The Jovian Oaks

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“Aahh, yes…

The great, unearthly trees.

They hail from a land known as Jove,

Where the ground you walk is not of this world.”

Long ago, in ages not defined and when this realm was still young, great transpirations came to pass that plucked at the fabric of this corporeal plane. So great were these disturbances that the foundations of the mortal world trembled and shook; inciting tears in isolated lands never found by Men, and inviting the chaos of the Void into a place where order was prime. The peace of early ages was ruined in these great swathes of land and made victim to the realm of everything and nothing, malforming the material Creation which laid bare there. Many of these malformations came to rise, and when Men foresaw the antediluvian horror which they displayed, they named them as Stratum Lands - cursed places where the Void ruled all.

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Tucked away within the endless expanse of ocean was an isle ensnared with abundant life; trees abound, with their roots reaching all land above the waters. In this form, this land had no name; but as the great tremors of worldly disturbance took place, one of these many tears in corporeal fabric took place here. The Void reached out to this tract of nameless beauty and made it alien and not of this cosm - the trees were not spared and given the mercy of destruction like all other disasters would set upon them once arrived. The very land, and the oaks which inhabited it, were sent into the throes of corporeal madness. After the chaos settled and a Stratum Land was formed there, only then was it named Jove. The trees, warped by the insanity of both everything and nothing, cast out their twisted seeds; sent upon the wind to thrive elsewhere.

Carried by ocean breeze, most were sent plunging into the depths to drown. But those that arrived to lands far from Jove soon touched bountiful earth where it lingered and took root. As seeds of bedlam were sewn into orderly earth, a great divide took place where Creation and Void became one; Jovian Oaks, which grew so alien, yet so deeply connected to the soil it sprouted from. The un-design of the Void both submitted and mastered the laws of Creation within the Jovian Oaks, yet the same was had for the other way around. These figments of twisted life came to grow as anomalies and half-breeds of the most existential level. So grand was the innate potential invested in these malformations that something close to souls formed within them -- as if set upon the earth like Men, the Jovian Oaks gained sentience.

With such capacity, the “reach” of the Jovian Oaks became substantial. Like a single, great sense, they felt the lingering spirits of Men far from where they were rooted, and sapped their nature like forlorn parasites. The nature of Men became a part of their very being; where they were once as automatonic as Golems, they came to behold both the warmth and wickedness of mortals, and thus were shaped by them. The Jovian Oaks became divided between two spectrums. Such a fate is ironic for them - for, as shocking combinations of the Void and Creation, it was Men which split them all apart, and made one alien species two.

The Kind and the Wicked took shape. The Kind Jovians bore visages of curling, smooth bark and leaves like rose petals, with minds containing every goodness that Men were born capable of. The Wicked Jovians bore visages of jagged, rough bark, leafless and thorny and gray, where the deepest dark that resided within mortals coursed through them like vicious, formless blood. Each Jovian Oak gained true expression by adopting the extremes of Men, and thus kept rooted in the earth to ponder their most bizarre existence forevermore - left astray to wait for other life to greet them, Men or not.

Innate within each of them was the capacity to become great and whole as their true tree brothers were, yet powerful and endlessly so by the deep binding their untimely spirits had with the vastness of the Void. From thin air they could bring things into existence; every form of Voidal magic was theirs and so powerful was their means of evocation that the most sacrosanct aspects of the mortal world could be mimicked by them. Yet, still, it was all a farce; all a falsity. Try as they might, they could summon what they wished into their vicinity, only for it to disperse back into the realm of everything and nothing where it originated. It is the Kind Jovians that would come to use their gifts for good deeds, and the Wicked Jovians to ensue the suffering that made them buckle in such warped ways.

Men who came upon them wrote in legend they were but magical trees, where their temperaments were split between divisive extremes strikingly similar to that of mortals. But they could not realize the very jarring truth, nor could the Jovians themselves; for all they knew is that they hailed from a land afar, where the ground you walk upon was not of this world.

