The Apu
In the beginning, there was darkness. Then Viracocha created the first humans out of stone, peopling his dark world with a race of giants. The giants became unruly, so Viracocha washed them away in a great flood, transforming those in Tiahuanaco and Pucara into stone — a cautionary tale for those that followed.
Viracocha tried anew, creating a second race of humans out of clay, painting each a different color to make them unique. He breathed life into them and placed them deep in the earth with instructions to reemerge at the appointed time.
The world was still dark, so Viracocha created the sun and moon, watching them rise high into the sky from the islands of Lake Titicaca. Soon after, the sun and moon had children, peopling the sky with constellations composed of their virgin daughters. So united, their light banished the darkness of the prior world, creating the World of today.
Viracocha set out from Lake Titicaca with his brother-sons Imaymana and Tocapo to spread civilization. They travelled in disguise as beggars, naming the trees and plants of the World, calling forth humanity from its caves, and instructing them in the ways of agriculture and civilization. Most willingly accepted Viracocha’s visions of a new world, but others scorned his teaching, forcing him to call down rivers of fire from the sky upon them until they acquiesced. The trio travelled north until they reached the coast of present-day Ecuador, looked upon their works, and judged them complete. Soon after, they walked across the sea, vanishing over the horizon to places unknown.
After Viracocha’s departure, Inti and Mama Killa bore eight children on the Island of the Sun in Lake Titicaca. Inti selected Ayar Capac as their leader and admonished him to establish dominionover the World as his favored intercessor. Ayar Capac was equipped with a golden staff that would sink into the earth when he reached the Promised Land. Ayar Capac and his siblings travelled through a series of underground tunnels to a trio of caves in a hill southeast of Cusco containing the peoples that became the core of the Inca state.
The eight emerged from the caves with their mortal allies and began their trek toward Cusco, stopping along the way to plant the golden staff in different locales to see if they had arrived. Their Band consisted of four brothers and their sister-wives, all Scions born of Inti and Mama Killa. They were Ayar Cachi, Ayar Uchu, Ayar Auca, Ayar Manco (later Manco Capac), Mama Ipacura, Mama Raua, Mama Huaco, and Mama Ocllo.
Ayar Manco was soon rebranded Manco Capac, and the wanderers negotiated peace with, or destroyed, the natives of the Cusco Valley and watched the golden staff sink into the earth at Cusco showing them they had arrived in the Promised Land. Manco Capac became the first Inca leader, the literal “Son of the Sun,” marrying his remaining sisters upon the death of his final brother and establishing a royal bloodline of Scions, each acting as intermediary between Inti and the World.
The Scions of Inti ruled first as kings, then “Sapa Incas,” or emperors, conquering what came to be known as Tawantinsuyu, the Realm of Four Parts: An empire divided into four suyu’s, or regions, centered on Cusco and encompassing parts of Peru, Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia, and Argentina. While ultimately conquered by outsiders, their traditions persist among the peoples of their former empire and are intimately interwoven among the cultures of western South America. Inti’s Scions and their allied Apu never abandoned their faith and simply disappeared from view among their conquerors, blending in and perpetuating Apu worship and traditions among their conquerors. As night gives way to dawn, Inti’s Scions rise yet again to take their rightful place in the World and forge Tawantinsuyu anew.
Principal Members
Sometimes called the Apu are purpose manifest, born of Viracocha’s desire to K’uh by themselves and others, the bathe a dark world in the light of civilization. All serve, or at least respect, Inti’s position as Viracocha’s intercessor, considering it their sacred duty to subdue the World in his name. Those who accept Inti as their master are welcomed to Tawantinsuyu as honored subjects under the Apu’s protection. Those who oppose the Apu are swept aside, consumed by their radiance. With few exceptions, the Apu prize order and stability, scorning chaos in all its forms as they use their superior organizational abilities to prosecute campaigns against titanspawn, rogue Scions, and their less orderly neighbors in an endless quest to keep the fires of civilization burning.
The Gods of the Apu pantheon include: Chasca (dawn, twilight, Venus), Coniraya (fertility, trickster), Illapa (thunder), Inti (sun), Kuychi (messenger, rainbow), Mama Cocha (ocean), Mama Quilla (moon), Pachacamac (creation, disaster), Pachamama (earth, fertility), Supay (death), Vichama (death, judgment), and Viracocha (creation).
Chasca
Coniraya
Illapa
Inti
Kuychi
Mama Cocha
Mama Killa
Pachacamac
Pachamama
Supay
Vichama
Signature Purview: @Apu
Virtues: Ambition, Duty The Apu were not called forth from the darkness to sit idly by and watch the World pass before them. They are dynamic, ambitious, and absolutely confident in their purity of purpose, emerging from the caves of origin to sweep aside their foes and build a world free from anarchy and disorder.
This ambition gave the Apu and their Scions the ability to establish the largest empire South America has ever seen. The downside of this relentless will to power is the self-destructive ambition it breeds and the attendant revolution to follow. Not every Apu is content to let Inti reign forever, pointing out that it was his Scions infighting that led to their empire’s demise. The Titans were quick to recognize this flaw and quietly whisper into the Apu and their Scions ears, always temping, always pushing them to greater feats of glory, always encouraging to reach just one rung higher on the social ladder.
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