Lore and World Overview

The first magic in our earliest days came from bargains with The Celestials and their Children. They were and are capricious things, swinging in cycles like the orbits of their bodies in the heavens, with strange needs and designs. These bargains often had costs, and most people feared the Celestials more than they desired the power of magic. But this was the way of things for untold centuries.

A couple of centuries ago the Shattering broke our moon, the Celestial Luna, and weakened her. Some say that day you could see a brilliant streak coming, like a star speeding towards her before it made impact. You can look up into the night sky tonight and see a full third of her is missing and chunks of her still float in the sky. To hear tell, it played havoc with the oceans and caused all manner of storms and problems until her orbit resettled.

But you see parts of her fell and struck the surface of our home. The resulting debris became known as Moon Dust and those who inhaled or consumed it became able to cast magic without the patronage of the Celestials. For the first time in our history we were beholden only to ourselves.

The thing is that Moon Dust also turned almost anything living that used too much or were exposed for too long into ravening Lunatics, shadows of their former selves which hungered for magic and often got animalistically violent when they couldn’t get their hands on some Dust. The stuff was also as addictive as the power it gave you, so once one started down the path it became hard to not inevitably become a Lunatic.

While we couldn’t help the animals and plants warped into Lunatics, which made the wilds of the world that much more dangerous, about a century ago we were able to refine Moon Dust through an alchemical process which turned it into a glowing, slightly sweet liquid called Moonshine. When brewed right, Moonshine could offer people the ability to use magic without the serious risk of becoming a Lunatic, though if the process wasn’t done right it was nearly the same as huffing straight Dust.

For a while things prospered. Magic made our lives easier and started a new golden age of trade and peace. But like any melody, all good things must come to an end and the Dust started to slowly dwindle as we desperately scraped it from every impact crater we could. As the supply dwindled technology tried to fill the gap. Powered carriages, flying machines, firearms, refined explosives, radio communications and entertainment, home convenience items and so many more wonders advanced into people’s lives. But it just wasn’t the same. Some turned to the Celestials again, but they had become more reserved since Luna was broken and struck their bargains more sparingly.

Then one country, Almennia, found a way to make synthetic Dust, called New Moon. They took this as the advantage it was. Every other nation desperate for magic was eager to trade. And trade Almennia did, charging ridiculous amounts of money for the pleasure of buying watered down, weakened, and poorly brewed Moonshine. Most other nations and their people were not happy with this. And while attempts were made to learn their methods, either through purchasing it or more clandestine acts, Almennia guarded this secret like their lives depended on it.

Well, the other nations didn’t like this, and one of them, and to this day no one knows who, decided it was best if Almennia were destabilized, and assassinated their leaders with a powerful magical ritual. The only problem is, when all trade and alliances run through a single country which has been extorting the world, the world gets pissed, greedy, and angry when all of a sudden that’s disrupted. The Dust War started, and tore the world apart as each nation made alliances, deals, and bargains with each other in an effort to either protectNew Moon’s secrets or steal them for themselves.

The war was bad. Not in a people killing people kind of way, that too, but in the, magically poisoned, salt the earth, and people can’t live there for decades, maybe even centuries kind of way. We augmented our soldiers with Moonshine, we used magical gases and bombs to melt people from the inside or burn them from without, we killed and tortured each other, and we weaponized Lunatics, twisting existing ones and making new ones just so we could seize what we could of the secrets about New Moon.

And the kicker, the worst of it all, is that dark and dirty secret. New Moon, the thing everyone fought for, the thing everyone killed for, destroyed entire nations for, sold their souls for. Well it was so simple and disgusting all at once. Lunatics. How most people were blind to it the world may never know, but at some point someone in Almennia realized that Lunatics are made when someone has high concentrations of Dust in them. You can extract that Dust back out, their body often leaves it as calcified deposits in their muscle and bone. If you kill a Lunatic, you can cut away the growths, grind them down, and try to purify and separate the powder. It won’t be quite as potent, and if processed wrong it’s actually more dangerous than natural Moon Dust, but it was that nation’s last, desperate attempt to keep their power.

The war also ate up a lot of Moonshine and Moon Dust reserves. It left soldiers addicted to the stuff. And while it made more Lunatics out in the world, it wasn’t exactly easy to take them down and extract from them. Nevermind the ethics and morals of farming from sentient Lunatics.

When all was said and done, we were scared, the earth was scared, the gods had gone nearly silent with the horrors, and the world took a collective look in the mirror and realized just how ugly we’d become. Most nations decided enough was enough and decided to heavily regulate magic, limiting Moon Dust, Moonshine, and New Moon collection and production, requiring licenses to cast spells, and limiting the spread of knowledge about magic. But Usonia, our great fatherland, decided a total Prohibition was in order. There had already been those espousing the dangers of magic for a long time and calling for Moon Dust and Moonshine to be banned. The War and the truth about New Moon gave them the ammunition they needed to convince the government to follow through.

Thing there is, most folks still need it in one form or another. Soldiers and mages from the war are addicted to the stuff, needing it just to keep their heads on straight. Common folk still like using it to help make their lives easier. Business people and factory workers need an edge against their fellows. And the rich and powerful want more wealth and power and Moonshine is wealth and magic is power. So while it’s illegal, most people agree that a little Moonshine here and a little spell there ain’t going to bring the horrors of the war home. They might be right, but they’re also dead wrong. And that brings us to today, a few years after the war and the Prohibition in Usonia.

Welcome to Locations/Moonfall City, a place where once upon a time the largest deposits of Moon Dust were mined and factories produced all manner of Moonshine and magical technologies. For a while that made it one of the richest cities in our nation. That wealth is on full display with towering buildings, beautiful sculptures, swinging clubs, and sharp dressed people. Most of the powerful in the city are still trying to pretend they’re as wealthy and powerful as the times before the war and the Prohibition. But new powers are rising in Locations/Moonfall City. Speakeasies and back alley deals with organized and not so organized crime are the main ways people can get their Moonshine, and that is the way the money is flowing right now.

But that also brings those even less scrupulous, willing to offer bad Shine, straight Dust or even raw New Moon to the desperate if they’re willing to part with their money. And aside from producing and selling the stuff, harvesting has created its own little black market. Hunters will venture into the wilds, or even the worse off districts of the city and try to bag themselves some Lunatics to sell to these groups, no questions asked. And desperate folks hear about caches of unclaimed Dust out in the wilds all the time and venture into danger just for the chance at some of the more natural stuff. Sometimes they find it, but they usually find trouble too.

Then there are those who are more morally inclined doing their best, offering rituals and spell services in dimly lit parlors for a small fee to those who can’t afford the Shine themselves. The police and government are up to their eyeballs trying to enforce the Prohibition on top of their regular duties. And finally, while the Celestials in our sky have gone near silent, their watchful orbit does occasionally grace someone with one of their questionable bargains for power and Children of the Celestials still roam our streets like shadows watching and judging us.

All the while the music plays, the money moves, the powerful party and the poor just try to get by. Again, welcome to Locations/Moonfall City. Hope you brought some friends to watch your back.