Library of the Cobalt Soul
"Reason. Knowledge. Truth."
Under the enlightening scriptures of Ioun, The Knowing Mistress , teachers, priests, and monks who have been drawn to the calling of truth and knowledge spend their lives training within the Library of the Cobalt Soul. Rather than a single physical building, the Library of the Cobalt Soul is a collective term for the universal knowledge and philosophies upheld by those who follow Ioun’s teachings. The Cobalt Soul is guided by a central belief that true strength is found in understanding the world around you. Despite their idealism, the pursuit of truth is hampered by the realities of life in the Dwendalian Empire and beyond: politics, propaganda, and the dangers of the wilderness.
The Cobalt Soul is based in Rexxentrum but operates throughout the empire and across the whole of Exandria. Temples to Ioun under the management of the Cobalt Soul act as massive libraries called archives, usually located in larger cities and cultural centers. Its members come from all walks of life and are expected to assist in the maintenance, organization, and protection of the archives. Its satellite archives collect artifacts and research information both historical and contemporary along the Menagerie Coast and in the distant lands of Tal'Dorei , Issylra, and beyond.
Archivists act as administrators at each Archive, delineating tasks, overseeing the training of new members, and even negotiating for or purchasing artifacts and records—often from those unaware of their true value.
The monks of the Cobalt Soul are the enlightened knowledge-seekers of their order. They research places where ancient knowledge could be hidden and lead large-scale expeditions to these places.
Expositors are the covert agents of the Cobalt Soul. These enlightened infiltrators extract information that others would keep secret and use their newfound knowledge to better the world. As masters of acquisitions, expositors answer only their High Curator.
At the top of each Archive is a High Curator, who dictates the Archive’s goals to subordinates and uses this power to assign marks to expositors, outline allies and enemies to their archivists, and approve the expeditions proposed by monks.
The Cobalt Soul was founded within the Julous Dominion before the nation fell to the armies of the Dwendalian Empire. The Dwendalian Crown permitted the Cobalt Soul to be assimilated into the social hierarchy of the empire rather than destroying it. This was not an act of mercy, but a political maneuver; the Cobalt Soul was allowed to survive only to provide a sense of normalcy and appease the restless populace.
The Library has continued to work with and under the empire out of necessity, but its archivists are savvy political players—whenever possible, they avoid making moves that could put them in danger of being exploited by the Crown or the Cerberus Assembly . Nowhere is this tension more apparent than in the very existence of the militant truth-seekers of the Cobalt Soul: the expositors, rigorously trained to root out corruption and falsehoods. Behind the scenes, a silent war is brewing as expositors bring the dark secrets of the empire’s social elite out into the light.
Operating under the will of Ioun, and driven by curiosity and the desire to further universal understanding, the diverse agents of the Cobalt Soul seek to change the world for the better.
Yudala is a wise and respected figure who has spent most of their life fighting to protect and maintain the Rexxentrum Archive. They have mastered the art of parrying the Crown’s and the assembly’s attempts to subjugate the Archive and bring it under state control. For nearly two decades, they have been engaged in a battle of wills with the infuriated Theolocrat Kon Bruda—and they fear that Kon’s patience is at an end. His vengeance will be elaborate, exacting, and swift, or so Yudala fears. Their network of spies and expositors is frantically seeking to find and publicize evidence of Kon’s unlawful dealings and end the feud before it escalates further.
At 29 years old, Jamil A'alithiya is the youngest monastic high curator in the history of the Cobalt Soul. He is often underestimated by his contemporaries and uses that fact to his advantage.
High Curator Greisalda Cassios
Half-dragonblood leader of the Cobalt Reserve
The High Curator of the Westruun archive of the Cobalt Soul is a high-cheekboned, bald woman who would appear fully human if not for her slitted, silver eyes and the silver scales that run across her head, neck, and upper arms. She is regarded as one of the fastest minds in Tal’Dorei, for she has the rare gift of perfect recall. Monks tremble when her clear, unpretentious voice rings through an archive chamber, for Greisalda remembers acts of justice and personal slights with equal intensity, making her a powerful ally and a furious enemy. She is concerned that corruption is spreading throughout the Tal’Dorei Council.
Cressida Holt
Orc expositor of the Cobalt Reserve
The name Cressida Holt is synonymous with style and effortless charisma—and also a blunt, merciless coldness. Cressida is nonbinary, and uses both she and they pronouns interchangeably. Though she's fresh blood to the expositors of the Cobalt Reserve, she has already taken advantage of her license to kill on her espionage missions. They are slim for an orc, but still more muscular than many of their human colleagues. Their assignments take them across Tal’Dorei in search of political corruption. She is currently stationed in Emon to observe a person of interest on the Tal’Dorei Council, where she alternates between lurking on rooftops and striding through ballrooms in fine suits.
