The End in Fire
In 338 GC, the famous End in Fire speech was delivered, and the Dragons left the Court of the Oath for good. What followed would be a very interesting time.
The Inevitable Awaits
338-344.
The Court reels from the departure of the Dragons, but the most hopeful are certain they will return. Inquiries are launched into the feasibility of alternate power sources for Artifice. Business at the court continues.
The Quorum is Broken
344-349
With two Great Races missing, the Court of the Oath is defunct. All motions are suspended as the fate of the court is debated. The King of the Sword and the various Thanes make do with back-room diplomacy.
(needs more detail)
The War of the Mists
344-364
An ongoing struggle against random outbreaks of essentia creating Monsters throughout the land.
The Dragon War
| Year/Date | Event |
|---|---|
|
349, Summer 8 Jusday |
Lone dragon enters the Gorge of Blood in the Thanelands and begins gathering Blood Crystals. Does not respond to demands to leave. Dwarven/human soldiers arrive; confrontation ends in the dragon's death by hundreds of rifle rounds. And so begins the Dragon War, later called the Second Great War. |
|
349, Summer 15 Winday |
Southern armies pushed to Saillonne, effectively held under siege for almost the entire remainder of the war. |
|
349, Summer 22 Soroday |
The Soroday Massacre; a flight of dragons razes Brinnish/Tirrith farmland, killing hundreds of thousands of civilians; massive amounts of infrastructure are destroyed, bisecting the northern Kingdom. |
|
349, Fall 3 Mainday |
The razing of the Dunlands culminates in the destruction of Auld Cardain, the capital. Hundreds of thousands flee the countryside. |
|
349, Fall 9 Sainday |
The Brood of Umaradyse suffers greatly when the Valor Mountain Hatchery is raided. Hundreds of dragon eggs destroyed. King Elgar dies in battle; sword claimed by King Morne, who quickly absconds to Oathkeep, spoiling offensive momentum. |
|
349, Fall 10 Jusday |
Retaliation of the Brood of Umaradyse; a grand work still unknown to non-dragons causes the Menendara and Birinflow to transmute to inflammable oil, setting millions of acres of farmland ablaze, destroying innumerable towns and villages, killing many thousands and imperiling the food supply of Obrith. Effectively trapped the King's army inside the province for 6 weeks. |
|
349, Fall 16 Soroday |
The Clash in the Skies. The long-awaited abatement of the fires occurred, with King Morne's army ready to advance into Dragon lands as soon as the flames died, and the dragons ready to ambush them en route. The battle went as expected, until Morne's new Titanmail suit sprouted wings, taking dragon-like form, and shot into the air, joined by those of his bannermen. An unprecedented aerial battle occurred, Man fighting Dragon in the latter's natural habitat. The flying titanguard and the dwarven artillery won the day; first Dragon loss in battle. |
|
349, Winter 1 Hayday |
After weeks of rolling battles across the west bank of the Blue Water, draconic tempers began to soften, and several emissaries met on this day to discuss a cease fire. However, King Morne himself broke the faith, attacking the peace conference, claiming it was not sanctioned, and riding the momentum to a second attack on the Valor Mountain Hatchery, which Umaradyse had re-seeded as an assertion of power. The Elder Dragon himself was there to meet the charge, but that was according to Morne's plan. What was not according to plan is that his ultimate weapon, the prototype Essentia Bomb, did not work as designed, and did not avail his foolish, cruel offensive. His Titanmail was ripped apart, and he met the same fate, but not before managing to shatter the bomb's casing, sending a torrent of chaotic essentia streaming into Umaradyse and his brood, though Auldellise shielded her sire from the worst of it. The Dynasty Blade is left alone, only after several dragons are slain outright after trying to move it; the dying Brood Elder invokes her ultimate authority over the hatchery, forcing even the Elder One to abandon its defense, lest the entire flight place itself foolishly between Man and the sword. |
|
349, Winter 1 Soroday |
King Orendil claims the Dynasty Blade in the ruins of the Valor Mountain Hatchery. According to legend, he ordered every single Blood Crystal found there returned, disarming no small portion of his forward army, and laid the remains of the destroyed eggs to rest as best he could, before swearing a vow to gods Old and New never again to allow the sword to be used in such ill faith. Attempts to reestablish peace talks went unanswered by the Dragons. |
