The Age of Creation

Seolous , the King Above, was the first god to arrive on the world of Palboria. However, it was Mina and Tira , the Builder and the Reshaper, who gave it shape. Mina scraped the rocks together into hills and mountains, Tira came behind and broke ravines into them and crumbled rocks into deserts. Mina spilled waters into great oceans and Tira followed, splashing lakes and swamps onto the land and throwing bits of land into the oceans to become islands. Mina made the plants and Tira turned them into a multitude of trees and flowers.

Dentros , the Great Tree, admired the woods the twins had created and came to Palboria bearing the gift of forest life, filling the woodlands with beasts. Tira embraced the forest creatures and reshaped them into diverse and wonderous forms.

Other gods followed and brought other gifts. [Mythros] brought the sky and stars and Hellista placed the fiery sun in the sky. Yalyin brought the beasts together into families and Aftioch gave them pleasure so they would reproduce.

The Second Age

Soon, the riches of Palboria began to draw the attention of those who exploited such worlds. The Titans were Eternals, but their magics were not as powerful as the gods. They were consumers, devourers drawn to the mineral-rich mountains, fertile woodlands, and abundant waters of Palboria.

The Titans brought with them the Trud'Voy, dwarves, who were an Elder race subjugated to the Titans. The dwarves were natural diggers and under the tutilage of the Titans they had long ago become artisan stone workers and builders.

The Council of 12

Without leadership - for Seolous, the King Above, was quiet in all things - the gods soon began squabbling among themselves over rights and domains. Some of the weaker gods feared stronger ones would destroy their tethers and end their time on Palboria. [Chorus], the god of communication, convinced many of the gods to assemble an impartial jury from among their number with the authority to preside over disputes and arguments. Chorus then held private consultations with eleven of the gods he deemed fittest for rule and told them they had been appointed to this council by a secret vote. This deception went undiscovered until long after the Council of 12, comprised of Chorus and his hand-picked 11, was established.

One of the Council's first tasks was to decide on each god's realm, or area of control on Palboria. They called each god in turn and made them demonstrate their powers. The Council then assigned permanent realms to each of the gods based on their talents. With these assignments in place, the Council established a rule that none of the gods would interfere in another's decisions over their own realm, and any god guilty of this would risk losing their own realm. (This meant, of course, that, regardless of their assigned realm, all of the gods became a god of loopholes).

War With the Titans

The Titans were angered by the formation of the Council of 12 , taking it as an insult that they were not given a voice in how the world was to be divided up. Rather than attack the gods directly, they pooled their most powerful magics and created an [avatar] on Palboria of a god who did not exist, hoping to use it as a spy and a force to manipulate the gods from within. This fake god, known as Meridian, was presented to the gods, demanding he be allowed to sit on the Council as representation for the Titans.

The Council, predictably, refused.

Meridian left and, as the Titans had planned, began sewing dissent among those gods not chosen to sit on the Council. Eventually, Meridian returned to the Council, this time with an angry mob of gods behind him. And this time he was given audience.

The Council probably would have given in to Meridian's demands if not for Kagan, the god of mischief. It was Kagan who first noticed that Meridian was using magical devices to achieve his spells. Kagan whispered this to the gods around him, carefully seeding and spreading doubt through the crowd. Soon, Meridian was unmasked for what he was and bound.

Some of the gods ran and told the Titans what had happened. The Titans, already prepared for war, moved quickly. They left the heavens and established strongholds on the surface of the world, where many of the gods would be limited to using their avatars. With the assistance of the gods who sided with them, the Titans faced the Council and the rest. The titans were able to hold off the assault - but not for long.

Seolous himself descended from the realm of the gods. The King Above, able to draw on his full powers in the physical realm, set about banishing those gods who had sided with the Titans, destroying not only their avatars, but also severing their tethers on Palboria forever. Without divine assistance, the magics of the Titans failed. One by one, their strongholds fell to the Council.

Some of the Titans fled before the end came, departing into The Shadow where the gods could not reach them. The rest of the Titans were captured. The Council stripped them of their immortality and banished them from the heavens to live forever in the physical realm. Shamed, the demi-titans gathered into clans for protection, eventually developing into the four distinct mortal_races of Palboria.

As for Meridian, the Council wanted to strip him of his divinity, if not destroy him outright. However, with the gods still recovering from war with the Titans, only Seolous had the power to do that, and the King Above had already gone back to his [welkin].

While the Council debated Meridians fate, Pana, still filled with the lust of war, attacked. He beheaded the artificial god with one blow. Then, with a second blow, he split Meridian's head in two. Pana was prevented from delivering a third blow.

The Council quickly concluded that it would be best for all if they just disposed of Meridian and be done with the whole nasty incident entirely. The halves of Meridian's head were buried separately under [the two largest mountains] to keep them safe.

The Rise and Fall of the Elder Races

Without their masters keeping them in check, the Trud'Voy dug deeper into the earth. There, they built vast cities, mined powerful metals, and devised incredible machines. They established the First Kingdom and built its capital, the wonderous stone city Odvertsa.

The Elves, meanwhile, set about gathering the magics of creation left over from the first age, as well as any artifacts and magics created by the Titans or used by the gods during the War. Their searches were fruitful and they became master spellweavers.

The two races generally left each other alone until Kulbar, a god of fire, took notice of the machines and forges of the dwarves. He cultivated worshippers among the dwarves, which in turn gave him power. When a dwarven expedition attempting to sail into [Glan Sende] was rebuffed by elvish ships, Kulbar stoked the dwarves’ anger, spurring them on to build more, burn more.

Chyorn Blackhammer, his heart twisted by Kulbar's goading, constructed the fortress of Grazny Dome, where the dwarves could workshop powerful weaponry in secret. With Kulbar's prodding, the dwarves crafted cunning weapons of unspeakable brutality. And when they attacked the elves, they did so without warning. Dwarven warships poured into Glan Sande and destroyed the elvish fleet. Meanwhile, war machines moved across the land to attack the [Balor Valley] itself. Elves fell before the weapons of the dwarves and soon [Bessermat] itself was burning.

The Elves regrouped to the south. Their forces sailed across the Vilyet, attacking directly at the undefended First Kingdom. The inhabitants of Odvertsa were powerless to stop the elves, who unleashed the furies of their greatest magics against the capital city.

The Dwarven and Elvish forces met at [Nebdolina] and fought for days. Some say months.

In the end, Bessermat and Odvertsa were in ruins. The [Balor Valley] was spoiled for centuries to come while the First Kingdom was reduced to bare desert. The beautiful and green Nebdolinan fields were left a twisted, blighted land of the dead.

Their homes gone, their powers spent, the elder races faded. In time, the elves and dwarves vanished from Palboria entirely.

The Third Age

For a time, Palboria knew peace. The forests heaved and receded. The mountains grew tall and lean. The animals in Dentros' woods multiplied and grew strong.

And the gods slept.

But the demi-Titans did not.

The First Age of Humanity

It was Humans that first rose from the ashes of the old world. Masters of the sea, they made great ships with which to conquer the tides of the [Rowhard]. On its souther coasts they made contact with goblinkind. They spread north and found the vargren. They crossed the Deadlands and found the orcs.

Then, they found something else. It was a Titan device left over from the war - and it opened the shadow.

Humanity was almost completely destroyed before the opening could be undone.

The Fourth Age

We are now in the fourth age. Humanity is rising again, as they done at least three times before. Will this time be different?