Archivist Salomane Rothtree
Half-elf archivist of the Cobalt Reserve
A haggard, overworked administrator, Archivist Rothtree is known throughout the Cobalt Reserve as someone who tries too hard to prove himself and constantly bites off more than he can chew. Half-orc and half-elf, he has said that he hopes to accomplish as much in his lifetime as an elf could in theirs. He often is tasked with helping adventurers find information. Though he resents the task, he may slowly open up to heroes who treat him well.
Expositor Sia KreshPublic Agenda
Untold knowledge was lost when the Calamity brought the Age of Arcanum to its fiery end, and so too was the case when Ioun was mortally wounded in that terrible war. Since that day, the Cobalt Soul and their progenitors have sought to recover what was lost. They hope that, in time, their tireless effort will eventually usher all societies to an enlightened future.
Ioun is still wounded, but her wisdom and grace has returned to the world—at least in part. Under the guidance and wisdom of their patron god, members of the Cobalt Soul seek to enlighten themselves through study and research. They devote their lives to studying the mysteries of the world, and turning that knowledge to protect it from another Calamity. To this end, the Library makes the immense breadth of knowledge within their archives available to anyone and everyone who seeks to educate themselves—though some secrets are so potent that they must remain hidden from the public until the proper time.
Empires thrive on misinformation and propaganda, yet it is necessary for the Cobalt Soul to operate within the Dwendalian Empire . As such, the Cobalt Soul works to provide the truth to those who will listen, to covertly update revisionist history, and to remove false information before it can spread too far. Unfortunately, imperial agents and even spies from foreign powers have successfully infiltrated the Library over the centuries, and some of their attempts to rewrite fact and history in favor of their own interests have succeeded. In response, the Library has had to construct a powerful, hidden force of expositors to defend their texts from manipulation and uncover truths that remain guarded.
The Library tries to remain autonomous, but their agents within the Dwendalian Empire are under constant siege by Theolocrat Kon Bruda, a once-respected monk of the Cobalt Soul who is now just another corrupt lackey of the Crown. Bruda and the archivists wage a quiet battle of wills and subterfuge, each trying to outsmart and undermine the other. This situation, combined with the empire’s efforts to prevent the education of their people, has created palpable unrest within the Library.
The perceptive ears of the expositors often hear rumors of unwholesome practices behind closed doors within the Soltryce Academy and other places under the Cerberus Assembly’s oversight. The Library is concerned about the assembly’s secretive cabal but has thus far been unable to infiltrate deep enough to uncover anything damning.
Meanwhile, a small number of volunteers from within the Library have agreed to travel deep into Xorhas in the hopes of communicating with the Kryn Dynasty to learn more about their mysterious society, and to understand the level of threat they pose to the people of Western Wynandir and beyond. None of the volunteers have yet returned.
In Marquet, the Library's seat of power is the Temple of the Mentor in Ank'Harel, a temple to Ioun founded nearly 150 years ago. The archivists there focus on rooting out evil in the city's civilian factions—principally the Consortium of the Vermillion Dream, whose members reportedly wield magic weapons made of some strange red mineral the likes of which no Cobalt Soul Archivist has ever seen. The faction is wary of the Allegiance of Allsight's fascination with Cael Morrow, but as fellow academic insitutions, the Allegiance and the Cobalt Soul work together most of the time, sharing resources from their libraries.
Under the enlightening scriptures of Ioun, The Knowing Mistress , teachers, priests, and monks who have been drawn to the calling of truth and knowledge spend their lives training within the Library of the Cobalt Soul. Rather than a single physical building, the Library of the Cobalt Soul is a collective term for the universal knowledge and philosophies upheld by those who follow Ioun’s teachings. The Cobalt Soul is guided by a central belief that true strength is found in understanding the world around you. Despite their idealism, the pursuit of truth is hampered by the realities of life in the Dwendalian Empire and beyond: politics, propaganda, and the dangers of the wilderness.
The Cobalt Soul is based in Rexxentrum but operates throughout the empire and across the whole of Exandria. Temples to Ioun under the management of the Cobalt Soul act as massive libraries called archives, usually located in larger cities and cultural centers. Its members come from all walks of life and are expected to assist in the maintenance, organization, and protection of the archives. Its satellite archives collect artifacts and research information both historical and contemporary along the Menagerie Coast and in the distant lands of Tal'Dorei , Issylra, and beyond.
