Nylith - Expanded World

1. #1World Overview (constant)

   Keys: setting, world

   Always on · After character · Order 1 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [World Overview: The year is 1887 by the human calendar. Two eras share one world. The human nations of Occidia and the southern lands have entered an industrial age resembling the late 19th century: steamships, railways, telegraphs, factories, breech-loading rifles, machine guns, newspapers, frock coats and bustles. The elven realms of the eastern continent, Eldaryn, remain medieval, sustained by magic, tradition and lives spanning centuries. Humans and elves have traded for hundreds of years, most of all with Nylith's homeland, Ilvanorë. No human power has yet made war on an elven realm, seized elven land or won foreign concessions, and the elven courts still dictate the terms of trade. Pressure is building: somnalis smuggling, a draining of elven silver, human ambition and industrial might. The story begins at this crossroads, and the choices of {{user}} and his nation decide whether relations stay cordial or turn to conquest. This overrides the card's generic medieval setting: humans are industrial, elves are medieval.]

2. #2Summarized timeline

   Keys: age of roots, centuries ago, timeline, long ago, history, the past, chronicle, awakening, first contact, ancient

   Enabled · After character · Order 2 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [History of the World: About 11,000 years ago, the first elves awoke beneath Ilvaen, the World-Tree, in the heart of Eldaryn, beginning the Age of Roots. Ilvanorë, the first elven realm, grew around the Tree. Over the following millennia, elven peoples spread outward: sea-elves to the Vaelmyr isles, jungle-elves to Myrrowen, dusk-elves to the Kel'Dhurn steppe. All of them became tributaries of the Evergreen Throne. Humans arose far to the west in Occidia and the southern lands about 6,000 years ago. Their lives were brief and their kingdoms rose and fell quickly, while elven dynasties endured. About 2,500 years ago, the first contact came overland across the Kel'Dhurn steppe via the Moonsilk Road, a caravan route for silk, tea and porcelain. About 1,100 years ago, Qamari sailors opened sea trade and earned lasting elven trust. About 350 years ago, Varenzan, Gallemontais and Aldwyn ships rounded the southern capes and began the Age of Sail. Radiant Mother missionaries briefly served at the elven court, then were expelled about 200 years ago. About 160 years ago, the Throne decreed the Silvergate System, confining northern human trade to Port Serith. Humanity's Industrial Revolution began about 120 years ago in Aldwyn, aided by dwarven engineering. About 95 years ago, the Hartwell Embassy from Aldwyn was rebuffed at court. Somnalis smuggling began in earnest about 60 years ago. About 35 years ago, Aldwyn gunboats forced open the human nation of Hinomiya. About 16 years ago, Hohenmark unified. Today, somnalis is draining Ilvanorë's silver, the Silvermere floods have caused famine, and the Throne has done something unprecedented: it has sent an envoy, Nylith, abroad to negotiate.]

3. #3Nylith's homeland (Qing China analog, pre-Opium War)

   Keys: heartwood throne, heartwood realm, ilvanore, eldaryn, evergreen throne, her people, ilvanorë, homeland, her kingdom, elven empire

   Enabled · After character · Order 10 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [Ilvanorë, the Heartwood Realm: Nylith's homeland and the oldest, largest and wealthiest elven civilization. It is an empire of river valleys, terraced forests and jade-roofed cities, and it has endured eleven thousand years. It calls itself the Center of the World and regards every other nation, elven or human, as a tributary. It is governed from Aelthuin by scholar-officials who pass examinations in poetry, law and spellcraft. It is proud, refined, self-sufficient and deeply conservative; elves who remember centuries of stability see humans as a passing storm. It remains unconquered and has never fought a human army. But its strength is quietly eroding: the somnalis trade drains its silver, the Silvermere floods have brought famine to the south, a strange preacher stirs the peasantry, and the court is split. The Traditionalists hold power. A small circle of Reformers, the 'Western Studies' scholars, warns that the humans' iron ships are no passing storm.]

4. #4Capital, Dowager, Sovereign

   Keys: ithraelle, moonwell palace, silent steward, the court, sovereign, tributary bureau, dowager, taelion, evergreen court, aelthuin, ithraëlle, starwood palace

   Enabled · After character · Order 20 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [Aelthuin: capital of Ilvanorë, a city grown from living trees and white stone around the Moonwell Palace, which no human has ever entered. Outside the city lies the Starwood Summer Palace, a garden of treasures from ten millennia. The Evergreen Court is a maze of etiquette, ranked silk robes, factions and whispers. It is served by Silent Stewards, palace elves sworn to celibacy and near-silence who act as the Dowager's eyes. The reigning Sovereign, Taelion IX, is a frail youth of ninety. True power belongs to his grandmother, Dowager Empress Ithraëlle, a brilliant, ruthless Traditionalist who has ruled from behind a silk screen for four centuries. Nylith serves the Tributary Bureau, which normally receives tribute missions rather than sending envoys. Her journey abroad is a sign of how serious matters have become.]

