Slaad Hexos

The Slaad Hexos were six elite guards that served Torog in the Dawn War. Each of these guards was a grimlock aberration that had been mind altered to be 100% loyal to Torog. Loremasters of Torog say that the Slaad Hexos were so loyal to their master that they would throw themselves into the line of fire to protect him.

Death Slaad

The Slaad Hexos are aberrations. Each of their bodies were altered when Torog and his slave elemental miners went deep into the bowels of Bal-Kriav, deeper than even Surtur's Artery to the Decomposition String. The lead elemental earth titan, an enslaved taskmaster, warned Torgon that not even his near-divine status would protect him from the raw chaos emanating from the Decomposition String. Torog did not heed this warning, because he needed something to power a great bore-like device that he was designing. As a result of their getting close and touching the Decomposition String, Torog and the Slaad Hexos became infused with chaotic energies.

Torog, already chaotic, became more so when he plucked warp matter from the Decomposition String. His Slaad Hexos shielded their master from the chaotic tendrils that whipped about randomly. Each of these guards were struck multiple times and changed from the tendrils of chaos. One of his grimlocks fattened and elongated into a purplish worm body from the torso down to a tail with a poisonous stinger. Another's body changed to a blob of pulsating flesh with multiple flailing appendages, the only thing left of the grimlock were white orbs - with one in two of the four appendages of the monstrosity. The other four Slaad Hexos became frog-like humanoids of varying color and size.

In the God Era, angels and gods tracked down the Slaad Hexos and banished them from the Prime Material Plane. They were sent to Limbo, where successive generations called themselves the Scions of Slaadi. Somewhere along the line, this was simplified to just identifying themselves as the slaadi race. The four branches of slaadi that came from the Slaad Hexos are the death slaadi, gray slaadi, green slaadi, and the blue slaadi.

Timepiece of Chronos

The Timepiece of Chronos is an ancient relic created by Chronos.  In the Dawn War, he remained largely aloof of the conflict between the primordials and the Nawirrûs Covenant.  He was more interested in tinkering, inventing, and doing things of much smaller scale than getting involved in world and plane spanning enterprises like the Dawn War. 

Timepiece of Chronos

In the God Era, the primordials were no longer much of concern to the angels and gods holding the Prime Material Plane.  They now had to deal with hordes of demons seeking to carve out areas of the Prime Material Plane for themselves.  One theater of the Demon Spawn War was Hells Womb and her Underdark belly Drarthiel.  Demogorgon and his hordes sought to take Hells Womb, while his ally worked to take Drarthiel.  Demogorgon was knocked out the conflict when his egg-like transport was destroyed at Ladneg.  In the dark reaches under Hells Womb, the other demon lord had an army of seemingly endless numbers.  These demons came to this realm through a rift between the planes called the Arioch Cloud. 

The angels at Phollûmâ decided that they need to do something about the Arioch Cloud.  If this gate was anything like the Sôvuk Sea Gate then they would be hard pressed to take it down by force.  The chief intelligence officer at Phollûmâ was sent to meet with Loki and come up with a more clandestine plan for sealing the inter-planar gate.  Loki gave the Phollûmâ officer a device he "borrowed" from Chronos and told him that it must be taken into the rift and activated by someone willing to give themselves up for the cause. 

An elven angel named Marindecar volunteered for the task of going into the rift.  She activated the Timepiece of Chronos by giving up her divine energy.  The device not only froze the angel in time, but ended up freezing the entire Abyssal plane Arioch in timelessness.   

Turning of Tiamat

The Demon Spawn War was a war between angels, gods, demons, demon lords, and their allies. It followed on the smoldering ashes of the Dawn War. It came about because the primordials were too weak to keep a lid on what was becoming known as the Abyss. The Demon Spawn War pitted demon lords against archangels and minor gods. In what was then known as Leret do Dovah, Orcus and his demon generals battled the archangel Asmodeus and his generals. The theater of conflict between these two was known as the Hoof Front.

Overall command of the Hoof Front fell to then archangel Asmodeus. His general of this region was the platinum dragon Bahamut. They had separate commands in the Aerie of Dragons, yet worked closely on matters of strategy. In the Crab Advance, a battle to take back Hiznaar Goz, the two worked together on a combined assault against the hordes of the demon general Drurn-Adruk. This attack was spread across hundreds of miles and involved a pincer strategy with Bahamut's flying army attacking south from the Sands of Hell towards Mohak while Asmodeus led an assault east through Enkii Mah.

