Primer to Anwar Dûn (ahn-wahr doon)

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The Age of Dominion

Over the period of four thousand years, three mighty empires arose to prominence among the scattered kingdoms and spanned the walking world of Anwar Dûn; Novorzhev, a rough, mountainous land under the iron rule of a council of chromatic dragons, Barwa Nimba, a vast area spanning swamps and desert where the sinister Naga were worshiped, and Dravaglot, a realm of wide, open spaces and high peaks under the debaucherous control of the Aerials. A fourth mighty empire, the aquatic En-mari, ruled the oceans and held several island areas near the other three empires.
These empires rose to prominence over the ages by subjugating the smaller kingdoms of Humans, Halflings, Elves, Goblins, Orcs, and Ratfolk. Only the Dwarves were truly able to withstand their assimilation, sealing themselves away within their mountain holds. While each empire ruled over their vassals in their own way, none of the nations were benevolent to those of the smaller kingdoms they saw as below them. In response, resistances grew within each empire, eventually leading to the three empires forming a coalition to assist each other in the ruination of these internal uprisings.

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In the draconic nation of Novorzhev, chromatic dragons held all positions of power or leadership, with the Kobolds acting as their voice among the people. Over time, the dragons allowed both the Elves and the Catfolk to represent the non-draconic peoples of Novorzhev at the Pentalon Confederation, but it was a purely performative gesture.
At first, the Elves and Catfolk had essentially no power, but the Elves proved themselves invaluable with their networks of quick and efficient communication among their peoples spread throughout the world, gaining them the begrudging respect of the dragons. Eventually, the Elves stood on nearly even footing with the Kobolds, who stood only below their dragon masters. The Catfolk, ever intent on changing the status quo, took to using their little influence to protect the peoples of Novorzhev from the vile machinations of the Confederation but had to act in secret so as not to lose their position of privilege, and thus their ability to engineer change. Novorzhev eventually would break apart when the chromatic dragons came to an insurmountable impasse, leading the Pentalon Confederation to its demise.

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Barwa Nimba, known as the Sunlight Empire, was ruled by the wicked Naga, with Lizardfolk and Nagaji filling out the ranks of their legions. The Naga ruled in lockstep, as long ago they presented themselves as godlike beings to their people who would devoutly worship them until the empire began taking over warmblood kingdoms. As more warm-blooded humanoids became part of the Barwa Nimba culture, and the Naga directed incessant cruelties toward them, a schism began within Naga leadership. Some

Naga believed their path forward was not through the subjugation of others but instead the full acceptance of the warmbloods into their society.
This splinter faction would eventually become known as the guardian Naga. At first, the words of the guardian Naga fell upon the uncaring ears of those who would become known as dark Naga, but over time the idea of assimilation began to take hold among some of the astrological seers of the Lizardfolk who read the stars in support of the guardian Naga. This would eventually lead to a civil war that would shatter the Sunlight Empire, splitting it between the dark Naga-supported Nagaji and the Lizardfolk who broke fully from their Naga overlords. The guardian Naga would not remain unified, instead, they set out to find new homes among the peoples of Anwar Dûn or laid claim to ancient sites of power to protect.

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Open plains and jutting karsts dominate much of the land that belonged to the avians of the Dravaglot Domain. Shisk, Strix, and Tengu were once one ancestry, known as Aerials, they comprised the upper caste of Dravaglot, with other, flightless humanoids falling below them in a caste system in constant flux, other than the Aerials who were ever on top. Debauchery and excess ran rampant through the realm, with the Aerials using their non-avian peoples as little more than a means to their own ends to be used in the pursuits of their ever-deepening depravity. As time passed, and the empire stopped expanding, Tieflings began appearing in alarming regularity among the Aerial newborns. At first, panic spread among the Aerials, and they did everything they could to keep this fiendish influence hidden from the lower castes, but, as the years wore on, more Aerials warmed to the idea and began to see the Tieflings as chosen among their people. This change of path would lead to the widespread practice of occult magics among the Aerials and their wingless peoples, and eventually the calling forth of devils and demons who would wreak unholy havoc among the Dravaglot Domain.

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When the rebellions began to show coordination, an alliance between the three empires was struck, but it would be at a heavy cost for the Elven people. Determining a message needed to be sent to the people of Anwar Dûn, the leaders of the alliance struck a deal. Spies from both Dravaglot and Barwa Nimba had determined that it was the Elves who were the key to communication between rebellions across the empire, and so a show of force would be necessary to cease any further uprisings. The dragons of Novorzhev, faced with evidence from both their newly allied nations, agreed to remove the Elves from their position of power within their borders. The green dragon Rezoldales, known as The Conjurer, proposed each empire handle the Elves their own way and was the architect of the Novorzhev Elves punishment.