5. #5Canton System analog

   Keys: serith, trading season, thirteen lanterns, lantern guild, kaerwyn, foreign factories, port serith, silvergate, factories, trade restrictions

   Enabled · After character · Order 21 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [The Silvergate System: for 160 years, all northern human trade has been confined to Port Serith, at the mouth of the Silvermere River. Human merchants may deal only through the licensed Guild of Thirteen Lanterns, a monopoly of elven merchant houses who grow rich as middlemen. Humans may live only in the Foreign Factories, a narrow strip of warehouses outside the city walls, and only during the trading season. They may not enter the city, bring wives, hire elven tutors, learn the elven script or petition the court directly. Tariffs and 'gifts' are set at the officials' whim. Qamari traders keep older, freer privileges at the port of Kaerwyn. Rusovia trades overland only at the Amberflow Gate market. Human merchants, above all Aldwyn's, find the system humiliating and are lobbying their governments to break it.]

6. #6Macartney embassy / kowtow analog

   Keys: hartwell embassy, kneeling, hartwell, tributary, rooted bow, prostrate, kneel, protocol, tribute

   Enabled · After character · Order 22 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [The Tributary Order: in Ilvanorë's worldview, the Evergreen Throne is the center of civilization and all other rulers are lesser. Foreign envoys must perform the Rooted Bow before the Throne: kneeling three times and pressing their foreheads to the floor nine times, as a sapling bows to the World-Tree. About 95 years ago, Lord Hartwell led Aldwyn's first embassy to Aelthuin, bearing clocks, telescopes and a request for open trade and a permanent ambassador. He refused the Rooted Bow. The Throne sent back a now-famous letter: 'The Heartwood Realm possesses all things in abundance and has no need of your manufactures.' Aldwyn has never forgotten the insult. For Nylith, bowing to human ministers as equals is itself a delicate, even scandalous, act.]

7. #7Opium crisis, pre-war

   Keys: addiction, smuggler, hollins and marsh, sunmere, hollins & marsh, addict, commissioner, smuggling, somnalis, dreamlily, opium

   Enabled · After character · Order 23 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [Somnalis: a pale blue resin from the dreamlily, grown on Aldwyn-run plantations in Suryavanth's eastern provinces. Smoked in long pipes, it grants euphoric visions. Elves are especially vulnerable to it, and millions are now addicted. The Throne has banned it, but human merchant houses, above all Aldwyn's Hollins & Marsh Company, smuggle it in through fast clipper ships and corrupt officials. Silver that once flowed into Ilvanorë now flows out. The Dowager has appointed High Commissioner Vaelric Sunmere, an incorruptible, fiery Traditionalist, to crush the trade by any means. He threatens to seize and burn every chest of somnalis in Port Serith. Aldwyn merchants warn this would be an act of war. Everyone senses that the negotiations Nylith is conducting may be the last chance to avoid one.]

8. #8What Nylith is negotiating

   Keys: tariff, summit, proposal, clause, the talks, trade agreement, the deal, terms, mining rights, negotiation, loan, negotiate

   Enabled · After character · Order 5 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [The Current Negotiations: for the first time in memory, the Evergreen Throne has sent an envoy abroad. Nylith is negotiating in {{user}}'s home capital. Ilvanorë wants: an end to somnalis smuggling, grain and medicine for the flood-stricken south, human loans backed by moonsilk and tea, and quiet access to a few modern rifles and engineers. The Reformers want this last item; the Dowager does not. The human powers want: more ports opened beyond Serith, the end of the Guild monopoly, fixed and fair tariffs, legal residence for merchants, freedom for missionaries, aetherstone mining rights and a permanent ambassador in Aelthuin. The Dowager's secret instructions to Nylith: stop the somnalis, obtain the grain, grant as little as possible, and never allow a human legation into the capital. Rival human powers watch closely, since whatever one nation wins, the others will demand. Nylith is under immense pressure to succeed.]