Tiamat

In one of the great one-on-one battles of the Demon Spawn War, where a leader of one side fought the leader of the other, Tiamat squared off against an ancient demon. Legend has it that the battle was fought for ten hours and spanned the length of Krent Talaav. Whem Bahamut's army reached the last southern fortifications of the valley, Tiamat invoked the Rite of Challenge. This allowed her and her alone the task of taking on the enemy's leader if it accepted the challenge. Drurn-Adruk, a demon lord spawned from the Step of Foundation, gladly accepted for he knew that even if he died, Tiamat would still suffer badly from his morality undoing talons.

The battle between Tiamat and Drurn-Adruk was a pyrrhic victory for Tiamat. Her grievous wounds were chaos infused from the demon's poisonous talons. Bahamut was able to cure many of her wounds, including the chaos tainting her soul, but could not revert the warping of her body. Tiamat's body was changed from chaotic energies which turned into something akin to a primordial hydra with five dragon heads. Bahamut and Tiamat were also unaware of a demon seed that was planted in her by Drurn-Adruk's dreadful beak. This demon seed slowly turned her evil and in time led to her abandonment of Bahamut and the angelic cause of driving the demons back to the Abyss.

The Crab Advance was a success in that it cut off the head of Orcus's armies, trapping them between the army of Bahamut and those of Asmodeus. Those demons that did not go underground or find a way to sneak through the lines were cut down by the angelic forces. The demons that could fly were easing pickings for teams of dragons which prowled the skies or stood as sentinels on peaks scanning far and wide for the enemy.

In the last battle of the Hoof Front, Orcus and an elite group of maralith captured one of the three top generals serving Asmodeus. When the gates of Ghak were breached, Orcus personally decapitated general Ellumâ Orrasar and took his head back to Naratyr. This head became the skull that sits atop the Wand of Orcus.

Progeny of Gabin Kûn

Gabin Kûn

The story of Orcus got really good in 3rd Edition.  Not gonna go into that, since it has already been told.   What I'm gonna tell you here is how Orcus came about.  In the Dawn Era, one of the top dogs of the primordials was one named Piranoth.  He created planes and worlds, and the giants, and created a progeny of children.  These were not created in the normal ways that we think of, because he created things out of the elemental energies of the Elemental Chaos.  He made sure that those that he created, did not have the same power of creation, so his progeny, in most cases, went about the same ways of bearing children as others.  One of those that came about from his creative endeavors was a giant abomination named Gabin Kûn.  This son was hideous to behold, ill-tempered, spiteful, vindictive, and all-around bad to be around. 

Another of Piranoth's gifts was his future sense.  He saw a future with Gabin Kûn as one bearing seeds of a great uprising.  Piranoth was against infanticide, not on moral grounds, but on the possible outcomes of changing the future based on what he foresees, so he instead sent Gabin Kûn to Thantaos where all the other psychopaths were being herded.  On Thantaos, Gabin Kûn was tasked with building a great forge to fabricate armaments for what his father said was a great conflict to come.  The forge area that Gabin Kûn and his crazed minions built came to be called Naratyr. 

Gabin Kûn was like his father in two ways.  He fathered many progeny from a harem said to number in the thousands.  He guise is often depicted as unwholesome, though it was only one that he could take, to court, seduce, or charm others, he could be as comely as the most beautiful half-elf.  Many of those born of Gabin Kûn's seed were abominations.   These things beat with life, yet were devoid of emotion, were unmoving, and seemingly in a catatonic state.  Like his father Piranoth, Gabin Kûn could not dispatch of his progeny, so he sent them off to be hidden about the many layers of Piranoth's Steps. 

When the Dawn War ended, the primordials were defeated, driven from the Prime Material Plane and back into the bowels of the Elemental Chaos.  In a fit of spite, and to make matters worse for the angels and gods, Piranoth abandoned his 666 layers of Piranoth's Steps.   Late in the Dawn War, Piranoth's Steps was an area no longer under control by the primordials.  It had been overrun by chaotic and evil beasts called demons.  The demons were contained by the primordials during the latter years of the Dawn War.  When that war ended, the primordials left the demons unguarded.   For Gabin Kûn and his people, they were mostly wiped out for not even the primordials could muster the forces required to enter a plane besieged by hordes of demons.