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In Dravaglot, every Elf over the age of one hundred years was thrown from the highest spires of the many karsts that covered the Aerial lands. In the territories they’d taken away from the karsts of the Dravaglot homelands, Elves were physically flown into the sky by their avian lords and unceremoniously released from great heights. Others seemed to simply disappear, likely stolen in the night for sacrifices to fiendish rituals, but some may have escaped into the woodlands to hide. The children of those executed were forced to be chattel to ranking families among the Aerial, and left to the vices of demon, daemon, and devil worshippers behind closed doors.
Elves in Barwa Nimba suffered a different punishment. Instead of executing the Elven insurgents, the military of the Naga rounded up the Elves and forced them into caged encampments. There, the Elves endured brutal treatment. Beatings and rapes were routine, murders only slightly less so. And that’s merely what the Elves, starved and weather-beaten, left purposeless, overcrowded, and forced to stay outdoors with insufficient food and shelter, did to one another. The coldblooded corps that made up the Barwa Nimba military saw the Elves under their charge simply as a source of sustenance.

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But it was in Novorzhev where the punishment of the Elves was designed to be enduring. The Elves of Novorzhev did not merely live among the other peoples of the empire, they were active agents in the tyrannical abuses heaped upon the various ancestries under their ‘protection.’ The dragons, without consulting the council, stripped the Elves of their status and wealth before casting them from their graces and declaring them “Unseen.” By the laws of Novorzhev, anyone declared Unseen was no longer recognized by the Novorzhev government, thus, the laws of Novorzhev did not apply to them, nor protect them. This left the (Rezoldales the Conjurer) once abusers powerless against any retaliation by their victims.

While not as violent as the responses of the other empires(there was violence, only not as widespread), the Elves of Novorzhev became ghosts of themselves; Elves were nothing more than beings that existed to suffer at the wanton whims of their fellow citizens without any legal forms of repercussion. Nor were the Unseen allowed to leave the boundaries of the empire. They were trapped to live out their achingly long lifespans as shunned pariahs given no peace or kindness.
As a result of the Elves' fall from draconic grace, the Catfolk were able to free a new people to the world. The Catfolk had long suspected the Elves of enacting perverse experiments on Goblins during the heights of Novorzhev power, but it wasn’t until the Elves were cast down that they were able to locate the secret prison/training ground of the Hobgoblins hidden away in the Darklands. Through eldritch and arcane rituals, the Elves had changed Goblins into a new form; hardier and more intellectually capable than the average Goblin, the Hobgoblins had been secretly turned into a private army intended to be loyal only to the Novorzhev Elves.
When the Catfolk brought their evidence to the council, it was met with varying response.
Initially, the red dragons, having developed the closest relationship with the Elves, refused to believe the Catfolk, accusing the Catfolk of treachery toward their Elven comrades, and wanted only to burn the goblinoid “abominations” to ashes, but the rest of the Confederation held differing opinions. The blue dragons, being inherent conspiracists, immediately needed to control this unknown variable and bade the red dragons to hold their fury. Tyrants by nature, the black dragons welcomed the Hobgoblins with fervor, knowing they could shape them into a lethal weapon. The white dragons, known for being the most brutish of the chromatic dragonkin but also the most united, unanimously followed their queen, the Immortal Rimebreath, who remained neutral to the Hobgoblins. The green dragons saw the Hobgoblins for what they were: organized, diligent, prepared; a twisted reflection of the green dragons themselves. They incorporated the newly “freed” Hobgoblins into their armies. With three for, one against, and one impartial, the Hobgoblins were formally brought into the Novorzhev Empire. From that point on, the red dragons refused to take to the field of battle if they’d be fighting alongside Catfolk or Hobgoblins.

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The natatorial empire of the En-mari held their secrets close, with the three land empires having little to no understanding of the sheer magnitude of the underwater sovereignty that spread across the entire sea floor, until they rose from the depths in a synchronized, worldwide assault on the peoples of ‘The Parched World’ in response to the coalition formed by the three empires. Coordinated assaults led by the Azarketi alongside their Merfolk and Aquatic Elf allies weakened initial defenses, but they brought with them all types of creatures of the water world. Bronze, sea, and brine dragons struck the strongholds of black and green dragons; elementals of water, ice, and mist flooded lowland armies; Undine living among the peoples of the three empires assassinated key political figures; and in some places it’s said the drowned dead rose to the call of battle. Sea Devils took advantage of the chaos, enacting their own designs knowing the blame would fall upon the En-mari, while Boggard swampseers, sensing the chaos of worldwide war, raided ad nauseam to fuel their sacrifices. There are even tales of schools of kraken sinking entire Novorzhev fleets, flocks of Tidehawks harrying the skies of Dravaglot, and a Water Yai storming Ophidiarium, the capital city of Barwa Nimba.
The En-mari strike was swift, catching the imperial coalition off guard as they were formally settling into Barvorzglot, a two-hundred level fortress citadel of glittering spires built into and upon a lone, spindly mountain. The absurdly extravagant monument, a metropolis that would hold a million people and took forty-two years and the lives of untold slaves, was to be the fortress from which the coalition would jointly put down any and all resistance by the peoples of Anwar Dûn.
The completion of what became known as “The City” brought large contingents of each nation’s armies away from the seas, and the inquisitions seeking conspirators forced much of the martial arm of each empire to deal with internal issues within their individual borders. This left only barebones forces to guard the coasts and port cities of the empires, allowing the armies of the depths to steamroll their way into a sizable footprint of land. Before their assault, the En-mari had a handful of small islands under their control, with only cursory contact with the governments of the individual empires. Once the initial assault was completed, the En-mari controlled nearly fifty percent of the Barwa Nimba coastline, including having pressed straight through Madman’s Marsh to the gates of Ophidiarium.

