In the context of the Coil, one supposes that “the Beginning” is in reference to the years spent before the birth of the earliest gods of On Ascension, and other things. These years are hazy and slip through the minds of those few old enough to remember them like grains of sand, numerous and singular and impossible to grasp. One would think that, surely the eldest that walk the continent, the immortal, the ageless Elves in our midst would have preserved the remnants of “the Beginning”. But knowledge on what life was like before the gods made the Coil what it is today (and, to be clear, they did— this is not a fact that any dare dispute, because how wrong and unthinkable that sentiment would be—), is scarce. Were it not for the physical remains (the countless and incomplete skeletons of buildings, the long worn paths to nowhere in particular) it would seem as if there were no folk to be had on the Coil at all, in the times before.
What little is known is that the times before On Ascension, and other things were hard. They must have been— for we have the Ruins left behind by those unlucky enough to have existed before them to be sure of that. Indeed, it’s not uncommon to find the collapsed frames and stray reminders of villages cobbled together by earlier, lesser, inhabitants of the Coil marring the idle countrysides and lingering like forgotten shades at the edges of settlements. In every inhabitable — and in some seemingly uninhabitable— corner there are traces of the people that once were, the people unlucky enough to toil and scrape a living without the blessings of the gods. It is the suggestion of their existence, and only the suggestion, that remains of them— as far as most know. And so it is from these hints of civilization, these traces left behind, that current inhabitants draw their conclusions; the Coil takes a toll on the people upon it, and those before the pantheon simply were unable to afford it.
The Coil is not an easy place to live, even now. As grand as her cities may be, as powerful as the Pantheon is, and as clever as her people are, at her core the Coil is a wild and temperamental place. Closer to a bristling, barely tamed hound than a well heeled lapdog, the Coil’s luxuriant bounties and unceasing wonders are rivaled in scale only by the ferocity of the wilds and creatures that live upon it. Were it not for the divinity earned and wielded by the Major Arcana that paved the way for the four great countries to take shape, we may yet still be in the age of yesterday, the age of ruin and toil, an age so insignificant as to be forgotten as soon as it is over.
They say it started like this.
Before there were our gods, there was nothing. Nothing so significant that its memory has made the journey past death to our current consciousness, anyway. And if it cannot be remembered, that begs to ask if it was worth remembering at all? So, no. Before the pantheon, there was nothing. Nothing but the merciless and vicious continent that would come be called the Coil. People were born, toiled, and died on this godless landscape, this story-less place, struggling to do even that. The continent’s beasts and monstrosities and dangers were even more numerous then, unmatched in their position at the top of the food chain. People could only hope to eek out a meager and dreary existence in their attempts to survive a place alive with all a manner of death.
It is in this time and space and instance of pure piteousness that the Major Arcana came into being. Like a fragment of coal being pressurized from all sides, the weight of the mountain, the world around you— ordinary people too, found ways to turn into diamond. For in this godless landscape all we had were ordinary people. Who else to take on the mantle of divinity, of a higher power, if not them? And so they did. Some through acts of awe-inspiring bravery and devotion. Others through a moral compass strong enough to reorient the North Star. Each had undergone their own trial, an albatross that would come to be the definition of their godly domains.
The Major Arcana, having been forged in the flames of their personal crucibles and come out with the power of gods for it, had but one thing in common. They all knew the hardships of their fellow Coil-folk. They knew just how impossible it was to thrive in these conditions— despite their own existences now serving as contradictions to that very claim. And so, they decided to share their gifts, to use their powers so that their friends, families, neighbors and any who would come after could live in a world kinder than the one they were born to. One should not have to be steel in order to stand, they thought. You can bloom without fear of burning, they said.
With their holiness earned, the gods of the Major Arcana remolded what life on the Coil looked like to what it is today. Yes, she is still a dangerous and merciless place, especially to those who underestimate her power. But her nails have been trimmed back, claws sheathed away, teeth blunted by the will of the Major Arcana. What the Coil has lost in its deadliness it has gained back, tenfold, in its prosperity. Where before a town would not last long enough to pass its name to the next generation, now exist cities whose origins can be traced all the way back to the appearance of the Major Arcana. The people of the Coil had been carved out a space from where there had previously been none. And with a relief so palpable it was as if it could be touched, the Coil-folk could finally exhale.
