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Most universes are not like that of the one we live in for they are formed of void and occasionally æther. It is only a long series of flukes that allowed the universe to develop p life as we know it.

The Beginning
At first there was nowhere. There was no time and no space for there to be none of. And then the universe sprung into existence, a 2 dimensional space, the dimensions are now known as the 4th and 5th dimensions by mortals, which was impossible to quantify yet did have a bound, full of empty, dark grey void.

Then into this universe came, from above the 5th dimension, æther, a deep purple fluid that leisurely swam into the universe. However it rested and settled with it's lower levels solidifying and distilling until they became Gaia. The weight upon Gaia was, however, too much. So she allowed the æther to fall through her. But she strapped some æther above which formed a vapor and then Neptune. The æther that had been allowed to pass below Gaia, however, had become trapped against the edge of the universe and had become doomed to be used for the petty whims of mortal men.

Gaia and Neptune decided to make a demonstration of their new found power to create another set of dimensions and not wanting to be out done by the universe before they created three. But this drained their power and so they could not create dimentions which like the original ones were both endless and with an edge.

This also caused the elements that they were formed out of to become less and less mixed and to begin to clump together until one day a craggy edge of Gaia became made only out of the element Earth and a drop of Gaia that flew into the Neptune before it could be reabsorbed became only made out of water.

This, of course, caused an imbalance in those areas that split them permanently from Gaia thrusting consciousness upon them creating what are now known as the elementals named after the elements that Gaia and Neptune have always been made of. This displeased Gaia despite the fact that in her weakened state she could do nothing to stop it. Meanwhile, Neptune was having his own problems for from him came the other opposed pair : Fire and Air.

The start of The Great Elemental War
Gaia and Neptune soon realised that if the elementals continued to spaw in their existing rate soon they would be completly consumed. They considered the subject long and hard and decided the only full solution would be to bar æther from rising to the surface again. Originally Gaia's existance did this perfectly but with the creation of another three dimensions gaps had apeared. They resolved to seal the greatest of these gaps with four great gates.

They tried many different things to destroy the elementals but found that they merely made the elementals stronger and more united. Eventually faced by four nations of elementals Gaia and Neptune realized that they could not defeat the elemtentals and so submitted to their dominance for the time. They watched the elemnentals for 54 days looking for weaknesses. First they observed their biology. Then they moved to planing out how they would react to different things before they hit upon a conclusion.

The elementals were completly and radically different. And they hated each other. True they had never met but Gaia and Neptune decided to change all this.

The end of the elemental war
During this war the elements combined to create new elements and although their predecessors believed that the fight was necessary the new elementals where unconvinced. They formed a plan. They would refuse to fight on the break of day on the 100th year since the start of the great elemental war. And they did.

However one of the original elementals was developing a secret weapon which would single-handedly turn the rest of the war into a small battle against rebels that they could almost certainly win. They decided that despite the fact that their army of combined elementals had decided not to fight the weapon could bring about victory anyway. So they detonated it.

It is irelivant which group of original elementals talked about above as they all did the same thing. Each group of elementals have differing reasons that were proposed for and against using the weapon but they all made the same decision. All the weapons had different ways in which they worked but they all had the same effect.

Those weapons caused the end of the cities in which the elementals lived and displaced them from their homes.

A Brave New World
These weapons had other effects as well. The earth weapon as well as obliterating all water settlements within the Æthelron sea, also thrust Æthelron up above the waves. The water weapon along with eroding the majority of Earth's settlements caused the edges of The Middle Mountains to subside into the surrounding sea creating continents that were extremely habitable for life.

The new elementals decided that to get over the fighting they would create a lush, green, beautiful world inhabited by wonderful animals. Eventually from one of the animals evolved a creature that was, barely, conscious.

Meanwhile in an attempt to continue the great elemental war the elemental of earth and water decided to create their own races, those being the Duradin and the Alran respectively.

Yet these races did not fight either, and so came a time when they all prospered.

The Cataclysm
Earth, now betrayed twice, became incredibly vengeful and so created the ultimate plot to annoy the elementals of water and shame the new elementals.

They raised a land of the bed of the sea known as Atoland and populated it with the primitive humanoid that the new elements had made but filled their heads with ideas of slaughter and bloodshed which such a primitive race could not defend against and then equipped them with revolutionary technologies that allowed them to build great weapons, ships and monuments with which they sailed forth into the rest of the world.

There is little documentation of what they did, as the Atolandians did not keep records, and most of the records belonging to their opponents were destroyed. But from the evidence it appears that they sailed to the human nation of eJ and those of Minutia and, most significantly, Athelron.

Minutia
Minutia is by far the least documented case, and so we shall examine it first. By around 2,000 years ago a few city states had formed in the land we now call Ilia. The strongest of these city states, Thebs, was razed to the ground and almost immediately afterwards Attica and Midea began to strengthen their defenses. It seems likely that other kingdoms did so too.

However it became evident that this did them no good, as around 70 years later, Pylos was also razed. Documents indicating hasty preparations of defenses have been found in the ruins.

eJ
In eJ, documents were very well kept and so we know with detail about coastal raiders unknown to the residents of eJ coming from the northwest and raiding minor coastal settlements, but dispersing before eJ's army could arrive. As eJ lacked a navy, they could not pursue them at sea.

