11.1.1 Varian, the Celestine

The story of Varian neither begins nor ends with Aetolia.

It was He that created the original Pantheon of Sapient gods - the Twins, those of the Cycle, the Fundamentals and Virtues. It was He that gave Them reign over Their respective domains. It was He that wrought Light and Dark, Life and Death, and everything betwixt. It was He that handed down fundamental decrees of how and why existence was shaped, and He that guided His creations in its early days as the arbiter of the Court of the Gods in Memonaransa.

Yet this was not the first universe wherein Varian had reigned as king. When Lexadhra emerged from the Source of all knowledge, deep within the leylines, She recounted the history of a time before time to all of Sapience. She ripped open the veil shrouding Varian's first creation, a world named Azhoa in a universe elsewhere - outside the spatial understanding of this time and age. The Celestine had devoured the planet whole in His bid to stay alive, fleeing from His Other at the cost of all of His works up to that point.

What happened between His departure of the universe holding what was Azhoa and His arrival in Aetolia is unknown, though it is recounted that He was somewhere that even Lexadhra did not know.

His arrival into Aetolia, and the creations recounted above of gods, does not paint the full picture; Aetolia already had a Creator, the one who yet reigns true. For ages did He battle with this counterpart, the Eschaton, until it came to be that the actions of mortals forced one side or another to win out and repair what had been broken within the worldspine. The Creators' Monomachy waged for over six hundred days.

Finding Himself on the verge of utter defeat, unable to overcome the offering of Damariel's essence that empowered the Eschaton and tipped the scales, He attempted to flee.

His first attempt was countered by an unknown Empress garbed in crystal and jade, unable to overcome the deity's protection against His unwanted ingress.

The last anyone upon Aetolia saw Him, He had fled through a portal with three moons distantly visible through it.