Legend of Ransera

Cithæra scowled at the strange sky that hung over the Luxium, and regarded the grim portent with senses beyond mortal vision. The Princeps Sibylla was, perforce by virtue of her station, the most potent Sembler in the realm of Solunarium. There were many who argued she was, in fact, the most powerful mage altogether, though it might be deemed treason to utter such a sentiment aloud. After all, centuries of established precedent and the official position of the Crown was that the Solar Sovereign held the distinction of being the mightiest mage in the kingdom. Whatever the case, Cithæra’s prowess for discernment was unparalleled and she saw cause to practice her puissant Craft upon the pitchy skies above.

“No.” She muttered, glancing to the golden figure at her side. “This must not be permitted to pass.”

“I see it, too.” Kyrin observed, grimly. “The other royals must be alerted.”

“All of them.” Cithæra confirmed, with a pointed look to Kyrin who inclined his head in acquiescence.

“All save the boy. He convalesces yet.” Kyrin appended.

“Very well.” The princess stalked toward the Radiant Palace in haste, as Kyrin made for the nearest entrance to the Umbrium.


“What is the meaning of this spontaneous audience, cousin?” The Solar Sovereign swept into her presence chamber, her glistering golden robes, while ostentatious, were very simple by the standards of Thalya IV Imperatrix.

“Only a matter of dire urgency would lead me to disturb Your Divine Radiance on such short notice. I have become aware of… a phenomenon.”

“Say on.” The Sovereign lowered herself and perched upon her throne, regarding the younger golden elven princess who stood before her dais.

“If we do not act quickly, we may see a disruption to the very lifeblood of our Holy Empire. Alien forces gather a darkness that would obscure the sacred light of Aværys and cut us off from our blessed Crafts.”

Thalya IV arched an eyebrow, painfully aware of what such would represent to their kingdom, which relied upon ætheric manipulation in sundry and deeply ingrained ways.

“A cessation to magic?” The queen rasped.

Cithæra nodded.

“And how shall we stave off this dread eventuality?”

“As the sacred scions of House Sol’Aværys, Divine Radiance: With Force and Fire.” Cithæra inclined her head deferentially.

“It will take a great deal of magic to combat this threat.I would ask that you summon everyone of Varværyn pedigree forthwith— trueborn and base— to gather at the Temple for an impromptu Missa Radiens. We may channel the power in our blood through the Eye of Aværys…” The Princeps Sibylla gestured to the amulet resting against the Sovereign’s bosom. The queen grimaced,

“And what of your Tethered Talisman, coz? Will you continue to hide it away, even when it might aid us in this hour of peril?”

“The remedy to what ails Ransera lies not in subtle moonlight, but in the stark, searing light of the Aværys’ sun.” Cithæra’s answer was met with a snarl, but through her sigh the monarch consented:

“I will call forth the children of the Unbroken Line and those of the Aværyan Guard. You may tend to your own house, as ever.” Thalya IV said, rising from her throne and descending the dais to attend to the urgent matter directly.

Within the hour, The Temple of the Blazing Sun hosted the princes of the realm, their trueborn children and bastards alike. Above their lofty crowns rotated the great prism of illumite that was housed at the summit of the pyramid. The congregants formed a ring around the two most potent mages of their divine lineage: Cithæra Princeps and Thalya IV Imperatrix.

“My kinsmen!” Called the Princess Sibylla, sending a hush throughout the great chamber as her voice reverberated through the hallowed hall. “You have been summoned to embark upon an holy endeavour in defence of our storied empire! A threat to the very livelihood of Solunarium has presented itself imminently...

“We of Light and of Shadow, Scions of Sceptre and Scourge, grow weary of foreign forces blithely exerting influence over our realm. Atraxia is not some great gaming board for apostate gods, and we who are descended from Divinity shan’t be forced into conflicts that concern us not. We are lords and princes, not gladiators in thralldom to peregrine powers. We were not born to sue, but to command!”

As Cithæra stalked the centre of this circle of her kinsfolk, Thalya looked on with a stoic stillness to her expression that she would not allow to betray her discomfort at allowing her rival this platform to speak stirring words of unity. In another Ransera where the Unbroken had lost their whilom war, this woman might have been Solar Sovereign. And this speech was like a glimpse into how she might have reigned. The monarch was not amused.

“The powers we would stand athwart are vasty and the work at hand will be hard wrought, but our famed family fights not alone!” Planting herself dead centre, Cithæra’s hands shot upward and the peak of the pyramid above began to split open into four symmetrical parts, revealing the inky black sky above the rotating prism. A bellow from above quaked the very foundations of the temple.

“The House of Sol’Aværys aligns with the royal draconic Zalkyrian Dynasty in this endeavour!” There were gasps amongst the crowd as they bore witness to a sight unknown to Solunarium since antiquity. All five surviving scions of The Crownwyrm Zalkyrion were circling above the Luxium- their scales of silver and gold casting a lustrous glow against the black backdrop of the blighted skies.

“Foreign forces would fain rob us of the sacred sunlight of Aværys that doth bathe Atraxia in warmth and lustre. They would dim the radiance of our empire, but we will not go gently toward the twilight of our greatest power!” Cithæra’s hands began to glow with white hot flame.

