Elementals

    Elementals were created to monitor and protect their environment. They make their haven in their element and keep it vital; protecting the things that exist there- in the case of the East, the environment itself.

    An artefact ship can move through water without disturbing it as if it were part of the water itself. As the vessel is inhabited by a water elemental or bonded to the anima of a Terrestrial Exalted this is actually true. A vessel of frost jade can move as easily over the frozen sea as snow over ice. A vessel of fire jade can travel through rivers of burning rock.
   Earth jade is extraordinarily hard and requires age of strenuous hammering to craft it into shape. It's far stronger than most tools used to craft it as a result they have to be repaired or replaced frequently. Jade can survive any condition of it's Elemental Pole. It was intended to be the bodies of elementals.
   Artefacts made from jade are the houses of elementals. The Dragon-Blooded are representations of the living things of Creation just as they are descended from their forebears. Their artefacts aren't just objects but living weapons.

    Phosphorescent creatures trapped in glass globes to create light. The creatures never die but need to be let out once in a while.
    Conical sea shells people use as ear pieces to hear eachother.

   They live in cave and make light when confined in dark spaces.

   Elementals bring life to their own element. They are remnants of the offspring of Gaia.
   The Elemental Poles themselves are the source of Essence for each element. They are the most material places in Creation and are bastions against the Wyld. Each one pushes the Wyld back from it in a vast swathe that defines Creation's borders. The further Creation spreads from them the easier it is for the Fair Folk to regain this new territory but they always come up against these fortresses that bar their progress. The Lunars loved living in this hinterland, beyond the heartland of Creation. When the power of the Elemental Poles dims the Wyld grows closer. Fortunately they've never managed to overthrow one of the Elemental Poles. To the Fair Folk they are unassailable obstacles; essential for their conquest of Creation yet unapproachable as the sources of natural Essence that upholds it. Even in their physical form as dreams there's only so far they can go. They can still make their way through with difficulty at the places between the Poles where their Elemental energy is weakest. So the Solars erected four vast fortresses at these places to guard them. When the Solars had vanished and Creation was decimated by the Contagion the Fair Folk stormed them and began to enter the heartland of Creation itself. Only the intervention of the Scarlet Empress activating the Realm Defence Grid drove them back.
   The area outside the influence of the Elemental Poles was once opened up by the Solar Exalted as a new land. This was the site of many of the greatest wonders of the First Age.

    Orichalcum- Light of Creation. Moonsilver Essence of the Wyld. What if soulsteel is the Essence of the Neverborn. It isn't just an ore found in the Labyrinth but part of the being of the Neverborn themselves. They have to travel to the very lowest level of the Labyrinth to find the material. They use part of the tombs of the Primordials that their dead consciousness is kept in and use it to imprison ghosts. Or they use jet black matter from the Labyrinth that part of the (unintelligible) sub division that at once imprisons the Primordials and shapes according to their dreams. Unlike Malfeas the Uderworld and the Labyrinth were created without design and by accident. In a way the Labyrinth appears to resemble the Wyld presumably changing form according to the Neverborns' thoughts. Their thoughts more than words or images echo through the Labyrinth, twisting it and bringing insanity. Maybe these black, semi tangible nightmares coalesce temporarily into eddies of insanity and malice. This is the Essence that soulsteelsmiths use.
   Perhaps the magical materials are actually made from Essence in some way. They are made from a specific type of Essence that relates to the Exalted who use it. In a way magical materials are similar to hearthstones. For instance jade is material brought about by the life giving effect of Elementals.

28th February

    Terrain features aren't created by ordinary geological forces but by the actions of Elementals formations impossible under normal circumstances.
   Elementals should be a family of exotic species who live unseen in the forest corners and haunt snowstorms. People have many myths about such things but few people really know about them anymore.

Dreams of the First Age

    Guided Essence weapons would need some way of transmitting and receiving information and a way of tracking it's movement. Black magitech weapons could use a bound Hungry Ghost and try to use their risen hunger to try to guide it onto their living enemy before it explodes. They would have to be careful it didn't turn around from it's distant target and move towards living (or dead) targets in their own army.
   In Jade Elementals can affect physical objects while remaining dematerialised. Water Jade submarine: the whole vessel is an Essence engine allowing it to move through water. It can dematerialise in water allowing it to travel to any depth.
   Dematerialised-  something becomes composed solely of Essence. Water has the power to crush, air has the power to float. The deeper in water (or the closer to the water's bottom depending on how you look at it) the greater the power of water gets. The higher up in the air you get the harder it is to float.
    Travelling to Yu-Shan means travelling across the infinite distance to the other side of the night sky which is the face of the Celestial Incarnae.

Jade

    What if Jade is made directly from a transformed Elemental? The dragon-blooded's affinity with that element makes it easier to craft than other Exalted. Making an artefact from one of the magical materials should be a genuinely supernatural process not simply a physical or alchemical one. Orichalcum is naturally molten as it is always found in lava.

10th of March

    The eerie noise of the wind is the sound of air elementals blowing it, wailing and howling.

   The North is naturally and eerie and haunted place because of it's element's association with otherworldliness.

Seasons

    During the Season of Water, the ice from the Season of Storms melts. During the Season great rain fall and snow melts to flood rivers as the earth starts to warm again. Snows that fall on fields melt and soak the ground. In warmer places especially around heavy rains fall. The sudden influx of water into the land and the warming weather paves the way for the Season of Wood which is he most bountiful season of the year as conditions are perfect; wet but not flooded, warm but not scorching, that sees plants grow more than any other time of year. During the Season of Fire the Sun shines the strongest and Creation becomes hottest. Harvests are usually gathered during the Season of Fire before the ground becomes too dry for crops to live or they'll wither in the fields. Animals are killed for food at this time of year before they put too much strain on the drying land. During the Season of Earth the land dries out completely and the ground itself often becomes exposed in lifeless fields. The power of the Sun diminishes but rain rarely falls. During each season of the year spirits of each element run riot across Creation. Like the forces of nature they represent they revel in the short lived opportunity when their powers are at their greatest.
   The Pole of Wood embodies all the other elements combined to form life.

   Water elementals' powers: flood, tidal waves, whirlpool- maelstrom, tide, current, waves.

Elementals and gods

    Precincts of Elementals and gods. Nature of an elemental controls an aspect of Creation's form. Ice elementals control the weather.
   Thunderbirds Ice elementals that fly above clouds and create thunder when the flap their wings. While each elemental is a distinct being with it's own personality and experiences they can also be categorised into groups that share variants of identical characteristics in the way that tigers always hae orange fur and black stripes but each tiger's stripes can be used to identify it. Gods however are unique.