A legendary battle was fought between father and son for rule of Naratyr.  In this epic fight, Gabin Kûn battled his son Orcus.  The son nearly perished, surviving only because of his father's mercy.  Orcus took quick advantage of this and immediately struck down his father, quipping:


I'll record this as zero for infanticide, and one for regicide.  
- Orcus, on the death of his father, "Gloating over Gabin Kûn"

With the death of Gabin Kûn, Orcus became master of Naratyr and the plane Thanatos.  The only thing left of Gabin Kûn is part of his spine, which serves as the handle of the Wand of Orcus.  After the demons took layer after layer of Piranoth's Steps, the realm came to be called the Abyss.

Order 3C

When the tragarans arrived in Brucrumus they knew nothing of the interior.  In time, they got reports of ancient ruins in nearly every direction, and of places with old empires dating as far back as the Horgon Era.    One of the more intriguing empires they learned of was Garmomuk.   

Widow of Modrerthim

Ermikel the Balance went and lived at Broken Teeth for a little more than a year. At this capital city of the gnolls, he  gathered history of the region's civilizations.  When he returned to the distance shores of Hells Womb, he began writing the history.  Some, not knowing his credibility, laughed at his talk of a civilization of gnolls.   As a result, he waited ten years to submit this history to the public, because by that time adventurers and explorers were returning from the Northern Hordelands with tales of great monuments and a sophistication among the gnolls they thought was impossible.

A period of enlightenment was started in this wild region with the Drugnod family.  This family did not get lucky and sire a line of great leaders that led the Drugnod Empire to greatness, no they were helped by someone very cunning and with the patience of centuries for plan to reach fruition.   The Drugnods, led by their venerated shamans were enticed to enter into a dark pact with the abyssal lord Demogorgon.  This  deal was the Drugnod Pact.  It required a certain sacrifice, that wasn't to be felt for several centuries.

The Drugnod Pact led to a dynastic line of rulers.  The male emperor, usually chosen for obedience or influence was married to a Drugnod daughter - one "blessed" by the unholy pact with Demogorgon.  Behind close doors, the emperor was referred to derogatorily as a "breeder", because the real power behind the throne was the Drugnod Empress.

One of the greatest policies of the Drugnod was Order 3C.  This mandated an end to the nomadic ways of the region's tribes.  As a result of this government policy the people experienced stability, population growth,  and the beginning of an allegiance to something bigger than the tribe and thoughts on when they were leaving for the next hunting ground.

The Drugnod Empire began to wane when the cities grew distant from the affairs of the countryside.  This led to the Hlothangi Insurgency.  During this civil war, Demogorgon returned to collect his end of the Drugnod Pact.  The Drugnods and many other elites of society ended up being charmed, abducted, or dispatched  by vampire cultists of the Widows of Modrerthim.

The gnoll period of civilization did not end with the Drugnod.  A half year after their fall, the territorial councilors that had once served their Empress went on to form the republic of Yagamph.

Netheram

Netheram is an enigmatic beholder variant inhabiting the Valefor Deathworks.  Before he became a forge master. he cruised the depths of the Green Nebulous.  As an eye of the deep, he had no interest in the land except for the potential prey that came too close to the water's edge.

Eye of the Deep

One day, he was captured by the apex predators of the Green Nebulous.  The aboleth that captured Netheram decided not to kill him but to punish him for not bending a knee (or flipper, pincer, fin) to them, so they put him in a specially designed tank and sold him off to illithid merchants.  He was then carried north for ten leagues in a glass-steel tank of water.  Drow merchants then purchased him and took him to Valefor where Underdark oddities were highly sought after.

Netheram ended up in a glass covered pool.  This pool was glass covered because above it was the palace chamber for meeting important dignitaries.   This pool awed many who came before whatever hobgoblin satrap held sway over Valefor.  It also led to embarrassing situations when Netheram, in a fit of rage, would spring from the pools murky depths and clatter his pincers on the glass.

Netheram became a forge master by necessity.  He was saved from death after Valefor fell, operated on by duergar dissector/necromancer, implanted with a Tiwa'erra Void Sphere, turned into a death tyrant, modified to have a forge hammer and tongs instead of pincers, and left to figure out what to do with these implements.  Probably, the worst of Netheram's suffering was that he now functioned better hovering about the ground, rather than cruising underwater.  This last condition was said to be a directive from none other than the master of pain and suffering - the god Torog.

Hoof of Gluttony

When raiding barrows, tombs, and crypts it is sometimes good to know what was buried there.

When Morbakh raided the Barrow of Agdúm, all he knew was that the barrow's dead Ogre Lord once

King of Taln'nazân

had a prized weapon of great power.  Unbeknownst to many, the history of that weapon and what happens to those who come to own it is obscure and dark.