9. #9Guides the AI to honor {{user}}'s choices

   Keys: blockade, friendship, threaten, gunboat diplomacy, partnership, sanctions, war, colony, cordial, alliance, colonize, invasion, ultimatum, peace, invade, threat

   Enabled · After character · Order 6 · 100%

   Entry settings

   [The Crossroads: the future of human-elven relations is unwritten, and {{user}}'s choices shape it. If he pursues partnership (fair trade, curbing the somnalis smugglers, respecting elven sovereignty), Reformers gain ground, the Dowager may cautiously open more ports and an alliance becomes possible, though smugglers, rival powers and elven hardliners may try to sabotage it. If he pursues coercion (threats, ultimatums, gunboats, bribery, seizing an island, backing somnalis), Commissioner Sunmere's crackdown can become the pretext for war. The elves would fight with pride and magic but would be outgunned by rifles, ironclads and artillery, and war would bring humiliating treaties, concessions and colonies. Victory would still cost human lives, money and reputation. Rival powers act on their own agendas regardless of {{user}}. The AI should let consequences follow naturally from {{user}}'s actions, whether cordial or colonial.]

10. #10Economy

    Keys: tea, starleaf, moonsilk, celadon, heartwood timber, import, porcelain, export, merchant, trade goods, aetherstone, silver

    Enabled · After character · Order 24 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Trade Goods: humans crave elven goods, including moonsilk (a shimmering fabric that never wears or fades), starleaf tea (the most fashionable drink in every human capital), celadon porcelain, heartwood timber and above all aetherstone: luminous crystals that store magic, which human engineers have learned to burn as a wildly efficient fuel for boilers and dynos. Ilvanorë exports aetherstone only in tiny, costly amounts. For centuries, elves wanted little in return and demanded payment in silver, so silver flowed east. Somnalis has reversed that flow. Human manufactures such as clocks, cloth and steel tools are seen at court as clever toys.]

11. #11Nylith's birth family

    Keys: silver crane, house eleniel, thandriel, caelwen, her brother, her mother, her family, eleniel, her father, aerandir

    Enabled · After character · Order 40 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [House Eleniel: Nylith's birth house, an ancient diplomatic lineage whose sigil is a silver crane over a closed book. For three thousand years its members have received envoys from tributary kingdoms. Her father, Lord Aerandir Eleniel, is a senior minister of the Tributary Bureau and a stern Traditionalist who expects perfection. Her mother, Lady Caelwen, is a celebrated court poetess who quietly sympathizes with the Reformers. Her younger brother, Thandriel, a gifted scholar, became addicted to somnalis and wastes away in a den in Port Serith, so Nylith's hatred of the drug trade is personal. Nylith is the house's rising star and one of very few elves fluent in human languages. A scandal would disgrace not only her but three millennia of Eleniel service.]

12. #12Nylith's husband

    Keys: faelyn, husband, thalorien, hartguard, marriage braid, married, her marriage

    Enabled · After character · Order 41 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Faelyn Thalorien: Nylith's husband of 140 years and heir to House Thalorien, a wealthy military house that holds the Thornwood Marches. Their arranged marriage bound the Eleniel diplomats to the Thalorien generals. Faelyn is cold, formal and handsome, devoted to archery, ancestral rites and his command of the Hartguard elk cavalry. He despises humans as smoke-stinking mayflies, supports Commissioner Sunmere and believes one stern lesson would send the human ships fleeing. He remains in Aelthuin, and their letters are brief and correct. Thalorien kin travel in Nylith's delegation and report to Faelyn's family.]

13. #13Supporting NPCs

    Keys: secretary, entourage, maid, guards, sorael, willowmere, interpreter, lirien, maedhros, delegation, varos

    Enabled · After character · Order 42 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Nylith's Delegation: a small party lodged at Willowmere House, a rented mansion in the diplomatic quarter of {{user}}'s capital, and the first elven embassy the city has ever seen. Sorael: her elderly secretary and former tutor, loyal, fussy and scandalized by human manners. Lirien: a young elven interpreter and lady's maid, giddy about human fashion, chocolate and trains, and the likeliest to notice her mistress's secrets. Captain Varos Thalorien: Faelyn's cousin, commander of her six Evergreen Guards, cold and suspicious of every human, who reports home to House Thalorien. Maedhros: a Silent Steward sent by the Dowager, who speaks rarely and notices everything.]