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(Anwar Dûn at the end of the En-mari Empire’s initial strike)

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While the En-mari’s greatest gain was in Barwa Nimba due to its density of marshes and lengthy coastlines, they were barely able to gain a foothold on their eastern holdings due to the sheer enormity of the desert known as the Infinite Emptiness. In Dravaglot, the En-mari faced the greatest resistance due to their defense forces being heavily airborne. Despite the adversity, the En-mari were able to take a key stronghold from the Aerials. The fighting was fiercest in Novorzhev, where the bulk of the En-mari dragons clashed with their chromatic kin of the Confederation. Casualties mounted quickly on both sides, but the En-mari had no true intent to assault the Novorzhev capital, it was a diversion that allowed the vast bulk of their army to secretly traverse under the Moonsickle Sea and threaten the newly built Barvorzglot.
The forces of the imperial coalition stationed in and around Barvorzglot marched forth to face the mightiest army of the En-mari on the Thrall’s Blood Plains, east of the mountainous stronghold. When the two forces met, the armies of the coalition attempted to parlay with the leaders of the En-mari force. Their emissaries were returned with their tongues cut out and permanently deafened, with only one left to speak. His words: “We return your envoys without the ability to continue to hear or spread your lies. Your meager fiefdoms shall drown in their own blood.” The four empires prepared for what would likely be the fiercest (Quoratwitwi) battle of the entire conflict.

At dawn the next morning, when the first rays of sunlight broke, the coalition forces were fully set to face their aquatic enemies, but as light spread across the plains the armies of their enemy were nowhere to be found. It wasn’t as if it was an illusion; evidence of their encampment was abundant. The En-mari legion was simply gone.
(Xin-Tashi) The story was the same across all the lands of Anwar Dûn. At sunset the previous evening, En-mari forces were active in the areas they’d claimed,

but upon sunrise each and every one of them had vanished. As swiftly as they’d struck, they had seemingly just as swiftly returned to the ocean depths. The leadership of the three empires were baffled by the unexpected turn of events but decided to take advantage of the sudden turn in their favor.
Xin-Tashi, one of the dark Naga overlords, noted the rebel factions had been making headway while the empires scrambled to respond to the En-mari attack, but with the threat suddenly gone many rebel factions had overextended and left themselves vulnerable. Quoratwitwi, the Dravaglot spymaster, fully under the fiendish sway of a maharaja rakshasa, deceived the imperial leaders and offered Barvorzglot as the center of rebellious coordination. The empires, having fallen for the devious scheme of the maharaja, turned their inquisitors loose on The City with the full might of their assembled militaries behind them.

Neverdawn

Inquisitions swept through the streets of every level of the colossal sprawling fortress. The results were beyond horrendous. That night, hundreds of thousands died at the hands of overzealous inquisitors, many of whom, if not the majority, were innocent of any crimes at all. That night, so much innocent blood was spilled that come sunrise, when the butchers raised their eyes to the east, they were met only with darkness. Anxiously they waited, many still bathed in the blood of their own kin, but it was to no avail. The sun never rose.
For thirty days the sun did not rise. An unending darkness settled over Anwar Dûn. Crops withered and died. Animals disappeared into out of season hibernations or began acting erratically. The empires themselves descended into chaos. Millions starved or froze to death. Everything the world had known came crashing down.
Deep within the mountains, creatures of elemental earth and fire, stoked by the greed of the shaitan and efreeti, assaulted the fortresses of the Dwarves. The unrelenting elemental incursion forced the Dwarves from their strongholds and either into the dangerous depths of the Darklands or onto the surface. Portals to the Abyss suddenly opened throughout Anwar Dûn, with the lion’s share opening in Dravaglot. Creatures of nightmare beyond description were seen stalking the wilds of Barwa Nimba’s forests and swamps, while even the stars themselves seemed to assail Anwar Dûn. Leviathan structures of black stone fell from the skies in columns of golden flame before embedding themselves in the Infinite Emptiness and searing the sand around them black as the Neverdawn.
Rifts in reality left refugees of an alien realm, the First World, stranded among the chaos of Neverdawn, leaving Gnomes, Leshy, Sprites, and Vanara scrambling to hide in their new, unknown and terrifying surroundings. The oceans became untraversable due to unending storms and waking sea monsters. Under the cover of only moonlit darkness, tribes of Anadi and Ghoran emerged from their hidden nature sanctuaries, and the undead slowly congregated upon the barren wastes of the Accursed Demense, toiling hour after hour, day after day, digging into the earth beneath them.
The dragons of the Pentalon Confederation turned upon each other, their armies clashing, weakening one another until the blue and black dragons each retreated separately, abandoning much of their armies to take up residence elsewhere on Anwar Dûn. While the red dragons held the heart of their territory and the Novorzhev capital, the white and green dragons were able to maintain their alliance and together lead their armies southward to the Patina Peaks, a mountainrange in the southeastern portion of Novorzhev, where they established the nation of Aestalon.
After thirty days, the sun returned and those who’d survived rejoiced at the sight, yet the wielders of arcane magics wept with despair. The light may have returned but their connection to the arcane had been severed.

