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Metallkönige, Lords of Metal

The Awesome

The Metallkönige, or Könige for short, worship what they call The Awesome, a primal cosmic force that holds sway over all things. Belief in The Awesome permeates all levels of their culture, from people attributing bad luck to “Being Un-Awesome” to their scientist referring to the Grand Unified Force as “The Awesome Force”. From religion and superstition to science and technology, all things involve The Awesome.

This is because for the Könige, The Awesome is a real, quantifiable factor in their lives. Looking awesome, doing awesome things, and generally being awesome all allow for the Könige to tap into powers beyond the ken of normal humans. Some outside their nation call it magic or psychic abilities, but the Könige know that while such things are indeed awesome, they are not The Awesome they wield.

The most notable use of The Awesome in Könige society is in their ruling warrior caste, the Rückers. Blessed with Awesome, they can command enormous powers, channeled through their music and focused by enormous amplifier arrays. When combined with an Oblivion Folder amp system, a Rücker of at least gold rank can literally rock so hard as to punch a hole in the universe to allow for FTL travel. What the Könige call a power chord most other people call a broadside. In tactical combat, a Rücker shredding his guitar will cause his enemies to literally shred.

The Awesome is also the motivation behind some of the more nonsensical things the Könige do. For example, they know full well that the gaudy decorations they put on their armour would normally be counterproductive as they decorations would tend to catch blows, but they look awesome, so it actually makes their armour stronger. When it is pointed out that the levels of drugs their leaders take should kill them, not extend their lifespan, the Könige counter by pointing out that its more Awesome this way. And yes, they know that their Trollmäche don’t make sense from a military standpoint, they counter that one cannot deny that a giant robot with a guitar and built in amps is Awesome.

Religion

Religion is very important to the Könige, although the effect is a bit different from other human religions in that actual worship tends to be a bit more self-gratifying for the devotee than normal. This has led to an accusation that their entire theology is cobbled together from a bunch of schizophrenics rambling to one another while under the effects of powerful hallucinogens.

The Könige prefer to retort to such accusations with a flippant, “Yeah, and yours isn’t?”

The head Könige deity in their pantheon is, somewhat surprisingly considering their patriarchal and often excessively masculine society, is the Lady of Awesome. For the Könige, the concepts of Awesome and Fate are somewhat interchangeable, and since they often describe Fate as a “kick in the balls when you’re not looking”, the only way to reconcile such behaviour is for the ruler of Fate, and thus Awesome, to be female, since groin shots are unacceptable between males.

The Lady of Awesome is described as having ten arms, four legs, three faces, and ten thousand breasts. The arms are for playing a double necked guitar-bass, a drum kit, and a double decked keyboard, while the extra pair of feet operates the pedals to the drums while standing. The faces are so that she can accompany herself vocally while keeping an eye on her instruments. The breasts are there because that many boobs on a woman are Awesome. Some also claim that she is some sort of dragon, because dragons are raw Awesome. Those that emphasize worship of the Lady are called Powerbringers, because of their obsession with getting just a bit more power out of their songs by invoking the Lady.

At her side is the Lord of Destruction, a deity so pronounced amongst the Rückers that outsiders occasionally believe that he is the actual head god in their pantheon. If they point out that the Lord of Destruction should be the head god considering how barbaric their culture is, the nearest Könige will proceed to beat the hell out of the ignorant heathen and then clearly explain that while destruction is pretty Awesome, there are other, more constructive ways of being Awesome. Like building a huge building studded with gargoyles and such that is also a giant cannon, or possibly transforms into a robot.

In any case, the Lord of Destruction appears as a towering suit of armour wielding a flaming blade, the only bit of what is beneath the armour being eyes that burn like stars. According to Könige mythology, the Lord of Destruction is the essence of the void made incarnate, and will be there to finish the reaping of the cosmos when the last stars. Some Rückers have dedicated their lives to the Lord of Destruction, seeking to spread his message, and are called Doombringers. Most of the rest at least pay some tribute to the Lord of Destruction, usually a shrine next to the Lady’s and whatever other gods they worship.

There are countless other gods, all with some form of cult around them, and the greatest champions are often elevated to godhood after their deaths. Due to a combination of life prolonging drugs and a religious belief that the only way for a Rücker to get into the Könige heaven, Van Halla, is through an Awesome, typically violent, death, this means that there are thousands of such individuals raised to the level of a minor deity. Images and relics associated with these fallen heroes of past ages adorn the homes and rooms of all Könige, and there are entire museums of weaponry and instruments claimed as trophies in battle and passed down to the next generation.

Surprisingly, despite their often sinister nature, the Könige do not worship their devil figure, but that is more because their conceptions of good and evil are not based around standard human morality but “Awesome and Not Awesome”. Called Riaa the All Consumer, this creature seeks to absorb everything into itself, forcing all those consumed to labour endlessly for little benefit, sucking all the awesome out of things. Foreigners are often considered to be pawns of Riaa until they have proven otherwise.

Könige religious observances are often characterized as a bacchanalia with more sex, drugs, and weapons fire, and even simple, personal reflections often involve the imbuing of small quantities of psychotropic substances, usually hallucinogens or analgesics. There is also some debate on whether or not Könige resistance to alcohol was genetically engineered or if it simply appeared via natural selection due to the near ubiquity of the substance in all aspects, including religious rituals, of Könige life.

