Category: Shattered Earth

“I am Jormungandr, master of the ocean and poisoner of the sky. I am the World Serpent, and you now belong to me.”

Concept art by Iwo Widuliński

During the Breaking of the World, where the land cracked and splintered, and the continents were reformed, the barrier between the material world and the immateria was at its thinnest. Breaches began to appear across the globe, leaking Ether and altering reality, with one of the largest opening a great rift near Alta in northern Norway. Curiously, the vast crack that formed stopped at the base of a single ash tree, leading some to believe that the tree was actually Yggdrasil, the World Tree.

After years studying the occult and his subsequent search for power, Lee Kyong-Min was well aware of both the breach’s location, and its significance. He knew that a great destiny awaited him there, so he travelled west across what was once northern Russia, now controlled by the UNM, with a small band of elite warriors.

For the entire journey there, Kyong-Min hallucinated with visions of Ragnarök and the battles between the gods that were foreseen to take place. He felt the World Serpent calling to him in his subconscious and he followed the voice to its source. The Ether around the breach was so strong it straddled the boundaries between the physical and the immaterial, warping reality and preventing any human from approaching. Any human except for Kyong-Min. In an enraptured state, he stepped past his followers and entered the rift.

No one is sure what happened to him whilst inside but, when he emerged, he was no longer entirely just Lee Kyong-Min. His appearance had changed giving him an almost glowing quality, his outline a kind of haze and his voice cracked and much deepened. Somehow he had merged with a being from the immateria, an ancient creature of dream and thought. And it had a name: Jormungandr, the World Serpent.

Sculpting by Seth Nash

There is a certain unpredictability when using the Cult of the Dragon, and Kyong-Min himself does not have full control of his own soul. On the tabletop, he is represented by two models: one of himself, and one of the mighty serpent god Jormungandr. Throughout the game, certain rules and battlefield conditions will determine which model is in play, representing Kyong-Min’s internal struggle for control of his own mind.

When enough blood has been spilled, the World Serpent is called forth, bound to Kyong-Min’s soul and tethered to reality by his will. The beast’s jaws can rend even the thickest armour, and the ancient Norse god has an almost peerless mastery over Ether. Able to call forth a poisonous rain to weaken his enemies, Jormungandr can tear through multiple foes in a single attack.

But it is Ragnarök that gives Jormungandr his most devastating power. With enough Ether siphoned from the nearby breaches, he is able to tear apart the very fabric of reality, and destroy the minds of those caught in this fell conflagration.

“There is a natural order to things – every system falls into chaos eventually. Why struggle against the inevitable?”

Concept art by Iwo Widuliński

It was his eyes that set him apart. His eyes had a deep blackness that burned into the camera lens. Meeting him in person left people awed at his presence, and this charisma transferred over the airwaves to the millions of teenagers convinced he was speaking directly to them and them alone each night. In the years before the Breaking of the World, Kyong-Min had risen to become one of the most recognisable pop stars on the planet, with his own devoted army of followers.

But his eyes held a deeper darkness. Throughout his rise, Kyong-Min kept secret his obsession with the paranormal, the occult, and the ancient Gods. He read copiously on Greek and Nordic mythology, on Wicca and folk religions. He studied Zoroastrianism and Hinduism, the history of Mesopotamia and Antiquity, and read about the magi of the Renaissance all the way up to the present day. He was looking for something – staring into the abyss and waiting for something to return his gaze and answer his questions.

By the time the first disasters struck, Kyong-Min was fully immersed in his own belief system, a construct of unexplainable powers and the worship of unknowable ancient Gods and legends. As the world crumbled and Ether began to permeate, Kyong-Min sought out these breaches between the real world and the immateria as others ran from them, terrified. And where he led, his army followed. The cult of celebrity had been transformed as the world itself changed, and Kyong-Min took on the mantle of a prophet, his fans now acolytes of this new religion.

Sculpting by Seth Nash

Lee Kyong-Min is the leader of the Cult of the Dragon, and perhaps the most infamous personality in the world of Shattered Earth. He is a gifted orator and carries about him a strange charisma – the kind that psychopaths seem to uniquely possess. His devoted army of followers – once fans, now soldiers – were galvanised in a violent political coup that destroyed the Pan-Asian Alliance (PAA) and allowed the Cult to take control of the Pacific Archipelago.

On the tabletop Lee Kyong-Min is a gifted swordsman, and his heavily-augmented body, utilising the most cutting-edge Cult technology, has allowed him to maintain his youth over countless decades. He espouses the core ideology of the Cult, and sees the only future for humanity in chaos and anarchy. He leads by example, manipulating Ether to rile his own soldiers into a battle-frenzy, and charging into combat with his Ancestral Hwando.

But there is madness in those deep, dark eyes. At times Kyong-Min appears in the midst of an internal struggle, fighting to maintain control over his own body. Despite his pre-eminent position within the Cult, there are those who wonder at the bargain that was struck, when a man became a God. What price was paid to the Dragon?