The Age of Absence Arcana

At the end of Neverdawn, upon the sun’s reascension, Anwar Dûn’s connection to arcane magic was lost. How and why this happened is unknown to this day. There are many theories, but the most widely believed is that the sun itself is an arcane object of immense power, and when it went dark it was slowly absorbing the arcane magic of Anwar Dûn itself.

No matter how or why, the world was intrinsically changed. Sorcerers of imperial and dragon heritages suddenly lost part of their very essence. Many took their own lives in response. Bards throughout the lands were unable to inspire art, creativity, and love in the masses, leading to an overall malaise hanging over the peoples of Anwar Dûn. Magi, often employed as monster hunters across the realms, were suddenly caught with only half their defenses available to them. Many died or were grievously wounded to the point of forced retirement. Arcane Summoners found themselves devoid of magic and suddenly alone; with their connection to their Eidolons severed, many were left with an emptiness they would attempt to fill by turning themselves over to the likes of hags and spirits of the natural order in desperate hopes they could fill their magical voids. Wizards across the world found their magic tomes bereft of their meticulously collected incantations, rendering their spellbooks into little more than catastrophes of blank parchment.

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Many of those who ruled prior to Neverdawn did so wielding arcane magics. In Dravaglot, occult spellcasters were far more common than their arcane counterparts, leaving the Avian society less affected than it’s neighbors. During Neverdawn, however, the fiendish presence within Dravaglot swelled, resulting in the overthrow of the Aerials by the malevolent beings they’d mistakenly viewed as nothing more than tools. While the loss of arcane magic was certainly a blow to the Aerials, it's availability would not have altered the final outcome. While fiends capable of flight existed in Dravaglot, there weren’t enough to capture all of the Aerials, leaving some able to escape, fleeing to the farthest lands they could to escape the hellforged wrath tearing through their homeland. Unlike their brethren who remained under the infernal yoke of the fiends, those who escaped Dravaglot still resemble the ancient Aerials and are today known as Strix.
A sect of hedonistic Aerials had become obsessed with the art of metalcraft. These avians, today known as the Tengu, were forced to forge weapons for fiendish forces inhabiting Dravaglot. To assure the continued “service” of the Tengu, these chosen avians were dewinged, their ability to fly stripped from them. While the vast majority of Tengu remain groundbound today, some have begun to evolve the capablity of flight once more.
A small group of Aerials were able to remain unbound by fiendish influence. These nocturnal avians operated as the Dravaglot defense at night, their darkvision making them a natural fit. During Neverdawn, despite their considered expertise in darkness, they chose to retreat underground, forsaking their flight for the defensibility of caves. Over time, the avians were harried deeper underground. Wave after wave of hellish entities assailed their retreat, but, eventually, the fiendish attacks slowed to periodic raids before stopping altogether. It seemed the hellish forces had lost interest in further pursuing the escaped avians into the unknowns of the Darklands while easier victims remained above. These resettled avians became known as the Shisk, taking sanctuary within the Darklands and making it their home. For centuries they disappeared from the world, eventually losing their ability to fly, but in exchange evolved defensive quills that would help protect them from the predators of the deep darks.

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Barwa Nimba had arcane magic users among them, but they weren’t integral to the function of Naga society. Primal and occult magics were both abundantly in use by the Naga, but the arcane crafts never truly took hold throughout most of the empire. As such, the Age of Arcane Absence’s impact on the Sunlight Empire was mostly minimal. The only major effect to Barwa Nimba was in the eastern lands of the empire, at the center of the network of waypoints hidden by the Naga in the dunes of the Infinite Emptiness. It was there the Naga imprisoned one-hundred captured Marid and, using arcane bindings they’d learned from the Novorzhev Elves, forced the Marid to open magical waterways connected to the elemental plane of water. They directed the conjured waters into a city of aqueducts carved inside of a two mile wide deposit of jasper. Serpentarium, or Bloodstone as it’s known to the Ratfolk, was the sole city in the empire engineered through arcane magics.

The night before the sun rose at the end of Neverdawn, the Ratfolk who made up nearly the entirety of the non-reptilian population escaped into the night. As the story goes, that night the reptilian ancestries were celebrating their Naga gods for their protection during the Neverdawn. One by one, as the festivities wained into the early hours, all the Nagaji and Lizardfolk of Serpentarium fell under into an enchanted slumber. The rodentia of the city took advantage of the moment, gathering meager belongings before scurrying into the dunes. When the Naga and their remaining devotees greeted the new dawn, the bindings of the one-hundred Marid failed. The enraged genie widened their portals to the Endless Sea and drowned Bloodstone's remaining inhabitants.

