My Skörne

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Map by CosmicOrrery
click to make it big, I think

 

O Blessed Prince of Longing, Hallowed be Thy Name!

Grant Us the Mercy of Your Golden Touch!

The Heavens Smile Upon Your Most Sacred Path: 

Deliver Us From Despair, Keep the Walls of Beacon Ever-Stalwart And,

With Thine Divine Sword, Slay the beast That Lies in The Dark

-Litany for the Prince, Book of Hope

 

The lowly peasant fears the Horrors that lie beyond the Wall.

The Craftsmen of Beacon fear the Church and its audits.

The Priests fear the Nobles and their dreadful appetites.

The Nobles fear the Red Hand's hidden knives.

The Red Hand fear The Prince's judgment.

I do not fear The Prince, for I lay every night by His side and  every night I hold Him in my arms as he weeps and screams in his sleep, repeating the words of Prophecy. 

I fear the Thing at the Heart of the  Darkwood, and whatever Fate awaits my beloved on the Day of Pilgrimage.

-Memoirs of the Pale Lady

The Prince of Want and his consort the Pale Lady rule over the Great Kingdom of Arcadia.
-The Red Count is his closest advisor and the master of the Red Hand, who protect the City of Beacon. Very little is known about him, aside from how dangerous his agents are.
-The Gourmet Baron Pentagruel is the most powerful of the nobles and the City's Administrator. He is a moody giant but cares greatly for his people, understanding better than most the meaning of sacrifice.
-The Primeval Knight is the Prince's Champion, and his beast-like Outrider Knights are fiercely loyal. He is seldom seen inside the Wall, always beyond the horizon slaying some terrible beast or conquering some vicious and barbaric enemy nation.
-The Patriarch is the only one who has not tasted the Fruit of Immortality gifted by the Prince. He controls the Priesthood and Inquisitors from the shadows of the Cathedral of Radiance.

The City of Beacon is humanity's last safeguard against the Mist and its Horrors.

The Thing in the Heart of the Wood is older than the dead gods slain by the Prince.
The Darkwood are an excursion of Otherness into our reality - parasitic and infectious.

The Wall surrounds the Ashen Valley, mostly fields, farmlands and small patches of woods, carefully monitored by Outrider Knights for any sign of the Darkwood's corruption.

The Town at the Wall's Threshold is called Blightburg. It is built alongside the River Nox, and is where the roads stop. Beyond this point is the Wilderness.

The Askellian Swamp hides ancient mysteries from the glorious civilization that once gave birth to the Prince, before He ascended to Godhood.

The Barrow Hills are riddled with underground passages, caves and crypts, a most obvious way into the Great Underground and its Otherness.

The Boreal Sea and the Mountains of Sorrow are extremely dangerous and the natural barriers that protect Beacon from enemy nations and Greater Horrors. Beyond the Mountains lies the Desert of Dreams and the distant Mirage-City of Ur-Shadad, as well as the fabled Jungle of Bones.

Nobody ever came back from journeys into the Boreal Sea, not even the Prince's own brother.

Heretics say the Horrors were human once, and tasted the Fruit of Salvation, offered a bargain when overcome with despair. Some say the very same Fruit grow on the Sacred Tree of Rebirth that the Prince cultivates in his Inner Sanctum, the same one that grant Immortality, and that the cost is one's humanity. They seek to undermine the peace of Arcadia and shatter the Prince's Dream. They heed not the Words of the Prophecy nor the Book of Hope's teachings. They will all be put to death, in time.