Timeline
The Time Before Time
In the beginning, there was only the darkness and the eternal cold. Deep in the center of this was born suddenly light and warmth and life, and this light and warmth surged to spread its rays throughout the dark void. At this sudden opposition, though, the dark cold void stirred and came to sentience, as if awakened from a deathly sleep. With the dominion it had claimed since the beginning of beginnings threatened, it tried to struggle against this newborn force. The clashes on the fringe of light and darkness sometimes shattered the edges of the two forces, and sometimes melded them, so that splinters of light were flung into the dark void and shards of darkness spun into the brilliance.One of those splinters of light flew deep and far into the realm of darkness, where only a few of its fellow glimmers had come to settle. As a fragment of the force of light, it also had a fragment of that force's sentience and immediately began to try to fulfill its purpose--the creation of warmth and life--within its small corner of darkness. The great force of darkness ignored it, for it was just a tiny speck and all the dark's energy was needed at the main battle-line far far away. And so the tiny spark was unmolested as it began to collect matter around itself and shape it, and infuse it with life.
One by one, the small light shaped five worlds, each with great love and care. As it finished each, it set them spinning around it in the darkness, but with each new world it found it had to place them further and further away from it. Still, the spark knew that its light could reach and warm them all, if only in different amounts.
However, as enthusiastic as the spark had been, it learned that it may have been too quick in making its worlds. As it reached far to set the fifth into motion, it felt the cries of the life it had coaxed into being on the first world. Its light had reached too near, too hotly for the fledgling world, and had scorched the planet's surface. Aghast, the light withdrew from the further reaches in order to try to mend the first world. When it turned its attention from its fifth child, however, it did not see the sliver of darkness that slipped in from the cold surroundings to burrow into the youngest and furthest of the worlds.
The fifth world, newborn as it was, had little sentience of its own and no way to defend itself, and so was swiftly and quietly consumed by the darkness. With one of its enemies subsumed, the dark sliver leapt next to the fourth world, which though still young was nevertheless stronger than its cold sibling. It cried out against the darkness, and the spark of light heard it and looked up from its careful mending, and saw what had happened. Angry, the spark wanted to reach out, but the scouring of its firstborn still weighed heavily upon it, so that it dared not send out its light far or in much force lest such damage happen again. And so it watched miserably as the life of the fourth world faded as well and the sliver of darkness leapt to the third.
It was on the third world that the sliver of darkness met its match, however, for this world was strong and vital and closer to the light than its younger siblings had been. The spark of light dared to reach out to aid it a little, as well, and so the sliver of darkness found itself unable to penetrate the third world's bright defenses. Considering this spark and its small worlds to be a threat for being able to hold any fragment of the darkness at bay now, the sliver called for reinforcements, and from the cold void came a black flood intent on eclipsing all light and warmth forever.
The wave of darkness washed over the two fallen planets and swiftly approached the third. The little spark saw this and knew painfully that it had to reach out again with all its strength to try to hold the darkness back, no matter what this might do to its firstborn, as otherwise all of its children would fall beneath the black tide. And so with regret it did so once more, and tried not to think about the damage it did to the already-scorched first world. The darkness crashed against the spark of light, and the light trembled at the force of it. Shadows struggled over the surface of the third world, but despite the spark's best efforts it felt itself being pushed back.
It was then that the sentience in the third world made its own choice. Quakes rumbled through the embattled land; the earth separated underneath the shadows to reveal the blazing core of life and fire that the world held. The darkness recoiled at this--it had smothered and chilled the furthest two to death from the outside, but could not withstand exposure to the light directly--and was pushed from the surface, but the world itself could not handle the strain of what it had done. Knowing that should it ever subside back to the quiet state it had been in before the attack, that the darkness would only return, it continued to force out its own light and strength until finally it shook itself apart. The fragments of the world spun out and settled into a broad ring infused with the energy and conviction of its sacrifice, and so became a shield for the remaining worlds behind it and its creator spark.
The spark, saddened by what it had seen and done, withdrew to once again mend its firstborn. The struggle with the darkness had been so violent and protracted however that what had once been a lush world had been burnt mostly to sand, though it was not lifeless. The spark tried its best, but knew soon that it had done as much as it could for its firstborn. Thinking upon its failures, it set back to create anew.
In the place where its third-born had been, within the protective ring of sacrifice, the spark shaped the last world it would ever make. Bringing together solid earth and embracing water around a sleeping core of fire, it infused them all with radiance and life before drawing a veil of air around them. From the seas and the soil it coaxed the world's first beings and then, wearied from the struggle and the making, it retreated from its children to watch from a distance.
This newborn world, shielded from the darkness by the sacrifice of its kin, came in time to be called Halci.
Its siblings were likewise named in time. Gannen the Cold, the Star of the Betrayed, was the furthest and darkest. Septa the Torn, the Star of the Watcher, still glowed faintly through its ice-rime. The Chain of Ydgys, Shards of the Guardian, glimmered like a band of stars in the night. Lyrach the Bright, the Star of the Wanderer, danced its way through the sky. Finally Achaer the Red, the Star of the Destroyer, gleamed sullenly against the light of the parent spark.
The Age of Wilds
The birth of the first of the Halion--the denizens of Halci--from the fertile earth was the beginning of the Age of Wilds. These first creatures--which would be known as the Eirendaph, Green Men or Rock-Sleepers by later ages--were somewhat akin to elementals and revered the earth and sky. Massive, they also built massively, shaping stone and earth into great formations to echo the mountains and the trees. They moved great chunks of stone to make walkways through the waters between landmasses. Meanwhile, smaller creatures evolved over the slow millenia of Eirendaph activity, too tiny to be noticed by the earthen giants.It was before the smaller races had achieved true sentience that two fleeing fragments of light from the distant war found their way to the Halion system, and slipped through the shards of Ygdys to descend onto Halci. The Eirendaph saw them arrive and rose to praise them like fallen stars, but the fragments were weary and unfriendly and wanted no dealings with lesser beings. When the Eirendaph tried to address them, the fragments put all of them to sleep, and so the first of Halci's civilizations crumbled into dreams.
Long ages passed before the one race of small Halions separated into two: the deep-dwelling creatures that would be called goblinids and the surface-walkers that would become skinchangers. Slowly, the populations split into little herds and clans, and some of them rose to sentience while others remained bestial. Along with them, the overriding spirit of the Halion race split as well. The spirit of the goblinids interconnected them all into a distant hive consciousness, while the spirit of the skinchangers slowly split into two: the Ravager and the Guardian, embodying the predatory and the protective instincts of the surface tribes.
During this time, tiny fragments of darkness managed to slip their way through the barrier made by the Chain of Ydgys and come to rest upon Halci. At first, they and the fragments of light struggled with each other, but both sides were wounded; in fact, it seemed that both the light and the dark fragments were refugees from the great war in the distance. The light fragments would not alert the spark to their or the dark's presence for fear of being shooed away from the fledgling world, and so the two opposing groups forged an uneasy alliance and vowed not to fight lest their squabbles bring attention upon them.
The first of the sentient races to develop a true civilization and begin recording time was the Teria. Their part of the goblinid overmind separated from that of the other deep-dwelling races and came to be known as Ciaunbran, making them the first independent race. Living within the mountains in the northwestern portion of the main continent, they slowly branched out aboveground and began carving cities both above and beneath the stone. The founding of the first Terian city, Stallancha, marks the year zero in their counting.
Teria-Recorded Time:0 ___ The city of Stallancha beneath the Teriathi mountains is founded and dedicated to Ciaunbran.
115 ___ The Terian city of Mannutha is founded above the Teriathi mountains, carved into the rock in the northern part of the range.
836 ___ Due to ages of ritual segregation between the warrior and the mage castes of the Teria, the racial spirit Ciaunbran begins to split as well, slowly dividing the Terian hive mind between the two castes.
1051 ___ The first Terian civil war breaks out in the city of Mannutha, between the two castes, over the increasing control that the mage caste was gaining within the ruling body and misunderstandings of politics.
1053 ___ The Mannuthan civil war finally ends, but not before the abandonment of the city and a long series of guerrilla battles both above and below the mountains. The war makes the Teria of both castes in other cities restless and distrustful of each other, and intensifies the separation of the hive mind.
1124 ___ Ciaunbran splits irrevocably in two, becoming Brancir of the warrior caste and Ciaures of the mage caste.
1143 ___ The Nimir gather together to build their first city, Alinren, in the mountains that would become known as the Garnets.
1171 ___ The mage caste of Stallancha exiles itself voluntarily and en masse from the city during the spring, and ventures into the mountain valleys to begin magically carving out a new home: the first purely mage-caste city of Niuvaurra.
1222 ___ The warrior caste of Vandreia forcibly exiles the mage caste into the underground and seals the gates against them, killing any who refuse to leave. This violent altercation and the subsequent deadly trek of the provisionless outcasts through the lightless tunnels sparks small uprisings of mage caste throughout Terian territory. Most of these quiet down shortly.
1374 ___ The Nimir complete their writing system.
1427 ___ The Solarians--cross-planar ocean voyagers--set up an outpost at Sharkrocks.
1621 ___ The first Underdweller city, Xaimakoth-Iilnidix, is carved into the walls of a cavern deep beneath the earth.
2057 ___ A member of the mage caste of the Teria, in the mixed city of Dannuesa, makes contact through magic with the darkness beyond the Chain of Ydgys while seeking power. The darkness floods into the mage's mind, and through him it flows into the overriding spirit of the mage caste, Ciaures. It corrupts and twists Ciaures, destroying what the spirit had once been, and through the spirit it infects the entirety of the mage caste. War breaks out immediately in mixed cities, and the full-mage cities begin to mobilize to take over those of the warrior caste. Warrior caste prisoners are also taken, and the mage caste elders attempt to create a ritual to expose a warrior to the darkness of their master in order to infect the warrior caste spirit Brancir. Upon discovering what had become of its sibling, Brancir with great sadness shattered the warrior caste hive mind, so that infecting one warrior could no longer infect them all. Brancir named the mage clans Feir Dhan, treacherous kin, and declared the Teria to be no more; those of the warrior caste would be Muri, the Solitary.
2291 ___ Niuvarra is abandoned by the Feir Dhan due to attacks upon its citizens from surface-dwelling skinchangers enraged at the demon taint. The Niuvarrans retreat underground, but not far, calling their new city Niuvarra as well.
