The Elves

“We were old when the world was young, and we shall be beautiful when it dies.”

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  The Elves are an ancient race of Acarus that, in the present day, is no more. Nobody knows what truly happened to them, though whispers abound—whispers that the Elves, in their cowardice, abandoned Acarus in its most dire time of need. Instead of standing beside the native races and fighting the tides of darkness, they fled the world.   Some don’t even believe the Elves ever existed, as it has been centuries since the last trace of their civilization.  

The Truth of Their Disappearance

  In truth, the Elves did flee—but not from monsters.   They fled from Humans.   The Elves had long vowed to prevent the return of magickal prowess to Mankind. The alliance between Humans and Elves had always been tenuous, stained by the devastation wrought during the Age of Myth, when the primordial wyzards of Man unleashed ruin in their unending hunger for power.   The long-lived Elves never forgot the true nature of Man—the desire to create monsters, to conquer, to destroy, and to covet endlessly. They feared that if Man ever regained the power they once wielded, Acarus would no longer be survivable.   Even the greatest Elvish arch-druids, in all their work to stabilize the forces of creation, could not undo the damage done when the comet passed in III-0. Seeing the inevitability of ruin, a treatise was made in the Elven capital—what is now whispered as The Fallen Republic. There, their ancient leader commanded the Great Exodus, a solemn pact to abandon Acarus and return to their ancestral plane: The Wildlands.   Within a century, the Elves vanished from the world entirely.  

Legacy and Ruin

  It has now been over five hundred years since the last Elven kingdom went silent. Their monolithic spires and crystal citadels were left to rot, overtaken by beasts and monsters throughout the Forgotten Wastes.   Adventurers in The Noose of Castillia whisper of the ultimate prize: The Fallen Republic, the mythic capital of Elven power. It is spoken of like El Dorado, a city of ancient relics, lost knowledge, and gold enough to make a god blush. Most dismiss it as fantasy. Others die chasing it.  

The Half-Elves

  The only living legacy of Elfkind now are their progeny: half-elves.   Though Elves do not breed as humans do, rare unions occurred between Elven maidens and human men. Their beauty—uncanny and unnatural—captivated many. These rare couplings bore fruit: a diluted, mixed bloodline. Some half-elves bear the long ears and ethereal features of their ancestors; others, more human.   These scattered descendants carry the last trace of Elven grace into a darkened world.  

Physiology and Temperament

  Full-blooded Elves were tall and lean, with pale skin and strikingly vibrant eyes, often in exotic hues like amethyst or gold—each color denoting ancient clan lineage.   Their personalities? Cold. Calculating. Melnibonean in their cruelty. They viewed themselves as superior—the divine spark of balance and reason made manifest. Other races, they used as tools.  

• Humans they tolerated—for a time. But they always resented their volatility and greed.

• Dwarves they dismissed entirely, believing them little more than automatons shaped from Acarus' clay.

• Beastkin, Goblins, and Others they abhorred as ruinous perversions, birthed by mankind’s folly.

  To the Elves, only they were fit to shape the world.  

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