Calaseid

Calaseid (pronounced: CA-la-se-id) is the goddess of the sea and storms; She who Controls the Tides, Mother of the Deep, the Stormbringer, and the Sea Queen. She is respected and feared by sailors all over Aldmeer and is often viewed as the sea itself; this is the reason that seamen refer to the sea as female. It is sailor belief that the weather in the sea reflects Calaseid’s mood, and if you have angered the goddess or her priests you better stay out of the sea for months.

While some scholars doubt that Calaseid has that much power over the seas in the material plane, they don’t dare go far into the sea to test their theories. One famous figure who questioned the power of the gods went into a cruise after he proclaimed Calaseid a false god and while out on sea that ship was never seen or heard from again.

In truth, Calaseid is both a Primordial holding sway over water and also a deity of the sea.

There are many places where the worship of Calaseid has greatly affected livelihood; two notable places in Rythalion are Ilika in Tejar where the clerics of the Church of Waves use Calaseid’s blessing to control the tides around the city assuring safe passage for trading ships, and the Ten Keeps of the Canary Coast where rulers of the past took Calaseid’s favor for granted and misused it leading to the anger of the goddess, the flooding of their ports, and the clergy of Calaseid leaving while taking the goddess’s favor with them and leaving them with problems and deaths at sea.

During the Primeval Era
Calaseid was the first Primordial to find Aldmeer and make it her home during the primeval times. She had grown weary of the ongoing conflict with which primordials and gods of the multiverse were occupied, endlessly fighting against one another. She had made Aldmeer her domain; the planet was still relatively young in terms of continents and even intelligent races, and its gods did not exist yet. The planet was mostly sea during that time and Calaseid had made it her dominion while enjoying some peace and quiet from the tiring war. The primordial of the waters enjoyed enough quiet time in the planet to see the first major intelligent and advanced civilization rise; the Lenavi Civilization. Races of the world as they are known today were still young and still developing. The first grand communities and cities were developing and as the world was being shaped so were they and their gods. Calaseid had become a mythical creature in these cultures and had been associated with the sea since then. The planet was even named Aldmeer (Primordial Sea) in the Luari language of the Lenavi Civilization once explorers made journeys around the globe and even talking with the Primordial herself. That name symbolised both how old the world truly was compared to them and how it is the domain of the only primordial and ancient power they knew. The world maps of this era depicted the world as an endless sea with not as many landmasses compared to the Aldmeer of today.

From Calaseid’s arrival, she was at odds and also sometimes in conflict with the Aboleths who were occupying the vast seas even before her arrival. The Aboleths viewed and still view Aldmeer as their rightful home and dominion. These super ancient fish-like sea telepaths still hate Calaseid, the Primordials and all the Deities with a passion.

During the Divine Rain
The war between the divine beings was continuing in the multiverse however, and Calaseid’s haven was eventually found by other primordials who sought to claim worlds for themselves. Calaseid didn’t like this one bit. The other primordials went and carved a bloody swath in the world, ripping continents apart and creating new ones in order to shape their suitable domains. Many people and cultures were lost like that; the Lenavi Civilization being one of them, leaving the lenavi a broken race. The name Aldmeer had taken another meaning, marking it as the Sea of Primordials in which numerous primordials were wreaking havoc as they were marking their dominions on the world.

Calaseid, mad at these turn of events that ruined her quiet existence in this world she had grown to call home, assaulted the other primordials, initiating the version of the war in this part of the material. Seeing these turn of events the new gods partook in the conflict as well. Some of these relatively newly formed deities of the world could not help directly but some sent their avatars while others named champions. Others descended from their domains and took to the fight. Some exceptionally brave and powerful mortals also partook in the conflict and sided with Calaseid and the gods; one of them was the mortal Annalyon who saved countless members of the lenavi race and together with Calaseid defeated a very powerful primorial of air named Zalakista. The conflict continued for years until the invading primordials were defeated; some could not be destroyed utterly and were put into sleep in the deep reaches of the world. These insanely powerful elemental entities are still laying dormant even in the current day and age.

