For the sake of brevity and since there's no way for me to track down the entirety of every reblogged lorepost from my now defunct blog I'm going to just do a quick and dirty series of bullet points so I can keep this pinned on my blog for future lore shenanigans.
Let's begin with some general things to know:
My lair is populated predominately (okay, entirely) by shifters/gijinkas. If that’s not your speed, that’s fine, but please don’t be weird about it.
All my dragons are gay, says so right in my bio. If you need a water nest hit me up I always have em’ open because I don’t breed.
I’m a G1 lair, notable exceptions include: my progenitors’ children, six or below digit oldies, and G2 imperials and that’s it.
Now as for the lore:
The Sirenian Empire is situated on a sweeping archipelago in the Sea of A Thousand Currents on a confluence of energy between the shadow and light flights. Originally known as the Clan of the Siren’s Spire the clan was founded by the oracle Asha and her unwitting guardian Nereus. Arriving in the archipelago by a twist of fate the pair found extensive second age ruins that had been built upon by an early third age draconic population that was nowhere to be found. Searching what appeared at the time to be the capitol they came upon Josephine in a magic-induced stasis.
This early third age civilization was known as the Sirenian Imperium and was ruled by a notable “Witch King” named Sanctoria. In addition to being a powerful mage Sanctoria was a gifted oracle the likes of which have not been seen in the late third age. While benevolent he became incensed with the creation of an empire founded by the might of magic that would stand the test of time to the point of obsession.
Josephine woke from her stasis and began to try and educate Asha and Nereus about the Imperium and what life had looked like. Unfortunately, the intervening centuries in stasis had left her an amnesiac, much of what she could remember was related to the history and founding of the Imperium, she could not remember its fall, what had happened, or truly the events preceding her stasis.
There are currently three major hubs in the archipelago: the capitol of Hydriop, the old capitol Saram, and The Upwelling. There was previously a former outpost to the north controlled by a mercenary group known as the Disciples of the Drowned, but they have long since been defunct.
The archipelago is a unique area in that the Imperium that once covered its islands pioneered the technology of artificial leylines.
These leylines are created from the sourcing, retrieval, and careful placement of massive shards of the Pillar of the World. As such all elements are at an advantage within the empire as it is saturated with mana from all the flights. This, however, does not apply to the surrounding seas.
The Archipelago is (was) surrounded by an array of twelve enchanted obelisks that formerly shielded the archipelago both from detection and attack. It is theorized that they also may have at one point dampened the influence of the artificial leylines.
While the arcane element is facilitated from crystals quarried from the Starfall Isles some several centuries before present day nature and plague energies are present for very… different reasons. The forests surrounding Saram are supernaturally charged with growth thanks to a sapling of the Behemoth from what was known in the Imperium as the Progenitor Seed (believe it or not I wrote this part before the bounty of the elements), plague mana is distributed by the Hag’s Womb… better to wonder about what exactly that entails, but what I can say is… it’s on the move?
After being educated by Josephine, Asha and Nereus were faced with the decision to remain in this lost empire to try and eke out an existence or to move on toward greener and possibly less haunted pastures. They chose to stay. While they’d initially offered Josephine the leadership position she declined stating that she was not fit to lead in her condition nor did she truly wish to.
Growth started slowly, first with Asha and Nereus’s children then through a slow trickling in of trade and shipwrecks and whatnot. Josephine was an early teacher to the children of Asha and Nereus as they both worked to secure and expand the clan’s territory.
The first several decades were fraught with challenges. Many of the ruins of the Imperium held volatile magic, angry spirits, and artifacts of unknown use and origin.
Time passed, the clan swelled in size and soon expanded out from the ruins of the imperium’s old palace into the city beyond. Hydriop was once referred to as the City of Wet Scaffolding due to the near-constant restoration that was happening as dragons and beast clans alike worked to renovate and restore the second age ruins that litter the islands.
Eventually the clan grew so large it was quickly turned into a kingdom. Asha and Nereus offered to bow out as leaders were chosen, but the populace voted for them to be crowned queen and king by a landslide.