2530 ___ This year marks the retreat of the last of the Murian forces into their mountain fortress-cities. Brancir sealed the gates of each against the might of the Feir Dhan, and blessed each one with as much power as she could spare to keep their grounds fertile and protected. Then Brancir, depleted nearly to death, fell into a deep slumber, and for a time the Muri ceased to make records in mourning both for themselves, their brethren, their past and their goddess. As word of this spread through the underground peoples, borne by the tales of those trading Underdwellers and Nimir that had been expelled from the Murian cities, the Nimir opted to take up the task of record-keeping.
Oread-Recorded Time:0 ___ Though the Nimir had kept track of years prior to this, the sealing of the Murian cities was such a shakeup to the underground civilizations that the thoughtful Nimir opted to call the year after the Murian Sealing the first year of a new age.
39 ___ Deprived of their beloved enemies the Murians, the Feir Dhan regrouped and then turned against the other underground races. A strike-force of Feir Dhan encountered and clashed with the Underdwellers, and failed to take over an Underdweller city of Rlyersstyi when they encountered Underdweller allies in the form of metallic golems unaffected by demon magics. This marks the first recorded appearance by the machine spirits.
47 ___ The Nimir nearly wipe out the wandering Feir Dhan as they first come into conflict at the fortified Nimir city of Sorond, under the eastern hills that held what would become the Forest of Night.
62 ___ A segment of the Feir Dhan population settles under the hilly central lands, naming their new home Avrastolla. Other Feir Dhan settlements spring up in the nearby underground, and under the more eastern and southern mountain homes of the Nimir. A few Feir Dhan clans travel even further south under the mountains of the Talislorian continent.
147 ___ The Nimir build the city of Varaku within the mountains that house the Eirendaph-made structure given the same name. They begin to study the structure and the deep magics that formed it, and small groups of Nimir leave Varaku to seek other similar stone-formations.
192 ___ While they had found and known the Hag's Needles to be another of the Varaku-like structures long before, the Nimir finally manage to create a small base of operation beneath the mountains near the Needles. This settlement, named Archandam, is constantly harassed by the Mar Keraatan that live among the Needles.
271 ___ Nimir explorers discover the Du'i-Oensha Eirendaph monument, but are turned away from settling the area by the feral skinchangers that protect the sacred place. They withdraw further and begin seeking caves to make camp in. These camps eventually made peace with some of the local skinchangers, began introducing them to civilized ways, and became the village of Sesskent.
315 ___ The Firine Stones, guarded and worshiped by the feline skinchangers of the south-central area, are discovered by the Nimir. The cat-changers are not so amenable to intrusion as the wolves of Du'i-Oensha; after the first 'defilement' of the stones by Nimir, they stalk and slay any that they find in the area.
327 ___ An observation post by the name of Calathrock is set up to watch the Firine Stones from a distance.
382 ___ The Archive of Stars and Stone, the Nimir' great library--in this case made up of thousands of earthcrafted stone tablets--is founded within the Nimir capital city of Alinren. The Order of the Star and Stone, a loose-knit organization of stonesmiths, historians and researchers, bases its operations from the library and sends agents out through the undermountain tunnels--and overland when necessary--to seek out the secrets of the deep, ancient magics of the Eirendaph and the reason for their slumber.
445 ___ A Star and Stone exploration party discovers the first world-eater. Not knowing what the creature is, only feeling that it is something not of Halion origin, they venture too close in attempts to study it. It awakes and devours many, leaving only a few survivors to return to Alinren to alert the others.
453 ___ At the site of the second discovered world-eater, the Nimir exploration party dispatched to study the creature from a distance is ambushed and slaughtered by local Feir Dhan, who then set themselves up as worshipers and guards of the creature. As further world-eaters are discovered, such ambushes continue, severely impeding Nimir attempts to study the world-eaters to find ways of destroying them.
484 ___ The Nimir city of Sorond vanishes, leaving behind a huge, smooth-walled empty cavern as if something had simply come and taken a bite out of the undermountain. In fact, this was the concentrated work of a huge group of Feir Dhan, who also systematically butchered any messengers or investigators sent by the Nimir to see what had happened. The Feir Dhan do not settle in the Sorond hole, but lair in the outlying tunnels.
516 ___ The Sorond area is reclaimed by the Nimir when the Feir Dhan presence in the area simply vanishes one day. A new city is raised from the remaining stone, and is heavily fortified and named Ungerand. Populated by warriors and stone-mages, Ungerand swiftly becomes the military center of the Nimir city chains, and sends out aggressive patrols to wipe out any Feir Dhan in the area.
687 ___ Another race is noted to have come into full sentience, this time from the surface-dwelling races. Originating in the southern jungles, the Oegar had developed over the ages from a skinchanger race into a single-formed, bipedal humanoid race, and had begun to create civilizations. At this point Oegar civilization is not much more than fire-building and small hunter-gatherer groups, but the wearing of clothing and the making of tools indicate to the Nimir that these newcomers have some intelligence. Otherwise, the Oegar are generally ignored, as their territories do not clash with the deep-dwellers'.
823 ___ The Children of Night make themselves known for the first time beyond their covert operations when the whole family visits the Nimir court for an audience. The topic of this discussion is never passed on, as if none who witnessed it could speak of it.
1042 ___ The sky-watching Nimir note the descent of a strange fleet of vessels from the stars onto the Upper World. Investigations by Nimir exploratory parties end in the slaughter of the explorers at the hands of the elves. Also the year 0 on elven calendars.
The Age of Myths (Pre-Human History, Elven-recorded time begins)
0 ___ The Elven race--led by three Princes--arrives on Halci, on the central plains of the northern continent. Having been harried through the dark spaces between stars by demon forces, they are edgy and frightened, and react badly to the Nimir that come to investigate their arrival. True Arcane magic first enters the world. Having destroyed the first welcome-party, the elves find themselves almost immediately besieged by the warrior-citizens of Ungerand, who declare the elves to be akin to the world-eaters because of their celestial origin.
2 ___ Despite the power of Ungerand, the elves manage to complete magical fortifications to their ships, now used as makeshift towns. The elven colony-ship city is named Liunaitheia, 'Swordpoint'.
88 ___ The elves of Liunaitheia--led by Prince Aelfwain--manage to fight their way into well-fortified Ungerand, aided--unbeknownst to anyone--by the sapping, magic and assassination tactics of many Feir Dhan. Ungerand falls, leaving the crystalline cave system it was built in to be used by the elves. Harnessing the earth through powerful magics, they collapse the cavern that held Ungerand and begin to build the flowstone city of Tantaelastarr.
92 ___ The forest-dwelling skinchangers (mostly wolf, cat and bear) around the newly-rising elven capital, Tantaelastarr, band together to assault it. They are driven back, and, having witnessed the 'corruption' of the predator animals into supposed monsters, the elves of Tantaelastarr--led by Prince Tirindain--and Liunaitheia begin a campaign of skinchanger destruction.
137 ___ In revenge for what happened at Ungerand, a team of Nimir sappers slips into the remaining sub-tunnels beneath Tantaelastarr and collapses many of the elven towers. The elves locate them, and scouts trail them through undermountain all the way back to Alinren. Outright war begins between the two races, with the elves also obliterating any skinchanger or goblinid that dares to stand in their way.
227 ___ A second flight of elven colony-ship--including the fourth elven leader, Princess Lliela--lands near Liunaitheia, releasing more elven refugees. These, who had been separated from the first flight by a dark vortex and trapped for the intervening years, are by and large heavily traumatized by their experiences. While some stay in Liunaitheia and most join the cause of war in Tantaelastarr, a few of them and some Liunaitheian guides and guards head further north to establish the city of Anlirindallora. At first a city of woodcrafted buildings, Anlirindallora grows into a forest of crystal towers when its mages discover veins and domes of beautifully-colored crystals hidden beneath the surface. This city becomes a refuge from the war waged by Tantaelastarr, though stays quite small.
256 ___ East of Tantaelastarr, between it and Alinren, the elves establish another fortified city on the tree-dotted grasslands of what would become the Heartland, near the foothills of the Garnet Mountains. Built of woven stone and wood, Hlacaasteia becomes the bastion of Princess Lliela and the remaining elves of the second wave of colony ships as they launch forays into the Garnets to assault Alinren directly. Tantaelastarr remains the head of the operation, but its garrison turns toward the defense of the colony-cities and the many elven towns that spring up between them and Anlirindallora.
315 ___ West of Tantaelastarr and the colony-cities, another defender-city is raised upon the grassy plains to defend the central elven kingdom from the threat of the cat-changers of the grasslands. Called Iseilian, it is the lair of the Hunter-Prince Darganel and his people.
343 ___ Upon the discovery by scouts of hostile Nimir south of the currently-held elven areas, another elven bastion--Syllastria--is begun deep in the Forest of Mists to serve as a springboard for assaults upon Varaku and the southlands. Prince Tirindain directs the Syllastrian garrison from his seat in Tantaelastarr.
418 ___ The Hlacaasteian garrison under the direction of Princess Lliela finally conquers the Nimir capital of Alinren. The Princess' troops go on a spree of destruction, demolishing the Archive of Stars and Stone and essentially erasing the historical records of the earlier world outside of Muria. All crafting and learning facilities are also oibliterated, the same with anyone found within the confines of the city--male, female or child. Some few scholars, females and children manage to flee the city while the last of the earthmages and warriors attempt to hold off the elven assault, but many of these refugees are slain by the Feir Dhan that lurk deeper in the tunnels awaiting just such an exodus. In the end, only a very few manage to escape with their lives. The elves make the remains of Alinren uninhabitable by placing arrays of wards and magical traps among the ruins, in the hopes of slaying any Nimir who might venture out to try to scavenge fragments of Alinren's magic.
425 ___ Emboldened by Lliela's strike and their own forays further and further south, the garrison at Syllastria launches an assault upon the Nimir at Varaku. They are repulsed however, when the battle touches upon the Varaku obelisks themselves. The obelisks seem to empower the Nimir with greater strength and determination than before, and elven magic is made suddenly less effective. The Syllastrian garrison withdraws from the Varaku obelisks with heavy casualties, and pulls all the way back to the elven city to reconsider the threat.
427 ___ Varaku is assaulted again by the Syllastrian forces, along with assistance from the Hlacaasteian garrison. Again, the elves are thwarted, though by a much narrower margin; nevertheless, they are forced to withdraw from the Varaku area again. Syllastria begins its defensive magical fortifications in anticipation of an Oread strike, which does not come.
458 ___ The Iseilic garrison under the command of the Hunter-Prince Darganel embarks on a concentrated campaign to eradicate a group of lizardform shifters, the Nazca-Vii, from the rivers and lakes of the west-central plainslands.
