Caelene/Cosmology
The Spirits
As the Second Balorian Crusade marched across the Threshold, Yu-shan was dealing with a war of its own. The unemployed spirits, which numbered far greater that originally thought, had been united under the banner of one of its own: Soma Haraja, the god of a forgotten city that was wiped out during the First Balorian Crusade. While the Second Crusade raged on in Creation, Soma Haraja's army spilled out of the poorer districts of Yu-Shan, surprising the more established gods. The Aerial Legions were called into action, but were hard-pressed to resists the waves of little gods filled with anger at their poor straits. The fighting was fierce, mimicing the advances of the fae in Creation below, and the rebelling forces were able to push towards the plaza which housed the Jade Pleasure Dome. As they reached the plaza, however, a blast of light poured out of the Done, blinding both sides of the conflict. As the light faded, the Celestial Gods were all standing in the plaza, looking VERY unhappy.
Those spirits who rebelled were thrown into a Starmetal Prison located deep in the Underworld, created by the few Sidereals who had not been involved with the fighting in Creation. It became a miniature Malfeas for the imprisoned spirits, which allowed those who dwelled within it to see what was happening in Creation, but did not allow them access. In time, these spirits were driven mad and fought with each other constantly. Their tale, however, shall be completed elsewhere.
The Celestines, having been pulled away from their Games, looked upon the Wyld-torn Creation and were horrorstruck. They spoke quickly on the matter, then made a decision: channeling their power through the Games, they would reshape the world below as best they could. This would leave them weakened, but it was the most they could do. They timed their sacrifice perfectly with the reactivation of the Realm Defense Grid below, their Essence wiping away the Wyld-taint as best as it could. Once completed, the Games laid silent for the first time since its creation. The spirits who remained in Yu-Shan were the first to notice that the gateways to Creation now led to stranger realms created by the Essence of the Celestines. Many travelled to these strange realms, while others fought their way through the odd webbing that had formed itself soon after the sacrifice had been completed, returning to Creation. Or so they thought.
The Essence that flooded the world to reshape it created an odd shadow which enveloped the new Creation. The strange webbing that had formed divided this shadow and the remade Creation. Spirits realized that this webbing was difficult to cross unless one found a gate in the webs, most located where manses once stood in Creation. Soon after this revelation was made, another one followed: Luna called the remaining leaders of the Bureaus together and, through some finagling, worked out a contract between the spirits and her Children and bound them to it through the Oath of an Eclipse whose name has passed into history. Although tribute would still be owed to the spirits, they would be bound to help the Lunars and their followers. Some chaffed under this proclamation, reminded of the oaths put on the demons of Malfeas after the Primordial War. However, they were still bound by the pledges of their superiors.
Over the years, the number of spirits in this Shadow grew, and they both changed and were changed by the actions in Creation. They aided Luna's shifter children at times, worked with those who inherited the powers of the Maidens at others. New rules were written, then broken, then written once more. Now, with the return of the Exalted, the spirit realms are all abuzz. What will happen now, they ask? That, one must say, is a very good question indeed.
The Triat
The Fera speak of a Triat who represent the three forces of the universe: Creation, Order, and Destruction. These three beings have their origins in the Second Age, and have changed as much as Creation has in the time between that Age and this one.
The Wyld
The Wyld has always existed. The Wyld will always exist in some fashion. During the Second Age, it sat on the borders of Creation, warping madly those who dared to enter. As the world was remade, however, the Wyld found itself pushed into Elsewhere. It was still connected to Creation, allowing its influence to be felt, but could never change and warp the land with abandon. The most noticeable area of the Wyld can be seen in a place in the Shadow known as the Flux by the Fera. Here, the Deep Wyld boils and writhes, changing those who enter it almost before they can blink. Some of the denizens of this Realm are shards of the Raksha who were destroyed during the Reshaping, while others are actually Unshaped and other Raksha who managed to remain whole.
The Weaver
Asna the August Weaver, the prototype for the pattern spiders that worked the Loom, was unswervingly loyal to the Great Maker that created her. However, she held some respect for the Primordial who had become She Who Lived Her Name. This was mainly due to the fact that some of her internal mechanics were constructed from what remained of one of the glass orbs that the Yozi had tossed into Creation as she was dragged into Malfeas. As the chaos raged both in and out of Creation, more tears within the Loom appeared than the pattern spiders could patch up. Asna, seeing no other way to keep Creation in one piece, reached out to the Yozi through the glass parts within her. She Who Lives In Her Name, who had originally been unaware of this connection to the Loom, grasped hold and merged almost completely with the spider. Almost.
