<div align="center">A World in Progress…</div><br/>The world, as far as anyone knows, is a sprawling landmass surrounded on all sides by endless ocean; attempts have been made to cross the seas, but most have made it a matter of a few hundred miles before turning back without sighting land, and those who have gone further have never been heard from again. Across the breadth of the world are forests, deserts, mountains, tundras, rivers, wastelands, prairies, islands on the periphery-- great cities and homely villages, vast empires and humble kingdoms, each of which is home to all kinds of peoples, cultures, and races, each of which practices all kinds of faiths, worships all kinds of deities.<br/><br/>Below is just a hint of the things to be seen, but this is a world in progress, a world forever being built and shaped, and there’s always more to be added…<br/><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Nations and Realms of the World</div><div class="spoiler_body"><br/><span class="bbc_u">The Rose Empire</span><br/><br/>Known as Rue Pantaz or Pantazia in the language of the empire’s founders, the Mard Pantaz (or ‘People of the Rose’), the Rose Empire is a sprawling, multiethnic empire that controls a vast swathe of the southwest of the continent. The Mard Pantaz consider it their destiny to rule the world, and this conviction-- along with a military might that draws on the strength of a hundred different peoples and races-- drives the empire's endless campaigns to conquer land and assimilate new citizens.<br/><br/>Capital: The enormous, sweltering city of Chatari, population one million, built on the edge of the Great Pantazian Rainforest; the name derives from a term in the Old Pantazian language whose meaning has been forgotten. Other major cities include Port Sunrise, on the southern coast, and Sunscorch, at the heart of the Rose Desert that spans the northwest of the empire.<br/>Geography: Covering nearly 3 million square miles, Pantazia is a microcosm of the world itself, containing virtually all biomes and terrains other than tundra. Nearly a quarter of the empire is dominated by the vast Rose Desert; to the east lies the Great Pantazian Rainforest, the ancestral homeland of the Mard Pantaz, while the southwest coast is characterized by marshes and stretches of green hills.<br/>Demographics: Extremely diverse, with virtually all races represented throughout the empire, but the founders and ruling classes belong to a human ethnogroup called the Mard Pantaz. Originally from the great rainforest to the south of the continent, the Mard Pantaz began their first campaign of expansion nearly a thousand years ago, and have since swallowed up countless nations, kingdoms, and realms in their quest to control the world and impose a kind of Pax Pantazia on all living things.<br/>Language(s): The lingua franca is Pantazian, but there are as many languages spoken as there are cultures, and the Mard Pantaz, to their credit, generally aren't interested in forcing the people they conquer to speak their language. Pantazian is typically the language of government, business, and mixed groups, but conquered peoples are free to continue speaking their own languages, and in some states within the empire, just a fraction of the population can actually speak Pantazian.<br/>Political system: The Rose Emperor– a title currently held by Sazir II, now in her 5th year as monarch– exercises ultimate authority, but smaller regions and cities are permitted to elect councils and administrators that exercise a surprising degree of autonomy. Over the past century these councils, as well as corrupt bureaucrats and advisors, have eroded the authority of the Rose Throne, although Sazir II is ambitious and determined to restore the prestige and power of the Emperor.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_u">The Spice Isles</span><br/><br/>Just off the southwestern coast of the world lie a string of islands, renowned across the land for their songs, their complex languages, and their eponymous spices. Once proudly independent, the Spice Isles were conquered fifteen years ago by the Pantazians, and while some parts of the archipelago have settled into a sullen but quiet peace, others are wracked by a brutal guerrilla campaign against imperial occupation. Islanders have historically been rare on the mainland, but refugees from the Isles have become an increasingly familiar sight since the invasion.<br/><br/>Capital: The Spice Isles have never been unified under a single, centralized state, and have never had a capital. The largest city in the Isles, home to some 12,000 people, is Masnawwuf, on the island of Qawsa', and it is from Masnawwuf that the Empire rules (or attempts to rule) the Isles; otherwise, settlements tend to be small.<br/>Geography: The Isles consist of some sixty or so islands, most of them populated, many of them shrouded in dry tropical woodland with stretches of high shrubland interspersed here and there. The weather is warm year-round, with a long dry season and brief periods of heavy rain.