464 ___ A massive assault by cat-shifters of all kinds almost brings down Iseilian, as some of the clever beasts murder and then mimic a garrison patrol in order to get inside the elven city's gates. Though they do manage to open the gates to the horde of their fellow feline shifters, the hardy elves under Darganel's command fight back with equal ferocity and superior magic, eventually sealing the gates again and slaughtering every cat-shifter trapped inside in a magical purge. The elven hunters reorganize their priorities and opt to break the cat-shifters first if possible.
482 ___ A new assault on Varaku by Syllastrian forces finds the Nimir city mysteriously abandoned. The elven scouts that attempt to explore it fall victim to a host of stoneworked traps and those that survive return without any knowledge of what has happened to the Nimir. In truth, the Nimir have abandoned this Varaku in favor of one dug more deeply and secretly into the nearby mountains. The Nimir of Varaku--a collection of shamans, seers and stoneshapers--sink into their quiet studies and careful plots again undisturbed. Hoping their enemies gone, the elves return to Syllastria in wary victory.
505 ___ The Nazca-Vii tribe of lizardlike skinchangers is finally driven fully from the lakes and rivers of the west-central plainslands. The remaining Nazca-Vii retreat into the deep swamps south of their prior river-dwellings, becoming the first of the skinchangers to Forget their sentience and become entirely monstrous.
512 ___ In the deep southern jungles, the budding civilization of the Oegar undergoes a few setbacks when a great eruption of the Tchellaryllyn volcano in the jungles of Zhangi-Uru sends lizardmen and cat-changers spilling out of the thick forest to the rivers and lakes by which the Oegar have built their towns. Crazed with religious frenzy on the the part of the fire-dragon-worshipping lizardmen, and fear on the part of the southern cat-changers, these newcomers decimate many of the previously-peaceful agrarian Oegar settlements. The shocked Oegar draw into tighter clans and begin to militarize to defend themselves from the lizardmen.
537 ___ A small plainsland cat-shifter tribe is forced into Forgetting by the hunters of Iseilian, becoming little more than wildcats with no shifting ability. This occurs after a vicious battle between Hunter-Prince Darganel and the breed avatar itself; his sword, brought from the elven homeworld, proves to be a powerful bane to spirits. The remaining intelligent cat breeds shrink away from Iseilian, some moving north to start picking off the softer targets in Anlirindallora and others moving into the deep southern plains to join with the lion-spirit Athalarr's growing tribe.
538 ___ Anlirindallora is fortified against the assaults of the skinchangers by experimental wards produced by the mages of Hlacaasteia. These wards end up binding the spirits of the Anlirindal elven mages that cast it to the land itself, making them a part of the security system and all but killing their physical forms. When outraged Anlirindal confront the Hlacaasteian magi about their now-catatonic, spirit-trapped fellows, the Hlacaasteians say that they warned about the untested nature of the wards; they do not use them because they have little trouble dealing with the skinchangers that come for them in a normal manner. When the remaining Anlirindal mages attempt to bring down the wards in the hopes of restoring the spirits of their comrades to their bodies, they are stopped by the ward-elves, who agree that though this is a horrific turn of events, they now have more power than ever expected to use in keeping the noncombattant population of Anlirindallora safe. Reluctantly the remaining mages allow the wards to stand, but charge the Hlacaasteians to research a way to seperate the spirits from the ward in the future. The Hlacaasteians promise to do so.
557 ___ The Oegar clans (except for scattered groups situated away from the still-smoking volcano) unite under their first military leader, Khargar One-Ear, to drive the Ibe-Wum lizardmen from the river-lands. The lizardmen refuse to be forced back entirely, calling more and more of their kin from the lava-caverns of Tchellaryllyn to fight; the combined Oegar forces are slowly pushed back, northeast across their ancient river homelands, to the less-hospitable badlands and savannah. The two forces come to a standoff with the great rivers between them, and the Oegar reluctantly try to rebuild homes and civilizations in the leaner lands.
582 ___ The Hlacaasteian elven forces annihilate the Nimir research-community of Archandam in the shadows of the Hag's Needles, despite the fact that the community had never been aggressors toward the elves and consisted mostly of historians and archivists. Those few who survived fled through the undermountain routes, and many were slain by hidden Feir Dhan as well. As with Alinren, the Hlacaasteians cover the destroyed settlement with magical wards and traps, to take care of any Nimir that might try to recover the research.
643 ___ The last Nimir settlement known to the elves is found abandoned and trapped like Varaku, with its former occupants burrowed deeper into the undermountain or scattered about the surface singly in hidden caves. The elves attempt to keep vigilant, but due to the lack of great threat from the Nimir since the fall of Ungerand and Alinren, they have already been settling into a softer, higher-culture existence. This trend continues.
677 ___ The entire population of a small elven town between Tantaelastarr and Hlacaasteia is found slaughtered by an elven messenger; many of the bodies are missing, or else missing parts, and some seem to have been gnawed upon. Scouts from the two cities track the perpetrators to hidden caverns nearby and discover a small Nimir town, with elven bones littering its outskirts. The Nimir are annihilated, while the Feir Dhan assassins that had set them up watch from the shadows. Episodes like this reoccur infrequently as the Feir Dhan cause their enemies to destroy each other.
715 ___ The constant threat of the Ibe-Wum disappears as the lizardmen are finally summoned back into the deep jungles by the end of the two-hundred-year string of eruptions. The Oegar, hardened considerably now from the lazy, portly creatures they used to be, spread back across the great rivers and begin to repopulate the land at a furious pace.
732 ___ A pair of elven scouts on patrol around their small village run across a Feir Dhan band poised to repeat the village massacres. They are attacked, and one escapes to rouse the village. Though the Feir Dhan withdrew upon their discovery, the scout and the village mages manage to track their flight to the underground. The village is evacuated to Tantaelastarr, and a garrison set up in its place.
745 ___ The two Candat tribes of the Cashtain skinchangers--the wild dog-men of the plainslands and forests--are hunted into Forgetting by the elves of Iseilian and Hlacaasteia.
828 ___ Between the hunting of the aggressive Tasa's Guard horses and the capture and breaking of Ten-Sky horses, the plainsland Tasain are forced into Forgetting by Hunter-Prince Darganel and his people. The perceived enslavement and murder of the horses of both breeds finally breaks the over-spirit of the skinchangers in two. Manifesting now as the Guardian and the Ravager--the protective/prey avatar and the predatory avatar respectively--the spirits begin to struggle directly with the elven race. The Guardian possesses and empowers members of skinchanger races to better fight off their attackers, while the Ravager forces itself into the minds of elves and causes them to attack their own people.
851 ___ The first true war between Oegar tribes begins from a dispute over a cross-tribal political marriage. The Leshya tribe attempts to take the land it believes belongs to it, is repulsed, and calls in its allied tribe of Maanja. Its opponents call in their allies, and the fighting escalates from skirmishes and raids to an increasingly broadened war.
860 ___ Though the Voryeshki and Ghesjek Oegar clans had joined the Leshya and Maanja clans in the war, more had joined the side of Leshya's enemy. United under a rather charismatic leader, this combined force pushed Leshya and its allies off their lands and exiled them into the badlands of the northeast. The exiles trek north in search of the few oases their ancestors had found when driven from the river-lands by the lizardmen.
864 ___ While not thriving, the exiled Oegar clans had found ways to live in the rough lands, and were again becoming toughened like their warrior ancestors. In this year, the Maanja tribe absorbed the Leshya, which had been most decimated by its warring nature. Feeling somewhat threatened, Ghesjek and Voryeshki split their forces from the Leshya-Maanja bulk and claimed other oases.
883 ___ A Ghesjek shamaness, Vina Treakhaher, is possessed by the Guardian. Under its influence, she attempts to persuade her chieftain to gather the other exile clans and take them and their people north, to the fertile green lands. After some resistance, the chieftain agrees to discuss with his associates. The Leshya-Maanja are interested, and the Voryeshki leader--Kirhuwa Kaar-Ventai, already possessed by the Ravager--agrees fully with the Ghesjek shamaness. The Oegar forces mobilize themselves to move northward.
884 ___ Passing through the Varaku lands, the Oegar forces are stopped by a small group of Nimir, who offer to join with them to aid in their settling. The Nimir of course know what is in store for the Oegar, as do the Ravager and Guardian, and so the spirits urge the Oegar leaders to accept. The massive force of Oegar sweeps into the northern continent, immediately encountering outrunners from Syllastria. Unimpressed by the small, pale scouts that run off as soon as they are sighted, the Oegar leaders declare that if this land belongs to those creatures, then they shall take it by force. Full-scale war erupts as elves from Syllastria, Tantaelastarr and Iseilian converge upon the Oegar masses, and the Guardian and Ravager call in the aid of the remaining skinchangers in the area: cat, wolf, bear, bird, rodent, and all others that still remember themselves. Many come in humanoid form in attempts to properly communicate with the Oegar. Meanwhile, the Feir Dhan gleefully undermine the elven cities, while the Nimir in hiding do the same in other places or aid the Oegar armies openly.
885 ___ Iseilian falls to Feir Dhan sappers while the bulk of its forces are on the fields of war. Those who remained inside the walls are butchered by the Feir Dhan, or rendered unconscious and dragged into the tunnels to be tortured, sacrificed and devoured later. Riders from the beginning of the city's destruction reach the Iseilian forces and draw them out of the war by order of the Hunter-Prince, only to find the city in ruins and its people eradicated. With Darganel's forces not pressing on the Oegar army, it manages to move further through the elven lands, steamrolling the elven towns in its path as it moves toward Liunaitheia and Tantaelastarr. The combined skinchanger forces move in on Iseilian and its shocked troops, seeking revenge for the hunt that forced so many of their kin into the Forgetting. They herd the Hunter-Prince's forces westward, away from the elven lands to make sure that the tough fighting force can not rejoin the defense of the cities. As Darganel's forces contain relatively few mages, the embattled elves have few options but to go where they are herded.
886 ___ Liunaitheia, though guarded heavily by Tantaelastarran forces, is overrun by the Oegar with the assistance of earth-shaping Nimir. The Nimir force the makeshift towers of the elven colony-ships to sink into the earth, entombing the ships and all the elven noncombattants that had been sheltering within them. Horrified and with nothing to defend, the elven forces retreat toward Tantaelastarr, evacuating all the towns between fallen Liunaitheia and Tantaelastarr. Upon arrival, however, the soldiers find Tantaelastarr also compromised despite the best attempts of the soldiers that had remained at the city: again, sappers have made their way into the ruins of Ungerand beneath Tantaelastarr and are hard at work bringing down the flowstone towers. The elves attempt to combat this tactic by splitting their forces: Prince Aelfwain's troops stay aboveground to hold the forest around Tantaelastarr, while Tirindain's troops delve into the undermountain to fight the sappers. They find Nimir and Feir Dhan both hard at work, and while the Nimir simply melt away into the stone when spotted, the Feir Dhan gleefully plunge into combat, taking prisoners of all that they can and catching many in traps and pitfalls as the elves tried to chase them off. In the end, Tirindain and his depleted forces come back to the surface to help Aelfwain defend the city. The Oegar settle back from the city as winter drew closer, making camps and sending forces back to pillage the abandoned elven villages and cities, and prepare to siege Tantaelastarr. Meanwhile, the remaining skinchanger forces that can handle winter-hunting advance north to harry the fringes of Anlirindallora, though they can not pass the wards.
