Lore

Airships: Conquer the Skies takes place on Adanati, a world orbited by the three moons: Ea, Tessagon, and Mith.

The community lore is here: Link to the community lore page

Lore Pages:

• Adanati
  • Nation of Gug

Airships Lore Blog Posts

• The Moons
• The HMS Sojourner
• Why no ground troops?
• On Suspendium

Bestiary Entries:

• Bestiary: Giant Bees
• Bestiary: Clockwork Wasps
• Bestiary: Dragons
• Bestiary: Giant Spiders
• Bestiary: Pirates
• Bestiary: Fleshcrackers
• Bestiary: Cultists
• Bestiary: Addenda

Miscellaneous Lore

• Stickied Lore Forum Post
• Suspendium Inhalation
• Suspendium

Adanati's Creation Myth

"First was the unknowable foam. Then Zagbu Ide was the first who knew himself. He looked about, and by seeing, he knew, and by knowing, he shaped the world. He formed the sun and the earth and the first moon and the people, and they lived on the earth. But the people grew callous and fought, so he took matter from the first moon and shaped the second and third moons, and bade the people to respect each other and the world.

Guided by the moons, the people lived happily but stopped sacrificing to Zagbu Ide. He grew jealous and angry and sought to humble the people. But the physical world had solidified like clay under the heat of the sun, and he could no longer change it. So he created devils out of pure thought and malice, perfectly obedient to him, and told them to spread doubt and disease, and pull a veil over the moons. The moons, pursued by the devils, took flight. The devils would catch up, and then fall behind again, exhausted, veiling and unveiling the moons.

Seeing this, the people rejected Zagbu Ide's jealousy and overthrew his idols and buried them in the sea."

"Floathoney is a rare and dangerous delicacy."

"The name of the airships world, the setting, is Adanati."

Aerial Scholar Archive

An archive of all of the Aerial Scholar's words of wisdom.

