Steampunk Amahara
Steampunk Amahara is an RPG run by Mal. It is about running around in a steampunk world, looking for ancient loot, awakening and enshrining gods, defeating evil, possibly being evil, and such and such so on!
Background
History of Amahara
Mythic Era
Long ago, at the beginning of time, the three creator goddesses summoned life, the universe, and everything into being in a fit of yuri. In the ages thereafter, gods and celestials toyed with the world freely and divine beasts struck terror in humans who hid behind fire by night and could scarcely carry on with their lives. The greatest human, Tatehaya, slew the monsters of the realm, accomplished the five impossible requests of Kaguya the moon princess and then went on to conquer the world. His final campaign was a war against the homeland of his wife, a war by the humans of the Earth against the celestials who dwelt on the Moon. The war saw him killed, the celestials extinguished, and the world shattered. The great flood washed all trace of civilisation away, leaving humanity a long age of rebuilding. In the end, the great land of Yamato was submerged beneath the seas and cut off from the rest of the world, leaving only the lands closes to Heaven - Amahara. Even today, this creation and foundation myth is believed to explain why the nation of Amahara is superior to the rest of the world.
Classical Era
During the Classical Era, the morals of civil governance were imported from the Middle Kingdom and the religion of Shinto developed out of the superstitions and old shamanism of the Mythic Era. Where the older beliefs held gods and demons as awesome and ineffable natural phenomena that mortals could only hope to appease, Shinto came to both revere and understand them - they could be guides or protectors and could also be petitioned for aide. The two sides were to coexist and interact through formal rituals and ceremonies. Amahara came to be ruled by the Apostles, a matriarchal line of empresses which claim descent from Kaguya and to personally enshrine the foundation hero Tatehaya as a kami and thus the ultimate religious leader of the realm.
Medieval Amahara
Amahara was overthrown by warlords and the line of Apostles was broken and subsequently followed a sequential selection instead. This allowed the clergy to more closely control the throne in the face of samurai encroachment and thus retain religious and moral leadership even as the strongmen took over other aspects of administration. A series of five shogunates ruled Amahara from 888 to 1858, interspersed with long periods of fighting and civil wars. Buddhism was imported, which penetrated into a niche alongside Shinto. Both belief systems gained wealth, built vast fortified temples and shrines and acquired military power in their own right. Amahara Shinto evolved from this militarism, leading to the conquest of Ryunan late in the Toyotomi Shongunate. Despite all efforts of preservation however, the last of the divine beasts retreated into the deepest of wildernesses and most gods fell silent in ever longer periods of slumber.
The Yanari Shogunate was the fifth and last shogun dynasty to rule Amahara, lasting the final 199 years of the shogunate era. Amahara fell behind Europa during those last two centuries
Bakumatsu
Foreign influences and weakness in the shogunate devolves into a massive civil war, propelling Amahara into the modern world. The current year is 1878.
Overview of Modern Amahara
Amahara's Home Islands is a large archipelago about the size and climate of Japan - in short it is mystic Japan.
Ryunan is a mainland peninsula to the south. Originally an honest colonial conquest, connection to the land fell during the Yanari shogunate and Amahara is busy trying to reassert its claim in the face of foreign powers.
Religion
The religion of Amahara is Amahara Shinto, an aggressively proselytising form of Shinto believing in a vast pantheon of gods who govern every aspect of the world from weather and earthquakes to steam engines and the fine moving parts of clockwork. The new Dominion of Amahara sees itself as having a responsibility to spread this faith, most commonly by establishing and protecting countless small shrines all over the world and encouraging people to recognize the role of the kami in day to day life. It is inclusive rather than exclusive, which is part of its attraction, readily absorbing local gods, spirits, and folk heroes into the pantheon. It promises spiritual progression through reincarnation (especially after dying well) and does not treat many of the things other religions frown on (like alcohol or casual sex) as misdemeanors. Its main conflict with the Abrahamic faiths is in the doctrine of monotheism, resulting in Christian, Jewish and Muslim clerics dragged through the streets and lynched or beheaded. A recent imperial edict has declared all monotheistic religions illegal.
Amahara Shinto has multiple ranks of clergy based on their role in the service of the gods and attendant level of devotion. The most revered and respected lead highly regimented lives full of taboos, restrictions, vows of devotion, and ritual duties. In theory, their word is law as they speak for the gods themselves. The highest of these is the Dominion's head of state, the Apostle of Amahara, a girl periodically selected in the traditional manner, through the consultation of complex astrological tables and the analysis of shifting geomantic and meteorological patterns.
Your Mission
- Learn about foreign ways if they are useful.
- Awaken and enshrine spirits and kami in foreign lands.
- Recover artifacts and knowledge for the good of the state and academic progress.
- Do not piss off the foreigners too much.
Others
Homeland Factions
Apostolic Government
- The political and religious leadership of Amahara with the Apostle of Amahara as the holy figurehead.
Old Guard
White Lotus Cult
Gaijin
Yan Dynasty
- The Middle Kingdom is the largest and most populous land empire in the world as well as the source of most overseas influence on Amahara in the classical and medieval eras. Unlike Amahara, it never gained a lasting warrior tradition nor a particular penchant for religion (though its indigenous beliefs are broadly compatible with shinto principles). It has always been a state centered around civil and financial administration with both faith and military prestige as tertiary priorities. In contrast to Medieval Amahara, its dynastic transitions have tended to be swift, decisive affairs involving only a few sides and given the sheer might of the empire in the past, it hardly ever had outside rivals. After decades of foreign pressure, the mighty empire has collapsed into the mother of all civil wars which could well dictate the fate of the region if not the world depending on who wins and who is left alive at the end.
Francian Empire
- The Francian Revolution began in 1793 with riots and civil disruption rocking the country against the excesses of the kingdom and its privileged class. The revolution gave birth briefly tot he Francian Republic which was in turn toppled by 1800 by the rise of Napoleon who crowned himself emperor and then proceeded to make war on the rest of the European continent. He eventually destroyed, the Britannian Empire in 1818. Francia then took over the lead in the industrial revolution and became the world's premier state power. It is currently ruled by Napoleon IV and its capital is Parys.
New Crusader States
Karlsland
- A relatively large though only modestly populated country in the north of Europa, the Republic of Karlsland has recently risen to become one of the leading challengers of Francian hegemony. It is a technologically advanced country and build some of the world's largest and swiftest airships. Its capital is Nidaros.
Danuby
- A country in the east of Europa which has seen significant success in wars against its neighbours in recent years. It is seen by some as another challenger of Francia but others consider it a Francian ally.
Rossiya
- A former state that took up a large part of eastern Europa and had been starting to expand beyond it. Defeat by everyone else has utterly shattered the empire.
New Britannian Empire
Catholic Church
- The Vatican City is located centrally in Europa, ensconced among a varied collection of very small states. The region has many major churches, reliquaries and large foreign communities that serve pilgrims. While tiny on the map, the Vatican has massive, global reach through its knighthoods and missionary orders. The beliefs of the Catholic Church in a single supreme God is inherently inimical to Amahara Shinto. Recently, the Pope excommunicated both the Yan Supreme Emperor and the Apostle of Amahara and in response Amahara declared the Catholic faith to be illegal.
The Caliphate
- The Caliphate is a large but loose alliance (more like a vague union of understanding really) of countries following the Islamic faith, which also refuse to honour the Eight Million Kami and are thus just as bad as the Catholics. However, the two also seem to fight each other a great deal.