With the malformed recreation of Jove, the seeds spread afar bore what could only be known as an “inheritance”. The Void did breathe deep upon them; and when things take shape in the Void, they took shape as Horrors. By inheriting the chaos of the everything and nothing, yet carrying themselves upon the winds with material form, Jovians were fated to inherit the same status as Voidal Horrors. But planted in the earth as agents of the Stratum, they were subjected to the far-off nature of Men, which was evidently so strong that it made them more alike the prime creations of the Creator than the nightmares they were fated to mimic.

Kind Jovian Oaks

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“They make better saints than Men could

ever conceive. The fire is not for them;

the world would weep with their loss.”

Shaped into truly selfless beings by the distant nature of Men, Kind Jovians stand to represent every good aspect of sentient mortal nature. There is not a single iota of bitterness which lines their bark, not a foul thought that crosses their incomprehensible minds, not a slightest spread of rot within a single petal which they hold high. To pagans of yore, Kind Jovian Oaks are coveted so deeply for their undying benevolence that some tribal folk even regarded them as Gods, for all these saintlike entities ever wished to do is bless all who come across them and better their lives. Records carved upon stone tablets say that offerings to Kind Jovians enables them to grant miracles to those in their vicinity, and companionship - not worship - easily goaded these otherworlders to speak timeless wisdoms into the minds of the few that kept close to their roots.

The forlorn came to the Kind Jovians and begged; and found their legs able to stand, severed limbs regained, eyesight returned, pain eased. Even when the Kind Jovians bore the slightest of sadnesses that they could not share their blessings beyond the reach of their roots, those that marveled them insisted it did not matter -- for those who came to them were enough to be helped. Even in times of great peril, when Men of yore rushed to these blessed trees for safety, so selfless were the Kind Jovians than some even sacrificed themselves for the sake of those in need. And as if they were but evocations themselves, their depthlessly humble spells caused them to fade into nothing, back into the endless Void once the deed was done with not a trace left behind.

Wicked Jovian Oaks

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“There is no known depth of

darkness to them; for they are

sick with every kind of wickedness.

Ruin ought to be cast upon them all,

before they bring the same to those

who fall into their ill presence.”

Legends are not written of Wicked Jovians; only warnings. Not a trace of warmth is set upon their cold husk, not the most meagre kindness or mortal genuinity amid their branches, not even the darkest of white lies in their whispers. No good deed dwell the minds of foul Wicked Jovian Oaks, for theirs embodies the darkest Men’s minds can become. They dream of chaos where peace is settled - fire upon forests which nurture them to life. They seek illness where disease hasn’t drifted for centuries, and curses upon the most innocent of the living. As Kind Jovians simply cannot summon even the smallest spite, Wicked Jovians cannot bring themselves to know good. They are snakes in treeborn shape, with many tails twisted firmly into the undeserving earth.

When Men come into their presence, all they come to know is affliction. While Kind Jovians are incapable of blessing the actual world around them with their deep Voidal magic, Wicked Jovians are very much capable of contorting their plane of residence, for there is such a destructive power innate with them that a cataclysm can be unleashed upon their whim - with pause only made for their own sake. So confounded is their ruinous Voidal arts that they are capable of placing actual curses onto living beings with forms of suffering limitless - eventually erased, for the Void can only procure mimicries, yet with all the damage possible being done before that point of release. Some harrowing tales of Wicked Jovians say that the most powerful of them can bewitch Men and keep them cursed for years, even miles and miles away from the vile otherworldly oaks, for the determination to cause undoing is so vicious and strong that their range can last far beyond their roots.

The worst of Men have worshiped the Wicked Jovians as the best of Men have made Kind Jovians their companions, friends and wisest of sages. But these dire entities force their worshipers to earn the privilege of praising them instead of welcoming it; and when they know their agents of chaos are honed by the agonies they cast upon them, they cast them out into the world to ensue havoc where their roots cannot reach. Even when rare, these beings are a blight upon the world, and those that have witnessed the realm’s passaging ages gather such fury that their lust for ruin matches that of Iblees himself. It is only the power they lack.