Treesian Unorthodoxy

The faith originated in the combined works of Zirandorthel and Sagart Siskind and date back to 2001. The religious tradition survived the destruction of Treesia and continued to influence religious practice in Elwynn to this day.

The Gloss of Sagart Siskind

The You probably all know about the Treesian Unorthodox Church - the clergymen with the weird Irish names and the missions named after the saints and everything - but (Christianity notwithstanding) a Church is only an apparatus for the spread of a faith, so, without further ado, let me explain the basics of the Treesian Unorthodox Religion.

Treesian is a polytheistic faith synchronized from Irish legend, the history of Treesia and the Apollo Sector, the twisted minds of a few Treesian bards, and, of course, Divine Revelation. Although we recognize over a hundred gods, there are only about ten major deities, each of which has a "sphere" and a mythology surrounding him or her, similar to Greek and other classical mythology systems. Rather than go into detail on each of the gods, I'll just tell, in vastly abridged form, a few standard myths here.

There are many other myths, with everything from The Sinking Of The Five Isles to How The Lyricans Became Possessed By Demons to The Fall of the Lord of Daemons, et cetera. A good place to start would be the three currently extant Books of the Orchids, which chronicle the Orchid cycle in vastly greater detail (and which took me uncounted hours to translate to English).

The Story Of The Creation Of The World

In the beginning, there were (the female) Paragon and (the male) Universe. Universe was absorbed into Paragon and Paragon gave birth to the four Irdia (Gods of Beauty), Tineon (Fire), Uisceor (Water), Salio (Earth), and Gaotheoria (Wind, usually just called Gaother). These beings spent countless ages shaping the Earth and creating the seas and mountains and forests and such, after which Paragon had another set of children, the Faldia (Gods of Destiny). These were Laguna (Goddess of Love and Motherhood), Utas (God of Light And Truth), Aeon (God of Time), and Ilass (Goddess of Magick and Darkness). Laguna had five children, and these five children became the founders of five races, Men, Animals, Talking Dogs, Centaurs, and Microns. The Faldia gradually took power from the Irdia, being cleverer if not quite as strong, and under their rule, everyone lived in peace with many servants and retainers and subjects in the great many-towered city of Ennabruk in Tirbal, the Land of Might, which men call Heaven.

The Fall

Due to the evil influences of Lest (more on him later), Ilass grew evil and decided to usurp power from Aeon, who was currently king of Ennabruk. Plotting in secret, she, with Lest and many of the Elder Demons, launched a surprise attack on Ennabruk. The object was to capture Elwynn (again, more on her later). In the attack, the gods were caught totally off guard, and the weapons of Ilass and her demons blinded Laguna while Yetal, a servant of Utas who had turned traitor, killed his master. A voice then rang out prophecying that Utas should one day be resurrected and redeem the world, but that seemed scant consolation at the time. Luckily the gods managed to regroup and use their magic to journey to Kalaspier, a fortress on the very edge of Tirbal.

The Birth of Mandorallen

In Kalaspier, things seemed hopeless, and the gods prepared for the worst. Aeon fell into a deep slump over what he saw as his lack of preparedness and share of guilt in the death of Utas and Laguna's blinding. In despair, he gave the Bow of Time, the source of his power, to Utas' lover Amariaa, and bound himself to Laguna's service as god of beggars. But when the gods continued to press him for aid, saying that he was their only hope to retake their city, Aeon secluded himself into deep meditation and incantation. When he came out, he had been vastly weakened, but beside him was Mandorallen, The Champion of Tirbal, clad in diamond armor and waving a banner with streaks of lightning. He gathered together all the remaining supporters of divine order in the Universe and attacked the demons in Ennabruk. At last he triumphed, with the help of the lore-god Carding, and he cast Lest and Ilass into the PRH. However, upon learning that Man and the other races (with the exceptions of the Microns) had been, if not complicit, at least not particularly helpful in the fight against the demons, he banished them to Tirlar, the Middle Plane, which men call Earth, and charged the god Mordicc to take their lives from them after a paltry span of a few score years. But Laguna interceded and got from Mandorallen a concession that if they had been protectors of the world and benefactors of the good for their time on Earth, they could be brought by the ferryman Jestun to Heaven, although if they had been evil, they too would be consigned to the PRH.

The Orchid Cycle

After the birth of the Faldia, Paragon gave birth to one more set of gods - the two twins, Elwynn and Lest. At the moment of their birth, a prophecy was proclaimed (which is one of the only parts I've managed to translate into Treesian of the BoO, so I'll write it here thus)

A sekel 'kmeka i'e-Tirbal zkhal Imeh i'au-kmeka pol Ifreann qANDAN a caroten o-sekel Rakat i-mianthrop kme~a kleen

That is, if the two were ever to grow up, marry, and have a child, that child would be ANDAN, a being of pure power that would inevitably result in the complete destruction of the world. Luckily, it seemed unlikely that this would ever happen. From the get-go, the two could not have been more different, not only in looks - Elwynn was white with white hair and dressed only in white gowns, whereas Lest was black with black hair and black eyes and wore only black robes - but in personality as well - Elwynn was purely good and selfless, whereas Lest was the most despicable creature any of the gods, including those who had done battle with the Elder Demons in the Time before Time, had ever laid eyes on. But, by the perversity of the Universe, they did indeed fall in love, and thus had to be separated. Elwynn was given to Utas' care, whereas Lest was placed under the guardianship of Ilass, and both gods were informed NEVER to let them meet. But they did - twice - once at the Battle of Ennabruk, where Aeon snatched Elwynn away just in time, and once at the Second Battle of Ennabruk, when Carding, to prevent her from running off to Lest, turned her into a white orchid flower, and then to prevent Lest from going to find her, turned him into a similar black flower. Thus they are the two Orchids - gods of good and evil. They have had many adventures, which culminated in the following:

• Elwynn currently resides in Mount Yaanek, a volcano in Hyperborea, and will answer the question of anyone who comes to her oracle (the oracle still exists, and answered a question as recently as yesterday)

• Lest, in an incident much too complex to recount here, lost his orchid form and, in an attempt to take over Treesia, incarnated into the form of a human. After being kicked out by the current Ard-Baron, this human has been wandering the world ever since, doing evil deeds and stirring up trouble wherever he goes. You may be interested or amused to know that the name of this human incarnation of pure evil is Thomas Hubert.

It is prophesied that eventually the two will meet, ANDAN will be born, and the Universe will be destroyed.