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Locked away for centuries, the Dwarves found themselves with plenty of time to devote to the arcane studies, and with occult studies forbidden in their society many powerful Wizards graced their halls. The Dwarven people, safe within their holds and isolated from other humanoids, had begun to rely heavily on their arcane magics, including their armies. Many of their soldiers wielded magical arms or wore enchanted armor, and, locked away with only their training regimens and few true battles to keep them in fighting condition, many of the Dwarven warriors leaned too heavily on their martial invocations and allowed their physical conditioning to worsen.
When the primal elements rose against them during Neverdawn, the Dwarven defenses held, as was to be expected. But when the sun returned, and their enchantments disappeared, all of the Dwarven strongholds fell save one, Steadfast Shieldhall. The lands under the sun, already overwhelmed with their own difficulties, were abruptly flooded with Dwarven refugees, further straining food shortages as the world tried to recover from the loss of crops during Neverdawn.

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In Novorzhev, arcane magics were commonly used to enforce their merciless laws. When the connection to the arcane was broken, Novorzhev disciplinarians found themselves unable to keep their charges under rule. Uprisings ensued, but many disciplinarians were able to lock themselves within their keeps believing their dragon lords would put an end to the rebellions. If they could hold out long enough, they’d have nothing to worry about. But the dragons never come to their aid. Larger, more coordinated uprisings sprang up across Novorzhev, fueled further by the dragons absence. The council, now only the Kobolds and Catfolk, wasin disagreement. The Catfolk believed it time to hand the government over to the people; the Kobolds refused to give up their position of power.
Many of the Catfolk relocated, settling in the northwestern region of old Novorzhev, establishing a culture whose core tenet was to remain free from the rule of those claiming any form of rule without the voice of the people. This became Riakhou, a land where ancestral prejudice is expected to be left at the border, and all must be willing to fight against monstrous domination.
The Kobolds, on the other hand, chose to consolidate their numbers within the old Novorzhev capital, Torrogezh, the Ossein Citadel. A fortress of sharp protrusions with no ground level entrances, Torrogezh got it’s moniker from the habit of their former dragon rulers to meet out executions by impaling the sentenced on Torrogezh’s spiked architecture. They never removed those bodies, leaving the organs to the vultures and the flesh to rot. Eventually, only pieces of skeleton would remain. Over centuries of draconic rule, the citadel had become so adorned with bones it was easy from a distance to mistake it as being built fully of bone. The Kobold denizens of Torrogezh were more than happy to continue their draconic masters tradition.

Although the sun returned to Novorzhev, the iron claw of the Pentalon Confederation, the chromatic dragons, did not. When the Age of Arcane Absence began, all the dragons of Anwar Dûn found themselves without the arcane power that fueled them. Chromatic dragons, like all dragons, are tied to the elemental arcane energies that they expel as breathweapons. In this sudden moment of weakness, the dragons succumbed to what is now known as ‘Canticum Draconai,’ or in the common tongue, ‘Dragon’s Song.’ The dragons of Anwar Dûn took flight, finding themselves pulled south over the lands of the Sunlight Empire and out further still, past the waters of the Jagged Shallows into the uncharted claret mists beyond.

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The void of arcane magic created political upheaval in every corner of Anwar Dûn. Over the next eight hundred years, kingdoms would rise and fall but none made significant historical impact. What were once three mighty empires and collective home to thirty-three million souls were now a mere million descendants. It wasn’t until the summer solstice of 822 AN(After Neverdawn, and BN - Before Neverdawn: the convention of time widely used across Anwar Dûn) that the void of arcane magic would be filled. On the 20th day of what is now known as Sarenith, with the sun at its peak, the people of Anwar Dûn had their first contact with a divine being.

(the goddess Saranrae)

The Dawnflower, Saranrae, deity of the sun, spoke to all who felt her light on their skin and set in motion a new dawn for Anwar Dûn. Today, in places that venerate the Everlight, the summer solstice is commemorated with the Sunwrought Festival.

The Divine Spark

(alternatively, the Age of Renaissance)

