Demons
On the south eastern coast of Tarren, near the present-day Graccan city of Elios,
the Elves were engaged in a fierce struggle for the control of the vital port city
of Tier-Eldral. The city’s rulers were a cabal of powerful sorcerers aligned to
the Eldraani cause. They were besieged by a vast Tothrein army led by the acclaimed
general Emryl of the Iron Spear. The majority of the city’s standing army had been
defeated by Emryl’s army at the Battle of the Ice Meadows the previous winter. The
city’s mage rulers, clearly desperate to break the siege, cast a powerful spell
from within the city. Whether it was their intention or not, the spell tore a hole
in our world through which foul demonic creatures poured through. From Emryl’s own
writings, we gain a clear picture of what transpired from the perspective of the
Tothrein camps. The city was ablaze with eldritch fire and the sky was filled with
screams of terror. After several hours, the gates of the city opened and hundreds
of elves and slaves poured out eager to escape. On their heels were legions of foul
demonic creatures. Utterly confused, Emryl ordered his warriors to allow the fleeing
Elves to pass and met the demons in battle. His warriors fought the demons for hours
in a terrible, bloody conflict on the gates of the city. As dawn broke and there
still seemed no end to the wave of demons pouring over the walls of the city, Emryl
ordered his army to perform an orderly retreat. His elite guard, the Iron Spears,
held the demons at bay long enough for his army and some scant survivors from within
the city to escape. The ferocity of the demons lessened sharply as the fighting
moved away from the city. Eventually, they became unable to pursue the Elves at
all and instead appeared to suffocate rather like fish on the deck of ship. The
city was never recovered from the Demons during the war and was the source of the
first great demonic incursions into Arcana, many years later. Each of these later
incursions created other rents in existence and consequently the demons have continued
to infect Arcana to this day. It was not until almost four hundred years later,
that King Phallanthos of the neighbouring Graccan city of Ephrades sealed the demonic
rift, ending demonic presence in this region.
The Undead
A similar event occurred during the following year at the city of Fethulmir, a minor
city-state aligned to the Tothrein cause. An Eldraani army led by a trio of powerful
sorcerers invaded the neighbouring area. The ruler of Fethulmir was a skilled general
called Miran, Heart of Anger. He led his army to battle at the forests of Dargmir.
The battle was bloody but indecisive. Both armies retreated from the field badly
mauled. The sorcerers, not willing to further deplete their soldiers in a costly
siege, turned to their magic. They unleashed all of their power in a spell that
would have devastating consequences, for both them and the surrounding land. The
sorcerers lost control of the complex spell they were weaving and each of them were
torn into pieces. The last sorcerer managed to channel the vast eldritch energy
towards the city before falling. The energy overwhelmed the city’s magical defences
and reduced it to an ashen wasteland of twisted glass and blistering heat. The magical
energy tore a hole in the world. Through that rift came strange creatures that inhabited
the bodies of the fallen Elves of the city and stepped out into Arcana as the first
armies of the undead. The surviving Eldraani warriors attempted to fight against
the risen Elves but they were eventually overwhelmed and only a handful of their
fastest riders were able to escape. The city of Fethulmir exists today … though
now called the City of Glass. It has become one of the few realms of the undead.
Since then other such places have appeared, created perhaps by the undead creatures
that first emerged from the City of Glass.
The Beastmen
The next notable event in the war occurred four years later. A fearsome Eldraani
general called Mord’uell of the Bleeding Lash was waging a campaign on the shore
of modern-day Tennebril. Here the Eldraani city states had managed to gain ascendancy
and only a single Tothrein city, Merdras, opposed their domination of the area.
Mord’uell was aptly named as he favoured the heavy use of slaves in warfare, as
with many Dark Elf generals today. On the Bitterfell marshlands his huge army met
the standing army of Merdras led by Serafryll the Burning Cry. Mord’uell assembled
a huge battle line composed of human and orc slaves, behind which stood his regular
Elven warriors. Leading these picked troops were over a dozen sorcerers. As the
war horns blared and orders given, the great mass of slaves slowly approached the
army of Merdras. The Eldraani sorcerers cast a series of powerful spells to mutate
the slave warriors and turn them into powerful shock troops. Some began to breathe
fire while others grew new arms, spikes and tentacles. The Sorcerers in the Tothrein
army also threw a terrible magical barrage against the unfortunate slaves. Lightning,
fire and raw destructive magic coursed through the slave ranks killing thousands.
As is the nature of such unbridled magic, the spells reacted with one another creating
a complex chain reaction that grew beyond the control of the spell casters from
either side. Tens of thousands of slaves caught in the eldritch maelstrom began
to mutate uncontrollably. Their bodies became fused with one another and with the
many other creatures in the marshland. Many of them died within a few heartbeats.
As the spell’s energy dissipated, the surviving slaves had become warped, twisted
creatures. These malformed, mindless creatures fled in a blind panic into the marshlands.
Those few that survived would become the host of beastmen tribes that infest the
land of Tarren today … the Ratmen, Pigmen, Lizardmen, Wolfen and Fishmen are but
a few of the races that were born in that place. Deprived of his slave warriors,
Mord’uell’s army was crushed by Serafryll’s forces. Mord’uell is said to have fallen
back into the deeper marshlands where he was cut down by Serafryll’s swordsmen.
In later years, the remaining Eldraani cities in the area would conquer the city
of Merdras and claim dominion over the region, which is still under Dark Elf control
today. Serafryll is said to have fled his home and retreated to Summerwind Isle,
where he spent the last of his years with his family.
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