—Nesku, Mitro, and Taariyah—kept the realm marching forward.

The history book gives an overview of the early mythos of the gods, minor gods, nymphs, spirits, and other forces of general chaos. There are short accounts of what the gods get up to during what the book calls the **Age of Divinity.**

Myths include:

* Goddess **Uli** puts the stars in the sky to lead seafaring spirits and minor deities and promise them safe travel, and Taariyah names the constellations.
* God **Bartak** shepherds lost creatures in the forest and settles disputes between woodland spirits.
* God **Suraat** wages wars between divine creatures and great primordial evils and other-planar beasts in the desert, and protects his godly oasis in the southwest Kkora sands.
* God **Mitro** gathers the stars and hides them in his cloak to play a trick on Uli, but some spirits and minor gods perish at sea. Uli, enraged, threatens to swallow up Mitro’s territory in the sea. But before she submerges half the continent, Taariyah convinces Mitro to return the stars to her, and she takes them to the Astral Plane where she can watch over them for eternity, and so that no one is ever lost at sea again. Heartbroken by her lover’s sacrifice, Uli’s tears grow into Balaayt’s first mortal race: merfolk, the children of the sea. Mitro returns to what is now the Wetlands.
* Among the stars in the Astral Plane, lonely goddess **Taariyah** brings the constellations to life to keep her company.

### **Age of Unity**

#### **King Siffir's Coronation and the Trials**

About 3,000 years ago, the **Age of Unity** began when the Gods chose a mortal king to rule the realm. **Siffir**, hailing from the North Highlands, led the realm for nearly two centuries, his human lifespan lengthened by divine influence. His reign was initially a time of peace and order during which the whole of the realm was unified, but eventually, the influence of divine Ark on his mortal soul made him hungry for power. His thirst for Ark corrupted his very being and unleashed a new, dark power unto the realm called **Wrath**. He became a monstrosity—a living weapon, capable of killing even gods.

Six warriors from across the realm underwent grueling Trials to become Chosen and oppose Siffir.

* Kinohou, a merfolk man, passed the **Trial of Will** to become Uli's Chosen.
* Nym, a female wood elf, passed the **Trial of the Soul** to become Bartak's Chosen.
* Meikku, a female Meranhi elf, passed the **Trial of Valor** to become Suraat's Chosen.
* Dalida, a female halfling from the Malabar region, passed the **Trial of Fates** to become Taariyah's Chosen.
* Tawny, a human man from the North Highlands, passed the **Trial of Eternity** to become Nesku's Chosen.
* Ashe, a human man from the Wetlands, passed the **Trial of Fortune** to become Mitro's Chosen.

#### **The First Ark War**

The **First Ark War** began shortly after, as the gods themselves led the six Chosen and friends of the realm in their clash with a once-mortal king turned the embodiment of destruction. Years of conflict ensued, centered around Balaayt Castle in the city of Casca, where Siffir ruled as King of the realm. During the conflict, the castle and city was corrupted by the dark energy called Wrath. Goddess Nesku's Arkspring, deep within the labyrinth of the city's catacombs, was likewise consumed by Wrath. At the height of the War, Siffir killed the goddess Nesku.

Shortly after, the six Chosen champions and their allies were able to take back Balaayt Castle and defeat Siffir. But no longer mortal, his body twisted and corrupted by Wrath, the champions feared that simply killing him would not truly end the War. Instead, they scattered fragments of his body—now known as the Godslayer Weapon—across the realm and sealed them away with the help of the gods themselves. The book identifies the post-war period as the **Fracture**.

### **Age of Sovereigns**

After Siffir's defeat and the Fracture, the Gods deigned to leave the mortal races to rule themselves, and so began the **Age of Sovereigns**. At the dawn of this new age, Balaayt's Six Nations were born.

