The Creation
of Ioz
"This is the story of the relevant history of the world, I'll not be boring
you with the customary "In the beginning" stories that won't help you like
those other sages will, no ma'am I'll be telling you the history that is
of use to the people of this planet..."
With
that the young priestess placed a sack of coins on the sages table and
sat down"
"Well my personal specialty is the story of how we came to this point,
civilization and all. Unfortunately the time keeping system has been so
distorted through the eons it's impossible to tell when civilization started,
but I can tell you almost everything else.
The first and greatest civilization that ever existed on this planet was
the Empire of Man. Now I know what you're thinking but no, they are much
more than just the stuff of boogie tales.
The Empire of Man came about when three equally matched clans each claimed
dominion over a single sea which were abundant with fish and islands where
minerals and even gold was right there on the ground for the picking.
Well they fought for decades over this sea and all the while none of them
could use it. One day a clan that was not decimated by years of warring
came in and took the sea as none of the clans individually was strong enough
to defend it. The three clans had grown to respect each other despite their
wars and thus would rather that one of the three had it than an outsider,
even if it couldn't be their clan. So the three clans sent their leaders
into the woods alone to discuss what they would do now, where their wars
would be fought, what was to be done about the interloper and so on. To
the amazement of the clans the leader decreed that the three clans were
now one and would work towards the destruction of the interlopers. The
three clans, The Dwarven clan Cave Bear, the Elven clan Raptor, and the
Human clan FireBlade joined together known as "The Clan of One" and they
drove the trespassers from the sea with ease, they drove them entirely
out of the valley that was their home.
The Clan of One seemed doomed, ruled by a primitive council of representatives
and burdened by the racism that was common then, but for five generations
they survived until a huge invasion came from outside of the valley they
now dominated. The invaders were humans dressed in a black armor that made
The Clan of One's crude stone and bronze weapons almost useless. The Clan
of One was conquered in it's entirety in under three months by the invaders
that now identified themselves as Clan Lightning. Clan Lightning were the
descendants of the interlopers of days past long forgotten by most of The
One's people. The One suffered under the yolk of Clan Lightning's tyranny
for nearly one hundred years until the One's dwarves discovered magic.
Secretly they learned and shaped this new force and created dwarves of
great power. Unbenounced to the dwarves their magic was so powerful that
is leeched the magic out of the dwarves and out of their surroundings (thus
accounting for the areas where magic is weaker even today.) These warped
dwarves were ten feet tall wielded both great weapons and great magic's.
The war that the warped dwarves fought (they now called themselves Voorka
a Dwarven word meaning something worked on a forge, it is now synonymous
with hope and is a common sur-name) a war of genocide killing all those
of clan lightning they could find, it was at this time that it was discovered
that a good deal of Clan Lighting were Orcs, Ogres and half-breeds. Clan
lightning started on a hasty program of magic innovation when they realized
it's power, but what they created were not the genius kind Voorka, but
horrible evil creatures which to this day are the bane of many regions
(most are descendants but some live to this day!) The Voorka skittered
and effectively destroyed them but some of the greatest creations of the
Lightning Clan (known as abominations) still roamed so the surviving Voorka
hunted them (there were less than 200 Voorka at this point) they were never
heard from again.
The One knew that parasitic enemies would some come to take clan lightning's
place so they created The council of three and selected an emperor. One
of each race sat on the council and the first emperor was a Dwarf named
Ku`lan Taap. The Emperor quickly created a military for the newly founded
empire of man (at that time man referred to any creature that was intelligent
sentient and did not prey on other sentients)
The Empire of Man prospered under Ku`lan's guidance for almost one hundred
years increasing their territory (through mostly peaceful means) four fold
and their technology tenfold (bringing them to the medieval standard)
The next Emperor succeeded Ku`lan after he died was a human named Hane
Dall. (The successor of the emperor seems to customarily have been the
most qualified child of the emperor and the council's children)
Hane ruled for only 2 years but he is remembered for being the "Inductor"
Emperor as during his term the Empire's land grew almost two fold as he
welcomed the Gnomes and Halflings into the empire (thus giving them seats
on the council)
Now there is a cloudy area after Hane's rule that I have concluded to have
lasted about 1,200 years where little of significance to them happened
but where I find the records pick up they rule the entirety of this continent
large areas on all the others and even have outposts on the moons! They
had thinking machines and other feats unimaginable by today's inventors.
About this time magic was waning (due to overuse or a cyclic motion is
unknown) and a huge rock was divined to collide with this planet in less
than one hundred years.
Now here's the amazing part they turned the third moon...
Well of course there's only two moons... now.
They turned the third moon into a huge ship able to travel to other places
suitable for life. Then when there was about 5 years left before the asteroid
hit and all life ended (or so they thought) About this time huge amounts
of people of all races from goblinoids to giant-kin were seeking refuge
with the Empire and thereby passage off the doomed planet. Most were accommodated
and the Ark as it was known left the planet one year before the asteroid
hit with over 500% of it's design specified capacity.
It is said that they left some people and caches of people behind in hopes
that they could somehow survive and repopulate the planet. History after
that is murky until a few hundred years ago. All that is know about the
fate of the Empire is that they vowed to return one day..."
With that the woman stood and said "You will no longer spread your heretical
and treasonous tales against my kingdom that has always been and will always
be!" She pointed one of her long tanned fingers at him and his eyes went
cloudy and his mind died. E`Rod the sage to this day has never said another
word.
Creation
story submitted by sCOREpion or Ginko as he is know on the Irc undernet
channel #ad&d.
