The deepest human fear lies not in violence or retribution, but in the stark moment of beginning—of confronting truth when lies offer comfort. What terrifies us is not the potential punishment for seeing clearly, but the transformation that clarity demands of us.
We latch onto familiar falsehoods, wrapping ourselves in the numbing security of doublethink and newspeak. To recognize reality—to call peace war, freedom slavery, ignorance strength—requires an unbearable courage. Once we truly see, we cannot unsee; the person who awakens is never the same as the one who slumbered in blissful ignorance.
In that threshold moment of recognition—that first rebellious thought—we determine whether we will embrace our essential humanity or surrender to the monstrous comfort of the collective lie. Like Winston scrawling in his forbidden diary, we know that the act of beginning authentic thought is itself a revolution.
Truth demands we step from shadow into unbearable light, while lies whisper promises of safety. Yet only in that painful first step toward reality do we discover whether we are truly human or merely mechanisms of someone else's design.
The World, the Game, and the Lie
I. The Divided Crown
Veritas is a continent of contradiction. It sings of unity, yet thrives on fracture. Truth is praised in law but buried in action. Twenty sovereign states stand like pieces on a board, each claiming peace while sharpening blades beneath the table.
They smile. They shake hands.
They lie.
The balance holds—barely—by treaties inked in falsehood, by spies cloaked in silks, and by masks worn more faithfully than crowns.
The Twenty States of Veritas:
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The Dreaded lands
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Virelia
Nytherra
Dauvalen
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The Abyss
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Kael'thros
Elarin
Zhurak
Iskareth
Quessan
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The Forgotten Hollow
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Valmere
Cindralis
Thergund
Myrrenhal
Ossaria
Brailith
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The dawn
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Fenmaris
Kaf
Draken
Sol'Vera
Noctherrin
Kyverna
II. The Birth of the Game
The Liar Games began in Kyverna, or so the myth says. What started as covert training for elite deceivers became something more—a ritual, a competition, a hidden war.
Now, the Game is everywhere and nowhere.
It crowns rulers. It buries kings.
And to join is not a choice. It is a calling.
Winners rise as legends.
Losers vanish without name.
Some say the Game controls Veritas.
Others whisper: it is Veritas.
III. Masks and Meaning
In Veritas, a mask is not something to be taken lightly, it is law, identity, a weapon.
To walk unmasked is an act of war.
To remove a rival's mask is a kill greater than murder.
Nobles do not duel with blades, but with implication, rumor, and perfectly timed silence.
Masks can be silver or wood, painted or plain—but the true mask is the self you wear.
Children learn to lie before they learn to write.
Loyalty is fluid. Memory is suspect.
Even truth is camouflaged until it is useful.
IV. The Lie Eater & The Liar King
In every age, the Game whispers of two mythic figures—never seen, never proven, but always feared.
The Liar King: a crowned deceiver who will win the Game so completely that truth itself becomes irrelevant. A ruler shaped by perfect manipulation and deception.
The Lie Eater: A shadow slipping between facades, the Lie Eater stalks through the labyrinth of deception, tasting falsehoods like fine wine. Relentless and insatiable, this phantom dismantles the Game piece by piece, peeling away pretenses with surgical precision, exposing the raw nerves beneath every carefully constructed identity. Neither malicious nor benevolent—merely inevitable—it consumes illusions until nothing stands between souls and their unvarnished reflections, leaving only the stark, blinding light of undeniable truth.
They are myths, not history.
Icons in stories.
Threats passed down like warnings.
Yet the world watches—
because one day, they may become real.
V. The First Rule
They'll whisper this world fractured long ago.
They'll claim our masks were once a choice, not armor.
That the Lie Eater stalks the shadows between truths. That the Liar King already sits upon his throne of elegant deceptions.
That you still stand at the crossroads, that reality remains yours to interpret, pristine and uncorrupted
This world is illusionary, if I were a liar—
This is exactly what I'd want you to believe.