Pandora
Titles: The Winter Queen, Mistress of Pain
Domain: Pain, Control
Symbol: A frozen spear
Sphere Granted: Dark
Pandora is the Dark goddess of pain. She teaches her followers through its application as a means to enforce submission and control. Pandora followers believe that the experience of pain builds resistance and empowers self-control. Her followers are split between those who seek pain zealously and those who see it as a constant aspect of life to be explored. Some employ pain as a means of enlightenment; they see pain and hardship as a blessing, as suffering forces them to become stronger. Others are merciless sadists who enjoy torture, blood and the power that comes from it. In either case, both forms of worship understand that pain is more than just a physical concept. True pain comes in all manner of forms, and to deny its guiding hand is to deny a fundamental fact of life.
Pandora is a cold and stern teacher, despising any form of comfort or complacency. She treats her followers like children who must be forced to see the truth. Her power is vast, and fuelled largely in part by her chosen race, the Ice Elves. These Ice Elven followers number in the tens of thousands and revere her throughout their culture. It is a common belief that if Malagant is the Lord of the Dark Pantheon, the Mistress of Pain is most certainly its Lady.
The Ice Queen’s enemies are few, given her reclusive habitat in the frozen north. She and her chosen often battle the Einher of Mjoll to their south, while east of her icy domain she wars with the Firstborn white dragon, Zsiera. The goddess of the elves, Ll’yandra, who claims that Pandora stole her children, declared war on the Winter Queen after Pandora released the Mortigest into Ll’yandra’s celestial heaven in the year 2258. So great was this crime that Ll’yandra withdrew her protection from all Ice Elves, declaring them enemies of of the elven nations. While this comes as no surprise to many of Pandora’s Ice Elven followers, there are rumours that some feel betrayed by their adopted mother and have fled her domain to seek Ll’yandra’s forgiveness.
Contents
Appearance
Pandora is a solitary but powerful goddess who always appears to mortals as a winter hardened Ice Elf. She wears armour of frozen steel that exposes much of her near naked form. Upon her pale blue flesh, up to her shorn scalp, are a combination of tattoos and scars, forming a living tapestry of pain and suffering. Her eyes are frozen, pupil-less orbs of icy blue. If she wields a weapon, it is always an old battered spear, covered in a hardened layer of enchanted ice. This spear, called Nevasca, is as old as the goddess herself and is said to be fashioned from the bones and teeth of the Firstborn she killed, many ages ago.
Tenets
Five things a Pandora follower should do:
1. Demand control of yourself and others, whether that be by standing at the front or manipulating from behind.
2. Pain and suffering remove weakness and grant knowledge through perseverance and strength. Teach this to the worthy.
3. Hardship is a blessing. There is little to gain in taking the path most travelled. The most difficult path will reap the greatest suffering. Seek it.
4. Study the body and mind. Understand their functions and limitations. Employ that knowledge in your control over others.
5. Fear not violence but recognise that subjugating a mind to do your will is often a more effective means to achieve the same end.
Five things a Pandora follower should not do:
1. Limit your infliction of pain to solely the physical. Scar the mind and spirit as well. True misery is divine and should be indivisible from pleasure.
2. Grant mercy if you can learn from their pain.
3. Give anything freely which was not earned. Charity is a missed lesson in hardship.
4. Allow the Firstborn to usurp control or authority. Work towards disrupting their machinations through manipulation or violence.
5. Become complacent, for complacency breeds comfort and weakness. Once you have achieved your goals, tear them down and begin anew.