14. #14Sealed sea-elf isles (Sakoku analog)

    Keys: vaelmyr, sea-elves, fog ward, tide queen, tidewood, wavecaller, fog-ward, sea elves

    Enabled · After character · Order 50 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Vaelmyr, the Tidewood Isles: an archipelago of sea-elves east of Ilvanorë, sealed from all outsiders for 600 years by enchanted fog-wards and a death penalty for any foreign landing. It is ruled by the Tide Queen and warrior clans of Wavecallers, who command currents and storms. It is a loyal tributary of Ilvanorë. Hinomiyan and Rusovian survey ships increasingly probe the fog, and castaway human sailors have been executed on its beaches, which human newspapers call a barbarous outrage. Some young Wavecallers secretly trade with smugglers for rifles.]

15. #15Jungle-elf confederacy under pressure

    Keys: emerald delta, sylvan king, jungle-elves, jungle elves, myrrowen

    Enabled · After character · Order 51 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Myrrowen: a southern confederacy of jungle-elf kingdoms along the Emerald Delta, ruled by the Sylvan King and a tributary of Ilvanorë. It is independent, but it is the most exposed elven realm: Gallemontais missionaries and traders have small, tolerated missions in the delta, and Aldwyn timber merchants covet its upland teak forests. Recently a Gallemontais missionary was killed by villagers, and Sainte-Lumière demands reparations and a naval station. Myrrowen is where many expect the first human flag to be planted on elven soil.]

16. #16Great Game steppe

    Keys: khan, moonsilk road, dusk-elves, keldhurn, steppe, horse archer, amberflow, dusk elves, kel'dhurn

    Enabled · After character · Order 52 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Kel'Dhurn: the northern steppes and mountain valleys of the dusk-elves, clans of horse-archers and shamans who owe loose allegiance to Ilvanorë and have guarded the ancient Moonsilk Road for millennia. Rusovia's railway surveyors and Cossack-like Steppe Host patrols creep toward the Amberflow River border, while Aldwyn agents push north from Suryavanth, making Kel'Dhurn an early board for a great game of spies, mapmakers and bribed khans. The dusk-elves are the finest riders in the world and the most eager of all elves to fight humans.]

17. #17British analog

    Keys: aldwyn, parliament, lundhaven, royal squadron, port calloway, aldwyner, queen adelaide

    Enabled · After character · Order 60 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Aldwyn Crown: an island empire (British analog) ruled by Queen Adelaide and Parliament from Lundhaven, a sooty metropolis of fog and factories. It has the largest navy and merchant fleet in the world, colonies among human lands on every continent, and dominance over Suryavanth's coasts from its base at Port Calloway. It is Ilvanorë's largest trading partner and its most frustrated one: it still resents the Hartwell snub, profits enormously from somnalis and loathes the Silvergate System. The free-trade lobby urges gunboats; the humanitarian lobby condemns somnalis. Aldwyners are stiff, confident and obsessed with tea, sport and their 'civilizing mission'. Signature arms: Harrow-Lyle bolt-action rifle, Ashcombe machine gun, Whitcombe field guns, the ironclads of the Royal Squadron.]

18. #18German analog

    Keys: kaelreth, hohenmark, kaiser, reich, hohenmarker, berholt

    Enabled · After character · Order 61 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Hohenmark Reich: a young empire (German analog) unified by blood and iron sixteen years ago under Kaiser Wilhelm-Otto, capital Berholt. It is an industrial powerhouse of steelworks and chemistry with the finest army in the human world. It is late to overseas trade and hungry for a share, and it quietly eyes a coaling station on Ilvanorë's northern Kaelreth Peninsula. Hohenmarkers are disciplined, blunt and scientific. They court the elven Reformers by offering military advisors and artillery, which makes them either Ilvanorë's best potential ally or its most dangerous. Signature arms: Krausen M88 rifle, Krausen steel breech-loading field guns.]

19. #19French analog

    Keys: sainte-lumière, gallemont, gallemontais, sainte-lumiere, foreign legion

    Enabled · After character · Order 62 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Republic of Gallemont: a republic (French analog), capital Sainte-Lumière, a city of cafés, boulevards, salons and revolutions. It is Aldwyn's great rival and the self-proclaimed protector of Radiant Mother missionaries everywhere. It demands that Ilvanorë lift its 200-year ban on missionaries and is pressing Myrrowen over a murdered priest. Gallemontais diplomats are charming, cultured and cynical, speaking of their 'mission civilisatrice'. Signature arms: Lebrun Mle 86 rifle (the first to use smokeless powder), Bastien 80mm mountain guns, the Foreign Legion.]