887 ___ Hlacaasteian troops arrive from the east to assist in the battle against the Oegar forces, as well as Syllastrian forces from the south. The Iseilic troops are pushed further westward, against the foothills of the Terian mountains. Abandoning the Oegar forces, the Guardian as Vina Treakhaher sets out to find the lairs of the Mountain dragon Ingriyak in the Terian range, and the great Plains dragon known as Grassfire. Convincing these dragons and their broods of the need to eradicate the destructive elves from the landscape, or at least break their power entirely, Vina returns to the Oegar army with mighty allies in tow. Along the way, a few blues from the Wind family join as well, and the battle for Tantaelastarr turns to the Oegars' side as the flight-capable dragons sweep down upon the combined elven armies and scatter them with breath of lightning and shattering force. Ingriyak tears the tops off the towers with ease and bombards the elven defenders with the wreckage, while Grassfire and his brood panic the horses of the small elven cavalry and chase down them and their riders. The elven armies are split in two by the Oegar forces as Tantaelastarr falls: half of it flees north, commanded by Prince Aelfwain, intending to seek sanctuary in Anlirindallora's wards, while the other half under Tirindain and including the Hlacaasteian elves and many Syllastrians are forced eastward through the gap between Tantaelastarr and Syllastria. Aelfwain's plans are scuttled unfortunately, when he and his harried troops--still being followed by Ingriyak and several of the Wind brood--find that Anlirindallora is being starved-out by skinchanger troops backed by Nimir. The stoneshaping Nimir raise walls between Anlirindallora's protective wards and the desperate elven troops, and the skinchangers break away from their vigil to assist the dragons in pulling down any of Aelfwain's people that lag from formation. With no other options, Aelfwain's people continue northward into the cold lands, leaving Anlirindallora to its siege. The Oegar forces follow the retreating elves into the east, toward Hlacaasteia itself. With the assistance of a few angry Wind dragons, the remaining vengeful Nimir of the Garnet Mountains, and the masses of wolf and bear-changers from those same mountains, the Oegar proceed to wreck Hlacaasteia and its defenders despite the fact that Hlacaasteia has the greatest concentration of magi of any elven city. The battle in and around Hlacaasteia in the autumn of the year is the worst of the war, drenching the land in the blood of elf and Oegar alike while the skinchangers, Nimir and dragons take few casualties due to hit-and-run tactics. The elves are pushed inexorably toward the shores of the Atharine inner sea, and though reinforcements from Syllastria manage to strike out along the edge of of the inner sea to make a small path for safe retreat, it seems that the elves will surely be crushed on the beaches. It is at this point that a Feir Dhan representative approches Princess Lliela and promises her and her people safe passage to a haven where no Oegar, Nimir or dragon can reach. All she must do is leave behind the non-Hlacaasteians and come with the Feir Dhan in the dead of night. Lliela sees no reason to trust the Feir Dhan until the representative says that they have far more in common than Lliela had known, for the Feir Dhan serve the demons beyond the Chain of Ydgys, and the people Lliela led on the second flight of colony ships have been irrevocably infected by those demons. The Feir Dhan promises Lliela and her people sanctuary from their enemies, and also the power to take revenge in future times. Realizing that her people will die along with the Tantaelastarr elves if she does not take this deal, Lliela agrees, and under cover of darkness she and her Hlacaasteians follow the Feir Dhan to the secret caves that lead to tunnels beneath the inner sea. After the long trek, the Hlacaasteians ascend to the sunlit lands again, on the White Isle in the center of the Atharine sea. As for the allies they leave behind, each and every one of the abandoned and betrayed Tantaelastarran elves is slain upon the beach in the few days thereafter. The Syllastrian rescue strike still tries to reach the now-greatly-reduced fighting force, but as Prince Tirindain and his last soldiers fall, the mass of Oegar, Nimir and skinchangers turn upon the Syllastrian rescuers and overwhelm them as well. Not many make it back to the safety of their dense forest. The war between the elves and the Oegar--and the other native creatures of Halci--is over. The bloodied land and shore where the Eastern Prince and his people fell is given the name Ha'an il Nincychaithe, Murder's Ground.
888 ___ Despite their staunch resistance and many attempts to return to the eastlands, the elven forces under Hunter-Prince Darganel are forced from the Terian foothill-caves in which they had sheltered for the winter and driven at last into the thick woodlands of the Border Forest. Here, they cluster together as best they can while the wolf-shifters in the area skulk around and attempt to pick off any elves that stray. Setting up a close-packed camp in a clearing in the woods, the elves--only a few hundred strong now--brace themselves for the slow eradication of their people. A messenger comes to them, however, in the form of a dark-furred wolfman who growls that they will be allowed to live if they turn over their leader and his fearsome blade to the justice of the skinchangers. Though his people object furiously, Darganel accepts this bargain and follows the wolf-shifter into the darkness alone. The huddled elves find themselves watched from all sides by wolfpacks but no longer attacked, and for a month they go about the business of survival as best as they can, nevertheless despairing. At the end of this time, though, the Hunter-Prince Darganel returns, changed: one eye has turned from blue to green, and much of his skin is now covered by green mosslike patterns. He also brings with him a silver-haired, elfin man who simply declares himself Cyclone, and tells his people that they are joining the wolf-shifters' civilization. Somewhere between shocked, horrified and relieved, the elves obey their lord despite the changes that have come over him, and form the beginnings of the Wild Hunt. Syllastria takes in all the refugees it possibly can, raising more tree-towers to house them all, and fortifies frantically in fear of an attack against it. However, the combined Halion forces seem to fragment at this point; the dragons return to their lairs, the Oreads and Feir Dhan to their tunnels, the skinchangers to their dens. The Oegar do not seem to feel particularly threatened by a bunch of elves hiding in the forest, and with the death of Kirhuwa in the battle at the shoreline, the Oegar war machine falls apart into a scattering of scavenger-tribes across the landscape from fallen Hlacaasteia to the green plainsland where the Oegar first entered the northern continent. Still decently strong in numbers, the Oegar begin to settle themselves by rivers and lakes as is their way and build towns and cities from the fallen fragments of the elf-kingdom. Many of the skinchangers in humanoid form join them for protection. In the winter, the besiegers of Anlirindallora vanish. Communication resumes between Anlirindallora and Syllastria, as do relief efforts, but the population of the crystal city has been devastated by the starvation-siege. It will take a long time to recover. Syllastria cloaks itself in protective, magical mist, and teaches Anlirindallora to do the same. The forces under command of Aelfwain, trapped in the northlands by the return of the northern skinchangers to their old hunting grounds, take cover in the shelter of the forests and ice-crafted caves of what would later be known as the Volske-Jek range and simply try to survive. They call themselves Luuihene, the Snow Folk.
The Age of Legends890 ___ Elven Recorded Time: The bulk of the Oegar forces east of the ruins of Tantaelastarr begins construction of its first great city from the ruins of Hlacaasteia, claiming it to be the capital of their new empire: Ghesh-Ruen. Years of city-building, agriculture, tribal warfare and changing regimes ensue. The population of skinchangers remaining with them slowly multiplies, drawn from all tribes. As intermarriage occurs, these skinchangers find that they can no longer assume their ancestral shapes. Over only a handful of generations, they Forget having been skinchangers at all and come to be called humans. Humanity spreads like a disease through the skinchanger populations that come in contact with Ghesh-Ruen. Within three centuries, humans have multiplied far beyond the Oegar population of Ghesh-Ruen, but are still treated like servants at best, slaves at worst. Humans find themselves cooking, cleaning, performing other housework, and also pressed into service in the fields and orchards, the clay pits and kilns and mines and forges--basically anywhere they can be substituted so that the Oegar can participate in the national pasttimes of wrestling, arena combat, raiding neighbors, eating and napping.
1128 ___ A lightly-guarded human settlement on the shore of the Atharine Sea is discovered by the elves of the White Isle in one of their furtive scouting missions. These elves--now called the Bian Siddhe--magically imprison the humans and bring them back to the White Isle to be studied and then bred and altered to serve as antimagic troops for future assaults against the Oegar.
1141 ___ Brigydde, a human slave woman blinded by the abuse of her Oegar master, becomes a central organizer of the human resistance against the Oegar in the western fringes of Ghesh-Ruen.
1145 ___ By attempting to stop an Oegar from ravishing a servant-girl, Brigydde is condemned to death by the local magistrate and thrown into the arena. The local human slaves are rounded up to watch her execution, and as the Oegar warrior advances upon her, she simply sits in the middle of the field with a peaceful expression on her face. The Oegar raises his massive axe and swings it down upon the unresisting woman, and as the weapon slices through her and ends her life, her flesh turns to light: an ascending spiral of blinding radiance, warm and comforting to the assembled humans but hot and fierce to the Oegar. The executioner's skin catches on fire for a moment, and though the flames fade quickly, he has already been blinded. All that remains of Brigydde on the field is her clothing; the axe is unbloodied. The assembled humans are dispersed by the unnerved Oegar, and return to their work, but start spreading the word quietly. Soon the whispers of Brigydde's ascension reach even the eastern heart of Ghesh-Ruen. These rumors also borne by the blinded executioner who seems to have been struck mad by his act; he declares this a sign that they have captured spirits of light, not fleshly creatures, and that their doom will be at hand soon. After the initial furor has died down and subsequent slave executions occur normally, the Oegar begin to scoff at this and forget that the episode ever happened. Meanwhile, Brigydde's hand and voice still aid the growing human resistance, giving shelter to those trying to escape Oegar control and those plotting to bring it down. The more the rumors spread, the more people the fledgeling goddess touches, and the stronger both their belief and her power.
1157 ___ A mysterious figure approaches the humans working at a logging camp on the borders of the Forest of Mists. After being let into the Brigyddian sanctuary, the figure reveals itself to be an elf: the Syllastrian mage Rellistiir Vanael Hanlaicos. He speaks of his people's battles with the Oegar and their understanding of the humans' plight, and conveys the offer of Syllastria to teach the humans to use Arcane magic in order to fight the animal spirits and scornful beastmen that the Oegar can call to their aid. The offer is accepted, and Syllastrian mages begin to infiltrate the slave ranks--posing as slaves themselves--to spread their knowledge of non-Halion magic among the human population.
