Magical Guilds
The Cabinet
The Cabinet is a secret council of twelve masters of psionic magic. They oversee instructors, who in turn train hundreds of psionic latents. The Cabinet’s instructors often also serve as neutral advisors to many nations and are dispersed across Ancerra, serving as translators, diplomats, and long-distance telepathic communicators. A representative from the Cabinet serves as a symbol of status and lends legitimacy to a nation’s leader.
When one of the Cabinet’s twelve masters knows that they will soon pass on, they choose a protege to take their place. This is generally a well-respected member of the Cabinet with a strong record as an instructor or advisor. When one of the Cabinet’s twelve masters finally dies, their physical body deteriorates, but their Essence lives on in a shared Mind Palace accessible by all of the twelve.
The Cultivators
Cultivators typically practice divine magic, and if they do not then they still ascribe to the higher principles of their gods - especially Tovare, the head matron of the Celestial Council. They take vows of poverty, humility, and chastity and commonly travel throughout Ancerra to the poorest communities to help them develop. Some Cultivators travel to many communities over the course of their lives, never settling down, and others (typically the wiser ones) focus on one or two key communities and spend their whole lives and livelihoods helping those specific communities.
Cultivators that settle in specific communities often become cherished members of society, while those that travel around more can be seen as out of touch.
The Fixers
The Fixers is an institution of psionic casters that boasts thousands of members throughout Ancerra. They primarily view themselves as the solutions to direct problems like collapsed bridges or roving monsters. They travel their regions to collect bounties, defeat monsters that are troubling settlements, and telekinetically repair infrastructure.
Haven Conclave
The Haven Conclave are guides and sentinels skillful in the natural world. Many members of the Haven Conclave are rangers, oracles, and witches, and most can use at least a little primal magic. Haven cloisters offer shelter and solace from the storm. Haven sentinels stand on the edges of the more depraved elements of wilderness, defending innocent settlements and beasts alike from unnatural threats. Guides often offer their services to merchants or adventuring parties struggling to navigate a fearsome land.
The Hierophants
The Hierophants are an esoteric divine organization. Prophets of the avadri, the Hierophants believe that they can learn to divine the future by deciphering the coding written into the universe. The organization is small and reclusive, but widespread. If one knows where to look and whom to ask after, a clever investigator can usually find a Hierophant alcove.
Illuminati
An order of arcane casters who consider themselves more knowledgeable and more discerning than any other order, the Illuminati master arcane divining, enchanting, and illusory magic. Members of the Illuminati keep their affiliation secret and communicate with one another covertly. Members of the Illuminati range from prominent scholars to minor nobles to monarchs of entire kingdoms. They use their collective wealth, knowledge, and influence to steer the geopolitics of Gathandia as they see fit. While they strive to keep the whole of Gathandia safe and peaceful, their means are often seen as invasive. The largest concentration of Illuminati dwell in Valstrom, and Valstrom’s monarch is one of the preeminent members of the organization.
Lights from Below
Colloquially known as Lebellos or Elbes, the Lights from Below is a small wing of psions dedicated to improving Ancerra. The Lights from Below use their telekinetic powers to construct bridges and dig wells. Those with psionic powers of persuasion will dissuade bandits and monsters from their violent actions. Members of the Lights from Below do not seek wealth or fame from the outside world, taking internal satisfaction in their work. While traveling, full members will nurture young latents. Their headquarters, the Hall of Heroes, is a massive hall carved into a mountain face in the Cloudpiercer Range. It is filled with statues and frieze sculptures that depict heroes from the organization and their famous adventures.
Path of Ascendancy
The Path of Ascendancy is an infamous school of the occult. Ascendants profess that anyone can become a god in their own right if they try hard enough and are willing to sacrifice enough; this sacrifice comes with immense physical and mental toll. For new initiates in the Path to advance in rank, they must bring in additional new initiates.
Ascendants cast their magic by drawing intricate, beautifully complex geometric shapes. Many Ascendants get these shapes tattooed on themselves as signs of rank, belonging, and power.
The Great Ascendant is the leader of the Path. Although once human, he has undergone so many permanent transformations that he now looks like an archfiend. He has goat legs, huge claws, cat eyes, ram horns, a snake’s tongue and fangs, and enormous bat wings. Every inch of once- human flesh has been burned and branded so many times that it’s as tough as leather and as red as raw meat. His skin is also covered in geometric tattoos that are never quite symmetrical.
Reweavers
A widespread and decentralized organization of arcane casters specializing in alchemy and altering, members of the Reweavers are a welcome sight in any struggling town. Capable of quickly repairing and rebuilding basic objects and even whole buildings, Reweavers believe that their magical powers should be freely shared with those in need. Reweavers are generally content to receive a modest income and free room and board for their services, caring not for great wealth. While the Reweavers do not have an official home and can be found in most nations, they are most active in Anedonia and Doshairiel. They used to operate widely in the region that is now Roshallan, but as the empire took over many of the Reweavers looked elsewhere. Roshallan’s effective infrastructure and its tyrannical rule gave Reweavers both little reason to stay, and great reason to leave.
