Like all things in Arth, there are sixes everywhere. Thus all spirits are categorized in the six tiers, dieties being the most powerful spirits and plants/ animals being the least.
Ge-Em moved from a transental entity to one of the first tier when it created all the other dieties.
First Tier
Spirits of the first tier are more transadental than other things. They do not have primary and sece' forms. They just are, and we beings of a lower level are lucky to be able to know they exist.
These dieties have associated sub-dieties. They are the third Tier. Since Ge-Em started as a superior diety, his subdiety (Luminance/ Spirit) manifests itself as the two elemental subforms of Luminance/ Spirit- Light and Darkness.
Ge-Em
* Omin form: Anything required. Assumed male, but could be female.
* Associations: None and All.
* Element: Space
* Color: Any single true (rainbow) color
* Symbol: A Star of Solomon, sometimes incribed in a circle.
* Profession Prime: Creative, Beginings.
* Profession Sece": Destructive, Endings.
* Cards: The Deck Itself.
Mother Arth aka Arth-A aka Mother Nature
* Omin form: Any female of any race, depends on local worshipers.
* Associations: Passive, but creatively active
* Element: Flora and Fauna
* Color: Bright Colors. Many use colors found predominantly in nature, Green, Brown, Blue.
* Symbol: A simple circle
* Profession Prime: Birthing /Fertility
* Profession Sece": The living of life with "the way of life".
* Cards: The Court Cards
Yi-Ang
* Omin form: A balanced male and female form. Depicted in one of three ways 1) Right half male, Left half female, 2) Two humanoids (male and female) joined as if they are holding hands, 3) As a womanly beautiful man (used least because it confuses people). The female aspects are red or have red on them, while the male aspects are blue or have blue on them.
* Associations: Chance and Balance.
* Element: The Dance: The way things interact.
* Color: Red and Blue in equal measures
* Symbol: Circle with an equal division (straight line or wave sign), one part red the other blue.
* Profession Prime: Gambler, Risk taker
* Profession Sece': Measurer/ Diviner
* Cards: Trumps
Tier 2
Light
* Associations: Passive, Positive, Submissive, LAW
* Prime form: Goddess: Law/Order-Stagnant. Things to stay the way they are right now. Appears as an inhumanly beautiful female bathed in light, with crystal staff and sparkly clothing/ items.
* Sece' form: God: Law/Order-Dynamic. Things to become stable and stop chaos. Appears as a beautiful male with wings.
* Element: Luminance/ Spirit- Light, links between things.
* Color: White and Lighter Greys, colors one shade off white.
* Symbol: Equilateral Triangle pointed right
* Profession Prime: Acolyte: Faithful. Desire for faith/ spirit
* Profession Sece': Archpriest: Control. Desire for dominance.
* Cards: Triangle/Temple, Priestess
Darkness
* Associations: Active, Negative, Dominant, CHAOS
* Prime form: God: Chaos Dynamic. Desire for changes to happen. Appearance: A dark haired, dark eyed man with a staff of ebony. Often in robes, but dressed for the situation.
* Sece' form: Goddess: Chaos Stagnant - Changes to occur only along current lines. Things to change as they are changing right now. Appearance: Dark Haired female in a long simple black dress.
* Element: Luminance- Darkness, magic and deception/illusion
* Color: Black and Darker Greys. Colors one shade off black.
* Symbol: Equilateral Triangle pointed left
* Profession Prime: Mage- worker of magic. Agent of change.
* Profession Sece': Thief and Actor, workers of mind/illusion.
* Cards: Staves/ Wands, Mage
Earth
* Associations: Passive, Negative, Dominant, LAW
* Prime form: God: Doer/ Leader. Does what needs to be done. Often seen as a king/ prince, but more correctly as a powerful man dressed as a guild leader or craftsman.
* Sece' form: Goddess: Protectress: Aids/ Helps/ Defends those in need. A female warrior of large stature or a sturdy healer in green.