That is, more or less, how things are today. The taming of the Coil has given rise to four nations that work (in various degrees of harmony) together to uphold the world that was given to them by the Major Arcana. As for the Arcana themselves, there are many rumors about what happened to them, in the millennia after the shaping. Initially, they had each gone their separate ways, to watch over and in some cases rule their own far flung reach of the continent. In truth, this is how the four nations came to be— where each Major Arcana settled became the centre from which the country blossomed, that deity’s influence rippling out like waves in a pond.
The manner of the countries, how its people lived their lives and how settlements organized themselves were more or less unique from one another. They were all distinctly products of their progenitors, traces of each Major Arcana’s nature leaving their mark.
For Bellamy, the nation founded by A candle, in perpetuity, this mark was keenly obvious. The Constance’s influence writes itself into the very bedrock of Bellamy. It is said that the god of crafters, makers, and the inextinguishable molded the landscape to suit their needs— an abundance of raw beauty and potential tucked away in every corner of the country, waiting to be found, shaped, and born anew in their vision. Many say that the Candle left the marshlands in the south in their unchanged state, intractable and un-navigable, to serve as a proving grounds for knowledge hungry scholars. Even the populace and governance of Bellamy is shaped by the Candle’s shadow, being run by the great makers and scholars institutions, upholding the Candle’s embodiment of the virtue of perseverance. There is an ebb and flow to the power struggle in Bellamy, if it can be called even that. The individual institutions that make up the government may change, and they have throughout the years a plenty, but the meritocratic structure carved into place by the luminance remains unchanged.
In Asbria, there is no mistaking the touch of A consumption, returned on its shores. It’s little secret that of all the countries on the Coil, it is within Asbrian borders that blood flowed freest. If the influence of the other Major Arcana settled and lulled the restlessness of their regions, then it can be said that the Consumption, did the opposite. True to form, the god of war and battle fashioned themselves a realm where only those with enough passion to fight for it would prosper. While Asbria’s government is currently in the hands of the House of Reflect, that statement is neither a given one nor a permanent one. Before the House and its twin line of rulers came into power there were the lords before them, and khans and czars and emperors a plenty. There is only one way to capture the hearts and minds of the Asbrians, those who live by the ideals of the consumption— by showing that you have passion strong enough to weather any rival that may come to challenge you; to consume their will and earn your place in return.
Lower Orchard remains the closest to what life on the Coil had looked like, before the gods. It is as A shudder, through midnight intended— tamed just enough to turn its thorns away, but not so much that the Coil become something she is not— docile, withered, and dull. And in turn, the landscape of Lower Orchard is anything but; for there is no other country on the Coil so unblemished and marvelous, fierce and seething. As the shape of the Coil settled into what it is now, those within the border of Lower Orchard settled too, into the pockets of wilderness carved out for them by their prayers to A shudder, through midnight. Living in Lower Orchard in some ways is harder than anywhere else— for the fear that you are not always the hunter and can easily be the hunted is stronger and more potent. People of Lower Orchard tend to huddle just a little bit closer to their hearths and cling just a little bit closer to their neighbors, knowing what awaits them, should they lose that healthy fear. The Orchard is also the oldest of the nations, settled first and least. The Afterdusk Court, the only entity consistent enough to rule over the Orchard, also stands as the longest serving for no one can seem to recall a time before the Queen of Dusk’s reign. A presence so steady and familiar that there is rumor that she may be the Shudder herself, the last of the Major Arcana who choose to still rule the lands they founded.
Life in He-yin is fashioned in the shape of A rhythm, merciless— fast-paced and free. The lands of the North-east are full of adventurers, wanderers, and voyagers; people who march to the beat of no drum but their own, or perhaps, no drumbeat but that of the rhythm’s. What He-yin lacks in flat and prosperous farmlands or lush and burbling wood it makes up for in spades with destines ready to be made and stories waiting to be told around every corner. When A rhythm, merciless was molding the He-yin landscape, they stuffed it to the brim with not treasure, but opportunity and adventure. Opportunity to let fate decide what comes your way, just as the He-yinites like it. As a result, He-yin has never been fully tamed by a single ruler and by this point there is little necessity for it. In any case, the current iteration of what passes for “government” in He-yin, the Northern League, is perhaps the best fitting to date, in part due to the fact that it isn’t very “fitting” or constraining at all. The thrum is an indulging god— both in the literal sense as the deity of indulgences but also in their crafting over He-yin’s free-spirited nature, a place where your time and music and fate is your own, and no one elses.