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Alshain
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The peoples of the Grythmar Peninsula worship many gods. Many of these gods date at least back to the era of the Ekkedian Empire, and were part of its pantheon, albeit some of their forms and names have changed through the ages. New gods have occasionally appeared since the fall of Ekkedia, and some of Ekkedia's gods appeared to vanish from history with that empire's fall.
In Vantia, the dominant religion is the Luminance, which follows Luminar, the god of light, justice, and civilization, often depicted with sunburst symbols, in statuary as a stern beaded paladin, elderly but strong. The Luminance expects its adherents to follow a strict code of conduct that emphasizes social order and personal virtue. Its priests wield potent holy magic and it also fields orders of holy knights. At various times throughout history, some of these knightly orders have launched wars of conquest and forced conversions, a controversial practice since one of the core tenets of the Luminance is nonviolence except in self-defense. The center of the Luminance in Vantia is the temple in Alshain, which is the headquarters of the Temple Knights and seat of power for High Priest Ranma, the head of the Luminance in Vantia.
The elves and dwarves each have their own deity they follow, that resembles them in kind. Among the dwarves this is Dungren, who is represented alternately as a dwarf of divine aspect and as a beautiful, perfectly geometrical gemstone. The doctrine of Dungren is a rigid code of strong traditions, a hierarchical social order, stoic acceptance of trials and suffering, family honor, and respect for elders and ancestors. Many non-dwarves might find Dungren's doctrines stifling, but such a severe deity is well-suited for a race of hard-working miners and builders of vast subterranean empires waging perpetual war against the evils and horrors of the Underworld.
The elves worship twin gods named Culo (male) and Telepta (female), though there are competing beliefs on whether the Dual Divinity are brother and sister or husband and wife. Despite this confusion, common to all elven doctrines is that the twin gods represent complementary aspects of a balance: justice and compassion; order and freedom; civilization and nature; peace and war; death and life. Aside from obviously being represented as a pair of elves, the Dual Divinity are also often shown as a set of scales entwined in leafy vines. Some believe them to be avatars of Neutrality, but the elves themselves would say they are definitively on the side of cosmic Good, and that rather than Neutrality the twin gods instead represent Balance, which is not the same.
The dominant religion in Rikenfald is Lamatism which worships Lamat, a dark god which is represented alternately as a sexless horned demon or a male or female darkling, although the feminine is considered its dominant aspect and it is most commonly represented as such, regarded by most as a demon goddess. Lamat is associated with self-fulfillment, the breaking of taboos, and the ever-changing and malleable nature of reality. Lamatism teaches its followers, the Lamati, to follow and honor their own will, and to break and rewrite rules. The high priestess of Lamatism is Malvoria, witch-queen of Rikenfald, who has ruled over her cult since time beyond memory. Lamatism is generally outlawed in societies outside Rikenfald, although it has secret cults and adherents everywhere.
The loxin tribes of the Primeval Expanse do not worship the gods of the other races, but rather practice a combination of animism and pantheism, believing both that gods dwell everywhere and that the power of the divine exists within everything. Many tribes also incorporate forms of ancestor worship into their faiths. Their most powerful shamans command potent nature magicks.
Finally, there is a curious religion known as Sourcism, which posits that the gods are not true divinities, not different from the mortal races in kind but only in degree, being merely more powerful specimens of the races that worship them. According to Sourcism, above all these gods is a "true" god, an ultimate being beyond time, reality, and comprehension from which all existence emanates and all will eventually return, called, suitably enough, the Source. The doctrine of Sourcism is to attempt to understand the Source and align oneself with its purpose. This entails acceptance of reality in all its aspects, light and dark, pleasant and painful, and to pursue the spiritual, mental, and physical perfection of oneself. Followers of the gods often regard Sourcism's rejection of their true divinity as an affront, and thus it is considered a heretical cult and outlawed in some societies. However, it is otherwise regarded as benign, since its teachings focus on practicing acceptance and personal virtue, so there are also many places where it is tolerated, including in Vantia. In any case, it is a fringe religion with relatively few followers.
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