1183 ___ The first revolution occurs in the west, near the logging camp where the elves first contacted the humans and also fairly near where Brigydde fell. Led by a man named Jason of Aragon--once a friend of Brigydde, now an old but very tough man--the humans with their mages and elven allies launch an assault upon the local slavemasters, slaying the overseers in the fields and marching upon the Oegar lord's mansion. When the Oegar threaten to slay the women and children if the men do not surrender, the Brigyddian priestesses and trained mages among the 'captured' women turn upon the Oegar lord and his guards. The Oegar find it impossible to attack the human noncombattants and are bombarded by the mages and the furious menfolk. This first assault is highly successful, and the Brigyddians ensure that those Oegar that do not wish to fight are released to seek shelter in other Oegar lands. Tales of the victory are carried both by the escaped Oegar and by Brigydde herself, so that by the time news reaches the Oegar lords, the human worshippers have already heard it and put their plans in motion. Jason and his people march out shortly after emptying their conquered town of all Oegar, and are met on the road by the many farm-slaves that slipped their bonds upon hearing of the victory. Fewer come as the Oegar tighten their grip on the slaves still imprisoned, but many of those that stay behind do so purposefully in order to undermine or slay their masters while Jason's army picks up speed and numbers. More and more elves come out of the Forest of Mists to join the human ranks and lend their magics, and the human army sweeps north first through the river-lands of western Ghesh-Ruen, driving the Oegar from their cities at every stop and collecting more and more freed slaves as it goes on. The western Oegar are scattered into the plainsland and pushed north, the same way they had pushed the Aelfs years ago. Only when the human army turns toward the east do they see real battle, because from the capital of the Oegar empire comes the royal army: a stomping mass of powerful Oegar who loved nothing in life more than combat. They still drag along their human and elven slaves, however, and are dependant upon them to see to the luxuries of marching life; thus many find themselves poisoned by the camp food as their slaves escape into the woods, or find their armor sabotaged and made useless. Though many humans die for their acts of rebellion, the constant sabotage weakens the Oegar army and when their general commands that the slaves be sent back to the Oegar manors, the Oegar soldiers generally do so. Left to their own devices for the first time in a good six decades, the Oegar prove inept at camp preparation and lazy off of the battlefield, and so when not awake and marching and ready for battle are easy prey for elven and human snipers from the forest fringes. Without the strong leader or truly militant backbone that they had when they had smashed the elven kingdom, and without their many allies, the Oegar soon find their army split up into many embattled regiments and hammered with spells. Many companies break and flee randomly from the battlefields, and while some with good discipline manage to withdraw to fortified towns, their enemies have been everywhere, and the noncombattant humans have nevertheless been hard at work while their masters were away at war: Oegar towns have become festooned with traps and sniper-holes, secret human-sized entrances and exits, and conveniently-placed but extremely-poisoned crates and barrels of Oegar provisions. Though the Oegar shamans call upon the spirits to aid them, it is the opinion of many spirits that the strong warrior race they had once aided is on its decline. Even when the spirits are incensed enough by the presence of elves among the human ranks to fight, the elves have long been studying how to turn their spells against spirits and have taught the techniques to their human apprentices as well. While the battle to empty the cities of Oegar continues for years, the war is basically won in the first few seasons by the planning, preparation and quick communication between mage and priest sects.
1188 ___ The main bulk of the remaining Oegar flee north from the eastern heartland that once held their capital, taking refuge in the Garnet Mountains and the tundra lands beyond. The Aelfs 'welcome' them. On the human side, much burying of the dead and rebuilding of the trashed cities, reclearing of the fields and rejoicing at the victory occurs. The elves return to their forests to finally reclaim Tantaelastarr and begin rebuilding.
1202 ___ The Mist Folk elves of Syllastria, the rebuilt Tantaelastarr and Anlirindallora find out about the tests the Bian Siddhe are conducting on their slaves in the White Isles, due to word of kidnappings passed on by their human allies. They demand that the abductions and tests stop. The Bian Siddhe refuse, and a small group of Mist Folk decide to sabotage the experiments and free the slaves. Upon landing on the White Isle, however, these Mist Folk are captured or slain by the wards and guards of the isle; those who live are dragged off to be sacrificed or experimented-on as well. The situation quickly escalates as Mist Folk start shooting down the raiding parties of Bian Siddhe as they glide to the mainland, and Bian Siddhe start razing human villages and sinking ships that dare to sail the Atharine. Finally the Mist Folk and Bian Siddhe clash head-to-head when the Bian Siddhe land a force of their created-warriors, the Gyles, at the Ha'an il Nincychaithe with the intention of marching them through to take over some human towns. Syllastria's entire garrison mobilizes to stop them, and encounters not only Bian Siddhe and Gyles but also their Feir Dhan allies. Reinforcements from Tantaelastarr and Anlirindallora pour down from the forests to join in the fray, bringing down the Bian Siddhe from their circling raywings and capturing or destroying as many of the Gyles as they can. For the Feir Dhan, there is no capture, only death. The two forces fight viciously, almost heedless of their own decimation, until the main Bian Siddhe controller of the Gyles is felled and the group of created-warriors he had controlled breaks away and heads for the hills. With the upper hand suddenly, the Mist Folk continue to shoot down the elven controllers, until almost the entirely of the created army is routing and heading for the Garnet Mountains. The remaining Bian Siddhe and Feir Dhan flee the battlefield, leaving a few remaining berserk Gyles to be slaughtered or captured. Though the Mist Folk find that most of the Gyles they catch are too mind-bent to be allowed to live, they do not chase the small army that fled into the hills; if they come to blows with the Oegar and werecreatures laired in the Garnets, the elves will not be bothered. Nursing their wounds, both shards of the elven race return to their home cities to consider what has just transpired. The land of the Ha'an grows dark with crows and vultures, and when the birds depart, the soil itself has turned red.
1232 ___ Elven Recorded Time: The Age of Legends ends with the founding of the first kingdom that will become Ruen Wyn.
The Age of Empires (Human-recorded time begins)0 ___ Anan, a small kingdom on the shore of the Atharine sea, is established by freed humans from the clusters of ex-slave towns along the shore and fertile river-laced interior. Anan at first encompasses only the shoreline communities, which had banded together to try to fight off the raids by the Bian Siddhe. Its leader, Garev Kalrah, begins organizing the scattered militias into a small army, and requests an alliance with the Mist Folk involving the training of archers. The elves, pleased to have more eyes turned toward their enemies on the Isle, comply.
15 ___ The rest of the towns around and just north of the Bloody Mountains agree to be a part of the federation of Anan, which now covers the farmland from the Forest of Mists, across the Bloody Mountains to the edge of the Garnets.
17 ___ In response to perceived annexation threat from the south, the small kingdom of Koron forms to encompass the land north of Anan and east of the High Hills that hold the fringes of the Forest of Night. With a stand of independance from elven aid, Koron rejects Anan's overtures to join it in a pact with the Mist Folk, instead citing the more pressing threat of the return of the Oegar from the north. Led by Seravi Gheranor, Koron fortifies its north and eastern borders, keeping Anan as an uneasy ally in the south.
38 ___ In response to skirmishes with cat-skinchangers in the western-central plainslands, Audric Karnothian calls for an alliance among the slave-towns of his area and begins the construction of a fortress that would in time gain a town and then a city around it, by the name of Karnoth.
56 ___ The fledgeling city of Valtan joins Karnoth in an alliance, followed by many of the smaller cities and towns in the area, to take advantage of Karnoth's military patrols. Lord Audric, as he is already calling himself, requests soldiers to train from the other cities.
59 ___ The Silent Circle is officially established by the apprentices--and a few senior members--of the first human mages, as a means to keep in contact with each other and communicate their research into elven magics and the ruins left behind. This small organization covers the entirety of human lands, from Anan and Koron to Audric's fledgeling kingdom, with the western mages researching more deeply of elven magic and the eastern studying the ruins scattered about their lands, from Oread and Oegar to Hlacaasteia itself. The fallen city of Lliela, like the Bian Siddhe hemselves, proves to be a bit too much for the human researchers, and they call Hlacaasteia off-limits and mark its perimeter with wards, and turn to study the spirit-magics instead.
83 ___ With the Karnothian army swelling along with the prosperty and population of its protectorate, land is cleared westward for settling by the people overflowing Karnoth's walls. More small cities join with Karnoth to establish trade routes and protection from the lingering Oegar threat, and the Karnothian army begins to push north as well, to rid the comfortable plainsland of the ogrish raiders.
87 ___ The humans of the High Hills, already loosely joined town-to-town and trading with both the Night and Mist forests, form the Sesen bandit-kingdom in order to take advantage of the slowly developing trickle of trade to move across the Hills. Under Kharavox Onriskar, the Sesenites begin a long history of smuggling and robbery as they take advantage of anyone trying to cross between the two thick forests.
115 ___ Koron advances its borders northward, and sends out the army it and Anan gathered in order to push the eastern Oegar further north. In doing so, the army treks through the metal-rich western foothills of the Garnet Mountains, and ends up leaving settlements all over them, made up of ex-camp followers and deserters. Koron declares these settlements a part of itself, claiming the land along the Garnet border to the deeply-furrowed valleys northeast of the High Hills.
136 ___ During the strife of Koron succession, the Garnet Mountain miners opt to secede from Koron. Having already fortified their towns against skinchangers--or in some cases, let the skinchangers in and begun to have relations with them--they feel they have little to fear from the squabbling Koronites, and they are right. When the succession battles die down, there are only a few skirmishes, and this area becomes Tavin.
151 ___ The Karnothian family line loses the throne to the Talcastaean family when, inspired by the Koronite succession, this family turns its segment of the joined armies on the king and stages a bloody coup. King Varion Talcastae declares the kingdom renamed to Altaera, after his wife.
213 ___ The human towns northwest of Koron, in the deep glacier-dug valleys and wrinkled hills along the spine of the Fores tof Night, declare themselves the Nurin kingdom. Consisting mostly of ogre-blooded humans driven out from the southern lands, as well as many skinchangers drawn to human life, they fight Koron's incursions off for many years--even when Koron tries to whip up Tavin and Anan to join it in its 'crusade against the halfbreeds'--and are finally acknowledged.
225 ___ Anan explorers make their way beyond their borders and the rugged swampland east of the Atharine sea to find that a few human groups had gone south, rather than north, upon landing and were brought into the land of the lizardmen and river dragons. Rather than be slaves, it seems that the humans had become wives and husbands, and the Anans return to their cities to report to their king of the already-blossoming empire of Shangal. Attempts to sail the Atharine sea begin, as do the building of trade routes around it.
