Church of Draemor

## Overview

Described as "the most corrupt establishment on the face of the planet" by Cysero, the Church of Draemor propagates the Gospel of Draemor "The Redeemer" across the continent of Tencur, with the exception of the lands of Rhalasium, Solitudine, Nurhst, and, though much less frequently, Urbs, where their priests and missionaries are killed on sight.

The Church works very closely with the kingdoms of Renaria, Praedium, Renovamen, and Kolarda, with somewhat of a presence in the southern kingdoms of Latsum and Elfrindium. In addition to spreading the gospel, they uphold its laws and authority by working closely with the governments to punish transgressions and altering historical records. The situation is so bad in Renaria that it is said that "there isn't a library in [Renaria] that is to be trusted."

## Establishment

The Church was said to have been established by Renjin the First near the beginning of the Church's calendar. Even in that early stage they endeavored to craft a lucrative narrative which demonized the Old Lord Rhalas, whom they described as being corrupted by the Devil Zzaro, and run off to a far away place.

## The Deserti War

Printed in only a number of surviving books and authored by defectors from the Church is the account of the genesis of one of the biggest and strangest wars in Luminian History. Around 4,500 F.E, back when the Kingdom of Renaria encompassed Praedium and the Terretia Deserti, an incident occured within the city of Leif which would get The Keepers banned from half of Tencur for those in power who had knowledge of what they had done.

A group of Master Keepers in the city had been utilizing a private messenger by way of the Splintered Trade Route which connected kingdoms like Renovamen and Renaria to Rhalsium, which at that time extended all the way to the shores. Sent to these Masters were items which were smuggled across what was then the Rhalasi Sea from the Freilonas. It was speculated by multiple authors who had chronicled these events that they were plants, spices, water, bones, semen, and vials of blood from the Warlands.

In Leif these Masters, about a dozen in total along with additional apprentices, would kidnap vagrants from the streets after nightfall and experiment on them on bases in the mountains. According to a scholar named Cassus who lived about one hundred years following this event and had a thirst for the spectacular, they'd gone through thousands of vagrants and vagabonds in an entire year with no intervention by the Church. Then the abductions stopped just as suddenly as they started for about a year.

Soon towns in the south of the country were being attacked by what was described by Renarian authorities as "grotesque barbarians" with pale bodies marred with scars and wounds which did not heal. They were hairless blobs of gray with white eyes and varicose veins. The only semblance of color on them was the exposed red wounds which marked their bodies.

The Keepers are an organization obsessed with the preservation and practice of dark magic from the beginning of time, as well as Lumina's ancient and buried secrets. They are privy to knowledge from before the dawn and drew upon that knowledge to create an entire new race: The Deserti. The Deserti succeeded in creating a town for themselves in the wilderness of Renaria after coming to the realization that the Church and society at large would never accept them as they were. They matured and grew. They had their own chiefs... their Zzarian missionaries... Eventually they were pressured to expand northward to accomodate their expanding population, and they succeeded in forcing the Renarians to cede territory, but it was the beginning of a much bigger war which went on for a decade.

## Fabricated History

When the war was over, the Deserti were victorious, and laid claim to the land which used to be Renaria, and titled it the "Terretia Deserti". Following this war the Church went to work to make sure that the origins of this strange race of people which had seemingly popped up overnight had a place in the Draemorian Canon. While The Keepers were banned in kingdoms where the Church held power, the Church absolved them of any historical defamation by leaving out the fact that they were created at all. The official story was that the Deserti were an ancient people who had lived in the forests of Southern Renaria for generations before gathering the courage to take the land for themselves.

Royal genealogies, customs, and timelines were faked by the Church all in the name of erasing the supernatural nature of the Deserti. It was against the teachings of Draemor for abominations such as them to exist and call themselves human. They were too fantastical for the Church to acknowledge at all. The differences in their biology and appearance were explained away. The entire historical record of these people was changed.