After the final and devastating battle with the primordials, the world could know stability again, and the age passed into legend and myth. The mighty mortals who faced the primordials passed into divinity as their deeds were viewed as divine; Annalyon, Dangad, Gideus and Vakan became deities during that time and rose to the heavens. Calaseid had already been associated with the sea and after all that, people started praising her as the goddess of the sea and the true queen of the waves of this world. However, Calaseid was not really after all that praise but the reclaiming of her turf. Yet after the Divine Rain as this conflict was later known, Aldmeer was not the same. Continents had spawned where before were none populated by people, diminishing the vast sea into a smaller one in the eyes of Calaseid. She dwelled for a decade more in the deep but was no longer satisfied and left for the Elemental Plane of Water to create a divine realm for herself with her power she gained as a deity. She still watched over the seas of Aldmeer as she still saw them as her old home and considered all the sea creatures her children.

Divine Realm
The goddess’s divine realm is called the Bottomless Swirl; a titanic sea tornado rising out of the sea where a gigantic whirlpool swirls around it. Located in the Elemental Plane of Water, it is a place where even denizens of the inner plane tread lightly.

Leviathans guard it zealously along with other sea creatures like dragon turtles and megalodons.

Her steward and herald is a Kraken named Zerhastatlal who takes his job very seriously.

Most notable events involving the goddess in the last 1000 years
In 1234 SR Calaseid caused the sinking of the city Vail’neria as well as its surrounding region due to their excessive hunt of sea creatures, destruction of a reef, slavery of sea elves and merfolk, and the killing of a giant sperm whale that was considered a sacred animal of the goddess.

During 1299 SR Calaseid appointed Erceas Dvintil as her Chosen in order to lead an army against the Aboleths and their minions in the Trench of Selxena. The army managed to drive back the influence of the Aboleths and reclaim the Trench.

In the year 1369 SR, Cultists of Dagon tried to usurp control of the clergy of Calaseid in Rythalion, Ule and Edevair in an intercontinental power struggle in order to root out her faith there and establish the demon lord as supreme ruler of the seas. They failed in all three continents.

During the Scarring in the year 1402 SR aka on -1 AS, Calaseid sent her avatar to Rythalion in order to combat two of the awoken primordials that were released during the harrowing events of this magical cataclysm. While her avatar was slain, the primordials were defeated and sent to slumber once again.

In 113 AS the sahuagin of the Svahan Deeps feeling disrespected and taken advantage of by the merfolk declared war on them. Both races invoked Calaseid to be by their side, but the goddess having been fed up with their feud refused to give aid to any side and instead instructed her agents and clerics to dispatch anyone who harmed the sea’s ecosystem in any way during the war. The war ended when a leviathan destroyed both sides while they were ravaging the reefs and trenches with war.

In 301 AS the noble marid Jrtea tried to enter the Bottomless Swirl and conquer it with an enormous army. Calaseid herself imprisoned him and is using his failed attempt as a warning to all who would repeat his folly.

In 464 AS the pirate lord Valeria Rines Tiela slew the gigantic manta ray of Vassal Cape in Aseldis and the goddess cursed her and her descendants to be petrified whenever they step in seawater. The petrification could not be broken except with a wish spell or divine intervention. This marked the end of Valeria's armada’s pillaging because all of the sailors saw this as a warning from the goddess. Many cities were spared that way.

In 687 AS agents of the archomental Ogrémoch, a sworn enemy of Calaseid, unleashed a Zaratan that was wreaking havoc in the reefs along the Canary Coast, aiming to destroy one of her great temples in the sea. Before the goddess acted the privateer Orikoris the Seasplitter slew the Zaratan thus performing a great service to Calaseid. The goddess gifted him and the whole population of the city he founded with her favor.