An excerpt from “Gods, Deities, and other powers to take seriously and avoid pissing off” by the Bard Rufus the Well Travelled.
Valtentis is strongly polythestic. There exist a multitude of gods, and in any cosmopolitan city you will find the residents worshipping dozens if not hundreds of deities. Throw a rock, hit multiple pantheons. Most of these deities are local or regional in nature, only moderately powerful (though still VERY powerful by human perspective so avoid fucking with even the little ones) and tend to grow and fade away over time as their number of believers wax and wane. But don’t tell them that. It won’t make you friends.
However, there are some exceptions to this. A handful of gods are ancient, global in scope and much older than the average set of deities. A variant of worship for these gods exist in most of the civilized world. While regional flavor is common, and there are different priesthoods in each culture and nation, the gods, ceremonies and beliefs are similar enough to be easily identifiable as basically the same religion.
The first set of these global deities are known in scholarly circles as The Three. In this book, for simplicity I will use the most ancient names for them, with the hope of avoiding drawing their attention, or that of their priests. These names are not common nowadays. You would not walk into a temple of Dumuzid in Valoria, you would walk into a temple of Theus. And in Dor-Brael it would be Wothan. But it's the same. These gods get around, and are extremely old, the historical record for them extends at least 5,000 years to the very early proto empires of this continent.
Note there are often other, lesser gods that cluster around the big three and form a pantheon, gods of love, war, poetry, all that jazz. They can really be thought of as extensions of the big three more than truly separate entities. Again, don’t tell them that, they won’t enjoy hearing it.
Dumuzid King of the Sky:
The patriarch of the group, father god, the big guy with a beard up in the sky. Dumuzid is portrayed as the chief of the gods, master of sky, weather and storm, wielder of lightning, dispenser of justice and authority, ruler of all.
Inanna, Queen of the Earth and of Heaven:
Matriarch, wife of Dumuzid, the earth mother. She is the mistress of the earth and all growing things. She controls the seasons, the harvest, childbirth, and all the natural earthly cycles.
Ereshkigal, Goddess of the Underworld:
Sister to Inanna, mistress of the underworld. She is associated with all things otherworldly, of magic, the afterlife and hidden knowledge. She is the final judge of the dead and queen of the realm of spirits.
You have about as much chance of meeting these three as you do having tea with the Empress of the East, they are way too important for the likes of us. Even Eresgkigal doesn’t judge the dead directly, she has people for that. But you will likely run across their minions and acolytes from time to time. Think of them like you think of the government, avoid whenever possible, pay your respects and taxes when no other choice presents itself and try to keep below their radar.
In addition to these three, there are a handful of other deities that are similarly well known and global in scope. They are mostly an odd lot, they differ from common deities in that they do not have a formal religion, temples or priests or seem to care much if anyone worships them. Nonetheless their stories and informal worship are found in virtually every nation
The Lady
Also known as Queen of the Sea, Lady Luck, or the Lady of the Sea, she is a mysterious and enigmatic figure. She holds dominion over all the oceans of the world. She is fiercely protective of her authority and is draconian in enforcing her Lady’s Law, to the point where magic workers the world over fear to cast any spell that affects the wind, weather or wave of the sea. This is not just ideal superstition either, copious documented cases exist of wizards or sorcerers who break this law quickly coming to a gruesome end, and clerical or druidical magic simply fails to function all together. Of all the gods in this book, this is the god you are most likely to personally piss off if you are a magic worker. My advice to you is, don’t.
She has no priesthood or formal worship, but sailors, fishermen and travelers on the sea often pray to her informally, occasionally being answered. Or not, she’s fickle like that. She also has dominion over luck, though the religious and magical texts that describe this dominion usually distinguish between two types of luck.
The Lady’s Luck is best translated as “luck of fate” and is associated more with the cosmic powers of Law and what is destined to be. It functions in the sense that sometimes things are fated and that even though cosmic forces often have the appearance of whimsy, the gods have a plan, the skein is woven and events tend to play out in an unstoppable way to realize that plan. It is the luck of the hero just happening to find the magic sword in the cave, the luck of the chosen one.
While she has no priesthood she does occasionally select a champion and agent from among mortals, generally called a “Sea Witch”. These agents are rare, never more than one a generation, and possess strange powers, including the ability to break the Lady’s Law with impunity. Many stories and legends surround these witches. If you ever encounter one, my advice is to back away slowly while smiling and avoid any rapid movements. Then get the hell out of there, you don’t want any piece of that.