|
349, Winter 11 Sainday | Saillone siege nearly broken by Orendil's army, when a band of traitorous Ahrimin nomads, in league with the Dragons, sabotages their efforts, invoking some unknown ancient magic, flooding the cataract, nearly destroying the King's army. |
|
349, Day of Memory | Oathkeep attacked by the Broods of Umaradyse, as the Brood of Ankhanis raids the landbound Artifice factories of the Crescent Vale. The latter are never rebuilt; his motive is unclear at the time. Umaradyse's seemingly pointless attack on the magically-fortified city bears fruit, as his brood--impossibly--wields arcane magic against it. Numerous spell failures, presumably unplanned, sabotage their efforts; it is not known if the brood had sufficient strength to disable the city's Sanctity Ward. |
|
350, Spring 5 Winday |
Orendil's army returns to Oathkeep, amidst terror of the dragons' new magic. Kingdom of the Sword enters defensive period, bolstering Sanctity Wards around established keeps and cities, abandoning the countryside to a nation-wide siege. The Reign of Fire begins. In Ascadia, Titanmail suits are being manufactured on an unprecedented scale; the secret goal: to arm the entirety of the Knights of the Round, to the very last, with Titanmail equal or better than Morne's. All the while, peace offers are made by elven proxy. |
|
350, Summer 19 Merriday | Brood of Majora and Brood of Tianinin agree to a cessation of hostilities by proxy at the Lake of Mists. A largely symbolic conference, as neither brood had committed any significant forces to the offensive; the site was chosen as a reminder of Man's misdeeds. The cost of the truce was a treaty binding the King of the Sword never to claim the lands of the Juni Delta, establishing the Menendara as the permanent westernmost border of the realm. |
|
350, Summer 22 Sainday | Zefira offers to meet with Orendil in person, guaranteeing his safety from all other dragons. Against his advisors' wishes, he agrees. The meeting goes off without incident. The details are never shared with the public, but it is believed that Zefira offered to broker peace on the condition that the Kingdom of the Sword renounce the Church of the One God and return to the old faith. According to church lore, Orendil famously replied "our souls are more precious than land, nor blood, nor any mortal thing.", and Zefira was so impressed with his conviction that he promised to speak on Man's behalf anyhow. This is highly disputed by sources outside the Church, but the act figures into the Church's later canonization of Orendil. In any case, the meeting has no obvious effect on the war's progress. |
|
350, Fall 7 Jusday |
The Siege of Ascadia begins, presumably due to word leaking out of the massive construction projects there. The islands endure siege day and night, where previously they were immune; they soon build cannons that fill the sky with shrapnel and airbursts, gradually bettering their defenses against the regular air raids. Still, the siege continues for most of the rest of the year. |
|
350, Winter 21 Mainday |
The Brood of Umaradyse, seemingly aware of the impending shift in his fortunes, mounts a massive assault on the heartlands of the Kingdom, first striking Cardien, then Uldath, then Tir Garod in a lightning siege lasting only 3 days. In each case, the city's magical defenses are overwhelmed, and catastrophic damage inflicted before the flight suffers too much damage and moves on to the next target. In the case of the final target... |
|
350, Day of Memories (1-2) |
The Great Dragonfall. Hundreds of Knights of the Round, clad in Titanmail, take to the skies, striking back against the dragons attacking Tir Garod. In a scene unlike anything ever imagined, hundreds of dragons die in a single day of battle, and the brood scatters to the winds. Only the knights of Ascadia joined battle; the others, far more vast in number, will soon suit up. The war turns. |
|
351, Spring 3 Jusday |
The Siege of Saillone is broken by the Knights of the Round. The Army of the Satrap is revealed to be near-useless due to attrition and atrophy. The city's few worthy Knights are added to the King's army. |
|
351, Spring 5 Mainday |
Roving through the skies, the Flight of the Sword encounters numerous dragonflights, winning most battles. On this day, they do battle with Auldellise, who wins the first major victory against the Titanguard by employing surprisingly sophisticated magicks of entropy. The White Tower gets to work on a counter-strategem. |
