Soul War
The Soul War is a term used to refer to the conflict between the gods of Dadauar and the onirarchs. This conflict comes about largely because the onirarchs and the gods are competing for some of the same resources, so the rise of one almost inevitably means the decline of the other. The gods want people to worship them, and generally want their worshipers to become as successful as possible, to demonstrate their power and attract more worshippers. It is to the onirarchs' benefit, however, to maintain the people of their nations powerless and complacent, and to keep them focused on quotidian activities and shallow recreations, lest they come to recognize and resent the way the dreamlords are using them. If the people must look to some greater entity for aid and succor, the onirarchs would obviously prefer the people rely on the onirarchs themselves, seeing them as benevolent providers whose rule is just and right—and people who devote themselves to gods are less likely to think of themselves as dependent on the onirarchs. Therefore, the leaders of most onirarchies have actively worked to induce the people of their nations to abandon the gods, the better to focus on their works for the state. Within most onirarchies, the gods are forgotten—or substituted with imaginary gods given to the people to worship to pacify them, but incapable of actually responding to their requests.
The Soul War is so called after the idea that the gods and the onirarchs are, in a sense, battling over the souls of the citizens of the onirarchies. The term, however, is not one that will be known to the typical person of Dadauar. Certainly most citizens of the onirarchies aren't even aware the Soul War is going on; it would be counterproductive for the onirarchs to make it publicly known that they were trying to draw people away from the gods. The term was coined by rebels against the onirarchs, but was later adopted by the onirarchs themselves, and is even used by some scholars both within and outside the onirarchies—but it has never been in common use by laymen.
The effects of the Soul War are not felt only in the onirarchies. Since the rise of the onirarchs, devotion to the gods has overall waned in the undeveloped nations, too. Part of this may be due to some people in the undeveloped nations envying the development of the onirarchies and wanting to emulate them, and it may also be that the slight lowering of the gods' power due to the decrease in their worship in the onirarchies leads to them being less capable of fulfilling their faithful's needs and therefore to their losing worshippers elsewhere as well. But certainly some of the decline comes about from the onirarchs' active efforts; many of the onirarchs send agents into the undeveloped nations with the express charge of fostering discontent with religion and encouraging people to abandon their gods.
Origins
It's difficult to say exactly when the Soul War began; the dreamlords have been strengthening their hold over their dominions since the founding of the Hsüfirst modern onirarchy. But if there were one day to be chosen in which the Soul War began in its present state, it might be eleven centuries ago, when the god Nuropus intervened and destroyed the president of Alfenane. In retaliation, a number of other onirarchs combined forces to destroy Nuropus. Until that point, mortals destroying a god was a matter practically unheard of, but apparently that interchange convinced both the gods and the onirarchs that the other side was powerful enough to make direct confrontations risky. The Soul War continued, but was mostly one of persuasion and influence. There were a few more direct strikes—the capture of Maior, the Enslaved God, a thousand years ago, and the Blessings of Yelay—but for the most part, the war has been fought not with physical weapons, but with words and magic, not over land or money, but over the minds of the people.
Combatants
The primary combatants in the Soul War are, of course, the gods and the onirarchs. Both work indirectly, the gods primarily bolstering and encouraging those who oppose the onirarchs, and the onirarchs propagandizing against the gods and discouraging their worship, either directly or through their mouthpieces. Both sides have allies and agents who aid them and further their purposes. The onirarchs have their absedists and dwalepriests; the gods have their evangelists and votaries. To a lesser extent, some who sympathize or whose interests coincide with one side or the other may meddle in the conflict as well. Some hoping to curry favor with the onirarchs may do their part to attack religion; some who hate the onirarchs may turn to the gods.
But not all gods and not all onirarchs participate in the Soul War with equal fervor. On the side of the onirarchs, Alfenane, Niruna, and Noric tend to be particularly hostile toward the gods, and especially active in quashing their worship and persecuting their worshippers. The onirarchs of Alfenane have perhaps never forgiven Nuropus's aggression, and do their best to paint the gods not just as useless or superannuated but as actively evil. The onirarchs of Niruna owe the fervor of their misotheism perhaps less to their personal comvictions than to their desire to show that they are in the forefront of the Soul War as they are (or want to be seen as being) in other things. The onirarchs of Noric preach a distinctive mechanistic religion (sometimes called banausism) with which they hope to supplant faith in the gods.
On the side of the gods, perhaps those who take the most proactive parts in the Soul War include the sky god Alațan; Cherdac, god of heroism; Qogow, god of refuse; and the nature goddess Xhadla. Alațan was once one of the most powerful of gods, but his worship waned long before the rise of the onirarchs; he may be hoping to distinguish himself in the Soul War and so launch himself back to his former glory. Cherdac, an androgynous god from the Sibling Nations, blesses those who fight the onirarchs and sometimes calls their worshippers to specific missions against them. Qogow, formerly a fairly obscure god with few devotees, has made creative use of his field to hinder the onirarchs. Xhadla has assembled a band of nature deities whom she leads against the dreamlords, hoping to reverse the destruction they have brought to wilderness areas.
Neutrals
Just as some gods and onirarchs participate in the Soul War more enthusiastically than others, some also do less. In fact, the hostility between the gods and the onirarchs is not universal, and there are some on both sides who do not take a part in the Soul War at all, or at least if they do so it is with subtlety and surreptition.