254 ___ A political schism in Altaera sees thousands of people exiled into the harsher, hotter southern grasslands. These refugees contend with the harassment of skinchanger clans and the discomfort of the hotter climate, coming to rest on the southern and western shores of the smaller inner sea they named the Danarine. From these small fishing and farming villages will slowly spread out the kingdom that will be called Meridia.
287 ___ The Koron kingdom mounts its first offensive against the quiet farmlands of Anan. Anan fights back. Watching from the outskirts of Koron, Sesen is soon to jump in to harry at the Koronite borders and claim what land and goods it can; likewise, Tavin and Nurin also take this chance to try to snatch up warmer, more fertile farmland so as not to be dependant on Koron's produce. The squabbling almost rips Koron apart, but after drawing up a truce with Anan and Tavin, they go on the offensive against the younger Nurin and the uncentralized Sesen. Chasing the bandits back into their forested hills, it also manages to capture several Nurinite cities and force the northwestern province to accept its nominal rule.
301 ___ Altaeran settlers are urged to move southeast into the warm, dry lands near Varaku on the discovery by its explorers of certain spices and exotic plant life--such as marokarashi.
364 ___ As the population of Altaera's southeastern province grows, it becomes more independant as it discovers more and more in the way of spices, scents, dyes, animals, minerals and foodstuffs that the north finds exotic. Oroth Sunvaranar, a merchant-lord heavily entangled with the Altaeran imperial soldiers in the area, bribes and sweet-talks a great number onto the side of full independance and great riches. Sunvaranar's revolution overthrows the Imperial governor, and the merchant-lord issues a statement to the Empire that the people of his city will no longer ferry their goods back to the cold lands for no gain. Several southern cities follow suit and, so far away from the southern lands, the Altaeran king has to accept this for now. Sunvaranar applies the name of his conquered city, Yezad, to encompass all of the cities brought under his banner, and Yezadra is formed.
447 ___ After millenia of a kind of racial depression, the Murians--once the Teria--open their doors once more, to find the world phenomenally changed. In the Teriathi Mountains--known to humans as the Thundercloaks--the Murians encounter towns and villages of human farmers and miners trying to make their livings in the rich alpine valleys and mineral-rich peaks. Settlers from Altaera, these hardy mountain men and women already see themselves as vastly distanced from the soft lowland lifestyle, and hold the Murians immediately in a mixture of fear and awe. As a way to shake their dark racial memories away, the Murians decide to offer to teach these mountain people the way of the blade and the Halion spirit, thus paving the way toward Ki Rin Dyr's fight for independance. Meanwhile, the Murians' spirit Brancir offers to join Brigydde and Briana in their exploits, and the Trifold is formed.
453 ___ Gwaryn Fox is born in Meridia.
476 ___ Yezadran surveyors and explorers, seeking further wonders in the southlands, stumble across tribes of jungle ogres, aggressive cat-shifters, dangerous lizardmen, and finally a civilization of strange, dark, slightly scaly humanoids that chase the Yezadrans off from their strange stone temples. Intrigued, the explorers return to Yezad to tell the king, who permits the use of aggressive exploration and dedicates the army to the cause. The first war with Aegythta is begun, as the Silent Circle mages of Yezadra test their might against the strange dragon-magic of the southlanders.
479 ___ Gwydren Greymar Fox is born in Meridia.
480 ___ One of Yezadra's forays into Aegythta causes the arcane destruction of a temple. Sifting through the ruins, the Yezadrans find shards of strange red crystal that they return to Yezad for study; the Circle mages determine that these crystals are in fact the crystallized blood of many beings. Due to frequent disappearances of settlers and explorers on the fringe lands in the past few decades, the Yezadran king decides that these stones are obviously made from kidnapped victims, likely ritually sacrificed, and declares the war of exploration to now be a war of righteousness and vengeance. The full might of the Yezadran army is turned upon Aegythta, with the intent of destroying its temples and the wicked magic they contain.
490 ___ Gwydren's parents are slain by an Altaeran mage-assassin planning to take on the persona of Gwydren's mother in order to get close to and slay other mages. Gwydren is offered a deal by Athalarr and accepts it, slaying the mage-assassin and thereafter facing the Lion's Price.
492 ___ Seeing Meridia's success in the southeast, and coveting its vineyards, citrus and olive groves and shoreline, Altaera begins to amass its armies to move on what it sees as its least-fortified neighbor before reaching to reconquer the Yezadran lands as well. Meridia, while it is indeed not particularly military--having made pacts with the local skinchangers through the romance between Athalarr and Brigydde--has had a strong collection of magi from the increasingly influential Silent Circle, as its land encompasses one of the strange elder monuments of the world: the Firine Stones, at the southernmost coast of the empire. While these magi consider their first loyalty to the Circle, their second is also to their adoptive country, and with their more fanatic Altaeran brethren set against them, they prepare to fight back.
495 ___ With their arcane magic, the Yezadran mages successfully fight off Aegythtan shamans and destroy more and more temple crystals. At the same time, it is noted by this year that much of the verdant land around the temples has strangely turned to desert in a short amount of time. This is blamed on the aggressive magic-use by the Yezadran Circle, but though they try to restrain themselves, the desert spots continue to appear and grow around the destroyed temples.
498 ___ Yezad calls off the war when its surveyors take stock of the creeping desert and determine that, for whatever reason, the sands have covered most of the cropland and destroyed most of the forest that was of interest to them and that the war is no longer worthwhile. Garrisons are posted around several of the northernmost temples to make sure that the Aegythtans do not attempt to reclaim them, but the dark people have already withdrawn away from the desert-creep to defend what few temples remain. Bit by bit, the garrisons are recalled, and Yezadran exploration turns east to learn more about the land south-southeast of the Atharine. The dragonblood empire of Aegythta is dead; the creeping desert will come to be called Aervach.
499 ___ The war between Altaera and Meridia escalates as Altaera sees Yezadra's attention turning distant again and wishes to win and move on to conquer further. Pressed furiously by the superior numbers of Altaeran mages, the Meridian magi delve into the deepest roots of magic they can find. One comes upon a strange incantation tucked into his spellbook--planted there, in fact, by a Feir Dhan spy. Upon deciphering it as a summoning to a great power of protection, the mage gathers his companions to cast the incantation, and unwittingly opens a portal that serves as a conduit for the demonlord Dys and his horrible army to bypass the Chain of Ydgys. The mages are captured just long enough to be forced to make the portal permanent, and then slain or devoured. Dys's army spills across the already-strained Meridia, destroying all in its path.
500 ___ The Meridian king, besieged by demonkind, sends out a message to Altaera asking for the cessation of hostilities--for aid, even, in fighting the scourge. Altaera refuses, though it is already drawing its troops back from the seething border. Demonkind spill over into the fringes of Altaera, and some in Yezadra, but most run rampant in the vast farmlands, vineyards and orchards of Meridia. Both Altaera and Yezadra begin to build magical bulwarks at their borders, while the Silent Circle basically ignores the pleas for aid from their Meridian members. Refugees from the ravaged lands are turned back at the neighboring empires' borders, with the claim that Altaera and Yezadra can not know that these people are not infected with demon magic. Some few manage to escape through the blockades, though not many. At the Pillar, the Silent Circle research tower stationed among the Firine Stones, an apprentice answers a knock on the door to find himself faced with an Oread, who demands the attention of the lead mage. The Oread imparts the secrets it has learned from ages of studying the Firine Stones, and what its people have learned of the other three monuments: that they can be used as conduits to change the very makeup of the world, specifically in this case to close the portal even though it is unapproachable. It tells of magical methods, and that its kin at the other monuments know of this need; it also explains that no Halion native has the power or the skill to craft these necessary wards, that it must be Arcane magic or the work of the Ascendant goddess. The Pillar mage, only a reasearcher and by no means an archmage--communicates this to his Meridian colleagues and through them to the rest of the Circle. Despite the Circle's initial refusal to aid, they are slowly convinced that to take no action will only see to the slow death of the world, and call out to their Mist Folk teachers for assistance in crafting this ward. Elves and humans once again bend their heads together in study, while the most powerful of the Circle and the elven magical Orders are selected to be the bearers of the wardmagic.
501 ___ Year of the Sealing: With Meridian humanity holed up in fortified castles and slowly being starved to death, and the bulwarks of Yezadra and Altaera straining at their seams, the world-seals are finally readied. In midsummer, parties of mages, priests and soldiers are sent out toward the Hag's Needles, Varaku and Du'i-Oensha from the Silent Circle base in Altaera. A party also attempts to teleport into Meridia, to the Pillar, but Infernalists among the demon horde seem to have prepared for this and shatter the travelling-magic remotely. In fact, there are Infernal spies infesting the Silent Circle at this point; the expedition toward the Hag's Needles is slaughtered from within as the archmage sent to cast the ward turns on his companions. A second party is sent toward the Hag's Needles, this time with the assistance of Gwydren Greymar Fox, who now serves both Athalarr and Brigydde. This party arrives successfully, but the next attempt to send a party to the Firine Stones also proves disastrous. At this point, two figures step forward: Jeronek Kintravard, a human soldier from the Yezadran bulwark; and Anas Kuthrallan called Kuthra, a halfbreed Bian Siddhe and self-taught sorcerer from the southern shores of the Atharine in Yezadra. These two, possessed by the Guardian and the Ravager respectively, volunteer to walk into Meridia if Kuthra was taught the seal. Seeing no other options, the Silent Circle accept and taught Kuthra what they could. The two begin their trek into the demon-controlled lands while the other parties fight off cultists and Feir Dhan in order to keep their positions at the monuments. The demons recoil from the possessed pair, and when they attempt to fight the two they are at a disadvantage even en masse from the very auras that the pair emit. They march their way to the Pillar, with occasional stops at the surviving human garrisons, and mount the tower only to be ambushed by the mages of the Pillar themselves as they try to begin the ritual. The Infernal mages--half of the tower at this point--slaughter their surprised fellows and attempt to slay the Guardian and Ravager, but the two manage to fight their way free and flee for their lives. Harried by demons, they trek toward the closest bastion of human power left, and manage to convince the lord and his mages that a strike for the Pillar must occur in order for anyone on Halcye to survive the demon onslaught. The lord, his garrison and his magi join up with the Guardian and Ravager, and together they fight back to the Pillar. Racing ahead of the main bulk of demons swarming after them, the heroes charge into the tower and slay the Infernalists, barricade themselves inside and climb to the top of the tower. Kuthra sends out the message that they reached their destination; though garbled by Infernal interference, the Circle mages understand the meaning. At all four monuments, the ritual begins; beams of light arc toward the sky, drawing a lacework of magic behind the clouds. As the seals burn into the atmosphere, the sky glows brightly, the energy coalescing into a lance of radiance above the dark portal. Lashing down, the collected power pierces the portal and burns out all the corruption it had sunk into the land, but with the same blast it shatters the continent. The land around the portal buckles down and is forced away from the point of energy-impact; cracks rip through the continental plate, and its edges are slammed violently into those of its neighbors, forcing the Terian mountains skyward and thrusting the Rift into being. Its structure broken, the pieces of the continent rebound from where they had been forced. The rending of the land, and the abrupt shove of all the continents, start tidal waves from all shores. Water pours into the chasm formed between Anan and Shangal, turning the Atharine Sea into a bay. Meridia breaks off from the mainland at the twin bulwarks: the north edge of the Danarine Sea--ripping away the landscape to create massive cliffs--and the eastern border with Yezadra, those magical constructions serving to buffer their lands even as the energy-waves and earthquakes slay the warding mages and those around them. The glaciers in the north fracture and shatter or are shoved into the northlands, pushing up great hills of debris; avalanches and landslides rain down from the mountains, and volcanos roar to life. Within minutes of the shockwave and the shattering of Meridia, the tidal waves hit, obliterating coastal--and somewhat inland--towns and cities unprotected by mountains. Even those on the Atharine find themselves savaged by waves, though less so. When the waves subside, Meridia no longer exists: it has been completely submerged, with its only remnants a few islands where the mountains of the Firine Stones once were. Debris washes up on the new-made shorelines for years afterward. Shangal also suffers a devastating blow: its many rivers are ripped wider in the cataclysm and overflow, flooding the land under a thin film of water and silt. While some of the flood-waters recede, much of Shangal's fertile land never rises more than a few inches above the water level. Every empire and kingdom in the known world ceases its hostilities against its neighbors or its internal struggles in order to recover and repair. Unfortunately, it does not take long before fighting begins anew.
