My Grandmother used to tell me the story of the First Transgression. She said that in the beginning there had always been Leviathans roaming this earth. These great beasts beyond our own comprehension and understanding that wander the earth as we do. It was how the balance of power worked we were always destined to live in the shadow of fear and through that come to understand ourselves. These beasts taught us the values of life and not to fall to hubris as if we ever built our cities too large or ripped apart the land too quickly, a Leviathan would surely come drawn by the noise and the moaning of the land and destroy the city of man with a terrible fury. But as time progressed and the age of stone moved to Steel our ambitions grew and with them our desire for power.

We saw what even the presence of the Leviathans long gone did. The taint which infected our brethren's blood changing and morphing them from children of men into beasts. We observed how even the smallest drop of blood from such a beast consumed by a mortal men could increase their own strength and abilities in the old ways of the arcane. We wanted that power for ourselves, we wanted to harness the power of the Leviathans and use it for our own gains. For they were merely beasts and we were man. Did our brains, morals and thinking not give us dominion over them? So an intrepid army set out to capture one such Leviathan and usher out the age of coexistence and bring forth the age of man. Those poor fools. had no idea what horrors they would bring forth upon the world.

For thousands of years Man and beast had lived in an ebb and flow with one another. Each balancing the other out and keeping the cycle from collapsing. This blatant attack marked the end of this peaceful coexistence. Man had made the first strike but thee Leviathans would retaliate. This attack is what we know call the First Transgression. An action filled by the same hubris and greed that fuel our leaders of today still trying to end a war that their ancestors started many moons ago. A war of man and beast. The Great War.

The countries of man bounded together in solidarity with their mixture of arts most arcane and technology in an attempt to hold of the hoards of their opponents both the Leviathans and the infected long tired of the segregation and oppression brought down upon them by their pure blooded brethren. The Great War began in earnest and the skies became aligt with a brilliant fire, the sea roared and turned red with blood as the earth was shattered by giant feet and arcane magiks. At first humanity almost fell and was pushed back far to their last strongholds in the North, caught off guard by the ferocity of their otherworldly attackers. But they regrouped and pushed the beasts back across the sea and retook some of their lost land. Even since this last push the two sides have been caught in a stalemate. Neither side is able to take much substantial ground as cities are sacked they are soon lost within months and retaken by the opposing side. It’s become an endless meatgrinder as the world slowly quakes and trembles in its death throes as the humans build bigger arcane weapons and the Leviathans strike back.

But there are rumors out in the wastes. Rumors of humans and infected capable of forming blood links with these Leviathans like the Shamans of Old. Pathological bonds of shared consciousness with one of the beasts. A forced unity between beast and man that could bring peace to the world or bring it crashing down to its feet. But as these blood links grow and these individuals lose their innate humanity will peace be what they seek?

Old Gods is a story that comes from many places and has congealed into something strangely alien. It's a story about an Earth and humanity plunging headfirst into the turbulent 20th century not so different than our own. Sure maybe it is a little bit more magical than ours but with familiar echos. Replace Leviathans with Imperialistic ambitions, nuclear weapons or the like, the Infected with the many non-european races of the world and their Great War with our own Great War. Either way it's always a story of ideology and power two ideas that are always closely interlinked with one another. Ideas of freedom, progress and the path of mankind in an uncertain future. A future decide by blood and death. And if that is the case then those bonded in blood are a fusion of ideas, a eldritch form of globalization, a merging of man and monster. How two sides of the coin can be similar but alien in so many ways from one another.

More importantly though then that Old Gods is in many ways a tale about monsters. You see I've always been one to humor that monsters can come in many forms: you have the pedophile down the street, the murderer in the upstairs apartment, the Adolf Hitlers, Stalins, but you always have other monsters less tangible ones. The kind that people deal with everyday and are classified as sane in their ability to subside the urges that come from these monsters to let us severely maim somebody for being a righteous prick or something. Then of course their are your classic hollywood monsters your Draculas, Frankenstein's Monsters, werewolves, and zombies. They are reflection of humanity that we distort and make horrific to help represent some of our more baser instinct. But you always have your monsters beyond the edge of human understanding things that make you look behind yourself when you're by yourself, the dark unsettling kind of monsters that keep you up at night. These monsters are so large and cosmic to us little humans that all we can do in response is hope they don't see us and our blue little marble. Old Gods is primarily about these last kind of monsters but also about all the other kinds as well and well the idea of monsters. What are monsters in the first place?

Upon this war torn Earth where the seas have turned red and great beasts lurked beneath the waves, were great clouds of grey seem to perpetually hang in the sky and where once great cities lay now desolate in ruin abandoned by time. Upon this world we will use it as a focusing lense to try and answer that question of what are monsters. Through some peoples "special" if not wanted relationship with some of them. A lense which has many different focus to get this point of monsters across some singular villains or opponents, others whole events and others larger nebulous concepts such as slavery, racism, biological weapons and war crimes which in their own right can create some very special monsters.

But it's also a RP where player interaction and involvement is very much valued. I've seen up a bare baseline for the world and a generally idea and feel that I want to go with. A sort of apocalyptic fantasy roaring 20s deal and have done a significant if not small amount of worldbuilding that will be displayed more thoroughly in the RP. But most of the world is a mystery, this Earth is not our own and whose to say the cities are to be the same either. Even so after decades of endless war many of those old world settlements have been destroyed and left in ruin only for new cities to rise in their wake. The stories of the people and the world they inhabit and the histories, and cultures they bring with them that's for us to work out together. To make a breathing world that every player has had a role in shaping the mold in some little way.

And it's also a RP that's not all introspective navel gazing a lot of it will be action heavy. You don't get to have a telepathic blood bond with a cthulu like abomination and not get to use your deadly eldritch powers to kick some ass. The road to truth it's not one easily walked and is filled with combat and troubles along the way that you must overcome. But that's the real point of Old Gods isn't it? Learning to overcome be it adversity or your own inner monsters. Well that is all I'm going to say for now really before running risk of over-saturating the Interest Check with information. If I have caught your intrest pop a squat and say hello. If I haven't? Well you can't win them all can you?