As one could expect, even a creation of the Great Maker could not fully house an entity such as a Yozi. Thus, Asna went completely insane, spinning more and more to create order in the chaos that surrounded her. Her pattern spiders followed suit, creating more and more threads to the Loom until they divided it into an upper and lower section: the upper dealing with the material world and the lower with the spiritual. However, Asna was not satisfied with this, and continued to spin, working to make everything calm, everything static. Everything...unchanging.
In time, the Apocalypse that had been looming on the horizon for centuries came to be. The Weaver's drones went out en masse to try and keep the Gauntlet intact while the forces of the Wyrm fought the Garou in the Umbra. At the climax of the battle, nearly all of the Fera sacrificed themselves in a ritual similar to that which the Croatan did while standing at the heart of Malfeas; the massive rush of Gnosis purged both the Wyrm and the Weaver, restoring some measure of sanity to both. The Weaver has been quiet ever since the ritual, her spiders repairing the rents in the Gauntlet but doing little to provoke others. It is thought by the remaining Glass Walkers that Grandmother Spider is doing a long-overdue diagnostics check.
The Wyrm
As the Realm descended into chaos, the Ebon Dragon chuckled. This was exactly what he had been waiting centuries for. For, you see, he had found a way that enough of his followers could leave the Demon Realm to allow HIM passage out, bringing the world into a darkness that they could not even imagine. However, She Who Lives In Her Name - who had bound herself to Asna, the August Weaver - caught wind of this plot, and did what she could to stop it. She informed the Dragon that she wished to aid him in his ventures, what with having her own connection to Creation and all. Although wary, he went to this meeting. Once there, She Who Lives In Her Name used Asna's webs, filled with her own power, to bind the Dragon in place. Oh, how the Realm shuddered that day! The Dragon thrashed and writhed, but was unable to release himself from his bonds. In fact, his flailings crushed his fetich; when this occurred, a roar echoed throughout the Demon Realm and into Creation itself, causing a brief pause to those who were fighting there.
Where there was once one Dragon, there were now three: He Who Defiles, He Who Consumes Souls, and The Beast Who Brings War. These three bickered constantly, all driven insane both by their bindings and by their division. The demons who served the Dragon changed as well, becoming more like their lords. The other Yozis were outraged at what She Who Lives In Her Name had done to her brother, but were fearful of suffering the same fate. They began positioning themselves in a new hierarchy of sorts, watched over by the crazed Three-Headed Dragon. She Who Lives In Her Name was pleased by this turn of events, and turned her attention to other issues.
The Three-Headed Dragon worked to remove themselves from the Weaver's webs, and gathered some of Luna's Children to their side. These shifters were his shock troops, acting in the roll that the original Dragon had planned for his Akuma servants: a way out of his prison. When the time came, the horns of Malfeas sounded and the Apocalypse truly began. The fight remained in the Umbra for the most part, with the mortals of the world none the wiser. Led by visions granted to them by Luna, a group of Fera were able to reach the Heart of the Wyrm, it's fetich. The ritual done there, which involved many of the Fera to sacrifice themselves, killed the fetich. The shockwaves of the Three-Headed Dragon's death rippled through both the Umbra and Creation, causing all to fall silent.
The creature that emerged from the Weaver's now-slack webs was a thing of balance. Where the original Dragon was a creature of darkness, this Dragon was the line between dark and light, between chaos and order. This new Dragon remains in Malfeas, which has changed greatly since the Wyrm's rebirth.
Yu-Shan
Much like Creation below, Yu-Shan was in shambles after the rebellion ended. Many of the spirits who remained had left for greener pastures, and even the Celestines departed, leaving for a realm which they had created as their new home. Thus, the mostly-empty city was left to Asna and her spiders. As the years went on, her webs wrapped around every building, remaking them in her own image. In time, this City where the Weaver held sway would become known to the Cyberrealm by those who could traverse the Umbra. Within the center of the City is the Loom, where Asna sits and watches.
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