"I understand you are very nervous dear, but I promise, the wisdom of the sages wills out. You may be disappointed at first, but you will eventually realize, like I did, that you are where you are meant to be."

Enna Liadon, speaking to her daughter Luminara Liadon

Blackwood Culture

The Elvish Consultari

In the Feywilds that Faetari had created, the Eladrin people lived for epochs before the first human age. In that world, time moved non-linearly, as days and weeks compressed into years. In the uncountable days that passed in her realm, some Eladrin became different. Legends say that a foul miasma spread across the land, and infected the heart of all Eladrin who came upon it. The miasma made them mortal, and weighed them down with worries, pressures, and the fear of death. These Eladrin could no longer live in their garden, they had to leave, and seek a better land. These were the Elves who first came to Adra. They banded together and explored the world. The world was dangerous and terrible, but they had powerful magic, and learned how to survive in their new harsh reality. They discovered a giant forest, with trees unlike any from the Feywilds. They named this forest the Blackwood, and those trees Blackwood Trees. The elves forged a realm there that would spread and dominate vast areas of the surface realm. Incredible complexes and architecture filled their lands, and they became masters of magic and craft. However, their elf realm began to rule over countless new Kith races, and with it came the power of conquest and subjugation. Many elves felt this was at odds with their beliefs, that elves should guide the world, not rule it. These new races and peoples needed to rule their own destinies. However, there were other elves who disagreed; these new races were uncouth, barbaric, and stupid. These elves felt that the new races should be purged from their realm, in order to craft a more perfect paradise. These disagreements built, factions formed, and lines were drawn in the sand. Eventually, the elves quarreled in what is called the Last Elvish Civil War, and the realm they had formed collapsed, the races they ruled forming their own nations. The softer faction pulled away from their territories, and withdrew to the Blackwood, their first home. There they built an insular realm, protecting the newer races by keeping their distance from them. Fearful of the rule of a king, but suspicious of the wisdom of the mob, the elves established the Consultari: a council of three, raised from birth to be wise beyond measure, to lead the elves into the future with foresight and grace. This is the world of the Blackwood. It is a society run by enlightened thinkers, rather than the most powerful or the most deadly. Furthermore, it functions like one giant community, where money is rarely if ever used, crime is almost non-existent, and people share all they have with their neighbors. However, in many ways the people of the Blackwood are less free than elsewhere. Here, your skills and prowess are identified at an early age, and they are honed. It does not matter if one dreams to be warrior, if they are identified to be a tree-tender. Furthermore, a culture that began from a fear of determining the destinies of other races and nations has taken it to its ultimate extent, rarely if ever interfering in any affairs outside of their woodland realm. From the safety of the forest, the Elvish Consultari has watched empires rise and fall, wars come and go, and the world turn on.

          Still, while the government of the Blackwood has remained stubbornly uninvolved with outside affairs, many of its people have ventured out of its confines. Those elves with wanderlust or a sense of duty to the larger world, and often the half-elves of the forest, would leave the Blackwood of Zaltia and venture out into the world. These elves often become advisors, diplomats, thinkers, and luminaries the world over. Therefore, not through the country, but through the culture, the elves have slowly fulfilled the purpose their ancestors set for them. Those of Blackwood culture value the ideals of rational thought: if something can be done, it should be done with accordance with reason. Not, because reason achieves the best result, or the fastest result, but because reason is good in and of itself, and therefore reason achieves the good result. Those of the Blackwood are quite obviously also interconnected with nature, valuing living creatures, and acknowledging the constant cycle of birth and death that necessitates any life outside of nature. However, rather than leave nature alone, those of the Blackwood tend to cultivate it, believing it should be protected, tended, and shaped sometimes for the better. Therefore Blackwood architecture incorporates nature, but blends it with traditional buildings of brick and stone. More than anything, Blackwood culture is defined by a desire for perfection. To some extent this can manifest in perfect creations and perfect work, but more often than not, it manifests as a desire for self perfection, for skill mastery. One attempts to achieve mastery, and once one has, they move on to a new skill, while maintaining and cultivating the mastered one. In elves, this results in highly skilled and intelligent craftsmen, statesmen, and warriors. However, such a drive for perfection can often lead Blackwood people to be overly judgmental of those who fail in their goals, and extremely judgmental of those who never set goals to begin with. Idleness, excuses, and laziness all tend to be criticized harshly. Those of the Blackwood try not to look down on other cultures, but this results in them setting the expectations for those cultures that they would for their own people.

          The Blackwood people are most highly concentrated, naturally, in the Blackwood of Zaltia. There are also many of the culture living in wider Zaltia. Outside of Zaltia, many of Blackwood culture can be found serving in high up positions, often as scholars, advisors, magi, and military officers. The races of the Blackwood culture are most predominately elvish, in particular High Elves, Wood Elves, and Half-Elves. However, on occasion others are invited into the fold, so some small numbers of other races can be found within the culture. The most popular pantheon among those of the Blackwood is Faetari, who is celebrated as their patron god. Many followers of Gökotta exist as well, often heralded as the twin-pantheon of Faetari by the elves. Worship for Yeshaya and Aerideia is not uncommon as well in the Blackwood. People of the Blackwood tend to be skilled, rational, and considerate. They also tend to be judgmental, distant, and anal-retentive. High Elvish is the primary language spoken throughout all of the Blackwood, though many learn Low Arissian Common in order to treat with surrounding communities.

If you choose the Blackwood Culture, you gain the following:

~A +1 to your Intelligence score~

~Either a -1 to your Strength score or a -1 to your Constitution score~

~As a known language, either High Elvish or Low Arissian Common~

~A Sub-Discipline in every knowledge skill on checks relating to Blackwood Culture~

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