Non-D&D Fantasy Inspiration: Riwa, for Exalted

[DShomshak]

A gift for Fantasy HERO campaign designers who, like me, are tired of "Well, that's the way D&D does it." There is, after all, other Fantasy. There are even other Fantasy games. I spent several years writing and developing for Exalted, White Wolf Game Studio's game of epic Fantasy -- one of whose enunciated design goals was, "This is not D&D." Inspirations ranging from ancient epics such as the Iliad to modern anime and wuxia.

 

Anyway, toward the end of my involvement with Exalted I wrote a few country descriptions for a project that never came together, leaving them as fanwork. Here's one of them. It is not only a glimpse into the game's setting, Creation, it's an experiment in a different style of setting description: more impressionistic, less like an encyclopedia article.

 

I won't try to explain very much about the setting. For the country of Riwa, the most important background information is that spirits of the dead sometimes continue their existence in an Underworld. Places saturated in death sometimes become Shadowlands where Creation and the Underworld merge at night. Also worth knowing: the High First Age -- the earliest period even most savants know about -- was ruled by the Solar Exalted. Their immense power and long reign still influences many aspects of Creation. They were overthrown by their servants, the Dragon-Blooded or Terrestrial Exalted, wielders of elemental power, in the Low First Age. That Age, too, has passed. The other two kinds of Exalted -- the shapeshifting Lunar Exalted and the fate-weaving Sidereal Exalted -- are much less known to Creation's folk.

 

For ease of reading, I'll break up the text into smaller chunks for multiple posts.

 

DEan Shomshak

[DShomshak]

Riwa

 

About midway between the Lap and Gem, the Diamond Road crosses the plateau of Riwa. Let the caravan move on; linger instead in the plaza of Qoba, one of Riwa’s seven cities. Listen to the bard, descendant of ancient princes, as he sings the Riwayana, epic repository of the country’s history, heroes and lore

 

Four times hath Riwa risen, ruled by mighty kings,

And four times hath it fallen through the faults of men.

An Age of Gold by glory gained, and lost through treacher’s guile.

An Age of Silver subsequent, built and lost for love.

A Dragon Age of toil and greed, by plague its vices purged.

A new law from the Risen King, by zealous pride undone.

A Fifth and Final King shall come: Hear now the prophecy!

When Riwa rises ne’er to fall, from mortal fault set free.

 

The Riwayana has five books, each taking a full day to sing, but the fifth book is not yet written. Today, the bard sings only a brief passage from the fourth book as a way to introduce Qoba’s king.

 

Blood and Soil

King Ruhollah stands on the high dais before his palace, his body painted black and a maguey thorn in his hand. He thrusts the spine through his earlobe, smears his hand with blood, and raises it high. A priest hands Ruhollah an ear of maize. The king then drives the thorn through his tongue and spits blood onto the dark soil that covers the platform. Finally, he lances his own manhood. He collects the blood in a small bowl and dribbles it over the skull of his grandfather. Thus does Ruhollah enact the covenant of the Risen King and proclaim himself the rightful heir: He hears the words of his ancestors, repays the earth for its life-giving bounty, and acknowledges that life comes from death. The charcoal on his body shows that his flesh comes from the Black Earth and to that darkness must return.

 

Colors of Earth

Riwans treat black as the color of both life and death. Strips and dots of Black Earth run along the seasonal streams and ancient qanats that bring water from the mountains. Here the Riwans plant squash, beans and maize. When Riwans die, they return their bodies to the Black Earth to nourish the soil with their flesh and the vital force of their lower souls.

 

Yellow Earth surrounds the farmland. This land is too dry for crops but supports sheep and goats. The half-nomadic herdsmen are not quite respectable in Riwa, for they do not live on land sanctified by their ancestors. Still, they can return to their native villages each year to perform the sacred rites. Yellow is the color of wild things, the world without humanity. Shrines to elementals are painted yellow.

