This is the day the world changed for the third time in recorded history. On an unknown day during the 2,000th year of the 2nd Era, the people of the Mortal Plane.....vanished. What happened is unknown, if the people disappeared is unknown, if they died is unknown. All we know for certain, is that at some point all the caretakers of the buildings and cities no longer were there to upkeep these places. Civilization took a long time to reemerge again. Interestingly, after collating the histories of our greatest nations today, it seems as though the beginnings of the four great nations in our world began around the same time.....
The Empire of Iyanus conquers the nearby Orc tribes, conquering the disparate peoples with minimal losses. Many orcs were pressed into a form of debt-bondage with others retreating into the forests and hills. These slaves were the backbone of the Iyanusi war machine.
The elven city-state of Jathan along the western coast of Krevna was soon conquered in the 33rd year, and was quickly turned to a trade port and gateway to the southern lands. Many elves were also pressed into slavery but far less than the orcs before them and few felt the need to flee.
In the 35th year of the 3rd era, the golden dwarves of Kiphox were betrayed by their own kin and turned into little more than slaves by the Empire of Iyanus. It was only through the efforts of the great dwarf Daragon the Lawkeeper that the people were not thrown into true slavery like the orcs and elves had been.
To further add insult to the Betrayal of Kiphox, these noble dwarves were then exiled from their ancestral lands completely by Emperor Vrathar II Merwynn a decade after the Betrayal. All 10,000 of them now forced to wander the lands in search of a new home. It would not be until the 53rd year that the Clans gathered together to form a new city south of the Ulark Fissure under the banner of the Daragon Republic, named as such to honor the great Lawkeeper.
It was at this point that the Dwarven-controlled merchant military, which rivaled the diminished Iyanusi army now, was to show its might. During the final stage of Holward’s reign as Emperor in the 90th year of the 3rd era, the city of Jathan had been during civil unrest between elves and the reigning humans. Outnumbered by raging citizens, the emperor, against the advice of many generals, retreated his forces to regroup near Kiphox. Declaring that Daragon mercantile interests were threatened by the abandonment of the city, the armies of the Republic moved to seize the city of Jathan. Informed too late and with poor weather the armies of the Empire arrived to find the city taken and defended by both well-armed and professional mercenaries and angered citizens of all stripes. The empire had lost it trade capital to a stroke of the worst luck and many blamed the Emperor Holward for the cowardly retreat of military forces from an Empire city. Within Jathan, the Republic offered autonomy and representation for sovereignty to which the city seemed mostly resistant. Dwarven guards were sent to occupy the city and many elves, dwarves, and others lost property, lives, and peace of mind before the city firmly came under the sway of Daragon.
Emperor Holward died about a decade after the loss of Jathan to the dwarves. His tragedy inspired many plays and ballads which praised the man as being a man of good character but cursed to be in a position that he could never succeed within because of it. The illustrious bard, Kelvar Swanglaive, produced the now classic play “Saint and Sinner” which explored many of the personalities which drove the tragedy of the Empire’s greatest defeat and the struggles of its most controversial ruler. Regardless, the empire had suffered a massive blow to its economy, and it never recovered.
Emperor Zerris II, pious like his ancestor, decided to build a grand cathedral to Nirvorn in the Empire of Iyanus to garner the favor of the deity against their enemies. This was to be a misguided gesture as the god of rebirth was also a god forethought. For every push there was an equal pull and Zerris II did not demonstrate that he had planned for the consequences of his actions…
The Dwarves of Daragon issued a formal decree of a grudge war for their birthright: the Great Fortress of Kiphox. For the first time in the two nations history, dwarven and human arms met on the field of combat. So much blood was spilled that it was said the river Kwell turned ruddy all the way to the city of Jathan. At the end of it all though, the mercantile military of Daragon had won their pyrrhic victory and had claimed the fortress for themselves again. This great battle would be called the Siege of Kiphox in the year 163 of the 3rd era. In vengeance, they expelled all humans young and old from the fortress much as they had been so long ago. The dwarves immediately set about replacing the exiled with cheap labor from former slaves with orcish and elvish strains of smithing and metalworking competing for grandeur. The great foundries were rebuilt but those who knew many of the formulas were humans themselves.
A new academy of magic and dedicated temple to the deities of magic were constructed with the aid of new stone-cutting guilds from the northern ranges which harvested from quarries on the edge of the Ulark Fissure and the northern run of the Kwell. These quarry towns boosted trade significantly in Korgroff which later allowed stone brick houses to become common in the older and more civilized areas of the northern ranges. The Azdara Academy was founded outside the capital city of Iyanus along the river Kwell to double as a watchtower for the possibility of dwarven invasion. Furthermore, the stone quarries were used to build a grand wall around the city of Iyanus to offer increased protection for a much-withered empire from a foe they were quite sure they hadn’t seen the last of...
In the year 243, a messenger came from the temple of Nirvorn with a request for an audience with the High Quorum, the gathering of influential clans and families from across the empire which governed the Republic in the names of significant landholders, and with a stipulation that they had a message from the deity themself. Grave and uncertain the Grand Cleric of Nirvorn entered the hall and delivered the message. A cryptic incomplete musing: “Thus will come a time to pass…” Stricken by the ominous message the High Quorum debated for nearly a month before deciding they would attack Iyanus itself and end the reign of their hated foes. Armies marched and soon a siege was at the very gate of the capital of the empire but when the final conflict arrived, the walls of the city, blessed by priests of Nirvorn turned back the noble armies of Daragon. Marching home in shame and broken by the defeat, Daragon feared that they had disappointed their god and now were doomed by prophecy.
Their armies marching home in shame, broken by the defeat at the gates of Iyanus, Daragon feared that they had disappointed their god and now were doomed by prophecy. They now faced a crisis of leadership with the many families retreating to their Clan lands to gather their personal forces. Soon enough, in the year 247 of the 3rd era, this tension erupted into a grand civil conflict the world has yet to have seen before. Those who did not wish to be involved with the Dispute of the Clans, as the cold war was named, fled to the countryside as the cities were becoming more and more paranoid and militant. The Dispute of Clans continues to this day. Who knows when it will end with the long lives of dwarves.
