The First
Riftspawn War, remembered simply as the Great
Riftspawn War, erupted when the consequences of
The Corrupted Veil could no longer be contained. At the time, the
Isendir Empire dominated much of the continent above, while dwarven, drow, and duergar realms held sway below. It was on their soil—and in their halls—that the first true frontlines were drawn.
On the surface, the war raged primarily across what are now
Greymoor and eastern
Auralea. Under the direction of the Taintwright and its dragon-general Mor’Xandrel,
Riftspawn packs and warbands surged from corrupted zones. Fortresses fell and rose again as nests. Campaign after campaign was fought over ground seeded with unstable
Breachpoints and crude formations of Rift Stone.
Beneath the earth, the conflict was even more brutal. Subterranean nations faced their own private apocalypse in magma-lit halls and deep chasms. Several dwarven polities were annihilated or forced into emergency consolidation. Every drow city fell save Draezzyn’Kar. Among the duergar, only Korth’Rendak survived as a major power.
Over nearly two centuries, the war shifted through phases:
- Open, burning slaughter on plains and in caverns.
- Grinding trenchworks and tunnel-fortresses where reality itself frayed.
- Desperate guerilla warfare in forests and mountains shaped by Rift storms.
Midway through the war, a pivotal development altered its course: a mixed regiment of hardened veterans from multiple cultures abandoned prior allegiances, founded Fort Vigil in embattled
Greymoor, and began experimenting with binding controlled
Rift Corruption into mortal souls. From this grim work came the Rite of Tempering and, in time, the order now known as the
Rift Wardens.
The war culminated in two decisive acts: the slaying of Mor’Xandrel in a cataclysmic battle in
Greymoor, seeding the region with volatile Rift Stone fields, and the metaphysical assault that banished the Taintwright back into the Rift, severing its anchors. Deprived of Architect and dragon-general,
Riftspawn forces collapsed into scattered, if still dangerous, remnants.
The Great
Riftspawn War left behind shattered nations, scarred landscapes, and an enduring sense that the world had barely survived its first true brush with extinction. It also created a new kind of power: an autonomous, Rift-focused order that would shape every subsequent war.
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