There are no records of the nations that existed prior to the empires, presumably having been destroyed by imperial forces over time, so there is no confirmation of whether or not Anwar Dûn was ever home to true divinity prior to the Age of Arcane Absence. What is indisputable, however, is the impact of Saranrae’s arrival.
When the Everlight arrived she brought with her several companions: Abadar, the Gold-Fisted, deity of civilization; Cayden Cailean, the Drunken God, deity of bravery; Erastil, Elk Father, deity of abundance; and Torag, the Forgefire, deity of creation. Known as the Quintet pantheon, these five deities blessed those who would have them, finding worship easily among those most worn by the world.
The Quintet’s divine acceptance created a ripple in the universe, attracting the attention of other deities in the void. Zon-Kuthon, Midnight Lord; Urgathoa, Pallid Princess; Rovagug, the Worldbreaker; Norgorber, King of Thieves; Lahmashtu, Grandmother Nightmare; all deities of malevolence and destruction, were drawn to Anwar Dûn in cosmic balance. With their arrival, Asmodeus, Lord of the Pit, was awoken and began his war to return Hell to order.
As always is with divine order, beings of neutrality also ascended to worship during the Divine Spark. Calistria, the Unquenchable Fire; Gorum, Our Lord in Iron; Gozreh, The Wind and the Waves; Irori, the Enlightened One; Nethys, the All-Seeing-Eye; and Pharasma, Lady of Graves; each represented a variety of points between the axises of Law and Chaos, and Good and Evil. In time, other good deities would find their way to answer the peoples of Anwar Dûn’s prayers. Desna, the Great Dreamer; Iomedae, Lady of Valor; and Shelyn, the Eternal Rose; these three rounded out the deities that appeared during the Divine Spark.
The arrival of true deities to Anwar Dûn spelled the end for the Naga empire. Upon feeling the touch of genuine divinity, the peoples oppressed under the Naga’s theocratic reign rose up against their divine impersonators. The Lizardfolk, already influenced by the guardian Naga, split from the dark Naga and joined the rebels. Many of the Nagaji, unknown to any but the most loyal Nagaji, remained under a powerful geas and steadfastly defended their masters. Under the sullen direction of the guardian Naga, the rebels were able to access and destroy many of the Naga’s hatcheries. The remaining dark Naga, fearing their lives, fled to the four corners of the continent, inserting themselves and their loyal Nagaji into other societies. Nagaji who remained found their geas broken, but their empire beyond repair.

Once more, under the direction of Clerics and Champions of the Quintet, a semblance of order began to return to the harsh realities of Anwar Dûn. Villages grew into towns, and towns would become cities. Initially, only individual city-states were able to establish political clout, but, as more of the wilds were brought back under the sway of progress, nations began to take hold. And from those nations, a few would stand till modern day, creating new technologies and ideologies that would alter the course of the world.
While divine prominence is credited for the return to civilization by many peoples of Anwar Dûn, there are those that forsake these and all other deities, referring to themselves as the Autonomous. Instead of giving all credit for the advancement of societies to the divine beings that now sometimes walked among them, the Autonomous believed that Anwar Dûn was already on the path of progress due to the grit and determination of it’s people. In their minds, these deities were simply in the right place at the right time and at best merely riding the coattails of the weathered survivors of a suffering filled past; and at worst had waited to “grace” Anwar Dûn until they knew they could quickly amass large throngs of worshippers. Many who would become known as Inventors and Alchemists, as well as others of lesser fame, found themselves among the Autonomous and are credited for many of Anwar Dûn’s technological advancements. The highest concentration of the Autonomous can be found in Aestalon and Barwa Nimba today, with other small guilds usually operating out of rural communities.
From the remnants of Novorzhev arose:

• Aestalon - established by remnants of the white/green dragon alliance, they appoint their rulers, known as Conductors, purely based on intellectual ability and live within a logic based legal system meant to remove emotion from government, it was here the first firearms were created, the Crystal Lighthouse of Nethys is located here
• Novorzhev - a loose federation of tribal societies of varying levels of technology, they consider themselves to be the spirit of old Novorzhev, each tribe appoints an Emissary(how is up to each individual tribe but it must always be a magic wielder) to represent their interests at the Ossein Citadel, worship of the dark gods is fully accepted here
• Riakhou - a self-proclaimed stronghold of freedom, the largest temple to Saranrae is located here, largest mix of ancestry population of any of the nations, each person has a vote within their town/city, all votes are held in public, no central military, instead every citizen is trained for combat and is expected to stand alongside their neighbor, but any who turn upon their neighbor is expelled

Barwa Nimba found itself split into:

• Boda - Lizardfolk heavy feudal timocracy focused on honor, heavily interested in reclaiming Ophidiarium, kingdom of essentially benevolent feudal landbarons, the Lizardfolk have given roughly half the territory they control to land owners of other ancestries, Desna is heavily worshipped here, if a Bodabaron is found guilty of intentionally harming their charges they are deposed by the other Bodabarons and replaced by vote of the people of the former barony
• Barwa Nimba - Nagaji heavy society ruled by elders, they outlawed all religions in response to their experiences with the Naga, elders are considered sacred and to harm one is a death sentence, a focus on self improvement has led to the construction of golden monasteries all across their lands

Dravaglot became:

• Glothloth - council of merchant lords, the merchants live like kings and wield the threat of the pressing wilds like a hammer against their superstitious people, much of the debauchery that brought down Dravaglot can still be found in Glothloth, nearly any vice can be found for a price, worship of Calistria and Cayden Cailean are most common here, and while Tieflings are welcome practice of the occult is outlawed
• Katetzu - military appointed judges rule by oral legal tradition, once appointed, a judge holds their position for life and is not beholden to the law, all judges are Druids, the society does it’s best to try to live in harmony with the natural world, there have been judges who have abused their power but the majority were well vetted prior to their appointments
• Drava’i - a land of hellish tyranny controlled by fiends, worship of Asmodeus is the only sanctioned religion within their borders, they are seen as a necessary evil due to their being a buffer between the abominations that roam the ruins of Dravaglot and the rest of Anwar Dûn

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(Anwar Dûn, current day)

