As someone who's experience with Exalted begins and ends with reading the wiki, what exactly is an Anathema and how is it being translated into this fusion with RWBY?
@NemoMarx and @Leliel have it mostly right for pure Exalted. An important part is that Solars and Lunars are the greatest of them, but it's an all purpose word for supernatural thing which destabilizes our society by the guys currently in charge.
For this story it is a bit different due to the differences in society, but the demons who will destroy the world if they aren't stopped part is there. Unfortunately for them, Hunters have a much harder time figuring out who to stab and also need to care a lot about how they're perceived by all of the bystanders.
Why are they treated like this? Something for later chapters to reveal in full.
But, one of the important reasons is that Solars and Lunars are very, very high variance regarding societal stability. This is even true if they're well intentioned, which is not guaranteed. They also rapidly approach a level of power where their actions will overwhelm the actions of almost anyone else.
The kingdoms of Remnant stand in an unstable equilibrium where a sufficiently large shock will cause everything to come crashing down. They're out numbered by the Grimm and the end of season three shows just how precarious the balance is.
The kingdoms of Remnant stand in an unstable equilibrium where a sufficiently large shock will cause everything to come crashing down. They're out numbered by the Grimm and the end of season three shows just how precarious the balance is.
Which itself is an interesting parallel to canon!Exalted. Creation's about to teeter into explosions itself by the time the Solars come back. A sufficiently large shock (for canon or this verse) could be the only thing that saves anything at all, given how things are going.
In the end, all exalted are people with tremendous cosmic power and the will to use that power for their own goals. I think you can guess why a tendency to take the world by its throat and shake it until you get what you want, combined with the power needed to succeed in taking the world by its throat and do said shaking, could be considered a bad thing by the powers that be in any setting, much less one that's in such a 'we are all going to die, are we not?' type position.
And that's before getting into the great curse, which while it isn't as blatant and quite as I remember it being described earlier in this thread, but is not anything like good news either...
Lunars in general are so absolutely suited for Remnant that it's kind of perfect. They were already border guardians, and after the solars fell they were pushed out into wastelands full of reality warping monsters that couldn't ever really be put down for good.
Also hey, if you have a tell that just means you're a Faunus! No need to worry about hiding it too much.
To expand a bit, the Sidereals and Dragonblooded had a very... I wouldn't call it good, cause they had the same issue in a different way, but definitely justified reason. The Solars and Lunars were going insane.
A bit of backstory to get there. The Lethe was a system created to allow souls to reincarnate. During the Great War some Yozi were killed flat out essentially, only each Yozi is an entire Pantheon unto themselves. It kind of gunked up the entire thing and they got stuck. They also hate all living things, but especially the Exalts.
So even when they were essentially lobotomized, they were still able to find a hole in the Exalt Shards defenses and inflict the Great Curse. They get all of their Willpower restored for the low, low price of going completely fucking nuts for a little while. Only its heavily, heavily implied (if not out right stated) that they were also driven towards that same type of insanity in the long term as well. Losing touch with their humanity to a degree, probably due to age, and turning into Sociopaths wasn't uncommon either. And these people were God-Kings of a lot of fucking people.
I can't remember the exact issues the Lunars had though.
So yeah. Of course Sidereals were cursed in their own way, they destroyed a Constellation, and they're insanity is that the more of them there are planning something, the worse the fallout is and the harder it is to convince them to change their minds. On the other hand, whatever they're planning turns out really fucking well planned.
So if Anathema are known, technically Ruby should be extra good, since Sidereals are opposed to them, right? Not that anyone would realize that, but still.
Someone earlier in the thread suggested that Remnant might actually be a piece of Creation that got cut off from the greater whole during one of the greater calamities that happened after the First Age... or maybe even something set-up by one of the Yozi on the side or something. They might not even have had any Sidereals before now.
Lunars in general are so absolutely suited for Remnant that it's kind of perfect. They were already border guardians, and after the solars fell they were pushed out into wastelands full of reality warping monsters that couldn't ever really be put down for good.
Also hey, if you have a tell that just means you're a Faunus! No need to worry about hiding it too much.
As someone who's experience with Exalted begins and ends with reading the wiki, what exactly is an Anathema and how is it being translated into this fusion with RWBY?
