Harkane

Overview
In the land of Pallacia, wars have waged and religions have fallen, emperors have kneeled and great citadels have burned. However, in the frozen peaks of the Harkane mountains, life has gone on, remote from the chaos of the land Harkane refer to as "the Lower Domains." Upon the mountains dwells a vibrant culture that has existed for thousands of years, interrupted only by annexation by the Theocracy, which served only to further cement the isolationism that is prominent in Harkane culture.

Beleifs
The Harkane follow a wide pantheon of gods, and have an expansive mythos around them, recorded primarily by word of mouth. However, above all others the Harkane follow Unimorgor, the Mountain King. Unimorgor lives within the tallest mountain in the range, referred to by the Harkane as the Krulkaln, or Wonderforge. Once, they say, in the time before history, there were no Harkane Mountains, and their people walked the Lower Domains with the other peoples of the world. Unimorgor ruled over humanity directly upon a great throne of stone, upon which there were carvings of a beauty that was so great only the gods could gaze upon it. The world existed in a state of blissful peace, until a great evil rose in the South. There is no clear account of what this evil was, but it is sometimes described as a shadow, or a void. This evil twisted the minds of humanity, and turned great armies against Unimorgor. In a rage, the Mountain King crushed the armies of humanity, and took their swords. He demolished his throne, and from the stones he build the Wonderforge. He made it empty, and poured the molten remains of his enemies' swords into it, then jumped in. He still dwells within the mountain to this day.

Unimorgor is a wrathful god, but first and foremost he is creative. Instead of prayer or sacrifice as forms of piety, the Harkane see the creation of beauty as the primary form of piety. The form of the art matters little to Unimorgor... whether painting, sculpture, writing, or something more obscure, all forms of beauty are equal before the Mountain King. Many pious Harkane men and women make regular pilgrimages to the Wonderforge bearing their greatest works of art. They stand at the precipice of the great mountain and hold their art above the magma held within. If Unimorgor approves, they are said to be blessed with good fortune for ever after.

Structure
Typically, the Harkane Faith has no leader. However, when an artist brings their work before the Wonderforge, very occasionally the god will react, with a jet of flame or tremble of the earth. These fortunate few are honored as the Eirvokhiln, or Great Artist. The Eirvokhiln spends most of their time making new art or inspiring others to make great works of their own. The Harkane entertain a massive culture of well documented trends in art, which usually follow new interpretations of the latest Eirvokhiln's work. While most cultures have perhaps a dozen or so notable art trends from their history, the Harkane have thousands, because of this.