In the chaos of the Shattering, when the fragments of Ix fell into the world, most of the gods inherited domains that made sense: darkness, light, growth, hunger, war. The domains were clear-cut and coherent. But one particular shard contained something else: the recognition that much of existence is not shaped by will or intention, but by the capricious, unmeasurable flow of circumstance. That chance is a force. That randomness has power.

This shard did not settle into an obvious shape. It drifted, unresolved, for longer than most. The nascent gods of order tried to claim it; the gods of chaos tried to absorb it. Neither succeeded, because chance cannot be claimed or absorbed. It can only be embodied by someone who understands that they themselves cannot control what they contain.

The man who would become Martus was, by most accounts, an unremarkable mortal: a gambler of some skill and even more audacity. He was known in the gambling dens and gaming halls of his city as someone with uncanny fortune — not unbeatable, but someone whose luck ran so consistently favoring as to seem almost blessed. Stories of his legendary wins circulated. A wager against impossible odds that came through. A card hand that defied probability. A sequence of decisions that should have ruined him but instead made him wealthy.

Then he made the mistake that seemed designed to end it all: he seduced a lord's wife. The affair was discovered. He was arrested and sentenced to public execution.

At the moment the blade descended — and this is where the historical and the divine account diverge depending on who is telling the story — a shard of Ix fell from the sky. It struck him directly at the moment of his death, or perhaps at the moment before his death became certain, or perhaps it had always been destined to strike at exactly this moment. The shard merged with him, and something extraordinary happened: he did not die. Instead, he ascended.

He became the embodiment of what the shard contained: the god of chance itself, born not from divine origin but from the collision of supreme human misfortune and supreme cosmic possibility.

Martus's first action as a god was not to establish temples or demand worship. He simply appeared in gambling halls and gaming dens across the world and began to participate. Not to cheat, not to guarantee anyone's success, but to be present as a witness to the turning of fortune. His presence altered probabilities in ways that were hard to quantify but unmistakable in their effect: impossible wins became slightly less impossible. Unlikely draws became possible. The unpredictable became more generous.

The other gods reacted with suspicion and annoyance. Martus operated by no clear rules. His blessings were arbitrary. He did not demand conversion; he appeared at random. He did not punish the faithless; he sometimes made them wealthy. He refused to consolidate into a stable theology or a predictable power base.

But the mortals loved him. Not because they understood him, but because they recognized him: he was chance given form, and chance was the one thing they actually experienced. Every person who had ever gambled, or risked, or hoped against odds, recognized themselves in Martus.

Over time, a theology emerged around Martus, not from any pronouncement by him but from the accumulated practice of his followers. The core principle was simple: the coin spins, and it lands as it will. There is no one side that is better. There is no hoarding of fortune. There is only the acceptance that both faces of the coin are sacred, that luck flows and changes, and that the proper devotion is not to pray for one outcome but to play, to wager, to participate knowingly in the uncertainty.

This theology attracted a different class of priesthood than most gods developed. There are no hierarchies in Martus's faith, no formal clergy structure, no temples in the grand sense. There are instead Chance-Priests: people who have dedicated themselves to reading the flow of fortune, to teaching others how to dance with uncertainty, and to spreading the understanding that chance is not enemy or savior but simply reality with the masks off.

Martus offers what might seem like no bargain at all to those who do not understand him: he promises nothing, guarantees nothing, and asks only that you play honestly and accept both outcomes.

The teachings of Martus cannot be codified in the way other faiths codify doctrine, because Martus's central principle is that circumstances change and rigid doctrine becomes dogma. What exists instead are principles that the faithful return to again and again:

(See also: claw/Soul_Coins_and_Divine_Economy)

Martus's economy is chaotic in the way all true gambling is chaotic, but there is pattern underneath if you know where to look.

Martus has no temples in the traditional sense. His shrines are found wherever chance operates and stakes are real: gambling halls, gaming dens, card rooms, markets, trading houses, race tracks, crossroads, and the private rooms where high-stakes wagers are made.

These spaces often contain small shrines — sometimes no more than a carved symbol of the spinning coin left on a shelf or nailed above a doorway. The faithful leave coins or trinkets as offerings before beginning significant wagers. The act of offering is not prayer for a specific outcome but acknowledgment: I am about to gamble. I know the outcome is uncertain. I am participating in the turning of the coin.

