Via

Via
"We call upon Via, who is the path, who shapes the way, whose course the heavens cannot turn"
Origin	From-Stone
Titles	Aryāṣṭāṅgamārga, Ásbrú, the King of Ways
Names	None, anymore
Aspects
Date of arrival	Before the dawn of man
Owner(s)	SRN

"Tis a long road, and tis a road that must be trod."

- Prelude to the Firstfold Path

And came the first Hours from the Glory to the Mansus, but from whence came the Mansus and the Glory? Wherever it was, it is the tentative agreement of the scholars that remain that the Mansus predates the Resplendence-of-Dawn, and so perhaps Via was the first Hour. Once there was an Hour of the gates and roads and bridges of the House and they were its Names, and then there was the war, and there was the incident at the Falls of Phaethon.

Description

History

"And it all... comes... tumbling... down."

- The Mirrored Ascents

Via awoke as the first Hours descended to the Mansus. Where the twins of day and night were the heavens, Via was its earth. When man first came to the Mansus it was Via that shaped unknowable tangles of dream into roads and stairways to guide them, and it was Via who first formed the ascents and the gates to keep them out of where they should not be for they would never understand. When Hours fought, it was Via that was the calming, gentle presence to conduct negotiations, and the great walls and gates that suddenly slammed shut to impede war. Via was a titan of peace; it never fought, but it could easily be considered one of the mightiest Hours.

Then came the war, and everything changed.

Via reacted slowly. It first tried to welcome the newcomers, and only when they proved inimical, corrupting Manifest Will did it move against them, sealing gates and ascents against them. When it smashed through them, as Hours could, it rallied its force and faced them at the Falls of Phaethon. What happened there is a mystery, perhaps even to Via itself. But the King of Ways limped away, ruined, desolated but still alive. And yet no longer an Hour. As the war dripped to its inevitable, dreadful end, Via came to a desperate, horrifying decision. One by one, it consumed its old Names, it consumed its old Long, and it consumed its old laws, filling it with divine energy to last however much longer. And as the last Hours of old retreated, it sealed its last bastion, the gate to the heart of its self. The Gate Without.

Via is a shattered, broken creature. It cannibalized and still cannibalizes what remains of its glories of old to survive, to be more than inanimate stone, and yet that is not enough. As the aeons drip by, what will become of it? What will become of the Hours who yet rest their survival on the King of Ways?

Appearance

Via once had many forms, legions and regiments of roads and bridges bearing its might. Now, it has but one - a quiet, moonlit stone bridge stretching over an inky void reaching out somewhere that none have ever been, that not even Via knows.

Principles

By its status as the way, as the road, it hums with Knock, and by its stone that has lasted uncounted aeons, it beats with Heart and life.

Worship

Mark

1. Temptation: Passage
2. Dedication: Passage
3. Ascension: Passage
4. Ascension: Passage
5. Ascension: Passage
6. Ascension: Passage
7. And we remake the way, we reforge the path:

Servants

Remnant-of-Splendours

Here lies all that remains of the Ways of the old House. Uncounted gates, stairs, ramps, crenelations, and more exotic architecture warp into this Escherian tangle of construction. Hovering over Via, long have gone the minds of wise arbiters and guardians, tricky riddlers and charlatans, furious protectors, the creatures that once were the ascents of the House. Now, Via consumes what remains of its old creations and Names to sustain itself for a little longer, for a little longer...

Shaper-of-Ages

One of the few remaining Long of his master, Shaper-of-Ages once presided over the creation of new Names. It was her dark eyes and obsessive notes which brought to being the Mirrored Ascent, the Gate Zui, the Third Stair and countless parts of the Mansus. With Via diminished, she is now the sunken-eyed, exhausted final envoy of a dying god. But unlike Via, her power remains, and when it waxes, one can remember why this mere Long was the terror of Hours.

Yu the Great

To tame the great and terrible spirits of the earth, an ancient Emperor once made a pact with a power high above. Aeons later, as humanity flounders and ages are lost in the dark, that pact yet remains. Almost as mighty as Shaper-of-Ages, Yu the Great is Via's hand, or what remains of it, in the Wake. Slipping under the eye of the new order of Nowhere, it is Yu who leads the war against the desolation of the world. Solar panels, insulation for the megacities, new farms, it is Yu who tames the new desolation and ensures the survival of man.

Items

Tools

• Thing
  • Aspects: 12 12

Ingredients

• Thing
  • Aspects: 1 1

Influences

• Thing
  • Wrd
  • Aspect: 10

Books

• Book
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Rites

• The Construction
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