Common gods of orcs and dwarves

Dwarves and orcs in the Forges, like most peoples in Chadun, divide deities roughly into two types: natural beings, and spiritual beings. This isn’t a very hard line, and the difference between them can often get confusing, as when talking about “nature spirits.” The idea, though, is that some divine beings arise out of natural elements and forces, and some arise out of personhood.

Examples of natural deities

• Elemental gods, like the The Stone Mother, and possibly the Stone Mother's Children
• Genii loci, such as river gods (see Lilies, the goddess of the lowlying marshlands at the foot of the Malfa peninsula)
• Animal spirits (though this is a grey area, and mostly specific to Valni (orcish) gods like Zel Tsuska)

Examples of spiritual deities

• Ancestor worship
• Folk hero/demigods, like Hewell
• Beings of ancient but unknown origin; possibly fey creatures that predate the schism between the Feywild and the mundane world
• The “gods of luck,” considered to be the disembodied luck of dead people. Playing games of chance attracts these small gods; they might add their luck to your own briefly, or they might eat your luck, so that you’ll never have any more. (This is a common belief in Chadun, based on the Norse hamingja.)

All these beings are considered to be of, and essential to, the material world. Orcs and dwarves in the Forges have no business with celestials or infernals.

Common gods

Valni, Hewellen, and other dwarves all venerate some of the same spiritual beings. The more important gods tend to be the natural ones, but there is a group of gods whose purview tend to be more social or cultural. Orcs and dwarves even use the same names for these gods, though they see them somewhat differently.

All these gods are gender-optional; they might manifest as male, female, both, or neither. They are of the "beings of ancient but unknown origin" type. They might have started out as folk heroes, or they might have always been there.

Keller Etil	order, the calendar, life
Keldo Ma	disaster, luck

These two gods are binary opposites, and the most important gods of social order. The calendar is of extreme importance in underground cultures, with no visible markings of time passing. It’s necessary to keep oneself oriented in time, as in space, or one gets lost. The calendar is full of special days and festivals. Keller Etil is the god that oversees orderly social life.

Keldo Ma is the god of interruptions to the orderly life; the unforeseen, the sudden twist of fate. It’s not quite chaos, but often disastrous.

Kelkou Shi

war

This god is the one seen most differently in dwarvish and orcish cultures. To dwarves, Kelkou Shi is the god of war generally, and is seen as violent and terrible. To orcs, whose culture embraces war, Kelkou Shi is specifically the god of bloodlust and slaughter in war. Since orcs are warlike, dwarves think they must venerate Kelkou Shi. In fact, orcs consider war to be under the purview of Keller Etil and Keldo Ma; they, like dwarves, consider Kelkou Shi to be an evil god.

Kel Mata	birth, fertility, growing things
Kel Kado	birth, hearth, family, generosity
Kel Balag	trickster

These three come as a set in dwarvish culture; to orcs, the first two are a pair, and Kel Balag is a solitary figure.

Kel Mata and Kel Kado are the gods of domestic life, especially birth and family. In stories, it’s these gods who bestow blessings on a baby at birth. The role of the wicked fairy who crashes the party with a curse is taken by Kel Balag.

Kel Balag can be a malicious, chaotic figure, but strangely, in orcish culture it’s also Kel Balag who comes for souls at death—especially peaceful, non-violent deaths—and opens the door for them.

Kelsu Lag Ma

death—specifically, killing

Kelsu Lag Ma is the god who is evoked at the end of a hunt, after a battle, and so forth. If the The Stone Mother is the god of being dead, and the The Stone Mother's Children are gods of dying, Kelsu Lag Ma is the god of killing someone else. They are stern and terrifying, but not necessarily evil.