* Element: Metal and Rock, Craft shops
* Color: Brown/ Greys/ Metallics
* Symbol: Equilateral triangle point down with a horizontal slash halfway through.
* Profession Prime: Merchantile/ Transactionsmiths
* Profession Sece': Crafter- Excellence in their craft
* Cards: Shield/ Jewel, King
Air
* Associations: Active, Negative, Submissive, CHAOS
* Prime form: Goddess: Thinker, Maker of Knowledge- Gain Wisdom. Apperance: A handsome, older woman, dressed well.
* Sece' form: God: Inventor/ Teacher- User of knowledge and wisdom. Appearance: Older, handsome male, dressed in what was once very nice, but is now threadworn.
* Element: Wind/ Cloud/ Weather Libraries/ Schools
* Color: Blue, White, Silver
* Symbol: : Equilateral triangle point up with a horizontal slash halfway through.
* Profession Prime: Teacher - Vessel of knowledge
* Profession Sece': Writer/ Scribe - Recoder of knowledge
* Cards: Disks/ Wheels, Queen
Fire
* Associations: Active, Positive, Dominant, CHAOS
* Prime form: God: Leaders- Foresight and charisma. Promotes growth. A red haired young man, handsome, usually in military garb, but any clothing will do.
* Sece' form: Goddess: Destroyers- Those who lead people down the wrong path. Promotes destruction, which allows for future growth. Appearance: A female with firey hair and too many weapons.
* Element: Fire/ Lightning/ Smoke The Wilds
* Color: Red and yellow, smacks of green
* Symbol: Equilateral triangle point up.
* Profession Prime: Travellers and Wardens (those that live in the wilds)
* Profession Sece': Farmers, Trappers, Loggers (those that use the wilds)
* Cards: Trees/ Swords, Knight
Water
* Associations: Passive, Positive, Submissive, LAW
* Prime form: Goddess: Feeling, Caring, Mental balance, Love (All positive or controlled emotions). Appearance: A beatiful maid with very long hair that "puddles" at her feet.
* Sece' form: God: Lover. Passions, Drives, and all emotions imbalanced, out of control, and all negative emotions.
* Element: Water, Oceans, Sailing, Healing
* Color: Blue Greens (tiny smacks of pink/red)
* Symbol: Equilateral triangle point down.
* Profession Prime: Art, Artists, Producers of Beauty
* Profession Sece': Courtisan, people who help people, healers, skills and edication to do so.
* Cards: Heart, Rainbow, Princess
Tier 3
Chro-No
* Prime form: God: Watcher/ Keeper of time and the flow of things. Apperance: Old Man
* Sece' form: Goddess: maker of time, definer of the flow of things: Appearance: A young girl with star field eyes.
* Associations: Yi-Ang, Balance
* Element: Time
* Color: Grey, Grey with sparkles
* Symbol: HourGlass
* Profession Prime: Historians
* Profession Sece': Historical Figures
* Cards: Pile of cards to draw
He is the keeper of time. The maker of destiny. One of the weavers of Ge-Em's master pattern.
Deth as to keep it seperate from Death
* Prime form: God. Simple robed figures or fairly normal looking person.
* Sece' form: Goddess? Exotic looking, playing upon the fears those have of death
* Associations: Life, Balance, Ge-Em
* Element: Spirit
* Color: Black and Gold/ Irridescence
* Symbol: Circle half black and half white.
* Profession Prime:
* Profession Sece':
* Cards: Discard pile
The collector of used/ lost/ disembodied spirits for his mother to use. He is the collector/ recycler of destroyed and used things. He holds on to them while Ge-Em gets ready to use them.
Luminance aka Balance of Spirit
* omin form: A pool of light in the darkness
* Sece' form: Two different Gods
* Element: Spirit
* Color: White/ Yellow surrounded by darkness
* Symbol: Circle of white/yellow surrounded by darkness. A star.