People have commented already, but i figured id give a deeper version;
Exalted Primer!
in Exalted, human souls have two parts; the Hun and Po, the high and low soul, the high soul is the seat of intelligence and identity, while the low soul is all that animal stuff that goes on in our head; hungers, vices, instincts. The process of Exaltation (for the main types) basically attaches a third piece (the exaltation its self) thats kinda like a ridiculously powerful reactor that floods the person with unimaginable power. The specifics vary however depending on the type of exalt (Solar, Lunar, Sidereal, Terrestrial (Dragonblooded), Abyssal, Infernal, Alchemical, Liminal, Getimian and Exigent).
Long ass time ago, the world of Creation was made by the Primordials (a topic that its self is worth a whole fucking essay, but suffice to say they were lovecraftian superbeings more like a planet than a person). Naturally once it was complete, they didnt want to do work... they wanted to play! So they made Gods (in the shinto kami sense) who manage everything from the growth of a individual blade of grass to the cycles of the seasons. These gods were in turn, powered and maintained by mortal prayer.
Of course, the Primordials were huge dicks, and constantly fucking up Creation in the course of their games, which pissed off the Gods whos job it was to keep everything working, not to mention trying to protect their mortal worshippers, but the gods themselves couldnt do anything about it because they were designed to be unable to fight their masters for obvious reasons. What the Primordials didnt bother to do however, was imprint that directive on mortals... because we were so small and insignificant in their eyes that the notion that we could be a threat was downright bananas as far as they were concerned. So the Gods got together with the Primordial Autochthon, who was basically the architect behind Creation and also the whipping boy for the rest of the Primordials. He crafted the exaltations, and gave them to the most powerful of the gods (namely The Unconquered Sun, Luna and the Five Maidens) who in turn imbued them with their essence, and Gaia, the Primordial who was also basically Creation and big on life, who got more organic about it. They then released the exaltations to seek out hosts with particular traits and create a army capable of fighting and killing the Primordials.
And they did! They killed some (and boy, did that turn out to be a bad idea) enslaved others to continue existing as near mindless cogs in Creation its self, and mutilated the losers into their own prison-dimension (ineffect, they turned the king of the primordials into Hell, and stuffed the others inside)
But, you know that whole 'soldiers in peacetime' problem? So did the creators of the Exalted, and each type (and each caste within it) had roles to play once Creation was theirs. The Gods retired to Heaven, taking over the Primordial's Games, and left Creation for the Exalted to rule. The Solars became godkings who basically single-handedly turned Creation into a utopia, using their powerful abilities, technology and magic to impose their will on everything around them, guided by their heroic ideals. The Lunar's clove to the Solars, for each solar has a lunar bondmate, and became their generals and boon companions (and often lovers), with a eye to protecting all that the Solars had built, as well as Creation its self. The Sidereals took their place in Heaven's Bureau of Destiny, where they worked to maintain the Loom Of Fate and advise the Solars on which paths would prove most fortuitous. Meanwhile, Gaia's brood, who are born rather than Exalting, filled the literally millions of middle-management type positions in the Solar's governments, filling their armies and otherwise doing the more ground level stuff you need to keep a much-much-bigger-than-'global' empire running. The others either didnt exist at this point, or were doing their own little things in such as way as they didnt matter in the grand scheme of things.
Alas, the Primordials were dicks and in their defeat, they managed to stick a curse on those who defeated them. The short version of this is that over time... the Solars kinda turned into assholes... not all of them mind you, but alot of them started developing dark streaks a mild wide, and this coupled with the Solar talent for mindfuckery, arrogance and hubris, meant that alot of their kingdoms started rotting at the core. It got alot fucking worse when the Solars discovered that massive expenditures of power could tweak the Loom (which is not something they can effect directly, and naturally upon discovering a way to interact with it, decided that naturally they should try to master it), and didnt care that this 'tweaking' looked alot like 'kicking it down the stairs and busting it up'. The Sidereals, terrified that the Solars were going to end up permanently damaging the Loom of Fate, decided to get all rebellious up in here, got the Terrestrials on their side (who were closer to the Solars than muggles and could see the growing darkness in them), and up and killed most of them, while at the same time attacking Heaven its self to interfere with the mechanics behind Exaltation, capturing the Solar's exaltations as they arrived in Heaven before being sent back out to find new hosts. The Lunars were scattered to the far fringes of Creation, and the Sidereals installed the Terrestrials (now dubbed the Dragonblooded) as the new kings of Creation.
