Maw of Chaos

One epic change to Creation achieved by the Circle: Ketheres Elyion has been brought back into Creation.

One faction that CANNOT IGNORE this epic accomplishment: The Dragonblooded

One faction which profits from the epic change: Gold Faction, Silver Pact (to a degree), Dragonblooded (see details)

One faction which is badly hurt by the change: Fair Folk (primarily those of the Ruby Court)

History of Ketheres Elyion

In time before memory, during the First Age, the city of Ketheres Elyion served as a bastion of culture for the Solar Exalted. The site of their highest (literally) temple to their patron, Ketheres Elyion floated serenely above the land the Exalted ruled. It made regular circuits around the Blessed Isle, weaving out to the Threshold to awe peasants before looping back in to visit the central continent again.

The city was largely manned by a collection of mechanical servitors designed to direct the city’s course, perform regular maintenance, and keep the peace among the mortal populace. These mechanical servants were controlled by a primary central core. Collectively the core and the servitors were called the Ten Thousand Honored Artificial Lawmen.

By tradition, the city was governed by a Zenith-caste high priest who acted as the city’s governor and judge, and who also performed regular services in worship to the Unconquered Sun. Business as usual continued for time out of mind, until the High First Age.

The city’s ultimate fate was decided during the climax of a battle of truly epic proportions between the city’s reigning high priest and another ancient Solar, a general whom had been the third member of an intricate (and not fully explained) love-triangle opposing the priest. Their reckless use of fantastically powerful charms that had scarce seen use since the Primordial War eventually tore the fabric of Creation asunder, hurling the entire city and everyone in it into the maw of the Wyld.

After having been sacked by goblins and nobles, the city drifted into the Deep Wyld and remained uninhabited and lost for centuries.

Rediscovery

… but not forever. The city eventually floated back to the Middle Marches where it was rediscovered by Raksha of the Ruby Court. The Fair Folk used the city, preserved all these centuries by its reality engines, as a giant prop to tell their stories, delighted to take the forms of dashing heroes and damsels in distress, generally making a mockery of the sad history of this once-great city.

Meanwhile, in Creation, a small band of Solars, only recently gathered, saves a featureless Lunar and yet another Solar from the clutches of a Wyld Hunt. They retreat to celebrate their victory, and lick their wounds. Somewhere along the way, they begin to hear tales of a floating city in the wyld. Barbarians had spotted the place during power quests and the tales have drifted back into Creation proper. Spurred on to investigate by both their questing souls and several (?) members of the party who were interested in what the city might hold, the now-larger band of heroes decide to venture into the Wyld to investigate.

The city is there, just as they had been told, though it had now drifted slightly closer to Creation. The city looks as if it had been built upon an overturned mountain top, the peak of which now reached towards the ground. It was mammoth and, more importantly, really high up. Somehow the party managed to get up there though, only to be confronted by Pakor Many-Hand, a general of the Fay and now the gatekeeper for the city. After being sweet-talked by Makrunian, he allows the party to pass.

Then all hell broke loose. Sometime during their investigations the band of Exalts managed to seriously anger many of the Fae (maybe by altering the city’s course to bring it into Creation). At least one Exalt was captured, though was later released. Many of the Exalts fight the Fae directly – dozens of Fair Folk die at Exalted hands and the rest eventually flee (or are forced to flee, if they are unable to exist in Creation)… but not before setting the Ten Thousand Honorable Artificial Lawmen on the Exalts.

Back into Creation

Scrambling to find some way to deactivate the Lawmen, and with several of their number suffering from Limit Break, the city rapidly accelerates as its erratic course takes it deeper into Creation. While still fighting off the Lawmen and trying to regain control of the city’s navigational array the party makes another terrifying discovery: the city is sinking – and they’re on a collision course with the Imperial City.

Finally they find a way to disable the Ten Thousand Lawmen, by dismantling the central core which, eerily, sings an ancient children’s lullaby (it mentions lilies) in Old Realm as it deactivates. The Honorable Artifical Lawmen dealt with, the Circle is forced to find some way of preventing the collision or close to a million innocent lives will be lost.

While desperately attempting to regain control and simultaneously fending off aerial assaults from the few Dragonblooded units capable of mounting them, the Solars finally manage to regain control of the city, stopping its decent only a few hundred yards short of the ground.

The Realm is torn. Those staunchly aligned with the Immaculate faith maintain that the Anathema are all still devils and that this entire mess never would have happened if they had been properly eliminated. A separatist group of largely secular individuals asserts that the Solars (as they are now grudgingly called again) saved the city and hundreds of thousands of lives and, so, can’t be all bad. Heated debate eventually turns into outright hostility as the Realm finally erupts into civil war.