* Profession Prime: Goddess of Light
* Profession Sece': God of Darkness
* Cards: #6 of all suits in the deck
This Diety is actually two dieties at once. The cosmology gets fuzzy at this point, so most people just accept Luminance, balance of Spirit as a theoretical construct, rather than an actual diety.
Tier 4
The Master
These are spirits charged with "administrating" a specific archetype. They are spirits of each primary things. They are sort of the patron saints of given places or things. Of these spirits their is a heirarchy of sorts, as masters of well defined archetypes report to masters of broader archetypes. So the master of Wolves and the master of Dogs report to the masters of Canines, who reports to the master of animals. Sometimes they will report to the master of the biome they are in.
Masters are of races, object classes, places, events, customs (manners, traditions, holidays), and times.
Masters control the flow of power to something they administer. So if you want knowledge about something, the master can flow it into you. If you want your swords to strike home, the master will flow it power to make it so. And so on.
In short, Gods get all the glory, Masters do all the work (at the directions of the higher entities).
How they are used is that you pray to the appropriate first to third tier diety, and include the master. Oh God of Chance, and master of horses and master of races, help my horse with this race.
Some important masters
These are sort of worshiped on their own.
Danu Master of Masques: There is a whole dominant religion based around this master in Maskland. Masques, is the controlling abstract for the physical noun masks. In the MaskLander's home tongue, mask/ masque has many additional meanings... the most important of which is the appearance of all things which is different than their core. Danu is a deceiver (hiding truths), a revealer (exposing truths), teacher (leading those to truth), and the core of which the natural universe is merely a mask. In short Danu, is associated with GM. Most people in the known world do not understand how these crazy people can ignore "The Gods" and just deal with a simple master of masks.
Master of Magik: This is the right hand being of The God of Darkness. This is the master of magik spells and the magik of life. Power use in all its forms are his providence. Those that practice power use (magic users, priests) all have a special place in their hearts and spells for this master.
Master of Sailors and Mistress of Sea: Folklore has them married. She is fickle, honest, fair, but when angered beware. He is strong, steady, handsome, but prone to party a bit too hard. The interplay of sea and sailor is played out in a variety of folk tales surrounding these dieties.
Mistress of Cold: Cold is the called by some the seventh element. This master is quite a powerful one. This master actually has a prime (Frost/ Ice - cold and beautiful Goddess) and sece' (Snow- happy and fat god). There are a variety of folk stories about her, fire, and water. Some have her as his mistress. Some have her as their daughter. Some have her as the actual tier two diety, with fire being her sece' form.
Master of weather: One of the most commonly called upon masters. This master is in charge of all the others (wind, rain, snow, lightning, sun, heat, humidity, etc). He is the one who coordinates the weather between Air and Water.
Masters of Years, Months, Days, Hours:
There is a series of thrones overseeing a party of many masters. Each Master of a year, sits for their year overseeing the party. Each master of Months, likewise. The six masters of days, trade between themselves, a throne. The masters of hours likewise. The masters of specific months, days, hours, act as servants at the party for their time.
There are many folk tales and parables built around these dieties, from tier 1 on down. Most did not actually happen, but they are alegorical.
Tier 5
These are the spirits of sentient things. That is all peoples, deamons, and elder races.
Tier 6
These are the spirits of all subsentient things, animals and plants. Strangely enough, these spirits are more powerful than one would expect because they are not burdened with thought. They are part of the Way.
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Key: (Note magic is built upon these same assumptions)
Active/ Air, Fire, Darkness
These promote change or motion in a system
Passive/ "Law" Earth, Water, Light
These promote stability and resistance to change.
Positive/ Fire, Water, Light.
Things are for the better, growth/ development
Negative/ Air, Earth, Darkness
Things are for the worse, or removed/ redeveloped
Dominant/ Earth, Fire, Darkness
In charge or controls situation
Submissive/ Air, Water, Light
reliquishes control of situation.