Godbound/Scion: The Titans, Part 2

A continuation of last month's expansion/rework of the Titans. These include Titans from not one but three different pantheon and Titanic Realm/origin, united by the common thread of their role within the setting.

The Progenitor Of Monsters

The most simplistic and obvious role for a Titan is to act as a direct or indirect source for monstrous antagonist. There is nothing inherently wrong with such a 'simple' feature and role, however. Mythologically speaking, monsters play an important role. They also happen to be quite iconic, always interesting, weird and most importantly very cool for people to use in their games. Monsters inspire both awe and terror in equal measure. Even in the 20th and 21st century we remain obsessed with monsters, our popular culture replete with supernatural monstrosities, alien terrors, demented slasher and the byproduct of science gone wrong. The monster is both an 'other' and a force of nature, primeval and terrible.

Some Titans are particularly tied to the birthing of monsters. It simply is in their very nature to be these dreaded forces of primordial fertility, giving birth to uncountable terrors. As some of the Titans have stirred, they have started to cast a shadow on the world. Their offspring have begun to slip through the 'cracks in the world' to terrorize a new generation of mortal and heroes alike.

Tiamat

Associated Realms: Beast, Water

Godbound Word: Beast, Fertility and Sea

Art by Victor Adame

The ever-fecund and primordial Tiamat is among the most archetypal of the Titans-as-progenitor. She is called the 'Mother of all Monsters' and is hideous to behold, an impossible amalgam of all traits which both exist and do not exist in nature. Tiamat's form is that of all beasts and monsters who ever threatened mankind and the Gods. With the Titans stirring, Tiamat's influence has crept back and her brood has begun to encroach upon the world and domain of the gods alike. In time she may seek to resurrect her husband, Apsu, but for now the direct threat she pose to any Scion is through the proliferation of her broods.

Limitless in their forms and permutation (but with a slight preference for predatory animals and sea monsters, naturally), the myriad offsprings of Tiamat run the gamut of small (relatively speaking) predatory monsters with limited intellect to much more dangerous beasts with shocking mental capacity, albeit ever predatory and primal. The greatest of her spawns are more akin to being likened to great dragons but this nomenclature is purely a side effect of modern popular culture associating great, vaguely reptilian beasts as 'dragons'. Her brood is truly limitless.

Spawns of Tiamat

As previously mentioned, Tiamat has an endless variety of Titanspawns of all shape and size obeying the will of their great mother. Her offspring are creature of primal aspects of beasts and ancient chaos, with maws filled with row of teeth, great wingspan or coiling tails which encircle entire buildings. Many of them display poisonous traits in some capacity.

• The least of Tiamat's Spawn are analogous to not only Thralls, but also the Chimera and Nemean, even if some argue that Tiamat's equivalent to such creature are a breed apart from the 'baseline' Nemean, if such a thing is even possible. Tiamat does not create human-derived Thralls (her essence is too distinct and opposite to humanity) and instead her 'primordial mud' or 'ichor' infuse animals of all kind.
• The ranks of Tiamat's Titanspawns lacks Giants in the traditional sense. While many of her spawns are indeed gigantic creatures, very few if any are of a humanoid body plan.
• Tiamat does not and cannot create Scion. Her nature is fundamentally opposite to humanity.

Echidna

Associated Realms: Beast, Earth

Godbound Word: Beast, Fertility and Might or Alacrity

Art by Genzoman

On the surface, Echidna is very much like Tiamat. Both are primordial creatures and bear a title of 'Mother of Monsters'. The devil is in the details, of course: for one thing Echidna is the child of Gaia and an ever so slightly less primordial monstrosity than Tiamat. Her form include human elements and she is a much more seductive entity: beautiful, fecund and rapacious. She is the monstrous mother of the greatest and most iconic of mythological beasts, such as the infamous Chimera. Each of her children became such a myth that they became a byword for all later monsters.

Tiamat's brood is endless but Echidna is a crafter and nurturer. Her monstrous children are quality over quantity. She doesn't really love her children in a traditional sense and can be a harsh parent but her spawns which survive their short childhood and her dangerous tutelage are dangerous beasts. She nurse a powerful grudge against the Gods, especially the Greek ones, who have treated her offspring as almost of a diversion to challenge and amuse their Scion.

Spawns of Echidna

Echidna's children tend to be less chaotic and nightmarish than Tiamat's mishmashes monsters. They tend to combine features of two or more animals into an amalgamated whole, with the Chimera being the most famous example of these. Like a cross between a mad scientist and an obsessives parent with expectations too high for their children, the modern Echidna is obsessively breeding 'the next big thing'. A new monster for the new era, the modern Chimera.

• Like Tiamat, Echidna mainly produce Chimeras (fittingly!) and Nemean. Its only fair, given these two terms come from two of her infamous children. Unlike Tiamat, who prefer predatory animals, Echidna has no particular preferences and anything non-human will do. Her most mundane creations compensate any lack of power with sheer ferocity and vigor.
• The Titanspawns of Echidna are all animalistic amalgamation. She has never directly recreated her 'classics' (such as the original Chimera) but some of the lesser descendants of these original spawns may still exist.
• The rare Scions of Echidna are all born Scions. Echidna is quite capable of taking the form of a beautiful woman with rapacious sexual appetite and she often mate with mortal men, only to devour them. She doesn't control completely what is born as a Scion and what is born as a Titanspawn and in some cases she has birthed twins, one which is human-like and one which is a monster completely removed from humanity.

Shuten-Doji

Associated Realms: Destruction(?), Chaos(?)

Godbound Word: Might, Endurance and Sorcery

Art by Christian Villacis

Some Titans and their Avatars are well defined things. Others are somewhat more complicated to ascertain, as their identities and mantles have been passed down through the ages. Both Shuten-Doji and Ibaraki-Doji have been associated with the status of being 'Leaders of the Demons in Japan' but where exactly they come from and what Titan they are associated with is a bit unclear. Having once faded into myth following its defeat by the potential Scion Minamoto Raikou, a new Shuten Doji has emerged with the stirring of the Titans in the modern day. As with all beings labelled as 'Oni', they are a dangerous creature of immense physical power. This new Shuten-Doji is just as much an agent of chaos and destruction as the original.

Unlike Tiamat and Echidna, Shuten-Doji doesn't directly birth its minions. Instead, styling itself as a power hungry warlord, it recruit most of its minion to its cause. Power, pleasure and more drive the various agenda of Shuten-Doji rather than true political or ideological cause. They are hedonist in the purest, simplest and most barbaric form: they enjoy good food, good wine (well, any alcohol really) and women. Or, men, too as the Oni hordes of the modern Shuten Douji include folks of all sex and tastes. In his own twisted way, Shuten-Douji is an egalitarian. Only might, cruelty and dedication to mayhem really matters to his minions. Anyone who disagree is free to disagree and let their fists decide.

Spawns of Shuten-Doji

A sizeable portion of Shuten-Doji's minions are miscellaneous Oni, as well as semi independent Giants from different mythologies which have flocked to his banner. Those minions which Shuten-Doji creates aren't born directly from him but, rather, he empower hordes of Thralls and mold men and beast into monsters more akin to himself: larger, powerful and rapacious. While Tiamat and Echidna represent monsters and beasts born of nature itself, it could be said Shuten-Doji's hordes are monsters born of mankind. Humanity reduced to its most petty self.

• Titanspawns of Shuten-Doji are rare, but generally created through indirect means rather than directly from Shuten-Doji itself. Their form is, invariably, that of Oni. Which is to say they are large and monstrous, ogre-like creatures. Horns, brightly colored skins and tusks are the norm. In addition to those he create, Shuten-Doji also 'adopt' rogue Giants and Titanspawns into himself.
• There are Scions of Shuten-Doji and most are Chosen, from those mortals who would be best suited to be Shuten Doji's generals rather than mere thralls. Given the sexual appetite of Oni, there are also born Scion of Shuten-Doji but his chaotic nature mean they are just as likely to rebel against him as they are to obey him.

Godbound: Cults and Demiurges of the (Alternate) Bright Republic

This post is (hopefully) a work of fiction.

