THE GREAT SOLSTITHEAN SCHISM
Initially, the people of Solstitheo accepted each god. It was agreed that each one offered their own path to salvation, their own method to the same transcendence. This resulted in the formation of a mixed pantheon of deities. You could find each citizen resonating to their own deity and, in many circumstances, even the reverence of an array of gods. All gods were regarded as equal in their power, no domain could overpower the other.
Some say it was the commonfolk drawing their faith into simple squabbles. Others, the fated failures of these mixed religions. But, the most promising theory for where the violence stemmed from were the prophets. Starting with simple tasks, preachings and condemnations, priests and other holy men garnered more followers to their places of worship. Then, the tasks grew more extreme; slander, theft, denunciations, violence, murder... Each church spiraled out of control, retaliating against one another in increasingly brutalizing fashions. The clergy's excuse? They held accountability to the whispers of their god, swaying them to blindly carry out these acts of cruelty.
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These microaggressions and acts of hate eventually spiraled out of control into what would be understood as the Great Solstitheian Schism when riots and brawls erupted in the capital. Citizens quickly dispersed themselves, forming under factions of their faith in fears for their safety. Cities destabilized into chaos as the military struggled to stifle the infighting; their own ranks weren't spared from the fury. The countryside witnessed the burning and slaughter of Annuatera-aligned hamlets by Partinax militias, the famines and disease striking isolated provinces of the empire by Annuaterra bioterrorists, and the kidnapping of innocent men, women, children by Solidaritus cultists to either be purged or experimented on. Within Edelith's walls, Totarash banners hung high and imperial enchanters silently brainwashed those still holding on to their innocence, circus festivities performed for the on-edge and bickering nobility were interrupted with coordinated slaughters by Hiebrief assassins, and mobs took to the streets to vandalize and capture religious offenders like a witch hunt.
This sporadic fighting defined a solemn few years of Edelith's history. Many lost sight of who they were fighting; friends, lovers, comrades, family. They lost sight of what they were fighting for, only viewing the conflicts as a means for survival and superiority. Eventually the fighting would have to diminish. It was too sudden, in fact. When a weakened Edelith just emerged from the ashes of civil war, so too did something else. Metallic and smelling of bile, it was the events of the Great Solstitheian Schism that allowed the Wake of Steel to be so devastating.