|
351, Spring 17 Sainday |
The Battle of Menendras. A dragonflight unlike any ever seen (save one, to come later) assaults the duchy of Menendras, attacking The Gates themselves, as well as the city of Arnholm. The King and the Knights are thousands of miles away, chasing at shadows. Umaradyse himself leads the charge against the mighty dwarven city, while Ankhanis fights to delay the King's response. |
|
351, Summer 1 Merriday |
After weeks of siege, Menendras nearly falls. However, due to a string of seemingly miraculous victories and natural events, the King slips the grasp of Ankhanis to return to his homeland. The Brood of Umaradyse is routed. Word comes through elven proxies that peace is offered; for the first and only time, Orendil refuses to treat with the dragons. This is disputed by many in Obrith and the Church. |
|
351, Summer 6 Soroday |
The Battle of Sundered Hill. After limited action in previous weeks, the expected assault occurs. The mother of all dragonflights rages across the land, headed directly for Oathkeep. Orendil's army meets them in the skies over Sundered Hill. Hundreds of thousands of men and dwarves die; almost two thousand dragons perish, including Umaradyse himself. Orendil dies; though his body is recovered, the Dynasty Blade is not. There is no successor to the Kingdom of the Sword. Auldellise succeeds her sire as the Brood Elder of her flight. She immediately offers peace, on the terms that her people be allowed to consume the fallen dragons. She does not wait for any response, and after the grisly deed is done, the Brood of Auldellise and its allies leaves the battlefield for good. The Dragon War ends. |
|
351, Fall 7 Sainday |
Official end of the Dragon War, according to the Kingdom of the Sword, as Supreme Potentate Meleb Cainem signs a treaty of peace. The document will later be signed by a representative of the Brood of Auldellise. |
The Great Sickness
355-404
A terrible plague ravages the Kingdom of the Sword. Old magicks are useless, but those of the Church of the One God make some headway. Lasts throughout the era and beyond.
Kurnish Spearhead
364-365
The first Kurnish invasion occurs. A hundred thousand Kurn riders ravage the countryside, even as it has barely begun to rebuild in the wake of the Dragon War, and suffers under the Great Sickness. The horde reaches Cardien before it is stopped, and a false sense of security abounds in its wake.
The Great Kurnish Invasion
385-388
The second Kurnish invasion vastly exceeds the first, which was merely a single large tribe ousted from their traditional lands by a much more vast army that was marshaling its strength in the Kurnlands. That army now invades the Kingdom of the Sword.
Legendary accounts swear that over a million Kurns rode into the East, conquering and despoiling all they touched. The Kingdom of the Sword and her allies were powerless to stop the onslaught. Every major city, save Saillone and those of the Ascadian Isles, was conquered and pillaged, and virtually all those in power were put to the sword. The elves took in many thousands of refugees, including a number of high-ranking clergy and nobles who managed to preserve their line in so doing. The dwarves were held fast inside their keeps, unable to save Oathkeep from the inevitable.
In 388, Oathkeep was sacked, its inhabitants raped and murdered, and the whole of the city put to the torch. Though the walls and central keep--built by dwarves and dragons to endure far worse fates--would survive, the rest of the city was put to such ruin and despair that none would ever forget the Kurns who violated her that day.
The Kurns ransacked the lands of the Kingdom of the Sword for some time after that, and virtually none of the continental human lands were spared. Many swore allegiance to their overlords, in desperate bargain for their lives, becoming willing slaves. Many died, the lucky ones quickly, and in battle. In the end, all that had been built by the Kingdom was claimed or destroyed.
Save, of course, for Ascadia. Per legend, the Kurns built a fleet of ships whose number vastly exceeded any that had ever sailed before. And yet, en route to the islands, God himself swept them under the waves, in righteous vengeance for their terrible crimes. Or at least, that's what the Church says. In more recent times, the Ascadian Empire claims they used powerful weapons, unlike any seen in the Dragon War, to destroy the entire fleet, killing most of a million riders in an instant. Such an extraordinary claim has thus far not been shown to be true...or definitively false.