A continuation of the (depressing) post from last time on an alternate Bright Republic where society is about to collapse and everyone is breaking at the seams, only what's coming is the cruel realities of the world of Godbound and its realm, Arcem. These are cult, cabals and malcontents of the Bright Republics. Everything is ten minutes from midnight. Society is at a breaking point. In a world where divine power and transhumanism exist, this can lead many down to a darker path.

The Khamite Ascendency

Art by Tiago Baltar

The Polyarchy of Kham was the nation/people which the Ancalian and others descend and they were quite focused on transhumanism. In the Bright Republic, advanced transhumanism beyond attempts at restoring a body to its original function through medical means are generally banned. Knowledge of human modifying their bodies and souls to greater, immortal beings is generally something that is seen as the purview of science fiction novels. The various movements of Khamite Ascendency wish to return humanity to a state closer to this Godhood.

Too bad they are crazy, bigoted assholes working off incomplete information and cooky theories. The Khamite Ascendancy movements believe that their ancestors were unfairly stripped of their divine perfection, enslaved and turned from immortals to mere mortal slaves. What they don't know/forgot is that the ancient Akeh people which fled to the proto Bright Republic were those who had come to regret the excess of the Polyarchy. Perfected bodies free of diseases are one thing but the Polyarchy took this transhumanist movement to absolute extremes, modifying themselves into beings utterly removed from humanity. These dangerous modifications created beings known as the Fey/Cousins (see: Ancalia the Broken Towers) who became so unstable once natural laws began to shift that they degenerated into mad monsters or even flat out died. The various Ascendency movements are working off incomplete and incorrect information, based off an idealized mythical past and a lot of wishful thinking. This has led them to become intensely racially segregated at best and, at worst, they have begun to practice soft eugenics.

A few powerful businessmen with Akeh ancestors have backed up many of these would-be attempts at eugenics, funding underground both clinics. These attempted process at creating super men of 'pure genetic heritage' have been met with intense failure usually resulting in rather mundane problems such as genetic defect and increased cancer. With little success in these clinics, they have turned to poorer urban and rural populations and young, ill educated malcontents. Their rhetoric is clad in righteous indignation at supposed past transgression but the heads of these movements don't really feel any sense of loyalty to fellow Akeh-descended folks. They see all flesh and all colors as nothing but fuel for the great fire of genetic rebirth which awaits them, fully committed to the fact the moment they will succeed their creation will deem them all impure. Already, they have begun incubating fast-growing embryo which they believe to be 'purified Akeh', based off illegally obtained genetic material from Ancalia...

The Machination Cults and Cyber-Gods

Art by Tsvetomir Georgiev

Where the Akeh tried to advance the human form and flesh to godhood, the Din sought to create great mechanism to control the world. These ranged from what we would recognize as technological marvels of our age or near future to more complex systems, including synthetic life and mechanical gods. Where the Khamite Ascendancies movements are angry malcontents, people with a victim complex and feeding off a sense of 'divinity denied', these various Din-derived movements are much stranger. Much of the Bright Republic's culture is Din in origin and much of Din 'mythology' is built around recognizable modernist ideas that technology and science will improve life. Many Din-descended folks thought that their society was an ideal through its technological superiority and, given the constant crackdowns against any technology the government cannot control and regulate, there's been a growing sense that the Bright Republic has "rejected the Din ideals".

While these movements and cults are rooted in Din cultural ideals, there is no racial component to these cults. The core of their ideologies is that mankind can build devices and discover new ways to interact with the world. As technology decays in the Bright Republic and every advance is stifled and/or controlled by government and corporate lobbies (as to not strain the etheric nodes or risk damaging them if modifications would be needed to make use of the invention), more and more scientists grow discontent. As fate would have it, discontent mad scientists and ancient cooky ideological cults of 'Din ideals' met one day in a back alley and things have escalated out of control. Under the nose of (or sometimes with the illegal support of) the Bright Republic's government, there have arisen cults of would-be 'futurist'.

In some circumstances, these could have been a good thing. Unfortunately, at some point, the ideas that man's progress and rights "Shall not be infringed" have definitely become warped. That is because these cults have succeeded much faster than the Khamite ascendants, since the basis of their theurgical knowledge already existed in society. Rural militias, would be entrepreneur, garage inventors, hackers, punks and more these people aren't dangerous by themselves. Underneath the control network of the Bright Republic, however, these people have created/awakened divine intelligences. They are incubating a new generation of technological demiurges. Should they attempt a revolution in the name of personal liberty, access to knowledge and advancement of sciences their victory could be short lived as the machine gods overtake the Etheric Nodes, the internet and their own devices. That is because, you see, this type of research has been done before. In the Bleack Reaches and Nezdhova...

The Procyon Project

Art by Deepak Dhawan

Known under a variety of names, all covert and all secretly illegal, the Procyon Project is the brainchild of several institutes within the Bright Republic government. It operates hidden under their nose and is dedicated to projects which go against the core tenets and agenda of the current (and all future?) administration. They've been at it for decades, now. The project heads and founders are part of the various factions which believe the Bright Republic to be completely lost and beyond repair. Under their secretive orders, entire facilities have been relocated, experts kidnapped and brainwashed and massive ton of materials displaced to secret locations. All in the name of the Procyon Project, the 'Great Gateway'.

The heads of the project have located a fairly isolated chunk of Heaven. While heavily damaged and mostly ripped out of its Celestial Engines, it remain stable, self contained and seemingly away from the gaze of powerful entities. It is, for all intent and purpose, empty and secret. Under the auspice of dimensional studies, the Procyon Project has spent the last few decades preparing to relocate its people and their resources to this part of Heaven. They have acquired samples of most of the population (which the government already had for gene-tracking), which is enough genetic material to recreate mankind. Since the Bright Republic is going down in flame and Arcem is likely to crumble, they have deemed it to be a lost cause. In order to ensure the survival of humanity (read: themselves), the Procyon project has spared no expenses in trying to terraform this relatively small shard of Heaven. It is believed, by their experts, that it will remain stable in its core functions within the next ten thousand years. This is, they believe, enough time to develop the means to restore more of its function and laws.

Because they require access to a Night Road to get there, much of the research of the Procyon Project is responsible for the eruption of small pockets of Uncreated activity within the Republic. Their experiments require them to 'punch holes' in reality and experts estimate that, as they continue to approach the 'promised time' that Uncreated activity will only increase.

Other Cults and Conspiracies

These are but a mere sample of what is going on in the Bright Republic. Truth is, just about everyone is either willingly or unwillingly the puppet of one or more organization or conspiracy. Everyone is a tool and everyone is bought to someone, somewhere they just don't know it. There is a growing list of groups and/or problems which add fuel the fire of the Bright Republic burning down.

• The Atheocracy of Lom and their cult of True Reason has grown in power. Social fabric in the Bright Republic was always on the more cold and rational side, which align perfectly given the two societies are of Din origin. The removal of God/Gods as the final arbiter of all thing in favor of impersonal state forces and organizations mean that the people of the Bright Republic are one step away from being like the Atheocracy.
• There are people in the Bright Republic who are of Ren descent and their ancestor-cults and worship of the True King have re-emerged, just like some Akeh have flirted with transhumanism and the Din turn back to synthetic gods. Their loyalty may not be to the Republic.
• The political and entertainment elites regularly get a pass to defy or ignore any and all government regulations, such as limitations on buying meat, going on vacations during periods of lockdown and suppression and more. They gorge themselves and enjoy life even during times when the common people can't enjoy life. The production of the resources and energy department in the Bright Republic are extremely one sided. This is coated in fearmongering and economic policies framed as people consuming less to help the poor yet in practice it isn't that.
• The poor which try to apply to a variety of government programs which claim to help them are sometimes never seen again. In truth many of these people are sent to extermination camps, genetic research facilities or even sold to slavery to other states in Arcem after having their minds scrubbed. This is to constantly purge and cut down on the population.
• Human trafficking has always been a problem but with cut down on population and a 'planned reduction', there has been an increase in human chattel and sexual slavery. The rich politician and actors have mind scrubbed slaves. The rest are used as raw materials or the aforementioned slave trade. Some have begun to research means to turn human souls into energy to sustain the Etheric Nodes.
• Meat is increasingly illegal in the Bright Republic in order to cut down on food spent on livestock and the 'printing' of synthetic meat. Vegan lifestyles are being encouraged and the cost/taxes on meat are ever increasing, all in the name of helping society in the environment. A sizeable portion of the meat on the market might be human meat.
• Hidden beneath the island are ruins of past incarnations of the Republic and shattered pocket-realms leading into Night Roads. These are haven of mutants and degraded scum. As the mutant kingdoms are organizing, the Bright Republic is increasingly unable to hide their existence and placate them.
• Religious resurgence is an issue in the Bright Republic, as classic religious values clash with blind obedience to an immoral state with no virtues. While the people who cling to religious values and a return to sanity aren't bad people, in the societal confusion of the collapsing Bright Republic many could become swayed by a 'false messiah' which could be an Uncreated entity or a particularly vicious and self-serving Godbound.

