Cradle

by Will Wight

In the world of Cradle, sacred artists train their souls to ascend through ranks of supernatural power. Wei Shi Lindon was born Unsouled — unable to use the vital aura that saturates everything. Told he will never advance, Lindon refuses to accept his fate and sets out on a journey through a world of sacred beasts, ancient sects, and martial artists who can shatter mountains.

55 characters, locations, and items in this world codex.

Characters

• Wei Shi Lindon — An Unsouled from a backwater valley who advances at impossible speed through sheer preparation, lateral thinking, and an absolute refusal to accept a
• Yerin Arelius — A sword artist raised in isolation by a Sage, fused with a parasitic Blood Shadow she's weaponized into a second self — blunt, fierce, and allergic to
• Eithan Arelius — The last scion of House Arelius — an insufferably charming Underlord who sees everything, plans everything, and is hiding a secret that would reshape
• Akura Mercy — The heir to the Akura Monarch — brilliant, warm, and crushed between the weight of a family that demands perfection and a heart that just wants to hel
• Orthos — An ancient sacred turtle who once served the Blackflame Empire — a cantankerous, fire-breathing mentor whose bond with Lindon pulled him back from the
• Dross — A mind-spirit born from dream madra and hunger aura in Ghostwater — Lindon's bonded advisor who processes combat data, generates battle plans, and nev
• Little Blue — A tiny Sylvan Riverseed spirit of pure madra — Lindon's oldest companion, a crystalline healer whose gentle chime belies a fierce protectiveness.
• Akura Malice — The Monarch of the Akura clan — an ancient queen of shadow who built a dynasty to survive the Dreadgods, loves her children in the way a general loves
• Reigan Shen — The King of Lions — a Monarch who murdered his way to the top, collects world-ending weapons as trophies, and believes the strong have not just the ri
• Northstrider — A solitary Monarch who hunts dragons across continents — a man who turned himself into a living weapon and measures the world by what he can kill.
• Ziel — A once-great Archlord whose spirit was shattered by a Dreadgod cult — broken, exhausted, and slowly being pulled back to life by people who refuse to
• Suriel — The Abidan Judge of healing and restoration — a being who can reverse planetary destruction, trapped between her duty to preserve the multiverse and h
• Makiel — The Abidan Judge of fate and prediction — a cold strategist who sees all possible futures and has decided that controlling them is more important than
• Fisher Gesha — A crotchety old soulsmith with an acid tongue and the best construct workshop on the Ashwind continent — she invested in Lindon before anyone else did
• Jai Long — A disgraced Jai clan exile with a Remnant arm and a bone-deep protectiveness of his sister — Lindon's first serious rival, eventually an unlikely ally
• Sha Miara — The youngest Monarch in the world — a teenager with world-shattering power who inherited the Ninecloud throne and treats sacred arts combat like a gam
• Akura Fury — Malice's son and the Akura clan's most terrifying weapon — a Herald who lives for battle and treats ascending to Monarch as an excuse to punch harder
• Akura Charity — The Sage of the Silver Heart — Malice's sister and the Akura clan's spymaster, diplomat, and chief strategist, executing her sister's will with quiet,
• Akura Pride — Mercy's younger brother and her opposite in temperament — intense, humorless, and desperate to prove himself worthy of the Akura name through sheer fo
• Wei Shi Kelsa — Lindon's older sister who stayed in Sacred Valley — talented, practical, and quietly furious that the world outside the mountains existed and no one t
• Elder Whisper — An ancient white fox spirit trapped in Sacred Valley who knows the truth about the suppression field — he speaks in riddles because the direct truth w
• Adama — The Sword Sage — Yerin's master and one of the most powerful sword artists in Cradle's history, killed in Sacred Valley where the suppression field re
• Min Shuei — The Winter Sage — an ice-cold sword artist who carries the legacy of her fallen peers and measures every sacred artist alive against the standards of
• Red Faith — The Blood Sage — a fanatical researcher of Blood Shadows who considers parasitic madra entities the next step in sacred arts evolution, regardless of
• Sopharanatoth — A gold dragon in human form competing in the Uncrowned tournament — fueled by the grief of watching her clutch-siblings die and a desperate need to wi
• Yan Shoumei — A Redmoon Hall Blood Shadow host and Uncrowned competitor — quiet, deadly, and far more dangerous than her unassuming demeanor suggests.
• Subject One — The original Dreadgod — an ancient horror imprisoned beneath Sacred Valley in the Labyrinth, the source of all hunger madra on Cradle and the reason t
• Jai Chen — Jai Long's younger sister, spiritually damaged and slowly healing — quiet, perceptive, and tougher than her fragile appearance suggests.
• Naru Huan — The Emperor of the Blackflame Empire — a wind-path Overlord managing a territory that sits in the crossfire of Monarch-level politics with nothing but
• Emriss Silentborn — The Monarch of communication — a sentient tree who became the most powerful being on her continent by spreading language and cooperation rather than c
• Tiberian Arelius — The last Arelius Monarch — a reformer who trusted the wrong ally and paid for it with his life, his territory, and his family's future.
• The Wandering Titan — A mountain-sized Dreadgod of earth and hunger that sleeps for decades and wakes to consume — its passage reshapes continents and its hunger devours sa
• The Bleeding Phoenix — A Dreadgod of blood and parasitic madra — it doesn't just kill, it infects, spreading Blood Shadows that turn sacred artists into extensions of its hu
• The Silent King — A Dreadgod of dream and mental domination — the most intelligent of the four, it doesn't destroy cities, it enslaves minds and turns populations into
• The Weeping Dragon — A Dreadgod of storm and lightning that circles the world in an eternal tempest — the fastest and most destructive of the four in raw environmental dam

