Vashirak

Among the Naga, there is no greater deity than Vashirak, the Serpent of Saba. They were the patron god of the Nagarajya, ruler of the Deva, and the symbol of a golden age for the Naga. When the Malika and her armies conquered and overthrew the Nagarajya, she used her arcane powers to cast Vashirak into a deep slumber, so that they could no longer answer the prayers of the Naga. Yet Vashirak was not forgotten. The Naga—both those who remain in Saba and those living in exile—still tell tales of their glorious awakening, when the Nagarajya will rise again. According to legend, this event will be heralded by the coming of the Nagavirosha, who shall unite the Naga as one people and overthrow the Malika and the Malikate of Saba.

A God in Ruins

When the Malika of Saba established herself as the sole ruler of Saba and the Sabaen Archipelago, she sought out and destroyed every shrine to Vashirak she could find. The Naga who still hoped for their god's return did their best to conceal their worship, and many fled the Southeastern Region of the Great Ring, establishing Naga communities across its southern arc, where they could venerate Vashirak openly. On Saba, however, this worship went underground - both figuratively and literally. Since Vashirak was said to sleep deep beneath the mountains of Saba, the Naga built their hidden shrines below the ruins of the Nagarajya, where they could connect to the slumbering serpent and evade the scrutiny of the Malika and her Glass Shadows.

At times, a Naga of exceptional devotion would touch the mind of Vashirak in their dreams, somehow navigating the perilous Dreamlands into which the god had been cast, and catch a fleeting glimpse of the serpent's thoughts. From these rare encounters grew the seeds of a new legend: the Nagavirosha, a savior who would one day rise to awaken Vashirak. The myth of the Nagavirosha spread slowly - pieced together from fragments of dreams and shared in secret gatherings - but over the centuries it has come to pervade Naga communities throughout the Great Ring.

Many signs and portents have become attached to the myth, and Naga scholars have written vast treatises debating which prophecies are true visions and which are the delusions of the mad. On the island of Bakunawa, the great inventor Zaman al-Razaz claims to have constructed a device for predicting the coming of the Nagavirosha - the strange and unsettling Prophecy Clock. So far, it has produced no precise date; rather, it indicates that the advent is approaching, only to suddenly retreat again - a phenomenon that al-Razaz attributes to the wavering devotion of the Naga themselves.