Ultimately, either the people in power or people at the bottom will snap. The Bright Republic will come undone by not only the sheer weight of lies it peddled but by a complete loss if faith in it as an idea. When everything become subjective and faith is lost in its wholeness as a county and as an institution (and people already have lost faith) the the street will run red with blood. Then the lives, livelihood and very soul of twelve million people become nothing more than a prize for monsters, crazed godlings, demented demagogues, irrational social engineers and criminal scum.

Godbound: An Alternative Bright Republic

Basically, 'What if the Bright Republic was a big conspiracy'. Of course, because Godbound is very heavy on its shades of grey, things are a little more complex than the evil corporate overlords and social engineers lording over us for their own greedy end. Its also exactly just that, too. Yet it is also the tale of freedom sacrificed for the sake of sanity and comfort.

Its For Your Own Good 

Art by Roger Creus Dorico

Obey the government. Listen to the media, the experts. They know better than you. Things might not always be perfect, in fact there's not a day without some scandal that last ten minutes or some political problem or societal issue. Yet, overall, for the people of the Bright Republic the world make sense. They are an island nation, living in the present day. Their world is one of technology, of science and reason. That much is known. Pay no attention to this which tell otherwise: they are liars, grifters, conspiracy theorist and peddlers of misinformation.

There are no such things as Gods and Monsters.

Except its all true. Because the Bright Republic exist in Arcem, a Realm in the Godbound universe. Its population is lied to on a constant basis, with subtle mind-altering memetic messages to ensure they believe the world to be a globe, that the wider world is akin to what we'd recognize loosely as modern day Earth and that Gods and monsters aren't real. It isn't that the masterminds behind the Republic are pure evil (although they can indeed be very evil and corrupt): it's that the alternative, the truth, is so terrible that it would shatter the minds of its citizen. Let's say YOU found out, some day, that the Earth is actually a broken shard floating around seas of un-creation where monsters come out of the darkness to unmake reality all because Manmade Gods fought to control Heaven and destroyed the world. How would you react? If you had absolute proof of this? You'd go mad.

When the Bright Republic was established, it was arguably one of the more 'sedated' places in Arcem: its people wanted to build a world where advanced technology would enhance human lives without overriding its existence. These ideals were noble compared to techno eugenics or being forcibly fused into the thought-patterns of Divine Artificial Intelligences. In their rather retro futuristic world, the people of what would become the Bright Republic walked a balanced between the comforts of high technology with the liberty (and limitations) of baseline human existence. In a way, their approach to technology and theurgy was similar to how the Amish do: all technologies had to be considered for a time before being applied to society. In that way, the way of life of people would not be instantly upset and drastically changed in ways which the rulers and people alike would have difficulty coping with.

Innocence Lost

Art by Dan Henk

The current state of Arcem has forced the Bright Republic to ever increasingly lie to its public. The Bright Republic is all which remains of the Arcem of old, as everything else has degraded into the post apocalyptic techno-magical world we know from the Godbound book. Castles and ruins, demons and monsters. Sword and sorcery, you could say. Every piece of information produced within the Bright Republic is a lie. Every scientific data is falsified. Every historical record is falsified. These are produced through Theotechnical wonders (which are rapidly breaking down) and amplified through the technology which is sent from the Etheric Nodes. People who go on vacations to other countries enter planes that take off and then land on small islands off the coast, where their minds are remolded to create false (but interesting and happy) memories.

This state of being was NOT what the founders of the Bright Republic wanted. However as the damage of the war over Heaven accelerated, it increasingly found it difficult to control immigration to its stable, etheric node-controlled lands. Not only that but many people from Kham carried with them transgenic modifications which either enhanced their bodies or minds. These people found themselves forcibly re-altered and 'neutered' to maintain a more egalitarian world view, as heavy transhumanism was taboo in the Bright Republic. In time, the Uncreated night kept creeping. The region which became the Bleak Reaches became increasingly alien and dystopian. It simply reached a point where the outside world was too much of a living nightmare, filled with monsters, mutations and war. Society was at a breaking point. Drastic measures had to be taken,

And so, the Bright Republic sacrificed Freedom for Security. Where once theotechnical means of control over the human mind and soul were illegal in the Bright Republic, it became the norm. Not as a mean to enhance humans but to control them and ensure they were kept 'sane'. Entire centuries of history were rewritten. Records were falsified. Then the nano-eidolon shrouds were released, creeping in everyone's brains to rewrite their mind's pathways. Artificial intelligences were created to help oversee these networks of control. Society and technology in the Bright Republic has been going downward for centuries now but people don't realize it. Since humans live around a maximum of seventy or eighty years, history is regularly rewritten, rebooted and reset. Past centuries are then cast as time of oppression, of war and terror where untold number of people died, reframed as a great narrative. All this to explain the mass extermination and lobotomization of past generations to hide that technology and lifestyles had to be downscaled to meet the limits of the Republic's current and ever-decaying technology.

Cryptids and Conspiracies

Art by Leo Colapietro

Every single conspiracy theory is true in the Bright Republic or, at the very least, make good fuel for an adventure. Cryptids are a good example: the truth is that, as the Celestial Engines are failing, mutations are growing in number. Lesser mutations are blamed on pollution and environmental issues but once in a while, a true monstrosity is born. These become the shaggy ape-men who live in the woods, the sea monsters and other creatures. Those which aren't found quickly are usually those whose twisted nature make them hard to detect even for divine-level beings. They warp time, space and mind around them.

There are shady 'Men in Black' and creepy doctors in white coats scattered across the Republic. These are either people without identity (having been erased from society and history) or artificial life forms. Such transhumanism was once banned in the Bright Republic's previous incarnations but as things have become more and more dire, such beings have been created. Of course, for the most part they don't actually target people who post on the internet about things the media have deemed 'conspiracies'. These are relatively harmless compared to what is classified as an 'Intrusion'. An 'Intrusion' is what happen when something akin to an Uncreated cult has sprung or a local area's laws of physics have started to degrade. These are far more pressing threats than a simple podcast or internet comment.

The threat of Intrusions are real, even if the Bright Republic has become little more than a paranoid and demented totalitarian state in the pocket of elites whose laws are passed to benefit them and no one else. Unfortunately what they don't realize is that this very elitism and abuse of power has fed into the Intrusion. Or maybe some of them do realize but don't care. Pockets of proto-cults to the Uncreated Night have sprung all over the country over the last decade. Even with the ever increasing censorship of information, angry and discontent people with meaningful reasons to be pissed are slowly taken in by the lure of ruinous forces. Desire for reform, freedom and meaningful revolution are twisted into depression, anger, rage and utter discontent for the lives of anyone else. Meanwhile, religious fervor is in upswing as people desperately need something to believe in the face of their society slowly crumbling yet the government and culture has heavily attacked faith, since it demand only faith in the state, the media and institutions. The moment a Godbound emerges within the Bright Republic, for all to see, it will be a reckoning: they could be a saint or a monster but it wouldn't matter so much as people find something to follow and believe in that isn't sterile decadence.

Cults to horrific powers aren't the only ones which have sprung. A few ancient, so-called 'Mystery Cults' have emerged. These are the survivors of older incarnations of the Bright Republic, before it became the one we know today over the last century. These range from ancient, abstract cults to the ancient machine gods of the ancient Din, who are the distant ancestors of the Bright Republic. As the fabric of society unravel, these mystery cults turn to theotechnical and theurgical knowledge which have long been proscribed and erased from culture by the current ruling elites of the Republic. Others are resurgent ancient religion and ideologies of the non-Din folks (such as the Ren, Akeh and other less known minor groups). Rejecting the current society they turn back to what their ancestors believed in and forment coup and plots to assume control over the crumbling Bright Republic, they too having been driven to despair and believing nothing can be saved. Lacking the resources and a complete understanding of their history and own belief system, they are little more than pathetic malcontents which would be laughed at as mere pretenders by the outside world.

