Codex Entry: The Continent of Começus

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The Lantern and the Jawbone

Overview

Começus is a continent haunted by memory and split by divine consequence. Once whole, its lands were sundered by the Celestial Cataclysm, the divine war that tore Saragossa’s heavens and reshaped its continents. At the heart of this rupture stand the Bradbourgh Mountains — a jagged, unnatural spine born from sacrifice, dividing East from West.

To the West: sun-baked coasts, cliffside cities, and relic-traders who drink wine beneath stone colonnades while whispering old prayers for coin.

To the East: veiled forests and dream-walking monarchs, where dynasties rule by prophecy and silence is a form of worship.

Começus lies roughly central upon the known maps of Saragossa, forming a nexus between distant continents. It is this position — cradled between ocean routes and ancient sky-paths — that has ensured its place as a vital artery for global trade, diplomacy, and conquest. The ports of its western edge and the veiled passes of its eastern canopy draw merchant fleets, scholars, and spies alike.

Começus is a land where prophecy once governed nations, where stars once spoke truth, and where every stone remembers something terrible.

The Land Remembers: Orientation and Realms

The Western Reach: A land of sun-scoured plateaus and coastal cities like Russadir and Asophdir, where the relic trade thrives and the scars of empire linger. Olive terraces climb the hills. Ruins litter the hinterlands. Cults flower in alleys, trading relics for blessings. Rain is rare. Memory is not.

Even the air remembers the divine rupture. Some say the dust here smells faintly of burnt scripture. Statues of faceless gods lean at angles no longer sacred, and the relic-trade has turned ruin into currency. Wild groves of sablevine knot themselves through once-holy colonnades, and herds of black-eyed goats wander between markets and mausoleums.

The Dokar Empire is predominantly human, its cities swelling with a cosmopolitan mix of traders, refugees, mercenaries, and emissaries from distant continents. In markets like those of Russadir, one may hear half a dozen languages before noon and see faces marked by desert winds, polar ink, or jungle sigils. Though humans dominate its ruling structures, the empire’s ports and courts reflect the world it draws into orbit.

The Eastern Veil: Temperate and forest-thick, the East houses the mystic Dranunait Dynasty, keepers of prophecy and spiritual rites. Cities such as Emhaserin lie shrouded in mist and memory. Here, magic is ritual, and silence carries the weight of prayer.

Mist-thick and verdant, the East is a place where time blooms strangely. Towering spiral trees — whose boughs shelter cities like Emhaserin — cast violet shadow over root-walks and spirit-paths. Rain falls in rhythms that align with moon-phases, and the rivers sing with unseen voices when the stars align just so.

Fungi glow with inner breath, and ancient stone causeways lead nowhere — unless followed in dreams. Here, silence is sacred, and echoes carry names no tongue has spoken in centuries. The forests are not wild — they are watching. Every fallen leaf seems to land with intention.

The Dranunait Dynasty, is formed around ancient elvish bloodlines — long-lived and forestbound, many of whom believe themselves to be kin to the original stewards of the Spirit Bark Tree. While other races may dwell in the borderlands under strict spiritual codes, true political and spiritual power is held by the elvish dynasties, whose rituals span generations and whose memories are cultivated like gardens.

The Bradbourgh Mountains — Eirun’s Scar: A divine trauma given form. The Bradbourghs are not natural; they are consequence. Peaks tear at the sky like the ribs of a slain titan. Their slopes are veined with unhealing wounds — fissures where starlight sometimes seeps like blood. Lightning favors these peaks without storm. Night blooms early in their shadow, and compasses turn feral.

No map agrees on their full expanse. Winds mutter forgotten prayers and carrion birds circle stones that bleed in moonlight. It is said the mountains do not grow — they brood. And every step into their heart is a step into a wound the world cannot forget.

The Land Remembers: Powers in Tension

Começus is ruled not by a single crown, but by two enduring forces forever poised in wary balance.

The Dokar Empire, occupying the sun-drenched western coasts, is a relic of conquest, bureaucracy, and imperial ambition. Governed by the iron-bound Board of Whisper and upheld by its griffion-led aerial legions and imposing navy, it seeks stability through expansion. Its reach is firm and visible — laws carved in stone, roads laid across shattered kingdoms. For a full chronicle of the Empire’s political machine, see [The Dokar Empire Codex].