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Recent History

The current year is 1322 AN, five hundred years have passed since Saranrae’s arrival. Few among the nations and tribes of Anwar Dûn other than the eldest Elves can recall a time before the influence of the divine orders. Today, twenty known deities are worshipped among the nations, but whispers of untold numbers of unidentified deities exist at the edges of civilization. Some nations continue to expand in an effort to take back the wilderness, others have grown content with their place and have fortified their borders, while the emergence, and disappearance, of new colonies with the hope of self governance has become more frequent.
In 1274 AN, on the night of 21 Kuthona, the sun set for it’s normal three nights of darkness. At midnight, on 22 Kuthona, in the desert of the Infinite (active monolith) Emptiness, the

monoliths that fell from the sky during Neverdawn began to vibrate. At first, each vibrated at its own speed, creating a cacophony of humming that could be heard for a hundred miles beyond the edges of the stone structures before settling into a syncronous rhythm, all coalescing into a single tone. Unverified witnesses say they saw the great black structures become lined with intricate runes that washed the cloudy the night sky in golden light. They supposedly remained that way for exactly 11 hours, 22 minutes, and 33 seconds before inexplicably returning to their inert states.
No matter the truth behind the story of exactly what happened that night, the effects of the monoliths activation would be felt across Anwar Dûn. Ancient, long forgotten tomes found arcane scripts appearing upon their once blank pages. Unprepared Sorcerers were suddenly appearing, many losing control of the arcane magics suddenly flowing through them and causing great damage. A mercenary fraternity known as the Union, having protected texts passed down to them from ancient Magi, found themselves suddenly thrust into the stagelight of politics as their services were wanted nearly everywhere. Other arcane powers blossomed across the world, and at 11:22:33 am on 22 Kuthona 1274 AN, the people of Barwa Nimba reported the near noon sky darkening as if an eclipse. In the sky flew hundreds of dragons. They flew as a single dragon flight, chromatic, metallic, and representatives of all the other dragon differentiations, above the slender tower monasteries dotting the land, momentarily blocking out the sun before dispersing across the world.

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Arcane magic had returned to Anwar Dûn. And with it came dragons.

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The majority of the dragons sought homes far from the humanoid civilizations of the world, instead preferring lairs in distant mountaintops, caverns secreted below the seas, or retreating into the deepest, darkest parts of the forests. Others chose to interact with the young nations of the world. In new Novorzhev, the return of four red dragons was met with a celebration of returning heroes, the dragon wing facing no resistance to their presence and claim of rule. Aestalon saw the return of familiar, but long-forgotten, wyrms; the Immortal Rimebreath and her mate Rezoldales. They chose a ‘talons-off’ approach to ruling the technological nerve center of the world, only interacting with the people of Aestalon when they do not leave enough tribute for the draconic duo.

New Barwa Nimba was the “benefactor” of the arrival of Larzos Elderteeth, a blue dragon that “asked” to be part of their council of elders. In the face of such a threat, they agreed, but only once they’d gotten Larzos to agree to their voice counting as only equal to that of any other elder. The blue dragon agreed, believing it would be easy to manipulate control from the elders, but their agreement allowed the council to vote in a second new member, Legathadi the Glorious, a brass dragon that only decided to ally itself with Barwa Nimba intent on countering Larzos’ schemes. Not out of any sense of honor, Legathadi simply enjoys infuriating the blue dragon.
For the first time in recorded Anwar Dûn history, metallic dragons held comparable numbers to their chromatic cousins. It’s said that prior to the formation of the Pentalon Confederation, their numbers may have been closer to balanced, but once the chromatic dragons united they used their combined strength to hunt down their often solo and isolated cousins, at one point bringing the metallic dragons to near extinction. The return of arcane magic brought the return of entire flights of each of the metallic breeds, and while most settled in remote areas, several metallic dragons other than Legathadi come into semi-regular contact with the humanoid world.

• Belzhukur, the Riddle Prince - a mirthful copper dragon that has taken up residence in Dribury Dense, a Veilborne pine forest community south of the ruins of The City. Belzhukur has become incredibly fond of Gnomes thanks to their large community in the Dense and takes great pride in protecting the forest from the monstrosities that sometimes escape The City.

• Symnoldic Sundremid - an aloof bronze dragon living in the hills of the Ghostwail Highland on the eastern side of the Praetorian Arches, a mountainrange separating the highlands from Glothloth. Occasionally seen flying through the skies all along Sarenrae’s Scimitar, the name for the peninsular region encompassing both Katetzu and Glothloth, the brilliant brass dragon seldom interacts with the people of the peninsula. Rumor has it Sundremid takes human form and visits Glothloth once a year to purchase rare books.

• Iadrares the Insurgent - a tenacious silver dragon living hidden within Novorzhev lands. She has created a hidden sanctuary for Kobolds who wish to fight back against their red dragon oppressors, assisting them in every way she can. The new Novorzhev red dragons have offered the title of Draconic Presenter, a reward carrying both wealth and prestige, to anyone who brings them the head of the Insurgent.

