Ikkatha

"Climb forever and always, despite how far you may fall." - Ikkatha proverb

The Ikkatha were an orcish people that traditionally occupied the far northwestern reaches of the Makovai Mountains.

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Inhabiting the mountains since before the First Era, the Ikkatha possessed an extensive mythology that explained their creation as well as their position among others who occupied the mountains, particularly dwarvish peoples. During the first portion of the First Era, the Ikkatha were great in number and had built a complex civilization, rivaling their Sverden and Makovai neighbors. They engaged in extensive trade systems with the dwarves, hardly ever fighting with them. The Ikkatha built massive monuments among their lands, and even invented a special type of magic based on the position of stars in relation to the highest mountain peaks, called "Rok Malga". This type of magic was extremely powerful, and was said to be a gift of the creator-goddess herself, Orada.   Much of the civilization of Ikkatha ceased to exist during the Great Collapse, a cataclysmic event which took place around the year 4500. What was known for certain about the event was that the mountain of Ur, one of the highest peaks of the Makovai Mountains and a sacred landmark to the Ikkatha, collapsed in on itself, creating a massive explosion. This explosion covered the area in an enormous cloud of dust for nearly one hundred years, in an event known as "The Dark Fog". Nearly the entire Ikkatha people were enshrouded by this dust storm, save for a group of about a thousand individuals who were travelling around Beurum at the time in a government-sponsored attempt to showcase Ikkatha technology and culture. This group and their descendants would eventually become known as "the uncorrupted".   The Ikkatha lost in the mountain collapse were unheard of for nearly the entire duration of the Dark Fog. Rescue parties had been sent by the Makovai and the Sverden during this time, but only individual, traumatized survivors were ever picked up. Most concluded that the civilization had been lost, with the area too dangerous to even try to rebuild. However, when the dust finally began to clear after nearly a century, large numbers of Ikkatha emerged from the ruins.   These Ikkatha were different from their predecessors. Though the same individuals (or, descendants of those individuals), they were prone to shorter lifespans, anger, and, in some, reduced intelligence. They told their dwarvish neighbors that they had remained alive by making a deal with Orada, pledging to stay entombed within the rocks for a number of years in exchange for continued life.   Though they retained some aspects of their cultural identity, such as familial structures, governmental organization, beauty ideals, gender ideals, religion, mythology, and less advanced uses of Rok Malga, the Ikkatha, by the Fifth Era, were not able to rebuild to their former glory. The orcs split up into several tribes soon after the Dark Fog, and took up war instead of trade. The "uncorrupted" Ikkatha made several attempts to intervene and help their people return to their peaceful ways, but these attempts were unsuccessful. This group eventually became a separate ethnicity in their own right. Many Ikkatha grew to despise the "uncorrupted," thinking that they saw themselves as superior and viewing them as cowards for not facing the Dark Fog as they did.   The Ikkatha remained largely isolated from monumental events in Beurum such as the Akathon Crisis, and the Imperial War. By the Fourth Era, however, certain Ikkatha tribes had united and established cities such as Ye Jmra, which sat on the ruins of the collapsed mountain of Ur. In addition, some Ikkatha tribes participated in The Twenty-Year War, fighting on the side of the Makovai dwarves, who had continued to lend them aid since the lifting of the Dark Fog. Despite these advancements, the Ikkatha remained locked in wars, and even their most developed cities were prone to violence, corruption, and squalor.