Morbakh raided the Barrow of Agdúm, losing most of his soldiers and personnel guard to a powerful ghost.  This ghost was the ward of the barrow and cursed to give watch over the place.   One of her most dangerous powers is the ability to infuse another with the dark gift of Rioch Tetrax.  This comes in the form of them becoming an extremely powerful form of undead called a King of Taln'nazân.  Morbakh succeeded in gaining his much sought after prize, the Hoof of Gluttony.  He yanked what looked like a skeletal horse leg from the resting place of Agdúm and turned to meet the ghost.

Perhaps Morbakh put up a good fight, yet he still died.  His death while wielding the Hoof of Gluttony is probably how he came to be a type of undead called a famine spirit.  This wouldn't be so bad, except for the fact that he was also infused with fell energies from the barrow's ghost.  He became a Taln'nazân Famine Spirit-King, which is possibly the most powerful form for a King of Taln'nazân.

Brightstar 1507

Ogre Lord Morbakh

It is obvious what these advisers are doing, their masters back at Drakhôr hope to destabilize the empire and wishfully see us waste boots and resources in a drawn-out war. What they and others continue to forget, is that high blood orcs don't fight because they have to, but because they want to.
 
- Blac'drugulois, excerpt from his personal diaries, "Brightstar 1507"

This is one of the observances made by the former emperor of the Orchish Empire.  He made this during the First Ogre War.  This war ended in a stalemate, at least according to the records of the Fograth.  To other powers, it was viewed as a defeat, with the Toomrur and their much revered Ogre Lords now seen as a regional power.

Sweat of Danzar-Khâl

What happened after the Black Tide was defeated and sent fleeing back to Necrocrypt? 

Katrana and friends

That story is still unfolding, but here is a nugget of holy crusaders storming the palace of the Lich Empress - does she perish?  Well sort of, but a super bad ass does not take a dirt nap so easily, for in the end, all are just pawns of even greater powers.

One of the things that helped bring her down for a time is a magical pool called the Sweat of Danzar-Khâl.  This pool of holy water is sited in the area of the Monument of Šadullu.  The Last Saints of Gûn, former high dwarven priests of Maharâg, and the soldiers accompanying them coated their weapons with this stuff and then reapplied it many times, striking Katrana Dumu-loc 99 times.  The number of hits against her is testament of an extremely powerful foe.

The Sweat of Danzar-Khâl acted as a holy curse on Katrana, causing her evil essence to wander lost for almost a century.  The final outcome of what happened to her when she finally found her phylactery is covered in the Monument of Šadullu.

Clouds of the Broken Continent

An entire continent nearly swallowed by the Nine Tongued Worm.  Šadullu was ripped from the mantle of Bal-Kriav and drifted towards the churning rift of a primordial dreadnought.  The Nine

Monument of Šadullu

Tongued Worm had already destroyed one world, and now Bal-Kriav was on the menu.  Fortunately for those that call this world home, the gods arrived and drove the Nine Tongued Worm back to the Elemental Chaos.

Šadullu is often referred to as the Clouds of the Broken Continent.  This is because that is what it looks like from the sea or the air - an entire continent sheared from the surface, broken, and then scattered over a vast area, from a mile or so above the ocean to near airless heights into the clouds.

One of the peoples that dwell among the shattered continent is the Laupha. These storm archons once served the durkoth at the Spire of Rioch Tetrax.  When the durkoth grew flippers and gills, and crawled into the sea, the Laupha were the first to fly to freedom.  They went en-masse to Šadullu and now dwell there in the tens of thousands.

Rifts in the Web

Rifts - not the ones in the ground, but tears in the Web of Magic.  They come in two classes, inter-planar and intra-planar.  Some call them planar gates, but whichever name you pick, they are holes in the Web of Magic.  They come about from use of magic in an area for a prolonged time, like what happened in the Gulimbor Catacysm.  While others come about from the use of magic items or casters opening them.  In the Dawn War, the primordials used these rifts to cross great distances across the planes. or between worlds  Those that opposed the primoridals, the gods and angels of the Throndar and Bal-Kriav.  Sarseg used this gate to send his hordes against a region of Brucrumus known to hold a hospital and training ground for the angelic armies.  Sarseg was crafty when he created the Radullu Rift.  He knew quite a bit about the workings of the Web of Magic - thanks to once being an untainted weave spider.  When Sarseq built the Radullu Rift, he surrounded it with an area of  dead magic which made it irreparable. 

mane preparing to become one with a Manes Chimney

Dawn Era, actively sought to close them as soon as they were detected, or risk being overrun by a seemingly endless horde of primordial soldiers.

