Other Gods
Yelm
When Orlanth murdered Yelm, he not only robbed the world of his light, but his warmth.
The (original) Sun, who is dead. Father to Elmal, Shargash, Little Yelm, and others, and Emperor in the perfect Golden Age. After his death, the world has grown steadily colder.
- Fisher King: Justified by his mythological role. When the sun dies, everything else does too.
- God Is Dead: The game takes place after Yelm's death at Orlanth's hands, and before his resurrection, also at Orlanth's hands.
- Top God: Yelm was the undisputed head of the solar pantheon... and in his absence, his sons and various pretenders have quarreled with each other over who should take his place, with none really filling the gap he left.
Aldrya
When the first seed opened, it contained Aldrya, ancestress of all elves.
Goddess of forests, worshipped by the elves.
- Alternate Character Interpretation: Invoked. Your advisors can portray her as a fond lover to Hyalor, and she comes off as very human in these anecdotes. Their daughter's tale of their meeting makes Aldrya seem much more alien, and her choice as less a matter of love than an attempt to ensure the world's survival.
- Second Love: She is the final bride of Hyalor... if you accept the Cenala Revelation, at least.
Samnal
Samnal Chain-Forger
The tension between our peoples erupts from the rivalry between Hyalor Change-Maker, and Samnal Chain-Forger. They are enemies, yes—but also cousins.
A son of Elmal and the divine founder of the Wheel culture. Known as "Samnal the Thief" to the Hyalorings, and as "Samnal the Charioteer/Chariot Maker" to his own people.
- Cain and Abel: He frequently quarrels with his siblings among the Hyaloring pantheon, especially Osara.
- Condescending Compassion: When his father calls him out for being a sexist douchebag, he scoffs that Elmal is "too generous" in accepting the Riders' "crooked worship".
- Enemy Mine: He and Hyalor briefly cooperate during one of Hyalor's myths, but soon quarrel again. It's also possible to call on his aid if you're lost in the gods' war and about to be squashed by a dragon, although only if Wheel clans helped you prepare for the ritual.
- Hero of Another Story: He's the hero of the Wheel versions of many familiar myths (although at least one goes to his son Rogoros instead). As Riders, your clan of course considers those versions of the stories absolute hogwash, but they do exist.
- Pretty Boy: For a god so focused on masculinity, he is surprisingly androgynous-looking, with a clean-shaven face and a slender body.
- The Rival: To both Hyalor (his direct counterpart) and his sister Osara.
- Right Way/Wrong Way Pair: His role in Rider myths is a cautionary/comedic one, used to illustrate what not to do. When Hyalor leaves Nivorah, Samnal stays. Where Ekarna respects strangers, he mocks them.
- Stay in the Kitchen: His followers are strictly patriarchal, and Samnal has a rite called 'Samnal Woman-Tamer'.
Verlaro
The man who was once a god.
Verlaro’s horses kept following Osara’s light. He complained to his father, Elmal, who said, ‘You should shine brighter.’
Son of Elmal, brother to Osara and Samnal, and formerly the god of common men in Nivorah. Although he figures in Hyaloring mythology, they no longer worship him as a god.
- Character Development: Some references to Verlaro eventually becoming a hero suggest that he eventually changed his ways.
- Distressed Dude: Frequently, and it's generally his own fault for leaping without looking.
- Famous Ancestor: To Beren the Tall, whose family trace their descent from Verlaro.
- Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: The Foolish to Osara's Responsible. Stories about them tend to involve Verlaro getting into trouble and Osara getting him out of it.
- Loser Deity: At the time of "Osara and Verlaro", he's this to the extent that his sister warns him that his human worshippers may soon stop bothering. He's fine with that.
- Made a Slave: By his own brother Samnal. Fortunately for him, Osara rescued him quickly.
- Toxic Friend Influence: Tried to be this to his half-brother Zarlen, because he knew Zarlen had the potential to outshine him and sought to convince him to become idle and dissolute instead, like himself. Zarlen saw what he was doing and refused.
Reladivus
Reladivus River Tamer
The Arcos [River] can never be truly tamed, but Reladivus could always master it.
City god of lost Nivorah.
- Ethnic God: To a people who effectively no longer exist.
- Heroic Seductress: In most retellings of "Taming the River", he seduces the dragon Arcos (who is also a river god) into going back to its banks. Which is good, because a lot of people were starving to death without the irrigation that Arcos provided.