To explain why they did this to the muggles, they created a new religion that basically strangled the God's supply of worship and put it under their own control, while dubbing the Solars and Lunars as evil demons pretending to be people that must be killed on sight lest they grow powerful enough to threaten everyone. They made quite a efficient little industry out of using their knowledge of Fate to point the Dragonbloods at freshly exalted Solars and Lunars before they could come into their power, and so the Dragonblood ruled a progressively shittier Creation (after all, they could not maintain the Solar's hyperclarktech that supported their empire, nor wield the level of magic they did), eventually coming to believe their own propaganda. But this only warns against the Solars and Lunars, and pointedly not the Sidereals.
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Now, onto the exalted themselves.
Solars are basically your classic hero-god-king archtype, they exalt from people who perform acts of dedication, heroism, self sacrifice or who achieve great things, etc. Their powers basically boil down to 'i do normal things abnormally well' as in; a person can throw a punch a hit another person, a Solar can throw a punch and hit a dozen people from a mile away, a person can parry a opponents blade while a solar can parry a mountain range, a person can punch a board in half, while a solar can punch a river in half. Etc. They are by definition, the best at anything they did to such ridiculous degrees that its hard to explain without dipping into philosophy. However, their particular talents seem to lay in sorcery (they are the only ones who could wield the highest order of sorcerous power), technology (they made clarktech look tame) and in social abilities... as speakers, leaders, rulers, demagogues, and flirts, they had no equal in that or any other age. Their powers typically manifest in golds or similar sunny shades, and start by displaying the Caste Mark (a golden symbol on their forehead), growing to battle auras, and at the highest levels, forming mile high golden totems. They have five Castes, which boil down to warrior-general-hero, utopian-thinker-hero, saint-diplomat-hero, assassin-champion-hero and priest-king-hero, each with its own caste mark and unique spread of talents.
The Lunars are more along the noble-barbarian-king archtypes, and exalt from people who struggle to survive, overcome great hardship, enduring great suffering, or stand in defence of nature and the natural world. While the solar's are better at anything they want to be, the Lunar's powers are more about the betterment of the self/more primal side of things. The most simple way to explain it without diving into rules, is that a solar fighter could be supernaturally good at martial arts, tactics and dodging, while a lunar-fighter would be supernaturally strong, fast and durable. In addition, owing to the mercurial nature of their patron the Lunars are also extremely powerful shapeshifters, possessing a natural set of forms based on a animal totem, but also able to take the form of any beast they have hunted and consumed the heart of... including people, and can also channel their shapeshifting powers to augment their already impressive natural abilities. Each Lunar exaltation is also bonded to a particular Solar exaltation, and binds the holders of each together as fated companions... basically, there will be a strong emotional tie between them... in the first age, this was generally either love or true-friendship depending on the preferences of those involved, but its equally capable of being hate. And they both have powers that can take advantage of the bond towards various ends. But its ultimately a relationship that the Solar has the advantage in, both in terms of how well a so-inclined Solar could manipulate their bondmate with their own powers and how they can leverage the powers of the bond its self. They kinda got fucked being in the Wyld zones on the outer edges of creation, and as a result lost their original castes, now they have only three, which amount to warrior, seducer and sorcerer-priest. Their power manifests in the same way as Solars, but silver rather than gold, and lunar/nighty colours rather than sunny ones, animal totems are almost universal, in addition they are covered head to toe in hidden silver tattoos that flare up with enough power.
