ORNITHOCRACY: A Parliament Of Feathers is a setting for a fantasy live role-play, focusing on Politics, Trade, Confrontation and Player-Driven Plot.
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When human Minds sleep, the soul ascends to the Dreaming, becoming part of a world of endless vistas, untold stories and impossible outcomes. The rulers of this world are the Birds, The Winged, whose spirits walk the Dreaming at night much like Man walks the Dirt in the day. The Dreaming Soul brings with it it's aspirations, fears, joys, needs and dreams. In the Dreaming, these are currency.
Most of these Human Dreams mingle with the world, blessing the sleeper with visions. Sometimes, they wander, untouched across the many unchartable, changing territories of The Dream. With purpose.
The Storm, the endless thunder & tempest of unsteady fears and crackling nightmarish terrors. In these great flashes of horror live the colossal castle towers of The Most Noble House Of Raptor, ancient fortresses older than memory, older than history, catacombs containing relics older than understanding.
The River, the stream of conciousness that flows from The Beginning to The End, ideas and shades moving beneath the surface. Upon it's surface travel the cities & castles of The River-States, the Swan dominated trade centres of Desire.
The occasional patches of Dirt, human memories of civilization, large monolithic images of buildings and great achievements, collected together in chaotic testaments to creation. The Pigeons were the first to colonise these memories, and have built great travelling cities around them, scavengers, pioneers & industrialists all.
The unstoppable Green, nature's oldest wrath, a veridian plague of wrath and primal urge that breaks through imagination's constructions. Civilization has been spurned by those that reside with the Green's branches, rabbles of anarchic Tits & Finches, armies of barbaric Grouse & Pheasants.
The Tumult, the surging, churning, endless sea of All Emotion, upon which sail the most fantastical of dreams and adventures, and beneath which lie the most confusing and frorgotten of waking visions. Sailing it's waves are the great flotillas & city-ships of The Wavefarers, Gulls & Comorants ripe fora dventure pillaging the tumult for all it's worth.
Deserts of Fugue, terrifying Dream static & silence, no memory, colour or image to be seen for nights. Travelling in their great pyramids and military Caravans are the anachronistic Fading Eye, a great lost civilization of yesteryear, Vultures & their Falcon masters returned to sow despair & suffering once more.
The Shade, the shadows cast by great Storm falshes and memories' monuments, great shadowy valleys of humanity's darkest, most secretive memories. Neon lights in the jet shadows are the Corvids of The Mourning Veil, artists & expressionists of suffering, from Jay actors and Jackdaw spies to Crow assassins & Rook psychopomps.
And above them all, The Abyss, a great black maw above creation, above the Dreaming, Night where the Stars don't shine, determined to consume all in it's jaws. Dreaming Souls that float up inside it are lost forever.
But inside that maw is a single flickering coloured speck, the distant and alien world of The Xenos, the strange bright travelers, explorers & invaders from beyond understanding.
And not in one place, not in one dreamscape, but in any, in all, can live The Parliament, the living embodiment of The Winged's control over the Dreaming Souls of Man.
The Parliament Of Feathers gathers to watch select human dreams that escape the Dreaming's landscape, make judgement, and sometimes, fight over the human souls for their own needs or enjoyment.
The Coteries of The Winged have long, turgid hatreds and relationships with each other, willing to befriend and betray in order to empower their Roosts.
Birdsong is as deadly a weapon as a blade - able to channel one's faith into song in order to empower your family, talk to your patron, or argue against another singer's statement.
But there are other threats to the Coteries too - The Xenos, all colours and noise. The Lost, all bones and memories. The Cuckoo, all hunger and shadows.
The Coteries must fight against each other for their own survival, or be crushed under the weight of human dreaming.