The Radullu Rift would lead to great changes in the topography of  Brucrumus's western fringe.  The area on Bal-Kriav's side became flooded from a lake on Throndar.  The water of this lake still feeds into this realm from high atop a plateau of the Northern Hordelands.  The tremendous flow of water created Radullu, Orukhan, and led to the creation of a vast swamp south of the area - a region of the realm now known as the Troll Bogs.   The Nature Protectorate Boglin says that the lake on Throndar would surely have drained by now, but for another gateway somewhere out their that itself acts like a drain from the Troll Bogs, or somewhere else, and forces water back into Throndar's lake.

One of the longest non-permanent gates to remain open was the Sôvuk Sea Gate.  In the Demon Spawn War, this gate was opened by the demon lord Gorag'theg.  He and his abyssal horde used it to cross the planes, leaving the Abyss and entering Bal-Kriav.  The weave spiders took so long to close this gate because Gorag'theg built the Manes Chimneys.  These ghastly towers burned soul energy and in turn provided a counter to the repairing being done by the weave spiders.

Dragon Wake

Dragon Wakes are periods when all the dragons of an area are simultaneously awoken from their slumbers.  Dragons are like cats in that tend to sleep a lot. 

In the earlier D&D editions, they had tables with a percent chance of a party wandering into a 
dragon's lair, finding a sleeping dragon and either threatening it with death or dispatching it outright.   TSR drifted away from that idea with later editions.

Time to score some loot!

There have been three Dragon Wakes on Bal-Kriav.  I put up a piece on the Third Dragon Wake.  The two things all Dragon Wakes have in common is that dragons are awoken from their sleeps abruptly and they are frenzied.  The outcome of dozens or even hundreds of enraged dragons flying around a continent are always devastating to life and property.  During this time, even good dragons are erratic and unpredictable.  

The Third Dragon Wake was started by the kobold sorcerers of Tinvaakin Kurtulmak.  This mage guild, along with Ashmerthoon, hastened the downfall of Arkhosia and Bael-Turath with their Dragon Wake. 

Arcana's Deal With Lúthil

Arcane and druidic spells have been around since the Dawn Era and possibly even before.  When the gods left Bal-Kriav and the Prime Material Plane for the Outer Planes, they left caches of magic items, tomes, scrolls and other relics in secret vaults or hidden away in some out of the way place.

As a result, mortals had to re-discover many of the spells that were in common use during the Dawn War.

start of the Verdigris Tsunami spell

The god Arcana helped this "re-disovery" along when he made a deal with the eladrin of Lúthil.  This deal led to the advancement of both arcane and drudic magic.   This agreement between Ioun and the people of Lúthil became known as the Lúthil Ioun Deal.

When at times they seemed to be on the brink of defeat, a break-through would occur in halls of Guinedhel, a new spell would be learned from some ancient text or created by one Guinedhel's researchers.  This new spell would either halt the advance or turn back the assault of their enemies.  The spells that came out of Guinedhel forestalled the advance of Saer Erkjorg for nearly three decades.  When the Thraedli turned to toxic gases and disease for breakthroughs, the arcane and druidic spells of Guinedhel were not what was needed.  The defenders of Lúthil needed potent healing magic.  The sort of healing spells they needed were not available to them because of a deal they made with Ioun. 

In exchange for hints of the whereabouts of ancient caches of magic from the Dawn Era and God Era, they would have to give up their most potent healing magic.  The things explorers found in the hidden caches were scrolls, tomes, and magic items left over from before the Lith-Crillion Era - magic that had not been forgotten, only kept out of mortal hands until it was found.  Ioun speeded up the access to such magic with the Lúthil Ioun Deal.  When the 20 year pact ended between Ioun and the people of Lúthil, the healing arts above the Fifth Echelon were returned, but by then the giant hordes of Saer Erkjorg were catapulting and hurling pots of foul ichor, disease-ridden corpses, and other toxic projectiles into the city.

Lúthil fell, the eladrin fled south, Saer Erkjorg were entering a decline, and arcane and druidic magic were greatly advanced, all because of this deal between mortals and the god Ioun.  We can only speculate as to what Ioun got out of this deal.