Locations

• Sacred Valley — A beautiful mountain valley hiding a terrible truth — its residents live under a suppression field that caps their advancement at Jade, and none of th
• Mount Samara — The sacred peak of the valley — home to ancestral trees whose vital aura draws sacred artists to meditate beneath them, and a doorway to something anc
• Heaven's Glory School — The most powerful sect in Sacred Valley — self-important Jades who rule their tiny domain with the arrogance of Monarchs, unaware they'd be nothing ou
• Blackflame Empire — A fading empire named for the destructive madra Path that built it — now a mid-tier territory in the shadow of Monarch-level powers, surviving through
• Serpent's Grave — The capital of the Blackflame Empire — built on the remains of an ancient dragon and powered by the aura that still leaks from its bones.
• Moongrave — A border town between Akura territory and the contested badlands — where ambitious sacred artists come to prove themselves and desperate ones come to
• Ghostwater — Northstrider's pocket world — a collapsing research facility where he experimented with dream madra, hunger aura, and the limits of what a sacred arti
• Ninecloud City — The Ninecloud Court's capital — a city of prismatic light and political theater where the Uncrowned King tournament decides the fate of factions.
• Akura Homeland — The seat of the Akura clan's power — a shadow-draped territory where Malice's will shapes the landscape and every citizen lives under the protection a
• Nightwheel Valley — The Akura clan's elite training grounds — where the most promising young artists are tested, broken, and rebuilt into weapons worthy of Malice's army.
• The Labyrinth — An ancient underground network spanning the entire world — built by a forgotten civilization to contain their greatest mistake, now holding Subject On
• Sky's Edge — A contested frontier region at the boundary of civilized territory — where Dreadgod cults recruit, remnants roam unchecked, and advancement is the pri
• Windfall — Lindon's mobile fortress — a cloudship large enough to house his entire team, equipped with soulsmithing workshops, training rooms, and enough firepow

Items

• Penance — A single arrow that kills anything it's fired at — the Abidan-crafted prize of the Uncrowned King tournament, a weapon that could assassinate a Monarc
• Void Key — A spatial storage artifact that opens a pocket dimension — the sacred artist's equivalent of a bag of holding, and worth killing over.
• Suriel's Marble — A glass marble containing a vision of the wider world — the gift that Suriel left for Lindon, showing him that power beyond Sacred Valley existed and
• Wavedancer — A wintersteel sword of legendary craftsmanship — Yerin's primary weapon, forged from the rarest material on Cradle and resonant with sword madra at a
• Archstone — A rare advancement catalyst that accelerates a sacred artist's progression — condensed vital aura in solid form, worth more than most cities.
• Lindon's Hunger Arm — A prosthetic arm forged from Subject One's hunger binding — it consumes everything it touches, stealing madra, techniques, and life force from any sac
• Midnight — Reigan Shen's replica of Ozriel's Scythe — a Monarch-crafted weapon of destruction that simulates the power of the Reaper on a reduced scale.

View full codex at Simulacra.Ink