The Dranunait Dynasty, cloaked in the twilight forests of the East, thrives through quiet consensus and spiritual resonance. It is ruled not by monarchs, but by the Council of the Bark — a communion of chosen seers who interpret the will of the Spirit Tree known as Dranunait. Theirs is a law woven through ritual, silence, and legacy. For more, see [The Dranunait Dynasty Codex].

At the spine of the continent lies Veltheris, a fractured city-state born in blood and necessity. Straddling the Bradbourgh Mountains, it serves as a brittle conduit of trade, diplomacy, and subterfuge — a neutral zone where spies change masks, caravans change banners, and one wrong word can shatter a tenuous peace.

The Land Remembers: Commerce and Coin

Though their philosophies differ, both the Empire and the Dynasty understand the necessity — and danger — of wealth. In the West, the Dokar Empire leverages its bustling port cities to control maritime trade across the world. Chief among them is Russadir, where merchant ships arrive from distant continents, offloading goods as exotic as desert glass and dream-leather. The Empire’s merchants speak many tongues, but their ledgers all answer to gold. Trade here is rigorous, taxed, and catalogued — but also thriving.

In the East, the Dranunait Dynasty trades in more esoteric forms of wealth: ink-forged prophecy scrolls, silks dyed with alchemical moonlight, and forest medicines cultivated under sacred rites. Though less open in practice, the Dynasty’s goods are often rarer and coveted by the arcane elite.

Between them lies Veltheris, the city of uneasy peace and secret coin. Technically neutral, it acts as an indirect trade hub between East and West — and a haven for those who deal in less… sanctioned materials. Its markets are unbound by law but governed by ancient codes of silence. One may find shadowfruit beside stolen relics, or a contract brokered in blood beside antique perfumes.

See [The Trade Roads of Saragossa] for a deeper exploration of economic arteries and illicit exchange.

The Land Remembers: Faith in Ruin

Faith in Começus is not a unified chorus — it is a shivering mosaic of broken hymns and hushed heresies. What once was divine certainty has curdled into caution, silence, and guarded reverence.

In the West, the Dokar Empire permits faith but binds it tightly to civic function. Shrines to fallen gods still dot the avenues of Russadir, their altars repurposed or left to crumble. Official worship is directed toward state-sanctioned powers — deified ancestors, celestial ideals, and the mythic vision of Empire itself. Outside these bounds, underground cults proliferate, whispering forgotten names and lighting censers with contraband flame.

In the East, the Dranunait Dynasty views faith as a dialogue between soul and soil. The Spirit Bark Tree — Dranunait — is not worshipped as deity, but as interpreter. Its roots stretch not just through the forest but through memory, dream, and fate. Rituals are not supplications but synchronizations. Those who speak too loudly of gods here often find the forest does not echo back.

And through all of Começus, scars of the Celestial Cataclysm still twitch beneath temple stones. Holy sites lie buried in silt or swallowed by ivy. Some say the gods are dead. Others say they sleep. A few — mad, devout, or desperate — claim they speak again.

Pilgrims still travel, but rarely for answers. Most simply want to be remembered.

The Land Remembers: Shared Cultural Tensions

Despite the mountains that divide them — or perhaps because of them — the peoples of Começus share more than they admit. Festivals held on opposing sides of the Bradbourghs often echo the same celestial myths, albeit sung in different tongues and beneath different constellations.

Food and folklore bleed across the faultlines. In Russadir, spice-merchants offer fermented root-ale derived from Dranunait flora, while in Emhaserin, street-priests carve protective charms based on symbols once banned in the West. Traveling troupes, both sanctioned and secret, carry plays from empire to dynasty — retelling stories of gods, betrayals, and beasts with faces blurred just enough to avoid war.

And yet, at the border towns like Veltheris, where every breath may be watched and every silence interpreted, culture becomes a mask. The shared tongue is thick with euphemism. The shared coin bears no sovereign’s face. It is a place where music is written in minor keys, and one misplaced proverb can brand a house a heresy.

Here, memory is merchandise — and forgetting is a currency of its own.