Sidereals were never meant to be any sort of king and they know it, they take their themes from the advisor to royalty, generals, philosophers, seers, oracles, etc. They are chosen to exalt by fate, and guided their entire lives to be prepared for the day they will exalt and take up the responsibility of their station. That said, when they went after the solars... that was bad, and attacking Heaven its self to do it? That was Waaay worse. Heaven was getting ready to kick their asses into the ground, so they tried to re-write fate so that it wasnt their fault... and they kinda pulled it off, at the cost of almost critically destabilizing the Loom (did you notice the irony?) the Maidens themselves had to step in to stabilize it, and it basically erased the Sidereals from history. They dont and never did exist, despite all evidence to the contrary, and as such they couldnt have attacked heaven now could they? In heaveny terms this means that everyone knows what they did, but cant punish them for it, so they get even by fucking the Sidereals over as much as bureaucracy that is heaven can. In more general terms, it means they fade into stereotypical vagueness over time... a sidereal could save a person, but the next day that person would only remember that they were saved by 'a hansom warrior'. Sidereals powers are mostly about manipulating Fate via astrology, enlightenment, and going with the natural order of things, with a side order of strange powers that are based on manipulating their fucked up non-existence to create thematic themed-existences to accomplish various tasks. Due to their connection to the natural ebb and flow of Creation, they also have a talent for martial arts, and they alone can attain the highest levels of supernatural martial arts without help (solars can, but need a teacher). Sidereals can punch you so hard you turn into a duck. Their auras are more subtle than the first two, they typically manifest a coloured aura up to a halo, but no massive mile high totem, and their caste marks are the symbols of the Five Maidens, and amount to warrior, wanderer, secretkeeper, killer and pacifist, though they approach these concepts in a more... lofty sorta way, they are agents of these aspects of destiny. <Ruby is one of these, particularly, she seems to be a Chosen Of Battles/Mars, which if nothing else, means that her life is going to be hectic as fuck.
Finally, Terrestrials, or Dragonblooded as they later called themselves, are born and bred, rather than exalting, they have elemental powers and aura, no Caste Mark, but those with unusually pure blood will sometimes have physical mutations that show their element, like burning hair or wood-like skin. Asian five-elements style with Earth instead of Metal, and generally follow both the direct physical and more esoteric/philosophical applications thereof. The castes are (element/combat purpose/noncombat purpose) fire/warrior/courtesan(<do NOT point that out to them, they do not like it), wood/healer/performer, air/assassin/advisor, earth/tanks/crafters, and water/underminers/managers. They also get huge boosts from working together, while most other exalts are essentially islands of phenomenal cosmic power that work together by choice and habit, Terrestrials were designed to work a a whole army and can only unleash their full power as cooperative units working towards a common goal. These are the ones who ended up ruling creation after kicking the Solars out, and well.... its not going well.
There are a couple of others, but I doubt they'll show up.
Unless Penny is an Alchemical here?
(For reference, Alchemicals are bullshit magic robots. Instead of having charms as techniques or abilities, they have charms as physical upgrades that can be slotted into them when they reconstruct their bodies and so on. They also sort of mimic the other types of Exalts, so like, Moonsilver Alchemicals are similar to Lunars a bit, in terms of shapeshifting, Orichalcum do the god king thing, and Starmetal are sort of Sidereal ish? There's more than that but it's not important.)
If and when that happens, i will explain Alchies too if no one beats me to it. For now im very satisfied with "The others either didnt exist at this point, or were doing their own little things in such as way as they didnt matter in the grand scheme of things."
So, what did the Gods think of all of this? Obviously they disapproved at least some, considering they were about to screw over the Sidereals. Until the Sidereals kind of screwed over themselves to a degree...
So, what did the Gods think of all of this? Obviously they disapproved at least some, considering they were about to screw over the Sidereals. Until the Sidereals kind of screwed over themselves to a degree...
Split: there are a lot of powerful gods that lost influence as their portfolio's diminished, but on the other hand there are new powerful gods who gained influence. More who dislike it than like it, though due to the nature of the system, most of those in power were those who liked it.
Or, that's what it was in canon until the Crusade and Contagion wiped out ~90% of Creation's people(it's unclear if the Contagion did 90% on it's own, or if both together did that). The resulting mess stabilized a bit, but gods gain more power relative to Terrestrials/Sidereals, and it's causing...problems.
Of course, that's in canon. This is very, very different, and so it's not clear what the role of Sidereals or spirits are(or if spirits beyond possibly the grimm are a thing).