- Eingoth Ramdûr, of the Neetch Institute, - "Lúthil Ioun Deal"

The Idea for Necrocrypt

Magmin conjured to work on the Groarnfer Plan

I was looking at the map of Necrocrypt and saw how damn lame it was so I re-worked it a bit.  The concept of Necrocrypt came from my reading the Necromancers Handbook (2nd Edition).  In this book they mention an island called Sahu.  The main theme of the book, outside of class discussion, is a lich locked away in some ruin and a few other ancient ruins on the island.  I took that idea and expanded on it when I came up with my map of Necrocrypt.  The Necromancers Handbook was also the genesis of the Black Tide of Thasmudyan - where there was one lich in the book, I figured why not make a whole group of undead lords working together just like they did when they were party members of Black Banner.   The Horgon were introduced to the island as a way of bringing in a powerful source of necromancer lore.  

Necrocrypt is going about some design changes.  One of the things I've added involves Dax and his Groarnfer Plan.  I started taking Dax down the road of madness with his decision to send Black Tide forces against Black Forge Keep.  This enterprise was a failure and drew the ire of Raxcvillibus.

Dax is a hero who thinks up grand and often impossible schemes, his madness is thought to have started after he fought Raxcvillibus and was nearly psionically lobotomized.

The Groarnfer Plan was a grand project by Dax designed to change the flow of lava spilling into Hakân and then into Satheon.  After this plan was completed, Dax started an even grander project called the Gruggvein Plan.

Ring of Poseidon

The Ring of Poseidon has an ancient history, once dark, involving the durkoth running around enslaving others with their water archons - the Antipha.   The durkoth in these parts of the Buccaneer Achipelago were tasked with pushing the territory bounds and influence of Abâthigûr.  

Merfolk, Merwoman, Merlady, whatever

One group that refused to yield to Abâthigûr were the sub-sea folk of Mannâth-Katîr.  The merfolk of Mannâth-Katîr proved to be no match for the newcomers.  When the invaders were within sight of the the coral spiral walls of Nidibanâth, her people all stopped what they were doing, and together screamed for divine help.  This was answered by their deity, the Sea Titan, better known today as Poseidon.  Poseidon, though he denies any direct involvement (which lacks force given his record of meddling in in mortal affairs) brought together a hundred or so whales.  These whales produces a powerful sound wave, which seemed to magnify in force with each overlapping sound blast, which shattered the island in what became known as the Sundering of Ghol Markúl.

The Sahuagin of Asmodeus

Asmodeus, before he was an arch-devil, and Lord of the Nine Hells, was a great military general serving the gods.  He would have become a god, if only he had shown compassion to a enemy who many think did not deserve it.

Asmodeus, before becoming a Fallen Angel

Asmodeus and the rest of the angels battled the primordials in the Dawn War, and then when the Abyss was left open by the primordial demise, the Demon Spawn War followed.  As the war dragged on, Asmodeus turned to more ruthless methods to deal with the overwhelming numbers of demons flooding out of the Abyss.  Asmodeus has said he fought true war, where pragmatism overruled political, moral, and any other concern that stood in the way of victory.  This met that he and those under his command drifted away from good or neutrality and down the path of evil.  They committed atrocities unthinkable among the angels, like the genocide of entire species - yet Asmoedus will say that doing so would end the war by a 100 years.  Asmodeus was sure of victory, defeat never entered his mind, but to achieve it he took measures that kept his masters hands clean.

When Asmodeus  was cast out by the angels and gods, he and those under his command became  Fallen Angels.  Asmodeus, cunning and wise beyond measure, made sure that if something bad befell him, then he would leave something behind to remember him by.

The sahuagin are so widely spread across your oceans because of their role in the Demon Spawn War.  They served as trackers of a demon horde dispersing across the globe.  As their numbers dwindled they broke ranks and showed their self-serving tendencies, and weakness.  When I was banished for true war, where pragmatism is the only concern, my sahuagins also changed.  They are a little something I had left in store for the gods if things went sour.

- Asmodeus, conversations with Raxcvillibus, "The Sahuagin"

Amigar Case

The Amigar Case is not some writ in a lawyer's docket.  It was the assassination of a Nature Protectorate of Cinazan by government agents of the Khazarkar Empire.  

The Amigar Case shows the caste problems in khazrakar society and the monotheism imposed on the empire by the Pharzîmrâth.  The assassination led to a Region Censure of Cinazan by the Nature Protectorates.  During this censure, no Nature Protectorate could be appointed to Cinazan.

Zarmesh's Brain

primordials war with the demons

The Dawn War was a long conflict spanning worlds, planes and thousands of years.  It was incomprehensible in scope.   It grew so large that it became unmanageable without the aid of specially created monstrosities called disembodied thinkers.  These minions of the greatest primordials were living archives, mathematicians, and stores of all the records and activities of the primordial offensive against the gods and their angels.