Archivists act as administrators at each Archive, delineating tasks, overseeing the training of new members, and even negotiating for or purchasing artifacts and records—often from those unaware of their true value.
The monks of the Cobalt Soul are the enlightened knowledge-seekers of their order. They research places where ancient knowledge could be hidden and lead large-scale expeditions to these places.
Expositors are the covert agents of the Cobalt Soul. These enlightened infiltrators extract information that others would keep secret and use their newfound knowledge to better the world. As masters of acquisitions, expositors answer only their High Curator.
At the top of each Archive is a High Curator, who dictates the Archive’s goals to subordinates and uses this power to assign marks to expositors, outline allies and enemies to their archivists, and approve the expeditions proposed by monks.
The Cobalt Soul was founded within the Julous Dominion before the nation fell to the armies of the Dwendalian Empire. The Dwendalian Crown permitted the Cobalt Soul to be assimilated into the social hierarchy of the empire rather than destroying it. This was not an act of mercy, but a political maneuver; the Cobalt Soul was allowed to survive only to provide a sense of normalcy and appease the restless populace.
The Library has continued to work with and under the empire out of necessity, but its archivists are savvy political players—whenever possible, they avoid making moves that could put them in danger of being exploited by the Crown or the Cerberus Assembly . Nowhere is this tension more apparent than in the very existence of the militant truth-seekers of the Cobalt Soul: the expositors, rigorously trained to root out corruption and falsehoods. Behind the scenes, a silent war is brewing as expositors bring the dark secrets of the empire’s social elite out into the light.
Figures of Interest
Operating under the will of Ioun, and driven by curiosity and the desire to further universal understanding, the diverse agents of the Cobalt Soul seek to change the world for the better.
High Curator Loman Turray, Herald of the Zadash Archive
Lawful neutral, male human
Curator Turray has held the position of High Curator of the Valley Archive in Zadash and the title of Herald of the Archive under the Crown for over forty years. He faces increasing pressure to instill his subordinates with loyalty to the Crown, and he is slowly giving in to imperial indoctrination. He fears that enforcing the will of the Crown when it contradicts the philosophies of the Library will cause his own colleagues to depose him — which only leads him further into the Crown’s protective embrace.
Curator Turray has held the position of High Curator of the Valley Archive in Zadash and the title of Herald of the Archive under the Crown for over forty years. He faces increasing pressure to instill his subordinates with loyalty to the Crown, and he is slowly giving in to imperial indoctrination. He fears that enforcing the will of the Crown when it contradicts the philosophies of the Library will cause his own colleagues to depose him — which only leads him further into the Crown’s protective embrace.
High Curator Yudala Fon, Herald of the Rexxentrum Archive
Lawful good, agender half-elf
Yudala is a wise and respected figure who has spent most of their life fighting to protect and maintain the Rexxentrum Archive. They have mastered the art of parrying the Crown’s and the assembly’s attempts to subjugate the Archive and bring it under state control. For nearly two decades, they have been engaged in a battle of wills with the infuriated Theolocrat Kon Bruda—and they fear that Kon’s patience is at an end. His vengeance will be elaborate, exacting, and swift, or so Yudala fears. Their network of spies and expositors is frantically seeking to find and publicize evidence of Kon’s unlawful dealings and end the feud before it escalates further.
High Curator Jamil A'alithiya, Herald of the Ank'Harel Archive
Chaotic good, male human
At 29 years old, Jamil A'alithiya is the youngest monastic high curator in the history of the Cobalt Soul. He is often underestimated by his contemporaries and uses that fact to his advantage.
High Curator Greisalda Cassios
Half-dragonblood leader of the Cobalt Reserve
The High Curator of the Westruun archive of the Cobalt Soul is a high-cheekboned, bald woman who would appear fully human if not for her slitted, silver eyes and the silver scales that run across her head, neck, and upper arms. She is regarded as one of the fastest minds in Tal’Dorei, for she has the rare gift of perfect recall. Monks tremble when her clear, unpretentious voice rings through an archive chamber, for Greisalda remembers acts of justice and personal slights with equal intensity, making her a powerful ally and a furious enemy. She is concerned that corruption is spreading throughout the Tal’Dorei Council.
