List of Ilaseuasa

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Masa Ilaseuasa

History

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Fifteen Shrines Period

The 15 Wellspring Shrines have most likely existed since time immemorial, though they gained great prominence during the 15th and 16th century. These shrines are based around the major wellsprings that feed three of the great rivers of Loa Republic and sustain millions. As such, the shrines wielded great influence in the past, with highland kings being expected to submit to the shrines. These shrines thus came to be a significant political power in their own right, establishing clerical states in the territories surrounding the shrines. The shrine states however came under significant pressure from the kingdoms of Batana, Nisoma and Kalia'ai, which were centered around rivers directly fed by the wellsprings and which bordered the shrines. The shrine states had begun constructing levees and dams around the rivers and sending mercenaries to exact tax from the trade barges on the rivers, viewing them as an extension of the wellsprings themselves. This eventually erupted into war as the kingdom of Nisoma besieged the Shrine of Eternal Peace, and the kingdoms of Kalia'ai and Batana also led sieges against their neighboring shrines. This war was ended within a year by the Loa Imperial Domain and by 1541 a peace was signed in the Floating Palace. This peace proved pivotal as it limited the power of the client kingdoms, and notably had very lax punishments for the shrines, prohibiting them from operating outside of their borders while entirely reducing the influence of the client kingdoms outside of central administration, completely stripping them of a military. This war also resulted in the severe weakening of Kalia'ai and Batana, with the latter being in a few decades by the Uelamanpu'ue Clan. For much of the succeeding century and a half, the shrines maintained a stable balance of power over the general populace. Maybe rework. Potential for salvaging

Beliefs

Indigenous Customs

The Masa has a strong focus on sacred wells. They revere these wells and the waters that flow from within, often ascribing a unique individual goddess or god to these wells. Weekly ceremonies are hosted to praise and worship these wells, with the village all joining in attendance to offer their praise and host a communal feast. This forms the basis for much of the regular religious practices of the Masa.

Law

====Higanmaua and the Fourth Incarnate==== Higanmaua was the younger brother of Selauin, a prominent clergy member in the port city of Ku'umata. They had emigrated there from the village of Magauelana, now the Shrine City of the Fourth Incarnate. The brother and sister were in particular fascinated by the Islamic faith practiced by the Kiravian traders. Selauin eventually attracted the attention of the High Fane, who examined her life more closely and declared that she must be the Fourth Incarnate. Although all the Incarnates are supposed to be nameless and their past forgotten due to having mantled the Perfected Mana, it is an open secret that Selauin became the Fourth Incarnate due to her close relationship with her brother. For a time they both studied in the High Fane, with the Incarnate pushing for the integration of many aspects of Islamic theology into the Kapuhenasa due to her ardent belief that Islam and the Kapu must share the same divine origins. Higanmaua shared her views and at times directly influenced her thinking, but in 1339, he had to return to their home village after his father died, given that the eldest child was unable to conduct mourning rituals as a result of becoming a goddess. It is in his legal work in the Masa scion and the many neighboring Ilaseuasa that his influence can be felt. He directly challenged the original legal system that operated differently depending on regional traditions and continuously pushed for cooperation in establishing a universal standard based on scripture. As a result, his rulings have affected every single scion, but he also issued many judgements for his own native Masa branch. It is in his direct judgments that the identity of the Fourth Incarnate is known, as he refers to both her and Selauin almost interchangeably. These judgments concern many things but the most influential is that of inter-tribal warfare. Higanmaua viewed it as a direct hindrance to establishing governmental rules and as such issued a great host of rulings related to wars for honor or sport. He explicitly condemned these tribal wars and made many rulings in favor of other methods of repaying grievances or honors. This has given rise to the feasts, kosa and sporting festivals of the Masa scion.

Juotoalangan

Juotoalangan lived a few decades after Higanmaua, having been born in 1401 and being predominantly active during the 1440s. She was one of a trend of scholars that challenged the authority of the High Fane over the Ilaseuasa, and her legal work was largely concerned with justifying local customs and especially the sikabenuala. It was custom in much of the Loa Highlands to use the domesticated sika as hunting apes and sacrifices, but this practice was hotly contested by the Insular scion who did not have any such traditions, viewing the highland customs as inhumane and cannibalistic due to the fact that the sika are tool using, near human apes closely related to the Kikpari. Juotoalangan did not try to deny the qualities or sapient nature of the sika but instead emphasized their closer relation to Nagala due to being less human, and thus cannibalizing them or sacrificing them is a sacred act and as such must be practiced. Although her ideas were contested by the clergy, she submitted many tens of thousands of rulings and judgements based on every single sacrifice in the Masa scion across a decade, enough so that it eventually became entirely unfeasible to overrule them all, with the matter of the sika being the single largest subject matter in the legal code of the Masa. It is estimated that following standard procedures, it would take over 50 years to overturn all of these judgements, and as such 'ape worship' is enshrined in the innate governing and legal bodies of the Masa.

Aladuinara

The scholar Aladuinara lived during the late 1800s and early 1900s, and was instrumental in shaping modern day Luitaoaka. Called "the great apologist of secular rule" by contemporary scholars, clergy and the Sacred Order, Aladuinara held great sympathy for the chieftains. Having served as a soldier in the imperial military and as a monk in the halls of the High Fane, he had seen the immeasurable corruption of these institutions. However unlike the Sacred Order, who thought secular rule tainted the institutions and that a pure theocracy was the righteous solution, Aladuinara thought that secular rule was stained by theocracy. He derived this belief from the fact that the Imperial Clan was descended from the Second Incarnate and utilized that to justify their rule and to garner the support of the High Fane. As such, much of his life was devoted to fomenting division in the Masa Scion, and emboldened the chieftains to establish the Luitaoaka Confederacy through his many rulings that diminished scion control. He maintained a great deal of contact with the queens of Nisoma and Isahotainao, the Regent of Kusama and the Totowa Confederacy, and is often credited as the 10th founder of modern day Loa Republic. Salvage somehow