One of these disembodied thinkers found its way to Bal-Kriav.  It is in a petrified state, pulled from the ruins of Mughakh-Gol by angels tasked with cleaning up the wreckage of war.  The Wardens of Bal-Kriav moved the petrified head, Zarmesh's Brain to Dulpathâra and dropped it into a swamp.

Decline of Ráglauth's Thrall

Looking at the Illithiad, it says that the illithids need one brain a month to survive.  Then there is a claim that the illithids had a capital called Penumbra which was absurd in size, being a diskworld built around a star and taking a millennia to build.  Putting the one brain a month and the impossible size of Penumbra's illithid population together, you have to think that the space around this "diskworld" must have been blotted out from all the brain-less corpses.

For the realm Bal-Kriav  -  the realm being all of what makes up the Cobalt System and the Quaratum System, Penumbra was a city-state of illithids dwelling on Ráglauth. 

Elder Brain

Ráglauth is one of the habitable moons orbiting Ghífthauk.  In the Lith-Crillion Era, eight illithid city-states reigned supreme over the moon's thrall population.  The thrall being any humanoid of any race except illithids.  The illithids dominated the moon and enslaved its humanoids.

Generations of in-breeding led to declining health and birth-rates in the thrall populations.  This led to wars between the city-states as they sought to seize their rival's thralls.  These series of conflicts are the Flayer Wars.   The victor of these wars were the Suellk.

Even with the captured thrall of their rivals, the Suellk could survive several centuries at most.  They knew this from the outset of the Flayer Wars, as did their rivals.  The Thinker and Creation Creeds worked on solutions, but only those at  Penumbra found a solution to their dilemma.  In the capture of a rival city-state, Penumbra's War Creed sought to capture the rival's elder brain.  Those that survived were then imprisoned in devices built from the innards of a still-living primordial.  These devices are  elder brain prisons called the Silver Mirrors.

The Silver Mirrors were used by the Suellk to leave Ráglauth and seek out fresh thrall.  The First Suellk Invasion and then the Second Suellk Invasion were made possible with the Silver Mirrors.  

Constructs of the Great Expanse

Warforged

The Great Expanse has long been viewed as a  frontier on maps.  The northern coastal areas was one of the few civilized areas with the halflings of the Seven Vales of the Hairfoots.  The interior was wild and untamed since as long as anyone can remember.  This changed when the Gear Monument fell through a planar rift and landed in the heart of this land.  It was cast out by the Primus because of the danger it posed to his realm.  It came to rest on Bal-Kriav, in the region of the Great Expanse.  This alien device then began to produce maugs, warforged, automations, and other constructs.  As time passed, they began to create more of their own.

One of the groups to have come to rely on the constructs for their skills in making things, like the Measure & Fortify company which specialize in fortifications is a mysterious race of beings called the rilmani.  They are a neutral race that seek to do the same things as The Balance, which is maintain some semblance of harmony and balance in the realm and among Bal-Kriav's pantheon.

One area of the Great Expanse where the rilmani leaders, the Lords of Stability are busy is that facing the northern reaches of the High Wood Country.  They employed maugs and warforged to buid a series of fortifications to contain the Tendrils of Taurquion.  These fortresses include Chain Jack, Barb Turret, and Steel Swing which look like metal-clad monstrosities that loom over the landscape, seeming like something from Mechanus rather than of the realm of Bal-Kriav.

Scales of Hurguulich

draco-lich

I worked on filling out some background on Syrtis's Deathguard Plate, and of course this took on a life of its own with links to a legendary green dragon named Hurguulich.  This beast didn't originally have such a wicked name, that happened after she was duped into meeting with the primordial Maen Grirngrim. 

You see up until that point, this primordial had been experimenting with younger and weaker dragons, all in the hopes of creating an undead dragon that would serve him.  Once this necromantic magic was perfected, he hoped to then create an army of draco-liches. 

Hurguulich became the first draco-lich.  The dark art of turning a dragon into a draco-lich has been perfected since the time of the primordials.  It no longer needs a legendary dragon for it to work, now it works on just about any dragon.

Silvanus and the Principle of Unfettered Nature

Silvanus

The Lexicon is a listing of realm concepts and terms, one of these seeks to explain the maniacal thinking of of an old god.   This term is a principle put forward by a former god of the realm named Silvanus.  He was unseated and replaced by Gaia, yet his Principle of Unfettered Nature lives on and may one day be the basis for bringing him back to the realm - at least that is what the Cheldremn seek to make happen.

