About Cerenth

Eissa (fore) and Aumae (rear)

Cerenth is a spheroid planet, 3rd out of 5 planets. It has a circumference of 12,500 miles, and revolves about its star in 340 days.  It has two moons – Aumae is the larger, a faintly swirling green, and it cycles in around 28 days. Dull grey Eissa is the smaller, and completes a cycle in 20 days. Cerenth has very little axial tilt, but has an elliptical orbit which gives it seasons.  Due to this, both northern and southern hemispheres experience the same season simultaneously.

Cerenth has no magical forces to speak of.  Science and technology – the ingenuity of the inhabitants – are the only things which lift civilization above the base animals.

Lands of Cerenth

Main Page: Lands of Cerenth

Cerenth around 560 NE

Cerenth is a world of seas, and commerce, culture, and civilization are carried on the wings of sail from one land to another. However, the mapsmiths divide the lands like a good cheese, and thus they name regions in which the realms are stuffed like so many breads into a feastbird! They are seven, thus: Stelias, Cadiel, Gwalynn, Virinir Ketrali, Zunae, Ralassa, and the Nightsun Lands.

  • In the west one finds the region of Stelias, mostly blighted land, with the Ever-Shifting Sands and Rosehael bound by the Southern Passage in the south and the Auvina Straits in the north.
  • North of Stelias a traveler will find Cadiel, a land of sweet flowering trees and rain three moons of every four! Retupa, by some luck, has remained the sole occupant of Cadiel, as long as the rebellion is held at bay.
  • Sail south from Cadiel or east of Stelias and you will find find yourself in Gwalynn. The Aeldarran Empire of old held all the lands of Gwalynn under its sway, and Old Alceyn after, but this mountainous land is home to those many lands and peoples who have gone their seperate ways.
  • Between the lands of west and east a traveler finds Central Isles, or in the tongue of Elves, Virinir Ketrali. The Elvenhome is found here between the Silver Sea in the west and the Nalen Ocean in the east, whose waters cradle the Navel of the World, Virin Ketral.
  • In the far east, one finds the mysterious lands of Zunae, whence, legend tells, come the savage stone races of Orcs and Dwarves out of the Elohos Mountains. The winds of the Ever-Shifting Sands blow ever west over Zunae; perhaps this created the peculiar people said to originate there.
  • Should you find yourself in wild Zunae and escape north you will find a land more beautiful but a reception more cold if you dare to travel the lands of Ralassa, home of the Forbidden Empire.
  • If you take the wiser course and head north and east or north and west you may find yourself sailing along the Endless Ice until you reach one of the Nightsun Lands, where the hardy yet friendly peoples may offer succor to a far-tossed traveler such as yourself.

Peoples of Cerenth

Main Page: Peoples of Cerenth

The Speaking Peoples of Cerenth are found in endless combination in the ports of Cerenth, and you will find members of every people if you look.

The Tall Folk

If you’re an optimistic type and always looking up, the first folk you’d no doubt cast your eye upon would be the tall folk:

  • You’d find first, no doubt, a Human, those inquisitive folks who are possessed of every color and shape you can think of.
  • No doubt you could find as well an Orc, though if you value your tongue you might not speak of them lightly.
  • If you couldn’t find an orc, you’ll likely find yourself surrounded by Elves, them not having much a fondness for the wildfolk.

The Short Folk

Chasing about you might chance to step on one of the Stunted Peoples. (Not as you should say it in polite company!) As to who you’ll be apologizing to, you can tell by their demeanor!

  • One of the Dwarfkind is likely to give the unwary stepper a good bash in the teeth… if they’re lucky.
  • If you’ve run into a Gnome you’ll be lucky if they even notice you’re there! Assuming you haven’t damaged their gadgets or gizmos or what-have-you.
  • If you have luck you’ve stumbled over a Halfling, the politest of folks in the lands. Don’t mistake a cool temper for meekness, or you might find yourself in a worse situation than with the Dwarf!

History

Main Page: History of Cerenth

You can find a scholar to tell you all the events of the day from scores of scores years ago when the world was created to the very gossip in the streets today. Course, a different scholar will tell you a completely different tale if you let ’em, and neither a one of them more true than an account you hear from Old Lon in the tavern over a mug, and you’ll be more in comfort than in the scholar’s den besides! As for the truth of things, lore is lost as the years pass, and what we know only goes back so far.

Reliable documents take us back to the end of the Shadow Era, near the close of the Water War and the Fever Year that ended it.

Many accounts of the Shadow Era exist as well, though you’ll find the accounts more dubious the further back you go. No doubt many of the stories and legends we know so well come from the day-to-day doings of those times.

Further back and we have murky myth of the First Years and the heroes of that age. Women and men greater than our days can know walked the lands and sailed the seas in those times, and no doubt more has been lost to the ravages of time than has been saved for us to know.

Religion

Main Page: Gods of Cerenth

Folks sometimes try to blame their troubles on the sun, or the moon, or the stars, but superstitions like that are only a way to avoid looking at the real troubles inside your own self. Everyone’s lives are run by the 12 Gods, and the humors inside your brains couldn’t make you so much as get up and face the day without their forces.

First there’s the light forces, what drives a scholar to learn new things, a plower to plow his best, or a Queen to rule with good faith:

  • Life
  • Strength
  • Wealth
  • Wisdom
  • Beauty
  • Luck

Then there’s the dark forces, that brings a Councilor to sell his vote, a man to kill another, or a thief to make her way on the backs of others’ labor:

  • Death
  • Fear
  • Destruction
  • Curiosity
  • Envy
  • Pain

Calendar

Main Page: Calendar of Cerenth

The year of Cerenth is 340 days in length – 12 moons of 28 days each and 4 days which lay outside the months: FirstdaySummer Festival, the Day of Remembrance, and Feastday.