Category Archives: The Empire of the Sun

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The Mara

My lord, I realized that in my previous entry, I referenced the “mara,” as if you should know about them already.  I see from my notes that I began an entry on them earlier, but I scratched it out and never finished it.  They are certainly not a pleasant subject to discuss, in any company, but perhaps it is time to at least broach the subject.  I doubt, though, that one entry will be enough to really describe these vile, unnatural creatures.

The mara are a sort of nightdemon that reside and breed in the deepest parts of the Twilight.  They tend to congregate in the highest concentrations around the spires at the center of the starsisters’ larger cities, though they can also be found lurking in force near the smaller towers that spread the Twilight in the outlying areas.  There are mixed stories regarding their origins.  Some say that they are the spirits of the dead who have opposed the starsisters, bound into earthly form as punishment.  Some say they are the shades of the evil ancestors who first betrayed the Empire of the Sun to the starsisters.  Still others say that they were brought into the world of Khumkato by the sisters when they pierced the veil of the heavens.  I of course have no way of knowing, but I suspect that some variation of the last is the true tale.  I have seen the mara with my own eyes, and I find it hard to believe that they belong here, even in the deepest crevices.  Khumkato can be a dark place, but the mara are darker still.

How to describe the mara?  They are shadow, formless and yet with shape; they are there and yet they are not there.  They have a limited ability to touch someone in our plane of existence, but they cannot hold complicated forms for long.  Thankfully I have never caught the attention of these foulest of  beings, but I spoken to those who have.  The mara slip in and out of your field of vision, even as you look directly at them.  It is said that as you focus on one, you suddenly realize that it is no longer there, only to feel its death-like touch caressing your throat and smelling its revolting breath as it whispers madness into your ear.  When you turn, it melts away only to come at you from some other, unexpected angle.  Its voice, I hear, echos through your mind and into your very soul.  A phrase, though spoken softly, reverberates through you, leaving the impression that certain words–usually the most horrible–are repeated again and again in a cacophony of jarring dissonance.

Perhaps it is their hunger that I find most revolting.  The mara feed off of light and life, both intangibles, but they desperately desire them in corporeal form.  All they need do is drink of a victim’s soul and mind, leaving behind a withered, shrunken husk.  But that is not enough for them.  They try to physically devour their prey, especially the remnants of the human sacrifices the starsisters regularly demand (perhaps it is a boon for their continued service).  However, since they have no settled physical form and certainly no digestive system, all they usually succeed in doing to tearing the poor soul to pieces, and smearing the remnants around until it is a bloody mess of pulpy gore.  I am sorry to say I have seen this happen to on two occasions.  I do not care to see a third.

That is enough on the mara for now, I think.  I would like to have enough stomach left to eat again before I sleep.

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The Importance of Tea

As I have traveled through Nightfall, I have noticed that, despite the most vigorous efforts of the starsisters, the culture of the Empire of the Sun has still survived in places.  Given, you see very little of it openly practiced in the Twilight, but in the sunlit lands that have fallen under the political thrall of Nightfall but have not yet been reached by the darkness, you see more of it.

One of the most common hold overs from times gone by is the people’s use of tea.  Tea was once one of the main exports of the Empire, and its own people drank it by the riverful.  it is still exported today–albeit in reduced quantities because of the devastation wrecked by the Twilight–but its use is completely banned within Nightfall.  I suppose the starsisters think it would serve as a comforting reminder of a better life in a different age, and so while they will sell it other gladly, they are somewhat less glad to have it circulating amongst their occupied territories.

That is probably also why I think more tea is poured into more throats today than it ever was while the Empire reigned.  The people are simply more discrete about it.  In the sunlit lands, they serve tea at every private dinner and, if you are lucky, before bed each night.  

In the Twilight, it is more difficult to come by–but still not impossible.  I have found that there are secret tea houses operating in virtually every major city on the continent.  I once passed a fine evening in a small tea room virtually on the very doorstep of Ahilisha’s spire in the City of Glorious Twilight.  In all parts, the ancient tea ceremonies (there are several, I believe) are still held in high regard.