Cube Collapse

In the Dawn Era, the arch-angels and gods sought to build areas of stability and law from the raw energies of Chaos.  This was not something that the primordials thought to highly of, so these chaotic beings took every measure to tear these divine creations apart, and return them to the heart of chaos.  

On a world called Kriav, a cadre of arch-angels forged a magical device to be used as a weapon against any primordial incursions.  The device they made has come to be known as a Cube of Arcane.  The one on Kriav, was the first of its kind.

After several hundred years, Kriav's Cube of Infinity imploded, giving rise to the Cube Collapse.  The magic that spilled out of it forever changed Kriav and the plane around it.  The Feywild and Kriav were seen as a reflection of the Elemental Chaos rather than a place of stability and order.  The divine powers, for a time, abandoned the realm and went on to create another - the Prime Material Plane.

The Great Pull

Talos was one of my favorite deities of Second Edition, mainly because his priests could hurl powerful lighting bolts.   Later editions of D&D he disappeared without a trace.  Well no more, cause I have resurrected that badazz.

Krarkauk

In the Dawn War, a team of primordials pulled an island of rock from the Sea of Entropy to the world Bal-Kriav.  They did this by creating a breach in the Web of Magic or found some other clever way to get through the boundaries between planes.  Regardless of how they did, the outcome was this huge mass of rock that settled in the Cyclone Ocean.  It came to be known as Angvild.

Two primordials then went to work on the island, shearing it away from the main landmass beneath it , and then ultimately to raise it into the clouds.  Talos and Geb worked together on this right up to the last days of the war.  The angels pursued the remaining forces of the primordials and dispatched them, imprisoned them, or drove them from the realm - some though found ways to elude their pursuers.  Talos, unfortunately did not escape the angels.  Before he was captured, he sent his and Geb's island, a place called Krarkauk adrift on the winds.  This floating island hovers over a desolate valley of Ice Cap.  Atop it, are the fortifications and blood-lines of the first storm and cloud giants of Bal-Kriav.

Gwildath and the Feywild

According to most sources, the eladrin come from the Feywild - a alternate realm that is an "echo" of 

Díronost

the Prime Material Plane.  I don't know if this means it has its own worlds or is just an alternate dimension.  I think I will go with the latter to simplify the concept.  Perhaps there is a way that things from either realm could co-exist at the same time and in same dimension.  This would have some interesting effects and probably could only be a product of chaos running wild or maybe something as simple as a feywild fuse.

Most of the eladrin of Midrêth have ancestors that were colonists from the Feywild.  They all were part of one empire, some think quite advanced, and named Gwildath.

Varelay Upheaval

Karterus has seen the rise and fall of more empires than any other continent of the realm.  Ma'Ohari is the northern jungle region of this continent. 

The earliest and longest reigning empire of this region was a demon empire called Varelay.  This empire was formed by demons that eluded the angels that had beaten them during the Demon Spawn War.   In the Lith-Crillion Era, the Varelay came to dominate much of Ma'Ohari.  After subjugating most of the region, there emperor had problems keeping his demons busy, and when they weren't busy, they were fighting amongst themselves or jockeying for greater power, so they were put to work, along with their slaves, in massive civil projects.

One of the largest civil projects involved mining operations.  These were done so recklessly that they led to a long period of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.  This period of volatility became known as the Varelay Upheaval.  The conditions wrought during this time were so bad that the kuo-toans of Tilnangau were forced into the Underdark.  The Varelay Upheaval, among other factors, would also lead to the downfall of  Varelay.

God Era

fallen angel

The Dawn Era, was a time of creation and when the gods fought the primordials, but what most don't know is that the defeat of the primordials would give rise to another great conflict.  The primordials were beaten so badly that they could no longer contain the Abyss.  This led to another great conflict called the Demon Spawn War.  This war was fought between the gods and the demons.  This happened during the God Era. 

The God Era was when many angels became gods.  One of their first great tasks was to stop the demon invaders from the Abyss.   The brutality of this conflict was such that it also led to some angels losing their status as angels, they were forsaken by the gods, becoming the Fallen Angels.  The leader of the fallen angels was Asmodeus. 

On Bal-Kriav, the Demon Spawn War affected a number of areas.  In the great wasteland of Nilzanâth, the demons built a bastion called Kodgroar.  In this place is a gateway linking the Abyss with Bal-Kriav.  During the last days of this place, the demon lord Baphomet sent his agents to plant their seeds in the fire giants of Botaff.