Athelron
Several fishing boats and two trade ships were sized by a mysterious force that then burnt the capital of Athelron, Alfheim.

The elementals of water struck back telling eJ how to construct a navy, which allowed them to inflict a great defeat upon the forces of Atoland, forcing them to return home to lick their wounds. However, the elementals of water had other ideas and returned Atoland to the depths of the sea.

The Attack on The Duradin
Water elementals attempted to flood Euphoria to get one over on the earth by killing the Duradin, but it was beyond even the water's power to submerge Euphoria. That would have been that if a water elemental hadn't noticed that the attack had created a weakness in the personality of the elves, who had lost their forgiving nature after witnessing their homes burnt to the ground, allowing the water to add to their above it all personality a feeling of superiority over other races and a desire to attack the water's enemies. This pointed them in the direction of the dwarves.

However on the way towards the dwarves a group of air elementals, wanting to keep the peace, brewed up a stormed that shattered boats and snapped masts. So much for keeping peace. Although the elves did eventually make it to land, most of them, with a few exceptions, did not want to press on.

But in stopping one attack, the elementals created another. Seeing air elementals attack forces about to attack the earth, fire turned the permanent irritation that was the orcs into a undefeatable fighting force that stormed into the central mountains and caused the semi-collapse of dwarven civilization.

The Rise of Man
Things rose to a peak for the dwarves, when the High King was kidnapped by the goblinoids. Fortunately for the dwarves, he was saved by the son of a cheif of a human tribe, who happened to be out with a group of men attempting to rid his future lands of orcs.

The dwarf king was very grateful and gifted to their leader, Aruseus, who held a weapon of great power and was determined to use it to unite humanity. He traveled from the north sea to the south rallying humanity to his cause and marched through the desert shattering seemingly endless goblinoid armies with his tactics and wisdom.

The Battle of the River Ind
Eventually, he and his exhausted forces came to a beautiful river (now known as the Ind). As they settled down to rest, they saw coming back through the desert a vast goblinoid army. He rallied his men for one more fight, and charged headlong into the oncoming goblinoids, coming straight out the other side. The victory was very close but after long hours of fighting, the soldiers of humans had won. The victory had been pyrrhic for Aruseus, however, as he had been stuck in the arm by an arrow. The best doctors spent days differing over whether to take it out of not before Aruseus pulled it out himself.

He lived, but was significantly weakened by his ordeal and had to be carried back to his home village, where despite the doctors insistence that he get early nights, lots of rest and drank a lot of water, he stayed up late plotting campaigns and drinking wine. He quickly got a sickness that slowly worsened over the week, and it became clear that he was going to die. His only living relative was his 3 year old cousin, and so his cavalry commander, Briskos, asked him to who he would leave his vast empire. Aruseus did his empire no favors with his next words for amongst groans of pain he managed to get out in a hoarse whisper, “To the strongest."

Divisions
Naturally, everyone thought they were the strongest. After much arguing, they eventually decided that it would be best to divide the empire between them and see whose nation became the strongest.

Briskos, leader of the cavalry, took the lands to the west and called them Leon.

Phatypus, The king's best friend and cook, took the lands to the south (then Minutia) and named them Ilia.

Ablerus, The leader of the infantry was tasked with looking after Aruseus's closest relation, His three year old nephew, Euphorion, and sent back to Aruseus home town, then Leris now Pleitsdorf.

The Sacking of Adwinglor
Aruseus's elite bodyguards, lead by Dreadalos, were unhappy with the passiveness of Ablerus and that they had not been given their own piece of land. So they went to join Briskos. They arrived in Adwinglor and went through the great gates and up to the palace of kings, where they requested an audience with Briskos.

Briskos demanded that they bow before him and grovel in the dirt, but Dreadalos refused and his forces followed suit. Briskos told them to go but they decided to sack the market place first, causing Briskos to release his elite cavalry, catching Dreadalos unaware.

Dreadalos and his forces fled Adwinglor and returned to the freshly dubbed Aruseus's land where they were greeted by border guards that refused to let them in. They fled north until they reached the northern extremity of Euphoria where they crossed The Devils Gap into Narlwage where they founded what has become known as The Tribes of Norwage.

The assassination of Euphorion
Briskos never wanted to bow before anyone again however if Euphorion was as stronger ruler as his farther then his ruling of Leon would be only a mater of time. It was with this knowledge that Briskos dispatched an assassin who found Euphorion and killed him.

The second conference at Orion
Shocked by the death of Euphorion the leaders of the human countries of the known world agreed to meet again at Orion. The only good thing to come out of the conference was a name for the continent, it was to be named after Euphorion. It was to be Euphoria.

The rest of the conference was spent arguing over the slight technicality of who was going to rule the thing. No one could agree on this and so they all went home dissatisfied. The nations on the continent of Euphoria were never united.

The Rise of The Dead
The outer edge of Achthal has always been a wild place with numerous forests and wild creatures. However it's isolation has lead to it's greatest problem, Necromancery.