The only other thing is that the Solars still have the Creation Ruling Mandate its their divine right to rule Creation as dictated by the Unconquered Sun, the highest of the Gods, so Heaven is technically on the Solar's side... But even then its very pointedly not Heaven's business to interfere in how Creation is ran... so in all probability they would have done nothing if the Sidereals had not attacked Heaven to pull off their coup. Gods would have either tried to defend their allies, or jockied to befriend the new rulers, as youd expect from a bunch of ambitious middlemanagers. The attack on Lytek's Office (the God Of Exaltation), and the assault on Lytek himself as well as holding him hostage to keep Heaven at bay long enough to pull off their coup really burned every bridge and crossed every line. Exalted's heaven is Celestial Bureaucracy style, so order/propriety/respect/etc are HUGE for them. And the Sidereals are not powerful enough to hold off the might of Heaven (alas, the Solars and Lunars who are that powerful were somewhat indisposed at the time )
The only reason they didnt end up Celestial Lionkibble was because they made themselves not guilty of their own crimes via the fate dickery that ended up biting them in the ass. The only thing we know beyond that is that there is a good chance that the Maidens A) knew what they were planning (obviously, goddesses of Fate here) and didnt stop them, though the stories are highly conflicted on whether they were happy, unhappy or neutral about it. B) could probably have fixed their little problem when they corrected the massive damage they caused to the Loom, but didnt, and instead left them cursed to be nonpeople.
And while the Sidereals are about as well liked in heaven as birdshit, they have managed to make allies (but not friends) due to the stranglhold that their invented religion has over Prayer. Basically, they make sure gods that are friendly to them get more, and gods that they catch specifically fucking with them get less. So lots of passiveagressiveness all around.
Though, when the solars finally did return and the Sids went to scope out Lytek's office, they found alot of Celestial Lions waiting for them. There will be no repeat of what happened last time, that is for sure.
That said, while we have no idea if Heaven is even a thing in this fic, or the Bureau of Destiny, i would love to see some random siddy pop up around Ruby and be all 'what the fuck are you doing down here?! do you have any idea how much paperwork is piling up in your office right now?!'.
Holy crap all this information is making my head spin. Not that I don't appreciate being properly brought up to speed on the particulars of Exalts, Anathema and the like. A good headspinning is just what's needed at times like these.
Holy crap all this information is making my head spin. Not that I don't appreciate being properly brought up to speed on the particulars of Exalts, Anathema and the like. A good headspinning is just what's needed at times like these.
I also like how we set up various levels/tiers of crash-courses into Creation. Makes it easy for those who can't read through the long lectures or who need stepping stones to expand their knowledge.
Guys, c'mon. Most of the Exalted half hasn't even been mentioned yet, you really don't need to wall of text all of this when the fic hasn't even gotten there. I know Exalted threads are always prone to this but geez.
Guys, c'mon. Most of the Exalted half hasn't even been mentioned yet, you really don't need to wall of text all of this when the fic hasn't even gotten there. I know Exalted threads are always prone to this but geez.
People asked so we gave a small primer. And yes, even the longest of these are small. He wasn't kidding when he said an essay could be written on what he condensed into a short paragraph if not less.
People asked so we gave a small primer. And yes, even the longest of these are small. He wasn't kidding when he said an essay could be written on what he condensed into a short paragraph if not less.
Well, no. He asked for what an Anathema is (and by context really specifically Solars and Lunars since they're what's come up so far). He didn't ask for the full history of Creation and he definitely didn't ask for background on Alchemicals or Gods. Almost literally every time people try to turn Exalted fic/quest threads into Exalted general threads.
Well, no. He asked for what an Anathema is (and by context really specifically Solars and Lunars since they're what's come up so far). He didn't ask for the full history of Creation and he definitely didn't ask for background on Alchemicals or Gods.
And why Solars an Lunars are Anathema really doesn't have any impact without the story of what they were an why they became such. And considering the entire theme of Exalted is basically "Consequences"... Yes, you really do need the history to fully understand it.
And why Solars an Lunars are Anathema really doesn't have any impact without the story of what they were an why they became such. And considering the entire theme of Exalted is basically "Consequences"... Yes, you really do need the history to fully understand it.
Because of the posts I better understand the Exalt concepts and how they relate to the story. I would argue that makes the posts relevant by definition. I asked about the lore of a tabletop RPG, expecting anything new less than several pages worth of information would be foolhardy.
Besides, speculation like this happens in every story thread. I'm not sure what you are fighting against.