 

The Fire Mountains to the west are the Blue Earth, the sky-land that brings water. Blue is the color of Heaven and a suitable hue for shrines to gods; an auspicious color, but not as good as black.

 

To the East, the plateau ends in a maze of canyons, knife-edged ridges and badlands. Beyond this Ragged Edge stretches the great Southern Desert. Riwans call the desert the Red Earth, the evil land of sandstorms and raiders where death brings no life. Ancient fortresses guard the passes through the Ragged Edge. All seven kings should send troops to the fortresses, for so commanded the Dragon Lords of old. The watch sometimes fails because the modern kings of the city-states cannot agree about which fortress belongs to which king. Some Riwans, especially those living near the Ragged Edge, volunteer. Such wardens cannot be conscripted for other battles.

 

The seven cities of Riwa are Borsuna, Dolawi, Orzad, Qoba, Resht, Uda and Wegál. Of the ruined cities, the most important is Aman-Ri, first and eternal capital of Riwa. Nothing remains of the Golden King’s palace except the great stepped, circular mound that supported it. Nevertheless, every king of Riwa since his reign — both high kings of old and the rulers of the schismed cities of today — crowns himself on the mound of the Golden King. They could not rule otherwise, or at least not rule in Riwa.

 

The Pact of Life and Death

Riwans build shrines to placate various useful or important spirits, but they reserve true reverence for their ancestors. They bury their dead in the Black Earth with clothing, food and ornaments for the afterlife. After ten years, Riwans exhume the bones and pack them in clay jars.

 

Wealthier Riwans use urns molded with death masks of the occupants. The jars of poor Riwans merely have a face sketched on the side. In return for prayers and offerings, Riwan ghosts bless and protect their living descendants. Few Riwans encounter ghosts, though. The Risen

 

King taught this covenant of the living and the dead, but also said that each should stay in their own world. Riwa has no shadowlands, so few ghosts have easy access to the living in any case.

 

Matters are different for nobles. Each city has several noble families. The nobles rise and fall in rank based on the number and power of their ancestral ghosts: The aristocracy of the living echoes the aristocracy of the dead. The royal family just has the strongest cohort of ghosts. New deaths can swell that cohort; Lethe shrinks it. Dynasties shift over the decades.

 

The ziggurat of the noble dead dominates a Riwan city’s plaza, overtopping the palaces of the living. Each tier of the ziggurat has crypts cut into its sides where black-glazed urns rest on altars of diorite, receiving sacrifices of incense, grain and blood. The royal family claims the higher tiers and crowning spire. The sacred ziggurat enables the dead to visit their tombs when mortals sacrifice to them, and so advise their heirs.

---------------

Dean Shomshak

[DShomshak]

Holy War

Tawia of the noble Darhune family dons the regalia of war: a breastplate, a skirt of leather strips, bracers, greaves and helm. Last she dons the silver-gilt mask of a desert jackal. The sisters in her martial order dress likewise, with masks of vulture, lizard and leopard. Tradition says that women must not fight in war, so they wear the visage of beasts instead. In their own chapterhouses, the male nobles don similar panoplies in the colors of their orders: Storm Knights in blue and white, Flame Knights in red and orange, Stone Knights in gray and brown, Maize Knights in green and yellow, and River Knights in green and blue. They paint their faces in their order’s colors instead of wearing masks. The warriors march from their chapterhouses to the plaza and shout, “Riwa and Qoba! Ruhollah and the Risen King!”

 

Similar ceremonies take place in Dolawi. The kings spent a month scheduling the war. Deaths among the aristocracy left both cities short of slaves, for nobles must not go alone to the Black Earth. A war enables the nobles to re-stock.

 

Meeting in battle, knight shouts challenge to knight. They wager handfuls of conscripted peasants on their duels. Tawia wins ten soldiers as slaves for the Darhune. Only the bravest dare to wager their own lives: The victor shall sacrifice the loser to his ancestors.

