> Could somebody give me a quick summary of the events of
> "King of Sartar", just enough so I can understand what
> you guys are talking about? Thanks.
OK: here's the summary.
Many centuries after the end of the Third Age, an author publishes "Argrath's Saga", complete with a collection of supporting documents which explain or elucidate some of the more confusing references in the Saga. He does so because he believes the End of the World is Nigh Again, and that it was only saved last time around by the acts of King Argrath, but nobody remembers what Argrath did. He is trying to rediscover secrets of Dragon Pass, of Orlanthi Mythology, of the Empire of the Wyrms Friends, of how things can be forgotten or how myths change over time: because, after Argrath saved the world last time around, people were less able (or unable) to contact the otherworld, or interact with their myths. The world is only now recovering from an era of illiteracy, and we have lost contact with our past.
The author fears we are doomed unless we can rediscover Argrath's solution to the threat that regularly menaces Glorantha, and presents his researches to the public at large in the hope that someone out there will learn what must be done, and do it.
The materials published include the Annotated Argrath's Saga, a collection of Orlanthi Mythology, a composite History of Dragon Pass, and sundry miscellaneous fragments about Argrath, Orlanthi, the EWF, the Grazers, and other subjects.
A more detailed review was published in Tales #9, and a critique by Oliver Dickinson is in Questlines.
The appendix on HeroQuesting in "Elder Secrets" says:
: During most of the Third Age heroquesting was considered evil, : because the God Learners had been so enthusiastic about it... : Only the Lunar Empire actively pursued the subject. The Pelorian : mystical geography was almost virgin territory since the area : was never part of the God Learner's conspiracy...
OK?
That bit of Emperorishness that descends on the Emperor when he completes the Ten Tests is sometimes called the Mantle of Antirius. No matter how bad, evil, corrupt or decadent the Emperor may be, there are times when he can be, simply... *Imperial*, because of this.
> Wasn't the creation of the Red Goddess an evil on the same
> order and with as dire consequences as loosing Nysalor/Gbaji
> into the world?
Yes, of course: just as great a blessing. The Red Goddess offered hope of spiritual and physical liberation to all mankind, but her "shadow", her "other", her polar opposite, Argrath the Deceiver, brought great suffering and left her Empire a ruin, and the world a far worse place than it was before. Just as Arkat the Deceiver destroyed Nysalor, that other blessing to mankind, an earlier incarnation of a part of the Goddess.
You're blaming the victims for the damage their conquerors do!
Let's say that in annual rites in every Sixth, the priests and rulers of the Sixth interact with their existing mythic geography. In the occasional Tournaments of the MoLaD, they get to travel through the mythic geography of *all* the Sixths, perhaps change that geography, and perhaps become a part of it (win or lose).
If the Talar of God Forgot won the tournament, there'd be a new and strong ("angelic") Talar-figure somewhere in the otherworld of God Forgot, doing whatever that Talar most wanted to do. And =
the body of that Talar would age preternaturally fast, inhabited by the soul of Belintar and acting to Belintar's agenda (which, we can presume, is not entirely in compliance with the Malkioni Laws of the Brithini, judging by physical evidence at any rate). The unaging bodies of Brithini are a moral phenomenon, not a racial subtype or anything like that.
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Nick
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