The Progenitor

Journal Entry V: The Progenitor—Forged from Blood and Bone

Aien Ballen, Contract Archaeologist to the Dragon Imperium Year 5330 of the Third Cycle

Abstract

Before the first orc war bands clashed with elven hosts, a singular figure, known as the Progenitor, performed an act of self-destruction that birthed the Orcish line. Departing from all worship of Wombwood, the Progenitor bound fragments of their own bone and blood into a new brood. Though surviving proof is scant, two remarkable relics hint at this primal sacrifice and the intertwined destinies of elves and orcs.

Introduction

Ey’Feay chronicles describe the Progenitor as a visionary consumed by the conviction that true creation lay in flesh and fracture, not in sap and sun. They shattered their own bone, poured out their blood, and shaped unholy vessels from The Wombwood ovums. From these blood-soaked brood-pods emerged the first orc kin: beings of residual elven form, yet driven by an insatiable urge to mold and rend the world in their creator’s image.

Surviving Evidence

1. Sacrificial Bone-Urn: This hollowed femur is bound with sinew and sealed with coagulated resinous blood. Microscopic traces match known Ey’Feay hematic markers, confirming the Progenitor’s self-harming rite.
2. Gore-Forged Brood-Pod: This egg-shaped vessel is fused from bone shards, sinew fibers, and dried blood. Inscribed along its seam are jagged runes, proto-Alder Script glyphs warped to convey both agony and generative power.

Cultural Emanations

From fragmentary annals and orcish myths, we glean that the Progenitor’s act established three enduring legacies:

• Inheritance of Frenzy: The orcs’ famed battle-lust and near-mad creativity reflect echoes of the Progenitor’s final delirium.
• Forge-and-Ruin Ethos: Early Orcs seem to have needed to reshape the land, a philosophy born from the sacrificial destruction of their parent.
• Blood-Oath Lineage: Many early tribes mark pacts by spattering orcish crests with dyed blood, a ritual echo of the original brood-pod consecration.

These principles placed the new race at odds with elves, whose rituals of renewal and harmony now appeared antithetical to the orcs’ carnivorous nature.

Hypotheses and Speculations

Given the presence of proto-Alder Script runes on the brood-pod, I theorise that the Progenitor intended orcs as a didactic mirror to the Ey’Feay: life born not of sap but of hemorrhage, not of growth but of fragmentation. The scattered orcish tribes’ penchant for rapid architectural projects may trace directly to the Progenitor’s contempt for Wombwood’s arboreal dominion. Furthermore, sporadic proto-orcish chants invoking “the shattering bone” hint at a lingering reverence for their creator’s final agony.

Conclusion

Though the Progenitor’s grove has vanished and their name is whispered only in spiteful legends, the Sacrificial Bone-Urn and Gore-Forged Brood-Pod stand as witnesses to an unparalleled act of self-creation. As I continue to survey peat bogs and derelict sanctuaries, I remain convinced that each new fragmentary find will illuminate how the Progenitor’s self-destruction forged a people destined to both build and break the old world.