The Lady is occasionally encountered by mortals while serving her mysterious purposes. While she wears a variety of guises, she is always beautiful and her eyes are eyes are always sea green
The Gentleman
Sometimes consort, sometimes foil of the Lady, the Gentleman is the casanova, trickster, wild card and a true agent of Chaos in the world. He is a god of music, style, wit and subtly. Also lacking in a formal priesthood or religion, he is revered by bards, thieves, tricksters, mercenaries, gamblers, pirates and rebels the world over. He is also a god of fortune, but his kind of luck is best translated as “luck-against-fate” , the luck of the rogue beating the odds or the gambler on a hot streak. In a way this second kind of luck is directly opposed to the first type, and is evidence that fate is not fixed, that mortals have agency, and that even the plans of the gods are not immutable.
Stories abound of the Gentleman appearing unexpected, outwitting those in positions of power and authority, and absconding with the treasure and usually the princess. Tales of his romantic exploits are also legendary, though the “he” is a figure of speech, it is important to note that in less patriarchal cultures the Gentleman often manifests as a female.
He/she has a multitude of appearances but will always be finely dressed and handsome/ beautiful, with black eyes. And they will always be able to hold their liquor.
This is the god you are most likely to unknowingly have a drink with in some disreputable dive bar. I think that actually happened to me once. Or maybe it didn’t, who knows? That’s the Gentleman for you
Needless to say the relationship between the Lady and the Gentleman can be only be described as complex.
And then we have
Death
The personification of Death is known and acknowledged by all cultures, civilized or not. He is the ultimate representation of the Law and inexorable fate. He has no worship, no prayers are prayed to him (at least not successfully), no alms offered, he has no temples only cemeteries, but he does seem to be a real supernatural entity and often makes appearances in many stories and fables.
This is the one god in this book you are absolutely guaranteed to meet. At least once. My advice to you is postpone that meeting as long as possible.
And then finally you have the new kid on the block
Mithra the Lightbringer
The new guy, Mithric worship is at best three centuries old, he’s a toddler by god standards. Born a mortal man in the Thousand Isles, his religion is a mishmash of western and eastern beliefs, borrows a lot from Mbo (which is a whole nother religion story, that will be another book entirely) and is heavily associated with the Sun and light. While originally a small cult, it has been growing rapidly the last hundred years or so, mostly due to the proselytism of an extremely devoted and active priesthood and fervent set of followers.
“Hello friend, sorry to interrupt you at home but may I tell you about our Lord of Light, Mithra?”
The story and legend of the life and deification of Mithra is too extensive for this essay, but most of it seems to have actually happened. He is generally seen as a proletariat, blue collar god, one of the people, entirely on the side of mankind and the mortal world even to the point of giving his mortal life for his followers (as his legend claims). His priests disdain worldly possessions or wealth, give all they have to the poor and minister endlessly to the needy, sick or downtrodden. There are also many warrior clerics and paladins among them, constantly at the forefront of battling monsters and other threats to civilization.
The motto of the Mithrac priesthood is “Bringing the light into dark places” and in my experience they generally live up to that. They can be frightful stick-in-the-muds though.
There are also rumors of hidden mysteries and secret upper level initiations in the mithraic priesthood, I would not know anything about this since admittance into these mysteries of the uninitiated is strictly forbidden. I would never for instance and strictly hypothetically don a disguise, impersonate an initiate, sneak into any of those gatherings and participate in those rituals just to sait my idle curiosity. But it is absolutely true there are some weird and hidden things going on there. Seem mostly harmless though unless you are a bull
This religion is not loved by the more established priesthoods of the older gods. Not only does the rapid growth threaten their base of followers (and if I can indulge in a bit of snark their revenue stream), but the Mithric priests, while showing respect and tolerance to other gods and beliefs, often insinuate that those other gods are a bit on the self serving side and don’t really care about you the way Mithra does. They also have unkind things to say about the more established priesthoods, especially their love of wealth and ostentation. They draw comparisons that, while accurate in the opinion of this author, are not appreciated by the hierarchy of the older religions.
This is the god in this list that you are most likely to fight alongside to save the world of man from the evil whateveritis.
While still relatively uncommon in Mythras, the religion is growing fast, especially in Valoria, and has become dominant in the The Thousand Isles.