Makoryn
God of Tyrrany and Vengeance
- Domains: Tyranny, Vengeance
- Channel Divinity Feats: Power of Amaunator, Bane's Instructive Stratagem, Tiamat's Bitter Vengeance, Righteous Rage of Tempus
Avengers of Makoryn
The avengers of Makoryn are unabashed holy slayers who seek out those who defy the tenets of Makoryn and murder them. They are silent and unmerciful, and often make dramatic examples of those who have invoked their wrath. Avengers who venture onto Paragon Paths often choose the following:
- Many avengers of all sects walk the Oathsworn, Watcher of Vengeance or Mighty Judge paths.
- Covenant Agents are all members of the Order of Saint Ilithra, and must foreswear allegiance to any of the established sects.
- Favored Soul and Ardent Champion avengers are referred to as "Iron Sons/Daughters", special chosen of Makoryn who are given special dispensation for their work within all of the sects of the church save the Almanni Inquisition.
- Hammer of Judgment avengers are trained in the Brotherhood of the Scepter, and are the favored champion of that order.
- Avengers of the Unveiled Visage all experience strange visions that lead them to the Hellshards themselves, to bask in the unmasked presence of Makoryn himself.
- Many avengers who are part of the Iron Heresy embrace the path of the Dread Imperator, while the other sects usually field Relentless Slayers in the hopes of purging all Iron Heresy from the church.
Clerics of Makoryn
Feared for their fiery tempers and thunderous power, clerics of Makoryn are the hidden saints and oracles within the church hierarchy. All clerics are priests of Makoryn, but few priest are true clerics.
Invokers of Makoryn
Invokers of Makoryn can be identified by their rust-colored eyes, and their dreams: every invoker of the King in Iron has dreamt of a tiny iron spider that crawled down his throat while he slept and wove a barbed-wire web around his heart. Makorynite invokers often claim they can feel that web tightening, cutting into their hearts when they wield the Iron Lord's power.
Paladins of Makoryn
Grim-faced and often mace-wielding, the divine warriors of Makoryn are often at the forefront of wars against tyrants. The church of Makoryn has a great many different knightly orders.
Runepriests of Makoryn
Like all Runepriests of the Talion gods, the Runepriests of Makoryn wield the discovered sigils that represent the defeat and binding of the Primordials. These runes - secreted throughout the iconography and holy texts of the various Talion gods - offer up great power to those who master them, and a great many runepriests hold to Makoryn as a patron.
Also called The King-in-Iron, Father of Tyrants, the Iron Lord. Among the drow of the Underdark, he is worshipped as a great and terrible spider goddess whose name must not be profaned by speaking it aloud.
- Depiction: Makoryn is most often depicted as a tall, lordly figure, clad in leathern robes set with rivets and clasps made of cold, dully grey iron. His garments are set here and there with dark, blood-red garnets, and he wears a mask-crown made of tall, sharp edges, with only pure void staring out of the eyeholes in the mask. He wields a long-handled mace crafted of cunningly interwoven iron shards, similar in design to his mask-crown.
- Symbols: Makoryn's holy symbol is an iron pendant, diamond-shaped, depicting a jagged-headed mace-scepter. The faith's other symbols include jagged, sharp iron or iron chains, iron masks that limit vision, hearing and breath, garnets of all kinds, and web-spinning spiders (due to their imprisonment and torture of their prey). Makoryn's favor is sometimes shown by a ruddy, maroon radiance.
- Godly Domain: Makoryn is the god of tyranny, imprisonment, punishment, and torture. His powers and those of his servants are concerned with concepts of misused authority, fear, intimidation and the lust for power.
- Origins: The sun goddess Khoro crafted Makoryn when she seized up the ever-transforming essence of the primordial Vabrosyn, and imprisoned it in iron and leather restraints which she imbued with divinity and fashioned into the King-in-Iron. He imprisons the eternally transforming and growing flesh-elemental Vabrosyn by slicing away all of his changes and growths, keeping him stagnant and in one shape forever by virtue of containment.