502 ___ The combined eastern kingdoms offer aid to the shattered Sesenite people in exchange for fealty. The Sesenites accept and become the Sesen province of the new-born empire of Ruen Wyn.
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1307 ___ Erandrus Enkhaelen is born to Kiara Alansrodellyn and her fire-spirit lover. This begins the rather tempestuous Enkhaelen ("of the fire") line.
1393 ___ Gheveron Enkhaelen and his brother Daarin are born to Erandrus' mistress.
1394 ___ Erandrus Enkhaelen disappears after inciting a civil war in the empire of Ruenwyn that nearly tears it apart. The Bear King takes the throne from his senile and manipulated father, the Owl King.
1410 ___ Ranir Kor is born in poverty, in the slums surrounding Ruenwyn's capital city.
1418 ___ Myriam Enkhaelen is born to Daarin Enkhaelen and his wife.
1429 ___ Syvestria Kor is born.
1435 ___ Shaidax en'Myriam, who would grow to be the Archmage Enkhaelen, is born to Myriam Enkhaelen in a small town on the border between Altaera and Ruenwyn. Irinia is discovered by the adventurer Ranir Kor and the Altruen Exploration Company.
1440 ___ The Ravager jumps into young Shaidax, but does not manage to take him over completely and soon finds itself trapped.
1442 ___ Shaidax's mother dies; he is adopted by his uncle and renamed Shaidaxi Ranir't Enkhaelen.
1451 ___ The Altaeran Emperor Calcarrus the Fifth dies, leaving the empire in the hands of his aggressive son, Venoreth the First.
1453 ___ Altaera and Ruenwyn go to war after a millenium of small skirmishes. Enkhaelen and the Company of the Black Banner rip their way through the Altaeran ranks, gaining infamy in a very short time.
1459 ___ The Company of the Black Banner vanishes without a trace, along with its leader. Copycat-Enkhaelens begin cropping up.
1462 ___ At the Battle of Broken Crowns, the war ends. Ruenwyn's capital is razed, its ruling family executed. The genocide of the Ruenic people begins.
1463 ___ Enkhaelen resurfaces as a terrorist, striking at the Altaeran military and aiding the resistance efforts. The Yearfrost Revolution topples the Emperor off his throne, and the reins of the Empire are taken by the Archmage Randal G'Kar.
1464 ___ Spring: Lagurnath Barony splits from the Empire, along with several other rebel baronies. Summer: Civil wars wrack Altaera. Autumn: The last of Altaera's fortresses falls, and the capital city is sieged. Randal G'Kar escapes. The Silent Circle closes its doors. Enkhaelen vanishes back into obscurity.
1470 ___ Mariss Ysara Enkhaelen is born to Shadix and his wife Jessamyn.
1476 ___ The Kingdom of Jernizan is founded in the ruins of the Empire of Altaera, under General Arastos Sa-Jernisan.
1478 ___ Jessamyn Starwater-Enkhaelen is killed in an ambush meant for Shadix. Shadix vanishes.
1485 ___ The Age of Empires ends as the last of the seals keeping the demons out of the world is released. The demons infiltrate.
The Age of KingdomsKingdoms begin to develop, as do fledgeling empires. The kingdoms of Amandon, Hjaltar, Ciri'theen, Baedor, Gylia, Cwynaith, Jernizan and Gejara grow, as well as the Baronies.
1 ___ The seed of the Demon Palace is planted in what will be the Dacian forest. Cults of Dys begin to migrate toward it, kidnapping unfortunate victims to feed to it as they go.
7 ___ King Arastos of Jernizan dies of illness, leaving no heirs. Magus-Advisor Karnathian Valamontis claims the throne and re-founds the Silent Circle within Jernizan. This begins the reign of the Mage-Kings of Jernizan.
85 ___ The baron of Kerori in Dacia, whose territory sits on the border of the Dacian forest, sends soldiers to investigate claims of monsters in the forest. The soldiers return to report nothing wrong. Relatives of these soldiers find them to be odd and distant from this point on, and over the next few years they all go insane or waste away and die.
97 ___ A Dacian noble's child, Kaim Elorinan is reported missing from an excursion to the forest. Soldiers and the noble ride out to investigate and return with the child, who was simply 'lost'. That child and all the searchers are also considered changed. Many of the soldiers waste away from a strange disease, and the noble lord becomes paler and weaker, but the child grows rapidly and has an intense, remarkable light in his eyes. The forest is named 'Witherwood' and considered off-limits.
102 ___ The baron of Kerori dies under mysterious circumstances, as do many of his immediate family. Sir Elorinan claims that the baron's family has offended the spirits and contracted the curse of the woods. He bids for the baronship and is granted it by the king of Dacia. He and his family move into the baronial seat.
105 ___ Sir Elorinan dies from an accidental fall within the baronial fortress. His son, Kaim Elorinan, takes on the mantle of baron.
108 ___ The barony of Kerori closes its borders to outsiders, claiming an outbreak of the plague.
110 ___ The barony of Kerori reopens its borders. Travelling merchants and visiting relatives find its populace very polite and very friendly, but with little memory of past relations. Those visitors who stay long return to their homes with similar demeanors.
126 ___ Baron Elorinan of Kerori visits Dacia City to present his daughter to the royal court. The king of Dacia is so taken with Alianna Elorinan that he asks for her hand in marriage within the week, much to the chagrin of his current wife. The current queen is exiled, and Queen Alianna is crowned within a month.
129 ___ Frequent disappearances of travellers and merchants near the barony of Kerori prompt an inquest by the neighboring barony of Ghenran. The soldiers and officials sent to conduct the inquest return with bland reports of animal attacks and a gift for their baron from the Baron Elorinan: a strange egg-shaped knot of roots that Baron Elorinan says a seed for an elven tower-tree. The dubious Ghenrani baron is intrigued, and plants it.
130 ___ The countryside of the Ghenran barony is noted to be plentiful with mushrooms in all seasons. Foragers gather them regularly for Ghenrani tables. In the Ghenrani baronial seat, the knot of roots has indeed sprouted, and from it grows a slender white pillar. Strange for a tree, but it is elven magic after all... In other news, Queen Alianna dies in childbirth, but gave the king of Dacia a daughter: Princess Mika.
133 ___ The barony of Ghenran closes its gates to outsiders, citing an attack of the plague.
135 ___ The barony of Ghenran reopens trade with the outside world, and exports a great deal of tasty mushrooms.
138-150 ___ Over this span of years, the outlaying baronies of Dacia one by one close their borders and reopen them, all citing containment of the plague. Dacians become known as people of short memories. The mushroom harvests become more and more bountiful, but they can not be shipped far before they rapidly decay. The Princess Mika is wooed by suitors from other kingdoms, but spurns them all, much to her father's chagrin.
151 ___ A young noble, ostensibly from Kerori, journeys to Dacia City to woo the Princess. The Princess seems charmed by the young man. Soon a royal wedding is pronounced between the princess and Sir Aradys of Kerori.
152 ___ Dacia City closes its gates in the spring due to an outbreak of the plague. The pollen season is exceptionally heavy, and mushrooms are everywhere. Many die, coughing and foaming at the mouth. When the city reopens its gates in the winter, it is revealed that the king succumbed to the plague, and that Dacia is now ruled by King Aradys.
153-195 ___ Dacia becomes increasingly withdrawn from its neighboring kingdoms. It cuts off trade entirely for a span of several years, and whole border villages pick up and move deeper into the country with no explanation. Envoys sent to Dacia City are rebuffed by armed guards. Mages that teleport into the city never return.
196 ___ Dacia ends its isolationist policies abruptly by sending an envoy to neighboring Trivestes. While Trivestes rebuffs the overtures, as Dacia did not help it in its struggle against Riddian, the envoy is never seen leaving the Trivestean palace.
198 ___ The Silent Circle withdraws its members from the capital of Trivestes after a series of murders of mages. The inquisitors it sends to discover the culprit are found dead as well.
199 ___ Silent Circle mages are withdrawn from the entirety of Trivestes after more mysterious deaths throughout the countryside. While the Silent Circle members in Dacia were all said to have died of the plague, the deaths in Trivestes are all violent; still, the Silent Circle becomes suspicious of both kingdoms.
201 ___ Secret investigations into Dacia and Trivestes by Silent Circle mages all end in violent death. The deaths in both cases are blamed on shamanic extremists.
203-208 ___ Murders of mages in Riddian, Wyndon and Amandon are blamed on shamanic extremists. The Silent Circle turns its attention to rooting out what it calls 'spiritist blood-cults'. More mages die in the investigations, but many shaman sects are destroyed by Circle inquisition squads.
