Zopha was born of a union between Jula, the goddess of peace, and Echo, the god of stability and knowledge. From her parents she inherited not dominion but obligation: to take the peace and stability they had won for mortals and to elevate it through understanding. Where Echo had taught mortals to survive together, Zopha saw the opportunity to teach them to thrive.

But unlike her parents, Zopha did not remain in the divine realm. At the height of her awareness, still fresh with the sudden consciousness of godhood, she made an unprecedented choice: she descended to the mortal world and lived as a human, renouncing her divine power to walk among those she was meant to guide.

She was taken in by a craftsman named Finy and his wife, a teacher named Brilda, who lived in a small settlement where learning was scarce and hunger common. She lived with them for years, asking questions, observing, learning the texture of mortal life: the struggle to preserve food through winter, the difficulty of passing knowledge from generation to generation, the loss when a skilled person died without teaching others what they knew.

She worked with her hands alongside Finy. She studied with Brilda, discovering the patience that teaching requires. She watched how knowledge — even simple knowledge, the kind that seems obvious to those born into literacy — could transform lives when shared with someone who needed it.

What struck her most profoundly was the waste: the gap between what mortals could know and what they did know, filled not with any natural limit but with simple circumstance, geography, and lack of opportunity. A healer's techniques died with the healer. A farmer's drought-resistance methods were known in one valley and unknown in another, separated only by a mountain range.

When Zopha returned to her divine form — not by gradual ascension but by a sudden transformation that witnesses described as the moment the sky seemed to look inward — she brought her insights to Jula and Echo. The world could be better not merely through peace and stability, but through the systematic spread of knowledge, the institution of teaching, the creation of spaces where learning could be preserved and transmitted.

Her parents understood immediately. Echo especially recognized in his daughter a completion of his own vision: a world in which mortals could build not just functioning societies but cultures of deliberate, continuous improvement.

Zopha did not claim temples as monuments to herself. She claimed them as tools. The first Circle academies were not built by her command but by followers who understood that Zopha's greatest gift would be the framework within which human knowledge could organize itself and grow.

Zopha offers a bargain that seems simple on its surface but demands constant engagement.

The faithful of Zopha organize their thoughts and actions around these convictions:

(See also: claw/Soul_Coins_and_Divine_Economy)

Zopha accumulates power through the spread and application of knowledge — not merely the knowing, but the teaching, the discovery, and the practical use of understanding to improve lives.

Zopha's sacred spaces are deliberately designed to be functional rather than awe-inspiring. The theology is made visible: the space exists to support learning, and everything in it serves that purpose.

Circle Academies vary in size but follow consistent principles. The buildings are arranged around a central open space — the courtyard or circle — where students gather, where books are sometimes read aloud, where conversations occur. Surrounding this are libraries, study halls, small shrines, teaching rooms, and (in larger academies) dormitories and refectories.

The architecture is intentionally accessible. Unlike temples designed to intimidate or humble, Zopha's spaces invite entry. Doorways are clear and welcoming. Light is abundant — study requires seeing clearly. Furniture is simple but functional. The goal is clarity, not grandeur.

Every major altar features not a statue of Zopha but an open book and a quill, surrounded by rotating displays of texts and objects representing different fields of knowledge. The shrine serves as a teaching aid as much as a place of devotion.

The most sacred spaces within a Circle academy are the Libraries — not as storehouses but as institutions. The preservation of texts, their organization, their accessibility: this is sacred work. Libraries are kept with meticulous care. Damage to a library or destruction of texts is treated as a crime not just against the faith but against all future learners.

The Circle is organized around competence and contribution, not hierarchy. The highest authority rests with the Council of Keepers — a rotating group of accomplished scholars and teachers who have established academies or made significant contributions to learning.

The Council meets annually to discuss the direction of the faith, resolve disputes, establish new initiatives, and ensure that the various sects are adhering to Zopha's core principles. Council membership is earned, not appointed, and members typically rotate off after a term so that leadership remains distributed.

Beneath the Council are regional networks of Keepers — scholars and teachers who lead academies, mentor students, and represent the faith in their communities. These Keepers answer to the Council but also to their local communities and their own conscience. A Keeper who is found to be suppressing knowledge, teaching falsehoods, or exploiting their position faces investigation and potential removal.

The various Sects function with considerable autonomy. Each sect is dedicated to a particular field of knowledge — natural sciences, mathematics, languages, medicine, craft disciplines, and so on. Within their field, sect members establish and maintain academies, produce texts, mentor apprentices, and advance the boundaries of understanding. The Council coordinates between sects and ensures they are not becoming too insular or competing destructively.

Conversion to Zopha's faith is gradual and organic — almost no one joins suddenly. Rather, they find themselves already practicing Zopha's principles before they formally convert.