Even the media and government aren't immune to the Intrusion: their own selfish greed and desire for adoration and power has left many even more corrupt than people can even imagine as they've started to sell out the Bright Republic to outer powers: some to Uncreated cults too, others to the Atheocracy of Lom. Others sell out not out of ideology but simply believing they will emerge on top once it all crumble and have begun to cut deals with Vissio or the artificial intelligences of Nezdovha, two nations interested in the infrastructure of the Etheric nodes.

The Special Resources Department

The Bright Republic need not be a place for antagonist to exist and oppress people. One must understand the Bright Republic's overlord have done this to survive. Yes, mainly to save their own asses but also the entire population of currently around twelve million. The world as presented in Godbound is a dangerous place: the Uncreated are monsters, dangerous Blighted mutations randomly spring forth and other, even stranger monsters, exist. The Bright Republic's SRD is akin to a cross between the BRPD of Hellboy and the fictional version of the FBI/CIA. They aren't 'heroes' in the modern sense, as their job often require them to be callous with individual lives but they aren't monster out to oppress people.

The important thing to remember to keep things in perspective is that, every time this comes off as 'really creepy', one need to look back at the setting material presented in Godbound and Worlds Without Numbers. These twelve million people aren't ready to face what's outside. Yet, at the same time the sheer monstrosity of the Bright Republic's lies cannot endure.

Godbound/Scion: The Titans, Part 1

Recently I've finally gotten the chance to give a decently thorough reading of Scion's Second Edition and its lore. As is typical and expected of White Wolf Onyx Path, just about everything in there is seriously quite the mixed bag. For every idea expanded and reworked into something better suited to developing a campaign and characters there are ten more terrible ideas. In particular, the Titans have seen a fairly massive chance: their nature and roster, in particular, have been both expanded and yet also contracted. Titans have gained in variety and what is defined as a 'Titan' as well as gained new and interesting ways to interact with the world. Yet, at the same time, they have become smaller (pun intended). Gone are the massive Titan Realms and the idea that Titans are these vaster, more primordial beings, at least in comparison to 1st edition lore.

This is my own rework of the Titans, combining what I personally consider to be the best part of either version of the lore, as well as notes and scraps which survived from John's Scion Resources. There will be quite a bit of incoherence where the old lore meet the new lore. This is perfectly intentional, as this gray area of where the lore changed between version of the games add further gray areas to what Titans are as well as what they could be.

A lot of these ideas also overlap with my Urban Fantasy concepts. This is because I've taken quite a bit of cues over the years from games such as Scion. Unsurprisingly a lot of material could end up reused in some capacity for either games and, as such, these posts are also tagged as 'Urban Fantasy'.

The Nature of Titans

Marduk vs Tiamat by Christian Johnson

Defining what a Titan is will be a complicated matter, as previously mentioned, due to the fusion of 1st and 2nd edition lore. Some of them are truly massive, primordial beings, less of an individual and more of an aspect of a greater concept, as these often were in the game's first edition. Others are more classified as such due to their action and nature in opposing the gods of a pantheon. Then there are beings which would be Titan by nature, but aren't because they aren't directly opposed to the gods of a pantheon. The Titans are beings which can/must include on or more the following traits in order to be classified as a Titan:

• Some Titans are Titans by Nature. All Titans share a connection with one or more concept of the natural world. This doesn't always make a being a Titan, as there are obviously Gods tied to such concepts, but the Titanic beings whose nature is Titan-like tend to embody these concepts on a less 'human' level and more of a 'conceptual' level which makes them appear more alien to the Gods and mortals alike.
• Some Titans are by Calling, which make them beings whose archetypal nature make them enemies of the Gods. They are adversarial, destructive and/or tyrannical beings which the Pantheon have held at bay, defeated and/or locked away.
• Some Titans are simply Titans because they are Monstrous. There may be gods with monstrous traits, yes, but some Titans are monsters on an archetypal level. This is the natural state of beings such as Jormungandr, Apep or Typhon. These also include beings which are Titans-like or Titan-derived through their own nature, even if they seemingly defy taxonomy.

This slightly contradictory nature does mean that the Titan roster include both the vast, cosmic beings of 1st Edition (which were called Titan Avatars) as well as the more oddball beings of 2nd edition which are always tied to a specific element or concept. Some Titans are tied to the Titanrealms (which are both a location and part of their body/essence) while others are more akin to rogue agents.

• Titans can create Titanspawns, which is the somewhat catch-all term for their minions. How exactly they are created varies, ranging from actual physical birth to more abstract creation as well as the infusion of a Titan's power into another being, such as creating massive Nemean beasts or deliberate twisting of a mortal into a semi-divine monstrosity.
• A rare few Titans can create Scions. This is not a common ability, especially not for the more primordial of the Titans but the 'lesser' of the Titans, those singular beings of great power and destruction often posses the ability to create Scions. Generally most posses only a single mean/type of Scion they create, such as creating them the 'old fashioned way' (such as the rogue being and enemy of the Shen, 'White Eyebrows' impregnating a woman) or through slightly more arcane creation means. A rare few Titans have taken up the concept of Chosen or Incarnation, but this is a somewhat slow and abstract process where a mortal is slowly remolded, through their actions (accidental or deliberate) into a Scion/incarnation of a Titan.

Lands of Mirhne: The Sorcerers, Part 2

For some on Mirhne, the term 'Sorcerer' conjure up the image of evil foreign wizards. They are foul men indebted to even fouler gods with 'unnatural' features to the Men of Mirhne. The isolation of Mirhne's culture has bred a certain level of xenophobia. To some extent this is to be expected or even healthy, as in their barbaric world anything which is foreign is a potential enemy or rival. One Sorcerer has exploited this stereotype willingly and openly, marking himself as a strange and vile exotic threat, preying on the superstition of the Men of Mirhne.

Arash Adraj, the 'Man of the South' (The Trickster)

Art by Duy An Doh.

The sorcerer who call himself Arash Adraj is the archetypal evil sorcerer from foreign lands. His features are either swarthy and hideous or strangely thin and sallow. His clothing, whichever form it take, is always strange and exotic and colorful compared to the more drab colors of the Men of Mirhne. He is either bald with busy eyebrows or sporting a magnificent beard which is style in odd and foreign ways. Whenever he does appear, he conjure the image of all which is alien and exotic. The men of Mirhne fear him as the evil foreigner with inscrutable goals, who speak in forbidden tongues and worship evil foreign gods.

In truth, this is (mostly) an act. For he is The Trickster.

A master of disguise and illusions, the man who goes by the current identity of 'Arash Adraj' has had many names thanks to his extended life span and unnatural powers, the only things the Sorcerers share among each others. He is the weakest of the Sorcerers and the only one which has likely been born in past centuries, to some isolated island folks to the deepest south of Mirhne. Ethnically and culturally distinct as they might have been they were still cousins to the men of Mirhne and not evil, devils-worshiping barbarians. Should one dig into the past of Arash Adraj they would, perhaps, be able to discover that he is the most recent of the Sorcerers and began his life as a mortal man (whether he still is a human being is debatable) in these now mostly extinct folks before learning his craft at the hand of one or more Sorcerer, enacting foul rituals and sacrificing people to eldritch powers. Of the Sorcerers he is among the most active in recent history and yet the hardest to ascertain. The man calling himself 'Arash Adraj' is a master of disguises, both magical and mundane. He has learned to speak hundred of languages and even invented some languages and accents whole cloth to further play along his disguise as strange foreign travelers. Simple trickery and manipulation come naturally to him and he can accomplish much without any hint of true eldritch powers.

His current identity as Arash Adraj is a relatively recent creation. After claiming one or more remote locations, he used his powers and manual labor to construct crude palaces which were then coated in layers of illusion to appear far larger and more grandiose than they really are. From these bases of operation he has created the identity of 'Arash Adraj'. an evil foreigner with inscrutable motives enthralled to evil gods, a slayer of kings and the supposed envoy of an evil empire from the other side of the world. Of the Sorcerers he is the most motivated by material wealth and pleasure but, given his nature as a trickster nobody can ever ascertain what his real, eldritch goals, might be.