• Those cute potted land anemones you see on windowsills are the same species as the giant man-eating ones, just stunted.
• Suspendium chemistry is notoriously obstreperous. It does not behave right. It seems inert, until it suddenly really isn't.
• The members of the League of Astoundingly Remarkable Gentlemen get on fantastically well. Just don't ask any of the twenty-seven former members.
• A refreshing glass of spider milk every morning, that's what kept my grandmother going in her old age.
• A great achievement of our modern age is the eradication of the giant mosquito. Sluggish nuisances.
• A lord's comparative nobility and wealth can usually be determined by the altitude of their residence.
• Discuss: did the edict of Konrad II granting each imperial city its own elector presage the collapse of the empire?
• The recent fashion for ever more ornate hats peaked when Mrs Malthorpe's hat supposedly declared itself an independent nation.
• Silverberg's bakery is advertising the heptascuit as a fully maggot-proof ration with infinite shelf life. No one has managed to eat one yet.
• I must remind you that opera is still technically banned throughout the lands of the former empire.
• The secret society of the Shining Trident disbanded when an obscure novel described their innermost secrets purely by chance.
• Many nations forbid any buildings higher than 80 metres, as there is yet no fully reliable way to keep low-floating islands out of the cities during storms.
• Popular myth claims that Vulta I bought the empire for three goats. An exaggeration, surely.
• Ah, the Great Game. Play it well, or die.
• Dogs are domesticated. Wurm lizards are waiting for an opportunity to bite you.
• The great caves of Xul Umak are best explored by airship, as the ground is too jagged for any other means of transport.
• Due to a long-running dispute, murder is legal in Ix if the deed is done entirely between four metres and four point three metres off the ground.
• The famous naturalist Thaddeus Wolpertinger has become the laughing stock of the Imperial Naturalists' Society for suggesting that gargoyles are related to wurms.
• The ancient sky map from the Whitland ruins? Yes, it only shows one moon. We're pretty certain it's a hoax. We hope.
• Downed or abandoned ships are often repaired and commandeered by pirates, which is why standard navy practice now is to burn them.
• Impossibly huge bones can be found in the corners of the world. But are they even bones?
• The greatest achievement a common air sailor can ever attain is retiring.
• Of course sky whales aren't real! How would they breathe?
• Radicals in the Ringfast Landstag are demanding that suffrage be extended to land-owners with as few as a hundred serfs.
• Few have dared venture to the crab pole. None have returned.
• When in doubt, blame cultists.
• The only cure for bone carver mites is swift amputation and immolation.
• Was the last emperor a tragic figure or a menace? Discuss.
• What were the powers of the emperor? There were many, in theory. In the end, there were none.
• Due to a calendrical shift, the Third Goat War technically ended half an hour before it began.
• To be an air marine corporal is a highly lethal honour: first to climb out, first to jump, and, quite likely, first to be shot.
• You can always find more sailors. You can rarely find more money.
• Most patent medicines are just purgatives and opium. Beware the ones that attempt real healing.
• Discuss: did the edict of Konrad II granting each imperial city its own elector presage the collapse of the empire?
• On the shores of the shining sea, fishmonger is a high-risk profession.
• The majority of the pilots of heavier-than-air machines are veteran air hussars. Those that managed to learn without crashing.
• Having to repaint the hull while underway is a traditional punishment for underperforming crew.
• I recently read a paper on a newly found species of parasitical goat. Then I burned it and thanked the moons that my fieldwork days are over.
• Are powdered memories real? Are they mere hallucinations? Why are they so consistent?
• Peacock stew is a favoured repast of starving southerners who can find no other food.
• Hunting with trained aerial eels is a noble sport, much maligned in the present day.
• Trick question: where was the capital of the old empire?
• Gardiner's book on dining etiquette does in fact have a chapter on cannibalism. Having to eat your crewmates to survive an airship crash is no excuse for using the wrong fork.
• Father Uldrich's Great Grammar of Glossolalia is the largest and least readable tome ever inflicted on mankind.
• When did the first human fly? Who carved the first Suspendium Throne and brought it out in a thunderstorm?
• Because of their kind nature, people sometimes hitch rides on turtledoves. They don't always come back.
• Turtledove nesting sites now only exist on remote mountain peaks. Visitors are pecked to death.
• How many air hussars does it take to screw in a lightbulb? No one knows, they leave domestic matters to their lovers' husbands.
• The great caves of Xul Umak are best explored by airship, as the ground is too jagged for any other means of transport.
• The heptakini is this summer's bold fashion statement on the Gug riviera, so my daughter tells me.
• In Kulinrovod it's seventeen pennies to the denarius and nine half-denarii to the guilder, except on Tuesdays.
• Far west, a gauzy writhing shadow sometimes passes over the sun. What is up there?
• Air marines used to play dice during travel, but one day a die fell off the ship and one of them jumped for it. Nowadays they play cards.
