“Haven’t you heard? The world’s ending. Best to look fabulous.”
Overview: The Gilded Gaze are illusionists and diviners, the velvet glue of Wuh-Zhei’s ruling class. They know the end is coming. First Oracle Nero saw it. So they’ve chosen a different path: not to fight, not to flee, but to illuminate. They are the message, the media, the mouth of the state. They run the parties, print the posters, sign the paperwork, and shape the story. Aesthetic fatalists with gilded masks and gold-plated stamps.
The Paragons uphold the law. The Optimists build the future. The Gilded Gaze throws the gala. Together they are the three ruling factions of the wizard city.
Philosophy: The Unraveling is fate. All paths lead to it. All oracles have seen the end and no spell can unweave it. But if we cannot stop the finale, we can at least choreograph it. The Gilded Gaze seeks to guide the city into its last act with beauty, wit, and pageantry. Document the world. Celebrate what’s left. Go out with a bang.
Figures: The Gilded Gaze does not have a single figurehead like the other factions, the Oracle Group™ is composed of a multiple seers each claiming insight into “the many forking paths.” Illusion and Divination combine in them to produce not unity, but variance. They often contradict each other. They debate what’s fated, what’s flair, and what’s optional. But on one point, they all agree, the world will end and that the Chronomancer Senator Dalton Marius finally died.
- First Oracle Nero is the factions senator and most fabulous figure. A bugbear illusionist and diviner, once a dropout bard, now a senator and vision-fueled prophet. He foresaw Matilda’s rise, was her kingmaker, and has been cashing in that one prediction ever since. He hosts the best parties and preaches aesthetic fatalism with rhinestone zeal.
- Second Oracle “The ORCACLE” Baba does not speak. She does not broadcast. She divines for the elite, by invitation only, using tea, tarot, and complete emotional silence. She is the only Oracle to foresee the time loop—and did nothing. No one paid her to.
- Third Oracle Gloria Bhutané is the former First Oracle and current public face of the Gilded Gaze on ‘official’ matters. The Oracle of the Airwaves. Former First Oracle, the “Clear Voice” of Plate 3. Monarch anchor, spin doctor, news matron.
- Fourth Oracle Gelato is the people’s prophet. A Plate 5 illusionist who won the Lowlight Games, he uses rave and spectacle to reach the masses. He idolizes Nero, but he’s never even seen Plate 2.
- Fifth Oracle Magnolia Lehgend. Head of the Pre-Crime Prophet Division. She wears blurred anti-divination around her. She doesn’t offer visions, she delivers verdicts.
Projects: They maintain the city’s vast bureaucratic functions, handle inter-faction diplomacy, curate media and propaganda, and run all sanctioned entertainment. They also document the Unraveling, both for history and because they believe it’s inevitable. Nero’s sermons draw thousands. Gelato’s parties draw more.
They are not without influence. They design the propaganda that makes the Paragons and Senator Dash a hero. They shape the story Matilda tells herself.
They also handle wizard-on-wizard crime. The Pre-Crime Prophet Division. Cloaked in illusion and backed by divination, they target high-risk magical threats before they manifest. Unauthorized chronomancy. Banned arcane magic. Illicit divine practices. Mostly on Plates 2 and 3. Quiet. Clinical. Dressed to kill.
Plate Relations: They’re second most powerful on Plates 1 and 2 to the Optimists, and the artistic hand behind nearly every high-society function. On Plate 3, they are seen and heard. On Plates 4–6, they are distant but present, mainly in bureaucratic checkpoints or public displays. At every border patrol, you’ll find two Enforcers and one Oracle.
They broker peace between Optimists and Paragons and make it look good. They’re the glitter between the gears.
Magic Affiliation Illusion and Divination. They predict the future, then paint it better. They use illusions to console, entertain, distract. Their divinations rarely offer answers, only glimpses and feelings. Their greatest trick is making the end feel like destiny.
Player Hooks
- You want to see the end, understand it, frame it. Or maybe you just want to dance before the lights go out.
- Drawn to the spotlight or the shadows behind it, you joined the media machine, or the Pre-Crime Division that hunts rogue wizards before they cast.
- Perfect for Illusionists, Diviners, glam sorcerers, aesthetic bards, or any character who wants powerful knowledge and powerful spin.
- Their level one feats are historically flexible and strong, just like their schools of magic.
Tone / Aesthetic
- Smells like: enchanted perfume, dry champagne, silk ink
- Sounds like: whispered predictions, orchestral synthwave, distant applause
- Feels like: the edge of a spotlight
- Symbols: gilded masks, golden spiral, eyes drawn in glitter on unseen surfaces
Secrets & Subtext
- Nero has a sister-wife who runs his inherited Enchantment empire.
- Oracle Baba sees more than she speaks. Which is to say: everything.
- Nero’s visions are failing, he keeps seeing something he immediately forgets.
- Gelato is a New Faith sympathizer: there are even rumors that his magic is not always Arcane.
