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The Fourth History was -- before the Segmenting of the Snake -- the demesne of [[the Great Serpent]] which, in the Serpent’s magnanimity, was donated as neutral ground for the Hours to meet under the flag of truce. It seeded its cults there, but other than that, the peace held, even past the Segmenting of the Snake. But held does not mean remained whole. The occult backdrop of the 20th century has been one of brutal suppression and desperate resistance, and even the People’s Committee for Openings has been forced underground.
Long before man walked upright, the Hours of the Mansus made an agreement under the watchful eye of the Great Serpent. No Hours would rule over this History, no Hours would enact their schemes within, and no Hours would fight over it. Even after the Serpent left, and was Segmented, this agreement held. [[The DecieverDeceiver]] was instrumental in the upkeep of this truce, for it had utilized it to spread a fantastic untruth. When the Great Serpent left, and the first Hours began to circle like sharks around the Fourth History, the Deciever Deceiver spread rumors of a great curse, one that was neither broken nor diminished by the death of the Great Serpent. Any Hour which broke the truce would be wracked by this curse, and suffer greatly from it. The Hours which were uninterested in staying away out of respect for their former ruler were frightened by the curse, and so the Fourth History remained safe.
In the year 1723 [[the Mendicant Without]] made its entrance into the Fourth History, wholly unaware of the millennia-long truce that had preserved it from greater influence until then. With no Names, no followers and little power of its own, it sought to establish a power base that would cement its presence among the older Hours, intervening much more personally than most Hours usually did. Donning a form that was passably human, it drew to itself the hungry, the destitute and the skeptics, asking the right questions but providing few answers. Instead, it urged its followers to spread the questioning, instilling a sense of longing and unrest for which there no earthly remedies. In exchange, it offered greater glimpses of the skin beneath the world than any in this History had yet witnessed, further fueling the hunger and drive of occultists throughout the world.