<br/>Demographics: The Isles are almost ubiquitously populated by native human Spice Islanders, of which there are at least three dozen ethnic groups.<br/>Language(s): The lingua franca of the Isles is Zawla' Yazani (literally, "Island Talk"); the language is notoriously difficult for outsiders, sporting sounds foreign to Common (like the pharyngeal fricative, denoted in Common script with a ‘) and a byzantine grammatical system. Each island generally has a unique dialect or sub-language-- some of them more than one, and many of which are not mutually intelligible-- that is spoken as the first language by its denizens.<br/>Political system: As the Rose Empire's latest acquisition, and a particularly troublesome one, the Isles are formally ruled over by a military governor, General Rozehir Ashali, who governs from Masnawwuf; however, there are still many parts of the archipelago where the empire's control remains hotly contested.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_u">Nagara</span><br/><br/>A great city-state that sits perched at the southernmost point of the Western Peninsula, Nagara had its modest beginnings as a ramshackle outpost established hundreds of years ago by refugees fleeing the Rose Empire’s ravenous appetite for conquest. Since then, it has blossomed into a thriving metropolis, buoyed by robust trade with other nations and protected by a phenomenon unique to Nagara: its legion of corpse soldiers, dead bodies imbued with new life and tremendous strength by Nagarite necromancers.<br/><br/>Capital: None; Nagara is a city-state with a population just shy of a million people. The city core is a walled expanse at the end of the Western Peninsula, with stretches of farmland that help feed and sustain the city spread around it up to the Sawtooth Mountains that hold the Pantazians at bay.<br/>Geography: From its vantage point on the coast, Nagara experiences fairly temperate weather, with warm, sunny summers and cool but gentle winters. It is a land of green and blue, with the ocean to the west and rolling hillsides and farmland to the east. The great, jagged Sawtooth Mountains serve as a natural boundary between Nagara and the Rose Empire.<br/>Demographics: Mostly human, although Nagara’s prosperity and penchant for trade has brought people from all over the world to its shores.<br/>Language(s): A true cosmopolis, Nagara’s residents are bound together only by Common; otherwise, a hundred languages can be heard on its streets.<br/>Political system: Power rests primarily with three Regent Captains, elected to staggered four-year terms and advised by an elected Council of Wisdom; the current Regent Captains are Khavari Junth, Ember Genasir, and Immeral Fornyth. The military plays a major role in Nagarite politics, however, with the generals frequently getting involved on grounds of ‘city security’.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_u">Vijnaya</span> (by yaracyrrah)<br/><br/>Capital: Gharamla (pop. 40,000) is the primary center for the Panchayat (see below).  Aprambhala (pop. 80,000) is Vijnaya's largest city and only major port.  The vast majority of Vijnayans live in smaller settlements of some thousands of persons each.<br/>Geography: Vijnaya is a large island plus associated smaller islands and islets.  The climate is tropical.  Fertile land and all vital natural resources and plentiful, and apart from the dense jungle and mountains of the main island's center, there are few significant obstacles to overland travel.  The surrounding seas, on the other hand, are notoriously hazardous, a significant factor in Vijnaya's relative isolation.<br/>Demographics: All native Vijnayans are human, and they are ethnically and culturally homogeneous.  The people of Vijnaya organize themselves by their vocations or Paths.  Children and adolescents study whatever Paths catch their interest and are not expected to prioritize or fully dedicate themselves; to formally choose a Path is to become an adult in Vijnayan society.<br/>Language(s): Vijnayan.  Merchants in Aprambhala know enough Common to trade with foreigners; few other Vijnayans learn Common unless they intend to travel.<br/>Political system: Vijnaya is governed, loosely speaking, by the disciples of the Panchayat path, who serve as advisers and mediators when communal decisions (at any level) must be made.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_u">Sekhar Ghol</span><br/><br/>Sequestered in the southeast corner of the world, Sekhar Ghol is a strange and gloomy land, a place where worship of the Buried Gods-- heresy virtually everywhere else-- is the law of the land. For many Gholis, the world is perched on the cusp of oblivion, and they alone carry the torch of truth that can save the souls of the world. This sense of doomed purpose seems to be responsible both for the joyless atmosphere that permeates Sekhar Ghol and for the Gholis' willingness to tolerate a repressive, frequently violent political system.