• Diplomats sometimes have unfortunate accidents, like tripping and falling down the stairs into an unfortunately placed pit full of rabid geckos.
• A honourably discharged marine or grenadier can usually find employment as a footman for a country noble.
• Free-floating Suspendium islands are considered a nuisance by some and a home by others.
• Most plants die from too much Suspendium in the soil. Glortweed thrives. The locals brew it into an inadvisable tea.
• I personally think that Gug Cursive is an unpleasant script, but it is easy to write.
• The secret bakery at Cogburgh makes 77 kinds of pie, most of them illegal.
• According to Professora Kurzburg, craters on the moons were caused by large Suspendium crystals being struck by lightning and shooting up into the sky.
• In the old days, a ruler could make mistakes and still be respected. Now, pamphleteers will tear them apart the next day.
• Due to a legal transcription error, witchcraft was briefly made mandatory during the reign of Esmerelda II.
• Formally, the emperor was also the high priest of the three moons. No one cared.
• The giant bee is a prime example of the influence that Suspendium can have on nature.
• The intake form of the naval academy allows you to choose from cremation, burial at sea, and aerial burial.
• Radicals in the Ringfast Landstag are demanding that suffrage be extended to land-owners with as few as a hundred serfs.
• In the ancient city of Ru Arak, kings were a secret even from themselves.
• The spores of the Gossamer Jungle induce vivid hallucinations, which is why each expedition reported different impossibilities.
• There are no dwarves in the Goatskull mountains. It's simple malnutrition, I'm afraid.
• Air marine veterans have never missed a jump.
• Who would want to be a sorcerer? Don't you like having hands?
• A lord's comparative nobility and wealth can usually be determined by the altitude of their residence.
• In the waning days of the empire, if an elector desired a new villa, the emperor would meet with an accident so a new round of bribes could begin.
• Any number of old imperial institutions persist, some through inertia, some because they are still useful.
• There is great agreement that there should be a new empire, and very little on who should lead it.
• If you fly far enough east, Suspendium stops working. They say that if you sail even further, you reach the ghost ocean, sailing on the underside of the sea.
• Down south, the geckos swarm to mate every thirteen years. A beautiful spectacle. Hard to navigate.
• The hives of the giant bees that produce floathoney rest high in the sky and are as formidable as any man-made fortress.
• When I was a kid, I would catch giant mosquitos in nets. We got tuppence for a bag. Kept us out of trouble.
• Pirates have their own crude tradition of arms, featuring much tedious red and black and skeletons and hour-glasses.
• Aerial jellies were once thought to be the ghosts of downed ships. We now know they are natural animals, but peasants will still pray and burn herbs when they see one.
• Major cultist organizations include the Cult of the Worm's Eye, Molten Church, Blind Cult, and the Anti-Tractionists, though that information is only current as of this Monday.
• In the old days of the empire, you could walk from town to town without being accosted by cultists, beaten by brigands, or overwhelmed by giant owls.
• Instead of making them walk the plank, some air pirates tie old Suspendium crystals to their victims and watch, cackling, as they float away.
• When a giant hive crashes, foolhardy apiarist-adventurers invade, scraping any honey they can find into jars, fending off any surviving bees, giant mites, and other scavengers.
• Does red Suspendium exist? What kind of question is that?
• Each clockwork wasp is an intricate machine held aloft by suspendium, powered by a spring that takes up most of its central body.
• The old imperial coinage is still preferred in most places. The coins are steadily shrinking, though.
• In peacetime, grenadiers spend most of their time trying to steal the regimental flag of their hussar counterparts.
• The empire kept the peace for a hundred years, but why appeal to the emperor for justice when it's cheaper to come to an informal agreement?
• The recent fashion for ornate Suspendium necklaces took a sharp downturn when several wealthy heiresses were found strangled after a thunderstorm.
• According to Semmelschwarz' Ghost History Theory, the Empire never existed. It's not a popular theory on account of how many people can remember it existing.
• Trilunarism only became the official religion of the empire during the reign of Konrad III. Not that it made any difference.
• The Suspendium codpiece of King Prolix IV is truly a sight to behold. Historians and structural engineers disagree about whether he ever wore it.
• After an incident last year, personal religious symbols that are aggressive and venomous must be relinquished at the gate.
• Keel-hauling is still a popular form of punishment. At altitude, if the captain's feeling merciful.
• Ten years ago, men in power acted as if the empire still existed. Now, they have woken up and are sharpening their knives.
• At high altitudes, coal stores dwindle rapidly. In part because the crew steal the coal to burn it for warmth.
• There are many domestic uses for Suspendium, such as floating chandeliers to light up grand ballrooms and beautiful if impractical dishware.
• In most navies, one can still buy a commission. Some use measurements of the skull to select officers instead.
• Levitite is a common ore of Suspendium. It is ground and magnetically separated to mass-produce dust.
• Patience, young sir or madam. Ask again later.

