The Kindred Lumnos

Mother Lumnos was the first of her Kindred Siblings to fall for and mate with a mortal and one of the first to have a Descended child. Lumnos had grey eyes like the rest of Kindred, but she gifted her offspring with blue eyes at the Forging.

It is well believed by the Lumnos Descended that Mother Lumnos can see what lies in the future. She’s been known to interact with her most devoted subjects. 

When it comes to the mortals, Lumnos loved them and never wanted them forced into submission. She even commanded her Descended to guard them from harm, not be the cause of it.

Lumnos’ societal structure

At the very top is the King or Queen and their consort if they have one. Then the Crown’s high ranks and council, which is made up of the Crown’s advisors, High General, Warden of Light, Warden of Shadows, etc… 

There’s the royal family, who lives at the palace – that’s the House of the Crown, which has been the Corbois for generations, since the past 5 Corbois Crowns haven’t been contested in the Challenging.

Next are the 20 Houses and their status is broken up into 2 groups: First are the 5 most powerful houses in the Realm, currently these are Houses Corbois, Benette, Hanoverre, Teniers, and Amraut. If these 5 make a decision the other Houses will follow. Then there’s the 15 other powerful houses that make up the 20 Houses of Lumnos.

After the 20 Houses are the Lesser Houses – this is everyone else with a house that’s NOT in one of the 20 houses, basically the general population of Lumnos Descended.

All the way at the bottom, but above the mortals, are the Unhoused Descended. These are the Descended that live on the outskirts of the realm, and are seen as inconsequential, unimportant, dirt on their boots to those in the 20 houses.

The Army

The Emarion Army supplies and trains soldiers for all of Emarion and guards the Courelle island by patrolling the waters around it. Though led by the Fortos King, the army’s ranks include mortals and Descended from every realm, except Umbros who doesn’t permit her subjects to join the army.

The army can be summoned by any of the Crowns if a conflict goes beyond what the realm’s own internal Royal Guard can handle. Descended soldiers in the army have their first allegiance for their army oath and loyalty to their home realm is secondary. 

NOTE: Guardians are placed strategically within the Army to divert weapons and relay plans, like Brecke and Auralie respectively.

The army is permitted to use Godstone weapons when necessary. 

Most of the army’s spies are women and all of the higher ups in command are men. We know from Andrei that many of his old soldier friends bemoan that women are “distractions” among the infantry’s ranks.

Fortos doesn’t have the resources to take on too many new soldiers at once, they barely have enough weapons as it is and they have to BUY them from different places like the Evrim in Lumnos fairly commonly.

Back before the blood war the Army was different. Fortos was given control of the continent’s army under the agreement it would act only with the consent of all Crowns. During the Blood War, the Crowns disagreed on how far the army should go to stop the rebellion. It was nearly impossible for them to come to any unanimous agreement, so a decision was made that the army could act on a vote of six Crowns, instead of nine. Some concessions were given in exchange, the use of godstone for example.

History 

During the Blood War, Ignios tried to stay neutral and keep out of the fighting, which definitely aligns with their hospitable nature we were just talking about, but neither side would let Ignois stay neutral.

The essential oases started getting poisoned, which led the Descended and mortals to each blame it on the other instead of looking beyond the borders for an outsider that might be the cause.

The army refused to send soldiers to help unless Ignios joined the war effort. Tybold took on three of the other Gryverns at once when the other Crowns were trying to force Ignios into joining. He gravely wounded the Montios gryvern which is why it was weak enough for the guardians to kill it.

Eventually the Ignois Crown had to give in before the entire realm became uninhabitable, and the rebels hit them hard for it. By the end of the war, there was hardly anyone from Ignios left. 

Those who did survive never let go of their anger, they stopped welcoming outsiders. When the current Crown took his throne, he banished all the mortals and for the Descended who are traveling through the realm, they must remain on the Ring Road unless they’ve been given an invitation from the king himself.

Geography

Rolling grasslands with futuristic cities. Sophos City has towering buildings of metal and glass in mind-bending designs that defy the laws of nature. They have Paved streets bustling with machines that zip around carrying people – in other words, the Emarion version of a car.

Sophos also contains Emarion’s largest libraries and a number of prestigious, invitation-only research institutions.

The Realms Residence

Mortals are permitted by invitation only. Mortals can earn a spot at one of its universities or as a researcher, but it is very difficult. If a Mortal is even caught breathing too close to someone who is suspected of being a rebel they are banned for life.

