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Description
Over time the bright elves turned the faith of their slaves into a twisted form; the rebirth and immortality they were promised in another world was now assured in this one. To die in service of their immortal masters was to bring their souls closer to reincarnation as one of the blessed elves dwelling in the heaven-on-earth of their gilded palaces. Mortals were not merely serving heaven's will, they prepared their own place in it with every stone they laid in the next monumental city.

Yet the sun set over the men of distant forests for three thousand years. In time, they questioned the order of the eastern world. The minor cults of elven saints performed no miracles and answered no prayers. The sage advice of immortal oracles became mere double-speak to men with time and scrutiny. The idea that immortality would come in their miserable world of winters and sickness fell on deaf ears, and the certainty of a hereafter for all worthy spirits became as set as cathedral stones. The theologians scrutinized every old scrap of papyrus for age-old questions. Were the souls of men just as worthy as those already bound to immortality? Was cruelty from master to slave moral, or even justifiable at all? If not, by what right did the bright-elves make human blood the mortar binding their cities together? It had been five centuries since men ceased to willingly sell the children of their enemies to a fate beyond the sea when pilgrims and missionaries were turned away from the coastal havens of the elves. Their testimony of heresy and blood-stained rituals by the the slaves deifying elves as living gods finally stirred the men to violent action.

The ships that once carried men and gold now carried men and iron.

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Part 2/2

Part 1 is here:

A character commissioned and written by my good friend RKR, part of a series

A paintover done in stable diffusion, based upon an original reference image that i was provided for a pose

Description
Over time the bright elves turned the faith of their slaves into a twisted form; the rebirth and immortality they were promised in another world was now assured in this one. To die in service of their immortal masters was to bring their souls closer to reincarnation as one of the blessed elves dwelling in the heaven-on-earth of their gilded palaces. Mortals were not merely serving heaven's will, they prepared their own place in it with every stone they laid in the next monumental city.

Yet the sun set over the men of distant forests for three thousand years. In time, they questioned the order of the eastern world. The minor cults of elven saints performed no miracles and answered no prayers. The sage advice of immortal oracles became mere double-speak to men with time and scrutiny. The idea that immortality would come in their miserable world of winters and sickness fell on deaf ears, and the certainty of a hereafter for all worthy spirits became as set as cathedral stones. The theologians scrutinized every old scrap of papyrus for age-old questions. Were the souls of men just as worthy as those already bound to immortality? Was cruelty from master to slave moral, or even justifiable at all? If not, by what right did the bright-elves make human blood the mortar binding their cities together? It had been five centuries since men ceased to willingly sell the children of their enemies to a fate beyond the sea when pilgrims and missionaries were turned away from the coastal havens of the elves. Their testimony of heresy and blood-stained rituals by the the slaves deifying elves as living gods finally stirred the men to violent action.

The ships that once carried men and gold now carried men and iron.

------------------

Part 2/2

Part 1 is here:

A character commissioned and written by my good friend RKR, part of a series

A paintover done in stable diffusion, based upon an original reference image that i was provided for a pose