Along with it's wilderness, The Borderlands (as they are known) have also been remarkable as a breeding ground for magic and it is where the humans first discovered Bending. People there have long known about channeling and experimented with it to bring the dead back to life. Although this merely left the bodies in the power of the channeler they were put to good use doing heavy labour for the living.

That was until the rise of Ichthor Mortimus. Ichthor was born to a group of magicians who had recently changed village. However the villagers in this village did not agree with the use of Necromancery forcing the wizards to take up new occupations. One day the village was raided by a group of bandits who killed all the villagers but Ichthor and his family from whom they wanted to know the secret of Necromancery.

Ichthor's mother and farther would not tell them but Ichthor Mortimus finally saw a place for himself in life.

He joined the bandits in the year 495 PA. Quickly he found out that the bandit leader was keeping his parents prisoner, so he killed him. He found his parents but squabbled with them and killed them too. And then he decided he would kill the rest of humanity to make everything even.

Year 496: The Folder of Flesh
This prompted a wave of rumours to erupt with people alleging to be the sole survivors (or less frequently part of a group of survivors) of vampire attacks. These people banded together sharing wisdom and ideas about fighting vampires and semi-formally founded the league of vampire hunters.

This group made slight progress at getting to the bottom of vampiric attacks for the best part of a month, then the Arusian Army arrived. They determined that the only clear and present danger was from militias without a royal charter to bear arms and as a move to tackle this they threw every vampire hunter they could find (along with quite a few people who were not vampire hunters) in the Bettenburg jail.

Their plight came to the attention of a monk by the name of Godefroy De Vereaux who went to see the Knights Templar in modern-day Ausfenz to request assistance. When they turned him down he travelled the length of Aruseus's land to meet with the leader of the merchant council who also turned down his request for aid but reassigned his forces northwards.

The monk disheartened returned. He spoke to his god (Quantrix) and asked for advice. Quantrix instructed him to free the hunters himself, which he does. Arusian forces quickly arrive in the area only to find them long gone. They turn to leave but stop when the mayor of Bettenburg comes running towards them.

The mayor informs them that the tax delivery from the local village of Andruvutych. The knights argued that this was an administrative matter for him to deal with but he argued that this might be part of some sort of secessionist uprising which the knights would have to deal with although he really wanted the knights to investigate because he was afraid it might be the first stage in a vampiric campaign. In the end the knights gave in and dispatched a small force to investigate while they rode south.

When the knights arrived home they were greeted with bad news: the gold mine in the west had been taken by Leonese forces. The knights were dispatched to destroy the Leonese forces but they proved too numerous and too fortified for them to defeat so they retreated back to the capital.

When they arrived more bad news greeted them. The scouting party have just returned from Andruvutych. When they had arrived they had thought the village deserted without any sign of attack: their was no one in the streets, nor any of the houses they searched; the gates hung forlornly open and the church was deserted. Then when they entered the governement building to collect the taxes and records they found part of the missing population: the flesh.

Bound in a leather case and branded with arcane scribbles and occasional hethan scribbles there it had stood in place of the official record book. The king, confronted with these peices of bad news sent a knight and two men at arms north to investigate this occurance while the Knights Templar were summond and would join with the Arusian Army which were returned to barracks in the meantime.

The Knights Templar did take some talking to convince them to abandon stations close to the north of their defensive area but in the end, it was pointed out to them that their charter compelled them to act. They rode back to the barracks and the force was together able to regain control of the gold mine but not before its reserves had been plundered. The Knights Templar forces were then placed in defensive stations around the mine while the Arusian army returned to base.

A banquit was held to celebrate the reclaiming of the mine but it was ruined when a man at arms came galloping through the gates to inform the king that the knight had been turned into a vampire. He alleges that they were riding along a road when they saw to people lying beaten up in the roadside. They told an incomprehesible tale of being beaten up by 'The things which are a man and yet are not.' They were assumed to be shocked and a bit mad after being attacked by some bandits and the other man at arms was dispatched to take them to the local village.

They rode ahead to find the bandits when it started to rain. The rain fell heavily and blocked out their vission while the sky above darkened. They found a woman lying beaten up by the side of the road who claimed to be the lady of a large part of the lands north of there. They stood guard around her and by the dying light they fancied they could see shadows which he was dispatched to investigate. He didn't find anything and set out back towards camp but when he arived he claims to have seen a dark ritual performed over the knight. He then fled south.

In 500 PA and every year after that for the next 3 years he killed a village and used their remains to create a book telling of his works. He brought terror to all of the villagers in the night forest and caused The Confederation of Achthal to start evacuating it's citizens from the night forest.

Then all went silent.

The fortifications that had been built throughout 503 and 504 PA at the passes through the mountains that surrounded Zuvinara began to become unmaintained and the garrisons stationed there under the Anti-Necromancery Accord were gradually pulled away to other areas.

However at the year of 510 PA the largest Necromancical army ever scene attacked The Betburgh Bridge. The garrison fought fiercely but found that they could not stop the vastly superior army belonging to Ichthor Mortimus and were forced to start a landslide leaving them stranded on the wrong side.