 

The second day brings the melee. Knights charge at the common soldiers of each city, striving with bola, net and mace to capture additional prisoners. The conscripts bear only padded clubs.

 

On the third day, the two kings duel. Ruhollah loses and so must give 100 of his subjects to the king of Dolawi.

 

“My ancestors demand more,” says King Fodjour. “Double or nothing? I know it’s irregular, but what can I do?” King Ruhollah allows that his ancestors say the same, but suggests they simply duel for another 100 soldiers. Perhaps they shall break even.

 

Secret Conquest

Indeed, lately the ancestors demand more every year: more incense, prayers and blood, richer funerals even for the common folk, more beasts and slaves sacrificed at the death of nobles. More wars. Everyone complies. No king would dare seem stingy: He would offend his ancestors and weaken his claim to inherit the Risen King’s reign. Instead of making war once every few years, Qoba has fought two wars already this year.

 

Nobody points out that the Risen King’s law does not include Riwa’s ritualistic slave-taking wars. When the Risen King departed, the lords of the seven cities elected a new high king from among their number. Sore losers turned to civil war. Kings and nobles sacrificed prisoners to strengthen their ancestors, which the ancestors endorsed for their own benefit. The Riwans eventually gave up on high kings, but the wars continued.

 

Limited contact between the living and the dead also means that no Riwan has yet figured out that the new demands don’t come from their ancestors. In fact, the First and Forsaken Lion conquered Riwa-of-the-Underworld four years ago. Most of the Riwan ghosts now labor in the Deathlord’s prayer mills. He destroyed any noble ghosts whom he could not break to his will. Many of the ghosts who manifest in the mortuary ziggurats are imposters.

 

In each city, bogus ancestors tell kings that ceremonial wars are not enough. They should train their knights and soldiers for real wars, marching north and south along the Diamond Road. Dutifully, the kings obey. Already, some launch raids against nearby tribes and villages, capturing entire populations for slaves and sacrifices. They want to be ready when the Final King appears to forge Riwa once more into a great nation… from mortal faults set free.

-------------

Dean Shomshak

[DShomshak]

[BEGIN BOXED TEXT]

Tephra, That Was Anadem

The nearest shadowland to Riwa lies almost 100 miles south of the plateau, along a now-unused spur of the Diamond Road.

 

Once there was a valley between two knots of mountains, its rich soil watered by several small streams. Here was built Anadem, City of Flowers. A high volcanic mountain overlooked the flower-scented city. The folk of Anadem prayed to Heaven in gratitude and joy.

 

Then the volcano erupted so violently as to destroy its eastern flank. A deluge of burning ash swept over the vale of Anadem in minutes, killing everything and everyone. The people had time only for brief prayers. None were delivered, for the gods are weak and inattentive; but many of the people became ghosts. Their death-prayers carried Anadem into the Underworld.

 

The city’s name died with its inhabitants. By day, the valley remains a desolation of barren gray ash where nothing moves except the wind. At night the city of Tephra appears, gray and white gables and towers rising in the starlight.

 

Many among the living and the dead believe that someone in Anadem must have sinned a great sin to offend the volcano’s god. Others suggest the god envied Anadem and destroyed the city out of spite. No one can ask the god, for no one has seen him since the cataclysm. The remains of the mountain, half a mile shorter than before, snarl toward Tephra like the jaw of a skull half-buried in the ground. Its former name is cursed and unspoken. Instead, men call it Anadem’s Pyre.

 

The ghosts of Tephra do not cultivate their ghostly ash-fields or otherwise pretend that they still live. They know they are dead. They could scarcely pretend otherwise, given the seared and seeping ectoplasmic flesh exposed by the blackened, flaking remnants of spiritual skin. The ghosts hate the living out of envy. They still pray, but now they have only one prayer that they offer to Oblivion: May all gods burn.

[END BOXED TEXT]

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Further explanations of references you can't figure out are available on request.

 

Dean Shomshak