Pre-Cataclysm | Falling Stars
It was the time of cheese and wine, of large families and prosperity.
Long years of relative peace held grip over Vaniya. The independent territories prospered, and bickered, and occasionally skirmished, but the bountiful harvests and long summers kept everyone relatively unscathed under the three moons.
Then, late into the penultimate harvest season, a faint new crimson star appeared, low on the horizon of the night sky. The winter was mild, and the glimmer grew to be a more prescient presence in the sky. Soothsayers proclaimed the return of the Gods, the end of the world, and the all number of other predictions, as they do.
They were all, for the most part, all wrong.
Spring brought the red star high and bright in the sky, visible even in the day. Farmers planted their fields with one eye safely focused on the earth, the other warily looking heavenward.
Summer reveled that one falling star was myriad objects, all gaining girth and terrifying the populace below, for it was now foreseen by all that the skyward visitors would not flit gently by, but would bring all the Gods wrath down on the lands below.
A tacit task of tempered adventurers were selected by the last of the Gods still interested in Vaniya. They were brought together and given all the blessed boons, for the Gods knew that if the stars should fall, it meant the end of this world and another expansion of a demonic empire across the prime plane.
Against all foes lobbied against them, the heroes struggled on, deeper and deeper to the heart of the miasma.
In the end, too late, they realized that the falling stars were sent from afar, from an overrun world, to crack the spine of Vaniya. The mountains that split the continent in two was the target. At the bottom was a portal being opened to unleash a demonic horde upon this new flush land.
The adventurers failed and died. Vaniya was cracked asunder and the flaming masses were unleashed upon the land. The last of the Gods retreated to other worlds where prayers still floated up through the clouds to them, although some still quietly listened.
Cataclysm | Oberon
War raged in the south and east, the west had quickly fallen, just years after the cataclysm.
But there was strength in the north. Isolated and independent, with no king or royalty, the powerful families went to ground. They were self sufficient, and did not suffer the squabbles of the kingdoms of the south.
Years went on, the continent burned, and trade and travelers from the south declined each year. Acrid smoke hung heavy in the air, even in the north.
Northerners hunkered down, and worried. In the end, they knew, the war would come to them and they would have to find a way to thwart the invasion, to preserve their way of life.
And finally the towns and hamlets along the southernmost border began to burn.
The northerners learned that all that saved them from the same fate of the south was that the falling skies brought with it an infernal civil war, slowing the inevitable progress of the devastation northward. With the demons came the devils, both fighting each other for these new fertile lands, their occupants largely insignificant to their overarching primal struggle.
Fearing annihilation, a conclave of the most powerful families of the north gathered at Feargal manor. They decided there was only one solution, one option to beat back the burning menace from the south. One option to save their way of being and turn the tide of the war.
They would awaken the unspoken Gods of the deep.
Not everyone agreed.
A group of adventurers were tasked with the mission to gather the items needed to expedite the awakening. The crusaders were given all available assistance in their quest to bring back the Gods.
These champions succeeded.
But their success was costly.
For the archaic tomes and tablets that spoke of the ancient sleeping Gods of the deep, were written by disciples, supplicants and mind bent individuals. They held many falsehoods and untruths.
The newly awakened power was much more terrifying than any could have imagined. The party of adventurers, now immensely powerful themselves, fell one by one in attempts to make the ancient horrors of Vaniya engage the new flaming terror of the demonic invaders.
The fate of all of the north, all of the Vaniya, came down to one individual who, sacrificially, in the end, finally enticed the world ending conflict that must occur.
Post Apocalypse | Catacombs and Cthulhu
Humanity had become rare and feral. All the remaining races of Vaniya retreated and hid in whatever manner they could. The elves took back the Ruhks, the deep northern woods and were more fae and wild than ever. The dwarves collapsed all their cave entrances and were not heard from again. The gnomes built a clever fortress of tricks and traps while halflings mingled, as always, amongst what was left of the human population. Enemies of the past were forced into friendship for survival. Any settlement of more than a few hundred beings would draw the interest of the ithaqua away from the south in search of easy vessels to consume for the great one.
In the north, growing season was always short, but now crops would not grow at all. The farmlands had become swamp lands. Insistent rain fell almost daily, but it was not a refreshing spring shower, but heavy, thick, dirty droplets filled with ash and acid. There was no word from the south or east anymore, most likely completely destroyed by the war between the demons and devils or, even more horrific, consumed by the new weirding horrors unleashed.
Worse, reliable magic had become wholly unpredictable. The power of priests and paladins to bless and heal was all but extinct. Since the return of the old ones, wild magic was powerful and untamed. As the moons were virtually never seen anymore, there were no clear skies, calling on their power was most often fruitless.
But then a clue was found. A chance. A slim possibility to restore Vaniya to some semblance of what it had once been.
There were so few people left, tired and giving up hope.
Would anyone be able to take the clue, track down its meanings and fulfill it’s prophecy?
Would anyone be able to save the world?
