Twilight of Empires

It all began with a stone. The legends do not explain where the Jewel came from, nor where it went. It just suddenly was, and the Darkness was banished; it is assumed that information gathered from demons is fictitious at best, and so far, very little of it matches. The Jewel is never portrayed as self aware: it simple was, and the world was all the better for it.

It is important to note that while sunlight is an issue for most forms of undead and creatures from the Darkness, it is Jewel Light that is considered the true form of holy illumination. The central feature of most Holy temples is a large self-luminous quartz crystal meant to represent the Jewel. Another important fact about Jewel Light is that apparently every living and unliving creature, plants included, recognizes it immediately. Philosophers argue this is because all life misses and yearns for the light of the Jewel ever since it vanished.

In most cases, we'll be referring to the gods by what they are the gods Of. This isn't to say they don't have names: they have many. However, it doesn't appear to matter if you are using the Elven or Mandarinate or even the First (dating back to the Divine Age) name for the god of Fire, your prayers still seem to work.

The Jewel spawned 108 gods into the world over the course of the Divine Age. The older gods can be generally grouped as the gods of Proper Nouns: Earth, Sky, Fire, Sea, Stars, and so forth. The younger gods are more the gods of Verbs: War, Justice, Love, Farming, Scholarship, etc. Then there is the one hundred and eighth god, the God of Endings, or the Unborn God. He's up in the Red Moon, which goes around Lunistria every eight days.

• Index of Divine Beings

This category of being covers a wide range of entities that are supernatural forces of great power, but not part of the original 108. Divine servants, the ultra-high end Elemental Beings that adept class shamans invoke, a few of the most revered Emperors of the Mandarinate, and the First Ancestors of the Fang Empire fall into this category. Unlike the gods, it is possible to get a conversation with these, even if it only amounts to “Die mortal worm!”

It is important to note that while the 108 original gods could (and did) manifest in multiple places simultaneously, the Lesser (awake) gods appear to only manage to be in one place at a time.

With the exception of Belkwynith Stormcrow, of course.

The stuff the Jewel drove back at the beginning. Depending on your lore book, it is either another plane of existence, or out beyond the stars, or between them. It is where demons, devils, and the Outer Masters dwell. The first two groups seem focused on screwing up the Jewel's territory, and corrupting souls to bring back home with them. The Outer Masters don't seem to care, and give the other natives of the Darkness the willies.

First the good news: free will exists, there is no predestination by default. Ignoring the known plot point that the First Sorcerer's War will be happening in the next several generations, there is no grand tapestry of fate directing the lives of mortals. With 107 active major gods, you have to ask, “How would that even work?” That said, there are hordes of fortune tellers, diviners, and prophets all trying to catch a glimpse of the future, or make coin convincing others that they can. Which feeds into the most terrifying and powerful force in Lunistria: Mortal Belief.
Once enough people believe an event is going to happen, it almost invariably does. The old granny says your son was born under a lucky star, and will Do Great Things? Thanks to the subconscious support of your village, he's headed for an adventuring career. Get a dry summer causing everyone to worry about a drought? Time to hire a weather mage lest the winter be frighteningly arid. And if that old fool on the edge of town rants about the mountain kami's anger, best invest in long term housing elsewhere.
And this doesn't even begin to take into account the interference of Belkwynith Stormcrow, Greater Dragon of Time, Demigod of meddling. Somewhere between Gandalf and the Doctor in his operations, he thankfully couches his predictions as deductive reasoning. “If these unfortunate events are allowed to play out, then this really bad situation will follow.”

Different sects have different interpretations of the situation, but there are roughly three places your soul can go after your death.

First is the afterlife of Salvation, where nearly everyone wants to go, but rarely do. Peace, paradise, release from the cycle of rebirth, and all that. Generally, no one comes back from here, though there are a few souls who have chosen to do so, usually during exceptionally disastrous circumstances to tip things back in the direction of hope.

Next is the afterlife of Redemption. where everyone else ends up these days. It is here that your soul is judged for your actions in life, given an appropriate punishment to redeem your failures, and in time, sent back to be reborn and try again. It is here the Divine Servitors apparently dwell.

And last is the Darkness, the afterlife of Damnation. In the Divine and Slumbering eras, the gods would send the irredeemable out to spend eternity with (or be eaten by) the demons and devils. Since the Slumbering Era, no one appears to have been sent there: this seems to be a decision reserved to only the gods themselves. It is possible to have your soul taken there, usually as part of a Warlock's contract.

There are three adjacent, closely overlapping planes of existence, permeating but not touching the physical world. One is the Astral Plane, the realm of pure mind and concepts. It is largely empty save for Mind using monsters, House Drowe researchers, and any number of eavesdropping effects. Apparently this is also where Spatial/Farseer magics route teleports through. Next is the Spiritplane, where location tied elemental spirits and ghosts hang out. It is NOT the afterlife. Last is the Dream Realm, which somewhat overlaps the other two. Dream, Diabolos, and most sleeping beings spend some time here.

Each of the ten (twelve?) elements has its own, less adjacent plane of conceptual embodiment. A popular method of reaching them is though the Spiritplane, but anyone who claims to have entered one is probably lying or mistaken. Each of the Elemental Planes has a marginally survivable buffer zone between it an the Spiritplane, probably created through the limitations of mortal understanding and the terrifying power of mortal belief. Most of the elemental planes also have buffer zones between each other. It is entirely impossible to map the interconnections between the elemental planes in three dimensions. Most of the arcanologists who master the four-dimensional math techniques to do so usually end up being masters of spatial magics.

Which brings us to the Other Realms. In the boundaries of the Dream and Spirit planes, eddies and currents are formed as the power of mortal dreaming creativity mixes with the malleable and unpredictable essence of spiritual substance. And in some of the calmer margins of this maelstrom, islands of stability form. It is best to treat them as pocket dimensions (or World of Darkness Horizon Realms), and they range in size from a small closet to moderate sized nations. The Hidden Kingdom of the Swanmai, Mount Hourai of the Greater Kitsune, the Questing Realm of the Tikume, and the Eternal Battlefield of the War God are all examples.