Soft entry is constant and unforced: a person becomes interested in learning a craft or subject. They find a Circle academy and begin studying. They may not believe in Zopha, but they are following the faith's practices. If they prove dedicated and curious, eventually someone will invite them to formal membership.

Formal initiation involves three parts: (1) the Pledge of Humility — a public acknowledgment that one's knowledge is incomplete and always will be; (2) the Oath of Sharing — a vow to teach others and contribute to the preservation of knowledge; (3) the Acceptance by the Circle — a formal recognition by the local Keeper that the initiate has earned membership.

Initiation ceremonies are often simple: the initiate publicly states their field of study or their commitment to learning generally, is asked whether they will prioritize truth over comfort, and are given a token or ring bearing Zopha's symbol.

What makes an enemy rather than a convert: Those who actively suppress knowledge, who teach falsehood deliberately, who exploit ignorance for profit or control. These are not approached for conversion; they are opposed directly through education, exposure, and when necessary, through testimony before councils or courts.

A devoted scholar of Zopha is recognizable by their habits and instincts.

The faith of Zopha is formally organized around five pillars, which practitioners understand as both individual practices and collective ideals:

Date: First full moon of the eighth month.

The eighth month marks the beginning of the yearly cycle of learning. New initiates formally join the faith, and existing members reaffirm their commitment to the Pillars. Those entering academies for the first time are welcomed. Tuition is discussed openly, along with grants and work-arrangements for those who cannot pay. The day is celebratory but also serious: this is when the next generation of scholars is formally inducted into the great work of understanding.

Date: First week of the sixth month.

The conclusion of the yearly educational cycle. Those ready to advance to the next level of expertise in their field are tested and honored. Those who have completed their full apprenticeship are recognized. It is a day of celebration and public acknowledgment that the sacrifice of study has yielded knowledge.

Date: Eighth full moon of the year.

The most important holy day, commemorating the moment Zopha reclaimed her divine form after her mortal years. On this day, all Circle academies hold public presentations. Scholars and teachers give short talks on their research or teaching. Leaders of the various sects present their work. The goal is recruitment, but genuine recruitment: showing what learning looks like, inviting those who are curious to imagine joining the Circle.

Temples invite "all who wish to learn something new" to attend. The talks are explicitly pitched at beginners. Those who show interest are often sought out afterward by mentors who try to ignite a genuine spark of learning.

Performed when someone formally joins the Circle. The initiate publicly states that their knowledge is incomplete and always will be, that they do not know all things and do not expect to, and that they are seeking to improve their understanding and share what they learn. This is spoken before the local Keeper and the community, making it a public commitment, not a private one.

Given at formal initiation, this oath commits the follower to teach others what they have learned, to contribute to the preservation of knowledge, and to refuse to hoard understanding for personal advantage. Those who take this oath are formally recognized as Circle-members.

When a follower completes a significant work of writing or research, they perform this ritual. The work is presented to the shrine, often read aloud by the initiate or by a Keeper. The work is then accepted as an offering to Zopha, blessing the author's future endeavors. This ritual is taken very seriously; many scholars consider it the moment their work becomes truly part of the faith's collective project.

When a member of the Circle makes a groundbreaking discovery — something that significantly alters understanding in a field — the Council may call an Inventa ceremony. The discovery is formally presented and explained. Scholars from related fields are invited to understand the implications. The ceremony is often attended by nobles and powerful figures who might benefit from the knowledge, creating an opportunity for the faith's work to be recognized and supported.

Worn by clergy during formal ceremonies and teaching roles. These robes are typically white or pale blue, adorned with Zopha's holy symbol and various motifs representing different fields of knowledge: stars for astronomy, herbs for medicine, geometric patterns for mathematics. The robes are functional rather than grand, designed to be comfortable for long hours of teaching and study.

A headpiece worn by senior scholars and Keepers during major ceremonies. The circlet is often embedded with a gemstone or jewel representing the wearer's primary field of study. This visible marker allows others to immediately identify the person's area of expertise.

Carried by high-ranking Keepers during formal ceremonies, particularly during the Inventa ceremony or when consecrating a new academy. The scepter is inscribed with ancient runes or equations representing fundamental principles. It is used to point to important concepts during teaching moments and serves as a symbol of the Keeper's authority to interpret doctrine and lead the faith in their region.

Given to every initiated member. These rings are simple, usually made of iron or silver, and bear Zopha's symbol. They serve as proof of membership and as a daily reminder of the commitment to learning and sharing.

Finy was a master craftsman — a carpenter and builder — known for the extraordinary quality and durability of his work. Brilda was a teacher, one of the few in her region who had been formally educated and who made it her mission to educate others, particularly children. They lived quietly, and their names might have been forgotten except that they raised Zopha during her mortal years.