Makorynite Orthodoxy of Liminal
The Makorynite Orthodoxy began in the great city of Liminal, an outgrowth of its proximity to the Eternal Hells themselves, thanks to the imbricate nature of that city, which provides access to the very domains of the Talion gods. For the most part, most Makorynite temples in Rinhony belong to the Orthodoxy.
Theology
The orthodox theology of the core Makorynite faith holds that tyranny and vengeance are sins. It is the duty of the faithful to be watchful for signs of those afflictions, both in themselves and others. Power is the great temptation, and must be a tool for an ends, rather than the ends themselves. The sinful will be cast into the Hellshards in the afterlife, to suffer at the hands of Makoryn's iron devils.
It is the duty of the priesthood to work against tyrants and those who would subvert or pervert justice to their own ends. Though this sounds very benevolent, the fact is there is something in the Makorynite faith which thrives on suffering and pain. The faithful who are dispatched to deal with tyrants and the wicked do so with terrible brutality, often making the suffering of their targets long-lasting and very public, as a warning to others.
Makorynite doctrine embraces the concept of Proper Authority, teaching its adherents that only the gods are worthy to wield power for power's sake. Mortals are meant to defer such power to the gods, and should limit their own exercises of power during their lifetimes to whatever is needful to accomplish their aims without self-aggrandizement. The holy know that effectiveness, not glory, is the order of the day. The Makorynite faith is fairly popular with the downtrodden and poor because of this philosophy, and less popular among those with temporal power, as one might imagine.
The Makorynite priesthood also teaches that imprisonment is a holy endeavor. It is the very purpose of the Talion gods, and Makorynites often criticize the priesthoods of other Talion gods for not taking that duty more seriously. The Makorynite faith teaches that pain is purification, and that suffering leads to enlightenment, as well. For this reason it tends to have an ascetic thread running through much of its practices.
Rituals & Observances
Among other things, Makorynite temples are always constructed to include dungeons, or at least a basic gaol. The priesthood makes it very clear to the powers that be that their services as gaolers may be invoked at any time, and many rulers do take advantage of those services, rather than bothering with their own dungeons or jails.
The Makorynite Orthodoxy maintains an ever-growing body of written lore called the Hierophantine Codex. These are the accumulated writings of the sect's Iron Heirophants over the years, regarded as holy writ due to the time the Iron Hierophants spend in communion with Makoryn and his favored servants in the Talion Court. It takes two generations of Hierophants after a given Iron Hierophant dies for his writings to be considered part of the Codex canon.
Orthodox Makorynite observances are held weekly at temples. These observances usually involve ritual prostrations and admissions of powerlessness before the altar of Makoryn, as well as sermons focusing on passages from the Hierophantine Codex. Because the Codex is not generally available to the masses, it is often the only time worshippers hear the Codex's contents. Outside of these weekly services, Makorynites may come to the temple for one-on-one time with a priest, referred to as cognizance, in which they admit their own sins of power, reveal the misuse of power by others in their lives and accept sacraments of labor, usually by helping to clean and feed prisoners of the temple. Those who are found guilty of great sins are encouraged to surrender themselves to holy solitude, in which they are imprisoned for a short time in the temple's dungeons as penance.
There are two great Makorynite festivals: the Prostrative Assembly and the Feast of Chastisement. The Prostrative Assembly is a three-day gathering in which those participating undertake to prove their abhorrence of the power in their lives: employers let their employees work unsupervised, parents relax their discipline, debtors forgive debts, and the high and mighty perform service for the lowly. The traditional opening to the Assembly involves the mostly highly positioned individual in the settlement making a bare-footed pilgrimage from their place of power, wearing sack cloth, to the altar of Makoryn and prostrating themselves before it. Not all nobles or lords agree to such a display, however; the rank of the one who actually performs the role of The Pilgrim is usually a mark of a given temple's influence with the local culture.