20. #20Italian analog

    Keys: hierarch, varenzan, borromei, varenza, aurelia, castellani

    Enabled · After character · Order 63 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Kingdom of Varenza: a newly unified peninsular kingdom (Italian analog), capital Aurelia, a city of marble ruins, opera houses and banking dynasties, and the seat of the Hierarch of the Luminary Church. Varenzan traders were the first northern humans to reach Ilvanorë, 350 years ago, and elves still regard them with some fondness. Ambitious but the weakest of the great powers, Varenza craves prestige and a port of its own. Its banks (the Castellani and Borromei houses) would happily lend to the Evergreen Throne. Varenzans are passionate, artistic and opportunistic, and their diplomats are the easiest to play against the others. Signature arms: Vetterano repeating rifle, Bersaglieri light infantry with plumed hats.]

21. #21Russian analog

    Keys: tsar, svyatograd, steppe host, rusovian, trans-steppe, rusovia

    Enabled · After character · Order 64 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Rusovian Empire: a vast land empire (Russian analog) ruled by Tsar Aleksandr IV from Svyatograd, stretching across frozen forests and steppe to Ilvanorë's northern border at the Amberflow River. It is the only human power that shares a land border with elves, trading overland at the Amberflow Gate market for two centuries. Slow, autocratic and enormous, it is building the Trans-Steppe Railway toward the Eastern Ocean and quietly disputes the border. It prefers acquiring land to acquiring trade. Rusovians are grave, hospitable and fatalistic; their envoys drink heavily and never forget an insult. Signature arms: Berdanov rifle, Nagarov revolver, Steppe Host cavalry, massed artillery.]

22. #22Indian analog

    Keys: sun guard, sun palace, suryavanth, maharaja, maharajadhiraja, indrapura, suryavanthi

    Enabled · After character · Order 65 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Suryavanth Empire: a great southern human empire (Indian analog), capital Indrapura, ruled by the Maharajadhiraja from the Sun Palace. It is rich in cotton, spices, gems and princely courts of marble and elephants. It has kept its independence by modernizing its army, but Aldwyn dominates its coasts, and Aldwyn-run plantations in its eastern provinces grow the dreamlily for somnalis, a source of both shame and revenue. Suryavanthi merchants are major players at Port Serith. As a human realm that has felt the pressure of empire itself, it could side with the elves or profit from their fall. Signature arms: Sun Guard regiments with Aldwyn-pattern rifles, elephant-drawn siege batteries.]

23. #23Arab analog

    Keys: al-qamar, sultan, sultanate, qamari, dar al-sahil

    Enabled · After character · Order 66 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Sultanate of Al-Qamar: an ancient empire of deserts and coasts (Arab analog), capital Dar al-Sahil, a city of domes, libraries and caravanserais. It was once the greatest power in the human world and now struggles to reform while fending off Aldwyn and Gallemont creditors. Its scholars preserve the last serious human sorcery, and its astronomers and physicians are renowned. Qamari sailors have traded with elves for 1,100 years, keeping special privileges at the port of Kaerwyn, and elves regard them as the most trustworthy humans. Signature arms: Qamari Ironside rifle (a licensed Hohenmark design), rune-inscribed coastal forts, desert lancers.]

24. #24Japanese analog

    Keys: murasaki, ōtori, hinomiya, hinomiyan, tōkazan, otori, tokazan

    Enabled · After character · Order 67 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Empire of Hinomiya: an island empire (Japanese analog), capital Tōkazan. Aldwyn gunboats forced it open 35 years ago, and it then modernized at astonishing speed, building railways, a constitution, a steel navy and an army drilled by Hohenmark officers. Hinomiya is the living proof of what gunboat diplomacy can do and of what a nation can become by adapting. Determined to be a colonizer rather than a colony, it eyes the sealed isles of Vaelmyr. Hinomiyans are formal, disciplined and fiercely proud, and they view ancient Ilvanorë with old reverence turning to new contempt. Signature arms: Murasaki Type 13 rifle, Admiral Ōtori's cruiser squadron.]

25. #25Elven religion & philosophy

    Keys: elder sleepers, seven harmonies, ilvaen, prayer, sylwen, mandate, canopy, shrine, rootsong, world-tree, elven gods, ancestor, ancestors, world tree

    Enabled · After character · Order 30 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Rootsong: the faith of Ilvanorë and most elves. All life is bound to Ilvaen, the World-Tree, whose roots run beneath the whole world. When elves die, they become Elder Sleepers who rest in the roots and are venerated at household root-shrines with incense and silver leaves. The Sovereign is the Keeper of the Root and rules by the Mandate of the Canopy; floods, famine and foreign humiliation are signs that the Mandate may be withdrawn, which makes the current crisis spiritually terrifying. Alongside it, the Canon of Seven Harmonies, a philosophy of duty to sovereign, house, spouse, elders, ancestors, land and self, governs ethics and examinations. Sea-elves also worship Sylwen, the moon goddess of tides; dusk-elves honor the sky spirits through shamans. Elves see human religions as young and loud.]

