Light and Taint are both poisons worshipped by people, whom also wish to spread them.
The Light seems to an energy, that for some reason got influenced by the power of Kethuru shaping it into an aberration of it's former self. The aberration being the Taint.. The Taint appereantly emulated Kethuru's nature becoming more destructive, and voracious than the Light. But both forces seek only expansion, and their are of completely cosmic origins, without a care of the beings they affect as long as they expand.

This may be kind of off-topic...but in the histories it often had the Celestians refer to the nature communes as inferior, 'the Serenwilde Preserve',....

I've often tried to play Sabriel in this fashion, referring to the Serenwilders as savage and unenlightened. and that it is our duty as servants of the Light to show them it's glory, that there is nothing wrong with converting fae to cherubs, etc' but what do I get in response from my city-mates?

'they are not savages. it is wrong to try to impose our ideals on them. they believe differently and thats okay.'

hello?
and forgive me for my crappy writing skills.

This is all one big facade trying to hide the true zealotry from the people of Celest. Be certain that inside of more than one Celestian the recurring thought of "I must bring all beings into the Light, only that way they will experience the Truth". Right now, it isn't convinient for them to exhibit their zealous ways, because they know that they aren't the dominant empire anymore so they would encounter more opposition than support.

And has everyone forgotten that events post reguarding... massacred fae? Anyone remember who did that? That's a BIG reason Serenwilde would hate Celest.

No, Celest really just acts liek it has a zealous way to it, but seems to lack any actual zealous action outside its own walls. Everyone remember Erion's episode? He was putting out exactly what people talk about, a zealous everythign needs to be in the light, type of person, and he was persecuted for it. Then it got to debating about bring fae to Celestia to be made into Cherubs, and the dominant cry was to not brainwash them, thus not bringing them into the light.

That was really, really a bad move though. The whole "making stupid faeries into happy good angel things that we summon because we're so closely tied with them being good is WRONG" thing, that is.

I do not understand. Do people of Celest kidnap fae to bring them to the Light, or don't they? Basically, in my opinion, as I already said... the Light and the Taint are of the same nature. The only difference is that the Taint originated from Kethuru and started corrupting the Light. But both forces in the end only wish to be dominant, this means that the Light equally with the Taint would preffer to convert every lifeform to represent the nature of either force. Light is power, the Taint a power that wasn't able to be controlled.

Edit: <---- And mortalkind, beings caught in the crossfire of both forces yearning to spread and control said Powers.

Well actually, we use Fae as food for gorgulu, and a celestian shows them the wonders of the Light, after which they willingly follow said Celestian to Celestia. Of course Magnagoras option is the best, since Celestia's would mean the Fae have it better in Celestia than in Faethorn .

I think they can be lead to Nifilhema for conversion into imps, too, can't they? 0_o That was the impression I got from and after they pwned me on the Ethereal Plane when I (stupidly) attacked the one I thought I could beat (didn't know they were together, doh!) and died for it.

sings the missinformation song.


Your all cooky, stop using your Real world biases and start looking at the words Lusternia uses.

What kind of monsters could do such a thing?!

I'm not sure if it's Fae that can be led to Nifilhema for conversion, but I know that Cherubs definitely can. It's one of the things she says to you if you greet her.

Ohhhhh, right. Hm, maybe I'm wrong then, that's just what I understood from what was saying.

Um... I'm not entirely sure what you're referring to here. But I would point out the following, from HELP COSMIC PLANE:

The events post said that nature magics and cosmic magics do not mix. Cosmic magics draw on pure energies and threads of creation, while nature magics deal with living forces. As I understand it, trying to use your Nihilist magics to alter the nature magic inherent in the fae was the cause of the problem. It did not say that the Ethereal plane is anathema to the Cosmic plane, and therefore Elemental and Cosmic planes are unnatural aberrations, as your own interpretation seems to be telling you.

The fact that Light and Taint both steal fae is good, but it really isn't enough. It appeals only to Serenwilde's self-interest, and I would have hoped we could develop some more depth than that alone.

My basic problem is that the followers of Light and Taint are hardcoded to be directly antagonistic towards each other, with Nature followers slightly apart but against both. Unfortunately, I think the philosophies of the three organizations are imbalanced and weighted unfairly against Magnagora. I think as someone suggested, a new Evil philosophy might reshuffle things a bit, or perhaps as Shiri succinctly pointed out, a change of the philosophy of Light itself? The only other alternative would be to lessen Serenwilde's objections to the Taint, which would make no sense whatsoever.

Andes sees the light as, well, the best comparison I can make is Buddhism. He love compassion (reason he left Magnagora in the first place) and has a innocent respect of all life, evil good or in between. He might be a bit odd in that he doesn't hate the taint or the tainted at all (his brother is tainted). He does, however, hate their actions sometimes. And he'll also get himself killed sometimes just stupidly, like walking into a battle zone and not really being prepared to fight (again, he's naive) and he only loses his temper when someone messes with his wife. Otherwise, to him the Light is sort of live and let live sort of thing.

Actually, I think Serenwilde should avoid taking sides entirely. Though this is very hard to achieve when both cities may end up involving the Serenwilde into some kind of conflict. If Serenwilde claims to follow a guideline of survival/self-preservation, they probably should try mimic a parasitic entity who keeps in general the least possible relation with either city, and simply attach to a host when needed. Something like taking a side when it is convinient, then release the host and continue independant and isolated from the rest.

Changing either philosophy of the Taint or Light could make a difference, but I believe that both should change accordingly to always mirror their opposite. I am not sure if I am making sense, but what I am trying to say is that if the Light changes it's philosophy the Taint should do as well but always being the direct opposite of the Light. Because in the end, the Taint is not very different from the Light, it is just a twisted version of it.

I've always argued against this attitude, in another thread though. I won't address it here, other than to say that I don't like it at all - but I know some other Serenwilders, particularly Serenguard I believe, do.

My point is that they -aren't- opposite.

Yep, they aren't really opposites are they? One side just conveniently tries to represent the counter of the other. Remember that it wasn't really like the Taint existed before Ladantine released it. The Taint is simply put a stain in the Light, a small porsion of Kethuru's will infused into the Light, not an entirely independant creation. Just a small piece of Light turned into an abomination. The Taint is the Light's illegitimate son.

The Taint did not come from the Light. It is not a twisted, warped, changed version of the Light. It was not created after the Light.

Their only relation is that they are mutually destructive to one another.

If you want to understand them, you need to go back to the relationship between Dynara and Magnora.

Elryn, why do you want Serenwilde to ally with Celest so badly? Can't you just build your own culture? Maybe you should just become a celestian too...instead of helping Merloch turn Serenwilde into a "Forest of Light" and save us all a headache.

The taint is of an antediluvian nature. Its range of action is so broad that it encompasses Life, having an alternative to Life itself.

For each creatures and novelty of the Creation, the taint has an alternative, much like a mirror reflects what is before it.
The taint questions Life, Nature, Philosophies, down to their elemental nature.
The taint questions but doesn't care for the answers, for it is a mere blind sap, it exists and that's all that matters, for whatever is touched by the taint is forever corrupted, no longer having its place in the former creation.
It's a farcry from the past ancient, an aborted world which refuse to cease to exist because it simply doesn't know the meaning of death.
It is an abomination... but Life is a die hard and manage to survive it on a corrupted shape which has forced the taint to evolve somewhat.

And now the tainted Life carries on what it knows best, adapt conquer and prosper.
The tainted Life and the Taint are probably not the same thing.