Dwam (History)

Creation Era

A long time ago, Amur and Rima--the twin gods of dreams and nightmares--created the world of Dwam as a place where the dreams of mortals could go once they came into existence, as such dreams left to run wild became dangerous. Wild dreams poisoned the minds of mortals and caused them to bring harm to others. When dreams reach Dwam they crystalize, becoming what Amur called dreamstones. These sparkling stones of assorted size and colour came to rest all over Dwam’s surface, glittering in the light.

Amur spent her time wandering among the dreamstones, staring into their centers to watch the assorted dreams held within them. She was endlessly fascinated by the strange things that mortals dreamt, for though she was the god of dreams she herself couldn’t dream as she never slept.

Rima was less fascinated by these dreamstones. All the stones formed by nightmares were quickly purified by his sister, leaving him with little to do. Regular dreams bored him. It wasn’t long before he wandered off on his own, taking a dreamstone with him to see if there was anything else that could be done with them.

After some experimenting, Rima brought life from the dreamstone. He was so pleased with himself that he called Amur over to show her. She was appalled by what he’d done and demanded that he destroy it. Rima was furious. He yelled at his sister, claiming that he had nothing to do on Dwam and he was bored. Creating this creature had at least kept him entertained.

Amur pondered this while studying the creature again. It was hideous, but beyond basic plant life nothing lived on Dwam. She admitted that other living things would be nice, but she had conditions. The one Rima had made was an abomination. If life was going to exist on Dwam, they should create it together.

As proud as Rima was of his creation, the promise of being able to make more and better ones was far too tempting. He took the creature away to dispose of it.

The twins spent the next century converting dreamstones into creatures that would come to be called speerites. They quickly realized that not all dreamstones were suitable for this process, nor would they be able to do this forever. They made alterations to Dwam’s air that would affect the stones themselves. Ones that met certain size parameters could potentially open and become speerites.

Other changes had to be made to Dwam to support the speerites. New plants and animals were made to help and nourish them. The gods didn’t require sustenance, but they knew from the dreams of mortals that such creatures required it.

When the speerite population was large and mature enough, the gods eased back and let them manage things on their own, assisting only when called on. They were called on less and less as time went on and eventually the gods went their own way, managing the flow of dreams into Dwam.

The eldest speerites don’t know how old Dwam really is. By the time they thought to ask it had been centuries since anyone had heard from Amur and no speerite in their right mind wanted to talk to Rima.

In the end, they shrugged it off. It simply wasn’t that important to them.

Blossoming Era

The speerite population was fully independent from the gods and had spread out into a couple different settlements. By this point, there was so much dream energy pouring into Dwam that it was beginning to affect the larger ecosystem. They were small changes at first. New plant species appeared. Animals that tried to eat the new plants either died from it or found themselves being altered. That was how the first of the fluffy kurowca came into being.

Smaller dreamstones that somehow became buried in the ground melded with plants and sprouted into abnormally large plants. They first appeared around speerite settlements. Being curious by nature, the speerites nurtured the odd plants until small creatures came out of the blossoms. These creatures were fascinating to the speerites and taken into their homes, treated as a kind of curiosity. The creatures appeared to eat the same kinds of foods that they did, although they had no masks and nothing to chew food with. As more of these creatures appeared it became something of a fad to take them in. They became a kind of pet to the speerites.

That was all well and good until they discovered that the creatures they decided to call virispree were capable of intelligence. This came as something of a surprise to the speerites who’d essentially had Dwam all to themselves up to that point. As the virispree grew and matured, their intelligence grew until they were on par with the speerites themselves.

At first, many didn’t like this, seeing this as if a kurowca had learned to talk overnight. Others took it in stride as they knew of their own origins. They took it upon themselves to look into the plants the virispree came from. After some searching they eventually found one with a small, cracked dreamstone in its roots. This was proof to them of their common origin. After some grumbling the others came around as well.

So the speerites continued to nurture the virispree sprouts until the first ones were old enough to take over this duty. Shortly after that the two species began to drift apart as they were quite different in needs and nature. Despite this they continue to acknowledge the bond they share.

Third Era

With the creation of the virispree, the speerites weren’t terribly surprised when trees near their settlement of Akata were showing abnormally large flowers. Those who remembered the early days of the virispree opted to watch these trees carefully. Sure enough, small creatures eventually emerged. They were similar in appearance to the young virispree but with distinct differences. Knowing what they knew, the speerites treated these new creatures as intelligent beings and were rewarded when the wilderspree-as they came to be known--developed much the same as their virispree cousins.

The wilderspree made their first settlement in the area where the first one emerged. They continue to revere the Mother Tree into the modern era. No harm may come to it and the most sacred oaths are sworn on her. Wilderspree that come from her are rare these days but are seen as lucky and special in some way.

Each wilderspree settlement has a Mother Tree at its heart, though none is as sacred as the first one.

The wilderspree revere speerites as their progenitors but would prefer not to have much to do with the virispree, seeing them as being too different. The virispree, on the other hand, resent the wilderspree. The younger race benefitted from the mistakes the speerites made with them, mistakes they never quite received an apology for.

Modern Era

No one has heard from either one of the gods in nearly two hundred years. This is distressing to the ones who still remember talking to Amur and Rima. The less longer lived virispree find it hard to be bothered by this. Wilderspree, who live longer and who may have had some contact with their gods, are a little disturbed. Most are bothered only because the speerites are so distressed and they’re taught to revere and trust the speerites.