The faith venerates them not as saints or prophets, but as exemplars of Zopha's core values: the dedication to one's craft and the commitment to passing on knowledge. Their lives are cited when the faith teaches that learning and excellence are not supernatural gifts but the result of patience, practice, and the willingness to teach others. Neither Finy nor Brilda was given dramatic supernatural abilities; their excellence came from understanding their craft deeply and sharing it generously. This is Zopha's ideal in its purest form.

An ancient elven scholar whose curiosity was so profound that it drew the direct attention of Zopha. Eneled became obsessed with understanding the transformation of caterpillars into butterflies — a process that baffled him despite his extensive research. One night, frustrated and desperate for understanding, he called out to the gods, and Zopha heard him. In a dream, she granted him comprehension of metamorphosis, showing him how the process worked at a level he had not thought to investigate.

Upon waking, Eneled received a visitation from Zopha herself, who asked him to dedicate his life to spreading the love of learning and curiosity to the world. Eneled accepted without hesitation. He spent the remainder of his long life traveling, documenting natural phenomena, and teaching others to observe and question. His journals are among the most important documents in the Circle's libraries, filled with detailed drawings and descriptions that remain valuable to scholars centuries later. His work established the foundations of natural philosophy and demonstrated that careful observation and honest documentation could reveal truths about the world that seemed self-evident once explained.

Eneled is invoked by naturalists, healers, and anyone whose field requires careful observation and patient study.

Kater was born into servitude — her early years spent as a servant in a noble's household. She befriended the noble's son, and he, seeing her intelligence, taught her in secret to read and write. When the noble discovered their studies, he expelled Kater in shame and fury, not out of concern for his son but out of rage that a servant would presume to literacy.

Desperate and homeless, Kater sought out the nearest Circle academy. The Keepers initially turned her away — this was early in the faith's history, and many circles remained bound by the social hierarchies of their surrounding cultures. Kater accepted this rejection without bitterness. Instead, she began to teach the other servants and poor people she encountered, sharing the reading and writing she had learned.

The story holds that Zopha herself intervened. The very Keepers who had turned Kater away were struck with blindness — not physical blindness, but spiritual confusion, an inability to see clearly. Kater, still teaching around them, became their guide and teacher. Slowly, as Kater shared knowledge with them, their sight gradually returned. By the time she was done teaching them, they understood both literacy and the reason for it: that knowledge belongs to all people, not just the privileged.

Kater went on to establish the Comitatus Academia, a sect dedicated specifically to educating commoners and those outside traditional structures of privilege. She developed the first standard written language that people of different regions and backgrounds could learn, allowing commoners to carry their literacy and skills across vast distances and into new communities. Her work was revolutionary: it meant that a talented person born into poverty need not remain limited by their birth, that knowledge could be a path upward, that the learned could escape their original circumstances.

Every Circle academy has a shrine dedicated to Kater. She is invoked by teachers of the poor, by those fighting against systematic ignorance, and by anyone whose knowledge has been used to lift themselves out of difficult circumstances.

According to the faith, Zopha planted a tree during her time living with Finy and Brilda. The fruit of this tree granted comprehensive understanding in the bearer's field of study — not magical omniscience, but a moment of clarity in which complex things became clear. When Zopha ascended to her divine form, she imbued the tree with this blessing permanently.

Greedy individuals stripped the tree of its fruit and, frustrated at finding no treasure or permanent power, cut it down. But Brilda rescued a single fruit and, through a process she never fully explained, cultivated it into a new tree, which continues to bear the blessed fruit. The location of this tree remains unknown. The faith searches for it continuously, believing that if the original tree could be found and protected, it would provide momentary clarity to scholars at crucial moments, accelerating the advance of human understanding. Some believe the tree exists in the Shattered Domain rather than on Dort itself.

After his lifetime of study and travel, Eneled's apprentices collected his journals — multiple volumes filled with meticulous drawings, observations, and descriptions of natural phenomena. The journals are among the most important documents in the faith's possession.

Kater's personal symbol was an eye — representing the ability to see clearly and to read the written word. When Kater presented the symbol to the Council of her time, seeking formal recognition of her new sect dedicated to commoner education, the eye is said to have blinked as a sign of Zopha's approval.

How they refer to themselves: the Scholars or simply Solum

The Solum Academia encompasses sub-sects, each dedicated to a particular field of study — mathematics, natural philosophy, medicine, engineering, languages, history, and many others. Members of the Solum aspire to become experts and masters in their chosen disciplines. They maintain the Circle's most rigorous academies, produce the most advanced texts, and serve as the authority on matters within their field. Advancement through the ranks of a Solum sect requires demonstrated expertise: a scholar must show that they genuinely understand their field deeply, not merely learn from books.

The Solum sects sometimes develop insularity — a sense that their discipline is the most important or that knowledge outside their field is less valuable. This is a perennial theological tension within the faith. The Council works to maintain balance.