The Feast of Chastisement, on the other hand, is a week-long affair in which the faithful tend to their daily duties while wearing shackles. They spend the day light hours fasting and drinking only water, but as the sun sets, they converge on the temple for increasingly lavish fast-breaking feasts as the festival passes. The first day is simple bread and salt, but the meals become more and more impressive, until the faithful are nearly eating like kings. Those who manage to make it all the way through are welcomed to this spread with glad tidings. This feast speaks to the Makorynite doctrine that says great suffering and service in life will bring rewards to the faithful and freedom from Makoryn's afterlife.
Hierarchy
The patriarch of the Makorynite faith is called the Iron Hierophant, who is clad in dark black leather robes, with a great crown of jagged iron, inset with garnets. The Iron Hierophant always considers the Iron Gaol in Liminal's Hellsward to be his home temple, and an entire section of that mighty temple is set aside for his use alone. Despite this, he is rarely in residence, spending much of his time in the Talion Court of Makoryn.
Beneath the Iron Hierophant is the Iron Collegium, an elite order of potent high priests of Makoryn. The great burden of keeping the church as a body operating lies with the Iron Collegium. They are given "dominions" over which they are responsible, either geographic territories or conceptual areas of interest to the church.
Beneath the Iron Collegium are the individual high priests of temples, called the Atera. This title is derived from an old term that means "one who subjugates," and refers to the priest's duty to subjugate the desire for power out of his congregation. Beneath the Atera are the ordained priests of the church, and the lay clergy who are not ordained but act in service to the faith.
Orders
The Makorynite Orthodoxy maintains several orders within its structure. The largest of their knightly orders is the Brotherhood of the Scepter, known for their brutal fighting style with maces and their ability to invoke terrible pain in their foes.
The Almanni Inquisition
The Almanni Inquisition is a branch of the Almanni Theocracy, a single religious structure that incorporates worship of all the gods both Empyrean and Talion, fitting their respective priesthoods into administrative and functional roles within the Theocracy.
The Inquisition pursues heresy and investigates impious activities in the nation of Almanni. Their agents are empowered to demand that anyone in the nation answer their questions (though an individual's rank in society can require a higher-rank inquisitor to ask those questions). To say that an inquisitor is a feared figure in the nation of Almanni is a dramatic understatement - they arguably wield more power than any other priesthood in Almanni, save perhaps that priesthood of Aevo himself (and even that is only because the Lord Theocrat, who rules the Theocracy, is always a high priest of Aevo).
The Almanni Inquisition, as a Makorynite sect, has nothing to do with the Liminal Orthodoxy of the church. Indeed, inquisitors are persecuted as heretics by the church of Makoryn outside of Almanni, and non-inquisition Makorynites take their lives into their own hands by entering Almanni.
Theology
Like all of the sects of the Theocracy, the Inquisition believes that outside sects have defiled the original intent of the gods. Just as the gods work closely together in the fulfillment of their divine duties, so should their priesthoods. The outlander tradition of setting up multiple, often conflicting religious structures for each god is blasphemy - only the Theocracy's organizational mode for all the priesthoods to work together is proper and sacred.
Within the Theocracy, Makorynites focus less on the imprisonment aspects of their god's theology, and much more on his role as a tormentor and torturer. Inquisition Makorynites believe that the primordial Vabrosyn isn't just imprisoned in the Hellshards - he is actively being tortured for primordial secrets to be handed over to the gods. To this end, Makorynites understand their role is to seek out those with secrets and discover them.
Rituals & Observances
Like all the gods worshipped in the Theocracy, Makoryn is given a slew of feast days in which the Theocracy focuses lavish praise and worship on the Iron Lord's gifts to the world. Such rituals are attended but not performed by Makorynite priests. Like many priesthoods in the Theocracy, the churches of Makoryn have priests but no congregants, since technically no single god has congregants.
The priesthood of the Inquisition has extensive rites and rituals for its priests on a personal basis, including their most sacred Rite of Discernment (as they refer to torture sessions), rites of cleansing after the Rite of Discernment, and ascetic rituals intended to strengthen and empower the priests as they carry out their missions.
