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The Draconic Era
(Only the wisest scholars and scribes know these secrets.)

After the ancient civilization of the Bygone people departed from Mundus, ending the Bygone era, it is known the Dragons became the dominant species of the world. Their incredible power and considerable intelligence (the latter always underestimated by the Bygone who'd enslaved them) made this fact almost an inevitablility, when compared to the other peoples of the Mundus. Man was weak and ignorant, elf frail and delicate, dwarf without guile or tact, orc foolhardy or exiled, animunculi obedient and honorable to a fault. The Dragons, with their power, guile, and ambition, set about dominating the world.

They had learned some things from the arrogant and amoral Bygone that had enslaved them. They forced the smaller mortal races to pay tribute to them and labor as their slaves or be destroyed, and established feudal fiefs throughout what was left of Mundus after the decimation of the inconcievably horrible Rift War. The only competition for any Dragon for power and influence was another Dragon, and the worst fighting among them was infighting. After years of feuding and warring between the Draconic fiefdoms, Kratos, an ancient and battle scarred red dragon who dated back to the rift war, emerged as the First Dragon Emperor of Mundus, lord and master of all that he surveyed. The other dragons, recognizing that continued infighting could cause their species to lose its foothold, grudgingly accepted his empire.

Kratos ruled for several hundred years before he was assasinated and devoured by his heirs to be. Assassination quickly became the mechanism of succession in the dragon kingdom. All other races were slaves or chattel, or went into hiding to escape the hunger and cruelty of the Dragon rulers. Man, elf, and dwarf who didn't submit to servitude dwelled in caves and lived primitive, pathetic existences. The Orcs were quick to submit themselves to dragonkind, and hence, achieved some modicum of power in Draconic society, serving as knights and feudal retainers to the Dragon lords or the Dragon crown. However, the Dragons never fully trusted the Orcs, and they themselves were not great enough in number (by necessity, considering their dietary requirements) to keep a watchful eye over all of their kingdom.

Fortunately for the Draconic empire, the Dragons had acquired more from the Bygones, their former masters, than a hunger for power. The Dragons used magic, artifice, and alchemy to grant themselves the ability to take human form, and in doing so, interbreed with humans. A controlled breeding program created the Draconians, mortal, humanoid creatures with draconic heritage, whose dietary requirements weren't as catastrophically restrictive as those of dragons. The Draconians could be trusted to be completely loyal to the Dragons, and there could far more of them than the number of actual Dragons mundus would support.

Meanwhile, the Elves managed to strike an accordâ€" of sortsâ€" with the Draconian empire. Using some powerful and long-thought-lost Bygone magic or artifact they'd found as a bargaining chip, a large collective of Elves secured a region for themselves, the haraia jungle in the south of the western continent, where they created the incredible golden city of the Elves, Laenaleish, which means “Land of the Elves” in Elven. Of course, after establishing their kingdom, the Elves had to worry not only about the encroaching pressure of the mighty Draconian empire, which was angry at having to cede any of its land to such a weak people, but also had to deal with the frequent raids from the desert citadel of Durosk, home of the Dark Elves, who had harbored a deep resentment for their fairer cousins since the Bygone era. Eventually, after almost a millenia of providing near-utopian isolation for Elvenkind, Laenaleish fell two hundred and fifty years before the end of the Draconic era, sacked and burned by a wing of radical dragons from the north. The ancient Bygone relicâ€" whatever it wasâ€" was lost during the doomed battle for Laenaleish.

Many adventurers to this day lose their lives searching for it in the ruins of Ald Laenaleish, now overgrown and haunted with the ghosts of the elves who died there.

The Draconic era came to an end when one manâ€" a warlord named Alrular Ormacâ€" finally had the courage to fight back. He was somehow able to slay a Dragon, although history, blurred by the lens of legend, greatly contradicts itself on exactly how: conflicting accounts say he used a legendary magic sword, that he recovered an ancient magic or technology of the Bygone, or that he simply directed his followers in a human wave tactic against an elderly dragon that had greatly underestimated them in its arrogance, and slew it when it grew exhausted with slaughtering them. However he did it, the act of killing that Dragon made Alrular Ormac a hero, a legend, and a leader of his kind. He was made the figure head of a huge populist mob of humans, armed with new courage and vigor in addition to the far greater numbers they'd always had. Led by man, but supported by the surviving elves, the dwarves, and even the Dark Elves, and supplemented by legions of recovered centurion animunculi, the allegiance managed to kill enough Dragons to drive themâ€" with their Orc and Draconian alliesâ€" away to their strongholds on the eastern continent of Aldland, where they remain to this day. The Orcs and Draconians left behind were slowly and grudgingly integrated into the society of the western continent, about to be christened Ormacia, after its savior.

