One myth however that still strikes a chord with many Klyros is the Tale of Ilgareth.
The name of Ilgareth comes from the name of a self-declared goddess of the Klyros in antiquity. She was enormously powerful and appeared as perfect specimen of Klyros heritage, but of course the Klyros did not readily except her as goddess. She fought no battles but quietly asserted her divinity standing aloof from the people until some emergency drove one or more of them to call on her she would then often perform miracles, healings, transmutations, polymorphing, the making of food from the air itself, being more than one place at once.
When a crisis was averted she made no fanfare but quietly left to her distant lodgings. Many generations passed and yet Ilgareth lived, lending credence to her notion that she was a Goddess among the people. Still they doubted, and the Klyros summoned all manner of stories to explain her existence: She was a Shaman of great power, She could appear more than one place because "she" was actually a pair of twins, she seemed to have outlived normal Klyros only because it was generations of the same family all pretending to be Ilgareth. Thus the Klyros spoke among themselves.
Six generations passed in this manner and slowly some of the more weak-minded or infirm started to allow the idea that Ilgareth might indeed be a goddess. Still no one spoke of her this way but the seed was there. The sick and elderly, having been raised with stories of their grand parents and parents of how often Ilgareth had come to the aid of the Klyros in this or that small or great manner began to weigh more heavily in their minds than all the denial their sires had concocted to explain away.
Ilgareth sensed this weakness, just as she could hear them call for her aid, she heard this silent worship of some Klyros, and moved quickly to exploit it. She too was pragmatic and rational. Ilgareth began visiting the elderly in dreams, the sick in visions, the substance of which was catastrophe and genocide for the Klyros if they fail to recognize her long service to them and honor her as a goddess deserved.
Even the elderly and sick were not as careless as to mention these visions and dreams at first. Theirs were the visions and dreams of madmen and they knew what fate they would meet if they should share their dreams. They did not even speak to each other.
Ilgareth knew of their reluctance and understood their fear of the Klyros traditions but she was beginning to age in the face of the Klyros disbelief, it became vital to her that they begin to worship her to stop or reverse her eminent death. Without the power of their worship she would surely wither and die, even her magic could not stop that.
Ilgareth thought many days and nights on the problem. She kept sending dreams to the more susceptible Klyros and watched their reactions. When a Klyros dreamed of her it was all conflict and turmoil. She watched individuals more and more and could see all of them wrestling all night with themselves. She feared it was something innate something a priori that stopped them from making that leap of faith. When she put the question to herself “would I believe in me if I were them?” Or, “if I encountered a force proportionally greater than myself, would I worship it?” she invariably answered no.
The would-be goddess then came to the answer she sought. Ilgareth would use her power to make herself dream. Her hope was that in finding a dream that she herself could believe she would find a way to convert the Klyros. In her eldritch dream Ilgareth saw the coming of her own doom a plague of her own creation sweeping among the people killing off those most faithful first then reaching through the strong all the way back to herself. At last a pitched battle between herself and the council elders and shaman. They pounded down her very door and she killed mercilessly. Days passed in the dreams a massacre previously unseen in all of Klyros lore, they could hardly harm her at all but that she aged more with each Klyros death and withered as she fought. Most striking was the fact that Ilgareth knew the people she slew, not knew of, but knew personally; she had raised them from the very start of their lives individually. Each one she knew their names and the names of their children even as she slew them she would recall this one’s aunt, that one’s lover, where this one liked to vacation, his favorite food, her first word . . .she had been mother to this whole generation . . .The dream shifted and she saw the sick and elderly she now had a hold on stealing away from parents with newlings and then a large repository of newlings all kept un a magical chamber of her devising so that each would grow to its maximum potential and she taught them everything they knew and how to worship. She taught them the culture of their own people albeit slanted with her version. She taught them how to filter back into Klyros society how to infiltrate it and make it their own, it was their birth right they we the brood of Ilgareth.
This dream would come to pass. Ilgareth saw to it that the young were brought all at once. On what Klyros now call “the Night of Tears,” 200 Klyros children were taken and the weak and elderly were all slain for their efforts, Ilgareth could not admit the taint these might have on her children.
The people awoke with their youngest and eldest generations gone and the sick and mad as well. The council gathered and a great furor was raised to destroy the so called “goddess” for surely only she could be behind this. So a militia was gathered and the mass moved on the distant hut where Ilgareth lived. They traveled for days their way hindered by all manner of beast hideous and alien to them before reaching the hut. It was barren. Not only was there no one there it appeared as though no one had been there for a few hundred years. . .They were stunned. They dragged their militia home confounded. It was decided the night of tears would not be spoken of ever again and that all the people should do their best to carry on as though this had not happened, the inexplicable was not to be cause for conjecture.
Ilgareth's Brood was relocated in anticipation and they were raised in all the love a being with enough power and arrogance to call herself a goddess could summon. The Brood grew strong and clever. Games of logic, and mathematics, physics and fierce games of physical skill were demanded of them daily. In Hunting and fishing they were superior to any Klyros, in fact in everything; Ilgareth spared little of her power for herself instead endowing her children with much of her strength.