Hierarchy
The head of the Almanni Inquisition is one of the Lords Holy, eighteen high priests and priestesses who form a political body without equal in Almanni. The Lord Inquisitor is a feared figure, clad in black vestments and an iron mask bolted to his skull. Like the other Lords Holy, the Lord Inquisitor dwells in the deepest parts of the Ancient Tabernacle, the temple structure the size of a town in the center of the nation's capital, Almanni City.
Beneath the Lord Inquisitor are the order's Watchful Bishops, who act as organizational heads for the sect's Inquisitors. Their equal in the structure are the Black Abbots, ascetic masters who run the sequestered monasteries where Inquisitors are trained. The reason for this division is simple: men often come to admire those who train them. Thus, Inquisitors are trained in their skills by those who never see or influence the world outside their monasteries.
Finally, the individual priests of the sect are simply referred to as Inquisitors, though elders among them may be Father or Mother Inquisitors. This title, while intended as an honor, is something of a punishment - it is given only to those whose service as an Inquisitor is established and permanent. They are under no consideration for a role as either a Watchful Bishop or Black Abbot.
Orders
The Almanni Inquisition forbids the establishment of any ecclesiastic orders and considers the veneration of saints as heresy.
The Sudmunari Sect
A relatively minor sect of practice within the faith of Makoryn, the Sudmunari Sect is based out of Sudmunar, one of the Holandi Cit-States in the southern reaches of Rinhony. The tradition is only about sixty years old, making it one of the youngest of the Makorynite sects, but it is a vibrant and growing one. The Orthodoxy of Liminal has expressed concern over the Sudmunari theology, but has not yet spoken out against the growing sect.
Theology
The Sudmunari teach that only the faithful of Makoryn can truly discern tyranny. They spring from the Liminal Orthodoxy, so they do hold tyranny to be sinful. Rather than seeking it out and destroying it, as the Liminal Orthodoxy would have, the Sudmunari maintain that the surest method of destroying those who would wield undue power over others is to themselves seize up the reins of power and use them righteously. The Sudmunari preach a theology of acquisition and conquer, a philosophy the sect put into practice sixty years ago in the Holandi city-state of Sudmunar.
Rituals & Observances
The Sudmunari hold to most of the rituals of the Orthodox sect. Their Prostrative Assembly is a five-day long festival, however, and always begins with the High Watcher making a pilgrimage from a shrine outside the city where the first High Watcher first received her vision that led her to raise a holy crusade that led to the seizure of Sudmunar's throne by the Makorynite church.
In addition to the rites of the Orthodoxy, the Sudmunari also celebrate the Feast of the Liberation, recognizing the day the High Watcher's army achieved victory over the old line of Sudmunari kings.
Hierarchy
The head of the sect is called the High Watcher, and he currently serves as priest-king of the Sudmunar city-state. While he pays ritual and liturgical fealty to the Iron Hierophant in Liminal, everyone in the faith is aware that it is a technical obeisance at best.
The High Watcher maintains a small council called the Chained Ones, high priests of the faith who tend to various needs of the sect. At current, there are two Chained Ones, one in charge of running the Makorynite temples under the Sudmunari banner, and the other whose responsibility is visiting other Makorynite temples near Sudmunar and convincing them to turn to the sect's practices. Other than this, the Sudmunari hold to the Liminal Orthodoxy's rankings; indeed, technically the Chained Ones hold the rank of Atera in the Orthodoxy, and the High Watcher is part of the Iron Collegium.
Orders
The Sudmunari maintain a single knightly order associated with their sect, the Order of Iron and Bone, a gathering of knights and paladins sworn to defend the city of Sudmunar and the person of the High Watcher.
Other Sects
- The Iron Fist Heresy: Considered wicked and deviant by most mainstream sects of Makoryn's church, the Iron Fist Heresy teaches that the Iron Lord's example is to be followed: the seizure of power and exercise of dominating others is a true Makorynite's first responsibility. Heretics can be found in all of the main sects, and they believe that this heresy was originally the true teachings of Makoryn before the other churches banded together to destroy that true theology and its order of warlord-priests.