• The Trickster/'Arash Adraj' is the most approachable of the Sorcerers and the one most suited to be a patron...yet is also quite dangerous and a liability. His person as a mad, exotic wizard or some evil exiled emperor might be quite amusing but they are enforced cruelly. Many of his slaves die in terrible display of violence ever so often if only so he can make grandiose declarations akin to "You have failed me for the last time!".
• The Trickster has a harem in his 'Arash Adraj' and he is not above kidnapping beautiful young maiden. The truth is that he isn't as vile as the stories claim and his many wives do live a rather lavish wife. Of course, the Trickster is not above sacrificing a few of them once in a while to power eldritch rituals or if he suspect one of them is trying to usurp him. He also has a second harem of men but those he keep for other identities and disguises...
• Any possible adventure could lead into the Trickster being the real 'man behind the man'. As the weakest Sorcerer he can make a good antagonist, since any mighty thewed barbarian hero has a chance to take him on in a fight. Whether or not the killing blow was a real killing blow and not an illusion, however, well that will remain to be seen...

Lands of Mirhne: The Sorcerers, Part 1

This is a repeat and expansion of the information which exist on the Sorcerers, as previously outlined in this post.

The Sorcerers are each unique individuals and they been woven through the history and myth of Mirhne. They are immortal and in the shape of men and women but beyond that who or what they are is unclear. They are said to possess unique powers, can speak all languages, curse the land, summon dead gods and travel all corners of the earth even beyond Mirhne. Sometimes the stories say they were the chosen servants of the Gods of old while others claim they are the last survivors of an older race of men, one closer to the powers of the gods. Others make them out to be evil and jealous individuals who have taken into themselves dark powers which no mortal should ever bear inside their flesh and soul. Some say they are all as old of Mirhne itself and were there when the land was young while others claim they are evil, foreign people with foreign magic and foreign gods to be feared and reviled by 'all good folks' (as the people of Mirhne often fear strangers from faraway lands). Their exact nature is unclear but so are their numbers, with an estimate around nine and twelve, assuming some names which pop up in myths are alternate names or conflation of different sorcerers.

The Sorcerers are as close as the Lands of Mirhne get to a classical spellcaster and even then, these beings are not a mere playable class. They are each a unique yet optional NPC, potential patron or even major antagonist. Much of their nature is mere hearsay and speculation and it is very likely that whatever is true of one sorcerer is untrue of another. Perhaps the only thing they do share in common is that each is a more/less-than-human, semi immortal being with powers to truly bend reality. While seemingly human in form they are alien and aloof in their goals.

The Night Witch

Art by Gal Or

Aloof and painfully beautifully, the Night Witch is the archetypal lady of dark magic, straddling the line between near mortal spellcaster and goddess of wrath. She is both the most physically and mentally human of the Sorcerers  and also one of the more alien and ill understood. She is a recurring figure in history. Kings and heroes have been driven mad by their desire to claim her as a lover and ancient tales speak in equal measure of her fruitful romances as much as it speak of dreadful curses and love affairs which end in bloodbaths. Some believe she is able to change form (all of them beautiful and terrible) while others believe there have been more than one Night Witch, as some stories do speak of her being (somehow) tricked and killed by a jealous rival or having passed the mantle from mother to daughter.

In truth, while the Night Witch is certainly desirable and gifted with a perfect, ever youthful body she is not as much of a sexual being as people believe her to be, although past incarnations/mantle bearer may indeed perhaps indulged far too much in their power over weak willed men (and women!). Perhaps it is due to this reputation of inciting desire and creating these painful tales of love, lust and revenge that the Night Witch has faded more and more in history, as making herself the center of attention has perhaps ended poorly several times. It is also possible that she has grown tired of mortal companionship, seeing lovers die one after the other. If this is true then perhaps her eternal youth is somehow limited to only herself or, at the very least, whoever hold the mantle of the Night Witch.

The Night Witch is a mistress of many arts beyond the gift of her ageless body, which makes her physically potent. Her title come from her powers of shadows and the night, although this is not directly the creation of physical darkness: the Night Witch can obscure or reveal certain facts, acquire long lost knowledge or curse people to forgetfulness. She can appear and disappear and maybe extend such gifts to others. Mists, clouds and even dust storms can obscure her domain as much as a metaphorical fog of forgetfulness. She is said to be a mistress of the arts of healing too but it appears she cannot give true immortality to men.

• For some players, actually attempting to court the Night Witch may be a valid goal.  Beyond the mere physical desires she may entice, many believe her to be the ideal queen or guardian mother of a people, as old tales do speak of her (or one of her predecessors) to have one time ruled a kingdom. In those days she was beloved by her people and feared by her enemies and many believe that winning her heart could establish the greatest kingdom on Mirhne.
• Alternatively, a female player character may seek the patronage of the Night Witch in a bid to further cement her power and influence through fear, as the Night Witch may very well be among the most powerful women in Mirhne. Of course that's assuming she's actually human.
• As one with powers to hide or reveal, it may be that the Night Witch knows some piece of information which no one else on Mirhne knows.
• Finally her medical knowledge may be the only way to restore one's crippled body without selling out oneself to truly eldritch powers.

Exalted/Godbound: The Age of Brass

Oh, Exalted: my eternal love-hate relationship of liking more the ideas of a game than any execution and certainly disliking the mechanical end of it all. Every few months my mind is inevitably drawn back to it either by something or by someone mentioning or discussing the game, reigniting my endless love-to-hate/hate to love feeling for the game. That's just the way it is for me, it seems.

Exalted: The Third Age

Artist unknown.

The best way to use Exalted, in my eyes, is to reuse the setting but at the same time wipe the slate clean. This may appear a bit counterproductive, but my primary issue with Exalted (okay well, to be fair I have so many issues its hard to list them all, let alone put them in order!) is that its interesting concepts are invariably screwed over by having too much lore written for it. I get that said lore is obviously the appeal but the issue of a setting being too written about is that it never seem to leave much room for a Game Master to interpret and use things in a way beneficial to his game. There need to be space to make shit up.

The name 'Age of Brass' come from the final comic in Return of the Scarlet Empress, which I've discussed before and called the second worst thing to happen to Exalted. It might seem strange to create a hypothetical take on Exalted which follows the events of the Second Edition metaplot I so often malign but the possible list of events described and outlined in that book are designed to utterly shake Creation and break it. As a result it makes a rather good starting point. The main ideas are as follow:

• The Yozi attempted the Reclamation with their Infernal Exalted. While it did temporarily 'work' in a manner of speaking and did immense damage to Creation, this 'second Primordial War' ultimately still ended in a victory for Heaven. At a price.
• Most of the powerful NPC are long dead and/or missing in some shape or form. All 100 Sidereals ended up dead either before, during or after the Reclamation. This mean there is not a single Sidereal alive in the Third Age who wasn't born after it.
• The same applies to all other Celestial Exalted. All Solars died during the second Primordial War or they became one of the few survivors, who then were killed by some other threat in the era of reconstruction that followed. No Solar or Lunar exist today that wasn't Exalted in at the very least the aftermath of it.
• A sizable portion of the already low in number Infernal Exalted are now lost, their Exaltations having been captured during or after the war and returned to their original Solar parameters. The remaining few (less than ten) Infernals are the 'neutral' Devil-Tigers, which are Primordials 2.0.
• The map has changed quite a bit from the ensuing damage, changes and then repair made to Creation. However the five Elemental poles remain.
• The original Realm has been dissolved and the Scarlet Empress is dead, having been turned into the new Earth Pole as eternal penance. There are competing forces of Terrestrials who would want to return either the Realm or Shogunate or something similar.
• Heaven is a mess with most Gods dead and thus replaced by their successors, some of them former mortals or even dead Exalt (previously Ghosts, now elevated to proper Spirit status). Heaven is ever-busy, messy and generally unlikely to ever assemble. Basically, beside calling personal favor if they can, PC cannot count on Yu-Shan and the Incarnae to fix any mess.
• Creation is not ruled by any singular force: there are scattered domains ruled by Exalted, some by Gods eager to retake their role now that the Immaculate Faith is fading, some places are Shadowlands ruled by ancient Ghosts and others are 'garden', invaded by the Fae/Raksha.