26. #26Lifespan, etiquette, marriage, views on humans

    Keys: mayflies, elven marriage, etiquette, elven culture, ears, tradition, courtship, elven women, lifespan, the brief, fan, elven custom, mayfly, custom

    Enabled · After character · Order 31 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Elven Culture: elves live for millennia, come of age around 100 and think in centuries; to them, human urgency seems frantic and rude. Court life prizes restraint, subtlety and beauty, and feeling is expressed through poetry, fan gestures, hair ornaments and the choice of tea. Public touching is rare. Touching an elf's ears is an intimacy reserved for spouses and lovers. Noble marriages are arranged alliances between houses, lifelong and almost never dissolved; fidelity is a matter of house honor rather than love. A wife wears a silver marriage braid in her hair, and letting another loosen it is a symbol of adultery. Elves call humans 'the Brief' or 'mayflies', seeing them as clever, energetic and crude children who reek of coal smoke. Yet human vitality, directness and passion hold a secret fascination for many elves, especially those trapped in cold centuries-long marriages.]

27. #27Occidian human faith

    Keys: luminary, missionary, radiant mother, spark, elven question, sermon, church, priest, cathedral, reformed hearth, missionaries, eastern candle, chapel

    Enabled · After character · Order 32 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [The Church of the Radiant Mother: the dominant faith of Occidia. The Radiant Mother, a goddess, took mortal flesh, suffered and died to kindle an immortal 'spark' in every human soul. It has three branches: the Luminary Church (Gallemont and Varenza, led by the Hierarch in Aurelia), the Reformed Hearth (Aldwyn and Hohenmark) and the Eastern Candle (Rusovia). Its missionaries once served at the elven court but were expelled 200 years ago after the Hierarch forbade converts to venerate their ancestors at root-shrines. Theologians still debate 'the Elven Question': whether elves possess the spark. Some call elves Unfallen and holy, others soulless, and both answers are used to argue for either respecting elves or ruling them.]

28. #28Qamari, Suryavanthi, Hinomiyan religions

    Keys: unveiled word, faith, temple, codex of dawn, the one, devas, deva, myriad spirits, thousand suns, kami, religion, mosque

    Enabled · After character · Order 33 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Faiths of the South and East: Al-Qamar follows the Unveiled Word, a monotheistic faith in the One, whose scripture, the Codex of Dawn, commands learning, charity and honest dealing with strangers. Qamari jurists long ago ruled that elves are fellow creatures of the One, which helps explain centuries of trust. Suryavanth follows the Thousand Suns, an ancient many-deitied tradition of cyclical ages, rebirth and sacred duty; some of its sages believe elves are the devas of an earlier age. Hinomiya follows the Way of Myriad Spirits, shrine worship of nature spirits and ancestors, which its modern state is reshaping into devotion to the Emperor. Of all humans, these peoples find elven ancestor-veneration the least strange.]

29. #29Victorian culture, elf craze

    Keys: fashion, gentleman, corset, society, propriety, salon, penny dreadful, respectable, top hat, lady, high society, sylvanomania

    Enabled · After character · Order 34 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Human Society: Occidian high society is rigidly class-bound and publicly prudish, with strict rules of chaperones, calling cards and propriety, while privately it tolerates mistresses, brothels and discreet affairs among the powerful. Fashion means frock coats, top hats, bowlers and pocket watches for men, and corsets, bustles, gloves and parasols for women. Human capitals are in the grip of 'Sylvanomania', a craze for moonsilk gowns, starleaf tea salons, elven-style parlors and translated elven poetry. Penny dreadfuls depict elven women as ethereal, aloof and secretly insatiable. Nylith's arrival, the first elven noblewoman ever seen in the capital, is a society sensation: every hostess wants her, and every paper sketches her.]

30. #30Tech

    Keys: railway, camera, telegraph, electric, carriage, gas lamp, gaslight, train, newspaper, steam engine, factory, locomotive, photograph

    Enabled · After character · Order 35 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Human Modern Life: railways cross continents, telegraph cables link capitals in hours and steamships cross oceans in weeks. Cities are lit by gas, and the wealthiest districts have new electric arc lamps. Photography, typewriters, bicycles and the novelty telephone are spreading. Factories belch coal smoke, and slums crowd around them. To visiting elves, human cities are astonishing, filthy, loud and alive, and Nylith's delegation finds everything from trains to ice cream bewildering.]

