Oken Rebirth: Tales of An Unknown World

GLOKENARY: W&W

Anname's Corner: World & Wonders

This world, as it was created by them it is only right that it be ruled over by the same gods. From one as powerful as the Liegen Arker to your everyday Salwn-god like the god of wine Ekil, they rule over anything and everything in their respective domains and of course they long stopped communicating directly to beings that are lower than themselves, meaning they only (sometimes) communicate with beings such as Dragons, Wraiths, Giants and Arks.

Of course there have been cases were people claim to have heard the voices of the gods, sometimes laughing and sometimes cheering them on in times of need such as times of war, some even when it comes to the battles of love. Some go as far as to say they actually had a face to face encounter with a god, but of course none of them have evidence to support such claims and thus people hardly ever believe their tales.

There are sixteen king/Liegen gods in Oken. Liegen gods are gods with higher power and rule over the other minor/Salwn gods as well as every other being on Oken. Under the gods there are the seven guardians, these guardians can be any divine being and they oversee the seven realms.

Before Razul, the seven realms were guarded by seven great dragons, but with the fall of the seven dragon guardians and destruction of the great dragon temples, new guardians were put in place.

The new guardians consist of three demons, three arks and one of both demon and ark descent. This is said to be the best way to keep balance and peace in all the seven realms. In each realm there are kingdoms, for example in Arsan; a realm heavily populated by humans, there are six kingdoms found on four different continents with one of the six kingdoms being Orion.

In these kingdoms there are cities, towns, villages and other smaller communities or landmarks. Each Kingdom is ruled over by a King, each city by a lord or governor and the same goes for towns, each village is governed or is under the rule of a chief and so on and so forth.

Right now I am on Enore, an Island almost half the size of Osias it sits as an independent country or kingdom of sorts. It has no king, no army, no borders, nothing, just one small village in the center of an island and yes, even though it is kind of weird, majority of the people on the island have names that starts with the letter 'E', Ezaire says it is a tribute to the creator of all dragons; the high goddess and goddess of fate and prophecy, Elis.

The island is well-hidden from the rest of the world thanks to Ezaire's concealment magic which makes it next to impossible to find the island. At first I used to wonder why they never really developed the island with architecture, but Ezaire explained that the villagers believe we should not take from the forest or we should not take more than we need -it will throw the Island off balance and that just doesn't sit right with them. If it were up to me this place would be filled with life, trade, a great army and so much more, but no, all I have around me is mostly old people who say we can't cut down more than we need to and their descendants -who sometimes are all for the idea of development, but out of respect for their elders, don't act on it.

Like I have already mentioned, for the last eleven months or so I have been under Ezaire's tutelage and she has taught me a lot; from currency to land development, to government, weapons, races I did not know about, magic and so on and so forth.
The most or customarily used currency in Oken is Drachma, used in Asarn, Felli'er and Rola'ac. Hanna, Titus, Ragnor and Axera use the currency Drauphnir as well as Drachma.

Both Drachma and Drauphnir range from copper to platinum, with an exception of bronze as the lowest currency in Drauphnir. For better understanding Ezaire put it in terms I could easily understand; Drauphnir's bronze is the same as Drachma's copper, they are only different when it comes to exchange. Copper is enough wage to buy one's daily needs -food, clothes, payment of rent, basically it is a commoner's wage. About twenty copper is enough to get a small family of five through all twenty eight days of any given month. Drachma's copper differs from Drauphnir's bronze by a count of only two coins -for every copper Drachma you get two bronze Drauphnir, but it makes no difference except for the fact that you'll have more coins to carry and count because two bronze Drauphnir hold the same value as one copper Drachma.

To break it down, there are four types of Drachma coins, five types for Drauphnir with bronze being the first coin type. There is bronze, copper, silver, gold and platinum. 10 copper Drachma amount to 1 silver coin (Drachma or Drauphnir), 100 silver coins amount 1 gold -in both currencies, 500 gold amount 1 platinum and 1000 platinum coins makes one a very, very rich person. The same goes for Drauphnir with an exception of bronze -20 bronze Drauphnir makes 10 copper Drauphnir, 10 copper Drauphnir amounts to 1 silver coin, 100 silver coins amount to 1 gold coin and 500 gold coins amount to 1 platinum coin.

Land is divided in/by continents and in these continents there are kingdoms, within the kingdoms there are cities, within cities there are towns, born of towns are villages and from villages are smaller communities. Every Kingdom has a king, every city a governor -who in most cases are nobles, towns are also governed by (lesser) nobles and other appointed governors (some with no noble blood, just title). Villages have chiefs or a village head -in Enore we have Chief Cordjo, and naturally every community, no matter how small or big, has a leader. Examples of such small or big communities could be your everyday guilds, parties and/or families.

Architecture is mostly built using timber and stone, examples of monumental architecture built from stone are castles, cathedrals, coliseums and guild halls etcetera. Wood built architecture include your stables, farm houses and sometimes normal houses like the Van'roe house. Streets and houses are also part of our ever developing world; architectures are always coming up with different ways to improve something that is already at its peak.

The governments of most kingdoms are simply put, Orion for example; at the top is the King, followed by the royal family -your Queen, prince and princesses, followed by the nobles and/or individuals put in place by the King such as advisors and strategists -in some way they have the same rank as nobles and can be addressed in such a manner, but socially they are lesser than the lesser nobles.

Weapons are simple to learn about in theory, but a bit hard to pick up for a certain someone (yours truly) in a practical execution. I found this out the hard way during my first sessions with Nirl before I acquired the swords of Vali'er from the dark elf hybrid Erin Sierra.

Simply put there are two types of weapons; long range weapons such as bows and arrows and a recently modified version of the same weapon that was introduced by the dwarves, they call it a crossbow and it allows the user to fire arrows faster than they would with a normal bow and arrow. The second type of weaponry can be classified as close combat weaponry, such weapons include your everyday swords, lances, staffs (in some weird cases, but they are mostly used for long range attacks as well as magic wands -mostly used by wizards, withes or general spell casters). I am more than qualified or skilled to wield a sword now thanks to Nirl and Los' skill in the field of sword fighting, but I can also use magic so if I wanted I could easily take up a staff or a wand as my primary weapon