This new Creation is an even more broken and diminished one compared to the Second Age but that doesn't mean hope cannot spring eternal. With the few surviving Yozis locked back in their prison and the Ebon Dragon gone (but is he really dead?), this new era of Creation is more open to sandboxing.

The Missing Exaltations

In Second Edition, the total and exact number of each Exalted type was given. In order to return a sense of mystery, such knowledge is lost in the Third Age. When the Solar, Lunar and even rogue Abyssals went to war against the rising threat of the Reclamation, most of them perished in the conflict. While their Exaltations did return to Heaven in some capacity, many more have become missing. Exaltations are believed to be indestructible but it is known they can be contained. Some have speculated that the dying Primordials could have uttered a second Great Curse while others believe these Exaltations are simply 'trapped' in the death throes of dying Yozis, especially the Ebon Dragon's black hole-like corpse which at one point covered the land in such metaphysical darkness and deceit that no one can even remember who it was that struck the blow which finally killed him. Or perhaps cowards fled into the Wyld rather than fight and simply never returned. Who can say?

The Sidereals are the only ones fully accounted for in numbers, being fated and all that stuff. However even their ranks are diminished as the loss of old factions and mentors have scattered them, with many younger Sidereals now pursuing their own agenda, often in defiance to a lot of other factors. Meanwhile most Infernals are gone, having been destroyed and their Exaltations taken back by Heaven to return to their Solar selves, safe for the remaining Devil-Tigers which will be detailed in a bit. To recap:

• Nobody knows how many Solar, Abyssal and Lunars are left. There might be one or two original Infernals around but that is unlikely.
• Sidereals aren't remotely united, many of them having gone rogue.

The Devil-Tigers and Asura

Art by Peter Mohrbacher

The Devil-Tigers were heretical Infernals, who came to resent their hellish masters and sought to transcend. Heretical Infernal Charms allowed them to reshape their own nature, powers and even Exaltation while also allowing them to create sub-souls like a Yozi. Befitting a slightly more optimistic take on Exalted, the Devil-Tigers are a neutral force in Creation, allowed to exist with the somewhat reluctant agreement of Heaven, even if the two clash just about every single day. Across Creation are pocket empire, cults or other organization and structures centered around the Devil-Tigers, the transcendent ones and the great Asuras. The name is taken from the pre-imprisonment name of Demons, which was Devas, as a nod to Hindu mythology. These beings are the New Titans, quite limited in power and scope compared to their predecessors but still dangerous to face. They are a new power in Creation, one which no one is really sure what exactly it will create in the long run.

The Devil-Tigers are the reincarnated Infernal Exalted whose Exaltation has become redefined by their own nature. They are exultant beings, newborn embodiment of Human will, desire and thoughts ascended to cosmic heights. Wherever their influence spread, the world is slowly reshaped either by their own hand or that of their Asuran sub-souls. The best way to explain them would be to see them as the Neutral or Chaotic Neutral alignment, in a way. They are capable of great feat of rage and destruction as much as grandiose feat of love and passion, creating wars as much as they destroy empires to usher in new peace in a region. Their purpose is to be a 'wild card' distinct from Heaven, the Underworld or the Wyld. Each of them is very much their own Faction and they can be allies just as much as they can become a major antagonist. Some of them work (with great difficulty) with Heaven an other Exalted to help push back ever growing tides of the Wyld, while others seek only material gain and to expand their would-be Empire because that is the nature they have chosen. Yet, fortunately for all, Devil-Tigers being born of once-human beings mean they are tied to Creation and human nature. Which, perhaps, is their only weakness?

Worlds Without Number and the Sine Nomine Shared Universe

In an era of franchises and 'cinematic universes', having a large shared universe is all the rage for companies. The wider and larger a universe is, the more one can produce additional movies, books, comics, videogames and more. While Worlds Without Number isn't out in its full form yet, there's plenty of material found in its pages which hint at an interesting prospect which may or may not be expanded by Kevin Crawford. Namely, that most (or perhaps all?) Sine Nomine games share a universe or at the very least a multiverse. Now perhaps this is just theories. Maybe its me digging too much into the pre established lore of his games, the myriad sandbox tables and, of course, all the repeating themes and ideas. Maybe Kevin Crawford never intended for these games to be connected and is merely recycling ideas that work as his personal tastes, likes and dislike create a tapestry of repeating and reused concepts.

Or perhaps it IS all connected after all.

The root of this connection lies in the beginning and the 'end'. They start with two games, one of which got an updated version: these are Stars Without Numbers, which is the 'central' and most popular Sine Nomine title and the setting for Labyrinth Lord called Red Tide. At a glance these two settings could not be more different, even if both are mostly mechanically compatible. One is mostly hard Scifi set in the future and the other is set in a fantasy world with Elves and Dwarves. However, given what we know of the latest Sine Nomine game, Worlds Without Number, we can see the two share an extremely suspicious amount of lore. We know the setting of Worlds Without Number to be the impossibly deep future of the Stars Without Numbers universe, which itself included that game and Other Dust. Combine the information we know from the Alpha of WWN with various Sine Nomine games and supplements and a clearer understanding of that multiverse emerge. These games are:

• Stars Without Numbers and Stars Without Numbers Revised
• Other Dust
• Red Tide
• Godbound
• Worlds Without Number

In addition there are two other Sine Nomine settings whose position within that universe is a bit harder to ascertain, which would be Spears of the Dawn and Silent Legion. It is likely they fit in, but the exact details are a bit more blurry due to having a bit less lore. One could very much treat Spears of the Dawn as a specific realm/continent/Iterum, but Silent Legion is a bit weirder. It could be that Silent Legion is a prequel to all this and that 'Meta Dimensional' concepts were never truly rooted in mostly modern soft science fiction but, rather, Lovecraftian madness. This can be up to interpretation.

Mankind's Expansion To The Stars

Art by Col Price

As established in Stars Without Numbers, humanity expand into the void of space. This may seem like an odd or even mundane place to start for a multiverse which will span alien realities and mechanical gods but big things often have small beginning. SWN gives us a date and general series of events, including The Scream. Around the 2100 humanity leave its homeworld to colonize the stars using the Spike Drive technology and humanity splinters into countless budding cultures and religious movements while Earth forms the Terran Mandate to oversee and control colonies, afraid of letting their resources and power slip through their grasp. Humanity make contact with aliens and Psychics first emerge from humans who were exposed to the Metadimensional Energies of the Spike drive and similar technology. This is the Golden Age of Man and it last until 2665. The Scream damages warp gates and humanity become one of isolated space sectors. This is the setting of Stars Without Numbers while the events which occur on the post apocalyptic Earth are covered in the game Other Dust. This era last for an unknown amount of time before leading into further, ill defined and ill explored eras. Both before and after this era, massive technological leaps are made, which sometimes depend on the 'Meta-Dimensional Climate'. Which I'll get into in a moment. In some forgotten corners of space, various branches of humanity began to diverge in form greatly from their cousins, including in some locations the ability to transfer or even duplicate minds. The details on this posthuman lifestyle can be found in the Deluxe version of SWN Revised.

Meanwhile, the SWN Revised supplement Codex of the Black Sun offers some optional material to add magic to a space science fiction game, as well as expanding on how such concept could work within the canon of Stars Without Number. There is a lot of technobabble involved but the long story short is that the Metadimensional Energies which created Psychics could be studied, harnessed, modified and used through a variety of interfaces and mental pathways to create what was functionally Magic. This is where the SWN universe radically diverges and cut ties with harder science fiction and goes fully into fantasy. One can surmise that, should humanity one day be reunited after the Scream and the following Silence that would include an incredibly varied array of subspecies, some of which have radically diverged through their use of Meta Dimensional energies and how they developed their arcane sciences. Ultimately the time scale of these successive eras is difficult to ascertain.

