Lore of Hy’ilrith: History of a Decimated World

Part two of our exploration of Hy'ilrith's lore. Today we are covering the history of our new world! Enjoy! As before, the transcript is below!

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Welcome back to our series on the lore of Hy’ilrith! For those of you new here I would suggest jumping back to the previous episode for an overview of what’s going on here. The short of it is that we’re spending the next few weeks dipping our toe into the waters of the setting of our new campaign and getting to know it just a little bit before diving full in. Last week we talked about Hy’ilrith itself, the magic that fills it with life, and the gods that govern those powers. This week we will be touching on the briefest overview of its history.

So, if that’s of interest to you, let’s hop in! I teased you enough last time and you’ve been patient.

The history of Hy’ilrith is long and ancient, full of mysteries and stories of great deeds and works. A world full of life and magic. War and triumph. The rise and fall of kingdoms.

All of it forgotten and lost in the days after the Decimation.

The Decimation was a time of absolute destruction following what was known as the Golden Age. Little is known of that time beyond that it was prosperous, that magic and people flourished. That no one went hungry or got sick or suffered. And as little as is known, even less is known about what caused the Decimation. The few records that survived that time don’t make it clear if it was over in days, or months, or years. What is clear is that it was sudden and devastating. It started with a day of complete darkness, very much like the annual days of Remembrance that would follow after it. At the end of it ninety percent of the world’s population was dead, and the only lands left livable were the area that the gods had been able to protect. Spires had risen during that night of total darkness, and a Veil of magic kept the lands inside those spires safe. At least safe in comparison to the world outside of it that had become barren, twisted and dead.

Those lands within became the lands known as Sanctum; the lands where all the remaining people of Hy’ilrith live to this day.

Following the Decimation was a dark time. Society collapsed, and the events of the Decimation had left people with a deep fear of magic, technology, and the knowledge that had allowed it to nearly destroy them. Nearly all records were destroyed in those days, and might have been completely lost if not for the efforts of a few who devoted their lives to protecting what knowledge they could. Among these were the Council of Elder Mages, who are responsible for what little magical knowledge has passed on to the modern day. Another group was those that settled in the ancient ruined city that would one day be known as Borashta, the center of the powerful country of Mereaset. They believed in learning about the past to prevent following the same path and became exiles from the rest of the world.

Eventually, after centuries of conflict, people were able to band together to found the city of Cal’drae. From this bastion they began making true efforts to rebuild a world that faced the challenges of the new world, rather than run from them. It was about strength and community and survival and in time it thrived and allowed people to spread to every corner of the lands of Sanctum. Over time peoples gathered and formed new cities and new countries. First Analaia, with Cal’drae at its heart. Next was the Cethil Highlands and the Ebren Protectorate. Soon Lothaeu, shortly followed by The Federation of Esthyne. And while it is unclear when exactly Meraset or Jestethos Mar were established, by the end of the Age of Dawning all the countries we know today, or at least what would become them, had been formed.

Unfortunately with all of this expansion came conflict and a time known as the Dawn Wars, a period of war between Analaia, Cethil and Ebren that started as an argument over the ownership of the archives at Ankaradeth. Eventually, despite a decade of war, talks were held in Esthyne and the conflict was brought to an end. From this people learned that even in this new age better infrastructure and communications were needed. It was a costly lesson, but it was taken to heart.

In the Reforged Age that followed people began to work together to rebuild and to try and bring the world closer together again.They began to build trade routes, to protect them, and establish crafthalls throughout the land. This eventually led to the formation of what is known in the modern day as the Guilds.

The Guilds are a consortium of organizations that eventually spread throughout all the lands within the Veil. Each hall presides over a particular skill set and provides resources, training, and guidance for those that join them. Their goal is not to control all aspects of a certain trade, but rather provide a resource that is backed and maintained by a large support system. The main halls are housed within the city state of Osthmana that was formed in the years following the Dawn War. Smaller halls also exist within nearly every city throughout the Veiled lands, with the exception of present day Meraset. And while the guilds are deeply prominent, a complaint of some, it is always easy to find a local shop or service if that is what one needs.

