Altuos

Altuos

Altuos, the seat of the short lived Eastern Romatenuon empire and the borderworld between the lands successfully conquered at the height of the Romatenuon empire and the Ancient now dilapidated and parched desert world of Abassi.

Altuos was a great city in its own right and if anywhere the hatred between Romatuos and Abassi could be tempered it would be here, relations between traders at least were good natured.   

A black robed Cynic living in secret atop a palace roof (or so the story goes) one day revealed himself to a noble living there to teach him a magic spell that would bring the prince good luck, the prince thought the hermit mad but he listened and said some magic words that the hermit taught him.

From that day onward the prince had incredible luck and good fortune, and was promised a beautiful Abassan princess to take as his wife.   

The prince consulted the hermit and the hermit said that there is magic in the Soulvowell he had taught him, and that only if it is kept secret between the Prince and the Hermit will its magic work.

Luckily though the Princes Abassan princess taught him the tongue that the vowel is written in, the prince learned what he had been saying.

"Swear my soul and power to the great Dark one, may that my soul find him when it leaves my worldly flesh"

Terrified the prince traveled into the desert temple and found atop its roof a white robed hermit. The White robed hermit transformed into a White tiger and came down to speak with the prince. he told him that the black hermit was a billion years old and had lived atop the roof of a million men before the princes time, he said that whenever a woman births a child, half of her soul goes with it and into it, but unless her Husband swears his soul to her to make two halves a whole the child will be born with half a soul.

He said that all evil in the world was born out of fools who swear their soul to the Dark one instead of their wives, friends, kings or priests. and birth children with no soul, or worse if both man and wife have sworn away their souls they will birth a demon into the world who will become a black hermit of his own.

The prince begged the Hermit for help and the tiger soothed him telling him that until you die it is never too late to change your vowell. and so the prince said the following.

"swear my soul and power to my wife be she alive, to my daughters and sons in their time, may that my soul find them when it leaves my worldly flesh"

Around this story grew one of the most influential religions in all of Myr, priests in their decadent churches would maintain record books of the vowels of everyone in the village, and through this control how many children people could have.

Its power over the people was absolute and unquestionable, and baseborn children were utterly demonised as a result.

The eastern Romatenuon empire was built around this religion, and its head monarch in 2097 was believed to be a descendant of the prince in the tale. But upon foundations of tales and stories it is dangerous to build too high, and the decadence of the priesthood soon became too much.

The Black Tiger rebellion (named after the Black hermit) was a movement of the peasantry who held the belief that the priests had secretly been supplanted by Black hermits in disguise beheaded priest after priest after priest, collapsing the efficient structure of the empire and causing absolute chaos along the trading routes essential for the maintenance of both empires.

An empire who separated itself from the western empire with ambitions of righteousness and moral justice caved in on itself as a result of generating obedience through religion rather than a threat of force.

Even though the wealth and prosperity of the eastern empire did not stand the test of time their early breed of colonialism it still evident on through to the Platinum renaissance, their peaceful envoys of missionaries traveled to every corner of Myr to spread the Saivrose Soulvowell. The stories and goals have changed in the pockets of the wide world that still whisper the Soulvowell even the supposed holy language has gone from Abassan, to Romassi to the native tongue of Jakhabban.

Each group after being cut off from Altuos has developed their own mythos and creed, but all agree on the holiness of the cities of Altuos and Abassi which was a contributing factor to last and longest land war Myr would ever see.

A people of olive and dark skin, brown and black hair, brown and amber eyes.