Prologue to 'Devour', as recorded by Alloden Garthry



Centuries ago, mankind was said to be the most populous creature on [[the word here seems to be so poorly scribbled that it is illegible]], or so the legends say. But mankind was born flawed, and would prove to be its own undoing. They were born with a hole in their heart, and thus were never able to sate their greed for power.

153 years ago, now, the world was engulfed in a tide of death and destruction. The Holocaust, some called it. To others, it was known as The War. Mankind unleashed their greatest weapons of destruction against each other. Few survived, and the world around them was in similar distress. A small niche of life still survived in the barren wastes of irradiated rubble: a small peninsula that was spared from oblivion. In it, humanity clung to life, and tried to climb back up to their former glory. Vampires watched with anticipation, helping them along.

The Empire of Steam and Steel
It's been 70 years since society as we know it was rebuilt. First a man used a steam pump to get water from wells that were otherwise too deep to pump out. Then he used it to heat houses and power mills. Finally it found its way into trains, and a few extensively wealthy individuals now use it in horseless carriages, a miniaturization of the technology that was thought impossible but ten years past.

In the wake of steam, several small city-states have come together to rebuild the shade of mankind's former glory. Though loosely associated by free trade and a railroad network still under construction, they now refer to themselves as 'the Empire of Steam and Steel.' Everyone wanted the simpler life presented through coal, and coal was abundant in the newly formed empire. Soon a megalopolis was built, the center of this new human order. A central spire, placed over the legendary first water pump, houses the government for the city, as well as providing a meeting place for the leaders of the other cities. All railroads lead to The Copper Tower, or so goes the saying. The Copper Tower resides within 'the Purple City'... Beland is its name.

At current, the people are content. The cities run like well oiled machines, producing copious amounts of goods. Their export is high. They enjoy peaceful relations with their neighbors, and welcome all to come under their banner for an easier life.

The Copper Tower
The Copper Tower is the center of the Empire of Steam and Steal. The ruling class, based on a technocracy, spends most of their waking hours in the building making sure that everything works well.

The rulers join the Council of Civil Mechanizations by creating a new and nation altering invention, by mastering one specific line of technology to a point of making new innovations, or by mastering many technologies to an astounding degree and bringing on an innovation in one of their fields.

Seats on the council look over the different areas of life, including health quality, food and water supply, factory production, civilian morale, foreign relations, raw materials, and many other positions. Every year generally two new seats are added. At current the council is a lumbering 278 person giant. They meet in a large council chambers with elevated seats. In the center, the oldest member sits, surrounded by the others, calling on the next person to speak and placing motions on the floor. Under each of these councilors, there is an immediate civil service work force of 100, employing 278,000 people total. These people are generally abroad, reporting through telegraph to their council head.

Society of Coal
Vampires dug deep into the society the moment steam proved effective. When steam proved to make life so much easier, they funded it, and pushed the progress of the humans. The social elite of the vampires created the Society of Coal, an organization specifically founded on promoting the use of steam. The socially elite are not the only one in the society, but they are the leaders of it.

The Society of Coal is led by the Board, a group of the five most senior vampires. They pushed the humans forward. They organized groups to cut down forests and clear land to build more metal cityscape. The Society of Coal pushed back the werewolves, and made the first truly safe bulkhead for vampires, and they did it through mortals, rarely having to fight any of their own battles.

The World at Large
There are no longer any countries; there simply aren’t enough people anymore. Civilization now huddles in a series of city-states, each populated predominately by a different bloodline. In the wilds outside the cities there are dangers, rabid beasts, Lycan Clans, and who knows what else. This is why all of the cities have a tall wall enclosing them.

Vampires have, one way or another, risen up to rule each of the known city-states. The Lycans and the Vampires have never been able to see eye to eye. In each race there are sects that feel the other is nothing more than an abomination, something that’s only good when it’s dead and gone.

For the most part they’ve maintained a tense neutrality towards each other. However, in recent decades The Cities have gone through a renaissance of industry. With the rebirth of humanity’s need to create, innovate, and explore, vampiric culture has gone from clinging to the rocks for survival, to as flourishing and decadent as it was in the Old Days.

But this steam and clockwork fueled grandeur has come at a high price. The Cities have had to send expeditions out into the wilds for resources. Cutting down the forests, and digging up the hills and mountains, building railways to connect the once distant cities to each other, all these things have earned the ire of the Lycans. Since the Fall, Lycans have been working diligently to set nature to rights after all the wrongs that humanity had caused. And here are the Vampires, starting it all over again, without a single thought about the consequences, without an ounce of respect.

Beyond the known bounds of the 'living' world are desolate wastelands, all that remains of the lost empires of man. Massive craters and radiation permeate the land. Nothing remains that is alive... nothing natural, that is. Several expeditions have set out in search of the 'great lost technologies' left in the irradiated ruins of the old cities. Few have returned, and those that have come back empty handed but for the tales of monstrous, mutated horrors.