Personally, I have come to prefer the savory flavor of the gudaara leaf, with its almost golden hue.  If you are in the mood for something darker with more kick, I would suggest the highly prized Ooilo from the southwestern provinces.  If your Majesty would like to try it, you would be well advised to purchase as much as your stockrooms can hold.  The Twilight is almost upon that region.

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Names as a Symbol of Status

In the country outside Nightfall–and to a certain extent inside it as well–the people still follow the older naming customs of the Empire of the Sun.  The starsisters are slowly bleeding this practice out of succeeding generations, but they have not succeeded yet.

The naming practices in the empire were (and are) odd when compared to the rest of the cultures I’ve seen in the world of Khumkato.     Some peoples associate names with family lines, some with places, some with both.  My own nation gives names based on what an individual accomplishes in his or her life, and that leads to some impressive names for the most distinguished among us.  In the empire, it was all based on the length of the actual word–of all things!

Even there, they seemed to just do it differently just because they could:  The shorter the name, the higher the position in society.  That seems to defy all sense.  One would think that the longer, more flowery names would be for the rulers!  I had one of the zhuan of an outlying district controlled by Anhilynya explain it to me once:  The fewer the letters, the fewer possible attractive combinations that can be made of them.  At some point in their history, it became fashionable for the noble classes to reserve these for themselves, with the shortest names being reserved for the emperor himself.

Based on what I have gathered, the emperor usually took a one or two letter name–Li or Zu, for instance.  The higher nobles took three and four letter names (Lya, Maki, or Lian), with the class system unfolding from there.  Some of the peasants have absurdly long names that no one even bothers to try to pronounce completely in normal conversation (though they still have legal uses).  Apparently, there used to be a long and complex process pursued through the empire’s courts in order to shorten an individual’s name.

Of course, the irony is that in practice, the peasants use a shortened form of their name for convenience sake, and those nicknames are almost always three-to-five letters long.  They are careful, however, not to do so in front of the ruling classes.

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The Empire of the Sun

My lord, as you know, the Empire of the Sun originally ruled this continent, that is before Hai’Lyn and her spawn took it by force.  That began more than seven generations ago, and still the war goes on.  It is a pitiful farce of a war to be sure, but at least the Empire can pretend it isn’t over.

The actual beginning of the war is lost in the fog of peasant memory, the starsisters having long ago slaughtered any historian who dared remember anything they didn’t approve of.  (I saw enough in the eyes of some of the village elders to make me think more is known, but generations of hard experience have taught them to keep quiet, no matter how drunk they get.)  I did learn that the Empire held on to at least part of the continent for the better part of two generations.  The emperor who lost it all was named Li.  He and his supporters lost their last foothold here and were driven onto the Iron Isles, far to the west.  Li was an arrogant man and he swore an oath on his ancestors that he would reclaim his empire.  Of course, we all know that the sworn word of an emperor is infallible (or so the Empire said).

That left the pittance that was the Empire of the sun in a bit of a twist when Li died on the Iron Isles as they tried to scrape together livable cities.  Not to be disproved, the Empire just renamed his son “Li” too, and then his son after him and so on.  I suppose eventually one of them might take something back over someday, and that would give the Empire the chance to say that the emperor still hadn’t missed a step–if you don’t count all the generations between one Li and the other.

From a strategic standpoint, the Empire cannot be expected to make inroads against Nightfall anytime soon.  The Iron Isles are a fortress–probably one of the most defensible places in all of the world of Khumkato, but they are also barren, rocky, and cold.  The “Empire” has difficulty maintaining its own tiny population, let alone mustering an army that could even make the starsisters nervous.  If you seek armies to ally with you against the twilight, you must look elsewhere.

Of course, the Empire has adapted.  What they lack in force, they make up for in guile.  Their intelligence network inside Nightfall is better even than that of my people, and their assassins are first rate.  They can be useful–if you can stomach their prideful reminders of the “greatness” of the Empire Sun.