When her children started to come of age by Klyros custom she began sending them into society one at a time among the Klyros people slowly she released her 200 children back into the populace. The brood fit well in society, they were needed. Their superior skill found them wanted in all places. Many of them rose in society, and as ordered many took roles in government, entertainment, and positions of strategic import. The fisherman’s guild head died and a Brood member rose, the dean of schools set his greatest teacher up to replace him, the medicine men were amazed a brood member’s imaginative cures, the greatest artist of the age emerged from obscurity . . .at all levels, the Brood was there.
Ilgareth spoke to them from dreams as well and told them the time drew nigh for them to announce the new order. The worship of their mother and goddess should be universal and those not allied with the new order. But now the brood was powerful and learned to love their people, many had married into families as ancient as the rocks, and they like their people began to doubt the strength of their goddess, began to resent the dreams. They met in secret in what they called "the Enclave of the Knowing. They debated for hours and decided to ignore the dreams as long as they could bear and consolidate their power in their own interest and in the interest of their people during their waking hours. The enclave of the know set a day to meet again and left resolved to put of the mother.
Ilgareth soon sense their disobedience their betrayal and intensified the dreams each day until the Brood could hardly sleep. Tormented by visions of plague and cannibalism among their people they were greatly sadden and ill tempered. When they met next it was decided that this or no pressure should bend them from their will. The strength they were endowed with gave them the fortitude to bear any catastrophe without divine interference. The Enclave of the Knowing decided to widen their circle. They moved as one to the council chambers and presented themselves: from all walks of life, now risen to become leaders in every field of Klyros society, as not the children of Ilgareth but the children of the Klyros people. The council welcomed them and told them of the Night of Tears and how they had resolved similarly not to worship a being who would cause such horrors. The council with joy that the calendar would now reflect the night of tears as well as this day, the Day of Union, as holidays and that the story of the Brood's rejection of Ilgareth be taught to all the people.
Ilgareth raged from afar, she aged ten years that day and felt the substantial loss of her beauty, she was now middle aged and destined to die by the will of these hard-hearted people. Ilgareth now saw the folly in targeting a planet where life would inevitably spawn sentient life without divinity as her dominion. Vodul and others had warned that planets of this type often spawned beings that would reject all faiths. Ilgareth needed worshippers to survive. The symbiosis between Ilgareth and the planet could not be maintained if the sentient aspect of the planet rejected her. The Klyros must comply. She summoned the strength to manifest a dream in all the Klyros.
The dream was herself as she now appeared standing tall and powerful over a city, and every Klyros saw their home city. “You will worship me or this land will be destroyed in my death.” Their visions then quickened and ages passed and the city seemed to with as the image of Ilgareth aged, famine and plagues swept their homes in droves, the made war on each other for resources, and Ilgareth laughed at them, laughed at their folly for a simple belief a single prayer could abate her tyranny as cities became ruins and the people more and more were limited to small bands of roving carrion hardly worthy of the proud name Klyros they began to be attacked by infestations of rats by the hundreds of thousands emerging first in the cities then following them through the countryside leave the trees bare and the berry bushes defiled. The dreamers watched as their source of light was covered by the now shadowy form of Ilgareth, now she cackled and the vegetation started to die off and event the rats began to die off leaving insects a feast but they too died off, and the Klyros who were eating those insects were fed upon by them. In the dream Ilgareth stopped laughing and could no longer be seen but neither was their light or food the Klyros burned all they could to keep their world lit and ate their dead until all was dark, and they awoke.
They all awoke with a fresh love for their land and all they had built. The council was again called together and it was decided rather than watch their civilization fall to plague and ruin they would strike Ilgareth in her home. The Brood was then called upon to reveal the location of Ilgareth’s new home and did so willingly but warned that the costs might well be grim. Determined to not be the newlings of some greater power, they moved as one people to destroy Ilgareth.
Ilgareth was aging more rapidly than was natural now and she knew her hold over the people was lost, rather than prepare martially for their coming, she prepared magically wielding the mightiest curses known to gods and men she wove a spell of damning so elaborate so unforgiving the knowledge of it is now untold throughout existence.
They Klyros can with an army and all the people in tow and found no armaments no weapons of siege no alien creatures of the elder days just a large mansion, the home of the brood it’s doors open and Ilgareth standing there radiant, though aged, and she “I will not allow myself to be destroyed and many of you shall die to today. In my folly as a mother I have given you too much of my strength and you will surely defeat me, but first you will hear my curse: this world will stagnate, dry up become unlivable and as sure as I am your goddess all the Klyros will die with it. All shall be as you have dreamed and though not all of you will die today none of you will long celebrate my defeat. Widows will weep, babes will be your food, and your suffering will rival any known in all times, for if I am to die by the cold of your logic, you will die by my need for your love.”