- Silk Hiding Steel: In accordance with the Fire Tribe's male ideal at that time. He can fight the rampaging dragon, but he can also control his righteous fury well enough to flirt or bargain with it.
Shargash
The Demon Sun
Shargash, god of Alkoth, is a half-brother to Elmal, mindlessly destructive where Elmal is loyal and just.
The Demon Sun of Alkoth, Elmal's half-brother and adversary.
- The Face of the Sun: During Elmal and Nyalda's ritual, Shargash is pictured flanked by a sun with his rather alarming face on it.
- Multi-Armed and Dangerous: He has four arms, allowing him to simultaneously wield spear, mace, shield and drum.
- Sinister Sentient Sun: He's one of Elmal's nastier rivals.
Little Yelm
The Pretender Sun
Click here to see the solar god of the Hill of Gold, along with his foe.
"I suppose you think you're the sun now."
Elmal's no-account little brother. May or may not be the Imperial god on the Hill of Gold, and may or may not be the deity known to later Glorantha as Yelmalio.
- The Face of the Sun: Like the other solar pretenders, he's flanked by his face on a solar disk during the Elmal and Nyalda rituals. His is the smallest and least intimidating, other than the Small Suns.
- Heel Realization: He was the only "small sun" to stop scavenging the sunpath when Elmal reminded him that what he was doing was wrong.
- Psychological Projection: After their father's death, Little Yelm lashed out at Elmal for keeping order, accusing him of trying to replace the Emperor. Since Little Yelm was currently trying to steal all that remained of the Emperor's power, this trope is probably the reason he's so ashamed when Elmal refutes the accusation.
Yonesh
The Cold Sun
Elmal met a chill, pale orb in the sky. It hurled snow, hail and sleet at him, and said, “I am Yonesh, the Cold Sun.”
The Cold Sun, an enemy of Elmal.
- The Face of the Sun: In Elmal's ritual, Yonesh is flanked by a blue-white sun with his face on it.
- An Ice Person: He can freeze a quester in a block of ice and then shatter it.
Yatelo
The Hungry Sun
Some foes cannot be defeated with weapons.
God of hunger and banditry, sometimes called the Hungry Sun.
- The Face of the Sun: In the first scene of Inilla's ritual, Yatelo's face glares down at Elmal and Nyalda from the sun disc.
- Lean and Mean: As one might expect of a malicious god of hunger, he's skeletally thin.
- Sinister Sentient Sun: Yatelo is sometimes numbered among the small suns that have tried to take over the sunpath Elmal defends.
- Walking Shirtless Scene: He wears only a kilt.
Yamsur
Yamsur the Shining
Yamsur flickered hot, always saw to it that his exploits were well noticed, and took his pleasures with the same zest he showed in combat.
A solar god that the Riders do not worship. He was once the companion of Hippogriff, before she became Gamari.
- Disappeared Dad: He played such a small role in his son's life that the Riders don't actually know of their relationship. Gamari, however, can reveal it to them.
- Doomed by Canon: Later Glorantha knows only one thing about Yamsur: he died alongside Genert during the Gods War.
- Fair-Weather Friend: To Hippogriff. When the tides of battle turned against them, Yamsur saved his own skin and left her behind to suffer.
- Handsome Lech: Yamsur liked to visit Nivorah back in the day because he said the finest women dwelt there. With one of those women he had a son, Hyalor.
Nivorah
The Golden City
We have come so far from the Golden City. Sometimes I find myself thinking that it is better as an ideal than a place to return to.
Elmal's first wife, mother of Reladivus, and possibly the mother of Osara, Samnal, and Verlaro as well.
- Genius Loci: She was both the city Nivorah and its goddess. Meanwhile, her husband and son were also gods of the city: Elmal was the city's governor under Yelm, while Reladivus was its protector god.
- God Is Dead: She died while Elmal was away trying to discover a way to bring his dead father back.
Death
Erissa's suitor
"I have become myself completely now. Do not call me Pain anymore. I am so much more than that. And I have increased your importance a thousandfold, now that it is possible to die when bad injuries go untreated."
Also known as Pain, a god who came late into the world.
- Age-Gap Romance: Erissa was a full-fledged adult when Death was just a concept, in keeping with Rider ideals. It makes a little more sense symbolically: life has to exist before death, after all.