#### **Balaayt's Six Nations**

Meikku, the desert champion, united the peoples of the Kkora Desert under the **Empire of Meranh**. Under the Empress's rule, the region flourished, and their people became famous across the realm for some of the Empire's deepest-rooted traditions, first of which being their martial prowess. In wartime, the Empire bore many of the realm's strongest warriors and most brilliant tactical minds, bred by a prestigious military academy in the capital and a culture which prized service to its banner. Most renowned of these soldiers, however, are the Empire's famous mounted archers and spellcasters. Over millennia, the Empire has bred and domesticated wyverns from blue dragons native to the Kkora Desert, and they employed them to great effect in wartime.

In the wake of the war, **Hyllis** operated as a nation state headed in tandem by three Archons elected by Hyllian nobility. Lhoam, its capital city, flourished as a hub for Ark technology, the rest of the realm in turn profiting from the city's wartime technological renaissance. The Linking, a yearly conference for Balaaytian heads of state, was traditionally held in Lhoam, and culminated in a three-day feast to commemorate the six Chosen warriors' three-day journey from the Temple of Hyllis to the god Bartak's Arkspring in the foothills of the Wilds at the end of the war. Sharing with Casca the brunt of the First Ark War's destruction, and thus its responsibilities toward both rebuilding and fortifying the regions, Hyllis is regarded by many across Balaayt as the gateway to the realm. Hyllis, in its role as both gateway and gatekeeper, has maintained over centuries a tradition of sending its combat-talented youth to the Hyllis Knight School, and as such, the region boasts military forces second only to the Empire's.

**The Wetlands** operated as a democracy, with the god Mitro's Arkspring serving as the centerpiece of its largest city, **Samsara**. This free and liberated society attracted artists, philosophers, and writers from across the realm. Many of these travelers found themselves so charmed by the canal city that they made homes there, making Samsara a worldly society rich in culture and perspectives. The Wetlands champion, Ashe, was memorialized in gardens in the city center.

Dalida, champion of the Malabar Region, united the South Coast's twin capitals and ruled as their queen, founding the **Helwa Kingdom**. Her rule was firm and focused on establishing the Kingdom as a powerful political force and bolstering its economy, emphasizing the importance of the city of K'nafay's central position between Hyllis, Samsara, and the Empire of Meranh. While the city of Ashta's more remote coastal location may lead one to think that she has been overlooked in trade negotiations in the past, the pair are not twin capitals in name only; Ashta contributes to and shares in the full measure of the Helwa Kingdom's prosperity. Given Ashta's proximity to Lhoam, she serves as a waypoint for South Coast travelers and merchants to explore the mainland and exchange goods and ideas. What sisterhood she may lack for her distance from K'nafay (for what true sisters know a bond without tension?), she makes up for with a sense of unity with the coastal settlements, resulting in strong cultural traditions and a commitment to preserving the beauty of the Sola Islands, among others.

Kinohou, the merfolk champion of the seas, ruled the **Lanikai Kingdom** and its mortal races. Despite their gregarious first King's exploits on the surface and his openness to the mainland's cultures and peoples, the Kingdom has since been insular realm, holding close many secrets and traditions. Surface dwellers, while welcome as visitors, cannot remain in the Kingdom permanently without magical interference, and this sociological barrier has oft extended to politics in the new Age. Conversely, many merfolk (themselves an amphibious race) embark on journeys across the mainland in their late adolescence, but few make permanent homes on the surface. Those that do are mostly drawn to the port city Lhoam, Sola Island, or other settlements on the southwest coast.

**Casca** (no longer a Kingdom as in the Age of Unity) and the peoples of the North Highlands faced a much more difficult period of rebuilding in the post-war era because of the destruction of the city. Tawny, the Highlands champion, led the reconstruction effort, centered around the ruins of Casca, while a man named Illyr rose to political prominence in the region, eventually being named the Grand Duke as restorations progressed. To this day, the region operates as a dukedom with a high council of nobles tracing their lineage to Illyr himself. Despite the importance of the Highlands' representative's presence at the Linking and Tawny's early efforts at fostering goodwill between the new nations, many across the realm have been wary of those from the Highlands even a thousand years after the fell King Siffir's misdeeds.