Aeon
Aeons have always been the caretakers of reality and defenders of the natural order of balance. Each type of aeon takes on some form of duality in its manifestation and works either to shape the multiverse within the aspects of this duality in some way, or to correct imbalances to the perfect order of existence. Aeons can bring weal or woe when they appear in a region, and their machinations can raise a nation, raze it, or restore it from ruin. Their reasons are their own, and they rarely share their motivations with othersthey simply create the results they insist through their strange envisioning communication are necessary to maintain the balance of the multiverse.
As a result of recent shifts in reality, aeons have begun to reassert a presence in the perfect planar city of Axis. To the aeons, this is merely the latest in a recurring cycle, albeit one that mortals have not yet borne witness to. Once regarded as an independent faction, the living machines known as inevitables are now revealed as having been agents of the aeons all along, and while inevitables have their own shared themes and features, they are very much living but constructed manifestations of the aeons’ war against imbalance—particularly with regard to how this war is waged against the forces of chaos.
Aeons have a name for this cyclic return, in which they welcome the industrious axiomites back to their fold and bring the inevitables once again under their control: the “Convergence.” At the onset of the Convergence, a council of pleroma aeons appeared in the Eternal City of Axis, where they revealed that axiomites were wayward aeons, split off long ago to pursue the act of creation. With the latest cycle of change it was time for the axiomites and their creations, the inevitables, to rejoin the aeon cause. While most axiomites and inevitables fell in line, realizing perhaps on a fundamental level of reality that what the aeons said was the truth, some refused to heed the call and waited for the wrath of the aeonsbut that wrath has yet to come. The dual-natured aeons have responded to those who have declined in confusing ways. With some they treat and even bargain, while a handful of others they have destroyed, and a few have been exterminated by the axiomites and allied inevitables. But most of these quiet insurgents they leave alone, allowing these axiomites to continue to create in peace and the inevitables to continue with their duties. How—or if—this Convergence will end is as little understood as the aeons themselves.
The ultimate arbiters of balance, aeons are the custodians of the cosmos and the silent technicians that ensure reality doesn’t break under the weight of any one prevailing philosophy. Created in the earliest moments of the multiverse, aeons continually spin off from reality to perform their duties before dissolving back into quintessence as their tasks conclude.
Unlike numerous other outsiders that adopt a form suitably dreadful, comforting, or awe-inspiring to the mortal souls that view it, many aeons take virtually no care to control their shapes. Their bodies are often little more than condensed swirls of matter dense enough to interact with the world around them. Instead, an aeon taps into the underlying These churning cores often look in equal parts like an unblinking eye or an ominous hurricane, though aeons’ bodies are rarely harmful to the touch or possessed of any identifiable sensory organs. In fact, their bodies—appearing to be expanses of crystal, dust, light, or energy—are nearly uniform in density and composition, with no single component being necessary for them to function. Those aeons that do attempt humanoid forms usually choose them to better perform their functions, but rarely trouble themselves with anything more than an uncomfortable approximation of the shape. Each aeon’s appearance differs slightly within a band of variation for each type of outsider, from the ominous, hooded forms of the pleromas to the roiling cloud bodies of bythos, to the virtually formless paracletuses. In all cases, these beings are faceless. Aeons recognize only one authority: the Monad. The Monad is an omnipresent being that has existed since the beginning of the multiverse, a network of channels that spiderweb across all of creation, and a repository of knowledge for everything that has happened since its genesis. Aeons come from the Monad, and their relationship to their creator resembles that of cells and organs serving a greater body, with each aeon understanding that it has a role to play as part of the whole rather than viewing the Monad as a god or divine patron. Aeons are simply part of the Monad, and likewise the Monad exists in each one. Once created, an aeon has all the knowledge the Monad deems necessary to complete its task, and aeons are constantly tapped into their creator to receive further instructions and information. However, an individual aeon’s connection seems to be imperfect, insomuch as a single aeon doesn’t demonstrate flawless awareness of everything in the multiverse, or even awareness of what other aeons may be tasked to achieve. This may be a limitation of the Monad, yet it’s as likely a boon that enables each aeon to demonstrate agency in how it interprets and adapts to each challenge. This is especially evident in the rare instances when aeons’ goals are opposed to one another, at which point an unspoken rightof-way usually convinces the lesser aeon to cede control to the stronger one. These goals are allencompassing for aeons, each of which embodies a physical or conceptual dichotomy—such as life and death, light and darkness, or thought and instinct—that it endeavors to keep in balance. This is not so simple as an individual aeon killing an equal number of creatures as it preserves. trends of its current region, assessing through mundane observation and supernatural sensitivity how to best restore equilibrium. The correct measures may involve trapping hundreds of creatures in a cave, coaxing warring factions to sign a treaty, or setting fire to a forest. No matter the solution, the aeon pursues it without remorse, pity, or ultimately even selfpreservation. Attempting to dissuade an aeon from its task is often a fruitless goal; only in rare circumstances