Fairy Tales of the Relics and the Maidens
The Sword of Destruction and the Winter Maiden for Atlas
Once upon a time, in a land of ice and snow, there was a Maiden of Winter.
There were those in the kingdom that called her cold as a blizzard, and they scorned this white haired woman, calling her a witch and driving her into the wilderness. The land was inhospitable and not even Grimm could last long but the Maiden had no fear and made her living alone. Some feared the Maiden blamed her for storms and tried to drive her further away while others pitied the lonely woman and offered her food and a place by their hearth. She had friends and enemies and though they feared her she did what she could to protect them from the Grimm.
The Maiden stood guard for many years, and became a legend and was forgotten about, just a story to tell children on a particularly cold night. Until the time of greatest need happened and an army of man and Grimm came to the kingdom and threatened to destroy everything. Herding the creatures of darkness and leaving a path of sorrow in their wake. All hope appeared to be lost and even legends were sought after to find salvation. A mighty hero sought the Maiden and pled for her assistance and the woman moved by the man's pleas agreed to his request.
On the First Bastion, the forces of the kingdom gathered and there the Maiden appeared, in her hand she held an unfinished blade with out a hilt. The exposed tang of the blade offering little purchase for grip on a blade so sharp that the Maiden's hand was cut and fresh blood dripped on to the white snow. She thanked the people for surviving and trusting in her and told them that she would end this threat alone. The hero and the Queen of the kingdom protested this plan but the Maiden would not be dissuaded. As silent as a wraith she made her way to the enemy army and when she reached the center a mighty roar like a thousand lightning bolts sounded and light and fury and wind followed. In an instant the darkness had been destroyed. Only ashes remained in the giant crater and in the very center sticking out of the ground was a blade without a hilt.
The Lantern of Knowledge and the Spring Maiden for Mistral
Once upon a time, in a land of green mountains and waterfalls, there was a Maiden of Spring.
The Maiden lived in a great library, her thirst for knowledge was insatiable and in a building filled with thousands of books it was only a matter of a couple of years that she had read them all. The more she learned though, the more she realized how ignorant she had been and became more and more dissatisfied by her own ignorance and by the conflicting accounts she read from authors on any subject.
Distraught the Maiden wept that she would never know anything when a cricket appeared beside her to wipe away her tears. The cricket told her that if she wished to truly know everything then there was a way to find out the truth, for long ago when the Twin Gods had walked Remnant, the God of Light had left behind a gift to humanity that she could find if she searched for it. The Maiden listened to the tale and set upon a journey across the world, seeing all the lands from the Great Desert, to the Icy Arctic, to the Blasted Lands, to pastoral lands of Vale and back home to her library in Mistral.
Waiting for her was that Cricket, the Maiden was sad, for she had wandered and had adventures around the world but not once had she been able to discover the Lantern. The cricket however asked the Maiden about the places she had been and how they compared to the books that she had read before she had started her journey. The Maiden told her story for three days and three nights with out break and the cricket listened to it all.
The Maiden felt all her sadness fade away and instead felt happy in her accomplishments and experience that she couldn't have gotten from reading every book that had ever existed. The cricket agreed and gave the Maiden the Lantern that she had so desperately wanted before and told her that she could ask the lamp three questions and receive true answers on anything she wanted or needed to know.
The Maiden thanked the cricket but told him to hide it away, for knowledge gained by ones own experience will always be of more worth.
The Staff of Creation and the Summer Maiden for Vacuo
Once upon a time, in a land of sand dunes and dust storms, there was a Maiden of Summer.
On the great sand dunes the nomads riding their horses and camels wandered the scorching sands, the land inhospitable for Grimm to last long and only by the cooperation of its people that in such a place they could create a land of leisure. A young Maiden saw the idleness of her people and grew concerned with their refusal to accept that any danger would upset their life. Then one day a Magician arrived in the Great Desert, holding a staff that caused springs to burst from stones and grass and flowers to grow in his footsteps.
The Magician wished to turn the barren land into a green land like Vale and Mistral. For a time, some agreed with the Magician, feeling that his efforts would lead to an even easier life. Small oasis became forests and sand dunes became plains of grass. The Maiden watched, and grew concerned as the Grimm that used to die in the heat now flourished on this changed land, becoming stronger, more cunning, tougher, and preferred hunting grounds. The Maiden warned that they must stop and return to their old ways and land lest a great calamity fall upon a people unused to how dangerous the Grimm could get. The Maiden and the Magician fought for several days, at first with their words, then their fists, and then with their magics until at last the Maiden was victorious.
The Magician in his final moments revealed that he held no power but that which was in his staff, the Staff of Creation, that he had only sought to do good with a relic from the God of Light that held the power of creation. Instead it only created greed and jealousy from those that wished to use that same power to their own ends. The Maiden pondered the words of her foe and took his staff and hid it. The green areas of the desert dried up in the ever present heat and things returned back to the way they once were. The new oasis dried up and the people quaked from thirst. Drought and pestilence was widespread.
The Maiden feeling responsible took up the staff and traveled to the center of Vacuo and used its power to create the Great Oasis. A shelter for the nomadic people that offered them a place to build their first permanent shelter, and she spent the rest of her life tending to her creation that it would not wither away.
The Crown and Fall Maiden for Vale.
Once upon a time, in the grand forests and towering peaks, there was a Maiden of Autumn.
The Maiden was a slave for a foolish and easily angered noble. He kept the Maiden in his tower, waiting upon his every need. The Maiden once a free woman had fallen into a great debt and had offered her services to the Lord in exchange for the debt to be paid off. She had worked for many years in grueling circumstances when her debt was paid off she asked for the Lord to release her from bondage but he refused.
The Maiden held a power in her and the Lord refused to let anything that he saw as useful and property escape his grasp. The Maiden threatened the Lord that she would destroy his entire fiefdom but he would not be dissuaded. He warned her that if she did so she would be a fugitive and all manner of hunter and mercenary would hound her to the ends of Remnant. The Maiden wished to be free when a rat appeared before her. The creature offered a way for the Maiden to be free stating that deep underneath the Lord's castle was a relic of the dark god, a gift for them to gain the power of choice.
Desperate the Maiden followed the Rat and gained the crown. With it on her head, the Maiden was filled with confidence and once again stood before the Lord, no longer having the countenance of a slave but the bearing of a queen. The Maiden was in control, again she gave her ultimatum that the Lord release her and the man quelled at her visage. He begged for mercy for treating the Maiden so unfairly and told her she was free to go.
With her rat on her shoulder and the crown upon her brow she told the Lord to release all his other slaves lest he face a great punishment. The Lord did so and the Maiden and the Former Slaves all vanished into the woods never to be seen again.