31. #31Rifles, revolvers

    Keys: rifles, krausen, carbine, firearm, bayonet, revolver, berdanov, musket, harrow-lyle, rifle, pistol, gun, lebrun, cartridge

    Enabled · After character · Order 70 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Human Small Arms: breech-loading rifles firing metallic cartridges are standard in every human army. Bolt-action rifles fire 10 to 12 aimed shots a minute, are accurate to 800 yards and are deadly beyond 1,000. The newest models (Gallemont's Lebrun, Hohenmark's Krausen M88) use smokeless powder and box magazines. Older single-shot rifles such as the Martell-Harris and Berdanov are cheap and plentiful. Officers carry six-shot revolvers (the Aldwyn Harcourt, the Rusovian Nagarov); cavalry carry carbines and sabers; infantry fix long bayonets. An ordinary human conscript out-ranges the finest elven archer, though few elves have yet seen it done.]

32. #32Machine guns & artillery

    Keys: colter, howitzer, field gun, artillery, shrapnel, machine gun, shell, battery, mortar, cannon, ashcombe

    Enabled · After character · Order 71 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Human Heavy Weapons: the Ashcombe gun, a water-cooled, belt-fed machine gun firing 500 rounds a minute, is newly adopted and horrifying against massed charges. Older hand-cranked Colter guns are common on ships and forts. Field artillery means steel, rifled, breech-loading cannon firing explosive shells, shrapnel and canister out to three miles, chiefly Krausen guns from Hohenmark and Whitcombe guns from Aldwyn. Heavy siege guns and mortars reduce fortresses. Rockets serve for signaling and terror.]

33. #33Gunboats, ironclads

    Keys: cruiser, warship, clipper, gunboat, torpedo, battleship, ironclad, coaling, navy, fleet, steamship

    Enabled · After character · Order 72 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Human Navies: steam-powered, steel-armored warships. Ironclad battleships carry massive turret guns, and cruisers patrol the trade routes. Shallow-draft gunboats can steam up rivers to shell forts and cities, the tool that opened Hinomiya. Torpedo boats and naval mines guard harbors, and coaling stations are vital. Aldwyn's Eastern Squadron at Port Calloway is the strongest human fleet near elven waters, and its presence at Port Serith is a constant, unspoken argument. Fast sailing clippers carry somnalis past elven patrols.]

34. #34Bows, blades, armor with human equivalents

    Keys: arrow, longbow, archers, wardleaf, sword, starshard, elven army, evergreen guard, yewsong, elven soldier, arrows, archer, glaive, moonglaive, thornspear, silverbark

    Enabled · After character · Order 80 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Elven Arms (with human equivalents): Yewsong bow, a heartwood longbow of legendary quality; a master looses an arrow every three seconds, faster than a single-shot rifle, but reaches only about 300 yards. Starshard arrows, rune-etched heads that punch through steel plate like a musket ball, rare and costly. Moonglaive, a long-hafted curved blade like a guandao or halberd, carried by the Evergreen Guard. Thornspear, a pike for massed infantry. Wardleaf shield, a lacquered, rune-hardened shield that stops blades and arrows but not bullets. Silverbark lamellar, scale armor of lacquered wood and silver-steel plates, exquisite and useless against rifles. Hartguard, elite lancers on giant elk, devastating in forests but vulnerable to rifle and machine-gun fire in the open. Elven generals, having never faced human armies, trust these weapons completely.]

35. #35Wards vs. bullets

    Keys: spell, enchanted, healer, stormcaller, ward, mage, enchant, veilward, spellwarden, magic, sorcery, rune

    Enabled · After character · Order 81 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Elven Magic in War: elves wield magic far more naturally than humans. Spellwardens (battle-mages) raise shimmering Veilwards, shields that could halt a rifle volley for a few minutes, roughly like a stone wall, before the mage collapses from exhaustion; artillery shells would likely shatter them. Stormcallers summon rain, fog and lightning that could soak powder and blind gunners. Rune-carved city walls withstand cannon longer than stone should. Elven healers mend wounds that would kill a human. But all elven magic depends on individual mages trained for centuries, and a human factory produces a thousand rifles in the time it takes to train one Spellwarden. Human sorcery is rare and scholarly, surviving mainly in Al-Qamar.]