Worship of their traditional gods still plays a major röle in the cultures of the onirarchies of K'eng and Yumaria, not only without the objection but apparently with the full approval and involvement of the local onirarchs. Drithidiach was once as virulent in its opposition to the gods as any other onirarchy, but since the Drithidian Amnesty it has become as tolerant of religion as it has of many other practices it once condemned. The people of Drithidian colony of Ludelt, in particular, long maintained their devotion to their gods in defiance of the onirarchs, and since the Amnesty now that such devotion is no longer prohibited it has flourished even more, to the extent that Ludelt may be the most religious place on all Dadauar. If some have argued that the continued practice of religion in these onirarchies show that devotion to the gods and to the onirarchs is not incompatible and that the Soul War is an unnecessary conflict, few other gods or onirarchs have taken this enarrative to heart.
On the other hand, a few gods have found worshipers among the onirarchs themselves, even in onirarches where religion is otherwise discouraged or forbidden. Foremost among them is Ulcan, god of dreams, who shows onirarchs willing to give him his due how better to use the dream energy they gather and to exploit and alter the dreamworlds of Magogenia. A handful of other gods have also found significant, though smaller, numbers of devotees among the dreamlords: Ku Tsu god of wealth, Ibhavi goddess of destiny, Thothet god of rulership, and the demon god Verilach. Whether these gods have betrayed their fellow deities or are playing the onirarchs for fools depends on whom you ask—and of course the answer may not be the same for each god.
Fronts
Although the Soul War pervades all of Dadauar, there are some particular fronts where it is fought particularly hard. One is the resistance—because they are trying to bring down the onirarchs, the rebels and the gods find themselves natural allies. Both because of the additional power they can grant, and to thumb their nose at the onirarchs' proscriptions, many rebels devote themselves to gods. Certain gods in particular have been widely embraced by resistance elements—Eieia, goddess of hope; Kavarne, god of lost causes; Kelestre and Lalilam, gods of warriors; Tecliuna, goddess of freedom. Of course, the resistance is far from unified, and there are resistance cells or individual rebels every bit as misotheistic as the dreamlords, but on average the religious devotion of the rebels is well above that of the general populace, let alone the onirarchs.
There are also a few redoubts the gods maintain power even within the onirarchies' borders. Surrounded by the Free Republic of Avelax, the Godhill is a mountain where a group of old Avelachian gods have established a base of power. The Hidden Isle in the Tanahire archipelago is a similar base of power for a different group of gods, who have so far been successful in keeping the onirarchs of Tanahire from finding the island. The Red Caves beneath the land now claimed by Sineae have been a place of hidden worship long before the rise of the onirarchs, and continue to be so now. An area of swampland between Sesael and Vorasia was long claimed by neither nation, leaving an opening for local gods and their worshippers to entrench themselves there, and today that area is called the Holy Mire.
Gnulus and other nonhuman residents of the onirarchs make up another often unappreciated front in the Soul War. In many of the onirarchs, the gnulus have been largely neglected by the national leaders, not having free access to what few rights and privileges the dreamlords deign to grant the human citizens—but likewise not being as actively monitored and molded into what the onirarchs want their people to be like. This means that these folks have had fewer obstacles than the human residents to maintaining their older traditions, including their religions, and many nonhumans continue to worship their gods while being largely ignored by the onirarchs who actively suppress such practices in their human subjects. Thus far, these bastions of religion within the onirarchies have not played a direct part in the Soul War, but some allies of the gods and enemies of the dreamlords have begun to consider how they might be used in their favor. Conversely, some of the onirarchs have come to recognize the potential danger they pose and are weighing how best to deal with the threat and stamp out these nonhuman religions without being too heavy-handed and turning people against them.
Consequences
There may be some reason to fear that while the Soul War is not currently a physical war, it may be in danger of becoming one. As it is, it seems that the influence of the gods in the onirarchies is ever decreasing—the onirarchs are winning the war. It may be a matter of time before the gods get desperate and revert to more direct tactics. If this does happen, it will mean a battle between two incredibly powerful forces—the gods, and the onirarchs who have proven themselves perhaps the gods' equals—and it's likely to result in devastation unparalleled in Dadauar since the Great Plague. Whether or not humanity can even survive such a conflict is not a foregone conclusion.
If a full-scale war does break out, though, the gods and the onirarchs may not be the only forces to reckon with. The Bathybius, too, is a being of immense power, and while it may not be the equal of the gods, it keeps its motives and abilities secret enough that it's impossible to judge. In a physical Soul War, the Bathybius could be a major wild card, and it's anybody's guess which side, if either, it would throw its own power behind.
Even if the Soul War does turn physical and humanity somehow survives, the world, if it remains livable, will be a vastly different place. Depending on which side won, either the onirarchs would rule the world unchallenged by the gods, and perhaps take the places of the gods themselves, or the onirarchies will be thrown down and the people either freed or brought under theocracies to replace them. Or, conceivably, the Bathybius, having bided its time during the conflict until both sides are weakened, will have rushed in to take control itself, and brought all of Dadauar under its own control.
Of course, at this point all this is completely hypothetical. It could be that this never happens—that the Soul War never becomes physical, but just continues indefinitely in its current state, or that one side will manage to defeat the other without resorting to anything so crass as a direct frontal attack. It could conceivably even be that the gods and the onirarchs will come to some sort of mutually agreeable compromise, though under the present circumstances this seems exceedingly unlikely. Still, even in its current state, the Soul War provides an important undercurrent that has a subtle but significant effect on the lives of all Dadauar's people... whether they realize it or not.