This was not without its pushback. Triton, eldest son of Asha and Nereus, attempted to lead a coup with a mercenary contingent known as the Disciples of the Drowned claiming his right to rule through might. Triton challenged his mother to Dracomachy, and in her stead his sister Calypso fought for their mother. While the contest of strength was close Calypso ultimately slew her elder brother earning the title Kinslayer with the people of the empire. It was later revealed that Triton had been ensorcelled by the shadow witch Hecate in her own grab for power.
While devastating, Triton's innate magic was that of astral projection. At the moment of his demise rather than moving onto the afterlife his soul was cleaved from his flesh and was sent to the deep to wander aimlessly until finding an appropriate host. The Triton that is known and loved by the people today is the original soul in a new body.
The Sirenian Empire, so named as a nod to Josephine’s people in gratitude for everything she had done for the clan over the years.
The royal family of the empire is known as Clan Fortuna. They are denoted on their onsite bios with the clan’s crest: an albatross with a golden crying eye on its chest flanked on either side by shells, pearls, and waves.
Current canon fortuna family members in my lair: Asha, Nereus, Calypso, Triton, Inesh, Matsyendra, Reinhold, and Yand.
After the empire’s establishment Asha sends her grandson, Yand, to the old southern capital of Saram to establish a basecamp and study what he can in the ruins. This would eventually lead to a second restoration period in which Yand and his coven of witches and mages would eventually repopulate the city while plumbing its depths for the secret. Yand is made a viscount by his grandmother and conferred all powers therein to govern the city as he sees fit.
Saram is a city of arcane study. While more degraded than Hydriop due to the aggressive nature of the nature-magic fueled forests surrounding it, its people have carved out a happy life. Saram boasts the largest beastclan population in the entire archipelago after Yand’s friendship with the Longneck Healer Sweetgrass defined early dynamics within the city.
Phorcys enters the picture here and is appointed court mage in the absence of Yand lured to the empire due to the rumors of leviathans.
Phorcys has a complicated history with the eldritch denizens.
Okay he hunts them and prevents history repeating itself to put it plainly. Prior to joining Asha’s court he bounced from clan to clan ingratiating himself over and over again and again to this end. Sometimes disappearing with an artifact or tome, other times leaving with blood on his hands.
The prosperity wasn’t meant to last, unfortunately… Just as it seemed the young empire was gaining momentum two mysterious figures from Asha’s past resurfaced; her siblings Uthkarsh and Saraswati. Their relationship unknown to Asha what followed were painful truths.
Asha had never been a “wanderer”, no instead she’d been the heir to a primordial clan deep within the trenches of the sea. Unwilling to be consigned to her fate to continue her familial line she’d traded her memories for safe passage from the lands of her kin so she might disappear forever. The spell came with the unfortunate stipulation that her sight would be blocked and that she would only see and only speak of disaster.
Word eventually reached her kin’s court and her siblings, honed into weapons in her absence, were sent to collect their wayward sister and bring her back by any means necessary.
Their initial meeting went off the rails fast escalating into a fullblown duel between Saraswati and Calypso in which Calypso nearly lost her life thanks to her aunt’s innate Prophecy Killer magic.Â
The pair launched an all-out assault against Hydriop, their forces battering and eventually destroying one of the eleven spires surrounding the whole of the archipelago. As the wards broke and the sky literally began to fall upon the panicking population an ancient evil sealed away by the sacrifice of the Imperium’s old king stirred.
It was revealed that during the early third age the maren schools inhabiting the archipelago had pushed back against the encroaching draconic influence of the Imperium. Driven to desperation they did the unthinkable: they attempted to create their own god akin to the arcanist’s birth through mass sacrifice. Rather than god, however, they birthed a twisted titan of flesh, bone, and magic known simply as Horkos. The titan rampaged through the archipelago killing maren and dragon alike and was only sealed through Emperor Sanctoria and his eleven strongest Sirens sacrificing themselves to bind the creature forever.
The titan devastated both the Sirenian forces and those brought forth by Uthkarsh and Saraswati leaving a path of gore and destruction in its wake. Seeing only one path forward Asha retreated to a secret sanctum known only to her and several other higher ranking members of her court and communing with the Mother of Waters, a water shard of the pillar that rested beneath Hydriop, she called forth not one, not two, but five leviathans into the seas she’d come to call home in the hopes they might kill the Horkos.
While the leviathans ultimately did kill and eat the monstrosity this has left five powerful creatures on the loose that are unaccounted for.