Cressida Holt
Orc expositor of the Cobalt Reserve
The name Cressida Holt is synonymous with style and effortless charisma—and also a blunt, merciless coldness. Cressida is nonbinary, and uses both she and they pronouns interchangeably. Though she's fresh blood to the expositors of the Cobalt Reserve, she has already taken advantage of her license to kill on her espionage missions. They are slim for an orc, but still more muscular than many of their human colleagues. Their assignments take them across Tal’Dorei in search of political corruption. She is currently stationed in Emon to observe a person of interest on the Tal’Dorei Council, where she alternates between lurking on rooftops and striding through ballrooms in fine suits.
Archivist Salomane Rothtree
Half-elf archivist of the Cobalt Reserve
A haggard, overworked administrator, Archivist Rothtree is known throughout the Cobalt Reserve as someone who tries too hard to prove himself and constantly bites off more than he can chew. Half-orc and half-elf, he has said that he hopes to accomplish as much in his lifetime as an elf could in theirs. He often is tasked with helping adventurers find information. Though he resents the task, he may slowly open up to heroes who treat him well.
Expositor Sia Kresh
Neutral, female halfling
As Yudala Fon’s secret right-hand, Sia organizes the expositors of the Rexxentrum Archive. She is determined to root out the infiltrators who would seek to undermine the leadership of the Library and grab power for the Crown, and she is swift and brutal in her work. Those that know of her fear her, and many wonder if her methods are crossing a line.
As Yudala Fon’s secret right-hand, Sia organizes the expositors of the Rexxentrum Archive. She is determined to root out the infiltrators who would seek to undermine the leadership of the Library and grab power for the Crown, and she is swift and brutal in her work. Those that know of her fear her, and many wonder if her methods are crossing a line.
Public Agenda
Untold knowledge was lost when the Calamity brought the Age of Arcanum to its fiery end, and so too was the case when Ioun was mortally wounded in that terrible war. Since that day, the Cobalt Soul and their progenitors have sought to recover what was lost. They hope that, in time, their tireless effort will eventually usher all societies to an enlightened future.
Ioun is still wounded, but her wisdom and grace has returned to the world—at least in part. Under the guidance and wisdom of their patron god, members of the Cobalt Soul seek to enlighten themselves through study and research. They devote their lives to studying the mysteries of the world, and turning that knowledge to protect it from another Calamity. To this end, the Library makes the immense breadth of knowledge within their archives available to anyone and everyone who seeks to educate themselves—though some secrets are so potent that they must remain hidden from the public until the proper time.
Empires thrive on misinformation and propaganda, yet it is necessary for the Cobalt Soul to operate within the Dwendalian Empire . As such, the Cobalt Soul works to provide the truth to those who will listen, to covertly update revisionist history, and to remove false information before it can spread too far. Unfortunately, imperial agents and even spies from foreign powers have successfully infiltrated the Library over the centuries, and some of their attempts to rewrite fact and history in favor of their own interests have succeeded. In response, the Library has had to construct a powerful, hidden force of expositors to defend their texts from manipulation and uncover truths that remain guarded.
Foreign Relations
The Library tries to remain autonomous, but their agents within the Dwendalian Empire are under constant siege by Theolocrat Kon Bruda, a once-respected monk of the Cobalt Soul who is now just another corrupt lackey of the Crown. Bruda and the archivists wage a quiet battle of wills and subterfuge, each trying to outsmart and undermine the other. This situation, combined with the empire’s efforts to prevent the education of their people, has created palpable unrest within the Library.
The perceptive ears of the expositors often hear rumors of unwholesome practices behind closed doors within the Soltryce Academy and other places under the Cerberus Assembly’s oversight. The Library is concerned about the assembly’s secretive cabal but has thus far been unable to infiltrate deep enough to uncover anything damning.
Meanwhile, a small number of volunteers from within the Library have agreed to travel deep into Xorhas in the hopes of communicating with the Kryn Dynasty to learn more about their mysterious society, and to understand the level of threat they pose to the people of Western Wynandir and beyond. None of the volunteers have yet returned.
In Marquet, the Library's seat of power is the Temple of the Mentor in Ank'Harel, a temple to Ioun founded nearly 150 years ago. The archivists there focus on rooting out evil in the city's civilian factions—principally the Consortium of the Vermillion Dream, whose members reportedly wield magic weapons made of some strange red mineral the likes of which no Cobalt Soul Archivist has ever seen. The faction is wary of the Allegiance of Allsight's fascination with Cael Morrow, but as fellow academic insitutions, the Allegiance and the Cobalt Soul work together most of the time, sharing resources from their libraries.
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