In the early days after the final disaster of the Empire War, life was more about survival than actual living. So many had been lost that every aspect of society suffered, from trade to religion to politics. But gradually conditions began to recover.
On the 34th day of winter in the first year of the newly-dubbed Age of Rebirth, a new ruler was crowned in the human kingdom of Larocia. Gregor, younger brother to King Sebastian III, had finally chosen to officially succeed his older brother who had fallen while attempting to hurry his soldiers to safety during the final moments of the Empire War catastrophe.
Imp male
Like his brother before him, Gregor was a man of action, although not as impetuous as humans are sometimes considered to be. His first official task as king was to approach the elves of the eastern province with an official peace proposal. Much bad blood had passed between the elves and the humans during the Age of Strife, and Solon Wildsong, the elvan High Councillor, received the new king with caution.
Talks began on the 61st day of Winter through an appointed elvan ambassador, Solon's daughter Alciphra, and carried on for almost three years thereafter. Despite the extended length of the conferences, they went exceptionally well. The humans and elves declared a pact of alliance on the 2nd day of Spring, AR 3. Three days later, Gregor and Alciphra married, further cementing the pact.
At the same time, a gnomish trade caravan set out for Khrushok Meir in cyclops territory, skirted along the edge of the Sorrowlands and happened across a most peculiar group of travelers. Imps had never before been seen on Ganedan, and this group consisted of nearly a hundred individuals. One of them, an elderly spokesman named Azik Longtooth, stepped forth and offered an explanation. The imp species was not native to Ganedan at all, but had originated from another realm called Nadirak. When the final battle of the Empire War decimated this area and transformed it into the Sorrowlands, a hole had been rent in the fabric between worlds at the center of the destruction. |
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Azik and his people had been slaves in their home realm and among the first to see the wonderful possibility of a world of freedom. Small, furtive scouting missions returned with even greater tales of beautiful green hills and endless blue skies beyond the borders of Sorrowlands. They realized that the window into Ganedan would not escape the notice of their cruel masters for much longer and their chance for freedom would be gone forever once it had been discovered. A mass exodus ensued and imps surged forth into Ganedan, the land of freedom.
The group that had confronted the gnomish trade expedition were only a small representative fraction of those who had escaped. Most remained hidden in the rocky Sorrowlands. Azik explained to the gnomes that little time remained. The portal had already been discovered and a full-scale invasion by their former masters was on its way.
Festivities in Larocia were cut short with the calling of a special meeting in the gnomish republic for representatives from all the recognized nations. The elected Voices of the time, Voice Ilkmarrin and Voice Fetterwill, presented Azik Longtooth to the assembly and allowed him the opportunity to speak. When Azik had finished, the leaders of the recognized nations could not understand how such a thing was possible, but Azik assured them that advanced troops had already slipped through and it would only be a matter of time before the Nadirak insurgence began in full.
Nadirak War Fiend
Seeing no other way to withstand an invasion on the scale that the imps had described, the various leaders made an impromptu alliance pact against their common enemy. Discussions about how to go about administering this alliance were yet to follow, but certain large issues had been unilaterally agreed upon early in the day. In exchange for as much intelligence as they could provide about their former masters, the imps were granted an area of land that had long been under dispute between the humans and cyclops. The Noctrian Peninsula became home to the displaced imp people and a small, established nation unto itself.
- Kitterwen, Chief Historian of Ignilly University |