Finally, a note must be made about the relationship between Könige religion and their sex lives. To outsiders, the Könige seem to have no rules about sex, but in fact there is a very complex structure and religious undertones to their sexuality. Obviously, they consider sex Awesome, which actually elevates it to a religious experience, but they actually take great care about when and where it happens, primarily to control pregnancy. This is because their civilization would suffer near complete collapse if their women were to imbibe the same amount of drugs as normal while pregnant. Thus a Könige woman will usually only have children after purging herself of all toxins, which tends to interfere with religious activity, as they can’t even enter a shrine without being exposed to airborne pharmaceuticals.

All of this combined leads to extraordinary religious protections for pregnant women and nursing mothers, they are in fact considered minor avatars of the Lady of Awesome. As one scholar puts it, “They’re hormonal, in withdrawal, and they can’t even ask for strength from the gods. In a fight between a pregnant Könige woman and a Rücker warlord in full power armour with a power axe, bet on the one with the kid.”

Social Structure

Könige social structure is a fairly simplistic hierarchy with a great deal of fluidity between layers. The most numerous members of the population are the faans, the lower class of citizens that do much of the manual labour in the society and make up the bulk of the troops. The faans are often described as having an attitude that would make a Marxist’s head explode, in that they like being the exploited underclass, because damn it, they’re not awesome enough to actually do what others do, but someone has to be that cool. Of course, the highly fluid nature of their society means that there is far less resentment in most as most faans are not being actively held in their social position.

Above the faans are the Rhodais, the skilled middle class that include various technicians and range up to professionals such as engineers, doctors, and lawyers. Aside from typically earning more money than faans, the Rhodais tend to have more contact with the Rückers, which has its risks and benefits; although most competent Rückers tend to treat the Rhodais working for them reasonably well as they understand that the Rhodais are what keeps tours going, a few are absolute dicks to those around them. Surprisingly, some Rhodais do not mind, or even enjoy, these more abusive Rückers because that was what attracted them to join in the first place. Additionally, most of the NCO and junior officer cadre tend to be drawn from Rhodai families

The highest “civilian” group are the Gröpais, the privileged upper class. Technically, the only thing that separates the Gröpais from the other classes is the patronage of a Rücker, but many of the perks mean that most Gröpais are actually financially independent of their patrons. There is a highly fluid “under-class” of Gröpais that are little more than faans elevated to the status of Gröpai at the whims of Rückers, who must keep their patron happy to ensure the continuation of their privileges. Above these are the wealthy merchants and former Rhodais who have proven useful enough for a Rücker to induct into the class of Gröpai. These Gröpais tend to be stable over many generations as the resources they can provide their patrons make them immensely useful to entire Rücker families. In fact, sufficiently wealthy families may in fact become the patrons of lesser Rückers, usually providing various resources in the hopes that they will become better, or at the very least provide a back-up should there be a fall from grace with more prominent Rückers.

One interesting form of Gröpai is the Pimp Tsar, a man or woman who can wrangle up kick ass chicks (or occasionally studly dudes) for the Rückers to satiate their often (some times literally!) nuclear-powered sex drives with. The practice of pimping is something of an ambiguous mess amongst the Könige, in that amongst the lower classes it is seen as a being a bit scummy and rather degrading for all involved, but those pimps that can cultivate sufficient Awesome to attract the attention of a Rücker are often held up as paragons of Awesome. Those that work with Rückers are often considered somewhat necessary as many Rückers will find themselves so inundated with offers for sex that they need a filter. The title is also often applied to non-pimps who are friends with Rückers and take on such a filtering role, further reducing the negative associations pimps often bring up.

Finally, there are the Rückers, who have their own parallel hierarchy based on how awesome they are. All Rückers are technically higher class than even the richest Gröpais, but the fiercely meritocratic structure means that some are little better than faans that have learned to wield the power of Awesome, languishing in obscurity. Still, one of the biggest perks of being a Rücker is the right to elevate anyone to the status of Gröpai, and smart Rückers will often form alliances with skilled individuals, elevating them to the status of Gröpai where they will be able to have access to wealthy and influential groups who would not normally associate with such people.

The lowest group of Rückers are those that are driven mad by contact with the Awesome, turning them into raging berserkers. While a few manage to overcome such stability issues, they are typically extremely dangerous to be around, and as such they are typically locked in special cages called Garaugs, where they tend to spend their days in a daze, practicing their combat and musical skills, safely sequestered from others until they are needed as front liners to soak up enemy fire.

Above those locked in Garaugs is a complex hierarchy that is often too labyrinthine for outsiders, including other Könige, to really understand, but eventually the officer class is reached, the Rückers that typically command military groups or captain ships. Called Tsars, they are extremely experienced warriors and commanders. Above them are the various Über Tsars, who lead fleets and armies and govern planets.

The thirteen greatest Über Tsars form the Iron Council and are called the Eisengrafen, or Iron Counts, and they serve as a supreme judiciary council and advisors for the leader of the Metallkönige, the Rück Tsar. The Rück Tsar is the Most Awesome Könige around, and leads them in peace and war. The position is typically decided via a duel to the death. There is a list of successors should the current Rück Tsar die of natural causes (rare) or enemy action (significantly more common).

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