Savants of the Pale
By focusing on the mystical mists of the Pale, members of this cryptic institution learn how to hide and obscure their tracks. They believe that this is of fundamental importance, because once they become experts at hiding their magical presence, they can steal more powerful abilities from gods and planar beings and escape undetected, free to use their newfound powers however they please. Casters from this group are notable for wearing deep, hooded cloaks and for casting occult magic by singing strange, dissonant choral melodies.
Soothsayers
A monastic collection of hermits, most of whom have oracular abilities, dwell in the Cloudpiercer Range in and around Betaal. As their numbers have grown, some have migrated and started new monastic communities to the south and west. These folk, known as the Soothsayers, have untold powers of divining. They typically keep to themselves, living within their own monasteries and only traveling into the greater world when they feel that a great prophecy must be shared. Some Soothsayers share prophecies with specific kingdoms or even specific people, while others prophesy to a broader audience.
The founder of the Soothsayers, Elindira Stavrelyden, began manifesting psionic divining abilities even before magic was widespread. She predicted the Tear exactly one year before it happened, down to the very minute.
Storm Conclave
Members of the Storm Conclave are vengeful naturalists trying to burn down society and return everyone to hunter- gatherer lifestyles, as this is the way that they believe nature intended for humanity to live. They especially target international trading groups such as the WGC, or popular routes utilized by intercity merchants such as the Golden Road, trying to destabilize the veins of modern living and return the world to its days of so-called glory.
Surrogates
A small and ambitious group of arcanists, the Surrogates specialize in summoning magic, taking their name from the fact that they conjure forth other creatures to act in their place. Primarily operating in Doshairiel and Nalathesh, the Surrogates strongly oppose the Unsoiled. The Surrogates profess that reanimating a corpse to do manual labor or any other task is disrespectful to the memory of the person, and that summoning other creatures is not only more humane, but also more effective as one can summon a creature suited to the task at hand. The Unsoiled, in turn, argue that any living creature should be free to do as it wishes while the dead see to the grunt work of society. The two groups often get into verbal - and sometimes physical - bouts with one another.
Unsoiled
Some arcanists hold that the greatest stain on humanoid achievement is death. None have been able to outsmart it or outrun it. Some powerful psions live on as ghostly presences in their mind palaces, and some druids - especially elven druids - might live for a thousand or more years before they die, but even they cannot guarantee that their bodies will never fade.
The Unsoiled find this an abomination. With a contemporary understanding of magic, surely a person ought to live forever if they wish to. The Unsoiled are expert necromancers who generally use their magical abilities to help their communities. They will raid graveyards and animate skeletons to perform manual labor around a town, freeing up other folk to relax or pursue other activities. This has been well-received in some communities, but others find the presence of the Unsoiled unnatural and repulsive. Many of the Unsoiled also aggressively pursue experimentation on humanoid corpses, trying to discern a way to extend a body’s livelihood indefinitely.
A majority of Unsoiled are well intentioned and are harmless to the public, if a bit creepy. Some, however, become transfixed by their fascination with death, and this obsession consumes them. Most famous among these is Mirva the Carver. Mirva was a Gavarese halfling with a relatively normal life. She practiced some arcane magic, but was more concerned with tending her family, including her two sons and her daughter. When a monster razed her town and tragically slaughtered her family, she turned to necromancy to revive her husband and her three children. Unfortunately, they were only shells of their former selves, so Mirva continues to seek enough power and understanding to restore their personalities. She wanders the southern Cloudpiercer Range, murdering anyone who loses their way and raising more and more corpses into her service.
Vigil
A large, decentralized denomination that worships all Celestials and Avatars - especially those that have a militant attitude against evil and corruption, members of Vigil or “Vigilants” have sworn to protect the innocent and weak from threats that lie beyond. Some branches of Vigil are welcome in settlements that fear attacks from monsters. While all branches of Vigil are founded on good intentions, there are totalitarian branches of Vigil that do more harm than good.
W.A.N.D.
W.A.N.D. (Worldwide Arcanists who Neutralize Danger) is a large and widespread organization of mages and arcanists. Their headquarters is officially in Constel on the east coast, but W.A.N.D. has regional strongholds across all of Gathandia and, according to their leaders, maintain a presence on Ancerra’s other continents as well. W.A.N.D.’s arcanists view themselves as magic-wielding soldiers, spies, and diplomats whose primary goal is the protection of Ancerra from extraplanar threats. Occasionally, if a tyrannical regime grows strong enough to threaten the world order, then W.A.N.D. might intervene, but they generally reserve their concerns for otherworldly threats. W.A.N.D. arcanists specialize in evoking and warding magic, but many arcanists choose a third function to focus on as well.