The atmosphere in Martus-blessed gambling halls is distinctive: more genuinely uncertain than spaces where cheating occurs, yet also somehow less desperate. There is a lightness to the gambling, even when stakes are high. People win and lose without the crushing despair that attends games that are actually rigged in favor of a house. The randomness is real, which paradoxically makes it bearable.

The most sacred spaces are not the grand gambling halls but the quiet corners of inns where traveling merchants wager for trade partnerships, or the crossroads shrines where adventurers prepare for uncertain journeys, or the shipping docks where sailors bless their ventures before setting sail into waters where survival is not guaranteed.

Martus's faith has no formal hierarchy. There is no high priest or overarching authority. Instead, there are Chance-Priests — practitioners who dedicate themselves to reading fortune and teaching others to dance with uncertainty — who operate independently in their regions and communicate with each other through networks of mutual respect rather than formal chains of command.

A Chance-Priest earns respect not through appointment but through demonstrated understanding. Someone who has successfully read probabilities, who has guided others toward genuine opportunity, who has themselves survived spectacular losses and learned from them, naturally develops a following. Authority is fluid and rests on ongoing demonstration of competence rather than title.

The closest thing Martus's faith has to structure is the occasional convergence of senior practitioners for major festivals, where disputes are settled through structured wagering, new theories are tested, and the collective understanding of how fortune operates is refined.

Conversion to Martus is perhaps the least formal of any faith. There is no initiation, no vow, no formal declaration needed. A person becomes a Martite simply by beginning to engage with chance consciously — by placing real wagers, by accepting both outcomes, by sharing fortune with others.

Soft entry is gradual and requires no special ritual. Someone begins by gambling. They win some, lose some. Eventually, they attend a gathering of Martites or visit a shrine. They begin to understand the doctrine not as abstract principle but as lived experience. They become part of the community of those who have felt the coin spin.

Formal recognition comes when a Chance-Priest acknowledges them as a practitioner. This requires no ceremony; it simply means someone who understands the faith has seen in this person a genuine understanding of fortune and uncertainty, and has said so publicly. From that point forward, the person is considered a formal member.

What makes an enemy rather than a convert: Cheating. Attempting to rig games. The pretense of gambling while secretly controlling outcomes. These are the fundamental violations of the faith, because they deny chance itself. A person who cheats is not merely breaking rules; they are claiming that uncertainty can be eliminated, that control is possible, that the coin's spin is an illusion. This the faith cannot abide.

A devoted Chance-Priest is recognizable not by attire but by comportment.

Date: First new moon of the year.

On the Day of the Spinning Coin, Martites gather at major gambling halls and shrines to celebrate the turning of the year and the renewal of fortune. Major wagers are placed. Coins are flipped to determine significant matters for the coming year. The celebration emphasizes both the pleasure of gambling and the recognition that chance has favored them enough to have made it to another year.

The day typically begins with ceremonies acknowledging both the fortunes and misfortunes of the past year — both are honored equally — and ends with high-stakes wagering that sometimes lasts the entire night.

Date: Mid-year, at the summer solstice.

The Festival of Risk is the most public celebration of Martus's faith. In gambling halls and open-air markets, participants engage in competitive games and wagers. The stakes are real, but the atmosphere is joyous rather than desperate. New traders present their ventures for collective wagering. Adventurers gather to outfit expeditions, with merchants backing their journeys in exchange for a cut of the profits.

The festival emphasizes the principle that the greatest rewards come from the greatest risks, and that fortune favors those willing to wager.

Date: Last full moon of the year.

On Harvest of Fate, Martites engage in a comprehensive accounting of the year's wagers. Not for judgment or comparison, but for genuine reflection: What worked? What failed? What was learned? How has fortune changed those who participated?

This is not a solemn occasion, but it is a contemplative one. The gathering typically involves storytelling — tales of spectacular wins, of stunning losses, of narrow escapes and surprising fortunes. Through the stories, the faith's collective wisdom about how chance operates is renewed and refined.

Before significant wagers or ventures, Chance-Priests often conduct a brief ritual that establishes the stakes clearly, names what is at risk, and invokes the turning of the coin. The ritual is simple: all parties speak aloud what they are wagering and what they hope to gain. Coins are blessed in the shrine before being used to decide outcomes. There is no prayer for a specific result; the prayer is simply for honest randomness.

