For: Heavens Aflame - A Civil War Amongst the Deities
Area: Advanced
Name: Metanoia
Titles: The Spectre of Sinners, Holder of Regret, The Present Past, Power of Guilt, Prince of Atonement, Lady of Loss, Child of Contrition, Keeper of Cliffs, among others
Gender: Has a default "male" form, but will take on whatever traits are needed to cause guilt.
Patronage:
Guilt,
Past, Memory, Atonement, Revenge, Punishment, Conscience, Pain, Anguish, Humility, Justice, Judgment, Knowledge of the Past.
Parentage: The spilled blood of a fallen army from long ago.
Pantheon/Affiliation: Technically, Deity. In reality, he's one of those weird constants that stays no matter what pantheon is in control. Even so, he gave a statement declaring that Aroesus had his obedience for the duration of his reign, just as he had done for the previous god-princes.
Appearance: Metanoia has nothing in the way of a true appearance, as he is a living emotion/idea. Instead, Metanoia has a method in his usual appearance: He takes the form of the greatest victim of the worst error that someone nearby has committed. Example: Two people are standing in a room when Metanoia appears to them. One has stolen, and the other has raped. Metanoia would then take the form of the rape victim for both people to see. If a person has equally heinous but different sins on the conscience, then Metanoia takes on either the appearance of the most recent victim, or that of a still-living victim. If Metanoia doesn't want to appear but still be present, then he is nothing more than a voice in the wind and a presence in the mind of whoever he wishes to speak with. If he wants to appear without explicitly bringing up someone's crimes, he will take on the appearance of the
general who began his birth. It is very rare to see Metanoia in his "default" form, and even rarer for him to remove the mask on his face when he does so, as it means he either finds no fault in the being(s) he will appear to, or simply trusts them enough to do the right thing even when they fall.
Centres of Worship/Places of Power:
There have been cities built over or near the battlefield where Metanoia was born, and each was proclaimed as Metanoia's holy city while the city was still, though Metanoia himself doesn't particularly care too much about that. However, he doesn't mind when people build temples to him, as long as they're more functional than formal.
Metanoia also has the strange habit of appearing at natural formations where people commit suicide, discouraging them from self-slaughter. Since this is usually cliffs or other high places where people drop themselves from, some temples of Metanoia are located near such places so that his clergy can do his work for him.
Servants, Prominent Followers and Worship Base:
Soldiers, lovers, leaders, doctors, and parents, in particular. Metanoia will lend an ear and a voice to anyone with regrets. Metanoia has no prominent followers, but his existence is common knowledge in both mortal and divine realms, though Metanoia is a little ostracized by way of his uncomfortable nature. Not many people want a god that makes them feel guilty, after all. However, Metanoia does have The Wanderers, an age-old organization that serves as his clergy throughout the world. Its members are doctors, teachers, priests, leaders, and warriors across the continent, using their skills to stop and prevent evil and misery wherever they go.
Psychology: Metanoia is an anomaly among the gods. He acts as a quiet and reasoning (though frank and sarcastic at times) voice in a pantheon full of loud and selfish deities, and mostly throws himself into mortal affairs while the members of the pantheon fret above. He has a genuine love for those who sincerely wish to atone for their wrongdoings, and he is more merciful than most when confronted with stubborn mortals in that he simply expresses disappointment and pity before leaving them to walk their path alone until they call on him. He is frank and stern with mortals who have fallen in their ways, but he is rewarding and blessing to those who walk the slow and difficult path to redemption. But when confronted with mortals or deities who are more than stubborn, who have proved themselves irredeemable, Metanoia unleashes his pent-up wrath at the flawed natures of god and man. He torments them with visions and nightmares of their crimes, eventually driving them to either insanity or death, "whichever comes last" in his own words. With deities, he does this to turn them from their old ways when they see what anguish it brings on them.
Concerning other gods, Metanoia goes out of his way to greet new gods and speak politely. Metanoia does keep his distance from more cruel and base gods, and will express his opinions on them frankly if he is asked about them. He disinterestedly swears loyalty to whoever is ruling the gods in the latest age, though Metanoia will at least not betray them.
Metanoia often prefers the company of infants, children, and animals, as they are guiltless compared to the rest of the living beings in existence. They provide him a small measure of comfort in the world, and he is always angered when they are harmed by anyone's actions. He has even dared to condemn god-princes for harming children. Aroesus was close to inciting Metanoia's wrath, but he was killed before that could happen.
History: In the truly ancient days, maybe before there were even pantheons, there was a kingdom whose name has since been lost to history. Plagued by sandstorms, the capital city and its rulers were lost. In their absence, the military commander did what he could to maintain order with his army while defending the kingdom. But unrest soon erupted, and a civil war occurred between insurgent deserters and those loyal to the general. To keep his place as the authority of the kingdom, the general committed terrible atrocities to men, women, and children alike. The guilt of these actions weighed him down constantly, but he was able to sleep at night with the self-assurance that his kingdom would rise again, and a new age of prosperity would wipe away his terrible deeds.
But he was wrong. The kingdom was unable to recover from its loss, its people crippled by war, disease, and famine. So when a rival kingdom appeared two years later to invade, its military outnumbering and outsmarting the general's own army, he realized that all of his horrible work had come for naught. On the eve of battle with the remains of his once glorious army, at the first sign of sunrise and the enemy's march, the general cut open his stomach for his failure to preserve the kingdom. His army, leaderless and unprepared, was utterly annihilated. The kingdom was conquered, and the sands retreated from the capital city as its invaders entered the gates.
On that same day, Metanoia appeared at the door of the capital's royal palace, covered in the blood of the kingdom's dead warriors to the extent that it flowed down the stairs like water. Condemning the invaders for what they had done, Metanoia disappeared and began his work of redeeming the world, one guilty man at a time. He would work quietly and subtly, with some pantheons and ages not even discovering his existence before they passed away. With the previous pantheon and the current one, Metanoia decided once again to show his face at the coronation of the kings of those pantheons, before promptly heading back to the mortal realm where he felt he belonged. Every now and then, Aroesus summoned him to be used as a chess piece in his divine political games. Metanoia would appear before a god or mortal that Aroesus suspected of doing him harm, and if Metanoia took on the god-king's visage, then the condemnation would begin.
Currently, Metanoia is quiet about the assassination of Aroesus. If he knows who killed Aroesus and Lyrikes, since he knows every action that occurred in the past up until his birth, he is not talking about it. The truth is, Metanoia actually doesn't really know who did it, as something is blocking his view of this event. Naturally, this irks him greatly, and he has become determined to discover the truth. Metanoia has been known for being a quiet wild card in pantheon intrigue, and this upheaval in Hevas could make him trouble for anyone in the conspiracy who realizes exactly what they're doing to him. His only actions concerning the assassination thus far have been attending Aroesus and Lyrikes' funerals and attending to Mysia's needs for a full week afterwards as his condolences, as he understands the pain she is going through.
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