Demons 101

Spirits, gods, devils, angels, and demons all refer to the only other beings to use magic on Shaar. It was misunderstood that they might all have been separate species based on their actions and behaviors (I.e. Chaotic demons seen as devils, neutral ones as spirits, benevolent ones as gods) but this has long since been scientifically disproven. See, as you’ll remember from the calendar post, it’s 6009 H.E. or Human era. Before this Era was the terribly bleak Demon Epoch, in which humans scarcely survived in small tribal societies, at the discretion of the demons which became deities or guardian spirits in man's eyes. This existence was brutal for mankind.

Out of unprecedented generosity (or sheer laziness) a few demons gave humans their own limited magic abilities, often through possession but sometimes by creating human/demon hybrids (through various methods, all of them being equally upsetting) who held fractions of their demon parent's power.

Physiologically, demons are trans-dimensional beings unbound by space and time. Through some twisted evolutionary process they are however bound to ideas and symbols. Being imbued with immense arcane abilities from their hatching, they rarely are seen in their natural shape. It is rumored to be an insect-like form, with segmented bodies and serrated fangs, but this has proven difficult to prove. Demon's lives span aeons, and their births are infamously random and spontaneous. Even after the gift of magic to mankind, demons had been able to posses any living thing and pervert its form or control its actions. This made any resistance or misstep by humans easily punishable.

Although Demons are not omniscient or omnipresent, their indifference to distance and ability of invisibility (to the naked eye, that is) made widespread fear their conquering tool in securing Shaar as their personal eden during the Demon Epoch. Being trans-dimensional, demons are able to traverse the entire universe freely, but it is only on Shaar- they claim- that their powers fully function. They really had created paradise for themselves, with Shaar as the hub of the demon race they presumably plied the galaxy freely, and toyed with life at will. Shaar was certainly very chaotic, environmentally, as it had always been, but it was also more diverse and lush. Most modern depictions of demons show them frolicking in fire and volcanism, but recent fossil evidence shows that they undoubtably used their magic to foster rich varieties of flora and fauna, as well as manipulating the evolution of many of the magically inclined non-sentient beasts known as monsters. Modern oceans are still filled with many relics of the Demon Epoch.

This demon golden age ended within a century of the first recorded human wizard. The proliferation of witches and wizards was massive, and with thaumaturgy being genetically inherited, there was an unprecedented amount of humans willing to rebel against their guardian spirits and local deities, as well as tribes who dared venture into the vast expanses of wilderness and take on every monster and native god of the wilds. For reasons still unclear to humans, a minority faction of demons joined various human tribes in their fight for independence. It's long been thought that without this demon civil war mankind would have been driven extinct for its rebellion, but demonic logic remains a mystery to human theorists, and despite the fact that they could have easily sided with their own kind and wiped man out for good, they did not.

The official end of the Demon Epoch came when a band of primitive Greater Shaarian warriors came across an enraged volcano god and found themselves immune to its possession. The discovery of this mutation, now called the M Sequence, lauded the start of massive waves of human migration and rebellion in all regions of the world. This mysterious mutation is genetically linked gene similar to those infused into the human genome by demons, but its appearance is unprecedented. The dark ages that followed gave rise to the first major human civilizations, and the dawn of agriculture and metalworking came about in the time between the end of the Demon Epoch and the start of the modern calendar. By H.E. year 1, hundreds of miles of wilderness and thousands of species of monster and animal had been obliterated. This gradual clearing of the surface of Shaar was painstakingly slow at first, with every forest and mountain guarded viciously by its native demons, as well as the beasts bred there. With the invention of weapons and traps almost all humans could join in the struggle for land.

Today, most demons reside in the ocean. Its high acidity and immense pressure dissuade most humans from venturing there. Seeing as most of Shaar's surface is covered in water, the demons do not see the rise of mankind as a loss of "their" world, but rather a tragic despoilment of the upper biosphere. Demons born after the start of the Human Era have their own views on mankind's place, and each conducts them self as they see fit. Fiercely individualistic, demons have no known nations or families, and only one need in their lifetimes. Being bound to ideas, their reproduction depends on the proliferation of their natural idea. Hence, a forest spirit will fight to preserve its forest, while a greed demon will sow greed in the hearts of humans to ensure a home for its eggs.

Their behavior is just as unpredictable as always, with some living in perfect harmony disguised as humans, and others conducting fierce attacks from the sea. They do seem to identify with witches and wizards better, however, perhaps due to their shared ancestry. A common relationship between a human and demon is the Blood Contract, in which a human offers a part of itself (symbolically, as demons have no real need for food) and in return enlists the powers of the demon for a specified purpose or period of time. Like spells, however, these contracts are prone to poetic irony, with demons gladly willing to twist the words of their contracts for or against their contractors for pleasure.