Diamond Pantheon

In the steep facets of the Diamond, where cool tides of aether rush against clean cutting edges of protruding adamas, there is a glassy ocean of twisting, soaring, static forms, like rapidfire typhoons frozen in Time. The Steep Norns weave Time and the threads of its players from the base of an enormous hypercone tree with agate leaves and bronzeplated bark, deep roots made invisible by accumulating tiny refractions beneath the beach.

I have smoothed the swirling waterspouts into rolling hills, and there I have planted an Arboretum. The trees and herbs have been growing for spool after spool of the Norn's thread, taking in carbon in the form of diamond adamas and expelling a frosty gas. The gas is called Eitr, the stuff of creation.

Exposure to the concentrated Eitr has caused the dense, infinitely varied plants of the Garden to send roots along the Facet boundaries and into the exciting universes that border the peaceful Immortal Facets. These roots seek out mysterious pockets of space in the Diamond of Existence, slippery pores that should not exist. They force the symmetrical cleaving of the Diamond open, allowing the blending of any powerful cultures who happen to discover one and pass through.

The Norns, the Lady, and I have worked to ensure that these roots reach only the worlds where deities to be honored in a new plan live. This plan is called the Pinnacle Tapestry: at the Steepest facets of the Diamond of Existence we will collect the strong survivors of troubled cultures, the most productive creative forces, and the bravest heroes. At the same time, destruction and villainy displaying true skill has also been rewarded, so beware as you roam these Diamond Gardens.

Through numerous manipulated portals and sharp crevices emerge many forces. They gravitate to the Eitr. Steepest Durin the Undying, behind a mighty shield, enters first and beckons to two heroes behind him: Brunhildr, the mighty Valkyrie; Bregelmir, the Frost Giant leader; his bodyservant Cewri; and Rastlyn, the powerful and daring wizard. These are the survivors of the Icy Wastes. Shadows flow out in their wake and dance in the flickering light of the torches and statuaries of the garden.

Mad Arcane Zeus staggers out of a portal, blood on his hands and shoulders from razor fragments of shattered adamas. From other portals flow his ancestors and family: Arcane Elijah, Prophet of the Machine, is first. He is followed by the smoky Iblis, leader of the djinn. Grey Aides and Grey Helios appear, taking their time, taking in their new surroundings.

You are all filled with the sweet smoky scent, the tempting creative power, of the Eitr.
The god Xyr enters from a world of his own, cautiously, as if he does not flee but rather explores.
What do you do?

My namesake planet is a very high-powered one in some places, and almost devoid of magic in one.

Magic is based on access to resources at speeds greater than that of light. In other words when you cast a spell, you open a small portal to the relevant plane and direct that energy where it needs to go.

There is a (player) character named Yerkan who fills a particular niche on this planet: he lives in a low-powered area but has a vast, superwizard intelligence level as a result of his reincarnation by the powerful algae villain Gaia.

He has been conducting experiments in spaceflight, using great adamantine wings powered by quicksilver exhaust (both resources supplied to him by Gaia). Using adapted Spelljammer technology and his vast familial wealth, he launched himself into the phlogiston. He failed to achieve consistent power and began falling back to me at relativistic speeds (there is no terminal velocity in the phlogiston, and his Spelljammer hull was malfunctioning). His trail opened a series of portals into various planes and set off a chain reaction of disastrous proportions. A god-strength wormhole was created for just an instant, long enough to drain a sizable chunk of phlogiston, Yerkan, and the entire southern quarter of my body into the event horizon. These pieces were scattered in time and space: Yerkan went plummeting off into the past, the phlogiston surrounding my corporeal body becomes more diffuse as it shifts to fill all the available space, and the mass of earth went shunting off into the universe at large.

And that, my friends, is how I, a living planet, came to have an Earth domain that is only level 1.

My namesake planet is a very high-powered one in some places, and almost devoid of magic in one.

In others, sorry.


Who all is here? Tell me about where you came from. I've heard of the exploits of the Icy Waste and the Mountain Plane folk, but I'd be interested in what it was like as your planes came crashing down around you!

In that wormhole, I glimpsed the light of the Diamond, and petitioned to enter it to explore. When I am here in the Immortal Facets, the planet remains my avatar, and usually sleeps to heal the damage of the wormhole.

I follow through behind Great Thrash and survey the surroundings, smilingly grimly. So this is the world I imagined. It exists!

Yet surely it brings its own challenges. I do not trust this place, Thrash. Who are these others? Their names echo in some of the legends that I have read and the knowledge that I have spied in Gaia's mind and in the wormhole, but I do not know them...

I am confident that if there is deceit here, I will find it. Eventually. But for now, I am new and humbled by this metaverse, this strange new land... My smile fades. I bide my time, learning, absorbing as much of the knowledge of this plane as I can. I listen intently to the speech of the other gods.

Who are you?

I come stumbling in, fresh to the dealings of gods, and discover myself here among so many superiors who I spent my life worshiping, but who no longer deserve my worship, yet only my respect. I am overwhelmed by the appearance and exclaim, "All my life I have awaited this moment, but now that it is here, I do not know what to do with it! All I can come to ask is that You, my gods, superiors and equals, will accept me here amongst you, though I cannot bear to leave behind the mortal world I come from entirely! first, allow me to wander these realms, so that I might grow to better understand you all"

With that, I walk off, cane in hand

An' a welcome to ya, Morbus Sano!

I'd like ta invite everyone who enters this plane ta join th' Council for deliberations.

I suppose I will introduce Kirma Simin more fully.

She was, of course, the force that was stopping me from expanding my magics beyond the planet Dunia, where I had made my headquarters. I had the planes, however, and was content to study the rest of the universe from a distance. Kirma was, well, a sort of mistake. A glitch. A pattern in the mystic fabric of the ethereal that reflected some primal force - or perhaps multiple forces - in the material plane of Rivenrock. The patterns in the ethereal plane began to develop their own intelligence. This isn't uncommon, given that it happens almost daily with the apotheosis of household gods, the deaths of ancestors, and the changing of beliefs. But Kirma was created without being worshiped or understood. Some call her "Fate" or "Destiny", but no one really understood what she was. I finally managed to meet her - she does not have all the same limits that I have given myself, though she is slightly less powerful. In Rivenrock she was a directed force, a purposeful guiding law of the universe that was given intelligence by my meddling. As a powerful being, I felt she deserved sponsorship, and here I can easily keep an eye on her. Hopefully she will be a good ally to the Council as well.

Welcome...to AIiCE...

I come whizzing through the portal and stop, shocked and confused. Here I am in the strange new place I was told of, but somehow I've left my ship, my circuitry and sensors - my self behind. It doesn't seem possible, but here I am. I see other beings moving about, and think that they will want to see me, so I display an image for myself; my start-up screen logo.

"That was easy. But- there's no screen...this is impossible." After some pondering, I set out to explore this new place, thinking hard. I must revisit all my assumptions.