- The Order of Saint Ilithra: The Order is something of an outside faction, practically a sect in its own right and for good reason: they forbid adherence to the hierarchy or tenets of any single Makorynite sect, but teach that there is a vital truth to be found in all of them. They have a reputation as wandering scholars and are generally welcome in most places where Makoryn is worshipped, even in the monasteries of the Inquisition (although not in its temples or public places).
The Hellshards (Domain)
A loud, clanging realm of eternal noise and a thousand-thousand sharp iron edges, the Hellshards were crafted to eternally cut at the flesh of the primordial Vabrosyn, a great web of eternally-reshaping flesh and sinew. Those who abused their power over others, or threw over justice in favor of vengeance are banished here, to be painfully tormented and hunted by the iron devils of Makoryn.
Favored Servants
- Devils: A number of devils serve Makoryn, as any of the Talion gods. In particular, Makoryn favors vizier devils, occasionally sending them to advise the faithful and pain devils to administer his holy torments. His noted favored servants among devilkind, however, are the kytons, the so-called chain devils. The Hellshards are administered by a cohort of pit fiends called the "Masters of Clangor."
- Spiders: In the Hierophantine Codex, there is a vision in which one of the Iron Hierophants - ill with a prophecy-plague contracted during a visit to the Eternal Hells - describes seeing Makoryn's robes open. Within the vast expanses of his holiness, there beats a glistening, slithering, twisting heart-thing that is all that remains of Vabrosyn. It is bound up in jagged iron webs, spun by a thousand-thousand spiders that dwell in the darkness of Makoryn's being. Spiders and the patterns of their webs have often been the source of omens for Makorynite prophets, and the god himself has on more than one occasion sent great demon spiders to do his bidding.
Saints of the Makorynite Church
- Saint Ilithra Illuminator: An ancient scribe and scholar of the early Makorynite priesthood, Saint Ilithra taught that some of Makoryn's faithful must simply watch and discover information - the more closely guarded the better. He swore an oath of neutrality and was largely trusted by all facets of the early church, a trust that continues to be extended (however guardedly) to his sworn followers today.
- Saint Chobinn the Manacled: Also called Saint Chobinn the Merciful, Chobinn was a wandering ascetic of Makoryn driven by a single purpose: to see that the imprisoned were cared for. He embodies the "cruel mercy" of some Makorynite priests, who hold that those who ought be suffering must be shown compassion and healing, that their souls might be purified by the suffering they experience during life. In short, the longer they live, the more they suffer, and so a little compassion is holy and needful. He often broke into prisons and dungeons to feed and heal those within, but never freed them. He was captured and starved to death within the dungeons of a tyrant in what is now one of the portions of the Empire of the Nine.
- Usmanax the Sainted: Terrifying but wise, Usmanax is said to be a great spider of immense size that dwells in a cavern in the Ilandor Mountains. This cavern is a place of pilgrimage for some powerful servants of Makoryn, for Usmanax understands more about the nature of Makoryn than any mortal or devil in existence. Those who show themselves to be merciless, powerful and yet humble may find wisdom and power given to them by the great Sainted Spider. Those who fail to measure up in his eyes are eaten.
- Saint Dovis of the Mace: The patron saint of the Brotherhood of the Scepter, Saint Dovis was a powerful dwarven paladin and master of mace combat and guerilla tactics. According to the Hierophantine Codex, he died in the war against the Great Tyrant, the founder of the Iron Heresy, his death serving as warning against the power of that terrible warlord who would have come to rule all of Rinhony.
- Saint Erithania the Pilgrim, the First High Watcher: Only canonized within the Sudmunari sect, Erithania was a warrior-priestess of Makoryn who received a vision of how to properly destroy the tyrants of Sudmunar and prevent others from taking their place. She is revered as an oracle and a great general, who raised an army not by money or political power, but by the power of her words and the justice of her cause.
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