can a witness determine what the aeon desires in the first place, much less convince it to pursue a different corrective measure. Outsiders are extensions of their planes of origindemons represent the Abyss’s hateful corruption and azatas Elysium’s unbridled joy. The same is true for aeons, yet these beings, having no home plane, represent the multiverse itself. Instead, aeons can tear themselves from reality, as the Monad requires, in a fit of spontaneous generation. Yet even in this, there are apparent limits. First, aeons tend to fade back into the planar fabric once their work is done, and the fact that the multiverse doesn’t crawl with aeons suggests that only a finite number of aeons can exist at once. Second, aeons often appear some distance from their ultimate goals, suggesting that they cannot manifest wherever they wish, but instead can do so only in particular places. From there, the aeons must travel by their own power, providing those who would oppose them time to rally a defense. The autochthonous births of aeons are most puzzling on the Material Plane, where elemental matter is far more prevalent than the quintessence that all outsiders are formed from. This suggests either that aeons are adept at coalescing from the dispersed background quintessence that remains on the Material Plane or that their creation happens elsewhere, after which they travel by unseen paths to their destinations. The latter especially intrigues occult scholars, some of whom speculate that the Monad is not just a divine being, but also an Esoteric Plane that interweaves reality and serves as a conduit for its servants. Without their own home plane, aeons congregate primarily where they are needed. There are two noteworthy exceptions: Pharasma’s Spire and the Antipode that exists within the Maelstrom. These two features anchor the cycle of souls—not only the distribution of quintessence after death but also the recycling of this essence into unaligned potentiality to beget new life. Aeons frequently patrol both features, though they rarely interfere with their psychopomp and protean neighbors. The prospect of creating their own organizations or fraternities is utterly alien to aeons. To them, there are only two states of association: those who are part of the Monad and those who are not. Likewise, aeons don’t appear to consider any non-aeons to be allies or enemies. At the best of times, an aeon approaches another creature with curiosity, communicating its queries through mental projections that convey concepts rather than words. More often, an encounter with an aeon results in uncomfortable silence interrupted by jarring blasts of telepathic imagery before the outsider abruptly departs. Even other outsiders rarely know how to handle aeons. Unlike mortals, whose minds are an imperfect blend of various ideals, aligned outsiders often represent an extreme interpretation of only one of an aeon’s interests, resulting in even greater difficulty understanding the latter’s dichotomous diction. Axiomites, inevitables, and shulsagas are the outsiders most likely to share an aeon’s goals and tend to have the most amicable relationships with aeons. Axiomites find aeons a fascinating embodiment of the multiverse’s truths, thus making them scientifically priceless. Inevitables appreciate aeons’ unflappable determination to enforce the multiverse’s laws, even if doing so means the aeons regularly inject chaos into some situations. This happens less frequently with each century, though, for the more ground the inevitables lose to chaos, the more often that aeons appear to help restore the balance. Shulsagas revere aeons as supernatural messengers and seem particularly adept at interpreting their messages. These astral beings almost always honor an aeon’s requests and almost never come into direct conflict with them. While psychopomps respect the aeons’ custodial work, they otherwise seem to treat aeons as rivals for mysterious reasons. Among mortals, only a few organizations interact with aeons regularly. On Golarion, the Riftwardens focus on the integrity of the planes and sealing extraplanar rifts. Such breaches often attract aeons to repair the damage, and the two forces manage to cooperate far more often than they clash. The Dikheiric Order, a network of Nethysians dedicated to achieving a perfect balance of their god’s creation and destruction through magic, consider aeons an extension of Nethys’s will. These spellcasters sometimes shadow an aeon, mirroring its agenda to help restore an equilibrium the group only imperfectly understands. These mortals also regularly conjure aeons to serve as mentors, attempting to translate the outsider’s wordless messages into gospel guidance. Aeons travel to the Material Plane to correct perceived imbalances, following the directives of the Monad. These rare encounters are equally likely to seem serendipitous or malicious depending on whether the aeon’s aims coincide with or oppose those of nearby mortals. Although an aeon virtually always aims to assess and act within the dichotomy it represents, determining which half of its dichotomy it seeks to enforce is difficult on a chance encounter. So long as doing so doesn’t impede its work, aeons are often willing to listen to strangers for a few minutes, though communication is often frustrating and riddled with misunderstandings. Convincing an aeon to seek out other targets, lend aid, or otherwise abort its mission, however, is very difficult—but not impossible. An aeon’s more subtle tasks—seeding new life, quietly freeing a trapped animal, or breathing life back into a forgotten corpse—rarely attract attention. More dramatic pursuits can draw witnesses from miles around. Most infamous are those cases where an aeon snuffs out the life of countless creatures, such as through arson or outright murder, and these in turn cast the outsiders as monsters to the endemic cultures. Though the aeon’s actions might be beneficial on a greater scale than mortal life-spans, such as by making way for new life or even inspiring new heroes to rise against a heretofore unknown threat, this is often a cold comfort to those who have lost homes and loved ones to the meddling of an alien creature that is acting on abstract principles.