Alrular Ormac became the first King of Ormacia, granting parcels of land roughly corresponding to those they already inhabited to his Elven, Dwarven, and Dark Elf Allies, and distributing patents of nobility, baronies, and duchies to his closest allies and confidantes. So began the Ormac dynasty and the first Era of Man.

The First Era Of Man
(Scholars and scribes know of this era; the common man, not so much.)

On the day that he was crowned King of Ormacia, Alrular Ormac pronounced that this year would be the first year of the First Era, and so the concept of dating first appeared reliably in written history. The kingdoms of men (the whole continent of Ormacia), elves (the valley of Valaleven), dwarves and gnomes (the northern mountain stronghold of Rockhaven), and Dark Elves (the citadel of Durosk in the Duskbloom Desert) gradually incorporated and assimilated the disposessed groups of stranded Draconians and Orcs, and the alien but sentient Centurion animunculi, now an independent species divested of its original purpose, and the widely distrusted Changelings. These four kingdomsâ€" loosely allied under the rule of King Alrularâ€" comprised the government of continental Ormacia at the start of the First Era.

At some point during the first era, around the year 100, the mortal human wizard Opteryl lost a chal'han (a several hundred year long, ritualized magical duel) with the elven lich Dyess, and as a humiliating punishment, was cursed to change into a crow whenever struck by sunlight or moonlight. Slowly learning to control his curse, the aging Opteryl eventually used his magic and guile to spread his seed to dozens of women, his only chance at his legacy being immortalized outside of lichdom, which didn't appeal to him. The children of these women all bore Opteryl's curse, beginning to shapeshift into avian form and when they interbredâ€" perhaps by coincidence, or perhaps through machinations Opteryl set in motion before his deathâ€" their children were in turn cursed. As the generations of Opteryl's offspring learned to control their shapeshifting, they became a new race of their own, that bred trueâ€" shapeshifters that could take the form of man and raven, hawk, owl, or eagleâ€" the Opteryx, so named after their deceased patriach. The Opteryx remain scattered throughout the civilziatons of Ormacia to this day.

The Ormac dynasty ruled well and relatively peacefully until the year 516 First Era. At that time, King Valton Ormac died, with no legitimate male heirs, and an adopted daughter, Princess Ovelia. During the king's illness, the Queen Belina finally became pregnant, with a son, but that child's legitimacy was wildly called into question, with many parties suggesting the boy was not truly fathered by the aging king. One powerul group of nobles and order of knights, the House Seyton, in the south, championed and supported the Queen's son, Orinas, as the legitimate heir, even going so far as to see the Queen murdered so that she could not rule in the boy's stead until he was old enough to take the throne. Another powerful noble order, House Kessar, based in the north, on the other hand, sponsored Princess Ovelia as the legitimate heir, and established its leader as her regent, to rule in her stead until she came of age and could be manipulated. The result of all of this was that House Seyton in the south and House Kessar in the north went to war to determine who would succeed to the throne of Ormacia. As everyone took sides in the conflict, this civil war split Ormacia in two, and would come to be known as the Hundred Year War.

The Hundred Year War
The knights and peasant armies of House Seyton of South Ormacia and House Kessar of North Ormacia battled each other whose proxy would succeed to the throne for a hundred years, exhausting the entire nation as war, famine, and poverty ran rampant across its face. At the end of the conflict, neither side was victorious, hundreds of thousands were dead, and most of Ormacia was in ruins. The conflict never ended conclusively in victory for either side or a teartyâ€" the remains of House Seyton and House Kessar were torn apart quite literally by peasant mobs, enraged at the woe that the succession war had brought to the entire country. The four surviving great houses offered Seyton and Kessar up to the masses in a bid to consolidate power, which they did, dividing North and South Ormacia amongst themselves. So ended the Ormac Dynasty and, in 620, the First Era.


The Modern Era
(All Characters are aware of these current events.)