Art by Jeff Brown

The Outsiders of Worlds Without Numbers may have in part appeared in this era. While it is true some might be aliens, it is possible at least some of them are human-derived in some capacity, from posthuman who developed and re-engineered their bodies to adapt to impossible environments to alien crossbreed or even 'uplifted' alien animals. How and why such beings would one day attempt a takeover of Earth and enslave humanity is unclear but presumably it may involve some deep seated grudge against mankind, either completely justified or the result of xeno politics far beyond our understanding. It could simply be that two or more vastly different branches of mankind met and, not understanding their common root (and the Outsiders being too divergent to interface with the Legacy, having splintered off far before) they fought.

The Far Future and Latter Earth

Art by Jeff Brown

There's a lot that happen in between Stars Without Numbers/Other Dust and Worlds Without Numbers. Mankind advances to a level as to basically be Gods. Key to this is The Legacy which goes far beyond the primitive nanotech and psychic powers of the SWN era. The Legacy is all encompassing and is the term which is used describe the very reality-rewriting which mankind once integrated into both the world itself, humanity and all life. How far it goes and how long this perfect era last....is unclear. The central interface of the Legacy itself is housed in a meta-dimensional realm, which forms the underlying mechanism of creation itself. These are the Celestial Engines as described in Godbound, with the central processor of all reality being the Throne of Heaven.

Where exactly in the timeline of WWN that Godbound fit is difficult, if not impossible to ascertain. It does require one to somewhat 'retcon' that the Throne of Heaven tale is partially allegorical and that fighting for God's throne may have meant fighting for the control of the Legacy and its interfaces. The beings described in WWN lore as Imperators could have been the greatest Theurge as well as Made Gods of this era, each a God-King in its own right, fighting over an ever splintering reality. The Realm described in Godbound's core book, Arcem, makes no mention of beings which could be comparable to the Outsiders but it could simply be that the lands which Arcem was part of did not suffer their invasion and repelled them. It could also be that the era of Outsider rule of mankind predates what is called the Former Empires, which are post-Outsider rule. The splintered nature of time and realities make things extremely difficult to properly pinpoint.

Both WWN and Godbound's humanity are rather similar: they live in a broken world where the natural laws have degraded and become unstable, making advanced technology difficult to maintain. They both feature advanced magical-technological modifications of the human form, which have degraded and become lost, leaving behind often dangerous splinter groups of beings which are difficult to envision as truly human. It is likely these worlds are part of a shared multiverse/realm system (which WWN call 'Iterum') and are merely the same worlds from the point of view of mortal versus the point of view of Imperator-level beings. Any slight difference in setting material is quite easy to explain, as in-universe information is quite shattered, incomplete and has been subject to thousand and thousand of years of  information drift and the changes in language.This is also true of other Sine Nomine games or, at the very least, of Red Tide (and Scarlet Heroes which use the same setting):

• Dwarves claim that, in their history, their ancestors were humans enslaved by an evil goddess called the Mother Below. In truth, she was probably one of many Outsider overseers and would-be gods. The Dwarves described in Red Tide are clearly a major cultural group within the created race of living Legacy Interfaces which are known as Dwarves.
• Elves in both Red Tide and Worlds Without Numbers share many traits, including the fact they reincarnate. It is possible the Elves described in Red Tide are a splinter group which attempted to ascend to godhood through the Legacy and 'merely'  managed to install their souls in the decayed system of reincarnation or it could be that the Elven origin myth is only partially true. Either way both types of elves are clearly beings of a near identical nature.
• The Shou of Red Tide and the Anakim of WWN, however, are NOT the same type of being. While on the surface both are aggressive, engineered 'savage humanoids' they share completely different origins, with the former also being a form of living Legacy Interfaces similar to Dwarves while the latter are bio-engineered living weapons. If Spears of the Dawn is connected to all this, then the Night Men are a form of Anakim.
• The Red Tide and the Uncreated Night are similar and related expressions of either massive decay to the Legacy/Celestial Engines. Both 'unmake' worlds and both produce abominations which disrupt reality.
• If all Sine Nomine games are connected, then a recurring theme of Hell appear. Red Tide/Scarlet Heroes has one, as does Godbound and Wolves of God should it somehow be connected. It is likely Hell was once some sort of mechanism for souls and identities to be recycled by the Legacy but it has since become perverted and exploited.

The Missing Games?

Art by Igor Kirdeika

As mentioned, there are other Sine Nomine games whose place within the timeline is unclear. Spears of the Dawn is most probably a specific realm within Latter Earth. However, this still leave a few others without a clear location within the shared 'verse'. It is possible, as mentioned, that Silent Legions is a prequel and that the SWN universe was always one of Lovecraftian madness lurking below the surface. A strange universe which, in utter defiance to its themes, mankind would conquer and then prosper in. The Kelipot and other weird arcane secrets would all likely be harnessed and form the basis of SWN-era magic which would one day form the complex workings of the Legacy.

Alternatively, Silent Legions could take place inside an Iterum where one or more Imperator has reset history and is studying humanity in its pre-FTL days. Unfortunately, the simulation has broken down and allowed many different Outsiders and other strange beings to 'leak' into it. Under this theory, Wolves of God could also be in a similar situation. If that's the case, then it is going to be immensely depressing to its people to find out that God doesn't really exist as they understand it. Spears of the Dawn could also have been such a simulation, albeit one which had enough time to decay and diverge into more fantastical things or it could simply be its own Realm and not have been engineered as a simulation.

Godbound: The Bleak Reaches

The Bleak Reaches clearly exist as a convenient 'clusterfuck' for GM to use as an adventure and trouble-heavy region. Well, at least on a meta-level of the worldbuilding which went into Arcem as a setting for Godbound. In universe, it isn't as simple as that but looking at the general design and outline of the place its clearly meant to be this adventurers-friendly area full of monsters, ruins, intrigues and political instability much like how Exalted had the Scavenger Lands. That and I haven't written about Arcem in quite a while as I haven't really gotten to use the setting and as such haven't really found any desire to write about it.

Well, It's Bleak All Right...

Concept art from S.T.A.L.K.E.R.

As with the rest of Arcem, the Bleak Reaches are a mess full of monsters, with technology which has degraded from extremely advanced to late Medieval. While everyone (except the Bright Republic) has degraded technologically, the Bleack Reaches (or whatever the hell it was called before) got hit quite bad as it used to be a so-called 'sister civilization' to the Bright Republic. When the Shattering came, the place got screwed beyond repair and was functionally nearly completely abandoned by any stable or structured society. It basically turned into a post apocalyptic wasteland filled with advanced technology now reduced to nothing but junk metal and plastic, unable to be activated. Given it's temperate to temperate-cold climate and the high level of technology, the image it conjures in my head (at least in the wake of the Sundering and the devastation that followed) is that of Metro 2033 or S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Shadow of Chernobyl combined with the so-called Original D&D setting.

This is the general image I get from the area: post apocalyptic ruins mixed with all the classic wilderness of Dungeons & Dragons, where small guarded towns exist as a 'point of light' within the monster infested wilds. To a certain extent, even the more 'dungeon punk' look of more modern D&D, especially the more silly art of Wayne Reynolds, could at least partially make sense and exist as people fashion armor from the recycled modern clothes, weapons and armors, cobbling together these bizarre armors and weapons out of whatever degraded material exist. Combine this with most settlers in the area being a later addition, exiles from other lands, and you get a rather eclectic place. It is a place where skeleton-haunted mines, swords & sorcery, old broken concrete roads and moss-encrusted crashed planes coexist.

Art by Jim Ling.

From what the stories of the Atheocracy tells, however, what became the Bleak Reaches was no utopia, not even remotely close to more 'relatable' Bright Republic. According to what we know of the Atheocracy's origins, these people fled the 'cold synthetic gods of a techno-theocracy'. What exactly this means is a bit unclear until one dig into now lost notes by Kevin Crawford back on Google+ where he describes the gods of that place as 'Geiger-esque AI-human god-hybrids'. Therefore whatever veneer of normality we would recognize in that ancient civilization would be but surface level, as their society was cruelly ruled and organized by man-machine hybrids who likely oversaw their society with nothing but cold efficiency or alien cruelty in mind. Kind of like Google but with more flesh-machine fusion and tentacles. Where did these creatures go? It is likely they died when the Sundering destroyed that civilization, these complex entities first to die when the laws of reality broke down, leaving behind only made mutated AI and decrepit mindless machines to wander the Bleak Reaches.

