The Palleseen conquest of Nihilostes' homeland
The Palleseen conquest of Nihilostes' homeland is a completed military and cultural campaign, referenced in City of Last Chances as a settled historical fact whose reverberations still shape the religious and political landscape of the Sway. Though the episode itself falls outside the narrative present of the novel, its aftermath is invoked in passing as background: the physical destruction of indigenous temples, the extraction of sacred metal for use as raw magic, and the paradoxical liberation of small cults from the persecution of greater gods. The conquest thus functions in the text not as an active plot thread but as a structural precondition, a wound in the divine geography that every character and faction inhabits without necessarily reflecting upon.
The event matters to the series because it inverted the logic of religious hierarchy across the Sway. Where the big gods had once persecuted little gods, the Palleseen conquest eliminated the native priesthoods that maintained those hierarchies, scattering subversive cults into foreign soil where they had not previously taken root. The cultural consequence is a diaspora of the sacred: gold stripped from shrines becomes fuel, transplanted rites mutate in alien contexts, and the conquered people's spiritual traditions survive only in displaced form. Nihilostes carries this history in the very naming of their homeland, which the text treats as already destroyed, already absorbed, already a source of plunder rather than a living polity.
The Event
When & Where
The conquest is completed before the events of City of Last Chances and is referenced only in retrospect. It surfaces in ch 19 as settled history, invoked obliquely when the narrative addresses the state of temples and cults across the Sway. The place of the event is Nihilostes' homeland; its aftermath extends across the Sway, where exported cults and repurposed relics now exist in foreign contexts. - ch 19
Who Was Involved
The Palleseen are the conquering force. Nihilostes is the figure whose homeland was the target of the campaign. The indigenous deities of that homeland, and the big gods who had previously persecuted them, are the parties whose power-balance the conquest irreversibly altered. The conquered people's subversive cults and their adherents were displaced across the Sway in the conquest's wake. - ch 19
What Happened
The Palleseen conquered Nihilostes' homeland in a military campaign that had already concluded by the time of the novel's present. In the aftermath, temples dedicated to the homeland's indigenous deities were torn down. The gold and relics within those temples were either carried off as plunder or rendered down for raw magic. The subversive cults of the conquered people were not suppressed in situ; instead they were exported across the Sway, scattering into foreign contexts where they had not previously taken root. The big gods' persecution of little gods came to an end as a direct consequence of the conquest's destruction of the structures that had sustained it. - ch 19
Causes & Consequences
The text does not narrate the causes of the conquest; it is treated as an established fact assumed known to the reader. Its consequences, however, are specific and material: the physical destruction of indigenous shrines, the conversion of sacred metal into a utilitarian magical resource, and the displacement of religious practice into unfamiliar regions. The most consequential shift is theological - the end of the big gods' persecution of little gods - which reorganises the divine landscape of the Sway in ways the characters experience as ambient rather than dramatic. The conquered people's spiritual traditions survive only in diaspora, transplanted and stripped of their native grounding. - ch 19
History
City of Last Chances
The conquest of Nihilostes' homeland by the Palleseen is referenced obliquely in City of Last Chances as a completed act of destruction whose cultural aftermath still reverberates across the Sway. In the wake of the conquest, temples dedicated to the homeland's indigenous deities were torn down, and their gold and relics were either carried off as plunder or rendered down for raw magic - ch 19. The effect on the divine landscape was paradoxical: the big gods' persecution of little gods came to an end, yet the subversive cults of the conquered people were not suppressed but instead exported across the Sway, scattering them into foreign contexts where they had not previously taken root - ch 19. The episode is treated in the text not as an ongoing military campaign but as a settled historical fact whose consequences - displaced shrines, repurposed sacred metal, transplanted religious practice - are assumed known to the reader and invoked only in passing.
Relationships
- Nihilostes - The homeland bearing their name was the target of the Palleseen conquest; their identity is inseparable from a territory that no longer exists as a living polity, only as a source of plunder and displaced cults.
Notable Quotes
No verbatim dialogue or quotable lines appear in the source material for this event.
Tags
- conquest · #temple-destruction · #god-harvesting · #colonial