Bone Lord
the Voices of Man
Bone Lord was a title of the leaders of the Neo Noch culture during the Randagri Period. A culture of mask wearers, the bone lords wore masks carved out of bone. By the end of this culture these would be made of full skulls. The bones used were usually Lizardfolk or Dragon, but archologist have fond Human skull masks in some surviving Neo Noch tombs.
Beginning as priests of the culture's cult of ancestor worship the bone lords eventually evolved from influencing the chiefs of the Neo Noch to becoming chieftains themselves. While often thought to be a title for one leader, due to few surviving, and often vague, records, we now known that the bone lord title was granting to every priest of the faith. Ancient texts suggest there were twenty priests at any given time to reflect the ancient Council of Man myths.
Some evidence suggests the bone lords discovered that the ancient ruins of Noch, that their city of Resh Noch was built upon, was a Shadowfell location. A place in the world where the vail between Aldern and Beyond Aldern was weak. Through this, it is suggested, they began communication with the Nod Noch Nine. This shifted their cult into worship of the "Old Ilu(god)", claiming them the ancestors of the Neo Noch.
It is common doctrine among the faithful of the Pantheon of Nine that the Bone Lord leadership had foreknowledge of the Gilgurth impact. How is lost to history, though the cult often claims Tyre, or one of the other Nine, told them of the coming event. There is some strong evidence of this, in that a powerful ritual was created pre-impact to channel the energy from the blast wave into Etu Enur through the Shadowfell of Resh Noch in an attempt to shatter the prison of the Nine.
While the ritual ultimately failed, it did give the Nine some access to the material world despite being still bound in Etu Enur. The ritual itself brought the death of the Bone Lord and most of the cult, which the expection of a single Bone Lord whose corpse was possessed by Tyre spirit, with the aid of Nyx. Tyre was this Bone Lord for much of the Randeris Period. Tyre, through this body, and title of Bone Lord, work to establish the foundations that would become the Pantheon of Nine. This single entity with the title Bone Lord was also the reason for early scholars believing there to be only one such leader in history. This Bone Lord is believed to be the first known Avatar in the world.
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