Dawn Wars
The Dawn Wars, also known as the War of Light and Dark, are the endless conflict between Tñarilu and Náiluv, the Primordial Spirits of light and darkness, for control of space. They began c. 55,000 BME, with the emergence of time at the end of the Great Erosion, and have never ended. Their ebb and flow produces day and night on Dalel. The Dawn Wars are not fought in Dalel, and neither side can win.
Etymology
Dawn Wars is the common name. In Tivayi, the language of the spirits, they are called Daveldúl, "the dawn war".
Background
Náiluv and Tñarilu were the first two of the seven Primordial Spirits to arise from the interaction of Umalyu's consciousness and Pavkanai's imagination. During the Era of Isolation, light and darkness fell on Dalel but had no bounded place of their own. The era ended when the two spirits drew them apart into realms of their own, Qaaniguaq and Woncu, on either side of Dalel.
During the Great Erosion, the boundaries between the realms collapsed. When Konmai, the Primordial Spirit of time, emerged at its end, events began to follow one another in sequence, and light and darkness began to contend for the space between their realms.
Course
Warden races
When the Dawn Wars began, each spirit created a warden race to fight for it, by gathering the consciousness already present in its aspect.
| Spirit | Aspect | Warden race | Realm |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tñarilu | Light | Inguik | Qaaniguaq |
| Náiluv | Darkness | Nuworno | Woncu |
The Inguik are winged beings of light and the Nuworno winged beings of darkness. Both are ageless, and both have fought since the war began.
The Great Equilibrium
The balance between light and darkness is known as the Great Equilibrium. It is often described as a scale that constantly tips one way and then the other. When light gains ground, it is day on Dalel; when darkness gains ground, it is night. As the scale tips, the boundary between light and darkness sweeps outward from the center of Dalel and back again, bringing dawn and dusk.
Neither side can win. Each advance by one is followed by the other's return, and the struggle has continued without pause since time began.
Where it is fought
The Dawn Wars are not fought in Dalel. They are fought in the space between Qaaniguaq and Woncu, beyond the edges of Dalel, and their course is known in Dalel only through the passing of day and night and through rare accounts of the warden races.
In culture
The Inguik and the Nuworno are very rarely seen in Dalel, and accounts of them are the stuff of myth. In art the war is usually shown as winged figures of light and darkness locked in combat above the land.
Some ancient texts tell of a time when Tñarilu's light nearly overwhelmed all of existence, before Náiluv drove it back. Whether either side could ever win, and what would follow if one did, remains a long-standing philosophical question. Some hold that a world of endless day or endless night could not sustain life; others that the Great Equilibrium is itself a law that cannot be broken.