Is Raya Royalty
Charise Scrivner
Members of the Carian Royal Family were prolific magic users and erstwhile heads of the Academy of Raya Lucaria, who were famous for developing their own glintstone sorceries.[1] They originated from the mist-laden region in the west of the Lands Between, known as Liurnia of the Lakes.
The Carian Royal Family would reach its peak under Rennala, Queen of the Full Moon. In her youth, she was a prominent champion who would go on to charm the academy with her lunar magic, becoming its master. She also led the Glintstone Knights and established the house of Caria as royalty.[2]
The Carian Royals have always been closely associated with the western coast of Liurnia,[3] which is the location of their estate, the Caria Manor, as well as the Three Sisters region immediately behind it. Another location of importance was the Carian Study Hall, a large library in eastern Liurnia that connects to the region's Divine Tower.[4]
The Carian royals were served by magic preceptors notable for large hats with the movements of the stars drawn on the inside of the brim,[5] as well as on their bright blue gowns.[6] All glintstone sorcerers are the descendants of astrologers, a fact that the Carians remained aware of.[5] The astrologers preceded the sorcerers and had established themselves in mountaintops that nearly touched the sky, and considered the Fire Giants their neighbors.[7] They would read fate in the stars, but alas, the night sky no longer cradles fate.[8]
However, the Carian royal family were mostly known for the famous enchanted knights that served them. These enchanted knights, anointed by the Lunar Queen, were heroes of the highest honors,[9] and served as direct retainers to the kingdom's princesses.[10] Their swords were embedded with blue glintstone, and could serve as catalysts, letting them wield sorcerous battle skills. Despite numbering fewer than twenty, this power made them a match for even the champions of gold in battle.[11] They combined this art with their swordsmanship to maintain pressure upon their foes, striking in waves of steel and sorcery.[12] The Carian knights never wavered, and even had sorceries that could alleviate the buildup of sleep or madness.[13] There were also enchanted troll knights among their number, comrades of young Rennala, bound by oath.[14] They were called into service when the Queen invoked an oath they swore. These trolls were treated as true knights of Caria, and would fight arm in arm with their human comrades.[15]
The famous Loretta was once a royal Carian knight,[16] and served as a personal guard to Carian royalty.[17] Despite fighting mounted and using a war sickle, her favored weapon was said to be the bow, and she developed sorceries imitating the power of a greatbow.[18] She would leave her service in search of a haven for Albinaurics,[19] but an apparition of her remains to defend Caria Manor to this day. Several Albinauric mages, such as Pidia, remained as servants to the Carian Royal family,[20] seemingly facing less persecution there then in other parts of the Lands Between.
The oldest sorcery devised by the Carians would conjure an enemy-seeking glintblade, and it would serve as a prototype for more enhanced sword-phalanx sorceries wielded by royal enchanted knights.[21] They also created sorceries that would conjure magic swords that could sweep, slice and pierce their enemies. Some sorceries were said to have been taught to them by the enigmatic Crystalians, to mark the swearing of an old concord.[22]
Due to the influence of the Carians,[23] the Lazuli Conspectus would eventually developed in the Academy. The scholars of this conspectus sought to master Carian sorcery, and viewed the moon as equal to the stars.[24] This would be seen as a heterodox pursuit, or even outright heresy,[25] by their colleagues at the academy.
When Queen Marika the Eternal established her new Age of the Erdtree, she dispatched a champion known as Radagon to lead her armies against the lands of Liurnia. Not much was known about Radagon before he joined the ranks in the Liurnian Wars,[26] but he was seen as a great champion with flowing red locks, and he would lead a great golden host to Liurnia, where he would meet Rennala in battle.[27]
Radagon would fight two wars against Rennala and the Academy,[28] both of which saw no clear victor.[29] Instead, Radagon eventually repented his territorial aggressions by cleansing himself with Celestial Dew,[30] swore his love to Rennala and became the husband of the Carian Queen.[31]
He married her at the Church of Vows,[32] and it would be this matrimonial union, and reconciliation between the houses of the Erdtree and the Full Moon[33] that would eventually have grave consequences for the Carians, as it was during the age of the Erdtree, that Carian astrology withered on the vine, as the fate once writ in the night skies had been fettered by the Golden Order.[34]
Rennala would bequeath Radagon with a greatsword,[35] to honor a long standing tradition in which a Moon Greatsword is bestowed by a Carian queen upon her spouse.[36] Upon entering into marriage with Rennala and joining the Carian line,[37] Radagon would order Carian magic preceptors to don masks of confidence, to make it clear that all of their matters were to be kept strictly private.[38] While husband to Rennala, he studied glintstone sorcery taught at the Academy.[39] Together, Radagon and Rennala would go on to have three children: Radahn, Rykard, and Ranni.
