History - the First Great War
The Devastation ended the first great war that was fought thousands of years ago.
There are very few records of the war, or what went before it, as the Devastation was almost complete. It has taken that long for the physical world and its people to recover to the position it is in today.
In the world of that era, magic had not long been discovered. But instead of using its vast power for the wider benefit of all, the discoverers coveted its great power for themselves and saw the opportunity to advance themselves as leaders of the world. So they hid the secrets of their discovery and instead conspired to conquer all around them - this group came to be known as the Circle.
The Circle was successful. The full tale of their rise is too long for the purpose of this record, but, in short, they used their powers to acquire and grow immense wealth, and influence. Over many years they made allies and positioned them across the many nations they coveted. And then they struck - they overthrew nation after nation and over many subsequent years, as their strength grew both conventionally and magically, they built an empire. But they wanted more - nothing other than world domination was enough - and their ambition was only matched by their brutality.
Eventually, opponents formed alliances and began to strike back effectively - the first great war had begun. They made gradual inroads into the Circle's empire. The struggles were approaching thirty years when the Circle finally knew they would inevitably lose. Foreseeing this as a possibility from the beginning they pivoted to their alternative strategy - Total Destruction and Repopulation.
The Beginning of the End
In the final months of the war, the Circle gathered those that they wished to become the Founders of the race of the new world. They were placed in underground locations where they would be protected when the final action of the strategy was executed.
When the war was almost lost the Circle unleashed their final weapons. Using magic and knowledge of anatomy, the Circle had developed a substance that would destroy all the races of the world - cleansing the world of their poison. Spread through the air, upon contact it enters the body and attacks every living part of the victim, ripping their life away within days, or sometimes hours, in excruciating pain.
They had placed devices containing this substance across their own empire and secretly across other nations prior to even to the beginning of the war. The devices were detonated with explosiveness that resonated for kilometers beyond their epicenter. Anyone or anything within two kilometers was killed by the blast. a spewing the deadly contagion into the atmosphere. Knowledge of their adversary's actions was now no use - the death that followed was unstoppable.
The Age of Devastation
The Age that followed was unpredicted by the Circle. The effect of the contagion they manufactured impacted beyond those they intended. It spread through most animal and plant life.
Vast landscapes became barren with soils now toxic and unable to sustain life. Forests, once beautiful, became twisted and dark like a child's nightmare.
Many animals did survive but were mutated, some beyond any recognition of their former selves. These creatures became the ancestors of the monsters that are now found in the world thousands of years later.
Surviving people too were mutated. From these, some species of monsters were born. In other cases, the mutation was less severe and actually held some benefits - some believe that the Devastation created new races that have persisted to the present time.
The initial emergence of the Founders to the surface did not go well - they found the world toxic and so the Circle adapted their plan to a much longer-term time-frame. They remained underground for two hundred years and when they finally emerged the world had recovered sufficiently for them to begin their repopulation of the surface.
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