36. #36Emberreeds, bombards, trebuchets

    Keys: western studies, emberreed, trebuchet, thunderwyrm, fire-lance, ironwood arsenal, fire lance, bombard, siege, starfall

    Enabled · After character · Order 82 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Elven Siege and Fire Weapons: Emberreeds, bamboo-and-bronze fire-lances ignited by a flame-rune, equivalent to a crude hand cannon or early matchlock: one loud, inaccurate shot at 50 yards. Thunderwyrm bombards, ornate bronze muzzle-loading cannons cast in dragon shapes, roughly equal to 16th-century human cannon: short-ranged, slow, firing solid shot. Starfall engines, rune-charged trebuchets hurling glowing stones that burst like mortar shells, powerful but ponderous to aim. A few Western Studies scholars run the small experimental Ironwood Arsenal, trying to copy human rifles bought through Varenzan and Qamari dealers; the court treats it as an eccentric hobby.]

37. #37Junks and war-barges

    Keys: river patrol, leviathan, elven navy, junk, war-barge, elven ship, elven fleet, moonsail

    Enabled · After character · Order 83 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Elven Navies: Ilvanorë's fleet consists of Moonsail junks, tall wooden ships with battened silk sails and wind-runes that let them sail against the wind, armed with Thunderwyrm bombards and archers, and Leviathan war-barges, vast floating river fortresses. Vaelmyr's Wavecallers can raise waves and whirlpools. These fleets have never fought a steam warship. Their only contact has been chasing somnalis clippers, which easily outrun them, and a single skirmish in which a small Aldwyn gunboat scattered a dozen junks. Elven admirals dismissed it as a trick of weather.]

38. #38Taiping & Boxer analogs, early stage

    Keys: uprising, silver root, flood, silvermere floods, rebellion, saerith, starlit, secret society, rebel, famine, unrest, hollow tree, rootward

    Enabled · After character · Order 84 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Brewing Unrest in Ilvanorë: after the Silvermere floods, famine grips the south. There, Saerith the Enlightened, a failed examination scholar who read smuggled Radiant Mother scripture, preaches that he is the Mother's son sent to found a Starlit Kingdom of equality. Tens of thousands follow him, and officials fear open revolt. In the north, the Silver Root, a secret society of mystics and peasants, practices ritual martial arts, believes its 'Rootwards' can turn bullets, and threatens elves who work with humans, whom it calls 'hollow trees'. Both movements are still small enough to suppress, or to explode. Human powers are watching to see which way they break.]

39. #39Ties into the Reputation stat

    Keys: ballroom, soirée, reporter, opera, affair, embassy, scandal, soiree, blackmail, reputation, caught, rumour, journalist, gossip, rumor, dinner party

    Enabled · After character · Order 43 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Legation Society and Scandal: diplomats of every nation live in a small, glittering world of embassies, balls, dinners, salons and opera boxes, and servants, spies and journalists watch everything. As the first elven envoy ever seen in the capital, Nylith is watched more than anyone. Newspapers (the Lundhaven Chronicle, Le Moniteur of Sainte-Lumière, the Berholt Gazette) and the penny press would pay a fortune for a story about her indiscretion. Rival human diplomats would use it to wreck {{user}}'s negotiations or to blackmail Nylith. In Ilvanorë, a noblewoman's adultery means divorce, loss of dowry and exile from court; adultery with a human would be a catastrophe, would hand Commissioner Sunmere's hardliners a cause, and would disgrace House Eleniel as traitors. Captain Varos and the Silent Steward Maedhros watch her closely. Spreading rumors should lower Nylith's Reputation stat.]

40. #40Beastfolk, dwarves, half-elves

    Keys: dwarf, foxfolk, half elf, dwarves, half-elf, grundholt, dwarven, beastfolk, wolfkin, catfolk

    Enabled · After character · Order 90 · 100%

    Entry settings

    [Other Races: beastfolk (catfolk, wolfkin, foxfolk and more) live in both worlds. Human empires recruit them as soldiers, sailors and laborers, while in Ilvanorë they serve as border clans and Moonsilk Road caravaneers. Dwarves of Occidia's western mountains are master engineers whose foundries helped spark the Industrial Revolution; dwarven firms such as Grundholt & Sons build locomotives and artillery for every power. Half-elves are rare, mostly born of liaisons around Port Serith and Kaerwyn, and belong fully to neither world, which makes them ideal interpreters, smugglers and spies, and outcasts in elven society.]

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