Unlike numerous other outsiders that adopt a form suitably dreadful, comforting, or awe-inspiring to the mortal souls that view it, many aeons take virtually no care to control their shapes. Their bodies are often little more than condensed swirls of matter dense enough to interact with the world around them. Instead, an aeon taps into the underlying These churning cores often look in equal parts like an unblinking eye or an ominous hurricane, though aeons’ bodies are rarely harmful to the touch or possessed of any identifiable sensory organs. In fact, their bodies—appearing to be expanses of crystal, dust, light, or energy—are nearly uniform in density and composition, with no single component being necessary for them to function. Those aeons that do attempt humanoid forms usually choose them to better perform their functions, but rarely trouble themselves with anything more than an uncomfortable approximation of the shape. Each aeon’s appearance differs slightly within a band of variation for each type of outsider, from the ominous, hooded forms of the pleromas to the roiling cloud bodies of bythos, to the virtually formless paracletuses. In all cases, these beings are faceless. Aeons recognize only one authority: the Monad. The Monad is an omnipresent being that has existed since the beginning of the multiverse, a network of channels that spiderweb across all of creation, and a repository of knowledge for everything that has happened since its genesis. Aeons come from the Monad, and their relationship to their creator resembles that of cells and organs serving a greater body, with each aeon understanding that it has a role to play as part of the whole rather than viewing the Monad as a god or divine patron. Aeons are simply part of the Monad, and likewise the Monad exists in each one. Once created, an aeon has all the knowledge the Monad deems necessary to complete its task, and aeons are constantly tapped into their creator to receive further instructions and information. However, an individual aeon’s connection seems to be imperfect, insomuch as a single aeon doesn’t demonstrate flawless awareness of everything in the multiverse, or even awareness of what other aeons may be tasked to achieve. This may be a limitation of the Monad, yet it’s as likely a boon that enables each aeon to demonstrate agency in how it interprets and adapts to each challenge. This is especially evident in the rare instances when aeons’ goals are opposed to one another, at which point an unspoken rightof-way usually convinces the lesser aeon to cede control to the stronger one. These goals are allencompassing for aeons, each of which embodies a physical or conceptual dichotomy—such as life and death, light and darkness, or thought and instinct—that it endeavors to keep in balance. This is not so simple as an individual aeon killing an equal number of creatures as it preserves. trends of its current region, assessing through mundane observation and supernatural sensitivity how to best restore equilibrium. The correct measures may involve trapping hundreds of creatures in a cave, coaxing warring factions to sign a treaty, or setting fire to a forest. No matter the solution, the aeon pursues it without remorse, pity, or ultimately even selfpreservation. Attempting to dissuade an aeon from its task is often a fruitless goal; only in rare circumstances can a witness determine what the aeon desires in the first place, much less convince it to pursue a different corrective measure. Outsiders are extensions of their planes of origindemons represent the Abyss’s hateful corruption and azatas Elysium’s unbridled joy. The same is true for aeons, yet these beings, having no home plane, represent the multiverse itself. Instead, aeons can tear themselves from reality, as the Monad requires, in a fit of spontaneous generation. Yet even in this, there are apparent limits. First, aeons tend to fade back into the planar fabric once their work is done, and the fact that the multiverse doesn’t crawl with aeons suggests that only a finite number of aeons can exist at once. Second, aeons often appear some distance from their ultimate goals, suggesting that they cannot manifest wherever they wish, but instead can do so only in particular places. From there, the aeons must travel by their own power, providing those who would oppose them time to rally a defense. The autochthonous births of aeons are most puzzling on the Material Plane, where elemental matter is far more prevalent than the quintessence that all outsiders are formed from. This suggests either that aeons are adept at coalescing from the dispersed background quintessence that remains on the Material Plane or that their creation happens elsewhere, after which they travel by unseen paths to their destinations. The latter especially intrigues occult scholars, some