“Are you done yet hag?” Galvius, one of the Brood spoke, laughter erupted among the host. Galvius turned to his people. “Let me be the first to die brave Klyros for ours is not a destiny of subjugation, but a destiny of will and fortitude. Those who utter curses curse only themselves, superstition and fancy are not our way, we will derive from this or any land what we can, and call it our own, and all we need. Now I say death to this wretched thing WHO IS WITH ME!!?” a cheer went up amongst them and Galvius turned on his mother and began to run as fast as he could with all of his might. As Ilgareth smote him she recalled her dream and saw it replay many of her 200 had volunteered to be the first in and she cut them with a blind hatred driven by the deep conviction of betrayal for as long as she could she weakened only after having killed 180 of her brood and thousands of the weaker and at last was over come. Her last act was to tear off her necklace and cast down the beads that rolled amidst the carnage before they sank into the dirt repeating the essence of her curse, “This world will stagnate, dry up, become unlivable, and as sure as I am your goddess all the Klyros will die with it.”
Decade passed much as the dream predicted all was woe and torment for the people. The twenty remaining brood were put to the task of finding a solution. They thought heavily upon Galvius’ words for he was thought the wisest of them before his valiant prideful death. “Those who utter curses curse only themselves, superstition and fancy are not our way, we will derive from this or any land what we can, and call it our own, and all we need.” The Brood turned on the phrase this or any land until it struck Ad Raax the eldest, of them, “Galvius may have sought another place for us to dwell knowing the efficacy of Ilgareth’s curse and its weakness . . . were are only doomed if we stay here . . .” Soon this was their consensus and they sojourned back to the mansion of the goddess in their dwindled darkening word to seek the portal magic that might free them from the curse. Searching the mansion they found Galvius old childhood locker and in it a book on portal magic always forbidden to the Brood by Ilgareth. I seemed even in the cleverly devised clinical environment the would-be goddess had made for the Brood; the Klyros willfulness was still manifest in Galvius. His book was crude knowledge of portal magic and as such required blood for its primary component. With time this could be derived slowly enough not to require anyone’s life but time was not their luxury. The Light had dies out completely as they arrived at the mansion and now all grew cold very rapidly. Ad Raax was sent to gather what people he could while the others did what was needed to open the gate . . .
Ad Raax traveled as fast as his old bones would allow, and did his best to move from fire to fire calling all to follow. Many days and nights he went amongst the cities, soon he was unable to walk the cold was getting the better of him and all Klyros but do to his extreme old age they bore him in a litter and protected him from those poor Klyros who had given themselves over to the hunger, the sickly carrion whose eyes looked like the last smoke of a squelched flame. Ad Raax went to each of the main cities and sent dispatches to many more. A huge host was assembled and followed Ad Raax’s litter bearers in the hope of a new land.
When the people arrived at the mansion they saw a gruesome sight indeed, the remaining members of the brood had forfeited their lives. A strange doorway seemingly pieced together from artifacts found in Ilgareth’s home. Even Ilgareth’s ashes were used in the spell, and the blood of the Brood ran on grooves to cover the mechanism. A mercurial light emanated from the doorway thus created.
Ad Raax was overjoyed at reaching the portal yet saddened by the death of his brothers and sisters, he was the last of them, and he should be first to walk through. He gathered his strength and commanded the litter be set down. Then he slowly stood and spoke to the people, “whatever shall await us I shall be the first to face it. We must all remember the courage and conviction that has brought us here, we who survive thank those who have died for the courage that now makes us free. As we face the new tribulations of this new world let us recall the words of Galvius: “Those who utter curses curse only themselves, superstition and fancy are not our way, we will derive from this or any land what we can, and call it our own, and all we need.” This will be OUR way not handed down from on high, but brought forth within us this is our strength, for we are the Klyros!” The people were uplifted the possibilities of a new life awakened in them, their hope and sense of identity quickened in them. Ad Raax stepped through, the others were eager to follow.
Insert from Planeshift history:
[Laanx was meditating intensely in front of the portal when its surface trembled for the first time. He watched a creature slowly rising from the portal. This creature was emaciated and translucent like a ghost, but seemed to solidify progressively. It seemed to suffer for passing through the portal, and it didn't seem to have noticed Laanx.
The being was bent by a spasm when it noticed the red-dressed person, hidden in the shadow that was observing it. It stayed motionless, without stopping to scan the god, and it didn't seem frightened.
Laanx spoke, showing completely his true essence. - I'm Laanx - she said - and I'm your god.-
The creature gazed resentfully and silently, and then sat on a rock with its chin in its hands.]
The Klyros would face many ages of persecution and woe [insert Kixie’s history] for their beliefs but having killed a goddess how could they fall prey to another. Eventually they made a permanent settlement and they called it Ad Raax after their defiant hero, the first through the portal, the first slain by Laanx, and they remembered the spirit behind the man and his pride so that even those who would call themselves gods would never crush out the mighty forbearing Klyros.
