Your worship is your furnaces/Which, like old idols, lost obscenes/Have molten bowels; your vision is/ Machines for making more machines.

Gordon Bottomley, To Ironfounders and Others

Why does it always seem that new fantasy roleplaying settings always have to have some new spin on the conflict between magic and technology? Better yet, they have to combine them in new and interesting ways. Why is this? Does the world really need more cyber-enhanced elvin mages? So why do all the new kewl roleplaying games have some technomagical something that allows PCs to wield swords and guns at the same time?

Here is the part where I hang my head and shuffle my feet. You see, in many ways, Alyria started off in just this way. One of the original impetuses for beginning design on Alyria was an attempt to create a meaningful justification for settings like Final Fantasy VII or Thief, which blend magic and technology in equal measure but without any sort of justification. Well, this setting would be different! Alyria was going to have a solid basis for all its technology and its magic. It would give good, solid reasons why guns and swords can mix. It would be so&so&kewl!

However, I was going to be different and original. Oh yes. I was going to lean more heavily on the science fiction side, rather than the fantasy side. This of course necessitated another planet on which to set my game. Somehow the Sea of Mist had already entered my mind, so I needed a gas giant. Now, everyone knows that human life cannot survive on a gas giant. So I knew that I needed some sort of terraforming machines to make the planet survivable. Yeah, thats it! And of course these machines would need a computer to run them and people to service the computer. Ooh yeah! And what if&what if these people thought that the computer was a god and worshiped it? Wouldnt that be neat?

And so, very early on in the development of Alyria the Keepers and their god/computer Pheric were born.
Not very inspirational roots, I know. However, the irony is that the Keepers did not develop far beyond this basic outline for quite a long time. It was as if they provided some sort of underlying excuse for the world to exist but nothing more. While other ideas have bounded into mind about so much else about Alyria, the Keepers have been quite an effort to develop.

Oh I knew some things, to be sure. I knew that the Keepers were descendents of the original scientists that built Pheric and the terraforming machines that provide breathable air to the human-occupied area of Alyria. I knew that these scientists retreated into their underground facilities during the Rape in order to protect the machines. I knew that sometime after the Rape they sent out missionaries, spreading their newly developed religion far and wide. I knew that some of the Keepers had found the Citadel and had developed a heretical offshoot of the true Keeper religion.

But that was all. I knew more about the heretics even than the true Keepers. I didnt even know the name of the place where Pheric and the Keepers live. So once again, I started from basic principles. Slowly I built a picture of the true Keepers. It is far from complete, but here is what I now know.

The Keepers live in a place called the Core. This is the underground complex dug into the mountains of Alyria that houses both the terraforming machines and the hardware for Pheric. The Core is surrounded by the Mountains of Glory that blaze with blinding light and intense heat.

Those that approach are burned alive long before they reach the Core. Instead secret entrances open into tunnels that lead below the mountains. Within the Core, the Keeper priests minister in the presence of Pheric (blessed be), the god of Iron and Thunder. They perform the ancient rites of maintenance that preserve the ancient machines that still pour out breathable air into the atmosphere. The lights are low. A smell of incense wafts through the air. In the distance a choir chants the Sacred Name of Pheric, his True Name that is not a word but a number. A feeling of holiness permeates these tunnels.

However, these facts still do not help me with a deeper question about the Keepers: I do not know how to feel about them. I know what I think about so many other elements of Alyria. The dragons make me shudder. The Sea of Mist takes away my breath with the wonder. My heart is filled with pity for the Restored. But these Keepers…

What should I feel about them?

Part of me is tempted to make them into an object lesson about technology. Look what happens when your technology becomes your god! Look at the harm that is done! But somehow that is not right. The heretics in the Citadel have perhaps fallen into this trap, but the true Keepers are different somehow. I want to hate them, but my heart is just not in it.

But another option presents itself. What if these Keepers have, in some way, learned that technology exists to serve man? What if they have secluded themselves as an act of service to all those who live on Alyria? What if they are being truly self-sacrificial? It would make sense. It would fit.

But if that is true, then they, too, have earned my pity. For though they dedicate their lives to selfless service, they do so in vain. Certainly they give life to the world, but it is not a life that lasts. They claim to have a true knowledge of the divine, but in the end it is only a lie, told first to themselves and then spread to others. Their service is tainted by their delusion, and it saddens me to think so. There is a peace in these tunnels, a sense of quiet purpose. There is a feel of reverence, of holiness, and yet, in the end, it is a lie.

How sad. How sad.

Must it end like this? I do not know. Unlike so much of the Alyria that I have shown you, the Keepers are still misty and vague to me. Perhaps over time I will come to understand them better. Perhaps there remains a hope to the Keepers.

The chant echoes down the empty halls, and I pray that it be so.