From Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Universe

Ade Telualla

This is the history of Ade's world. If you want disclaimers, look at the main page listed above.

For reiteration though, I'll repeat the most important part: 'This page has been marked for mature content due to the nature of the society explained in further detail below. This includes gender roles, power plays, health issues, child abandonment among others. Naturally this is not intended to be an ideal world, and as such none of what is written is endorsed by the writer. Furthermore, while there are historic precedences for many of the elements described, none of what is written is intended to reflect any real world culture. MuGan Earth is stuffed up. It's not our Earth. Simple as that really.'

MuGan Earth

Ade was born on Tau Sigma 13-8, commonly referred to as 'MuGan Earth' which is short for Mu-Oranbegan. As the name implies, the war fought between the nation of Mu and the city-state of Oranbega never reached the definitive end as it did on our Earth. Rather the siege stalemated for numerous years, resulting in the patron gods Ermeeth and Hequat actively spreading their influences to other fledgling societies with the purpose of rallying more reinforcements to their cause to conqueror their sworn foes. In time the original combatants were no more; the city of Oranbega was reduced to rubble that even animals steer clear of and the nation of Mu had drained itself too much, their resources spent and their surviving populace nothing more than the elderly and those far too young to fight off the raiders that swept across their civilisation. This was by no means an end to the conflict as many more people flocked to their Godly causes and continued to use the originator's names.

The Oranbegans were those who rallied to Ermeeth's banner, believing themselves to be liberators championing the cause of humanities' freedom from the rest of the fickle pantheon of ancient gods. Like all self-righteous militant movements, however, it was not long before their 'purpose' was little more than a justifier for truly inhumane actions. Unlike our Earth though the Oranbegans of MuGan Earth never made agreements with demon princes, rather they practised more earthbound sorceries and martial skills with considerable aptitude.

The Mu on the other hand were those that shouldered the position of holy arbiters for the pantheon of ancient gods. Believing the Oranbegans to be nothing more than rebellious heretics the Mu movement resorted to the same theocratic, magic based system of order as their namesakes. Eugenic breeding and politics shaped them into a standing testament of humanities' monstrosity.

The tides of the war ebbed and flowed over the countless generations that followed. In time the two deities managed to spread their influence across the ocean and reached Eurasia and Africa. The results varied but the loss of life and freedoms were global.

In the lands of Asia the traveling disciples of the Mu and Oranbegan causes (collectively referred to as 'Loyalists') taught their secrets of magic to those with the strong will needed to fight for their cause. Naturally this lead to a rise in warlords across the continent and the violence that was from beyond the sea was continued in this new land, steel and sorcery governed human life from that point on. Many parts of the Asian continent resisted these movements and have managed to learn the secrets of the arcane through other means. The fact remains that these stout resistors are but islands of sanity in the waters of fanatical war.

For a long time Europe followed a similar route, monarchs and nobles utilised this newly learned aetheric force in their own power games. In time however the balance of power shifted from the ruling classes to the numerous knighthoods, societies and sects which kept Europe running while the so-called rulers played at games of war. Whilst many of these factions are Loyalist founded and directed there still remains a sizable number of independents. Though some of these are arguably just as bad as the violent theocrats, such as the so-called Carnival of Life.

Of all the lands of MuGan Earth, it was Africa that suffered the same levels of violence and inhumanity of the original MuGan conflict. The city-states formed along the northern coast and the Nile faced not only hostilities from each other but foreign interests as well. The largely unknown continent sparked considerable interest from an arcane point of view and in time tales of lost cities and items of fantastic power circulated across Europe and Asia. The loyalists in particular desired to discover what lay in the vast and strange land; any city they could not convert to their respective causes were subjected to raids and crusades. Many of these city-states remained stoutly independent and stood their grounds, even as disgraced nobles, warlords and their underlings fled into the continent to become mercenaries fighting for whoever paid more. Commonly that meant either the Mu or Oranbegans.

The tribes in the southern parts of Africa collectively refused to parley with the missionaries who ventured into their territories and, using a mix of cunning and martial prowess, made any incursions by loyalist forces strategically infeasible. The tribes had many concerns of their own, however, that concerned them far more than the would-be converters and conquerors.

MuGan Earth never developed technologically like our Earth did. Rather it was the arcane disciplines which garnered much more interest and developments than the sciences. Over the centuries of warfare the very atmosphere and landscape of MuGan Earth became contaminated with etheric fallout which in effect corrupted much of the flora and fauna across the globe. The 'Wildlands' of MuGan Africa in particular is rife with twisted creatures, many of which pose considerable dangers to the human populace.

A far more dangerous threat for the tribes of southern Africa has arisen from the roving bands of outcasts. Humans are not immune to etheric mutation and many begin to change during their childhood. Due to the severity of some of these changes it became common practice to either execute or cast out any child that showed signs of alterations. The outcasts who did not devolve into slobbering beasts would commonly join in roving bands for the sake of mutual survival. Their lack of agricultural skills coupled with a general hatred for those who exiled them in effect quickly turns most of these into marauders who take what they need with excessive force.

The most dangerous element to all in the continent is something that cannot be fought by conventional means; Loyalist-created plagues which have been unleashed in an effort to weaken resistance. This added with the problems of mercenaries and marauders destroying crops has created a major health concern in MuGan Africa.