Kami and Karavan - The Great Deception

[rhaenaan]

<sigh>
I find myself wandering these lands of my birth and feeling like a stranger. So many young warriors dying in pointless battles, directing their fury at enemies that were once their friends. Drawing lines in the sand between the Lord and Lady of Atys as if they could somehow forge a dapper with only a single side.

Jena and Ma'Duk are not our enemies. They are our heritage. Our Birthright. A part of who we are as Atysians. To deny one is to deny a part of ourselves.

Before I left these lands to journey beyond the branches, there were many Fyros who loved Jena and just as many Matis who honoured Ma'Duk. Yet I return and find our lands polarized and I fear for my life in my own home when I offer praise to Jena and Ma'Duk as equals.

The Kami and Karavan have conscripted our history and twisted it to their own purposes. They claim to be led by our heroes. Yet, we have only their words to convince us of these alignments. I have not seen Jena or Ma-duk emerge from the Mist demanding tributes. I have seen no true Homin acolyte of Jena (ie: one that has not been indoctrinated by the Karavan) proclaim her to be the leader of the Karavan. All I have seen is two warring alien factions using our own lore to polarize us against our fellow Homin.

Some claim that all that we have, we have learned from the Kami and Karavan. Magic, Crafting, Fighting, Foraging, etc. Somehow we were nothing before them and owe our entire existance to them. The claim is that they share openly with us from the goodness in their hearts.

We did not learn these things from the K*. The K*, instead, have done everything possible to keep us as children. They decide that we are too weak-minded to be trusted with the technologies that we once held before the Great Dragon seduced us from our original homeworlds. The very things that you claim they have taught us have been held as secrets that they dole out as rewards to the faithful. I have seen no Homin-built teleporters. I have seen no resurrections without paying tribute to the K*. I have seen no major construction like the great city of Pyr since before the collapse. Every "gift" that they provide to us is paid for with the Sap of Atys and the blood of our fellow Homin.

The libraries of Thesos spoke of the wonders we held and hinted at how we travelled here from our original dying homeworld. Though most of the writings were shrouded in religious claptrap, there is little question that we once held the very power to travel to the stars. Now we rub sticks together and consider it "progress".

The dragon led us here to Atys long before the Kami and Karavan were in the picture and it was Jena and Ma-Duk that liberated us from his betrayal. Not the Kami...not the Karavan. They hijaak our lore for their own purposes.

Now the Kami loot our libraries "for our protection". They censor our amber cubes and allow us access only to the bare minimum of our racial knowledge. The Karavan are no better. They travel in thier mighty ships and taunt us with powerful technologies and scold us "don't touch...too dangerous for feeble minds". They claim to be children and caretakers of Atys, yet they can't even breathe our air without their masks.

..and today we find ourselves in the middle of a war. A war that will decide the fate of our world. But I see the battle not as a fight between Karavan and Kami, but one for our very survival. It's simply a matter of time before the war awakens the Great Dragon and our world is torn apart. We've fled a broken planet in the past, but this time we have no ships or knowledge to flee the coming disaster. We need to determine the motivations of the Kami and Karavan and stop them from destroying the only planet we've got.

In my heart I beleive that the Lord and Lady would not turn us against one another. I do not beleive that they would tear our world apart in a war between those who would enslave us; those who do not feel the blood of our homin ancestors in their veins and were likely not even the seed of Atys.

I will fight for Atys and for Hominkind. Worship who you will, but put my people or planet at risk and I will consider you my enemy. I care little for whether you choose Kami or Karavan, Matis or Fyros, Zorai or Tryker. If your motivations are the preservation of our world, then you are my ally. My own alliance (at this time) is with the Kami. The Karavan have become too strong and the balance of power is too far in their favour. Until I understand the motivations of these aliens, I will ally with the Kami. But this alliance is a tenuous one built on common goals. Not one built on religious fervor and mindless devotion.

I urge you all to look within yourselves. Choose your alliances wisely and with the knowledge of what has gone before. The fate of Atys and Hominkind hangs in the balance.