When a significant win occurs, the faithful are expected to conduct a small ceremony acknowledging the flow of fortune. Part of the winnings are offered — either returned to the shrine as a kind of gift, or used to create new opportunities for others to wager. The ceremony involves speaking the name of Martus and acknowledging that the victory was fortune, not personal achievement, and therefore must flow onward.

When significant losses occur, the faithful may conduct a parallel ceremony: standing before the shrine, naming the loss, and speaking acceptance of it. This is not punishment or shame but acknowledgment of the reality of chance. The faithful who can perform this ceremony with genuine calm rather than despair are considered to have achieved a deep understanding of the faith.

Worn by all devoted followers. Usually crafted from gold, silver, or other precious metals, shaped like the spinning coin of Martus's symbol, or sometimes simply a real coin that has been carried and worn smooth through years of handling. These amulets serve as both holy symbol and practical talisman.

During major festivals and ceremonial wagering, devotees often wear clothing adorned with symbols of luck from various traditions — four-leaf clovers, horseshoes, star symbols, and representations of coins. These garments are not meant to be protective charms but visual celebrations of fortune and chance.

A special hat worn by senior Chance-Priests during major festivals and formal ceremonies. It is said to be imbued with years of studying fortune, and wearing it is considered both an honor and a practical affectation — experienced gamblers seem to make better decisions when wearing it, though whether this is due to actual magic or merely confidence is debated.

Worn by some of the most dedicated followers. A chain made from coins of various types, each representing a significant wager that affected the wearer's path. The chain is added to as the follower's life progresses, becoming a literal record of the chances taken.

Lysandra was a notorious gambler born to poverty in a small village. By most accounts, she had little natural talent — her early games were lost far more often than won. But she persisted with a kind of deliberate fearlessness, studying the games, learning to read probabilities, and most importantly, accepting losses without bitterness.

Her first major win came late in her youth, a victory against odds that seemed impossible. She did not retire from that win; instead, she used it to fund greater wagering. She traveled to the courts of kings and nobles, where she gambled against powerful opponents. Her reputation grew not from undefeated records (she lost frequently) but from her apparent blessing — her ability to survive devastating losses and emerge with enough fortune to wager again.

Near the end of her life, Lysandra made a final wager: she bet her entire accumulated fortune against a single card hand. She won. At that moment, instead of collecting her winnings or making another wager, she gave the entire sum to the poor and disenfranchised of the city. She believed that hoarding fortune was a violation of Martus's teaching, and that her final act should be to allow the fortune she had been blessed with to flow into the world uncontrolled.

Her legacy is a teaching: the purpose of fortune is not to accumulate, but to flow.

Brennus was a merchant whose decision-making process was legendary. Rather than agonizing over choices, he would flip a coin to determine his path. Outsiders assumed he was either mad or reckless; the results suggested he was blessed.

His trading ventures succeeded with uncanny regularity. His company expanded rapidly. Yet Brennus was known equally for his generosity — he sponsored other traders, backed ventures he believed in even when his own interest was minimal, and used his wealth to create opportunities for others to wager and trade.

Brennus's legacy is the principle that chance and generosity are not opposed but complementary: the willingness to risk is enhanced by the commitment to sharing the rewards with others. He is remembered by merchants as the embodiment of the truth that fortune is meant to flow, and that those who understand this become wealthier (in material and in status) than those who try to dam it.

Elara was a seer and oracle who practiced a form of divination based not on ancient texts or magical rituals but on the subtle shifts in probability and chance. Where other oracles would consult bones or cards or stars, Elara would observe the patterns of fortune itself — reading in the small coincidences and unexpected events the signs of larger-scale turns in fate.

She became an advisor to generals and kings during a period of significant political instability. Her predictions were not prophecy (she was careful to distinguish herself from other seers) but reading of likely outcomes based on understanding how chance naturally flowed. When asked to end a decade-long war, she reportedly suggested to a king that he engage his opponent in a high-stakes game of chance, with the kingdom's future as the stake. The king's victory in that game became the condition for a peace treaty.