After Godfrey, the first Elden Lord, was hounded from the Lands Between, Radagon left Rennala to become the second husband and King Consort of Queen Marika, and would receive the title of second Elden Lord.[40] Queen Marika made Radagon's and Rennala's children her demigod stepchildren.[41] When Radagon left, Rennala's heart left with him.[42] Realizing their heartbroken queen was no champion at all, the Academy rebelled against the Carian royal family and Rennala would find herself under the assault of her own students, who would eventually lock her away in the grand library.[43]
Liurnia would descend into civil war, with the Carians and their retainers on one side,[44] and the Academy and its Knights of the Cuckoo on the other.[45] The soldiers of Raya Lucaria were known as the Cuckoos, as their symbol was a peering cuckoo bird, the bird's shrewd gaze an expression of their refusal to be mere servants of the academy.[46] They were given free rein by the scholars of the academy to wage war as they pleased, and they were infamous for their rapacious ways.[47] The Knights of the Cuckoo would use "faux sorceries"[48] and would be taught lesser spells by the academy as payment for their contract.[49][50] Meanwhile, the Carian royal family had secretly been preparing against the disloyalty of the academy by devising sorceries that could dispel incoming spells and retaliate with glintblades. The moon and stars would go their separate ways.[51]
The war would eventually lead to the siege of Caria Manor.[52] The Carians were taken of guard, but their strength had not yet fully waned, and they managed to repel the onslaught by conjuring a powerful enchanted snare that remains potent to this day.[53]
As the Lands Between fell into disarray, the last Carian Princess, Ranni,[54] made her way back to her family's ancestral home, where she would gather her allies and vassals in order to set her own plans into motion.[55] Her vassals included her faithful shadow, the Half-Wolf Blaidd,[56] her families old troll blacksmith Iji, who was now her war counsellor,[57] as well as Seluvis, a preceptor in the sorcerous arts.[58] She also won the loyalty of Glintstone Dragon Adula who swore a knightly oath to her and now guards the path to her tower.[59] The Tarnished can join the group and eventually become her consort as she ushers in her Age of the Stars.
Raya is a headstrong young woman who is mature and wisened for someone her age. She is a very capable person and is shown to easily adapt to situations around her. Despite her maturity, she retains a sense of humor and occasionally shows a bit of playfulness when such a moment presents itself. She deeply cares for her father and has a strong emotional attachment to certain people she considers her friends. Her biggest flaw is her inability to trust others. At a young age, though she was reluctant to trust anyone outside of her tribe, Raya did attempt to make with the other tribes, following her father's advice. However, upon being betrayed by Namaari, the princess of Fang, Raya's distrust over others grew worse as Namaari's betrayal caused the Dragon Gem to break, leading the return of the Druun and her father getting petrified. This led Raya to be overcome with grief and guilt where she grew extremely anti-social and blamed herself for her home and father's predicament. Except for Sisu, many of her new allies are immediately deemed suspicious or sinister in her eyes. Over time, she learns to overcome these issues and can see when someone is truly good. Raya is a very focused individual and is determined to see things through to the end.
Though Raya initially had trouble trusting others, she was able to recognize the good in people. She was even capable of sympathizing with others who suffered from the Druun, like her. This lead to Raya forming friendships with those who joined her on her quest, which slowly led her to start trusting people again.
Raya is an 18-year-old Southeast Asian girl of average height with a slender, slightly muscular build, tan skin, long black hair, and dark brown eyes. She usually wears a yellow shirt, a brown vest, a brown belt, olive green jeans with light green stripes, dark brown boots with maroon cuffs and dark gray soles, a red cape with a thin turquoise stripe, and a yellow necklace around her neck, and a salakot on her head. She also wears a blue band above her elbow and a thick brown wristband on her right arm.
Raya first appears in her youth, tested by her father for the role of the Guardian of the Dragon Gem, which gives the powers of Sisu and protects Heart from the Druun. She successfully passes and earns the title. Chief Benja invites the Tail, Talon, Spine, and Fang Lands to join in a feast. During the party, Raya befriends Princess Namaari of the Fang Land. They immediately bond and form a close friendship due to their shared interest in dragons. Namaari gives Raya a dragon-shaped pendant. In return, Raya reveals to Namaari the hidden location of the Dragon Gem, only to be ultimately betrayed by her. The other nations soon arrive at their location and fight over the orb. As a result, the Dragon Gem is shattered into five broken pieces and awakens the Druun. During the evacuation, Raya has trouble carrying her injured father to safety. Knowing they won't make it, Benja sacrifices himself to give Raya a piece of the orb and throws her off the bridge into the river below. As she falls, Raya is forced to watch her father get turned into a stone statue by the devouring plague and can only scream as the current drifts her away.
4a15465005