Writing Journal: Deities and Races, Volume VIII; Eleuth and the Luthans

Eleuth comes from the word "Freedom," which is exactly how I conceived of the idea for that deity. The race that he created being named directly after him, the Luthans, are the epitome of a free species.

Eleuth has already been described as having been intrigued more than anything else by the plight that the deities themselves found themselves in. While he seems insistent upon his assertion that there is no Prime Creator, Eleuth's belief is that the rest of existence and reality is of their own makings.

Eleuth watched with mostly amusement and fascination at the works of the other deities in the course of Creation, and only stepped in at what later seemed to be the last moment, when Heah created orderly systems for the universe.

Eleuth's fear in that moment was that all of existence, not only Creation, but the actions of the deities themselves as well, would devolve into mindless, predictable realities, which caused Eleuth to balk and imagine an eternity without any sort of surprise or variation. In effect, Eleuth's greatest fear is of an eternity of boredom.

As such, his action within Creation was to add variation and diversity to all of existence, such that no two living things will ever be exactly alike. He could not undo Heah's impact by creating rules and laws by which the universe behaved, but within those confines, Eleuth still found ways to create infinite variety within the world.

Later, as the various deities were creating their mortal races, Eleuth again watched in wonder. He found himself feeling something of a mix between horror and fascination as most of the deities Created races that would serve their own ends, but who were otherwise nothing other than tools of their Creators' own desires. Eleuth felt strongly that, although he had his own thoughts regarding his own race's goals, that ultimately, they should be responsible for their own destinies. In fact, his entire goal FOR his race was to show to the rest of the mortal world, and hopefully to the deities themselves, that they ARE responsible for their own destinies.

And thus were the Luthans born. In some ways, they were given the greatest gifts of all of the mortal races from their Creator, though they were also given the greatest of burdens, as well. For each one of them is able to see a short duration of all of the possible futures before them. Thus, every Luthan is burdened with the reality that they are TRULY choosing each of their actions, as they know exactly what the consequences of their acts are, as well as what the consequences would be if they chose a different course. No Luthan can ever plead ignorance or naivete when they take a course of action that another finds unpleasant. They are, at base, ultimately responsible for their own choices.

And thus do most Luthans act in the interest of forcing the rest of Creation to see that they are likewise responsible for their own courses of action. For many Luthans, they see many things like politics and policy to be such a major bungling job for many races, and particularly in interpersonal relationships, Luthans view other races as a curiosity. For their part, they end up believing that most individuals spend more of their lifetimes trying to avoid responsibility or having to actually define themselves than they do actually living their lives. And in some cases, this actually brings about a certain jealousy in many Luthans, who would rather mitigate some of their own responsibilities and accept the comforts of ignorance. After all, every Luthan was given enough freedom from their Creator to choose their own destiny, even if that leads to wishing that they had no control over their own destiny whatsoever...

Another interesting thing to note regarding the Luthan race is that they are a race who do not, for the most part, believe in luck. For when you are merely able to jump aside before lightning strikes, or you recognize that shifting your palm slightly before releasing the dice will have a completely different outcome, you tend to find that what most other races denote as "luck" is simply foreseeing an outcome that has too many variables for you to be able to entirely control or maneuver.

In terms of other races' views and responses to Luthans, the responses tend to be a mixed bag. Luthans have no organized society of their own, but instead mix in with various other races, or tend to live nomadic sorts of lives on their own. And yet, they always seem to be a bit at odds with the rest of the world around them. When people are in bad situations, having somebody tell them that they are in control of their situation and that they are choosing to remain in their unhappy state tend to not be smiled upon. At the same time, though Luthans themselves tend not to believe in such a thing as luck, they always seem by others to be extraordinary benefactors of said resource. If they play at games of chance, they always seem to win. When there is an opportunity for one to stride ahead compared to somebody else, the Luthan always seems to find the way to get the edge. Luthans, therefore, regularly engender bitterness amongst those who do not necessarily control their own destinies. And at the same time, most Luthans actively manipulate many situations in order to prove the need to take responsibility for one's actions, even to the potential detriment of individuals or societies at times. As such, they are not often readily trusted, if not actively chased out or executed.

In the end, however, every Luthan knows that he/she brought him/herself to their own destinies through the choices that they made. And not a single one of them would have made different choices if they knew then what they know now...