- Anthropomorphic Personification: In "Erissa Denies Her Suitor", Death eventually appears as a young man.
- Born as an Adult: As a result of his godly nature. Before Death sprang into existence, he was just a disembodied voice.
- Card-Carrying Villain: As a god, he is very honest and enthusiastic about his purview. He only feels ashamed about it on very rare occasions, and only then because it prevents him from getting laid.
- Color Motif: Depicted in black, while his beloved Erissa and her followers wear white.
- Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: The personification of Death is depicted with black hair and very pale skin.
- Grand Romantic Gesture: He claims that his efforts to cover the world with pain and fear is just his way of motivating everyone to realize Erissa's value.
- Hopeless Suitor: He does not accept the word "no". Every death since the exodus is another attempt to intimidate Erissa into joining him.
- Lack of Empathy: So overjoyed by his new invention that he got very drunk celebrating it. This invention? War.
- Love Ruins the Realm: A narrowly averted example. Death's bullshit is one reason why the Riders don't consider "I really love her" an appropriate reason for marriage. Love doesn't mean shit if it's attached to complete disregard for the bride's people and cosmic purpose.
- Sadistic Choice: He promised Erissa that if she married him, he'd allow her to choose who lives and who dies. Although he didn't mean it that way, this was a cruel thing to ask of an All-Loving Hero like the goddess of healing.
- Skeletons in the Coat Closet: Death wears skulls (mostly of animals) on his belt.
- Star-Crossed Lovers: Death loves Erissa; she returns his feelings, but cannot accept his offer of marriage without betraying everything she is.
- Swiss-Army Tears: Apparently the heartbroken tears of the god of death make excellent medicines.
- Yandere: He was being honest when he said he'd never attack Erissa, but he is fully okay with using her people's lives as bargaining chips to entice her into marrying him.
Uldak
The Thirsty Earth
“I am parched, and must drink the life of a human to revive myself.”
Uldak, the Thirsty Earth, is an outlaw god. He is also Nyalda's brother: they are both children of Oria, the first Earth Queen.
- Human Sacrifice: He offers cows in exchange for you sacrificing a member of your clan.
- Kick the Dog: In addition to wanting humans sacrificed to him instead of cows or goods, he specifically requires the sacrifice to be a member of your own clan.
- Sdrawkcab Alias: If you already know and have rejected him, he'll present himself as Kadul the next time your explorers meet him, in an attempt to deceive them.
Cenala
The priestess of the Last Tablet Plateau
“I have come to restore this land.”
A powerful priestess, said to be the daughter of Hyalor and Aldrya.
- Ambiguous Situation: Is she truly the daughter of your founder god and the elf goddess? You have to decide that for yourself. And initially, no one claims that Cenala is a goddess— not even those who believe she's truly Hyalor's daughter. But as time goes on, she starts providing miracles and omens to her followers when they pray to her...
- Divine Parentage: Both her parents are gods. Interestingly, Cenala herself starts off Semi-Divine, but there are hints her power is growing.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: In a bad ending, the Ram Killer clan rip her skin off.
- Half-Human Hybrid: Of a sort. Hyalor is a human god, and Aldrya an elf goddess; as elves are plants in this setting, hybrids aren't usually possible— but gods aren't bound by the same rules as mortals...
- Hope Bringer: Possibly. She can rescue your clan—and the whole valley—from the devastation of the skyfall. And her parents created her specifically to help their peoples survive the darkness ahead.
- Long-Lost Relative: She regards all Hyalorings as her nieces and nephews, because they are the descendants of her father.
- Semi-Divine: Her parents were gods, and she exists on the boundary between mortal and divine.
- Walking Spoiler: Cenala's existence is revealed to your clan partway through the game, and comes as a great shock. It's hard to say much of anything about her without spoilers.
Venurtera
The Dara Happan goddess of pottery and Yelm's niece. Hyalorings do not normally worship her, but you may learn about her if you adopt a particular group of Dara Happan refugees during an event, which will allow you to build a shrine to her.
- Odd Job God: Her domain is very specific — pottery. Her blessing is Porcelain, which gives you an additional exotic good and allows you to support an extra trade route.
- Secret Character: You can worship her only if you succeed at a specific choice in a certain random event; otherwise, she's not even mentioned.
