Saving the world on a Sunday afternoon
The Citadel is a plane of existence and a gianormous city state all at once – a monument to the exceptional technological advancement of a race with a total understanding of magical and divine power, and the way in which they can be worked with in harmony with their nature to achieve works of great scale and utility. Shimmering structures of crystal and glass, impossibly delicate walkways harder and more sturdy than rock or steel, wide open spaces with the ability to accommodate hundreds, thousands, at once, empowered lighting and heating, symbiotic control of the environment, a library of knowledge that may stand pre-eminent among all existence, architectural wonders built not out of practicality but simply of possibility…it is the pinnacle of evolution to which sentient races may strive in their time.
It is also the spiritual home to a reclusive but highly advanced race called the Durae’el, who remain behind in spirit, but not in body, their Citadel guarding their immense knowledge and power against misuse while teaching it freely to any who can prove themselves genuinely worthy of knowing it.
Many hundreds of thousands of years ago, the Durae’el developed the ability to cross to other worlds – a Balance ceremony that unlocked the doors between dimensions within the universe and allowed travel between them. They called it “Planeshifting”, and quickly realised that this was a source of power that had the power to both unite the universe and tear it apart. They were determined that it would not be used for nefarious purposes.
Taking great care, they Shifted far and wide to many other places, observing the native people before choosing whether to make themselves known to them. In the places they Shifted to, they built prepared sites that were ceremonially locked into a network, allowing them to come and go trivially, safely and either publicly or privately, whichever was most sensible. In the places the native people accepted the Durae’el, these sites became temples, meeting points or centres of settlements.
Any native people who wished to learn the technology were mentored through a set of tests – the “Path of Enlightenment” – designed to prove their dedication to learning, and to show they could understand the power being given to them and use it sensibly. The Path consisted of a race’s mentor Shifting selected individuals to a series of worlds that contrasted with their homeworld, and required them each time to carry out a task that would prove physically or intellectually challenging, bringing back proof of their success. The final stage of the Path would take the traveller to the Durae’el’s homeworld, The Citadel, where their reward would be full tuition in the technology.
Some races followed the Path, and joined the Durae’el in enlightenment, but in time, the Durae’el became disillusioned with the younger races’ lack of respect and unwillingness to follow the Path, instead demanding the technology as their due, fighting and killing for the opportunity to travel between worlds in search of fortune, glory and dominion, rather than enlightenment. They took their leave of the wider universe, turning their backs on mortal concerns that had become so far from what they were supposed to be. Before they left, however, they put in place technology that would reveal the Paths, and the Citadel, to new races aeons in the future, and grant them the opportunities that their contemporary young races so spurned.
The Citadel has been corrupted in the past, occupied by a warlike race named Tarantraal, who held dominion over the Citadel, and the power of Shifting, by twisting the rules designed to ensure that only the worthy gained the knowledge for their own gain. For almost a thousand years, the Tarantraal ruled countless worlds through their control of Shifting, until the one remaining other mortal race with knowledge of the power – the Eylish – made contact with the people of this plane when their Shift Site reactivated near the village of Maiden Ery in the south of the Barony. The brave individuals of this plane walked the Path of Enlightenment, gained entry to the Citadel and defeated the Tarantraal at their own game, wiping out the empire and returning the Citadel to a place of enlightenment and knowledge, free from the corrupting influence of greed.
At present, some of those individuals, as reward for completing the Path as the Durae’el originally specified, reside within the Citadel, learning the art so that they may use the ability themselves. These individuals have been gone for several years, and will be gone for several more, but are promised to return, both to those who know them, and a world awaiting their coming with excited anticipation.
A race of genuinely godlike power, who retired from active participation in the universe tens of thousands of years ago. The only signs remaining of their influence are Shift sites where, with the correct ceremony, ways to other planes of existence, and other people, can be opened up. They are strong followers of universal balance, ignoring personal, plane-wide and even inter-planar concerns, viewing them as part of the balance of all things across the entirety of existence.
An originally pacifistic, knowledge-seeking people who were the first race in modern times to rediscover Shifting, only to give the knowledge to the Tarantraal, who immediately used it to invade, conquer and subjugate them. They aided themselves by aiding the Kingdom in its fight to avert Tarantraal invasion, and were part of a successful venture to remove the Tarantraal leader, after which the Empire fell apart under the weight of its own numbers.
As a result of the successful co-operation, an Eylish ambassador to the Kingdom – the Shifter Captain Esmeralda Hawthorne – resides at the Kingdom Shift site near the town of Carlin Howham in the south-east of the Barony.
Ones known to the Kingdom of Exiles are Captain Esmeralda Hawthorne, Commander Cassandra Pendragon, Captain Jarreth Hawke (deceased).
A humanoid race distinguishable by the gills on their necks, the Tarantraal come from a lethally violent realm where survival is a daily mountain to climb. Granted the ability to Shift from plane to plane by the Eylish, they escaped their world and embarked on a campaign of interplanar military conquest that, at its height, encompassed thousands of planes and trillions of subjugated individuals under their harsh, militaristic regime.
A combined force of Kingdom patrolees and Eylish infiltrators successfully removed the head of their organisation, after which the empire underwent widespread revolt, a victim of the sheer number of people they had made into slaves. Any remaining Tarantraal not struggling to hold on to power now exist in small pockets across the planes, keeping their identities quiet.
Ones known to the Kingdom of Exiles are Tia, Lord Tarantraal, Commander Drake and the Wild Hunt.