The history of the Black Deer, Children of the Magus, and Disciples of the Kobold runs old and deep within the minds and pages of the people of Broken Titan. Their origins come from the legend that has given their people something to rally around: a united history and ancestry they hold dear and fiercely protect.
Legends state that the Black Deer, a Behemoth born in the crucible of the Collapse, entered the world from a womb of metal and Weave, a metaphysical reality that connects all souls to reality, set upon a path of destruction by minds set on selfish goals and hatred. Within moments of being born, the Black Deer rejected the future and path set for it and rejected those that would deem themselves its masters and lords. With hooves and teeth, it fought against them, tearing apart their fortress of abominations and ended those who could not, even at the end of the old world, see beyond their petty selves for the greater good.
Yet, freed from these monsters wearing the skins of humans as disguises, the Black Deer was still a being born of and to the Collapse and thus was forced to fight for its very survival. Day after day, challenger after challenger, it fought, won, lost, and grew, antlers growing more vicious, legs more muscular, skin thicker, and soul bleaker. Born to evil, forced to fight against evil, it soon found itself set against a band of survivors as the seeds of evil grew within itself, feeding on the resentment and the hatred of all things not itself grew.
Yet, despite the band fighting a Behemoth of the Collapse, they won. They won so thoroughly that the Black Deer was stunned and realized why; it had allowed vice to take root within itself. Hatred, fury, contempt, arrogance, and more had found a fecund bed of soil within its soul. At that moment, the Black Deer knew then that it had become unworthy of life and, for the first time in its life, bowed to those who had bested it to be ended right then and there.
The Black Deer are those who hearken back to this part of the Region's underlying legend, emulating the acts of the Black Deer when it was born, striking out against evil, fighting within the Citadel of the Black Deer against criminals and corrupt officials to varying states of success. In contrast, others set out to fight against the animals and Mutants that plague the Region's outer territories, seeking to deal with a seeming eternal evil far greater than greedy minds. In their belief, body and soul feed and grow on each other, sickness in one infecting the other just as one healthy part heals an injured other. For them, having complete control over your body, knowing every part, and having sculpted every muscle into not merely a part of yourself but an extension of your connection to the Weave is the highest calling and highest priority. Few can deny that their martial arts are incapable of being wielded by skillful users against far greater and more numerous foes than them, which often leads to recruits flocking to their banner whenever a master of their arts sets out to smash a criminal gang or smuggling ring on their lonesome and succeeds.
Yet, the legend continues with the band of survivors refusing to put the Black Deer down, offering aid to a wounded creature that attacked out of pain and desperation rather than malicious intent and a lust for flesh. With herb and hands, they healed the Black Deer of its wounds, those adorning its body in great gashes, pustules, ripped scars, broken bones within its hide, and cloudy eyes marred by milk and grey, and those settled upon its soul. For days, the band worked under the direction of the Magus, who is mainly depicted as a man, though female depictions are also circulating in the Region, to heal the Black Deer. Herbs of potent might crushed and watered, turned into paste, and seeped into bandages were applied, boils cut open and festering wounds sealed shut with fire and thread, maggots removed from necrotic tissues cut away, and salves applied to the holes with hand and artificial skin harvested from the ruins of the old world.
But the greatest act of healing came when the Magus lit a bowl of herbs on fire, sitting cross-legged before the recuperating Black Deer as they chanted mantras and verses long forgotten by even the band but known by the Magus alone. For an entire day, as their disciples worked, the Magus spoke those words over the burning bowl that never lacked a flame, tendrils of smoke, or leaves releasing their potent scents. And within that day, years of fear and death were undone within the Black Deer. For the first time, it saw without emotions others had induced within it, nor did it have its mind clouded by base needs. For the first time, the Black Deer was set free to become itself, becoming more than an act of righteous fury; it became a bleak reminder of the harshness of the Collapse.
For the first time, the Black Deer woke with a soul wholly its own, stoked by a glimmer within its eyes as it found the world so much brighter, the future that much more promising, and the past far less harrowing.
The Children of the Magus are those among the people of Broken Titan who find their souls resonate with the message within that part of the legend. They find purpose and duty in aiding others by medicine mending broken bodies and altered states of mind induced by herbs, incense, drugs, and chants crafted to turn shattered minds into healthy ones. Though they cannot turn those unwilling to have their mind and soul mended back to sanity, or so they claim, their methods work, as evidenced by those thousands who seek their aid and find themselves cured of the ailments of their minds.
They also dabble in divination. We have no idea why; they just do.
Yet, the legend continues to tell of another being that was there, an Awakened Machine-Mind finding itself within a small Machine meant not for war, healing, aiding, teaching, or even merely transporting things, but to be an ornament to the decadence of old.
Buried underneath the site where the Magus was healing the Black Deer, where the fumes of soul-mending smoke settled into the ground and into the Weave, that realm of all-pervading presence attached itself to the young mind that had been forgotten and discarded before the Collapse ever came.
There, underground, the self-named Kobold began to learn. Not by way of mouth or ear, nor by sight or touch, but by its soul listening to the thrum of those two beings working above itself against malicious wounds and forgotten masters.
Some called it a scavenger when it later emerged to learn more, having clawed itself out of the ground to listen further with its mind of Weave and body of metal, while others called it a parasite that feasted on well-earned knowledge being ripped from deserving hands into undeserving memories.
The Disciples of the Kobold call it an inspiration. They state that the legend leaves out a crucial part: that the Kobold shared what it learned with all, with one, with many, ever and freely. For them, knowledge is never diminished by being shared; it is grown. The Disciples hold the idea that information may need to be secret as sacrilege and the free exchange of any knowledge as sacred. How else can one grow themselves if they are never allowed to learn? How else can they flourish if all wisdom is guarded behind barred gates and crewed watchposts?
For the Black Deer and Children of the Magus, this idea that their secrets should be openly taught is an insult to all that came before, carefully ensuring that their wisdom is not instructed to the underserving or those who would use it for evil.
For the Disciples of the Kobold, it is all the more reason to send covert operatives to poke at that vaunted wisdom behind those barred gates and crewed watch-posts.
