Cosmology (Aegenon Supplement)
Cosmology
Travelling the Planes
To travel between planes of reality is no simple task. Very few have managed to create the powerful anchors that are required to bend reality into passable gates, and even fewer so have survived the experience. Despite the danger and rarity of interplanar travel, permanent gates do exist, hidden around the world. Ones form changed intrinsically between planes, to match the realm within which the will reside. Beings from the material plane travelling to the Feywild will be changed by its whimsical nature, the same with the Shadowfell, become twisted shadows of their real selves. It is this that is most dangerous about travel, as the transformation often draws upon a beings soul and life force to power the change, which can obliterate weak souls, often in a fantastical and explosive manner.
Planes exempt to this are the Underdark, as it exists as a part of the material plane, the astral plane, as it is accessed through the projection of one’s own soul, and the ethereal plane as it exists parallel to the material, but simply cannot be accessed without the right assistance.
Underdark
Twisted by centuries old blood, the depths of Aegenon had long been locked away, divided from the surface world. The Stout, however, through their curiosity, and desire to go ever deeper, brought this tainted madness to the surface. While sealed in centuries past, the beings within grew aware of what was above. The depths of the Underdark do not submit to the laws of reality that the surface holds, instead the world twists, gravity has no meaning, and wild magics roam free.
Many beings lay claim to the Underdark, but no hold more dominion than the Illithid. While madness contorted the minds of the unwilling, the Illithid accepted the poisoning of their realities, and, in doing so, grew in power. While for centuries they were solitary and without conception, once their minds became too toxic, many merged together, creating great minds that could contain the insanity that gripped them. The first hive mind was born, and many Illithid ventured to offer themselves to the collective consciousness. After this, clans spread across the Underdark, but none ventured so deep as to disturb the great insanities that rest at the bottom of reality.
Deemed the Great Depths, the lowest layers of the Underdark are so tainted, so twisted beyond comprehension that few of powerful mind dare to tread into its shadows. Light escapes this place, the entire realm cast in a deep arcane darkness. The layer itself is riddled with great crevasses, that fall deeper into the ground than the tallest mountains on the surface. What rests at the bottom of these rifts is unknown, but many believe tears to the Mirror Realm rest at their bases. It is the place of demons, and seems to be growing higher every day.
Shadowfell
Known as the Mirror Realm, the Shadowfell is the shadow cast by reality. Souls of great power created the realm, destined to become the evil that would inhabit the reality. The Shadowfell is divided into domains, realms conquered by powerful demons and inhabited by their devils and the other evils. The Demons, however, were not satisfied with simple subservience, so they reached into the Sea of Souls and stole the fundamentals of reality, creating a race known as the Gith.
The Gith were immediately subjugated, destined to lifetimes of torture at the hands of great evil beings. The Great demons quickly grew bored again, instead searching into the material plane for souls to demand. These attempts quickly created the first rifts in the Underdark, spreading the darkness into the Great Depths.
Demons began to strike deals with the beings of the Material Plane, trading power they could provide for the souls of these beings. When these contracts were up for collection, the souls would be torn from their natural cycle to suffer in the Shadowfell.
In the year 450 GE, several Gith escaped their subjugation in the Shadowfell, and cast a powerful magic to trade places between the two realities, tearing their refuge onto the material plane. They claimed the land they arrived upon, naming it Khadak, from which they built a new society amongst the material.
The Sea of Souls
An endless grey expanse, the Sea of Souls holds nothing but the wandering energy within. Travel to the Sea of Souls is not done without risk, as those of mortal comprehension wandering the endless plane gather the attention of every extant will in the realm. They also risk undergoing a process known as the Unknowing, wherein they dissasociate, simply reverting to another soul to wander this endless abyss.
The Nature of Souls
The soul is intrinsic to oneself, and the primary wellspring of all internal magic. They make up 70% of the being, while the other 30% is the body and mind. They are the only thing that lasts after death, drifting their way back into the Sea of Souls if not pledged to a god or demon. Recently after death, souls maintain a vague identity of their past self, but slowly dissolve into back into another piece of wandering energy.
Souls can, to a certain extent be manipulated, stolen and traded. They are unstable when outside the Sea of Souls, and practically no-one will put whole souls on the line. Demons and the like break them into fragments of their energy, and trade parts of them. Theft and Barter of an entire soul is rare.
Souls can be fragmented in different manners; specific portions lost can affect the body in different ways. If a large enough chunk is stolen the victim will typically fall into a dreamless coma, but people who are exceptionally somatic or arcane, and those who have mastered manipulation of the soul can function without it though it’s not easy. Their higher mental functions become more difficult, their instincts become sharper to the point they might go feral and the elemental spirit of their bodies might try to kill the remaining pieces and take direct control.
Apart from direct tampering the soul can be reached indirectly through body, mind and spiritual link. Ultimately everything a being does and happens to a being is connected to the state of their soul; a physical wound can cut into the ethereal body and beyond.
Souls can be granted in many ways beyond the natural process of escaping the Sea of Souls. This can be done by divine intervention or an effort of magic to splinter a pre-existing soul or pull it from the Sea.