of whom speculate that the Monad is not just a divine being, but also an Esoteric Plane that interweaves reality and serves as a conduit for its servants. Without their own home plane, aeons congregate primarily where they are needed. There are two noteworthy exceptions: Pharasma’s Spire and the Antipode that exists within the Maelstrom. These two features anchor the cycle of souls—not only the distribution of quintessence after death but also the recycling of this essence into unaligned potentiality to beget new life. Aeons frequently patrol both features, though they rarely interfere with their psychopomp and protean neighbors. The prospect of creating their own organizations or fraternities is utterly alien to aeons. To them, there are only two states of association: those who are part of the Monad and those who are not. Likewise, aeons don’t appear to consider any non-aeons to be allies or enemies. At the best of times, an aeon approaches another creature with curiosity, communicating its queries through mental projections that convey concepts rather than words. More often, an encounter with an aeon results in uncomfortable silence interrupted by jarring blasts of telepathic imagery before the outsider abruptly departs. Even other outsiders rarely know how to handle aeons. Unlike mortals, whose minds are an imperfect blend of various ideals, aligned outsiders often represent an extreme interpretation of only one of an aeon’s interests, resulting in even greater difficulty understanding the latter’s dichotomous diction. Axiomites, inevitables, and shulsagas are the outsiders most likely to share an aeon’s goals and tend to have the most amicable relationships with aeons. Axiomites find aeons a fascinating embodiment of the multiverse’s truths, thus making them scientifically priceless. Inevitables appreciate aeons’ unflappable determination to enforce the multiverse’s laws, even if doing so means the aeons regularly inject chaos into some situations. This happens less frequently with each century, though, for the more ground the inevitables lose to chaos, the more often that aeons appear to help restore the balance. Shulsagas revere aeons as supernatural messengers and seem particularly adept at interpreting their messages. These astral beings almost always honor an aeon’s requests and almost never come into direct conflict with them. While psychopomps respect the aeons’ custodial work, they otherwise seem to treat aeons as rivals for mysterious reasons. Among mortals, only a few organizations interact with aeons regularly. On Golarion, the Riftwardens focus on the integrity of the planes and sealing extraplanar rifts. Such breaches often attract aeons to repair the damage, and the two forces manage to cooperate far more often than they clash. The Dikheiric Order, a network of Nethysians dedicated to achieving a perfect balance of their god’s creation and destruction through magic, consider aeons an extension of Nethys’s will. These spellcasters sometimes shadow an aeon, mirroring its agenda to help restore an equilibrium the group only imperfectly understands. These mortals also regularly conjure aeons to serve as mentors, attempting to translate the outsider’s wordless messages into gospel guidance. Aeons travel to the Material Plane to correct perceived imbalances, following the directives of the Monad. These rare encounters are equally likely to seem serendipitous or malicious depending on whether the aeon’s aims coincide with or oppose those of nearby mortals. Although an aeon virtually always aims to assess and act within the dichotomy it represents, determining which half of its dichotomy it seeks to enforce is difficult on a chance encounter. So long as doing so doesn’t impede its work, aeons are often willing to listen to strangers for a few minutes, though communication is often frustrating and riddled with misunderstandings. Convincing an aeon to seek out other targets, lend aid, or otherwise abort its mission, however, is very difficult—but not impossible. An aeon’s more subtle tasks—seeding new life, quietly freeing a trapped animal, or breathing life back into a forgotten corpse—rarely attract attention. More dramatic pursuits can draw witnesses from miles around. Most infamous are those cases where an aeon snuffs out the life of countless creatures, such as through arson or outright murder, and these in turn cast the outsiders as monsters to the endemic cultures. Though the aeon’s actions might be beneficial on a greater scale than mortal life-spans, such as by making way for new life or even inspiring new heroes to rise against a heretofore unknown threat, this is often a cold comfort to those who have lost homes and loved ones to the meddling of an alien creature that is acting on abstract principles.
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