<br/><br/>Capital: The city of Choria, population 325,000, houses the Tombs of the Saints-- a vast underground network of shrines that serves as the capital of Sekhar Ghol. From the tombs, amongst the remains of their forebearers, the Gravekeepers rule the land.<br/>Geography: Sekhar Ghol is bounded to the west by the Twenty Jewels of Heaven, a vast mountain range running south-to-north; to the north by the Moonlight River; and to the east and south by the sea.<br/>Demographics: Humans and dwarves comprise about four-fifths of Sekhar Ghol’s population, with the remainder made up chiefly of halflings, tieflings, and a sundry mix of people unlucky enough to wind up in Sekhar Ghol.<br/>Language(s): Sekhar Ghol has no widely spoken 'native' language; the vast majority of Gholis simply speak Common. The Gravekeepers speak a liturgical language that is said to be a rendering of the Buried Gods' own language, passed down by the Mad Prophet Bellasar himself, but this language is known only to Gravekeepers and their scribes.<br/>Political system: The Gravekeepers– the powerful priestly class– exercise complete authority in Sekhar Ghol, where public life is oriented around worship of the Buried Gods. Power struggles amongst the Gravekeepers are endemic and often vicious; factions are ever-shifting, and losing sway could mean being branded as a heretic– with all the horrors that entails. Currently, a Gravekeeper named Audhil has managed to cobble together a ruling faction based on a purist and deeply conservative interpretation of the Buried Scriptures– and, more alarmingly for Sekhar Ghol’s neighbors, a belief that the Scriptures must be brought to other nations, by force if necessary.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_u">The Unconquered Marshes</span><br/><br/>Once upon a time, the orcs ruled an empire legendary for its feats of science and engineering, and for the diversity of its client races-- until it became a casualty of the enterprising Mard Pantaz to its south. Devastated by the ensuing war, the orcs withdrew to a small backwater corner of their lands, ceding the rest to the new Rose Empire. They've since managed to rebuild a respectable if modest society, but they haven't forgotten the great empire they once ruled-- or, for that matter, forgiven the Mard Pantaz for destroying it.<br/><br/>Capital: The Unconquered Marshes are mostly decentralized and have no capital; the largest village is Murren’s Fall with a population of 9,000, ruled by the House of Ilor.<br/>Geography: The marshes occupy some seven thousand square miles dominated by wetlands, swamps, and bogs. Towards the south, on the border of the Rose Empire, the marshes give way to stretches of green fields, dotted with the handful of farms that are largely responsible for feeding the people of the Marshes.<br/>Demographics: Almost entirely orcs, as well as their former client races, including kobolds, goblins, and those tieflings who have not left for the Ashlands. Many half-orcs also call the Marshes home, finding an acceptance among the orc Houses that has been denied to them elsewhere.<br/>Language(s): The orcish languages are widely spoken, with Western Orcish serving as a kind of lingua franca alongside the smaller dialects and the various client race languages.<br/>Political system: No overarching government exists over the Marshes; instead, each village is ruled as an independent fiefdom by one of the various orc Houses. Once prominent aristocratic families in the old orcish realm, the Houses are helmed by an Elder who acts as the village’s virtual monarch. Once a year, the House Elders convene in a different village around the Marshes to discuss issues relevant to the Marshes as a whole, and to each of the Houses. The next such meeting is to be held in the territory of House Mileva, whose Elder-- Mileva Arren-- has as of late been pushing for the establishment of a central government in the Marshes; only time will tell if her quest proves successful.<br/><br/></div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Regions and landmarks</div><div class="spoiler_body"><br/><br/><br/></div></div><br/><div class="spoiler_container"><div class="spoiler_header" onclick="hideSecond (this);" role="button">Faiths and deities</div><div class="spoiler_body"><br/><span class="bbc_u">The Buried Gods</span><br/><br/>Centuries ago, the Mad Prophet Bellasar began preaching a message that shocked listeners from one end of the continent to the other: the great gods and goddesses to whom so many pray and swear fealty, from whom so many derive strength and power, are false, lesser creatures. The true creators of the world, the true powers that be, have lain inert and asleep since time immemorial– but, Bellasar warned, they wouldn’t be for long, and only those who renounced their false gods would be spared when the Buried Gods returned.