Bala is a gem-world (“a world that was inside a gem”) made by Lucifer as a refuge for strangers and survivors. It is “a crystal, a valley”: place and container are the same matter.
| Type | Place (gem-world) |
| Former name | Atas |
| Ruling house | Blue House |
| Spanish entry | Bala |
Description
Bala is said to be the first layer of the world Amoria (also the name hopeful poets give the same territory), which holds “several layers of possible worlds”. Bala is the layer facing the horizon, beneath which “a gigantic turtle is walking”. Its one recorded feature is stone plazas of “a very active world”. Other names for the one place: Bala Cristales, Ardis Bala, Balacan. As Atas, it was formerly a dark background kept in the negative plane.
Its lands are made up of seven houses, ruled by the Blue House.
History
- Lucifer made it in the crystal “with magic probably of dual influence”; it is called “a pothole of Lucifer” (un bache de Lucifer), an escape world.
- When two planets were destroyed, the survivors fled to Bala. A saber fell into it from above when a gesta (campaign-cycle) was completed. The four stars of the Southern Cross “project toward a place facing the present territory of Bala”. Sheridan is among the few who knew it firsthand.
- Bala “did not have these rules until a few births ago”; its origin and law are written in the Genesis of Bala, a portable founding text.
- The region of Bala “is annihilated”; when is not established. All that survived the two planets depends on Bala existing.
Conflicting accounts
- Hell is connected to Bala but distinct; the link is used to summon infernal creatures.
- Bala is Hell; from that view one is at once in Arden, in Bala and in Hell.
- Bala appears as a world in a gem, a layer of another world, a region of seven houses and a pocket “pothole”, perhaps nested levels.
- The spelling Bala, Vala or Vala Cristalis is not settled.
Open questions
- What “the ancient balas” (objects or entities) are, and their tie to the place.
- Climate, light, size, the inside view of the crystal, which house holds each plaza, the contents and author of the Genesis of Bala, and what the new “rules” were are unknown.