Unused Quotes

The following archive is a list of quotes once used by the Aerial Scholar but have since been removed. Although they are no longer used, it is confirmed that they are still canon.

• Counterfeit floathoney is made by mixing powdered Suspendium and rhododendron extract into normal honey.
• The most popular faith in the civilized world is the Trilunar one, which evolved from an earlier Mono-Lunar religion.
• Of course, Trilunarians do not actually worship the moons themselves, but rather what they represent.
• Mono-Lunar and Bilunar cults are mostly tolerated as long as they keep quiet.
• Professor Septimus recently proclaimed a new religion of science, electricity, and Suspendium, to universal apprehension.
• Scholars can't agree on whether magic is real, but they do agree that if it is real, it should not be practiced.
• In Cardinalius von Lothe's Great Book of Dragons, he identifies five kinds of dragon. Most respectable scholars are pretty sure he was high on floathoney.
• According to Glassile's "Creatures of the Realm", giant aerial krakens may be tamed by prayer. No one has ever dared try this out.
• Turtledove shell jewelry, with its clever constellations of floating and non-floating elements, is very popular.
• Giant stone guardians stand watch at some ancient places, generally supposed to be burial or ritual sites.
• The last Great Conjunction of the moons happened when the old empire still stood. What will the world be like when the next one happens?
• Wurm lizards are powerful beasts of burden, but they are hard to breed.
• Wurm lizards become temperamental and hard to control if they have too much Suspendium in their diet.
• Turtledoves are far more rare than they were a century ago, as they are a favoured repast of airsailors.
• Working in a Suspendium chamber is complex and hazardous. Double pay rates are usually applied.
• While properly trained airsailors are preferred, a ship short on crew may replenish itself by impressment in the dockside taverns.
• Floathoney merchants are despised but mostly tolerated. Common sailors will have their honey confiscated by the officers.
• Deserters will be shot or used as bait for giant spiders.
• A Mr Stockton is attempting to sell his "safe aerial descent device" made from cloth. Sailors distrust it. The navy thinks it too expensive.
• If the biscuit floats, it's safe to eat. If the biscuit sings, it is not.
• Sometimes, a giant beehive dies and crashes to the ground. A massive opportunity and a great danger for the locals.
• Suspendium Hail is a very rare atmospheric phenomenon that leaves everyone dead.
• Supposedly, some southerners were using Suspendium for crude barges centuries before the advent of modern Suspendium Science.
• "Sentenced to the Suspendium mines until you float away" is meant figuratively. Only your soul floats away.
• Poor crofters sometimes trap clockwork wasps until they wind down, then sell the gears. Sometimes, its friends come to the rescue.
• A century ago, wurm-drawn field artillery ruled the battlefield. Now, it has vanished.
• Aerial hussars substitute bravery for armour.
• Aerial hussars substitute armour with bravery.
• No one likes boiled wurm meat.
• Fleshcracker mechs don't actually consume their victims, they just shred them for maximum visceral effect.
• The beard of Greenbeard the pirate is not made from Suspendium, it is merely painted green.
• Any number of cults and political movements have sprung up to fill the modern world's vacuum of meaning.
• Heavier-than-air flying machines are widely distrusted, but they are clearly effective.
• Duelling is forbidden at the naval academy, but this is rarely enforced as long as no one dies.
• During a storm near Arwick, a barrel of floathoney broke free of its moorings, shot into the sky, and exploded. The locals spent weeks in a honey-haze.
• No one likes boiled wurm meat substitute, and it is unclear why it is advertised as tasting just the same as the real thing.
• Real floatmead is clear and faintly luminescent. The fake stuff contains commercially ground Suspendium dust.
• Frost wurms hibernate throughout the winter and emerge ravenous in the spring.
• To obtain the best frost wurm hide, the beast must be caught in the spring and fed throughout summer, until its skin is supple and shining.
• Are you ready to fight for your country? Visit the nearest navy recruiting post. YouQUOTEll be flying in no time.
• What are birds? We just don't know.
• The rare survivors of moon disk visits agree that they come from the moon, but are unable to tell us anything further.
• In the wild, gargoyles nest in caves. Recent wars have left them with many abandoned buildings to nest in, and they have greatly multiplied.
• The worm left as suddenly as it arrived, taking five fleets and a whole nation with it.
• Remember the days when people obeyed the Gug Convention? Wait, why are you laughing?
• A recent study shows that the main cause of the old empire's collapse was a lack of tea.
• Floatpie is a northern delicacy. The trick is to bake it without rupturing the floatfruit.
• Do not ask what's inside the three moongazy pies. Just eat them, quickly, and wash them down with plenty of beer.
• The old imperial navy cookbook has been banned in several cities following riots. "Things were boiled that man was not meant to boil," according to one eyewitness.
• A bit of Suspendium in the soil is considered healthy for plants, but too much, and nothing much grows. Certainly nothing edible.
• The game of Floatball enjoyed a brief spell of popularity a few years ago until it became clear that the scoring was completely unfair.
• The current air-speed record is held by the airship "Silver Streak". People are divided as to whether using rockets is fair, and whether the ship has to survive setting the record for it to count.
• There are valleys in the Goatskull Mountains where Suspendium fails to float. The locals see the rest of the world as cursed.
• Recent archaeological excavations in the Tooth River delta have found ancient bits of carved Suspendium that were probably used for ritual purposes.
• Doctor Grottenholm is seeking more experimental subjects for his novel steam-powered replacement limbs. Veterans with strong constitutions and high pain tolerance preferred.
• What, exactly, are the moons? Were there always this many?
• An empire can never have too much steel or too many men.
• The dose makes the poison.
• Do cultists summon the kraken, or does the kraken summon the cultists?
• The famous naturalist Thaddeus Wolpertinger has suggested that gargoyles are related to wurms.

A handful of these quotes appear to be inferior or previous versions of newer quotes, such as:

"Sometimes, a giant beehive dies and crashes to the ground. A massive opportunity and a great danger for the locals." (old)

"When a giant hive crashes, foolhardy apiarist-adventurers invade, scraping any honey they can find into jars, fending off any surviving bees, giant mites, and other scavengers." (new)