About the time the guilds had become fully established a calamity arose in Esthyne. Now, this is one of those things I could go into great detail about, but I am instead going to be infuriatingly vague so that you, like my players, are wracked with questions.

So in the year 909 Post Remembrance a titan, a remnant of the days of the Decimation, burrowed from beyond the veil, underneath the barrier, and began laying waste to Esthyne. It was laid low a year later by a group of heroes and one of the primordial dragons. When it was dead all that was left was a corpse and a tunnel that led underneath the barrier and beyond the Veil.

But I don’t want to bore you with the details.

The age that followed was a time of exploration and discovery as people used this new passage to begin exploring the world beyond the Veil. This led to new discoveries in magic and technology that quickly ushered the world into a new age. An age of learning and discovery that began to slowly incorporate magic and technology back into the world. One of the greatest discoveries was that life still existed beyond the Veil, including tribes and clans of people that had managed to survive and bind together in the years following those dark days. They came to be known as Wildlings and while they preferred to keep to themselves, now that the new world and old world had met it was impossible to not at least be curious about each other.

It wasn’t long before conflict arose again, this time in Lothaeu. The King, upon his deathbed, had divided his kingdom into three beyond his children and what followed was a decades long civil war that led to the complete destruction of the monarchy. It only ended when, as a last ditch effort, the Guild cut off all trade and support for the country. It did help end the war, but showed the depth of the influence the guilds now held.

And if that isn’t foreshadowing I don’t know what is.

Soon people began to notice that the Veil that had protected everyone during the days of the Decimation had begun to weaken. It was not noticeable at first, just a few places where passage through became possible, but eventually it was clear that the entire barrier was growing thinner. Weaker until eventually passage through it was not just possible, but easy. This was great for those wanting to explore the world beyond, but not great for the country of Meraset.

Their location for years had been a key to their role in trade. The peninsula that they lived on extended past the Veil, effectively blocking direct access between the Western coast and the Southern Sea. They had specialized in trading goods between these seas but with the barrier now passable people could bypass them completely. Immediately their economy began to suffer and they reached out to the Guilds for assistance in finding a solution to the problem. When the Guilds’ help proved to solve nothing they opted to blockade the passage with their own ships and demand tolls.

Remember that foreshadowing? When Meraset refused to end their blockade, the Guilds cut them off from their resources completely. The already economically struggling Meraset was forced to end their blockade, but surprisingly they refused the Guild’s offers to return afterwards. In fact they burned guild halls in their cities and cast out every member of the guilds from within their borders. To this day Meraset refuses to work with the guilds, determined to stand on their own so that they can never be at the whims of others again. They would depend on their own Ministries, and make themselves strong on their own.

And a little over a century later they would return with a strength that the world hadn’t foreseen. In what is now known as the Occupation War Meraset’s more advanced army overran large parts of Ebren and Lothaeu, holding control over them for decades. The only thing that stopped them was the assassination of their Sovereign and military leadership. The war effort collapsed and soon most of the lands they claimed were back under the control of those that had once held them. Only the lands they had first taken, and held since the first days of the war, stayed under their domain. Meraset did gain one victory in all of it, though, as the influence of the guild in the lands they once occupied has not fully recovered to this day.

And that is how the world sits today. Meraset still holds the ire of many and in return has no love for them either. Peace has reigned for the forty years since the war’s end, and the cycle of seasons moves on. Soon we’ll see what history holds next, but that is where our tale ends for today. Next time we’ll talk a bit about the countries themselves, and the world we’ll be living in, but after that, we’ll be taking our first steps on Hy’ilrith’s ground. Thank you for joining us today. Hopefully you found this little history lesson enjoyable, and hopefully you’ll join us next time. If you do, I’ll be seeing you then. Well… talking to you then. You get it.. Until then, take care!

 

"The Pyre" by Kevin MacLeod, Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License, Incompetech;