Other arcane creatures began to appear around Anwar Dûn. In the north, sitings of gargantuan wingless dragonic creatures have been reported. Throughout the forests of the main continent, fox-fey humanoids known as Kitsune have made their way into Veilborne communities without notice. In the Clockwork Civic, a region of Aestalon under the astute leadership of a respected Hobgoblin inventor, some of the small constructs known as Poppets that tend to the menial tasks of Civic society attained full sentience and set out to explore the world. Unknown to all but the small Veilborne community hidden on the large unnamed island near the eastern region of old Barwa Nimba, an entire city of small rhino-like empaths phased into existence on the southernmost coast. Since the return of arcana, the Veilborne of the island have created an alliance of mutual assistance with their new Kashrishi neighbors. In Boda, three years after the return of black dragons to Madman’s Marsh, a patrol of Goldenscale Knights came across a being of both cosmic energy and plantlife. This was the first recorded encounter with a Conrasu, a being theorized to be pure arcane energy taken physical form. Since that time, only a handful of other encounters have ever been confirmed.

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In Dravaglot, at exactly midnight on 22 Kuthona 1274 AN, a rift of pure magical energy ripped apart reality in the pleasure-palace of the Shiskborn-Tiefling and Dominari, Thasshinsho. This explosion decimated the palace. When the rift closed a short time later, none of the survivors could recall their lives before that night nor what happened at midnight. As the dust settled within the heavily damaged palace, seven humans stood at the center of the destruction. These were the Runelords, powerful Wizards wielding stolen magics that bound their souls in Sin Magic. Without hesitation the seven Runelords set to wresting control of Drava’i from its fiend lords and enthralled the damaged people within the pleasure-palace. Dominari Thasshinsho would be at the front of their army, leading by example. That example: eternally trapped in between a state of life and undeath. The Dominari had been delimbed, her torso and head strapped to a banner and raised at the vanguard of their force. There, she remained on display, alternating between tears, rage, and maniacal laughter as the Runelords spent the next six years driving the fiend lords from the Material Plane or enslaving them through esoteric glyph magics they’d stolen from the beings they were fleeing from when they ripped through reality into Thasshinsho’s palace.
Today, the Runelords have vastly expanded the Drava’i borders, pushing deeper into old Dravaglot. Their magics drew to them the giantkin; ogres, trolls, and cyclops all were rolled into their humanoid armies. They made alliances with Umbral and Underworld dragons to protect their skies. No one knows what the Runelords seek to the north, but their armies continue to fight through the aberrant beings that have claimed Dravaglot’s husk.

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Your character is welcome to be from any of the regions presented within this primer. They may also be from any of the areas on the current political map noted as Veilborne, Subterran, or Grounded. These are general groupings of like minded beings living in smaller communities. Many of them are frontier-like towns or even a grouping of villages, while others are tiny, often isolated communities with little to no contact with the wider world.
Many of these regions are far removed from the settled nations, and little is known about them. If you want to create a unique community from one of the VSG for yourr character to be from, go for it! Work with me and we’ll get it put into the world. Most of the largest VSG areas have defined communities, but the amount of information known about them is relative to how close they are to each individual nation. If you think one of thse areas looks cool and want to be from there, do it! We’ll add some details to your character to tie them to the community there. Below are the common ancestries found in each region:

• Veilborne Communities: Catfolk, Elf, Ghoran, Gnome, Goblin, Grippli, Hobgoblin, Kitsune
• Grounder Communities: Catfolk, Dwarf, Elf, Goblin, Gnoll, Gnome, Halfling, Hobgoblin, Lizardfolk, Nagaji, Orc, Ratfolk, Tengu, Shisk
• Subterran Communites: Dwarf, Elf (Cavern), Goblin, Hobgoblin, Kobold, Orc (Deep), Ratfolk (Deep)

• Drava’i: Dwarf, Goblin, Gnoll, Halfling, Human, Lizardfolk, Orc, Shisk, Strix, Tengu
• Glothloth: Dwarf, Goblin, Halfling, Hobgoblin, Human, Lizardfolk, Orc, Nagaji, Ratfolk, Shisk, Strix, Tengu
• Katetzu: Dwarf, Elf, Ghoran, Gnome, Halfling, Human, Orc, Ratfolk, Shisk, Strix, Tengu

• Riakhou: Catfolk, Dwarf, Elf, Ghoran, Gnome, Goblin, Halfling, Hobgoblin, Human, Lizardfolk, Orc, Nagaji, Ratfolk, Shisk, Strix, Tengu
• Aestalon: Dwarf, Gnoll, Goblin, Human, Hobgoblin, Lizardfolk, Nagaji, Orc, Ratfolk
• Novorzhev: Dwarf (Rock), Elf, Goblin, Human, Kobold, Lizardfolk, Orc, Ratfolk, Shisk

• Boda: Elf, Goblin, Grippli, Halfling, Hobgoblin, Human, Lizardfolk, Nagaji, Orc, Ratfolk, Strix, Vanara, Vishkanya
• Barwa Nimba: Catfolk, Dwarf, Elf, Gnoll, Goblin, Halfling, Hobgoblin, Human, Lizardfolk, Nagaji, Orc, Vanara, Vishkanya