<br/><br/>For the most part, Bellasar’s message landed with a thud; most were appalled that someone would so blatantly disrespect the gods, and he was run out of towns across the world by angry mobs. After a year of itinerant preaching, Bellasar was arrested in an ancient kingdom that no longer exists and put to death for his heresies. It’s been hundreds of years since, and the Buried Gods are nowhere to be seen. But the message Bellasar brought to the world has survived, and has even become the majority religion amongst the people of the bleak, gloomy country of Sekhar Ghol. Outside the borders of that realm, adherents to the Cult of the Buried Gods tend to be looked upon with distrust and fear; in some places, cultists are routinely discovered and killed for fear that their heresy will bring down the wrath of the gods. They are considered wicked, devious, manipulative, as delusional as their ancient prophet himself.<br/><br/>The truth, of course, is never so straightforward. Most cultists are convinced that the Buried Gods will be returning within their own lifetimes, and they are desperate to rescue as many people as possible from the Buried Gods’ wrath. They may not all be paragons of virtue, but many place themselves at great risk– social ostracization at best, death at worst– to save the souls of their peers, although some may have ulterior motives.<br/><br/>Cultists hold faithful to a nameless tome referred to only as ‘the book’ or ‘our book’, allegedly written by Bellasar during his lifetime (although there is some evidence that it was actually written years after his death by his closest disciples). The book delineates certain rituals for delaying the return of the Buried Gods so that evangelists can reach more souls; the priests and priestesses of Sekhar Ghol, known as Gravekeepers, hold services during which they sing, chant softly, and burn incense in an effort to keep their gods asleep. The book also claims that those who save many souls– that is, convert many apostates– will be favored by the Buried Gods when they return, so while many cult evangelists are driven by humanitarianism, some are certainly a little less altruistic.<br/><br/><span class="bbc_u">Desert Folklore</span><br/><br/>A general term for a philosophy practiced in the Rose Desert, adherents to desert folklore, known colloquially as Wanderers, are a nomadic sect that holds that enlightenment can never be achieved through permanence in the physical world; thus its followers travel the desert, never staying in one place for long. Wanderers adhere to no holy book or written set of rules, and their traditions are oral, passed down from master to student. As such, in some sense, each Wanderer practices their own version of the faith, following what they learned from their master and then eventually taking a student of their own.<br/><br/>The one common belief binding all Wanderers together, aside from their love of the open road and belief in nomadism as the path to enlightenment, is their veneration of the Friend. The Friend, according to desert folklore, was a primordial nomad who, accompanied only by a nameless disciple, took to wandering the desert while others settled in towns and founded cities, seeking out its oases and criss-crossing its vast dunes. One night, the student awoke to find the Friend had vanished in the dead of night-- had, according to desert folklore, become one with the desert, had achieved enlightenment, had attained the true form of permanence. Since then, Wanderers have sought to follow in the Friend’s footsteps; many regard the Friend as something like a guide-- indeed, as a friend-- and pray to them for counsel and direction. Others believe that to call upon the Friend for guidance is to forget that the Friend attained permanence only by being lost. This aspect of their faith is widely misunderstood, as outsiders frequently assume the Friend is a deity and the Wanderers are monotheists.<br/><br/>Many Wanderers believe that at the root of all human wants, joys, and pains is the longing for permanence-- for love that lasts forever, for friends whose paths never part, for a home that will always be home. Such permanence is impossible in the physical world, because all things have a beginning and an ending: people grow old and die, cities and homes decay and fall apart, friends drift apart and lovers find themselves parting ways. The only solution, they believe, is to seek permanence not in the physical world, but in a place beyond, a place that can be found only by parting with all earthly connections and becoming a vagrant. There, it is said, one will never long for home, will never know the pain of parting, will never yearn to love and be loved.<br/><br/>There are other precepts which, though they are not universal, are widespread and have become almost stereotypes for Wanderers. For example, many abstain from alcohol, drugs, excessive food, profanity, and violence. Many also are poets, singers, and musicians. For some, art serves as a way of venerating the Friend or pointing out the anguish of impermanence; for others, it’s just a way to make some money during their travels.<br/></div></div>