At the conclusion of the devastating Hundred Year War, a civil war fought to determine who would succeed to the Ormacian throne, the Ormacian throne itself was officially dissolved by agreement of the four surviving noble Houses who had not taken a side in the conflict. The Ormacian nation was also effectively dissolved, leaving only a loose confederacy of feudal powers in its place. The four Great Houses roughly divided the face of Ormacia into four counties, which they would rule over as they saw fit.

In the north of Ormacia, House Aufidane rules Prywyn county from the township of Prywin Falls. The falls power a watermill that produces lumber, one of House Aufidane's major industries. House Aufidane's ruling nobility have traded a great deal and intermingled somewhat with the dwarves of the nearby city of Rockhaven. As a result, Aufidane have advanced techniques and tools for masonry and stonework.

House Castaigne, an honorable, ancient, and somewhat stuffy noble family claiming direct descent from Alrulan Ormac, rules the beautiful agrarian breadbasket of the Keldari Isles. House Castaigne does not deign to deal with other races, and remains isolated from much of the outside world.

The territory of House Carolus ranges from the Watergate south to the ruins of Ald Laenalaeish, excluding the free city-state of Freeport. House Carolus controls the eastern coast of South Ormacia from its stronghold of Kraekeep, and also earns money from river fishing in its territory and selling water to the people of the Duskbloom Desert. In the past few years, House Carolus has come more and more under the influence of the Dark Elves of Durosk.

Finally, the noble House Valatar rules Newarc county, from the ruins of Ald Laenaleish south and east to the tip of the Newarc pensisula, and the Merrilake isles as well. House Valatar, based in the ocean city of Spindleport, earns its' income from shipping, fishing, trade in ancient Bygone artifacts from the ruins in its territory, and the excellent vintages of the Merrilake vineyards and wineries. House Valatar has been influenced the most by nonhumans out of all the noble houses, and several Elves of the Merrilake Isles sit on its ruling council.

Meanwhile, with the human lands of Ormacia thus reapportioned, the dwarves maintain their stronghold at Rockhaven, the elves remain in their kingdom of Valaleven, and the Dark Elves continue to lurk in the desert caverns of Durosk. Of course, many dwarves, gnomes, and elves, and dark elves have also struck to make their way in human society, as do large numbers of displaced animunculi, changelings, Draconians, orcs, and Opteryx on the continent of Ormacia. In the far east, in ancient Aldland, the Dragons and their draconian servants rule the northern mountains with an iron claw from their citadel of Dracwyn, and the Orcs rule the fortress city-state of Iron Hollow further south. The two civilizations intermittently and inconclusively war with one another, but are just as often allied and plotting against the free peoples of Ormacia.

Farthest east is the unincorporated isle of Aysein, where the ancient Opteryx wizard and scholar Thaddeus has created a great Academy of magic and science, Mages Guild, protected or shrouded from the barbary of the outside world by powerful magic. In Ormacia, other centers of learning and knowledge include the library of the Lochwinter and Tallowisp monasteries, maintained by pious orders of cloistered monks, the Hermetics.

In the center of Ormacia, on its eastern coast, is the free city of Freeport, which is not in the territory of any Great House, but comes under the influence of agents of all of them. It is in freeport where trade, guilds, and crime flourish out of the shadow of the Great Houses, and it is also the port of call for trade with the monasteries, the Keldari and Merrilake isles, Aysein Isle Academy, and even occasionally the Orcs of Ironhollow.

In the last generation, leading up to the present year 752 M.E., the most ‘history' has occured in the area of Freeport. North of Freeport, the Elven nation of Valaleven closed its boarders to foreigners and to foreign trade, in response to frequent occurences of smugglers sneaking Bygone artifacts out of the ancient ruins of Eldilia in the Silverwitch mountains. The Elves are even maneuvering to build a dam at Watergate that will cripple southern Ormacia. The mayor of Freeport was changed, as it cycles between the Great Houses every seven years, from a noble of House Castaigne to a noble of House Valatar. Retired tradesmen from Freeport moved out the city to establish the town of Golden Falls near Watergate, a town with no Great House charter or allegiance, which lead to agents of House Aufidane, House Castaigne, and House Carolus all maneuvering to gain control of the new township. A camp of Dark Elf bandits and raiders from Durosk has been wandering nomadically through the plains of Krae County, frequently raiding the caravan routes from Watergate to Freeport. And dragons, not seen in Ormacia for years, have been spotted in the mountains near Valaleven.