Age of Emancipation
The recent history of Acarn was dominated by a conflict between two large nations: the Tasnican Republic and the Thamassan Empire. At the zenith of their power, these two nations controlled almost every habitable regions of Acarn. Each of these nations grew out of a single city state that came to dominate all of their respective neighbours. While both nations were in competition for centuries, they did share one common core tenet: wiping out any form of organized worship. This was not borne of some ideological notion but a very practical one. Religions, and their gods, were the dominant social, political and military construct of what Acarn historian refer now to as the Age of Gods.
Kings and Queens alike were beholden to the Clerics thanks to the magic granted to them by their deity. As secular magic developed, the Clerics feared for their own power and banned all non-religious magic and violently repressed their practitioners. However, that approach proved futile. Numerous nobles allied with secular spellcasters to break free of the Clerics. Over the next couple of centuries, the power of the various churches weakened considerably, which actually affected the strength of the gods themselves.
No gods, no kings
In the year 2652, a cabal of Mages formally took power in the city state of Tasnica. The magic of the Mages was well beyond that of any wizard, sorcerer or cleric. They actually claimed to be a race distinct from humans, though their physical appearance did not differ much (*more later*).
The neighbouring city states did not take kindly to this new political entity. The fact that the Mages bowed to no god or king made them enemies of both church and state. However, over the next three centuries, the Tasnican Republic gradually took over all the plateau areas of over half the Acarn continent.
Meanwhile, in the northern half of Acarn, different forces, eventually coalescing into the Thamasan Empire, were overthrowing kings and churches at about the same pace. In fact, the weakening of a cult’s deity anywhere, by destroying temples, killing clerics or simply preventing worship, sapped the power of the deity themselves, thus weakening their clerics further and perpetuating the cycle.
Acarn historians refer to these three centuries as the Age of Heathens or the Age of Emancipation, depending on their political views. However, it should be stressed that this was not a continuous war but rather a succession of several dozen conflicts, not all related to the struggle between secular and religious forces, interspaced with years of peace and with multiple examples of unlikely alliances that counter the historical narrative established after the fact. Regardless, at the end of that historical period, all cults and most of their deity themselves were either exterminated or driven into obscurity and irrelevance. The fall of the last Elven city, Kerebalia , in the year 2962, is generally considered the event that marks the end of the Age of Emancipation.
Collateral
This series of conflicts also saw several victim of collateral damage, most notably the Elves and the Dwarves. Both of the elder races had several powerful kingdoms, with strong military and magic that rivaled any of the younger upstarts, with one exception. Each of the elder kingdoms fell for different reasons: alliance with the losing side, betrayal by the winning side, a hungry neighbour... Two systemic factors ultimately led to the downfall of all the Dwarven and Elvish kingdoms: demographics and isolationism. Both races had low fertility rates which did not allow them to keep up with three centuries of wars. The Elves in particular, won most of their battles but were still defeated by attrition.
Both elder races were also very proud and looked down on the younger races. The Dwarves in particular, with their long held grudges and unforgiving culture, racked up the enemies as their own numbers dwindled.
A few nomadic tribes of Elves remain to this day, though they are scattered and strategically weak. The few remaining Dwarven clans have, reluctantly integrated into cosmopolitan cities but no settlement larger than a couple hundred claims to be purely “Dwarven”. Individuals or even small groups of each race can be found striking out on their own, generally in larger cities where they are better tolerated.
A third factor is to be blamed for the fall of the Elder races: new forms and applications of magic. While both races had well developed understanding of magic, they failed to embrace the arcane modernization that the Republic, and, to a lesser extent the Empire, were going through. Moreover, the Mages’ innate spellcasting abilities were simply beyond what Elven spellcasters could muster.
Calm before the storm
The Empire and the Republic reached their apex within the same decade, 2960 to 2969. No large scale military engagement occurred for almost a decade. Both nations consolidated their political structures, asserted control over their numerous colonies, vassal states and protectorates. Within and between both nations, trade flourished and fortunes were amassed. Trust, however was never established between their respective governments.
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