Mortals here get paid so much that most of them send money back home to their families. Thieves realized this and started targeting anyone with relatives in sofas so people began faking their debts. Their loved ones know that they’re safe but everyone else from their home realm thinks they’re dead.

This is how they protect their people, but this rumor has been twisted to mean that when a mortal outlives their usefulness in conducting research, they BECOME the research themselves. According to Henri (and the guardians), the Descended experiment put them in cages to run tests, sometimes with medicine and sometimes with magic or weapons. 

There is a little truth to this rumor: there are experiments that are done to Mortals but those Mortals volunteer,  they want to do something useful with their lives and they get paid a fortune to leave behind for their families. 

 It is seen as a very noble choice. The results of these experiments save thousands of lives and the money The Mortals make will keep their families out of poverty for generations. Overall The Mortals in Sophos are really happy, they’re treated well and they’re proud of the work they do. 

Mortals and Descended commingle and most residential buildings are communal with a diverse mix of people. Citizens are expected to embrace a love of curiosity not just in their research but also in their private time as well. To encourage this each quarter within the city held nightly events featuring Music Theater and food or neighbors can mingle and learn something new. 

While they embrace this communal aspect, the Descended are still freely able to come and go as they please and the city is closed to mortals except by invitation, like we covered earlier. Even in Sophos classrooms are segregated to prevent mortal children from learning things the crowns deem too dangerous for them to know. 

Most residents dressed smartly with cleanly tailored suits in elegant fabrics, some even wearing ballooning sleeves and oversized jeweled buttons and overcoats that trailed like billowing capes. The residents of Sophos are always rushing to get from place to place and they don’t like when people are just kind of casually strolling through the streets making it more difficult to get where they are going.

Crown Doriel

Insists on being called by their name and NOT their title, claiming the only thing titles do is encourage an inflated ego.

They are non-binary and described as “beautiful beyond words” with androgynous features, and a clean shaven head. Their crown is a ring of crackling sparks that splinter out like lightning. They also have a very powerful aura, strong enough to make both Diem and Luther a little hesitant 

The sophos crown is also in charge of the rituals and responsible for guiding the rest of the crowns through them and making sure everything goes according to the rules and traditions.

Geography

Montios is the largest realm in Emarion, and this is because it was once 2 different realms until it was redrawn into one very large realm. Only 1 half is really used, the other half, the forgotten lands, is largely ignored, but more on that in a bit.

The endless lilac slopes stretch the length of the horizon and while it’s beautiful with all its mountains, the Montios terrain is desolate, too harsh for most life to survive. Due to the snowy winter-like conditions there is also little vegetation within the realm. 

That’s not to say there isn’t ANY vegetation or wildlife, there are streams with an abundance of animals. This includes a very specific rare herb that only grows here. This is the herb that would have been the cure for Henri’s mother’s illness.

At least one of the cities of this realm is underground. To get to this underground city, you have to enter through the caves, which open to a cliff that disappears into a deep ravine. Using their ice magic the Montios Descended are able to create spiraling bridges that go into the ravine.

After you go down the bridge, you enter a tunnel of carved stone which has a room for visitors since no one but Montios Descended are allowed past this point.

With a Montios Descended’s touch on a huge rock slab, a doorway will appear with the Montios sigil etched into it. After which you’re in the atrium with the high ceilings crafted entirely of ice. This icy ceiling allows them to light up the space but also it keeps their location unknown from the outside. The atrium has towering stone columns and firelit torches at the center of the room is a statue of Mother Montios.

King Renmai

King Renmai was the late Montios crown. He was an old frail-looking man and used a walking stick. Just like the rest of his realm, he refused to talk to anyone who is not from Montios. 

He was the only other Crown that was alive during the blood war along with Yrselle. Considering how old he was in our story, seemingly much older than Yrselle, I’d guess he was mature for a Descended even back then.

Forgotten Lands

The Forgotten lands is actually the lost realm of the 10th kindred, Omnos, but no one except Sophos Crown knows that. To the Montios Descended, this is an area of the realm in which they do not enter, they say the land is evil and cursed. Few Descended are willing to go, and most who do are never seen again.

When the lavender mountains end, a dark forest set on a series of steep hills forms. Its trees are blackened and gnarled, like they’ve been burned or poisoned. At the center, is a valley so deep you can’t see the bottom. Though it was within Montios borders, it feels angrily disconnected, like it’s being rejected by the realm itself.