The Land Remembers: Timeline of Começus

Era of Silence and Splinters (c. 0 – 2000 A.C.)*

Following the Celestial Cataclysm, Começus collapses into regionalism and isolation.
Western city-states (pre-Dokar) flourish independently, ruled by merchant-princes, old knightly orders, and rising holy orders. These faith-driven factions seize abandoned divine sites and form localized theocracies, often fortifying relic-rich regions with zealot militias. One such group, the Ember Cloisters, was known for purging apostate ruins in the name of ‘sacred silence.’ They wore ashen robes and carried incense-blades said to hold prayers within. The Ember Cloisters branded their victims with coal runes and built reliquaries atop mass graves, believing suffering anchored divinity. (c. 310 A.C.) These faith-driven factions seize abandoned divine sites and form localized theocracies, often fortifying relic-rich regions with zealot militias. One such group, the Ember Cloisters, was known for purging apostate ruins in the name of ‘sacred silence.’ They wore ashen robes and carried incense-blades said to hold prayers within. The Ember Cloisters branded their victims with coal runes and built reliquaries atop mass graves, believing suffering anchored divinity.
Over time, these orders begin to forge feudal pacts, offering divine protection in exchange for land and tribute, sowing the seeds of a fragmented yet devout feudal system that will later shape the foundations of the Dokar Empire.
Eastern forest realms fall into spiritual schisms. Dream-prophets and wild cults vie for influence, but deeper within the woods, the ancient spirits and forgotten deities withdraw into isolation. Their groves grow silent and overgrown, their once-living temples consumed by moss and silence. (c. 470 A.C.) their once-living temples consumed by moss and silence. Some believe the gods of the forest are sleeping, others claim they are watching, waiting.
Ancient divine ruins are buried, sealed, or forgotten entirely. (c. 1010 A.C.)
The First Fall of Russadir is now understood to have occurred far earlier, potentially as early as 1367 AC, when a sky-born plague swept in with sails blackened by prophecy.

Age of Ashen Crowns (c. 1800 – 2450 A.C.)*

In 1830 AC, the Second Fall of Russadir occurs during a wave of divine silence that sparks hysteria and infighting. A coalition of relic-hunters and desert warlords breaches the southern gates, looting much of the central archive. The city is retaken a decade later through coordinated naval blockades and the intervention of flame-wielding theurgists.
In 2031 AC, civil uprisings in western trade cities lead to the rise of zealot militias backed by relic-seers and war-clerics.
By 2176 AC, Russadir suffers its Third Fall, when a coalition of eastern mercenaries and outlawed warlock covens launch a devastating siege. The assault is driven by vengeance for centuries of western maritime embargoes and theological purges committed by Russadir against eastern sects. These longstanding tensions, inflamed by the death of a Dranunait emissary under suspicious circumstances, culminate in a surprise attack during the Festival of Ascension. The city is breached by nightfall. Its famed bronze archives burn for the final time. Survivors retreat to Asophdir, beginning a period of mourning and martial reform.
In 2230 AC, the Burenia family, once stewards of trade and temple routes, rally the western provinces under a single banner. Through alliances and brutal suppression of rivals, they declare the birth of the Dokar Empire, crowning the first High Imperator from their line.
The Violet Dagger arises as a clandestine holy order, claiming to act as the hands of forgotten gods. Operating in shadows and alleys, they silence heretics, control relic trade, and whisper prayers through blades.
The Dranunait Dynasty develops through arcane kinship lines and forest-borne prophecy, centered around Emhaserin, its veiled capital.
The Bradbourgh Mountains become sacred and cursed: both empires seek to control its secrets. Relic-hunters, black-market arcanists, and divine interpreters surge into its haunted passes.
In 2311 AC, the city of Veltheris is founded within the cleft of the Bradbourgh foothills, born from an uneasy accord between Dynastic root-scribes and exiled imperial logisticians. Designed as a neutral zone for necessary commerce and diplomatic subterfuge, its creation is whispered to have been overseen by a blind Oracle and a relic-binder from both courts, neither of whom left a name. Built atop the petrified remains of a pre-Cataclysm world-heart tree, its foundation stones hum faintly in moonlight. Its position would soon make it the keystone in both espionage and survival along the borderlands.*

Age of Long Forgotten Warnings (c. 2450 A.C. – Present)*

In 2451 AC, the Bradbourghs fracture again — literally. Minor earthquakes, strange lights, and whispering winds plague the region.
By 2453 AC, the Dokar and Dranunait empires edge toward open war over relic discoveries beneath the mountain’s spine.

“The stars forget, the trees forget, even the mountains forget. But the land… the land remembers what we choose to bury.”

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