Thardferr 4e

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Probable Cause: Planar dominance for the world of Kyranath has passed through many hands. First the pantheon ruled over the fledgling world, then came the ancients. The ancients blocked the pantheon from truly entering and interacting with Kyranath, but their faithful followed them religiously and through that faith they were able to grant powers to change the world of their followers.

Following the gradual extinction of the ancients the Fey took over where the ancients had left off, even undoing some of the changes that the powerful race of demi-gods had made to the world. But one change they could not undo, only attempt to prolong. The ancient known as Karakas had charmed the moon Zakarus with a part of its own life force, that should the ancients die out, Zakarus would slam into Kyranath as a final act of revenge against the one that destroyed the ancients. The fey saw this early, and a branch of them known as the Sidhe grew the Lunar Trees to trick Zakarus into thinking that the ancients still survived; but the lunar trees began to die out.

The fey had known that the Lunar trees would not last forever and had studied a new way to have the entire life-force of the world work to protect it. They created a dozen obelisks, each drawing upon the aspects of Kyranath and placed them on Thardferr, then fearing there was little else they could do they returned to their homes and watched.

The Cursed One – Kailes, forbidden from joining his lover by the Lady of Death cursed the gods, cursed death, cursed the fey and cursed Kyranath. In the dichotomy of love and hate he went about finding a way to destroy the world of Kyranath and can now be seen as the instigator of too many tragedies for one being to ever be responsible. Though I can in no way be objective in this statement I am certain that Kailes was behind 75% of the tragedies that happened within Thardferr between the time of his curse and the fall of Zakarus.

In what began as a way to dismantle Thardferr through aiding the Blood King of Edilar he found his answer. It began first with the Lunar Trees, and when his goal was so close to completion the Fey erected the 12 obelisks. Over the span of two-hundred and thirty years, Kailes would coerce group after group to destroy obelisks and rival in the destruction that he later blamed on the Fey.

After the eleven calamities, the Moon Zakarus realized the ruse; there was no further warning as he charged for where the final fey obelisk stood, under the Sythian Sea.

The first ten years: It’s unknown how many died in the first damage from Moonfall, estimates from Coopersville Forge, Keytown and Crosslandford show mortality rates of 70%, certain areas of Lithar, especially on the western coast have upwards of 95% population decreases.

The first effect of the Moonfall was the giant tidal wave that swept from east to west, and west to east. The impact was just offshore of Syth. Somehow we survived the four days that the world was flooded, but other things were happening below our feet that were far beyond our comprehension. The Moonfall shattered the upper crust of Kyrananth, and the force of the hit knocked the orbit of the world somewhat closer to the sun. With more gravity and a cracked crust the continents began to shift, and the other two moons began to work at righting the solar alignment.

During the continental shift earthquakes once again shattered the abandoned land of Syth and many of the newly formed islands gave way to volcanoes. Kyranath began to heal itself, and those few of us left braved a new world that would not last; but proved more deadly than any war we had ever wrought upon each other.

The races turned on each other; dwarves blamed orcs, orcs blamed dwarves, goblins blamed elves and elves blamed everyone. Our confederation was torn asunder, of those who braved travel to their homeland, we heard from only one in thirty.

Most clergy are certain that the gods took pity on us, indeed there are tales of priests that withheld not just one tidal wave, but several for certain cities. The divine sages all agree that the gods will not let Thardferr die as to do so would mean an end to their followers and make their wars on each other much less interesting; some even say that Diadria was not prepared for some many to perish at one time, and due to the back log the gods stepped in to slow the line.

The next ten years: The strain of the orbit and pull of the moons righted itself about ten years after Moonfall, our apprentices continue to apply theory to the conundrum of how this works but the only answer we have found is an act of higher power.

Moonfall’s effects seem to be permanent, and have affected the very fabric of the veil and Thardferr. At one time the barrier of the ancients kept us safe from all outside influences, with those creatures on the other side of the veil only coming through by powerful magicks that brought them to Kyranath. We, the IMA, had done little study of the planes before this time, so what went on before is of little concern, what happened when Zakarus fell; well that is history.

It seems that Kyranath had a ‘normal’ cosmology before with the ancient’s barrier keeping the veil closed; we have since learned that the veil is made up of two exact copies of our world: The Feywild and the Shadowfell. When Zakarus fell, its copies also fell, causing a rip through the veil, this rip pulled and pushed, like a rock hitting glass, and the veil shattered leaving a lattice network of rips and holes that lead to the Shadowfell and the Feywild.

Those creatures that find their way through the veil find themselves trapped, as the lattice works shift and change constantly. These creatures roam throughout our world searching for those holes so that they may return to their home planes, and through them we have seen much destruction in the last 10 years.

The cities begin to be flooded with refugees as odd monsters and aberrations attack more and more outlying villages. The landscape of Thardferr had mostly returned to normal after the first ten years, and communication between nations had been attempted. Contact with Khardfee, Ruch and Lithar was possible; but no sentient peoples could be found out in Alderd or Eldilar; only monsters.

We set to our defenses and formed into city-states. From then on the Confederation became only a loose affiliation between allied city-states that had little communication or cooperation. Each state became autonomous, adapting to survive. Communications dropped more and more until finally in 21 PM we received out last communication from Sorrowtown; Khardfee had fallen to a point it could no longer support the out-lying towns and villages, southern Khardfee was now under demon rule.

The monsters too had changed and adapted to the new surrounding, and with little to no interference from us they began to breed and populate the areas we had to leave behind.

Terrance Farsighter; Address to the Emperor, 25PM (post moonfall).