Generating A Village

Vaulters from Endless Legends.

The only any of these communities have in common is that A) life is hard and B) they live in the ruins of an advanced civilization. The only people who live in the Bleak Reaches are people with nowhere else to go and this heavily shapes what kind of village they are. Many of them will have a more 'sinister' side to them, as the region is full of monstrous abominations such as Parasite Gods (who are very common in the area) who will often set themselves up as a protector or God of a local community. To outsiders from calmer, gentler lands these people can come off as obviously in the wrong but one must understand that it is generally a mixture of desperation and pragmatism which drives them. For those who manage to establish a (mostly) stable society in those lands, away from their enemies, then it doesn't seem all that bad. Better a harsh, cruel but free life rather than death at the point of a sword.

The results on these tables should help inform what Features and Problems a village would have should the GM need to stat it as a Faction. For example: if the Ancalian Nobles In Exile result is rolled, it is likely the ruling caste of the community will have leftover transhuman enhancements while a Scavenger village, whose entire society is built on recovering, repairing and even reselling lost technology is going to have a technological edge over its neighbors no matter what.

D10	Origin of its People (Roll Each Column)
1-3	Mixed Origin: This community has come together from disparate origins. Roll 1d3 times on this table.	Political Exiles: These people have fled the authorities of their homeland (or another, nearby community) and created their own village.
		Religious Oddities: These people have particularly odd/foul religious beliefs and have settled the land from a mixture of religious reasons and simply fleeing.
		Cultural Deviants: Be it Ulstanger pacifists or Bright Republic Anarcho Primitivists these don’t belong back home anymore.
4	Din Survivors: These people are direct descendants of the original inhabitants of what are now the Bleak Reaches who have returned.	Escaped Slaves: This group was oppressed and enslaved, possibly by a nearby community and have since built their own society.
5	Bright Republic Exiles: For one reason or another these people have left or been exiled/cut off from the Bright Republic. Their life sucks, now.	Mutant Outcasts: These people have been cursed/mutated in some way, possibly even before arriving in the Reaches. They are feared, perhaps unfairly. Roll on the Mutations Table.
6	Lomites Returnee: These people have decided that it's better to flee the Atheocracy and go back to these lands than live another day there.	Scavengers: This community, whatever its roots or origins has evolved into a society heavily invested in scavenging and reselling technology. Roll on the Scavenged Technology Table.
7	Ulstanger Exiles: These people are from the Ulstang skerries, or at least their ancestors were. They now live within the Reaches.	Warriors: Whatever its roots or origins, this society has evolved into a hardy and spartan people; part mercenaries, part monster hunters. Roll on the Warrior Ethos table.
8	Ancalian Nobles in Exile: These people descend from some far off branch of Ancalian nobility, now fallen from grace and living a simpler existence.	Parasite God Cult: This community is wholly dedicated to its patron deity, which is a dangerous Parasite God. Roll on the Parasite God table.
9	Faraway Travellers: The inhabitants of this community are from another region which is quite far away and have travelled an absurd distance.	Arcane Research: This community was originally funded by seekers of forbidden knowledge, mages and the likes. This has heavily shaped their society. Roll on the Arcane Secrets table.
10	Night Road Immigrants: This group is not originally from Arcem and has arrived post-Sundering through a Night Road. These people bring with them stranger culture, magic or artifact.	Nanotech Corruption: This community has built its village in an area infested with still functioning nanotechnology, either imbuing and/or cursing the inhabitants in some shape or form while also making them unable to leave without their health failing. Roll on the Nanotech Corruption Table.

1d6	Mutations
1-2	Mutant Outcast Colony: There is no particular origin to these people’s deformities, they are simply united in their misery, welcoming any and all who have been shunned due to mutation and sickness.
3	Night People: Whatever has caused these people’s mutation (disease, magics or else) they cannot tolerate bright lights and have a nocturnal society. The sun either blinds them or burns their skin or they could all be albino.
4	Diseased Outcasts: These people are deformed by a particular metaphysical sickness which can be transmitted to others. They have created this colony to live out the rest of their lives. The sickness is carried in their blood and their children are born with it.
5	Miasma Tainted: These people were normal when they arrived in the Bleak Reaches but quickly became mutated by unseen forces. One side effect of these mutations is they can live in the most toxic/unstable areas of the Reaches without dying.
6	Devolution: These people are, for lack of a better term, ‘devolving’ as each generation is increasingly more beast-like both in appearance and mannerism. They are strong, hardy and well suited for survival but find higher concepts harder and harder.

1d6	Scavenged Technology
1-2	Ancient Firearms: The community has access to a few firearms which are mechanically equivalent to a Bright Republic magnetic gun with the ‘Hardened Tech’ upgrade. Every year more and more guns cease to function permanently.
3	Regalia Armor: The community has scavenged some Regalia Armor from the Bleak Reaches, which looks like high tech suits of armor crossed with an H.R. Giger painting. Malfunctioning suits have a bad habit of trying to merge with the wearer.
4	Unstable Automatons: The community has repaired and reactivated a few mechanical creatures which they can use to defend themselves. These half-broken robots have a chance of breaking down and going berserk.
5	Nanotech Medicine: Extremely limited in supply, these devices can be used to extend life and repair damaged organs...at a cost. The wealthy and powerful who use them are haunted by visions of synthetic gods trying to connect with their minds in vain.
6	Godwalker: The community has repaired and reactivated a fully functional Godwalker which now has a trained pilot.

1d6	Warrior Ethos
1-3	Discipline: When one lives in a monster and mutants-infested land, discipline is paramount. Hard discipline, punishment, stoicism and enforcement of rank and protocol is how this community operates.
4	Berserkers: These guys are crazy. The only way for them to have a fighting chance is through chemicals, fungus or Low Magic-infused battle rages where they feel nothing; not fear, not pain.
5	Warrior Code: There is a complex, philosophical code to these warriors on what they can and cannot do. It could be philosophical, religious or something with a bit of both. This mentality is derived from their origin.
6	Ruthless: The only ethos they follow is ‘we will survive, the enemy will not’. These people are ruthless pragmatics to the very end. While disciplined, they will cheat, fight dirty and do whatever is needed to win.

1d6	Parasite God
1-3	Cruel Overlord: The Parasite God is the typical demanding and very likely insane God, who must be constantly appeased less he or she destroys those under its ‘protection’. As long as it is pleased it will destroy the community’s enemies.
4	Formerly Benevolent: The Parasite God, when it was mortal, was already some heroic champion of its community. The transformation was seen as a blessing but as with all Parasite Gods it is now losing its mind.
5	Appeasement: The Parasite God does not directly interact with its community but rather simply claim the area they inhabit. As long as the locals appease it by giving offerings it will kill any enemies in their lands.
6	Complex Religion: This Parasite God has gone the extra mile to create a complex and compelling religion and mythology around itself to appear to not be yet another dime a dozen despotic monster. It has holy symbols, sacred texts, priests and everything.

1d6	Arcane Research
1-3	Low Magic Traditions: These people have maintained a form of Low Magic, which is stable and reliable enough to be used to enhance and sustain their society. It can be a pre-existing one from the book or a new one.
4	Theurgy: The community has one, maybe two true Theurge who are the inheritors to years upon years of research and experimentation. They could be enlightened or they could be some cruel overlord.
5	Transmuted Slaves: Through a mixture of theurgy, low magic and/or scavenge technology this community has an underclass of mutated slaves who are kept in line. They form the backbone of their workforce or military.
6	Alternative Energy: Through some complex and slightly dangerous magic process, this community is able to generate power for more advanced technologies on a limited scale. It is reliant on specific materials which are limited or human energy in some capacity.

1d6	Nanotech Corruption
1-2	Mutation: Roll on the Mutation table instead but refluff taking into account that it involves rampant nanotechnology.
3-4	Connected: The individuals are partially connected by the nanite colonies, able to sense the intent of others. It also carries a mental impulse to conform and obey.
5	Cyber Husks: The nanite colonies are damaged life support and/or enslavement technology. Those members of the community who die come back to life as biomechanical husks.
6	Assimilators: The members of this community are corrupted by the nanites and use it as a tool of growth and control. They can implant their will in the nanites and infect others with memetic control.