The Order of Reasonable Teachings

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What is that Ancient saying? To have power is to have glory, and by having these two, it is which that makes the demon. We ourselves may not be demons, nor do we wield the same powers as they by birth, but we are devils. Our very nature is curiosity. Our very nature is to pursue power. Our very nature is to return to the old glories that our ancestors had achieved.
Too long have we been starved of the knowledge that our Elders relinquished from us. They fear we Devils, that due to our weaker natures than theirs, could never comprehend such concepts as they could. But look at us now. Look at our society, our economical, and technological advancements compared to theirs. These advancements, they were not theirs, but of us Devils alongside Mortals.
I say we need not the secrets of our forerunners. I say that we Devils and Mortals alike, in our desires to pursue knowledge, can go even further than the Ancients. We do not need divine guidance, our current society speaks so for itself. Let us journey forward, and expand our minds past our mortal horizons and into the reaches of the divine.
The age of the divines...it has come and long passed. The time has come for devils, and all mortal beings alike in the name science and power to rise further than we ever have. The time has come for us all to...become as gods.

—Sanur Vaniikel, 1st Grandmaster Scholar of the Order of Reasonable Teachings. Mortal Year 1840

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Twisted Enlightenment

When mortals passed from their initial lives from Mortal Plane to either Paradiso or Infernus during the Age of Enlightenment, they introduced their ideals to both the Angels and Devils. Both Paradiso and Infernus, unlike The Mortal Plane, for the near entirety of their histories, were guided and worshipped their respected deities. When mortals, resurrected into either Plane of Existence: An Overview, two new ideologies were introduced: human rationalism and secularism.
Rationalism and secularism were not new to the angels and devils living during this time. In fact, since angels and devils lived shorter lifespans as well as more generations living without divine guidance, they had already begun to think of themselves as being decent off without their deities. With the resurrected humans of this time, blind arrogance was also introduced; arrogance in the form that both societies were purely where they were due to either angels or devils, and not of a deity.
Such ideologies were adopted by the masses until they eventually became normalized. Although these ideologies were not inherently dangerous, a small group, led by Sanur Vaniikel, believed that by pursuing and achieving great knowledge, one could understand the nature of Divinity. Sanur, with his newfound ideology he called Kul'niir Enlightenment (known as Chaos Enlightenment/Theosophy in modern times), tied it with the existing ideologies.
What began as harmless pursuits of knowledge, quickly turned into dangerous grasps of power with Sanur's ideology. And it was widely accepted by both angels and devils, and within less than a year, became normalized. It was normal to hear about young devils or angels igniting themselves in infernos or blowing off limbs in their pursuits of knowledge. But this wouldn't stop society's ways of thinking. Sanur's ideology bled deep into the hearts of both Angel and Devil: so far so that both firmly believed that in the names of science and knowledge could achieve divine status. In other words, either Angel or Devil could become as gods.

The founding of the Order and its Role

After Sanur Vaniikel first introduced Kul'niir Enlightenment in the Mortal Year 1839, many angels and devils practiced their studies either on their own or in small groups. Many mages, especially younger ones, fell victim to fatal accidents. By the beginning of the next Mortal Year, there was a need for an institution to oversee the practices of mages in both Planes. In the Mortal Year 1840, in his now infamous speech "The Age of Mortals," Sanur announced the proper formation of an institution that would allow any and all of those who wished to pursue great knowledge.
In the Mortal Year 1843, he opened the first institution that would not only allow mages to study and practice but also integrated into the curriculum of various universities throughout Infernus. Sanur called this institution The Order of Reasonable Teachings; Sanur coming up with the name believing that it was reasonable that one day, all mortal species could become as gods through the pursuit of reason and knowledge.
The role of The Order of Reasonable Teachings was first and foremost, to act as a haven for those pursuing knowledge with the utmost safety. This role was further extended when the Order was integrated into universities. The second role was to allow safe access to knowledge otherwise inaccessible to non-members of the Order. The third role, and not added in until the Mortal Year 1848 when the Order became so big and funded they sponsored universities, was to regulate the teachings of their sponsored universities.

It's a placeholder image... by bnichs

• Formation - Mortal Year 1843
• Extinction - Mortal Year 1895
• Type - Magical & Educational 
• Location - Infernus & Paradiso

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Structure of the Order

Reasonable Teachings Structure by bnichs

Corruption of a Haven in Infernus

Up until the Mortal Year 1860, the Order and their teachings and practices were reasonably acceptable, in the sense that mages under the age of 30 had a low death rate compared to the rate before the Order's founding. It's unknown exactly when, but in sometime in Viish'renzall, Sanur fell ill from an unknown disease. While in a hospital, fighting for his life, he was met by Kanvur Iinkaniin, who revealed to Sanur that he was near death due to a powerful, but non-lethal poison that would leave him in a near-death state for years without the antidote. Kanvur, dangling the antidote in front of Sanur, demanded that the two make a deal: the deal that Kanvur become the next Grandmaster Scholar of the Order for him giving Sanur the antidote, allowing him to live and continue his research.
After the deal between Sanur and Kanvur was struck, Kanvur became the next Grandmaster Scholar of the Order, and almost immediately enacted significant changes to the Order. First and foremost, the Order began appointing their top members to the boards of directors for nearly every university they were involved with (usually in the form of buying the former members out). Another significant change was the complete and total disregard that knowledge itself was the way to understand divinity.
Kanvur, like Sanur, sincerely believed that mortal beings could become as gods. However, unlike Sanur, Kanvur thought knowledge itself was not the only way path to divinity, but also extreme power. Kanvur firmly believed that to understand divinity, mortal beings would need to acquire the same power as gods.
In the Mortal Year 1862, the Order, having placed their members in the highest of positions, decided that their next step would be to seek what was deemed forbidden knowledge. Within a short time, the Order saw a significant spike in the deaths of all mages in their Order, primarily due to the Order propagating their newfound ideology. Within a year, it was estimated that 16 out of every 100 mages within the Order would suffer from life-threatening accidents. Yet, due to the propaganda by Kanvur and the Order's high-ranking members, the mages in the Order continued in their practices, believing in Kanvur's ideology.

Disorder of the Order & Creation of a Dark Order

In the mortal Year 1873, Kanvur was killed by an unknown assassin, leaving many of the Order's high-ranking members in a grab for the position of Grandmaster Scholar. In the mortal year 1874, Jolvaliik Volpanum, Master Scholar of the Order as well as on the Board of Directors at the Takriin'kal'miir University, was killed by Anvranai Yulna, another Master Scholar. This begun infighting amongst many Master Scholars as well as members of various boards of directors.
Unknown to most of the Order, that while they were fighting each other, a second, secretive branch order was founded under their noses: The Scholars Path to Hidden Divinity. The Order, composed of several incredibly powerful mages, in less than a month, had every high-ranking member of the Order of Reasonable Teachings in their hands. This new order had only one goal in mind: to collect powerful artifacts and use them for what they called research. The Order didn't care for their parent Order, only for what they themselves wanted, using the Order of Reasonable Teachings funds and connections for their disposal.