How they refer to themselves: the Commons or the Keepers of the Common Tongue

Founded by Kater Barne, the Comitatus Academia is dedicated specifically to making knowledge accessible to people outside traditional structures of privilege. They establish academies in poor districts and villages, teach common languages and basic literacy, and work to make learning feel possible rather than exclusive. Comitatus teachers are often not themselves elite scholars; they are people who have learned enough to teach and who are devoted to the work of education for its own sake.

An offense against a Comitatus member is considered an offense against the entire Circle — the faith honors this sect especially. Their work is seen as foundational; without spreading basic literacy and learning, the more advanced work of the Solum sects cannot flourish.

How they refer to themselves: the Preservers or the Keepers of Memory

This sect is dedicated to the preservation, organization, and accessibility of knowledge stored in physical form. They maintain libraries, copy texts, develop cataloging systems, and fight against the decay and loss of information. Archivists are often less concerned with creating new knowledge than with ensuring that existing knowledge survives and remains accessible.

This is unglamorous work, and Archivists sometimes struggle to be taken as seriously as active researchers. However, the faith recognizes that without them, knowledge would be lost in each generation. An Archive-keeper who has successfully preserved a library through war, disaster, or institutional collapse is honored equally to a scholar who has made a great discovery.

How they refer to themselves: the True Learners or the Blessed of the Hidden Arts

This heresy argues that Zopha values magical and arcane knowledge above all other forms of understanding. Its adherents look down on practical, mundane, or craft-based knowledge, viewing them as inferior to the supposedly deeper truths of magic and the supernatural. They argue that Zopha's ascension to divinity proves that magical knowledge is her true focus.

The Circle considers this a fundamental misreading of the faith. Zopha's parents are Echo, god of practical organization, and Jula, goddess of peace — neither of whom privileges magical knowledge. The faith teaches that all beneficial knowledge is valuable, from the mason's understanding of stone to the healer's knowledge of herbs to the mathematician's comprehension of numbers. The Arcane Supremacists' arrogance and dismissal of practical knowledge contradicts Zopha's core doctrine of humility and inclusive learning.

How they refer to themselves: the Seekers of Ultimate Truth or the Unrestricted

This heresy argues that Zopha's refusal to teach certain knowledge — necromancy, destructive magic, torture techniques, and other harmful practices — is itself a test of faith. True devotion, they claim, means pursuing all knowledge regardless of consequences, trusting that Zopha would not forbid anything that was truly worth knowing.

The Circle rejects this firmly. The faith is clear that some knowledge genuinely is harmful and that the ethical restriction of certain information is a feature of proper learning, not a bug. A scholar who uses knowledge to harm others has corrupted the work of understanding itself. The Unrestricted heresy often produces people who justify increasingly harmful research through appeals to truth-seeking, corrupting the pursuit of knowledge into simple cruelty.

How they refer to themselves: the Initiate or the Enlightened Few

Led by the charismatic scholar Elion Whisperleaf, this cult claims that Zopha hid the ultimate truths of the universe in arcane riddles, esoteric puzzles, and hidden teachings that only the most dedicated seekers can access. They focus obsessively on solving these riddles rather than pursuing practical learning or engaging in the work of education that the true Circle values.

The cult's theology is seductive: it appeals to the desire to be part of an exclusive group that possesses secret wisdom. In practice, it isolates members from the broader work of the faith and replaces genuine learning with treasure-hunting. Members often become detached from reality, spending years on puzzles that have no solution or whose solutions are meaningless.

How they refer to themselves: the Seekers or the Chosen

Founded by Seraphine Quill, who claims that Zopha revealed to her the existence of a "Sole Truth" — a single, ultimate piece of knowledge that grants immense power and wisdom. The cult is dedicated to finding this Sole Truth, dismissing other forms of knowledge as distractions or inferior preparations for the grand discovery.

This cult corrupts Zopha's teaching that all beneficial knowledge is valuable. Members often neglect their duties and families to pursue this phantom knowledge, and the cult functions as a control mechanism — Seraphine claims to be closest to discovering the Truth and demands increasing devotion and resources. It is, in essence, a con operating under religious guise.

How they refer to themselves: the Guardians or the Protective Circle

Founded by Thaddeus Greymane, who claims Zopha spoke to him in a dream, revealing that some knowledge is too dangerous for the mortal realm and must be kept secret. The cult actively seeks out and suppresses what they consider dangerous knowledge, even when that knowledge could be beneficial in the right context.

While the Circle accepts that some knowledge requires careful handling, the Silenced Word takes this to an extreme — they have been known to burn libraries, kill scholars, and suppress medicines or agricultural techniques they decide are "too dangerous." They invert the faith's values by treating the suppression of knowledge as sacred work, turning Zopha's followers into enemies of learning itself.

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