212 ___ The king of Trivestes takes a new queen. Towns on the Trivestean border cut off trade, citing plague.
213 ___ Towns on the Riddish border cut off trade, citing plague. The plagued Trivestean towns reopen.
215 ___ Towns on the Darronwayn border cut off trade, citing plague. The plagued Riddish towns reopen. The Riddish Queen adds another consort to her harem.
216 ___ The plagued Darronwayn towns reopen. Towns in northern and north-western Darronwy report attacks by feral, furless grey dogs that leave many people dead and maimed.
217-221 ___ The attacks on Darronwayn towns increase slowly in ferocity and frequency. They seem to appear around shamanic enclaves, and assault magic-users before anyone else. Darronwayn citizens flee into southern and south-eastern towns, away from the mountains and the Forest of Night. More Darronwayn towns close their borders, these reporting fear of the marauding beasts. Soldiers from the capital that go to hunt the beasts are found ripped to shreds or simply vanish.
222-225 ___ A company of Dacian knights fights off a dog-creature incursion on a Darronwayn town, and slaughters the shamans that supposedly called them into being. The knights are immediately drafted into hunting down more of the dog-beasts. The beasts--and shamans--are hunted down one by one until no more attacks occur.
226 ___ Darronwy's governing council accepts two of the Dacian knights into their number.
228 ___ Lights in the sky over southern Gejara cause people in Darronwy, Dacia and Riddian to arm up in preparation for an assault, but the lights fade after several weeks and no explanation is given.
235 ___ The rough towns on the edges of the Garnet Mountain Territory become hostile to all kingdom envoys and traders that had previously been accepted within their fringes. Trivestes declares war, and skirmishes between the soldiers and the mountain men begin.
238 ___ The king of Amandon rejects overtures from the king of Dacia about combining their royal lines. The Dacian envoys are found murdered near the Amandic palace, but the Amandic king denies knowledge.
241 ___ The king of Dacia officially declares himself Emperor of the East. Riddian, Trivestes, Darronwy and the tiny kingdom of Kareth pledge their fealty immediately. The Emperor demands that Amandon and Baedor yield. The king of Amandon scoffs and starts to arm his populace for war, with the assistance of Baedor and the Forest of Mists. The new Empire makes no immediate move to fight.
246 ___ The subject kingdom of Trivestes ends its series of assaults on the Garnet Mountain Territory. Amandon braces for war. The Amandic king is murdered by his sons, who immediately sever ties to Baedor and the Mist Folk and pledge fealty to the Empire.
247___ A true arcane prodigy, Aldastus the White becomes the Mage-King of Jernizan at the young age of 28.
248 ___ The growing Empire turns its attention to Baedor. After a few skirmishes on the Baedor/Amandon border, the entirety of Baedor suddenly vanishes. Magic can not locate it, and any attempt to step across the border simply turns a person back the way they came.
249-271 ___ The Shamanic Purge takes place in the Imperial lands. Practicing shamans are imprisoned, tried and executed for their contact with spirits. Those who try to hide or escape are hunted down and slaughtered. The Trifold faith, already embattled in the east, goes underground as soon as the first arrests are announced. Strange unexplained deaths and unsolved murders are reported in more far-flung lands, of priests, paladins and shamans of various deities.
272 ___ Overtures from the Eternal Emperor to the Silent Circle are rebuffed. The Mage-King of Jernizan allows diplomats from the Eternal Empire to join the royal court.
273-279 ___ Imperial troops amass, and start a real war with the Garnet Mountain Territory. Pushing their way around Baedor's magical wards, they raze every township that they find in the territory, then send ships and build bridges across the Sky-Cut in order to invade Gylia and Cwynaith. These two large but sparsely-populated countries bow easily enough to the Empire, then start guerilla warfare as soon as the army's back is turned. The Empire claims fortresses and starts fortifying outposts, and also captures insurgents and civilians and ships them back to Dacia in long prison-caravans. Once they get to Dacia, no one knows what happens to them.
280 ___ With the eastern front secured, the Empire goes to war against the elven forces of the Forest of Mists and the Forest of Night. The Imperial troops are split into two armies: the Sapphire Shield, which assaults the Forest of Night and guards the Imperial Seat in Dacia City, and the Golden Hawk, which fights the Forest of Mists and continues to pick at the magics of Baedor.
282 ___ The first Ravener-attacks upon humans are reported in Jernizan.
285 ___ Promised the opportunity to take over and plunder the elven ruins in the east, as well as conquer the magical elven cities, the leader of the Silent Circle tentatively allies himself and his organization with the Emperor. The Emperor also promises previously-unknown elven magics from the mysterious White Isle.
292 ___ Ogres, aelfs and human shamans and their spirit companions assault the northern border of the Empire. They fight the Sapphire Shield in a long, bloody attempt to reach the Witherwood, but though they slay many of the defenders, they are turned back.
294 ___ A second assault by northern forces succeeds in breaking through to the Witherwood. However, the corrupted forest consumes its attackers, and many of them are sent back to their homelands with a strange gleam in their eyes.
295 ___ The young mage Morshoc Denrivett joins the Silent Circle's ranks.
296 ___ The Mage-King of Jernizan, Aldastus the White, is slain by a popular uprising aided by the Athalarr- and Trifold priesthoods. His Ravener creations are hunted, and the first Priest-King is raised in his place.
297 ___ Chased from Jernizan, the Silent Circle establishes a new base in the east base, creating a flying citadel called Darakus in Dacia, south of Dacia City.
298 ___ Wyndon yields to the rule of the Empire of Light, and the Golden Hawk army spreads throughout Wyndon in order to continue its assault on the Forest of Mists.
299-302 ___ Prompted by Wyndish urgings, the Golden Hawk turns its attention to decimating Corvia. Expeditions to find the Black Corvish strongholds fail repeatedly.
308-310 ___ The Sapphire Shield marches on Gherenoch. The small kingdom puts up a strong defense, but is overrun by the inhuman might of the Shield. Gherenoch yields to the Empire.
311 ___ Gejara peacefully yields to Imperial control.
313 ___ Kerrindryr yields peacefully to the Empire, and requests aid against Jernizan to the south. The Sapphire Shield refuses this request for the time being, but claims the Kerrindrixi foothills and starts building fortresses from which to assault the elven city of Anlirindallora.
314 ___ The siege of Anlirindallora begins.
318 ___ Anlirindallora falls.
320-321 ___ Initial skirmishes between the Sapphire Shield and the forces of Jernizan are interrupted by assaults on the northern border of the Empire by ogrish and elven shamans. The Sapphire Shield abandons its posts in Kerrindryr and Gejara in order to withdraw and crush the attempt on the Witherwood.
322 ___ An insane Circle Mage destroys himself and the Citadel at Darakus, and kills dozens of Circle mages and demons.
324 ___ A flight of sky dragons assaults the Witherwood and its defenders, destroying much of the dark forest before the arrival of Circle and White Isle mages forces the dragons to retreat.
329 ___ The Golden Hawk army stretches outward to claim the allegiance of Savinnor in Illane, then that of the kingdom of Averogne.
330 ___ The Golden Hawk claims Averogne's fortresses as its own and uses them as a staging point to assault the elven city of Tantaelastarr in the Forest of Night.
331 ___ The new Silent Circle headquarters at Valent is completed.
334 ___ Corvish guerillas and elves from the Forest of Mists attack Wyndon from two sides, forcing the Golden Hawk army to pull back and devote its attention to chasing the miscreants back into their forests and mountains.
344 ___ Supported by Trifolders and the Shadow Cult, a revolution in Amandon briefly frees the country from Imperial control with the slaying of all the demons in the capital of Silverton. The Sapphire Shield and the Golden Hawk both descend upon Silverton and nearly eradicate the city. The surviving Silverton revolutionaries are forced to hide in the Shadow Realm or flee to distant cities to escape the packs of ghoul hounds set loose on the streets.
349 ___ The newly-made dreamraker demons clash with the Dream God's minions and are frozen in a nightmare realm.
368 ___ Demon forces, with the aid of the Feir Dhan, take over six of the Undercities. Underdwellers commit mass suicide rather than be twisted into ghouls.
377 ___ A princess of Trivestes poisons her husband and her husband's friends with the help of her ladies-in-waiting. She is caught, and tried and sentenced to death along with her ladies, but the Emperor shows an interest in the case and has them all brought to the Palace for punishment. The princess is later declared the new Empress.
379 ___ The Empress gives birth to the Crown Prince, Kelturin Dysson.
382 ___ The barony of Kareth is laid to waste in entirety; no explanation is given.
393 ___ The third Imperial army is formed: The Crimson Fist. The Fist takes over the western side of the Rift from the Golden Hawk, using prisoners taken from Averogne, Illane and Wyndon as a slave-soldier base, as well as heavily recruiting. They immediately assault the Corvish along with Golden Hawk troops, and push the Corvish deep into the forests.
395-397 ___ The Crimson Fist lays siege to Tantaelastarr, then to the mountain cults of Kerrindryr. While Tantaelastarr falls, the army can not pursue the Kerrindrixi into the high mountains. Garrisons are formed in the low country of Kerrindryr, and more prisoners are absorbed into the army.
398-400 ___ The Crimson Fist goes to war with Jernizan on behalf of Kerrindryr. While the Crimson Fist manages to drive steadily in toward Jernizan's capital at the Tair, the Jernizen's hit-and-run tactics constantly sever the Fist's supply lines, forcing the Fist to double back and retreat to Imperial territory frequently.
401 ___Kerrindryr yields to the Crimson Fist and is occupied. The army begins assaulting and purging the high-country cults.
403 ___Command over the Fist is given to the young Crown Prince Kelturin. Kelturin and the Fist immediately turn west to attempt control over Jernizan.
404 ___ The Crimson Fist crushes Savinnor when that city-state attempts to resist the reassertion of Imperial control. The army absorbs many prisoners into its slave troop population, then moves north.
411 ___ After several years of failed assaults on Jernizan, the Crimson Fist starts the trek down the line of Illanic city-states, and is forced to crush Savinnor once again.
412 ___ Reaching the northernmost Padrastan city of Kanrodi, the Crimson Fist is stalled by the city's defense and forced to begin siege tactics.
413 ___ The true Second Demon War begins. The Demon Emperor is banished by a small band of heroes as the Guardian tries once more and succeeds. The Ravager is freed from its confines, and together the Ravager and the Guardian go about trying to rid the planet of the demon taint.
The Second Demon War lasts a good ten years before all the major pockets of demonic influence are destroyed. Solitary demons and small bands continue to roam the land, corrupting people or trying to open dimensional portals to recall Dys or just attempting to survive.
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