Lima Das

"Lima Das" is a Chelatti term that translates to "World Soul" in the Traders' Tongue. Among all but a few wise and scholarly humans, the term and its meaning are unknown, as it finds its roots back in the time when the Divine Artificers created the world known to the Chelat as Orbis, and to mankind as Rheya. However, the Lima Das is, to this day, the very essence of Orbis and everything that walks upon it, and plays a significant part in history and every living being's life.

The Lima Das is for the most part beyond the understanding of mortals, but in simplest terms, is everything but the stone that shapes the world. Every living thing, be it trees, grass, animals or sentient beings such as humanity and the Chelat, is a part of the Lima Das. It is the sole reason that the Divine Artificers created the world.

The Lima Das is an ever-growing phenomen, and has been since the creation of Orbis. With every child that's born and every tree that sprouts, the Lima Das grows, as all living things exist because of it. It is every being's soul and lifeforce.

Collect & Consume
As living entities grow older, stronger and wiser, the lifeforce within them grows with them. Eventually, the lifeforce of a being will have reached its full potential, and at that point, the being will die, and the lifeforce it contained is set free from its body, released into the world, to be collected by the Divine Artificers to empower and restore them at the end of the world's cycle. When a being's lifeforce is released upon their death, it is collected by several hidden, ancient artefacts of the Artificers that are scattered around Orbis. At the end of the cycle, these artefacts' stored energy is consumed by the Divine Artificers.

Discovery of the Sidec
Main article: Sidec

One such artefact was discovered by humanity during the Age of Man, when an enormous cave system was revealed unexpectedly in the heart of the Thyraenis Empire: Lynnea. Inside this cave system, the people of the empire found the artefact, shaped like a scythe. They, fittingly, named it the Sidec, which simply meant "scythe" in the Lynnean Tongue. It was discovered that the Divine Artificers, who the humans of that time had no knowledge of whatsoever, weren't the only ones capable of harvesting the energy stored within the artefact. Humanity began to study it, and though they became capable of using the lifeforce stored within for great, previously unimaginable things, they never truly understood the Sidec and its origins.

Near the end of the Age of Man and close to the fall of the Thyraenis Empire, however, something unexpected happened with the artefact that humanity had taken for granted. As the last of the energy stored within the Sidec was drained, it shattered with such force that the caves surrounding it were dissolved, and only a large crater remained in the landscape. The pieces of the Sidec were flung across the continent of Rheya, and though some of them were later found, the pieces, to the humans' knowledge, no longer contained the power the empire had begun to depend upon.

Mirakki & Chelat Magic
Upon their creation by the goddess Fel, the Chelat were granted wisdom the humans of today would have trouble understanding. Before her departure, Fel taught her Chelat of the ways of the Lima Das and why it must be protected from forces that would harm it to slow its growth. The Chelat, being created only for the protection of the Lima Das, were granted a fraction of Fel's divine power to help in this endeavour. They were given the power to alter the Lima Das, and with it, the minds and movements of living organisms.

The Mirakki, the order founded at the end of the Age of Man, marking the beginning of the Age of Magic,