“Those who would weaken and humiliate us, will instead give us cause to dazzle the skies in a spectacle that befits our Sacred Sovereign’s centennial!” The solar heat slowly rose forth from Cithæra’s hands toward the prism above, and Thalya IV stepped beside her to raise her palms skyward to join her light with that of her kinswoman. At her chest, the golden amulet of old began to blaze with the fury of the Searing sun, an aura of light spreading forth to encompass all who stood within the walls of the temple. The walls of the pyramid itself began to radiate with the light of Majesty. Though it was warm like sunlight, this was something altogether different and all those of the blood who were bathed beneath it felt the euphoric, empyreal high of the ancient, dormant divinity that dwelt in their blood- rarely if ever tapped, but suddenly put to pointed focus by the united will of their Dynasty. Sanguinist and Immaculist alike were united in this queer, common cause as the Sovereign’s own Majesty aligned them and summoned forth their æther to be channeled to purpose.

“Join us, cousins! Let the rest of Ransera be dimmed beneath this preternatural penumbra, whilst we illuminate the Solunarian skies with the glory of Aværys, æternal burneth his pyre! If forces abroad would steal the very sun, we shall erect another that shines for us alone!” The beams of light emitting from the hands of the two mighty mages reached the illumite prism, which glowed brighter and spun faster. The Pater and Materfamilii were the next to join, stepping into the middle of the circle of congregants and raising their hands to lend their Craft to the task, and soon the entire princely class was contributing æther to the cause. Many magicks were interwoven, with the Princeps Pontifex exploiting his grandmastery to conduct familiar Symphonies toward their common goal, so the family worked as a seamless, united front as other masters and grandmasters plied their potency.

“With force!” Shouted Cithæra.

The ring of princes and dukes became a mass of bodies, drawing and sending æther upward into the shard. The prism rose above the temple and into the skies above. Phocion stood beside his winged half-brother, applying his own passing potent Kinetics to the younger Avialæ’s similar efforts to raise the prism above the temple.

“And fire!” The dragons, led by the eldest and largest, Zalkyriax, descended toward the shard and parted their jaws wide to send forth plumes of dragonfire toward the rapidly rotating prism. All over the city, eyes turned skyward as the gleaming illumite bathed in dragonfire brightened enough to wash the Luxium in light.

The process proceeded over a matter of hours. Geomancers manifested solid stone, which was blended with the Craft of pyromancers and sent rocketing upward to be absorbed into the prism’s orbit as it swirled ever faster. Kineticists pushed it higher above the temple as the newfound fuel collected around the crystal, creating a flaming orb- a second sun.

The Solar Sovereign called out over the din of their thunderous task:

“Let all of Atraxia be bathed in the light of Aværys’ sceptre and may no Solunarian sorcerer be denied the blessing of His ætheric radiance!”

The dragons flapped their massive wings to rise with the growing orb of light, like a draconic escort to an ascending godly chariot. They drew the solar simulacrum high into the night sky and turned it to an approximation of day.

Thus did five dragons and scores of elven mages bathe their desert in the light of their own solar orb, manifested from æther and hung in the skies over the Atraxian Expanse. Night would fall upon Solunarium no more for as long as The Sceptre of Aværys mounted the heavens.

NOTICE: Until otherwise noted, a dim supernatural semblance of sunlight will be cast across the entire Atraxian expanse by a fiery orb, which has been dubbed: “The Sceptre of Aværys”. The Sceptre’s light nullifies the magic-dampening effects of the Shadow of the Eclipse throughout the realm of Solunarium and renders the creatures drawn by the shadow’s darkness vulnerable to mundane and magical attacks, if they dare to breach the borders of its light.

While the newfound demideific glow may be brilliant at close range, The Sceptre’s additional light obscures the bolstered auras of any demigods within Atraxia significantly, making the divine light visible only between one and ten miles from the source depending on its level of brilliance.

The Crown has officially declared The Sceptre of Aværys to be a national monument intended to honour the Solar Sovereign’s Centennial Jubilee with a display of Aværyan divinity. It is not widely known outside the royal family that it was engendered as a preventative measure against foreign influence on Solunarian sovereignty. Though the eclipse is visible in the skies, it is largely believed to have been established as a backdrop to better highlight the monument, rather than a supernatural phenomenon in its own right.

Additional effects: Plants, including crops, will grow larger than normal from the additional photosynthetic opportunities of 24-hour concentrated sunlight. Elementalists have been set to work at protecting the River Vasta, its tributaries and other water sources in cities, villages and oases from depletion, as the additional sunlight leads to the evaporation of more water than usual. Nocturnal and crepuscular creatures in the open desert, disoriented by the dearth of darkness, are taking to caves or growing aggressive due to the shift in their habitat. This phenomenon covers the entire desert right up to its borders and five miles out into the sea beyond the Atraxian coastline, but the miniature sun casts no light over the Commonwealth and is only visible from within the realm of Solunarium.

All questions or concerns about these effects may be posed directly to Pharaoh.