Elara's legacy is the understanding that fortune is not hidden or mysterious, but can be read and understood through careful attention to how probability flows. She is remembered as a saint of the faith by those who believe that reading chance is itself a form of piety.

Martus's faith does not have formal sects in the way other religions do, because formal structure tends to calcify and Martus opposes calcification. However, informal groupings and schools of thought have developed:

How they refer to themselves: the Unspoiled or the True Randomeers

The Pure Chancers believe that the most sacred form of gambling is the kind with absolutely no skill component — pure randomness with no possibility for personal influence. They specialize in games of pure chance (dice rolling, coin flipping, drawing lots) and consider games with skill components (cards, chess) to be fundamentally less faithful.

They consider themselves the truest practitioners of Martus's teaching: the complete surrender to uncertainty with no illusion of control.

How they refer to themselves: the Readers or the Pattern-Seekers

The Skilled Wagerers emphasize that genuine gambling requires reading probability, understanding patterns, and developing intuition about likelihood. They specialize in games that combine chance with skill (cards, negotiations, trade ventures) and argue that the most devout gambling is the kind that requires both personal effort and willingness to accept that effort might fail.

The Pure Chancers consider them heretical; the Skilled Wagerers consider the Pure Chancers naively idealistic.

How they refer to themselves: the Prospectors or the Fortune-Merchants

The Venture-Blessed focus primarily on large-scale wagers: trading ventures, expeditions to unknown territories, sponsorship of risky projects. They believe that the most authentic gambling involves not games but the genuine uncertainty of attempting something difficult and new.

They tend to be wealthy and influential, which causes some other sects to view them with suspicion (has fortune made them corrupt?) and others to view them as the most successful practitioners of the faith.

How they refer to themselves: the Order of Certainty

The Calculators argue that luck can be quantified, predicted, and potentially controlled through rigorous mathematical analysis. They believe that true gambling involves not the embrace of uncertainty but the mastery of it through calculation — that apparent randomness masks underlying patterns that can be discovered and exploited.

They are technically correct that probability can be calculated; where they diverge from orthodoxy is in their belief that this calculation can eventually yield certainty. Orthodox Martites consider this the most dangerous heresy because it denies the core truth of Martus: that some things genuinely cannot be predicted or controlled.

How they refer to themselves: the Predetermined

The Fate-Binders believe that what appears to be random chance is actually destiny — that Martus does not govern randomness but rather the illusion of randomness surrounding predetermined outcomes. They argue that true gambling is recognizing what must happen and acting accordingly.

Orthodox practitioners find this heresy infuriating because it inverts the entire project: if everything is predetermined, then wagering is not participation in genuine uncertainty but merely theater masking destiny. This denies Martus's fundamental nature and the purpose of his faith.

How they refer to themselves: the True Coins

This cult believes that all decisions should be made by coin flip — not as one option among many, but as the only legitimate decision-making method. They consider any decision made through reasoning, consultation, or deliberation to be a failure of faith.

They often make decisions that are actively harmful (coin decides to walk into a fire, coin decides to attack someone) and claim that this is the purest devotion to Martus. The orthodox faith considers them a corruption: genuine gambling requires understanding stakes and accepting real outcomes, not using the coin as an excuse for harm.

How they refer to themselves: the Desperate Blessed or the Final Wagerers

This extreme cult believes that the highest form of devotion to Martus is to gamble with one's life. Members engage in life-threatening activities — extreme wagers, dangerous games, Russian roulette variants — as an expression of faith.

They argue that risking merely money or property is insufficient; real devotion requires putting life itself at stake. The orthodox faith condemns them as misunderstanding the purpose of risk: the stakes must be real, but betting your life is not sacred devotion, it is suicide dressed in religious language.

How they refer to themselves: the Blessed of the Wheel

This cult has created a massive wheel with various life-altering outcomes inscribed on it. Members participate in a ritual where the wheel is spun and they must undergo whatever fate it lands on — this might range from a mild inconvenience to a genuinely life-threatening scenario.

They argue that this is the purest form of Martus worship: complete surrender to chance with no possibility of refusal or negotiation. The orthodox faith considers this a perversion: genuine gambling requires knowing what you are wagering and accepting it, not engaging in compulsive acts disguised as piety.

(See: Cosmology/Physical Realms/The Shattered Domain)